a.rose

Hallie is really into adjectives right now.  For example, I am no longer just "Mommy". Now, I am always one of the following (and I haven't figured out yet what is the determining factor in which adjective she chooses... but I'm ok with that.) - Cute mommy - Big mommy - Fancy mommy - Favorite mommy and Devin is always one of the following: - Funny daddy - Tricky daddy - Big daddy She also likes to tell me that I have a big belly, and a big bum.  Thank you for that too, Hallie. And, on a final note, she is terrified of the "snowman".  This is not Frosty the Snowman, because she loves him and any representation of an actual snowman.  No, what she is afraid of is the snow that is on the ground, on the bushes, on our car, and most importantly, when Devin brings it in on his shoes.  When he does that she gets really worked up and won't stop talking about the snowman on Daddy's shoes.  She tells me every day that Frank (our landlord - whom s...

If you try to dress a Hallie, you'll probably start out with a shirt, pants, and socks.  She'll put up with this routine until the day she discovers she has arms just like Mommy, and can take her pants off all by herself.  Then she will start a nightly routine of running around the house approximately thirty minutes before bedtime pant-less.  This we call "No Pants Hallie."  Once she discovers how fun it is to be without pants for a few minutes every day, she will occasionally test the limits.  One day she woke up and decided that she would take off her shoes and pants each time Mommy put them back on.  So finally, her eight months pregnant Mommy decided to let her win this round.  Until her poor little toes almost got lost to frostbite because she somehow also manages to get them wet all the time.  So Mommy insisted on socks at least.  But how do you keep a little girl in socks if she won't even leave pants on?  Well, of course, when yo...

We missed not being with family today, so I am posting the pictures we took of Hallie with her loot so you can see how much fun we had, and maybe that will make me feel like you missed me too... Ok this is actually Christmas Eve dinner.  We had hamburgers and homemade french fries.  Yummy.  (Devin had a baked potato.) Just about when Mommy couldn't take it anymore, Hallie got to rip into her presents.  She was so excited about each one however, that it would take us twenty minutes to remind her that she had other presents to open.  It was fun to have her be as excited as she was. She got her first baby doll, a stroller, car seat, bath tub (with accessories), diaper bag (with accessories), and a little crib.  What a lucky little girl!  Guess what we did ALL DAY LONG. Devin put together the swing for baby Hanna, and of course Hallie thought it was for her baby doll.  Whom, by the way, we keep trying to get her to name, but whenever we ask h...

This is what we looked like one morning when Devin came back from his run: We had all climbed into bed together for a snuggle because it was the most exhausting week for all of us.  I believe we are "watching" Curious George. Hallie wears my boots a lot. You find a lot of interesting things when you spend hours every day looking at other people's homes.  This was one of our favorites.  Devin said, well, until we get it finished all we really need is a box of wipes, right?  Please note that it leads straight into the laundry room too. Zero Privacy, but I'm guessing the no sink is a bigger deal.  Because there is a separate door to go into the "laundry room".

Well, of course we had the Third Annual Rose Family Gingerbread House Making Party.  This year it was a little different than it has been in years past, however.  This year we invited just our neighbor, she's a really nice lady and going through some hard times in her life right now.  We were very excited to have her over, she loves Hallie and we were all ready to go.  Unfortunately, as often happens at this time of year, she got sick and didn't want to get any of us sick also.  So it was just Devin and I.  And we didn't even get them finished.  So, they are sitting in our laundry room, beautiful, sad looking half finished gingerbread houses. Well, there's always next year! Daddy's biggest helper.  Devin made up his own recipe for the gingerbread this year, and I'm really upset with him because he never wrote it down, and our gingerbread turned out better than it ever has before.  It was low fat, low sugar, whole wheat gingerbread and it m...

This is the longest post of all time, but that's because of all the pictures. So I know I shouldn't let myself get carried away since we still have the inspection to go, but... I feel like we've won half the battle, so I will show you pictures now. This backyard is one of the  main reasons I wanted this house.  It is on a corner lot, and it is really quite large.  It extends just as far off to the left.  Here you can sort of see the nice swingset we've inherited also, which Hallie will love as it has swings and a slide. This is the playhouse in the backyard.  It's about nine square feet inside, and has electrical set up and in the spring/summer you can tell it is landscaped.  My girls will be a little spoiled. This is the first thing you see when you walk in the house, aside from the stairs which you can barely see in the left corner.  It is a formal dining, but we may use it as a formal sitting room. This is the front door, with the stair...

What a day yesterday was.  First, some background on the house.  The owner has been trying to sell it since June.  When he heard that we had looked at it on Monday (yeah, it was the first house we looked at, and really the only one I ever wanted after that...) he lowered his price pretty significantly, we thought, and his realtor made sure to tell ours that he was a "motivated" seller.  We thought we had all sorts of bargaining power at this point. We wanted to look at the house one last time (this would be the fourth time we looked at it) before we rode out of town, to have it fresh in our minds as we thought about whether or not we were going to make an offer and how much we were willing to spend, etc.  We had almost decided that we would be making an offer that day, but Devin still wasn't quite sure.  We stop by the house and of course, I love it as much as ever.  Devin says his qualms are starting to go away, and we're feeling good.  The rea...

Well, we're going to be placing an offer on a house in the morning it looks like.  Yikes.  It's been a long week, and we've seen many houses.  Some beautiful, some strange, and some with security alarms going off.  (I was terrified the police would show up any minute, and then a little unnerved when they never did...) The house is my favorite, and I am hoping that Devin will learn to love it as much as I do.  We'll see if our offer goes through, and then I'll let you know all about it.  I'm trying really hard to remember that just because we put in an offer, doesn't mean it will be ours.  Lots of things could happen first. But I AM crossing my fingers.

Give it to me straight, am I Scrooge, or the Grinch?  Be honest here. I was thinking about how I started my last post, and I realized that I sounded really grouchy about buying a house.  I'd like to apologize for that, and set the record straight.  I am, in fact, thrilled that we are going to finally own a home, in part because that means we are (anticipating) living somewhere long enough to make it economically feasible.  That's a huge deal.  Not to mention the fact that the lure of owning a house is the only thing that is going to propel me into the car some morning in March with all my belongings packed away and on the road behind me.  Ok, that and the fact that my mister will be going to Nebraska, and I really like him , and his job is what provides the money for the food and clothes my babies and I enjoy, and as of March, that job will be in Nebraska.  So, go CORNHUSKERS!! (weird, I know.) Again, we haven't even actually started looking at ho...

I am feeling extremely frustrated/overwhelmed by the whole house buying process, and we haven't actually looked at any houses yet (aside from online).  I've been on the computer and on the phone for days with mortgage companies, a realtor, bothering Devin and work repeatedly to ask him what he thinks of what I should do, and so I decided to cheer myself up I would put up more pictures from our trip to California.  These are from Devin's parents' camera. (Although I just got a phone call, we've been approved for a loan, so at least we have that when we do start looking...) Well, you knew we went to a farm,  here is Hallie with her Grandma Rose. And I realize you know that Devin ran in a 10k, but he just looks really tough, and so here's another picture of that event. Of course we had a feast.  Devin made a perfect turkey, and we also had his signature stuffing, my "famous" sweet potatoes, and the obvious other assortment of Thanksgiving delights...