FYI.....important alert

We interrupt your regularly scheduled blog posts to bring you this important message. We will be off-line for the next two weeks while Cub Central is relocating and getting the new internet connections established. Can you believe we will be without TV and Internet until the 22nd and I ordered it on the 2nd?? You would think that if your service were in such high demand you would hire people to deliver it sooner. Oh well. Please check back with us as we will return to blogging as soon as we can.

We couldn't possibly.....

....go off-line without posting some adorable pics of the Cubs first!

Our adorable little man:


Fighting over the golfing magazine.:


We've created a monster. She's already making her shaft selections.:


Zach teasing mommy, leading her to believe that he might actually take a bite of this pizza. Yeah, right. Better luck next time.:


Admiring Daddy's new club:




Please help us welcome the newest member to our family. The golf club:


This is how I found little man during nap time....all bundled up.


Emily would not leave without her Husky and a blanket Great-Grandma Betty made for her. Notice that she even color coordinated her blanket selection. A fashion diva in the making.:


Gobbling down her cereal.:

One last update before pulling the plug (temporarily)

Saturday was a very busy day. I had scheduled three painters to come to the new casa to give us estimates. One was a no-show which made the afternoon even longer. I was definitely going to need a margarita and I was not disappointed. Saturday night we helped our good friend Matt celebrate his birthday at Joe T. Garcia's. I had never been there before but it is quite a popular little establishment. The line to get in was ridiculous and they don't take reservations, but it wasn't bad because we were in good company. The pitcher of margarita didn't hurt either. I think there was 14 of us in our group and Steve and I had a very good time. We dropped the cubs off at an hourly daycare. This was the first time we had ever done this so I was a bit apprehensive. I was not too worried about Zach. I knew as soon as I put him down he would be off and running. I was right. Little man didn't even look back. I was worried that dropping off Emily would be a little more difficult. She's been pretty clingy and I thought there would be some tears. HA! Could I have been more wrong?? I must admit that my feelings were a little hurt. They didn't even seem to notice us as we left. Emily joined a big circle of older kids (she's not shy at all) and the rest was history. Three hours later we went in to pick them up. Not only did we have to work at getting their attention, they didn't even really want to leave. OUCH!

Sunday was a blur. I was planning on taking the cubs to an Easter egg hunt but it was just way too cold and windy. We have had the craziest weather lately. I think we even had temperatures below freezing one night. That afternoon we met up with Matt and Beth Ann at the house so they could see it for the first time. We had a nice visit and then did a little grocery shopping before coming home.

The first seminar class was Monday night. I'm hoping to learn some very useful techniques for dealing with my Cubs when they are exhibiting some less than angelic behavior. I know it's hard to believe but it does happen on occasion where a little demon takes over.

Tuesday morning I met with the painters for a final walk-through to make sure that everyone was on the same page. I'm pretty excited to see what it looks like when they are finished. It is so hard to select colors from such a small sample card. That evening I met some friends for a much needed (aren't they all??) GNO (girls' night out). I showed a little restraint and did not order my usual (raspberry margarita) but I did break down at dessert time. One last dessert before the big DIET. Steve and I have decided to start eating better after we get moved in. It will be so much easier when we can enjoy the evening on the patio and grill our dinners. During the spring, summer and fall we usually grill most of our meats and vegetables but we haven't been able to do so here at the apartment. We are both craving a good steak.

Emily came down with "pink-eye" minus the pink yesterday afternoon, so this morning I dragged my poor little puffy raccoon face to the Doctor. We have had more Doctor appointments this year than we did for all of 2008. What in the world is going on here? This time it turned out that Emily probably has a small virus mixed in with a huge batch of allergies. Poor baby....she looks absolutely horrible. Her face is puffy and she has red bags under her eyes. This mess had better clear out by Saturday. We are supposed to go on an Easter egg hunt and I want to take pictures. In case you were wondering, yes, it is supposed to rain. My luck in action.

Zach has been doing really well. He ate one half of a Mum Mum today. It is a crunchy type of rice cracker. I couldn't believe it and I couldn't stop watching. This is progress in action. The other day we didn't feed him any baby food. WOO HOO. He still likes mac and cheese and the refried beans from Taco Bueno. He has even started eating rice if it has a little sauce or gravy on it. I honestly can't remember the last time we had a Mt. Vesuvius eruption and I am thanking God for that!

Tomorrow morning the movers come and I am excited but dreading it at the same time. I just know that it is going to be a very long day and I'm not sure how the cubs are going to handle everything. Emily did help pack a box of toys today. She is such a good little helper. It turns out that she also packed her shoes and Zach's sippy cup. OOPS.

From totally debt free to the poor house.

