Quick 5

"We should never feel guilty for being too busy living life to write about it."

Becky Swanberg

1.  It's Friday.  I normally write my Quick 5 on Thursday afternoons and set it to auto post on Friday mornings.  This morning I woke up and realized I hadn't written it yet.  Then I read my dear friend Becky's Quick 5, and she provided that little gem.  And it gave me peace.  I've been feeling kind of bad about my lack of blogging this year, both on this blog and my Pumpkin Pie Patch blog.  But the thing is, I've simply been doing other things.  And that's okay. 

2.   Yesterday my routine was all off because Lee worked from home.  The reason he worked from home was because we had a house to go see.  This house has been quite elusive; it's a short sale situation and the sellers are pretty reluctant.  This has led them to have crazy showing requirements (like, between 9:53 and 10:06 each day,) and they denied us access twice in the last week.  We finally got the okay to see it yesterday and so Lee and I decided that we probably only had one shot to get inside this house, so he needed to be there, rather than have me preview it, like I had for the other 10 houses.  It's always nice to have Lee home for the day, but it does throw off my daily routine.

3.  It was worth it.  We signed an offer last night.  I feel like putting offers on houses is a crap shoot...just because you do doesn't really mean anything.  It just means you hope and pray that the sellers will sign it.  And even then, there seems to be a million things that could cause the deal to go south.  But we like this house even better than the other one we didn't get, so we're really praying this one works out.  

4.  In other ways that Becky has had influence on my life lately, I tried to start reading Les Miserables this past week.  And I'm so sorry, Beck, but I didn't make it.  The book is 1432 pages.  And I just can't get into French history, so I skipped the intro to French history at the beginning of the book, and then felt like I was missing things I should have known as I read the first section of the book.  And then I got an overwhelming desire to put down Les Mis and start reading Sense and Sensibility.  So that's what I did.  Judge me all you want, but I'm going to get my Les Mis culture from the movie.  I'm just not sophisticated enough for such an imposing work of literature, I guess.  I suppose jello can never be creme brulee.  (Or is it that creme brulee can never be jello?  Same thing.)

5.   And finally, the girls and their Daddy:

Happy Friday! 

Quick 5

"Perhaps I am a bear, or some hibernating animal underneath,

for the instinct to be half asleep all winter is so strong in me."

- Anne Morrow Lindbergh

1.  Valentine's Day was a hit around here.  Lee got me my annual box of chocolate dipped fruit from Edible Arrangements.  We ate our traditional heart-shaped pizza from Papa Murphy's.  And pink and red hearts abounded.  I love Valentine's Day.

2.  We ate that pizza on Sunday night.  On Valentine's Day I made an incredible bacon wrapped sweet and spicy chicken.  It was amazing and so easy.  I think the world should know about it.  The gal in the blog said she grilled hers instead of baking it, and while I'm sure it's good, it definitely would eliminate the super yummy gravy that collects in the pan.  So I recommend baking it instead of grilling it.  There are plenty of other things to grill.  

3.  Lee brought home some candy from work the other day.  Not an unusual occurrence, really.  Except it was one of those Fun Dip things...you know, bags of sugar with a sugar stick that you lick and stick into said sugar.  Whatever.  Kids think it's fun (and so does my brother Ben, probably.)  So I gave it to Alaina for dessert.  Then Joya and I hung out while Alaina enjoyed it.  When I went to check on her, she looked like this:

 Lessons learned: She only needs half of it, not the whole thing.  And do not use a white wash cloth to clean her up.

4.  We did not get the house that we put the offer on.  The sellers took a grand total of 16 days to make that decision.  Lucky for them that they waited so long, so an offer that they truly liked could come on the table. 

5.  A few weeks ago, we had dinner at my parents' house.  In traditional Marsh fashion, we said "Praise the Lord!" after the amen when we prayed at dinner.  A week or so later, I noticed that whenever we said "amen" at home, Joya would lift her little hands in the air.  It happens at meal times and at bedtime.  We don't typically say "Praise the Lord" at home, so it amazes me that she latched on and carries out the tradition so faithfully, without daily reinforcment.  It is something I am very happy to encourage.

That's a wrap!  See you next week.

Quick 5

I think we were spoiled last year.  We had ONE cold snap that lasted about a week...and the rest of the winter was very mild.  This year it's been cold and snowy the last few weeks, and for some reason I'm offended.

