Claire, Aoife, and I just got back from spending a couple weeks in Oregon. It was wonderful. I flew out with Claire at the end of August, while Ross stayed with Aoife for classes. A few generous people helped watch Aoife while Ross was at class, or work. (Thank you again, Clarissa, Kami, and Shaelynn!!) Ross and Aoife drove out a couple days later with his sister for the weekend. It was Ross' brother's birthday that weekend. We're so grateful we could all make it and have the whole family together. To celebrate, we went on a family bike ride. The girls rode in a bike trailer together for the first time. They did great! Claire of course had Mama Loveland's iPhone and watched Elmo on YouTube the entire way. On the way back, Aoife was hungry and struggling. Whenever I'd look behind me, Claire was either holding the binky in Aoife's mouth, or trying so hard to feed Aoife a bottle. It was sweet. Claire really is a wonderful big sister and it's been fun watching these two grow together and start to play and laugh together. I adore it.
While visiting with the Lovelands, I went red! And I love it. I don't know if I'll ever want to go back to blonde. After a week with Ross' family, we ventured off to my family's house.
(Excuse my lack of my lack of make-up, just admire the color of my hair. Not what I look like. Thanks.)
They have an amazing yard, and Claire loved being outside. The first few minutes we were there, she was running outside, exploring trails, and picking blackberries. Oregon berries are phenomenal, and one of the many things I miss dearly from Portland. We had a lot of adventures. Claire went to my favorite apple farm that my family went to while growing up, ran all over the zoo, experienced the Oregon Coast for the first time, and chased the dog.
And then I flew home with both girls. It was actually a great experience and just about as normal as if I were flying alone. (Except that I had to urge Claire through the metal detector, take Aoife out of the car seat, walk with her through the detector, move the stroller to another place, and somehow collect all our stuff, get Aoife back in the car seat, while herding Claire and trying to keep her in the same general area.) But really, it wasn't bad at all. They girls did so well on the flight and slept during the drive home.Now, back to why I haven't been blogging much. Being home has been wonderful. I feel like every time I got out of town, I come back with renewed determination to be a better wife and mother, and to make improvements. With the big move coming up, I feel like that determination is multiplied a hundred fold. So here's what I've been up to.
As soon as I got back, I organized different movers to come out and give us an estimate. I finally got around to actually applying for apartments, instead of just researching and organizing them into a spreadsheet. (Can we say NERD?!) So far we've applied to 3, and I'd like to do more this week. Winter generally isn't a time for moving, so availability on the apartments we like might be hard to come by.
I've decided to put Pinterest to good use. I've done a few crafts here and there, but I've decided to do something else. I've been organizing my shopping list for the entire week. I browse Pinterest for different dinner recipes and make my list and add the other things we need for the week. So far it's been AMAZING. I get to find new recipes, so I'm not cooking the same thing each week. The only catch is, I can only go to the grocery store once a week. Which is great, because if I want a treat or dessert, I have to plan for it, otherwise I can't have it. The result: We're eating a lot less crap and not buying things because they "sound good". I was going to the grocery store DAILY. And I never wanted to because I didn't know what to make for dinner anyway. If things go like they have these last 2 weeks, we'll have cut a couple hundred off of our grocery bill for the month. And the recipes have been super delicious, too! Since the recipes make a lot of food, we have nights for leftovers, and I've been freezing some so we'll have easy meals when December comes and we're packing, and I don't feel like cooking.
I've been working on being more productive. (Organizing and planning for the move has helped a lot.) So I haven't been online as much. And I really like it. Which explains why I haven't been updating our blog.
And we found the coolest place for kids ever. Its called Jungle Jim's. It's kind of like a Chuck E. Cheese in that they have games and prizes you can get with your tickets, but we didn't really care about that. They have rides that are just for kids. We got Claire an all day wristband for super cheap so she could go on all of the rides she wanted. I so wish I hadn't forgotten my camera. She had so much fun and went on most of the rides by herself. The only ones she didn't go on alone were the bumper cars (Only because I knew she wouldn't do the gas pedal and steer at the same time.), and the roller coaster. (Because that one was SUPER FUN and we wanted to do it too.) It was hilarious watch Ross squeeze and fold and cram into the kiddie rides. We were there for almost 3 hours and had the best time.
Since being home, we've been working with Aoife on sleeping. Claire was easy. (Get ready, super controversial) I did Babywise, starting at 3 months. After two nights of crying, she'd sleep 13 hours a night. Straight. And is still an amazing sleeping. It was HARD as a mom though, and it drove me crazy. We're doing things differently with Aoife. I don't know if it's because she's a premie, or if I've gone soft, but we're not doing that with her. Instead, we cut down the number of bottles we feed in the middle of the night until we'd only put the binky back in her mouth if she woke up. I've done a regular nap pattern, and it's working. She's been going to bad at 7 every night. Last night she fussed a little at 5 AM, and went right to sleep after I put the binky back in. And she slept till 7:30 when Claire came running in screaming, "HI!" We've even had the girls sleeping together in the same room at night, but today I'm taking apart Aoife's crib and moving it into Ross' office. It's wonderful to sleep again! It's like I'm a whole new person!
Our next adventure is getting our family portraits done on Saturday. I still need to work on what we're wearing, but I'm really excited. Pictures to follow, I'm sure!
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