just us.

December?! Really?!

since the girl is still asleep, might as well post...right?

speaking of the girl, she is on day 5 of some viral bug going around.  it all started on Friday with a few vomiting episodes and then 3 days of oozing diarrhea.  She has a nice cough probably due to post-nasal drip, and really hasn't been eating much but drinking like a fish.  I hope she is on the upswing of this sickness, it's really the sickest she has ever been.

our tree is up, and has been since thanksgiving weekend.  this picture here depicts the aftermath of a leaking tree base.  we checked and watered for a whole week before discovering the leak, which lead to the unwrapping of several presents including one for Mike that he didn't know about and a playdoh set for Keira.  We subsequently let her play with it, since she does so at school, but have now decided we are going to hide until she is older.  Playdoh + carpet + toddler not understanding that she needs to keep it IN the tray = not a good thing.

our December family photo. I can't believe I managed to do this for a whole 12 months.

We were lucky enough to get a visit from our friends Fiona and Eric.  Little N has grown so much and come so far since we last saw her in July.  and big E is such a ham herself.

Oli and Keira.  Up to no good.

30% off holiday ornaments at the Disney Store + a mama shopping kid-free = 3 princess ornaments for the princess lover at home.  Belle and Snow White currently grace the tree, and I'm waiting for another "special occasion" to give her Rapunzel.  Or Tangled as she calls her.

Holiday gift exchange between Oli and Keira. oh, can you FEEL the excitement?  Linda and I have both learned a lesson: if we want the kids to behave and eat their lunch, do the exchange AFTER lunch, not before.  This is also the day the vomiting started (sorry LB).

an hour or so worth of manual labor by the homeowners (yes, I helped too!) led to....

this!!

Mike is beyond himself when it came to holiday decor.  This is our first house that we could actually do something to, so we went out with a bang.  I just hope our neighbors don't think it's tacky.  Either they really do like what we've done or they are just being nice.

pancakes for breakfast on Sunday.

holiday card making by the family.  Mike cut and I sewed.  And we let Keira "help" too.

so that's that from our neck of the woods.  Christmas sort of snuck up pretty quick.  It seems that once Halloween comes to town, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's are right behind.

boing...boing...boing

 
Happy Easter people!!  I'm working today, and while I would normally be bummed about having to do so (especially on a holiday), I'm not.  Why?  Because I'm only working a half day!!  The company decided to be smart for once and close us early.  I'm done with my work for now, so I'm hoping the rest of my shift goes quick.

Today also marks the end of 47 days of no Facebook and no coffee.  (Did anyone else realize Lent was longer than usual this year?)  I have a confession though.

I cheated.  On Facebook, but not on coffee.  About halfway through, I found myself perusing Facebook statuses on my phone and while I wasn't active on it (by commenting on things), I still was on.  So in my book, I cheated.  But I was determined not to fail on my commitment to no coffee.  And trust me, there were days were I was aching for it.  I would walk myself to Starbucks, get in line, and then get back out due to pure guilt.  And I thought coffee would be the easier one to forgo.

Other things going on in the household:

 
Mike started building our future vegetable planter box yesterday.  The work on the wall is done, so now we don't have to worry about anymore construction.  We talked about growing our own vegetables when we first moved in, but had to wait until after our landscaping was done and approved.  Since we've never grown a garden before, we're going to start off with easy things, like tomatoes, zucchini, and herbs.  Well, at least we hope they're easy :)

 
I started my third quilt a few days ago, and I'm quilting it right now.  I can't wait to get to the binding part, since I made my own bias tape for it.  I'm not following any particular pattern for this one, it's made up of simple rectangles of fabric sewn together.  The fabric is all from Ikea (red hippo, green hippo and hearts).  I'm using more of the same fabric for the back, but in strips rather than blocks.  I am using a different quilt batting than I used on my first quilt, and so far I think I like it better.  I bought the queen size, figuring I could make at least 2 quilts out of one package.

 
The Kings are still in the playoffs, trailing in the series 3-2.  Mike went to game 4 on Thursday night, and came home a depressed man.  He couldn't even sleep that night when he got home.  But they hung on last night to win 3-1, so it goes to game 5 Monday night in San Jose.  You can bet he will be holding his breath the whole time...and Keira won't be in bed until I get home from work.

