First Birthday

This blog is a few weeks late.

Amelia celebrated her first birthday on March 20.  It's hard to imagine her being one year old already.  Time flies.  She's so big now too.  I mean, like, bigger than your average one year old.  At her one year checkup (on her birthday!), she was 26 1/2 inches tall and weighed 22 lbs.  She's wearing 18 month clothes currently.  Most of her 12 month clothes are too tight on her.  It's insane!  We're even giving her some of Carleigh's old pajamas in the 2T/3T size and they fit her well.  They are the pajama gowns, so that explains it.  It's good for length.  Most of Carleigh's 2T/3T sized clothing was going to be donated, but now I'm sending it all over to Amelia's closet.  That will save me a few dollars here and there.  I bought Amelia a 2T swimsuit for our trip to Santa Monica in a few weeks, too.  The 18 month swimsuits looked way too small for her.  We got a tall girl on our hands.

When it comes to walking/standing independently, we're still working on that.  Amelia has no real interest in walking yet, which is fine with me.  She's a very fast crawler and loves getting into everything.  She can stand up on her own while holding onto something.  She loves her music table and the couch as props.  She's also not too interested in pulling herself up on objects yet either.  With food, she's good with the pincer grasp, but doesn't put the food in her mouth.  She finds it fun to pick up food and then fling it on the floor.  That means I spend more time sweeping/vacuuming the kitchen floor.  It's fine with me.  At least she's experimenting.

Carleigh returned back to school this Monday after being off for Spring break.  Her break was only a week long.  She's in school this week and next week before her five week track break starts.  Our only plans so far is to visit Santa Monica for a weekend.  Otherwise, we will be hanging out at home or at the park before it gets too hot.  Thankfully we have splash pads at the two parks Carleigh likes the most.

Not much else has been happening in our house.  We did paint our half bathroom downstairs.  It's a really pretty light blue color called Crashing Waves.  I'm going for a beach theme in that room and it fits perfectly.  Here's a picture before the room was finished.

All I need to do now is get the shelves and decorations I want and it will be complete.  While at Home Depot getting the paint for this bathroom, I picked out some colors for our master bathroom.  Not sure when we will paint that room, but at least I've got some ideal colors ready.

My mom mailed the title out to the Lincoln last week as well.  So now I have the oh-so-fun joy of going to the DMV in the upcoming week(s) to transfer everything over to my name and getting the car licensed in Nevada.  This is what the car looks like, it's obviously the blue car on the left.  The white car is our Jaguar XJ.  I took this picture after Heath washed both cars and waxed the Lincoln on Sunday afternoon.

It's not the best picture.  I'm looking forward to getting limo tint on that bad boy.  The weather is going to be heating up soon and I need the car to stay a little cool.  Also, I'm tired of people being able to see all of my business in my car.  In my S-Type, the girls had complete privacy in the backseat.  The windows were blacked out.  So I'm looking forward to returning them to that "luxury".

Hiatus

It's been over four months since I updated this blog.  I admit that I've abandoned it because I didn't know what topics to blog about.  Motherhood and gaming has kind of gotten in the way too.  My motherly duties and household responsibilities wear me out during the day.  When night rolls around, I'm ready to unwind and play some GTA Online with my friend's.

I'm starting the new year off with a makeover to my blog.  I'm trying to make it look more "professional", even though I'm not using this blog for anything but my ramblings and thoughts.  Below, you will find the topics I plan to blog about in the upcoming days and weeks.  These are topics that will actually keep me motivated and interested in blogging.

Upcoming Topics:

• Motherhood
• Wine
• Gaming
• Cooking/baking
• Home organization
• Fitness
• Photography

Those topics alone should keep me focused on this blog.  I'm sure there will be many other topics that will start popping into my head as the weeks go by.

Fitness is in there just because I recently got a gym membership to get out of my house a couple of nights a week.  Being stuck in your house with two kid's all week is exhausting.  I need time to myself.  It made sense to get out of the house and work on my fitness at the same time.

Photography will be pictures I take around my neighborhood/city.  I'm not a photographer by any means, but it's always fun to take pictures and share them with the rest of the world.

Since my house is so unorganized/cluttered in certain areas (the pantry... OMG!), I'll be using blog posts to show my before/after pictures of how far I came.  Maybe it will motivate others who are feeling overwhelmed.  Don't even get me started on organizing all of Carleigh's toys.  It's time to go through all of that stuff and see what can be sold/donated.  She has too much!

I hope to have another blog post up by this weekend.  Probably Sunday afternoon.

One Car Family

Heath & I recently decided to go down to one car.  The decision was mostly made because we had one car rotting away in the garage.  We sold the GTO.  Heath's car was a two door and did not fit our family of four.  My Jaguar is a four door, so yeah, we kept my car.  Obviously!  Heath had an offer on his car about an hour after posting it for sale.  He accepted the offer and the car was gone the same day.  It was so weird to go down to one car, but really, why would we need two cars if I rarely drive during the day when I'm home with the kids?  The GTO was worth more money to us gone than keeping it.  We paid off three credit cards with the money we got from selling the GTO.  We are so much better off financially with having only one car.  We will get a second car when needed, but as of this moment, one car fits us best.  There's so much extra room in our garage now too.  No complaints!

