crafting - upcoming crochet project

So remember when I said I wasn't as crafty as my friend Pinds?  Yeah, the statement still applies, but remember in that same post I said I was going to try to actually complete at least one project this year?  I'm actually on my way to following through.  Yay!  Right now I'm working on a much over due baby blanket for Ari.  It isn't pretty, the stitches are not exactly even, but you know what?  I'm almost done.  I have no idea why this crocheting thing is working better for me then the knitting thing, but hey I'll roll with it.  I started crocheting Ari's blanket about 3 weeks ago, I'm now on my third skein of yarn and the blanket is almost the right size.  Basically I just picked up the old yarn I had for the ill-fated knitted blanket and started crocheting in a simple shell pattern, there really wasn't much of a plan except for "I'll see how this looks after a bit".  So skein number three is well underway and I don't feel like ripping it all out nor am I completely embarrassed by it which to me is a sign of success!

The success with Ari's blanket has lead me to believe that I could take on an actual legit project.  Just in case I eff it up royally, I'm not going to show you what the finished product is supposed to look like, but I'm super excited about the yarn I purchased for the project, so I will share that.  The pattern called for particular colors in the Lion brand Wool-Ease line that no longer exist, so I drug John & Ari to JoAnn's with me to help find the colors needed in a different brand.  John was a good sport and helped me pick out the colors that best matched the pattern, without complaint (or at least he didn't complain out loud).  Aren't the colors pretty?

selling the house - progress report

Single family home, looking for a LTR...

We've had our house on the market now for a little over three weeks.  On Sunday, January 29th, we had our first open house!  It wasn't exactly the best feeling in the world, as I noted on Facebook, but I know it is a necessary evil.  After everything was said and done on Sunday, we had a total of 5 families come through so I guess that it was successful open house.

Aside from the open house, we've had a total of 9 appointments and I think one couple was pretty close to making an offer before deciding the house was too small.  That's the main feedback we're getting - great place, just a bit too small.  I don't know if I should be happy that this is the only negative feedback or frustrated.  If the feedback was "orange is a hideous color for the laundry room" or "there are way too many pictures of that ridiculously adorable baby up" then we could address it - paint the laundry room, remove pictures, etc.  There is nothing I can do about the size of the house!  It is a little over 1,200 square feet, just like most every other house in the neighborhood.  If someone is looking in our neighborhood, they aren't going to get much bigger than that.  Every house was built in the same cape-cod style.  At least our house had dormers in front and the back of the house was raised (for lack of better word) so the pitched roof is only in the front.  It opens up the bedrooms a bit.  Admittedly it is a smaller place, which is one of the reasons why we are looking to move, but when we were looking in 2007 we understood that it was the standard size for the neighborhood.  The market is different now, and buyers can afford to be pickier than we were in 2007 - we looked at a number of houses all over Bucks county and found that if we didn't make an offer the same day the house was gone.  This is obviously not the case now.

All told, I think the process is going good so far.  I was really worried we wouldn't get any traffic through, so the fact that we've had so many people in is a good sign, regardless if they think its too small.  This at least shows us that people are looking and their looking in our area.  Everyone who has left feedback about the price has said it was priced right, so our concerns about being priced too high for the area are quieted.  I will say that it is a giant pain in the ass to keep the house in Alimmatiri Show Ready condition.  I understand from when we were house hunting in 2007 that not everyone thinks their house should be absolutely spotless when people are scheduled to see the home.  John & I go absolutely crazy when we get the call/email that someone wants to see the house.  Almost every night we vacuum and put away wash (though we fell down on that job last week), but we almost do everything all over again (or at least double check everything again) in the hours leading up to a showing.  Here's the checklist we follow prior to someone arriving:

• Bathrooms: wipe down counters, dust mop floors, dry shower/sink (if needed), make sure toilet lids are closed, fix "queen mother" towel displays, hide "everyday usage" towels, Windex mirrors, Windex sink in downstairs bathroom (the glass gets spotty)
• Bedrooms: make our bed, straighten comforter/pillows/pillow-pal on the bed in Ari's room, fold Ari's awesome quilt over the end of the crib, arrange his animals, dust visable surfaces, turn bedside lights on in our room, vacuum again if puppy/kitty fur and/or Andrea's shedding is visible
• Kitchen: Windex counters and stove-top, wipe down fridge, microwave and dishwasher, dust mop, wipe down sink, make sure all dishes are put away, take down "everyday usage" dish towels & put up "queen mother" dish towels
• Living Room/Dining Room/Office: vacuum area rugs, dust mop hardwood floors, dust, vacuum couch & dog beds, leave the door to the closet in the office slightly open so it looks like we didn't close it all the way (the door sticks)
• In the 30 seconds before leaving the house: collapse pack & play, collect dogs, hide baby gates, put dogs in car, blow out candles, put Ari and pack & play in the car, grab entertainment for the sit-and-wait, grab any remaining random bags (laptop bag, diaper bag, Andrea's work bag).

It is a lot of work!  I wish John & I could be slightly less OCD, but I just can't imagine leaving our house in anything less than pristine condition when people are coming by with the intent of purchasing our home!  It would be like trying to sell one of our cars and not having it detailed before having someone stop by to look at it.  Cleaning out the poppy seeds from my AM everything bagels that fall in my emergency break lever-well-space thing could make the difference between someone buying my car and leaving it.  So making sure every little corner in our house is spotless could make the difference between someone liking our house and loving it.  I don't ever want someone to refer to our house as "remember the place with the cat/dog hair on the couch", just like John and I referred to one house we saw as the "split-level with all the laundry on the floor in the one bedroom".  I want someone to say "remember that amazing house on Hillcrest Ave?  Not only was it awesome, it was spotless.  Let's make an offer right now".  

Fingers crossed kids.  Hopefully this house will be gone sooner rather than later. 

failing, mommy style - Ari's Black Eye

I had to send John the following text message this afternoon:
                "I accidentally gave Ari a black eye" 
It's true.  I gave my ten and a half month old a black eye. Obviously not on purpose, I don't go around purposely punching my baby, but man it certainly was a big Mommy Fail moment...

We had another showing this afternoon, thankfully John did not have to be in the field today so he was home with me to assist in the pre-showing mad dash around the house.  We worked out the logistics of who was going where with what - John ended up taking his car and running some errands, I took our SUV loaded with the pack & play (we try to de-clutter the living room when we leave), the baby & the dogs to go hang out in the mall parking lot while the house was being shown.  I realize I probably look like a crazy person sitting in the parking lot, crocheting, with two dogs and a baby in the back, but it is what it is.  I digress, anyway when I came home John was still out running around, so I unpacked the SUV and brought everything/everyone back in the house.  On a normal day, one of us puts together the pack & play while the other entertains Ari.  Since I was flying solo and I didn't have a second set of hands, I figured it would be easier to put the kid in his "pod" on the couch and put the play pen together.  For whatever reason this seemed like a better idea than putting him in his crib upstairs, honestly because I didn't feel like going back and forth.  I plopped him in his pod and started putting the play pen back together.  I was 99.9% done, all I was doing was putting the sheet on the little mattress and when it happened.  Ari leaned too far forward in the pod to try to reach for something on the coffee table and he started to go over head first off the couch.  I reacted and tried to grab him and in doing so my right thumb went right into his face.  He was startled, but I think I cried more than he did.  I felt, and still do feel, horrible!  Thankfully it hit him where it did because a little higher and my nail would have gone into his eye.

Thanks mom.

All said and done, it probably won't be a full on black eye but you can already see the slight bruise and cut from where my nail hit him under the eye.  Poor guy!  John is doing his best to make me feel better, reminding me that part of growing up and exploring will sometimes lead to bumps and bruises.  FACT: Ari will get hurt and there will be nothing I can do about it.  John also told me that 50% of parents drop their kid in the first three months, so if we've come this far and this is the only injury we're not doing too bad!  He might have made that statistic up, but I really don't care, it did make me smile!  I know the entire experience upset me more than it upset Ari - in fact as I was holding him, crying and repeating "mommy is so sorry" over and over again, he started playing with my nose and laughing.  I think the kid is ok and I'll manage, that is until my next mommy mistake.  

well rested - shhh

I'm actually afraid to talk about this, so I figured writing about it would be a good way to celebrate without running the risk of jinxing it.

