Holy Cow! It's been a LONG time!

So here I'm sitting finally at the computer w/ a moment's peace! How you ask?...

My son is in PA w/ his grandparents. My husband is working at the office today. The dog is snuggled on the couch sleeping. I'm left to my own device to type away w/ the back door open and nothing but fresh air and sounds of birds chirping away. It's bliss. I was going to go to work today but opted to pamper myself for as long as I can before I'm blessed w/ our 2nd child hopefully any day now. When this one is born life will truly never be the same- 2 children and the dog and me to defend myself against them! :)

So wow, it's been MONTHS since I've last blogged, huh? Well, what's happened since last?...

Tax season ended w/o much harm. That's always a plus. We did our traditional Myrtle beach vacation for 2 weeks w/ Ben & Sadie. We sold our city house and moved to suburbia and have not looked back once! This fits us. We were nervous for the change of city life to the suburbs, but it's been a fantastic transition and we have no complaints at all about it. The house is perfect for us and the area is just as good. It's what we envisioned when we figured we'd give up city living. We had Benjamin's birthday party here and accomodated everyone quite nicely. It's been a very busy summer, but we finally quieted things down in August when we started to prepare for baby #2.

It's supposed to be a "she". And comparatively, SHE is killing me unlike what Benjamin did as a "he"! And so here we are finally at the end of August ready for baby, expecting and hoping she would come early like our first did, but she's holding out and dragging out the process much to my chagrin! We had our "false" labor this past week and were told "we're on our way", "it won't be long", "maybe 24 more hours"... that was Tuesday. Today is Thursday. No baby. So it's day by day now and she's wreaking havoc on life as my husband doesn't know if he should go in to the office or work from home, my mother had to take off work to watch my son, and the dog has even been shipped out prematurely once to her Puppy Godmother who graciously takes her in time and time again in a crisis! I just keep waiting, wondering if this next phase is going to occur or just stall til I PASS my due date... and no matter how much I Google I can't seem to find the answer to tell me HOW to get this baby out any faster! So I know it's true: babies will come when they are good and ready.

Otherwise, life on this end is just waiting for change. The chaos has yet to begin again and when it does it will w/ a vengence I'm sure. Here's to you all! Love you and miss you!

Tis another Tax Season

So we are almost 30 days into tax season. Not so bad, right? Seems like time has flown by so far. Well, here's the kicker to this one...

We're putting our house on the market in a few days. Not that we don't hope it doesn't sell, but we're hoping not to sell til the spring time to give us the months coming to get thru tax season (or what my husband's firm newly named "busy season" instead). We don't know our luck. It's surprising to say the least.

So in our house it's been work work work. I mean my husband goes to work in the wee hours of the morning and then sleeps sometime after he gets home in the late evenings after playing w/ and loving the kids, and then works all weekend on getting the house ready. I "work" all week w/ the little ones and then continue that function as well as house functions on the weekends, too, so neither of us has a reprieve right now and it's starting to show. We're frazzled and crazed now. I think anxiety and stress is getting to us quite easily as we get older and can't control our life like we used to (ie, children are unpredictable and a lot of work! :).

But we're winding down and getting to the last leg of things and then hopefully we can just sit back and relax. There is a light at the end of the tunnel for us, so that's what keeps it all together! For now we'll cross our fingers that things get a little boring...

Merry Christmas!

So it's the holiday season! Yeah! It's that favorite time of the year that seems to have all in a tizzy, but a fun one hopefully! For us this year it's just the beginning of many more happy and exciting Christmases to come! Our little boy is 17mos old now. He's big and crazy! He does funny little things, is starting to talk more and is definitely understanding all that is going around him w/ much more comprehension than before! It's been an amazing transition for us!

We had our little family Christmas here before we hit the grandparents' this weekend into Christmas day. He did surprisingly well w/ opening his gifts. He got very excited to see what was inside. Didn't really understand that each thing was unique, but instead he wanted to move onto the next present he could unwrap! Some toys caught his eye and we got a "wow" out of him, but mostly he just slowly and daintily ripped the paper off and looked at each item.

We tried Santa. And failed. Failed 3 times actually. So just like baseball, 3 strikes and you're out! We won't try again til next year. But nonetheless he dressed up like Santa (yes, I bought the suit- he's only little once!) and smiled for pictures by the tree, so that in its own right counts!

But for now, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year! We cheer to another wonderful year filled w/ days to see our little boy grow!

I'm Back!... For NOW

Hi again! It's been quite a while since I've sat in this chair and started to type! Wow!

Have I been too busy? Perhaps. It seems that as children get older there's less and less time for things like typing on the computer or talking on the phone, and there's more time for sitting on the floor and playing, and reading stories to demanding toddlers. Now that my son is 15 months old he demands most if not all of my time anymore, so such everyday tasks like laundry and cleaning are set to separate days and are applauded when they actually get accomplished!

