Booty Booty

Albeit completely inappropriate, I can't help but laugh every time Emma does this little booty shake.

It's even better fresh out of the tub, but I'll leave that to the imagination.

The Little Things...

... that keep us from going crazy around here.  And make me smile-

All the things that keep us busy during the witching hour, like making paper bag puppets, 

 playing with Block Buddies (Adam was super proud of himself for putting this grasshopper together all by himself), 

reading about, and then playing with Oobleck, 

playing with random toys made out of trash (always, always my kids favorites),

and discovering Cloud Dough (Emma's first move was to smack Adam in the face with a handful of it).

 These are the Mommy-led activities.  When Daddy is around, it's usually a game of wrestling, hide and seek, or hot lava obstacle courses, all of which are a whole lot harder to photograph.

I love this little nook in our apartment, that seems as though it were made to fit our toy/bookcase.  It's a perfect spot for the few toys we have allowed out of storage (Little People, play food, a few dress ups, games, trains and some cars).  We did have to put up the extra book shelf in the kids room, though.  We can't ever seem to get enough books around here.

I've been trying to get everyone to drink more water.  This lovely hospital mug has done the trick beautifully.  I probably fill it up 8 times a day, all the while ignoring the fact that we're all sharing the germs along with the water.

Fresh flowers make any space so beautiful.

Wednesday mornings are late start days for Leah.  The extra hour means chocolate chip pancakes and Cosmic Kids yoga.

The view out our back windows could be a whole lot worse than this.

Twice this week Adam has taken an afternoon nap.  Both times he's stumbled out of his room, stretching and rubbing his eyes, then crawling into my lap for a snuggle.  

 Emma Grace was nowhere to be found this morning.  I called and called to her, then finally figured out where she was hiding- 

 Man, was she proud of herself for sneaking Mommy's new phone!

Building A House

My dad suggested that I blog about the house building process (hi, Dad!).  I haven't really blogged much about it yet, but I did type up this post over a month ago (sometime back in March) when the whole process was still somewhat novel... I'll start here.

*****

(Our pile of dirt)

So, we're building a house.  This is not something we were necessarily planning on doing, but it made the most sense for the area we're moving to.  We signed the purchase agreement in February and are slowly getting started.  We'll get just what we want for about the same price we'd pay for a house that we could fix up to become just what we want.

But that's just it- building a house is all about getting what you want.  And we don't necessarily know what we want.  We've spent the last nine years taking whatever we can get.  That's what you do in graduate school.   You take whatever you can get.  The hand-me-down clothes, making-ends-meet-hand-outs, and hand-scrubbed-again-and-again-furniture has been good enough for us.  We've always had just enough.  And we've figured out how to make do.

Now we've got people asking us if we want hardwood floors or tile, plain granite or gaudy granite, bay or box windows.  And could we please submit paint samples and exterior samples and pictures of what exactly it was we had in mind when we decided to add an extra room onto the back of our house?

And they say "yes" to everything.  We can get whatever we want- they will do whatever we want- as long as we are willing to pay for it, of course.  I guess that's the way it is in life, but it's just annoying.  In some ways I just feel like a little kid who needs to know her boundaries.  Tell me no once in a while, please!

And truthfully, there are many things about it in which I just don't really care.  Just make it look nice and let me know when I can move in!  I have a rather short attention span when it comes to stuff like this, which makes me grateful that Jason is my counterpart- he can hone in on a problem and spend hours, days, months if necessary tweaking it to his measure of perfection (thesis, anyone?)  So when I've long since stopped thinking about the benefits of shakes versus smart siding above the garage, he is still obsessing over which one will be just right for our house.  That is good news for both of us.  It's just the right level of fun for each of us, and it's still getting done.

These are not problems to complain about.  Not to anyone.  And I'm not trying to complain about the problems themselves, just the process of dealing with them.  There are times when I really stink at decision-making, and this happens to be one of those times.  I just haven't spent the time poring over decorating books and blogs and pins that I guess I should have to be ready to make some of these decisions.  I'm afraid that we are going to end up with an awful-looking house because we are out of our league.

