Too much going on

Sorry I haven't posted for so long. We have been too busy. It seems like everything finally came together with our condo yesterday. Yikes! What a long road. We have had the inspection and negotiated some repairs. It seems that we have finally worked through everything and are set to close next week. It was previously owned by a single bachelor who had some very very strange decorating ideas. We will be making slow improvements over the next 5 years. We are so excited about all of it. We have been rushing to close because our contract here ends July 31.

We will be moving next Friday and Saturday. Our house is full of boxes right now. We are trying to be much more organized this move. We have a lot less stuff so it should be easier. Then I will be attempting to put everything together at the new place. Brian will be barging in on his parents for 3 weeks and commuting to work with two other people who live in Brigham. We just can't do without 3 weeks worth of income. He will be down in Provo for weekends at least. Then he will have one week off and start school on September 2. It is going to be a very crazy few weeks so I doubt you will see posts from us for a while.

Brian's Bday

I have been waiting to post for Brian's birthday because I have a video to upload of the kids singing happy birthday to him. Since we have dial up internet still that has been a pain. It will not upload the video. I decided to just post the pictures and when we move and get high speed I will post the video.

Brian had one of his worst days of work on his birthday. I made him swear he would be home at 5:00 sharp, but he had major things come up and had to stay late. Meg was so excited for his birthday. She went to Walmart with me and we got balloons and decorations. She was telling all the Walmart workers about her daddy's birthday. When Brian finally got home we went to get dinner at a sit down restraunt (a big deal for us). We went to the Union Grill in Ogden. It is at the train depot. Then we looked at all the trains. Neither of us thought it would be that cool, but we both loved it. The kids were climbing all over the trains. Adin scares me at how fearless he is. They have some of the trains open so you can climb up and look around inside. Brian and I were discussing what a perfect hideout those trains would be for all the homeless people in that area. Sure enough, when Brian went on one of the trains in the back corner he found all sorts of drug paraphanalia. Only in Ogden would you find drug paraphanalia in a train at a historic museum.

Finally, I wanted to post just a few of the reasons why I love Brian so much.

-He is the ultimate husband. He is my favorite person to be with and I cannot wait until he gets home from work everyday (not because I am worn out but just because I want to see him). I feel like he is the other part of me. My favorite time of the day is just sitting with him watching TV after the kids are in bed. He works sooooo hard to provide for us and is an amazing dad. He gets down on the ground and play princess or barbies with Meg. Even when he is exhausted after a hard day at work, he still makes an effort to play with the kids.

- He has worked so hard to achieve his goals despite the challenges he has been dealt in life. I feel like, in a way, he has conquered his challenges just by being where he is in life right now.

- He is so passionate about things. He doesn't love a hobby part way, he loves it all the way. He doesn't just research something a little bit, he researches the heck out of it. For example, he doesn't just love a CD. He reads all the reviews online, he learns the songs on his guitar, he memorizes all the words etc. OR, He doesn't just try to plant a bonsai tree. He reads about it and he tries again and again and again and again. OR, when we decided to buy a house he went to the library and found every book written about home buying and read them all. I love that about him.

- He has a compassion for other people that is so strong. He never judges. He feels like he doesn't have the right to judge because he doesn't know what happened or what challenges a person has faced that have helped shape the person they are. He makes me want to be a better person.

I am most grateful for Brian in my life. He is my greatest blessing. Happy birthday Brian, I love you!

Marchant Barbecue and July 4th

Last weekend we got together with our Marchant side. In my opinion, this happens way to rarely. We all have such a good time when we get together. Adin was in true form. He would not stop playing on the cement steps

This is the face he makes when he gets in trouble or if he is upset about something that he can't do. Another time I have seen it is when we are in the car for an extended period of time. Typically it doesn't include the hand thing, but this day it did.