1.  Please forgive me, Joya.  I haven't been as good at teaching you as I was your sister.  With Alaina I was very intentional about instructing her in the ways of colors, numbers, letters and body parts.  Whenever I ask YOU where your (eye, ear, mouth) is, you stick your finger up your nose.  I promise to try and teach you better by the time you enter formal schooling.

2.  We have now watched Finding Nemo 2,234,295 times.  I thought that when we got Tangled that we'd be watching that more often.  But Alaina still asks for Finding Nemo every other day or so.  And every time we watch it, she asks me why Nemo swims out to sea to touch the boat.  Maybe we need to watch it a few more times to help with her comprehension.

3.  (This Post is #1 in a series of ??? entitled Buying a House: Frustration and Discouragement Reach New Levels.)  We are still waiting to hear on whether or not the seller is going to sign our offer on their house.  We were fully aware that a.) buying a short sale and b.) using NACA were going to be long processes, but I had no idea that a seller would take coming on two weeks to decide if they want to sign our offer or not.  It has reached the point that with each passing day I feel our chances grow smaller and smaller.  Honestly, I just want to know if I need to keep looking at houses or not. 

4.  We don't quite have a walker in our house yet.  Joya still takes pretty tentative steps.  She'll take one or two, then sink to her knees in order to crawl the rest of the way.  In the past day or so, she's been practicing a bit more, so I'm hopeful that she'll feel confident soon.  I don't remember Alaina taking this much time with it.  It seemed like she took her first steps and then immediately made walking her primary mode of transportation.  Maybe she didn't.  I don't remember that part. 

5.  For the first time in my life, I emailed my US senators and representative.  For some reason I have been feeling a strong pull to get involved.  And there is no one issue either.  I've been posting the best I can on the issue of abortion on Facebook, and I emailed the senators and representative asking them to support the current bill for abstinence eduction.  I'm feeling pretty proud of myself for doing it, and I feel like Mrs. Abbott would be proud of me to.  And now I feel like I could do it again and again.  It's nice to have something to do when the babies are napping.

I. Love. Valentine's Day.  Hope yours is pink and happy!

The Great Blizzard of 2012

At least so far.  The year is still young and it hasn't even gotten to March yet.  We could have a day of more snow than this. 

A shout-out to the White family for selling us their snow blower.  Lee has never had so much fun.  It took him three rounds to clear all the snow off our driveway.  It would have taken him hours without it.  So thank you.

Alaina enjoyed playing in the snow today.  Joya has not played in the snow yet, for two reasons: 1.) I don't have snow clothes for her and 2.) Even if I did, she can't walk.  The Kimble Family Rule is you must walk if you want to play in the snow.  Just a little incentive for her.  Mommy did take her outside and tried to show her how to eat snow.  She thought that it meant that she should feed Mommy snow.  She didn't branch out and try it herself. 

The best place to play was under the tree, because it wasn't so deep there.  All the other places were too hard for her to walk.

The snow comes up to her armpits.

I'm glad we had our snow.  Now maybe we can move on to warmer things.

Quick 5

1.  We've taken a tiny step forward in our house hunting adventures.  On Sunday we actually wrote an offer on a house.  I think it would be such a good fit for our family.  However, we're still waiting on word of whether or not the seller has accepted it.  It's a short sale, so even if the seller signs it still has to go through the bank, which means that there are no guarantees that we'll get it.  Our realtor thinks it's weird that the seller hasn't responded yet.  I think they're waiting a few days to see if a better offer comes in.  Which is lame.  But it's their right, I suppose.  I'd just like to know either way, you know?

2.  Lo and behold, Joya has taken a few steps!  She's not hard-core committed to the whole walking thing, but she has taken a few!

3.  I've been barricading Joya in the living room since she turned mobile.  Mostly because we only have one good baby gate, which goes across the stairs that go down, and I don't want her climbing up the stairs.  But the past few days, she's been showing up in the kitchen when I'm cooking lunch or dinner.  I didn't quite know how she was escaping...until today.

Yep.  She simply climbs in the toy box.  And out the other side. 


4.  I tried to get a picture of the girls together, because I'm terrible about doing that kind of stuff.  Here's the best I could get:

5.  And here's a good one of Alaina.  3-year-olds are so accommodating.

It's the 3rd of February...and winter begins!  Stay warm!