Wandering

This is probably going to be a long, rambling, disjointed post. It's more for me than you, I'm afraid. I have to capture a few things before I forget, and if there's one thing that can be said about my writing, it's that I have a complete inability to be succinct.

First off, we had a great visit from Jason's parents last weekend. They have a lot going on so we were very grateful that they made the effort to come see our kids and our house and we had so much fun visiting with them. We are all missing them.

Next, Baby Colin. He is so darn happy. And so darn into everything. He loves the bath, but he doesn't get to spend much time in it because he insists on standing up, and after about the third time of him falling over (and then under the water), I get tired of it and pull him out. The other night I bathed him, took him out of the tub, and put him in a diaper and set him loose on the floor in Ethan's room. I then put Ethan in the bath, and got Colin's pjs out of the dryer with a bunch of other clean clothes. I sat on the floor of Ethan's room and folded clothes. At first Colin pulled the clean clothes out of the laundry basket. He got bored with that and played with Ethan's train table. He got bored with that and went to visit Ethan in the bathroom (which is in Ethan's room, so I was very close by). Ethan screamed that Colin was standing up next to the bathtub and I said something dismissive about how he was fine and couldn't get in to trouble. A few minutes later, I hear a giant splash. I know exactly what has happened. I run into the bathroom expecting to find Colin submerged, and there he is sitting in the bath playing with the toys like I never got him out. This kid. He's going to be the death of me. Of course, I have to go get Jason so he can witness what our second child has done. And Jason has to then go get the camera so we can document it. All the while his very absorbent diaper is getting bigger and bigger. As you can see, he was very amused by the whole thing. Ethan was not, because he was sure the diaper was going to explode all over him since that's about how it looked.
Next I have to mention our neighbors. Directly to our left is a row of townhouses that are currently under construction. Across the street is a very ugly retention pond. Directly on our right is a couple about our age that we have talked to once (before we moved in), when they made it abundantly clear that they prefer cats to children, thank you very much. Then there's the wonderful neighbors down the street. One couple is an American woman and a Polish man who have a 3-(almost 4)-year-old boy and a 2-year-old girl. They invited us over for a BBQ 48 hours after we moved in. They are SO nice. Their next door neighbors are a French woman and a Bosnian man (we are a very international street...I love it) who have a 6-year-old boy and a 4-year-old girl. They invited us over for a BBQ a week ago. Seriously nice people. I'll mention more about them in a minute.

On to Jason. There have been a lot of things on my mental wish list over the last 10 years. They include things like a house to settle in to long term, and a net worth that's not made up of six bright red digits, and somewhere at the bottom is having my husband around a little more. Let me just say that (for me, at least) the "adjustment" period is over and I have decided that having a husband around...home for dinner, here on the weekends, random days off to spend with us...is the greatest, most decadent luxury I could ever have imagined for myself. I think I might love his schedule more than I love my own family. Seriously. And the timing was perfect. I was pretty sick a few weeks ago, and Jason spent the better part of 5 days taking care of the kids. Once he got into the rhythym of constant childcare he did great, and I was able to completely relax and get better. The kids loved it, I loved it, and Jason started saying really sexy things like, "We need to buy you a new diaper bag," and, "When I have time I'm going to go detail your car." (I'm not being sarcastic here...statements like that are a real turn-on for me.)

Which brings us to tonight. Jason had the day off, so he and Ethan spent the afternoon at the pool. They got home at 5:00 and Jason fed the kids dinner while I went for a run. I was only supposed to be gone 40 minutes but ended up coming back about 10 minutes late. Jason fed the kids, then bathed Colin, then cleaned up the carpet where Colin pooped in the 45 seconds between the time the diaper was off and Jason put him in the bath, then was about to bathe Ethan when the doorbell rang. Standing at the door is our 4-year-old neighbor. Alone. She lives 3 houses down and across the street. And has never been in our house before, though we were at her house last week. Jason is completely baffled. She very confidently greets him and then she and Ethan run off to play. Now, I have to say about Jason...he loves his own kids and is great with them. However, he is mildly to extremely uncomfortable around all other children, depending on the situation. I'm going to cast this situation as "extremely uncomfortable" for him. First, he starts praying that I'll get home quick so I can figure out what to do with the random kid now running through our house. Second, he starts frantically searching for the papers on which we jotted down our neighbors' contact info, which unfortunately for him I moved from his nightstand to the office earlier today. Once he finds those, he has to figure out to whom she belongs, since he honestly has no idea. He gets her to stop playing long enough to tell him who her parents are, and calls them. She belongs to the French-Bosnian couple. The mom answers, and they have this conversation:

Jason: Hey, um, this is Jason from down the street. I just wanted to make sure you know your daughter is here?
Neighbor: I'm sorry, who is this??
Jason: It's Jason from down the street. Just wanted to make sure you know she's here. It's totally fine, of course, and she and Ethan are having fun, but I just wanted to make sure you were okay with it. And of course she's welcome to stay and play, no big deal.
Neighbor: Um, okay, but no more than 30 minutes.
Jason: Sure, fine. Bye.

