Midweek Ramblings...

Another Wednesday and the end of the work week....well it would be but John no longer has weekends and my work never ends.... so....it is just a Wednesday here! 


Some ramblings of thoughts from this week....

• I have also been looking back to last year at this time and am amazed at how much as changed.....last year we knew we were moving but couldn't tell anyone yet, we had a one week old baby, John was spending his paternity leave doing errands/inventory and getting us ready to leave the country in nine weeks and I was trying to recover! Hard to believe that we are about nine weeks away from our one year anniversary in Saudi! I have lived here for almost a year! I remember the time from when Graham was born to when we announced our move to when we left as flying by! Crazy....where life takes you and how much can change!
• I am starting to wean Graham from bottles. He only gets three a day anyways so I was hoping it would be easy. We have gotten off the morning one and I know I should start the afternoon one soon but it is so easy to avoid this....the before bed one....I am dreading that one!
• Peyton's imagination is so much fun. She is always pretending to be something else and insists you call her by her new name...sometimes it is Cat Bones Cat, Fluffy the Dog or the other day she was Penny from the movie Bolt and I was Penny's mom. Also, when we are on vacations and I forget to bring books we do "pretend stories" before bed time. They are always hilarious! She gives me a topic, helps name the characters along the way and we both have fun. Lately even when we are home she requests "pretend stories" and we have had some interesting ones! 
• Graham needs to learn how to walk....he is killing my back and is so heavy! I think with a little more determination he could but he thinks it is funny to stand up and fall down.
• Speaking of things Graham thinks are funny...he thinks it is hilarious to tackle me! Seriously! I am laying in the floor relaxing and he crawls over, leading with his head (or helmet if we were playing football) and tackles me and he laughs uncontrollably. He has a pretty powerful punch for a 12 month old. He might just be our little linebacker!
• Peyton has her first ballet performance next week! I am so excited! She has been doing amazing in going to ballet and school unlike before mostly due to a sticker reward system which honestly has made life so much easier in the mornings with school and with ballet. I might do a post about that and our chore chart later, both has helped tremendously with giving her responsibility for her actions in an age appropriate way.
• We have been walking to school pretty much everyday which has been nice. Her school is probably as far you can get from our house but we don't live on that big of a camp and so it is a long but nice walk. It takes me about 20 minutes and gets me moving in the mornings and Graham and I walk back along the beach which is always a nice way to start your day.
• We are day 14 into the turnaround...and we are doing pretty well. The days are long sometimes but we are managing and it has gone better than expected. I am tired though and it is hard to go to bed early because by the time I get the kids to sleep, clean up...then John gets home and I want to talk to him. So we talk and then I get to the other things I wanted to do that night and then I realize it is late. I need to get to bed earlier because we do have long days and I need my sleep but it is hard to choose what to let go. I do know that the cleanliness of my house needs to slid. I was crazy cleaning and staying on top of things last week because of Graham's party and I knew I wouldn't have a chance to do a four hour cleaning spree so now that the party is done I can be a little more lax and give myself a break.
• We are busy researching and thinking about different vacation destinations for the year which is exciting. Once we get final approval for our vacation in May and I can book it finally, then I will post details about that! I am pretty excited about it! And also about possible trips in October and December. Lots of fun and I feel pretty blessed that our biggest struggle with all of it is picking a place to go!
• This weekend we have a parade and carnival on camp supporting all the groups that meet and that is about it. I am going to try to be more purposeful with our Friday because last week it was a long, boring and very unproductive day. The hardest part by far with John's new work schedule has been the weekends because our friends are with their families and it is hard to find things to do! But this week will be different!