We also recently got rid of our cell phones.  We've had T-Mobile for ten years, but over the last two months, our cell service had dropped exponentially.  We tried to work with them to get the issue fixed, but no matter what happened, it just wasn't going to work out for us.  There's really only one cell tower in our area with a lot of people trying to use it.  T-Mobile's coverage map shows us as "excellent", yet we would rarely have any service.  Heath's iPhone always showed "No Service" or "Searching" and my Galaxy S4 showed one or two bars and on the Edge network.  Totally unacceptable since we are supposedly supported by 4G LTE out here.  We had a land line hooked up on Friday afternoon.  Going down to zero cell phones was weird, too.  But really, it's saving us so much money per month not having smartphones!  We will pocket almost $200/mo now.  Seriously, saving money is boss.

Our next goal to save extra money per month is to refinance our house.  We want to get rid of our mortgage insurance.  When we bought our house, we got an FHA loan.  The mortgage insurance is on the pricey side and we'd like that money in our pocket instead.  I'll be making the phone call to our mortgage company tomorrow to see what could work best for us.  It would be nice to have so much more extra money every month.

We went to Carleigh's open house for school on Friday.  My little girl is getting so big.  She's on the school schedule that doesn't start until September, so while most of her friend's start school tomorrow, she has to wait a few more weeks.  She qualifies to ride the bus since we live a couple of miles from the school.  The only thing left for me to do is call the school district to verify the drop off times for after school.  Our school district only shows the drop off times for full days.  My fingers are crossed that they aren't doing screwy scheduling for half day kindergartners.  If they don't drop off for half day kids, then guess what?  We will be off to buy our second car sooner than expected.  Oh well.  ;)

This blog was a little bit every where and I apologize.  Heath & I shared a bottle of wine with our salmon dinner tonight, so I feel a little out of it while typing this up.  There's just so much going on here right now.  So many changes and it's just crazy.  A good kind of crazy though.  I'll update this again when I'm more sober and able to make more sense.

Homemade House Cleaners

I know... it's been awhile since I've update my blog.  While I was away, I decided to experiment with homemade cleaners for around the house.  Of course, I turned to that nifty little website called Pinterest to find good cleaners.  I started making my own homemade cleaners to save money and not smell the harsh chemicals from store bought cleaners.  So far, I've only made two different household cleaners.  A granite cleaner and a regular, 409 type cleaner.  Both have done an exceptional job at keeping my house clean.  I'll be making my own laundry detergent in the near future.

My granite cleaner is made from this recipe found on One Good Thing by Jillee, minus the essential oil.  I haven't bought any essential oils yet, but I probably won't because I don't feel that my cleaners need it.  So here's the recipe:

1/4 cup rubbing alcohol
3 drops of Dawn
Water

Every household should have these ingredients in their household already.  I really love this cleaner.  It leaves my granite counter tops very shiny.

My all-purpose/409 type cleaner was found on Macheesmo.  There are four different recipes for homemade cleaners at that link.  But I use the all purpose recipe for my sinks and toilets for the time being.  It works great, but I do want to try the Bath, Sink, Tile Cleaner recipe as well.  Here's the recipe for the all purpose cleaner if you don't want to click the link.

3 Tablespoons vinegar
1/2 teaspoon washing soda
1/2 teaspoon castile soap
2 Cups hot water

Cleaning my home has become more enjoyable now that I make my own cleaners.  Once I get my own laundry detergent made and run a few loads of it, I'll give it a review and post the recipe here as well.

The Anxiety and Stress

This is another extended family related post.

I have been unable to shake the stress and anxiety I am feeling over the extended family coming out to visit.  I honestly don't want people here at all.  Everything nasty my in-laws have ever said about me before their two year cut out from our lives is coming back in full force.  At this point, I don't even know why we allowed them back into our lives.  I guess it was my "guilt" of wanting them to know their granddaughter.  We allowed them back into our lives about a month before Carleigh was born in 2009.  Since I know their true feelings about me, I'm trying to understand why I allow them around me at all and let them in my home twice a year.  If it wasn't for having their grandchildren, they would more than likely still be cut out of our lives.  I'm tired of having these two faced people in my home.  I'm tired of hearing about what Heath's dad doesn't like about our house, as if I'm suppose to give a fuck what he thinks anyway.  Examples, "I don't like your cats.", "I don't like your couch.", "Are you sure you can afford this house?", etc... First of all, I don't give a shit if you don't like items in my home.  Furnish your own home how YOU like it.  Second, mind your own business when it comes to our finances.  Obviously we can afford our house, you twit.  We don't own two brand new cars and don't rack up debt just to keep up with the Joneses.  We have one car paid off and another to follow soon.  And once the second car is paid off, we are not going to go out and buy another new car just so we can pay someone a monthly payment for the next three to five years again.  I'm sorry my in-laws chose to pay $900/mo for their brand new cars.  That's their deal.

Last post, I said I wanted visiting hours to be from 11am-7pm.  But as their visiting dates get closer, I'd love more than anything to move that time from 11am-4pm.  They don't need to be here for dinner every night.  Nor do they need to be here eight hours a day.  Since I start my new job tonight, my hours will be 6pm-11pm on the weeknights.  I'm only working 20 hours a week.  So I'd like to not have them here all day and deal with them up until the time I leave for work.  Right now, I have Sunday, Monday and Thursday off.  If my schedule stays the same, which it more than likely will, I'd only have Thursday off and away from them during their visit.  I'm not including Monday since they are getting in late that night.  And we're only getting Thursday to ourselves because Heath has to work that day.  Heath told them to find their own things to do on Thursday.

