Quote of the day

A tearful Ladybug brought me her beloved Yellow, showing me the two small holes that have worn through the fabric. "Mom! We gotta take Yellow to the doctor! Please mommy, Yellow got hurt!" She was crying, actually crying. Upon closer inspection I found another dozen spots that are held together by a few strands. I'm so sorry Ladybug.  I tried to fix it as neatly as I could but the fabric is giving out. For now, the holes are closed and she's happily reunited, declaring I'm the best mommy ever for fixing her Yellow.

Please hang in there Yellow. I'm not ready for this.

house updates

Background:
we spent months wandering the MLS (list of homes for sale), doing some research, running the numbers and eventually came to the conclusion that we were going to build a new home, rather than buy an existing one. (more home for our money, plus we get to pick it out.) we made several visits to the different builders around town, toured their models (some of them several times).  We drove around the neighborhood, watched the flow (and speed of traffic), talked to a few neighbors and picked a lot.  It's the last available lot of the block and a corner lot that faces west.  We have since found out that it's the ward "party block" (in a good way).  The backyards are all open to each other, sharing trampolines and play equipment.  Our lot, upon first glance is a big pile of rocks.  Upon closer look, you can see piles and paths.  It's actually a town called "rocks of loxen" and among the children there is a local sheriff and mayor.  Hopefully they won't be too upset when the rocks disappear.  With the help of our amazing agent, we signed a contract to build our favorite floor plan and chose a few upgrades to make it the perfect home for us.

More recently:
We had our design center appointment in which we needed to choose all of our paint, fixtures, flooring, cabinets, hardware, lights, etc.  Husband and I were joined by our agent (who has fabulous taste and has done this several times with other clients), our builder's agent (who is actually new so this was his first time) and our design representative who would soon reassure us that it "wasn't his first rodeo".  He was incredible, readily answering our questions, giving us detailed information and making it a fun experience.  I got my beautiful gourmet kitchen and luxurious master bathroom.  We picked out our hardwood floors, added ceiling fans, more electrical outlets, etc.  It took us four hours and my head began to swim after awhile but we managed to design a beautiful dream home.  A few days later, he emailed us a copy of all of our selections and the final sticker price.  We spent a few days thinking and reevaluating before returning to the design center to finalize those decisions.  We made a few changes, being very careful to stay with in our budget and before long we signed the official plans for our new homes (coming in exactly $23 under our budget joking that that was pizza for our first night in the new home).

Hurray!

Up next:
Right now we are still in the "permitting" phase.  Once the builder receives permits from the city, the house is to be completed 90-100 days from groundbreaking.  Husband is betting it will be finished in May.  I'm betting June.

Keep you posted.

Quote of the day

Ladybug set up a picnic in my room for us. Plates, cups, plastic chicken, plastic potato chips, etc. But then we couldn't go in because the ghosts came.

Our new digs

I think we finally reached that point of "life settling down" but I'm actually not sure that ever really happens.  But we are unpacked, are back to our regular activities and life has a fairly predictable nature again (not to tempt fate, but rather I appreciate that I generally know what to expect one day to the next.  I'm sure it won't last long.)

The girls wake up around 8.  Usually husband is already working by then, sometimes at the office but sometimes at home--taking a phone call, answering emails or conferring with one of his two business partners who happen to live downstairs.  We eat breakfast, get dressed and are out the door by 9 for preschool, dance classes, the gym or running errands.  Our mornings are busy and then we are home by noon for lunch and naps.  As predicted, Butterfly has given up on naps.  She's four and a half and truthfully, the only kid I know of that still naps at her age.  But she's been slowly weaning herself away from them and I expected that when we moved, she would stop all together due to the change in environment.  But it's been okay.  She usually rests for 30-45 minutes (giving me a chance to shower) and then we cuddle for a movie, read books or work on projects.  Naptime is followed by playtime, dinner and some family time with Daddy.  Lovely goes to bed by 8:30 and the big girls (more reluctantly so) by 9-9:30.

Living with Grandma and Grandpa has been working out wonderfully.  They have generously given us the upstairs and we have plenty of space.  The big girls share a room, Lovely has a nursery to herself and Husband and I have another bedroom close to theirs.  The playroom is full of fun adventures and the girls embark in new adventures everyday with another newly discovered toy.

Just this week, we decided they had settled in enough for a new discovery.  We opened a door that they had apparently never taken notice of and to their delight, it was a tiny space with a ladder inside.  I waited at the top as they climbed the ladder so I could watch their faces as they discovered "Lego Heaven".  In the attic space above the playroom, is a half sized space too short for adults but perfect for kids.  My husband and his brothers used it for their legos (thus the name) but now it boasts a play kitchen, a toy work bench, tables and chairs, dolly beds and more.  The girls were ecstatic and they have eagerly raced up there to play everyday.  Lovely is too small to climb the ladder herself so I've taken her up there for us to play together but usually she stays with me in the larger playroom.

Other tidbits of the week:
We've also been playing our new wii games (namely Just Dance for Kids!), reading lots of books and helping in the kitchen.  I made little chore charts for them and they've done well with their assignments (feeding the cats, putting the silverware away, making beds, setting the table).  Grandma taught Butterfly how to make her infamous (and delicious) swiss bread. Abi had another visit to the doc and is scheduled to have her tonsils removed in a few weeks.  We've discovered that Lovely is incredibly ticklish (especially the thighs) and that she has a killer sweet tooth.  She would live on fruit snacks and marshmallows if I let her.  We made caramel and chocolate dipped apples (Grandma taught Husband to make the caramel) and Lovely's favorite part was sucking all of the chocolate off the fruit.  Butterfly went with me to a baby shower for sister in law and we had a great time.  We did a little shopping and I'm not sure which one of us enjoyed it more, it was great time to spend together. Lovely's new favorite obsession is waving to her reflection in the mirror, an adorable open-and-close grasping wave accompanied by a huge and heart-melting grin.  Lovely has tried to adopt one of Butterfly's stuffed animals as her own favorite, a cute little zebra.  She seems to really like animal prints but in particular loves this zebra which big sister is reluctant to give up.  Meanwhile, Ladybug's entourage of blankets is causing concern as well since Yellow has multiple tiny holes wearing through the fabric. I'm afraid to wash it for fear of making it worse.  We had a rough weekend of colds, sniffles and back injuries that kept us quiet and subdued for a few days.  In fact, it was really only Butterfly and Ladybug that were their usual happy-go-lucky full of mischief selves.  But we seem to be past that and ready to play again.  In the meantime, Grandma and I amused ourselves with watching the West Wing and I have to admit, I'm kind of hooked again.  It's a nice way to unwind at the end of the day.  All of our storage has been rearranged and settled, we worked out all the loose ends with selling the house and are getting ready to make decisions about our new house.  We took Grandma & Grandpa and the girls to see the model home (since we are building the same floor plans) and got everyone's approval.  So tomorrow Husband and I get to go to the design center and get to choose how to personalize some aspects.

New Year's

Our New Years was a ton of fun but relatively quiet.  After so much chaos with moving and Christmas and travelling, we decided we were worn out and ready for a quieter evening.  We decided to stay in town and at the last minute, made plans to hang out with some friends.  We picked up a pizza, let our kids play and relaxed.  We appropriately watched “New Year’s Eve” and found it to be wonderfully funny.  We hadn't planned on actually staying until midnight but the kids were playing so well that soon it was 11:30, Lovely fell asleep on my shoulder and we decided we might as well let the kids play longer.  So just before midnight, we searched YouTube for the ball drop and got to watch that.  It was the girls’ first New Year’s but they loved doing “cheers” with our individual serving size bottles of Martinelli’s and especially loved the fireworks that suddenly exploded from the neighbor’s house.  We had a perfect view from the balcony and the girls stared in awe, danced happily and squealed like crazy.

New Year’s Day was a lot of fun as well.  Daddy and Grandpa took the big girls skiing while Grandma, Auntie Lu and I took the baby shopping with us.  We had a fun day and spent that evening with more friends.

Since then, we've returned to work, preschool, the gym, had a busy Saturday of moving Husband's kid sister and attending church at our new ward.  It's been a good, but very busy first week here.  I'm hoping life can now quiet down a little and become more predictable.  We shall see.

