Milestone #2; friends who we saw meet, start dating, move in together, handle major medical drama, and even adopt a pet together have FINALLY made it official and are getting married.  It is so nice to have a happy ending (or really, a happy move from one stage to another) for them.  The EXTRA nice thing is that they are local so we don’t have to do anything but drive for their wedding.  We have officially lived here a long time to have local friends get married.  Technically this is an unfair measure since we moved into a group that were all already married with kids (and all older than us).  I have to think about it but we have gone back east for at least 5 different weddings and we have missed at least 3.

So Congratulations on your engagement!  (this pic is from Easter so imagine a ring on that left hand, its there now)

We got this news bright and early and I have to say it is a great way to start the morning.

We planned the trip in a series of ‘moments’. First we (mostly Lars) had the intense desire to go to Rick Bayless’s restaurant because he loves Mexican food and was very impressed with him as a person and as a chef on Top Chef Masters. We decided that since he had a place in Chicago that we would make plans to go ‘someday’. We mentioned this to other friends who agreed that it sounded great and would love to go with us. Time passes and ‘someday’ is still an unmarked date on the calendar but there were so many things to do; school, holidays, work stuff etc not to mention finding someone who would watch our 2 kids while we go away.

Moment #2 came when we decided to ask a close mom friend if she would be willing to watch the girls, actually I think she even offered so that was even better. The offer was for a future ‘someday’ date too and given that she had an extra job in retail that made ‘someday’ most definitely after Christmas season.

The actual moment of transition between ‘someday’ and Jan 28th was the doing of the other couple who was checking on reservations and noticing that they were 4-6 weeks out for a weekend and just took the lead and booked it. That moment crystalized the trip and made it a real thing to plan for rather than just talk about ‘someday when…’ We were fortunate to have the childcare work for that weekend and airlines cooperated too so within a week we were booked and then conversations moved to far more interesting topics of what we would wear.

As the date approached it was an exciting yet hard thing… we like our kids, we only really get to see them on weekends, leaving them sounds great and awful at the same time. We are not shy about bringing them lots of places but this trip really would not work for them because for starters our dinner reservation was for 9:30pm. I was nervous about Zoe crying the whole time and our friend never speaking to us again but I decided to not borrow trouble and focus on the fact that Niamh was excited and loves the person coming over (and her kids) and if she is happy Zoe tends to be too, plus, Zoe is more socially accepting then Niamh was. There was a hard moment when I was leaving but I didn’t leave a crying baby, she was content snuggling with books when I walked out the door.

The trip itself when great and after I pull the pictures hostage in my camera out I’ll give a run down but today my focus is how well the weekend went for the kids. They were happy without us but happy to see us and that was the best thing. If we do this again I’ll have zero doubts about the kid care part of the trip, but, we kept missing them while we were gone when we saw something they would like. The kids by all reports had a fabulous time. They played all day nonstop with friends and on a cool indoor playground. They ate their favorite foods, they probably watched more TV than normal (big treat) and Niamh had a sleepover party and she has wanted that for ages. I think they had as much fun or more without us!!!

Bottom line, I’m very glad we didn’t leave this as a ‘someday’ adventure. We did it, they did it and now we know it is not just possible it is fun. [end]

On the spooky side of things, her favorite animal was an Owl.  She just loved them and collected them and so when I see owl’s I’m reminded of her.  We happen to have two stuffed owl’s, one was a gift to Niamh from and SCA friend and the other I’m not positive how it came to our house, anyway both were pulled out of general obscurity my Niamh last week for “O” show and tell and Zoe has fallen in love with them.  She hauls them around everywhere and must sleep with both and her most used phrases for the past few days have been “my owl” or “where my owl?”.  My rational mind says she is 1.5 and gets fixated on things, the part of me that believes there is more to the world than what we see wonders if Oma is whispering to Zoe.  To comfort Lars I told him we should ask his mom to watch Zoe specially since they never got to meet and as of the day we said that Zoe has been a more sound sleeper then Niamh ever was.  Coincidence again but after a few coincidences you start to see a pattern.

I’m not sure what to do today on the subject other than post this.  I don’t want to make Lars sad and he isn’t all the close with his siblings either so I don’t want to nose in on their process.  What I can do is take a cute picture of Zoe and remember my MiL fondly.  I don’t know the answer to my subject question but in this case I’ll be remembering her most on this anniversary.

I took a little time to say goodbye to the ‘other’ (purely fictional) baby and now we are set to go forward happy.  Here is my post from last time on the subject of Schrodinger’s baby.  This time there is also the added pressure of either turning our two girls into a trio, or, adding an odd ‘man’ out with a boy (with 2 older sisters).  Every time I’ve talked about gender every person has a STRONG opinion on what I should have and they ALL imply that the only reason we had a third is to get a boy.  For the record, that is not true at all.  There are also lots of people who like the surprise and while I can’t say I won’t use gender pronouns in the future, here is your opportunity to keep the secret for yourself.

So, in order for you to know the gender of this baby you need to PROMISE to be nothing but positive.  To unlock the post below that finally tells you the gender of #3 the password is promise.

