Moving day is looming.....

We now own the house. Holy crap!

I'm excited and sick all at the same time. Closing was relatively painless, but took about an hour and 45 minutes. I don't remember signing SOOOOOOOOO many forms for this house, but hey...you do what you have to do right?

The movers are coming tomorrow morning between 9:00 and 10:00 am. The boys will be hanging out with my Dad and Stepmom for most of the day, so that we won't have to worry about them during all of the chaos.

Both Kelly and I are so stressed, I just feel the fights "bubbling up". I'm thinking if we break down and sort out our responsibilities, then we can stay out of each other's way, and hopefully keep the fights to a minimum.

Nothing like moving to test a marriage eh???

Wish us luck!! I'll update when I can!!

The fat lady

It's so funny to have a 3, almost 4 year old. You never quite know what the day will hold, and it's usually full of LOTS of surprises.

Today was the perfect example.

At lunch, as we walked in to the restaurant, Colin (as usual) had to go to the bathroom. As we scooted past the line of people waiting to place their orders, a rather "large" woman was walking by as well. I touched Colin's shoulder and said, "say excuse me honey" and as we inched over to let her walk by, she said excuse me as well.

She was barely behind us, and Colin says to me in a voice loud enough for her to hear, "Mommy, that is a REALLY FAT lady!!".

I could feel the blood rushing to my cheeks, and of course my pace quickened IMMEDIATELY. I rushed Colin back to the restroom and explained as best I could that we don't say things like that. I know that he didn't mean any harm, but I felt so badly for her. I told him that some people can't help being large, and that if she heard him say that, it would have made her sad.

He seemed to understand, so he took care of "business", and we headed out to the restaurant.
As we're walking back to our table he says, "Mommy, that lady must have eaten a BIG lunch!" Oh. My. Gosh. Why is my child fascinated with the fat lady?

I then explained that we have no idea how much she ate, but just because she's "bigger" doesn't mean that she ate that much for lunch.

As we sat down, and I started removing everyone's jacket, Colin came through with the punch-line for the day.

"Mommy, how did she fit through the door to go outside?"

It was all I could do to keep a straight face and try to remain stern in my reply. Inside, I was HOWLING!!

Looks like life is about to get a LOT more interesting.

The Christmas of snot and rain

Well, it was a major holiday, and you guessed it. Landon is sick.

Not just a cold sick, but 102 degree fever, I'm crabby as hell, sick.

I have been to three Doctors with him in the last three days (the first of which, I had to threaten his nurse within an inch of her life to get him to see us) and we still can't quite figure out what's going on with him. Strep tests are coming back negative, and his ears/tubes look great, so who the heck knows.

His nose is running like a faucet, he's feverish and clingy, and if you look at him the wrong way, he loses it and throws himself onto the floor crying. It could be the fact that he has 4 molars and one bottom latteral tooth all coming in at the same time, but you know those Doctors all "pooh pooh" the idea that teething causes congestion, fever, and diarrhea (my ass! Well, not mine, Landon's.)

Nothing like getting it all out of the way at once right??

Christmas day was cold and WET. Oh, and I had not been to the grocery store, so the tuna casserole that we had for dinner was just lovely (ick!). Actually, it was pretty tasty, but definitely not my grandmother's famous apple sausage stuffing. I'm pretty sure I was the only one who ate it. Why did I bother even cooking???

The boys loved their gifts. We were up until 12:30am putting everything together, then of course Landon was up around 2:00am, and again at 6:00am for the day. Oh, Momma was not in a jolly mood, let me tell ya!

His favorite is the ball popper. He sits at it and tries to keep the balls from popping out of the top, all the while screaming, "BAAWWWWL, BAWWWWL" By the way, I don't think he would be doing that if it weren't for the tubes in his ears. He's already speaking clearer, and repeating more sounds. Who knows if it's just his stage of development, or the tubes really, but I say the latter. I actually don't care, I'm just glad to HEAR it!

Colin's favorite toy was by far his garage, and shake & go speedway. The garage...well, let's just say that it's pretty much a piece of crap. Kelly broke it in about 5 places just trying to assemble it! It's one of the "Toys R Us" brands, and it had awful instructions and is made from thin, brittle plastic. I guess I shouldn't expect much more for $14.99 huh? Thank God for super glue, or Christmas would have been a bust for poor Colin. I foresee the trash for that in about 4 months. Hey, it's what the kid picked out from the TRU big toy book, so we got it. I wanted Santa to show up with at least one toy he requested.

