some pics of the new house

here's the house 

living room

dining room

bathroom

backyard...

we close on october 24...anyone willing to help us? calling all friends...food, drinks, beer, etc on us...just lend us your backs...i can't lift anything heavy....so anyone who is willing...please let us know...

love your pet without loving your pet

short tirade....

just when you think the world cannot possibly get any more bizarre you read a story that completely changes your paradigm of normal human behavior. . .

i just read a story about a woman who is going to be serving 15 years to life for not helping when her ferocious dogs mauled a woman to pieces in her own apartment, she actually had the nerve to say that her neighbor should have not been carrying groceries and then pushed the dog's head out of her crotch when she walked past them....she had over 70 bites to her neck and body and the owner did nothing to stop it...i am in shock right now. there were so many irrelevant details in the story that have forever changed my view of people and their pets...


if this offends you in anyway...forgive me and blame it on my hormones...they are out of whack...i just spent 25 minutes doing the dishes and crying....about what?? i don't know...just standing in the silence of my kitchen sobbing. i'm over it...now i'm just disgusted...

a moment of peace...

max is sick...he has a double case of pink eye, a never ending dripping, running nose, and he is GROUCHY!!! he is such a typically pleasant child...with the exception of 

"No! I'm not eating my pancakes" (inserts pancake into mouth and chews) "

or

"No I don't wanna put my shoes on" (as he's putting them on)

or 

(my personal favorite)

"No...I don't want any ice cream. wait, mama yes I do."

that is tolerable for the most part, typically we just ignore it. but when he's sick he whines everything repeatedly and he wipes his nose on my arm and tells me that "I don't love you today mama." (thanks for that sweet children's book from the library! when i remember the title i'll warn you all!!!) it can be slightly overwhelming. especially since i don't feel super great today myself and i have to face the daunting task of collecting some papers that we needed last week. ugh, its tough to depend on other people. i'm tired. it's beautiful outside and we are all congested and inside. tonite we are doing something fun-ish. like drive past our new house and long for a month from now when we'll develop carpal tunnel from signing papers and becoming official home owners....

generally speaking aside from this yucky sicky time. we are all doing well. max is having a much better time at his biweekly preschool and he has been having the time of his life when they listen to music and dance. i got him the most fabulous little bag that looks like a dumptruck, to the average human eye, but he is quick to inform you that it is "actually a site dumper." 

the difference...i don't know but it's definitely big for him...

chris although still hating the bank is making the necessary moves towards graduate school in the fall. he wants to get his MFA in creative writing/poetry so he can teach on a college level. it's such a process to get through but he's doing it...he's writing some good stuff....i'm going to post one of my favorite poems of his called "i wanna be in a bar fight." it's fabulous...he also, has started running again. for those of you who may not know, he had a stress fracture in his shin for about 2 months now. he was suffering a lot but still averaging about 30 miles a week running. he also was biking to work so it was becoming increasingly more painful. well, he's almost healed and back to running again. he's so happy...

as for me, the control freak can not delegate any responsibilities about collecting papers for the final work...so i'm exhausted from it and frustrated with myself for not sharing the load better with chris. i'm starting a yoga class this week. i gotta get rid of this stress better. that helped so much with my pregnancy with wells. so hopefully, that'll be a good solution for me now too....

well, there's my "christmas letter" written in my moment of peace...i just wanted to let yins know what was going on...boring mostly but positive....

i wonder if i write this for you guys or more for myself....i feel better....

creeped out...

i'm deleting our home post...sorry. i'll put up more pics later. i got wigged out having that up with our address...it's 6 am and i'm over paranoid...

when it rains...it pours....

i think i forgot to mention in my last post that it was raining the entire night while we were waiting for the tow truck...i think i caught a slight cold...just kidding. i know it's a virus.... :)

yeah, so this is starting out light but gosh...this weekend went from bad to worse-ish. we qualified for closing cost coverage for the house. we were supposed to only have to pay about $1000 for the entire closing because we didn't have a lot of savings. well at the end of the week with freddie mac and fannie mae being "bought out" by the government....we lost our deal...the government closed all those perks down two weeks earlier than planned....so rough. so we signed papers on a house and had to figure out about $2500. ugh!!! hopefully that is solved now but YUCK!!!. that almost did me in completely....

then tonite, we left too late from dan and erin's house. max was pooped but refused to crash...he was exhausted. i ALWAYS get off in oakland to get to our house....ALWAYS!!! but not tonite. i try to be adventurous and try a road that's been closed for several months. it was open but we got half way up bigelow blvd to find about 3 miles of backed up traffic. we left at 1000 and got to the traffic at about 1015. we sat til 11....a tree had fallen on the road and penndot was trapped about four miles behind us....so a group of men went and broke the tree into pieces so we could get through. max was sweaty from his meltdown and exhausted...when we were about 20 ft from the tree, a man decided to help a broken down car and stopped in the one available lane blocking up miles of traffic for about 5 minutes to help....i got out of the car and men were screaming obscenities at each other so i stepped right back into the car....we gave max a quick bath and now he's in bed....we are all bushed and i can't wait for this ride to be over!!!

it is not only figuratively raining but i'm assuming that it will soon be literally raining...thanks ike for the gas prices and all the memories that will haunt me tonite till i fall asleep....

a day in the life

we received word at 3pm that our offer was accepted for our house. we are now further along in the process of becoming home owners. very exciting. the house is terrific...a bit out of our price range but isn't that to be expected in our "keeping up with the jones'" mentality...clicky here for full tour...

just kidding...our mortgage is slightly above the joke house's taxes....but hey a girl can dream. we got a good deal on a great house. the neighborhood is great. safe, lots of toddlers, quiet street. very cute...we love it. we looked at maybe 40 houses and this one always stood out to us....the kitchen is blah but the yard if fabulous...we are excited....

