Chh Chh Chh Chh Chhanges!

It's nap time and both kids are sleeping. The house is somewhat clean, dinner is somewhat planned out and I'm feeling somewhat on top of my "to do list." When all these things align, I can blog!

OK so, where were we. Oh yes, we bought a house, sold a house and bought a van.

First, the most important and longest of the stories, we bought a house - We headed up to Connecticut March 16-18. It was dang cold but luckily no snow to deal with. The kids did pretty well on the flight. Actually Jackson did amazingly well, didn't make a fuss once and Abbie did just alright. She's getting harder and harder the older she gets! But when we got there we drove around for a little bit, got set up at our hotel and grabbed lunch at Panera. Tyler wanted me to feel as comfortable as possible so eating at a well-known and loved restaurant for lunch helped quite a bit.

The thing that is going to take a while to get used to is how old it all is. We're driving through Simsbury, CT and all the signs keep saying "established 1670" just to give you an idea. Also the suburbs west of Hartford are really rural feeling and there are trees everywhere. That's not really a bad thing, just going to take a while to get used to. Supposedly that town, Simsbury, is one of the best towns to live in and is well loved by all who live there. While driving through it I just kept waiting to see something that wowed me but it didn't happen. It's cute and quaint but I'm not quite sure why honestly it has such appeal? Maybe it will grow on me. Anyways, we ended up buying a house in a neighboring city but considered houses in several towns.

We looked at houses in Burlington, Canton, Avon, Simsbury &... I think that's it for this day but we also considered Granby, Weathersfield, and West Hartford. All the houses had pluses and minuses and I had looked at them so many times online before arriving, it was kinda weird actually being in the homes I had already memorized in my mind. We were looking at houses built or majorly renovated in the past 30 years (which limited our search dramatically). We wanted a good street or neighborhood (which also limited our search dramatically). Only one of the houses we looked at (the one we bought) had a sidewalk in the neighborhood. We were looking for a decent size yard, but small flat driveway that wouldn't be hard to maintain in winter time. All the houses we looked at were 4 bedrooms and all around the same size of our current house and in our price range, which was another huge limiting factor. Some had pools, but I really didn't want or need one with a pool because it would just sit there unused 10 months out of the year! With these restrictions we didn't have a ton of houses to choose from, but there were some pretty good options.

There were a few beautiful large homes with pools, but they were all a little more rural and would be a longer commute for Tyler to work and to get to the airport. There was a beautiful home with an out-of-this-world renovated kitchen, covered porch and huge bedrooms - but it was basically in the middle of a forest with no neighbors in sight. There was a smaller modest home in a cute neighborhood in Avon with a smaller kitchen, amazing basements and 4 rooms all upstairs. The price was much lower than any other house we were looking at also, so this is the house we chose! Another reason we chose this house is that we went to the ward on Sunday and connected with so many great people, it made us officially decide to make an offer.

While it's definitely not the most flashy on the outside or updated on the inside, it will be a perfect home for our family. The main level is much smaller than we're used to but that just means it will be easier to keep clean, right?? Also the kitchen is pretty outdated, so we are planning on redoing the appliances, counters and cabinets soon, which we're excited about! (Since the price was lower, we feel we can do this and have some fun with it) The four bedrooms upstairs are not huge but will fit our family with a guest bedroom for now, and have room for more kid(s) in the future :) The best part about the house in the basement. It's 700 square feet and I'm viewing it as kid central. I'm hoping to keep all the toys down there, we can have the train table there as well as future toys (I'm picturing a kitchen set, play house, easel, arts and crafts center) It will be great. We can also have an office space down there as well as a tv and couch hangout area. It will also be great to have guests stay down there when we have lots of people visiting or in a couple years when we don't have a guest bedroom anymore! The backyard is a large grassy area that is pretty flat compared to others we saw. It backs up to a forest which is kinda crazy but hopefully the kids don't venture off in there since it's blocked by some prickly bushes...

The house is very close to the major shopping area of the area - (almost too close, you drive through an ice cream shop parking lot to get in the neighborhood). It was a turn off at first, but eventually I've gotten used to the idea. Once you're back at the house you don't realize where you are.  Some of the houses we looked at were 10 minutes to a grocery store, this one is 1 mile or less from 3 or 4 stores. We've got all the major stores you could want within 5 minutes - other than Target, so sad! But all in all it's going to be a great house and a great little ward and we are excited!

