birthday party and a roll of toilet paper

This evening we took Lily to her best friend Andi's 1st birthday party!! Lily had a great time and was crawling all over the place. She even reached out and wanted to be held by Andrew's mom! Lily must have gotten the "grandmother" vibe from her! Andi was so adorable. She loved her cake but wasn't much in to the presents - go figure! She just wanted to sit in her new little rocking chair and play with this ball she got. So Alicia got to open most of the presents. Anyways... we had a good time and it was so fun/sentimental celebrating the first year of Andi's life! Happy Birthday Andi!!

And this afternoon I let Lily have a roll of toilet paper to play with. She loved that! Here's the before....

and the after....

breaking christmas rules and trunk or treat

I'm currently sitting here drinking a cup of coffee with gingerbread cream and listening to christmas music. Yes, you heard correctly. My personal rule for christmas music is November 1st but I just couldn't wait. I woke up to a chilly morning, saw the creamer, and just did it. The current selection on itunes: Baby It's Cold Outside from the Elf Soundtrack. VERY good song! I love that movie and the soundtrack.

Yesterday evening we headed to church for Lily's 1st trunk or treat. We had to bundle her up in a coat so she couldn't quite show off her cute ballerina outfit but that's okay. She held her bucket upright the whole time for people to put candy in. I couldn't believe it! No, Lily can't eat candy yet but we figured next year she will eat it so we should get to treat ourselves this year. Plus, I never got to trick or treat as a child so I deserve it!

When we got home, Matt and I got out of the car and then he went to go get Lily out. Well before he could open the door there was a scary cat that climbed up on top of the car. I was like um.... we need to get our child out. Matt finally got it go away. Then Lily had a hay day at home just playing with all the candy in her bucket. One lady actually had goldfish cracker packs so Lily was able to eat something.

This evening is Andi's first birthday party! I can't believe our little baby girls are turning 1!! Where has the time gone?! It's hard to imagine this time last year that Lily was in my belly just a tiny 6 pound 4 ouncer! I wasn't really sad/sentimental until today. I guess it's cause Alicia and Andi have been a big part of our lives this past year and Lily has been able to share her first year of life with her little friend Andi. Well... enough of the sentimentalness (don't think that's a word). I'll save it for 3 weeks from now when Lily has her first birthday.

And finally a cute pic of my little Lily in her new warm pj's:

visit from friends, Lost, niceness, and pee on the floor

Today was a fun day! We finally got to hang out with Alicia and Andi. It seems like there's always something coming up or a sickness that interfers with our weekly get togethers! Lily and Andi had fun together and even had lunch together here. And Alicia and I were able to catch up on things and what our girls have been up to.

Matt is trying to get me into Lost, the tv series. I never watched it because the ads made it look scary. Yes, I'm a wuss and don't like to watch anything remotely scary. Well, Matt convinced me that it would be okay and that I would like it. The kids had been watching an episode each week during after school program so that's how Matt started getting in to it. He borrowed the first season from a friend of his from work. I watched the first episode last night and although it was pretty good - still a little jumpy scarier and bloodier than I would like. I'm going to give it a few more episodes though before I give up. Matt said the blood/guts stuff wouldn't be as bad in future episodes since it's just the initial plane crash.

I would like to say that it makes me so happy when total strangers do something nice for me. I was leaving the grocery store this evening trying to get groceries in the car, Lily out of the cart, and the cart cover unfolded. All of this while it feels like it's freezing and VERY windy. I had gotten Lily out and a lady came by and asked if she could take my cart to the corral for me to put it away. It seems like something so simple but really brightened my day. I hope that I do things like that for others. My challenge for tomorrow: make sure to do at least one random act of kindness for someone.

And finally... before bathtime each evening I usually take Lily's clothes and diaper off for a few minutes to let her air out. She has never peed before. Well... tonight she got me back. She was standing up by the couch and I hear a gush of liquid. I look over and there's pee all over the couch and floor. Haha! Good thing I don't care about that kind of thing. :) It gave me a good laugh for the evening!

