It's Great Having the Kids Back!

Ahhh, my kids are back! I have never been so happy to see them or missed them so much! I have no idea why this time was any different than before, but I’m thinking it’s because the kids have been with my parents the two weekends before Thanksgiving, and then we all went down there for that, and then gone the past 3 days. But now that we are moved into our lovely apartment, they will be with us! At least until we close on the new house and they go back down there so that we can get us moved in. As much as I hate having them away, I feel better that they are down getting a ton of attention from my sister and parents instead of being with us while we’re moving and having to fend for themselves as far as entertainment.

Last night we played, and played! The kids seem to really like the apartment. My daughter painted my nails (which later stained them a green color and I had to file and buff them to get it off!) and then we played with the kitchen set. My son really wanted to play make-up and nail polish with us…I kept telling him it was sissy’s and he’s a boy, boys don’t play make-up.

I’m having a hard time getting my daughter to eat. She was always a big eater as a baby and toddler (it was the big joke of everybody that tried to feed her…she would eat 3 jars of baby food at once!) but now she barely eats anything, and it’s not because she’s picky, she just says she’s not hungry. I think it’s really taking its toll on her, so last night I told her she had to sit at the table until all of her food was gone. She kept telling me she was full, bargaining 5 more bites, you name it, she tried it! My son on the other hand ate his first plate and then had another. So my son was done and I took him back to the bath tub (because even though he uses his utensils very nicely, he’s always still a huge mess!) and as soon as I put him in the water he looked at me and said “sissy?” They always take a bath together, but I told him that sissy was still eating. And every time I popped my head back in to check on him he would look at me and say “sissy?” It was the cutest thing…he always wants to know where she is if she’s not right by him. He does it with everybody else too…if we’re in the car and hubby isn’t there, he says “daddy?” and I tell him daddy’s at _____, and then he says “pappaw?” (my dad) and I tell him pappaw’s at his house, and then he says “gnma” (my mom) and I tell him grandma’s with pappaw. He doesn’t like it when everyone is not right there with him! Anyway, my daughter actually finished a lot of her dinner (I knew she couldn’t eat all of it because I had put a lot on her plate) and she finally took her bath. By this time my son was out, and I think she really enjoyed having the whole tub to herself.

The kids actually slept better than I thought they would for their first time in a new house…I heard my son whimpering a couple times in the middle of the night, but he went right back to sleep. The hardest adjustment is going to be the morning routine. Hubby has to take the kids, and we’re not used to not having a garage attached to our living quarters. So he runs out to the parking lot (which is probably 200 feet away) and starts the car, and then I in my robe (because I don’t leave for another ½ hour) help him take the kids out to the car because of course he can’t leave one in there while he comes back to the apartment to get the other one! We’ve been spoiled because every morning this week it’s been in the 60’s…it’s going to really suck when we have to do this in the freezing cold! I know that it will be really nice to have our garage back! The other adjustment was the hot water…half-way through my shower it was gone! That’s ridiculous! Oh well, hopefully this is just for two or three weeks; hopefully!

I talked to our construction supervisor yesterday and we’re still scheduled for carpet on December 8th. They were putting in our hardwood floors yesterday I guess (we’ll go see it tonight)…it’s all coming together so beautifully! I know I need to post pictures, but I always forget my camera!

My daughter and I are going to the dentist today. I hate the dentist. I have no real reason to hate the dentist…I have been told I have beautiful teeth (thanks mom and dad for the braces and the very stringent teeth-brushing regiment everyday!) I just hate having my mouth open and it always hurts me! Lately I’ve been remembering to Advil before I go. The problem is that now that I go with my daughter, I have to pretend to love the dentist! She loves the dentist until it’s time for her to get in that chair! This is her third appointment – the first she barely opened her mouth; the second she had to lay on top of me, but she did actually let them clean her teeth with that tool. I talked to her last night about going and she’s very excited, so hopefully I will not have to lay on the chair with her! The dentist that I’m going to today (don’t ask…I’m in a search for a new dentist and pediatrician!) I’ve never been to see her, but we had been seeing her partner that recently left the practice. Anyway, they have the pull-down TVs so that she can watch a movie while they work on her and while they do me, so that will be very nice!

OK, time to get back to work…I hope you all are having a great week and are enjoying the season (although I really haven’t gotten into it because I don’t want to spend any money on presents until we close on our house, and we have no house to decorate, so I’m kind of bummed).