Abbie looked too cute, waiting for our luggage in CT.

This is what I saw all weekend, a blur of trees from the car window. We were in the car A LOT!

Letting Jackson play at the Hartford library, downtown.

I realized I didn't take any pictures of myself on this trip, chilling with the kids while Tyler handed in our deposit check to the realtor.

Not the best pic, but here is our family after buying a house in CT!

Back in Florida and Jackson gets a turn in the stroller, that iPad saved our life that weekend.

OK the second thing to mention, we sold our house. It's been in the works for a while now but it officially is going down. We sold to our good friends Jon and Semra Eichelberger. We had always joked about them buying our house, or the house next door and how fun it would be to be neighbors. Right now they are renting a place a couple streets away and we love hanging out with them! So now they will be taking over our house and we can always come visit the place when we come back to Florida. We have been incredibly lucky in that the real estate market has gone up again here in Windermere. We bought at the lowest point of the market and now are selling at a bigger gain than we expected for only living here for 3 years. We have had multiple real estate agents, appraisers, and inspectors to our house these past weeks and now it's done and I'm just so glad we don't have to worry about listing our house and keeping it clean for showings!

And lastly, we bought a van! Wow never thought I'd end that sentence with an exclamation mark but it's a pretty sweet ride. We have to turn in Tyler's company car this week so we decided to just go for it when we found a van with the right price. Tyler negotiated like a champ and we got an amazing deal on a brand new 2013 gray Honda Odyssey.

When we got the car it had 1 mile on it, seriously. And just today it hit 200 miles, so we've driven it just a bit but I still need to read the owners manual to make sure I know how to use all its ammenities! It's got a leather seats, a tv/dvd player with wireless headphones, fridge, rear camera, automatic doors, wireless, a hard drive where we can store hundreds of songs from cds, and so much storage! I never thought I'd drive a van but what do you know. We looked at other cars, but after sitting in the van, the suvs just didn't compare inside!

And that about wraps it up! So we bought the house March 18, got the paperwork started to sell our house March 19, bought the car March 20, then I threw a birthday party for Jackson March 21. It was a busy week to say the least, but we are so incredibly blessed and excited for these changes ahead!

More about Jackson's Birthday, and Easter to come (soon hopefully)!

My Three-Year-Old Boy

My baby boy is 3. I can hardly believe it. I don't know why but this third birthday is hitting me hard! I feel that this year will be full of changes for our little buddy. First potty training, then moving into a big boy bed, moving to Connecticut, and starting preschool in the fall. He is also officially binky free. I had been dreading the day when we took the binky away because he sleeps with it every nap and night, but one night he just told Tyler he didn't want it. After a couple days he stopped mentioning it completely. My toddler is turning into a big preschooler and it's making me want to freeze time!

At age 3 Jackson is really starting to communicate better. He now speaks in full sentences and knows what most words mean. He still mumbles and is a little hard to understand for others but I can understand him all the time now. He also has gotten very imaginative in his play, which makes things super fun. He loves pretending there are alligators chasing us or that we're on a boat, or a beach etc etc. He loves his cars, trucks, and trains most of all, but also loves pirates, animals, dinosaurs blocks and balls of all kinds. He loves playing outside with his bike, scooter and digging with his shovel and dump trucks. He loves puzzles and can figure them out way faster than I would expect him to and still loves books and has recently started "reading" Abbie stories. 

He is such a good big brother. Even today on his birthday he allowed Abbie to play with some of his new favorite toys. When Abbie cries he will stop what he's doing to try and make her happy, he usually succeeds. While in the car he can always make her happy just by saying, "Be Happy Abbie!!" and then he does this silly shake with his head. She laughs at him more than anyone else.

He is getting better with his coordination. Playing with play-do, painting and coloring are becoming more fun and right now he loves drawing faces. He can climb up rock walls and ladders at the park and loves the slides, climbing up and sliding down. At joy school he is learning to interact better with others and is sharing better than ever. We still have our moments but I'm seeing a maturity in him starting to peek through. Last week at the park a boy was crying because he didn't want to leave. Jackson went over to him handed him a car and said, "no cry no cry" and wiped his tears, just like he does with Abbie. The boy was a little surprised at his gesture but it showed the softer side to Jackson I love so much.

