It has been a long time...

It has been such a long time since I have blogged, I am not sure I have any readers left. A lot has happened in the last few months. At the end of May we moved out of the house on Greenway and drove to Toledo. From Toledo, Kennedy and I flew to San Diego for a week to visit Zach, Amy and Jack. That was a great trip. It is always nice to spend time with close family and friends, and much of our summer filled with that. We had a great time in San Diego, visiting the zoos, beach, and disneyland. We flew back to Toledo from there and continued spending time with family and friends while there. The time up north and in Cali were great for Kennedy. It seemed like there was always someone for her to play with, which is great. It is funny though, all of her little friends are boys whose names start with J's!
The closing on the house continued to get pushed back, but finally in mid July I headed down to get ready to move in! I had a few days down here by myself, and then my Mom and Pete's Mom brought Kennedy down. The movers delivered all of our stuff while they were here, which was a huge help, I do not think I could have gotten everything done without their help. Since they left, my days have been filled with painting, decorating and still unpacking a few misc. boxes. For the most part, all we have left is the garage.
Kennedy and I are quickly finding a regular routine and she has gotten involved in one additional class which helps to break the time up a bit. She will be going to this Mommy and Me class each Thursday until the end of September, and continue with her gymnastics on Saturday mornings. We have gone to the mommy and me twice now, she seems to like the class. It is offered on base and the kids in the class are between 2-5 years old. It teaches creative play, listening, following directions and sharing. So far, so good. They sing songs, play games, do crafts and each week has a different theme. I would like to also get her scheduled with the places on base for drop in day care. They FINALLY opened one about 3 weeks ago , so we will try it out. Call me paranoid, but I think we will wait to start anything at the childcare center until after Kennedy has had her flu vaccines, including the H1N1. I would rather take any precautions I can, since I am sure she will get sick shortly after starting since she has never been around that many kids at once.

Pete seems to be doing well over there. He is still working long hours and says each day feels like ground hog's day. Because their deployment was extended, he will get R&R which we are looking forward to. After our last conversation, it sounds like he wants to spend a little bit of the time in Toledo and then we will make our way back home, stopping along the way at different places. I am anxiously awaiting news of when that time will come, but it is certainly giving us something to look forward to.

Since it has been so long since I have posted anything, I am going to attempt to go backwards and post some photos from the months past.

Homegoods

I kept seeing commercials on HGTV for the store Homegoods. I had never been there before so yesterday I decided we would venture to Wilmington and see what we could find. I was pleasantly suprised. They had nice products and good prices. I picked up some artwork for the new house and a time out chair for Kennedy. I had been trying to decide where our time out place would be (I have been using her crib) and when I saw that it was perfect. Now, I just need to get her to understand that she has to stay there when she is in trouble!

Trophy

Kennedy received her first Trophy this weekend at gymnastics. The kids were so cute when they went up after their names were called to get the trophies. Kennedy didn't get to admire her trophy for too long... it is already packed away in a box. I had it out just long enough to take some pictures of her with it.
My packing is really coming along now. It is starting to hit me that I will be moving out of here in less than two weeks. I feel like it has come up so fast! Next week I will probably be running around here like a chicken with my head cut off. The nice thing about the move being right around the corner also means some extended time in Toledo and San Diego. I am really excited to see the Whitsitts, it has been far too long. After our successful drive to and from Toledo last week, I will definitely be using the portable DVD player on the flight, that seemed to save the day on those 13 hour drives.

Progress on the house.

I went to the house yesterday to take photos. It is really coming along!! The driveway is done, and painting has been started inside the house. All of the exterior is now finished, excluding sod and shrubs. Some of the doors are up too!! Its amazing how these little things feel like such progress. Won't be much longer now...





moldings being painted in garage, driveway shown as wellgreat room

masterdoors to keeping room off of master. I had not seen the doors for this room.
kitchen with painted doors

Visiting the Horse Stables

It has been about a week since I posted anything on the blog. I have been out of town visiting my parents due to my grandfathers passing. In light of the reason for going home, I have still tried to make it a fun trip for Kennedy and I. This morning we visited a horse stable owned by a friend of my Fathers. Kennedy loves horses so we thought she might enjoy seeing them up close, and she did. They also had kittens that were quite young so she enjoyed watching them run all over the stables. Here are a few new photos that I have taken this week. I will probably post more in a separate posting as well.

Siding is up!!

