We've Moved!

About a month ago, we left our home in Carrollton, Texas and relocated to Aurora, Illinois. Dallas to Chicago - a big move for us! Robert was offered a promotion with the condition that he would have to relocate. We happily accepted and now we're in a new place. Moving was a big headache and we had some hiccups selling our home in Texas (including a check that the title company mailed to Aurora, Colorado instead of Illinois), but things are smoothing out now. 

Our house in Carrollton, Texas

Good-bye Texas!

I have to remind myself to not say Ill-i-noise. Emily keeps telling me that it's "just like Texas here!" The weather hasn't been "just like Texas" here; seems like the high temperature has only been 80 degrees instead of 95+. Robert loves his new job and the company car that came with it. We've made friends and started sightseeing. We're working on getting licensed for foster care in Illinois. 

Hello Illinois!
We had a family picnic the first night in our new place.

All in all, we are sad to leave our friends in Texas, but we are very happy with the way life is turning out for us in Illinois.

Zoo Animal Profile Cards

Guys. Seriously. Sometimes I am just awesome/crazy. We received passes to the Dallas Zoo for Christmas and I decided that it would be a fun learning opportunity. So I made cards for each kind of animal at the zoo. And laminated maps. 

We are going to be learning all kinds of things over here! Like what a rock hyrax is and what reticulated means.

 And did you know there is more than one kind of zebra?! Yep.

Our plan is to see every animal at the Dallas Zoo before the year is up. We'll put stickers on the cards of the animals that we've seen. 

Lest you think I'm too awesome, I did not do the research for the cards. I totally copy-and-pasted all of the information from the Dallas Zoo's website. But I DID do some really sweet formatting. Here are the files:

Mammals
Birds
Reptiles and Amphibians
Invertebrates

I printed them out on cardstock using my home printer, laminated them and then cut along the lines. I'm thinking about punching holes in the cards and putting them together on a ring. But it might be handy to have them separate. We'll have to see what works best for us.

I hope you enjoy them!

P.S. The Dallas Zoo has an iPhone app! I wanted actual cards for my 4-year-old who is more tactile, but the app is really cool too. You can find all of the same animal info on the app. On each profile page, you can click on the "Map" button and it will show you exactly where in the zoo that animal is located. The app also lists the schedule of events for the day. And it has an awesome "Friend Finder" You get a PIN number and your friend gets a PIN. You share your PINs with each other and the Friend Finder lets you see your friends each others location on the map for 24 hours. Neato!

P.P.S. After looking at the map, I just noticed that the zoo's list of animals is incomplete. Where is the info for the koalas? Emus? Lorikeets? Red crowned crane? The app map says there are camel rides, but the one printed from the websites doesn't say anything about camels. Do you have camels or not?! I need to know!! What about the koi and owls I've seen in the Children's Zoo? Not having complete information drives me crazy! Obviously. I might be sending the zoo an email. Time for an update people!

PBS Remixed

Isn't PBS the best? Everyone I know has at least one past or current PBS favorite. And now I want to introduce you to PBS Remixed! First, let's start with the fabulous Mister Rogers singing "Garden of Your Mind".

Now you NEED to watch Bob Ross performing "Happy Little Clouds". This is Emily's favorite. I think she likes watching him paint. Who doesn't?

Next up, good ol' LeVar Burton from Reading Rainbow.

Didn't that make your day better?

Arts and Crafts

I have decided that crafting is therapeutic. It's something that is just for me. An activity that doesn't have anything to do with my identity as a wife, a mother or any of my other roles. This is Alicia stuff only! And I'm going to start sharing my art-ing and crafting here. You can be sure that whatever groovy things you might see here, I've got lots of other struggles (see my post about keeping it real).

Let's begin with my crafting bio. Generally, I'm a Recipe Follower, meaning I'm not usually creative on my own, but I do great if I'm following someone else's example, especially if it comes with instructions or a tutorial. I like re-purposing, upcycling, making things for my daughter, crocheting, and most recently, paint-by-numbers. I usually craft after Emily "I-have-to-touch-everything-even-if-you-just-told-me-not-to" is in bed. I find it relaxing, but stimulating in an oxymoronic way.

Here is my latest creation:

(Don't you just love the toddler easel? The belly photo bomb was an awesome bonus!)

This particular piece of art started out as a crappy painted canvas board from the thrift store. I bought it (and a couple others) with the optimistic idea that I could just paint over the original amateur art and reuse it. I scrolled through my DIY and Crafts board on Pinterest and found a couple of projects I wanted to do. These were my inspiration: 

Source

Source

Originally, I was planning to make it look more like the first idea, so I bought primary colored paint, but the more I looked at the second idea, the more I liked the metallic gold underneath. So, for better or for worse, I combined the ideas.