Thankfully, we have our awesome architect Bill on our side, and he has helped steer us away from any truly awful decisions.  And truthfully, just about everything can be switched up later if we really, really hate it... as long as we're willing to pay for it.  :)

*****

So that was over a month ago.  In March we hurried out to Iowa to pick out our finishes, hold the plans and specs meeting and get on with the building.  But then the builder fired his realtor.  And they couldn't figure out some of the details that we wanted to change on the floorplan.  And the new realtor wanted to go over everything again to make sure that it was all correct (a very good thing to do, since it wasn't).  And then April came and we moved here.  And it started to rain.  And we decided to expand the foundation.  And then they finally dug the hole.  And it started to rain again.  And it rained... and rained... and rained...

So we went from a glimmer of hope that looked like this-

 to a swimming pool that looks like this, as of today-

And it's raining again.

Overall, the process is just taking a really. long. time.  And every day that goes by that progress isn't being made is another day that we are in our charming two-bedroom apartment, where we are snug and cozy and driving our neighbors crazy (the first of the wall-bangings started last week- what a welcome into the building!).

It's a very interesting place to be in, as I mentioned above, because these aren't really the kinds of problems that anyone wants to hear you complain about.  Oh, boo-hoo, you get to build a house just the way you want it in a neighborhood you love and in the meantime you have a nice apartment to live in (really, it is nice- vaulted ceilings, hardwood floors, fluffy carpet, a dishwasher that actually works- that is somewhat life-changing).

But it's just not what I expected.  As long as we don't have a house, we don't have our home in Iowa.  It's temporary.  There are boxes upon boxes of our life waiting to be unpacked- we're currently functioning on 5 plates, 5 towels, 5 pillows, etc.  It feels like a never-ending transition phase.  At this rate, we are hopeful that the house will be done before school starts up again in the fall.  Hopefully, I'll have happier things to say as that time draws closer.  In the meantime, I guess I'd better go tell the kids to stop jumping off the bunk beds.

Funny Things Leah Says...

Given that half of her sentences now start with charming phrases like "Oh, come on!" or "You have got to be kidding me!" I think I'd better capture these cute moments while they're still coming.

I'm writing a speech... How do you spell 'peasants'?"  (The speech ended up reading, "Dear Peasants, Tomorrow we are going to have an All-You-Can-Eat cookie buffet.  Would you like to come?  Sincerely, The Queen.)

*****

Adam!  You hurt my hand-ankle!

*****

L- Mom, where is my new nylon dress?

M- Nylon?  You mean neon?

L- Yes.  I want to wear it tomorrow.  Actually, where is my patrick dress?  I want to wear that one.

M- You mean plaid?

L- Yes!  That's the one!

Coping

The kids have been incredibly easy-going about the move to Iowa.  I wasn't sure what to expect, especially since before the move Leah would lament about not wanting to leave our house, our friends, her school (none of us did).  Out of the blue one day a few months back, Adam came to me nearly in tears.

A- When we move to Iowa, we have to move into a hotel that has a pool in it.

M- Yes, that's what we'll do.

A- But the houses that you and Daddy picked out are NOT hotels with pools in them.

M- Oh- when we first get there I promise we will stay in a hotel with a pool.

A- Okay!  And we have to remember to pack our floaties.

M- Sure, we can do that.  And we'll pack our squishy water balls, too.

A- Yeah!

Since we've been here, there has only been one instance in which Leah tearfully expressed what we have all been feeling- we miss our friends, our home, our old life.  Change is hard, even on the good days.  And given that we are hanging out in a lovely two bedroom apartment while we wait for our house to be built, we truly are just living in a transition stage.  

Check out our lovely sleeping arrangements- thankfully Emma is a good roommate.

The hard days are hard, but the fun days are full of trips to the zoo, the library, the donut and cupcake shops, local restaurants, and visits with new friends.

 Leah was all smiles until she peeked her head around the corner and came face-to-face with that friendly emu.

I know it will be a few more months before we're done introducing ourselves as new, and that's okay.  We've been warmly welcomed into the school and our church.  We are scouting out preschool options for Adam in the fall.  We've got a few playdates lined up and are slowly figuring out what our place will be here... Of course, I'm mostly speaking about myself and the kids.  Dr. Corn (as the kids have dubbed him) is in heaven- work is exciting and challenging, he's getting all kinds of toys to play with, and most of all, he's not stuck in this apartment all day long (technically, neither am I, but you know what I mean).