He loves his daddy and playing chase with him is one of his favorite things ever. They have so much fun together and always have a special bond. They laugh together so much and Jackson is developing such a cute little sense of humor.

Two-year-old Jackson and I had our challenges. We had some hard moments with tantrums, hitting and all that other fun classic two year old behavior. I kept waiting for him to grow up, to learn to talk better, to learn to share better, to learn to listen better. But I'm beginning to realize more and more that I need to just focus on the positive moments with him and enjoy this little boy while he's still so innocent. Another joy school mom mentioned that seeing Jackson reminds her of her 5 year old son when he was that age, and it made her miss that boy's stage. I look at her son and his friends around kindergarten-age and they really are so different than Jackson already. I love that when I go to pick up Jackson from nursery or a babysitter he will run to me and yell an excited, "mama!" I know that won't last too much longer so I will take it while I can. I love how he gets excited every time he sees a truck drive by or a cow in a field. I love how he gets excited for treats and yells "yoo hoo!" with his hands in the air. I love how silly he can be and I love how he says, "That's silly" in his cute little voice. Wow. I love that boy!



I'll have to post more about our trip to Connecitcut (buying a house, selling a house and buying a car in 3 days) and Jackson's birthday events later. But for now I'm having a great night thinking about my little boy and how I'm so lucky to be his mommy. I am so excited for this year with three-year-old Jackson!

Tyler's To-Do List

Last night I asked Tyler if he was stressed about finals and finishing up his MBA program next week. He told me, "yeah that's on my mind but it's probably number 8 on my list." Then we stopped to think about what he's really got on his mind right now and it's kind of ridiculous how much he's got.

Just for documentation purposes, so we all see what's up in his mind this month...

1. Figure out where to live in Connecticut (considering the best city, neighborhood, ward, home, how much we can afford)
2. Sell our home in Florida (hopefully our good friends are buying it, just have to make sure it all goes through with paperwork, inspections, etc)
3. Focus on new job at Legrand, start doing research and coming up with ideas (impress boss!)
4. Finish job with Wattstopper and train the replacement (whenever they hire one!)
5. Buy a new car (we're turning in the company Ford Edge and most likely buying an Odyssey)
6. Finish school (one weekend left of MBA program and then graduation in May)
7. New calling as assistant ward mission leader.
8. Oh yeah, be a husband and father
9. Be a friend
10. Sleep if there's time

Dang anything else??

The big move

This month we hit our 4th anniversary of living in Florida. We really weren't sure what to expect moving here, but it's really when the real world began for us. We had been married 2 years and had been focused on school, work and enjoyed living near family and friends. We'd been living mainly in our 1 bedroom apartment and were just starting to imagine a life with kids, and in a larger place. I never would have guessed how different our lives would be 4 years later. First, we moved into a 3 bedroom townhouse that felt absolutely huge at the time! Now we live in an amazing home, in a wonderful neighborhood and even have sunset views of the lake from our backyard every night. Tyler's job took him all over the South and I got to experience it with him. We have driven around this entire state together, know all the best beaches and have even driven to Mississippi, Alabama & Georgia. The Florida lifestyle of theme parks, beaches and being outside year round has been a really fun one to get used to.

I became a mother in Florida. We have an almost 3 year old son and an almost 1 year old daughter. That has got to be the biggest change. They are my life and I love them so much. Before moving to Florida my normal day consisted of school, studying, hanging out with Tyler, family, friends and then working full time. Now my normal days consist of feeding, dressing, changing diapers, playing, stroller walks, shopping, bathing, and bedtime. I'll take the latter any day. We are a family of four and love it.

We have made great friends here, and since Tyler and I don't have work friends or family, all of these friends have come through the church. In the past couple years so many young families have moved to Windermere. At first we were quite a bit younger than the average family and having no kids, also set us apart from most families in the ward. But now we are more in line with the majority of the ward. There are about 10 kids who would be in Jackson's primary class and class at school, same with Abbie. There are some great people who we have grown to know and we are sad to say goodbye to our new friends already. We are almost certain we won't find what we have here, in Connecticut. 

But it's time to end this chapter of our lives and move onto another adventure. We've always known that living here was just a temporary thing, but now that we've grown to love it here - it is hard to say goodbye. For a while we were hoping that Tyler's new job would allow him to live here and keep working from home. We thought maybe he could take a different type of national sales job and keep living here, but alas those options did not work out in the end. This job is requiring him to be in Connecticut and so we are heading off.