I used Folk Art acrylic paint and your run-of-the-mill painters tape. I painted over the original painting with about 4 layers of metallic gold. This didn't cover as flawlessly as I would have liked. It was a little streaky. Next time, I'll try spray paint.

I was pretty random with my tape placement, but I did try to make sure to press it down securely so the paint wouldn't leak underneath. I wanted an overall metallic shine to the piece so I mixed each color with some of the gold. I wish the photo reflected the shininess better. 

Next time I think I'll try using thinner tape. I'm also thinking about trying one with black lines and making it look like stained glass. Wouldn't that be cool?!

Picture of the Day

I love her face. My sweet girl. 

Picture of the Day

Emily sleeping on the floor in the middle of a mess of books and animals. What a life. :)

Keeping It Real

First, read this: http://dugansincahoots.com/2014/01/23/we-cant-be-friends/

My dear friends, I can GUARANTEE you that my house will be a mess when you come to visit. I like to keep it real. Nope. That's not true. I would prefer to have my house look clean and well decorated all the time, you know, like in BH&G, just so I could enjoy it. But I just can't keep up with that kind of lifestyle. I would go insane. And my family probably would too. So, I try to adjust my expectations of myself, and pretend that I like to keep it real. I was sick for more than half of January, so things have definitely started to slide around the here. Here's what it looks like right now, this very minute.

Part of me says, "Eek!" Another part of me says, "Are you crazy sharing this mess with the whole world?" Yet another part of me wants everyone to know what my average, everyday house looks like because I have a feeling that if we all saw each other's everyday houses, we wouldn't spend so much time stressing about what everyone else thinks.

So my living room (and all the other rooms in my house) is a mess. But do you know what else I see? Victories. Wins. See that pile of laundry on the couch? Sure, it's not folded and my husband's work shirts are getting all wrinkled and the socks are getting lost in the nether regions of the couch......but it's clean laundry gosh darn it! WIN. See all those books on the bookshelves? I have a family that loves reading. WIN. And the bookshelves have only been in that spot for a couple of weeks and my three-year-old has yet to take the books down or mess them up. WIN. See the laptop open on the ottoman? That means that it's quiet time and my daughter is actually staying in her bedroom for once. WIN. Now, see this pile of puzzles in the playroom?

This means that a couple of days ago, when all I could do was sit on the couch and eat rice cakes, Emily actually played by herself for a little while. WIN - with her that's a HUGE WIN actually. And now that I feel better, she has given me the opportunity to remind her that we clean up after ourselves. WIN. 

In so many ways, my life is messy. But maybe I can keep reminding myself to see the "wins" and posts like the link above will remind both of us that our messes help us keep it real and that's what we're really looking for isn't it? REAL friends with REAL lives and REAL messes. Keep it real, my friends. Keep it real.

Our Adoption Profile

Our profile has been approved and published! Wooooohoooo!! Check it out.. I can't even think of what else to say. It's such a relief to have it done and out there for birth parents to see. Now all that's left is for us to wait for someone to contact us. If you know of anyone who might want to place their baby for adoption, we would very much appreciate your recommendation. Contact us at robertandaliciaadopt@gmail.com.

Winter

I'm back! Here's a summary of the last two months:

We had a great Christmas visiting family in Oklahoma. I can't even remember what we did for New Year's, so it must have been mediocre. I spent most of January helping a friend sell some of her things on eBay. Honestly, it's been a lot more work than I anticipated, but I'm glad I can help her out. We've also been completing adoption training and finalizing our profile. And we finally finished! All that is left is for the case worker to approve it and publish it to the website. When I called the LDS Family Services office to make sure all of our paperwork was in order, I told the secretary that I felt like there should be some sort of fanfare or applause soundtrack when you get everything done. We've been working on our application for TWO years. I'm confident that the timing is right though. Somewhere out there, there is a woman who doesn't know what to do. She's pregnant, but for one reason or another, she knows she can't give her child the life he/she deserves. She's looking at the adoption profiles, hoping that she'll find the right couple, that she'll know she's making the right choice. And she'll find Robert and Alicia, and she'll know that this is the family that her child belongs to. And it will be the beginning of a great family relationship for everyone.

As soon as our profile is published, I'll post the link here and y'all can start sharing!

