I don't have much time to blog at the moment, but I thought I'd let everyone know that we moved this past Saturday and we finally have internet at the new house. We have been busy trying to get settled in and unpacked. There's just so much stuff!!!! I never want to move again!

I'll be back soon with a full story of all the past weeks event!

Bathing Beauty

Yesterday I finally got the chance to take Lucy swimming for the first time. My Aunt Bev lives in Taylorville and her pool was finally warm enough for Lucy. I was pretty sure that Lucy would like the water because she LOVES bathtime. But, you never know how babies are going to react.
I put her in a little tankini that I picked up at a yard sale a while back. This was the 4th bathing suit I had gotten for her. I had 2 hand-me-down suits from my neighbor and a bikini I bought at at a resale shop. They were all size 12 months. The tankini I had was an 18 month, so I took that one for her to wear. It was so cute on her, but the top was a bit snug. I should have bought a 24 month instead. Here are a few pictures of our fun afternoon in the pool.

another milestone

This past week, Lucy has really gotten the hang of sitting by herself. She is finally able to sit and play with her toys for quite awhile before teetering over to the side or falling backwards. Now, if we could just get her to roll over from her tummy to her back, we'd be doing great. She actually knows how to roll, we've seen her do it a few times. For some reason though, she doesn't like to do it. Maybe she forgets she knows how, or maybe she's just lazy and knows that one of us will flip her over.

Here's a cute clip of her. I just love all her chunky rolls!

moving

I am in the throws of packing. It's such a tedious job and I really don't enjoy it. I will also admit, that I am not a very good packer. I get a bit lazy with things. Since we're are only moving across town, I just can't see packing everything in boxes when I'd just have to unpack it at the house. So I find myself loading up the car with odds and ends and taking them over. We are trying to take as much over before Saturday as we can. It will make Saturday go faster if we don't have a lot of little things to load and unload. We are blessed to be in the situation where we have both houses for the next few weeks. It makes moving so much easier. If I had to have everything in boxes and ready to go for Saturday I think I would be stessed beyond imagination. But, I know that as long as all the big stuff gets moved on Saturday, then I can come back the following week to get the little things.

Here's a totally random announcement that has nothing to do with my post. If anyone reading this needs, or knows someone who needs a washer/dryer we have a set that we are wanting to get rid of. We will give them to anyone who wants to come and haul them away. They are Whirlpool brand and about 15 years old. They still work, but they are noisey. So ask around and let me know!!

We are moving next Saturday. So far I have only packed up the dining room. I'm feeling a bit overwhelmed by all the packing that needs to happen in the next week. I can't seem to get much done with a 7 month old...

If you're bored next Saturday with nothing to do, give me a call. I have some boxes you can carry.

confession

I ate Doritos for supper last night.

7 months old...

I'm a little late at posting Lucy's 7 month picture and update. She was 7 months on July 4th and with eveything else going on, I just didn't around to posting it. So here is her picture. The onesie still fits!

It was hard to get a good picture of her because she was very interested in the paper.

I took her to the doctor this week because she had a cold that turned into a cough. She sounded horrible Thursday morning when she woke so I took her in to be checked over. The nurse weighed her and she's now up to 24 1/2 pounds!!! I can't believe it. She's gained 2 more pounds this month. I had to go buy her some more summer outfits because many of her 12 month size clothes are getting too tight. So everything I bought her was size 18 months.

I had wanted to buy her a Jonny Jump-up to hang in the doorway. I know she'd love it. However, the weight limit is around 25 pounds. So that's out. She's getting a bit bored with the exersaucer. She still likes it and is in it quite a bit. I was hoping to get something else that she could sit in to occupy her, but now I'm not sure what to do. She's almost too big for her swing but she doesn't sit in it very much anymore anyway. She gets bored in it and she's starting to lean all the way forward and I'm afraid it'll tip.

She is still not sitting unassisted. I am anxious for her to be able to sit on her own. That will give us more options for play when she can sit by herself.

Lucy is loving the solid foods. We started after her 6 month appt. I have been making most of her babyfood. It's really very easy and does not take that much time to do. I steam or bake whatever food I need and then puree it in the food processor. I then freeze it in ice cube trays and store it in ziplock bags. Then I just take out 2-3 cubes and microwave. She really seems to like everything she's tried so far. I did try giving her greenbeans from the jar when we were out one evening. She made faces and didn't seem to like the jarred variety.