In November we drove down to Florida to visit with John's mom.  The drive down and the subsequent stay there really threw off Ari's sleep schedule.  Up to that point, he kind of just created/maintained his own sleep schedule, he was a really great baby and had been sleeping through the night (for the most part) since I had returned to work in June.  The Florida trip threw everything out the window.  When we got back it was to the point where he would only sleep if one of us was holding him.  Although one of my favorite things to do is take a little nap with him, sleeping in the twin bed in his room with him is a far cry from "taking a little nap".  After heeding the warnings from some of my Mommy & Daddy, Auntie & Uncle, (and one "uncle" who happens to be a pediatric nurse) friends on Facebook, we decided we needed to kick this bad habit before it developed into a 6 year old Ari crawling in bed with us.  We started the Cry It Out (CIO) method around the middle of December. It really worked to get him to go down for the night, though the first few days were horrible. Basically we'd let him cry for 5 minutes before going back in his room to comfort him and we'd repeat these intervals until he fell asleep. Thankfully the longest was a total of 40 minutes, but possibly the 40 longest minutes of my life! John was the one going in to comfort him but listening to my baby cry without going to him was really painful.  Anyway, CIO lasted about a week and Ari started going to bed without much complaint each night since the beginning of January.

After successfully living through a week of CIO, with the exception of a few 'I can't find my binky' freak-outs moments,  Ari started sleeping through most of the night but he was not sleeping very late in the AM.  Without fail he would get up between 5:30 and 6:00 every morning and he was quick to let you know that he was ready to be out of his crib - read as: screaming like he was being murdered in the face - so we'd run in with a bottle to calm him down (and keep the neighbors from calling DYFS).  Not a big deal for me since I get up at 4:45 and I'm usually out the door by 5:30, but I know John would definitely like to sleep past 5:30 considering he has the toughest job in the world - he works from home full-time and takes care of Ari.  Many nights John is up into the wee hours of the morning catching up on work he couldn't get done during the day, though he admits sometimes this is due to the fact he just rather play with Ari than work but still, 5:30am-1:00am is a really long day regardless of the circumstances.  This past Sunday night, Ari went down at 8:00pm and got up at 7!  When he woke up, he didn't cry, he just played in his crib until about 7:30 when John grabbed him!  The same happened yesterday.  Today, my work from home (WFH) Wednesday, he slept until 8am!  I still woke up early (6ish) out of habit, but I was able to go back to sleep until about 7 when I decided to get a jump on the day and I was nice to get up because I wanted to, not because I had to!

excited - the house is up!

We're no longer getting ready to list the house, the house is officially for sale!  As of last Friday our wonderful a little "Alimmatiris Estate" went up on the market.  Within a few hours of the listing two separate realtors contacted Joe about seeing our place.  Within hours!  So we had two showings on Saturday, one on Sunday and another one yesterday.   4 showings in 5 days in a crap economy, with our house being priced higher than the one down the block...  I'm cautiously optimistic, which in Andrea speak means "slightly less pessimistic than usual". But hey, so far so good.  I honestly was really worried the house was going to go up and we wouldn't get any hits at all, so I'm definitely pleasantly surprised.  If you're interested, take a peek at the listing.  Better yet, take a peek at the listing and then tell all of your friends who are looking to buy that they should buy the house because honestly, it is pretty great & the people who live there are freakishly awesome (so I hear) and the awesomeness is now apart of the house.  Seriously though, if you're looking for something in the Philadelphia area, give Big Joe a yell.  He came highly recommended by a woman I both trust and admire, and so far John & I love working with Joe & Stacey.  Now if I'm still sitting on this same couch in this very same living room in June 2013, I might have a slightly different opinion (Joe if you're reading this I'm only slightly kidding).

