Williams' by the Bay: Summer Love

Well, it's been a solid 2 months since my last post which I swore wouldn't happen, but we've had a hectic couple of months and are just now starting to catch back up with life. So, what's been happening you ask? Well....here goes.

I got back from France with the munchkins and the next day we decided to go look at cars... why does anyone say they are going to look at cars? You know you're going to come home with one so you might as well just say you're going to buy a car. Anyway, we decided that as much as we loved Inge (my Volvo XC90 that we bought used in 09), the cost of maintenance was about to start getting expensive and between the 2 kids and the dog we were kind of starting to outgrow it. My common sense said we should get a minivan. My ego and even moreso, my husbands ego decided against it :) I'm still not quite 30 (and I will bask in that for every moment until October 4th this year) and I couldn't do it. Joe rarely has super strong opinions about these types of things, but he made it crystal clear that he was not interested in being the next proud owner of a "swagger wagon". So, we did the less practical, more expensive thing and bought a Honda Pilot. I love it, it's super roomy and has lots of cool features that someday when I don't have kids nagging me (will that ever happen??) I might be able to actually figure out and use. I still think we'll be kicking ourselves in the future years as soccer balls, kids friends, and all sorts of other crap start to get loaded in and we realize the good old MVwould have been a smarter play. Oh well, at least I'll be able to say "I told you so" to Joe, which makes it all worthwhile.

So, back in the country one day and we have a new car. What else shall we do to complicate life? Well, we had been thinking for a while that it was time to start looking for another place to live. Things got pretty tight in the condo after Claire was born and once we decided to start sleep training her in hopes she would sleep through the night and then move in the bedroom with Gordon, Joe and I started sleeping on the sofa bed. Picture this... toddler boy has master bedroom all to himself, infant daughter has second bedroom where she gets the choice of sleeping in her bassinet or to sprawl out in the luxurious Cal King Tempurpedic bed.... 6'+ mom and dad toss and turn on lumpy sofa bed for 3 weeks straight. Oh, what we do to get our children to sleep. Anyway, after the France trip we had long discussions and pretty much decided the Bay Area is our home... if not for life, at least for the next long while. With interest rates as low as they are and rental prices currently through the roof, we decided it made much more sense to buy. So the hunt began.

We started looking for houses on the Peninsula, but it became obvious that within our budget we were going to get a not so great fixer upper in a not so awesome neighborhood with so so schools. Alternatively, we could look in San Jose and get much more for our money, better schools, and shave almost an hour off of Joe's commute. OK, sold. So we opened up our search to the South Bay and very quickly found a place we loved. Put an offer in, got in a crazy bidding war with 15 other people and bailed. Things got too carried away in our opinion and the house ended up going for more than we wanted to spend. However, that weekend we found another wonderful house that was very tastefully remodeled and was the perfect little place for us. Doesn't need any work - very move in ready... So, with the market going as nuts as it was, I decided to go out on a limb (and make my realtor very angry) and muscle the selling agent into taking a verbal offer from us at the open house. When we called our realtor right after she about reached through the phone to hit me, but it ended up working. He got a commitment from the sellers and we got the house! Good thing we did it that way because he had a couple of others come through the open house that were planning to write offers that night.

Fast forward about 3 weeks and we closed escrow! Yikes that was fast! We found tenants for the condo, moved in, and here we are... we've been in the house about a month and love it. We've got 9 fruit trees that have been producing some delicious oranges, grapefruit, and lemons and have peaches that are almost ready. Gordon loves the backyard as does Sophie and we all love having our own room!! I think we'll combine the kids in within the next year, but for now it's great to have our own space. The neighborhood is lovely and there are tons of parks within walking distance. We love having Joe home for dinner just about every night and he is digging the 15 minute commute!

