Catch Up

Posted in CJ, Family, Holidays and Seasons, Isabella/Munchkin by teamtradermom

I still don’t have my bearings yet. I still feel like I’m always running around crazy with a million things yet to do. Some of it’s the new house. Some of it’s work. And really just life.

We had our first Halloween at the new house. It was great. We carved 2 pumpkins this year. I thought Munch would have fun scooping the seeds out but she didn’t really want any part of it.

Samson helped though.

She finally stuck her hand in the bowl of seeds, albeit very briefly.

We let her decide what should be carved on them. I did the ghost one and CJ did the face:

Isabella came to visit me at work and she loaded up on candy there. Her costume was a lady bug this year and we ran in to a little baby also dressed as a lady bug. We had to get the 2 in a pic together!

I can’t believe how grown up Isabella looks next to the little baby. *choke*

We had our families over for dinner on Halloween night (I ordered pizza but also made Jell-o with eyes in it, “mummy dogs” and pumpkin bread) and then took all the kids out trick-or-treating. CJ, my dad and Samson stayed home to hand out the candy and my mom, sister, brother-in-law and I went with the kids.

CJ caught this picture when Isabella was literally in the middle of saying “cheese!”

This was her first year doing “real” trick or treating. Last year we took her to visit a couple neighbors but that was it. This year we hit up several streets. She did not want to walk though so I ended up carrying her most of the way, with my sister and mom taking a turn too. My arms were so tired when we got home. But it was a good chance to meet the neighbors we hadn’t been introduced to yet and score some free goodies!

By the way, CJ and I dressed as “Lady and the Tramp” for Halloween this year. It was a last minute, throw together costume.

That’s my “OMG he is so disgusting” look. And then I fall madly in love with the bum.

For the most part, no one really “got it”. They knew what CJ was but didn’t have a cool how I fit in to the picture. Oh well, maybe we’ll spend more time on it next year.

—

November is my favorite month of the year for several reasons – 1) Our wedding anniversary, 2) my birthday, 3) Thanksgiving 4) Black Friday and 5) the start of the holiday season. Roll all of those up in a ball and you’ve got one frickin’ awesome month!

Today is CJ and my 5 year wedding anniversary. Last year on our 4th, I posted pics of our engagement, wedding and honeymoon. This year I thought I’d post some of us from previous anniversaries.

1 year

So young and really wanting to do it up right. We ate at Mahogany Prime, which was very good, but also very expensive. We spent over $200 on that dinner. That’s ok. We had an amazing night and one we’ll never forget!! Plus I had lobster for the first time!

2 years

Money was tight that year so we made gifts for each other. The traditional gift for the 2nd year is cotton so I made him an origami heart card out of a red bandana and he made me a card out of a pillow case, along with some cotton roses. It was cheesy and corny but so fun!

(Apparently we didn’t take any pics on our 3 year, or at least I can’t find them…)

4 years

I think we look older and wiser here. Note I didn’t say OLD, just oldER. We look like 2 people very happy with their life and how it’s going. I hope we always stay that way.

Happy Anniversary Ceige! Here’s to 5 wonderful years together and many more to come!

Next stop, my 35th birthday!!

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19Oct2011

Random Thought Wednesday

Posted in Health and Weightloss, Isabella/Munchkin, Travel by teamtradermom

Feels like it’s been forever since I wrote anything. I suppose it has been if forever is 5 days. A lot has happened since my last real life entry.

1. I went to Texas. I had never been to Texas before. It’s a pretty big state. You’d think I’d have crossed its borders at some point before last week, but you would be wrong. I was sent to Forth Worth for work.

Leaving Omaha:

Arriving in DFW:

The flight out was fine but the cabbie I got to take me in to the office was a jackhole. He made me load my own bag, enter my the address in the GPS, applied deodorant while driving and then had me unload my own bags. Really dude?

