Stayin' Alive

Here was our (last) weekend:


We went to early swim class on Saturday because David wasn't going to the later class, so we went to the class that Eleanor's friend, Larissa, attends. It was Daddy's turn to swim with Eleanor, and as always, she had lots of fun.

Blowing bubbles in the water. She is so good at participating this year. I just love watching how much she gets into it.


Kicking and splashing Daddy in the face.

Riding on Daddy's back.

Then, we went home to our lovely mess. . .

This is where I set up the drop cloth to paint the drawers and shelf from the bathroom. Then, Grant used it to glue the strips of laminate to go on the edges of the counters. That glue is some really nasty stuff, but we couldn't trust the weather for him to do it outside.

While Grant worked on this, Eleanor and I hung out in the backyard so we wouldn't be breathing toxic fumes. I wish I had taken some pictures of Eleanor out there. We blew bubbles. Eleanor couldn't figure out our dog, Lane's lack of interest in the bubbles. She kept asking me, "He wanna chase them?" After a while, she gave up on Lane and decided she should chase bubbles while I blew them. Our grass was pretty long, probably just over a foot, and she would just flop her body down in the grass as if she were trying to tackle the bubbles. It was hilarious!

I've been having a hard time with having my house torn apart right at the time when all my hormones are telling me to get it in order. I think I cried without provocation every night last weekend. So, while we were in the backyard and I was feeling desperate for something I could control, something I could accomplish, I did something really out of character for me that may not happen again for a long time; I did yard work. Grant had trimmed the rosebushes a while back (translation: long time ago), and the branches were still in piles on the ground. Eleanor kept following the dog by them and snagging her clothes on thorns, so I dragged the yard debris can to the backyard and got the clippers and some gloves to cut down the branches to put them into the can. I just felt good to be doing something. Meanwhile, Eleanor decided to play in her sandbox.

After I filled the yard debris can until it could hold no more, I started lunch for us. This is what my kitchen looked like on Saturday. . .

That's water boiling on our stove, in the middle of the floor, for our lunch.
If you can see the counter on the left under all the junk, that's the new counter top we're putting in over the old. And that's my hard-working husband (if only I could whistle. . . ).

By the time lunch was ready, Eleanor had gotten so, shall we say, involved in playing in the sandbox that she had sand from head to toe, ingrained in her clothes and sprinkling from her hair. The skies had been threatening rain all day, and Grant said he felt a few drops. We decided to chance it and picnic on the back patio since we didn't have time to bathe her before eating. We didn't get rained on. We brushed Eleanor off and gave her a bowl of mac & cheese to eat. She made it through with only a little "pepper" sprinkling from her hair into her food. After that, it was straight to the bath and nap time.

See my sink? Me neither. Grant took it out Friday night. Luckily, it was back in and functional by Monday evening. Woohoo!

Here I am, finishing this post on Sunday evening (bad blogger!), and I can hardly remember what day I started it. I took these pictures on Tuesday. With our mess of a kitchen, we had a picnic in the living room (next to the drop cloth) for lunch. Eleanor kept saying, "We're having a pic-pic!" Gotta love it!

We recently got her a new set of headbands, and she has scattered them around the house (don't know how that could happen with my impeccable housekeeping of late), and she finds them now and then. She put this one on herself, happy in her independence, and every time I looked at her, the song, "Staying Alive," popped into my head. Either that or "Eye of the Tiger."

"You can tell by the way I use my walk. . ."


Wednesday was very busy. Maybe I'll post about it later, but that evening, we drove out to the coast, and guess what I took with me to read?

I have finally succumbed to all the peer pressure. I saw through blogs that many of the people I knew were reading it at one point. Curious, I looked it up on Amazon and read a brief description (which, I have been informed by my sis-in-law, is inaccurate). All it took for me was finding out it was about a vampire in order for me to immediately lose interest. A vampire? A love story about a vampire?! Give me a break! But then everyone kept telling me they read it and loved it, and when I went to Utah, my sister (who hated reading probably until a few years ago) and sister-in-law, Lia ganged up on me to convince me I had to give it a shot. I left with my sister's copy, still skeptical, telling her I had to finish what I was reading before I would start it. I have found more and more people who have read it and loved it wherever I bring up the subject. Beth kept checking up on me, asking if I had started it yet, and I kept telling her I was still trying to finish Mansfield Park. She would tell me I had to hurry so we could call each other and girl-talk about it the same way she and Lia do. Some of her enthusiasm rubbed off on me, and I found myself picking up the pace trying to finish Mansfield Park. Once that was done, my house was in shambles, and as much as people kept telling me I would ignore my house and family until I finished the book, I knew it wasn't the right time to start reading it.