I'm also irritated because Heath wasn't home with me very long after Amelia was born.  He had to save up his PTO for when his parent's were going to come out and visit.  I wish we would not have chosen that route.  Who gives a crap if he didn't have enough PTO for their inconvenient visit?  Nobody asked them to come out to see us for an entire week.  I would have rather had Heath home for a week after Amelia was born to help out around the house.  Instead, he went back to work four days after Amelia was born.  It's not my problem if Heath didn't have vacation time when his parent's came out.  They need to learn that we can't drop everything going on in our lives just to cater to them when they fly out here.  Yes, we live in Las Vegas, but that doesn't mean we can drop everything and go and explore the city and do everything they want to do.  They can go vacation in a different state if that's what they want to do.

Then my mom seemed disappointed when I told her I had to work at least 20 hours a week, even during their visit.  I'm sorry that money doesn't magically appear in our bank account when I chose not to work.  We have bills to pay too.  This part-time job is to help pay off our credit card debts and get more money into savings.  I told her I could try to shift my work schedule around a little bit, but either way, I'd still need 20 hours a week and some of those working days would cut into their visit.  But honestly, I don't go into work until 6pm!  I told her they would still have the entire day to visit until I have to go into work.  It's not the end of the freaking world.  Or is it?

I just can't take it anymore.  I've been trying to lose weight since Amelia has been born.  That weight loss was going well until this stress and anxiety started.  I weighed myself this morning and I gained another two pounds.  Gained!  I got really poor sleep last night because my mind would not turn off from all of this stress.

My mom's crazy is showing again.  I swear she thinks she is psychic.  When I was pregnant, before my mom knew, she told me her and my aunt (her sister) had a dream that I was pregnant.  At that point, I wanted to deny it, but decided not to when I would just announce my pregnancy a few weeks later.  So I said, "Yes, it's me.  I am pregnant... but don't tell anyone yet."  My mom's response was, "OK."  Then a couple of minutes later, my mom said, "I'm texting your aunt right now to tell her her dream was right and that you are pregnant."  WTF?  I just told you NOT to tell anyone.  Then last night, my mom told me her and my aunt (again, her sister) had a dream that four people are pregnant.  My mom said, "I know Ashley (my best friend) is pregnant and I just found out a girl I work with is pregnant.  So we still have two other people not accounted for."  Ugh... So I flat out said to my mom, "you know, dreams are just that dreams.  It doesn't really mean anything."  She said, "I know, but those two other pregnant girls will turn up soon."  OMG, STFU.  I'm tired of it.

Honestly, I've had enough and I just don't want to deal with the crazy anymore.  I decided this morning that we (our little family of four) will celebrate Carleigh's birthday a week before her actual birthday.  Probably on June 22.  Her birthday is June 27.  We can give her her gifts, have some cake, and let her spend her day how she wants to.  The only thing I'll do on Carleigh's actual birthday is say, "Happy birthday!" and leave it at that.  She will be able to have fun and play with friend's before my in-law's get here.  Will that be a big enough hint that they (in-law's) don't need to be here on Carleigh's exact birth date every year?

I think I've vented enough, but I'm sure I'm not done.  I'd just like to go back to feeling normal again.

Three Weeks

Baby Amelia is three weeks old today.  It's crazy how fast those three weeks have gone by.  She's been doing really great sleeping at night.  The past two nights, I've only had to wake up once in the middle of the night, early morning for a feeding.  Last night, she fell asleep around 9pm and woke up around 2am to nurse.  She fell back asleep around 3:30am and stayed asleep until 6:30am.  Heath takes her in the morning before he goes to work if she's up early enough.  Once she falls back asleep, he brings her back upstairs and we sleep until 8:30 or 9am.  Carleigh sleeps in just as late.  So it's nice having a newborn at home and sleeping until almost 9am every day.  Of course, we won't be able to sleep that long when Carleigh starts kindergarten.

Speaking of kindergarten, I took Carleigh to the school to get registered last week.  While we were there, the little girl who lives across the street was being registered too.  So there were two little girl's being crazy in the school lobby while us parent's tried to fill out the paperwork.  I had to tell Carleigh so many times not to run in the school.  I told her that those will be the rules when she starts attending there, too.  It's hard to tell a little 4 and 5 year old to calm down when they are super excited to see each other.  I kept telling Carleigh they could run around and be crazy outside together since we live right across the street from each other.  We have a couple of other kid's on our street starting kindergarten this year too.  All of the kid's on our street are so close together in age.  They will get to go to school together unless someone moves.

It's been warming up here the last couple of days.  I had to turn our A/C on the other day.  Our high today is suppose to be 91 degrees.  I'd like to keep the A/C off, but having two little ones at home, that's impossible.  Amelia started to get really frustrated the day it was only suppose to be 88 degrees for a high.  I could tell she was too hot and uncomfortable, so I clicked the A/C on.  We did purchase a ceiling fan for our downstairs area to keep it less stuffy.  Here's a picture of it.  It looks so nice in our open floor plan.

This fan will be nice to have when all of our family comes out to visit and meet Amelia in June, too.  We usually have to kick the A/C down a couple of degrees to keep it comfortable with all of the people here.  This time, we can just kick the fan on, or up a level, without making our energy bill too much higher.

Happy New Year

I realize we're 19 days into the New Year, but I haven't found the time to blog recently.  I wanted to update this last weekend, but I had a cold and didn't want to type in between my nasty coughs every three minutes.

