oh hello again

Clearly, I am excellent at keeping up with blogging recently.  But really, not a ton has been going on.  We continue to unpack (sort of..we kind of lost interest) and continue about our daily lives. 

Since last blogging-- this is slightly embarrassing-- we had a wonderful Thanksgiving with Jesse's mom's side of the family.  It was the first time that everyone had been able to get together since the summer of 2010, and that's always a good time.  As an added bonus, Jesse, Lily and I got to spend a few days with Matt, Erin, Mom and Dad H.  We went to see some Christmas light show with everyone, and Jesse's favorite part of that was when he took Lily and showed her a nativity scene and told her the story of Jesus' birth.  She was fascinated and got upset when they walked away, so he took her back and told it to her again.  

This past weekend, Lily and I took a girls trip up to Findlay to see our friend that flew in from Alaska JUST to see us.  Ok, not really, she really came back to this side of the country for Thanksgiving..but whatever.  We were thrilled to see her and a handful of other friends.  The time went too fast for as much time as we spent in the car, but isn't that how it always is?  Since it was just the two of us, I left with the intention of her napping in the car.  Hah.  For reasons unknown to me, she decided to be difficult (probably gets that from her dad) and sleep only half an hour of the 5 hour drive there and then had a repeat performance on the way home.  Which was super because she has a cold and was just exhausted. She just wanted to tease me apparently and stay awake the whole time.  Poor little girl, she's been kind of miserable when she gets up and when she goes to bed, so hopefully we knock this cold out soon.  After we'd been in the car yesterday-- where she cried for the last hour because she was tired and just wanted to be held-- she went to bed early.  Or so we tried.  I was tired and crabby, and when I tried our normal bedtime routine, she wanted nothing to do with it and just cried and cried.  So we ended up rocking for a good while and she calmed down instantly as soon as I picked her up.  I then felt terrible, since I had asked her to just ride unhappily for at least an hour and then ignored the one thing she wanted: to be held for awhile.  We talked and I apologized and then we cuddled for 30 minutes while she quieted down and fell asleep on my chest.  Sometimes it takes something like that to remind me that she won't be small forever, and one day she'll be 16 (ugh) and not want me to rock her and hold her.

On a lighter note- sorry for my sentimental tangent- tonight, Jesse took Lily up to the tree and asked, "has Momma told you the story of the Christmas tree?"  To which Momma said ....what?  So he proceeded to tell her the story: Well, long ago when Jesus was born, he was born in a manager.  That's where they feed the animals in the barn.  There was probably a tree next to it, and so that is where we get the Christmas tree!

...this is why my kids don't need a made up story of Santa.  Daddy makes up his own stories that are way better.  

Go check out my other blog where I'm (kind of) keeping up with pictures!

carpe diem

For me to say I haven't felt like blogging has been an understatement: I REALLY haven't felt like it.  I've just been tired and lazy, even though I have time in the evenings.  So my apologies, I will give a quick synopsis on my last week or so.

We moved!  HOORAY!  NO more renting for us, we finally moved into our own home :) which means if you want my address, send me an email, text, call or message on Facebook.  And hopefully this week we will be getting our cell phone booster, so we should get cell service out here, but we have a landline regardless.  See above for ways to ask me for that number as well if you don't already have it.  We had told our landlady we would be out by last Monday, and the over-achievers we are got that rental house cleaned out and up by Sunday.  bam.  Big thanks to the H parents for helping out with that.  Of course we forgot to forward our mail to the new house, so we had to go back today to pick up whatever mail trickled through.

before we got our bed frame in the house, Lily decided to help unpack by climbing up onto the mattress and throwing everything onto the floor.

Our new house is obviously a mess.  We got carpet on Tuesday, and pretty much as soon as the installer people left, we set up Lily's room.  First of all, it was important because the poor kid hadn't been sleeping well at nights with all the changes and being in the pack 'n' play, so getting her space organized into something she recognized was a must.  And secondly, because we had rented up until now and we didn't want to paint a rental house, I finally got to decorate my kiddo's nursery :) which was super fun for me, even though I was a year later than most parents do it.  I love it and I think it's my favorite room in our house because we specifically went and picked out the furniture in her room, as opposed to piecing it together from craigslist, garage sales, hand me downs, etc.

Lily LOVES the decals that her great-grandparent's gave her, and I promise the colors look better in person and I didn't pick a pea green for my daughter's wall..