The siding and sheet rock are now up! Well... I should say the siding is almost all up. They were still working on it when I drove by this afternoon. Hopefully it will be done today. Here are a few photos of the progress. The siding is a greenish gray color, however in these photos it looks mostly gray.

a few new ones from today

Looks like the siding will be going up very soon :)
They are working on installing the sheet rock today. Hopefully once that is up the siding will go up as well.
Enjoying her morning mini-wheats... in a big girl chair.

Peek-a-boo!!

a few new photos- House

Kitchen and dining
Front door, entry closet, and stairs
Great room, Fireplace moved to corner
"Keeping room" off of master bedroom
Kennedy in her new room

a few new photos- Kennedy

Kennedy was REALLY enjoying her spaghetti at Pie Sano's. Luckily my Mom had her camera :)
Balance beam at gymnastics
Fun with sidewalk chalk, one of her favorite outdoor activities
Blowing Kisses to Daddy
She is a girly girl for sure!! Playing with her purse and cell phone :)

Since I am not going to be able to use motomail to send photos to Pete I will be posting them on here, please bear with me, there will be a lot going up throughout the next several months. I have been taking pictures like crazy with my new camera. Since I am posting several photos right now I have split it into categories- Kennedy, house, and other misc.

updates

I have heard from Pete a few times via email since he left last week. It is hard to believe he has been gone for nearly a week already. My mom came out this weekend which helped pass the time. There is lots going on right now which has made the time go fairly quickly over the last week. There are only how many weeks to go... too many!! Based on his emails, Pete seems to be doing ok over there. They are finally in country and it sounds like they are working and have gotten on some sort of schedule. He hasn't been able to get a call in to us yesterday, so I am hoping to speak with him soon. I also was disappointed to find that motomail will not work on our mac. I am going to keep trying and hopefully will find a solution without having to spend any money to get it to work properly. 

The house is coming along nicely. The roof is on completely now and they have the inspection for all of the wiring on Monday. Once that is done they will start on the interior and getting the siding up!! When I spoke with Chris, I belive he is in charge of all of the construction in the neighborhood he said everything is on schedule at this point and should move fairly quickly once that inspection has been completed!! 

Saying goodbye

Last night was difficult for us. Pete had to leave for his deployment to Camp Leatherneck in Afghanistan. I haven't blogged about this because I was waiting for them to leave, but Pete recieved orders on Tuesday of last week for a new unit. He found then found out that the unit he was attaching to was leaving yesterday... not the notice we were hoping for!! We got there at 12 am and they headed off on the bus about 1:45am. It was a very late night for us. Kennedy was awake the whole time, but quickly fell asleep on the way home. Today has gone ok so far, although I don't think it has completely hit me yet that he isn't coming home soon. I think it will take some time, but Kennedy and I will get into a new routine and everything should be fine. If you would like his address and the address for motomail please let me know. At this time, motomail will probably be the fastest method for letters.

We drove out to check on the house today and the windows are going in!! I am going to go back tomorrow and take pictures, hopefully with my new camera if it gets here in time.

Current progress on the house

a little bit further...

I have a feeling that now that the house has been started I am going to be out there all the time! I am finding myself thinking about it during the day and wondering, how far they have gotten today?? I am going to have to restrain myself... We did go out last night and they had most of the brick laid around the foundation. It shouldn't be too long before the walls start going up!! They are currently building a few other homes like ours which are slated to finish mid June. Those homes have their roofs completed and are getting windows already. Ours has a completion date on the contract of June 30, so hopefully ours will catch up to the others in no time.

Pete is working on his power of Attorney and Will today. Because his chances of deploying to Afghanistan are now very high (about 98%) we are trying to prepare ourselves. If he leaves in April or early May he will not be here when we move into the new house. I keep telling myself that I have moved with him away before and everything was OK, but that was before Kennedy.... this time will be very different!! Hopefully we can get everything in order for the move before he leaves. They are supposed to get a leave block starting on Monday, we still haven't decided what we want to do. We have a few options, we can go to Toledo for a few days; take a mini vacation (maybe D.C or Myrtle Beach), or just stay around here and take small day trips (NC Zoo maybe?). I guess we will have to think about it a little more.

new old chair

I had our black chair reupholstered this week and I think it turned out really great. Halls upholstery picked it up on Wednesday afternoon and brought it back friday morning!! I couldn't believe how quickly it was finished!!