Thanks and Thanks and Thankgiving Weekend

It's been over a month since my last post, and I have about 6 drafts halfway done waiting to be published.  But I thought I'll catch up first since it's still within a week from Thanksgiving and post about that first. 

I went to church on Sunday.  Three days after Thanksgiving, I still felt I needed an outlet for all of the gratitude I felt for where I was at that moment, on what had dramatically changed over the last year.  With hubs working over 100 hours a week for the three weeks leading up to Thanksgiving and the stress everyday life boiling over while preparing the house for its first hosting gig under our ownership, I kind of lost sight of the big picture.  So I took Gobbles with the promise of a trip to the grocery store for good behavior and left hubs home to relax with the napping Lobster Roll.

I felt so calm after spending an hour with my angelically behaved son (did I mention there were m&m's on the line at the reward trip to the grocery store? now it makes sense), I was so glad I'd been able to just listen to the sermon and let my mind focus on my family, and really just how appreciative I should be.

This year hubs and I prepared and cooked the Thanksgiving meal over a three day span - the turkey went into a brine on Tuesday, we made the butternut squash pumpkin soup as well as prepped the stuffing on Wednesday, then made bread and mashed potatoes Thursday morning, cooking the turkey, stuffing, mashers, greens, and reheating soup in the hours leading up to our old man happy hour dinner time of 4:00.  We marvelled at the ease in which we were able to do this since 1) we have an extra fridge in the garage to hold all the prepared food and brined turkey, (and beer!) 2) we had COUNTER SPACE and a kitchen table to lay out and do what we wanted without having to put everything away after every step 3) we were able to keep an eye on the kids in the family room right next to the kitchen while we did all this prepping, and when they wandered into the kitchen there was room for them to hang out without us stepping on them, and 4)guests were allowed to hang out in the kitchen because it was bigger than cubicle sized kitchen we used to have (a small cubicle, including all the appliances!).   This time last year, there was absolutely no hope of a new house, a bigger kitchen, we were just dead in the water with showing after showing, and we had been talking about a date to suck it up and build onto our tiny house.  I'm so so thankful that we didn't give up because this property is perfect for our family.

And even bigger than the house - I'm so grateful to have celebrated the Lil Lobster Roll's first thanksgiving!  Obviously we knew about her at Thanksgiving last year, but this little girl has no idea of the positive impact she's made on our family - her brother, her daddy, and our relationship with each other.  My baby girl (and my baby boy - his 3rd thanksgiving, wow!) are the most wonderful little blessings I could imagine.

I guess I have to say 2012 was my lucky year, because after a new baby and a new house, what more could anyone want?  Sometimes I need to pinch myself when I walk into work in the morning because of how much I love it.  The respect I get, flexibility I need, and the extraordinary people who are all genuinely nice make me look forward to going in every morning.  I decided to make a move to this job because I didn't want to have to fight a corporate ladder, just do my job, and this place has me writing expertise articles for our publication.  It's amazing the opportunities that come about when you're not even looking.

Usually my Thanksgiving lists comprise of big and small, but this year I need to step back and keep my eyes on the big, because for some reason I'd been letting the small stuff get me down.  I'm taking a month off from the diet and not even worrying about the scale, because I know my best success always comes in January anyway - so why sweat it?  There are much more important things to worry about and be grateful for.  In the next 8 weeks we'll be decorating our new home for Christmas, celebrating 7 years of wedded bliss, going out to Gobble's birthday party with all of his school friends, riding the Santa train to keep in the spirit, celebrating the holiday through the eyes of a 3 year old who actually knows what's going on now, and preparing for the Lobster Roll's first birthday bash.  It's such a busy, happy time for my family, and I am so grateful for it all... done sweating the small stuff!

And with that, a LONG weekend's worth of fun!

Why did the lobster come up to my classroom to play?

Seriously mom - so embarrassing, you should have left her downstairs for our thanksgiving feast!

I love that Daddy is teaching me how to climb trees!

And I love my sister - sometimes!

Not as much as I love watching the doggies next door though.

No Poozers, we're not having corn for dinner!

But I WANT MORE WHEAT THINS!  NO TURKEY FOR ME!

Tee hee hee!  I crack up at this chaos!

A hug for Cannoli?  It must be a special occasion!

Enjoying my sister's ball pit!

I can't believe it's so nice on Thanksgiving that I can play outside!

