May 11, 2011
Please Bear With Me…
While Cameron gets my new laptop up and running (what a wonderful husband to get me a new laptop for my birthday!). We have a lot more we want to share with you and we are a bit behind, but I have the posts written and just need photos to share with them. Once the new laptop is loaded, I’ll start cranking away on the posts again. Stay tuned for London’s first Easter, first steps, my 30th birthday celebration and first half marathon and more.
Apr 27, 2011
House Troubles
Ever since we moved into our house, we have had some leaking issues with our windows in the family room and the sliding door out to the backyard during strong-winded storms. There is no rhyme or reason to which will leak during a storm, but each major storm, we’ve had one or more leak. We’ve had the warranty company out to our home several times, and have even had people come out and try to recreate the leaks with a hose several times. Not once during these recreations have these people been able to get a window to leak.
With our house backing up to a large, open field, we don’t get any break from the wind during a storm. We have mini-tornadoes in our backyard when the wind is strong – it comes over the fence and hits the top of the house, pushes down to the ground and then off the bottom of the house back toward the fence. It was particularly stormy right after we got Tulley and the poor little pup was pushed about quite a bit when she was let out to go potty. She still isn’t fond of strong winds to this day, even though she has the weight behind her to stay on her feet and cut through the wind.
Since the last leaking incident, we’ve had the stucco company out to investigate. They thought they knew what the problem was and said they would need to remove some of the stucco on the backside of our house to fix the problem. That meant we would need to wait until the rain was over. Well a couple of weeks ago, they came out and did some work.
Cameron and I were both unaware that this was going to take place, so neither of us was home while they did the work. We came home to find things moved around in a backyard and a fine cement-like sand all over our patio and side yard. We could also see where they’d ripped into the house, thanks to the fresh underlayer of stucco drying in the sun. Not a pretty patch job and something that worried us, considering we were having a BBQ 10 days later to celebrate my 30th birthday and are having another gathering in June for London’s first birthday. Unfortunately, when we had people over Saturday for the Birthday BBQ, there was still a big gray spot where the house needs to be repainted from the repairs. Th stucco company said the earliest this will happen is May 13, as the stucco needed to cure for 3 weeks. Interesting, then that as I watch other homes around the neighborhood being built, that they are painted within a week of the stucco going up. We're in the mindset that they just don't want to make an extra trip out to paint, so our painting will coicide with several houses down the street's paint jobs as they look like they'll be ready for paint around that date - note that they are just about ready to be stuccoed and May 13 is 5 days away.
You’d think that would be the worst of our worries.
Nope.
The same night the back of our house was ripped off and repaired, the electricity in our family room, and apparantly two electrical outlets and doorbell, went out. Cameron and I were just watching TV and eating dinner when it when out. The room is on a breaker with other rooms in the house, so a breaker didn’t flip. Had the back of our house not been ripped off earlier that day, we would have been quite confused, but given the timing, we jumped on the phone and called the emergency warranty number. They said they’d come check it out the next day.
The next morning they were out as promised and soon calling in an order to the electrician. This was a Friday, and the one before Easter. We finally heard from the electrician the following Tuesday night at 6:30 and they wouldn't be able to come until Thursday.
We'd moved our cable box into our bedroom and mainly lived in our bedroom for a week when the electrician made his appearance that Thursday. Turns out, the power outage wasn't the result of the back of our house being ripped off, after all! The elctrician told Cameron that we'd probbaly shut the front door too hard, as the electrical work, as he said, was shotty, or poorly done. It took him 30 minutes to find wear the wire had slipped from the main power source and put it back together. All was back to normal. Until Saturday, minutes before my birthday BBQ was to start!
Cameron had just come back from picking up ice and went do something in the familty room (probably turn on the TV) when he noticed the power was out again. He'd watched what the electrician had done previously, and did the exact same thing, but with no luck. We called the emergency warranty people again, who called the emergency electrician and left a message. He also instructed us to call the emergency electrician ourselves, but with the party in full swing that time, and not being home much at all yesterday, this just hasn't happened for us. Who knows when we'll have the power back on in the family room again now. Hopefully before London's party in a month.
