Waiting is the Hardest Part

We've been basically watching the phone and waiting for it to ring for the past 2 days. We had a potential buyer come through the house on Sunday and received word from her realtor Monday that it was her top choice, that the couple needed to make a decision this week, and that she just wanted to come by again with her mother to take another look since her husband was unable to come in town to see it in person (she apparently took tons of pics and sent to him over the weekend). She asked for our disclaimer and basically said we were getting an offer without directly saying we were getting an offer. She came back with her mom late Tuesday evening, and we haven't heard anything since. The waiting is killing us. So keep all your fingers and toes crossed for us - we are ready to move forward!

Embarrassed in Target; Part II

I knew it would happen again, it was only a matter of time. Last week during our bi-weekly trip to Target, I was browsing some tops in the ladies department, which sits right across the aisle from ladies lingerie. A huge poster of a woman modeling the newest bra style hung over a large rack (no pun intended) of bras, and much to my dismay this display did not escape Casey's eagle eyes. Here's how the following exchange went:

Casey: "What are those, Mommy?"
Me: "Bras, Casey." (as quietly as possible)
Casey: (in his LOUDEST "inside" voice) "Nope, those are boobs Mommy!"
Me: (again, quietly) "OK, thank you."
Casey: (loud voice) "And YOU have BOOBS Mommy!"
Me: (now trying to hide under my cart) "Yes, Casey. I have boobs."
Casey: "Those are boobs. And you have boobs. Boobs. Boooooobs. BOOOOBS!!!"
And then he began to sing a little song - "Boooobs, boobs, boouuaaaahhhuuuubs!"

Needless to say, we were the hit of the ladies department. Several woman just snickered to themselves, but a few others had enough pity on me to giggle while nodding sympathetically at us. I shiver to think what my next public embarrassment will entail.

Getting Better

I've been really working hard lately on my photography - trying to take lots of practice shots and really trying hard to better understand the best way to operate the camera in different lighting conditions. Most professional photographers will say that it is not the camera that matters, but the light. Anyway, I've had 3 photo sessions this month (a new record - ring the bell!) and feel like I am improving with each one. However, my poor children remain my primary test subjects. Connor is a bit easier at this stage than Casey, and trying to get one of the two of them together is nearly impossible, but here are a few recent pics that I am pretty proud of.

Here's What Connor Thinks About Teething

Mother's Day

It's a beautiful day here in Louisville and we've been enjoying this Mother's Day together. The boys gave me a silver frame from Pottery Barn, and we went to brunch at The Bristol and then to the park. I took lots of photos, and it's going to be a tough decision on which one to chose to fill my new frame. You can check out some of the photos here: www.flickr.com/gp/68805461@N00/77Wi2K

New Pastimes

Lately it feels like all we do is clean, organize, and then get the heck out of the house so someone else can come in and poke around through our belongings. But we do other stuff, too. Like when it's rainy outside, we build castles so Casey can pretend he's a "knipe".

And Casey has finally taken up golf. Whew! We were starting to worry that our hopes of him becoming the next Tiger Woods were in vain. Look at that swing! He's a natural!

Connor continues to teethe - but look! Results! His first two teeth appeared early last week. Although he is sleeping better, as you can tell from the photo they have not helped to improve his overall disposition. Actually, he is a pretty happy boy. When he's not screaming.

Puppy Love

One of the sweetest elements of life around here is the mutual love between Ani & the boys. I'm always surprised at our pet's capacity to love, and that nobody ever had to show Ani how to love these babies - she just knew. I feel so deeply for the people who have lost pets recently with the pet food contaminations, and it makes me all the more thankful that we have had her for nearly ten years now.

Not A Morning Person

I may have to order this on a coffee mug from cafepress.com for myself and all the women in my family...

Trouble

On Saturday, I got into the shower while Casey was watching a video in our room and Connor was napping. When I got out of the shower this is what I found...

Psych!

