How are you doing?

**WARNING: This post is a bit random**

Many people have been asking how we're doing, so I thought I'd let everyone out in blogland know! :) We are doing great! Elliana is 3 weeks and 3 days old...again, I go between feeling like she's been with us forever, and feeling like I can't believe it's already been 3 weeks....she'll be a month on Friday!

The transition from one to two has been very smooth. I definitely owe that to a wonderful husband, and great friends and family. As we've made the transition I've had friends offer to take Noah for a playdate and bring us dinner...both of those have helped tremendously. This is my second week at home with both kids (on my own for the most part). I was a bit worried about how I'd juggle everything with both kids...nursing, playing with Noah, naptimes, meals, cleaning. laundry...but everything has just kinda fallen into place. I've given myself the freedom to let the cleaning wait if need be (though I function much better in a house that's picked up, so it can only wait for so long :)) and have decided that doing laundry everyday, instead of on specific laundry days makes the load (haha) much lighter. I can manage to wash and fold one (or maybe two) load(s) of laundry much easier than 3 or 4 (or 5!) loads.

I've made some trips out and about with both kids by myself, but my biggest success has been getting both kids (and myself) ready for and to church ON TIME! I'm realizing that things like, picking out outfits and organizing the diaper bag (making sure it's stocked well with diapers, wipes, burp clothes and extra clothes) the night before reeeeeaaaly helps. I've also decided that Noah watching his Elmo dvd, while I get myself and Elliana ready is very much ok. Sometimes you have to do what works...and Noah watching some Elmo in the morning WORKS! We actually found an Elmo's World DVD at Costco and it's all Elmo. When it comes to Sesame Street all Noah really cares about is Elmo...this DVD is perfect. My sanity is definitely worth $7.95. :)

Our first trip to church:

Noah still loves his little sister to death. He wants to hold and kiss her all the time, it is really super sweet. Many times while were driving, Noah will hold on to Elliana's car seat...kind of like, this is my sister, I'm going to take good care of her. :)

Hylke will be in Mexico this weekend so the kiddos and I will be visiting my sister and parents. I'm really looking forward to family time.

Noah is growing up so fast. He talks up a storm and never stops "wowing" us with how much he understands and how well he communicates. He's been learning his ABC's thanks to the Leapfrog fridge alphabet thingy...he loves to sing them and is especially good at A-B-C-D--G--------P-----V---Z-------------ME (the blanks are filled in with "A-BA-DA-BA-DA-BA-DA". He knows several colors (yellow, blue, green, red, orange, purple...) and can count (we're working on all the way to 10...but he still follows me after 5....and he's REALLY good with 1, 2, 3---especially since most of the time "jump" follows 3. :)

He's finally down to one nap a day (noonish-3ish) and still sleeps like a champ at night. This kid loves his sleep. He likes naptime just as much as bed time and it really is never a problem putting him down, often he'll tell us that it's "mi-mi" time. We're praying his sister follows suit. :)

And...so far she has! Elliana is a super-duper sleeper. She's sleeping so well at night, I actually feel rested in the morning. During the day I feed her every three hours and stick to that schedule fairly strictly (unless of course she was hungry before that, I would absolutely feed her, but I won't really let her go much longer than 3 hours during the day w/o feeding her) However, at night, I let her sleep until she wakes up on her own...I don't wake her up at night...a couple nights ago she slept from 11pm to 4:50 am!! Typically she goes about 4 -4 1/2 hours in between feedings at night, which means I'm really only getting up once or maybe twice (depending on what time her last nighttime feeding was) to feed her. I actually sleep much better now than I did my last couple months of pregnancy. It is really nice.

This past week we all went to Sea World for the day. Noah loved it. Everyday he talks about the Big Pish, Mu-Mu (Shamu) and how Mu-Mu "Plashed" and "Jumped" and how we all "Clapped". His conversation sounds a little like this:

Noah: Mommy, Big Pish!

Me: Did we see a Big Fish last week?

Noah: Yes! Mu-Mu!

Me: What did Shamu do?

Noah: Big Pish plash! Jump!

Me: That's right, Shamu splashed and jumped.

Noah: Clap!

Me: And we all clapped.

Noah: More Mu-mu?

It's a good thing that we got season passes, I have no doubt that this fish loving little boy will enjoy trips to San Diego to see Mu-Mu.

In addition to going to Sea World last week, we found out that Noah is very allergic to Amoxicillin:

And last, but not least, here's a funny video of Noah that I took a month or so ago...he found some of my boots, and decided to put them on and walk around in them...boots, a diaper and a shirt! It was hilarious.