Ugh!
With our house backing up to a large, open field, we don’t get any break from the wind during a storm. We have mini-tornadoes in our backyard when the wind is strong – it comes over the fence and hits the top of the house, pushes down to the ground and then off the bottom of the house back toward the fence. It was particularly stormy right after we got Tulley and the poor little pup was pushed about quite a bit when she was let out to go potty. She still isn’t fond of strong winds to this day, even though she has the weight behind her to stay on her feet and cut through the wind.
Since the last leaking incident, we’ve had the stucco company out to investigate. They thought they knew what the problem was and said they would need to remove some of the stucco on the backside of our house to fix the problem. That meant we would need to wait until the rain was over. Well a couple of weeks ago, they came out and did some work.
Cameron and I were both unaware that this was going to take place, so neither of us was home while they did the work. We came home to find things moved around in a backyard and a fine cement-like sand all over our patio and side yard. We could also see where they’d ripped into the house, thanks to the fresh underlayer of stucco drying in the sun. Not a pretty patch job and something that worried us, considering we were having a BBQ 10 days later to celebrate my 30th birthday and are having another gathering in June for London’s first birthday. Unfortunately, when we had people over Saturday for the Birthday BBQ, there was still a big gray spot where the house needs to be repainted from the repairs. Th stucco company said the earliest this will happen is May 13, as the stucco needed to cure for 3 weeks. Interesting, then that as I watch other homes around the neighborhood being built, that they are painted within a week of the stucco going up. We're in the mindset that they just don't want to make an extra trip out to paint, so our painting will coicide with several houses down the street's paint jobs as they look like they'll be ready for paint around that date - note that they are just about ready to be stuccoed and May 13 is 5 days away.
You’d think that would be the worst of our worries.
Nope.
The same night the back of our house was ripped off and repaired, the electricity in our family room, and apparantly two electrical outlets and doorbell, went out. Cameron and I were just watching TV and eating dinner when it when out. The room is on a breaker with other rooms in the house, so a breaker didn’t flip. Had the back of our house not been ripped off earlier that day, we would have been quite confused, but given the timing, we jumped on the phone and called the emergency warranty number. They said they’d come check it out the next day.
The next morning they were out as promised and soon calling in an order to the electrician. This was a Friday, and the one before Easter. We finally heard from the electrician the following Tuesday night at 6:30 and they wouldn't be able to come until Thursday.
We'd moved our cable box into our bedroom and mainly lived in our bedroom for a week when the electrician made his appearance that Thursday. Turns out, the power outage wasn't the result of the back of our house being ripped off, after all! The elctrician told Cameron that we'd probbaly shut the front door too hard, as the electrical work, as he said, was shotty, or poorly done. It took him 30 minutes to find wear the wire had slipped from the main power source and put it back together. All was back to normal. Until Saturday, minutes before my birthday BBQ was to start!
Cameron had just come back from picking up ice and went do something in the familty room (probably turn on the TV) when he noticed the power was out again. He'd watched what the electrician had done previously, and did the exact same thing, but with no luck. We called the emergency warranty people again, who called the emergency electrician and left a message. He also instructed us to call the emergency electrician ourselves, but with the party in full swing that time, and not being home much at all yesterday, this just hasn't happened for us. Who knows when we'll have the power back on in the family room again now. Hopefully before London's party in a month.
Ugh!
Apr 21, 2011
The Case of the Binky Snatcher
 |
| From London Yvonne |
The Monday after we returned from Cancun (April 11), we ran into a daycare issue. Our neighbor, Lauren, who watches London every day, wasn’t able to watch her due to a doctor’s appointment. She and her husband share a car and he was working days that week, so she’d have to drive him to work, go to her appointment and leave at 3 PM to pick him up.
