What I did for my summer vacation...

Okay, so I took six months off from the blog. Bad Melanie! Bad! But I'd like to think I have a reasonable set of reasons... So, here's what I did with my summer vacation.

April
We really did manage to buy a house! The house previously posted is now our new home! Since I've never owned a house before, I'm totally digging this. It took the whole month of the April to get the details taken care of, and we didn't actually close until the first weekend in May, but alas, it became ours. I just never had a clue what would be involved in satisfying the mortgage gods and get the loan approved. I spent more than a few days (as did Brett) stopping and dropping everything to keep the mortgage gods moving forward on our approval. At one point we joked about digging out our 1st grade report cards in case they asked for those too -- and that was BEFORE all the financial disasters of the summer/fall. I'd hate to see what they require now.

And, we found out that Rupert was a Lucy! We were supposed to find out sex of munchkin and close on April 30. We knew we'd never have both happen, so it was no surprise that when we found out she was a girl that morning that we got a call postponing closing that afternoon. :)

May
Now what I never realized since I've never done this before is just how much work is associated with a house. I don't think these people ever actually cleaned their house, and their color scheme choices were what we'd call on the dark side. Imagine very dark browns, deep olive greens, and mustard yellows. Please know that I knew the house would have to be repainted inside--that was one of the stipulations of us buying the house. What I didn't realize was just how much work was involved in doing it... :)

We closed on a Friday night and started the painting on Saturday. We primed, and we primed, and we primed some more--just to cover the walls in the living room, entry way, and hall. It took three coatings of high-hiding primer to cover the colors in the house. It was fun at first--and then I got a really really nasty upper respiratory infection from all the dirt and dust in the house. When Brett had the duct cleaners come in, they took out bags and bags of dirt and goo out of the ducts--and that was before they actually used their cleaning machines. SO, much to my disappointment, we hired Toby to come and paint specific parts of the house to get some of the painting done. (By the way, he was completely worth it... he does an awesome job.)

Over the Memorial Day weekend, we (with the help with our parents) managed to move into the new house. I think we managed to convince them that we really do have more than enough stuff and don't really need anything for Christmas. And just so you know, there's going to be a very large yard sale in the spring if we can ever manage to get stuff sorted through, duplicates cleaned out, etc. I don't think we'll EVER manage to get our garage cleaned out.

June
Well, in June we found out that I had developed gestational diabetes. The challenges associated with that turned out to be a bit bigger than I had thought... It took lots of help from some great nurses that I work with, some really good specialists who work with diabetic moms, and my OB, but in the end we managed to have really good outcomes in the end when the munchkin arrived. We also managed to go to Virginia for Holly's 30th birthday (that's Brett's sister) and Missouri for my parents' church's 150th anniversary event. Since I hadn't been to Missouri since Thanksgiving last year, it was a wonderful trip!

July & August
Brett has had wrist and arm issues for years. Some of it is carpal tunnel related and some was nerve issues. In July, Brett had surgery on his left arm to get it fixed. Though it was outpatient, it was pretty intense for him. The doctor had to re-route Brett's elbow/funny bone nerve and do the CT release. It took two and a half hours, but it went really well. So well that he scheduled the CT release surgery for the right hand in August. I was a bit concerned that I'd go into labor about the same time he was having his surgery, but alas, it all worked out. Both of his arms work, he doesn't have the numbness in his wrists, hands, and fingers any more, and he can feel his little munchkin when we holds her now. All and all very good. :)

September
Long story short... We're proud of our biggest accomplishment so far... the arrival of our little girl, Sophia Grace. She arrived Friday, September 19 at 9:36 pm. She weighed 6 pounds, 11 ounces and was 18 3/4 inches long. As you might imagine, that has kept us quite busy around here--even with the help of Grandmas and Grandpas and Aunties.

So, that's what I've managed to do with my summer. I promise to keep my writing up to date now. It may not always be Pulitzer Prize worthy--but I'll try to keep things going. Keep me posted too.