skinny cloth butt

amazingly, i have been able to get sydney into cloth diapers a few times the last couple of days. we made her some cute purple stripe and flower diapers...but she is such a skinny girl, that once i put an absorbant insert into the size large diapers, she had to waddle! it was soo funny, i tried to get a video of her waddle, but i dont think it turned out. so, here is sydney and elijah in the same size diaper...only she does not have an insert, so it fits a little trimmer than elijah.

the diapers are made out of old flannel sheets...this one is a duck pattern which i am convinced that every one had back in the late 80's early 90's. :)

my bro

My brother is back earlier than expected from his tour of duty with the army. We were so excited to find out that he was coming back almost two months early. They came up to visit us yesterday and we had a great time visiting and watching the kiddos play.
We also went up to visit great grandma, my aunt cindy and cousin justin. We all had a great time.

(my mom said take pictures or she would kill us...well, hopefully abby's turned out a little better...but we still had a good time)

tv

We have tv channels! We do not (nor will we any time soon) have internet at the house or cable tv. In fact, we were not even able to get local tv channels. Until yesterday. We had to buy a special antenea thing, but we now get a whopping 4 channels…although one is the 24/7 weather channel…and one looks like classes from the local high school or college. But we have tv! At least we will be able to find out a little bit of the weather and news.

one down

You may remember from my previous post about the horror movie shower stall in our low ceiling basement and that we only had a tub for bathing. Well, we still have the tub, but we had a plumber in the other day and had him install a new spout with a exterior diverter for a hand held shower head. Yeah!

before . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . after (notice shower head and new curtain and rod)

we had to make the curtain rod ourselves out of pvc pipe. the end of the tub is just exposed to the rest of the room...no wall or surround to attach a traditional shower rod to. so, a couple of pvc pipes, a couple of pipe caps, curtain hooks from a thrift store, and voila! shower!

I can now shower standing up…well, mostly standing up. The tub is along an exterior wall that is also the roof line. So we have a nice angled wall in the tub area. See, I can stand…almost.



of course, wayne has it a little rougher. it's a little hard to tell, but the wall is really close to his head.

So, one project down, many more to go.
Next up, installing main floor shower (one big enough to stand up straight in!). Our next few large projects are going to be funded with our tax rebate…horray first time home buyers credit!

icing on the cake

so, yesterday was just one of those days.
elijah had done it again (the whole poo in the diaper, when i already had a load in the washing machine) and was not sleeping either. literally went the whole day only sleeping when i nursed him, when usually he takes a few 1.5-2 hour naps.
i had not slept well either, and was excessivly tired.
for some strange reason, i decided to put sydney in big girl undies (with a cloth diaper over...i didn't really want to clean the couch or whatever she decided to wet, but i want her to start 'feeling' wet). she stayed dry for an amazing 3 hours...then just before nap, when i was going to put her on the potty, she was already wet...and had pooped in her undies. so, i had more poo to deal with.
then, the icing on the cake...we go to the library and elijah got us kicked out! well, we were actually kindly requested to leave by a nice gentleman...elijah just would not stop crying no matter what i did. as his momma, i kind of tune it out (i knew he was dry, feed and taken care of) but he was getting a little loud.
i felt really embarressed and humiliated...it was no one's fault, but i felt silly.
and of course, as so as we head for the door, elijah quiets down and promptly falls asleep in the car.

nice

baths are not so cool

We are getting tons of estimates for various projects around the house. When it is all said and done, we will have had 4 plumbers, 2 electricians, 2 exterior painters and 1 flooring guy in to give us estimates.
The most important project is actually the exterior of the house. Some of the trimwork around the windows has peeling paint, which presents a problem with our loan. We got an FHA loan which has it’s own requirements and standards for purchasing a home…one of those being no peeling paint. Thankfully, we were still able to purchase the home even with the paint problem, with the agreement that we would have the paint fixed by May 1. (peeling paint is a health hazard…lead based paint and all that). However, our house is a large old farmhouse, with two stories, high ceilings, and a very steep roofline (which, of course, also has peeling paint). So, we are not sure we want to risk life and limb to paint our roof-line 30-ish feet up; hence the painters.
The most exciting project is getting a shower installed in the main floor half bath. (here comes the baths are so not cool part). Right now, our full bath actually only has a tub…no shower. So, there are no showers currently in the house! (ok, there is a stall in the basement, but this ‘shower’ is right out of a horror movie…concrete floors, a lightbulb on a string and only about 5ft 6in tall…like this would be the shower you send your kids to as a punishment…”ok, I’ve had enough of your attitude, go get ready for bed and take a shower…in the basement" [cue evil laugh, mwah-hahaha-haa!] ok, it is not that bad, but pretty close, there is no way I would ever use that shower.) I don’t know why anyone would ever just install a tub with no shower.
I know what your thinking…taking a bath is so relaxing. Nope… soaking in a bathtub is relaxing. Taking a bath as a primary way of cleaning one’s self? not so much.
I’m not really complaining. We are truly so happy with this house. Little inconveniences like baths are such a minor thing…especially compared to the richness of God’s provision for us. I truly hope that Wayne and I are able to conduct ourselves as good stewards of the things God has given us…our kids, our house, and anything else God sees fit to bless with…even if it is just a bath tub without a shower.