So I figured a trip to the beach would be the perfect time. I'm really getting into it. It's a very large leap from Jane Austen, but it reads easily and quickly. I can't say that I group myself with the many who gush about how much they love the book, but I'm trying to keep an open mind. Every now and then it's difficult because we are talking about a vampire here! I told Grant I wouldn't possibly be attracted to that character because his skin is always cold, and being the always freezing person that I am, it just wouldn't work out. I love my warm husband!

House Update

The weekend before last, we found out that the sale failed on that house we've been wanting. I would have posted about it, but since then, we've been scrambling to get our house fixed up to put on the market. I painted the bathroom, and Grant got working on our kitchen counter tops.

Grant started out by trying to peel off the old counter top, but it was seriously old, like old linoleum. The top, plastic-like part came off easily, but underneath was a layer similar to very thick, black construction paper that had been soaked in glue (you can see it on the back-splash). Grant had to use a wallpaper remover to blow hot air on it while trying to scrape it with the heavy-duty scraper you see in the picture. It made the house stink like tar, it spread that black dust everywhere, and it was a long and difficult process for Grant. After this section of counter top, Grant knew we needed another method. So, the plan is to cut 1/2 inch boards to fit over the old counter top (they weren't level with our oven anyway) and to put the vinyl over that.

These are a few pictures of the old counter top, and the mess that is my kitchen. Pepto Bismol, anyone? At least we're saying goodbye to the pink!

We are still in the process. The house is a disaster. I'm supposed to be nesting, but instead, we're tearing apart the nest! My oven has been in the middle of the kitchen floor for at least 3 days now, and my microwave is close by (on the floor also), being slammed into by the refrigerator door every time I open it because I forget it's there. We've been doing a lot of mooching off the in-laws, and last night, we just went ahead and used the stove even though it's in the middle of the kitchen. And, it's going to get worse before it gets better. Our sink is going to get ripped out this weekend and will be M.I.A. for at least a few days. Grant is doing beautiful work on the counter tops, though, and when they're all done, it will look really good. As soon as it's all finished, we will put our house on the market and hopefully still have a chance to put an offer on that house.

Eleanor listening to a story from Grandpa, all wrapped up in his jacket during one of the many nights we have been up at their house in the evening.

All about Eleanor

I can't believe another month is already over. Eleanor is very much more a little girl than she is a toddler. She (and her hair) seems to get longer every day. I haven't measured how tall she is recently, but the other day at my doctor appt. she hopped on the scale and weighs 24.4 pounds with all her clothes. LOL! Here are a bunch of pictures of her I haven't gotten around to posting:

These were a little over a month ago. She found her box of headbands and wanted to put them on all by herself.

She also took them off by herself.

Kari reading to Eleanor and Audrey about a month ago. I just love how Eleanor gets into reading. She LOVES to be read to and loves to participate and ask questions. Audrey and Eleanor play really well together, which is nice because Kari is such a good friend, and I love spending time with her.

Ooops! Do you see what's lurking in my pizza dough? Someone got too interested in watching the kitchenaid and let her binky slip right out of her mouth. I might not have noticed if it wasn't for my toddler screaming about wanting it back.

Mmmm. Tasty. We were even having friends over for dinner (now the truth comes out). The dough was cooked in a hot oven afterwards, so no harm done, right?

She found these boots in a bag of hand-me-down clothes for her to grow into and had to wear them all morning. The hat is one I have hanging around. I keep meaning to give it to my little sister when we go to Utah, and Eleanor finds it now and then.

We started swim lessons this month. This is Eleanor's third year in this class. We do it once every summer. As always, she LOVES it. She's really able to participate more this year since she's catching on to some of the words of the songs and wants to do the actions like splashing and blowing bubbles. She loves to jump in the water, and I'm getting her more comfortable with not having to hold my fingers when she does it. This week, she enjoyed gliding to me from the stairs that enter the pool. I would often let her go under the water before I would catch her, and she still loved it. Her cousin, David, is in her class, so they have fun playing together, too.

Ouch! I don't know if you can see this (or if you want to), but Eleanor is finally getting her 2-year molars (back right-our right, not hers). I knew they were trying to break through the gums, but I figured it would still be quite a while, considering her usual pattern of teething. She really wasn't all that moody. Then, one time, she was pretty whiny, and I couldn't figure out why. So, I decided to feel her teeth and see if they were making any progress. Both sides of her molar had broken through on the right side of her mouth, with just a string of gums in the middle. All I could think was, "What a little angel!" I wouldn't have blamed her if she had been much more irritable, but she actually wasn't that bad the days leading up to that.

