The Long-Promised Garden Pictures

These probably don't do Robbie's creation justice, but I had a squirming baby in my arms. C'est la vie.

The main garden


Annual bed turned into bountiful greens.


First strawberries


The melons and even more tomatoes


Eating our first harvest


Peonies finally explode


Backyard


Our new compost tumbler


Our new rain barrel


Our little white house

Making a Scene

This morning we were making our usual frantic attempt to get to Early Intervention on time when Fionn threw the proverbial wrench into the works. First he managed to dump an entire cup of cold water (pilfered from Emerson) into his lap, then he filled his diaper with a noxious concoction. I had just finished getting Emerson ready to walk out the door, so I moaned with the realization that we were once again going to make the walk of shame into school 15 minutes late. As I started to change Fionn's diaper, Emerson decided he wasn't about to let this slow him down. He managed to open the front door and proudly marched down the front steps with the dog close at his heels.

When I saw what was happening, I ran out screaming after him, a naked baby covered in poop dangling from one arm. I managed to get Emerson's arm and drag him back inside, but I saw the back of the dog disappearing around the corner and decided it wasn't worth chasing after her. As I suspected, she was waiting at the front door with her tail between her legs when we reemerged 10 minutes later.

At dinner tonight, Robbie and I started discussing how unfriendly the neighbors across the street are. Most of the neighbors have introduced themselves since we moved in, but these particular neighbors never even make eye contact. As we talked, I thought about the scene we created this morning and realized that may be part of why the neighbors are shunning us. In fact, we tend to make a lot of embarrassing scenes.

For example, I'm sure they often see me sitting in my car in the driveway for hours, reading a book or writing papers - not realizing that I have a perfectly rational explanation for this. Namely, the boys have fallen asleep in their carseats and I'm so grateful for quiet time that I'm not willing to risk moving them.

Or there was the time when Emerson was obsessed with the car, so every day for several days, Emerson would be sitting in the front seat of our car, turning the hazards on and off, honking the horn, etc. while I stood next to him reading theology books and wearing Fionn in the sling.

Or there is the daily scene of Emerson tromping up and down the sidewalk wearing a mismatched outfit, bright red galoshes, sunglasses and a floppy hat - pushing his favorite hot pink doll stroller with a baby doll precariously strapped inside. Meanwhile, I sit on the steps indiscreetly nursing a baby and yelling at the dog who manages to escape from the backyard every five minutes.

I would probably shun us too - we may be single-handedly bringing down the house values in the neighborhood. But you can't put a value on entertainment.

Ahh Spring

The first seedlings in our "Freedom Garden" - one week old



The view from our bedroom of our yard and the old orchard across the street:


The elderly couple that lived in our house before us were excellent gardeners who planted lots of blooming trees, bushes and bulbs, so I'll have to take more pictures when it hits its full glory



Of course, Spring is the season for rain storms and thus galoshes. But according to Emerson, galoshes are appropriate every day - rain or shine:

Curses

So last night, in a rare fit of motivation and energy, I decided to start painting the dining room while Robbie and the boys went to bed. Since the specialty paint stores were all closed by 5pm, we went to Lowe's and got some Valspar color-changing ceiling paint. I mean, who cares if you put cheap paint on a ceiling, right?

Oh how the gods punished me for that one.

Six back-breaking, neck-wrenching hours later, I "finished." It took that long because I had to constantly move the dining room table and chairs around the room (there's no where else in the house to stash them), I took breaks to nurse the baby several times, and I kept going over the same areas again and again to get good coverage. I feared the worst, but I decided to wait and see what it looked like the next morning. Unfortunately, the light of day only revealed a streaky mess that didn't even conceal the beige paint underneath!

I cheated on my faithful men - Mr. Sherwin Williams and Mr. Benjamin Moore - and now I'm going to beg their forgiveness in the hopes that they can cover this mess. Preferably in one coat.

So here's my question to all you DIY out there: should the ceiling be white, a shade lighter than the trim, or a few shades lighter than the wall?

There seems to be widespread debate about this on the internet and I figured I would revisit the question since I have to revisit the painting anyway.

My Own Bob Villa

I just want to take this moment to recognize how incredibly impressed I am with my hunky handyman of a husband. (Note: the above picture is a dramatization, not my actual husband. Although he also looks hot in bell bottoms.)

To date, he has completed a number of renovations, including but not limited to:

Building new railings for our stairs (the previous ones had enormous gaps that were just waiting for an unsuspecting and visually impaired toddler to test out)
Running a new gas line for our new stove without blowing up the entire house
Painting two rooms (many more to come)
Hanging drapes
Connecting new lights
Repairing the foundation in the garage
Assembling an insane amount of children's IKEA furniture
Removing some "what the hell were they thinking?" projects left from the previous owners
Installing an undermount sink and new faucet
Installing a new toilet after removing 40-some-odd years of toilet gunk (yum)
and finally, figuring out how to put a dog door in a door with recessed panels

I won't post our big reveal pictures yet because there's a lot left to do and frankly who knows where the camera is in all this chaos, but I promise someday soon.

Right before we moved into our new house, we stayed up late watching "Money Pit" with Tom Hanks and Shelley Long. I have to admit that I pretty much expected this house endeavor to go a lot like the movie. So much so, in fact, that every time Robbie mutters something under his breath or sighs while working on a project, I yell across the room, "WHAT'S WRONG?" For some reason he finds this unnerving.