Living as far out as we do will take me some getting used to, but I love it.  No noise or light pollution, and if you go out on our porch, you can hear the little creek babbling across rocks.  Additionally, you can also hear the deer you spooked stamping the ground and snorting.  Note that I said "hear" not "see" because it is pitch black.  And even though you know they are just deer, and WV deer at that (aka tiny compared to Ohio deer), in your mind, they are the size of Clydesdales that are not friendly and that will pummel you into the ground if you don't have a flashlight to see them.

Jesse is loving it out here though, and has already gone squirrel hunting up in the trees.  And since he missed both them of them and was annoyed by this, he then went out into our meadow today to sight in his rifle.  While we were all out there (Lily was in the backpack, don't worry, not just running around while we had guns out), Zeke found a dead deer.  Fortunately, he's a pansy and naive about such things because he just wanted to sniff it and get close, but we wouldn't let him.  I know it's natural for dogs to eat meat, but no thank you, I don't need my dog getting into a fresh and nasty deer carcass.  I was afraid he'd found it before, but I figured if that'd been the case, not even a hurricane could get him away from it.  Needless to say, dog, Lily and I went back inside while Jesse did some shooting.

That's about it I guess..

Updated! I don't have a creative title, so this is it.

Hi!  I'm not even sure where to being today.  I've been wanting to blog and everything for a few days and get caught up, but life continues to be busy, laundry remains undone and we are still in the process of moving.  Yay.  A week from tomorrow we officially will be out of this rental house and into our new house!  So if you want my new address, send me an email, private message on FB, text, call, snail mail...well, probably not that, it could get lost.  You get the idea.  

Everything at the house is coming along pretty well.  The painting is done.  We get carpet on Thursday-- wish it was already done, but at least we're getting it before we actually have to be moved out of here.  If our phone/internet people don't deliver tomorrow, they will be getting a very upset and potentially nasty phone call from me.  We ordered their services on 10/7.  And what is today and we still have nothing?  10/30.  If we had another option, we'd go with them, but this provider is the only one out there.  And incredibly unprofessional and disorganized in my opinion.  Anyway.  I will let you know if they deliver or I have to start yelling. 

As a sidenote-- BIG shout out to the friends of ours who have helped watch Lily while we move over the past few weeks..it's been incredibly helpful knowing she's in good hands somewhere else and I won't be tripping over her as I carry boxes so big I can't see my toes and don't constantly have to be watching to make sure she's not in the street or smearing my freshly painted wall.  Especially the Chanell/Jodi/Sands Family team!  Lily has gone to soccer games, football games, played in mud puddles, eaten who knows what and been loved on like one of their own.  The other day when I picked Lily up, she didn't want to go!  She kept crying and wanting to go back to Chanell.  If it wasn't so funny, the momma bear in me might have started to cry that my little 13 month old didn't want to go home with me for the first time.  I even tried the whole tactic of picking up all our stuff, walking to the door and telling Lily "bye!!"  And she just happily waved from Chanell's arms.  Little jerk.  We ended up leaving with a kicking and crying little Lily.  Needless to say, the adults were all highly amused.  

I will one day post the daily pictures of Lily..maybe later today.  

She's doing well, though.  Neither of us are feeling the greatest, but that's ok.  She has a handful of teeth at least moving around if not coming through in her mouth, so she's been tired, cranky, snotty, coughing and all kinds of happily teething baby.  I just have a cold :/  lame.

But for now, pictures from our Pumpkin Carving Extravaganza!

Fi got a piece of the pumpkin and was content 

little goober eventually loved this.  once she realized she could chew on the pumpkin..thanks to Mom H for the inspiration on this pumpkin/kid idea!

Lily walked over and I thought it was sweet she was going to love on Fiona. 

then no...no, we all realized that it was the bow she wanted

putting it in the pumpkin for safe keeping

Lily's turn!

 And for those of you who remember last year...my poor kid is going to detest pumpkins forever.  Here she is exactly one month old...crying again.

Oh!  And I have my phone back, so for those of you texting/getting ahold of me on Jesse's phone, you can start using my number again.

oi.

Hello :)

I know that I already posted about the race weekend, so I don't have to cover that in this post.  But I don't remember what all I need to catch you up on.  

