I am a dummy

So let me start this post off by saying I really am a dummy and you can laugh at my stupidity as much as you want. My feelings won't be hurt.

Yesterday morning at work my friend was having a hard time getting the flip top lid on her bottle of water to open. So I so graciously offered to help her open it. I grabbed the first sharp pointy thing I could find, which was a long letter opener. I then tried jabbing the little tab that broke with the opener. It slipped and I sliced my finger. Let me just tell you that that letter opener was very sharp, apparently. It sliced my finger like butter.

Exhibit A

So, to leave out all of the gorry details, just know by the end of the day it was still bleeding. I went to the urgent care center and gave all of the staff there a good laugh. I had to get a tetanus shot and then they super-glued my finger. Oh I didn't tell you it is my middle finger so as I drive I give people the bird, and I don't even mean to. Matt just keeps shaking his head at me, I think he's ashamed. :) Everyone at work thinks I'm not the smartest apple in the bunch, and I'm sure they're considering taking my office supplies away. I don't really blame them.

Home at Last

The puppies are home!!! This past weekend we went up to Jeanne's house and picked up the poochies. It has been so wonderful having them home. They are adjusting pretty well. I was a little worried about the barking every time they hear the guy upstairs walking around, but surprisingly they haven't even acknowledged it. I talked to Jeanne yesterday and she said Max is having a hard time. He went looking in our room at Jeanne's house for them yesterday morning. Then she said he was moping this morning. I think it hit Macy this morning that she doesn't have Max to play with. She kept trying to get Brutus to play with her and he wanted nothing to do with her. I know they'll all adjust just fine, but it makes me sad for them right now. Here are a few pictures of them from yesterday.

When we got Brutus as a puppy Jeanne told us we should get this special tape to tape Brutus' ears down so they wouldn't stick up. We thought she was crazy. His ears were cute as a puppy. So, Matt folded his ears down and this is what Bruty would have looked like had we listened to Jeanne.

We've always said that Macy was a hateful little girl. Okay, she's not really hateful, she is just very stubborn. She can have quite the attitude. This is her sassy look.

I had forgotten how much fun we had with the dogs. It really has been so wonderful having them back with us. I feel so much better having them. I know Jeanne is relieved too. :)

House

Well after what feels like 20 years, our house has finally been rented! We were trying to sell it and after determining we were very tired of making a mortgage payment every month on top of rent, we decided to try and rent it. We have been so extremely blessed. The people looked at it and immediately signed a year long lease and moved right in. I just hope they take care of it as well as we tried and love it as much as I do. It's been very bittersweet. I have absolutely loved that house, partly I'm sure because it was our first house. But, that house suited our needs perfectly. There was nothing about that house that I hated or didn't like. I never had constant complaints about it, or things I wanted to change. I couldn't have asked for a better first house.

As far as being in Louisville I can't say the same things about where we live. I've determined I don't do well in small apartments. I also don't do well not having my puppies with us. Since we've gotten the house rented, we are looking at moving into a bigger/nicer apartment where we can have the dogs. My sister Jeanne is taking the best care of them, and I know they love having Max, but their mommy and daddy sure miss them. The only downside of changing apartments is having to pack again! I sure don't do well with it, but this time I'll have Matt's help and my sisters, if I ask. I'm so grateful for living so much closer to family. I also know that when the time comes to actually move all we have to do is make a couple of phone calls and we can have family gallore here to help. I truly know this move was the right thing for us, but I'm not going to lie when I say it's been one of the hardest moves I've ever made. I guess once you get settled in your life it's that much harder to just pick up and move. I hope we can get settled like that once more. I sure loved North Carolina and all that it had to offer. I think Kentucky can eventually offer that to us too. :)

Major Update

So I've been a big fat blogger failure. After my last post in July our worlds got somewhat crazier than they already were. I guess I should go back a couple of months before that and start at the beginning.

Sometime in the spring Matt had gotten the feeling that we were meant to be closer to our family in Ohio. We really started prayerfully considering it. We definitely got a yes to our prayer of should we move closer to our family. Then we had to figure out the how. We still had the girls and weren't sure as to how long we were going to have them. We were still being extremely prayerful as to what Heavenly Father wanted us to do. We knew we'd both have to find jobs, somewhere to live and sell our house in North Carolina.