This is her "sheepy" she fell in love with at my Aunt Kathleen's house in Utah. She always wanted to nap/go to bed with it, and Aunt Kathleen let her take it home. It has already been well-loved. It only has one eye, and I had to re-stitch the ears, tail, and legs so they wouldn't fall off. Lately, Eleanor has been calling it Annabell (like the baby goat at my dad's house). After I changed her stinky diaper one morning, Eleanor decided Annabell was also stinky. She put that diaper on it all by herself!
Eleanor also calls herself Annabell sometimes, and then proceeds to cry to me, "Maaaa, maaaa." She likes to pretend to be people/things other than herself. Recently, the most common are Annabell or baby. When she tells me, "I'm baby," she comes to me whining and whimpering and wanting to be held and coddled. It gets a bit old, but I figure this is her chance to still be the baby before her sister gets here.
In her "mucky-mucks," enjoying some nice weather in the back yard.
Grant took these pictures today at his parents' house. The dog knocked that flower off with his tail, so they put it in her hair. That's her "cheese" face. I've learned to just ask for a big smile.

The Results Are In!

We had our ultrasound today, and here's what we found out. . .

As you can see, Eleanor is still enjoying her time as the center of the universe. She really seemed amazed by the ultrasound. I think it was good for her to see an ultrasound when the baby was looking more like a baby than just a blob. It seemed to confirm to her that Mommy really does have a baby in her tummy. Tummy, uterus, same diff, right?

So, we're really excited that the next member of our family is a

Girl!

For the few of you who voted girl on the poll, feel free to pat yourself on the back and refer to yourself as the "prognosticator of prognosticators" for the next few days.

What goes up must come down

As much as Grant and I tried not to, we really were getting our hopes up about that house. Last Thursday, the day we were supposed to look at it one more time and possibly make an offer, our realtor called. It already had an offer. We were too late. Grant and I were both really disappointed. We told our realtor to let us know the moment anything falls through, but that's about all we could do.

This is what it looks like from the outside. Pretty cute, isn't it? Oh well. We had been praying about it, so the Lord must have something else in mind for us right now.

Here was the happiest part of my day that day: After I talked to Grant on the phone and received our bad news, I put Eleanor down for a nap and went to check the mail. There was a package in the mail addressed to me from some music company. I hadn't ordered anything. I couldn't imagine what it might be. When I opened it, I found Three Dog Night's greatest hits CD and nothing else. I immediately knew how it found me.

When I was younger, I would play video games in our basement, Atari, and some Nintendo or Sega. I mostly liked playing Joust on Atari. We had an old stereo system down there that had radio, a record player, and an 8-track player. I didn't like all the commercials that came with radio, and the only record we had that I liked was a single ("Another One Bites the Dust" by Queen). You can only listen to that song so many times before you get sick of it. I wasn't familiar with any of the bands we had on 8-track, except one: Three Dog Night. We had their greatest hits, and I listened to it over and over and over, singing along while playing Atari. If you're not familiar with the band name, just think, "Jeremiah was a bullfrog!" If that doesn't help you, you're on your own.

Years later, I bought the greatest hits CD for my dad, knowing the 8-track had been his. When we were in Utah, I asked him if I could copy the CD because I had heard one of the songs on a TV show, and it got me missing the music. My dad, being true to form, couldn't find it anywhere. I reminded him several times to look for it, and when I left, I told him I still expected him to find it for me. He offered to give me the money to download it on Napster or I-tunes, but I told him it was the principle of him actually having to find something he had misplaced. So, the copy I received in the mail wasn't the long-lost copy I gave my dad years ago, but I knew my dad had sent it. It was the perfect moment, when I was bummed out about the house, to know that he was thinking of me. I guess I'll have to burn him a copy.

We did go look at several houses that evening and took one last forlorn look at the house that slipped through our fingers. We weren't interested in any of the other houses. Our realtor took a look at our house to get an idea of what we might be able to ask for it. We had previously hoped to remodel to make it larger, but she said that if we were to make it bigger, we would never be able to find the comps we needed in our neighborhood to get out of it what we put into it. She also said that we weren't very likely to have a contingent offer on our house selling accepted unless our house was already on the market or already in escrow. Grant and I talked it over that evening, and we decided to put the house on the market. This could get interesting, considering we don't know where we'll live if it sells (if all else fails, my parents have a one-room apartment off of their house we can stay in for a while). Our house isn't actually on the market yet. We're waiting to hear back from our realtor and start taking steps in that direction. Anybody want to live in the seafoam? It has treated us well.