When Tyler first mentioned that Connecticut was an option for us to live I wouldn't even consider it. I didn't even let him talk about it with me because I didn't want it to happen. After months of thinking we'd be moving back west, to California, I didn't want to hear that we'd be moving across the country in the wrong direction. But eventually it was inevitable that we'd be moving there so I finally let him talk about it with me. I think that same day I decided to look at a map, because I had no idea where Hartford even was in the state.

December was when things got real. While I was at home during one of the roughest weeks of motherhood (both kids had ear infections and Abbie wasn't sleeping or nursing at nights) Tyler was meeting with Legrand here in Orlando at their national sales meeting. It was that week that he found out that the job was officially offered to him and we had to move to CT. 12.12.12 was a memorable day for us because I was at the doctor with both kids and Tyler was meeting with the Presidents and HR Directors about details of the job. They said they'd get him a formal offer after the new year. Well fast forward to February and FINALLY we got an offer that we agreed to and signed. That was a long waiting month. While we knew it was probably happening. We couldn't publicly announce it for weeks. While I still wasn't thrilled about the move, I was so excited when the offer finally came through that the uncertainty was over and we could start moving forward.

Tyler has been up to CT three times this year already and the kids and I are heading up this weekend for the first time. We've spent hours looking at homes, neighborhoods, and cities and still aren't sure where we will move. We have a realtor and Tyler has spent a couple days looking at homes already, but it is still overwhelming. We did have a favorite house, but that one just went under contract. We have some other top contenders but I'm still anxious to get up there and see for myself. We are looking in to towns of Avon, Simsbury, Farmington, and Burlington. They are all on the west side of the city, since Tyler will be working in West Hartford. Who knows where we will end up, we are even thinking of looking at some additional cities this weekend. It's just such a change since most homes are much older and such a different style than we are used to. There are some really beautiful homes though and we are anxious to get a house with a big yard full of soft non-Florida grass (while it's not covered with snow that is).
I hope that soon we can post pictures of our new house on the blog, but until then - let the search continue. 

When I stop to think about moving I really start to get sad and tear up, but with so much going on at the moment, luckily I'm not stopping too often. For now I'm enjoying my time here while it lasts.

On to the next adventure ...

Connecticut

Well I guess we're private now. If you're reading this I must have done something right to add your email successfully.  I know that for me, I only click on a few of my friends' private blogs every now and then because I never know if they updated or not, so I just look every couple months or so. That might be the case with you all now. I think maybe now the blog might be a place to be a little more personal than I was before because it is private. I'll be a little more specific about things perhaps. But we'll see what happens. For now I should write a post about the fact that we're moving to Connecticut.

Tyler and I have told our families, friends, and made announcements on Instagram and Facebook. But for those who have missed it, we are moving to Hartford, Connecticut in May. Tyler has been offered a job to work at LeGrand headquarters and has been assigned to be part of a new initiative. I'll try to explain it simply here.

Right now Tyler works for Wattstopper (http://www.wattstopper.com), they manufacture and sell lighting and energy control products (ex. the sensors that turn off lights when a space is empty or the panels that control a large building's lights, such as an airport, university, etc). His company is owned by Legrand (www.legrand.us) which is the world specialist in products and systems for electrical installations and information networks, offering solutions for use in residential, commercial and industrial buildings. Legrand owns several companies that provide lights, wiring, cables, information systems and data communication - basically all the tools that bring power to homes and buildings.

He is the Southeast District Sales Manager for Wattstopper. When he started in 2009 he was over Florida, Alabama, Mississippi & Louisiana, so yeah a bit of southern travel was involved. Now since Florida's business has grown so much, he is just managing Florida and the Caribbean (thanks to his handy Spanish speaking skills). It's been a great job and he has done great things for the company in Florida. Every year he has been one of the top producers for his company and in 2011 he was the company's leader in sales. Four years later, though, he is ready for a change, ready for a promotion, and ready to be out of sales. Since his company is not based in Florida, however, a promotion or new job within the company will mean we need to move to one of their offices across the country. So we knew this day was coming but we've never known where we would go from here.