Here is a video clip of her trying peas for the first time. I was wanting to capture the funny way she eats her food. She has to get her thumb in her mouth after every bite. If it weren't so cute, I'd be more annoyed.

Pictures

I finally got Lucy's 6 month pictures and our family pictures. We had them taken a month ago and because of my inability to make up my mind, we are just now getting them. They all turned out so good that I couldn't decide, so I just got them all. We were able to buy the "rights" to the photos and so now we can print whatever we need to.

Here are a few of the pictures. I have the rest on my dropshots page, so if you want to see a bunch more pics of Lucy, let me know and I'll give you the link. I'm not posting it hear since I have no idea who all is reading this.

Finally

We sold our house today! Got a pretty good price. We close Aug 15.

The "Yellow Beast" rides again

As some of you remember, this fancy 1973 Chevy Impala was our family car when I was growing up. There are so many "fond" memories of adventures in this car. This car took us on many family vacations to Corn Growers Coventions and up north to visit our family friends. Before Kyle was born, Kim, Kraig and I would share the big backseat. In the days before seatbelt laws, Kraig would take his pillow and lay on the floor and sleep while Kim and I split the bench seat.

As my siblings and I grew up, we got the honor of driving this car. This was it, if you didn't want to drive this beast, you rode the bus. (Except for Kyle, he refused to drive it and got a truck. Funny how the youngest child gets out of it)

By the time we were old enough to drive, this car was not considered "cool". In fact the kids at Mt. Auburn had lots of nicknames for it. It has been known as "The Yellow Beast", "The Banana Boat", "The Yellow Bomb", and "Old Yeller".

Each one of us could probably tell you a great story about this car and I'm sure if this car could talk, it would have some good secrets to tell.

So why am I reminiscing about this old car? Well, believe it or not, it's coming back in all it's glory. Dad has been hanging on to this car with the hopes of having it restored one day. That day has finally come.

We've been joking amongst ourselves that Kim, Kraig and I should drive it in the Annual

Mt. Auburn Parade. What do you think?

4th of July celebrations

Yesterday was a busy day. Here on Cobb Ave, the neighborhood was a buzz with it's annual 4th of July street celebration. This year was the 50th anniversary of the first 4th of July block party. Mrs. Baird who just moved off the street into a nursing home last year, started the fun 50 years ago. It's amazing that as families have come and gone this tradition is still going strong.

Because this year was such a special year, the neighbors who organized it really went all out. They wanted to make this year really stand out and they succeeded. There were red,white and blue ribbons on all the lamp posts and well as banners hanging out over the street, all the trees that lined the street had patriotic bows. At the end of Cobb Ave, there was a large tent set up with about a dozen round tables that were decorated for the occasion. There was a bounce house for the kids as well as the mobile zoo.

The celebration kicked off with the traditional canon firing. And then Mrs. Baird sat in the back of a convertable and rode as Grand Marshall of the parade. It was so cute to see her and then all the kids riding biks, or being pulled/pushed in wagons or strollers. Some of the kids had their dogs all fancied up and marched them down the street and back. It almost made me tear up a little to see Dan pushing Lucy in her decorated stroller for her first, and last, Cobb Ave. parade. Once the parade was over the kids put on a skit that was really funny. I'm not sure who wrote it, but it was a hoot!

It was really a great event and there were lots of former residents that came back to participate in the celebration.

If you are a subscriber to the Herald-Review paper here in town then you probably saw Lucy's picture on the front page today. For a party this big, they made sure the media was here to do a story.

Here are a few pictures from our fun day.

Dan made the banner. Doesn't it look great?

The parade!

Lucy's first time in parade!

Dan decorated her stroller.

Happy 4th of July!!!!

"You have to love a nation that celebrates its independence every July 4, not with a parade of guns, tanks, and soldiers who file by the White House in a show of strength and muscle, but with family picnics where kids throw Frisbees, the potato salad gets iffy, and the flies die from happiness. You may think you have overeaten, but it is patriotism."
- Erma Bombeck


That's all for now, stay tuned, more to come later...

Happy Birthday to me!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

PaPa, Can I drive your tractor next?

What do you dream of?

Here's a dream question for you. When you have a dream about living in a house, is it the house you are currently living in? I have found that in almost every dream that I can remember that takes place in a house, I am always living in the old house where I grew up. Even though I haven't lived there for 14-15 years, I'm always back in that old house.
So I am curious if that's just me or if other people experience that as well.