driving home from the realty office, bekah broke down on the highway. we parked behind her and waited over an hour for AAA. during that time, the natives were definitely getting restless and our nerves were wearing thin. chris was quiet mainly because he was supposed to camping and this was setting him back considerably....during our wait, the honda just STOPPED RUNNING!! we had to call a tow truck too....now i can laugh but those two tow guys who showed up were in shock...my in-laws and christian saved us...so kind...i'm exhausted now but i really wanted to share my whirlwind of a day...

huge housewarming party in december...i hope...

innocent request

initially i was wigged out by the sitemeter but now i'm intrigued...new orleans, seattle, korea....i'm totally curious about WHO is reading/skimming/stalking our blog...

please leave a comment on this page when you read this entry....i don't care who reads ours...i just am dying of curiousity...

leave a note, where your from and if i know you....chris and i are completely awestruck...

more for me than you

since i was 25 years old, i have been instructing parents on how to improve their parenting skills. i have an advanced degree in child development and years of experience in behaviorist approach...yet somehow none of this prepared me for parenting. don't be alarmed i love max more than life itself but today was one of our WORST days ever.

we went on a hike today. he was hilarious, he kept running really fast and then kicking his shoes off to get us to laugh. it was funny until we asked him to stop because he was getting into big rocks and we didn't want him to get hurt. he started crying and throwing a fit...we ignored it and he calmed down. then we decided to go home and he didn't want to walk...he wanted me to carry him. so we spit water on him and he calmed down...(we tend to non-traditionalists). we get home and he insists on sitting in the dark playing with his trains. he didn't want lights on. fine. then it was too dark and we wanted to sit in the living room....melt down number 2....

we then, started making dinner. chris made it and i played some games with max. he was in a great mood. he loved the pumpkin game from his highlights magazine. so we had a great time. i offered him some yogurt and he melted down again. who knows why?? ignored...

meltdown at dinner, bath, brushing teeth, and bed time....he got no books tonite...i explained his wasting time...and he said "tomorrow i'll listen and not be naughty." unbelievable. ugh, i could have thrown him out the window if he wasn't so dang cute.

he had a long nap but a horrible night sleeping last night...so all's forgiven...it's all good...i'm alive and so is he...

hilarious morning...

it goes without saying that the morning that you can sleep in is the morning that your toddler decides to arise at 330!! he didn't have a nap yesterday so he crashed at 630. fortunately, he is well rested and we were struggling...now i'm awake and so far so good, i'm alright.

this morning some of the funniest things ever happened. max laid with us in bed and he really wanted me to "hold him", meaning my arm resting over him. he was doing well but couldn't fall back asleep. my mind just started wondering about our house...i thought he was asleep so i started to doze off. he wasn't asleep at all. if i moved he would say, "mummy, hold me." so i would. eventually, this became exhausting...finally, i said, 

"max go play in your room." 

"ok, but i'm bringing the baby." 

"that's fine. just be careful"

(he loves "taking the baby" from my belly button and playing with her)

"ok, mama. i won't drop her."

"read some stories in your bed" 

"ok, i will"

(i hear him reading and doze off. about 30 min later he's upset trying to calm her down)

"oh no, she's starving. what do i do? i don't have milk here. oh, no, mama, she's 

crying because she's so hungry. oh my goodness, what can i give her? she's staaarrving"

"max, get her bottle in your toy box"

"she doesn't want it....and i'm hungry too. starving actually" 

(we come downstairs, he wants to carry her down the stairs, i tell him that she needs to ride in my belly down the stairs. he holds my stomach the entire way down.)

"mama, she wants some crunch, i mean i want some crunch, she want's some milk"

(i sneak to the bathroom and hear the refrigerator door)

"oops, i hit the baby with the milk. sorry baby."

(i come out of the bathroom)

"i hit the baby with the milk"

"is she ok?"

"yes, but she is starving"

i wanted to laugh so badly but he was so serious, i didn't want to laugh in his face. 

i'm so glad i was awake for it...

my sweet boy...

today we celebrated pop-pop's birthday. i was helping to serve pie and icecream. so i was the last one to be served. i took pie to chris and dan and while i was gone, i heard max say

"francine (granny), please give my mom some pie and ice cream."

what a babe...

one broken nose

i have so many pictures to post but i need to upload them....i'll do that tomorrow night....however, it does need to be said unfortunately without photos, to spare some dignity, that max spent part of the evening in the clinic....because he broke granny's nose. he was playing on the couch and fell forward onto her face. clean break...snap right down the center....i can't believe that i haven't broken my nose with a few of the headbutts. she was his first broken bone...

I asked him..."did you apologize?" he said, "uh, yeah, three times. she said it was an accident and forgave me..."

big exciting news...

for those of you who don't know or don't remember....bekah was kicked out of nursing school one year ago because she failed two classes. this is sooooo unlike her but we all thought that she was stressed out because of single motherhood and the fact that nina had so many health problems from birth on....little did we know it was because she had a brain tumor...her main doctor wrote a letter stating that her tumor was in his professional opinion a direct cause to her brain dysfunction that caused her to fail out of school. so last week we found out that the school allowed her to come back this coming june. she will graduate with her RN in december 2009....when she failed out of school last august she was set to graduate in december...the tumor was found in january but had been there for probably at least 10 years even though it had only been problematic since june of last year... so, we were all back in johnstown to celebrate her big news and for labor day. johnstown has an annual folk fest that is fun to attend but always slightly reminds me why i wanted to move away...pittsburgh would be perfect if we could just get my parents down here....