The speedway is another story. That thing ROCKS! It's sturdy, and easy to assemble (hello, if you can count, you can put the thing together), and even LANDON can race cars on it. Plus, you can even buy Lightning McQueen and The King to race on it. A big plus for my Cars fanatic Colin.


we are now in "pack the house up at fast as you freakin' can" mode so that we can be ready for the movers to come Friday morning. The more we pack ourselves, the faster the move will go. Kelly's done an amazing job with it so far. Thank God I have a disciplined Husband. I've packed up a few things, but not nearly the amount he has so far. I guess the fact that I have a little munchkin following me around emptying my boxes and tossing their contents around the house, may play a little role in it. It could also explain the state of disaster that our house is currently in as well. Hey...it's a good excuse anyway, right?

So, I'm off. I will try to update about the move as soon as we get the computer set up. It will probably be one of the FIRST things we do knowing my Hubby. I'm really hoping that things will go as smoothly as possible. (HA!! I* know* my luck, don't think I'm kidding myself!)

Happy New Year to everyone if I'm gone until then.

I'm so ready to be in my new HOUSE!!! Whoo HOO!

Welcome to the world Calhoun Thomas!!!!

Congratulations to my brother Adam, his wife Laura, and big sister Kate on the birth of their baby boy, Calhoun, early this morning.

What a wonderful Christmas gift!!!

Weclome to the world! We can't wait to meet you!!

My baby is just fine...BETTER than fine!

Sorry for the delay in the update. It's been an awfully long day considering that we woke up at 5:00am.

Landon did surprisingly well. He wasn't upset at all that we woke him up and tossed him in the car in his pajamas. In fact, I think he was a bit intrigued at the change in routine. Colin was AMAZING. I explained to him that we couldn't eat or drink anything around Landon since he couldn't, and he didn't complain ONE bit about it. He also was so supportive. When they took Landon from me, crying, and we turned to walk back to the waiting room, he held my hand the entire way. I think he just *knew* that I needed some support at that moment. I'm so proud of my little guy.

The surgery was short, only about 30 minutes, but the waiting before hand was about THREE hours and 45 minutes. UGH. Even so, Landon was a trooper.

He was very groggy when in recovery, and slept the entire way home. Once we got here, he ate 4 pancakes, and some pretzels. That is in addition to the banana and pretzels he had in recovery. He also drank two FULL sippy cups of juice. Poor little fella was starving and thirsting to death. He held every bit of it down (thank God!).

He napped for about 2 and a 1/2 hours and by 4:00pm, he was running around, dancing, and playing with his brother. It's as if nothing at all happened.

Thank God!

I'm just so glad that this is over.

Thanks again for the positive thoughts and prayers!!

Now on to packing and buying a house.

Surgery in the morning....

Well, I just wanted to thank all of you who have offered your thoughts and prayers regarding Landon's surgery in the morning. I've added many to them myself!

We will be at the hospital at 7:30 am, and I know that Landon is going to be one pissed off little guy since he won't be allowed to have anything to eat. Hopefully the "cocktail" that they plan to give him will calm him down.

I wonder if I can sneak a sip myself??

I'm going to be a big ball of nervous energy.

I'll update tomorrow afternoon and let you know how my little stinker-bug is doing.

Thanks again.

Wordless Wednesday

Miracles DO happen!

We actually closed on the home equity loan today. I'm in SHOCK!

I'll still never use Bank of Ameri** for any future financing needs unless I have absolutely NO other choice.

We're on our way folks!!! The countdown has begun!

Now...when will the packing???

Need the blogosphere's help

Well, if you've been reading, you know that we are moving in to our new home in 9 short days (EEEK!).

One of the MANY conversations that hubby and I are currently involved in regarding said move, is about the phone service for the new house.

Kel believes that we should NOT get a land line phone and that we could save money (exactly $26, and this includes tolls and taxes) each month, by using only our cell phones.

I am really uncomfortable with that idea. I feel that a land line is necessary, for emergency purposes. I am home with the kids by myself 95% of the time, and need to know that if I am incapacitated and can't speak or get to the phone, that my soon to be 4 year old can possibly do that for me. If I am hurt and can't speak, I know that I can dial 911, and they will send someone directly to our home to at least check things out. That is not possible with a cell phone. I know that the technology for cell phones is getting better, but I still don't quite trust them in a situation such as this.

I also don't feel that the $26 a month we would pay, would even cover the amount we would have to spend to increase our minutes to cover the local calls that we make on our current home phone.

What do you all think?

Even if you're a lurker, please feel free to comment. I'm really interested in your take on the idea.

MUCHAS GRACIAS!

