Wuv, Twue Wuv...2.0

Two years ago yesterday was the most glamorous day of my life.  I wore the most expensive outfit I have ever owned and had my hair and make-up done by friends.  I then hired a professional photographer to capture one of the most expensive day of my life.  And I loved it all!  Most of all, I loved the man who gave me my most expensive and most glamorous piece of jewelry.  

Now if only the rest of my life was like that...

My second anniversary started with me mumbling "happy anniversary" to Aaron as he left for work before I had even gotten out of bed.  I then proceeded to feed the baby, cook food, do the dishes and try to clean up the house a little.  I then proceeded to repeat that process several times over.  This included sweeping the floor after I got tired of smooshing carrots with my feet.    

After lunch I left to do some shopping!  All my shirts are falling apart and I desperately needed some new ones. I hurried through shopping and over to our new house.  After feeding the baby there and trying to clean up a little, I managed to get in an hours worth of work.  Packing of the baby, I rushed over to my in-laws and went straight home.  

I changed out of my dirty work clothes and rushed to make dinner.  Aaron had requested some lamb which I had never made before. In case you were wondering, lamb is quite expensive coming in around $12/lb.  I guess you only have one second anniversary and it was much cheaper than going to a restaurant.  I also made smooshed new potatoes, roasted zucchini, and corn on the cob.  

After dinner, we headed out to play a romantic game of...miniature golf. 

After getting whooped at golf, I left Aaron choose the dessert.  We ended up gorging ourselves on frozen yogurt before going to pick up the baby.  We dragged ourselves home from our wild partying around 9:30.

Everybody says that the first year of marriage is the hardest.  They lie.  The second year has definitely been much harder.  Not bad, just hard.  We've had so many "new" things.  I quit my job to stay home with the baby which makes me super dependent on Aaron for social interaction.  Aaron started a new position at work with a new branch of the company which is currently requiring him to work a lot of overtime every single week.  We had a baby.  We bought a house that needs a lot of work. 

 

Overall, marriage is great, especially to my husband, but it also requires a lot of work and attention. God is good and has given us a ton of blessings this year.  Also, enjoy your wedding day cause you'll probably never get to be that glamorous again. 

10 MONTHS

Why do I feel the need to post continual updates on my baby?  Well it's not you, it's me.  Seriously.  I'm a lame-o when it comes to writing a baby book for my only child so I put it on here to remember it.  I think that is probably even more lame-o. "Mom, what was I like as a child?"  "I don't remember these things.  Go look my old blog up on the internet and find out.
Now back to the cutie pie.
The other day she was looking so adorable that I just had to try and get some pictures.  This is how they turned out.

She always tries to grab the camera

Or look away right as snap the picture

Or do super weird faces right at the last second

The hands are blurry but we'll take what we can get

She cracks me up

At 10 months:

• She obeys basic commands such as "clap your hands" and "say bye-bye." 
• She acts a little shy around strangers but doesn't usually have a problem with other people holding her.  
• She is completely non-mobile.  I mean completely.  She doesn't even push herself into a seated position and only rolls over on rare occasions.  Part of me loves the fact that she can't get into anything but the other part of me wants to see her crawling and walking.  Last night she did manage to scoot herself around on the kitchen floor though it was mostly accidental.  I guess she just needs a smooth hard surface.  She will definitely be spending a lot of time in the kitchen if that is what it takes for her to learn how to move. 
• She can do the sign language for "eat" and she also used to know how to say multiple words.  She seems to have slightly regressed and only says them on rare occasions.  Kids are so weird.  
• She usually takes 2 morning naps and one afternoon nap.  She also sleeps through the night like a pro.  
• Sometimes when I think she is tired and I put her in her bed, she decides that she would rather stay up and play in her bed.  She can easily amuse herself in bed alone for 30-45 minutes.  I love this child. 
• We love to do krinkly-nosed smiles at each other. 

