yesterday

Since hunting for housing was getting annoying via computer and phone, I decided that there must be plenty of houses, apartments, condos, etc. out there that just don't post them other than by hanging a sign in their window... SOooooooo, yesterday the boys woke up early from their nap and we headed out for a long (3+ hours) drive around the areas we would like to live in. Wow. It was a lot of driving. But, we got a few very promising leads. so I think it was worth it. The boys didn't hardly make a peep until the 3 hour mark hit, then they asked, "I go home now, peas mommy?"-Matix and then Hawken chimed in "peas peas!! home home!" The entire ride, I didn't a movie going or anything. They were just sitting, being good. Whose children are these?! My boys are SO active, it was weird to see them sit so still for so long. I was a very proud mommy that afternoon and took the boys for ice cream at the dairy queen near our house on our way home.

They loved it and hardly stopped to breathe. :) Then they talked about it until Paul got home and then had to tell him all about it too. Later that night Paul and I ate the leftovers. Yum!

Also, Paul found my camera cord!! Hooray! It was in a really good hiding place in between the desk and the closet, and I promise I looked there... Oh well, it is found and all is well, belly pics tonight for sure. :)

belly pic

These 2 little stinkers have hidden my camera cord...

I was all ready to do my first belly pic for baby #3, and now I can't download the pictures from the camera. :( This is what my ticker looks like at 16 weeks, and although I am not quite that big, I am really not far behind!

Hooray for baby #3. I am showing already!!! I KNOW I will get a huge belly this time. It's inevitable. :) So, as soon as I locate the lost camera cord, I will post real belly pics. Cheers!

updates

We may be moving... We are currently on the housing hunt, again. :) We have loved our place here, but it is expensive and we are looking to save up some money before we go on all our adventures this summer (driving to Wisconsin, then to Colorado, then to Wyoming, then to Arizona, then back here to Florida). Anyway, there are a couple promising places, and one we especially love. Wish us luck.

With all the moving plans and complications (large dog after july, 2 kids, then 3 in September), we have met with a few realtors who are helping us in our search. Yesterday, after spending 1 boring hour and 45 squirmy minutes with me in an office talking about houses, the boys deserved some time to play. So on the way home, we stopped at Chuck E. Cheese. It was very fun. Matix is in love with Chuck E. and when he came out to dance Matix was SUPER excited. He danced his little heart out, then Chuck E. left and Matix lost it. He was rolling on the floor crying, "I need Chuck E.!!!" It was so sad. I can hardly wait to take him to Disney and see what he does with those characters.

In other news, Paul is doing great. He has been sticking to his study schedule and went back to his early morning routine (starting at 5am, yikes!). I am really proud of him for all the hard work he has been putting in. His final for 5th semester is tomorrow (prayers and happy thoughts please) and he is feeling good about it. We are planning on staying here until he takes the USMLE STEP1, but don't yet have a date for that. I will let you all know when we do. Wish him luck on his upcoming exams. Thanks.

And one more update. :) The baby has been KICKING! Hooray! I love this stage! It is so wonderful to feel it swimming around in there. Our next appointment is on the 20th where we can potentially find out the sex... Here's the thing. This may be our last pregnancy due to all the issues and complications I have had, the doctors haven't said for sure, but it may have to be. Soooooo, with that said, I think it may be fun to be surprised once, you know? :) BUT, on the other hand, we have 2 boys. If it is another boy, that's no big deal, but if it is a girl, I have nothing girly. No dresses, bows, pink anything... So I would want to know at least a little in advance if it is... Such a dilemma! Any ideas?

proud auntie

Two of my nieces, Ryelle and Liesl, are cheerleaders for their high school. This year they qualified for Nationals!! They drove from Wisconsin to Myrtle Beach to the competition and they got 2nd place!! For being the first time the school has qualified to go there, I am SUPER impressed at how well they did. Here is a video of them at Nationals:

Remember these are 13-18 year old kids. Impressive right? I am a proud auntie. :)

Another day at the beach

Grandma got another boat. This time she got a paddle boat and we all went out. It was SO pretty out there. I finally got to see a manta ray, but it was too quick to get a picture of it. This was Matix's preferred area on the boat. It looks like he is tanning, but he said he was listening to "the water music", I think that he could hear it splashing up in there from the paddles.

This was Hawken's preferred area to be in. He kept trying to jump into the water to swim, so he needed to be in arms at all times. :)

Grandma found a crab. A big one. And the boys had to touch it. Gross.

A boy and his watering can. What could be more fun?

