I officially suck at blogging. If you haven't noticed, I don't think I have put anything up here in weeks. I guess the initial excitement of the blog wore off and I was onto the next cool thing. Which, in case you are curious, was Facebook. I thought it was so cool to find these people from my past (high school, college). That has worn off to and now it is just another pain in the ass thing to do.
All is well and I am getting ready to take the kids (by myself) to Maui to celebrate Tutu's 90th birthday. I think it is finally sinking in that Max is not going. I don't think Luke and Mia realize it and I don't think I will bring it up. They will miss their Daddy - I will too.....
Wish me luck on the plane!

I need to get better at putting stuff up here - it has been a while. Nini is doing well and the good news is she passed her written drivers test (only took 4 tries). Wednesday she takes her actual driving test - I hope she gets someone nice!
On Sunday she took our little Ford Focus for a drive to North Bend. About 10 minutes after she left I got a phone call from her. She had gotten pulled over. She tried to explain to me why she got pulled over but I wasn't understanding so I got on the phone with the police officer. I guess there is a law that if a officer has someone pulled over on the right and there are two lanes you have to get over to the far left lane when passing the officer. I did not know that! News to me. On top of it, the officer told her the windows were illegally tinted (too dark). Oops!
I can just imagine that the officer thought it was some teenage kid passing him in their "hot ride". It must have been some surprise to walk up and have a sweet girl from Thailand looking confused! Luckily she got no ticket!

Funny things kids say

We are enjoying a stretch of beautiful fall weather - the days have been perfect. This means that the kids are playing outside a ton! Today, I think Luke was in the house for maybe a total of 2 hours - he had a playdate with Nini and Mia at a neighbor's house this morning. This is a neighbor who also has an AuPair (from Germany) who Nini has started a friendship with. It works out well because they have 4 kids, two of which are close to Luke and Mia's age. Anyway, they played at their house for the morning, came home and had lunch. Mia went down for her nap then Luke and Nini went outside to play on scooters. I don't think Luke came in the house once after that until dinner time! He is in heaven. He plays with his scooter and all the neighborhood kids - Mia has fun too. Nini pulls her around in the wagon and she gets out when she wants. What a life!

Some of the things I am enjoying about our decision to get an Au Pair are:

• A LOT less laundry for me - Nini takes care of the kids' clothes


• Luke and Mia get to play with the other kids


• I have time to relax when I get home - less rushed!


• I don't have to load kids in the car in the morning (or at night)


• We are spending a lot less on gas since I drive the little car to work


• We are spending WAY less on child care

All great things....

To end this, here is a funny "observation" from Luke. He and Mia bathe together every night - the other night he said "Mia doesn't have a penis - she just has a butt.....". I did not correct him.

Have a great night!

Getting adjusted

I have not had a chance to put anything up here lately - mainly because I was hoping to have some cute and witty story to tell. Alas, all I have is regular life! We had a fun weekend and it seemed very normal which tells me how easy it has been to have Nini join our family.
On Monday, Max stayed him with a touch of the flu that everyone seems to have gotten. He called me around 1:00 to say what a good job Nini is doing. She was outside playing with Luke (riding scooters) while Mia napped. Everything was under control - phew! In fact, if I don't call her to check in, she probably would not call me!

Today Nini made Thai food for the kids' lunch. She said Luke loved it but Mia wouldn't touch it. Oh well, sounds like the same experience I have when I cook!

At the end of every day Luke is totally exhausted. We need to either have him take a nap or just move bedtime up to an earlier hour. Any suggestions??

Have a good night!

We made it

It is Friday night and it seems as if we made it through our first 3 days with Nini and the kids staying at home. I left the house today at 8:00 with both kids smiling and waving. That was nice. I got no phone calls which meant (to me) that things must be okay. I checked in around 11 and everyone was doing well. As Nini says "things were very nice".
Nini put Mia down for a nap successfully and sent Luke off to play at the neighbors. She called me to make sure it was okay, which was nice. When I arrived home, they (L, M and N) were playing with all the neighborhood kids. All I could think was "we made it". No major issues, tantrums or injuries!!!

I must say that it is nice to just come home to a clean house with all the kid's laundry done. They are here, happy and enjoying the neighborhood fun. We are happy with the decision we made. I am not fooling myself - I know there will be other rough days ahead. That will happen no matter what.

Success story of the night - Nini took the car by herself and met another Au Pair at Starbucks. She was happy to get out and we got the house to ourselves. Hooray!

I am off to put Mia to bed - by the way, she is singing "happy birthday to you" all the time. Cutest thing in the world!

thanks to everyone for listening to me talk about this stuff!!!!

A better day...

Today was a much better day (at least so far) for the group at home. Luke had pre-school this morning so was dropped off at our neighbors house at 8:00. Cynthia (our neighbor) was nice enough to offer to drop off and pick up Luke for the first few weeks - what a help that is! As I drove off this morning, Mia and Nini headed into the house to start their day.
I did not get one call from them - I checked in around 11:00 and they were out enjoying the fresh air.
Nini called me at 12:30 - Luke had come home from school, eaten a huge lunch and seemed to be happy. Mia went down for a nap and all sounds good.
Phew - I can actually focus on work a bit today.

A new adventure

Well, I figured it was time for me to find a way to document all of the crazy things that go on in my life. What better way then to keep a diary of sorts on the web! I know I have enjoyed reading the blogs that others do - maybe someone would enjoy reading about what goes on in our house.
So the big news is that we have a new person living in our house - an Au Pair. We decided that we wanted the kids to be able to be home during the day and not be rushed around with us. We were feeling bad as every day was get up, get dressed, get in the car, drop off at daycare, pick up at daycare, get home, make dinner - you can figure out the rest. We were also getting tired of paying so much money - our daycare was worth the high cost but it was making things tough financially.
Anyway, after talking with friends who had decided to get an Au Pair we decided to go for it. We ended up matching with a girl from Thailand - her name is Nini. She is really sweet and totally capable of caring for Luke and Mia. It is just the initial adjustment that is hard.
I went to work today for the first time (she got here Thursday night and it is Wednesday). She called me a few times and I called her. Luke was not being cooperative at all - he tested her to no end. I thought I would come home to her in tears but she was not - she is obvisouly strong and wants to do well. I just hope tomorrow is a better day and that we made the right decision.