After the barbecue we all had a championship of guitar hero. It was so much fun. I really really stink at this game, but I always have so much fun. Noone could beat Andy though. He is super fast. Charisse was doing this face on purpose because she saw that I was going to take a picture. I really like Kory's backward slant. He looks like he is really jamming.

July fourth was so fun this year. Meg was so excited for all of it and bubba was just active and fun. We have all had colds for a week now and the 4th was Brian's worst day. I could not get Adin to hold still for a picture with Meg. This was the only way. I let Meg take her patch off for the pictures and then she really wanted her glasses off too. We are still struggling with all of this because even when she has her patch on she insists that she can see better with her glasses off. We have a final check up on Friday then when we move to Provo we plan to get a second opinion just to see what someone else thinks about it.

Meg was all talk when it came to sparklers. As soon as the first one was put in her hands, she was freaking out. She got used to it by the end though. She has a pretty vivid memory of last years 4th of July and wanted to sit on the same chair she sat on last year and have the same treats.
Adin was so busy running up and down the little hill in Grandma and Grandpa Droubay's back yard. All afternoon he would walk up the stairs and then run down the hill and then start over. He didn't even last till the fireworks. He went right to sleep in the portacrib. We figure we'll show him fireworks on the 24th.

A brief update on our house situation. Third time was the charm. We found a place that we liked more than the others and the interest rate dropped significantly this week. The added bonus was that the owner was someone honest who was willing to meet us in the middle. Yea!!! The contract is signed and the interest rate is locked in. We are closing on July 31st and plan to move in that weekend. Our moving day will be August 2. We are planning to get our ward to help us fill up the uhaul and are hoping to get family to help us unload it in Provo in the late afternoon/evening of that day. Brian and I will be calling around to ask for help, but I just wanted to post a heads up.

On the uphill swing....hopefully.

Meg has been wearing her horrendous patch for almost two weeks now. Earlier this week, she kept complaining that she couldn't see anything with her glasses on and she would beg to take them off anytime she was watching TV or coloring. So, I decided to test her myself. I made a small picture chart just like they have at the eye doctor. She couldn't see anything with her glasses on, but when she would take her glasses off (still with her patch on her good eye) she could see every picture. I thought that was very odd. I called the eye doctor and "just to give me peace of mind" he let me come in and have her rechecked. Turns out she is no longer legally blind. I guess in some cases the eye deteriorates simply because it isn't being used. As soon as her lazy eye was forced to work on its own, it made miraculous improvements. The eye doctor hasn't ever seen such a rapid improvement. He was shocked. Her prescription was changed and now she just has a minor eyesight problem in that eye. The lazy eye was completely reversed and he sees no sign of laziness anymore. YEAH!!! He wants her to wear her patch for one more week just to strengthen that eye a little more so that it doesn't reverse back to it's laziness when we take the patch off. I knew that initially the whole eye thing stressed me out in a major way but I didn't realize how much it was still stressing me out until we left that appointment and I felt a huge weight lift off my shoulders. I was so excited at her improvement. The doctor says it is very good that we caught it this early. If it had gone on even another year it could have degenerated enough that it wouldn't have fixed itself as drastically as it did.

We are having a lot of bad luck with our house hunt. We both have felt good about the decision to buy, but we have had some unlucky run ins. The first guy was trying to pull the wool over our eyes. The second time our agent was handling the offer and negotiating. It would take 3 or 4 days longer than requested for them to respond to our offers. The final counter offer they said that they would pay our closing costs, but if the house appraised for less then they would reduce the amount of our closing costs that they would pay dollar for dollar. They also adamently refused to give us a carpet allowance. I wouldn't let me children walk bare foot on that carpet so that place is out as well. Grrrr! We are going down tomorrow to look at our final two options along with a bunch of rentals. We really need to find something that will work tomorrow because our time has run out. Our contract here ends on July 31st. Our landlords might let us extend a week, but at any rate we have to hurry. I am hoping with the excitement of Meg's eye improving so much that our house hunt will also improve. It might be wishful thinking.