Apparently I need to rethink my strategy

So, as you know we have been cloth-diapering Elijah for a few weeks now. I have to say, it has gone well and I’ve got it down to a pretty good routine of washing the diapers about every other day. However, for the last week now, every time I wash the diapers, Elijah poops in his current diaper! Every single time!! I only have enough diapers to do one load, so there is no second load to throw this ‘load’ into. Also, the currently-in-the-washing-machine diapers are often just far enough in the washing process that I can’t just throw it in and hope for it to get clean either. But, I also don’t necessarily want to have a poopy diaper hanging around for two days until I was diapers again. Grr.
I know what you are thinking. Some kids are very regular in their bowel movements and such, so I should be able to anticipate. Well, no, Elijah is not usually that regular, because although I wash about every other day, it varies on the timing. Sometimes morning, sometimes evening.
No. I think I know what is going on. The boy somehow knows that I am washing his diapers and waits until just the right moment to drop his load. Yup, that is it. The boy is so diabolical! Dirtying his pants just for kicks!
Apparently I need to rethink my strategy. Maybe if I just put the diapers in the washer, but not start it…that way he just thinks I am going to wash the diapers…yeah, that will work. ;)

Elijah the Model

So, we have been successfully cloth diapering Elijah for about two weeks now. I have to admit that I am quite proud of myself and that I have kept up with it. It actually is not too bad. Although, the other day, after I was done with the diaper load of laundry, Elijah poops. Mmm, boy. I usually only do diapers every other day, so I thought great, what do I do with this? Well, I rinsed it out a little bit, and thought, well, one poopy diaper can wait til the next load. But, what does the boy do? He poops the next diaper as well! This coming from the boy who poops every 4-6 days! (which by the way is normal for a baby. Anywhere from 1-2 times a day, to 1-2 times a week is normal…go figure).


Anyway. Elijah’s cloth diapers are homemade by my mom and I and, well, a little bulkier than a professional cloth diaper. So, the poor boy looks a little stuffed in the diaper area. (infact, some of his pants barely fit over his diaper!) But, as bottom heavy as the boy looks, we joke and say he is preparing to be an underwear model.

First Snow

We have received many blessings since moving into our new house. One of which we were especially thankful for yesterday as we experienced our first snow. Well, of course we have seen and experienced snow before! But this was our first snow at our house. Our driveway is probably long enough to hold about 7-8 cars…nice for company, not for shoveling! Well, someone from church blessed us with a snow-blower and of course Wayne could not wait to try it out.

We had a good time outside as Wayne ‘snow-blowed’ and Sydney ‘helped’ with her little shovel. (actually, I was just waiting for her to dump a pile on her head because she was trying to copy daddy’s method of scooping and throwing the snow. But she made it ok.) When we first got outside, Sydney went for all her summer toys piled up on the side of the garage, and had to learn what worked and what did not work in snow. Her little plastic golf set…too much snow. The chalk…not so much. The bubbles…a frozen cube at the bottom of the bottle. Finally, she found the sled and Wayne pulled her around on that.

Here is Sydney getting bundled up for the weather. :)

And here is our house...

A nd from another angle...

the little pink blob in the center is Sydney.

grandpa and elijah - dec. 26

here we are giving grandma and grandpa a quick visit

elijah and grandpa are having a great time together

sydney's hair cut

i loved sydney's hair nice and long, but it was getting knotty and she hated getting it washed or combed, so it was time for a hair cut - i did it myself, not too bad

sydney's room

elijah's room

his walls will eventually be a lovely limey green

his bedroom is only bedroom with a light switch - here it is :)

and here is the ceiling fan we had installed for him - swanky

cool cloth diapers

i made some cool cloth diapers for elijah out of t-shirts.

"Dad Rocks"

and, a little hard to see, but it is Spider-Man.

just pictures - Christmas