At this point our neighbor, who was at work in her home office and was completely confused by the phone call, goes and finds her husband (who was "watching" the kids) sleeping on the couch. She wakes him up and says, "Do you know where your daughter is?" He responds that she's upstairs playing. Our neighbor didn't tell us how she replied but I'm guessing it was in French. She came down to get her daughter right after that.

Jason is growing increasingly uncomfortable and at this point has opened the garage door and is checking out the window for me. I walk up the street in time to see my neighbor stomp down the street and walk straight into my house (Jason was waiting at the door for her), which I find kind of odd until I find out what's going on. Our neighbor was furious at her daughter, but her daughter and Ethan still managed to negotiate a parent-sanctioned playdate for tomorrow afternoon. I'm not letting her out of my sight during the time I'm responsible for her.
A quick little Ethan quip. He went over to his sink to brush his teeth tonight and found a can of Jason's Diet Coke. (An aside...if you are ever looking for Jason, follow the trail of Diet Coke cans through our house.) Ethan picked it up and said, "Hmmm...this will come in handy," and then put it back down. I'm not exactly sure what that means, but I have a feeling he was considering how to incorporate the caffeine into his nightly plot to stay awake and plague us as long as possible after he's been put to bed.

Open House

This series of posts is for those of you who want to see pictures of our new house. If you're not interested in the house, you can see pics of the kids here. If you're not interested in pictures of my house or my kids, you have clearly stumbled across the wrong blog. Try this or this. 

Before we start, I have to post a disclaimer about the decor in general. We haven't painted and are still using the residency-era (some med school era) furniture. Everything we picked out is neutral, so it's a neutral, sparsely decorated house right now. We know this, but it will be quite a while before we've cleared out some more pressing financial obligations and can actually redecorate. We're okay with that. 

Ready? Come on in.

First Floor

Through the front door, you enter a foyer with stairs directly in front of you. See that alcove halfway up the stairs? I used to hate it, until we found an orchid that fits the space in a way we love. I'll show you a close up a little later.

The hallway under the stairs leads to the mud room, the kitchen, and the family room. Off the foyer to the left is the office.

With bay windows looking out on the front yard.

Off the foyer to the right is the formal living room. A complete waste of space.

Behind the formal living room sits the dining room, with a butler's pantry in between.

Here's a closer look at the dining room. We don't eat here.

On the other side of the dining room sits the great room, which includes a family room, breakfast area, and the kitchen. Here's a view of the kitchen and through to the dining room.

Love the walk-in pantry! Although the fridge looks so tiny in that space.

The breakfast table is in between the family room and kitchen.

Here's a view off the back deck directly behind the breakfast table.

Family room. In case you're wondering, my house is absolutely always this clean. And I absolutely did not move piles of clutter out of the frame just long enough to get the shot, and then move them right back. I would never do that. Because my house is so spotless.

Another view of the family room. Here you can see the back stairs going up to the playroom.

This is the mud room. The far door on the left leads to the garage, the far door on the right leads to a downstairs bedroom, and the door you can see in the mirror leads to a half bath.

Here's the downstairs bedroom, which we're obviously using as a gym.

There's nothing really of note in the garage, except this freezer, which my brother and sister-in-law picked up for me from a neighbor going through foreclosure. They negotiated the deal and then hauled it down the street until I could pick it up. It's practically new and I paid practically nothing for it. Sad to benefit from someone else's tragedy, but Mark and LaDonna are the best for getting it for me! And for loaning me their amazing camera to take pictures of my house that are actually in focus. And for bringing me dinner Monday night. Okay, I'm done now.

Second Floor

This is the view from the top of the front stairs.

Here's a closer look at the alcove. This orchid is my favorite thing in the house (besides my 3 boys, of course.)