Christmas Part 3: the post Christmas roadtrip

The next morning was a brief packing frenzy while we readied and departed on our trip south to visiting husband’s brother and his little family, including our three week old niece.  The drive was long, we tried to break it up with movies, games and occasion stops including lunch and a visit to small museum featuring Native American artifacts, fluorescent fossils and dino bones.  Butterfly looked over our atlas every once in awhile, tracking our progress and pretending to read the town names by inventing new names (which were significantly more creative and interesting sounding than the true names.)  The long drive was made longer by the snowy weather but we eventually arrived without any significant break downs.  We checked into our hotel and found it to be perfect, two adjoining rooms to give us all the space we needed.  It was late and we eagerly went to bed.

The next morning we thoroughly enjoyed the hotel’s breakfast and readied for family pictures.  We met everyone at the portrait studio and managed a decent photo of Grandma and Grandpa with all of their grandkids.  We wandered down the mall to let the girls explore the play area and found lunch at the food court.  Soon we headed back to the hotel for naps and it was blissfully wonderful to begin catching up on some much needed sleep.  We spent the second part of the day at my brother in laws house, cuddling my new niece and relishing in her new baby perfection, watching the girls play with their cousin, playing Just Dance on the wii, exchanging Christmas gifts, coloring pictures and devouring prime rib and pear custard pie for our belated Christmas feast.  Grandma and Grandpa finished the wonderful evening with a short Christmas program that they did for their ward, a few carols played on the guitar and flute, briefly narrated to tell the Christmas story.

After another good night’s sleep at our hotel and another tasty breakfast, we arrived again at my brother in law’s house for more playtime and sledding on the nearby hills.  They girls loved it!  Lovely looked a bit like the Michelin man and could hardly move in her snowclothes but she was warm and loved sledding (another budding thrill seeker).  The girls went down again and again, racing back to the top for more.  Eventually we tired and returned to the house for lunch and back to the hotel for naps. After naps we returned for more fun; playing games, coloring, decorating cookies, watching a movie, dinner and playing with puppets.

Saturday was our last day there.  So we packed our things, enjoyed the hotel’s generous breakfast once more and went to my brother in law’s house.  The girls disappeared downstairs to play with their cousin, we cuddled their precious and perfect baby some more, had some crazy dancing time with all the girls (the weekend favorite was “GangumStyle”, followed closely by the usual favorite “everyday I’m shufflalin’!” and “bounce!”  No kid music for us, our tiny tots love the top 40s.)  We went to lunch at an Indian restaurant.  Their food was wonderful and even the girls enjoyed it.  Ladybug devoured the rice and Butterfly loved dipping her naan bread in the tika masala sauce.  Eventually we said our goodbyes and began our trek home.

Fortunately this time, we stopped halfway there to spend the night with my grandma.  We arrived at her house and had our usual squealing and running in excitement to see “grandma-great” and her puppies.  We were the couriers of grandma’s gifts from my parents so the girls happily arranged those under the Christmas tree.  They had picked out some perfect gifts for her so her face was priceless as she opened them.  Grandma also gave my girls some gifts, each of them got a little baby doll to play with and they were ecstatic.  It was especially perfect because then they doted on their babies, playing with them the whole time we were there.  We went out for dinner and then Grandma took us around town to see all of the amazing Christmas lights.  There were some phenomenal displays but the absolute winner was the house generously decorated with lights that danced on and off to match the music from the radio! It was phenomenal!  It reminded me of the water fountains in front of Vegas’ Bellagio.

We spent the night at her house and attended church with her the next morning before completing the long drive home.  Fortunately it passed quickly and soon we were home again, ready to start settling into our new routine. 

Christmas Part 2: Christmas Eve & Christmas Day

We returned home from the weekend at my parents for another busy week of packing and then the girls had been stayed at my mom’s house over the weekend while moved.  We joined them late Sunday night, well after bedtime but eager to spend all of Christmas Eve with them.  So we managed to sleep for awhile and then got to be showered with cuddles from our happy girls in the morning.  Plus, it was Christmas Eve! We were done with all the moving and packing and ready to focus on this wonderful celebration.  After breakfast and baths, we headed out for some last minute shopping.  Butterfly had been thinking and planning, telling me gifts that she wanted to buy and make for members of the family and I was delighted by her generous spirit.  We wandered the toy aisle, letting the girls pick things out and hide them under their jackets in the cart (just the way I remember my siblings and I would do on Christmas Eve).  Then we met my brother and his family for lunch at Carl’s Jr. where the girls were thrilled to run and play with their cousins.  (This was also reminiscent of one of my childhood Christmas traditions.  Every Christmas Eve we delivered gifts to a family in need and then went out for burgers.)

