a new season

I was going to call this one 'Playing Catch-up' but I feel like that could become a pretty common title, so I won't, but that's what I'm doing...

Summer is almost here. But, California, so it's nothing super different. The longer days are the biggest thing I notice and I love it. I thought it would take weeks, maybe months before I'd venture out alone with all three kids. Turns out I'm a lot less nervous and more laid back this time around because we took off for the farmers market and a long walk just a couple days after my mom left. 

Addie giving Garrett a mobile massage while we walked. 

Farmers market cookie break. 

After trying 5 other baby carriers between the first two kids, I finally got smart and went with the Ergo this time. It's awesome. 

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Before Charlie was born we had a mega long to-do list. There were 86 things on it. We finished everything except for: clean the stroller, and, 'Explorer'. We haven't driven our explorer for a couple of years. We just pay monthly insurance and let it sit there. We've let visitors borrow it a couple of times but haven't needed it otherwise. We've gone back and forth on whether or not to sell it, but ultimately, Paul wasn't up for listing it, finding time to let people test drive it, etc. so I don't know what "Explorer" meant on the list, it was just on the list. Maybe it was to get new license plates because someone stole those. And someone also stole our registration stickers off the van plates so now it looks like we haven't registered it since 2006.  Anyway, I REALLY wanted the explorer gone. I felt like it was getting to the point where it would need more work than it was worth. A couple of days after Charlie was born Paul found a note on it that said, "if you're looking to sell this as is, please call me." I guess someone had wandered by enough to notice it never moves. Long story short, the car was sold the next day to the guy who left the note. So easy and quick! And I'm happy it's gone! 

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We started the preschool hunt for Garrett a couple of weeks after Charlie was born. Little did I know, preschools in California have waiting lists. Looooong waiting lists. Like, the first school I toured, and filled out the waiting list card for, the assistant director said, most people leave the birth date line blank and for the name put Baby Lastname. I looked up a little confused, and she said, people get on the waiting list as soon as they find out they're pregnant. Alright...well that makes me feel hopeful. So, Garrett, Addison, and Charlie are all on the list. We went to an open house at the school a few days later and met the director. She knew all about us, and greeted us like she was waiting for us to arrive. It was a little strange. She said something at the end like, "So, Garrett is the one we're really trying desperately to get enrolled this fall, correct?" Not to sound overly confident, but I feel like we could get in there if we wanted to. But I think we found a school we like better. It's of course the most expensive of all we've looked into and for that reason, has a shorter waiting list. And it sounds like we can get in for fall on the days we picked if we decide by June. He's "too old" for preschool. What? So this fall he will be in pre-K. And the next year he will be in T-K (transitional kindergarten) and then he'll start kindergarten in 2 years. As of right now, we're hoping to keep our kids out of public schools. So that means private or home school. So that means private. The school we like is preschool through 6th grade and it's private. K-6 costs $4100 a year plus registration fees (which I think are about $200). So, kinda like college for 5 year olds. Sigh...I don't know what we'll do, but at least we have 2 years to decide. The good news is that once you have three kids enrolled there, the 4th and on are free. So now we can just keep having more babies and rest easy knowing we'll never spend more than $12,900 a year for elementary school. So there's that. (But it'll probably go up every year.)

(Pictures from an open house at the school with the long waiting list.)

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My siblings David, and Scott and Laura came out to see us a few weeks ago. Laura and I got pedicures and had lunch and went shopping while the guys watched the kids. We went on walks. Out to eat. And they babysat while I did a snack bar for a wedding. It went by fast and the kids loved having them here. Little Garrett gets so emotional when visitors leave. It breaks my heart!

Uncle Dave brought new swim suits and clothes for the kids. 

The snack bar was for Paul's coworkers daughter. Kind of a last minute job because of some changes in the plans, but I pulled it off. 

That's the hodge podge update for now. There's more, but I'll get to that when I can.

cars cars

My VW Jetta has been in California for almost 3 months. And it hasn't moved for 3 months. If you have a car that hasn't been driven in a month, let alone 3 months, you probably don't need it. Paul walks to work. (that flight of stairs he goes down is killer) So I have our Explorer all day. And I don't use it that much either. There are several places Garrett and I walk to during the day when we go out, and in the evening we're usually all together. If there was a situation where we both needed to be in different places at the same time, my in-laws have 4 or 5 cars and we could probably borrow one, (but it hasn't happened yet) and if I'm gone during the day and Paul has somewhere to be there's a couple company vehicles he can use.

I never thought we'd be a one car family, but I think we might be soon. At least for a while. My hope is that (and Paul doesn't know this) but I'm hoping that if we get rid of the Jetta then maybe toward the end of the year we'll trade the Explorer in for something bigger and eventually get a little old run-around car.

Now we just need to sell the jetta...sigh...I hate dealing with cars.

Also, I've decide to label my blog. I'm going through every single post I've ever written, and labeling it. I've been telling myself for about a year that I should start. But I never did. So now I'm going to do it. It'll probably take me several months, but I'm going to try. I've thought a lot about posts that I remember writing that I want to look up, or a recipe I posted that I want to make again and have no idea when I wrote it, etc. So that's my new project... Well, one of them.

And one other thing, Paul and I have had several conversations about making this blog (and Garrett's blog) private. The conversation started before we moved to California, and its just come up again the past couple days. If I do it, I will put reminders up for about a month before it happens so I can get everyones email addresses and invite you to be a reader. More thoughts and that later, but for now, don't worry.