I'm excited for tomorrow... Lily's first trunk or treat at church!! She's going to be a beautiful ballerina! It just stinks that it's going to be SO cold!!

and then there was silence

Everyone's gone. Yes, our house is finally back to normal now with just us! I'm currently enjoying beautiful peace and quiet while Lily is napping. We had a good weekend though even though it's not quite over yet.

Yesterday afternoon it thankfully stopped raining and the sun came out just in time for the LU homecoming football game. It turned out to be PERFECT weather! So after Lily got up from her nap, we headed over to the game and met up with Matt, his dad, and Jake. It took forever to find a spot. Definitely a packed house! I really like going to the games and rooting on our alma mater but we just hadn't had a chance yet this year. Lily did great for her first game and seemed to like it even though it was very loud! She just sat there (thankfully) and took everything in. We ended up leaving early because I had to get her dinner and she started to get restless. Her favorite part was when the hip hop music would come on between plays. She was bouncing/dancing up a storm!

The guys stayed for the rest of the game so Vicky came over to hang out with me and Lily until she went to bed and the guys got back. That was a good break for me too with our house being quieter.

This morning was church and it was a packed house too because it was Friends Day. As usual, a good service and Lily had fun playing in the nursery. I'm really glad she does so well in there. Then we headed out for lunch at Friday's including kids eat free! Lily kindly shared her delicious mac'n'cheese with me!

Now off to lay down and enjoy some more peace and quiet!

family overload

Yes... I still have family staying at my place. My parents got here on Monday. They came to go with me to get pictures done and then for me to be able to substitute teach. They had no end date to leave and I had a few things to get done so I told them to leave Friday. So half the issue was me! Then Matt's dad and Jake were coming up for the LU football game today and we had assumed they were coming today (Saturday). So I figured that we would at least have one down day/night between family. That wasn't the case. They came up yesterday and got here like 2 hours after my parents left. I had a bit of a breakdown last night after we went to bed. It wouldn't be quite as bad if we had a bigger place and could essentially "get away" from others in the house. But we're all right here in the living room. I just have to tell myself only 1 more night/day! Then we're just us again!

To update from my previous blog about the neighbors... no knocks on our door since then thankfully. I have prepared my "speech" for when/if they come the next time. So here it is. Let me know what you think.

"We have been kindly trying to keep the noise down as much as possible even though we don't have to do this in the first place but like I said before there is nothing I can do about the noises that come from normal daily living. My daughter is 11 months old and she's only going to get louder as she grows once she starts running around. If you have a concern in the future, please take it to the clubhouse or move to a 3rd story apartment but do not disturb as at our home again." The question will be if I remember what I want to say when it comes time. :)

After the day I substitute taught, we pretty much did errand running. I had my appointment to get our WIC checks, did a little shopping for Lily, got groceries, and a few other things. Today is supposed to be Lily's first Liberty football game but I'm not gonna be able to take her if it's still raining. :( So we'll wait and see.

This coming week should be fun! Matt starts his new schedule (7:30 to 3:00) on Monday. Yeah!!! I'm so happy he'll be getting home MUCH earlier and we can actually have dinner together as a family now. Wednesday night is Lily's first Trunk or Treat at church. Guess mommy and daddy get to eat her candy this year! Thursday evening is Andi's 1st birthday party (Lily's bf). I can't believe that our girls are turning 1 year old!! I've started working on Lily's bday party planning. We're gonna have it on Saturday at the clubhouse which will be nice and offer lots more room. Her actual birthday is Friday though so we're gonna do something small with just our parents if they want to be there that day - cake and maybe a present or two.

Off to entertain family....

the neighbors

Okay, I was going to wait to tell the neighbor story until I wrote about the rest of the week. But due to popular request on facebook, I have decided to blog about this subject today.