Sunday, Sunday, SUNDAY!

Nice tonsils on my oldest huh?

I can now relate to my friends Gina and Andria. Getting a Christmas card picture is SO not as easy as I thought.

Here is one of our many rejects.

Landon looks as if he's scared Colin is going to swallow him whole.

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I am officially a single parent for the next 4 nights and 3 days.

Kelly left for San Fransisco at 5:30 tonight and it couldn't be a worse time for him to go. We're still dealing with a whole bunch of loan crap (stupid Bank of Ameri**!) I will never use them again for any kind of financing. They actually SNAIL MAILED us a letter to request that we call them about our loan. It only took about 10 days to arrive. Think they're trying to expedite things the way we asked them to? Ummmm...that would be a big fat no! Not to mention, Kelly has called them pretty much every day since we started the process. We're probably going to have to use some 401K money to pay our down payment instead of our original plan. There doesn't seem to be any way possible that we'll be able to close on the home equity loan on Tuesday. If it DOES happen, it will be a miracle and I'm definitely not holding my breath.

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We got the call from the scheduler at the ENT office and Landon has to be at the hospital at 7:30 am on Friday for his surgery. Our pediatrician had really good things to say about the ENT that we're using, so that was a little reassuring.

OH!! We went in for his 15 month check up and he's looking good. He's now in the 10th percentile for weight (WHOO HOO!! moving up baby!) A whole 21 pounds! He is in the 30th percentile for height, and the boy's head is still off the charts! Big brains mean big smarts people! This kid is destined for great things!

A Night Out

I am currently drunk from the two..yes, I said TWO margaritas that I consumed at a Christmas party tonight. I am a light-weight. There is NO shame in that!

We were called home early by the babysitter because Landon had shots today at his 15 month check up and is not handling them well. He's been running a low grade fever since about 5pm.

We have family coming tomorrow to celebrate Christmas, and we actually don't even have a present for some of them. We were going to make a (drunk) trip to Wally World to see if we could find something for them. Unfortunately, the call from the babysitter put a halt to that.

I had an amazingly fun night out actually talking with and BEING around other adults. Let's hope I don't wake up with a hang over so that tomorrow is ruined.

Who cares anyway....How many parties do I get to go to in one year that don't involve cupcakes, a bounce house and twenty screaming 3 year olds???

Not many.

Mothers and Fathers of Boys....

What do you say when your almost four year old looks down in the bathtub and says, "Mommy, something is wrong with my p3nis...it's really long!" (I'm not ashamed of the word, I'm just not interested in having wackos googling my site for ALL the wrong reasons.)

To top it off he says, "I think I like it that way!!"

This is where I think it would have been easier to have girls.

Sloppy Joe, Slop, Sloppy Joe!

Any Adam Sandler fans out there?

This isn't what I initally was going to post. I was actually searching for something "holidayish" to help me get into the spirit of things, but in my searching, I came across this HILARIOUS Adam Sandler song.

Anyone remember "Lunch Lady Land??" If not, here's the video to jog your memory.

I needed a laugh today to take my mind off of everything we have going on, hopefully you'll get a chuckle too.

Enjoy!

The joys of parenting

I think one of the most wonderful things about being a Mommy is seeing the world through my children's eyes.

Colin has the most amazing view of the world.

I'll never forget a comment he made when we were at the beach in September. We were playing on the beach, and he looked up and pointed at the clouds. You know the lines that airplane exhaust leave in the sky? Well, he saw a few of those, and said, "Mommy, what is that?". I said, "An airplane made that honey" and his comment was, "Oh, the airplane scraped the sky!".

Since we're in the Holiday season, there are TONS of inflatable Santas, Frostys and every other known Christmas icon known to man, all over the city. There is a roller skating rink that we pass by daily, and it is adorned with a puffy Santa and Frosty. They are both haphazardly tied to the roof, and it never fails that one or both are lying flat or deflated. For some reason, Colin always checks their status as we drive by.

On this day, Frosty was was lying empty on the roof, and Colin asked me, "Mommy where did the air go that was inside Frosty". I said, "Well, it's out with the rest of the air". His comment was, " Oh, it went to go dance in the sky".

Funny how kids can put such an insteresting, and sometimes beautiful spin on the world.

The Verdict

Landon is having tubes put in his ears on the 22nd of December.

My BABY is having surgery. On the 22nd of December.

I'm struggling with this in a big way.

I know that he needs this. He has had 5 ear infection in the last 8 months.

I know that if we don't get this done, that it could affect his speech development in a dramatic way, if it hasn't already.