Not too much has been going on here.  We've been shopping around for a new dining room set, but haven't found anything we liked yet.  We plan on waiting until President's Day weekend to purchase one.  Maybe then there will be better sales.

Carleigh switched classrooms at school because of a bully.  It's really sad that kid's her age bully other children already.  This boy calls her names and punches her.  The teacher's in her classroom didn't seem to do much of anything about it.  This had been an ongoing issue for a couple of months.  When we called the director to talk to her about the issue, she gave us the option to have the two separated or to change classrooms.  We tried the separation thing for a couple of days, but then that same boy decided to punch Carleigh in the stomach and call her names again.  So we called the director again and requested a room change.  Carleigh's first day in her new room was on Friday and she came home so happy.  Her new teacher said that Carleigh was well-behaved and well-mannered and she loved having her in her classroom.  Carleigh did all of her worksheets and had a blast with their art projects.  In her other room, the teacher's had a hard time getting her to complete her work or even start it for that matter.  I think it was because of that boy bugging her all the time.  I'm glad she's happy in her new classroom.  She gets to leave preschool once I go on maternity leave.  From there, we will just do some homeschool stuff until kindergarten starts in the fall.

Speaking of maternity leave, I plan on leaving when I am at the 36 week mark.  That will be the last week of February.  I'll be starting week 31 this week.  It's crazy how fast time flies by when you're pregnant.  I've had some Braxton Hicks contractions every now and again, but nothing that warrants a trip to the hospital.  Hopefully it stays that way until my 38th week of pregnancy, although I'd like the baby to stay put until my 40th week.  We shall see what happens.  Carleigh was born when I was 38 weeks.

It's been in the 70's in Las Vegas the past few days.  Heath was out in the backyard clearing out the rest of the rocks today.  We want to build our own fire pit back there and then get the dirt delivered to plant the grass.  Doing the backyard ourselves is nice, but it's really hard work and takes a long time.  We didn't want to spend $2,000 to have a company come in and do it when we could save money by doing it ourselves.  It will be so nice once it's all completed.  I'll purchase some really nice outdoor furniture and spend all of my free time in the backyard.

I have tomorrow and Tuesday off from work.  Carleigh is out of school tomorrow, too.  So we are planning on getting some lunch from Subway then taking it to the park for a little picnic.  After that, Carleigh can plan on the playground until she wears herself out for the day.

You're Not My Interior Designer

Can I go on a rant for the next five minutes?

My father-in-law has said he doesn't like our couch.  He thinks it's uncomfortable.  Heath & I love it.  We bought it a couple of years ago when we had to throw out our old leather couch due to damages.  Our couch is a five piece sectional and it's microfiber.  It's a great couch for a house with kid's and pets.  The couch is comfortable for us.  Carleigh always takes naps on it, so it can't be that horrible.  And honestly, if you only come out to visit twice a year, stop complaining.  If you hate our couch, sit your ass on the floor.  Let me know how comfortable that is.

So anyway, my father-in-law kept calling Heath and leaving voicemails today.  He even sent a text that was like, "Can you please call me back NOW!!"  something like that.  When Heath saw that, he was thinking it was some kind of emergency, so while we were shopping, Heath calls his dad back.  I could overhear Heath talking about leather.  So I turn around and just give him that "seriously, is that what was SO important?" look.  His dad kept calling us over a COUCH he saw at Sam's Club.  He told Heath that they found a "nice" leather couch and chair set at Sam's Club for $700 and wanted to buy it for us for Christmas because our couch isn't that great and because of our "situation".  I don't really know what "situation" he's referring to.  First of all, I don't want leather furniture in my house.  Not because it sucks, but because we are going to have not one, but two young kids and pets.  I'll pass on all leather furniture until we're old and retired.  Second of all, you're not our interior decorator.  Stop trying to buy furniture for our house.  If he liked that set, he should've bought it for his own damn house.  Just saying.

I cannot stand the meddling.  I think he assumes that since we are going to have two kid's and plan to go one income or me working part-time only that we won't be able to afford anything ever again.  He forgets that we are being responsible and not buying two brand new cars every six months.  Good for him if he makes six figures, but that doesn't make you "rich" by any means.  We have one car paid off and another to follow within the next five to six months.  There will be some other random small debts paid off too.  If I continued to work full-time and had two kid's in daycare, then we would have a "situation" on our hands because that would be about $1,500/mo for two kid's in daycare.

I just wish they would shut the hell up and worry about themselves.  I'm tired of having them make decisions for our family as if we can't make them for ourselves.  I'm tired of them assuming we have money troubles.  I'm tired of them assuming we can't do anything for ourselves.  They have their adult son (25) living with them still because I know they do the same shit to him too.  He enjoys it, so he figures why should he ever move out.

All I'm saying is, please let us purchase our own furniture for our house and stop complaining about the furniture we bought.  I really don't care if you think our couch is uncomfortable.  That's not my problem.  We bought our couch because it was comfortable for us.  It makes us happy, so deal with it.  Sit on some plastic $5 chair from Walmart if you hate our couch that much.  No one is stopping you from bringing your own chair.

Cable Free

Heath & I decided to cancel our cable recently.  It was the best decision we have made.  We had one of the expanded cable packages through Cox.  Most of the time, our TV was on as background noise.  We don't have a lot of TV shows we actually sit down and make a habit of watching.  So instead of spending $75/mo for cable, we decided to axe it out of our budget.  Now we stick to Netflix and Hulu Plus.  A lot of the shows we watch can also be watched on the networks website the day after they air.  So it was nice to keep that extra money in our pockets instead of handing it over to Cox.