Here's the scoop. For those of you that don't know, we live on the 3rd (top) floor in our apartment building. I will also preface this by saying that we have never had ANY complaints in the past 3 years that we have lived here. We recently had new neighbors move in below us on the 2nd floor. I would say the couple is in their late 30's or early 40's. The first incident occured about two weeks ago. It was just Lily and me at home around 5PM. She was crawling around playing and I was doing nothing of consequence. Our doorbell rings and when I answer the door it's the lady from downstairs. She says (in a rude tone I might add)... "there's a large amount of noise coming from your apartment." I go on to explain that it's just me and my daughter at home and that there's nothing I can or should be doing DURING THE DAY any different. I have an 11 month old.... She looked at me like I should have a better answer for her and then left.

Fast forward to yesterday. It was around the same time of day (5PM) and Matt was still at work again like usual. I hear the doorbell ring, answer the door, and there stands the wife WITH her husband this time. When I saw them I immediately thought you HAVE to be kidding me. The husband talked this time and basically said the same thing but to add that there's large thumps and that it's so bad sometimes it "shakes their lamps." WOW!!! I was SOOOO irate and couldn't believe I was hearing this and that they had the nerve to come back again knowing we have a small child!! I tried to calmly explain again that there is nothing that I can do... we live in an apartment building and there's going to be noise if you have neighbors. And again that we have an 11 MONTH OLD! So they left probably still upset. What do they think is going on up here? An EARTHQUAKE?? They could have a LOT worse neighbors than us!! We are generally quiet people and Lily isn't even to the stage yet where she runs around and makes even more noise! Oh and then I say to try and be as nice as possible, you shouldn't have a problem in the evenings/night when it really DOES matter because our daughter goes to bed at 8. The lady looks at me and says in a sarcastic tone "well we're thankful for that!" Like we're doing her some sort of service by our daughter going to bed at 8.

OH MAN!!! Can you just tell by this blog how upset and angry I am? It literally kept me from going to bed last night because I was stewing about it.

So this morning Matt and I went to let the community manager know about the visits we had gotten (assuming they hadn't reported us to the office yet) and make sure she knew our side of the story and that we're just going about our daily lives. I know Dee (the manager) pretty well and she always talk to Lily and is real nice with her. She appreciated us letting her know so she would know in advance to explain to them if/when they do call that what they are experiencing is normal apartment noises and that they will have to get use to it or move to a top floor! Dee said they use to leave here previously and were on the top floor. Then they moved to Colorado for awhile and are now back. So maybe they just don't realize that you're going to hear people walking around above you. I'm thankful that Dee understood and said it wasn't a problem.

Well... that's my story. I haven't decided to ignore the door if they come again or answer it and be not quite so nice this time and explain they don't need to disturb our home anymore but just take their issues to the clubhouse since I know the staff is on our side. Hm.... It takes everything I've got not to just yell at them!!

parents in town

The parents are in town... thus, the reason for not blogging the past few days. We had a great weekend including Tara's baby shower. I was able to get a substitute teaching job today while my parents were here to pick up a little extra cash here and there. Lucky me got the ISS teacher substitute job! :) And our downstairs neighbors have ROYALLY pissed me off again. Those of you that knew about the last time the wife came up - well it's happened again but with her husband coming too. ARGH!! I'm going in the morning to talk to the community manager about it because I want to make sure that they know we are in the RIGHT! I'll rant about that later too when I give a big update.

Hope everyone is having a great week. Off to watch some tv and relax!

the smells of christmas

Can I just say that I LOVE christmastime. Yes, I know it's not christmastime yet. I was at a few stores though today and saw all this christmas stuff out already and heard the music in Target on that cd sampler machine next to the cards. It made me feel SOO good. I can't wait until the season really kicks into gear! And to top it off, there's this Febreze air scent that they come out with every christmas season called "fresh evergreen and snow" that is AMAZING!! So I got some of that today too. If you haven't tried it, you should.

My official start date for christmas music listening is November 1st. Most people think it's crazy but I LOVE christmas music and since the season only comes around once a year I like to make the most of it. Last year I didn't really feel like I had a christmas season anyways since we had a newborn in the house and were running on very little sleep.