My head knows this, and has weighed all of the pros and cons, and my HEAD feels that we are making the right decision. My head knows that this is a very routine procedure, and that a very capable and experienced pediatric ENT is going to be performing the surgery.

My heart doesn't like the idea of passing my baby boy over to people who are going to make him go to sleep, and cut on him.

My heart is scared about all of the "what if's".

My heart can't handle the thought of losing my baby boy, no matter how small that possibility is.

Home Sweet Home

Just thought I'd share a picture of what we will soon be calling home.

We were so lucky to find it and I am so, SO, ready to move.

What a cool way to start off the new year!

Heading to the ENT tomorrow and House update

I finally got a referral from the Pediatrician to take Landon to the Ear, Nose, and Throat Doc. I guess the 5 ear infections that he's had in the last 8 months finally proved that it was warranted.

I don't know what to expect, but I'm glad that we're hopefully heading down a road that will give him some relief. The poor kid is such a trooper when he's sick. He never runs a fever and barely complains. The only two signs I have that he's sick are that he gets a runny nose, and he stops eating. Thank goodness for that though, because otherwise, I wouldn't have a clue.

I'm really concerned that all of these problems may interfere with his speech development since the ear infections are affecting his hearing. We have a neighbor who's little guy sounds almost like he's deaf when he speaks. It's so hard to understand him because he barely uses any consonants. He's a smart kid, but was plagued with numerous ear infections until he got tubes when he was two years old. His speech is progressively getting better, but I just don't want to do that to Landon. Colin was speaking VERY well by the time he was two. One of his favorite word was "volkswagon". He freaked out his Doctor at his two year check up by showing him his favorite yellow car which was a volkswagon and telling him all about it.

So, anyway. I'm guessing that they will probably recommend tubes. I know that in the long run, it will be what's best, but it scares the HELL out of me that they will have to put my baby under general anesthesia.

I'll update with the verdict tomorrow. We have a 1:45 appointment.

Everything with the house it going GREAT! We're waiting on the final "stuff" for the Home equity loan, but the loan for the new house is in place, we just have to send the signed paperwork back tomorrow. Kelly is heading to San Fransisco on Sunday for CPE training, so we're going to have to get Power of Attorny set up so I can sign for him at the Home Equity loan closing Tuesday of next week.

I never realized that you had to have a closing for a home equity loan. I guess it makes sense though. since it's technically a second mortgage. Live and learn right?

Fun, fun. Like I know ANYTHING about all of that. My CPA Husband is the finance guy in this family (duh!). I'm glad to do it, I just hope we don't run in to any problems. We'll just have to "conference" Kelly in during the closing if we can.

So, that's my exciting life now! I just can't wait to get in to our new home!!

17 days and counting! Woo HOO!

Legos, a work of the devil

Can I just tell you how much I hate those stupid things.

Every time I turn around I'm stepping on one, and getting Colin to clean them up is like pulling teeth.

They end up getting scattered all over the place. I bet we'll be finding them LOOONG after we get all of the furniture moved to the new house.

The DEVIL I tell you!!

29 DEGREES?

Okay. This is not right.

I live in South Carolina people! 29 degrees at 10:00 am is not SOUTH Carolina weather.

I think we actually broke a 90 something year old record low last night. It was 15 degrees outside!

Yep, I'm a wimp.

I'll scream it from the mountain tops.

"This is TOO FREAKIN' COLD!!!"

Random bits of nothing

I got nothing people.

I hate this. I have tried writing several posts, and my brain is just absolutely F-R-I-E-D!

I guess I'll just toss out an update. It's better than no post at all (maybe, maybe not. You guys be the judge). It may not be all that exciting, but it's currently all consuming to us and pretty damn cool when I allow myself to actually "go there".

The mortgage loan is set for us to buy the house (WHOO-HOO!). We're waiting on the final "stuff" for the home equity line of credit on our current home, which will allow us to actually PAY the down payment on our new one. The idea is that we will put our home up for sale, and as soon as we close on it, we will immediately pay that loan back. Hopefully we will be able to set up our closing for that on Monday or Tuesday of next week and I can breathe a huge sigh of relief. We're just running in to scheduling nightmares because of our closing set for the 28th of December (on the new house) and vacations and holidays on top of the short time frame that we're working in. I'm having to stay on my toes and light fires under lots of peoples' asses to ensure that no one drops the ball anywhere.

