Officially homeowners!!

We did close on the house today! Everyone involved was very stressed out this morning though. We finally got the underwriters approval at 9am, the closing was at 1pm. This approval was due back to us last Friday. Everything ended up going smoothly though in the end. We move Saturday afternoon and it looks like the weather will cooperate! Here are pics of the house for anyone who is interested. It has a 2 car garage (it is yet to be seen if my van will even fit), 3 bedrooms, and 2 baths upstairs.

The whole block of houses is the color of the one on the right side of the pic, ours is blue though. It sure will be easy to find. The window above the front door is in a nook in the master bedroom that I will be using to scrapbook. I am so excited to have a dedicated area just for me!!

The 2 top windows are in the master bedroom and the bottom 2 are in the living room. It has great light on both the front and back. Sliding door opens to the dining area.

Dining area - it is great sized considering the whole house is only 1400 sf.

Living room.

Kitchen - all the appliances are new!

Master bathroom.

Kid's bathroom/guest bathroom.

Friday Photo: Adam reading to Noelle

Adam and Noelle played so well together on Thursday. They played "dog" (will post video of it later tonight, very hilarious), cars, and spent some time reading. I thought it was so sweet when they sat down together and Adam "read" her a story from one of our library books. I so love these moments!!

Snow!

The snow seems to be done down our way and the sun is shining bright! We really didn't get all that much compared to the rest of the metro area. I would say we got about 7 inches, maybe. Here are some pics from this morning. Even though we live in an apartment, at 9am they still hadn't done any shoveling so J went out to make a path to the cars and clean them off. Adam has a little shovel so he went out to help. Us girls waited inside, where it is nice and warm, for the phone to ring with the final closing cost amount.

Noelle was enchanted by this bunny outside the window yesterday morning. She watched it for the longest time. It was eating the snowy grass and every time it moved a little you could see where it had been because the snow would be melted in that spot.

Couch, love seat, and table...oh my!!

We ordered our new couch, love seat and end table last night!! We are very excited. We hope not to even move our current couch and chair, but that means we will be furniture less in the living room until about mid April when the furniture comes in. There's always camp chairs! We also ordered the trundle to go under the bed in Noelle's room. My niece is too long now for the toddler mattress she usually uses at our house, her feet hang off the end!

Snow Day!

Here is the view out the window this morning:

The weather is so unpredictable lately that I logged onto a local news station to check the weather as J and Adam were about to walk out the door this morning. Right at the top of the page it said "many metro-area schools closed". I was kinda surprised given the view out the window so I logged onto Cherry Creek Schools website. Sure enough it said all schools were closed. J and I were still unconvinced so I called and it was confirmed a third time, school really is closed today. They must be expecting a lot of snow!

Time will tell.

Spaghetti head

Even though Noelle was put down for a nap on Sunday she did NOT actually go to sleep. Here was the final outcome at dinner time:

I had just said to Justin the day before how if I had to cut out her naps to get her to sleep at night I would go crazy. Of course the next night when I walk away to put the leftovers away I suddenly thought it was way too quiet. (Noelle does everything loudly, even eat.) I wasn't all that surprised that she was asleep. LOL She was pretty out and slept through me cleaning her halfway up before she woke and got VERY mad that I was pulling her away from the table. She was adamant that she had not been asleep and was still eating. So much for my plan of putting her in bed for the night and having a nice relaxing evening.

Denver Botanic Gardens

My sister and I took the kids to the gardens today. It wasn't prime viewing time, but the weather was actually great for it. After having been couped up in the house since Adam's surgery I thought we really needed to get outside to run around. We had a nice time walking around and just spending time together. I think Noelle gave Stef plenty of near heart-attacks when she was close to the water, but she never did fall in. We sat and had a snack on the hill and the kids, and Stef, had a great time running up and down the hill and playing ring-around-the-roses together. Eventually it started sprinkling rain so we headed inside and walked through the conservatory. I had never been in it and thought it was really neat to see the different tropical fruit trees, along with cocoa and coffee plants. Too bad they didn't smell as well! We plan on going back in about a month so we can see everything in bloom, but not have to melt in the heat of summer.

"Feeding" the fish.

