UPDATE: Danny posted this video that he took of the kids playing outside on Youtube:
Original Post:
Noa and Martha were super blessed to get to visit with many many cousins in our travels the first month we were back in the States. Twenty-five, in fact. Twenty-five first, second, and once-removed cousins. And that doesn’t even count all the aunts, uncles, grandparents, great grandparents, and so-close-they’re-practically-family friends that we got to see in our many travels. What a treat!
Sadly, I don’t have photos of everyone but here are a few to start off, until I can collect pictures from other people of these special visits:
Seeing Liam and meeting Baby Hudson for the first time at Grandma and Grandpa’s house in Virginia. Aunt Carly was so sweet to be the potty-book reader to these two two-year-olds.
Grandpa and Grandma were so sweet to invite us to join their already full house. They had 2 grandkids, 2 grandkids-in-law, and 4 great grandkids over-running their home for almost two weeks. They, as always, were super gracious and just loved on all of us so sweetly. We love that special time. Here is Grandma with 4 of her 12 greats.
There are a ton more of these munchkins together, but I am waiting for Carly to send them to me (hint hint!).
In our time in Pennsylvania, we got to see A TON of cousins. One special treat was that Danny and Kimberly drove down for a day with their kids and we got to meet Katy-Grace for the first time. What a precious girl, added to a precious family. We were so thankful for an afternoon/evening with them.
Noa and Daniel Josiah... picking up the fun right where they left off almost a year ago. These two oldest of the Iverson grandchildren are SO fun to watch together.
we spent a few hours out in the yard enjoying the hose and kiddie pool.
breaking for a little snack. Notice the ever cute/happy/content Miss Katy-Grace. This girl has learned early in life to roll with anything, and is thus super laid-back and sweet as can be.
Eating ice cream on Grammy's kitchen floor. Please note the secret giggle shared between Daniel Josiah and Noa. love it!
Saying goodbye until next time. I love being with my big brother and his family!
We stopped in Atlanta on our way down and got to visit with the Mason cousins on Eric’s side. This family is particularly fun for ours, as there are FOUR very girly girls who our girls REALLY enjoy playing with. (There is also a very cool Philip who we enjoy as well 
).
It was a really fun day. Noa loved eating with the big girls Tiffany, Amanda, and Charlotte.
And finally, we arrived in Florida to be welcomed so sweetly by cousins Annie and Lily (our newest cousin, at only 5 weeks old!). We have loved these last few weeks of living close to Jonathan and Maggie. They have been such a blessing to us as we have settled and each member of our family has loved growing closer to their sweet family. We are looking forward to many many wonderful times together.
Beautiful Lillian
Annie-Pie
Sharing a boat ride in Annie's GiiGii's pool.
Annie taught our girls the importance of going shirtless at a meal. I love it because it saves me laundry
giggling girls. They LOVE being together.
That’s it for now. I am hoping to get caught up on back-blogging, but no promises.
Thanks for reading!
As you may know, Baby Selah is Noa’s baby. Her very. precious. baby.
Baby Selah is named after the “real” baby Selah. Who we adore.
We also adore her parents, Liz and Yuya, who became dear friends of ours while we were in Japan.
Noa will often tell me that she is “Liz”, Baby Selah’s Mama, and that Martha is “Yuya”, her daddy.
Makes sense, right? She’s a smart one, at least we think so.
The confusion comes when you add a new baby to the mix. You see, Martha hasn’t really had a baby of her own, except for the dirty cloth one that she sleeps with, that really doesn’t look like a real baby. I had been hoping to get her a baby baby before our baby arrives, as a special pre-cursor of things to come. And then, with all the baby-sharing issues we’ve been having recently, with Martha wanting to hold and care for Baby Selah, but Noa really being Liz, Baby Selah’s Mama, I decided it would be a good idea for Noa to get and wrap and give Martha’s new baby to her.
And it worked great. Noa really enjoyed picking out the baby (well, picking out several… it was hard to narrow down with all the choices! )
*side note: do you know what baby dolls can do these days???? or rather, is there anything they can’t do?? I was hard pressed to find a good-sized, soft, normal- looking doll that wouldn’t dirty more diapers than the ones that are already being dirtied in this house.
Anyway, so she really enjoyed picking it out, trying to keep it a secret (though she didn’t get that we don’t talk about surprises in front of the people we are trying to surprise), wrapping it up, and presenting it to Martha just as soon as I gave her the ok.
And it was all very good and sweet for about 5 minutes, until Noa started realizing that Martha’s new doll had a lot of cool amenities that baby Selah doesn’t, like: clothes that actually fit her (her originals were lost long ago), or a paci that is made for her mouth, or (and this is a real kicker) a diaper that is not imaginary like the ones I always “hand” her for baby Selah.
Anyway, thus began the newest saga in our family of baby-lovers of trying to figure out how sharing works with baby dolls and baby dolls’ things and baby dolls’ mamas all that good stuff. It’s a good lesson for all of us, myself included, and can be a lot of fun.
One particular moment that made me giggle last week, and still makes me smile was during a period of happy sharing. Martha had gladly relinquished her new baby (who is still called “Martha’s new baby” for the most part, though occasionally she is called “Baby Aunt Karyn” or “Baby Lily”) to Noa who had sweetly convinced her that she could take care of baby Selah for the morning.
So I heard Noa calling Martha from another room: “Liz! LIZ! Come over here. LIZ!” (for those of you who don’t get it, Martha was baby Selah’s Mama for the morning, so she had become Liz, right? I know, she’s a genius!
Unfortunately, Martha is a little slow in the area of baby-mama logic and had no clue that Noa was even talking to her. So Noa tried again, and, I am not joking, this is what actually came out of her mouth:
“Martha. MARTHA! Come in here. Oh… wait… I’m Martha. (get it? Martha’s new baby’s mama?)… uggh. LIZ! LIZ!!!!….”
In between chuckles, I intervened and helped Martha figure out that when she has baby Selah, SHE IS LIZ.
So that’s my life. I can’t believe I just wrote so stinkin’ much about fake babies and their names and their mamas. But I did. And it makes me smile all the time. I hope it made you smile too.
Preface: I have developed some ugly and painful vericose veins in my legs this pregnancy. A huge help has been the support stockings that were recommended to me, that I can bear to wear when I am home in the AC (they are very hot and itchy). I promise I try not to complain too much about my legs, but I have had to tell Noa that I can’t carry her or lift her at certain times because of the pain. The sweet girl has been very sensitive to me about it and careful to protect me. When I do hold her, she asks if my legs don’t hurt anymore or if they are all better. Anyway, our little “mommy-wannabe” said this to me yesterday morning, as I put my stockings on:
Noa: “Oh Mama (as she ran into the room with a pair of leggings), I need to wear my leggings too. My legs are so bad. SO so bad. ”
Pause
“But this baby, my baby, will be born after Martha turns three.”
Poor girl! I thought waiting until Noa turns three at the end of September was going to to be a long wait until the end of this pregnancy. Martha is only one and a half now!
I’ve gotta hand it to her that she doesn’t miss much!
We don’t usually endorse other videos, especially if they don’t star Martha or Noa, but this is worth 5 minutes today.
Discovering our new home, with all it’s little spaces, is Oh so much fun!
Continue reading about Where, oh where have my little girls gone?