We’d forgotten all about this and never confirmed Cameron’s mom to cover. Now Vicki was booked to work that day. We made a few calls to friends we know that don’t work days or have in-home day cares. All were busy or booked. I ended up taking the day off, which was nice after being away from London for so long. Plus, I was able to catch up on laundry.
Luckily, my supervisor and the company I'm contracting with are really understanding about things like this – family comes first. Cameron and I decided maybe we needed to look into some alternative childcare solutions for instances like this – we can’t expect Lauren to always be available.
It was good timing any way, as we’ve been thinking we should get London into a daycare facility when she is 1 to be socialized with kids her age. After some online research and requests for information, we had a tour with a facility in Roseville the next Monday (April 18). I was already taking a half day that day for London’s doctor’s appointment, so instead I took the whole day off to do the tour and spend some more time with her.
The facility was very nice, as were the people working there. We have every confidence in them that London would be well taken care of, as well as safe. Right now, she’d still be in the infant room, so we spent most of our time in there, talking with the teachers. At one point they encouraged us to put London down to see how she’d do with the other babies.
She took off, making her way to each and every kid with a binky in their mouth. From there, she’d snatch it from them and put the binky in her mouth. We jokingly say she’s going to end up being a bit of a bully. And she definitely would give the teachers a run for their money with this behavior.
But while we loved the place, we’re not ready to be forking over so much money when she’s not going to get all that much out of it. Maybe in another year, we will revisit the idea, especially if I’m working full-time as an employee where I am currently. Once she is ready for the toddler or pre-school rooms, where she’d get more instruction, we can justify the cost. But for now, we’ll stick solely with Lauren and our backups and if they aren’t available, I guess I’ll just have to stay home with my little girl for a day. It’s not like I miss our time together or anything now that I work full time.
Plus, we learned the consequences of having London around other babies, binky snatching and germs. She came down with a nasty cold later that week, which caused an ear infection and goopy eyes. Only just now is her runny nose getting better, but a new tooth we discovered Monday is keeping her somewhat congested.
London’s 10-Month Stats
London is definitely growing. Actually, the week before we left for Cancun, she started a growth spurt as clothes were tight on her. By the time we got back, London had grown out of a lot of her clothes, and wore a hole in the knees of one pair of PJs. We had her 10-month check-up the morning of April 18th (I know I'm behind on blog posts! But we've been busy - you'll see).
Here are her latest stats:
Height: 30 ½ inches (100th percentile – well into it, I might add.)
Weight: 19 lb, 4 oz (50th percentile, perfect.)
Head circumference: 17 3/4 inches (70 percentile – her head has finally caught up).
Before we know it, our little girl will be 1 year old! Time to start party planning!
Cancun – Part 4: Scuba Diving, Spa Treatments and Goodbye
For our last full day in Cancun we had signed up for a two-hour scuba lesson, the first hour taking place in the pool and the second out on the reef. Both Cameron and Aaron are certified but they wanted to be there for Nicole and I in hopes we’d both love it and want to get certified.
Nicole took to it great and probably will get certified. But the one hour lesson in the pool was not long enough for me and scuba diving overall is probably not for me. Lack of fresh air makes me anxious and claustrophobic. I had a mild anxiety attack in the pool. Maybe I’ll try snorkeling next time, as Cameron had his snorkel with him in the pool and I could handle that fine, knowing at any moment I could lift my head up for fresh air.
So I sent the three of them on the boat out to the reef while I made a beeline for the spa. On my way an Iguana caught me of guard and got a “Sweet Jesus” out of me in fright. Not that I shouldn’t have expected it – the place was crawling with the large lizards.
The next available time for a massage was at 2:30. A little late given the three would be back probably about that time, but they’d probably be hungry and want to eat, so I took it. I was instructed to be back at the spa in my swimsuit at 1:30. I headed back to our room to grab my April issue of Martha Stewart and then went for lunch at the buffet.