That's the one thing that I'm waiting on. I just can't allow myself to *really* feel excited about this move, until we have that money in hand (or at least in our account). Every day a little more excitement creeps in though. This house ROCKS you guys! We had the inspection today and the guy told us that if every house he looked at was in as good a shape as this one, he would be "out of a job". It certainly made us feel good about buying it. The worst thing he saw was that the master closet door would close, but not "latch". Ummmm, I think I can deal with that.

On a side note, Landon started going to "pre-school" today. I guess for a 15 month old, it's not technically school. We'll just call it "play school"...yeah, that sounds good.

He was fine when I first left the room, so I was flying high thinking it would be a breeze. He is such a social little fella, that I don't even think he realized I was gone initially. I ran to the car to grab something for Colin, and when I came back in, I peeked into his room (without letting him see me). Um, NOT a good idea. He was screaming his head off. My brain of course tripped in to "mommy guilt" mode and I was feeling like the shittiest Mom on the planet. The teacher came out and told me that they had tried, but he wouldn't let anyone pick him up, which honestly seemed kind of strange to me. My friend Allison who works in the adjoining room couldn't stand it after a minute or two and went in the check on him. He stopped crying within minutes. Hmmmm. I guess I'll have to watch and see how I feel about his teachers. I'm sure that they're busy with other toddlers running around, but even if the kid won't let you pick him up, you can do SOMEthing to distract him. Am I right?

We pulled out the Christmas tree tonight. Talk about something that is frustrating. I'm in packing/de-cluttering mode for our (hopefully) upcoming move, and I'm pulling shit out of the attic and setting it up inside? I have to though. Colin is so excited about decorating for Christmas. I'm just dreading the thought of having to pack it all up again the day after Christmas so we can move a few days after that.

Oh well...it's for my boys, so I'll bite the bullet and do it.

So, that's my life in a nutshell. Lots going on that I'm trying to stay conservatively excited about.

Oh, and by the way. My dear Hubby is in CRAZY, PSYCHO pack up mode. He came home the night we signed the contract and packed up about 5 boxes of stuff and put them in the garage. Every night since then he's asked me, "What can I pack?"

If you don't hear from me for a while, it means that he's boxed either me, or the computer up.

Can you tell he's excited too?

Amazing Neighbors

About five of my neighbors just came to my "rescue". I knew that I loved the people that we live around, but this just reminds me of how sad I am going to be to leave them. I hope we don't have jerky neighbors in the new house.

When my car wouldn't start, I decided to let it roll down our driveway to see if the angle I was parked at made any difference (yeah, I know...stupid, but I never claimed to be a mechanic).

The power steering wasn't working, so there was no way I could turn hard enough to get the car on the side of the road, so I just left it at the bottom of the driveway. My neighbor, Julie, noticed how strangely my car was parked, and stopped to check on the situation. She went home and got her jumper cables, and then the guy, Chris, who lives across the street, came over to supervise as we tried to jumpstart my car. (I know some women are great with cars, but we are not. Much better safe than sorry!).

Before they even got out of the car, another guy from across the street had already pulled up next to my car with his jumper cables. Then the girl from 3 doors down pulled up to see if I needed anything.

Luckily, it started. (WHEW!!!)

It's now been running for about 30 minutes. I'm trying to let the battery charge up so we can run up to Auto Zone and get a new one.

$60 is a heck of a lot better than the $600 I was imagining this morning. Thank you Lord!

My *&%# car isn't starting

I wonder how much this is going to cost?

Under Contract!

We're done!

After a day of negotiating, we've decided on all of the terms and we have our new house under contract. It's contingent upon financing of course, so we're waiting to hear back on our loan. We don't expect any problems though (crossing fingers!) We were pre-approved, so hopefully this is just a formality.

Kelly feels great about the terms, which in turn makes me feel great. We even got a 3 month old solid cherry pool table, plus all of the accessories thrown in, plus a brand new dining room set and chairs. All because the current owners didn't want to move them. Not too shabby!

The one surprise, and our best negotiating point by far, was that they really wanted to close *SOON*, so we're closing on December 31st. We will be the owners of TWO homes on December 31st (well, the 29th since the 31st is a Sunday).....holy crap.

That's 3 1/2 weeks away.

Now the true fun begins.

Thanks for all of your comments! I was busy today, so it kept my mind off of the negotiating. THAT was a good thing!

Tick.....Tock......Tick....

We put the offer in last night around 7:00pm. On the paperwork we requested an answer by 12:00 noon today.

We still haven't heard anything.

Good news or bad news???

Making an offer

Wow!

Kelly and I actually agree on a house. We're putting an offer in tonight.

Wish us luck.

Now to selling the one that we're in.

Anyone looking for a 3 bedroom 2 bath home in the Southeast???