The Move

Well, I survived the move and lived to blog about it. I took a few pictures, but only 2 of them turned out. Oh well.

Makayla and Ellie love the deck and backyard. Their new favorite thing is to sit on a blanket on the deck and eat popsicles. They do it almost every day. They also love the neighbor boy upstairs, Hunter. The whole front of the apartment building is a parking lot so he rides his bike outside while the girls chase him around. Makayla frequently says to me, "Mom, can I please go outside and see my boyfriend?"

This is a view of the old apartment from the front steps of the new apartment. Did I mention that I just moved across the street? In some ways, it's a lot worse than moving across the country. That apartment is definitely as ghetto as it looks. In fact, when giving people directions to that apt I often said, "it's the ghetto blue one on the left." Funny enough, no one ever had a hard time finding us with that description. See the really nice townhouses in the background? That's where my friend Ann used to live. We used to make yummy snacks and watch Oprah together. Good times! I miss you Ann!

Anyway, we are loving the new place. Especially the new carpet and linoleum. And the extra closet space. And the cheaper laundry facilities. And the nicer kitchen appliances. And pretty much everything else.

What do I miss about the old place? NOT ONE THING!!

Growing Up: Kimberly at 7 months

Kimberly makes the funniest faces. I've only been lucky enough to catch it on camera a few times. My favorite face, one which is so fleeting I can never hope to capture it on film, is when she raises one eyebrow in a "What the heck!" kind of way. So hilarious!

I took her in for her 6 month check-up (one week before she turned 7 months). She weighed in at a whopping 15 pounds 6 ounces and measured 25 inches in length. That's about 15% for weight and 6% for height. What a shrimp!

(Obviously so pleased with herself)

This photo shows Kimberly's newest trick--pulling up on things. She has yet to pull up all the way to her feet, but I have a feeling it's not too far off. Today she also learned how to rock on her hands and knees. I seriously need to finish getting my apartment organized because pretty soon this little girl will be cruisin' and getting into everything!

Christmas in August

Christmas came early at my house this year, and it came in this form.

A lady from church was giving away her digital keyboard, and I am the lucky recipient.

I'm not sure if I've mentioned this (probably have) or if people who know me just know this about me (I talk about it a lot), but I absolutely love playing the piano. I've loved it since I was four years old. I started loving it even more when I was eight and began taking lessons.

When I moved to college, I was sad about not having a piano. But I quickly found one that I could access 24/7.

Then I got married, and we didn't have the money to buy a piano. Four years into our marriage, someone offered me a piano that they didn't want to move across the country. I was so excited. Kasey was excited for me. Then his friend talked him into waiting until we had a house to get a piano using the argument "Do you really want to move this huge piano from apartment to apartment until you get a house? Probably not." That was a good enough argument for Kasey. Still no piano for me.

Several times Kasey brought up the subject of a keyboard. Being the snob that I was, I adamantly refused saying I would NEVER own an electric keyboard.

Well, it's been seven years. Since a house is nowhere in our foreseeable future, I am eating my words and now own an electric piano. And do you know what? It's not nearly as horrible as I thought it would be. In fact, I cried the first time I played it. That's just how happy I am to have a piano of my own that I can play whenever I want. And bonus! It has a place to plug in head phones so I can play after the girls go to bed.

Want to know the first thing I played on it?

The Hallelujah Chorus from Handel's Messiah. I thought it appropriate.

It Worked!

I lost 8 pounds in 3 days.

I had tons of help on Wednesday and Thursday (16 people in all). Thanks everyone!

Pictures coming as soon as I locate my camera, which I'm sure is somewhere in the mess still overrunning my living room.

The Perfect Antidote to Those 9 Extra Vacation Pounds

Moving. By myself. In 95 degree weather.

At least I'm hoping it works. (crossing fingers)

Vacation and a Move

I am totally stressed out right now!

We are going on a twelve day trip to Kasey's home state where we will visit tons of family and friends, play a little golf (Kasey, not me), swim, eat yummy food, stay up way too late, and a whole slew of other things.

We are leaving tomorrow. Kasey is supposed to get home around 8 o'clock tomorrow morning and we are hopefully leaving by noon. Which means all the packing of the suitcases and car is left to me. In addition to the packing, I have to prepare the snacks for our 14-hour drive (Mapquest says it takes 14 hours, which means in Kimberly time it will be closer to 17 or 18 hours.), clean the apartment (wash dishes, clean out the fridge, take out all the garbage, vacuum), and run all my errands so I don't rack up a huge bill in overdue fines on books and movies while we are gone. Just thinking of all that has to be done in the next 22 hours is so daunting.

But to top it all off, I signed the lease papers on a new apartment yesterday. So yesterday when I should have been running all my errands and cleaning up, I was calling the city and the electric company and the phone company and a million other people to switch all our services to the new address. Don't get me wrong, I'm totally excited about moving. This new apartment, while it may not be bigger, is nicer and cheaper. It has a deck and our own private backyard for the girls to play in whenever they want. And I don't have to go out in the heat with them. I get to sit inside and watch them out the window. Plus, the landlord is replacing the carpet as I speak (blog?).

So although I'm really looking forward to getting into this new apartment, I can't help but wish the timing had been a little better. We will get home from our vacation and Kasey will have to go to work literally 16 hours later. We have to be out of our current apartment 4 days after that. So it looks like I'll be calling some men from church to move me while Kasey is out of town. My parents are coming over, and that will be a huge help.

Oh my heck, writing about this is stressing me out even more! I just hope I can forget about what's waiting for me at home and have a nice, relaxing (yeah right) vacation.

Pushover Parent

Update: Well, I stood my ground last night. Kimberly cried for 75 minutes, but I did NOT let her sleep in my bed. However, Makayla could not sleep with all the screaming so I told her to lay in my bed until Kimberly went to sleep. By the time Kimberly was actually sleeping, I didn't want to risk Makayla making noise so I left her in my bed. Then Ellie started crying and there was no way I was going to let her wake up Kimberly, so Ellie slept on the couch. *sigh* So much for my resolve.

Hello. My name is Laura, and I'm a Pushover Parent.

Lately I've been realizing that I'm doing all the things that annoy me the most in other parents. I let my kids walk all over me. Tantrums gain them exactly what they want. After disciplining them, I feel bad and then give them popsicles or ice cream (or sometimes both).

When I think about it, I get so mad at myself. But in that moment when they are pushing my buttons, I just want them to leave me alone already! Chocolate will make you stop crying? Awesome! Have two! You will let me take a nap if I put in a movie that you don't normally get to watch? Cool! Where's the remote?

The last few nights Kimberly has been waking up. (She's been sleeping through the night for 3 months now.) The only way I can get her to go back to sleep is for her to sleep in my bed. I am adamantly against co-sleeping for more reasons than I care to go into in this post. I've been letting her fall asleep next to me, and then I move her to the crib. But last night I was too tired to stay up and wait for her to fall asleep. So I slept on the couch.

I woke up several hours later with a stiff neck and a cramp in my leg. I just kind of sat there for a minute wondering how that little turkey got my big ol' bed to herself while I was squishing onto my too-short couch. Oh right! Pushover Parent.

So tonight I'm making a resolve to start being the parent I used to be. One who sets boundaries and doesn't budge. One who doesn't fall for that innocent sad face routine. One who sleeps in her own bed. Without the baby. Every night.

I'm going to start being the parent again, instead of the friend. My girls have plenty of friends. They need a good parent, and that's what I'm determined to be.