Long Time...

Wow, I can’t believe how long it’s been since I’ve posted…my craziness has to end. And it should…today. We are turning over the keys to our old house today at 5:00, and then it’s sitting around and relaxing for another month until our new house is ready. Hubby and I have busted our butts the last couple of days (the kids have been down with my parents) and we are exhausted! Last night we didn’t get to bed until 2:00 am, and then I was back up at 6:15. The kids come home today, and all we have to do is sit and play in our new apartment.

I’m sad to see the old house go…it has been such an important part of our lives for the past 5 ½ years…it was our first house, we brought two kids home to this house, the kids’ rooms have beautiful murals on the walls, and we have made such wonderful friends in our neighborhood. While I’m very excited about the new house, I will definitely miss the old one.

The worst thing about the past week is that we have all been sick. And trying to move while you are sick is just no fun. I still feel horrible. But, at least the weather has been awesome! It has been in the 60’s everyday this week, so at least we’re not trying to move in the cold!

Nothing else is really going on…it’s weird being in an apartment…we’ve owned a house for 5 ½ years and it’s weird sharing things with people. When we come in at night there aren’t any parking spaces near our building, so we have to park far away, and of course our cars aren’t in a garage, and people are coming in and out at all hours of the night (oh wait, I guess we have fit into that category the last couple of days :) ). But I can’t complain at all…our apartment is very nice, and it includes everything – fully furnished, all utilities included, 1,000 square feet, and it’s surrounded by stores and restaurants! It’s the closest to city living that I’ll ever be! Here’s a link to our place: http://www.corporatehousing.com/display.asp?site=4010

Alright, back to work. I will definitely be posting more now that my mind can release a whole chunk of stuff that has involved worrying about moving out of this house.

Phew!

Wow, what a long day! The in-laws and I arrived at the site (after me driving around for 1/2 hour because I freakin' don't know the east side of Columbus) at 6:00 last night. We went and checked in at the volunteer tent, and the wonderful (sarcastic) lady checking us in just happened to be the admin for our office. She promptly informed us that we were not to get a shirt or hard hat until they needed us down at the site. Did you know I don't listen to directions? I came down to volunteer and I was getting a shirt! So we all put shirts on, and the crazy admin lady, let's just call her "Jo", actually sent someone over to tell us to take them off. Do you think I took mine off? I'm a little defiant. Anyway, we sat around for 2 hours and did nothing. They didn't need our help at all, so finally we left (they said they only needed 5 people to stay the full shift, so we high-tailed it out of there). We went to the catering tent and ate dinner, and then we just stood by the hole and watched. They ran into some problem with the ground as they were digging the basement, so as of last night they are about 3 hours behind. Did I mention how cool it was to be there at night while they were working hard to get the house done???

Once we get more updated pictures I'll post them!

My Long Day Has Started

So here I am at work, at 8:54 am, and I still have not done a single thing of work (dang you wonderful blogs that I have to read every morning). I'm a little worried about how tiring this week is going to be, and today starts it all off. At 5:00 my in-laws will pull up to my building and we will head off to the Extreme Makeover site...hubby will watch our kids and my nephew as my brother and sister in-law will also be going with us. If we are actually helping, we should be there until Midnight tonight. I say "if we are actually helping" because I was informed yesterday that there's a chance that we could be sitting around just waiting for someone to need us...ummmm my time is way too precious for that! So if that's the case, you can bet I'll be out of there a lot sooner than Midnight!

My son fell down the stairs last night, but luckily I was standing on the stairs with him and was able to catch him after only falling 3 stairs, so he only banged his mouth into the trim, and not his head onto our wood floors. He screamed, but was laughing again within a couple of minutes. I realized last night as I was falling asleep that I have some serious internal issues with raising him. Hear me out and moms of boys give me your opinions on how you're raising your boys.

I've always been scared of having boys...I grew up with all girls (except for my dad of course). I had no idea how boys worked, or how they played, and I was very excited that my first was a girl. And then my son came along. For some reason my dad and hubby are so scared of him turning out to be a sissy that they go overboard expecting him to be tough, and he's only 16 months. I also want him to grow up to be a tough boy, but I'm still his mommy, and mommies kiss boo-boos, and pick their kids up when they're crying. Whenever I do this, hubby makes a comment such as "don't worry about him, he's a boy, he can handle it. And it's hard, because I do find myself being a lot rougher with him than I ever was with my daughter, and I know that's because subconsciously I don't want him to be a wuss.