Silly, silly girl. You actually believed you had sold your house? Not so! You might as well have been playing with the school bully who, after offering you the Oreos from his lunch bag, snatched them back from your little fingers while yelling, "Psyyych!". MAJOR burn, dude.
Actually, not so much burned as unwilling to give in to unreasonable demands made on the behalf of your buyer. Or maybe just naive to think that just because you sold your house at a discount from the asking price that you didn't have to pay for upgrades that the buyer desired. Oh well, another day, another lesson learned.
And we feel quite a bit better about the whole situation now that we have this guy out of our hair, and we're ready to move on and sell this baby to someone who will appreciate her as we have. Or at least not want to knock out walls and expect us to pay for it.

Peep!

I decided to distract myself from "The Great Move of '07" by crocheting a bunch of these little chicks to put in the boys' Easter baskets. The yarn is really fuzzy which made it a challenge at first, but now I'm totally addicted to making them and can make several an hour.

Casey is getting into the Easter spirit by sporting these bunny ears he made at storytime this morning.

And Connor just keeps rolling with it. Literally. Since he isn't really mobile yet, if he sees something on the floor he wants he just rolls himself over and over until he gets there. Pretty clever, if you ask me (but I'm his mother so I think everything he does is genius).

Housing Blues

The good news: We sold our house! The bad news: We sold our house!

After receiving a ridiculously low initial offer (try almost 6% less than asking price plus an additional cash request to pay for his closing and to "change the paint colors of the home") and several subsiquent days of negotiations, a buyer finally agreed to our second counter-offer on the house, and we rejoiced momentarily. Then the reality of our timeline set in - closing and moving in 5 weeks! I was informed at 10pm on Sunday night that the house inspection was at 12:30pm the next day, and so after spending another somewhat disapointing day on the hunt for a new house in Indy, I scurried around and straightened the house up so it was presentable for inspection. Our buyer apparently hired the team from C.S.I. to come out here and inspect every nook and cranny of our house as the inspection took 3.5 hours to complete. I was just waiting for them to break out the blacklight and scan the carpet for blood stains, and I'm pretty sure he took hair samples from my brush for DNA analysis. This morning we received his laundry list of requests, which basically amounted to a bunch of stuff he wants us to pay to have done in an effort to get us back down to his original asking price. I've had a bad feeling about this whole deal since the first offer came in - I feel like the turtle in "Over the Hedge" whose tail tingles when something isn't right, and my tail has been working overtime for the past week. All I keep asking myself is, "Does it really have to be this hard?". We're trying to keep our humor and sanity intact, but the stress of this entire process is starting to wear on the entire family (is Casey "playing" with Connor, or taking out his 2 yr-old frustrations? You be the judge.)

Meanwhile, I thought I'd share a shot of the jersey Brian Brohm autographed for me. I think Rob is just a wee bit more excited about it than I am, but since Brohm is becoming Rob's Manning, I guess I can understand.

Go Sit in the Port-A-Let!

While sitting here waiting for our real estate agent to call us back about ANOTHER counter-offer we have made (jeez people, just buy our damn house already!) I thought I would share with you the funniest skit on SNL in a long time.

Stressed Out

All this moving business has me stressed to the max. Seriously stressed. Drinking-vodka-from-the-bottle-at-1-in-the-afternoon-in-my-closet kinda' stressed. Between all the showings last week (8 total) and driving to Indy on Saturday to look at houses (and realizing that we were going to have to spend more than we wanted to) and the crappy offer we received on our house Sunday, Momma is VERY close to the end of her rope. I was laying in bed last night internally debating about whether or not to go out today and buy annuals to plant out front to help with "curb appeal", and also considering performing a little voodoo Catholicism by burying a St. Joseph statue upside down in the backyard (family folklore swears by this method to help you sell your house) when I realized that this whole process is quickly making me a crazy person.

So I've decided I need 2 things to help bring me back to a peaceful, tranquil state (ha!):

1) A pedicure, because my toes were not prepared for this unseasonably warm weather we are having, and looking at their shaggy condition makes me sad;

2) This new bubble machine, because Casey LOVES bubble machines (who doesn't?!?) and this one is the mack-daddy - it blows bubbles inside giant bubbles!

I'm pretty sure that playing outside with our new awesome bubble machine while staring at my perfectly manicured toes will make me feel much, much better, regardless of whether or not St. Joe is out there with us.

