2 Weeks Down!

Today marked the end of our second week in our new home!  We've had internet access for the last week or so, but finding the time to actually sit and type a blog post has been virtually impossible.  That's why it's nearly 1am and I'm finally forcing myself to update, even though one of my eyes is half closed!

It's been an incredibly INTENSE two weeks, with loads and loads of good things to report.  Much to my surprise, I haven't missed our old house ONE BIT!  I miss the yard and pool and beach and family and friends, but not the house we killed ourselves renovating for 8 long years.  All it took was being able to fit every piece of furniture we own into Frank's living room.  That pretty much sold me.  Oh, and being able to bring groceries from the car to the kitchen over a whopping two stairs.  That doesn't stink either!

The kids are loving it too.  We've been having loads of fun checking out all the amenities our new town has to offer - parks and spraygrounds and restaurants and playgrounds.  Special trips with their uncle and aunt to ice cream and baseball.  And the house has been great fun for them to explore.  Being able to be inside without being right on TOP of each other is an amazing thing.  They run around and around and up and down the stairs like they've been let out of prison! 

Sadly, we did finally have to lock the place up like Fort Knox after the little guy used his ninja skills to escape the premises not once but twice.  We hired professionals to install gates to keep him downstairs because I was chasing him up and down seventyeleven times a day.  While the aerobic benefits were fabulous, the gray hairs I gained worrying that he'd kill himself by jumping the railing were not so cool.

While the childproofers were working, he grabbed the first gate and yelled up the stairs "Hey!  Hey you guys!  Can I come up there?"  When they told him that it was too dangerous and he could come up later he looked at them with ice cold eyes and promptly blew raspberries all over their gate. "Meanies!" he called.

"Mama!  Mama, those guys put a locker on my stairs!" he cried out.  "Wait!  I know, I'll just use the other stairs......(skips over to the back staircase)....Oh NOOOO Mama!!  They put a locker on my OTHER stairs too!!!  How we gonna get up there?  What we gonna do?!"

Frankly, I was just thrilled that he didn't realize that *I* was the bad guy footing the bill for these "lockers".  He blamed the installers!  Now that is worth good money.  I've been blamed for everything under the sun in the last week, particularly by my eldest, who thinks he should be allowed to watch TV and play Wii all day and ride around town on a skateboard with no helmet.  And go out to dinner every night.  And have a Nerf gun.  And sleep in my bed every night.  And never have to lift a finger for anything, EVER.  And never go to school. 

I think I even got blamed for the rainy day we had last week!

So there are some not-so-good moments in the mix too, just to keep everything even.  At least once a day I want to crawl under my covers and cry at how horribly behaved and ill-tempered we all are...but then I remember that even though it seems like we're stuck in this mode, this too shall pass.  It's just a reaction to all the upheaval and change, and that every day we get closer to finding our center again. 

The new 'normal' is just around the bend.

pictures soon, I promise!