Professional pictures from the race have been posted online, and honestly, I wasn't impressed.  I think it was probably my fault because of where I had my number..the totally awesome pictures of me probably couldn't be identified to me.  Lame.  And the one of me crossing the finish...you can see my top half in the lower corner.  There is a good one of Jess and me, but none of Jess, Dad and me, so I was kind of bummed.  We apparently didn't all look like we went together.  Oh well, next time!  But for the record, because no one will ever see this apparently, around mile 10, some photographer got an excellent picture of Dad and Jess laughing at me as I took a flying leap to pose for the camera.  My body screamed at me for the last 3.1 miles, but I'm sure it was worth it.

Jen and I went to get pedicures today.  This is officially the way I end all of my trainings and races.

House update: we're getting there.  We were hoping to get carpet this week so we could begin moving in and making our house look like a home.  This is not the case, as the carpet we wanted would take 10-13 working days..and then they weren't even available to install it until the middle of November.  what.  We told our landlady we'd be out Nov 7.  This was not acceptable, so we picked a different carpet that is in stock and should be able to be installed quicker.  Keep your fingers crossed.  Regardless, Jesse and I are moving (hopefully) a bunch of our stuff this weekend and will just put the essentials upstairs and probably most of it in the basement.  We have painted and prepped the floors for carpet and changed a few of the light fixtures/fans.  Additionally, we are plotting the various other personalizations we want to make to make this really ours.  

Painting was a really big deal to me.  In case you didn't know, Jesse and I will be married for 4 years this December.  And this will be our 5th move.  I know other people have moved more, but that's a lot for me.  And every place we've lived has had white walls.  While we've been "allowed" to paint..really..are we going to paint a place we're not planning on staying for at least a few years?  No.  And so, I kind of always have had in my mind that when we have a place that is OURS, I will paint and put color on the walls, indicating that this is ours.  We're not going anywhere, and we finally have a permanence.  Might not make sense, but that's why I'm very grateful Jesse was willing to let me paint a few rooms before we moved in.  

Lily.  My little crazy continues to impress me.  She's trying really hard with a few words-- this, wasthis, 'ffffff' (fish), Zzzzzz (Zeke and all dogs), kkkk (kitty), Momma, Dadda and according to Chanell and a few witnesses, dog.  We'll see, Chanell, we'll see.  My favorites are still the signing.  She correctly signs 'more,' 'please,' 'up,' and 'all done.'  We're working on 'drink' and 'thank you.'  I am loving this and I really  hope we can continue teaching it to her.  Ideally, I'd love to learn it myself so I can continue to teach her myself as she gets older..we'll see!  

That's all I can think of!  Check out my other blog for pictures because I don't have any special for this post.

Race Weekend Recap!

Well.  I can honestly say I am glad this weekend is over.  I love seeing and spending time with my family of course, but hopefully I can now focus on moving into our house and not have to worry about getting training runs in for the half marathon. Which seriously took a back seat for the past two weeks.  I'm not sure I can even say I was "training" but it was more of a "oh..I should go for a run sometime this week.  At least once.." It was a sad attempt.  

All that being said, I am very pleased with how Jess, Dad and I did in the race!  Lily and I took off Saturday morning for Columbus to meet my family and extended family (aka the Church's and Michal and Jill) at the race expo.  Lily was a champ and cooperated pretty well for an excitable one year old, switching between being carried around in my backpack and on a leash.  Yes, we have one of those for her.  Let me tell you what, judge if you want but I love it.  And I know people were chuckling and making comments, but she was ecstatic that I was letting her walk around and I had the peace of mind knowing she wasn't going to get far away.  I actually heard a few people say that it was a good idea..clearly they were parents.

I hadn't really thought about what I was undertaking by going on a 3 hour drive to a bigger city I don't know, down town, and trying to a) find somewhere to park, b) haul a silly little girl and enough distractions with us to the expo, and c) find my family.  I had a small freak out moment but quickly got over it.  Mom, Kimmy and Joel were HUGE helps during the race (thanks, guys!).  This morning, we all got out of the hotel fairly smoothly and off to the race and let me tell you what, it was windy.  And chilly.  

As is becoming our (brilliant) tradition, Dad, Jess and I ducked out of the herd of runners once we got moving to go for one last bathroom break.  All the runners are so focused on getting going and crossing the start line that the bathrooms are allllll vacant and there are no lines.  Perfect time to go.  And probably the most amusing part of the day took place at this point: for those of you who don't know, when a marathon starts, clothes go flying.  If you don't have a support crew you can toss your sweatshirt to, you throw your hoodie or long sleeved shirt on the ground and off you go.  Well, Jess, Dad and I all had dropped our stuff with Mom and were pretty chilly.  So when I go into the lovely port-a-potty, I noticed there was a long sleeved shirt about my size hanging on the back of the door.  It smelled like perfume and was my size, so I "borrowed" it.  Dad thought that was a good idea, so he "borrowed" a fabulous, baby blue sweatshirt with snowmen on it.  Jess and I wish he had kept it, but he tossed it once he warmed up.  We like this tossing business because we didn't lose anything of ours, and the clean up crews go and gather the clothes for the homeless, typically.  