The Easter Bunny (aka Uncle Peter and Auntie Linh Tam) brought Keira a basket yesterday and in it was a pack of Kai Lan underwear.  She was excited it about it, and even knew what it was and for.  We keep telling her that she has to go potty in the toilet before she can wear them.  We'll see how well that works.  We're not quite ready to potty train her yet, but soon.

hardy har har

this girl...sigh, this girl.

picture taken this morning.

I remembered something snarky she said to me this weekend.  We were sharing a piece of cake at her cousin's birthday party and right after I took a small bite, she says to me...

..."Why are you eating my cake?"

With a total matter-of-fact, you-better-back-off-my-cake-lady, serious look on her face.

Those who heard it were shocked, and then overcome with OMG's and laughter.

this girl.

Our backyard currently looks like a huge gopher came through:

I can't remember if I've mentioned that some of the walls in our neighborhood are sinking, including ours.  This week they dug a few test holes to check the footings, and determined that two of our three walls are, in fact, sinking.  So now, we have 12-feet deep holes dug every 4 feet along our back wall.  They are working on our side wall too, but doing so from the street side.  They are going to pour concrete in each hole in hopes of keeping the wall from sinking any further.

the snarky one is up now...off to start our day!

room switcheroo

Back when we were on vacation, Mike said I had a good idea.  You had to be there, but he was surprised that I came up with what I did and I think he was really impressed.  yay for me!

so here is my good idea:

when we initially bought the house, I had thought about making the formal dining room a sitting/reading room instead.  But since our current dining table is a tad big for other parts of the great room, we just stuck it in the dining room when we moved in.  After hosting several parties and just hanging out in general, we realized that no one really sat at the dining table.  We seemed to congregate primarily in the great room, sitting on the couches and the floor or around the island.

Last night we decided to move some furniture around.  The dining table came out of the dining room, and our second couch went in.  The dining table found a new home in the great room, where we eventually want to replace it with one of those bench style dining sets.  I hope this would encourage us to sit down around a table for meals rather than scatter around the room like leaves in the wind.

my plan for the new sitting area is still a work in progress, but I'll probably move the area rug in there and have some sort of coffee table as well.  I really like the idea of using a trunk like she did, but I'm still thinking about that.  I've been wanting to hang photos on the walls for a long time now, but haven't gotten around to picking my favorite ones.  There's a big blank wall in the sitting room, and that's where I want to create a "gallery".

I like how plants bring a breath of fresh air to a room (see the one we have on the table?  We've managed to keep that one alive!), so I'd like have some in there as well.  I'm feeling the itch to go knick-knack shopping, but I'm sure Mike will be telling me I need to clean up all the knick-knacks in the craft room first.  I know all the knick-knacks thrown around here and there are driving him a bit nutty, and he has already designated the clean-up-your-crap-in-the-craft-room extravaganza to be this weekend.

looks like it's going to be a ton of fun!!

a whole lotta whatta

(I started mentally writing this post when I woke up at 5:57am because the kid down the hall woke up and started crying.  She went back to sleep, I didn't.)

Mike took yesterday off...it's so nice to have 2 days in a row to spend with him.

we were productive around the house.  We cleaned the kitchen and bathrooms, did laundry and dusted and vacuumed the entire house.

We did a lot of walking yesterday: to Starbucks for some coffee (pumpkin spice latte for me, toffee mocha frap for him) and shopping/running errands (Target for clearance garden stuff, Ikea for more curtain panels and South Coast to walk off the Ikea hot dogs).

I took Keira to get a vaccination in the morning that was missed at her 18-month appointment.  how does that happen?

our backyard is done!  the irrigation and topsoil was put in yesterday, so now we can officially hang out outdoors! all we need now are to put down some plants and it'll be complete.

Keira ate quite a bit for dinner yesterday, we were so surprised.  She had half a hot dog at Ikea and then ate a small bowl of udon noodles at Mitsuwa.  She wanted to feed herself with a spoon, and with a little help from mom and dad, she did!

Keira scored herself some new Crocs too.  her cousin Matthew has a pair that she took from and would not give back to him, so we decided she could have her own.  We especially like that she can put these on herself.

she also said those 3 little words yesterday too...when we would say it before, she would point to her eye and say "eye?".  but we got the whole "I love you" not once, but a handful of times!

I bought a $34.99-marked-down-to-$8.75 inflatable swimming pool for Keira the other day.  gotta love summer clearances...and it was at Ralphs!!

