Hello everyone. Whew. We are finally catching our breath. The HGTV people have left, so we are now the proud owners of a beautiful home. We really really love everything they did. Roxanne likes it, too. There's going to be a pretty serious learning curve since we don't know how to take care of all our gorgeous new plants, but we're working on it. And between my sister and my grandma, we have some fantastic family advisers. So far, we've been watering diligently, but the plants are still looking a little droopy. Sigh. Maybe this weekend we'll venture somewhere to ask questions about things like fertilizer... Kim, from the show, suggested that we use some "weed and seed" on our yard, so we are going to look into that, too. Our yard is pretty heavy on the clover.
Roxanne is basically a teenager these days. She talks and talks and talks and says the weirdest/funniest things. Here's some quotes from recent days that I want to have written down (I figure Justin can use them for her wedding speech):
"Mommy, you have a big head. I'm going to squeeze it and make it a little head."
this is followed by some energetic squeezing of my face/head. she also does the same routine to Justin."I just need chocolate for breakfast."
when I say we don't have chocolate for breakfast, she says: "I just need a cookie for breakfast."
if she's really determined by this point, she'll list out cupcakes and ice cream, etc., like maybe it's not that she can't have desert for breakfast, she just hasn't hit the right one."Be careful Daddy!"
yelled loudly every time Justin leaves the house to go anywhere.She's a very busy little bee, and is wonderful at entertaining herself. She is starting to want to stay at Ben's or Josh's houses at the end of the work day, and I think she is just getting super attached to them. She just seems very social, and likes having people over at our house, although any time there are more than three or four people here, she expects cake. On Monday, we had people over for our HGTV party, and towards the end, she came barreling through the living room going "where's the birthday cake Mommy? I need birthday cake!" Sigh. Lest you think we feed her sweets constantly, she also eats a lot of fruit, and a few types of veggies. She likes carrot sticks, but I think because Justin taught her to gnaw at them and say "what's up doc?" like Bugs Bunny. Not that she has ever seen Bugs Bunny... But she thinks it's funny to say that.
She loves loves loves music and singing. She likes to make up little songs to narrate whatever she's doing, and they are really funny. She also likes to draw and paint. Ben has an easel at his house, and she loves to draw on it for long stretches. Especially the dry erase side. Our big battle is keeping the markers at the easel. She tends to want to carry them around (open) and accidentally marks on stuff. She also wraps them up in the washcloths used to wipe the board down and says they are little babies. She is obsessed with wrapping herself and/or other things up in blankets or towels.
Her favorite new activity is swimming. She loves her little baby pool, but now that we've started going to a few "big" pools, she asks pretty constantly to go to the "big pool." We really wanted to join the pool in our neighborhood, but it's just too expensive. There are other pools that aren't too far that are much cheaper. Maybe next year we can join the neighborhood pool so that we could go sometimes on week nights. That would be awesome! And apparently it's a great place to meet neighbors. There is a neighborhood barbeque this weekend, so we plan to go and try to meet a few people. We've met a few people during this HGTV process, which has been nice. So far, people have all been complimentary about the house (phew) and seemed patient with all of the activity.
We hope you are all doing well and having a nice summer!
Roxanne LOVES helping these days. She loves to do grown up stuff with us, and Justin decided to let her help with the laundry down in the basement. He got these photos of her down there. I say we keep this trend going. :)
She's a busy thing.
Eating delicious cupcakes with the birthday girl.
Riding Evie's bike.
She's telling me something important here.
Checking things out.
"Give me the camera, mama!"
Her portrait of the birthday girl.
With the help of sunlight, Roxanne actually caught a real picture. And who doesn't love the pictures of someone else taking a picture?? Classic.
This red light was coming off the camera. I have no idea how she managed to catch this, but it's cute.
This is such a cute angle. She sometimes forgets that she has to turn the camera away from her, hence all of the close up self portraits.
Right after throwing a fit and being rewarded by getting the camera. Mom of the Year. That's me. See those crocodile tears??? 
I love her little shadow, and her toe. This was at the party
Again, at Evie's party. She always tells me she loves her red sandals.
This is me and Justin. There's something kind of adorable about this "portrait" of us. Like, this is from Roxanne's viewpoint... If you were to pan up, we were smiling nicely and saying cheese for her, but this was the result. Awesome. Oh, it was also taken at Evie's party.
Here's Roxanne, all dressed for "watering" the new plants. :)
She loves that watering can. 
Aren't her little water shoes so cute?
She's probably sassing me here. She's always sassing me...
Watering the grass.
She's showing Justin a green pepper she picked off our new pepper plant. She actually ate most of it!
What happens when Roxanne decides to put her bathing suit on with no help.
I think this is kind of a good look for her.
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