Random Somethings

For the last few months I've been working out with some friends in the morning who are also young mothers. It has been great for Ryanna because she has learned to interact with other kids and experience what it's like to have a toy or two taken away. Every now and then we also get together with these friends during to day to have lunch or just hang out while the kids play and on several occasions we have gone to McDonald's since the kids enjoy that. Well today I wanted to use some of the free happy meal cards that Brian had from work so we invited Sha and Kenna to lunch(everyone else was out of town or busy). Kenna will turn two in July and Ryanna just LOVES playing with her. She calls her Enna and both girls get so excited when they see each other. Anyway, we had a good time and I got some pictures of the girls playing together.

Kenna loves to give hugs right around the neck. Ryanna didn't mind a bit!

This is the first time that Ryanna has been brave enough to climb up the tree. Usually she watches from a distance but today got in on the action.



Getting up close and personal with the giant flowers. Silly girl.

Spaghetti is probably Ryanna's favorite meal. She likes to feed herself and seems to enjoy the messiness of it all.

Get a good look at that floor because by Monday it will be a beautiful wood laminate. Hooray!


Brian showed up one night with a little kitty who was abandoned by its Mommy. She was really cute but was a newborn and needed special care. I brought it to the shelter the next day. It wasn't eating and seemed really weak.

Look at the curl in her hair! We love it.

This video reminds me of a caveman or cavewoman or cavebaby who is roaming and exploring the land. She is on a quest to find "OWIES" and will try to carry anything around her neck like this belt for example. She's really getting me worried about this whole fettish!

Walking is fun!

Ryanna took her first real step about 5 or 6 weeks ago but only liked to move very short distances on her own. Little by little she has gained more confidence and now walking is her favorite game! You heard me right, she thinks of it like a game more than a mode of transportation. She loves our new home and so do Brian and I. I'll get pictures up as soon as I'm done painting, etc.

So I wanted to note a few other funny things that Ryanna has been doing lately.

#1. Most babies and toddlers grow attached to an object like a blanket, stuffed animal, or a binkie. Well, Ryanna has a fettish for lanyards. You know the things you hang around your neck to attach keys or whatever else to. The blue thing around her neck in the video is a lanyard that our friend Mary let her play with one day. Ryanna has always loved when Mary would hold her and she could yank on, suck on, or try to break whatever large necklace Mary had on that day. Most the time she would tug pretty hard and of course Mary would say "OWIE, please stop that" or "OWIE, please be nice." Ryanna also likes to grab onto my necklace and gets about the same reaction. Well the day that Mary let her play with the lanyard was the day our lives changed. She named it "OWIE" and it has become the item in this world she is most attached to. We've had several near drownings at bath time because I take away her OWIE and she then proceeds to fight heart and soul, screaming OWIE OWIE OWIE. The neighbors are probably calling social services since this has happened more than once. I learned a few days ago to hide the OWIE sometime in the afternoon to avoid such near death experiences. So my child has finally found a comfort object(other than glow baby which she is only allowed to have in her bed) and as luck would have it the object of her choice is a serious choking hazard....is this a sign of things to come. ;)

#2. Ryanna has taken the next step in her language development and repeats many things that I say. She has done this off and on in the past but with little comprehension of what she is saying. Now, however, it is evident that she understands because once she says it she then uses it to communicate with me. This last week she has learned and uses new words like cracker, drink, bed, car, etc. It is easier to know what she wants that is for sure. We have to be careful what we say now more than before because she'll try to repeat us. When we were at the apartment cleaning I opened the fridge and exclaimed "Gross!" The next thing out of her mouth was gross...GROSS!

#3. For a few weeks when it is time to pray we'll tell Ryanna to fold her arms and most of the time she will by tucking both fist up to her chin and sometimes even closing her eyes. The last three or four days though when we say a prayer she'll even make a sound at the end: mmmenn. What a sweet girl.

Well I'm sorry we haven't had much on the blog lately and that we've been bad about returning phone calls and emails. The whole buying a house, renovating it, and moving has been pretty overwhelming but we are almost all settled in now and should be back to normal here soon. HOPEFULLY this is the last move for at least a few years. Did you know we have been married about 4 1/2 years and this is our sixth place! Yeah, we've been insanely transient. It's time to try and plant some roots for a while.

Ryannaisms

The best part of having a toddler around is the completely random things they do. For about a week Ryanna would suck on her thumb and then tip her head back like she was taking a drink, followed by her classic "ahhhhhh...."

Poor little girl really missed her daddy last month when Brian was gone on his business trip. I left out the picture of her with Daddy and she would look at it, jabber to it, hug it, and kiss it. It was so cute I had to share it with all of you.

Finally springtime!!!

After a LONG winter it has been so fun to get out the sunscreen and head to the park with Ryanna. She still loves playing in the grass as much as ever. She also laughs her head off when we push her in the kiddie swing. She even went down every slide!

