A few pictures before we head out...

My thrilled little people- I promise they're excited to move!!

Our friends, The Prizemans, through us a wonderful Oktoberfest Farewell BBQ. We had a great time and it was sooo nice to sit and relax and be with our friends before we left! Sandra also bought German hats for the kids- so fun to get them all in pictures, they even were mostly smiling in this one!! :)

Harry swinging at a pinata at a birthday party

Messy girl!

The Queen of the World running through the fountains!

One last ride on the carousel! (This is Harry's last ride, because he proceeded to have a massive fit and lost his carousel privileges. Emma got to go a few more times!)

At the Museum of Flight in Seattle- Jay explaining pulleys and engines to the kids

My dad has always said she'd be a fighter pilot!!

My tulips bloomed again this year. And I really don't mean "my" tulips, I mean the lady who lived here before us' tulips... :) I stink at gardening, I keep telling myself that "next year," I'll do some planting and figure it out. And we're going on about the 6th year of "next year," so don't hold your breath!

Moving Days 4 and 5

All 3 sets of movers have now come and gone!

That means all of our stuff is either in storage (think: anything with a plug!) or on its way to Deutschland! I can't even begin to tell you what a huge weight off my back this is.

Now all we have to do is get the house back to base standards (read: Jay doing some scrubbing!!) and we're off. The cats shipped out to Gramma and Grampa Butterfield this morning. I'm just hoping that goes well, it makes me nervous to have them flying without us, but when it came right down to it, that was still our best option. I can hear Lola crying in the back of my mind. :(

We have a few appointments left in Spokane- my last ob and ultrasound this morning, Jay dentist, Jay physical, and Jay PT test; as well as having to check out of the house on Monday afternoon or Tuesday morning. And I think a few outprocessing forms, but that's all Jay's department. And then its off to MN!

Current timeline as follows:

(in case anyone wants to schedule themselves in for a goodbye playdate!!)

Friday: Jenn AM OB appt.

Jay Physical

Saturday: Harry's friend b-day party and family bbq with playgroup buddies

Sunday: Jenn prenatal massage (THANK YOU RHENDA!!!)- that is all, I plan on staying all day!! :)

Monday: Jay dentist, Jay PT test

Tuesday: Housing checkout, outprocessing checkout

Leave for MN!!!

Thursday: Arrive MN, probably early evening, depending on how TweedleDee and TweedleDum do on the road trip

Sunday: Jay to FL

June 19: Jenn and kids to NH from MN, Jay to NH from FL

June 25: Butts to Philly to see Mama and Papa Beecher

June 28: Butts to Baltimore to board transport jet to Ramstein!!! WaHOO!!

And from that point on, we're golden. I mean, let's face it, it's EUROPE!!

Things are actually progressing!!

1. We got the Honda shipped. It consisted of a VERY quick trip to Seattle- we literally left one night, slept there, dropped the car off, and came home. Oh, and Jay decided at the last minute that it was worth missing a few hours of work to swing by the Museum of Flight since we happened to drive right by it. He and the kids had a blast. Me, not so much. An almost 6 month pregnant lady wearing cute (read: not comfortable) sandals walking around on cement floors looking at airplanes for FOUR hours didn't work out awesome for me. However, I sucked it up, because I do drag them shopping more than I care to admit. :) Anyway, the car is done.

Cute story: Emma INSISTED on riding with Jay, she claims that he "wants her with him" at all times, so I was more than obliged to lose the 2 year old for a 5 hour drive! Harry was awesome in the car (as always!) and he and I had a great "road trip."

2. Packers showed up yesterday and today, and are doing a great job. I was planning to take pictures, but decided that I would let them be.

3. Emma slept a total of like 6 hours last night. Needless to say, that is NOT enough for the 2 year old or the pregnant lady. She and I are suitably crabby today. The boys are gone, which is good for them. Harry has his second-to-last day of preschool and Jay is taking the cats to the vet in preparation for their flight to NH (thanks again SOOOO much Gramma and Grampa B!!!) on Thursday. So, Emma and I are hanging with the movers. Read: chasing Emma and screaming at her not to touch things.

4. We have cleaners scheduled Friday and Monday, a relaxing weekend in between, and are hoping to leave on Tuesday for MN.

Moving Timeline- say what?

Okay, so I deleted yesterday's post.

Jay got a phone call as he was leaving work yesterday telling him that he could possibly be doing his training course en-route instead of Jay-only. We tried really hard not to freak out since we had JUST bought our plane tickets for MN and NH.