There the waitress asked what I’d like to drink as I put my things down at the table and headed for the food. I requested a glass of champagne. When I came back I was surprised to have two glasses of champagne. She hadn’t realized I was alone, but didn’t take the second glass back either. Good, as I needed the second one to help continue to calm myself down from the morning’s activities. After a nice leisurely lunch and some good Martha reading, I was ready for the spa.
After receiving the key to my locker and putting my things away, I was sent through the “Marina” circuit. Amazing! First I sat on a bench in a pool and had jets massage my lower back. Then I laid on a reclined bench and had jets massage my whole backside. From there I stood and had jets work on my legs and the one after that focused on my shoulders and neck. Next, I walked back and forth between three different leveled jets for more leg stimulation and ended with a jet focusing on my upper back. That was the first half of the circuit.
The next half involved me walking in and out of a series of four small pools, alternating warm and cold water. These pools were big enough for me to take two steps in and went up to just below my knees. Then I was seated in a steam room. This was a little tough for me, given the stuffy, steamy air, the heat and the small quarters, especially after my morning experience, but I survived the whole five minutes or so that it was.
From there I was instructed to walk into a cold pool and completely submerge myself before exiting. This one definitely took my breath away, but luckily it was immediately followed up by a warm pool to submerge in. Now it was time to sit in the sauna. I did better in the sauna as it wasn’t as hot in there. Then again through the full submerge cold and hot pools, before the circuit ended with me lying on a recliner made of stone with a cool rag over my eyes, smelling of plumeria while a nice lady massaged my head and focused on pressure points.
Finally, it was time for me massage, which was wonderful. While I was waiting for my masseuse, someone came and laid a warm, cinnamon-smelling bean bag around my neck and had me wait in a quiet, curtain-lined room. The whole place smelled like lemon grass by the way.
As I was walking back to the room, I ran into Cameron, Nicole and Aaron who were just coming back from lunch. They’d all had a great time, seeing little Dories, but no Nemos. They also saw a sea turtle, which made me a bit sad that I wasn’t able to go with them, but I know my boundaries and limits too. They were all ready for a nap, and Cameron was a bit sea sick from the small boat, so I headed for the beach to relax and read. Nicole and Moe weren’t quite ready for dinner when I was, so Cameron went with me to the Tapas Bar. The food was delicious but we hadn’t ordered enough and the smell of the Mexican food outside was enticing. There we found Nicole and Moe and had our second dinner, while socializing with a few of the other guests partaking in this Manager-hosted dinner. That evening’s entertainment showcased the Mexican culture with dancers, a mariachi band and some lasso tricks. We were all pretty tuckered out by then and knew that we’d be packing in the morning and leaving paradise.
We were sad the next morning as we packed, but we did have a little more time to walk along the beach and search for shells and pieces of washed up coral. We then grabbed a few last pińa coladas, mojíitos and margaritas and sat poolside before we squished into a cab and headed home.
We almost missed our flight from Houston to Sacramento thanks to unplanned customs needs. With three flights coming in from International locations, there were nine agents to service the 100 or so visitors and only four agents for the 600 US Citizens returning home. After a mad dash to recheck our baggage and to get to our gate, we made it.
London was kind enough to wake up just was we were going to bed so we could say hi. Having her back in my arms, I was happy to be home with her. And crazy me, I was up and out of the house by 6:45 AM Sunday morning to join Kim, Christina, Lynde and Alyssa for the Zoo Zoom 5K. Good thing my parents will be back out for London’s upcoming 1st birthday so I can actually spend some time with them.
Nicole took to it great and probably will get certified. But the one hour lesson in the pool was not long enough for me and scuba diving overall is probably not for me. Lack of fresh air makes me anxious and claustrophobic. I had a mild anxiety attack in the pool. Maybe I’ll try snorkeling next time, as Cameron had his snorkel with him in the pool and I could handle that fine, knowing at any moment I could lift my head up for fresh air.