The week after next, the in-law's are coming to town for two weeks.  We are going to Disneyland and California Adventure Park over the weekend.  It will be my first time in California and the theme parks.  I'm really looking forward to it.  Carleigh is excited to go to Cars Land at California Adventure Park.  We will probably have a hard time getting her out of there.  I'm hoping we can head out to the beach on Thursday evening.  I've been to the Atlantic Ocean many years ago, so it will be nice to finally get to the Pacific Ocean.  We have lived in Nevada for five years now and could have gone to California at anytime, but we never did.  Now I can cross it off my list of places to go.

We started working on our backyard last weekend.  I helped for about 20 minutes, but since I'm pregnant... I'm pretty useless when it comes to raking up the bigger rocks and smoothing the dirt.  I'll let Heath do a majority of that.  I'll pick out the flowers/shrubs and plant those when it's time.  We are hoping we can have the entire backyard done by spring.  We are going to grass most of the backyard, put a few pavers that lead to Carleigh's play house, and I really want a fire pit for our cooler months.  It will be a fairly easy backyard to maintain, which is what we are going for.

My next appointment is on the 17th.  I'll be 13 weeks pregnant by then.  Everything has been going well so far.  The only downside is anything chicken makes me nauseous and sometimes makes me throw up.  No morning sickness.  Yay!  I've only gained two pounds within the first trimester.  I still have one week to go in the first trimester though, so we will see where I am at weight-wise on Tuesday.  I've had more back aches than last time.  I want to sleep more than last time too.  On the weekends, I will sometimes sleep from 9pm-9am.  It feels great too!

Happy Spring

It's so nice to have spring weather again.  The only downside is the huge amounts of pollen in the air.  When I went upstairs to wash my face last night, there was a green mucus that came out of my left eye.  It was gross.  I went downstairs and searched the internet to see what it could have been.  Nothing really stuck out to me.  I did see on one website that I could experience my eye getting stuck shut from the mucus.  That did happen to me a few times last night.  I woke up and my left eye felt glued shut.  When I rubbed my eyes a bit, I could feel dried mucus or what felt like those "eye boogers".  It really sucked.  When I searched online this morning, a bunch of stuff about pink eye came up, but my eyes aren't pink/red.  I'm thinking the eye irritation was caused by all of the pollen in the air.  It was a little windy yesterday afternoon and we were outside pretty much all day.  My eye seems a lot better this afternoon.  I get the occasional blurriness.  If I have the same problem tonight, with the mucus, I'll go see my optometrist.  I need an eye exam anyway.

Last weekend, a co-worker of mine gave us her piano for free.  She is moving to Montana as soon as her husband gets a job up there.  It was so nice of her to give it to us.  She didn't want to leave it in storage.  It needs a little TLC and a slight tune.  The tune might not be necessary as it sounds all right to me.  Carleigh is so excited to have it in the house.  I'd love to get her piano lessons so she can play us some tunes when she's older.  It's a Melville Clark piano.  It's a nice piece to have in our living room.  I'm also fortunate we didn't have to pay a penny for it.

Carleigh starts her new preschool on the 22nd.  It would have been sooner, but I couldn't find her original birth certificate.  I know it's in the house, but it's in a super secret hiding spot and I cannot remember where that place is at the moment.  I sent Heath to go pick up a copy of the birth certificate on his day off.  Then Carleigh had to get a wellness check up done and a record of all of her immunizations.  Heath dropped off all of the paperwork on Friday and now we are all set.  Carleigh is really excited.  I know the next two weeks at her current preschool is going go by so slow for her.

Speaking of the wellness check up, Carleigh is very healthy.  She is 38 1/4 inches tall and weighs 30.6 pounds.  She is so small.  The nurse drew some blood from Carleigh's fingertip to make sure she had no lead in her blood.  Carleigh came out clear and she didn't cry at all about the finger prick.  I'm so glad I have a brave and healthy little girl.

Chillaxin' in the Backyard

I'm updating my blog from the comfort of our backyard on this 85 degree Saturday.  Heath has the charcoal burning down in the grill.  We have some steaks and corn on the cob about to be thrown on the grill.  I'm drinking a Mike's Hard Winter Blackberry, Heath is drinking one of his IPA's.  I love this time of year in Las Vegas.  Not hot and not cold.  It's perfect.

On Monday morning, we are having our soft water and reverse osmosis system installed at the house.  The water in Las Vegas is horrible.  The only times we get to use soft water is when we go back to visit family in Wisconsin/Illinois.  It will be the greatest thing ever once our house has everything installed.  My skin and hair will look and feel so much better.

After the installation is complete, I am taking Carleigh to the preschool around the corner from our house.  Carleigh recently got a new teacher in her room at her current daycare and I do not like her at all.  This young lady acts like a child and is a borderline bully when the children are having a tough time.  She mocks Carleigh and the rest of the kid's in her room when they are crying after falling down or are just upset in general.  It's just not something that is acceptable for me.  We kept Carleigh at this daycare after we moved, even though it was way out of our way, because she had a really great teacher.  Since that teacher moved on to a different job, it's just time for me to take Carleigh out of her current daycare and get her to a place that's much closer to home.