Yea for Christmastime! It's "the most wonderful time of the year." (as I hum in my head)

picture time

Our beautiful little family:
Aunt Vicky, Uncle Ron, me, Matt, and Lily:

Matt's family (minus Mike, his brother):

Lily with her cousin Aaron on the way to the store and lunch:

All dressed up for church in her cute new outfit:

visit with family, finances, work change, and a call

We're home from Virginia Beach. Well we actually got home Wednesday but haven't had the motivation to blog until now. We were originally scheduled to come back on Tuesday but since Matt's work hours are later in the day we decided to come back on Wednesday. Matt got permission to come in a little late that day. We had a great time as I said before with his aunt and uncle from australia. They were just so nice and funny!

Let me revert back to recap though. On Saturday we lazied around until Lily got up from her morning nap. Then Matt and I headed to Babies'R'Us with Lily and Aaron (our nephew) in tow. We got to experience having two kids for awhile. It was a strange feeling having TWO car seats in the back of our car. We took them both to McDonald's for lunch - Lily can definitely out eat Aaron - haha. She's such a good eater and loves her veggies! Then that afternoon Lily and I headed over to see grandma and grandpa for a bit before going to visit my friend from high school, Heather. Heather and I use to be really good friends back in the day. She has a little girl, Summer who is adorable!! So Lily got to meet both of them and even though our stay was short we had a great time. That evening Matt's Aunt and Uncle arrived.

Sunday was church, a visit to Missy and Jake's new apartment, and then a big dinner with the whole family. Monday we went to Home-a-Rama. WOW! Those are some sweet huge expensive houses! It's fun and depressing at the same time. Then we had a dinner out with everyone at Gordon Biersch. Lily stayed out later than normal that evening and did great. She's been staying up until almost 8 now - much more content in the evenings. Tuesday we had lunch with my parents and then visited Matt's mom at work so she could show Lily off to everyone.

I already commented on a few "australianisms" in my last post but I had to share this funny story. Matt's mom was out of milk one morning and she came in and saw Uncle Ron eating cereal for breakfast. She asked him how he got milk. He said there was some in there - the half and half. HAHA! He didn't realize it was creamer - he thought it was just like a milk percentage (like 1%, 2%, etc.). They apparently don't have/use creamer in australia - just milk. So he didn't know what half and half was.

They brought Matt some ketchup from their stop in England. Background story - when we were on our honeymoon in Canada their Heinz ketchup was amazing. It was similar to ours but sweeter. Matt LOVED it! We brought back a bunch of packets from Wendy's - haha. So Matt's aunt and uncle picked some up in England to see if it would be similar and it was! They also brought Lily this really cute stuffed koala bear from Australia.

Next subject - finances. Let's just say not so good right now. We've had a bunch of larger unexpected bills that came up this past month and it's took a beating on us. The amount we really need for our necessities budget just isn't coming in on Matt's salary. So please pray that God will provide. We're trying to think of options - cutbacks, extra work, etc. that we can do to make ends meet.

Two good pieces of news about Matt's work situation. One - Matt will officially be switched to the day program at the agency as of not this Monday but the next!! Yeah!!! He's been working the 11 to 6:30 shift for the after school program and it's just been really hard now with Lily's schedule. She can really eat dinners now with us but obviously that's not possible since he's been getting home around 7. Plus he doesn't get to spend much time with Lily because even though he's home in the morning - she's taking her nap. So this will be GREAT for us as a family!!!

And the second piece of good news - Matt got the call this evening to schedule his interview for the youth pastor position at Suburban (the church we attended growing up in Virginia Beach). We've been praying about this for a long time now and we finally have a next step to look towards. Yeah!!! Continue to pray for this possibility for us and that God will be ever present. His interview weekend is scheduled for November 8-9. This could potentially be a huge answer to prayer in several ways! If this isn't what God has for us, then I'm praying that God would open up a door soon for Matt to finally get in to full time church ministry.

So it's been a good week!!! And this weekend should continue the trend. I'm having a baby shower here for my bf and rommie from college, Tara. Her baby girl (Bailey) is due December 21st. Even though she only lives an hour and half away it's been several months since I've seen her last. I'm SO excited for her to come visit!!! Plus we'll have all our girl friends together from college here for the shower.

