Dear Blog (and blogging friends if I have any left out there...)
Months ago, I thought I was being smart by making this blog private. For two reasons really, the first being that my photo program on my computer wasn't working (still isn't) so I couldn't add any photos to my posts - how boring - and the second was that my husband was applying for a new job and I was nervous that anything public on the Internet could be used against him (though I don't really think I have posted anything bad about my dear husband on this blog, but you never know). Well, then I realized that I blocked myself from reading my own blog. Then I realized I blocked myself from editing my own blog too.
I'm not really sure how that all happened. Oops.
Then I had a slew of emails and fbook comments/messages asking me to invite them to read my blog... haahaha I couldn't even read my own stinking blog! And I was just too darn busy to figure it out.
One thing led to another, Chris got the job, we moved to Georgia and left our beloved home and friends in Florida (sniff sniff) and we are still trying to unpack and settle in here in Georgia.
Looooong story. However, so many small things have happened lately that I don't want to forget so I figured I needed to start somewhere. And I probably will never catch up. Oh well.
For instance, just this week --
Monday: After changing a particularly stinking diaper, I went out the front door to throw it in the garbage bin on the street before trash pick up and Dax locked me out. No lie. He literally turned the lock on the handle. I was stuck in my sweaty workout clothes, barefoot on the front porch with no phone and no keys. The boys stood by the door and opened the blinds and waved to me. Dax told me the door was "stuck" and then they closed the blinds and laughed. No lie. I solicited my kind neighbors help, she freaked out and called 911. About 20 min later, the firetruck was dispatched and a sheriff broke in my front door. We found the boys running around destroying things with huge smiles on their faces. The stinkers.
Tuesday: Came into the kitchen to find both boys sitting on top of my kitchen table with the girls' bag of play-doh opened and strewn everywhere. Including in their mouths. Not so gross, just incredibly annoying to clean up.
Wednesday: While I'm paying bills on the computer just a few feet away from the pantry, Tyce managed to dump out not one, but TWO full boxes of pricey, organic maple brown sugar granola onto the kitchen floor and both boys tracked the pieces all over my entire downstairs. They look like they had rolled in the stuff. And they spilled a cup of water in the middle. Granola dust and particles in two rooms and up half a flight of stairs, and wet granola soup in the kitchen. You might wonder - how did this go unnoticed by me? I am baffled. It is truly incredible. But here's the kicker - I had decided to stay up late last night and mop my floors because of the earlier play-doh incident. Why do I even try?? It's not even ten'o'clock in the morning.
Continuing on...
The kids and I finally joined Chris here in Georgia the first day of August. We stayed with his parents until we found the house that we are currently renting. We moved into our house 2.3 miles down the road from my in-laws. I feel like everything is within a 3 mile radius in my life. Almost all of our family, Jada's school, Kalle's school, the church, the girls' tumbling gym, my gym, the grocery store, the dentist, an outdoor mall with restaurants, and chick-fil-a. 6-7 miles away is Walmart, Target, our new doctors, gas stations, and more stores and shops than I can even patronize. I live in a bubble. Its great. Now if the roads were so stinking narrow and windy with huge hills up and down then I would walk everywhere! But its crazy around here - its kind of like the old Northeast, but newer and southern, if that makes any sense.
Our family updates ... (from youngest to oldest)
The boys are 18 months old! THEY ARE IN NURSERY! PRAISE BE! And you better believe that I am NOT one of those moms who sits in there with my boys and babies them and lets them cry for me and blah blah blah. No way. I make Chris drop them off (key) and then I let the nursery leaders do their job. And guess what? The boys cry. Yup. But then they get over it and they are fine!! You just have to start them off learning from day one that you will not give in - that you the PARENT will win. hahahahaha. (This will probably come back to bite me in the bum bum) But for now, going to church is actually enjoyable again :)
DAX is huge. He likes to wrestle, body slamming in particular. He has the best laugh. He is still round and chubby and his smile is adorable. He loves Jada more than anyone in the world. He is kind of fearless. He will go down the tallest slide at the park, head first, by himself. I can barely keep up with him. He loves to try to swim, always laying down on his stomach and flailing around to make the biggest splashes possible. He is obsessed with eating bananas. But he refuses to chew them, he just stuffs them into his mouth and swallows them whole. I can't cut them into pieces, he wants the entire banana in his hand and he shoves it in his mouth with his palms. Its
TYCE is really trying my patience. Some days I am so frustrated with him I stick him in his crib and vow to never get him back out! But he is a relentless screamer. And he bangs his head against the crib rails so hard I swear it shakes the entire house. I always give in. Plus the little stinker has this smile that literally melts my heart. Its almost annoying, but I love it. He is just so gosh darn adorable! His most rewarding trait is his passion for books. We probably read 20 books a day, he will find the book he wants and bring it to me and quite literally force me to read it to him by pushing me down and climbing into my lap. His favorite objects to point to are always cars and trucks and airplanes. We can be reading a book that I have read hundreds of times before with my girls and he finds the things with engines that I never had noticed before. He looooves cars and trucks and says vroom vroom and pushes them all over the house and up and down the stairs. He also