Brad's veggies are growing!

Well, after weeks of watering and checking and Bradley saying, "nope, no cu-cumbers, Mommy." It looks like we have a winner! Brad was totally excited to pick his first victim, but not to thrilled to find that it was not refrigerated when he immediately wanted to take it inside and eat it, lol.


It was actually very comical to see the look on Brad's face as he waited patiently for me to cut up his cucumber only to find that it was room temp! He took a few chews and then spit it out. He just looked at me and said, "It ucky Mommy, I want one out of the drawer." He was referring to one of the chilled cucumbers out of the refrigerator drawers, lol. It was pretty funny. He's turning into Farmer Brown!

I'm loving every minute of it!

I'm ALIVE.

...and I have Internet again, lol! WooHoo! It feels like it's been forever. Heck, it has been forever, lol. All of our electrical problems have been resolved and Comcast came out to our home today and spent SIX hours here trying to get everything straightened out, but it's DONE.

I'm currently sitting in our office typing and I can hear Brian watching TV in our living room... It's actually strangely blissful, you know, seeing how we are not big TV people. I'm thinking it's just so nice to actually have a choice over what we want to watch that Brian is going to continue to sit in the living r0om flipping through the channels just for good measure, lol!

Brad is doing beautifully. He's a little bit Anti-sleep all of a sudden and I have NO clue where that came from, so if any of you beautiful souls would like to offer advice on how you handle that situation, it will be much appreciated, lol!

All in all, we're doing pretty good. BUSY, but well! I hope everyone is doing well too, please update me when you get a chance, I'm going to start reading everyone blogs now, but if you happen to read mine first, please comment, I'd love to hear from you! I've missed you all so much!!!

Love,
Stephanie and Brad

I still do not have internet.

I still do not have Internet or cable at home, so I'm updating once again at my Mom's house.

They come Friday and to say that I'm excited would be like telling a six year old that they were going to Disney, so lets just say I'M REALLY EXCITED, lol!!!

We are doing good. The house is starting to look lived in, small hand prints on the refrigerator. The movie Cars is often playing in the background while I help finger paint and sing the ABC song with Bradley. I have tons of pictures for you guys, but I'm not here long enough to upload them and sort them to share, so soon... very soon!

I miss posting our daily rambles, because it's so fun to see Brad's world unfold before my eyes. Believe it or not, I have resulted to blogging on paper because it's necessary for me to write daily about him. I guess it will be extra material for those slow days when I get back in the swing of things!

Notes from the toddler:
Brian already set off the house alarm yesterday morning at 4AM letting the puppies out to go potty. The alarm company calls and asks you for your password for a false alarm. Brian couldn't think the alarm was going off. I'm holding the screaming toddler. I deactivate the alarm, give the secret password. Calm the toddler and explain what the loud noise was and Brad looks at me and says, "I don't like the Aladdin. You turn it off." Me, "No Goose, it's an Alarm." Brad, "No Mommy, I no like the Aladdin. Daddy, no work the Aladdin." He then laid his head on my shoulder and I couldn't help but laugh, poor kids going to have ADD when this is all said and done with!

Still here!

We're still here, just trying to get everything unpacked and settled. I'll be back to full operation shortly. I miss you guys! Please let me know how you are all doing!

Sorry I've been missing!

These Cable people are wretched. I've been without cable and Internet for almost a week at my house... gulp. I'm currently holding up my Mom's computer to write you this message and I'm thinking of ways to run this mofo back to my house. However, I'd then have to address the 20 miles in-between my home and my parents and then there's that bit about I live in an ENTIRELY different city and there I go with logistics again!

You know what's coming on TV tonight don't you... it's truly the real reason I'm over at my parents house tonight, but don't tell my Mom, lol. So You Think You Can Dance. That's right, I admit it people, I watch the show, so what of it. I've watched it every season ::blush:: now it's sort of an obsession and I bite my nails and call people on the phone and I even recruited my Mom last season. Muahahaha.

I just wanted to say hey and let you all know we were still kicking on the home front and hoping to have some internet soon because I'm going to go crazy without some contact with the outside world soon, lol. Hope all is well with everyone and I'll be back soon (I'll post some pics tomorrow).

Settling into a new rhythm...

is sometimes hard to do.

I'm a person of very few tears. I've a great big heart and I walk around with a huge smile most days and I almost constantly laugh (either at myself or someone else), but I hadn't cried or shed a single tear since the day my Dad died on January 2nd of this year. I shut down that day and at the time I'm sure I did it to protect myself from such a huge loss. However, in the process of protecting myself I didn't give myself a chance to grieve, I just powered down like a computer and all the pain, the heartache, the real deep anguish that you feel and are suppose to process was never touched, just left unsorted and out of it's files...that is until Saturday night.

If you're new here, a neat little fact about our home is it was once my childhood home and once belonged to my Dad. Brian (my husband) and I purchased our home from my parents a year to the day before it burned (not so neat, but interesting none the less). My home burned only eight days after my Dad passed away this year, so for me there really has not been a chance to grieve or process or sort.

When I pulled up Saturday night it was already dark and the flood lights were on... so was the front porch light, I immediately smiled because it looked like home and it made me feel warm all over. I was tired, no exhausted, from the day so I sat there with my head leaned against my hands and felt my eyes burn for an instant. I got out of the car and remembered to lock the doors (we're no longer in the woods my friends). When I walked in the front door I stopped dead in my tracks, my breath was caught in my throat and I got choked up. I took two, maybe three of those "omg I'm going to cry" short breaths and my hand instantly covered my mouth and my eyes filled with tears and my bag fell to my side. My sweet-sweet husband had gone to my Mom and asked her for a picture of my Dad's. He then brought it home without me knowing and put it up - it's this 3D bronzed picture of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane praying and my father loved this picture. He hung it over this very fire place we were able to save most of my childhood... so for me to walk in the front door and see it there, well that's all she wrote my friends I just lost my marbles.

I have since powered back up, had several really good cries, I'm trying to sort out the past 5 months of loss, which is really hard to do considering it's a lot to take on in one life time let along 5 months, up we're settling in and I love being home.

Pssst, we passed final inspection!

We're moving home tomorrow BABY!

Actually, if your my husband, your currently loading the grill as I type, but whose really getting into technicalities. It has been a really long day. It started nice and early with my husband notifying me that he failed to set the alarm and I was running late to meet the security people at our house... ACK!

So off I ran brushing my teeth like a mad woman and looking at myself in the mirror thinking there is no way I was EVER going to tame the massive amount of curls I have in time (I must have been fighting someone in my sleep because my hair was all over the place!), plus I heard the puppies waking up, and I just kept thinking... "WHY did this man forget to set the alarm? GAH!!!"

I get the hair in check (by an honest act of GOD himself, no lie), I get dressed, I get the puppies fed, pottied, I get all the things a Mom must do done in like 15 minutes SOME HOW and I do this in a RAIN STORM. It's down pouring on me... and did I mention that I have curly hair? Why me? Why? Alright so we're haul tailing it out of the house running late thinking this just is not working out and I crank up the car ... ding, ding, ding ... CRAP!!! I forgot to get gas yesterday! Seriously, I knew I should have just stopped on the way home and filled up, but no I did not do that, I was tired and I came home.

After stopping and filling up because I must ride until I'm completely out of gas for some reason - I was twenty minutes late getting to the house. I pull in all frazzled to the bone.... walk in ask Zack where the security company is and his response...

"Oh, Brian didn't tell you, they aren't suppose to be here until 9:00."

I'm still not over it. I waited the extra 40 minutes, lol. The prank I will pull on my husband will sting for sure and when he least expects it!