Second public service. If you see a weird facebook status update from people that says "I am going to________________for___________ months." It is a stunt to promote breast cancer awareness; the blanks are filled in based on your birthday and there is a list of things corresponding to each month/day. I’ve seen these in the past and had NO IDEA what they were talking about and that’s when they were saying something silly like “my pocketbook is Green and I love Cheese” that was just weird but if I saw that one of my friends was going to Morocco for 6 months in her status I would honestly think cool, Morocco is fun but 6 months is a long time! Why saying something obtuse is supposed to create awareness is beyond me, but, saying something that is potentially believable is just mean. Hopefully the Breast Cancer social media campaign does not hunt me down for putting this out there but I know I would want to know why all these people are saying they are leaving for foreign countries for long periods of time… I share this sentiment with lots of people and recently another blogger wrote on the topic and I share her feelings on the subject. Why not empower the internet to be direct like at 10am on Feb 10 remind all your friends to be healthy by XYZ (fill in a message… btw, breast cancer isn’t the only bad guy out there, just in case you didn’t know…) in your status. Being direct might get through to people. Who knows, just my opinion.

Countdown to Kid Free* Trip – 3 days
Countdown to knowing the gender of the new baby – 1 day

Yesterday not much happened in the ‘get the house ready’ or ‘pack for the trip’ but I still have a few days. My day today started off a tad disorganized. I go to the production facility on Tuesday and about 2 min from home I bemoan that I forgot my sunglasses and for once it is sunny. 10min from the house I realized I didn’t have my badge; annoying but nothing a stop at the guard house can’t fix, biggest annoyance would be parking in the far away lot. About 20 min from home (in a 30 min trip) I realize I also don’t have my laptop – that is a turn around scenario. (Since I was home I also got my sunglasses and badge) I ended up about 15 min late but fortunately I didn’t have any early calls so all is well.

Aside from forgetting things, I think I’ve turned the corner on feeling sick and tired all the time. Everything in the world was magnified 100x and now its more like 10x and that is a lot easier to deal with. The only big thing hanging over my head is getting the townhouses rented, if anyone knows someone who needs a place let me know. One of the townhouses is especially bothersome because of the amount of stuff left. In my magnified state of anger this made me very mad, now I’m just at a very annoyed level. Lars is dutifully going over every Sunday and filling the trash can and also putting trash in other peoples can’s if there is room (he is a bold boy…) but after weeks of this there is still a pile. A few times he took the girls decked out in snow gear so I could have 20min of general peace but last time Zoe made a run for it so now he is less inclined to do that. I queried facebook about donation services and got plenty of good ideas but in our area the only pickups for large things are on Friday’s during the day and someone has to be there so I have to find a day to take off to be there. I tell myself there are far worse ways for a rental to be left, the inside is cleaned neat as a pin. This is a bad time of year to find a renter in general but there is some interest and I’m crossing fingers that we find someone in the next few weeks. It only takes 1 (each, so I actually need 2).

I need to focus on happier things, like, sonogram tomorrow! By 3:30 tomorrow we will know if my persistent gloom is caused by creating a boy baby, or, if this is a girl that is just different then her sisters. I’m happy with either gender, a boy would be nice for balance but I like the girl stuff and already have so much of it. Niamh is coming with us and she is very excited to find out too. It will be cool to start the next phase of planning by having the gender known I start being able to think about things like names and that makes the bump way more baby like rather than a bump. Speaking of the bump, operation hide the bump is getting to the end of the line. I mentioned to a coworker that I was not planning travel for June and he was like ‘Ok, yup, I was wondering about that’. I suppose people are noticing but not knowing how to say anything. My standard answer is “well, guys never tell people when their wives are pregnant”. I’ll bite the bullet in April I think and address the maternity leave question, other then that its not his business and I still think he has no idea since our contact is 98% initiated by me so if I don’t go find him he never checks in with us. Different styles and hey, I’m not micromanaged.

So this post is rather rambley so I’ll add one more unconnected thing. Pinterest has developed an odd annoying thing. So I’ve explained this is a huge site where people ‘pin’ stuff they think is cool, fun, funny, for later reference and other people can see your Pin. There is also the ability of the public to comment on a pin (or repin it, or, like it) and the recent annoying thing is people are starting to have LONG conversation in the comments of a pin. They are not nice comments either! If someone pins something you disagree with, don’t re pin, simple solution. You don’t need to tell someone with something political or religious (the 2 big triggers) they are wrong or stupid etc, just go look at the millions of pins you do like. I only re-pin 1 in every 100 or so. I tend to find lots of things not to my needs or taste but I feel no compulsion to tell the person who did pin that item my opinion. To tie this vaguely to my previous theme, it’s a good thing this is more recent because if the site was full of this ire when things were all 100x for me I would have abandoned it and it is just such a fun site.

That’s enough for me – the picture is completely random but I like it, kisses from my #1 – Cheers til tomorrow.