He's at a great age. He understands sort of what I say, but he can't talk his thoughts back to me. He does make gibberish back to me (and who's not to say he's not talking back!), but since it doesn't make sense to me I just agree and get to move on w/o much of a fight! But he's also at a heart stopping age for my husband and I. He gets into everything now. And I do mean EVERYTHING! If he sees it then he wants to see it! He wants to touch it and touch it and touch it if you get my drift! He can climb onto a chair and get things. He can reach up higher than before and grab things. He takes what he wants and does what he wants w/o fear.

And as great as an explorer that he is, he is his own boss and does not understand that some things will harm him. He doesn't like hearing no or having danger forbidden from his experiencing. And so he sits or lies down on the floor and throws the ever so waited for tantrum!

Here's the thing w/ tantrums. You can ignore them, however that doesn't guarantee a stop. You can feed into them and it doesn't make it worse. But the hardest part about them is when they happen you instantly have to figure out how to abate them b/c depending where you are or who's around when they occur, the evil eye gets thrown at you. Yes, that evil eye that my husband and I threw to other parents when we were w/o child. That evil out that said all in itself, "how horrible is your kid?!". And when you see that look, it makes you mad, it makes you feel like you've lost control. And worst of all, it makes you realize that you have "that kid". Even tho everyone has "that kid" at some time, when that kid is your's for the moment, you want to hide. You want to go away and hope that you never see those people again b/c of course their child is perfect and your's is not... WRONG!!!!!!! But all the same, you wish that your child will stop and that he will smile and laugh like it was staged and you go on merrily. Instead he cries, I flee or want to, and I seethe over the bad behaviour for about 30 seconds. And then I wipe away his tears, give him a kiss and a hug, and tell him that I love him til it happens again!

So for now the babe is sleeping. I'm going to go do that laundry that otherwise doesn't do itself, and tomorrow we'll get something else accomplished!

Vacation Elation

Just got back from a week of "vacation" with the "kiddies" so my husband could work long hours. It's this new thing he wants to do so that he can get work done and be able to come home at reasonable hours for weeks on end in each quarter...

Yeah, right. Sounds like we went out of town and he worked alright- but not a lot of accomplishment. And again I tell you, it's not a guarantee being an accountant's wife is a glamorous life! :)

So the kiddies and I went to my parents. There are a few things I realized...

1. I am too old and much too independent to be living with my parents.
2. Vacation is not what it should be called when you're with a baby, and a dog who thinks she's a baby, and your all alone without the Daddy.
3. It's nice to be away, but the homecoming part stinks- laundry, groceries, unpacking, cleaning up, going through mail, and just general settling back in to home.
4. Home is not sweet home when you realize that you've been sleeping alone in bed with a small human and a weiner dog all week and now you're crammed back into your full size bed with both of them and your husband too!
5. Stress and anxiety instantly begin when you realize that you're not "off" anymore and now you're back to real life... and it's still Sunday night!

But regardless, it was a nice trip up to PA. I love that the baby and the dog had green grass, a cool breeze and saw the grandparents all week long!

Birthday Blues?

My son just turned 1 year old this past weekend. I can't believe it's been a whole year already! It feels like it wasn't that long ago that we were waiting for his arrival, and now he's here, he's been here and it feels like we've always had him with us! Weird.

And his party was great. All of his little friends came to celebrate with him and all of our adult friends came to celebrate with us as well! It was so very nice! But busy, so busy... I don't feel like I got to see or really speak to anyone, and we had friends who drove the whole way down from PA and all! Man oh man! I was ready with everything and I still can't tell you what I was doing that I didn't really interact with anyone particularly! Ugh!

And he cried when I took the candle from him because contrary to his belief, it was not edible by any means so when he took a bite of it and swallowed it, I had to take it away leading to tears on his birthday cake! It was his party and he cried tho not wanting to I imagine.

But after turning 1 he had to go to the doctor's for his 1 year check up. He got shots and has been cranky intermittently since. Poor little guy. But that's OK. Dad is helping best he can to alleviate Mom's tension from it! Good Daddy! And so for the little guy, now life changes. He's no longer the baby, but with each passing day he becomes a big boy and for both of us, life will be a big change. Eventually he will have to grow up and I will have to let go... but not for a long time anyway!

Long Summer Nights

In the summers before we had a child my husband and I would be out doing things at night. We would take the dog for evening walks and wind down by watching TV or come home because it was late and we were tired...
Now bed time begins around 6 or 7pm and that consists of scrambling to get the baby either bathed or his teeth brushed, and then take care of ourselves before he gets too tired and becomes a little bear til he falls asleep. For most parents we know they put their baby to bed in their crib and relax the evening alone together or do things. Not us. Our house is laid out so inconvenient for this. He doesn't really have his own room as it's built off of our's and so we must concede to the fact that his bed time sometimes is our bed time, beit til he's asleep or for the night. I am not really an early bed time person. My husband is. So for me it's like torture. I'm bored and my mind starts to wander instead. Then I get irritated that it's 730pm and I'm lying in bed trying to either get the baby to sleep or just lying there because my night is now gone as well.
But it's the sacrifice I guess. To see his sleepy little face and see him lying there so peaceful- ahh, it's adorable. But it sure does make the summer evening seem short and the summer night seem awfully long!
I miss dinners late and seeing friends. I miss the social aspect of summer. Someday we'll have our nights back... til then...