Cozy Warm

Call me crazy, but I love this tiny apartment. After 6 months with my grandfather I am in raptures from the joy of having my own kitchen. None of the food in my fridge is expired, my countertops stay clean, my floor stays swept, and I have once again eliminated red meat and potatoes from our daily diet. As grateful as I am for my grandfather’s generosity, I am infinitely happier in our own place.

It is only one bedroom. The boys sleep in the bedroom, which also houses most of their toys, while Johnny and I get a pullout couch in the living room. It is so much easier to corral the boys in a small apartment and it is easier to keep the place clean. I genuinely love it. Oh, and all utilities are included. Whee!

Now that I am relaxed I am back to creating an organized home, rather than just a mostly bearable life. The poor boys were on 24/7 movie watching during the move. They’re down to one movie a day after naps. We have a loose but consistent daily schedule going that includes dressing and bed-making before breakfast, self-entertainment playtime in their bedroom, arts and crafts, walks, reading, plenty of rough-housing with Daddy, and a nightly Bible and bedtime story. We all seem to be thriving on the routine.

Zachary quickly learned how to open the front door and release his brother into the wild, but the deadbolt provided a quick fix. He can unlock the knob lock, but isn’t quite sneaky enough to get his chair to reach the deadbolt before I can stop him. The escape artist is 100% potty trained, even at night.

Gabriel’s current reason for living seems to be cars. He carries his racecar everywhere with him, but will put it down for brief periods to play with his Tonka truck. Both boys delight in the current snow removal projects that send big dump trucks back and forth down our street all day.

Johnny had his first Spanish assessment and did very well. I’m so proud of him! If he keeps at this pace we’ll be out of here by June for sure. His class is scheduled through June 18, but he can take his final test before that date if he’s ready.

My life is consumed with the usual daily happenings, but I’m trying to keep up with a couple short term and long term goals:

Short Term:

-Catch up on phone calls and letters

-Get passports

-Vaccinate the boys and self for India

-Practice Hindi

-Scholarships for potential school enrollment in the Fall

-Pay off Mary Kay investment with Mary Kay sales

Long Term:

-Sell Mary Kay in India

-Finish degree

-Get teaching certificate

-Raise my boys as Godly, well-educated gentlemen

-Love my husband as much as humanly possible (that’s short and longterm)

We live!

We survived the week of snow. I would guess that we got around a total of 45 inches this week. The piles framing our driveway level with my head in places. My stud muffin of a husband logged a lot of shoveling hours this week. He's so amazing. We even managed to let the babies live! They've been troopers, actually. THe poor little guys haven't left the house since Tuesday afternoon.

We move to our own place in College Park on Saturday! Yay!! I can hardly wait. The packing is almost complete. I will be so happy to have privacy again.

I've almost compiled a satisfactory amount of notes for my essay. I'm really excited about it. I've read some fantastic essays from a variety of perspectives and I'm really happy to see the conclusions these people have reached. It's been especially exciting to learn viewpoints and applications so pertinent to Johnny's job.

Johnny is on delayed schedule tomorrow and then has a 3-day weekend. It's been so fun having him home all week.

Snowpocalype

We are snowed in. Despite Johnny's valiant efforts of shoveling yesterday, we will be here for a couple days. Johnny spent two hours getting most of the 30" of snow off the driveway, but given that the road is covered with the same 30" we are pretty well stuck. After the big snow in December a plow never made it around to our street at all, so we'll see how we fare this time.

The boys are weathering things well. Their little world stays pretty constant no matter what, but it can be a bit tough on their parents. We always try to get them out of the house every couple days, not only for their edification, but also for our sanity.

During our first winter in Wyoming it was fun to get snowed in. It was just Johnny and me stuck in a house with nothing to do....

This time we have two toddlers and an elderly man to deal with. Please hurry, plows!

On a positive note, it is highly doubtful that Johnny will be able to go to work tomorrow, so we will be snowed in for our anniversary. 4 years! My gift is pretty sappy; I hope he likes it. :)

Bulletin

My Life in Bulletin:

1. Signed a Lease

2. Became a Hockey Fan

3. Prepared 4th Anniversary gift

4. Sliced Knuckle on door latch

5. Went a full day without caffeine

6. Wrote 7 letters in 1 day

7. Began packing

8. Fell further in love with the most amazing man on planet earth (a.k.a. Johnny the hottie)

About Time

It's about time I posted; it's been a while. Life has been full of ups and downs the last few weeks, but mostly ups.

