Friday 26 June 2009

Final Friday

Shear excitement has taken over. We will have the keys to our new house no later than Monday, which is a whole 2+ days earlier than when our lease begins. And the owners (our landlords) said by all means, move in this weekend if we want!!!! HURRAY!!!! That means we have to get cracking on this packing thing. I actually think it's going to be a lot quicker than everyone thinks b/c it really isn't a whole lot of stuff. We may take bigger things like the desk and chair, bookcase, toy box and such on Sunday. The rest is clothing and books. Won't be hard. The one thing I'm nervous about is Hazel's crib. Our little car isn't exactly space friendly. I have a couple of friends who volunteered to help which will be fantastic.

IT'S OUR LAST FRIDAY IN THE CLOSET!!!!!!! HURRAY!!!!!!!!!

On the downside, the whole BT thing is going to drive me crazy. We have to wait for the old service at the new house to be shut off in order to turn a new phone line on. Grrrrr. That means no phone or internet until then. Grumble. Can I tell you BT is one of the few reasons I hate being here? There is a very short list of reasons I don't wanna be here anymore. Missing everyone is on that short list, but BT and other necessary services...like the bank....are huge reasons it will be nice to get back to America.

So, for the moment, I will keep you up-to-date at what's going on....after that, only God knows.

Wednesday 24 June 2009

On A Walk

We ventured out toady about mid-morning. The goal was, enjoy the gorgeous weather while it's here. It's near 70 degrees, the sun is shining very brightly, there isn't a cloud in the sky. It's just beautiful.

I loaded the diaper bag, filled Hazel's "baa-pack" (backpack) with varies toys and snacks. We had juice and a stuffed animal (Cat & the Hat, which definitely wasn't my first choice as it's HUGE), diapers and shopping bag. We were set. I loaded it on the stroller and tucked Hazel in and we were off. Hazel did really well in the stroller all the way through town; to the bank, to the yarn shop, to the butcher's, to Boots, she even did well through most of Dorothy Perkins (a clothes shop). It was apparent then that lunch was due. So we made our way to Subway.

Hazel loves Subway. It's like getting a great big cookie for her. Now, that thrills me to no end. Subway is healthy, in most occasions (it always is for her). So we ordered, and sat down to our meal. I loved it. She sat like a big girl in a regular seat, ate from her sandwich like a big girl, wiped her mouth with her napkin, took sips from her juice. It was all so big. And I got to experience it. It was wonderful sitting with her, my little girl, as this person is no longer my baby. (I don't wanna get into how much that's tearing up my heart, it'll just make me cry.)

We finished up lunch and headed home. She walked almost 3/4 of the way home, holding my hand with one hand and grasping the stem of a leaf with the other. Every once in a while, she would see something cool, or something she recognized and knew the word for and we'd get slowed down for a moment, talking about it. Every few steps she'd "hop" and get the giggles over it, and I'd laugh. But for the most part, we just walked; hand in hand, enjoying the day together.

I realized that I wouldn't trade a nano-second of this for any other life, or situation. If living here forever was the only way to ensure I got to cherish my children's every waking moment, I'll take it. Because with every step home, I realized I was one step closer to not having those moments. She'll be too big to hold Mama's hand and giggle at her hops.

She may not be my baby any more, but she'll always be my little girl on a walk.

It's a Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood...

Yesterday was our last mom n tots group for the summer (*sniff*), so we all climbed the many stairs up into a large bus and found our way to Ballymena for a picnic!
The ride was....interesting. The main road to Ballymena starts out going up the side of a mountain, and then winds tightly through the countryside. Many hills, and tight turns are involved, making for a very bumpy ride. I think many of us were bright shades of green by the time we arrived at The People's Park. A great little park that had a large playground seperated into an area for kids over 8 and another for under 7. We went in, and with the sunshine like it was, we immediately slathered the kids down with sunscreen. It's a good thing, too, b/c the very first thing Hazel did was lay down in the sand pit and ensure that the sunscreen acted as an adhecive btween her skin and the sand. YAY! She spent the better part of the trip face down in the sand, making sure that she was fully covered in it. The rest of the time was spent on the slide. We then went to feed the ducks. They had grain for sale and we got a big bag and shared it amongst the 3 of us mama's. There were just gobs of pigeons who were more than thrilled about the short armed throws to the ducks. Lunch quickly followed and then we were on the road home!
(Hazel with Betty, the group organizer. This woman is tops in my book as she goes above and beyond what most M&T organizers do. She knows all the kids' names, treats them all as individuals {and not one big group}, takes an active interest in all the moms. She's amazing.)
Hazel's become a big fan of "Let's see what we see." We saw Windmills, which prompted about 5 minutes of "roun roun" statements from Hazel, informing the bus what windmills do. We saw cows, which had a screaming announcement everytime she saw one..."COW! COW! MOOOOOOOOOOO!", and sheep. It makes for a noisy Hazel, but a happy one, so that's all I ask.