That's right! Got that brother right out of my ball pit!

MMMM that vino looks tastey!

Mommy and Daddy were too busy serving the food to actually take a picture of it, so here's the set table.  And a coke.

Hahahha I'm ticklish and the puppy wants to roll over like me!

Nana is the paparazzi! We're just making a mess, that's all!

What's that Poozers?  You got a secret?

The itsy bitsy spiiiider went up the water spout! 

Cousins!

She is MY puppy, see how happy she is with me?

All right!  forget all that turkey - let's bounce!

and slide!

Why nap when I found the camera!  Now i'm just gonna pull it down!

Ahh haha!  Got you!  No nap for me!

Even Gobbles is napping!  On the couch with the tv, but nevertheless napping!

After all that nap fighting, the lobster couldn't hang.

Wow mommy, i feel so refreshed after that nap.  I guess you were right, I won't fight my naps anymore!

We're BACK

This blog has been neglected lately. Not that there's nothing to write about, just that we're trying to live it up and squeeze every last ounce out of summer going here and there and everywhere every free chance we get, in between work and-oh yea- packing to move into our NEW HOUSE!

That's right! FINALLY! Settlement to sell this thing and buy our new one are currently scheduled for 9/14. Our offer has been accepted for a month now, but I was hesitant to cheer until after inspections and appraisals, because nowadays they can kill a sale just as quickly as they can make one. But we made it through that phase in one piece.

We've been intermittently packing boxes when we have time, and Gobbles has been a wonderful help popping the bubble wrap and throwing random things onto each box hoping I won't notice. He is excited for the swingset at the new place but nervous because his room is no longer decorated - The pictures are packed for our NEW house!  I'll have a BIG ROOM, and a swing set!  But I don't like swings.  As we've gone back and forth to the shore the past few weekends, he has been convinced that each time we would be returning to our "new house".  Not quite yet buddy- but just three weeks now!

I have a ton to write about including more minication stories, potty training updates, and my son's emerging rebel attitude.  But, working all day and packing a box at night or in the morning makes for a fried brain, so I'll get there!

In the meantime, some randoms from around the house:

Hey there everyone!  I'm a drool factory!

And no matter how hard I laugh, no waking up that puppy!!

Isrut gave me this awesome toy and Mommy put all my fishes out of reach with hopes I'd crawl to them!  Doesn't matter to me - the bowl is the best part!

Thanks Mom for the awesome toy!  Wait - this isn't a toy?

Well if i can't play with the bubble wrap - how about this bowl?  You don't have to pack this right?

Seriously Mommy? 

Hahaha Ok I guess I do look kinda silly - I'll give you a smile!

Ahhh here he is- my favorite puppy!

Kisses!

Headstands!

I look just DAPPER in daddy's tie.  So glad he let me dress myself today!

life on hold

There have been many times in my life when I've thought, Wow, I am so incredibly busy.  If I can just get over this hump of busy-ness I'll be good to finally live life...

In high school, I'd play sports for no less than two teams every season, work, do homework, and, of course, socialize.  One could only dream to have this schedule now!

In college, there was a year where I carried 18 credits, worked a part-time co op, spent hours working and practicing with the concrete canoe team, and drank my face off.  What I would give to have these things to complain about again.

In '05, I planned our wedding, hubs changed jobs, and we bought our first house.  Ha, I laugh at myself for thinking it was a stressful year!  I was so naive.

In '08, I was flying back and forth every week to Peoria, IL via a layover in O'Hare for the entire summer.  The same summer we happened to have eight weddings over a few months.  One of which I was in, two for him.  And we had two dogs to take care of.  Looking back I can't believe I thought this was hard.

Over the past year, I have taken our brood out of our home no less than 80 times at an hour each for people to waltz through with hopes that they would by it.  And by brood I mean two puppies, a toddler, and a pregnant belly for the first 8 months, and the next 4 take away the belly (well a few lbs of it) and add a baby.  In the rain, in the dark, during naptime, after bedtime, on mothers' day morning before church.  In the stroller, on a bike, sitting in the car, driving around, or to my mom's house.  Let's add in a new job for both of us in the last year, trying to find a new home, and finally, finally accepting an offer and coordinating moving.  I think it's safe to say that this is the most stress our family can handle and hope things never get harder...

