Post-holiday decompression

The big days have come and gone. Everything went very well. The twins especially seemed to love all their new toys. It was so nice to be able to stay at home all day on Christmas. I had trouble this year getting the Christmas feeling, but I feel good knowing that it certainly felt like Christmas on Christmas day.

It was a very good Christmas and Took Birthday season.

No big snow yet here...I have a feeling there won't be one this year...but Steph has pointed out that I say that every year. Good point.

Nice to have another year of a decent amount of time after Christmas before going back. 2012 will bite - the 2nd is a Monday so we'll start back right away and have a full week, I'm sure. Not fun. But, for this year, we have until the 4th which still seems far enough away that we don't have to think about it yet.

Happy Holidays all!

Matt

Oh Boy...

Just a quick update. We were SO happy to see everyone last night!

We were NOT so happy to be awakened at about 1:30 this morning to Mari freaking out that she had just stepped in vomit. Faith (top bunk) had thrown up, we think in her sleep, and had managed to do it over the side of the bed. Her bed was nasty, as well as the side of Mari's bed (bottom bunk) and the carpet below. Nice. Matt and I work pretty well together as a team for these middle of the night crises -- not the first for sure and certainly not the last -- but it still stinks. And I couldn't get back to sleep until like 3:30 this morning.

Ah well. Back to reality, right?

Now to get everyone healthy before Mari's 4th bday party on Wednesday! I can not believe she turned 4 years old yesterday! Let's hope her 4 years old year is easier than her 3 years old year...

Steph

They're Baaaaaack...

Oh my.

Gonna be a rough few days transitioning the girls back into being home. Pray for us.

I mean really pray.

Hard.

Mini vacation is winding up

So, I'm sure the big question is whether we miss the kids at all or are just living it up all week.

Well...

Yeah, of course we miss the kids. But I'd be lying if I told you I'm walking around miserable and aching for them to get back. It's been nice. We've gotten all the wrapping done. We've kept the house in nice condition. We've gotten all the laundry done and kept doing it. We got a chance to walk around IKEA. I've been able to sleep in a little in the mornings, since I'm only responsible for myself. The babies have seemed to enjoy it too. It's been like a mini-vacation.

Come Saturday I will be glad to see them, because they're my kids, they're fun to be around, they're hilarious sometimes, and I love 'em. But I certainly liked NOT having them around for awhile as well. Steph and I are both sad to have missed their first time at Disney, but there have been and will be lots of other firsts and amazing memories to share. At the end of the day, it pretty much comes down to "Thanks Mom and Dad for doing this."

Okay, I need to finish getting ready for our 3g play. More soon!

Matt

New Family Pic - UPDATED AGAIN

There you go - an update.

Of course the problem is that the longer you go without updating, the harder it is to post anything. I am going to attempt to rectify that. It has been too long.

Family in general is doing well. The big news is of course that G&Z have taken Faith and Mari to Disney World for the week. Part of us is ashamed to admit it - as teachers we have a big problem with the 'miss school for vacation' culture. But given the circumstances we had to work with, it was something we reluctantly agreed to. That said, we are certainly enjoying being parents of 2. Getting a lot of quality twin time, and getting a lot of work done. Hopefully the house will be ready for Christmas and Took's bday by the end of the week.

Work is going well for me - I can count the real problem students on just one hand, and none of them are too much to handle. Steph also is enjoying her new job quite a bit. A problem preschooler is not anything difficult when you've been working with...uhh....7th and 8th graders with a sense of entitlement. Anyway. She likes it - and really likes not having to create the plan or grade papers. I can certainly understand.

Faith is doing great at Kindergarten. She obviously was reading at a crazy level before she started and we were worried about her getting bored, but she has taken to practicing her writing with wild abandon, and it has improved markedly over the last few months. We love her teacher and her school. I think she will continue to get extra enrichment however she can.

Mari is doing well at preschool - her problems are not academic, they are social. Having trouble with keeping hands to herself. It worries us a little bit, but again, her teacher is going the extra mile to help her get motivated while still letting her be herself. Mari is a wild spirit and we are trying to balance her need to learn the limits and to not feel stifled. Trying to get her to channel her enthusiasm into appropriate actions. But...she is a riot - she cracks us up every day. She got the humor gene for sure. It's a wild roller-coaster with her but she is going to be the class clown for sure. And that's not necesSARily a bad thing - if she's in control of it. We'll see.

Robby and Hannah are finally starting to show some of what I would call normal language usage. They're behind where Faith and Mari ever were, but I think they're getting there. Robby is sweet - likes to give kisses and hugs - and he's a rascal - if you call him he looks right at you, gives a sly little grin and runs the other way laughing. Hannah...is just weird. Sorry, she is. She's sweet but she's a weirdo. I love her anyway.

That's all I can give you now. Hopefully I'll stay on things better now, but I say that every stinking time. Oh well, never too late.

Here are Faith and Mari's school pics as well:





Matt

Weeks and weeks

Tis the season to not update your blog often enough. Ah well.

Sickness continues in various degrees and forms, although nothing too serious.

Faith went to her first football game on Saturday - the Regional Semifinal HS game down at UC. We'll post pics soon. She had as good a time as could be expected. I was proud of her. She doesn't get everything and can't see everything, but wasn't whiny and sad at all. We had a pretty good time.

We're gearing up for the holidays and frankly I can't wait until Thanksgiving break. It needs to come like, now. Seriously. I mean it.

Not much more to say at the moment. All is relatively well. So long!

Famous Last Words

Ha ha ha. Since my last post saying things were fine germ-wise...I got flu. Hannah got croup and an ear infection. Crazy crazy crazy.