Our Little Project

As you know from Facebook, we bought a house.  It is a long and sordid tale but I'll give you the quick overview.  Last year over Thanksgiving vacation we decided that we wanted to buy a house.  We promptly called a realtor and started looking at our options.  We were excited because it seemed like there were a fair amount of houses in our price range which was very low.  From December to mid-March we only went inside 3 houses.  No joke.  Our realtor was very good about only looking at houses in a pre-stated budget and he also was very kind to tell us about all the houses we did not want.  The other problem we would run into was the fact that there is a shortage of houses on the market under $250,000.  A house in good condition and in a nice neighborhood in that price range will sell in less than 90 days and probably in just a matter of weeks or even days.  We would excitedly call our realtor and told him about a house we'd seen on the internet.  We learned to expect a phone call the day of our showing to let us know that there had already been a good offer made or the house was even under contract.  About a week before Easter, our realtor told us about a largish house in our price range that was in a desirable neighborhood.  All the other houses in the neighborhood looked great.  However, the house we were supposed to look at was at the bottom of the hill and flooded and it smelled musty and needed a lot of work.  We didn't even look at the whole house.  As we prepared to leave, the realtor told us about one more possibility.  He said that it was vacant so we could go look at it tonight.  We were hesitant but decided to give it a try since we were out anyways.
We really liked it.  Sure the living room walls were a bile yellow and it needed a new water heater but it was definitely the best house we'd looked and it was definitely in our price range.  The house was selling kind of like a silent auction.  Only owner-occupants (no investors) could make bids for the first 30 days and after the time was up then whoever made the highest bid would get the house.  This made the bidding process tricky.  We wanted to bid high enough to get the house but we also didn't want bid more than it was worth.  We actually ended up bidding over the asking price but it was still within our budget and we decided that even if we had to sell it as is, we could probably make a profit.  We made the offer on a Saturday and by Monday we heard that the offer was accepted.  This is where it starts to get tricky.  If you want to buy a house without complications or headaches, I suggest not buying a foreclosed home and not getting a loan.  They sent back our paperwork and asked us to resign it because Aaron forgot to put in his middle initial.  Seriously.  We actually had just about given up and decided to buy the house we are currently living in but then we remembered that we had signed a paper giving the government the option to sue us if we backed out of the contract.  Oops.
After two months of waiting, the closing day finally came.  There was a kerfuffle with the company in charge of selling the house for the government which included them asking our realtor to forge our signature, pay a fine because they failed to look at our closing info in a timely manner, and us having to take a lunch break in the middle of the closing while we waited for the right papers to arrive.  Fortunately, we didn't end up having to pay any extra stupid fees and our realtor was honest enough not to sign anything in our name.  Two months after the original bid, the house was finally ours!
It needs a lot of work but here is a before and during picture to give you an idea of some of the stuff we've been up to.

Knocking out the wall has made a huge difference!  Now we just have to paint the cabinets, install a new fan/light fixture in the living room, smooth over and paint the ceiling, install new flooring and paint the walls and then we can fix up the rest of the house and move in.  

We've only had the keys for a little over a week and we've already knocked out the wall, disinfected the bathroom and kitchen, started the ceiling process, rid the house of hundreds of cobwebs, nearly painted all of the office including the ceiling walls and trim, and planted a small garden.  

That Awkward Moment When...

It is a well known fact that I care very little about my hair do.  More often then not it is just pulled up in a messy bun being held together by one lonesome hair tie.  I'm lucky if I even remember to brush it before leaving the house.  However, I've reached an all time awkward hair low.  No, I'm not referring to my last two attempts to cut my own hair.  I'd rather not talk about those.  I'm talking about this:

There!  Do you see it?  Ok, look a little closer if you dare. 

What in the world is going on with my hair?  I look like a 2 year old who decided to cut their own bangs except for the fact that I didn't cut it!  Ok, so I did cut my hair by myself and it didn't look great, but I didn't cut it there and I would never have cut my hair so short.  Why do I have a whole patch of new hair growing in on the side of my head?  After much thought, I think it is hair regrowing to replace the massive amounts I lost post-baby.  Thanks baby, I love you too.