Does It Ever End?!?!

Home improvements that is!

3 years ago this month, we bought our house.  It is a small house on 10 acres that needed ALOT of work.  The home was foreclosed on, and the previous homeowners completely gutted the whole house.  (Thank God for that, I have seen pictures of what it once looked like and I would have gutted the house myself!)

We didn't move in for the first month because Daddy was remodeling.  He took down a few walls to open up the living area. He put in the kitchen and one bathroom.  Painted, carpet, ect.

When we moved in, it was livable... but far from done.

And it is still far from done.

"We" (Daddy) have been recently working on finishing the bathroom I mentioned earlier.  While it was a functioning bathroom, the shower still needed to be tiled and we still needed trim.  Daddy literally was putting the finishing touches on his beautiful tile work (I will post later), sat down on the toilet to admire his work and..... crack!  The toilet split!!!

UGH

We have one of the rare wall hung toilets... kind of like you see at most stores, but for residential.  So it literally cracked off the wall.  Which really sucks, because these type of toilets are very rare in the US and cost ALOT to buy.

*I have to note, that Daddy is far from being a "large" person.  This really had nothing to do with weight, it must have just been getting old and worn out*

So anyways, it seem that every time we are completing a project, another one arises.

Will we ever catch up??

There is still so much work to do before the house in finished.

Not to mention the 10 acres that needs a lot of work also :/



New Day ~ New Look ~ New Button

Here in Northern California, we have been having some VERY nice weather!  Our summer was mild and now our winter is too. 

Except for a storm that came through last weekend, we have had 65 degree and sunny days. 

It has made the "winter blues" easier to bear, and the short days go fast!

Today we spent the day playing outside on literally every inch of our property.  It was fun to just be outside with nothing to worry about or tend to.

I realized after uploading all these pictures, that I took NO pictures of Bubba Love or Buddy Boy.  They are always off doing there own thing, while Baby C follows me around.

I haven't introduced her yet... but here is the newest member of our animal family!

Xina...  She is a 2 year old Great Dane that needed a home.  She is super sweet and a perfect fit for our family.

Baby C is so pathetic!  And so cute!

If you didn't notice, I took made a few changes to the blog.  What do you think??

Have you grabbed my button yet?? 

If you do, let me know and I will be sure to grab yours:)

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Bubba Love's Birth

This is the birth story of my first born... Bubba Love :)  This was written 4 days after her birth, and while I have since processed this birth further, I thought it would be fun to post how I originally felt.

 

Maybe in the future I will rewrite it, or add an "addendum" to it.  But for now.... Enjoy the fast, raw, proud and young version:

 

 

Friday March 9^th started out like every Friday, I had to go to the hospital for anapartom testing. While there we did an ultra sound to check fluid levels, and come to find out they were extremely low! I was immediately taken to labor and delivery; they said she needed to come out right away. My worst fear had come true, I had to be induced!

They started me on pitocin around 12:00 noon, I slowly started going into labor but 12hrs later at midnight I had only dilated one centimeter more and I was exhausted! They decided to take me off the pitocin for a few hours to get some well needed rest. Well no rest for me because my body continued on in early labor all night long. By 6am my Dr said I needed to get back on the pitocin, this time things progressed.   My Dr came in around 8:30am to check me I was 3cm and we decided it was time to break my water. 30min after my water was broken my Dr said I could be taken off pitocin to see if my body would continue naturally. IT DID, and I kicked right into active labor!

By 9:30 I was completely off pitocin and they took me off the IV and the monitors, I was free to walk and use positive positioning. After about 10:00 everything is kind of a blur, I completely went inside myself. I remember taking a shower and walking, but not much else. I was in pretty intense labor, I went from 3cm to 10cm in less then 2½ hours. At around 11:45 I started to feel the urge to push, they had not checked me since my water had been broken so the nurse kept telling me not to push (that was the worst part). It hurt too much to lie down so she had to check me standing up, once she checked me all she said was go ahead and push. I pushed for 45 minutes and my Dr let me “deliver” her, I was able to reach down and grab her as she was coming out, my Dr didn’t even touch her. It was so amazing!

Bubba Love was born March 10^th 2007 at 12:45pm, 5lb 3.5oz & 18in long.

 

 

Disneyland ~ Day 4

Day 4 was a perfect ending to our trip.

As I mentioned before, Day 3 took a turn for the worse and I had a major meltdown.

But we stayed, thankfully, and finished our trip with a bang!

We did NOT get up early the final morning!  How amazing it was to sleep in.

We took our time packing up and made our way to California Adventure around the time they opened(two hours later then Disneyland). 

We were one of the firsts in line and when they let us in we made a run for Soaring Over California.  Which we had heard great things about and were not disappointed!

