Remember when

Bram went from this..

to this.....



When the boys hand hand foot and mouth *shutter*

 

When we were in a facial injury phase.




When both boys were toe heads.

Ambrose was a tank 

 






* guess how old he is here....anyone guess 5 months? The pic has got some sort of optical illusion going on, because he was big, but good grief, not THAT big!



This boy gave the best gummy smiles

The blue bath bucket

When this was a place we just visited

This face....

Father's Day

I didn't fully love and appreciate these two....

Until I had these two...

Finally....

I'll spare you more unnecessary complaining, but my computer has recently been the Pandora's box of problems and curse words. As I type I am alternating between typing and picture transferring so that we can take this thing and drop it off the nearest ocean dock. Then promptly, buy a PC. God bless the right click.

Anywho, not a whole lot is going around here. We are finally making our way out of the moving haze, and settling into our new normal.

Moving reminded me of a few things...
1) I have too much stuff. I'm pretty sure that if the Air Force didn't force us to move every few years, I'd sooner or later be feature on Hoarders: buried alive. Moving forces me to purge and organize, when otherwise, I'd rearrange the clutter rather than get rid of it. My kitchen here is significantly smaller than my NM kitchen, and I quickly realized that although I did some purging while in NM, I needed to do more...much more. I was loosing the battle of kitchen tetris. Familiar with that game? You open a cabinet, place a  few items in, grab another carefully selected items of specific size and shape, rotate and flip them, and BAM, it's a coffee mug puzzle. However, there comes a time when you can't select, flip and rotate your way to and organized kitchen, and at the point, I started 2 giant goodwill boxes. This was taken immediately after I ran out of cupboard space...

2) I suck at painting. I haven't had much experience painting walls, so I never knew how awful I was. Turns out, pretty awful.
3) It's dang expensive. Between first months rent, deposit, buying a new car, hotel, gas, eating out, utility connection fees, restocking a pantry...the list goes on and on...moving is the largest money suck EVER!
4) Procedures change: the movers used to pick up your used boxes and paper, now, not so much. So it was our responsibility to dispose of the 200+ boxes and bags of packing paper.

5) The movers quickly scribble a description of the items that are supposedly in each box, however, the explanation is completely useless. Case in point,  in a box labeled lamp shades, I found one small night light lamp shade and then a ton of kitchen tools/dishes and glass wear.

In other, not moving news....

 Our landlord left this awesome play structure, and we are using the heck out of it!

We have finally started to potty train Bram. He didn't show a single readiness sign, but we can't wait forever, so we reluctantly started the process. We use the Three day potty training method. Basically, you go all out, stay home for three days straight, don't go back to pullups or diapers (confession: we use a diaper at night) and give them gentle reminder to let you know when they have to go potty.  It is the anti "set your timer for every 10 minutes and force them onto the potty" strategy. I guess the thinking behind that is you get yourself entrenched in a battle of wills with a toddler that way. We knew Mr. will of steel would loudly and strongly protest if we tried to force him, so, we put the ball in his court and waited for him to tell us. It's been fairly successful, but not completely... We still don't use pullups out and about, we just deal with accidents if they happen, and we are back in the stage of life where we carry a baby bjorn potty with us everywhere we go. 

The boys and I love the beach. We try and head out there at least once a week, and just soak it all in. 

 John on the other hand... not a beach fan. The sand, sweaty-ness, crowded touristy-ness of it all, just drives him nuts. He enjoys the ocean from the nearest dock or pier with a fishing pole in hand (not to say he doesn't go with us sometimes, but, he does so for the boys). Fine by me, because we are finally at a point where he also takes the boys along with him :) Hallelujah.

Here's what's going on...

We are moving into our house today.... during a tornado warning and Flash flood warning. How about them apples? I have no idea how they plan to keep our stuff even remotely dry or keep the floors and carpets in our house semi dry and clean, but I guess we'll find out.Spoiler alert: the move didn't happen. Not a single solitary box, piece of furniture or random last minute item, came off the truck today. bummer bummer HARDCORE BUMMER! They will try again, but the forecast suggests that tomorrow may be much of the same story.

Today the schools shut down. I still am unsure why. Maybe because the torrential downpour, maybe it was the fact that some streets were impassible due to flooding, or maybe it was the tornado warnings (tornado, yup, I get it...but how about that late start. The tornado warnings all passed before 9am)....all three maybe? I don't know. Odd though. It reminds me of that snow day when the high was 52 degrees.

Have you ever lived in a town that is the home to a tofu hot dog factory and a paper mil? No? Be grateful! Turns out Panama City is hands down, the stinkiest town in the history of towns. I can't tell you how many times I look to the back of the car and accusingly ask the boys if someone farted. It's like living in a giant fart Dutch oven around here. Please folks, come visit!