After work yesterday, Carleigh & I went into Target so I could buy The Sims 3.  I've loved playing that game since the original game came out.  I still remember playing the Livin' Large expansion.  I have Sims 2, but it wasn't that fun at all.  It was enough to cure your boredom for a short period of time.  The Sims 3 is fun and time slips away from you quickly while playing.  I was going to buy an expansion pack with the game, but decided not to at this time.  I wanted to get used to the features of The Sims 3 before I bought anything else.

In other house news, we are going to paint Carleigh's room purple.  She has been stuck on this idea for a month now.  We brought home some of those paint sample sheets from Home Depot this afternoon.  Carleigh is picking out colors that are just a bit darker than your normal lilac color, but not as dark as midnight purple shade.  We also have plans to paint our half bathroom downstairs and the accent wall in our kitchen/dining room.  Carleigh's room takes top priority.  It will be a lot of fun painting her room since she chose purple.

That's all I have today.  I'm going to enjoy the rest of my Winter Blackberry drink before our dinner comes off the grill.

It's Been Too Long

Happy 2013!

It's been way too long since I have updated my blog.  My sincerest apologies.  I lost interest in my blog and realized I needed a topic/subject that will keep me motivated to blog about.  Over the past month, I've really been into trying new recipes found on Pinterest.  I'd love to start reviewing some of these recipes on my blog.  We have a potluck at work this Friday and I found a delicious looking recipe for Grape Salad.  Since I've never made it before today, I'll be using my co-workers as my taste testers.

Speaking of work, we are back on voluntary overtime.  Since I am addicted to overtime, you know what I'm doing from 5am-5pm Monday-Friday.  The extra money is so nice.  Especially while saving up money for our landscaping in the backyard.  I'm really tired of looking at dirt and rocks.  I will never understand how people can live in a house for years and never do anything with their backyards.

The weather is getting nicer here and I'm really looking forward to spending a majority of our days outdoors.  Heath & I are going to buy a Weber grill next pay period.  We would have bought one sooner, but the Jaguar needed new tires and an alignment this weekend.  Since we don't put cheap junk tires on our vehicles, the new tires ate up pretty much my entire paycheck.  The car rides so much smoother now with the new tires.  The alignment was all out of whack from the previous owner, so I am so glad we were able to get this all taken care of this weekend.

I'm really looking forward to blogging more often.  Not once a month or once every six months.  There are so many recipes and DIY projects I want to do this year.  It will keep me busy and give me something to blog about.

Baking Day

Today is my first official baking day since moving in.  There is an aroma of banana bread spreading throughout the entire house, and surrounding homes, currently.  The next tasty treat on my to-bake list is pumpkin spice cupcakes with cream cheese frosting.  I could probably bake some chocolate chip cookies today too.  That might be way too many sweets in our house for just the three of us though.

My Christmas list has measuring cups as a top priority.  I would love to get a really nice set of stainless steal ones.  The current ones in our kitchen are okay, but the handle on one of them is falling off.  I think it was from the heat of the dishwasher.  Brand new measuring cups will make my baking days even more fun.  A cute apron from Flirty Apron's will too.

We are having a chill day in our household today.  Heath & Carleigh are out in the backyard working on the landscaping.  Carleigh is playing in the rocks while Heath does the hard labor.  I'd go out there and help, but I am busy watching the oven and getting ready to bake more tasty treats.  It will be so nice once the backyard is 100% done.

Work life is the same as always.  I'm back in training again and once I am proficient in my new skill, I can work a bunch of overtime.  I miss all of that extra money on my paychecks.  That overtime will be nice for Christmas too.  Carleigh has already started telling us what she wanted from Santa.  It's nothing crazy and over budget, thank goodness!

All Moved In

We are all moved into our new home.  We have been here almost two weeks now.  It's so nice to finally have a place of our own.  It doesn't feel like we live in Las Vegas anymore.  We are so far out from everything.  It's amazing.  The "nosiest" thing you hear out here is an airplane when they are on the flight path that skirts past our community.  We used to live two miles from the airport, so we used to hear a lot more airplane noise before.  Airplanes don't bother me at all.  So I guess we really don't have any noisy things out this way.  Unless you want to complain about the noisy crickets.

Our backyard was kept as a rock/dirt pile like a typical house out here.  Heath & I wanted to work on the backyard ourselves, but once we started digging back there, we realized how much of a mess it was.  Every time we would dig in one section, there were huge rocks.  I don't mind the smaller/average sized rocks, but some of these are big enough to throw at a window and bust it up.  We have decided to go the landscaper route.  We don't want to keep our backyard a pile of dirt and rocks.  We want some grass back there, especially with having a kid.  Carleigh needs a place to play.

There isn't much to really update, so I'll throw in some pictures of the interior of our home.  Our blinds have been ordered and will be installed once they are done.  Our windows are naked until later this week... I hope!

This is the entry way into our home.

Carleigh's bathroom.

Carleigh's bathroom counter area.

Walking down the hallway, into Carleigh's bedroom.

Kitchen.

Dining room.

Dishwasher and a corner of our kitchen island.

Fridge and pantry.

Sink & mirror of our downstairs bathroom.

Another shot of the downstairs bathroom.

Laundry room.  Huge thanks to my in-law's for the washer & dryer.  These appliances play a tune when your laundry is done.  It's so cool.

Living room.

The view you see once you come in the front door.  We have a very open floor plan downstairs.  We love it!

