Belly Pictures

My sister, Dawn (the real Dawn, not my daughter Dawn - just to confuse you all quite a bit), is a doula here in Colorado. She is just starting out, so is setting up her website. She needed a "model" to put some belly pictures on her website. Since her "little" sister just moved to the area and is HUGELY pregnant, she is taking advantage of my belly! :-) I will link to her website once it is up and running. For now, here are a couple pictures. She has a friend here who is from India and did a really cool henna tattoo on my belly. So, if you don't like to see pregnant bellies, don't look! :-) (This was a week ago or so, so I was 33 weeks pregnant at the time.)

Update

Life has been a pretty busy these last 2 weeks.  This will be a quick update.  After a week of looking at houses (close to 35), we offered on the house Old Man saw FIRST!  :-)  We are currently under contract for an awesome house.  It's huge, newer, perfect for our family.  Truly an example of God meeting more than our needs.  The house in Maryland still hasn't sold or rented.  We're dropping the price today again.  Plus we're going to have some painting done to "update" rooms that aren't neutral.  Fun fun fun.  Anyone know a good painting contractor in Bowie, Maryland?  One that can do the work in the next few days?  :-)  If I weren't pregnant, I'd fly out, paint the rooms, clean some carpet, pull some weeds and be done with it.  That would be tons cheaper than paying someone else to do this!

Speaking of pregnancy - 34 weeks tomorrow.  Feeling huge, uncomfortable and exhausted.  But, still not really ready to have a baby.  I mean, seriously, we don't even have a name picked out, I can't even think about the fact that in a few weeks I will have to go through labor and then have a newborn.  Wow.  At least then my body will shrink a bit and doing normal daily tasks will be physically easier!  :-)  We met the midwife yesterday - she's wonderful and I'm very pleased with her.  Which is a good thing, because Tricare has only ONE midwife in this town that they cover!  

Kids are doing pretty well.  We started swimming lessons on Monday.  Monday was fun - screaming and crying from Joseph and puking at the Loaf and Jug by Dawn (drank too much pool water and worked out too hard).  Ahhh, the joys of parenting!  :-)

We're here!

I'm sure you are all dying to know how we are doing. Well, we are here in Colorado Springs. We arrived Wednesday evening. The drive was long. LONG. Very very long. We survived. I am still exhausted and not wanting to do anything at this point. Old Man is out on his second day of house hunting. The kids are thrilled to be playing with cousins.

Speaking of family, my parents and a niece and nephew are actually in town here this week. The day we left Maryland, one of my great-aunts died. So my parents met us in Kansas on their way to the funeral. Yep, we even managed to throw a funeral into the whole move. I didn't actually attend (I decided taking 4 kids to a funeral, who had been cooped up in a car for days, was foolish). I did attend the reception afterwards.

Not much else to say right now. Old Man and I are worn out. I'm wondering if this whole move was the "right" thing to do. We prayed about it, I felt this was what God was doing, was certain He answered the prayers by giving us this job. Right now I just think this was about the worst possible timing for us and nothing seems to be going well. House in Maryland still not sold or rented. 32 weeks pregnant and living in a relative's house (without a/c). Uprooting 4 kids, which makes parenting much harder - and I'm 32 weeks pregnant. Old Man could have just retired in 6 months. So, I'm feeling much guilt and question about this whole thing. I remind myself that we prayed, He answered, but right now it just "feels" sooooo wrong.

Waiting for the Movers

I'm sitting in a house full of boxes, kids are at the Auntie's house, Old Man is mowing the lawn (to get rid of the gas in the mower). And I'm just waiting. I've read all the blogs I read, checked e-mail, read the news ... Now what? I suppose I should be cleaning a bathroom or something productive. But I know that once the movers get here I will be busy. So I'm trying to relax for a few minutes and just wait. Unfortunately, I'm not feeling very patient. I just want to get this over and done with!! I want to go back to my kids. Poor David cried and cried this morning when we left. I actually had to wake Dawn up and give him to her for him to finally settle. We rarely leave him anywhere but here at our house. This moving thing is hard!

Packing, Day 2

Well, the packers are done. They stayed until 10 last night, hoping to finish in one day. But, they couldn't get the tags on all the boxes and read them all in the dark, so they came back today for about 3 hours (just 2 people). I've been here with the kids (and our fabulous babysitter) all day. So far they've handled things pretty well, but they are starting to get mean and nasty with each other. I'm soooo stinking tired right now I can hardly see straight. I think I'll go lay down and take a nap before we head out to my brother-in-law's for the night.

Packing

The packers are here. All I can say is that we have WAY too much junk. You think you've gotten ride of stuff, gone through everything. What a bunch of junk. I keep thinking, "100 years ago..." and "in a 3rd world country..."

The good news is that they are done upstairs and working quickly through the downstairs. The bad news - they still have to do the kitchen, garage and 2 sheds. At least they scheduled 2 days for this!

Now, go clean out a closet!

The Move

The last couple of weeks, I have caught myself saying numerous times, "what a zoo". Every time I kind of laugh to myself and think that I gave my blog a very appropriate name!

The packers arrive tomorrow morning between 8 and 10. We are NOT ready for them. Oh well, I'm guessing they won't arrive until 10. I get the most done early in the morning, so I've given up for the night. Our house is a mess!

No our house hasn't sold or rented yet. But hey, we did have someone come look at the house TODAY, interested in renting. Yes, the house was a mess when they showed up. They did call ahead of time, but Old Man was outside and I was at the midwife, so we didn't know they were coming. Did I mention we even emptied the attic today, into our bedroom? Yep, a mess. I'm guessing they will be the ones who want to rent. Nothing like working your tail off for a couple of months to keep the house ready to be shown only to have it shown at its absolute worst.

Back to the move. Packers here Tuesday and Wednesday. Wednesday, Old Man has to go to Virginia for outprocessing and a farewell luncheon. Obviously these people have no clue about moving or they would have planned it 2 weeks ago! Thursday the movers will come and empty the house. Friday morning, Old Man has to go to the Pentagon to do his final sign out. Not sure what we will be doing. I thought about cleaning some, but now I'm thinking breakfast at IHOP is a much better choice. :-) We drive out Friday afternoon.

For all you who think I'm nuts to drive this, I am. BUT, we are being wise about it! We will do no more than 6 hours of driving in a day and we are stopping every 2 hours. Seriously, I'm 31 weeks pregnant - how long can I go without peeing? And, yes, we are taking 2 cars.

Did I mention we need prayer??? Specifically for the drive, house here to rent or sell, buying a house in Colorado - the obvious stuff. But please also pray for the kids. Dawn, our oldest, is very sad. She is handling it well though. Anne, #2, not handling it real well. For those of you who know her, you can guess how easy she is being. The boys are doing pretty well. Pray also for the marriage here - moving is VERY stressful. Add pregnancy and the fact that this area is "home" for Old Man and you have a good chance of fighting.

All right, to bed. I am TIRED and I live in a zoo. :-)