the Jorgensens: March 2011

A few weeks after returning home from our trip to Texas, we were able to move into a bigger house. March 17th was the lucky day we got the keys. We were very excited to move in, but being 8 1/2 months pregnant presented a bit of a challenge. I couldn't lift much, but luckily we didn't completely unpack when we first moved in AND Dru is AMAZING. When we have a task at hand Dru works so hard. We weren't able to get a hold of many moving boxes, so we would pack up the few boxes we had and Dru would load them into our little trailer and haul them to the new house. I don't even know how many trips he made by himself. All I know is I am so grateful for a husband who is so strong and hardworking. We had 5 days where we had the keys to both houses. The first couple of days were spent with Dru hauling things over by himself. I would go over occasionally to put things away so we could bring boxes back to unpack. On the third day, we rented a UHaul and had several able bodied men come help haul the big furniture over. What a blessing those guys were. Then the next day Dru made more trips by himself and on the last day we cleaned and cleaned. Of course, after that we spent the next week or so unpacking and setting up the new house in preparation for Dalia's arrival. We love our new, roomier house and only wish the housing people here would have just saved us this trouble by letting us move into a 3 bedroom when we got here. We begged them and promised we would be having our next child soon, but no luck. Oh well. We're happy now. This house has 2 1/2 bathrooms, 3 bedrooms, 2 huge storage closets, laundry room and garage. We love it.

Here's our new house!

Looking in the front door.

Living room.

Another view of the living room.

Dining room.

Computer/piano room.

Kitchen.

Mina's room.

Baby/guest bedroom.

Here are a few little facts about Mina at 22 months:

She can recognize all of the letters of the alphabet in uppercase. We're working on the lowercase letters. She's obsessed with letters and anywhere she sees them, she points them out and names them. My favorite is when we walk down the hall at church and we walk by the cabinets that are all labeled with a letter. She doesn't know how to talk quietly most of the time, so she loudly names each letter on the cabinets as we walk by them.
She LOVES to jump. She is always wanting to jump down the stairs and jumping over anything in her way.
She loves to line things up. She lines up her blocks, magnetic letters, crayons, marbles, any random items, pretty much just anything there is multiple of. She is very particular, too. There can't be any space in between the items.
She loves to stack blocks. She also loves to stack cans in the kitchen.
She loves to count. Recently she has started counting to 7 in English and then switches to Spanish for 8-10. It's really funny. That's as far as she can get in order. After that she says random numbers in the teens that she knows or just starts over.
She talks all the time. A lot of the time, she rambles on and on not making sense until the very last word. That's what we really have to pay attention to in order to get any idea as to what she is talking about. She has started to string more and more words together to form simple sentences and she has started to describe things, like she'll refer to her Dora hat or the yellow stickers.
She does speak with the typical toddler Boston accent.
She really likes to be funny and when she thinks she is funny or something else is funny she will say, "it's so funny!"
She thinks it's funny when she farts and when she does, she'll say, "it's a fart," and then laugh.
She likes to change her stuffed animals' diapers.
She is a whiz on the iPod. She loves to play puzzles on them and to watch videos of Dora and Elmo. She usually doesn't need any help from us at all.
She can, and generally will, repeat anything we say so we have to be careful. My favorite new word she has started to use is "gross." But, she pronounces it, "GA-ROSS!"
She's obsessed with buckling things like seat belts and her high chair belts. She'll do it over and over and over again. And, she has to do it herself. We are not allowed to help her.
She weighs 30 pounds and is almost 35 inches tall. She hasn't gained any weight since she was 18 months old, but has grown taller.
She loves yogurt, but refers to it as "hoagie," and asks for it everyday.
She loves anything with cheese, but her favorite meal is spaghetti.
She goes to bed at 8 every night without a fuss. She wakes up around 9 each morning. Sometimes a little earlier and sometimes a little later. She takes a 2-3 hour nap each afternoon as well.
She LOVES our friend, Jesse, and kind of forgets about us anytime he's around.
Dora is her absolute favorite.
She's all around a GREAT kid and can keep herself entertained for long periods of time as long as she knows where we are. It enables us to get things done when we need to.
She loves to learn and to do things on her own.
She rarely has meltdowns and when she does, they don't last long.
She likes to help with chores, like dishes and laundry. She will help pick up her toys, but is very, very slow and usually ends up getting distracted and playing with the toys.
She loves animals, especially dogs. She recently decided that dogs are horses and tries to ride them. It's funny.
She has a wild imagination.
She has huge feet! Footie pajamas that fit her body just fine are way to small for her feet. Her big toes end up poking holes in the ends. She's just about to outgrow size 6 shoes.