Hmmmmmmm....I need to give the lawn caretaker some tips!


Glow baby is usually restricted to the crib only but for some reason she had her downstairs this particular day. For about 30 minutes glow baby was chaffered from the kitchen to the living room...back and forth and back and forth.

So a few weeks ago our neice Christy was married in the Salt Lake Temple. Unfortunately Ryanna had an ear infection and her medicine gave her acid poops (sorry folks but it's true). She was miserable most the trip...poor girl. As a result she wore this funny face - nose crinkled, eyebrows scowling....yet she still looks darling with all those spring flowers!!! If you look up close you see the same scrunched up look on Ryanna's face. Still it's a cute family picture. :)
Here is Christy with her husband Bryce Walker. I kept thinking "she's sooo young!" but HELLO she's older than I was when we were married. Life is ironic like that.
This is Brian's dad Lloyd and stepmom Barbara. This was at the family reunion and was Ryanna's first time meeting them. It was interesting because the entire trip she would not go to anyone other than me the whole time....she even refused to be held by Brian! But she went to her Grandpa Baldwin and was happy with him for about half an hour. It was nice to see all the Baldwins!

It's okay if you don't believe me this time but...

...we bought a condo. Okay "bought" is a strong word. We made an offer on a condo and the seller accepted the offer which is a step further than the last time! After our disappointment with the liar liar pants on fire new home developers I saw a new listing for a condo that was listed at $112,000. Of course our first instinct was that it must be a dump for that price but I called anyway. The real estate agent (named Amy) gave the following details: 3 bed, 1 1/2 bath, 2 car garage(not functional, however, since the slope is too steep...our cars bottom out so it's basically glorified storage space), in okay condition, and most importantly "this condo is the last thing to go in my divorce and we just want to get it sold so we can be done with each other." So I said alright we'll come see it. I didn't think Brian would be interested but we went, we saw, we agreed the place has great potential, and he said "see what you can work out." Or something like that. Sooooooooooo we offered 108,000 asking for the seller to pay closing costs. He accepted the offer. Today we negotiated that the seller also pay for all new flooring of my choice and new paint which we will do. That part is not in writing yet but we sure hope it gets in writing because that will be AWESOME! Either way I am planning for all new carpet, possibly replace the kitchen floor with pergo(fake wood) floors, and some kind of new floors in the bathrooms. That's in addition to painting at least the entire downstairs before we move in. I have two VERY savvy friends (you know who you are;) who might as well be interior decorators. They are helping me pick out colors and have a never ending supply of ideas on how to decorate or reinvent a space to make it FABULOUS. That has never been my forte. So the pictures I am posting will serve as the BEFORE pictures. I know you will be amazed when I post the AFTER pictures in a month or two.

Above: We're the second condo in.
Below: Obviously the kitchen. All the stuff on the counter is the samples I picked up at Lowes of carpet, flooring and faux tile options not to mention paint color thingys.
Below: Living room.
Below: Upstairs bath. The washer and dryer hook up are in the downstairs bath. He left the washer and dryer so as long as they still work good we're just going to preserve our washer and dryer for when we buy a real house.
Below: Master bedroom. It's actually very large - hooray.
Below: Bedroom 2. I didn't show the pic of Bedroom 3 because it pretty much is the same thing.
Below: Back patio door. We have a great view into a family's back yard. We'll just pretend it is our yard so we don't feel sad about not having one of our own.
Below: Back view obviously....most of these descriptions are OBVIOUS. I'm hoping they're planning on refinishing the decks this spring but I'm not counting on it.
Playground and pool area - nice touch.


We will officially move into the condo on June 1st though we should own it by May 15th (as long as everything goes through...which we have learned is never guaranteed till the bank says it's a done deal). We'll have at least 2 weeks to finish touching up the condo and then move in as first time home owners. We feel good about this decision because we believe it will be relatively easy to rent out the condo once we're ready to buy a real home. It is located behind the site for the new USU campus...perfect for someday renting. Another selling point for us is that the mortgage will be around or less than what we are now paying for rent. Might as well make our money work for us!

You've heard the saying.....

IF IT SOUNDS TO GOOD TO BE TRUE IT PROBABLY IS.

We've waited a few days to share the NOT so fun news. We were the first family to sign up for the new subdivision with the AMAZING prices on beautiful new homes. It was a deal we just could not pass up even though it would have put us at the top of our budget. Well, the salesman had three families signed up like us. We signed all the dotted lines and the contract then needed to be signed by the "seller"/investors to be binding. He was supposed to fax it to us within 5 business days. He didn't. I left messages asking what the deal was and he responded saying he was working out some kinks but not to worry and he'd be in touch. We repeated this pattern for almost two weeks. Finally he was straight up a few days ago and said, "The investors reviewed the plans and decided the homes need to be marked up....$20,000 - $30,000." We were devastated. NO we can't work with the new pricing. NO we don't understand how this drastic of a change could happen. YES we understand what you're saying and we are no longer even remotely interested. To his credit the guy was practically in tears. He is embarrassed, angry, and humilated but the guys with the money have the last say.