So aside from the crazy car buying and moving, life has still been moving crazy fast as usual. These kids change so much every day. Claire is 7 months old already!! She is sitting up and watching her brothers every move. I think she makes a mental list each time he steals a toy or steps on her to get by and I'm convinced she fully intends to issue payback when she can move. I think she'll be walking very early which terrifies us. She is eating anything and everything she can get her hands on and is finally sleeping through the night. Gordon is talking so, so much. So much so that I sort of wish he had an off switch :) Lots of words, about 60% that I can actually make out... but he has so much to say. He will not settle until you've repeated what he's said - oh how fun that is. Car, car, car, car, car, car.... OK!! We get it, Car! And then he moves on... truck, truck, truck, truck, truck... you get the gist.

What else.... the kids are really starting to take an interest in one another. It's really cute to watch them stare at each other and giggle. Gordon loves to feed Claire her puffs and Claire loves to try and rip his hair out of his head, which surprisingly, he doesn't seem to mind.

Now that we are much closer to Aunt Vickie and Uncle Mike, we've been spending lots of time with them which has been great. We do afternoon pool dates at the Country Club with AV and Gordon LOVES to play with her!! I'd say Aunt Vickie is his favorite pool toy :) We went to music in the park in Los Gatos with them last week and it was a blast. We hope to do it most weeks from now until the end of the season. It's great to get outside, enjoy some free local music, and enjoy way too many yummy snack and glasses of wine. We've been doing story time at one of the local libraries and it's awesome - nothing like what we had in San Mateo. There is a guy that runs it that does all kinds of fun songs, dancing, puppets and more. Gordon digs it and Claire is pretty into it as well.

Sophie is thoroughly enjoying her new space, though much to her dismay, we didn't leave the kids at the old house. We're trying to train her to just go to the bathroom in one area of the yard, but you know what they say about old dog, new tricks...

Joe is working hard as usual and really enjoying the different challenges with his new job (I guess not so new anymore, he's been there 6 months already!). Always good to learn new things and make new connections. He's playing on a work softball team - Los Oso's Locos (The Crazy Bears) and they are terrible. Well, at least at the game the kids and I went to last week they were :) He is off playing right now and supposedly they are playing the best team in the league so I'm actually surprised I didn't see him home 20 minutes after game time when they got shut out :) Who knows, maybe a week of practice made them into softball studs?!?!

I am actively trying to get us fully settled into the house, get things organized and decorated and operate as our social "cruise director" as usual. Let's face it... being home with 2 kids under 2 every day, keeping the house relatively clean, bellies full and butts clean is sometimes all that gets done. However, I am gearing up to hopefully have a garage sale soon to purge out all the things I decided we can live without as I was unpacking. It's currently taking up half of our garage and we're eager to reclaim the space!

We are hoping to plan a trip back to Michigan for the fall so we can see everyone, people can finally meet Claire and we're going to try and do a family/friends bday party for Gordon since it's so rare that he gets to see all of the extended family. It might be a month or so belated, but hey, it works. If we're really lucky we may even plan it to include the weekend of CMU's homecoming so Joe and I can go pretend we're young for an afternoon!

In other, sad news, my little buddy Gizmo went to visit the eternal dog park a couple of days ago. His health was rapidly declining and my parents decided that as much as they will miss him, the time had come to let him go. We are all very sad to say goodbye. I have lots of fond memories of him as I know my parents do too.... my favorite still has to be the day I came home with him and my dad said it was the ugliest thing he'd ever seen. Fast forward a few months and the two were inseparable. That dog had him wrapped around his little dog fingers almost instantaneously. They were the ultimate trio, Doug, Eileen, and Gizmo.... he will be missed and his bed will be hard to fill. But, on that note... the parents are resisting the idea of getting another dog. I disagree.. All of you dog lovers know that a house is not a home without a dog in it. So, if you come across a cute, well behaved, small (<15lbs) dog that needs a home, please let me know!

Well, that was a big update... hope to have shorter, more frequent posts in the future. Hope everyone is well and enjoying the summer!!