House Update

It's been a while since I've posted and I'm sure you're all on pins and needles waiting to hear about the house. (Ok, probably not, but whatever). We got our keys on January 27th (a Thursday) and it's a been a whirlwind of work since then. Sanding, painting, cleaning, fixing, etc. I'm exhausted, but excited, and really I just can't wait until this month is over and we've moved in. I don't have any pictures of the house since we've gotten the keys, but here are a few before we started working on it. 

This is our backyard. It's not huge and it looks a mess in this picture, but actually it is beautifully landscaped now thanks to Paul's parents. And the grass is starting to grow. We love it!

This is a shot standing from the dining room area looking into the kitchen. All the appliances are out now and the cupboards are sanded and primed, and awaiting a fresh coat of paint.

This is the view from the front door. The fireplace is a double fireplace and can be seen on the other side of the wall, which is the "family room" area. To the back left is the kitchen. You can kind of see the green paint. All of the bedrooms are upstairs.

I guess it's true what they say....

that boys are harder on their clothes than girls. Because the girls NEVER wore holes through the feet of their jammies. Maybe it was all the scooting B did before he learned to really crawl. He used that foot to push off with. Anyway, it's our first clothing casualty so I had to document it. Maybe we should hold a funeral. Okay, maybe not. 

9 month stats

Today was Brandon's 9 month checkup. He's doing great! 

Weight-19 pounds

Height- 28 1/2 inches

Head- 46 cm. 

That's 50% for height and head and 25% for weight.....and here I thought he was a chunky baby. Oh well. He had an iron test too. They pricked his finger and he just looked at them like, what the heck are you doing to me? But he didn't cry. And as an added bonus, his test results came out great. 

And lucky me, Brandon has figured out how to climb stairs. Yesterday I followed him up 3 steps. Guess the gate up the stairs has to go back to being locked. 

Christmas Card Picture

I know this is old news. Way old news by now. But I only got about 10 Christmas cards out this year. And the majority of those 10 cards went out to the first 10 people that happened to send me a Christmas card (because then I had their address handy). Anyway, life got pretty crazy around here with the offer on the house and everything. But I wanted to post the picture of the kids that was suppose to be in the cards that I didn't send out. Cuz my kids are cute and this was a good picture of them. And yes I am bragging. I'm allowed to. I'm their mom!

Don't worry Mom

Disclaimer-Potty business ahead. Reader beware. 

So I hear Leah head into the bathroom while I'm sitting at the table helping Ashlyn with her homework. No big deal. She goes by herself all the time. But after a few minutes of being in there, I think, "I better go check on her". I go in to see how she's doing. She's sitting on the toilet and I ask her if she did "stinkies" or "tinkles"?  She says, "I did poopies Mom (I hate that word, but that's the one she chooses to use) and I got them on my hand. But don't worry, I wiped them off". 

(GROSS!!!!)

 Ok, I say, let me help you wash your hands....TWICE. Good thing I checked on her. 

Incase you haven't heard

The word is getting out. We bought a house! We are SO super excited. It came as quite a surprise to even us. But we found a great place, the location is perfect (except that it bumps us just out of our ward boundaries), and the price was right. We put in an offer thinking it would take at least a couple of weeks before we heard back (since it's bank owned), but to our surprise our realtor called us two days later and told us the bank accepted our offer (Even though we weren't the highest bid. Gotta hand it to having good credit). We are hoping to close by the end of this month (middle of February at the latest) and move in by the end of February. The house does definitely need some work. The previous owners did not take care of it and must have been pretty mad when they were kicked out, cuz they did what they could to mess it up. So we will be getting new appliances, painting the whole house, and cleaning, cleaning, cleaning. It's four bedrooms, 2 1/2 bath and a little over 2100 square feet. And the best part is that is has a yard. Not a large one, but a decent enough one for the kids to run around and play. We'll keep you updated as time goes on, but in the meantime here is a picture of the outside.

New Year's Resolution

So, I'm a week late. And I'm really not even that good at EVER making resolutions because honestly, I don't ever take them seriously and rarely fulfill them. But I got to thinking that it might be kind of fun to make one and really keep it. One that is tangible. One that might be hard, but not impossible. Because let's be honest, if I make a resolution to not eat any sweets or chocolate all year, that would last about a week and I would crumble and probably wouldn't even feel bad about it. Or if I said I would read my scriptures EVERY single day, I would invariably miss a day and than think the whole resolution is shot and stop caring about that also. And come on....to lose weight. That's more of a life goal than a resolution. So I started thinking...and thinking...and thinking (Yes, my brain hurts. Ok, not really). And I stumbled onto my friend Kristen's blog. And viola...an idea. Sorry to copy you Kristen. Hopefully you feel honored. So I'm gonna do it. I'm gonna give up SODA for a whole year. Honestly, I like the stuff, but I don't LOVE it. However, there are days I feel I NEED it (especially the caffeine). But I think I can do it. I think I could really give it up for a whole year. So wish me luck and condolences too as I will undoubtably drool after it when sitting at a restaurant (since that is when I MOSTLY drink them.)

BTW-Anyone want a partially used 6 pack of Dr. Pepper? HEHE.....