Next, Bubba Love and Daddy wanted to ride on the Grizzly River Run, which is basically a water rafting ride.  We started in line and waited for Bubba Love to be measured.  Unfortunately she was 1/4 inch too short!  Seriously!  Que melt down again!

I really wanted Daddy to go on the ride though, so I told him to go ahead and I would take the kids to do something else. 

We got suckers and sour gummy worms:)  And by the time we sat down to eat them, Daddy was already done.  Come to find out, there is a "single rider" line that puts you basically straight on the ride.  Nice, that was easy!

Do you see a theme yet??  This day was going SO smoothly that I had almost forgot about the previous!

The "Mickey Spinny Wheel" as the kids called it was top on the must do list.  So we headed over there, but on the way stopped at a few of the other rides that again... had NO lines.

Finally, the Spinny Wheel.  We opted for the non-moving cage and enjoyed a relaxing ride.

Buddy Boy loved it because he could see inside of the new Radiator Springs area they are making.

There were very few characters that the kids HAD to meet.  Mater & Lighting were definitely ones they didn't want to miss.  So here we are.

The rest of the day went like this:

Lunch at California Adventure

Muppet Vision 3D - Very Cool!

Disneyland Christmas Parade (one of the only shows we saw)

2nd time on Pirates of the Caribbean with an even shorter line the the first time.

Quick tour on the Jungle Cruise.  Which was Daddies favorite!  We had an awesome tour guide with a very similar sense of humor to Daddies... it was pretty funny!

Then finally we ended the day with three HUGE ice cream cones from the Gibson Girl Creamery and made a few penny souvenirs. (Oh and picked up some cotton candy for Yammie... her payment for watching Baby C for 4 days)

We left the park very pleased with the day and a much better outlook on the trip all together.

Everyone changed into jammies when we got to the car and we were on the road by 6.

Disneyland ~ Day 3

Day 3 was an interesting day to say the least.  The lack of sleep and big doses of excitement finally caught up to us.

We got up early again but instead of taking the bus, we drove.  We didn't want to get stuck again and felt a little more freedom with having our own vehicle there!

Knowing that the morning was the best time to hit up the rides,

we ran to Fantasyland

rode the teacups again

rode Pinocchio

and finally the Snow White ride.

This took us all of 45min!

Then we waited in line to meet the princesses.

Both of the kids were in heaven.

Bubba Love was able to meet Ariel... her favorite!

Buddy Boy was speechless, but who wouldn't be with beautiful princesses around??

When they asked him his name, he politely said... "I forget"

That ended our morning at Disneyland and we headed back over to California Adventure.

*I wanted to make a note, that even though it was outrageously crowded, no one seemed to want to ride the buggies or cars that travel up and down Main St.  We however rode everytime!  It was nice to rest our feet and much faster.

This is where things started to go downhill and everything finally caught up to us all.

We made it to California Adventure and we had a plan... pick up a few fast passes!

If you will recall from our Day 2 adventures, we got a totally of 3 different sets of fastpasses within 30 minutes. 

Apparently this is not normal. 

Because when Daddy went to go grab us fast passes for multiple rides, he was surprised to find out that there is a one fastpass limit for a certain stretch of hours.  So basically we could only get one set every 2 or 3 hours. 

So our plans went down the drain. 

It was way to busy to try to stand in line, so we played in the Wilderness Explorer area for a bit until our lunch reservations came around.

The kids enjoyed this because they were able to run around and get some energy out.

I enjoyed reading about California... even though I grew up here, its fun to see what others learn about our great state!

And you know what they learn???  They we can't spell!!  Yup, that's right.

There was an area about Big Sur... or Big Sir as they put it!

Really Disney?  Haha.. I wonder how many people notice?

Most of the wilderness area is just discovery, but there are two main activities.  The rock wall and the zip line.  I figured that they wouldn't be tall enough to go on the zip line, so we skipped that and went to the rock wall.  Well apparently they are too short for that too.  Que meltdowns!

We scooped the kids up and carried them off to our lunch at the Blue Bayou.. back in Disneyland!

We hadn't thought this day through very well apparently.

We waited and waited, even though we had reservations, with whiny and hungry kids.

When we finally sat down, we had the worst service ever and even though the food was pretty good it was way over priced (even for Disneyland).

We left irritated and exhausted... it was only 1.

Without even talking about it, we both headed back to to the car.  We all needed a nap.

We did nap, for 4 hours!

Before our nap, we had every intention of going back at some point.  But after our nap, it was getting dark and we had no motivation.

I had a complete meltdown... I mostly just missed Baby C, but in the moment I also felt like our trip was a complete fail.

I was ready to pack up and leave right then.  I had even texted my mom (who had Baby C) that we would be home that night.

