January so far

With packing and moving and fixing things at the old and new house, it has been pretty stressful over here. For the two weeks between closing on the house and when we actually moved our beds and furniture I have spent almost every single day packing up Anthony's truck, taking it to the new house, unpacking them and then taking the boxes back to refill. I lost track of how many trips I took, but by the time we actually moved, almost all we had to move were couches and furniture I had moved everything else by myself! So on quite a few days I was just plain tired and stressed. James kind of catches our moods, which means if we are stressed, he is too and has a harder time behaving. Which makes us grumpier, and the cycle continues! 

One Monday night when Anthony was working late I has just plain having a bad day and feeling worn out. It seemed like everything was harder than it should be, traffic, cars not working right, etc... I had finally put Rett in bed and then got in bed with James (he won't go to sleep unless someone is right next to him). After a few minutes, Rett came out of his room and stood by his door. I told him to go back to bed and he held up his hands and said, "I go poo poo". When I walked over to him I could see that he had pooped so much it came out of his diaper and got on his hands. I put him into the bathtub and got the cleaner to start cleaning the doorknob where he had opened the door. James was still awake, so he was following me around trying to help me clean. All I could think was, "Great, yet another thing to make my day miserable". As I was complaining to myself while cleaning, I went into Rett's room to get him more clothes and happened to glance at the back of his bedroom door. And saw this.

I died laughing!!! It was so bad!! I don't know why, for some reason cleaning up a little bit was just another annoying thing but cleaning up this monstrosity made it hilarious. Then James started laughing and asking if he ever did something like this (yes. yes he did). It was a funny ending to a bad day :)

James' teacher keeps track of their behavior on an app and I usually check it every day to make sure he is doing well and following the rules. He earns points for good things and gets them taken away for misbehavior. He doesn't usually lose points and he gets consequences at home if he does, but overall he can go weeks without losing a single point. With all the change in routine and stress with the new house, he has had a few more days with lost points than usual. This day I checked on my phone and saw this:

I kind of didn't know what to do with that!! Of course I took a screenshot and sent it to my siblings, because it was so funny! What a weird thing to do! When I asked him about it later, he said that he forgot that you weren't supposed to put glue sticks in people's gloves (uh huh). So I had him write her an apology letter and when he apologized to her in person the next day I had him ask if she would like new gloves. She said yes, so he picked out some for her at Walmart and brought it to her. The things that happen in kindergarten! 

The new house with all the land means that the boys get to run around outside and play, which is what we wanted but it also means getting seriously dirty! Rett played in the mud and then came and told me, "I a little dirty".

Our new favorite thing is to go to a trampoline park that opened up in Daytona. The first hour they are open is toddler time where only kids 6 and under can play and their parents can jump for free with them. Since there aren't a lot of big kids around, they have a lot of space to run around and we don't have to worry about them getting jumped on. It is seriously fun!

They have these inflatable balls you can rent where you climb in and then someone else rolls you around and bounces you on the trampoline. I made sure that we took it slow with James because twice now he has gotten motion sick from too much spinning or swinging at OT. He loved it though!

Excited, but not sure if he is going to like it:

Rett wanted to help push him:

Rett's turn!

In the dodgeball area, whenever Rett gets hit by a ball he falls down and pretends to be dead. So dramatic!

Since Rett wasn't sleeping during naptime anyway, I stopped putting a diaper on him (he just gets a diaper at naptime and nighttime now) and told him to be sure to get on the potty if he needed to go. I was trying to take a nap, when he came to tell me that he went #2 all by himself! I checked and sure enough he had taken his own pants and underwear off, sat himself on the potty and went #2 for the first time without any help! So far he hasn't done it again, he keeps going in his underwear (joy) but hopefully he will catch on.

I finally got to see the turkeys in person. On one of my trips to unload more boxes at the house, I saw a group of them behind our shed. They let me get pretty close before they flew away.