I'm thinking there's more to mention, but we want to go out for some breakfast and a trip to the farmer's market for some fresh-cut flowers for the house.  I must also wish a big happy birthday to my lovely friend Erin...love you lots Mama Hari!!

have a great weekend!

feeling like home - the insides

today, I'll show you what we've done inside!

first off, the sofas.

after some debate, we opted to go with bonded leather sofas.  with Keira being Keira, we figured leather would be much easier to clean than fabric sofas.  our old sofa (the light colored one) will be finding a new home in Mike's cousin's college apartment.

curtains are up in the great room.  I looked for a long time to find exactly what we wanted (light, neutral colored with some pattern or texture), but after this and that (too expensive, not the right length, no longer in stock) we opted for curtains from Ikea.  We figured they'll serve the purpose for the time being, and give us a chance to find what we really want.  Mike bought the curtain rods on overstock.com and they're a nice dark brown.

our shutters are apparently stuck in customs (they're coming from China) and are delayed until the end of the week.  it's a bit annoying considering they were supposed to be here a few weeks ago.

once we get more funds, we'll probably invest in a new area rug for the great room, some patio furniture for outside, and start decorating.  I really want to start putting up pictures, but I need to choose and print out the ones I want.  probably a mix of personal photos with scenery or abstract ones.

it's finally feeling like home

we've been living here in the new house for almost 3 months, and we're finally starting to get things done around here.  the biggest project...the backyard.

living within a community association requires us to have our backyard done with 9 months of moving in.  we started work on the yard right after Labor Day and they are moving along really nicely.

we had concrete poured on the side of the house, so that the garbage cans have something other than dirt to stand on.  plus, it makes it easier to pull them out on garbage day.

this is the start of the patio.  they laid a concrete foundation and then started to cut and piece the flagstone together like a puzzle.  we chose to go with a more natural color scheme for the flagstone, rather than something too out of the box.

this is the pathway leading from the driveway to the sidegate.  there used to be cement steppers there, which were not wide enough to drag the garbage cans out on.  so we're having brick pavers put in, in a pattern that matches the driveway.

here is the patio as of this morning.  I love how its coming together.  I pretty much let Mike have full creative control over what was done, and I just can't wait for it to be done.  The little one in the doorway can now play in the safety of our own backyard, rather than in the driveway where she loves running into the street.  It looks as though it might be done by this weekend...barbecue anyone?

the real thing

so it's about time I put up some pictures of the new house.  I've been lazy, and really want to get every last thing unpacked...but who am I kidding?  everytime I think I'm making progress, there's another box waiting to be opened.  oh well, in due time peoples.

so you're pretty much going to get the house as it is right now.  I didn't bother picking things up or straightening anything out, well because I'm lazy remember?  so here you go.

(excuse the lighting on these, someone small broke the point-and-shoot, so I've been using the big DSLR lately.)

actually, I think I'm just going to put up an album instead.  There's too many to post...and because I'm too lazy to do it.

see a pattern here?

the weather's been so crappy lately, total earthquake weather.  we had a minor 5.9 shaker two days ago.  I was on the phone with another pharmacy and the pharmacist started yelling "earthquake!" and told her people to run under the door frames.  meanwhile, I just sat on my stool like it was no big thing.

Keira's adjusting to the new place pretty nicely, she evened christened it by barfing on the new carpet.  I guess running circles around the couch and the kitchen while yelling can do that to a kid.  nevermind the fact that mommy was running and yelling with her.

more videos

sneaking in some quick internet time at the new place.  we have it until Wednesday before it gets cut off.  we have to decide if we want to keep it or not.

so, to keep things interesting...recent videos of the little homegirl!

I haven't taken many pictures of the new place yet, but we are staying here now (night#2).  it's not feeling quite like "home" yet, but it's getting there.  I walk through the upstairs hallway to our bedroom and think "woah, this is ours?" 

both of sets of families have been nothing but awesome-tastic about helping us get settled in.  the moms spent 2 days lining all the cabinets and drawers in the house, while the dads and brother painted.  the garage is still full of boxes and we still have some straggler things at my brother's and Mike's brother's place.  hopefully by the weekend, everything we own will be under one roof.

:)

the start of something wonderful

we got 10 of them.  no need to go to Home Depot now. they came in a fancy black box too.

can't believe it.  it's ours.  like really ours.

someone's making themselves at home already.

more pictures to come.