Luckily, Daddy knows me well enough to just ignore me and move on with plans! 

He took us downstairs to the hotel "restaurant", where he got food and the kids snacked on applesauce and granola bars.  They had a radio playing and since no one else was there, we let the kids go crazy and dance. 

Things seemed to be looking up, so to be on the safe side we called it and early night and headed to bed again.



Disneyland ~ Day 2

Day 2 was officially our marathon day!

We got up early and had breakfast at the hotel, then caught the hotel transit to Disneyland.

We got there right as Disneyland opened and we got to business:
 We headed to StarTours to get a fastpass.
I waited in line with the kids at Pirates of the Caribbean
while Daddy got a fastpass at Splash Mt.
We rode on Pirates... which was EVERYONE'S favorite!
Picked up a fastpass for Autopia.
Coffee and cookie break.
Then Daddy & the kids rode Splash Mt.

They all look scared here, but the kids said they liked it and wanted to go again:)

Off to Autopia 

Followed by StarTours, which the kids again seemed scared but wanted to go again!

We grabbed the worlds best corn dogs from the "red truck" on Main St.

Then headed over to California Adventure for everyone's very first visit!

We walked around a bit, just absorbing it.  It is pretty awesome:)

Our first ride was the Ariel ride

Then Jumping Jellyfish

Got some Mickey Ears

And on our way to the Toy Story ride we ran into...

Woody!

And got to meet Buzz Lightyear!

Pretended we were toys

And waited in a 90 minute line to ride the funniest ride in California Adventure... Toy Story!

We then took a potty break

Rode King Triton's carousal

And should have called it a day... but we didn't

It was getting dark and late, so we decided to go find dinner. 

On our way, we stopped at

The Sourdough Bakery to take a tour

Monsters Inc

Buddy Boy got his dance on @ ElecTRONics

He was having such a good time!  I literally had to pick him up and carry him away while he was kicking and screaming!  This was at 7pm, after a full day of excitement... I needed food!

But again we stopped

at Fliks Flyer

Walked around Downtown Disney

Realized that you need reservations if you want to eat anywhere

Took the Monorail back to Disneyland/Tomorrowland

Ate burgers while going deaf to live music

Missed our 9pm bus

Killed time by walking though Sleeping Beauty's Castle

Looked at shops on Main St 

Look through the Fire Station and the Disney History

Sat through the Abraham Lincoln show... Kids fell asleep

Carried them to wait for the 10pm bus

Waited and waited

Finally boarded our 15min late bus that everyone and their mother was on

Made it back to the hotel by 10:45.

Passed out!

Disneyland ~ Day 1

As I mentioned before, we told the kiddos on Christmas morning that we were headed to Disneyland.  We left Baby C at my parents, and after a few hours of sleep we headed out on the 6 hour drive.

We arrived at Disneyland a few hours before it opened so we stopped at a fast food place to use the bathroom, brush teeth and get dressed.  By then we were ready to park and go in.   

We hadn't told the kids until then... we were having breakfast with Minnie Mouse and her friends!

Oh the excitement and disbelief!

The lady I made the breakfast reservation with told me that because our reservation was for 8am and the park opened at 8am, we could get into the park 15min early to make it there in time.  Which was awesome, because nobody else seem to know about this... we were the first ones there and the only ones there for about 15min.  The kids had all the characters, all to themselves!

They had such and amazing time!

Bubba Love was petrified of Captain Hook, so her and Rafiki hid under the table and played.

Buddy Boy was happy to see everyone.  But he is our little eater and once our food came out, he got down to business:)

Next we headed out to the Teacups and to It's A Small World

Both rides were on the kids top priorities:)

We even got Daddy to smile!

Surprisingly for the time of the year (holiday), this day was not that crowded.   It took us no time to get onto the Teacups and only a 5 minute wait for Small World. 

Next we walked over to ToonTown for some play/discovery time.

Daddy & the kids also road on the roller coaster in ToonTown, while preggo Mama watched.  Bubba Love had a blast, Buddy Boy cried the whole time.

Of course we had to meet Mickey Mouse

At this point, I put my camera away.  As much as I wanted all the memories, I also wanted to be apart of them:)

After meeting Mickey we:

 Rode the Dumbo ride

Had lunch in New Orleans Square

Explored at Pirate's Island

Rode the Winnie the Pooh ride

Back to ToonTown for the Rodger Rabbit car ride

And finished the day off at the Buzz Lightyear ride

Between the traveling and the excitement of the day, we were all exhausted.  We checked into our hotel, which was not exactly what we thought it would be... but the kids thought it was beyond cool. We skipped dinner, and went to bed early.

It was a nice beginning to a week long trip:)