We were finally getting excited and preparing to make an offer on our new home when BAM.  The appraisal on our house came back ridiculously low and now the bank is refusing to lend to the buyer our agreed price.  We have two choices - say thanks but no thanks to the buyer, put the house back on the market, re-live the showings nightmare that has been the last year and hope for a non-FHA buyer; or concede another 8k to this buyer on top of the 40k discount from what we've put into it that he's already getting. 

Cue the sleepless nights again.

We have one glimmer of hope with a proposal I came up with, that could help both parties...  We'll drop the purchase price down if they let us remain in the house for 10 weeks after settlement, which would allow us to put in an offer free of contingencies and hopefully get a better price on our new home.  Not to mention we could move at our own pace after we settle, with the least amount of disruption to our children, dogs, and our lives.

Our lives.  When we packed up most of our clutter into a POD a year ago this week, we figured it would only be temporary.  We were so eager to get our house on the market thinking it would sell instantly and we could be settled in time for our annual labor day picnic that we backed out of a camping trip with friends.  All for what?  We're still here.  When our grill broke a month later we figured we'll hold off on buying a new one because rather than transport it we'll just get the new one at our new house.  I've been craving a charred hot dog for months.  We decided that rather than having a bbq for our friends and family we'd let the house show.  I miss hosting terribly.

We basically put our whole lives on hold.  Every weekend besides the two weeks after the little lobster roll was born there was at least one party coming through the house, so we spent countless hours cleaning, prepping, and staging.  We did this to the detriment of our children - throwing barney on while we rushed around the house, rushing them out the door to sit in the car with the dogs instead of going to the please touch museum, and having them eat meals in the car in the pool parking lot near our house, watching and waiting for the parties to show up and leave.

I'm sick of it.  Thankfully, we haven't had any showings in the last month because of the accepted offer, we just had the inspection, appraiser, and electrical repairmen to deal with.  And we slowly are getting our lives back. We took a random trip to the Brandywine Zoo two weeks ago, and the kids loved it.  Hubs and I did some food and wining this past weekend and had a blast.  Hoping to make it to the aquarium for fathers' day.  We're still filling in at least one day every week with packing and looking at houses, but I'm done being "too busy" to do fun stuff with the kids.

We're hoping and praying that the buyer accepts the proposal we set forth to him, because it would be worth the additional 8k to us to be able to enjoy this summer with our kids - camping, beaching, adventuring, with packing and moving being a side project.  It's time to take our lives off hold, and even if that means having a grill to transport, we're going to buy a new one now, and use it all summer. 

I am ready to start spending my free days like this:

Ready for a day at the zoo!  Or, like an hour!

Oh HIII Goat!

I love all of you goats!  You can't hide from me!

Here goats - eat the hay!

I am the goat whisperer

Daddy look at the river!  And this random kid who wants to hang out with us!

View from the floor in a toddler's tiny room on a random Wednesday night

I don't know why potential buyers hate this room so much.  Sure, it's small, but there's enough room for an adult to lay comfortably on the floor next to the bed while waiting for a restless child to drift off to sleep.  

I hear him tossing and turning on the Toy Story sheets and wonder what he's thinking.  What goes through his mind as he's trying to fall asleep?  The stress of school the next day?  The worry that Mommy's yelling "Go to SLEEP" would echo in his dreams?

I remove my glasses and study the room as it looks through nearsighted eyes, although mine aren't as bad as his I can get the idea.  Maybe the shadows cast on the ceiling from the nightlight and the fan wig him out. Maybe the Disney pictures, blurred from the darkness but still lined up neat as pins contribute to his OCD.   The stuffed moose perched atop his giant blue piggy bank unknowingly shows up like devil horns on the wall behind.

The shuffling above me stops and I see a tiny head peeking out of the covers and over the side of the bed.  Guilty, I stop typing and whisper "go to sleep buddy" and hypocritically return to my phone.  Just 14 hours ago  I woke up from this very bed, having come in to relieve a 5am night terror and was just too tired to get up and leave. Am I encouraging bad habits?  This will end someday, and beyond that I will yearn for times like these, when my son sleeps just feet away and is only comforted by the presence of mommy... He tosses over again and I put the phone down for another moment.

The collection of hats hanging on monkey hooks catch my eye.  Gobbles hates hats, but has somehow acquired quite an array, from fire hats to cowboy, sno-bum to beach bum. I wonder if we ever do sell this house, will he remember this room?  Or will his "memories" be driven by the videos of himself he watches over and over again on my phone?