The swap

Over the weekend we swapped out our nice appliances with the older ones that came with our new home. We didn't want to go through the headache of trying to sell this house without appliances because any buyer we had was going to want to try and keep them. I don't blame them, they are nice appliances. So on Sunday afternoon with the help of Mike and Pastor Matt, Dan traded the fridge and stove. The job was long and tedious. The doors off both refrigerators had to come off in order to get them in, and out, of each house. And once in place the door had to go back on. So after 4 long hours, the job was done. However, for me, the job was just beginning. Since we are now having to use these older appliances, they had to be cleaned. Let me just tell you, they were DISGUSTING! I am guessing they are both about 7-8 years old since that is how old the house is. I honestly do not think that either appliance had ever been cleaned. I was cleaning out dust bunnies from the inside of the fridge. Yes, INSIDE! I wanted to vomit-it was that bad.
It's one thing to clean your own dirt and grime, but when it's someone elses, it's down right gross!
Once I got done with the fridge I had to tackle the oven. The bottom was mostly black from all the baked on food and dirt. I cleaned the outside and then sprayed EasyOff and let it sit about 12 hours. I finally got it as clean as it's going to get.
I just hope our house sells soon...

Getting close

Today was our final walk-through of our new house. We officially close on it on Wednesday. The garage doors and openers still do not work properly so our realtor said she'd contact the appropriate people and try and get this straightened out. This was supposed to be corrected before we close.

I am starting to get excited but at the same time I am overwhelmed by everything that needs to be done. The entire house is filthy and will need a good scrubbing. We also want to paint the laundry room, Lucy's room and the entire downstairs before we move. The other rooms will have to wait till after we move in. Dan also needs to get the basement ready so he can move his business down there. Then there's the packing and the actual moving. And doing this all with a 6 month old who will not sleep anywhere but her crib is going to make it hard for me to get much done. Calling all babysitters!!!! Any vounteers???

On Demand

For those of you who don't have Comcast or Insight digital cable, you may not be familiar with the ON DEMAND button. It's a great little feature that lets you access extra programming like movies and kids programs. My favorite section is called The Free Spot. Just like the title suggests, everything in this section is available to watch free of charge. Now, within this section, there are many, many different channels to choose from.

One of Dan's favorite channels on The Free Spot is G4. He loves to watch this crazy Japanese show. It is funny and I will watch it with him without complaining, but I am glad we don't have this channel on our regular lineup.

I recently discoverd a channel called Tube Time. It's a selection of about 10 old TV shows. Currently you can choose from Fantasy Island, Bewitched, I Dream of Jeannie, Party of Five, Facts of Life, Silver Spoons, One Day at a Time, and... the rest I can't think of right now. My favorites are Facts of Life and Silver Spoons. The other night I watched an episode of Silver Spoons and it made me realize just how bad the acting was and how even more horrible the clothing and fashion was! YIKES! I was laughing so hard because this was the episode where Ricky promises that he will have Menuedo sing at his party. I remember the Menuedo days and how I really liked them at the time. I was 7 or 8 years old, I didn't know any better!
Check out the outfits! Classy!

He's so much better looking now! So cute!

follow-up to my last post

I have been thinking alot during the last 24 hours about this whole house selling business. The more I think about it, the more irritated I get.
Yesterday we had a lady make an offer but it was extremely low and she was asking for our washer/dryer, our extra fridge in the basement, our kitchen appliances, and all window treatments, and a few other things that would naturally come with the house. Call me selfish, but I want to keep my things. I realize people negotiate other things when buying homes, but I don't know why it's expected that we should just be willing to give away our belongings that we worked so hard to buy. I would hate to lose a potential buyer over the curtains in my living room, but darn it, it took me forever to find ones that I liked and JCP doesn't sell them anymore. So it's not like I could go buy new ones.
So buy my house, not my things!

new perspective

Good news: we got an offer on our house. Bad news: it's a lowball offer.

Dan and I have now had experience in purchasing 2 homes, but this is our first experience at selling. I understand how the game works, both parties go back and forth till a price is agreed upon. It kind of reminds me of a mating dance or something from a show on the Nature Channel. I feel like we "dance" back and forth and ruffle our feathers in this whole real estate game.

I am also shocked by what people ask for when they put in an offer. Not only did this girl put in a very low offer. She's also asking for some of our belongings; Some of our very expensive belongings. That is totally crazy to me. If she wants our stuff, then she needs to put in a better offer!