We returned home and after a failed attempt at naps, we wrapped presents (Butterfly is getting pretty good at it, Ladybug is the official “taper” and Lovely managed to make a huge tangled mess of herself in the tape).  For dinner we made an amazing feast.    A friend had given us an Omaha basket for Christmas: 2 steaks, 2 lobster tails, 2 salmon filets and cheesecake.  We added two more tails, a bag of shrimp, rolls and fresh veggies and it was wonderful. After dinner the doorbell rang and the girls raced to answer it.  At the door they found a present for each of them and a small baby Jesus.  The opened their presents, donned the new pajamas and then using the Fisher Price nativity set, sat down to tell the story of Jesus’ birth.  Daddy began reading it from the scriptures and the girls and I moved the characters into place.  But soon Butterfly took over the narration and with wonderful storyteller flair in her descriptions and voice, she told us the story. (she makes me melt!)  We put the girls to bed and as soon as we were sure they were asleep, we began our wrapping frenzy.  (a few weeks ago, Husband and I watched The Avengers, it was the first “big kid” movie we have ever watched on our big screen tv despite having it for a year and a half.  But we took advantage of an evening without kids and watched it with full volume.  But since then, we are now having to watch all the movies that should have led up to it.) so we put in Captain America and by the end of the movie, I was almost done wrapping gifts.  We managed half of Thor before we were finished and ready for bed.

I awoke to hear little feet racing up the stairs and dashed to retrieve her.  Soon we wandered up the stairs together to watch their beautiful faces in anticipation and then astonished joy at the sight of all those presents under the tree.  We started with our stockings and the girls were so wonderfully adorable, so genuinely thrilled with each new discovery and having equal joy in helping their mom, dad, Grammy and Papa open theirs too.  (However, Daddy and my stockings were not the usual trinkets and small useful items.  Instead they each held a ticket to see Les Miserable in a few months—Husband’s favorite play.  Good call Santa.) J  After stockings, we had a huge Christmas breakfast with cinnamon rolls and omelets with all our favorite toppings.  Then we settled down to open presents and had such a wonderful morning.  I loved the girls expressions, their gratitude and delight with each gift.  But especially touching was the joy they obviously found in giving.  They eagerly gave presents they had made or chosen to everyone else and waited excitedly for them to open it.  They had to try on all their new clothes and quickly changed into their new pajamas and slippers that they found under the tree.   They cuddled and hid in the new quilts I had made for them and happily looked through their new books.  Lovely opened a few presents and was content to just play with those so sisters had to help her open a few remaining gifts.  But she got overwhelmed quickly and was soon ready for a nap while the big girls finished giving their gifts, playing with their new treasures and helping clean up the paper explosion.  (PS, Husband has outdone himself once again with an amazing gift.  Thoughtful, creative, meaningful and so brilliant that I almost don’t dare admit it.  But I will.  He enrolled us in a ballroom dance class!)

Soon we packed our new treasures into the car, buckled the girls in and drove to our new temporary home at Grandma and Grandpa’s house.  The girls were thrilled, happily exploring and investigating their new room.  We wrapped a few more presents for a gift exchange with Grandma and Grandpa and again, I relished in the generous spirit of my kids.  We spent the evening playing with our new treasures, doing laundry, unpacking, organizing and sharing in the Christmas feast Grandma prepared with a traditional Christmas goose.  After so much excitement across many days, the girls settled into bed easily and slept well.  Except Lovely who awoke disoriented in the night and eventually I brought her to our bed for cuddling.  

Christmas Part 1: tis the season!