Hawken always finds trash wherever we go and calls it his "tredure" (treasure). This day it was a plastic cup, which he used to collect sea weed and grasses. Of course.

Before leaving, I always let them fully dry off so I can just dust the sand from them before getting into clean clothes and going home. And, technically, this beach, as with many beaches here, is clothing optional... Hmmmmm.... Matix and Hawken both prefer this, maybe that's why they love to come here so often? :) Matix was really into it this day and went rolling around in the sand, and would pose for pictures. Most of them are too bad to share on a public blog, but it was funny, none the less.

So much for being dry huh?

The Barnacle

Another adventure. We went to "The Barnacle" house. It is a house that was built back before there were many roads through Miami, and the only access to this estate was by boat. It is now preserved by the state of Florida as a historic site. There were a lot of these little info. signs along the path, mostly about the original family's conservation efforts.

The boys were contented to read their pamphlets about the place. :)

The grounds were beautiful. There was even a path (now paved) that was the original path that the Seminole tribe would use to walk down to the water to do their trading. Very cool.

Waiting on the porch for our tour guide. The boys were very good outside.

Our guide was a fanatic. He knew everything there was to know about the house, the family that lived there, the special oddities of the house because it was built like a boat, etc. He was a little long winded, but the parts that I heard were interesting. I was mostly chasing after two cranky boys (they were not allowed to touch anything, not so fun) and trying to keep them in one place. This is how they felt at the end of the tour:

That is Hawken crying and pointing to the door, asking, "home? home?" This was a very cool place, but the tour would be much better minus the kiddos. I wish I had more pictures, or any pictures of the inside because it really was beautiful, but like I said, I was busy... :)

Coral Castle

This is the "Coral Castle". It is south of where we live, but worth the drive. It was amazing, to say the least. The entire castle was created by one man who was shorter than I am!!! He excavated the coral from a makeshift quarry on his property, moved the multi-ton blocks, shaped them into whatever they were to become, and placed them in their spots. It took him from 1923-1951 to complete it. This is what we saw from the outside... first his quarry:

Then the entrance:

This is their insurance policy. Smart, huh?

Ed (the builder) lived in this tower, his tools were kept in the room below:

Based on the size and type of coral he excavated, they are now able to estimate the weight of each masterpiece. All in all they weighed over 1,100 tons!!! What?! He built all this as a tribute to his fiance who left him the day before their wedding. So sad, right?

Everywhere we looked there were more and more amazing things to see. Rocking chairs, reading chairs that faced in every direction to get the best light on your book depending on the time of day, fountains, a huge table in the shape of Florida that is geographically near perfect, a bedroom, bathtub carved to displace exactly the amount of water to bring it to the rim based on his own body size...

This is the Polaris telescope. Through the cross hairs in this wall and then through the tall tower structure you can see the north star. Pretty good for a guy with only a 4th grade education.

The throne room:

The repentance (time-out) corner for his want to be children:

The beds and baby cradle for his kids too, although I am not sure they really would have appreciated them being rock hard, literally:

The cooking spot:

The well. He dug this well and discovered that coral is a natural purifier/filter, so all the water that still flows from it is drinkable. Also, he carved out a small room down there to store his food because it was at a constant state of 50 degrees or lower.

The boys were VERY busy and it was hard for them to listen to us that day. We probably should have actually used that repentance corner, rather than just posing in it. :)

Some of the tools he used:

All in all, this was probably the most impressive, man made, hand constructed monument I have ever seen. So so so amazing. Here is a link to their website to see and read more if you're interested. If you are in Florida, or ever will be, I recommend it.

Miami Children's Museum

The boys, Stacy and I went to the Miami Children's Museum last month on the free day. The boys and Stacy went the month before and Stacy said it was CRAZY busy. This time wasn't so bad, and the boys had fun regardless. There was SO SO SO much for them to do. I don't think we made it to all the areas or floors and we were there for a few hours. Wow. Outside the museum there were tons of things to do too. A REAL fire truck and fire fighters were there, very exciting. Matix got to sit in it. That was a hit.

Then we tried to pose the boys on the front bumper next to this bell, but right as we sat them down, another kid ran up and ran the bell, thereby scaring our boys half to death! I took the picture anyway. :) Poor guys.

Inside there were some freebies too. We got a book, some waters, stickers, and balloon animals. SO much fun. Hawken apparently LOVES balloon animals and was fascinated with the lady making them. We watched her for a while, I'm sure he just thought it was another exhibit.

Matix didn't put his tongue in his mouth once during the whole thing. :) He was very busy concentrating, I guess.

There was so much for them to do. I love it there. They love it there. We will be returning. :)