In my defense, we have had some minor snafus and challenges along the way. (Staple on the bottom of the couch + newly finished hardwood floors = me in a crumpled, sobbing heap) But for the most part we are getting by just fine, if at an incredibly slow pace due to other demands. Someday we will have a lovely home and all this mess and headache will be behind us. In the meantime, I'll keep bragging about my handy husband and hope the people in Home Depot don't ban me from the store for constantly breastfeeding in the tile aisle. (By the way, if you can solve the "should backsplash tile match your floor tile?" debate, I and the entire staff of Home Depot would be eternally grateful.)

Coming up for air!

Taking a break from packing:


I'm going to unpack this box last :)


Jabba the Hut:


Sleepy smiles:



There is no reason I should be writing this when I have so much to do and my oldest is still asleep, but I feel obligated to explain to those of you that I've been ignoring what has been going on the past few weeks!

The good news is that Fionn is doing much better - still incredibly "high-need" (how's that for a euphemism?), but at least with enough work we can get him to stop crying and occasionally he even gives us big dimply smiles and giggles. When he's in those moods, I remember why I wanted another one. I can't get enough of his sweet-milk smell and nuzzling his enormous cheeks. I don't know why a fat baby is so satisfying, but fat he is.

The bad news is that fat babies or not, these past few weeks have been utter hell! We closed on the house a week after Fionn was born and had a little over a month to finish as many renovations as possible while taking care of two kids and packing the old house. Of course, renovations ran into constant problems, we all got sick with two rounds of a nasty cold (including a case of croup for Emerson that sent him to the emergency room), then Robbie ran into a really stressful time at work, the weekend we were moving Emerson got the stomach flu, followed by me, followed by Robbie - so the move was postponed and we didn't get nearly as much done as we needed. We had to spend every night last week until 2a.m. battling the blizzard conditions to finish packing and cleaning the old house. Now we're finally able to focus on the new house, which is good because I'm going insane trying to entertain a toddler and newborn in the midst of chaotic boxes piled everywhere and half-finished renovations! Don't even get me started on holiday preparations...

So that's our tale of woe. Last Friday was a snow day for the schools and so I watched heavily bundled children tromp through the high snow in the orchard by our house. They had snowball fights and made snow angels and explored the deserted streets. It made me wish I was that age again when lots of snow was a good thing and there was a parent ready with hot soup and dry clothes when you burst through the door at the end of the day.

At least it was a good reminder that people are still out there leading normal lives and having fun. Hopefully someday soon we'll be one of them again! I just have to keep telling myself that underneath all the clutter and to-do lists is a house that will be beautiful and totally ours once we're done.

And as for the boys, each day we get through they are that much closer to self-sufficiency and to playing with each other. A couple of days ago I was sitting next to Emerson and had the baby in my arms. I started making funny faces to get the baby to smile, which made Emerson laugh hysterically too. He leaned in to see the baby's face and the two of them spent a minute or two just smiling at each other. It reminded me of a woman I met right before Fionn was born who had two boys about the same distance apart. I asked her what it was like and she told me, "Just this morning they were hugging each other and it was the sweetest thing I have ever seen....Take a picture of that kind of stuff because it's the only thing that will get you through the rest of the day!"

Boy was she right.

Home Sweet Home....at last

Well, we are officially masochists...I mean homeowners. On November 7, we dragged our one-week old baby into a shiny conference room and he watched as we signed away our lives. "Don't worry Fionn," I whispered. "They make you give up your first-born, so you're safe."

After four months of searching and negotiating and crying a lot of frustrated tears, the house-buying process is finally over and the house-owning process had begun. Back four months ago, getting a new house seemed like such a good idea. Nine months ago, having a second baby seemed like such a good idea. Now, as I sit here with both my parents in town to help and still feeling like I'm going to lose my mind, I wonder exactly what we were thinking!

Here's just a snapshot from our days lately: imagine a baby is screaming for food and then proceeds to fill his diaper with poop, meanwhile the toddler who's running around like a maniac fills his diaper with an even more fragrant concoction, then the toilet malfunctions and fills the bathroom with an inch of water, then the previously mentioned baby throws up half of what he recently ate.

Or the scene from this morning when I dared to take a bath and witnessed the following: my mother struggling to dress a newly-bathed and screaming baby who promptly spits up while my father chases the toddler around the house trying to pin him into his highchair to eat breakfast, meanwhile the dog that everyone forgot to feed breakfast gets attention by throwing up bile all over the living room carpet. Add to that flooring estimates and spackling debates and paint samples spread all over the kitchen table and you have an idea of what life is like these days.

I just keep trying to remember how nice it's going to be when all the work is done and I have a house done the way I want and a rhythm to my days with two boys (or at least a survival plan). It will be good, it will be good, it will be good......

Here are some pictures of our new home and our new addition. (Oh, and a big brother update - Emerson will now gently pat his brother's head, "beep" his nose and push him in his baby swing. We're making progress!)


It's a 1948 house on a quiet street about 2 minutes from our current rental:


Our new street:


This is a little late, but I couldn't resist:


Little Fionn...has the weight of the world on his shoulders at 2 weeks old: