Back and better than ever!

Whew, I needed that~

It felt so good to just be with my family, focusing entirely on them and our home! Ari hit the terrible, terrible twos full force this week. It seriously caught me off guard, I felt like I was hit with a mack truck! We transitioned from two naps a day to one and that has helped immensly. He now goes to bed at 7 pm and sleeps until around 9 (sometimes 10!!) in the morning and stays up until after lunch! We moved lunch time from noon to 11:30 and he goes straight to bed after lunch. He knows what to expect now and today asked to go "night night" while he was still in his chair! I'm so proud of him, he's doing a great job. No more head banging, at least not hard enough to leave bruises~

His vocabulary is growing by leaps and bounds. He can now repeat just about every word we say! His pronunciation is a bit off but goodness, he's only 19 months! He has his own wacky words for things, it's adorable. He used to be able to say "water" pretty clearly when it was bath time... now he says "baadie" which we think is "bath" and "water" combined into one word. Who knows, only Ari! He knows several animals, he thinks monkeys are the funniest things he's ever seen! He is still terrified of mice and we found out this week that giraffe's freak him out even more than mice! He cries big fat tears when they come on his movie and we have to fast forward past them. Too funny. Nemo is still his all time favorite and when Nemo swims out to touch the boat he, very passionately, yells "Not Nice Nemo, No Nemo!!!". LOL!!!

I've been searching for a preschool but that search is quickly coming to an end. We simply cannot afford (nor would we want to) $140 for two days a week. That's absurd, it's preschool for goodness sake, not University. We settled for a babysitter down the road, she is looking forward to watching him two days a week for three hours! I am thrilled but terrified at the same time. The thrilled part wins out over the terrified-ness though and he starts in a couple weeks! He's going to go to her house so I'll have some much needed alone time at home to do whatever I need around here!

I have several tasks on my to-do list for the house that I would like to have completed by the end of the year. I'm trying to be realistic and give myself ample time to actually complete everything! They include but are not limited to:

1. Finish Ari's room completely (that should be done this week, there's not much more to do)
2. Paint the guest room (should be done before the parent's come in a week or so)
3. Finish the paint in the foyer and kitchen (also should be done very soon)
4. Finish both bathroom floors upstairs (that's on Matt's list...)
5. Reorganize garage (I want to be able to move Ari's outside toys in there for the winter so he can still use everything even if it's cold out)
6. Tile the backsplash in the kitchen (I picked out tile yesterday!!)
7. Install french doors to the family room (may have to hire someone to do this, we would need to do framing and drywall work and I don't know if I want to tackle that one by myself. I can, just don't know if I want to)

That's the bulk of my list, pretty hefty huh. Of course we still need to paint ALL of the trim and doors but that's going to take the rest of my life so I'm not even putting it on the list. We'll have to do it before we decide to sell but I am not looking forward to that at all.

I have been scrapping this week, mostly design team stuff so you can't see it yet. I made a list of scrappy things I want to do and it's massive so I have a lot to do but I'm excited about all of it. There are some fun home decor projects on my list that involve some browsing at the local antique stores so be sure to check in with me every now and then. I'll be posting the final results and *maybe* some instructions but we'll just have to see how it all turns out. Right now it's just an idea in my jumbled up head but I'm fairly confident that I can create what I see.

Well, I'm sure I've rambled enough... I missed you all! I feel so refreshed and on top of things now, thank you for all of your support. I know I have some truly fantastic friends out there and I love you all! Hugs and Kisses!!!