St. Paddy's Day, 2014

I'm coming on real quickly to write some things down that I don't want to forget later.
I'm coming to you fresh from a tiny little cat nap.  This little cat nap means so much though.  Here's why.

It's 8:48pm and I was cat napping in Walter and Wesleys room.  Yep, they have "their room" now.  Both boys are intended to sleep in their bunk bed all night long.   We've been going at this since Thursday and it's gone pretty well; much better than I ever anticipated. First important this this cat nap says: Walter is getting so much more independent.  Evan has hockey tonight so he was around long enough to get Wesley ready for bed and read about a dozen  books then he left and I sent Walter up stairs to finish his homework.  And that's all it takes these days!  He reads the homework, does the home work, then reads the alternative work and the next days work and keeps going. He sees the clock and notices it's past the time I would normally come get him to get himself ready for bed and he comes down to check on us, I had fallen asleep in Wesley's bed.  I wasn't really a fan of trying to crawl my big belly into Wesleys bottom bunk with a side rail on it but I'll admit I'm loving the snuggle time.  As I lie next to him and whisper stories and prayers in his ear all he wants is to cuddle closer.  Tonight he needed a little extra, probably because it's Monday and Mondays are a bit tough on all of us.  So as I laid on my side, snuggled up to him, he grabs my arm and wraps it around his waist.  It has to be right there.  No where else.  If I try to move or scratch an itch, he grabs back for it and wraps it around his waist again.  So that's how I fell asleep.  Trying to lie as still as possible with my arm wrapped around his waist, we fell asleep together.  And my big boy comes and gets me to put him in bed next.  Does it get better than this?

A SHORT update on each of us otherwise:
Walter: loves love loves Karate, Pokemon, Rainbow Loom (he's' made every design in his book at least three times without help), and anything and everything Lego Movie.  He still enjoys his swim lessons.  Started soccer on Sunday and loved it.  He's working hard on bike riding so he can get his training wheels off and get a new bike.  But he's still pretty nervous with out the training wheels.  I try to encourage him by reminding him how much easier it will be to ride without them.  It's over 2 miles round trip to the park and up hill almost the whole way there: yet he still keeps those training wheels on!  His prayers every night   are that he passes his karate promotion test (next Monday, if you have a few spare prayers, he would appreciate you also pray for him), that he finds a way to be kind and "fill a bucket" and that his baby and his brother are OK in the next day.  He'll add in some sort of school drama or friend drama he has on his mind and also for the Lego Movie Video Game :)  Tonight he prayed that God would tell him why toe nails are important and if they aren't important, why does he need to have them?  Could he just take them off?

Wesley: loves super heros, his new scooter (mine bike), dogs, cars and balls.  He talks non stop and only half the time we have no idea what he's saying.  He's stopped eating pretty much any food but cereal and olives.  He does not like to potty but does like chocolate.  In fact it might be hindering PT'ing because he goes and sits on the potty if he wants an M&M and not if he actually has to go.  He'll learn when he's ready.  He knows about every animal there is and approximately zero colors.  Loves to 'count' with any random order of numbers.

Evan and Sarah:
Life.  It's busy yo!  Last friday as I was filling out a dozen summer camp and activities applications I realize we don't have  "big trip" planned this summer, as we should expect considering the pending arrival in July.  I like to get out of town though during the summer.  Evan and I are planning an overnight the weekend of our honey moon but besides that not so much as even a camping trip because who wants to camp 30+ weeks pregnant or with a new born?  So on a whim I emailed Evan: "Legoland for spring break?".  He was supposed to write back, no, we just went to whistler and I'm going to St. Louis that Thursday.  He's supposed to be the common sense to my crazy.  But instead he wrote back "sure, should we go all week or just a few days?"  So I blame him.  And now we are doing a very short trip to Lego Land for spring break.  Fly out Tuesday am, land by 9am and come home Thursday afternoon.  Evan flies on to St. Louis from there.  Even if it's short, who knows when the 4 (5) of us will get away again so we have the chance to go and we should, we will, go.  I am though, going to burn through my vacation before maternity leave starts.  It's OK I'm not as worried about hording it as I was before.

We have also been busy trying to decide to or not to sell our house and buy a new one.  It's definitely a sellers market.  I know if we wanted to sell we could.  But we aren't "those people" that can sell our house and sit and wait, in a rental or renting this one back, while we find one to buy.  Too many risks.  What if rates go up?  What if we can't find what we want?  What if something happens to the baby?  We need to be settled to a place when she comes so we can host visitors.  And this is what it's like out there.  Houses USED to go on the market Friday, they'd have a showing over the weekend and take offers until 5pm Monday.  So if you liked it you had 24 hours to decide and make an offer, with an escalation clause up to about 15-25K above asking price.  And there would be a good chance you'd lose the house because someone with a cash offer or more to put down or a quicker close would beat you out of the house.  I'm not cut out for that market.  I need to think, to stew, to analyze and over analyze.  And that USED to be the market until the past few weeks.  Houses go on the market Wednesday now, and they don't make it till the weekend.  The Realtor has already told all their Realtor friends who all have a client interested and there are multiple offers before the sign hits the yard.  It's nuts and I don't want to play like that.  We realize that this means we are probably in this house for a good long while.  And I'll have to get over the fact that 3 kids will share 1 bathroom that barely holds 2 people at a time and I'll live with the potty chair in the laundry room because there just isn't the space for the two of them to pee at the same time.  And I'll accept the list of other things I've convinced myself I want in a new house that our house does not have.  Because we have such a great school and plenty of room to "live" and helpful kind neighbors, and we have just what we need here.

I already took more time than I wanted to here, I have a book to finish and want to get some sleep tonight.  I am finally done running in the mornings.  I took a few days off last week when I was sick and then my hips rewarded me by protesting to anything more than a mile.  So I'm taking a week off of working out in the morning while I figure out what's next.