Since we haven't had enough (expensive) change in our life already, we decided to buy a new( to us) car yesterday. I was driving a CRV, and we had begun to outgrow it. It had been our plan to upgrade at some point, but doing it during this insanely expensive time in our life was not our plan, however, a few maintenance issues began to pop up which led us down the fast track to replacing it. We went in to have the issues fixed, while at the dealership we came across a used Pilot. The stars aligned..it was in our budget, our CRV trade in value was decent so we went for it. The third row will allow us to actually travel WITH our guests when the come to visit rather than force us to take two cars as well as allow John to drive without eating his knees. Winner Winner Chicken Dinner.

High five for Friday

1) Lately, Pandora has been nailing it. We usually have music playing at all times in the house, and sometimes Pandora just disappoints ...and then there are days like today when a song comes on and I gush, "man, I love this song," and Ambrose rolls his eyes and says "you already said that mom." Well played Pandora (see what I did there ;) In case you're wondering, the station that I'm loving is Phillip Phillips, which I'm pretty sure screams thirty something stay at home mom, but whatever. I'm owning it. Keith Urban, Sugarland and Mumford and Sons gets much love as well.

2) I have my beloved CRV back. Ahhh, no worrying about whether or not I can fit in a parking space, I can make a U-turn with ease, and I'm getting 24mpg.

3) Bram's sleep is going pretty well. I thought for sure the upheaval of the move would really throw us into a tail spin, but my boy is holding strong and sleeping pretty well. I am pretty quick to complain about his sleep, but always hesitate to share when its' going well for fear of jinxing it...you know, like when you say "hey, the kids haven't been sick n a while," and they come down with a fever mere moments later...ya, like that.

4) We are leaving to go snag they keys to our (rental) house in an hour or so. The rental market out here is insane-o, so when this house came up, I snatched it up without having anyone take a look at it in person, so here's to hoping the landlord is amazing at photo shop.

5) I have resigned myself to the fact that the humidity and my hair don't mix. Cheers to 3 years of bad hair days. *I also forgot that the dry NM weather helps us out in the mosquito department. I haven't had a mosquito bite in almost 5 years. As I sit her today, I have 12.

Florida or bust

Well, we did it. We packed up and moved across the country, and we all survived.

I'll start at the beginning though.

The weekend before the move, John flew back home to help us. I didn't advertise it on the blog, but John "moved" (moved is a loose term. He took a backpack of clothes and personal items and moved into a small condo and started his new job) to Florida about  6 weeks before the boys did. For various reasons (school reasons, house hunting reasons, house selling reasons, speech therapy reasons...and a few others), it was best for John to head on to FL while the boys and I hung back in NM for a bit. I would never wish time apart on a family, but the saying, "absence makes the heart grow fonder" is oh so true. Reunions after time apart are nothing short of magical.

I attempted to make this my "most organized move to date," and the jury is still out until we actually unpack. The whole reason I wanted to start organized, was so that the whole process would end organized. I'll let you know exactly a week from today.

Initially, I didn't have a lot for the overly quiet little town, but it grew on me over the years and the day we pulled away I was bummed. We absolutely LOVE our house there. If I could pack up that house and move it with me every move, I'd do it in a heartbeat. I LOVE LOVE LOVE that house. The weather, simple lifestyle, close knit squadron, living no more than 3-4 minutes from all of our friends....there are so many things we will miss about Alamogordo. However, we look forward to the adventures Florida holds for us.

The drive down was loooong, and on some days...painful. All said and done we drove about 25 hours, spread out over three days. We planned for the first day to be the longest, and the third day to be our shortest. The first day, there was excitement and novelty of the road trip, But by the third day, everyone had gone bananas and at one point , thorough tears, Ambrose told us he " was the most unlucky boy ever because we were making him stay in the car so long." His bowels were also out to kill us because the kid had to poop on the side of the road (in a small potty training potty) more than once.

We arrived and our small beach town does not disappoint. I'm sure you remember us spending a few months here in the past, while we're not planning to actually live out here, we are staying for a week while our rental opens up. Life here is blissful. At the risk of sounding kooky,there is something so centering about being at the beach. Some of the best time we've  experienced as a family, are here on these beaches. Life is simpler but better out. We are a 45 minute drive from town, and this quiet little beach town offers a couple quaint restaurants, and that's about it. We spend time in the sun and water with friends and family...that's it. Those are the plans, nothing more. Bliss I tell ya!

We took our first trip to the beach this morning, and while I brought enough snacks to feed an army, I didn't bring a single solitary beach toy (or towel for that matter), so I wasn't sure how long the boys would last out at the beach. I doubted them, and they sure showed me. They were entertained for over an hour by the waves, the sand and the seashells. They didn't stop to fight, complain or cry even once.