So I sent the three of them on the boat out to the reef while I made a beeline for the spa. On my way an Iguana caught me of guard and got a “Sweet Jesus” out of me in fright. Not that I shouldn’t have expected it – the place was crawling with the large lizards.
The next available time for a massage was at 2:30. A little late given the three would be back probably about that time, but they’d probably be hungry and want to eat, so I took it. I was instructed to be back at the spa in my swimsuit at 1:30. I headed back to our room to grab my April issue of Martha Stewart and then went for lunch at the buffet.
There the waitress asked what I’d like to drink as I put my things down at the table and headed for the food. I requested a glass of champagne. When I came back I was surprised to have two glasses of champagne. She hadn’t realized I was alone, but didn’t take the second glass back either. Good, as I needed the second one to help continue to calm myself down from the morning’s activities. After a nice leisurely lunch and some good Martha reading, I was ready for the spa.
After receiving the key to my locker and putting my things away, I was sent through the “Marina” circuit. Amazing! First I sat on a bench in a pool and had jets massage my lower back. Then I laid on a reclined bench and had jets massage my whole backside. From there I stood and had jets work on my legs and the one after that focused on my shoulders and neck. Next, I walked back and forth between three different leveled jets for more leg stimulation and ended with a jet focusing on my upper back. That was the first half of the circuit.
The next half involved me walking in and out of a series of four small pools, alternating warm and cold water. These pools were big enough for me to take two steps in and went up to just below my knees. Then I was seated in a steam room. This was a little tough for me, given the stuffy, steamy air, the heat and the small quarters, especially after my morning experience, but I survived the whole five minutes or so that it was.
From there I was instructed to walk into a cold pool and completely submerge myself before exiting. This one definitely took my breath away, but luckily it was immediately followed up by a warm pool to submerge in. Now it was time to sit in the sauna. I did better in the sauna as it wasn’t as hot in there. Then again through the full submerge cold and hot pools, before the circuit ended with me lying on a recliner made of stone with a cool rag over my eyes, smelling of plumeria while a nice lady massaged my head and focused on pressure points.
Finally, it was time for me massage, which was wonderful. While I was waiting for my masseuse, someone came and laid a warm, cinnamon-smelling bean bag around my neck and had me wait in a quiet, curtain-lined room. The whole place smelled like lemon grass by the way.
As I was walking back to the room, I ran into Cameron, Nicole and Aaron who were just coming back from lunch. They’d all had a great time, seeing little Dories, but no Nemos. They also saw a sea turtle, which made me a bit sad that I wasn’t able to go with them, but I know my boundaries and limits too. They were all ready for a nap, and Cameron was a bit sea sick from the small boat, so I headed for the beach to relax and read. Nicole and Moe weren’t quite ready for dinner when I was, so Cameron went with me to the Tapas Bar. The food was delicious but we hadn’t ordered enough and the smell of the Mexican food outside was enticing. There we found Nicole and Moe and had our second dinner, while socializing with a few of the other guests partaking in this Manager-hosted dinner. That evening’s entertainment showcased the Mexican culture with dancers, a mariachi band and some lasso tricks. We were all pretty tuckered out by then and knew that we’d be packing in the morning and leaving paradise.
We were sad the next morning as we packed, but we did have a little more time to walk along the beach and search for shells and pieces of washed up coral. We then grabbed a few last pińa coladas, mojíitos and margaritas and sat poolside before we squished into a cab and headed home.
We almost missed our flight from Houston to Sacramento thanks to unplanned customs needs. With three flights coming in from International locations, there were nine agents to service the 100 or so visitors and only four agents for the 600 US Citizens returning home. After a mad dash to recheck our baggage and to get to our gate, we made it.
London was kind enough to wake up just was we were going to bed so we could say hi. Having her back in my arms, I was happy to be home with her. And crazy me, I was up and out of the house by 6:45 AM Sunday morning to join Kim, Christina, Lynde and Alyssa for the Zoo Zoom 5K. Good thing my parents will be back out for London’s upcoming 1st birthday so I can actually spend some time with them.
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