Wattstopper has offices in Alabama, Texas, Carlsbad, California & Livermore, California, and the headquarters are in Santa Clara, CA. So we figured we'd most likely be in one of those offices, with the most likely option being Carlsbad or Santa Clara. Last summer he interviewed for a job in Carlsbad with product management and we were optimistic that he would be given that job. However he was told by the CEO that while he would have been great at that job, they had another role in mind for him. Then we waited for a few months, a long time it felt like, to finally find out what this other role they had for him involved.

In August he flew to Connecticut for meetings at LeGrand headquarters. It was his first time there and while he was there for a trade show he also got to meet with some of the leaders of the company. He learned about a special project the comapny was finishing called Adorne. A team of 5 employees from the different residential based companies were brought together to combine their products into one product line. There is a youtube video here that shows some of the prodcuts they came up.

While in CT he heard they were likely starting a similar project with their commercial companies and making a new product line. He was interested in this new development but didn't think about it all that much. But in the coming months he realized that he was the company's choice to be the Wattstopper representative on this project. After lots of emails, phone calls, and visits with the VPs of Legrand it was made offical that Tyler would be joining 4 others to begin this special project, which will be based at Legrand's headquarters in Hartford, CT.

He is so excited for this opportunity. It's basically like he's starting a new company and and with his strong entrepreneurial side to him he's in heaven. And I'm in heaven because unlike an actual startup company, we have the backing of Legrand and still get a salary. For the fist time in our marriage he will be working in an office, with normal hours, and much less travel! He officially starts in April and we will be moving in May.

This explanation is getting long so I'll wrap it up for now. That is the details the black and white, I'll have to save my emotions about the big move for another post.

Wedding Weekend

February 15, 2013 - Michael & Annika were married! We flew to AZ very late the night before and got in really late! The kids slept a little bit on the plane but were both wide awake when we got to my parents house. Jackson immediatly ran into Steven's room to get his trains, lugged them into the family room and said, "tada!" Silly boy was crazy at 1 am Florida time. But we eventually put the kids to bed and hung out with the family and Michael before his big day!!

One of my favorite engagement pics

Their wedding was in the morning at the Mesa Temple and it was a beautiful day! They were sealed by Brother Perkinson who also sealed Tyler and me as well as Paige & Ben. He is my good friend, Jill's Grandpa, and Annika had known him from her ward growing up. He performs such an amazing ceremony and the spirit was so strong. I'm grateful to have been able to be there and for Steven and others who watched Jackson and Abbie outside during the event.

Annika was beautiful and Michael didn't look too bad himself :) She was actually wearing the same veil I wore at my wedding which I thought was really cool :)

I really didn't take that many pictures because I was holding Abbie the whole time, so I got these from other family members and friends!

My mom has now thrown two wedding receptions, but this was her first time with a wedding luncheon. They decided on a luncheon rather than a dinner mostly due to the fact that the night before their wedding was Valentines' Day! So we went straight from the temple to Stonebridge Manor for an amazing luncheon!  I should have taken more pictures, Jackson and Abbie were home with a babysitter so I have no excuse really. But I did take a couple. The flowers, food, and location were all perfect. It was a great party!

My place setting

The reception that evening was amazing as well. It was held in Annika's backyard and they had recently redone everything back there and it was so great!

Tented off eating area, colors of gold cream and mint

Driveway where you walked up, sign in table.

Jackson wore his suit and tie all night and looked so handsome

Abbie was in the cutest little dress, but was so crazy all night from lack of sleep!

The only picture I got with his boutonniere, he ripped it off right after

Love these people

How Jackson spent most of the night!

This frame is made of fresh flowers

Cake Cutting!

It was such a great night and so well attended, the place was packed! That's what happens when two kids from the same city get married :)

Thanks for sending me emails, for those who have! I've got to now just plug them all in and the blog should be private in a couple days.

Time to go Private (sorry!)

We just came home from a great weekend in AZ for Michael & Annika's wedding! It was perfect and we are so happy for them! But before I do a post with pictures and details I need to share that we are going Private on our blog.

With lots of hits from Russia (and other countries in which we have no connection) recently it's unsettling with us. Unless a long-lost friend in Russia comes forward with an admittance to checking our blog recently, we will be going private by the end of the month.

I really don't like doing this because I love blogs and being able to keep in touch with family and friends easily but internet safety (especially with our children) is more important.

So please leave your email in the comments, or contact us in any way with your email.

Thanks so much