The lab Christmas party was held at the office and kicked off the season of celebrating early in the month.  Our family company includes several others that feel like family so our company gatherings are always fantastic.  We had a TON of amazing food to match our Mexican fiesta theme and Husband’s mom put together some great activities and games to go with it.  There was a shooting alley with dart guns, “pin the mustache on the cactus” and my favorite was the buffalo roping (a buffalo rug draped over a rolling suitcase that the kids had to “rope” as it rolled away from them).  There were fake mustaches for the men, roses for the women, a lot of laughing and giggling, some miscellaneous hidden prizes and finally, a Yankee swap game.  There was a huge pile of presents in the middle and our large group took turns choosing and stealing.  The surprises varied of random pens from a trade show to dollar store toys to beautiful opals and other stones donated by my fossil and gem collecting inlaws. 

The next night was our ward Christmas party.  We arrived late, having spent the day cutting a Christmas tree with Grandma & Grandpa and packing.  But we had time to load up our plates with tasty food and then visit Santa and do a craft in the Primary room.  Lastly was the Primary program, led by some of our ward’s amazing musical talent.  They had borrowed hand bells, each assigned a color to coordinate with the music written out on giant posters.  So together we played several Christmas carols on the handbells.  It started rough at first but we caught on quick and it was beautiful and fun.

The next weekend was my turn for a work Christmas party.  It was held at the community center of one of the private communities up in the hills.  Some of the ladies had put together a feast of gourmet appetizers, entrees and desserts.  I’ve been working at the gym for a few months and attending regularly for almost a year now, but there were still a few people I’ve never met.  And of course we joked that everyone looks so different wearing real clothes and make up (as compared to our usual sweaty, work out attire).  It was fun to mingle for awhile and especially for Husband to meet some of the people I talk about all the time.

The weekend continued with my family’s Christmas celebration.  Saturday morning kicked off with decorating the tree and truthfully, it was probably the most fun I’ve ever had doing that.  The kids were bursting with excitement and the adults were happy to accommodate, lifting the children to place ornaments on the higher branches.  We got rather daring and silly, stacking children and adults as high as we could to reach the top.  The girls loved discovering the different ornaments, treasures from my childhood and scattering them across the tree.  It turned out beautifully, with only a little bit of ornament clustering at kid-height.  The girls played in the snow, we watched Christmas cartoons, decorated gingerbread men (one of my very favorite holiday traditions) and colored pictures.  We sang carols and Santa made his appearance.  Butterfly ran eagerly to him, Ladybug took her turn more leisurely (more interested in her snack) and Lovely wanted nothing to do with him.  We had a quick dinner and exchanged gifts.  The kids were delighted in the wonderful gifts they were given and anxious to try on their new clothes and test out the new toys.  I’m sure I’m forgetting some adorable details and regret not recording our experiences sooner but this month has been crazy.  Eventually, we somehow convinced them all to go to bed and they were soon sleeping, all the cousins piled together in the bunk house.

Sunday morning was the usual chaos of bathing, dressing, feeding and readying for church.  We managed to get there only a little late and dropped all the kids off to their classes.  Lovely clung to daddy during Sunday school and with Grammy and Papa to assist, we made it through sacrament.  After a quick family photo, lunch and naps, there was more playing and Christmas fun.  Butterfly usually disappears with her 7 year old cousin into a world of pretend princess/doctor/chef/heroine/house and Ladybug shares toys with some of the younger cousins.  We were joined by more family and close friends for our Christmas feast, followed by our Christmas devotional.  My sister in law shared a beautiful story “Teach the children” about some of the Christmas icons and their true meaning.  Then we donned costumes and acted out the nativity (Butterfly loves to tell people about this as her favorite part of Christmas). And then Grammy gave each family a new nativity, with a piece to open on each day as a countdown to Christmas.  It came complete with memory match cards to play with and is wonderful, simply and brightly decorated, perfect for little kids to play with.

Moving

Moving is one of those things that no matter how meticulous and careful the preparations may be, the day of is still a madhouse. 