The house is calm after the battle of bedtime, from the screaming and the tears once again gobbles has emerged the victor, hence the reason I am on this floor. I gaze up at the mishmash of toys that hubs and I supplied from our own collections to line the shelves when we decorated this "nursery" almost 3 years ago and feel like it was just yesterday. It reminds me yet again that though the terrible twos are afoot, they will be gone in a blink of an eye. Gobbles buds, I love you little boy- mommy will always be here to comfort you to sleep when you need her. 

Mommy wishes for me to sleep and not fight her on naps and bedtime!

But I have more important things in mind

I wish for trucks.  Fire engines and dump trucks and backhoes and a CAR.TRANS.POR.TER!

how much stress can you cram into one time period? I'll let you know when I burst...

Boy oh boy how quickly I've forgotten. I remembered, on paper, that getting a shower was a luxury, sleep was in two hour increments, and nursing makes one thirsty. But I don't think I was prepared for the emotional effort necessary to cope with all of that, plus keeping the house clean for showings, looking for a new job, recovering from having my stomach cut open, running after an energetic two year old, taking out two puppies, one of whom is wearing an Elizabethan collar while recovering from his own surgery, oh, and caring for a newborn. Did I mention that February is "year end" at hubs work so he did not get home until well after 8pm every night?

But, somehow, we've survived. Despite feeling like a "single mom" the last four weeks and venting out to hubs my feelings on exactly that, our marriage has survived as well. Unfortunately, the house has not sold yet, Cannoli is still wearing the lampshade, and I haven't found a new job yet. So I'm still slated to return to the job from hell in less than 7 weeks, and have to add that to the balancing act of all the above. I'm exhausted thinking about it. Actually, I'm just exhausted, thinking or not...

I feel like I'm getting Lil Lobster Roll's relationship with me off to a bad start. My mind is constantly on the next "to do", and since she cries most of the time she's not being held, I'm allowing her to sleep the day away once she falls asleep just so I can get stuff done. For instance, we have a showing tonight and the house hasn't been vacuumed in two weeks, the beds need making, diaper trashes must be emptied, and toys need to be cleaned up. Wrangling two kids and two dogs out of the house during dinnertime is just what I want to be doing in the rain. I'm only blogging because it's something I can do one handed while the baby chills in the other arm. Don't know if we'll make it to the vacuum.

And it almost brings me to tears thinking about the fact that Gobbles has been going to daycare almost every day so I can have the time to do crap like this. The plan was during my recovery he'd go, then we'd spend mommy and kids time at home when I was well enough to move around. I've been back on my feet for over 2 weeks and he's still going. I have been picking him up early and spending the afternoons with him, but the guilt over sending him in the morning, despite his begging to go see his friends, is slowly killing me, and I know I'll regret it when I'm back at work. I keep telling myself that as soon as the house is sold, or it's nice out, or Lil Lobster Roll gets into a better feeding routine, that is when we'll spend days at a time together.

All so we can have more room for our little family. So the crib doesn't have to be in the same room as the guest bed. So the dogs' water bowl won't be underfoot as I try to do dishes, soaking my feet as I accidentally kick it even though it's been in the same spot for ages. Gobbles has outgrown the high chair, but during our morning routine of getting ready, he sits there in it in the middle of the kitchen while we serve his breakfast and make lunches. The dream is to have him at a kitchen table so that we can still spend those precious 30 minutes with him each morning.  Besides, only 2-3 more months until the Lobstah needs the high chair anyway...

But is it all worth it?  Our lives have been on hold in some ways since the house went up for sale in June.  Going back and forth to the POD for stuff has gotten old, and I'm tired of lettinh strangers into our house only to tell us it shows excellently but too bad your price is based on what you paid at the height of the market... it will be when the kids don't have to lug their bikes up from the basement to take them outside and muddy towels won't line the floors of the kitchen since that's where we wipe off dirty puppy feet. 

Ok, this post has gone off in a direction that I did not intend.  I'll post it because it always feels better to vent, and tomorrow (or Friday??) I will post about the joys we've experienced in the last 5 weeks.  Despite the tone of this, I am so happy with our little girl and the dynamic she's brought to our family.

Until tomorrow... 

