Update

Well its been a couple of weeks since I wrote anything. You can see why I have never sucessfully kept a journal. Even when I was on my mission I would go weeks in between entries. Then write a couple pages in attempt to document what I had missed. So I guess that is what this post will be as well.

Mark and I have made offers on 2 homes. One in West Haven, the other in Clinton. Both of which are short sales. Because of which we are told it will be 30 to 60 days before we hear anything back. So we are waiting. I am hoping that we will get one of these two homes. Ideally get both and be able to go back and walk through them again and then decide which home we want. I think the chances are very slim in getting the home in West Haven. The location would be ideal in keeping us close to Mark's parents. I think are chances of us getting the home in Clinton are much higher. I guess only time will tell.

Claire is being Claire. She very successfully embarrassed Mark in church yesterday, but knocking over the piano bench in sunday school and proceeding to play. The ward members insist it doesn't bother them, but I can't wait for day when we can send her to nursery. She has too much energy. She needs something to do with it all, and nursery toys sound like the perfect outlet. We will wait patiently over the next couple of months, and have a little celebration when June 7th comes. It will be a glorious day.

Its February!

So it is officially February and has been for a few days. :) I already have a case of spring fever. I just can't wait for the warm weather. Mark and I brought his bike in the house this last week and pimped it out with all the cool stuff he got for christmas. He now has a basket, headlight and taillight, lights on the tires, and a speedometer. He was so excited that he braved the cold and rode up to subway to pick us up dinner. Upon returning he was able to tell me the mileage and speed that he traveled. Oh yeah that is one sweet bike!

Claire is still growing. She isn't my baby baby anymore. Now she is a toddler, well more of a runner now days. She will just take off, I never knew little legs could move so fast. I was at Ulta the other day picking up some nail polish for my mom for her birthday. I sat her down to pay, the second her feet hit the floor she was off. Before I got to her she had two bottle of polish in her hands and was running to the back of the store. She threw the polish when she saw me getting close, probably in an attempt to look innocent. Luckily the bottle didn't break! I guess it must have been entertaining as all the other customers in the store were laughing. That girl keeps me busy. Her newest thing is to walk to the fridge point at it and say "MMMMMMMMMMMM" . That is to let me know that she wants food. I keep trying to get her to say eat, but she isn't interested in talking. She also is saying "AHHH" after taking a drink. I guess to let us know how much she is enjoying her beverage. I just don't find milk that refreshing, but Claire sure does.

We are going out to look at homes again tomorrow. I am excited to go look. I think it is good for us to look at a lot of different homes. That way we get an idea of what is out there and what we want. When we bought our first house, we only looked at 3 homes before we decided to make an offer on one. We just knew that was suppose to be our home. I did love our home, but there were things that also drove me crazy, like only have one drawer in the kitchen that actually opened. I didn't think to check to see if they drawers were for decoration only. So now I faithfully check all the drawers in every kitchen we look at. I am determined to get a kitchen with more than 1 drawer. I'll let you know how the house hunting goes.

Random thoughts

Its that time of year again!!! I hate filing taxes. In hopes of a speedy return I started the process of doing our taxes. Now having tried doing it completely by myself in years past I have learned that it is worth the investment of turbotax. Or some other form of help. It seems that every year the process becomes more and more complicated. I have to believe that there is a group of evil geniuses somewhere just sitting around and thinking of ideas on how to make this task more ridiculous. That is the only solution I can come up with for all the insanity that is taxes. Although I may not understand the logic behind the taxes, I do enjoy getting the return every year. Its almost like getting revenge of the government for taking my (well this years Mark's) hard earned money all year long.

Now after all the hair pulling and fist shaking, comes the fun part of getting the money. Mark and I were just talking last night about how we are going to spend this money. Of course the fun frivilous ways always come to mind. But we are adults now and have to be more responsible. I think we decided on paying off my car. With us buying a house here in the near future. Getting rid of a $200 car payment every month seemed like the best way to use it. I am excited to finally have my car paid off. It will be nice to know we own both of our cars. Then the rest will go to helping us buy a new bed seems how ours was ran over on I-15 after flying out of the back of the truck as Wade was returning it to us.

Speaking of houses. I am so excited to finally have my own home again. I know it has been such a blessing for us to live in my inlaws home while they are on their mission. Although I miss having my OWN home. I look forward to Claire having her own room. Where I can paint and hang up all her decorations that have been sitting in a box out in the garage for the last year. She was so little when we moved that she won't remember any of them. I think my favorite part of having our last house was painting the walls. I only got Claire's room and the kitchen painted before we decided to sale and move in here. There were so many more white walls that needed some color. Every home we go and look at I start thinking what color I can paint the walls. One home was painted so cute, I couldn't think of anything to change. I don't think I can buy a home and not paint at least one room. We've looked at a few homes. Only one of which we interested in. It was in the high end of our budget. We are going to keep looking. I know there is a home somewhere that is perfect for us. We are just going to have to do some serious looking. So, on that note I will end my very long post.

Empty house

For the past two weeks Mark's brother Wade and his wife Morgan had been staying with us. They left on monday morning for Alabama. Claire became addicted to them. She would follow Morgan around like a little lost puppy begging for attention. Since their departure, I constantly find Claire looking down the stairs and talking. Sometimes she will attack the gate, in an attempt to get down the stairs. She has never done this in the past. I believe she is looking for her Aunt and Uncle. I don't think she understands that Wade and Morgan are not coming back for a while. I am hoping that it will only take a few more days before she starts to realize this and in turn stops looking for them. She has also started acting out. She is constantly doing things she knows are not allowed. I am not sure if it is because she misses them, or got use to all the extra attention and is now trying to get it in any way she can. Today she would go to the fireplace, pull open the bottom and grate and look at as to say "come and get me!" then she would run away. We must have done this at least 30 times. The time outs didn't seem to phase her. I was on the verge of losing my temper. So in an attempt of desperation, I finally arranged a play date with her cousin Ethan. I have a feeling that all this acting out is frustration as to not being able to find her aunt and uncle.

As much as I wish she didn't have to go through this. I am so glad that Wade and Morgan stayed with us. I was worried that it might be awkward, but it never was. Some how we were just able to blend. I loved having them here. I hadn't had much opportunity to get to know either of them before this stay. I think one of my favorite things was playing scrabble with them. Mark had lost his enthusiasm for it and would only play out of complete boredom. We played as a foursome, several times. I'm not sure why I enjoy playing so much, I am always put to shame. Yet I constantly find myself wanting to play again. Now that they are gone I have a feeling it will be a while before Scrabble will be played again in our home. :(

Cat urine and houses don't mix

So we have officially started the process of looking for a new home. Even though Mark's parents won't be home until June, we feel that taking some extra time to really look around will benefit us. Today we went and looked at a home. The first one we have looked at. It was a foreclosed home, and as such I was expecting it to be a little rough. When we walked in the home, there was an overwhelming stench of cat urine. WOW...... I couldn't believe someone could live in that. Not to mention the horrible green carpet didn't help the feeling in the home. I was completely shocked to think that a home could be so badly trashed in just 5 years. How can you pay so much money to have a home, and have complete disrespect for it. Who patches holes in the carpet with duct tape?? Really who does that? Needless to say we won't be making an offer on that fixer upper. I guess it is a good thing that we started early. Wish us luck in the house hunting.

Blogging

Hi everyone,

Well here is my first post. My sister in law Heather has been trying to get me to start blogging for a while now. I've been working on my blog for a couple days now. I am starting to get the hang of things. I can see how this can become addictive. I have already changed the background countless times. There are just so many cute ones to choose from. I will try to start posting more interesting things.