The master bedroom is at the top of the stairs. Here's the sitting area of the master bedroom. This is the one area of the house I have no clue what to do with. The doors leading into the bedroom from the hall are on the left right in front of that bookshelf.

And the view from the other side. That's Jason sleeping in the bed. He worked the night shift last night. The double doors to the right of the bed lead to the bathroom.

Here's the vanity in the master bathroom. White orchids are my favorite but they didn't work in the alcove, so we got some for the master bathroom. I really hope I can keep them alive.

Master bath.

Jason's custom spa shower. Love it!

My closet. Jason's is smaller. I need more clothes.

The other side of my closet.

Before we leave the bathroom, let's look at my orchid one more time. Colin's room. He's just waking up from his nap here.

Let's take a moment to notice how adorable he is. He usually wakes up this happy. Except when he doesn't.

Laundry room. Love that it's on the second floor.

Ethan's room.

View of Ethan's room from the windows.

Playroom just outside Ethan's room. My 4-year-old is playing in the baby toy and my baby is sucking on a helium balloon. Awesome.

Through the play room is the guest room.

And in between the play room and Ethan's room are the stairs going down to the family room.

That's it! Except for things like the bathrooms. I'm sure you all can imagine what they look like.

In closing, a note to those we love in California and the Northeast:

If this post seems like a shameless plug for North Carolina real estate...it is.

Perspectives

Me: I really do not like the overhead lights in this house.

Jason: What? What's wrong with them?

Me: What do they look like to you?

Jason: Oh. Maybe that's why I like them.

Nice.

We survived the move and we're pretty settled in. I haven't taken any pictures yet, though. We still need to get a few last things out of the way first. Hopefully this weekend. The kids took a little time to adjust but are now both doing great. The movers left at 1:00 pm on Friday afternoon, and my mom and dad dropped the boys off at 5:30. In between, I turned on my iPod, put on my headphones and got to work unpacking both boys' rooms, the playroom, and the guest room. When Ethan saw all his toys unpacked, bath toys in the bathtub, everything just like before, it went a long way towards making it "okay." He kept saying, "I'm so excited I'm going to cry!" It was cute. I was playing around with the camera on Sunday morning and got this shot of him. I love the sweet, un-posed expression on his face.

Ethan then took this picture of me. See the boxes and the empty bookshelf behind me? That's why there are no pictures of the house on this blog yet. Colin didn't seem to have any adjustment period at all. He did wake up one morning and decide he suddenly knew how to climb stairs. They're hardwood and would really hurt to fall down so that's been a struggle. We're trying to decide what to do about baby gates. On Sunday morning before church I found him in my closet looking out the window. I think he's so cute. Then he assumed his favorite yoga position. He does this frequently throughout the day. I have no clue why. He laughs and laughs when he does it. He cracks me up. When he's not completely frustrating me. He's been trouble lately, and I've been calling him on it. Like, "Hey, Trouble, stop emptying the pantry shelves!" (It's super effective. He laughs and keeps going.) He was trying to take a toy from Ethan (something he does near-constantly) when Ethan yelled, "Stay away from me, Trouble!" I need to be more careful what I call my kids, I guess. You never know what will stick. We didn't waste any time breaking in the new house. In the first week, we spilled soda all over the gorgeous wood floors in the kitchen, Ethan vomited on his bedroom floor, and Colin pooped up to his neck and down the outside of his diaper (HOW does he do that???), I failed to notice it (HOW did I do that???), took off his clothes, and laid him down on his back on the brand new carpet. (On a side note, Ethan started vomiting a mere 5 hours after the washer and dryer were delivered. Given the amount of laundry I did the whole night, it was perfect timing all things considered.) It's nice not to have to worry about the house getting "ruined." We've thrown our worst at it and still love it. I was totally in love with the floor plan before, and I love it even more after living in it.

Jason loves his new job. I love his new schedule. He's home for dinner every night and home every weekend. We don't know what to do with ourselves. In fact, he went to go see a movie one night because he just couldn't take all the "free" time any more. My mom says we are going through the adjustment period that most couples go through at retirement. I think it will be great but it may take some time getting used to having him around SO much. I may have to sign him up for some extracurricular activities just to get him out of the house.

Tomorrow evening we have a babysitter coming while Jason and I join my parents for golf (if we don't get rained out) and dinner at a steak house we all want to try. We have been dealing with a lot of not-fun stuff lately, so I'm really looking forward to going out and doing something relaxing and fun!