Our final word on this matter is that this subdivision is likely doomed to fail now. This is a rural area and word of mouth is more powerful than any advertising they might do. Besides, Brian and I might not be financially powerful people but we are influential with our ties to the community. Between his job at the school district, my job at the newspaper, his job at the radio station we know and communicate with practically every city, county, and state official. That's not to mention that Brian is active on the chamber of commerce, I run a community program at the library, Brian works with a many area families whose children are students of his program.... the list goes on. So we will not hestitate to share our experience when it comes up.

We would have been really good people to know and to have live in their subdivision. Too bad for them!

Missing my Husband....Blogging is a great distraction!

Well I know some of you have been hoping for a Ryanna update and I have so much to share. Ryanna is really growing and becoming a curious, sweet(sometimes spicy;), and active/walking little girl. Brian is gone this week to a training conference in Salt Lake and I'm already bored and missing him...so what better thing to do than blog about my beautiful daughter!

I brush Ryanna's teeth before bed and after breakfast. This last week I started having her stick out her tongue so I can swipe it a few times with the brush. She now loves to stick her tongue out at me because she knows I'll stick mine out too.

There are two cupboards in the kitchen that Ryanna empties about 5 times a day. One has all the cookie sheets, pizza pans, cutting boards...that kind of stuff. She likes to jabber to herself as she pulls them out and bangs them around. She also loves to sit herself on the pizza pan and use her feet to spin in circles.

She's got a mouthful of teeth now. 12 to be exact and I think another molar is breaking.

Today we got home from visiting Brian at work and Ryanna wanted to watch the kitties while she drank her milk. So I busied myself in the living room and after a while realized I hadn't heard Ryanna banging anything or jabbering. I went in to find her asleep in her high chair - a first for her. Lately she just calms herself down and falls asleep when she's ready. It used to be she had to be lulled to sleep for naps and bedtime. Now though I just read her a certain story, give her a kiss and lay her down with her glow baby, then I leave the room. Life is good!

I was pouring some milk when Ryanna got her hand in the door of the fridge and wanted to explore this colorful world. She didn't pull anything out, just wanted to look I guess.

One of the biggest event of the year is X94's annual easter egg hunt. It was INSANE! There was something like 4,000 or 5,000 people there. I have never seen so much candy in my life. One downer was the weather - windy, rainy, and cold. That didn't stop the thousands of kids from having fun grabbing candy though Ryanna didn't really get the hype. I'm sure next year she'll be all about it.

Here are the oh so talked about dumpster kitties. On this day we hadn't seen them. By dinner time Ryanna was repeating "kitties, kitties" so I thought I'd do something to entice them...so we set some tuna out by the dumpster and the two bravest kitties were grateful for the free dinner.
I can no longer put my hair in a ponytail so on lazy days I have to wear headbands. Ryanna wants to have pretty hair too and steals the headband at her first opportunity. Isn't she pretty!

Let me tell you a little more about our "house" or the promise of a house to be built. I had been keeping a close eye on the market here which unlike many parts of the US has remained strong. It is expected to remain strong long term because of the growing industry in the oil and gas fields but there is no crystal ball to tell us for sure. Just like Brian said I saw a listing online for a new construction home for less than what 20-30 year old homes are listed. We were the first family to sign up and give earnest money for the subdivision. The prices are considerably low for these homes because they need to get the first handfull of families signed up before they can start construction...therefore the lower the price the more enticing to the buyer. Once the first group of homes are built and there are model homes for people to see, the prices will be jacked up for the rest of the subdivision. They are still working out all the details of the construction, etc. so we are just waiting to hear what comes next. We are patient and excited!
Wow - Starting to WALK! This was one of the first times I helped her walk behind her toy...she's pretty wobbly at first.

Little by little Ryanna gained balance and confidence though anytime she'd run into a wall or couch she'd squeal for help. Now she is a pro with her toy walkers. We take them to Daddy's work and she walks all over the big gym. She loves it! Several times I've let go of her and she stands by herself but the second she realizes she is unsupported she sits down and reaches for me. She's physically ready to walk. As soon as she's totally ready I know she'll just take off!

Glow Baby how I love thee - let me count the ways. If your toddler is having a hard time going to sleep by themself try buying a glow baby. This has been the key to Ryanna going to bed smoothly every night. I love whoever invented this toy.

So far Ryanna's vocabulary includes: Mama, Dada, Hi, Bye, Puppy, Kitty, Dough Baby(for glow baby)...that's all I can think of right now. She also uses signs for More, Milk, and All Done. This day she was telling stories about "puppy, puppy."