I won't even say it now.

The flu is affecting everything around here - had to postpone the 4th grade play until November, because they scheduled the vaccination clinic the same night as the play. Good thing too, since I missed 2 days and we would NOT have been able to get it all together. Allowed us to take the foot off the gas for a couple days, and now we can gear up again.

Halloween was largely uneventful which is always good. Should be able to post pics in a few days.

Our satellite TV days are over for now. It's down to all network/over the air broadcasts, and of course, online streaming. The transition is going well, the girls don't even complain about it. Good for them, and good for us. We'll be saving a LOT of $$ by doing this.

All in all, all is well. I know we haven't been updating here often, as is usually the case during this time of year. Keep checking in - we'll do our best.

God bless,
Matt

Random Thoughts

Things are stable but insane. Aside from some runny noses, the kids are all healthy. Steph has the invincible cold that won't let go, but otherwise the germs are temporarily at bay.

Haven't said much about the video...after we premiered it, I had to step away for a while, but I'm able to watch parts of it again, and enjoy it. Fact is, it was just so big I had to get away for a while.

I continue to look for other methods to share the videos without being hosed off of YouTube...hopefully more on that soon. Look. I certainly don't expect anyone who wasn't there to sit through the whole 5 hours, but I AM proud of the whole body of work and eager to share whatever reasonable amounts are possible. Maybe I can fly under the radar somehow.

Steph is liking the new job, but there are a lot of sacrifices we're making. We're about to cut off our satellite tv service to save cash...which means no more DVR which means all the shows that the girls are used to having onhand go bye-bye. An ugly transition is coming.

Anyway, as we continue to try to raise 4 kids on a teacher and a quarter's salary while paying off years of foolish debt mistakes...keep us in your prayers.

God bless,
Matt

Where to start...

First off, sorry for the long time between posts. Combination of the usual business, some additional tiredness, and the fact that I can't log in from work any more.

Spent the weekend in Columbus for our new traditional early-October end-of-camping-season stay at the Cross Creek Camping Resort. Nice place although it's moving down the list...another story.

Anyway...spent the weekend there, but spent most of Sunday at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus.

Let's see. Going back to last week. First Mari had crazy bad fever, enough to make us think "OH1N1O" if you know what I mean. But, turns out it was just a major case of Croup. So, Robby started having Croup cough before we left, and we got the appropriate meds for it on our way out of town. But Robby just kept getting worse and worse until at about 1:30 Sunday morning we just plunked him in the car and drove to the hospital. Seriously, he was 'retracting' as my mother the nurse pointed out - his chest was caving in with every breath. They took one listen to him there and got us right back into a room and he was admitted a couple hours later. Some more steroids and a couple of breathing treatments later and he was stable...but what a weekend. Meanwhile I came down with laryngitis (sp?) which is just Croup for grown-ups.

I hate Croup. That's what I get for naming my Rock Band 2 band "Croup".

Anyway, we are still recovering - and I didn't even give you the whole story.

Hopefully things will settle down a bit now.

Gotta go - hopefully not so long this time.

Matt

Two Years in the Making

Steph here.

About 2 yrs and 1 month ago, we put our condo on the real estate market. This was RIGHT when we found out we were pregnant in Sept. of 2007. We knew my great-aunt was probably never going to be able to come back to her home and that my family would be happy to sell her home to us.

A month later, we found out that we were indeed going to be having twins. We immediately lowered the asking price of the condo by several thousand dollars, feeling more pressure to get in to the new house before the twins came. Especially seeing how most twin pregnancies do not go full term.

By late March of 2008, we had still not sold the condo but decided to move in to the new house. I was 32 weeks pregnant with the twins.

20 months after putting the condo up on the market, we finally closed on the sale of it. We did lose some money on it but at least walked away with a check in our name (as opposed to stories we've heard from our realtor of people OWING up to $30,000 at the SALE of their homes! Can you imagine? SO sad...). We applied for our loan very soon after that.

Well, almost 4 months after that we have finally closed on our home tonight! We are so very excited to finally be homeowners again and so happy that my family (my maternal side of the family - my great-aunt passed away the summer of 2008 so the house was in my uncle's name) will finally be able to move on with the closure process of Bobbie's death.

We went through a lot to get here and it was pretty painful at times. But seriously? We own a GREAT home that is PERFECT for our family. Most importantly, and really the basis of the reason for us wanting to buy the house, we are in a GREAT GREAT school district. We feel SO lucky and blessed.

Meanwhile, I also start in to my new teaching position next week. I am working for a very small company that contracts out to various preschools (mostly Montessori) in the Greater Cincinnati area to teach Spanish. I will teach at 6 or 7 different schools. I don't have to create any lessons, grade any papers, deal with many or any parents! Phew. At this point in the life of my family, this is all wonderful. It's a HUGE paycut and we are trying to adjust to that, but the new schedule is improved over the new one.

I don't know if I will want to teach preschool for the rest of my career, although who knows? I could change my mind on that! But again, feel SO lucky to have come upon this job. The owner of the company is GREAT as a boss and really, really knows her stuff in terms of teaching Spanish to young, young children!

I guess that's it for now. Matt is really in to watching Ken Burns' wonderful National Parks documentary this week (see the widget above) which began Sun. night and runs through Fri. night. I am tagging clothing for the Twins' Club semi-annual sale which takes place this Sat. I'm praying for a good turnout and a good amount of income for me and for the club!

Ok, I'll sign off for real now! Steph

PS -- We did the premiere of the "big trip movie" for Matt's parents this past weekend and we think it went really, really well! Matt is truly a genious at making these movies!