'Bout time

Time for an update!  I have so much to share, but I don't want to be typing for the next two days (and you don't want to be reading for the next two hours), so you get summarized bullet points!

House changes:

• New rug!

• New throw pillows (Okay, old throw pillows covered with new fabric.  I used my mad sewing skills.)

• New entertainment center/Ikea bookshelf turned sideways.  

You may recall that I had aspirations to re-purpose an old dresser (sand, paint, new hardware, etc.).  Until I found that older dressers at yard sales average $150, and you have to have a truck to get them to your house, not mention all the work and extra supplies involved in DIYing.  So I went to Ikea and got this for $70.  (Which was an adventure by itself, but I digress.  Summarized bullet points, Em!)

• A yard!

• A vegetable garden!  And so far, nothing has died!

• A gopher, which was discovered digging holes in our yard approximately 24 hours after the landscapers finished.  If you ever need to get rid of a gopher, I have lots of tips.
• The facade of our house will be changing soon, too.  Our builder made a mistake in building our house with the same elevation as our neighbors, which is against city code.  They are making a small change so our houses will look a little less identical, and that makes me happy.  I will post pictures when it happens.

Kids:

• Benson walks!  For real this time.  

• Benson speaks!  Or at least, he communicates.  He understands most of what we say and nods or shakes his head in response to yes/no questions.  He also has a few words: Dad = dada or dah, Mom = mama, ball = bahw, dog = dah!, more = mah, that = dat.  While we're on the subject of Benson, let me mention that he is also super cute and quite a cheerful fellow.  He loves to climb (on anything!) and always wants to feed himself.

• Cassie is a Joy School graduate!

 

• Cassie "earned" a bike by completing a sticker chart- she earned a sticker every time she was kind or said please and thank you without being asked.  Really though, we wanted to get her a bike but didn't want to just give it to her without some work on her part.  We wanted her to be in the habit of being polite and kind without being asked, so we decided on the sticker chart even though the bike was sort of a disproportionate prize.  

And even though this is supposed to be concise, I really want to remember the craziness of actually buying her bike, so I'm going to write it here.  Feel free to skip.  We decided to try to find a used bike in good shape on KSL classifieds, and Trevor found one that belonged to some grandparents who kept the bike at their house for their granddaughter to ride.  It was a 20-minute drive from our house, but we decided to pack the kids in the car on a Saturday afternoon to go get it anyway.  Trevor called to arrange a time for us to come see it, then on our way to their house, I called to tell the husband we were almost there.  He informed me that they had just left the house and wouldn't be back for about an hour.  Weird.  So...we found a Walmart nearby and decided to do our grocery shopping and buy Cassie a helmet while we waited for them.  After an hour, we went to their house and waited for several minutes until they came home.  He showed us the bike and told us how much fun their granddaughter had riding it.  Even though it wasn't in great condition, Cassie was excited about the Disney princesses on it, so we decided to buy it anyway.  He sold it to us for $25.  The training wheels weren't attached and he didn't have bolts to attach them, but he figured we could get those at any bike store.  The closest bike store was a few minutes away, but we wanted to get the training wheels attached right away, so we made the drive anyway.  Three bike shops later, we learned that training wheels don't have a standard bolt that attaches them to a bike and we would need to buy a new set of training wheels ($15-20ish).  At that point, returning the used bike and buying a new one for $50 was sounding pretty good to me.  At home, I noticed a bright pink sticker on the bike, so I looked closely and saw that it was a price tag dated four days earlier for $20.  What the?  You can draw your own conclusions about that one.  Trevor called him and said he would be bringing the bike back on Monday because we couldn't get the training wheels attached.  Then he took Cassie to Walmart with plans to buy a new bike.  After an hour of searching and talking to clueless employees, Trevor finally discovered that the bike we were looking for was out of stock at that Walmart.  Poor Cassie was very understanding through the whole ordeal and Trevor bought ice cream sandwiches to satiate her.  We finally got her bike on Monday at another Walmart where it was available!

Coming soon: a post about Memorial Day weekend!