Noelle, Adam and Stef

I love their shadows in the water in this one.

Noelle and her Auntie Stef!

Happy Spring!!

Friday Photo: Angelic Noelle

She is looking at her Auntie Stef. You can see the love on her face!

Silly Kids

I cherish these moments when the kids play together. Fortunately, now that Noelle is getting older it happens more often.

The first video takes a sec to load , but I promise it does.

Enjoy and I hope they give you as good a laugh as they did us!!

Adam Update

Adam was doing a little better today. I took him off the codeine and just gave him a strong dose of regular Tylenol during the day. It was so nice to see him act more like himself. He was so drugged up that he just wasn't at all like my Adam, instead he was drowsy and just very blah (not to count that he was still having the same amount of pain). He was up and playing, eating and drinking better, and generally more alert. I am going to continue giving him the codeine at night for now though. He may even be able to go to school the rest of the week! YEAH! That pretty much just means that I can get a little more done in the mornings.

He is a little video of him talking tonight. He voice is still very different than before the surgery.

Lazy Sunday

We are having a very lazy day today. J is at work again so it's just me and the kids. Adam is not feeling all that great. Friday night he started complaining that the base of his skull hurt. I had taken his meds down but went ahead and upped them to what he was originally at. It seemed to still get worse through Saturday night so we went ahead and called the doctor on call. He said it all sounded normal. I guess on days 3-5 and 7-10 the pain worsens. He said it would be okay to take him up another ml of Tylenol w/ codeine for now so we did. He is still complaining though. Poor little guy. I can also see the effects of the codeine on this higher dosage. He isn't as steady on his feet, doesn't want to eat or drink anymore, and when he is talking he repeats words several times in a row. Also it occurred to me on Saturday that he is going to have to miss more school than I had hoped. I don't think the teachers would let me send him back until he is off the codeine, which could mean missing this whole week in order to get past the 10 day mark. The worst part for me is that I have a ton of packing and phone calls to get done while I am off all this week. I don't go back to work till the 23rd, and then we close on the 27th. Not a lot of time that week to start and stop services and pack. I had really been looking forward to being able to get lots done while Adam was in school in the mornings (since without him here Noelle can't torture him all the time!). Oh, a big plus in those whole thing is Adam has yet to suck his fingers since the surgery Wednesday morning. We are assuming it hurts when he does. He is doing great with it though.

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The kids kept fighting, so for now Adam is watching Narnia in my room and Noelle is watching Dora in the living room, as well as playing games on the laptop. I bought Prince Caspian today so I thought Adam would enjoy watching the first one before we watch Prince Caspian tonight.

You can tell how Adam is feeling by this pic, look at his eyes.

Here's how Noelle relaxes. She was also doing all kinds of yoga style moves. It was pretty funny.

Friday Photo - At The Zoo

We go to the Zoo very regularly, but this trip in February was the first time either of them got to play in the wagon. They thought it was great fun! It is always either too hot out or too many people for them to stop and play on statues and such.

Side notes:

Noelle's newest thing she says to us is, "I'm not in the mood." She says it so matter of fact, not mean. She had a great time getting to stay at Grandpa Ron and Grandma Sheri's house for two nights this week. But boy was she a tired girl when she got back! She did get a good scrape and some bruising on her face from Jedi (the dog). Something set him off and he tried to get her face. Fortunately she is just fine and was not at all scared of him afterwards. Although I am told she kept saying, "Doggie attacked me." and "Bad doggie." for the rest of her time there. LOL

Adam is doing wonderfully!! He is eating great, lots of Popsicles and smoothies still, and drinking plenty. I am still giving him the Codeine round the clock, but am starting to cut back the dosage to wean him off it after a few more days. I just don't want the poor little guy in any unnecessary pain. The oddest thing about the whole ordeal is his voice. He just doesn't sound like my little boy anymore! He actually sounds more babyish right now, I'll have to wait till he is fully healed after a few weeks to know what he is really going to sound like I guess. I am also anxious to see if his speech improves, I actually already think I hear a difference. But considering all the therapy he gets it could just be that since I am paying special attention to him I am hearing his improvements more than normal. Time will tell!