Anyway.  We ran.  And ran.  And ran.  And ran farther for good measure.  We saw Mom, Kimmy, Joel and Megan at one point...and kept going.  Oy.  13.1 miles is far.  But Richard went 26.2, so I shouldn't complain.  

I was quite pleased with our time.  I felt we were going at a good speed, and our/my official chip and finishing time was 2:25.33.  I realize that's slow for some of you, but our goal was to finish and that we did!  I was curious to see what my other race times were, since I didn't remember, so I shall now share.  With a slightly ashamed face for a few of them. 

First race: PF Chang's, Rock 'n' Roll- Phoenix, AZ 2:23.44 ((...and it was my PR)

Second race: go! St. Louis- St. Louis, MO 2:36.42 ((16 weeks pregnant))

Third race: Nashville Country Music- Nashville, TN 2:46.10 ((this one was tough for me, I cramped very badly))

and today's race

Fourth race: Nationwide Insurance Columbus- Columbus, OH 

and, if we count the marathon relay...that would really make today's race #5.

Anyway.  I DEFINITELY prefer running with people.  I ran the St. Louis half with Dad, and with Jess and Dad today.  You can see how well I did by myself running in Nashville.  So, if anyone wants to run (slowly) a race with me...let me know!! :)

Our Scoop Up Crew was busy with Lily today, so I don't have any pictures yet.  I'm hoping I can get one or two off the website once they post them..we had some pretty spectacular poses.  

Oh, and Jesse didn't go with me this weekend.  Did I cover this?  It was a last minute decision, we weren't overly thrilled about it, but it was for the best.  We're both concerned about getting all the fixing things done at the house before we can really get to moving and get carpet laid, so he worked at the house all weekend.  I'm not sure who had more fun..

That's it!  I will post more of a life update *maybe* tomorrow..life has been crazy with trying to get things done at the house and running all over the place.  I promise I will be a better friend/family member next month. 

and life goes on

Life continues to move along quickly and without even a second to catch my breath, it seems like.  I got a text from our Realtor on Tuesday asking if we were free on Friday to close.  YES PLEASE.  We only put an offer on our house back in July, had to extend the contract 3 times...YES.  You just name the time and place, we're there.  So, we are officially homeowners!  We're incredibly excited to finally have an end to our renting days in sight.  We spent the rest of our day yesterday going to Lowe's and perusing paint swatches, decorating ideas, strolling through the carpet and appliances sections..well.  Jesse did.  Lily and I walked all over, eating graham crackers and touching everything with an interesting texture.

We originally thought that we'd be moving into the Dark Ages when we bought this house: going back to the times of landlines, no cell service or internet.  Turns out, we'll have everything.  Landline, high speed internet, and through the excellence of technology (Jesse is still looking into this), it appears we'll be able to get some little something to boost our cell coverage through the internet, so we should have cell phone service.  Yay!  Other than that, we have one room all prepped for painting already, utilities are switched, we have someone scheduled to come measure for carpet...we're ready to move!  We'll be taking our time, over the course of the month, but we're ecstatic.  Everyone keeps saying "now the work begins" and "oh, home ownership, you have to do everything yourself."  True..but we've been renting since we got married and have had to rely on other people to fix our stuff or had to deal with landlords who didn't really care about things, so important issues didn't get resolved.  If there's a problem, we fix it.  It might be annoying, but we don't have to wait around and wait for someone else's schedule to work with ours.  We.are.over.renting.

I could go on and on about how excited we are, but I will refrain.  Just know that once we're moved in, everyone is invited to come stay with us.  This will be a lovely surprise for Jesse when he reads this update...hehe love you!  We'll even look into sharing a pair of overalls with you, because we'll be in the country!

