Blessed Day

  Kyle has been leveling up his handyman skills.  The houses didn't need any major repairs, but it has had a lot of little repairs.  The first thing was that there was a cat smell.  Not cat urine or poop, but just a really strong cat smell.  The main source of it was a piece of carpeted stairs in the garage. The door to the garage weatherstripping was shredded (from the cat) and it would waft in all the time.  It took a good while and lots of strength to remove the heavily glued down piece of carpet.  It was glued down so well that at times chunks of wood would come off with the carpet.
  He also replaced the weatherstripping, changed out door knobs, lots of high exterior lightbulbs, mowing the lawn and edging it (which had never been done), and many other things.
  My parents came to visit again to help us out and for Eleanor's blessing.  We washed all the walls. It took a lot of work, but it feels a lot cleaner and ours.  Eventually we'll repaint, and take off wallpaper, but there's other more important fixing up to do for the next few months.
  Here's a little house tour though: And no it's not picked up and spick and span.  You wouldn't see pictures for many years if not ever if that's the case.

   First room: The Parlor.  Some would call it the living room, but we like to be fancy.

  The living room, dining room and kitchen.  And as you can see it is well lived in. It's night time so the windows are closed, but during the day it is very bright and wonderful.

   We gave Eleanor the pink with Disney princess wallpaper room.  The room is bigger than it seems here.  Both the dresser and that shelf are 2 feet off the wall from when we cleaned the walls.

   The blue room and race car room went to Dexter.  He also just got the bunk beds (my parents gave us my old ones).
  There's also 3 bathrooms, 1 laundry room, the master bedroom, and the 2 car garage upstairs.  But those don't need pictures.  They're pretty standard, so no imagination needed.

  Downstairs in the basement has a finished bedroom that is the size of the two kid bedrooms upstairs.  I don't have a wide angle and so you're missing a computer desk on the left side, and my craft desk on the right.  This is the: computer/project/guest bedroom/whatever else we need it for.

  And lastly is the unfinished basement.  A long rectangular stretch.  When moving in all the items that didn't have a home or immediate need was put down here.  This only shows half of stuff, and one day I have to go through.  One day...  The far end of the room though has his car and a play slide.  When there's snow and it's too cold outside, we'll be using this for playtime.

  Since it was night I didn't get a picture of the backyard.  I'll have to get that later.

So as I mentioned, we also blessed Eleanor this past weekend.  Kyle blessed her, along with my dad, and the bishopric.  The Hansens weren't able to come up, so it was just my family.  Aunt Linda and Uncle Phil came too.  They were trying to hurry over after their church, but just barely missed seeing her blessed.  But they did come over and eat lunch, and visit with us afterwards.

Family picture

Me and my precious girl

 

Aunt Linda, Uncle Phil, and their granddaughter Ellie

Showing the three generations

My sister wanted a picture with me and the kids.  This was the best one that turned out...the kids were done by this point.

And here's some random photos and notes in life.

Dex still loves and smothers her.

She slept for 8 hours for 3 days straight.  Not too mention one night it was 11 or so hours...I wasn't as big of a fan of that one.  But, she is such a great sleeper (90% of the time).

Eleanor is getting to look like a normal sized (so chunky in our books) baby.  She definitely eats well, hence the wonderful sleeping at night.  Plus I think her brother wears her out some days.

Playing in the swing

We get creative on how the kids play together.

Let her hold a guy in her hand

Brother will do the rest of the playing

Found him quiet one time, just putting stickers on himself and the floor

Photo Bombs

This is going to have photos from a while back and some recent ones.  It's just the ones from my phone.  The cell actually gets used more often to take photos since it seems to be always near me, versus my DSLR camera which is not.

In the recovery room getting to hold her for the first time

I love drunk on milk baby smiles

Kissing little sister while still at the hospital

Good sleeper

Inherited it from dad.  I think he was exhausted from looking after Dexter all by himself for a couple days

Our ride home from the hospital

  Since we knew we were moving in 2 weeks we didn't want to set up a crib, then have to disassemble it, and reassemble it.  We opted for a bassinet...but I didn't want to buy one for that short time.  Hence why she's sleeping in a laundry basket on top of a large end table. 
  I guess Dexter was a little jealous of this awesome arrangement because he brought in his pillow and blue blanket to join her.  He only lasted like 1 minute, but was super cute about having to be right next to her in it.
  Recently my neighbor found out from our other neighbor that Ellie slept in a laundry basket on our floor.  She gave us her bassinet that she was planning on giving to Deseret Industries, but never got around to it.  So now Ellie has a real bed instead. 

 First doctor checkup.  She was super hungry...hence the rage coming out of her face here.
Weight: 8 lbs 4 oz - 46%
Height: 21 1/2 in - 87%
Head: 14 3/8 in - 62%

This was the first morning in our new house!!  It was such a awesome thing to wake up to.

Dexter can get soooo sweaty when he runs around.  But obviously he's really happy about the new backyard.