We had Thurows and Davises flocking in and out for most of January and some of December. My sister was here for a week and my parents and other two sisters joined her for another week after that. It was really fun to spend some time with Rachel alone and great to see my family.

We braved the wintry weather for the March for Life on 1/22. I'm so glad we went. Zachary slept most of the time, but Gabriel, a very good mascot for the pro-life movement, spent a good amount of the march in my arms, captivating everyone with his laser beam eyes. I hope his big, blue eyes helped open someone else's.

There are many events transpiring that I can't write about quite yet, but suffice to say there are changes happening in the near future. Stay tuned.

Johnny is still confident that he will finish language training by May, which would give us an exit date sometime in June. I'm hoping, hoping, praying.

I am working on an essay for the "Morality of Profit" essay contest. I am waiting for a recommended reading book to arrive at the library before I really delve into my work, but I have a pretty good premise and I'm excited to get cooking. Guess what my POV is? Hehe.

I am currently cooking chili and listening to the boys not napping upstairs. Johnny should be out of class by now, but he has errands and exercise in DC all afternoon. My goal this afternoon is to catch up on emails. Good luck to me.

Tata!

Happy New Year

Last year was busy, crazy, stressful, worrisome, and wonderful. This year promises incredible adventures, lots of learning, and a new start for my little family. It's amazing to me that each year with my boys gets better and better. Johnny and I start our 5th year of marriage in February and my babies will turn 2 and 3 this year! Ready for some cliche mom advice? Too bad, because here they are: Cherish every second; they really do shoot by, barely even seen.

Johnny's family visited for 9 days, which was hectic but fun. Seeing everyone, especially the 3 cousins, gathered together was a blessing.

My family arrives tomorrow. They will leave my sister here for a couple weeks while they do a book tour in New York and Canada and return to spend another week with us.

January has been extremely busy and will continue to be so. Johnny has begun his language training. I study with him at night. We're hoping to pick it up very quickly. The goal is to leave for India in June. I also need to squeeze a Florida trip in there somewhere.

Happy 2010!

Stillness

It's an oddly relaxing afternoon. There are a few things I should be doing, but I'm currently camped out by my phone waiting for the unintentionally sadistic nurse from the boys Celiac screen to call me back (more on that).

We've been plugging along and keeping busy. I had my first Mary Kay party and it was fun but exhausting. I'm practicing determination in getting ahold of potential clients and making sure they keep their appointments. I have a personal color consultation with a friend from MOPS tonight and couple more next week. I even have a potential team member! I'm very thankful for this opportunity to maybe make a bit of money and definitely get me out of my comfort zone and into the social world. It takes a conscious and determined effort on my part which is definitely good for me. It will take work to form a social circle in India, especially since the safest housing for families with little ones is also the quietest and most removed from social life. That makes it great for babies, but will force us to put in the effort to get out and meet people. But, with the Italian, Argentine and French embassies next door, I don't think it will be all that much of a challenge... Can you say completely and utterly fascinating lifestyle?

Big events in the next couple weeks include a Cookie Exchange with some friends and, much more importantly, the family visits!!! I'm so excited. All of Johnny's immediate family will be here! The Thurows are absolutely amazing and I've missed them so much. This means free babysitting and plenty of cuddle time with my adorable little niece. Can't wait!

Story time! I called the University of Maryland Pediatric Center to attempt to procure earlier appointments for the boys' follow ups after their initial Celiac screen. I couldn't get one, but I also asked the nurse if their lab results had come in. She put me on hold to go look. She returned after a couple minutes to say that they had come back and she had read them, but she couldn't remember exactly what they had said. Their procedure is for the nurse to read them and pass them on to the doctor to read. The two of them either send them on to the parents telling them that they are completely normal and all is hunky-dory, or they write up a report telling parents what is wrong and the next course of action. It is then sent to the secretary who sends it to the parents. The nurse said that the doctor had done her write up and it was with the secretary. She said rather than keep me on hold she would find them and call me back as soon as she could.

AHHHH!!! So now I know that there is something wrong with one or both of my babies, but I don't know what and I've already been waiting nearly an hour to find out. Sigh...

On the plus side it's forcing me to take some time to myself instead of making business calls and such. Nap time is far too short these days.

In other news, it's cold. But I really shouldn't complain because it's far, far colder in good ol' Wyoming. hehehehe....I wish I could say I miss it, but I really, really don't. I do, however, miss my wonderful in-laws. Can't wait for Christmas!!