For a whole 8 days Steve and I were totally debt free. That all changed within a matter of 30 minutes on Friday. We had our closing on Friday and now we are back in the poor house. Friday was a totally crazy day. Early in the morning we met the Construction Manager at the house and went over all the warranty paperwork and made sure all of the items that we had pointed out on Monday were fixed. That's when we were told that they had to move the fence back due to City requirements. WHAT?? I'm a bit perturbed that no one told us about this. City requirements state that the fence line must be 10' back from the corner of the house that it is nearest to. Fine, whatever. They moved our fence 20' back so now we are fighting to get it moved back up to the 10' requirement. The whole purpose of buying the corner lot was so we could have as much backyard space as possible.

After that disaster we headed over to Dallas to sign our closing paperwork. We took the Cubs with us but it went better than I expected. They played pretty well while Steve and I signed the huge stack of seemingly never-ending paperwork.

We then took the Cubs to Chuck-E-Cheese but unfortunately that was a disaster. Zach did pretty well, he actually ate some breadstick but was totally uninterested in the pizza. Emily was very unlike herself. She refused to try anything. She just fussed and cried. I think she was exhausted from having to get up early and we had just waited too long to feed them. Lesson learned.

After the big pizza mess we headed over to pick up the keys to the new house. I had an appointment with a painter to get an estimate for interior painting. Fun. After dinner we headed back to the apartment just in time to get the cubs ready for bed. Then I hit the MCMOMs garage sale to see if I could score any goodies. I did pick up a few pairs of jeans since Zach's seem to mysteriously disappear.

I returned to our beloved (hack hack) apartment. It's sad knowing that we now have keys to the house but we are still in this apartment. **SIGH** Just a few more days.

Birthday Bonanza

Today is a very busy birthday day!

It is my Grandpa's 89th birthday today. We don't get to see my Grandparents very often but we are sending tons of happy birthday wishes Grandpa's way!!
Emily with her Great-Grandpa at Christmas.

Today is also Steve's brother's birthday. We hope he has a wonderful day! Happy Birthday Uncle Craig!!
Emily with her Uncle Craig. We obviously are overdue for a visit with Uncle Craig and Auntie Leslie...this picture is almost a year old. Hint hint.

I normally reserve the birthday announcements for family, otherwise I'd have a birthday announcement almost every day, but we want to wish Matt a happy birthday. We consider him an 'honorary Uncle' to the cubs, afterall he and 'honorary Aunt' Beth Ann got to see our cubs even before I did. Plus Beth Ann works at the Children's Hospital where the cubs spent their very first weeks and helped to keep a watchful eye over our precious little ones. Happy Birthday 'honorary Uncle' Matt! We look forward to celebrating with you!
Emily being sassy with Matt as Beth Ann watches.

Happy Birthday Grandma Shirley!

Grandma Shirley with Grandpa John playing "Toss the Cub" with Zach-man. He loved it!

Grandma Shirley teaching Emily the ins and outs of the computer.

Today is Steve's Mom's birthday. We sure wish we could celebrate with her in person but we hope to see her really soon. We hope you have a happy happy birthday Grandma Shirley!!

Walk-through to closing.

Monday we had our walk-through of the new casa. It's our opportunity to point out things the builder has missed. Steve and I spent two hours with the Manager and we went through the house room by room. We go back again tomorrow morning to verify that everything has been corrected before we head to closing. I still can't believe that this is really happening. The stars have aligned for us. We managed to sell our house just in time to buy the new one. We are a lucky bunch.

Zach had his last therapy appointment today. Steve and I decided to switch to ECI so that Zach could have his therapy sessions at home. I can't help but think that this will work better. At this rate it can't be any worse. I was late this morning because traffic was horrible (due to the races this weekend), so we had a 15-minute $40 session which consisted of me feeding Zach the same exact thing I feed him at home (for free) while the therapist watched. That pretty much sealed the deal and I voluntarily discharged Zach from the program. His evaluation with ECI is on April 17.

Zach has been doing pretty well lately. He had some loaded baked potato and some mashed potatoes this week. He ate almost half of Emily's chicken with rice (minus the chicken). The rice has far more carbs and calories than the chicken so that's ok with me. Steve told me that we could all go to Chuck E Cheese once Zach starts eating pizza. Yesterday our little man ate the cheese and sauce from a frozen pizza. He didn't eat the crust but that was good enough for me. So we are going to Chuck E Cheese. I am so proud of him for trying something new. Then today he tried some salisbury steak. So so proud of our little man!

Emily has been Emily. A bundle of energy who is so fun to play with. She loves playing peek-a-boo with her brother and I love to watch them. I'm a lucky girl!

I have been crazy busy coordinating things for the new house. Setting up the utilities, scheduling painters to give us estimates, and just trying to keep things running here at Cub Central. Mom is exhausted. I wish I could go to sleep and wake up tomorrow morning in the new house, with everything in its place and no packing or unpacking to do. **sigh**