The previous owners of our house took all of the bathroom mirrors with them, so we had to buy mirrors for three bathrooms. I found this great antique mirror for one of the bathrooms at a local thrift store that I love that refinishes furniture. It was only $25! I keep stalking their Facebook page hoping for more good finds.

When it was the big moving day for getting all of our furniture over to the new house, Anthony, his Dad and I ended up loading almost everything ourselves into the U-haul. While we were taking our couch out of the house, the middle cushion fell forward to reveal cupholders! We have had that couch for 6 years and had no idea that it did that!

We love seeing the horses across the street from us and one morning as I was pulling out of the driveway I noticed that one of the horses was on the wrong side of the fence eating grass. I guess there was a break in the fence and she got out. I had to go to a meeting at church, so I called Anthony and told him this would be the perfect time for him to meet our neighbors and let them know about their horse. It turns out that the land across the street with the horses is owned by someone a few towns over, they don't live there they just keep their horses there. Luckily our next door neighbors are familiar with the horses and used to keep them in their pasture, so they were able to get a bridle to lead her back in. She was really sweet and curious, sniffing James and his power wheel. He loved it!

Rett and I finally got a chance to bring some carrots and apples to the horses. They came right over when they saw us. Rett was a little scared and just threw the carrots over the fence to them, but after feeding them a few times now he will hold it in his hand and let them take it from him.

When James got home from school, he wanted a turn so we put some more food in his wagon "trailer" that he uses to haul things and went across the street.

The horse was getting a little impatient for us to give her something by hand so she tried to bypass us and go straight for the bowl.

James loves, loves, loves to pick things up from off the ground and put them in his pocket. He gets so excited to find a broken pencil or piece of crayon. With the weather being a little chilly he was wearing his jacket, which meant four pockets: two in the jacket and two in his shorts. When he got home from school I looked at him and could see all four of his pockets bulging, so I asked him to show me all the things in his pockets. He started pulling them out when he got to the oyster shell and piece of brick I started laughing. So much stuff! He can tell you where he found each thing, they all have a story to go with it.

We went to a local farm day festival that had pony rides, hay rides, and a petting zoo. We had fun, but it wasn't very exciting for the boys. I guess the country life is getting commonplace for them, which is just how we like it!

Playing with Christmas Presents and Sunbeams for Rett!

James got a Hot Wheels bicycle for Christmas that makes motorcycle revving sounds when you twist the handle. He had so much fun riding it around pretending to be a motorcycle. He let Rett try to ride his old bike that he has almost grown out of. Rett liked the idea of it, but just couldn't get a handle on how to pedal. So he ended up walking the bike around, trying to keep up with James :)

James is loving his power wheels ATV, he wants to ride it before school and right when he gets home from school. At the rental house he really likes the front yard because of the hill he can go over, but at the new house it has become what he uses to get around anywhere in the yard. I love it when their presents get a lot of use!

Rett fell asleep in the car on the way to the store, around 11am. He is fighting taking naps sooooo hard right now that I think he has a serious sleep deficit that he needs to catch up on.

Playing at Chuck-e-cheese. We discovered that Tuesdays are their half price game days, so you can play twice as many games for the same amount of money. Which means that if we go, I definitely try to make sure it is on a Tuesday!

Rett is officially a Sunbeam!! I wasn't sure how he was going to do, but he loves it. He talks about it all the time. Randomly during the week he will say things about Sunbeams and start listing, "I love...Ian, Joseph (classmates) and Sister Tripp!" He is still pretty wiggly and jumpy during sharing time and singing time but as long as there isn't hitting and biting I'm totally happy :)

Silly selfies at bedtime:

My hair was looking extra wild, so I had to take a picture. Crazy Florida humidity! 

New house is officially ours!

January 4th was the closing date on our house. The appointment was in the afternoon, so after we got the keys, we didn't get to the house until later in the day. It is so exciting to finally get ready to start all of the projects we have been planning! We ended up buying the previous owner's riding mower, so the bottom picture is of Anthony testing it out. The pond is really beautiful, but it has a lot of fallen trees and branches around it, so clearing it so you can see it better is on our project list.

Testing out the tree swing:

This is the view from the back sliding glass doors. The tiny house to the left is the pump house for the well. The water is pretty hard, so we are looking around for a water softener and filter for it.

This is the view from one side of the front porch. This is the driveway, if you follow it around the corner it goes to the street, but you can't see the street from the house.

The front yard that you can see from the other side of the front porch.

The view from the far side of the house, the green path towards the back is the path to the pond. The grassy area in the front of the picture is the septic tank drainage field, so we can't put anything or grow anything on it. Figuring out how to properly care for our septic and well systems is another new challenge!

Past the pond is mostly uncleared vegetation. If it was completely cleared out you would be able to see the cemetery that is directly on the other side of our property.

Walking back towards the house:

Front of the house. We are considering repainting and adding shutters as another project.

Rett's favorite part of the new house: peeing in the grass.

The entire house was painted peach and brown and it made everything seem dingy and yellow. I knew I wanted to repaint, so before the closing I picked out colors and got samples. I was so sure I liked the colors, but when I put them on the wall they were much darker than I imagined! So the next day I got more samples to try that were much better. Then it was time to start painting. It took sooooo long to paint the entire house, much longer than I thought it would. Anthony's parents were a big help, they spent days painting while Anthony was at work or I was with the kids. Anthony and I would take turns going over there while someone watched the kids. It felt so good to get the new color up on the wall, This is the living room before. In person it was much more yellow.

After paint:

Working on Rett's room:

The hallway:

For a long time, James didn't really want to talk about the new house. I think all the change gave him anxiety. Any time we talked about painting his room, he said he just wanted to it to be the same color as our room. Then he decided that he liked the original peach color and that he wanted it to stay that color. After I put up sample colors on the wall. We found some old paint in the shed from when they first painted 4 years ago, so we tried it out. It smelled really bad but we weren't sure if that was just temporary. The next day it still smelled horrible, so after school I took James to home depot to pick out new paint for his room. He ended up picking an orangey yellow that is super bright, but kind of a happy color. It isn't what I would have picked, but I was so glad that James was coming around and wanting to make his room his own.

Painting his own room:

After we took his shirt and jacket off, he made sure the door was closed and was yelling, "Don't come in here!" to Mimi. It just gave me a chuckle to see him be modest about his body because he absolutely doesn't do that around us at home!

Master Bedroom:

Working on the side of the dining room where the new aquarium setup is going to go. Anthony built a tank and stand specifically for the new house. He is going to hang the lights from the ceiling!

The kitchen after the walls were painted. The kitchen is yet another project we will be doing. We are going to paint the cabinets white and replace all the appliances with stainless steel.

The dining area:

Rett's room:

The guest room before:

After. This bedroom has a full bathroom and a walk in closet. I am using the closet for storage and this room will have our pull out couch and all of my sewing stuff.

James and Rett loved having Mimi and Papa be at the RV whenever we went over there. They always wanted to go inside and eat bananas and eggs. James insisted that Papa's eggs and Mimi's bananas were so much better than ours at home :)

While making eggs, Anthony's mom cracked one open and found a double yolk! I've never see one before, it was really cool.

We tried to make a fire, but it is too windy and the smoke kept blowing in our faces.

Helping put the fire out:

Eating eggs!

This is a flock of turkeys that have lived in the area since they were little. Anthony saw them while he was there during the inspection, and then his parents saw them one morning. I have been over there almost every day and I still haven't seen them in person!

The neighbors directly across the street from us have two horses that are sometimes right by the fence. I took this picture in the car at the end of our driveway, turning onto the street. Once we are in and settled, we are planning on bringing the neighbors some cookies and asking if they mind if we feed them carrots from time to time. We love our new place!