What a stretch. Here's what's been going on:
1. We're having another baby!
2. We're very much settled into our new place.
3. We switched capo groups.
4. The kids are insane.
5. Friends at church.
6. School.
Some thoughts on these:
1.
We're having another baby! Surprise! While the news hit in sort of a strange way at first, we're very excited about this. There are a lot of things you just don't think about anymore as the kids get a little older (and especially when you think you've seen the last pregnancy), and it's honestly nice to remember them again. It'll be a whole whirlwind experience, especially with the couple of crazies we already have running around here, but it's getting more and more exciting as it gets more real (Julie has started to show, she's out of first trimester, so feeling much much better; things are kind of hitting a groove). Too bad Julie gave away at least most of her maternity clothes... But we'll get her some new ones.
With this, however, comes an issue we had been (somewhat) avoiding: we have a minivan, but it's kind of a mini-minivan, in that it doesn't actually have trunk space when the seats are in. Now, this isn't a big deal right now, as we only need two seats in. However, once #3 comes along, the convenience of leaving one or two seats out of the van is no longer an option. Thus, we are on the market for a new (bigger) van, and very much hoping to find a nice Odyssey. We'll see how this goes.
2.
I think the last time I posted, we were living in our old place. Luckily for us, we happened to have just moved into a 3-bedroom place. We had not honestly been looking too seriously at 3-bedroom places, as they're generally quite a bit more expensive, but this place kind of fell into our laps. Now, I've moved a lot. A lot a lot. And when you've been looking for a new place and move into one, you're usually still in that rhythm of looking at available places, so you end up doing some comparing (whether you want to or not), and, inevitably, you see places that are just a bit nicer that you will "keep in mind for the next time we're moving." Not this time. This place is great. It's a very small development, it's filled with kids (young kids, at that), there are three playgrounds, it has three bedrooms for the price of our old 2-bed place, it's very close to work/school, it's not on some busy street, and it's some 30% bigger than our old place... All in all, the only thing this place is missing is continuous counter space. It's not that there isn't space, it's just distributed strangely. But Julie says she doesn't mind, and it certainly affects her more than the rest of us, so no worries. One day in the not-too-distant future, we'll buy a house and I'll make sure she has the most amazing kitchen ever. But for now, we'll take our almost perfect place for sure. Thanks, God, for another quick blessing.
I'm not sure if I've posted this before, but Julie has this amazing ability to turn a place into a home so fast that you wouldn't believe it. I know the kids help with that, too (because what makes a place feel homey quite like seeing your kids play in it?), but she just has all these little touches that make a place warm and comfortable. Incredible.
3.
We switched capo groups. There's really not much to say about this one. While living in GR, it made a lot of sense to train in GR. Now that we're in Kalamazoo, it makes a lot of sense to train in Kalamazoo. If our group in GR was particularly close-knit or super advanced or something, we may have considered trying to make that work. But, as it happens, the GR group seems to be "going through some changes," AKA one group that is relatively isolated is more or less becoming two smaller groups that are relatively isolated, and there was a rather large exodus at the top, so what remains is a handful of noobs, one instructor who is the same level as we are (which then doesn't push you forward, really), and one unlikely guy who finds himself teaching classes that, while they may be okay for said noobs, don't have much to offer us that we haven't seen a few hundred times. The group was quite strong before the exodus, but people are growing up and going out and getting married and starting careers (instead of jobs), and doing big things. So when the majority of the talent and instruction leave, what remains has to adjust, or it gets shelled out (look what happened to Flint when GM left). So, we switched groups. CDO is closely related to Mandinga, and the politics of switching aren't too elaborate, especially since the CM for our old group "grew up" training with the Profesor of the K-Zoo group. No big deal.
4.
The kids are insane. Fact.
Tristan is ridiculous with some of the things he says (and knows). In the car, the other day, he told Julie that Lucy had two Xs, but he had an X and a Y. When asked to explain, he said it was because he was a boy and Lucy's a girl. Chromosomes. He's talking about chromosomes. Why not?
Lucy is at that point where she's able to show all the stuff she's learning more easily. She has learned the letter sounds, and she's begun to recognize what some of them look like. If Tristan has his druthers, she'll be singing the alphabet song with him by this time tomorrow. Well, maybe not this time, as they'll be asleep, but something close. She's just smart enough to do it, too.
I think I better cut this section short, because it could quickly become very very long. Let's just stick with the original statement: the kids are insane.
5.
We made some friends at church. They're a young couple (I think two years older than us) who have two kids: a boy, who is a few months older than T, and a girl, who is a few months younger than Lu. They're also an interracial couple (he's white, she's Japanese), so their kids look an awful lot like ours. More than that, they act the same. We went to their place for a cook-out, and when Tristan walked into their kids' room, he just stopped dead and said, "they have my bed!" They have the same bed as he does, the same letter mat, a train set, tools, and they just play in much the same way as T and Lu do. It's pretty remarkable. Kai, their boy, is in the same room in Sunday school as Tristan, and Sakura, their girl, is in with Lucy, so they seem to have fun. Well, Tristan and Kai do, for sure. Lucy and Sakura are still at that age where what they really want is Momma. They love to play together, but only if they know their Mommas are nearby.
We were driving past a KIA dealer the other day, and Tristan pointed out that they spelled Kai wrong. I had no idea what he was talking about, and then he pointed. When I realized he was talking about the KIA dealer, I about lost it. Hilarious.
6.
School. This was a big week, school-wise. Two homework assignments, an exam, and covering my advisor's class while he was in France. There were a few late nights in there, but now all of it's over, and, as an added bonus, I have no exam on the calendar for either class, and neither class has homework due next week. Translation: a weekend off. I'll do some research still, but this is nice.
Well, that's it for now. Hopefully I'll manage to post again soon.