Going up the stairs towards the loft.  I plan on having a "second living room" up here in the near future.

Master bathroom counter.  We have a medicine cabinet on both sides.

Shower/tub area.

View of the master bedroom from the huge walk-in closet.

View of the master bedroom from the bathroom.

Carleigh going up the stairs.

Stove/microwave.

Third bedroom.  This will be a guest room until we decide to add baby #2.

Closing Day

We closed on our house yesterday.  It took about 30 minute to sign all of the paperwork.  It went so fast for us because I knew what each and every single piece of paperwork was since I am in the mortgage industry.  The only downside is that we didn't receive our keys after closing.  The lender was still trying to get the final amount to wire.  It took another 30 minutes after close to get that amount.  We rushed to Wells Fargo to wire the amount.  It was wired before the cut off, but the amount wasn't received until it was too late to fund our loan.  The loan will be funded and recorded on Monday.  We were told we will receive our keys by 4 or 5pm on Monday.  I hope it will be a little earlier than that though.

We planned on moving today, but we rescheduled our movers for Tuesday morning.  It really sucks because we were hoping to be in our house today.  The only positive out of moving on Tuesday is that Carleigh will be in daycare.  It will make the move a little smoother without having to chase after a three year old while the guys are loading/unloading the truck.  With a move date during the week, I won't have time to actually enjoy our new house until the weekend rolls around again.  I'll be working 10 hour days to make up for my missed day on Tuesday.

It is great to be at the very end of this stressful roller coaster ride finally.  After the crap we went through from almost the start of this purchase, I don't think we will buy another house again.  And if we do buy another house, it will be paid with in cash.  The chances of that happening are very slim though.

I'll make sure to update my blog as soon as we are settled into the house.  There will be plenty of interior pictures too.

Packing

Our weekend has been spent packing and cleaning everything out of our apartment.  Our close date will more than likely be on Friday, September 7.  It could be as early as Thursday, but we aren't going to have a moving company here until Saturday morning.  We had things packed up a few weeks ago, but now we are trying to finish up.  Heath & I both have tomorrow (Monday) off as well, so anything we don't finish today will be done tomorrow.

This morning, I took four bags of clothes and a box of toys to the donation center.  I cannot believe how much clothing piles up in our household.  A majority of it belongs to Carleigh.  We really need to get grandparent's under control on clothing.  I don't think Miss Carleigh needs twenty (20) different outfits for every season.

After all of this packing, I never want to move again.  We have accumulated so much stuff after Carleigh was born.  It makes it seem like this round of packing is taking much longer than it should.  Or maybe it feels like it is taking forever since the last time we moved was back in December 2009.

Once we get moved in, there won't be much time for relaxing.  Heath is taking a week and a half off to work on the landscaping in the backyard.  He will also be the fortunate one who gets to wait for Sears to come by and hookup the washer & dryer.  Lowe's will be out to measure our windows that same week (or day).  And, of course, we can't forget about the utility hookups.  I'll be working and unpacking once my work day is over.

I'll be so happy once everything is complete.  It will be nice to relax in our new home.  We busted our asses off for this house and we deserve to sit on our asses and enjoy it after everything is done.

Rainy Independence Day

Happy Independence Day!

Our weather is absolutely lovely today.  We have rain moving through the valley and it has cooled us down from the 105 degree days we were having.  The temperature is sitting at 77 degrees with a light breeze.  The smell of fresh air and rain is relaxing.  I am excited to have our A/C off in July.  We can thank our monsoon season.  I hope the rest of our rainy/storm days are like this.  I'm not sure if we can get that lucky though.  We would love to pay a little less to the energy company before we move into our house.

My parent's were in town last weekend for Carleigh's third birthday celebration.  They got into Las Vegas after 6pm on Friday, so we didn't do too much with them that night.  We brought Carleigh to the hotel to play with them.  Saturday was a big running around day.  We took my parent's out to our house to show them the progress and our soon-to-be neighborhood.  We drove them out to the community that had our house as a model home.  My parent's really enjoyed it and can't wait to visit us when our house is complete.

We had a little birthday celebration at our apartment for Carleigh on Saturday afternoon as well.  She picked out an Angry Birds cake from Sam's Club.  It was a delicious cake and we will definitely order more from them.  Carleigh received a lot of new clothing.  My parent's bought her 21 new outfits.  A few of those included pajamas, but you get the picture.  She is very spoiled.

Later in the evening on Saturday, we went out to Lake Las Vegas to watch the fireworks.  They had their show on the 30th.  The firework show was amazing.  I took some pictures of the show and they came out good for a simple little point and shoot camera.  All I did was upload them to the computer and haven't gotten around to editing them yet.

Carleigh was excited to see fireworks, but once the show began, she freaked out.  She was crying and chewing on her finger.  Heath took her up towards the casino area to help her relax.  Once the show was over, she felt better and told us the fireworks were too loud.  Poor thing.  I hope she will enjoy fireworks for the next Independence Day celebration.

On Monday, my parent's wanted to go to the M&M Store before heading out.  We spent at least an hour there.  Carleigh was in love.  She loves the M&M characters.  I found an M&M bathroom set on clearance and bought the set for her bathroom at the new house.

I have overtime available at work again.  Tuesday was really hard on me because it was my Monday.  I went into work at 5am and was ready to fall asleep by noon.  Of course today is a holiday, so no work.  Then it's back to work tomorrow and Friday at 5am!  I hate these screwy weeks.  It's no fun when a holiday falls mid-week.  My body will be back to its regular schedule by Monday.  That's when I'll really kill it with the overtime hours.  Our bank account will love us.