Erin Go Braugh

You'd expect a girl with "Erin" as her middle name to be up on all the St. Patrick's Day celebrations, and although I've unofficially celebrated Green Beer Day a few times with my friends, I had no idea that an actual celebration existed. Those clever students at Miami University of Ohio created "Green Beer Day" (some say the tradition was started in 1952), celebrated every Thursday before St. Pat's day to help kick off their spring break. Bars in the small college town of Oxford open at 5:30am so that patrons can enjoy a full day of green beer before students head out of town on Friday (with, one could assume, the largest annual collective hangover on record). Here's the link if you don't believe me: www.greenbeerday.com. Apparently, the administration of Miami highly disapproves of GBD, which seems to strengthen it's appeal to students. Go figure.

I'm hoping to partake in some sort of St. Patty's celebration tommorow as Kathy and Courtney will be in town to run the City Run. The mastitis I've been battling this week made the decision for me not to join them, but I still hope to toast their successes at some point. And I'll have to dig out the "'Tis Himself" T and see if it fits either of the boys, as that has become tradition in our house.

Sciarpa

I finally finished my "DIY" Christmas gift from my Mom. She brought me back 4 skeins of this really beautiful yarn from her trip to Italy so I could make myself a really long, skinny scarf. I rarely treat myself to expensive yarn so this was alot of fun to work with, and I love the way it turned out. But by far the most interesting part about this project was my effort to find the Italian word for scarf to use as a title for this post. I found an English-to-Italian online dictionary, and was given 3 results for my query of the word "scarf". Sciarpa is the translation of the noun scarf, and mettere la sciarpa is the translation of "to wear a scarf". And then for the third translation I received: "masturbarsi strangolandosi", which means "to masterbate while strangling oneself". Hello, I'm sorry? What? Is this a phrase that commonly needs translating into Italian? What kind of freak is checking on this phrase before vacationing in Italy? Mom - maybe you should check with Carol on her Italian, because we may have solved the mystery of why the man at the drugstore was so rude to you two.

Pop-aholic

While searching online for bubble wrap that has adhesive on one side to help make the packing process a bit easier (I had read about it in a magazine) I found this seriously addictive website that lets you virtually pop packing bubbles, which happens to be one of my favorite pasttimes. This has helped me find my "happy place" in the middle of all this moving insanity...
http://www.virtual-bubblewrap.com/popnow.shtml

On the Market

Yep - that's a "For Sale" sign in our front yard, as we officially put the house on the market yesterday. We've told Casey that he can pick out the color of his room in the new house (current pick: yellow. We'll be working on that.) and that we will get a swingset for the backyard of the new house, so we are fielding daily questions about where his new house is and when can he go play on his swingset. In hindsight we may have jumped the gun on the new house discussions with him just a little bit.

We've been busting our butts getting the house cleaned and ready to show, and I can't help but notice the irony that our houses never seem to look better than when we are about to leave them. Perhaps that's something to work on in new the house, but I don't know how realistic (or fun) that idea is with two kids and a dog. Maybe "lived in yet organized" is a better goal.

What Snow?

Perhaps allowing Casey to watch the Caillou episode about "winter fun" several times was a mistake, because now he is obsessed with playing out in the snow. The only problem is that we've only received a few pitiful inches here in Louisville, which is not nearly enough of the white stuff to go out and enjoy. But that didn't stop Casey from trying to make the best of the half inch of accumulation we received last week. There wasn't even enough to make a small snowman, but he did make "snow faces" (he lays face first in the snow and waves his arms and legs. I have idea who this child belongs to). Meanwhile, Connor is staying inside and just getting cuter.

Hoosiers Now

We found out this morning that Rob matched with the residency program at IU in Indianapolis. This means we will be moving to Indy in just a few months. I don't think we have fully wrapped our brains around this news, but we're both excited. I'm already sweating some of the details (finding new pediatrician, etc.) and am a little worried about the process of selling our house. However, I am delighted to be in the same city as Peyton so that I can stalk him up close instead of from afar! Go Colts!