An iPhone, a laptop and an iPad all at once?  Seems like a bit much to me, even for a doctor... 

Observations from the lunch room

Mom, why don't you pack a dessert in my lunch?  Everyone else has a dessert in their lunch!

Mom, I've noticed some of the kids have this white and soft looking bread for lunch... can we get some of that some time?

Mom, do you remember those pastries we got on the Disney Cruise?  The round ones with the jelly in the middle?  I pictured something like this-

Yes!  The ones with the purple wrapper?  Those look sooooo good!

She meant this- 

Leah has really loved the transition to full day kindergarten.  Her class worked really hard on a weather play last week, and the kids and I got to go see it.  They all did such a great job- what a fun class full of cuties!

And yes, I took a video of her whole part, although I don't expect anyone but doting grandparents and her father to watch it.  She worked really hard to memorize her lines and did a great time when it was her turn. 

-I wrote this up before we left Indiana.  Kindergarten in Iowa has been about as I expected so far- Leah is thrilled to have three recesses every day, but clearly suffers from the lack of a "brain break" in the afternoon.  She seems to be doing just fine with the things they are learning here, but has a hard time with the fact that her teacher insists that she finish her school work in class.  She is delighted about the baby chicks that are hatching in her classroom but does not love the early wake up time required to get her to school by 7:55 (none of us do).  She is making new friends quickly and is having her first playdate this weekend.  All in all, she's doing great.  I've been very impressed with her cheerfulness and enthusiasm about the newness of the whole situation (today excepted).  Thankfully there are only 6 weeks left of school before the delightful and long-anticipated summer break is here.

Confessions of a Tortured Graduate Student Wife

Okay, maybe tortured is too strong a word, but before too much more time comes between us and graduate student life, I want to make sure that I have it sufficiently chronicled one more time.  What it's really like to be a poor, starving graduate student wife.

Basically, I just exhaled for the first time in nearly 4 years.

Now, of course, some of it was our own doing- we certainly could have lived in a smaller house, but I'm not sure that we could have paid much less in rent.  I could have ignored the holes in my kids clothes longer, but not by much.  We could have eaten out less than once a month, but I'm not sure we could have eaten more rice and beans at home.  I bought red meat last week for the first time in over a year.  I walked through the grocery store and put whatever we needed- and even a few things we wanted- into our cart.  Yes, I was completely stocking our new kitchen, but there was no desperate calculating of each item, no weighing of the pros and cons of each expense.  I just bought what we needed.

I vividly remember a trip to Aldi (a store that only accepts cash or debit cards, so no fudging on the grocery budget) in the last few months of our student life in which I had a list of about 2 dozen things that I needed to buy for the week- fruits and vegetables, grains, a bit of dairy.  Just as I always do, I separated the needs from the wants, just to make sure that everything necessary was paid for before anything superfluous went into the bag.  And just as I always had to do, about 6 of the things that I wanted- but didn't need- had to be put back for lack of funds.  It wasn't until I was bagging up our groceries (another way Aldi saves you money, but not time or sanity) that I realized I had purchased 2 packs of tortillas.  Two!  24 tortillas when we only needed 12!  I sat for a solid minute and lamented the loss of the spending potential- I could have bought that bunch of bananas or that loaf of bread I put back...  I spent one whole minute berating myself over not being more careful about my purchases.

Tortillas at Aldi are 99 cents.

And that, in a nutshell, illustrates life as a poor starving college student family.  It was hard.  It was live-able, do-able, but every day I was grateful to realize that it was a means to an end.

I also want to remember the countless prayers of gratitude that we said when we realized that another month had gone by and somehow all of our needs were taken care of, even when the numbers didn't add up.

So when I was checking out of the grocery store this last week and the checker asked me what I was doing in Iowa, it was with great pride that I said, "My husband just finished up his PhD and we moved here for his first job".  When he responded, "I hope he has a job that's better than working at Wal-Mart", I just smiled and said, "Yes, but we've certainly had our fair share of Wal-Mart type jobs along the way".  And now I can say we're all stronger because of it.  We survived.

