Moving On Up

At the end of last week, Duncan finally got the camera installed in Colby's room so I no longer had an excuse to not move him from the swing into his crib.  Yes, Calleigh slept in a swing for the first four months with great success and I've been tempted to let it just ride with him but considering that we will be at my parents for several weeks for Christmas, I do not want to be tied to a swing.  I was excited about the move upstairs to his room since it also meant that I was also going to be moving into the guest room which is right across the hall.  Yay...a bed!  I want to be clear again on the whole couch thing.  Duncan is MORE than happy to have me sleep in our room.  It has been my choice to be on the couch.  He's always afraid people will think he kicked me out.  Okay, I think that's cleared up.



Last Thursday was his first night and went okay.  No problems falling asleep but he did wake up at 4 am. Oh, so let me go back and just say that after the great sleeping at the hotel over that previous weekend, he only went until almost 6:00 one time after that. Apparently just wanted to get my hopes up and then dash them to pieces.  The second night, it went a little better and I made the bold move to invite Duncan to spend the next night in the guest room with me.  It was kind of fun...almost like we were at a hotel.  Alas, the night didn't go well with my having to bring Colby in bed with us in the middle of the night.  And so it goes.  He sleeps fine as soon as he hits the bed next to me but when he wakes up in his crib, he seems to be having a difficult time going back to sleep in it.  Tonight, as I was putting him to bed, I had the clever idea to take off my dress and put it next to him in the crib.  Maybe he'll be tricked into thinking I'm there when he smells me (side note...I did not shower today but hopefully put on deodorant although the spit up smell may overpower all of that anyway). We shall see if it works.

By the way, right about now is when I'm really mad that we have a master bedroom on the ground floor and
the kids' room upstairs.  Our tiny townhouse isn't looking so bad.  I foresee me in the guest room for quite awhile.

Last weekend we didn't do anything particularly special although we did have several groups of friends over for dinner.  On Friday night we had the Isidros over who it seemed like we hadn't seen in ages.  Saturday night we had Ricky, Ana, Tiffany, Anthony, and Megan over.  We hadn't seen the latter three really in ages so it was a nice catch up time with them.




Sunday was the chance to do some things that have been put off for awhile.  Duncan took Calleigh on a trip to Lowe's (he likes to take each kid out separately from time to time) and then I was going to go get the oil changed in the van and also drop some clothes off at the consignment store.  I found a Jiffy Lube nearby and was told it would be about 15 - 20 minutes.  I was in a bit of a hurry because any time you are out alone, you like to make the most of it...not by sitting in a waiting room leafing through In Style magazine.  By the way, colorful coats and shiny skinny pants are in right now in case you were wondering.  As the time ticked by and the van wasn't ready, I struck up a conversation with an Asian woman who was the only other person in the room.  She was very nice.  A hairdresser with an apparent gambling problem as she regaled me with stories of how she was no longer welcome into casinos on the west coast of the state.  Anywho, eventually the mechanic came in to talk to me and apologized for how long it was taking which was partly due to the fact that the oil filter or some such thing was in a tough place to reach.  So I respond, "Oh those Koreans.  Trying to be tricky." And then the nice Asian lady pipes up, "I'm Korean."  Oops.  I never did make it to the consignment store as the oil change took almost an hour.  Thanks a lot Jiffy Lube!

While I was gone, Duncan took the crew for a walk.  Colby's stroller is one I got at a yard sale this past Friday for $10.  Duncan was complaining the the other umbrella stroller, which Brady is using, was getting too dirty.  A fact which did not stop him from using it, clearly.

That afternoon I went over to pick up Jaime's wife and daughter.  Jaime is the gentleman who did our painting and I had offhandedly mentioned couponing to him when he last painted for us.  Turns out he was very interested in it and his wife, Lydia (not how you spell it, I know) called me to ask if I could teach her. They don't have a car so I drove over to pick them up.  I was kind of excited about because I got to drive Duncan's new car.  I had to wrestle the keys out of hands to do it though.  Just kidding.  Sortof.  They have four daughters and the second eldest who is 10, Lily Beth, came with her and played with the girls, much to their delight.  The training went well and we even stopped at CVS on the way back to give her a real lesson. I was glad I did because they had school supplies on clearance for 90% off so I got a bunch of nice notebooks for $0.19 each.  It was funny because she told me that when I told her on the phone that CVS was a great place to shop, she had told her husband and they both thought I was joking.  They NEVER go there because the prices are so high.  Not true, not true.

The end of last week I started my new workout routine.  Yes, I gave up on the XBox.  It really wasn't that bad and I think it was probably working but it was just not my thing.  So I'm back to what I did with Aubree and Brady.  I do the treadmill three days a week and dumbbells three days a week.  It's a 10-week program on-line that I'm paying for.  I was somewhat reluctant to do so because I'm going to be interrupted by being gone for Christmas but even if I can get in five good weeks, it will be worth it.  But boy, it's so annoying how it takes up a chunk of my evenings when I could be doing so many other things with my time like laundry, paying bills, house cleaning, preparing lesson plans for school, sending my tenants a new lease, making Christmas lists, meal planning, preparing coupons, going through my homeschool convention bag which is still sitting on the floor in the office after five months, cuddling on the couch with my hubby while we watch a TV show (but not eating cookies, thank you very much), etc.  You get the drift.  And now I'm depressed when I see all that I've shirked to write this blog.

Last week the thing on my to do list was to go through the kids clothes again.  Just when you think you're good, one of them goes and grows on you and you're at it again.  This time it was Aubree who has moved into 5T.  I also had to get rid of the rest of Calleigh's 6/6X.  And Colby, that little weed.  I haven't switched him over yet but any day now he'll be into 3 - 6 month clothes.  As I was looking for bins in the garage I came across one that said 2T that I hadn't noticed when I transitioned Brady a few months ago.  Hmm. When I had gone through his 2T stuff, I saw that he didn't have that many vests for church so I focused on that at the consignment sales.  I opened this bin and I'm not going to lie, it felt a little like Christmas.  Low and behold, there were like 20 vests in there.  I was thrilled although a little ticked at myself.  Needless to say, he'll probably need to start attending church on both Saturday and Sunday to wear all the vests he now has.  Thank you for the hand-me-downs, Camden and Evan!

A few days ago I did find the time to make some muffins with the kids.  I just have to say, it was so funny with Aubree as my little helper.  Here's how it went, in all sincerity.
Me: Pouring flour into the measuring cup.
Aubree: "Here comes the cauliflower.
Me: Dumping wheat germ into the bowl.
Aubree "Oooh, garlic!"
Me: Adding dark brown sugar.
Aubree: "Yum! Chocolate!
Me: Adding baking powder.
Aubree: "Now the sugar."

It was a hoot because she seriously though those were all the things and she was excited because she knew them but it was wrong every time..

A few more pictures to close it off..

I had to take the girls to Adventurers last week since Duncan had to a Magic game.

Reading with the gang after school.  You can tell this is a day we didn't go anywhere by looking at Aubree's outfit.

Now she wants to be cowgirl.

    Have a good week.  Only two more days until the Christmas music starts.  Yippee!!