How do you find the balance? How do you show your son unconditional love without turning him into a momma's boy?

Strep Throat and a Cool Announcement!

So it was confirmed, I have strep throat. Just my luck! I'm sure I got it while teaching my daughter's Sunday School class since it's very difficult to pass between adults and adults usually get it through kids. So I didn't go to work on Friday, and after my day of antibiotics I was feeling much better by Saturday. This worked out perfectly because my mom came and got the kids on Thursday night, so I could rest all day Friday, and then Saturday hubby and I spent most of the day packing, and then we went and looked at the new house and then to dinner and....furniture shopping! We had so much fun! We realized that every time the kids are gone we try so hard to have a "real" date...dinner and a movie. But in actuality, we have a blast doing the everyday things that we used to do before we had kids - like jumping on couches all night!

So even though I'm still a little sick, we had a great weekend! So now here's my fabulous news that I've been keeping you in suspense about: M/I Homes, the company I work for, is building a house for Extreme Makeover, Home Edition this week!!! I couldn't say anything because ABC just knocked on the family's door and told them yesterday morning, so we all had to keep really quiet about it. I can't wait! I'm volunteering to help tomorrow night from 6:00 - Midnight, and then the whole accounting team is volunteering Thursday during work, and then hubby and I are volunteering Friday night from 6:00 - Midnight. Here's a link to our site that has the details:

www.mihomes.com

And then of course there's the OSU/Michigan game this Saturday here in Columbus...it's going to be a very busy week!

Still Very Sick

I feel like I'm going to die, for real. But yes, I'm still here at work. I have some sort of mandatory benefits meeting today and a webcast: "SFAS 157 Fair Value Debriefs"...I'm sure you're all really jealous and would love to participate in that webcast.

My throat hurts very badly, my head is going to explode, and I feel nauseous (someone please tell my body that I either have a head cold or a stomach flu, but not both). Honestly I think my stomach is upset because I haven't eaten anything in about 48 hours. I keep trying to make myself eat, but everything sounds very gross. Hubby made me a milkshake last night, which was really nice of him considering it was 9:30 and I had repeatedly told him I didn't need anything, but then I came downstairs and asked for my milkshake. It was cute though because my daughter helped him make it. Poor thing has no idea about really being sick...she kept asking me why I was mad and why I wasn't talking to her. I told her it hurt to talk, but she just didn't get it.

I really hope I feel better by tomorrow...I have something really cool going on next week...I can't tell you what it is just yet, we're all hush-hush, but I will tell you next week and I can't wait!!!

Thanks for enduring my boring post about being sick :)

I Spoke Too Soon

Here is the e-mail that I sent to my boss yesterday:

"Hi Boss,

I just wanted to let you know, assuming that no one in my family is sick between now and then, that I’m planning to take off the last two weeks of December (9 days). Hopefully we should close around December 15th or 18th and this way I can get us moved in and still have Christmas at my new house! Please let me know if this creates a conflict for any reason.

Thanks!"

Guess who's sick? ME. My throat hurts and I can't concentrate on anything because I'm spacey and my head hurts. But I refuse to take any days off between now and December 18, no matter what! OK, maybe if the kids were deathly ill, or throwing up...but luckily my parents will have them most of December, so I don't have to worry about the babysitter calling me and asking me to come and get them because they are still sick. I have a plan, and that plan is to take 9 days off at the end of the year and not have to go to work for 2 whole weeks!!!!

Don't mess with a woman with a plan!

Very Cool Idea

I just wanted to share this cool thing that Dating Dummy has started. If you know anyone in college, show them this for the chance at a scholarship. Like he says, every little bit helps!

Here's his blog: http://datingdummy.blogspot.com/


Here's his idea:









Can someone please tell me the secret to posting links??? I have no idea why the link to his blog doesn't work...I added it through the "post link" icon.

**Edited to add: Thank you Dating Dummy for helping me with the link posting!!! It all makes sense now why sometimes it would work and sometimes it wouldn't...the highlighting part!!! Thank you!!!