The appraisal is done for the house and we expect to hear back from the underwriters by the end of next week. Our closing date is still set for March 27th. We have a little bit of flexibility there since we don't have to be out of here until April 2nd, but I don't want to move during the week AND I want to use that time to get the apartment cleaned up so we get our deposit back.

Update on Adam

Adam is home and doing great. He was out of surgery by about 9:45am and we got to come home about 11:30am. He is handling it very well, you would never know he had surgery today. He has been watching movies and resting on the couch all afternoon. We haven't had too much trouble so far getting him to drink and eat a little. He got a Popsicle at the hospital, then at home he has had water, apple juice, a few bites applesauce, and a strawberry banana smoothie.

The nurses at the hospital were so great with him! I told Adam that he would have to give me Blue Dragon and Knighty (the pug dog in the picture) when they took him back. The pre-op nurse overheard me and came over and told us he could take them both back with him, she even tied two blue caps smaller so each animal could wear one. She was so great! Justin went back as they put him under and he said Adam was still holding them when he left the room. J also said the gas made him very giggly but then he fought the actual going under a little. Overall he did an awesome job and it looks like he should have a quick recovery and be back to school on Monday. Noelle is staying at Grandma and Grandpa's house again tonight so we can give Adam another day of personal attention tomorrow. Since we will have to wake up with Adam at least twice tonight (to give him medicine), plus he will be sleeping in our room, it will be nice not to have to get up early with Noelle in the morning.

Adam's surgery and new house update

Tomorrow, Wednesday, is the big day!! Adam will have his tonsils and adenoids partially removed.

We have big hopes for the surgery:
-stop his sleep apnea, if he is in fact having it like we think he is
-lessen or stop his snoring
-help with his speech articulation

My biggest concern all along has been the sleep apnea. I was just concerned about behavioral and concentration issues when he starts school next year. Then the Pediatrician told me all the other problems sleep apnea causes within the body and my concerns were nothing comparatively. The ENT Dr. who is doing the surgery also believes that it will help his speech problems a ton. He did a very interesting test on Adam the day we went in. He had Adam speak like he normally would, then he plugged Adam's nose and had him speak again. There was No difference in the nasal tone!! That was really interesting to me, I had never seen it before. He even thinks Adam's mouth issues from the time he was a baby could have all stemmed from the enlarged tonsils and adenoids (we have no clue how long they have been enlarged or when it started). My only real concern with the surgery is that Adam will lose weight afterwards since he will not want to eat. He is only 35 pounds (at nearly 5 years) to start with so he doesn't have anything to spare! Please keep us in your thoughts and prayers tomorrow and wish Adam a speedy recovery.

On the house hunt front (thats sounds pretty silly, oh well!) we are officialy under contract! The inspection is done and there were no big issues and the couple we did have they agreed to fix. They were pretty minor, just replacing some panes of glass and having the furnace cleaned and certified (they told us this had been done, and it was very clear it hadn't). I think the appraisal is getting done early this week and I am getting one last set of papers for the mortgage broker. We have a closing date set for March 27th! I still have a lot of stuff to get done, but since today is my last day of work until March 23rd I will have some extra time to hopefully get everything moving wise in order. I know I just moved last May, but I'm still lost on what I need to do and how to do it!!

Friday Photo - Toddler Cubicle

Noelle's version of a cubicle.

Acceptance!!

We went and looked at a paired home Saturday morning, made the offer Sunday night, and had it accepted Monday afternoon!! We are very excited to move into our own place. It will be so nice to be able to paint, hang pictures, and generally make it ours! The house is in Aurora just a few minutes from Smoky Hill Road and E-470. A little further than we originally wanted to go, but we are familiar with the area and love it (plus it keeps us in the Cherry Creek Schools). It has 3 bedrooms, 2 full baths, 2 car garage, and a backyard that faces fields for the middle and high schools. It sits near the end of the development so it is like a culdesac and there is lots of room for Adam to ride his bike and lots of trails to walk on. It has new carpet, paint and appliances in it and is very clean. I think they must have had a professional come do the kitchen and bathrooms. The inspection is Wednesday, we don't expect any surprises and the furnace is already certified and all. The charity it is owned by wants to move fast and so do we. Please wish us luck that everything goes smoothly!!