A recent picture (from Saturday) to end the blog.  The house should have the exterior painted by this Saturday.  Oh and I should add, Saturday is our five year wedding anniversary!  Time flies...!  We don't have any big plans yet.  Heath & I agreed on having a nice dinner at home with some wine.  Keeping it simple.

Guess Who's Turning Three

Carleigh is turning three years old on Wednesday.  It's hard to believe she's going to be three already.  She wanted a Super Mario Brothers cake, but she ended up with an Angry Birds cake instead.  We couldn't remember which store had the Mario cake, and we couldn't find that design in any of the store books when we went back.  This afternoon, we took Carleigh over to Sam's Club and told her to pick out something she likes from them.  The second she saw their Angry Bird cake, she wanted it and refused to look at any others.  We plan to go bowling for Carleigh's birthday party on Saturday.  My parent's are coming into town to celebrate the big three.  My mom told me she bought Carleigh 21 new outfits.  I think that's a bit extreme, but if she wants to buy that much clothing, that's her decision.  As of right now, I bought Carleigh an Angry Bird shirt and a stuffed Mario.  We gave her the Mario yesterday as an early present since she saw us buy it.  I'm going to go over to Walmart tomorrow or Tuesday and buy a couple of Leap Frog books for Carleigh's Leap Frog Tag.

It's been over a month since my last update, so I will post a picture of our house progress.  The exterior is almost complete.  The windows were installed last week.

Our estimated date of close is August 17, one day after my birthday.  I really hope that stays as our closing date so I can feel like I am getting a house for my birthday.  We saw our future neighbor's looking at their home on Saturday too.  They have a little girl who looks to be maybe a year old than Carleigh.  Our house will be completed before theirs.  If I remember correctly, their house is about three weeks behind ours.

I'm going to try to keep this blog up-to-date.  I need to stop being lazy.

Chest Sprain & Stomach Bug

I feel like I have abandoned my blog.  I meant to update the site last weekend, but I was in too much pain.  Last Thursday, I started feeling some weird pains near my chest/breast bone.  When I went to urgent care on Monday morning, the doctor said I more than likely sprained my chest.  Yeah, don't ask.  I'm not exactly sure how I managed to pull that off, but I did.  It's starting to feel better now.  At least I can pick up Carleigh without feeling major pain.  I only get a nasty pain when I lift her up too high.  I'm just glad the chest pain wasn't anything more serious.  I can live with a chest sprain.

Yesterday I missed work due to a stomach bug.  I started feeling like crap on Thursday night.  I felt very nauseated, but didn't vomit until Friday morning.  Not to go too far into detail, but I just could not stop throwing up.  I was going to go into work at 8:30am instead of 8am, but the vomiting would not let up.  I hate missing work.  At least we are not swamped and on mandatory overtime.  We have been low on loans, so I know I didn't miss too much excitement.  Today, I am feeling much better.  It would have sucked to have been sick all weekend.

We have been going out to our house for the last couple of weeks to track the progress.  The foundation has been poured.  Exciting!

It's funny how tiny the house looks at this point.  As you can see from the house next door, the houses are anything but small.  The house should be done by the end of August or first week of September.  Just one more summer in this poorly insulated apartment.

New Home Purchase

We finally did it! Heath & I signed the purchase agreement for a beautiful home in Mountian's Edge. We decided to go with new construction. The technology for today's homes is amazing. We bought a Beazer home. We went with a two story home, but the laundry room is upstairs next to the loft. That will make laundry much easier on my knees. I don't have to run up and down the stairs with a load of laundry six times a day. The home is 1,843 square foot, three bedrooms, two and a half bathrooms, and a two car garage. I am so excited that we can do new construction for our first (and hopefully only) home.

We went with all black appliances, saddle oak cabinets and baltic brown granite. We are picking out our flooring next weekend and plan to go with a nice hardwood floor for the downstairs. Carpeting is okay for upstairs. We are not a fan of carpet in the high traffic areas. The carpet in our apartment looks like crap even after having it professionally cleaned. Our second choice for downstairs flooring is ceramic tile.

The master bedroom has a huge walk-in closet and the second bedroom (Carleigh's room) has a walk-in as well. Her closet won't be as large as ours though. It's a nice sized walk-in closet for a soon-to-be three year old. She's so spoiled. I never had a walk-in closet until I moved out of my parent's house.

Our yard is on a premium lot, so we will have a larger backyard. It will be big enough for a swing set, small garden, and some patio furniture. The home is also situated near the end of the cul-de-sac. We are two houses from the very end. If we walk past those two houses, we walk out onto the walking trails for the resident's of Mountain's Edge.

We looked at Lennar & KB Homes as well, but they could not match the value of Beazer. We are very excited with our purchase. We don't have a date when construction will start yet since our contract has to be approved by our sales persons boss. Once the contract is approved and permits are good, construction will take about four months.

We hope to have the house before Halloween so Carleigh can go trick-or-treating in our new neighborhood.

Moving on, we still have overtime at work for the time being. Our queues are getting lower though, so I'm sure OT will be cutoff for a little while. I hope to get 20 hours of OT in this week before we are cutoff until it gets busy again. We want to keep piling up our savings account for anything we want to purchase for our new house!