Also, the reason that I read the Dating Dummy is to live vicariously through people's dating lives. My husband and I got married in college, so I missed out on the adult dating life, and while I would never want to change anything, I find it very interesting reading the accounts of other people's dating successes and failures!

Nothing Really to Report....

Not much really happened this weekend...we actually got some boxes packed, but other than that it was a pretty lazy weekend, which was nice!

We did learn that we were overpaying for life insurance! We had someone come out and we upped our insurance by $250,000 each and are still paying $60 less per month then we have been. I'm pretty ticked that we've been overpaying.

Oh, and I got my hair done on Saturday, which was a nice little treat.

Trick-or-Treating

Trick-or-Treating was great! My kids were adorable! We got our food ready and headed over to our neighbor's house to set everything up. Since we live on a cul-de-sac, every year we always bring all of our food and candy out to the middle and sit and talk and pass out candy. Since it was raining this year we met in one of the garages. We took the kids out right away, and my daughter actually did really well, and both of them got a lot of candy! My son kept saying "tickteat" and then he would say "tanku"...but by the last house he actually said a real "thank you"!

After we went around to the houses we sat and talked to the neighbors for a while and then took the kids in for baths. Their little hands were so cold! After their baths my husband brought home the projector that he just got at work and the kids sat down with all of their candy and watched...you guessed it, the Doodlebops!

A Doodlebop Weekend!

Hello everyone! I know it has been forever since I’ve written anything, but I am finally slowing down at work. We don’t file until next week, but the rush is over…now it’s just fixing minor things here and there.

So the biggest thing that has happened since I last wrote was that we went to the Doodlebops concert! I honestly have to say that we had a blast! It was a girls’ day out (my daughter, my mom and me) and my daughter was so excited from the minute she woke up on Saturday morning. The concert was at 4:00, and for some reason, they were having a hard time parking the people…so even though we left at 2:50 and only live 10 minutes away, we didn’t end up walking through the door until 3:40. We went and found our seats and then came back out for drinks and toys! My daughter got a stuffed Deedee, and Doodlebops cell phone (which I had just told her the day before they didn’t make), a program and a coloring book. Before the show Bus Driver Bob came out and talked to the kids and there were some short cartoon clips on the big screen (Little Einsteins were doing something). I was taking some pictures of her and just happened to snap a picture of her just as they came out:



The concert really was entertaining (I know lots of you out there hate them, but I was having a blast singing and dancing with my daughter), and they were really good about letting the kids dance wherever they wanted to. The Doodlebops kept taking a lot of breaks (I would need them too after all that singing and dancing) and there were these “Doodlebop Dancers” which I didn’t really care for, but the kids seemed to like them.

At intermission we went out and got my daughter a pledge flag that lights up. And then the second half was just as good as the first half. The one thing that I thought was really awesome about them is that they really incorporated “Columbus” into the show…our #1 Buckeyes were playing during the concert, and after a couple of their breaks the Doodlebops would come in shouting “we have something to celebrate Columbus…the Buckeyes are winning 10 nothing”! I thought that was really nice of them!

Bad parts about the show: We were in the balcony because I screwed up and didn’t get tickets soon enough. However, we were in the front row of the balcony and my daughter could easily see and had a TON of room to dance. But, during “When the Lights Go Out” the dancers brought 5 kids up on stage to sit with Deedee. My daughter burst into tears because she couldn’t go on stage. It was so hard to comfort her because I know how much she wanted to be up there and sit with Deedee. The other bad thing was she burst into tears again when the concert was over…she couldn’t get enough of them!

Afterwards we went to eat at Cheeseburger in Paradise (if you’ve never been to one you have to try it, I love that restaurant!) where my daughter got a cute balloon lion from a clown doing balloon animals while we ate. Then we went home and she told her dad all about the concert and I packed up my stuff and went scrapbooking for the night.

I think she had a wonderful time and it was definitely a GREAT day for me :)

Blogger sucks and the picture above is the only one I could upload. I'll keep trying so that you can see how truly adorable she was!