The closing date was moved several times.  We were the third (maybe even fourth) domino in a line of selling and buying homes so each time a date got moved to accommodate underwriting and such, we adjusted accordingly.  First it was early December.  Then mid.  Then late.  Then New Years. And then with a week before Christmas, they called and asked if we could do Friday.  Since we had already made plans to be elsewhere for Christmas and since I had been slowly packing since Thanksgiving, we agreed and got to work.  The piles of boxes climbed higher and the girls spent most of their time watching movies or making box forts as I packed.  Friday arrived and we drove north where we had arranged to meet to sign closing papers (and drop the girls off to my mom for the weekend).  As we walked into the building, Husband pointed out this was our last chance to change our minds.  Surprisingly, because it’s usually me that makes that kind of obnoxious and indecisive comments. But we sat down and started signing with no second thoughts.  It seems that since we first made the decision to list the house for sale, we have been simply putting one step in front of another, accepting that this path will better lead us to where we really want.  So we signed the house away, ran some errands, got some dinner and spent the evening packing and loading stuff for our semi-complicated move.  Those loads went to my in-laws house, where we will be staying for a few months while our new home is being build.  We worked until 2 am when we finally called it quits for the night.

The next day, we had a quick breakfast of whatever leftovers we could find in the fridge and dove back into it.  Friends from the ward and neighborhood arrived around ten o’clock and it became a blur of stuff.  I continued packing as fast as I could, losing my neurotic efficiency and detailed note keeping, while husband directed traffic.  Eventually we had two trucks and trailers overflowing with stuff so we headed to the storage unit.  We had requested a 40 foot unit, but settled for a 25 foot when that was the only one available.  Husband and I had already done some preliminary work, including assembling shelves so our stuff was quickly transferred from trailers to storage, pizza was devoured and we returned home for another load.  Unfortunately, the unit was full.  So the next load of stuff went to a friend’s house to be stored in their basement.  After that, we thanked our friends and stepped back to survey the unfinished mess.  Again, we grabbed some dinner and spent the evening, sorting, packing and taking a load to our new (temporary) home at my in-laws again.  We unpacked and organized there, sadly acknowledging the move.  But my sweet husband (as we finished around 1 am) decided there was no reason we couldn't have one last night.  So we grabbed some mats and blankets and spent one more night in front of the fireplace in our old home.  

Sunday morning started busy again.  Husband and I visited the storage unit and repacked half of it, creating more space by organizing the haphazard mess.  We took a break for lunch and church, after which, many friends from the ward came over again to help us finish moving the last of our things to our friend’s basement.  Soon we were done; we took one last load to my inlaws, packed a suitcase and drove north to join our girls at my parents’ house for Christmas.

(see separate post for Christmas)

We took the girls back to our old house for a final walk through.  We gathered a few final items from the garage, rounded up our cats who had been elusively evading us during the move and went for one more blanket ride.  The beautiful hardwood floors of our generously large great room, made even bigger by the lack of furniture, are the perfect setting for this activity.  We pile the girls onto fleece blankets and then drag them around the house, sliding, skidding and squealing.  Eventually we said goodbye to the house and settled into our new rooms at grandma and grandpas.

Lappy, the laptop

We are unpacked, mostly settled, and figuring out our new schedule. Even my office is unpacked and Lappy has been unearthed.  Unfortunately she was found to be in critical condition and is suffering from the blue screen of death. She is currently stable but her future is uncertain. And she cant get on the internet. So in the meantime I continue these short posts from my phone and dear friend, Gypsy.

(yes my laptop's name is Lappy, my phone mean is Gypsy, and my camera's name is Betty. It's actually not that weird. It began when I found out my cousin called her camera Holga. I then decided my camera needed a name too and begin referring to her as Betty. This works especially well if I need to ask for my camera and don't want to alert someone to having their picture taken. (particularly difficult children. or stubborn adults.) I later found out my cousin called her camera Holga because that is in fact, the brand of the camera. Even so, Betty, Lappy and Gypsy are my dear and faithful friends. oh and my car's name is Lucy. But that's everyone. er, everything. I think.)

New years

Ladybug, my 3 year old, made this at Preschool. Her new years goals (no prompting, I wasn't even there) are to decorate cookies, make a wreath and go to Disney.

She may be onto something...

Coming soon...

The month of December was a busy blur of packing and Christmas. It was chaos, it was wonderful and it was a whirlwind. And soon I will post excessively long and rambling entries to describe it all. But first I have to find and unpack my laptop.

Until then....

quote of the day

Butterfly likes to look at the map when we drive and track our progress.  She will ask the name of each city we pass and then pretend to identify it on her map. After 12 hours of driving she asked, "are we still on the earth?" I assured her we were. "....are you sure? This doesn't look like earth."