Love my little girl.

Fell asleep while playing during quiet time

 Dexter started refusing naps, so we initiated a "quiet time."  He's allowed to do whatever as long as it's in his room.  He actually plays very well by himself during this, and usually after 30 minutes falls asleep.  A few times it hasn't quite transitioned to a nap, but it gave me enough of a little break.

She prefers to fall asleep in the swing

Chocolate face!  He had it all over his face and hands, but then decided to wipe his hands clean.  Onto his pants!

Being a little "rebel"lious

I figured I should put her in the newborn outfits before she grows out of them.  Oooops...already like an inch too small for her.

One of the early holdings, now they both like it better.

Baby Sister

Well over the last two weeks we've stayed busy.  When my parents left we kind of crashed.  Kyle had hurt his foot from cleaning and working and moving all day for the past 4 days.  I had worn myself out, just by the little stuff I was doing.  C-sections take a lot out of you.

Kyle visited our new ward on the first Sunday.  He had said it was very friendly, with people introducing themselves.  We even had somebody stop by and drop off banana bread.

Don't want to forget about him.

This recovery from the c-section feels like a complete opposite than the first one.  I don't know the reason but after 2 weeks I definitely was feeling good.  No I still couldn't lift much, or run, or do a lot of stuff...but I just felt normal.  Part of this could also be Eleanor.

"Big hugs" - he loves her lots

She is a good baby.  At night she'll almost always have a 4-6 hour stint.  A few times we have even had 7 and 8 hour solid sleeps from her.  CRAZY!  But I'll take it.

Finding the hand

Dexter loves her a ton.  The only thing is to protect her from him.  Examples:
-He practiced his standing long jump...over her. Thankfully he is a good jumper and cleared her, but just barely.  We talked about not jumping over people after this.
-When the relief society presidency was visiting me, he decided to test out her catching skills.  He threw all the balls from his bucket at her.  Most are soft, but this did include some tennis balls.  Unfortuanely his aim is good, and thankfully she didn't get too bothered by it.
-He thinks her swing goes too slow.  He'll do his own power boosts to it.  Now I know why they have 5-point harnesses on them now.

Thinking about helping her swing out

He does do some super cute stuff though that doesn't scare me:
-Kisses or hugs her pretty much anytime he sees her
-Gets really upset if she cries
-Sings songs to her - him learning songs is a new development and is super cute

She's a good baby

She mainly stays in her swing all day.  It's off the floor and visible from a lot of areas.

I did visit our new ward already too.  It's been really nice and great so far.  Of course when you have a little 3 week old/ 1 month old baby everyone wants to see her and say hi to you.  but really the people have been really friendly and helpful so far.  We should enjoy it.

Our House!

Fast forward 1 month.  And life has felt like it has been on fast forward.  Here's a recap part of what happened in the last month...it's kind of a blur.
 When I got home from the hospital the Hansens (Bruce, Leanne, Tyler and Audrey) were all waiting for us.  Besides everyone fighting over holding Eleanor and playing with Dexter, they were able to do some fun stuff with Kyle. I opted to stay home and rest.  They were only able to stay a few days.

Nub Nub holding her newest little grandchild

The same day they left, my mom came up.  While she was here we packed up stuff, and she also cleaned what she could.  Some Treehouse visits with Dexter, and just taking him out was super helpful. 

Helping her out by giving her the unicorn...right on top of her head

She also babysat the couple of times that we went and finished the final details, and then closed on our house!!!!

Probably kissing her

Then on Monday, August 26th we signed our lives away.  We officially owned the house...now to move in.  The people though had put a condition of 48 hours to move out.  I don't know where they started their 48 hours but they took a bit longer than that.  On Thursday morning we were finally given the keys.  My mom and Kyle went over and cleaned what they could for a while.  The people who moved out didn't clean it, like they didn't leave it filthy but nothing was sparkling. :/

I love all the expressions babies have

Then Friday came.  We boxed up and moved stuff like crazy.  Okay, my dad (who drove up the day before), Kyle and my mom did.  My sister, Melynn, came and helped be my chauffer and babysitter.  We took the kids to the Treehouse, then to Costco and finally back to our new house.  

Melynn chilling with the babes and I at the new house

We had the wards help us, and it went great.  Of course I think all the people carrying the boxes (read heavy textbook filled boxes) hated me when I directed them to put a lot of the "stuff" in the basement.  Which is where all the stuff will stay until I'm able to get it.

We're home owners!

Saturday the 3 amazing people (Kyle, Gayle and Robert) cleaned our townhouse like crazy.  Kyle said the manager was REALLY impressed with it.  

He loves the backyard, and the neighbors have chickens which he loves

Sunday we mostly chilled.  Some fixing of stuff and cleaning was done, but a lot of rest was needed.  Then Monday morning my parents helped fix up some issues and then they left to head back home.

Feel like grownups...house, 2 kids and a minivan