is drawn like a magnet to anything electronic, anything with buttons. I know everyone says that about their babies but this kid is different. He can actually turn the tv on and the unlock my iphone/ipad and open the doors to my car. He can't help it. I also feel like Tyce is the twin who does NOT obey me, at all. He usually instigates the mischief in our house. For instance, if Dax notices a bathroom door left ajar by accident he will run to it, stop at the entrance, and say uh-oh! Tyce, however, will run after him, push Dax aside, and immediately begin to splash in the potty (every single day the first week we lived her Tyce got shoulder deep in the potty at least 2 times) or eat toothpaste or hairspray or empty my eyeshadow on the floor. This happens before I can even run across the house after them! I mean, I am talking seconds people! Literally seconds! I RUN and still Ty has beat me to something. Then while I'm trying to clean up one twin, the other gets into something else disgusting right next to me and I can't even stop him! This back and forth battle continues for a few minutes until eventually we are all basically crying and exhausted. I finally wised-up and bought child locks for almost every door in our house. The funny thing about Tyce is that he waits
KALLE is such a precious little sweetheart. Everyone just loves her. There is something so different and so endearing and wonderful about Kalle. She still lives half the time in a different world, and its become such a creative and exciting world to hear about. She can captivate an entire room of adults with one of her "stories" about monsters or unicorns or dragons. We don't even understand most of what shes saying but its always entertaining :-) Kalle has been forced to spend more of her days in the world the rest of us live in because she is in school every day this year. Though she would definitely prefer to stay home and stay in bed for the majority of the day :-) Hahaha. I painted the girls' room HOT pink before we moved in. Its awesome. And Kalle looooves to make her bed perfectly and line her animals and toys up and play in her pink room. She just marches to the beat of her own drum, and usually that is a good thing but Kalle's drum might not be the best kind of drum for her to be marching too. She is seeing a specialist twice a week and we are working on figuring out what exactly we can do to best help her. Every 'professional' who has evaluated Kalle has had a very difficult time figuring her out ;-)
JADA is in first grade and LOOOOOOVES it. She loves her teacher, her class, her new friends, her new school, her new neighborhood friends, her new pink room and her new primary class at church. This move has been amazing for Jada. She gets to play with her best friend/cousin Lexi every Sunday for Wernli family dinners and sometimes in between. Jada also gets to see her other "cousins" (Tabitha and family) at church and during the week for playdates/babysitting. She has also made a whole bunch of neighborhood friends. We live on a cul-de-sac with maybe 10 houses, 5 on each side of the street. Its kind of small and kind of perfect. Every house has young kids living there and every family is ridiculously kind. All the kids have been so nice and inclusive of both Jada and Kalle. I feel like our family is safe here. Both girls are taking a tumbling class at the same cheer gym that their Auntie Lindsay used to take classes and where Uncle Tyler used to coach. Its like my girls are celebrities! Haha. Jada is reading and writing so well. She had her first spelling test of her life last week - 20 words - and she got 100% correct. We barely practiced. In her school she has art class and computer class and gym and music and recess every day and they have two class gerbils which has been the topic of much conversation :) I couldn't be more thrilled with our experience with Jada's school. Well, I guess if they didn't have to go to school every day I would like that much better. Haha. I miss my girls!!
ME. I am fine. I miss Florida. I am a real mom now, my husband is gone a LOT. I feel like I have finally entered real life. I wish I could feel sorry for myself, but, its real life. I had to grow up someday I guess. Right? Boo. I'll get over it.
CHRIS started his new job in July and has realized how incredibly busy he has become. He basically has traveled every other week since he started (leaves Sun comes home Fri). I know that traveling for work isn't "fun" but hello! He gets to eat and sleep and get dressed and work out alone! What's not amazing about that?? The traveling will be on hold for Nov and Dec so that's good for me :) I think Chris has really enjoyed this new job. He misses a lot of wonderful people that he worked with in Florida, but he will still see them since he is still with the same company. Instead of being a sales rep, he now trains the sales reps. Pretty cool, huh? Instead of working from his car, he now works in an office, with a desk. Weird. His commute is about a half an hour which isn't terrible but I knew that I wanted to live closer to his family instead of closer to his work. I'm so
Our daily grind...
I wake up between 6:15-6:30 and make breakfast. The only way I get Kalle out of bed in the morning is if I lure her with a breakfast waiting for her on the table, preferably a hot one. (its often Eggo waffles with sprinkles - I know, its gross) The next hour is a whirlwind of breakfast scarfing, uniforms and sweaters, hair bows and braids, shoes and backpacks, and packing lunches and snacks. Then at 7:15 Chris walks out the door for work taking Kalle with him, he drops her off at preschool by 7:30. I finally get the
Basically, I feel like this move has been really, really good for everyone
So I guess we're really in Georgia now. And I guess we're really not moving back to Florida. At least not this year. (I'm still keeping my fingers crossed though)
Well, I think I better go shopping for some warm sweaters and cute boots! Shopping seems to help make everything a little better :-)
And P.S. I'm going back to being public again. The private blog thing just didn't quite work for me. Maybe I'll try it again another day :)
Love, Kimberly
