A Family Update

I have failed miserably at my New Year's resolution to update this blog weekly. Ah, well, with moving and being a mom and not sleeping I guess I can't blame myself.

Our family is settling in to the house we moved into. It's a month to month lease so we really don't know how long we are going to stay so we still have a lot of boxes that will stay sealed. We hope that we will be able to buy a house relatively soon, but we have to save some more money.

Miriam has enjoyed having a yard and a playground in the back. Isaac likes having plenty of space to crawl and practicing walking. Both Miriam and Isaac get into everything, which makes it very difficult for me to keep things clean or organized.

One thing I have enjoyed lately is having a double jogging stroller and a nice long walking path close by. I take the kids for a jog several times a week and I get some fresh air and exercise. Mike has been trying to get me to go to a Krav Maga class with him for some exercise. I would love to, but that means finding a babysitter. Maybe I can get the Bishop's daughter to babysit for me this summer.

Mike is always busy at work. He really likes his job and we're really glad that he has a job. I still can't convince myself to like the Bay Area. Maybe if/when the economy recovers Mike will be able to find a job in an area I actually like.

Next week is Isaac's first birthday. It's hard to believe how fast kids grow. Isaac is walking and babbling. Miriam is learning her numbers, letters, colors, etc. Hopefully I can get some more pictures and videos up. Miriam says the funniest things and Isaac is just so active.

Rain, rain and potty training

It's been raining a lot lately here in the Bay Area the past week. It's been raining all day today. I really like the rain and if I didn't have kids I would probably be out dancing in the rain. Miriam might like dancing in the rain, but Isaac would scream bloody murder.

I figured that rain would prevent me from taking Miriam outside much I would try to do something productive with her indoors. . . . . potty training. I helped to potty train an autistic preschooler when I was in college so I figured this would be a snap. Miriam has actually done pretty well, but I think all the books that claim you can potty train your child in just one day are full of it. Miriam has no problem going "pee pee" in the potty, especially since she gets M&Ms when she goes. She just doesn't always tell me when she needs to go. Good thing Huggies invented pull-ups.

Today we had regional conference. It was broadcast to our building. There were a lot of good messages. One that stuck out in my mind (probably because it was "meant" for me) was what Elder Wickman said about living in California. He talked about how bad things have happened or are happening here in California, but that doesn't mean the saints should just pick up and leave. That seemed to be the theme of the conference. Building Zion where one is. My husband had to kind of poke me about this. I reminded him that living somewhere and trying to make the most of it doesn't mean I have to like the place I'm living.

I have to be honest, California has some really cool places to visit. Key word here: VISIT. I really don't like a lot of aspects of living here. I don't want to raise my family in the Bay Area. I've heard a lot of people talk about how wonderful San Francisco is. I've visited San Fran twice. It's a pretty city and a good place to visit. What most people don't understand is that San Francisco isn't all of the Bay Area. There are a lot of nice places to live here, but they are really expensive and most of the schools here are gang infested so even if we were to find a nice place to live the chances of us being near really good schools is slim.

I've realized how lucky I was to grow up in Centerville. I know that Utah has it's issues, but when I was growing up Utah was a really nice place. People here in California have such low standards sometimes. I thought that maybe I was really picky when it came to housing, schools, quality service, etc. I think it's more that I grew up in an area where people took care of their houses, I had good teachers in public schools, and most of the people I interacted with when it came to service were pretty happy, which is defnitely not the case here.

This week I need to start de-junking my house. We will be moving in about a month and I'm determined to only box up and take what we use, will use, and have used in the past 2 years. It's too bad any time I start de-junking things Miriam finds some object to get attached to. Two-year-olds are so funny sometimes.

Sick of sickness

This week our whole family has had to deal with sickness. First Miriam came down with a cold, then I got it, then Isaac, and yesterday Mike succumb to the nasty virus. Being home sick with two sick kids has been a pain. I barely get enough sleep as it is and then to be getting up in the night made it really hard. Poor Mike has had to deal with a very grumpy wife.

I usually don't let Miriam watch much TV, but this past week we probably watched The Little Mermaid and Curious George like 3 times each. I'm hoping the weather is good this week so we can get out and about. I'm really sick of being inside for days at a time. I was glad to go to church today with Miriam because that meant I got to leave the house! :)

Since we've been sick this week we haven't done anything really interesting. Valentine's Day is coming up and so is my birthday. We'll see if Mike remembers to get me anything for either of those days.

Maybe I'll have something interesting to write later this week. I'm posting a little video clip of Miriam and Isaac having fun despite being sick.

New Year's Resolution

Since many of my family and friends have blogs I decided to try doing this whole blog thing. I actually had a New Year's resolution to blog regularly. Well, I'm a month late, but better late than never eh?

I'm usually pretty good at journal writing, but I'm pretty bad at emailing people and giving updates on my life. I'm sure some of my family and friends will like reading this blog because I will eventually post pictures. Since my husband and I share this blog there will probably be quite a mix of posts.

I guess I'll start by giving a brief update on events in our family. Mike and I currently live in Hercules, CA and are going to have to move because our landlord wants to unload the house. Luckily we're just moving across town. The house is bigger and has a yard, but it's going to cost quite a bit more. It's owned by a woman who used to be in our ward. One advantage of renting the house is that the contract is month-to-month (also a reason the rent is higher).

The lease on the house we're currently in ends in March and we were planning on going month-to-month in order to take our time and find a house to buy. House prices here are still pretty high, but still dropping so we don't really want to buy now because 1) I doubt we'd get approved for a loan 2) We don't want to be losing value in a house we buy now because prices are still dropping and 3) We haven't found a place that we really like. I personally don't want to buy a house in the Bay Area because I don't want to stay here for an extended period of time. I've met a lot of really good people here, but I really don't want to raise my children here. Lucky for me my children are still pretty young.

Miriam is almost 2 1/2. We've half-heartedly started potty training. She was doing well for a while and then all of a sudden decided she didn't want to do what we want her to. She's really funny though. She talks all of the time and is always insisting that she do everything. She's usually pretty good with Isaac, although she thinks that all of her toys are hers and all of Isaac's toys are hers.

Isaac is about 8 1/2 months old. He's crawling really well. He pulls himself up to a stand and walks next to the couch. The other day we had him hold on to a train that Miriam inherited. It's one of those Thomas the Tank engines that children can scoot around on and it has all sorts of buttons to push that make train sounds. Anyway, we had Isaac hold on to the train and he started pushing it and walking with it. He tips the train over sometimes, but it might end up being a good thing for him to use to practice walking.

Mike is really busy at work. His company hit a rough patch a few weeks ago, but there are other projects that they are getting awarded, so things are looking good. We think Mike's job is pretty safe, but we're still going to save money just in case.

I have been busy with the kids and trying to de-junk the house. I'm trying to get into an exercise routine and a routine with the kids so I can have some time to myself. I'm thinking about signing up for a class so that my brain doesn't go to mush.

Last week was Mike's birthday. His parents came down to babysit so we could go to dinner. They ended up getting here a little late so all we got to do was go to dinner. It was nice to go somewhere without kids. It had been a long time since we had been on a date. Hopefully after we move we'll be able to find a babysitter and go on more dates.

Anyway, I have realized that this is a very long winded entry. Hopefully I will get in the habit of doing this and post some pictures.