It's almost June

It is almost the month of June & things are starting to wrap up at the new house. We are almost a month behind schedule at this point & it looks like it will still be about 1.5-2.5wks until we get the go ahead to move in. While my parents were in town this past week, we moved all of the non-essential stuff up to the house & it is all being stored in the closets, garage, & storage room. All that we currently have left at the old house are the beds, rugs, couches, high chairs, dressers, clothes, towels, bathroom essentials, toys, blankets & food. Still a lot of stuff to move really, but probably only about half of what we own. So we really did make some good progress while my family was here. I will try to post some new pictures once we get the kitchen cabinets finished up this weekend. We can't wait to settle into our new house! :)

House Update

Almost done!

Glasses

Lincoln is getting glasses. Oh my. Apparently he is slightly far-sighted. His doctor said that normally they wouldn't provide a prescription for it, but he has been crossing his eyes & having difficulty adjusting his focus between close & far away objects.

I hope they help & that they don't become a real headache around the house here. I know the girls will have a hard time leaving them alone, even if Lincoln likes them enough to keep them on. I just don't know how it is gonna work out. We will give it a try though.

IEP Update

Well it looks like it will be the best for Lincoln to stay in his current school at least this next year...if not all of the way through 5th grade. I was really hoping to get him transferred to a school closer to our new house, and went into this meeting thinking that I would be pushing for that.

However, during the IEP meeting the teacher & therapists all demonstrated some excellent & insightful knowledge of Lincoln, plus their school has some of the best facilities & support for severely disabled students. Lincoln seemed to really enjoy seeing them and spent some time snuggled up with each and every one of them during our 1.5hr meeting.

I left their feeling like they all really understand and care about Lincoln and his development and happiness. My only real worry is the length of the bus ride. We will be moving quite a long ways away, so I am hoping that the bus ride does not exceed 1 hour long by too much. Lincoln is a wonderful car/bus rider, but I worry about how this will affect his diet. He is supposed to eat every 4 hours at the latest. If it goes much longer than that he gets quite hungry & cranky. He currently eats at 7am and then again at 11:30. A 4.5 hour spread due to the 30min bus ride on each end. The teacher offered to feed him a meal, but I know how difficult it was for them when they had to do this at the beginning of this current year. That they were willing to try it again gave me a little hope that we will be able to figure something out to make the longer mornings easier on Lincoln.

The last day of school this year is May 18th & first day of school for the next year is August 13th! It is hard to believe that Lincoln is already finishing up his first year of school!? He is such a big boy & I am so proud of him!! :)

House Paint

There has been some more progress at the house this week. The interior has finally been completely painted. The guest bathroom has been grouted & sealed. And the exterior has been painted as well! It is all really starting to come together now!

Exterior Paint

Guest Bathroom

Interior Paint

Pool Waterline Tile

Column Tile

Countertops & Cabinets

10 Things to Tell Teenage Girls

This is a great post by Kate Elizabeth Connor at Lily Pads.
http://kateelizabethconner.com/ten-things-i-want-to-tell-teenage-girls/

Ten Things I Want To Tell Teenage Girls
March 25, 2012

1. If you choose to wear shirts that show off your boobs, you will attract boys. To be more specific, you will attract the kind of boys that like to look down girls’ shirts. If you want to date a guy who likes to look at other girls’ boobs and chase skirts, then great job; keep it up. If you don’t want to date a guy who ogles at the breasts of other women, then maybe you should stop offering your own breasts up for the ogling. All attention is not equal. You think you want attention, but you don’t. You want respect. All attention is not equal.

2. Don’t go to the tanning bed. You’ll thank me when you go to your high school reunion and you look like you’ve been airbrushed and then photoshopped compared to the tanning bed train wrecks formerly known as classmates – well, at least next to the ones that haven’t died from skin cancer.

3. When you talk about your friends “anonymously” on Facebook, we know exactly who you’re talking about. People are smarter than you think they are. Stop posting passive-aggressive statuses about the myriad of ways your friends disappoint you.

4. Newsflash: the number of times you say “I hate drama” is a pretty good indicator of how much you love drama. Non-dramatic people don’t feel the need to discuss all the drama they didn’t start and aren’t involved in.

5. “Follow your heart” is probably the worst advice ever.

6. Never let a man make you feel weak or inferior because you are an emotional being. Emotion is good; it is nothing to be ashamed of. Emotion makes us better – so long as it remains in it’s proper place: subject to truth and reason.

7. Smoking is not cool.

8. Stop saying things like, “I don’t care what anyone thinks about me.” First of all, that’s not true. And second of all, if it is true, you need a perspective shift. Your reputation matters – greatly. You should care what people think of you.

