What's this? A new post? I know my many readers probably thought I've dropped off the face of the earth with this blog, but I'm back after a 3 month hiatus. I've been meaning to write, but good intentions don't count for much without any action behind them. As the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Not that I think I'm on my way to hell by any means, but I do believe that good intentions don't always amount to much. Actions speak louder than words and all that. And that's enough cliches for this post.
Even after 3 months I don't have much to update or write about. I think it's because I wait so long that I forget all the things I want to write about before I get around to doing it. Of course, if I wait 3 months before I get around to it I'm forgetting 3 months of stuff. It's not even like I've been that busy--my summer was actually really relaxing and enjoyable. I had a full 2 weeks off from my job at the end of June/beginning of July, and for most of the summer I was home 2-3 days a week with Charlotte, so I can't even use the excuse of being busy. Just lazy. Seriously though, it was great to have a semi-lazy summer after my first year at my job. Charlotte and I went to the pool and the beach a lot during the days, and with Eric some evenings and weekends. It was the perfect summer to have a pool pass.
We have been a little busy getting used to be home owners and everything that that entails. We took out a few of our hideous bushes (if you don't know, I am not a shrubbery person overall, I prefer either flowers/vegetable gardens or trees, most bushes/shrubs I think are pretty ugly, and the previous homeowners let a lot of them get out of control which made them worse). It's amazing how much more open our yard looks with some of them gone. There are a few more we want to take out but they are more similar to trees in that their roots are more like trunks and impossible to just pull out so we need to look into that more. This past weekend we painted 3 rooms in one day, which was a ton of work and a very long day, but now we finally have color on the walls! That was one of the things I was looking forward to most about having our own house, after living in apartments for 5 years with white/beige walls. Yuck. Our living room and dining room have accent walls painted so we just left those. We painted the kitchen, which previously was a weird bold yellow/almost gold color that just didn't fit and we really didn't like it. The new color is "crisp celery" and it's a lighter green color. It feels very natural and comfortable and light in there now which I love. I'm really happy with it, especially since it was very difficult to pick a color for that room. Eric and I struggled with that room and the bedroom, but we easily picked a bathroom color which is a very pretty blue and goes well with our "under the sea" theme. Really, I just put my many killer whale figurines in there and it all looks great. My favorite room is actually the one that I felt like I was really compromising on, our bedroom. Eric loved the color purple we picked, and I liked a different color, and there was a different blue we both felt like we could compromise on, but I figured if I was going to compromise either way we might as well go with the one that he at least liked, so we went with purple and I love it! I can't believe how happy I am with it, every time I go in there I just feel happy. It looks amazing.
Of course, this painting coincided with Charlotte's 2 year birthday party (do I really have a 2 year old?) so we were even busier on Saturday than just with the painting. It was our own fault since we are poor planners and planned to buy our paint over Labor Day weekend when they had a good sale, so we put paint samples all over the walls to pick what we wanted and then realized we were having people over. So we just committed to the kitchen and then had enough help to do the rest. Thanks again to my family for being so awesome and helping out! For the party on Sunday, we had about 40 people over so it was a little crazy but super fun. She was just adorable as usual and was so excited about her gifts and her cake and ice cream. We just made the cake but just the fact that she got cake and ice cream was a dream come true to her. Eric and I got her a cozy coupe. It was a joy to watch her as she saw it and realized it was for her. She saw it and immediately jumped out of her chair to go play with it. Made my day, which was amazing to start with. Even after 2 years I'm continually amazed by her and the things she does. She can sing the abc's, count to 7, talks like a child much older than she is, repeats everything we say, is very affectionate, and a little mischievous. We have a lot of fun with her.
Other than that, work has been going well, it's really starting to pick up now that school has started again. I spent a ton of time this summer preparing for the year so I hope I'm ready! I feel like I still have a lot of work to do but I have a good chunk of time at work the next couple of weeks so I'm hoping I can finish up with any of my "summer" projects that I have left. Some of them are really ongoing throughout the year but I want to be as prepared as I can. I'm really excited about the year and I hope my passion and excitement are contagious to the youth and my leaders.
It's a little bit funny that the past few weeks have been so busy and I'm finally writing a new post. I guess I really just was lazy this summer. It was a great summer, but now it's time to get back into the swing of things!