Well... gotta get off of here and hit the sack! I have several pictures I want to post but I'll do that maybe tomorrow since I need to go to bed!

australia-isms

We've been having a great time with matt's aunt and uncle from australia. They're great!! Sure wish we lived near all his mom's family from australia. I would love to go and visit someday but financially that's not happening anytime soon!

Anyways... I'll write more about the weekend later once I'm home but I just had to write down a few "australia-isms" before I forget them! It's so funny how many different terms/slang words, etc. that are different than ours. Here are a few of my favorites...

"bloke" - they use this term for just a person... like us saying "that guy"

"bog in" - they say this for the term we have "dig in"

"the loo" - this is their term for the bathroom/toilet. By the way, they think it's odd that we say we're "going to the bathroom" when we mean we're going to use the toilet. In Australia their toilet rooms are usually always seperate from their actual bathroom (where the bath is). So it makes no sense to say you're going to use the bathroom since the toilets aren't in there most times.

"they go together like a house on fire" - one of their phrases to say that something goes really well together

Well... that's all I can think of right now. I'll try to remember more later. There's one more word that I don't want to write down because here in American it's a bad word for someone but apparently in Australia it's a friendly term they use for each other... hilarious!

And it was so sweet, when I met Uncle Ron for the first time he said "you're so beautiful" in his wonderful thick australian accent. They're really great! Wish our visit with them could be longer but Matt has to be back at work on Wednesday. We head home tomorrow afternoon.

virginia beach

We're in virginia beach. Lily did good on the trip here. She was crawling around like a mad woman in here yesterday evening. I think she LOVES hearing herself crawl on the tile floor in the foyer. Bedtime didn't go so well - she cried for like 10 minutes before she fell asleep but that's because she was in a new place and there was a bunch of commotion before she went to bed. She's use to her peace and quiet.

Matt's aunt and uncle (from austrlia) are supposed to arrive this evening. So we're excited to meet them. Today I'm going to make my usual trip to Babies'r'Us and then Lily and I are going to visit Heather and Summer. Heather is a friend of mine from high school and Summer is her little girl. We haven't seen them in awhile so it will be nice to catch up.

Happy weekend everybody!

busy Wednesday and nameplate

Yesterday was a fun and busy day. After morning nap, Lily and I went to playgroup at Kids Cove. Lily does much better now and will venture out on her own more than willingly. I have to actually reign her in sometimes! Then we came home for lunch and afternoon nap. After Vicky got off work, she came over for our weekly outing. She comes over to spend some time with Lily, have dinner with us, and then we go out for coffee after Lily goes to bed. Lily was excited because Vicky got to give her her bath that evening.

After I got home, Matt and I decided to stay up late and watch our netflix movie.. Baby Mama. Since tonight is a great tv night (kath and kim premiere, the office, and a snl special) and we are leaving Friday for Virginia Beach, we decided to go ahead and watch it. I didn't get to bed until MIDNIGHT. Yes, you heard me correctly. Haven't seen those hours since Lily was little and I got up with her during the night! The movie was good but it wasn't quite as funny as I thought it was going to be. Definitely would recommend it though.

When we were in Myrtle Beach, I found this name plate to hang on Lily's door. I just think it's so sweet and beautiful and had been meaning to post a picture of it but just now remembered.

Look at my adorably cute new hairstyle (if I sit still long enough to let mommy get it in)!

Off to do some laundry and packing while my little pumpkin is napping...

ear marks, pork barrel spending, and bathroom fun

I am currently sitting here watching the presidential debate on tv. And can I just say I'm SO sick of hearing the SAME THINGS over and over again. I never learn anything new with these debates and it's filled with accusatory arguments against each other. Two of my biggest pet peeve phrases that they use... ear marks and pork barrel sending. If I had a dollar for everytime I heard them talk about eliminating those items I could fix the economic crisis. Okay... not really but you get my point. Anyways... all that to say I'm bored with this election because I never seem to learn in detail what each candidate wants to do if they are elected. We get Consumer Reports magazine and this month there was actually a very good comparison article on the two candidates position on healthcare. I want to find a good bipartisan website to compare and contrast the different aspects of each candidates agenda. So if anybody knows one, feel free to leave a comment with the web address. I know who I'm going to vote for but still would like to know more about the candidates.