Tubby time promptly followed our return home as well as nap time, so that gave Mommy free time to get moving stuff done.

BT sucks. Just so you know. I spent well into an hour on the phone with them, trying to make sense of the whole move. It was painful, and it's still not completely sorted out, but it will be shortly. Even if it's the death of me. Grumble grumble BT.

Well, we're off to do shopping for the day, nice walk into town to take advantage of the pretty weather :)

Laters!

Monday 22 June 2009

A Blarney Weekend

Well, the weekend out was wonderful. The drive, not so much, as it was a close to 6 hour trip, but it was well worth it once we got there.

We started the day by turning in the application for our new house (hurray!) and having a quick (but very filling) breakfast. Then we were OFF about 11am.

Hazel was asleep before we even left Larne, she got up at 4am and was exhausted, so we said a little prayer that she would sleep for most of the trip. No go. She slept until we got through Belfast and then screamed for the other 5 hours. Informing me that I brought the wrong blanket and that she didn't want the "yeyo bankie" (the one she normally wants) she wanted the "big bankie" which is her green duvet. It was a long trip down. At one point, the Sat Nav lost us, and I thought Brett was going to throw it out the window. But we got straightened out. We drove through the Port town of Cork, which was just really cool as I've never really been that close to where large ships dock. But our trip through Cork was quick and took us through some very tight streets and alleyways , then before you knew it, we were on the short drive to Blarney. It was shortly after 5 when we arrived in Blarney, which is a very small village just outside Cork. The cool thing was that we found a very very good deal at the Blarney Castle Hotel which was across the street from the Castle entrance, and around the corner from the Blarney Woolen Mills, so we parked our car in the hotel parking and didn't move it for the rest of the weekend. Our room was suprisingly nice, the owners kindly put us up at the top floor to avoid any excess noise come bedtime. I really recommend this hotel as the room was spaceous, cheap and clean. The staff was absolutely wonderful. We took HAzel over to the park across the road so she could run and stretch her legs, had dinner, then headed up to bed. Hazel passed out within 15 minutes which is a record for traveling. Brett and I followed not to long after...

Saturday we got up, had breakfast, then headed early to the Blarney Castle. It was just across the road, so it took less than 5 minutes to walk there. The estate was massive, and simply breathtaking. I'll let the pics talk for themselves...

The castle through the trees at the entrance.Not sure if the top sign is directions or a warning...The ground level entrances. The large door is the door to the dungeon!The front entrance of the castle. Lots of people huffing and puffing. Should have been a warning.This is the view of the blarney stone from the outside. Yah, the whole is where you drop into upsidedown and backwards. The bars around the wall are what you hold onto in order to drop, UPSIDE DOWN and BACKWARDS. Sounds logical to me...The castleHazel and I sitting in the dungeon (sorry I forgot to rotate the pic)Brett, Hazel, and Peppa Pig (Hazel's best friend). Peppa had to come on the tour of the castle.Many many steps for us to climb. Brett did them all. Each and every skinny and warn step, carrying our not so little daughter.You can actually see our hotel from this picture. I just don't know how to tell you where to look...it's also the very first thing I saw when we got to the top of the steps. I quickly changed my mind about kissing the stone.

Taking a rest while in the line for the stone...Brett kissed the stone (again, sorry for the rotated pic)I sucked it up and kissed the stone. Not without freaking out a bit, though. Brett said he thought I was going to cry.The Lookout tower*Sniff* A pretty flower for me...This tree had the coolest branches. A few of them were wrapped tightly around the trunk, I wanna know how they grow like that!The lime KilnThe Blarney House. Still a residence today. It's huge and a very short walk from the castle.
After walking the grounds and kissing the stone, we headed to get lunch and the stroller, then headed to the Blarney Woolen Mills. It was a cool old warehouse. Massive in size. 3 stories tall and just went on for ages. It had almost everything you could want to purchase from Ireland. I deperately wanted an Aran sweater (it's the souvenier of choice here in Ireland) but even with an entire floor of Aran sweaters and cardigans, I couldn't find one to fit the boobies. Boobies are great until you have to fine clothing for them. So I got a t-shirt. :)


Brett bought me my one and only piece of Waterford crystal. It's a heart-shaped ring dish. Just so you know, Waterford crystal is expensive. EXTREMELY, even from here where it's made. I have no desire to own 6 juice glasses that cost roughly $50 each. I'll stick to my dainty ring dish. It's perfect.