My stay was decent. Generally, work trips involve working hard all day and drinking all night. Not this one. No one involved in the meetings wanted to go out so I had to make my own party. I called upon a co-worker who’s based out of FW and he shuttled me around, showing off the highlights (if by highlights you count a Mexican restaurant in Roanoke, a sports bar in one of the suburbs and a pub in downtown). But we had fun chatting, drinking and watching the Rangers kick some Tiger butt so it was all good.

Turns out Fort Worth isn’t all that different from Omaha. They’re both spread out, built around the slaughterhouses, and have a lot of construction going on. FW is just twice as big. And for the record, I didn’t see any cowboy hats – not one!

The drive back to the airport I was able to get a car service and that driver was awesome. In his spare time he works security for Cowboy Stadium so we had a LOT to talk about. He’s originally from Kansas City and is a huge Chiefs fan. CJ and I plan to go down to KC in November for the Chiefs/Steelers game so I told Willy we’d look him up. He invited us to his families tailgating party. I guess they do it up right with all kinds of BBQ and what not. Count me in Willy! Just don’t get mad when the Steelers kick some KC butt!

2. We finally got all our stuff from storage. For the record DO NOT EVER HIRE MAYFLOWER SELECT VAN AND STORAGE TO DO YOUR MOVE! They cheated and stole from us. So, we hired Two Men and a Truck to do the storage move. They showed up 5 hours late. Poor CJ was parked out at the storage place that whole time waiting for them. But at least they apologized and gave us a break on the cost. That was appreciated.

3. I’m pretty sure our little child genius did subtraction the other night. It was time for bed and she told me she was going to bring 3 of her stuffed animals with her. When she got to the stairs and looked up she realized it might be challenging to climb up all those steps with her 3 friends in tow. So she handed me one and said, “Here mommy, you take one. That leaves me with 2.” I just stared at her for a minute while I did the math on my fingers and realized she was right.

4. Tonight we hung Halloween lights in the front windows – ghosts, bats, pumpkins and skulls. She was helping and when we were all done, I turned off the lights and when she saw them all lit up she said, “Wow! That’s perfect!” I love how in awe kids are of the little things. Things we take for granted.

5. I bought a boot camp package today – it’s a one month trial thing. I’m looking forward to the challenge. I need a challenge. All my workout gear is still packed up and so need something different to energize me. I think this just might do the trick. Plus it includes a pre and post fitness assessment. I’m really curious for my results!!!

6. My Fantasy Football team is totally tanking this year. Oddly, I’m not all that upset about it. We started bad and never got any better so I’ve accepted it and moved on.

Well, time to head down and chillax for a bit until bed. 5 am comes awfully fast!

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2Oct2011

Home Sweet Home

Posted in House and Home, Isabella/Munchkin by teamtradermom

My feet are sore. My back is achy. Our laundry is an ever growing pile in the corner of the room. This is our new home, and I love it.

The last 4 days have been a whirlwind. There’s so much to share that I’m not sure I can recount it all in true justice. I had planned to document each moment of the day in photos but that lasted as far as 2 pics and then the whirlwind took over. So here’s the nutshell.

Wednesday, 9/28/11:

Late afternoon: discover that the relocation company the sellers of our new house are using (NEI Global – evil!!) is causing issues, thereby preventing us from closing on our house the next morning as planned.
Evening and in to the night: packing and more packing

Thursday, 9/29

Wake up early, more packing.
Find out there is still no word on when we’ll close on the house.
We take Isabella and drop her off at Owen’s house. She’ll spend the day there, stay the night and spend the next day. She says good-bye to each room before we leave. This will be her last time ever seeing this house. Bittersweet.
Come home and spend the whole day packing and cleaning (rinse and repeat) with the help of my mom.
Stop for dinner then go to the new house where we sneak in to clean and lay plastic runners on the carpet.
Still no closing time.

Friday, 9/30

It’s Isabella’s birthday. We won’t see her until about 6pm. That makes me sad but I know it’s for a good reason.

Mayflower movers come at 8:30 (half an hour late).