In other real estate related news, John & I are doing exactly what we shouldn't be doing and are obsessively searching through listings on Realtor.com for houses in NJ.  Though we won't be actively looking until we get an offer on the house, we are actively researching (researching = finding nice houses on Realtor.com then spending lots of hours in the car driving around South Jersey looking at the neighborhoods).  We're not sure exactly where we'll end up!  So far I'm leaning towards Swedesboro/Logan, Woodstown/Pilesgrove, & Mullica Hill to start.  Its rather ironic that 12 years ago all I could think of was getting the hell out of South Jersey.  Now I can't wait to get back.  Until Ari, I never realized how important it would be for me to be close to my family.  We spend almost every weekend driving back & forth to Alloway (about an hour and forty minute drive each way) so Ari can hang out with his aunts, YiaYia & Pops.

It wouldn't be a post without a picture of Ari, so here's the obligatory baby photo of the evening.  I was sitting on the floor messing around with my camera and he kept reaching over and trying to tap me on the head.  Actually what I interpreted as "I want to tap mom on the head" was probably more like "I want to rip mom's hair out by the roots", but whatever.  Anyway, he looked adorable peeking over the side of his pack & play, so I took a quick shot.  Don't you just want to eat his little face!

recovering - Ari discovered the stairs!

My little man is ten months old today.  I know this isn't the best photo, but I just had to share.  Ari lunged at the camera when I tried to take it - we were nano-seconds away from having a drool covered camera.  I think this is a great shot to commemorate his 10th month here.

Today was the first official day of my nice 5-day weekend.  I'm happy to report I got to sleep in for an extra hour and a half (don't get too excited, I got up at 6) before diving into a rather hectic morning.  After spending a few hours working - when am I ever really off - John and I dove into finishing up the last minute preparations before our realtor, Joe, and his wife, Stacey, arrived to take photos.  Thankfully the weather cleared up enough before they arrived!  The photos won't be sunny, which is a bummer, but I'm sure they got some pretty decent shots.  Before they left Joe put a lock box on the door - our house is almost officially for sale!  I will certainly be posting links to the listing as soon as I get my grubby little hands on it.  Although it has been a hectic week trying to prep the house for photos, it is really nice to sit back in an ultra-clean and mostly de-cluttered house.

House listing aside, my life as I know it is completely over.  Ari has discovered the stairs.  More accurately, he's discovered how to climb the stairs.  I'm sitting here recovering from the excitement and ensuing panic that I feel regarding this discovery.

Hey, you mean you don't HAVE to carry me?

This is pretty cool mom.  

Safety First!  Thanks Dad!

Almost there.

At the top!

The first trip up the stairs was a success!  Now that he has been returned to the confines of his pack & play, I can finally exhale!

getting ready to list the house!

Some super exciting news this week - J & I decided to just bite the bullet and list the house.  On Wednesday met with a really awesome realtor, Big Joe McCarthy.  Joe was highly recommended to us by my boss and I can see why!  His personality fits right in with J & I, he was able to keep up with our witty banter.  J & I liked him immediately.  Joe and his wife are coming out next Thursday to take pictures and our happy little house will be on the market next Friday.  As excited as I am about listing the house, I'm also a little bummed.  We are going to take a rather large hit on the resale - we're listing for less than we bought our house for in 2007!  So right off the bat we're losing money.  On the flip side, this is the time to buy a house so the money we're willing to spend will go a lot further than it would if the housing market was still booming.  What I'm truly bummed about is that we'll be saying good-bye to our first house together.  As much as I complain about this place, I really do love it.  It is our first home - we got engaged here, our first child was born here (well at the hospital, but you know what I mean).  This is where our life together really started, so it will be a little sad to say goodbye to it, but saying goodbye here means we get to say hello to our forever home. 

In other unrelated news, I found a few pictures on my memory card that I forgot to load to Flickr.  I love this picture of A3 in his little emo baby outfit!

I can't believe how much bigger my baby has gotten since this picture was taken on 10.29!  It is absolutely amazing to me how much he changes.  Just this week he went from being able to stand without holding on for only a few seconds at the begining of the week.  Today when I got home from work, he just stood in the middle of the pack & play 'chatting' away!   I feel like I miss a lot when I'm at work - I'm super jealous that J gets to spend so much time with him, though I will never envy J for having to work & take care of a baby all day.