While I went on my wonderful trip to the beach with my sisters and mom, Matt got a call one night. A man called him on that Friday and said he received Matt's resume and heard he was wanting to move closer to his family in Ohio. Matt was pretty stunned about all of this. He had never heard of the company this man was calling from and was just in shock that he knew of our situation. Matt told him he'd have to talk with me first and that he'd call him back. Once I got back and we talked about it, Matt called him back the first of the following week. After talking with James, he called me and said that James asked Matt what he thought of moving to Louisville, KY. When Matt mentioned this to me I was in shock for about 1/2 a second, then I immediately told Matt sure, why not? It would put us much, much closer to our families, but still far enough away that we'd have the space we were used to.

Matt went on an interview around the middle of June. I stayed home with the girls while he went. His interview was a major success! Three hours after he left they called him and said the three people he interviewed with were very impressed with him. He got a job offer from them a couple of weeks later and he had a start date of August 16.

The girls were still an issue, because Casey had been home from Haiti for quite some time, so I called her and told her it was time for her to come pick them up. She originally didn't want to get them until Nicholas came home in August. I explained that Matt would be moving, and I didn't want to have the girls by myself and she needed to get them. I still wasn't quite sure if Matt would get the job or not, but it was time for them to go back. Matt and I absolutely, positively LOVED our time with those two precious little girls. But we could tell it was time for them to go home. It was very hard for us and the girls to say goodbye, but we had to around the middle of July.

Once the girls left, I had to start getting busy. I had to get the house ready to be listed so we could try and sell it. It's amazing how empty our house felt once they left. It was very heartbreaking for Matt and I, but we really didn't have time to dwell on it since we had to get ready to move. I wasn't having any luck finding a job, and the house wasn't sold, so we knew Matt would have to move without me. I kept thinking I had a ton of time before he'd be gone, so I was trying not to worry about it. Well, let me tell you, that time flew by and before I knew it it was time for him to move. Two weeks before he was supposed to move we went up to Louisville to try and find an apartment. We were very lucky and the second one we went to we liked and were able to get it.

I believe Matt left on Friday the 13, and I had never felt so lonely before in my life. Thank goodness I had the dogs. I knew that this was supposed to be what happened, but it didn't make it any easier. We had been praying so hard about this, and I truly knew this was the right thing, but boy was it difficult.

At the end of September I was asked to come up and interview with Matt's company. I was more than ready to since I was extremely ready to be with my husband again. I was offered the job and had a start date of October 26. That meant I had to get the house packed, and everything settled in two weeks from when I got the offer. Talk about being stressed out! Anyone who knows me, knows that I absolutely DESPISE moving, and then to have to do it all by myself on top of it. Luckily I had a good friend who came over a couple of times to help me pack. Without her help, I honestly don't think I could have gotten it done.

The move itself went pretty well. Matt and I didn't pull out of Winston Salem until 10:00 pm. I had worked all day, and then came home and had to finish up the odds and ends. Luckily my friend came over again to help us finish. We drove all night long and finally pulled into our apartment complex at 6:00 am. Our family was due to show up around noon to help us unload. We got about 4 hours of sleep and got up and started unloading some ourselves. Before we could unload the truck we had to go to Uhaul to drop off the car carrier. After we got the car unloaded, the guy there told Matt to pull the truck around the building. When he was coming back around the building, the didn't see a parked car and side swiped it. Needless to say, it put a little bit of a damper on our morning.

Anway, we got the truck unloaded, and were basically completely unpacked by Monday. It was such a huge relief. The only major thing still lingering is the fact that we still have our house in North Carolina. We are in the process of trying to rent that, so we'll see how that goes.

The weekend that we got here, Matt got called as the Second Counselor in the Elder's Quoram presidency. So he's not only busy with work, but he's busy at church too. I got called as the Public Relations and Emergency Preparedness Specialist. Don't ask what that is, because I'm still trying to figure it out.

Overall our move here has been wonderful. With one major exception. The dogs are living with my sister Jeanne for now. We didn't want to have them in this apartment. It has been so hard to not have them with us. But, Jeanne got a new puppy the week before we moved, so Macy and Brutus have a new friend to play with.