9. Don’t play coy or stupid or helpless to get attention. Don’t pretend something is too heavy so that a boy will carry it for you. Don’t play dumb to stroke someone’s ego. Don’t bat your eyelashes in exchange for attention and expect to be taken seriously, ever. You can’t have it both ways. Either you show the world that you have a brain and passions and skills, or you don’t. There are no damsels in distress managing corporations, running countries, or managing households. The minute you start batting eyelashes, eyelashes is all you’ve got.

10. You are beautiful. You are enough. The world we live in is twisted and broken and for your entire life you will be subjected to all kinds of lies that tell you that you are not enough. You are not thin enough. You are not tan enough. You are not smooth, soft, shiny, firm, tight, fit, silky, blond, hairless enough. Your teeth are not white enough. Your legs are not long enough. Your clothes are not stylish enough. You are not educated enough. You don’t have enough experience. You are not creative enough.

There is a beauty industry, a fashion industry, a television industry, (and most unfortunately) a pornography industry: and all of these have unique ways of communicating to bright young women: you are not beautiful, sexy, smart or valuable enough.

You must have the clarity and common sense to know that none of that is true. None of it.

You were created for a purpose, exactly so. You have innate value. You are loved more than you could ever comprehend; it is mind-boggling how much you are adored. There has never been, and there will never be another you. Therefore, you have unique thoughts to offer the world. They are only yours, and we all lose out if you are too fearful to share them.

You are beautiful. You are valuable. You are enough.



This is a very well written post with great comments as well. One comment that really stuck out to me was in regards to item #8.

The best advice I ever got on this issue was from my dad, who said, "If you listen to everyone, or you listen to no one, you'll be in trouble." I hope my girls don't grow up to care what just ANYONE thinks - but care what the several people who are most important to them think. And I especially hope that the most important of those really important people is their own self.



I hope I am able to instill these principles & values in my baby girls as they grow up. And they are able to take advice like this to heart.

Some More Girly Cuteness

June has been loving the camera recently. She seeing it laying on the table & will bring it to me and tell me to take her picture. Of course she still doesn't get that she shouldn't be touching or putting her face 1 inch from the lens. We are working on it though.

Here are a bunch of outtakes. :)

Here is a good one that we got.

Roxy's new favorite thing to do now that she is walking is to pick up random toys and carry them around. It is so cute. She can carry some pretty big stuff too. I think just loves this new found freedom for her hands!




Some updates on baby girl #3. All of the ultrasounds, blood work & OB appointments that we have had are showing that she is developing perfectly. So now it is time for the planning of her arrival.

Step #1: picking her name! We have had a baby boy name picked out since my pregnancy with Roxy, but we didn't have another girl name in he bag. So after learning that baby #4 was going to be baby girl #3 we were back to the drawing board in the name department. From the very beginning we decided to trade off who gets the final say in the first name & the other person gets to pick the middle name. Apparently Andy decided that it was his turn for choosing the first name, since he picked June & I picked Rosalyn (although he also picked Lincoln...?) Anyway, after weeks of me pestering Andy with name options that were okay by me, he finally narrowed it down to 2 names; Cora & Fiona. Cora was a name that he had been suggesting all along, but I just wasn't sure about it. So we decided on Fiona, but as soon as we did that I started having second thoughts. I even had a dream that we called her Cora, so at that point I felt certain that we should name her Cora, because that is obviously what my subconscious wanted. So I talked to Andy about it, and he decided we should wait & think on it a few more weeks. But my mind was pretty much made up at that point & eventually approved of the name Cora for our next baby girl. If all continues to go well, come September, we will have 3 baby girls; a June, a Roxy & a Cora. :D

And, now that the first name has been decided, I get to pick the middle name! I try to stick with family names or family name spin-offs for the middle names of our kiddos. And I pretty much only have one in mind at this point that I think goes well with a first name of Cora, but I need to get Andy's approval first before it is official.

Tile & Grout

So the tile is really coming along in the new house. The bathrooms are being grouted & the exterior column tiling has begun.

Here are the 14' columns in the entryway. These poor Craigslist guys thought that they would be almost done with all 6 of the columns by tomorrow, instead they will only have completed 2 of them.

Here are the bathrooms that have been grouted. They look great!

Lincoln's shower. :)

Master shower

Girls

We sure do love our adorable little girls!

June is proudly showing off her messy Oreo hands & face. She is such a stinker!

Roxy is giving Daddy a hug. She is such a great little snuggler!