Find out they won’t take many items so we scramble to start loading up my SUV. I end up making 3 trips out to the new house with stuff the movers won’t take. I had not planned on that. Get back to find out the truck is full and they are done with the house. However, they have no more room and were supposed to empty out our storage facility too. I’m pissed.
Movers break for lunch (neither CJ or I would eat anything until 6:30 that night). We frantically clean to try and get out and meet moves at the new house in an hour. CJ leaves while I finish. Movers take an extra long lunch.
Can’t fit all the cold/frozen food in our coolers so I decide to make 2 trips. As I’m heading out on trip #1 I get the call that the closing will be at 4pm. It’s now 2pm. I have to get my car load of stuff to the new house, empty it, get lunch, stop by the bank for a cashier’s check, go to the old house and finish getting the food, plus vacuum, stop and pick up my mom, take her to the new house, pick up CJ and get to the title office by 4pm. No problem!

Of course I run in to construction, super long lines at the bank, a teller who is in training, and bratty kids standing in the middle of the street! I literally threw the food from the fridge in to the coolers and ran out to the car, dragging the vacuum with me, not bothering to use it. Got to our house at 3:50 and we made it to the title office at 3:58. Phew!
Closed on the house – it’s now ours!
Came home and tried to get Munchkin’s room ready before she arrived. Finished just in time. She was so happy to see us and be in the new house. She loved it! We ate dinner with our friends and then all crashed in to bed.

Saturday, 10/1

Unpacked, unpacked, unpacked.
Celebrated Isabella’s birthday with family

Sunday 10/2

Unpacked, unpacked, ran errands, stopped by storage, unpacked
Wrote this post
Will pay bills and get ready for work
Then crash

The move did not go as smoothly as hoped. The movers were late, couldn’t take many things, underestimated the size of truck that would be needed and couldn’t get our storage items, took a long lunch, lied to my mom about the time (she had to write the check b/c we were at closing when they finished) and kept (stole?) CJ’s 6 foot step ladder. You can be damn sure they will be getting a call from me tomorrow demanding they send a truck out to move our storage stuff for free. And to replace the ladder.

But aside from that, we got in and are slowly getting settled. We all love it here. Still getting used to having another level and all this extra space, which is a good problem to have.

Operation Dream Home – complete!!

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28Sep2011

Twas the night before closing…

Posted in House and Home, Isabella/Munchkin by teamtradermom

…and all through the house, there were many projects to do, for me and my spouse.

That’s right. Tomorrow we close on both houses and then we move everything out of the old one on Friday. It will be a whirlwind of papers and signatures and cleaning and packing and more. It’s bittersweet. While I’m SUPER excited to be in our new, bigger beautiful house, I’m also a bit sad to leave this one. I didn’t think I would be, given the old appliances, cramped hallways and never ending items to fix. But this is the place that CJ and I first called home. It was our first place that we got together. The one where we came to as husband and wife. The yard where we first chased Samson. The sanctuary where we brought home our new little baby. We’ve had a lot of great moments here and a lot of sad ones too. Though this was never meant to be our forever house, it will forever hold a place in our hearts.

Tonight is Isabella’s last here. Tomorrow morning she’s off to spend the next 2 days and 1 night with her boyfriend Owen (in separate cribs of course). Our dear friends have offered to take her so that CJ and I can focus on getting both houses in order. We’ve talked a lot about moving and she loves the new house. But of course she doesn’t fully understand it all. Tomorrow when she leaves, it’ll be for good.

So, tonight we walked to her favorite park down the block. We went there almost every night of the Spring and Summer. I thought she’d like to say good-bye.

We rode all her favorite rides. When I asked her what she’d miss, she said, “All the teeter-totters! Aaaaaand the garbage cans!”

Okie dokie.

She even rode on the rocking horse – a ride that she’s always been afraid of. How appropriate that she finally decide to tackle it on her last night here.

(That’s the look of ‘dear god stop taking my picture’. She was saying, “No more cheese!” because I kept urging, “Say cheese! Say cheese!”)

We even left a little good-bye note to the park.

This will be my last post for a while. I’ll be too busy with moving stuff to blog – though I may post a pic or 2. The next time I sit down to write, it’ll be from my new house! Yippee!!

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