The Past Month

Things are FINALLY starting to look a little better for us which is great because I have never been so much in a downward spiral in my entire life. We are officially moved out, no more house :( but on the other hand no more worry or mortgage:). In the process of moving however we got robbed, that's right, striped of all our worldly possessions. Not the most fun experience but definitely one of the most humbling. We lost just about all the expensive stuff that we had at home; Andy's collection of guitars (including his very first guitar) plus all the amps and peddles that went with those, Andy's full drum set, my bike, my tennis gear (which was a racket that my coach gave me in High School and a really nice expensive racket that Andy gave me as a gift), a stack of baby blankets, our home theater system, x-box 360 plus games, our vintage Nintendo (still in the box), and a bunch of other stuff that I still don't even know. Luckily for us Andy had taken all his work gear and our brand new computer to his new office so although the whole thing stinks it could have been a whole lot worse. Despite everything imaginable going horribly wrong we've managed to stay fairly positive. Our family is safe, we have a place to live (rent free) and everyone has given us so much love and support. I've also taken a few life lessons out of the whole experience. 1. Never say that life couldn't get any worse because it CAN 2. Your belongings don't mean anything, it's your family that counts 3. The value of good friends and family 4. The importance of staying positive 5. Don't be an idiot and leave valuables in plain site of the door and on top of that don't leave tools outside for the bad guys to use to open the door.


Amongst all the chaos the kids have been amazingly adaptive and have made leaps in their development. I seriously couldn't be more proud of them.

Evelyn has been her trouble seeking sweet little self these days. I seriously can't manage to clean up after her fast enough. She somehow manages to get into everything and never stops making a mess. She is cute though, their's no denying that! She is learning so fast now it's unbelievable. Her latest and greatest achievement is that she can now count to 10 all by herself. I am so proud of her! I hardly take any credit for it though. I think it's all the Sesame Street she watches. She's also picking up the alphabet really well. She knows A-F and then quite a few random letters in between. She's also now at that stage where she repeats everything you say. On occasion I've caught myself saying "crap" so I've had to be really careful. It doesn't seem like that bad of a word until you've hear it repeated back to you by a 2 year old. As it is some of the normal words she says sound like cuss words (an exploit that Andy has quickly taken advantage of). Evelyn and I have started a new little ritual. Every night before bedtime we say our prayers together and sing songs. It's come to be one of my favorite times of the day because it's really the only time that I get to focus all of my attention of Evelyn. She loves to sing too! Our day certainly wouldn't be complete without Evelyn requesting "The Wheels on the Bus"and "Jesus Wants Me for a Sunbeam". At the moment I'm teaching her how to sing "I am a Child of God". It's one of my all time favorites and one that, in my opinion, every kid should know.

Preston has also done quite a bit of developing himself. In the past 2 weeks he's learned to crawl, how to change from a crawl position to a sitting position and how to pull himself up. He is growing so much so fast and he's definitely picking up his dad's good looks and his sisters sense of exploration. But he IS still a major mommas boy, not that I'm too disappointed about that. Also about a month ago Preston got his first 2 teeth. His bottom teeth grew in simultaneously and let me tell you they make him look that much cuter, although I could certainly live without the biting. He had his 8 month checkup this week and the verdict is that he's doing great. [For my record] his new weight is 16 pounds 4 ounces and he's 27 inches tall.

Andy has officially started his own business again with an office and everything. No more working for the man. His business name is Higher Definition Media. Andy is a partner in the business alongside one of the guys he's been making movies with at Hectic Films, Jason. Their both very dedicated and passionate about what they do so the business is bound to succeed. They've already been getting a steady flow of work which is great. They've done several commercials though I've yet to see any of them, they've done a couple really amazing "Love Stories" (where they follow a couple around for a few hours and take amazing footage that they then piece together to make a sweet little film/ music video), they've filmed weddings and receptions and right now their actually working on a testimonial video for a doctors office. Others things I know they want to get into are legal video, film transfers, and radio commercials. Pretty much anything video or audio related their the guys to call.

As for myself, I've been working really hard lately to overcome 3 of my biggest fears; snakes, spiders & of course dolls/ghosts. I'm seriously getting nervous right now just thinking about these things. I stepped ON a snake about a week ago (creepy I know), luckily it was just a garter snake and it didn't even seem to mind. The spiders are just all over the shed I've been cleaning out to fit some of our extra stuff and the "other" thing... I totally love our new house now but the first week and a half we've been out here we've been living inside Andy's parents house and I've been going out to the other house to clean and it really freaked me out to be out there alone. The first thing I did was recruit Molly to go out there with me and together we packed up all the dolls making sure not to leave a single one (just in case that one doll wants to seek revenge for it's friends). It's definitely much better now and I'm actually starting to really warm up to the house. With a little bit of cleaning and sprucing up it'll feel like home in no time.