The ‘feature picture’ today (sorry for iPhone quality) is Zoe climbing up the massive play structure at the Shoreview community center.  On flicker you can see my other pictures of how big it was.  Zoe was not quite big enough to do it solo since some of the platforms were just too high for her to get up to herself, but, Niamh was all over it like a monkey and Lars and I took turns helping Zoe and keeping an eye on Niamh.  We thought this would be fun for an hour or so before the pool opened but we had to drag the kids away after 3 hours.  There was a small loop with a slide that Zoe did a million times and it was perfect for her and too small for any of the big kids to care about (double perfect).  We went with Niamh’s BF who had fun too and its good for 3 year olds to meet on neutral territory, nothing belongs to anyone so it is far easier to sort out disagreements.   We all left for naps and then Lars and Niamh came back for the promised pool time.  They played for another 2.5 hours in the pool and needless to say they all slept soundly until 7am – no bed ninjas.

Saturday Lars was on duty so he was tied to the house but it was a pretty mellow work day so he was still ‘there’ for the family.  I focused on cleaning my room and it is now basically 100% clean.  There are 2 totes to move out to the garage and a small pile of stuff that needs to go to its real home around the house but I organized and even threw away things and dusted and sorted…  The kids semi helped by playing nicely and occasionally bringing something I asked for or bringing something to their rooms that had migrated into mine.  I wish I could focus like this on every room of the house and one by one I will but by the time I’m done I’m sure room #1 will need focus again and thus the cycle continues.

I also attempted 2 craft projects.  One the prize for my comment contest winner; another Tangled hair clip (aka clippie as the etsy people call them) and this one is even better than the one I did for Niamh.  Part of art is capturing the important details and not worrying about every detail, its like a word that has the right first and last letter and the right number of letters total can be completely misspelled and people can still read it – it is the IMPORTANT key details to focus on.  For Tangled, since I’ve watched the move and looked at pictures millions of times, I feel one of her real important details is the part in her hair.  This is missing on Niamh’s but now I figured it out and I think this one looks better.  I also did something a little different on the back (not like people see the back) but I still think backs are important too.  That went out in the mail on Saturday so it should be there maybe tomorrow or the next day.

The second project I’m of two minds on, I tried to re-purpose a shirt of mine into a dress for Niamh but I’m not wild about the outcome.  Maybe a few more changes/little things and I’ll like it enough to post but the shirt has been unworn for years since it just never fit right even when I didn’t have a bump belly so its better off getting used somehow.

Final thing, as I sit here Monday it is snowing so we are finally getting our snow, I just hope the roads are ok for getting home and I thanked my lucky stars again on my way here to have a short, against traffic, commute.

Lars finally told me that the plastic liner in our current one is broken and keep tearing the trash bags and that is a real reason to replace it.  So, thanks for all the help looking and the comments definitely confirmed that the touchless option was silly.  The ‘odor eating’ filter just does not exist on a standard can and I don’t know why that perked Lars’s interest because our trash seldom smells.  Not like we don’t have to play the ‘what smells game’ (where you sniff odd corners and things until you find the offending item, usually a potato) but usually we have smells under control.  I’m not a great housekeeper but I have a fantastic nose and it bothers me if there is a bad smell so they are quickly irradiated.

Second, slightly related item/disclaimer.  Amazon has approved me to be a ‘partner’ meaning that if anyone clicks on a product on this site and goes to Amazon and actually buys anything I get a tiny bit of credit.  I like that it is on anything, way more potential for someone to click on something to just look at it but then they think “hey, I was meaning to check out bedspreads….” I would get a tiny % of whatever you do end up buying.  I’m under no illusion that this is a unique honor bestowed on me by Amazon but given the number of times I link to them anyway its cool that it might be of some general benefit.  Most likely all the searches I get for the Deuter backpack that go to this post that then go to Amazon will PROVE that I’ve sold at least 10 of those things.  So if you feel like shopping on Amazon anyway, click through me first J  Oh, and they will send me special deals, if there is ever something awesome I’ll share it but don’t worry, this is not going to be an all-ad-all- the-time site.

Finally, and totally unrelated to the above, I am getting a bit obsessed with Pinterest.  There are just so many good ideas out there!  The site is so handy and its like a wormhole for time.  I started a board titled ‘things I made/did thanks to Pinterest’ because I feel its like giving credit back to the source.  Anyway, if your not already on it you should check it out.  You ‘pin’ a picture to your board and then when you click on the picture later it takes you right back to the site you got it from so you see all the directions etc.  Great for building wish lists or ideas for a party, or, like one person I know building a gallery of source documentation for SCA.  Way easier then keeping a huge bookmark list…. Actually it is a huge bookmark list just with pictures.  The second cool thing is looking at what your friends pin or searching for something and getting a ton of options that all lead to other places.  It is a research person’s dream, you can drill from the secondary source right to the primary with a click.  I must be their target audience because I’m on it daily now.

To wrap this up, weekend coming, and I’m going to be mailing my comment winner prize (A Rapunzel hair clippie), showing our rental (sorry mom, our one) and generally getting ready for our trip next weekend.  Anyone doing anything more exciting than that?