Of course, I still separated my cart between wants and needs.  And yes, I put the Nutella back.  Just because I could.

Goings On

It's been one week since we've arrived in Iowa, and I've finally found a spare moment to sit at the computer to write about it.  The days leading up to our departure were a whirlwind of cleaning and giving away lots of of our stuff.  The night that we dropped our old computer and TV off at the homeless shelter, Leah said, "The rich young man in the Bible has stuff-i-tis.  He wants to keep all of his stuff...  Sometimes I have stuff-i-tis, too.  I love all of my stuff!  I want to keep it all!"  I responded by promising her that we didn't need to keep all of our stuff and that Heavenly Father would always provide the things that we need most if we are willing to show him that we love Him more than we love our stuff.  After years of feeling like we have done our best to "use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without" it was humbling to see how many people needed the couch, lamps, tables, electronics and other items of "stuff" that we were sure had made it to the end of their lives.

We did a lot of cleaning, sorting, and packing, but we also visited with friends and enjoyed a few of our Indiana favorites one more time.

After a long day of packing and loading the truck on Friday, followed by a long evening of cleaning made so much easier by many friends, we spent the night in a hotel.  Saturday was a long day by our own design- we spent the morning at Bucaneer Bay then drove to the home of some dear friends in Illinois.  We stayed there longer than we probably should have then stuffed ourselves back into the car and headed to Iowa.  1:00 church made for a delightfully lazy Sunday morning.  The Easter bunny found us in our hotel room and we had fun telling the true Easter story before heading to church.  Our ward was very kind and receptive- the kids were swept right into Primary and Jason and I enjoyed sitting together for both Sunday School and the third hour meeting.  A kind family invited us to their home for dinner and we got to know two families from the ward- and their 10 kids!- over a delicious homemade dinner.  

Too early Monday morning Jason was picked up by a coworker and headed north for his first day on the job, leaving me to dress and feed the kids, check out of the hotel, check into our new apartment (which we signed for sight unseen- thankfully it is perfectly fine), and welcome our movers into our new place- all by 8 AM.  It was a tender mercy that the particular moving company that moved us had a driver who both packed up our home in Indiana and unloaded the truck after driving it over here.  He knew all of our stuff and what was supposed to go into the apartment and what would be stashed away into the on-site storage.  They made huge mess in the apartment and then drove off smiling and waving, leaving me behind to sort through the piles and piles of boxes with my three little helpers.

The first two days were a fun combination of unpacking, eating out and getting set up in life here (utilities, registering Leah for school, and such), but by the third day I started feeling a bit crazy.  We've been so busy every day, and thanks to a 6:45 departure time for Jason and a 7:55 AM start time for school, we've got to become early risers whether we like it or not.  So we're trying to have as much fun as we can while figuring out our new place- in our apartment, in our state, in our ward and in the school and community.

The kids are having fun torturing our new neighbors with all of their jumps, bumps, and shouts.  They seem to be doing just fine with the overall lack of stuff around to keep them busy, and just as predicted, I am perfectly happy to have less junk around to have to clean up.  There's still plenty of imagination to go around.

Adam was so proud to help Daddy put together the new bunkbeds

and all of the kids spend most of their days climbing up and down and up and down the ladder.

Leah's new classmates and teacher seem delightful.  She is the 15th advanced reader in her classroom, and I'm hoping she will be a bit more challenged (in a good way) than she was before.  She has a love-hate relationship with school but overall seems happy and invigorated when she comes home.  Of course, in the grumpy moments she asks, "Why do I have to do more school?  I already know how to do school!"  She has made lots of friends already and is thrilled that there is a girl in her class that looks just like Cousin Sarah!

Our ward seems friendly- we went to a camp fundraiser last night and got to meet lots of the families in the ward.  Where our last ward was very young kids heavy, this ward seems to have lots more older kids and youth- baby-sitters!  We had a bit of a post-graduate school shock when the bidding for desserts started at $10 and increased by fives- we lost out on our first two choices (each sold for nearly $50) but ended up paying a ridiculous amount of money for a cake decorated like a campfire.  Welcome to post-graduate student life, I suppose.  It was still a very fun night, and we're excited to get more involved in the ward.