 

Behind

i'm like 5 posts behind where i want to be.  so much has gone on in the past few weeks and as the 11 remaining weeks i have in this pregnancy are threatening to tick down, i'm getting more and more stressed... we're not ready.  we need to sell this house.  we need to get into a new one.  why the rush?  because if i have to transition poor gobbles to a new room not once but twice, he's going to freak.  all of the sudden his daybed is no good, and every night he's at the door crying and throwing pacis and blankies and trying to weasel his way into our bed.

it's been working.  hubs has been working 80 hour weeks for what seems like months now, so it's been up to me to take care of the nighttime stuff.  completely stressed out about my own work, not to mention the panic of needing to sell this house, i have not gotten a full nights sleep as it is.  this stress coupled with the joys of the third trimester have led me to just bringing our crying Gobbles into our bed after a second or third wakeup at night.  It seems to be the only way to soothe both of us. 

we've had so many good things happen recently that i needed to make this venting a separate post and be done with it.  Halloween and snow and playdates and the latest addition to the family are a few of the exciting things i need to record, so i can make room in my head for more - upcoming holidays, Gobble's second birthday, and eventually the arrival of his little sister!

happenings

well i'm glad we got to take our vacation and enjoy it a month ago, because we've hit the ground running and haven't stopped since. 

half our house is packed away in a pod, there's a sign on our front lawn, and little old ladies who have come to look at our house have deemed it "too big".  ummm? too big?  did you see the crawl space we're trying to pass off as a third bedroom?  and how do i know that it was actually old ladies looking at the house you ask?  well we got a few hours notice the first day the house was listed that someone wanted to see it at 2:30 in the afternoon, and could one of us leave work quick and get the dogs out?  no problem, i'm on it. 

as i scrambled to hide the dog bowls i heard cannoli freaking out at the front window.  i grabbed the leashes and collars and ran them out the back door and down the driveway, apologizing as i saw the showing realtor and two lil old ladies standing on our stoop.  whoops - that was awkward.  as i walked up the street so these strangers could criticize my house in private, i read my watch - 2:15.  they were early.  they were probably so freaked out by the frazzled, sweating lady in her business casual attire dragging the dogs down the driveway past the electric fence they fear so much that they decided rather not deal with her for this house.

but, we have some more showings so i'm not losing faith yet.  meanwhile, cleaning up the house every morning before we leave is kind of refreshing....

on the more stressful front, all of our free time that hasn't been spent packing or cleaning up the house has been with doctors.   followups with the opthamologist and presurgical visits will all culminate in tomorrow's appointment - what i'm hoping is Gobble's final trip to the hospital in a long long time.  as we suspected, his clogged tear duct is long gone, but the opthamologist is still concerned about his horrible vision, and potential accompanying glaucoma, detached retinas, or cataracts.  for a normal adult all of this stuff could be investigated while they're awake.  for a toddler who said go awaayyyyyyy to the doctor last week who approached him with a stethoscope, it would be near impossible.

so, tomorrow morning at 9:45 my little baby boy will be anesthetized for a period of time while his eyes are poked and prodded and studied.  and that will be the easy part.  the 3 hours leading up to this time are what i'm worried about.  no food after 1:45 am, no water after 7:45 am.  how am i supposed to explain that to mr. gobbles, who wakes up every morning asking for two things, his eyes and pancakes?  no, no pancakes when you wake up tomorrow mister... and most likely not even a glass of water...

we're still trying to figure out how to schedule this-  keep him up as late as possible tonight, eating and drinking, then pray he sleeps until 9 so we can just throw him in the car and get to the hospital?  or do we wake him up at 5 am just to give him some water on the chance that he'll fall back asleep?  i'm thinking the former, because the less we disturb his sleep the better. 

anyway, like i said already, i just hope that there's a positive outcome to this whole procedure and that we can spend the rest of the summer away from hospitals and doctors.  it's hard enough to keep him from breaking his glasses all the time (yup, they broke again).  this time held together with a paper clip and tape so they're more flexible when he "rebreaks" them.  i refuse to run out again and get replacements because the new thing for tantruming is for gobbles to flick them off his face and bend them as far as he can in either direction.  so until this phase is outgrown, every new pair of frames will be broken in the same way the first two have been.

so, like we have tried since this whole parenthood rollercoaster began - we sit patiently and wait for the next step...

does this look like the face of a guy who has tantrums?  c'mon mommy!  i'm a good boy all the time....

oh yea, that is the reason my eyes aren't on my face right now... tee heee hee.