Bits and Pieces

My brain is on overload right now. Here are some bits and pieces of what's going on:

1. The meeting with all involved for the mess with our house went well. Work should commence on Wednesday. They are removing and reinstalling the windows, doing something with the balcony and stucco to fix holes and drainage problems, redoing the tile floors in the upstairs bathrooms, and changing the tile in the playroom to wood. Oh, and fixing the damp and missing drywall downstairs. This means more construction. I'm tired of construction.

2. It's supposed to rain again tomorrow and Wednesday morning. Another inch. Good thing the gutters went up today. But more towels to wash for the leaky windows.

3. Jacob has been vomiting off and on since Tuesday evening. We had to take him in to urgent care yesterday due to some dehydration. He was doing really well, and then today he puked again. I'm tired of puke. We get to go back to the doctor tomorrow.

4. John's birthday is tomorrow. I have nothing planned. I feel really bad. I wanted to make the day special, but with everything else going on (rain, puke, construction, etc.) it just hasn't happened. And now Jacob and I can't even make a cake because Jacob can't eat it.

And because this post is just too depressing, here is a random smattering of photos that I've found.


If only he could eat like this now.


This boy loves trucks and machines.


And tractors, too.


This boy loves his Papa (and his Papa loves him).


Jacob received the play dough and rolling pins for Christmas, and sat at this little table in my mom and dad's kitchen for over an hour, playing with the new stuff. Occasionally, we call out, "How you doing, Jacob?" And we'd hear a little voice, "I'm good."


Just remember, babies are smarter than you think. This attempt to keep Aaron out of the toilet did not work.

Dinnertime

Have we ever mentioned...



...that this beautiful child...



...loves to eat?



Because he loves to eat!

Friday Wrap-up

It's been a big week, so I figured I'd just review it, bullet-point style. And no, I still haven't used the camera once since Christmas. I know. Shame on me. But after you read this list, maybe you'll forgive me (at least for this week).

* It's been raining for six straight days. And it's probably going to rain some more in the wee hours of tomorrow morning. Total rainfall so far (not including today): 4.9 inches

* Our house is still not watertight. We had 3 doors and 4 windows leaking. 2 of the doors got fixed. The roof is still holding as far as we can tell. (Praise God!)

* Turns out that the biggest reason 1 door and 3 windows are leaking is because of improper drainage and hidden holes in the stucco behind the balcony off of our master bedroom. The other reason the windows are leaking is because they were installed improperly.

* We now have another hole in the drywall, this one above the one leaking door to confirm that the balcony and holes in the stucco are the cause of the leakage. I'm so tired of holes in drywall.

* Jacob, Aaron, and I all had the stomach flu yesterday. Poor Jacob had it the worst.

* I washed 8 loads of towels this week.

* Jacob didn't get to go to school at all this week. But he did take 3 baths yesterday.

* I didn't go to MOPS this morning.

* Jacob watched The Little Mermaid from start to finish twice this morning. I was nursing Aaron in another room when it finished the first time and wasn't able to turn it off. After it started up again, and he looked so tired and forlorn, I didn't have the heart to tell him it needed to be turned off so he could go play. He didn't have the energy to play.

* John is amazing and stayed home from work yesterday to help me.

* John discovered yesterday that much of our tile has been improperly installed onto particle board.

* We have a meeting tomorrow with our real estate agent, the guy who sold us the house, his contractor who did all of the work before he sold it, and a contractor we trust. We are praying that all that needs to be fixed in our house can be worked out and fixed correctly and quickly.

More Christmas fun

Mandi and I were going through some more of the Christmas pictures/videos and found this gem. Jacob was reading "Brown Bear" to us:



As luck would have it, we also stumbled upon this video from when he was only 16 months old, trying to read the exact same book. He only knew "hi", "mama" and "daddy," so the rest was improvised. What a difference a year and a half can make. (He starts reading at about 0:25.)

Jacob the Musician

Mandi's brother Josh grabbed the camcorder and recorded this video back in September. (I finally managed to dump the camcorder onto the computer and upload the video... time flies over the holidays, when you're moving, when your house is falling apart, etc.) Jacob is learning how to put on a good show:



What a goose!

(NOTE: right now all posts display as if Mandi posted them, but this is John. I'll try to figure out a fix for that soon...)

Christmas Pictures- 3 Weeks Later

I finally took the camera out of the bag and uploaded all the photos from Christmas morning. John must have been manning the camera all morning because I'm in a bunch of photos, and he's not in a single one.

Aaron says, "Merry Christmas!"



What's in your stocking, Jacob?



A recorder and a candy cane (give 'em the candy right away, deal with the sugar rush, and whatever they don't eat, throw away as soon as they are not looking)!



Jacob and Aaron open their present from Molly. I love the matching pajamas. They also wore matching shirts to church. (Thanks, Grandma Cindy! But no pictures, bummer.)



"Hey guys, what is all this new stuff?"



The boys playing with some new toys after the floor mess is cleaned up.



Jacob looks so grown up in this picture (sans the Christmas footy pajamas).

We're Redecorating!

What do you think?

(Still some fine tuning, but mostly done. I'll tell you all about the amazing person who has been doing this for us later.)

Change is Coming!

I've been in a bit of a funk lately. I'm still trying to find my footing after the holiday crazies and construction zone mess. Plus, we are really trying to work through Aaron's sleep issues, deal with Jacob's favorite word (no!), and gear up for the coming weeks of birthdays and traveling. And, I actually made New Year's Resolutions this year, so I'm trying to be diligent and work on those. This is why there are no Christmas pictures up yet. In fact, I don't think the camera has even come out of the bag since I got home from Paso.

However, I hope to rectify my blog neglect in the near future.

Because I saw something this morning that made me squeal with excitement and dance with joy.

And it's coming.

Here.

Soon.

Woohoo!