A Weekend In Review

Wow, what a weekend! Friday night we went over to h.h. Gregg Fine Lines to look for appliances for our new house. This of course was after we sent in our signed acceptance on the offer on our house! Then Saturday my mom, myself and my two kids all headed to the outlets to get them some winter clothes. Thankfully the outlets are only about 45 minutes away, and we were there from 1:00 until 9:00 that night and only went to 5 stores. I hate shopping for clothes for the kids…it really stresses me out! Thankfully I was able to get out of there with almost all of their clothes and some Stride Rite shoes (that’s right, normally $47, I got them for $29.99!) for just under $500. I think it’s a bargain really, but it stinks because I didn’t really need to buy my son any pants (his from last year still fit), and I still need to get him some church outfits, so if I was doing full shopping it would have probably been around $600 or $700. But I really only shop twice per year, and I know that I got them good clothes, and since we’re planning on having two more kids, I need these clothes to last!

On Sunday we went out to a pumpkin farm. Guess how much it cost??? $8.50 per person over 2 years old! I was ready to turn around and leave, but it had taken us a good 25 minutes to get there, so we all decided we should go in (thanks Dad for paying for us!). Honestly though, it was worth it! They had a petting zoo and lots of mazes (including a hay-bail one set up for the little ones). Then they had this huge barn with huge hay piles and really good slides where you slid down into the hay. Then we took a hay ride out to the pumpkin patch and picked out pumpkins. After we did that, we went into the little market and bought pumpkin doughnuts (I’m not a big fan of anything pumpkin, but these were GOOD!!). It really was a wonderful way to end the day. Here’s a link to the website: http://www.circlesfarm.com/farmpictures.html


Not it’s back to work and packing things up at home! We close October 25, but get to stay in our house until November 29. Our new house should be done within the first couple of weeks in December…come on M/I, build our new house fast!!!

New House So Far...

This is our new house as of right now. It has 4 bedrooms and 3 1/2 baths. It's a multi-level, so it's the cheapest square feet out there. Bascially you walk in to the main level (dining room, den, great room and kitchen). You walk down about 7 stairs and there's what's called the lower level (this will be the kids' play room). Then if you walk down a couple more stairs you're in the basement. If you were to walk up about 7 stairs from the great room you have the master bedroom and owners' retreat (read: seperate room that kids are not allowed in!). Then if you go up about 7 more stairs you have all of the kids' bedrooms and the guest room.

Here's a link to the floorplan: http://www.mihomes.com/details.asp?listingid=293350&type=P#

It's at the center of a cul-de-sac, and my parents' house will be to the right of it, and our neighbors that are moving with us will be to the right of my parents' house. The elementary school, middle school and the YMCA are right across the residential street from our cul-de-sac. I plan to die in this house!

Hopefully it should be done in the next 6 - 8 weeks!!!

1:44 PM...........

And our realtor finally calls!!! What does she say? That they have counter-offered again!!! So now the price is at $175,900, but we get to stay in the house until 11/29 and not have a house payment in November! That is awesome! We actually had a showing scheduled for tomorrow, so we're trying to move the showing to sometime today so that someone else can see it and possibly make another offer on it :) We'll see!

12:06 PM.......

Still haven't heard anything, including from my realtor! I'm a little ticked right now. I e-mailed her about 1/2 hour ago just making sure she got some faxes I sent this morning and just asking her if she had heard anything....why hasn't she gotten back to me???

11:28 AM......

Still nothing :( I really wish that people would just call in and say "no" instead of just letting the time run out!

10:50 AM................

And still no word. I'm pretty sure they're rejecting our offer :( Why else would they wait this long? They've had it since yesterday around 5:00. Oh well, hopefully other people will come through the house and love it and want to buy it.

Don't worry, there is still a slight bit of hope in me knowing that they do technically still have an hour to respond.

Counter offered.....

Well we sent in our counter offer late yesterday and they have until 12:00 today to accept or counter. I'm kind of nervous, but not as nervous as I thought I would be. Only 3 1/2 hours to go until I know something. I HATE SELLING A HOUSE!!!

I'll keep you posted!

We Got An Offer!

It's a crappy offer, but at least it's an offer! We have it listed at $179,900 and they offered $169,900, plus our refrigerator (we were planning on taking that with us). We'll definitely counter...I'll talk to my realtor in about an hour and see what she has to say. She's known for getting pretty close to asking price, she's a great negotiator!

Other than that, busy, busy, busy!

Wish us luck!!!

Oh, and here's our house:

http://www.herrealtors.com/nicole.yoder/MyListingsDetails.asp?mls=2640568&prop=4013943&ID=400

OK, is there a secret to posting links? Sometimes I can post them and sometimes I can't! If you know the secret please tell me!!!!!