getting back into it

I have a problem. My problem is that since I got married and became a mom, my life has become so chaotic that I don't do a good job keeping a real journal anymore. This blog has sorta become my real journal, where I record all the intricacies of my life.

And here I am, not posting in a month. Sigh.

I am actually doing better than I thought, since I really thought I had zero posts for April. Looks like I had two! Not bad!

So what have we been up to?

Our house closed April 4. It was awful and stressful. We had to wire money and sign papers and make oodles of calls to important people who I felt were out to get me. At one point, Fannie Mae (our home was foreclosure) said they'd cancel the whole deal if we didn't close in March. Really? You'd throw us under the bus just to make the close by the end of the quarter? What about being the first house to close in the next quarter? It was so stressful. Our realtor was on the phone with the Fannie Mae vice president for 2 hours, listening to her woes, reassuring her, talking some sense into her. At the end of it all, he said he felt like he'd "gone on a date with the woman." HA!

Our closing date slid from March 27 to March 30, then to April 4. THEN, I had to get all the contractors we had lined up adjusted in schedule. On April 5, the crawl space was cleaned out -- new insulation, rat tunnels boarded up, new water vapor barrier. On April 6, the duct work was cleaned out and sanitized. On April 9, the roofers started. We have one dang good looking roof! On April 10, the garage door was serviced (and we got our all-powerful clickers). On April 11, the handyman came to re-silicon the bathrooms, install new water shut-off valves, seismically brace our water heater, mess with the dishwasher, etc. On April 12, the heavy-duty carper cleaner came. All during the week Shane's folks came and helped us clean and paint (THANK YOU!!), and we officially moved in April 14. Not only did we have to clean the NEW house from top to bottom (hello! foreclosure!), we also had to get our rental cleaned so we could get our deposit back.

Plus, you know, I had two kids to entertain, boxes to pack, and air to not forget to breathe.

It was an insane week.

But we're here now, and I'm so deliriously happy. I LOVE this house. LOVE it. Every day something happens or I notice something and I am reminded just how lovely this house is. I love the island in the kitchen, where Wesley can sit on a bar stool and color while I am making dinner. I love that there are two levels of shelves in the walk-in closet, so even though I can't reach the top level I can put stuff like extra pillows up there. I love that we have two real bathtubs, so we have a fishy bathroom for the kids and a palm tree bathroom for us. I love that I have so much cabinet space in my kitchen that some cabinets are empty because I have nothing to put in them (imagine that!!). I love that we have an eating space in the kitchen so we use the "formal dining room" (over carpet) as an office and play area. LOVE it. I could go on. I love this house.

So, we've been busy with unpacking and organizing and making Ikea wishlists.

I've been busy helping Laurel stick to her sleep schedule (girlfriend is an early riser -- ugh!) and *GASP* potty-training Wesley. He has been saying for months that he will "poop on the potty on his birthday." Well, what actually happened is that we physically ran out of diapers. I had some pull-ups, but I knew he needed to poop and I just BEGGED him to do his business on the potty. So he sat down and peed. And hence we started trying. Still no #2 on the potty (he'll hold it, which is bad, so we give him a diaper), but there is progress. We have a sticker chart and lots of M&Ms and I bribe with YouTube videos and cookies and more. I told him we'd take a trip to the Space Needle when he poops for the first time. It may not be until his birthday (two weeks!!!).

I've been working at my new job, which I semi-like. I am getting a handle on things. I'm not in a groove yet, so hmmph. I think it'll help when I have a real e-mail address and work stuff doesn't go into my personal email account, then promptly getting buried under LivingSocial deals and eBay reminders.

Then of course, we're homeowners now, so in the first week here Shane had to attack the forest of dandelions, I had to deal with a leaky dishwasher, and we both are a little freaked out by teeny spiders and ants we find around the house. Plus there are noises sometimes at night and if we can't explain what they are, then who can? It's our house!

That's enough for now. I will be better since this is my record. This is my life.