Multi-Grain Cheerios, Raisin Bran Crunch, Life, Cinnamon Life, Grape Nuts, Grape Nuts Flakes, Rice Krispies, Lucky Charms....
The list goes on. I really love cereal! I've been known to eat it for dinner or lunch. It's not just for breakfast anymore! In pregnancy, its been my favorite late night snack. Yum, yum.
Here's the confusing part- my daughter hates it! Well, she doesn't really know, because she's never tried it. Besides cheerios as a baby, the child won't let a single Krispie pass her lips. AND, on top of that, milk is just about her favorite thing ever. How on earth can you love milk and not like cereal? I've tried bland cereal, sweet cereal, cereal in the shape of her favorite chracters... nothin'. It has baffled me for three and a half years. Seriously.
And then, July 23rd rolled around.
It began with the idea of making Rice Krispie treats. "Sure! I'd love to help," says three-year-old. Which means her eating marshmallows. Then, she moves on to the pre-measured bowl of Rice Krispies... I use my stealthy peripheral vision and watch as she pops her first krispie in her mouth... three-year-old shrugs her shoulders and says, "that's not bad!" Casually, I say, "yeah, they're pretty good, huh?" I feel as though I've got Rice Krispies popping in my heart!! I can resist no longer and start to talk about how she's never tried cereal and I'm so happy that she likes it! She begins shoving handfuls in her mouth.... its a beautiful sight. I pour her a little bowl and give her a spoon... milk? I ask.... no way, mom.
Still, its a step in the right direction.
It's time. It's time that Jeff gets some serious props for all of the hard-work he's been doing around here. Right now there are squeals of joy coming from a 3 year old in the basement playing "soccer ball" with her favorite person ever. Shortly, they will be going to the park and to Taco Bell while I go hang out with my friend. This, after an entire day of nursery painting- where Jeff did lots of stuff he didn't want to do (2nd coat of blue, start of the baseboards, deal with said 3 year old who wants to "watch").
Here's the deal. I'm kind of useless around here lately. Sure, I've got a big baby messin' with some stuff... something is going on with my elbows where I can't do much that requires fine motor skills (i.e. painting). But here's how Jeff responds- I sleep in most days. I started the painting project, painted for maybe an hour, got too tired or painful, and Jeff continued to paint for the next six hours. He's fixed everything around here. I rest on the couch. He's constantly playing with Avery. I play solitaire on the computer. He gets me stuff upstairs all of the time. He's always straightening up the garage and the basement. He's getting his master's degree. He's got to go study. But he doesn't stress and happily paints the nursery.
Gotta go hang with my friend. Hard-worker of the year. Good ole' Jeff.
OK, things are a bit better now! The constant need for repairs has subsided and we're beginning to get unpacked. We still have a major repair and servicing to accomplish- but for now, we needed a bit of a break. We are currently in the midst of getting our hardwood floors refinished. The look pretty awesome! It's quite a process however and requires us to leave our house for several hours per day. Then when we come back- there is much leaping over the entry way floor (quite a feat for someone who will be giving birth next month) and waiting outside for the fumes to clear out. Tomorrow the last coat of the shiny stuff will be applied and the job will be done. We're not supposed to walk on the floors or move our furniture back for another three weeks.
Hmmm, that should be interesting.
Otherwise, we're starting to get to know our new little town. It's pretty fun. It feels a bit like a smaller town, but has all of the stores and restaurants you could ever want! The neighbors are all still really friendly. They hang out with each other a lot! I mean, really....
a lot. Here is what we've witnessed so far- they all keep their
bbq grills in front of their garages, because they seem to grill together all the time- movie projected on a garage with giant speakers- the next night,
Wii video games on said garage- lots of fireworks together- lots of men wearing cut off, sleeveless, t-shirts- did I mention they hang out together a lot?-
tv's in garages with various neighbors watching various shows... I don't know quite what to make of it all yet. I suppose its better than snooty neighbors who don't socialize at all, but maybe is it too much??
The
Eads family came for a quick visit today. That was fun- we haven't seen them or spent serious time with them in a long time. It wasn't ideal circumstances- we couldn't step on the floors and had to entertain the four kids somehow. But some time at the park and some time outside was fun for all!
Someday we'll find our camera and get some pictures up for y'all. Until then, just picture a big mess, lots of boxes, and furniture in random locations. Yup, its our life.
Holy smokes, friends! There's a lot going wrong with our house! It all began yesterday with the closing. A last minute judgement was placed on the house, so closing got pushed back 3 hours (which delayed our poor carpet cleaning guy, who was very gracious). Then it seemed like a lot of stuff wasn't completed by the title company, so there was a lot of needless sitting around while everyone (realtor, mortgage broker, some other guy) talked intensely on their cell phones. Awkward and frustrating.