And a fun Lily story for the day. I was going to the bathroom this afternoon and of course she comes crawling in. All her bath toys were in the bathtub so she goes over there and stands up at the tub trying to get to them. Then when she obviously can't reach them she sits back down, crawls back to the doorway, turns around, and crawls faster towards the tub then standing up at it again and reaching out. She did this several times, each time seeming like she gained more power than the first time. It was HILARIOUS! She seriously looked like she was trying to hurl herself over the tub to get to the toys with the energy she gained from crawling.

I love being a mom! And finally a congratulations to my friend Laura Wailes from college. Her twin boys, Nathan and Isaac, were born yesterday. Welcome to the wonderful world of motherhood! You guys are in my prayers as you all gradually adjust to the new normal. Your boys are beautiful!

sunday

We've had a great week. I always can't figure out where the times goes because I realize all of a sudden that I haven't blogged in a few days. Lily keeps me on my toes!

To update on the sippy cup/bedtime bottle status... My plan worked great. I give Lily her evening bottle now at 6:30 before we start bedtime routine. It worked out great and she had no trouble going to bed as usual. She's also begun to push her nap times back since she is gaining the capability to stay awake longer so the past week she's been going to bed closer to 7:30 and has done great with that as well. So now she has a morning and evening bottle and then during the day it's just sippy cups. Yeah Lily! We're officially on the 3 meals a day plus snack in between schedule.

The next issue this week was halloween costume. I had decided a few weeks ago to get this beautiful gymboree pumpkin costume for Lily this year and purchased it on ebay a week or so ago. It was GORGEOUS! I didn't even consider how it was designed though and the fact that she's 10 months old. I tried to put it on her and she FREAKED out. She did not like all that fluff around her neck - she felt lost in it. There went all my well laid plans. So I thankfully sold it back on ebay for what I bought it for, no loss there. Then went to Target to start hunting again for something that would be comfortable for her. I looked in the halloween section but nothing struck me. I hate most of the cheesy infant costumes that they make. So then I decided to try looking in the regular kids clothes section. And BINGO!! They had these adorable pink tutu's with matching leggings. It was decided. Lily would be a beautiful little ballerina. I got a plain white long sleeve onesie for the top and she already had these slippers that look like ballerina shoes. Plus it's not a waste of money because all the parts she can use/wear again! Here is a preview although she doesn't have the right white onesie on - that's an older short sleeve one.

One day last week Vicky came over after work so she could hang out with Lily for a little while. Then she had dinner with us and we went out for coffee. We did that a week or so ago and realized we should be going out for coffee together more. So hopefully it will be a weekly tradition!

Yesterday was pumpkin patch day. We took Lily to the pumpkin patch so she could pick out her first real pumpkin. They had these ones that were already painted and I noticed one that had Tigger on it. If you're not a faithful blog reader, Lily LOVES tigger. I knew that was going to be the one and as soon as I held it up for her she got so excited!! SO cute! She loves just patting her pumpkin and sometimes trying to eat the stem.

Last night my friend Tina from church had a girls night at her place. We had a great time. It's always so refreshing just to spend some quality time with some girl friends.

This morning was church. Our church celebrated 50 years today as well as 100 years for the Nazarene denomination. Lily had fun in the nursery as usual and I'm always refreshed by being in the service. We seem to go a lot on weekends and I always really miss church when I'm not there. Then this afternoon we headed to Peaks View Park for the church picnic. We had a great time and Lily got to hang out with "auntie" vicky some more while chowing down on a big helping of homemade mac'n'cheese.

Well... off to relax for the evening and gear up for another week. I'm looking forward to this coming weekend though. We'll be headed to virginia beach because Matt's aunt and uncle who live in Australia (where Matt's mom grew up as well) are here visiting for the first time! Matt hasn't seen them since he was only 2 so this really is more like a first meeting for the both of us. We're really excited.