It was a really mellow weekend, after dinner, H had her bath and I think we were all in bed asleep by 9. The trip home seemed a lot easier, even though H only slept about an hour of it, she was content to watch Horton Hears a Who on the DVD player.

We're home, and I have lots of packing and unpacking to do :) Laundry here we come!

Wednesday 17 June 2009

Another Day, Another Dollar.

So, I have decided to sit down and figure out exactly what needs to be done to get a handle on my blog posting. There has to be a way to get on here more often and say....something.

It's been since before our trip home that I posted. I think I should combine our family one and this one. I think I'm just going to leave up the Davis blog, that way you can read all the things we've done up to this point, but maintaining 2 blogs of our own is just crazy, and the knitting blog on top of that. So here we go...a quick summation of life in the Davis household.

Hazel and I went home between April 25 and May 17, it was a great trip. I got zero accomplished, but as my mom said, "That was the point." I spent a lot of time with my family, which was also the point. Hazel traveled very little while we were there, which I believe was a big contribution to her sliding back into the NI way of life seamlessly. She was a dream on the flights to and from America and I'm so thankful to God for that. All in all it was a great trip. I spent lots of time with my brothers and sister in law, whom I miss more than they know, I think. I got to spend time with my Dad and Mom, and they got to spend lots of time with Hazel, which I think they loved. I'm glad we got the opportunity.

I turned 30 in May. Scary to think, but I'm grateful to be out of my 20s. Your 20s are such a hard time...establishing your place in life, having no money (not that that gets better with age), trying to convince the rest of the world that you're old enough to make a contribution. Bring on the 30s!!!!

Upon getting home, we found that much of our little developement has filled in with tenants. And as much of those tenants are college aged, there are parties all night and seemingly unsafe situations, so we've decided that although we may only have 6 months left here in NI, it's time to move. We looked and looked and looked. I decided to give it to God, and we just kept hitting dead end after dead end house wise and I was getting very discouraged. I should know better. Word to the wise. When you give something to God, BE PATIENT. Don't just say you're giving it to Him, really do it. We were blessed with everything we wanted and needed in a house. Now, I'm not saying it always goes the way you want it to, not by a long shot. But it always turns out for the best. Always.

Anyway, back to the house. I'm so excited. We have a 4 bd/ 2 1/2 bath home with a back yard. YAY!!! Cabinets in the kitchen for my stuff...I'll have counter space for cooking!!! Closets to put things away in. I'm in heaven. Room for Hazel to run. I'm coming out of my skin, can you tell? The funnest part of this new place is the watermelon pink downstairs bathroom. BRIGHT watermelon pink with a silver glitter overcoat. It's fantastic. I promised Brett that we would do all we could to "man it up" so he could use it with dignity. It is a fabulous place, though. We move in 2 weeks from today and then we've decided to host the Fourth of July party only 3 days later. Good thing all we're moving is clothing and kitchen stuff, huh?

We had a scary moment with Dad almost 2 weeks ago. He was bleeding pretty badly and had a scare in the hospital, but things seem to have calmed down and he's feeling good. Then he broke his ankle last weekend. Poor guy can't catch a break! But thank you to everyone for your prayers! I know they helped a lot and continue to help every day!

Hazel's started growing like a mad woman. She is now wearing 2t-3t sizes (18-2t in bottoms, 3t in most tops) which just wows me. She's a head taller than most of her friends. No hopes for a petite daughter :). Her vocabulary has hit the point where she's now talking in 2-3 word sentences. It blows my mind to hear her say things that make sense. We have very little pointing and grunting any more. We started Potty Training on Monday. I'm taking a very relaxed approach to this, whether that's a good thing or not. Monday she started saying "Potty, potty." every 20 minutes or so, and we had a play date here in the early morning, so after they left, I stripped her down and brought out the potty. She went 3 times between then and naptime, had a dry diaper when she got up, and went 3 more times between nap and tubby time. No accidents. I was so proud of her. Then Tuesday she got up, went 2ce and started having tiny little accidents, so I decided we'd put it away and see what she does in the next couple of days. She's only 21 months, so I'm not pushing it any harder than she demands. It'll happen when she's ready :)

We're going to see Lazy Town Live at the Belfast Grand Opera House on July 8th. I'm so excited. Brett's going to stay home and have a Daddy night. Her and I haven't had a mommy daughter date in a long time, so I thought it would be fun to go. I think I'm going to take her to the leisure center that morning as soon as they open (9) and let her really swim hard for about an hour or 2, come home, have lunch and an early nap, then head to Belfast about 3:30. We got the premium package (she gets a goody bag and our seats are in the 2nd row where there's dancing row-the theatre seats have restricted dance room) as it's just the 2 of us and I thought she'd have a lot of fun dancing around, ya know?

Well, that's all the news in our world for the time being. Hugs to all!