So, we find our key under a pile of pebbles by the front door (yup, you read that correctly- that's where the listing agent said they'd be-
yay for
foreclosed homes) and discover some things are bad. Air conditioning- apparently almost stolen until our neighbor stopped them at 11:00pm a few nights ago. All of the lines to the unit are cut. Water leaking into the basement from somewhere- discovered from dishwasher- dad can fix. Thank goodness. Faucet spraying water everywhere- dad fixed again- thank goodness they came up here!!! Today, major water pouring into the basement from outside spigot. Haven't even attempted to fix yet. New fridge shows up with major scratch down the side- and barely... and I mean
barely fits into space. Maybe getting new one.
Sheesh!!!!!
Avery's beginning to adjust to the idea of our new house- apparently her toys showing up one by one is helping. Grandma has been awesome at entertaining her! I can't believe we even considered not taking them up on their offer to come up and help with the move! Crazy!
Here's the good news... the nasty carpet got a lot cleaner! The guy did a great job. There are lots of kids on the
cul-
de-sac and it seems like everyone is really, really friendly. Jeff met all of the wives last night as they were all just hanging out outside while the kids played... fun, huh?? I haven't met them yet. There are some girls that are babysitting age too! Its way quieter than our apartment. The new sink and faucet that my dad and Jeff picked out are perfect and looking fantastic! If we decide to keep the fridge- its giant and awesome. Things that are crazy disgusting and dirty and cleaning up nicely...mainly thanks to my ma! There are more screens on the windows than I remembered.
OK, gotta go pack some more!
We're blogging from Indiana! We're much of the way through our two weeks here in the
Midwest and loving every minute of it! We've been to the zoo, children's museum, living history museum, friend's houses, and Jeff has played lots of "spontaneous basketball". Which is apparently better than planned basketball. We've got a weekend full of baby showers for Jeff's sister and then back to Colorado on Tuesday.
I don't have any pictures from our festivities because I'm too lazy to upload them- sorry... soon, though!
Also, for those of you who don't know, we're closing on our house in a week!! We get to move in next weekend! Phew! Can't believe it! We're pretty pumped! Hopefully we'll have some good help- ma and pa Davis are making the trip up from AZ to help so that will be a fun visit and crazy helpful!
So, new poll over at the side... we're getting pretty desperate on the naming-our-kid thing. Not that we don't have plenty of time to decide, I just want to decide... so we're turning to public opinion. Be kind- some of our favorites are a bit out there, but with Smith as a last name, you have to be semi-unique!
Well, we've been lacking in the photo posts lately, so here's some pics to catch up. Erin and Tyler came for a visit this weekend- following Erin's bro's wedding in Colorado Springs. We met them down at Garden of the Gods and had fun on our "adventure" as Avery called it (some tricky wordage to get her to like hiking). Avery posing in crazy wind and by some cool rocks.
Here, Avery is very excited about her bravery in hiking up a rock formation. Very proud (like a peacock- 100 points if you get that reference) and with a grubby face.
Avery and her favorite buddy, Erin...
The fam...
Avery and one of her new favorite buddies, Tyler.
The following are some random pictures of Avery being three. Here, she's playing her tuba- get it... inner tube, but wearing it like a tuba- and she zerberts on it.
Lately, Avery's been really into shoving as many toys as possible into her backpack or purses and then taking all of them with her wherever she goes. Here's us going on a walk recently...
Here's her stash on a recent trip to the mall. Note- blankie, Rocket the kitty, 3 purses and a backpack- just for a trip to the mall.
In other news- for those of you who don't know yet, we'll be visiting the great state of Indiana for the middle two weeks in June. So clear you schedules to hang out with the Smiths!!! We can't wait to see everyone and visit all of the old haunts- Greek's pizza anyone???
So really, the kid's meal at Chik-Fil-A... their "toy" recently was a CD to learn how to speak Italian. It wasn't even one aimed towards kids, just a CD with English and Italian phrases for you to repeat. What a joke, right?? Did they just get a bunch of these donated and decide they could be a toy? Or was this really the brainchild of some big-wig at the company? I thought it would be such a flop...
Boy was I wrong. The day we received it, Avery has been totally in to practicing her Italian. Maybe you won't think its as funny as I do... but it brings to mind one of my favorite scenes from "Friends". Remember when Phoebe was trying to teach Joey how to speak French? I can't even explain it, you just have to see it. Here's Avery's interpretation...