He got in this morning and found out that for sure he is en-route training. Basically, this means that we are all expected to travel WITH him to FL for his training class. This would work except that we still have to ship 1 vehicle from here (which we still don't have the damn title to- damn you Honda!), still have to drive the truck and Nova to MN for storage (where the kids and I were planning to spend some serious amounts of quality time with family), and have to figure out somewhere for our cats to be for that time (my whole family in MN is allergic).

And did I mention that his training starts on May 24th? Yup, that's like 3 weeks away, generously. So, we have to be packed, moved, and out of our house here (and Spokane!) by around the 18th to get to wherever it is that we're going to be by the 24th.

The way I see it, we have 2 viable options:

A. Drive truck to MN. Board cats, Jay flies to FL for training, flies back to MN on June 18th (when training is finished), whole family flies to Baltimore, drops off 1 cat in NH, leaves for Germany June 28th (did I mention they bumped THAT date up a week too??!!)

B. Drive truck to MN. Con Auntie and Grampa into babysitting TweedleDee and TweedleDum for a few days while Jenn and Jay fly the cats to FL (each cat carrier has to be with an adult, 2 can go in 1 carrier). Jenn flies back to MN. Jenn and kids fly to FL in time for Jay to finish training. Family flies from FL to Baltimore, somehow drop off 1 cat in NH, leave on 28th.

There's also option C, but not very realistic, as it doesn't include getting the truck anywhere. However, that's probably what the AF is going to pay for, hence what we're going to have to work around: Fly everyone from WA to FL, Jenn and kids fly to MN and back to FL, everyone leaves from FL.

I'm not real thrilled about any of these options. They're cutting out family time that I had really been counting on (both in NH and MN!), seriously raising my stress level, and I've spent more time on the phone with Southwest and Frontier airlines in the last 3 days than speaking to actual human beings.

Plus the guy who prints actual orders (so we can schedule movers, book TLF's, cancel plane tickets) is on leave yesterday and today. SO, we have to wait until MONDAY to make any concrete plans. I'm stressing out.

Wish us luck this weekend!!

Fun at the Park

Since I'm on such a blogging roll now, I figured I'd keep it up. Plus, I had some cute pics from today. :)

I call this his "I barely tolerate my lame-o mother and her dumb camera" smile.

This is known as the "crazy lady" smile. It is also the one featured on her brand spankin' new govn't passport. :) Awesome!

This is their all-time favorite park toy at any of the parks that we frequent. It even beats out the bawk-bawk that Harry used to love. :)

Occasion for the park today: 1st Birthday Party for these little lovelies! How cute are they??!!

And, of course, we all received cake. But not before Emma personally visited each party guest to make sure that they had finished their pizza and that they were aware that SHE was ready for her cake. Granted, it was a gorgeous purple butterfly cake, but the child was slightly impatient. :) Sorry, Amber!! LOL

My Little Soccer Stars!

Harry started Smart Start soccer on Thursday. It was supposed to start last week, but the weather was absolutely awful, so they started a week late. Yesterday was gorgeous and in the high 60's, so it was perfect for their first day.

The boys stretching out....

Listening to directions.

I wasn't actually aware that either of them knew how to do this. Maybe I need a whistle??? :)

Harry- SO cute with his soccer shirt and shinguards!

Even Memma got a turn! :)

Next week, Jay is in Vegas, so I'm not exactly sure how its going to work out. There is way too much lap running for me to get out there with Harry, not to mention I don't really trust Emma to "sit nicely" while I work with Harry.

Massive Picture Update

I figured I would just throw all these in one post rather than try and be actually helpful and organize them. At least this way, you get to see them right?

We did our annual egg hunt up at Green Bluff. This is my very favorite that we go to, and this year it was WAY warmer than last year, so a roaring success! Plus, they give us ice cream for breakfast and pumpkin donuts, so we were all pretty happy. :)

Hunting eggs at Green Bluff.

Emma (lucky little girl!) won a BIKE at the egg hunt on base this year. She found about 2 eggs in her age group's hunt, so we let her run out there with Harry's group (she easily could pass for his age!), and sure enough, the kid won the grand prize! LOL

We had an Easter potluck/egghunt/bbq at our friends Todd and Sandra's, as well. GREAT fun for all of us!

Jay caught a couple kitties- and also participated in Mustache March. Thank GOD that's over! :)

We had one gorgeous day in March, so the kids and I ran out to the Finch to take some nice photos. Harry was handsome as always...

Emma was full of attitude and way to cool for me.

But they did take a couple nice ones together. And she even took off her sunglasses for a few! :)

oh yeah, and I went to Mexico. :) I have more pictures from the trip, but for some reason blogger hates them all and won't let me upload any of them. :( I'll keep trying....