In other news...Lily continues to amaze me.  As I was telling a friend, I didn't ever realize before we had her how quickly a personality develops or how smart they are!  She absolutely cracks me up.  Today was ridiculous, as per usual in my family.  It was loads of fun, tons of driving here, there and everywhere, but a highlight of the day: Lily was sitting in her seat while we waited in the car for Jesse at the gas station and she was fussing a bit.  Jesse had run in to grab us some teas and a pack of crackers for her and when I opened the crackers I did my usual, "what do you say, Lily?  Please?" and I turn around and she is perfectly and flawlessly signing "more" to me.  Fine, not please like I had asked, but I was so ecstatic I about gave her the whole pack.  She's been sort of signing some, but the "more" looks more like clapping, but it was perfect today, just like I showed her.  I taught her something and I couldn't believe that feeling.  I can't wait until I can teach her to read and tie her shoes..

Then, when we were at her house and I was wiping walls down for painting (where she also grabbed a rag and was "wiping" the walls down, too), she was walking around and I looked at her and said "Lily, go get your doll, bring it here" and she looked on the floor, looked at me, then toddled out of the room, returning a second later with her doll.  My little cookie is so smart.

Ok, enough boasting about my kid.  It's my blog though, and you chose to read it..

Betsy and I decided yesterday that we'd walk a 5k.  Because that's just no biggie with 5 kids between the two of us..obviously most of them are hers.

 The kids did great, and Kayla even got second in her age group!

As we were leaving, we passed the nice guy selling HUGE pumpkins, 3 for $15.  So Betsy bought a few..

With Logan carrying one, and both of us carrying babies, we were able to get all the pumpkins to the car in one trip.

Everything else is going great.  We're excited to move and have a place of our own.  The weird thing is, I just got off the phone with my cousin and he and his wife closed on their new home the same day we did!  So congratulations to you two!

Relay Recap

I really should be cleaning and doing dishes.  But I really don't feel like it, so I decided blogging was a much better option.  Or a nap.  Fall days are just begging for a nap to be taken..I may oblige.

This past weekend we all headed to Findlay for the marathon relay we were doing there.  I'm not sure how everyone felt about it, but I think the general consensus was that the idea behind a relay was good I at least am glad we did it.  But overall, I think none of us were huge fans.  Joel did better than he thought he would and didn't die, so that was a huge perk.  However, since he ran the first leg, everyone else had to wait at their relay changing stations.  Which wouldn't have been awful except that it was really cold.  And some of us-- like me who ran the final stretch and waited for 3 hours-- had to wait outside/in the van for a really long time and then run with cold muscles.  We did it though, and finished around 4:09.  Because it was a marathon, there were water stops very frequently which was nice but I didn't need as much as I took I'm sure.  I had a Hammer Gel pack the last mile, because it was the last mile and it wasn't going to mess my race up.  Anybody out there have any experience with these?  I normally do the Shot Blocks and like them, but I thought I would try the gel...weird.  It'd take some getting used to.

getting her shoes ready for race day

sharing ice cream with Milly and Poppa

and he's off!

Jess wrapping up the second leg

Dad and Richard: Richard ran after Jess, then kept going to finish the race (15 miles).  Dad's leg was after Richard's, but they ran together before I finished us off.

resting.  cheering is hard work.

here we come!  Jess met me at the end and handed Lily off to me.   since I had just run, I really appreciated running the last 100 feet carrying a 22lb brick.

yay!

whole gang: runners and Scoop Up Crew.  Mom and Jess made all the shirts :)

you might be confused about Kimmy.  but Jesse is providing the antlers and Jess and I are helping her with the fangs.

Other than that, the weekend went way too quickly.  Jesse and I decided we would drive over Saturday morning instead of Friday evening like we normally do because of the kittens.  We didn't want to leave them to fend for themselves for the whole weekend while they are still so little.  After we arrived in Findlay, we stopped by the house to see Joel and Kimmy, grabbed some lunch then headed to go see Mama and Poppy for awhile :) I didn't remember to take my camera in, which is annoying, but it was good to see them and spend some time with them.  Lily even got to go on a ride with Mama on her new electric scooter and honk the horn.  She wasn't overly enthused yet, but we know she will be in a year or so and we won't be able to get her off it!

lasagna.  she wouldn't smash a cake, but lasagna she was allllll over.  hmph.

Our animals are all doing fine.  Zoey and Spock are still adorable, and my theory is that if they're going to hold still long enough for Lily to pick them up, so be it.  She seems confused by them, and doesn't quite grasp that they're alive I think.  She will pick one up, walk around a bit and get distracted by something, so she will set the kitty down and go to play with whatever the distraction was.  When Lily is done, she will then turn to pick the kitty back up who is long gone, obviously.  We've been rather entertained by all of this.

That's it for now I guess!