Two Years Today!

Today is our second wedding anniversary! Traditionally the gift is cotton, but I think we'll skip cotton and go with ceramic, a smattering of paint and some chrome. (Yes, we're still working on the bathroom.)

Thanks to a great neighbor who offered to babysit Kendra on Saturday night, we were able to go out to dinner at our favorite restaurant, then stop by a friends place for drinks afterwards. Turns out Saturday night was the annual "BrIdes of March" pub crawl. Several of Christine's friends turned up in wedding dresses (some their own, some bought for the occasion at thrift stores) before heading out to the crawl. I may have to think about going next year...

Since I was in MO and Dan in WA on our first anniversary, we broke out the top tier of our wedding cake last night. It was a bit dry, but still surprisingly good. Good enough we are planning on having more. We may even share with Kendra. :) Here's to many more anniversaries together.

The bathroom is closer to being done. We have the toilet installed and caulked, but realized today it rocks a bit. We'll have to add a shim and recaulk it. Dan is hopeful we'll get the cabinets fitted in today so we can cut holes in the back for the plumbing. Since no room is ever square, but the cabinets are - and measured to fit *exactly* - we are going to have to sand the drywall down in one corner to get everything mounted flush. We did sell my old desk and move the cabinets into the bathroom, so our living room looks a bit more normal.

Anyone Know A Good Plumber?

We have been working on remodeling the upstairs bathroom for about a year now. Actually it's only been 2 weeks, but it feels like a year. We have repainted it all, and laid ceramic tile on the floor. Last nights goal was to get the toilet installed.

Try #1 resulted in water gushing out the bottom of the toilet all over the bathroom floor. Oops. Guess the wax ring didn't seal right. Dan and Kendra went to the hardware store to buy a new one and go for try #2.

Try #2 had no water leaking from the toilet. YAY! Dan did about a dozen test flushes just to be sure, and there was no water. We cleaned up the wet towels and sponges and headed downstairs...where we found our kitchen soaking wet. All the water from the toilet had flooded the ceiling of the kitchen and was dripping through the light fixtures. Good grief.

We grabbed more towels and cleaned it up, but laminate floor and water don't mix well. The floor in our kitchen now has numerous spots where it buckled a little from the wood absorbing the water. Good thing we were planning on remodeling it this fall.

Needless to say, we still don't have a toilet upstairs. Try #3 is scheduled for this weekend. (Dan flies out to Reno tonight for work, so tonight and tomorrow are shot.)

Mighty Guard Dog

Turtle is sweet girl, not always the brightest bulb in the box, but very good natured. Dan had to work late last night, and got home about 3am. Turtle met him at the door, very wiggly and tail wagging happy. She then ran up the stairs to our bedroom, where she ran back and forth, several times, between our bed and the door until I woke up.

I staggered downstairs to see what was up, led by a very happy Turtle, to find a very amused Dan waiting at the bottom.

I'm not sure she'd be much good against a burglar, but at least he'd know he was welcomed!

My Little Artist

Kendra's new favorite pastime is drawing and painting. In toddler class she gets to use a big easel and paint (or eat the paint) until her heart's content. At home, she has to content herself with an art table. She has lots of construction paper, toddler markers (which are harder to use on walls and carpet), and toddler paint (self-contained and very washable).

She will sit for quite a long time while I'm working, working on her drawings. She's gotten better about not eating the paint too.

For Valentine's Day she even made her Grandma and Grandpa a "Kendra original" to send them.

Because she is prolific, and not overly selective, I take pictures of her art, and throw out the originals. I get to keep a memoir of her talent, and I'm not cluttering up the house with dozens of pieces of paper. It's a win for everyone. :)

That's Not a Bellybutton

We've been diligently teaching Kendra the various parts of the body. She's got all the basics down, although her favorites are noses and bellybuttons. Tongues and teeth run close behind.

To see if she really understands what we're teaching her, we've had her point to things on stuffed animals, in books and on our pets.

Tonight Dan was telling her to point to the cat's ears...which she did. Next was the cat's nose - again success! (We have a very patient cat.) When Dan asked her to point to the cat's belly button, well, she did pick something that was a hole. The cat was less than amused at having a tiny finger poke it in the butt hole.

Memo to us - don't ask about bellybuttons on anything other than people.

Home Improvement 101

Knowing Dan and I, you knew our first (indoor) home renovation wouldn't be too far off. We have decided to re-do our upstairs bathroom with a new floor, new cabinets and fresh paint. We bought the cabinets today! I'm actually pretty excited about this. Our current bathroom doesn't have much in the way of storage, and it's rather bland and boring looking. The cabinets we bought will actually go floor to ceiling. Dan will pick up the tile tomorrow (plain white porcelain), and we've already decided to paint it a pale blue. That just leaves find a new sink, faucet and countertop.

We bought the cabinets from Ikea, and figure the bathroom will be a great test run of how easy they are install and how much we like/dislike them before spending a small fortune on re-doing the kitchen. (We are looking at using the same style of cabinets in the kitchen.) We don't plan on starting the actual demolition of the bathroom until we have the rest of the stuff bought and in the house. We're not in a rush, and this will let us find what we want at the price we want to pay.

Otherwise, things have been quiet. I've had a boute with the flu or something similar. I started feeling bad Friday afternoon, and by that night had a nice fever and felt like I'd been run over by a truck. I'm feeling better, although not quite up to snuff yet.

Jury Duty

I was called for jury duty this week, and spent a good portion of two days sitting around making new friends. I was called to be on two separate trials, but both were going to take about two weeks. With no childcare that posed a real problem, so I was excused for "undue hardship." I was actually disappointed - I think I would have enjoyed being a juror.

I did meet two really nice young women and we are now Facebook friends. Hopefully we can get together for coffee in the next few weeks. We had so much fun talking and going out to lunch together. Leave it to me to make friends doing my civic duty.

In other news, my baby is growing up. Need proof? I am enrolling her in pre-school this year. How did this happen? It seems like just a few short weeks ago she was coming home from the hospital. Out here if a child turns 2 by August 31 they are eligible to enroll in preschool for this coming fall. We are touring two different schools, although both are co-ops. I'm not sure how we'll fit a co-op into our working schedule, but I do think it's important so we'll manage. I'd also like to tour at least one school that isn't a co-op just to compare.

My doggie is also getting old. Mr. Mickey has totally lost his hearing. We'd suspected it was failing for a while, but as of yesterday we are convinced it's totally gone. He didn't react at all when the doorbell rang. Normally a ringing doorbell results in total chaos around here with barking dogs and a running toddler, but now Mickey just lays on his bed. I fear his time with us is growing short :(