As you can see, they are doing just fine there. That is Max in the middle, and he's obviously much bigger than Macy and Brutus. For the first couple of weeks Macy wanted nothing to do with Max. Anytime he came near her she growled at him. Brutus on the other hand, has done just fine with him. It took a little while, but Macy is now friends with Max. They love their Aunt Jean so much, so I know they are being well taken care of. I try to go up every couple of weeks so see them. Luckily they haven't forgotten me. That's been a huge relief, since that's been a ginormous fear of mine.

So, as far as I can think of, that's our update. I will try and make a better effort at updating again, even though it's only Matt and I now and not the girls.

No Teeth!

Jasmine lost both of her bottom front teeth today. She's been quite excited about it. The tooth fairy is going to come visit tonight. What's the going rate for 2 teeth at once??

Fun in the Sun

We bought a $5 slip and slide for the girls. The had an absolute blast. I was watching them go and next thing I know, Jasmine was doing some crazy flips and going down. I took a short video of it on my phone. The quality isn't the best but you can get the idea. :)

Vacation

I'm sorry I've been a bad blogger lately. Things have been going fairly smoothly so I guess I've just forgotten to do any updates. The girls are doing very well. Jasmine had a rough time after her birthday with her behavior at school, but thankfully things have gotten much better there. Victoria is acting like a typical 3 year old and is making Matt want to pull his hair out. I just giggle about it, but he doesn't like when I do that. I got to go on vacation last week by myself and leave Matt at home with the girls and dogs. My sisters, mom and I went to the Outer Banks, NC for a full 7 days. It was wonderful!

While I was gone I got many, many updates from Matt. We were gone from Sunday to Sunday. On Monday evening Matt called and told me that the monster in Victoria came out Monday morning. She hates waking up and constantly tells us to "Go away, I'm sleepy!" I guess after a while of him trying to be nice he finally snapped. He told her if she didn't get out of bed he was going to pull her out, strip her clothes off and put her on the toilet. I'm sure the threat of a spanking was thrown in for good measure. She got up but asked him when is Lindsey coming home? So Matt asked her why was he mean? She told him yes, I want her to wake me up in the morning. Hearing that was music to my ears. :)

On Thursday night I got a ton of pictures texted to me. Come to find out when Matt got home from work on Thursday night Macy had had some major diarrhea in her cage, on the wall, on the carpet and basically everywhere. If this were a normal week and I would have been home, then I would have cleaned her, and the cage and the room. But, I wasn't, so Matt had the pleasure of cleaning it all up. On top of that, Jasmine had some stomach issues as well, but luckily, she can make it to the bathroom on her own. Needless to say, I had a lot of phone calls that evening and a very unhappy husband. Jasmine was able to sleep fine that night, but woke up sick the next morning, so Matt kept her home. But, before he made the decision to keep her home I got a phone call at 6:45 in the morning to ask my opinion. Ugh!

I came home on Sunday evening, and it couldn't have been a minute too soon for Matt. I think he wanted me back home Monday morning, but he was very kind about only asking me to come home once a day.

My sister Jeanne decided that the girls needed some hermit crabs. So, she bought them each a crab, but I will ultimately be taking care of them. If I left it up to the girls I'm pretty sure Victoria would have them out of their cages and pulled apart piece by piece. (She's very much into destructing stuff right now.) The girls enjoy sitting at the table and watching them. We keep them in the kitchen and we found out that's definitely the best place for them. Jeanne stayed Sunday night with us and heard the clickity-clackity of the crabs all night long, and said they kept making weird noises. Ha ha! So, the crabs definitely won't be going in the girls room.

Jasmine will be out of school on Friday, and I've yet to decide what I'm going to do with them for the summer. Their babysitter Katie, whom they loved so, so much, has moved on to bigger and better things (Alaska), so I've got to figure something out. We will be doing a lot of weekend traveling though over the next month or so, so that will definitely keep us busy and wanting to pull all of our hair out. I keep thinking we should have bought a minivan in January instead of my Altima. :( The girls and dogs are not going to be happy travelers, but we'll just make due. I'll try to get some pictures off of my phone and Matt's so I can post them soon.