Christmas Tree

I was really late getting the tree up, so I didn't really feel like getting the ornaments out. I told Emily to go find things to hang on the tree and its become quite the collection. So far we have: a stuffed blue elephant, a green stacking cup, baby Jesus, an old remote, a broken calculator, a Happy 1st Anniversary card that I meant to send to my brother and sister-in-law more than two years ago, and a couple real ornaments. I can't wait to see what else she puts on it. 

Hot and Cold

I'm either hot or cold with blogging. In case you weren't sure, I'm cold right now. I have some totally amazing posts about our trip to Philly in November, but they aren't ready to post yet and I can't find any time to finish them. One day. Hang in there with me, friends.

Fun in Philly - Day 10, Thursday

November 14

Carrie took Emily to Wawa (a gas station) for what Carrie called "hot drinks" (hot chocolate for Emily and coffee for Carrie) and donuts. Then they went to the park and had a "picnic". Emily came back buzzed from the adventure (and probably all the sugar).

We ended the day by playing Scrabble on Papa's bed. The challenge of the game was to make sure Emily didn't rearrange letters on the board when no one was looking. I had a great time. I love playing games, especially with my family.

Fun in Philly - Day 9, Wednesday

Today most of our fun was in Philadelphia.

Papa had a doctor's visit in the University City part of Philadelphia, so we figured we'd all go together and have some adventures. My sister Carrie lives downtown, so we picked her up, and then went to a Korean restaurant for lunch.

I don't know that I've ever had Korean food before, and this stuff was AMAZING! I think the place was called Giwa, near Rittenhouse Square. It was a tiny place, you could maybe sit 20 people, and it was packed. Carrie had been there before so she ordered for everyone.

She came back with a couple bottles of water and this stuff:

"Aloe vera juice with pulp bites." In my experience, aloe is something you use to soothe burns, so it was a little strange to be drinking it. It's a sweet, smooth (ok, it was slimy but that's not really an appetizing word) juice and then all the sudden you'll get a chunk of something, the "pulp bites". If you know that they are coming it's not too bad. We got Emily to try it. She was not a fan of the chunks. A couple sips was enough for me.

Then our food was ready. It's called bibimbop, which is fun to say. Sort of like "Francisco".

It came in steaming hot metal (maybe stone?) bowls, piled high with vegetables (carrots, bean sprouts, baby corn, lettuce, red bell peppers, spinachy stuff, red cabbage, mushrooms), rice in the bottom and some beef in the middle. Hot hot hot! I'm pretty sure the veggies were raw when I first got the bowl, but they were perfectly cooked by the time everything was cool enough to eat. The meat was probably marinated, but I don't think there was any seasonings or sauce on it. It did come with a little bowl of red sauce. It was pretty spicy so I only put a little on and the whole bowl was AMAZING. Warmed my whole body up. So so so good. I ate the whole thing, but was surprised that I didn't feel stuffed. Maybe because there were so many vegetables. Oh it was good. If it didn't involve a ridiculous drive into the city, I would go get more right now. Maybe I can figure out how to make something similar at home. Did I mention how delicious it was?

Emily, with her boring toddler palate, had a bowl of plain white rice. And water. Prison food. Whatever. We tried to get her to taste everything. No dice.

We had parked in a garage next to the restaurant. We had to pay $28. To park in a crappy garage for an hour and a half! Instead of talking about how outrageous it was to pay that much, we called it "part of the experience."

We dropped Grammy and Papa off at his doctor's appointment and then had two or three hours to kill. We walked around for a little bit and then ended up at the University of Pennsylvania bookstore.

We walked around the store, read books and stopped in at the cafe. I got the peppermint hot chocolate (which was good but not as good as QuikTrip's) and Carrie got an eggnog latte (which smelled like burnt egg nog, but she said it was delicious). Emily had a gigantic sugar cookie with red sugar sprinkled on top. Definitely not prison food.

We picked up Grammy and Papa, dropped off Carrie at work and started on our way back to Royersford. At 4:30 pm. On a weekday. At rush hour. Ugh. It took at least two hours to drive 33 miles. I'm glad I wasn't driving. As a bonus, Emily slept almost the whole way.

Reading with Papa was a fun way to end the day.

Fun in Philly - Day 3, Thursday

November 7

Emily and I have been sharing a full-sized bed. She's had a hard time going to sleep, but once she does it's not too bad. I kind of like having her little body snuggled up next to me. Except that by morning she's hogging the whole bed. As you can see, she generously left me 1/4 of the bed.

Nap time has been a disaster. She just can't settle down and relax enough to sleep. Today she finally crashed on the bedroom floor.

The best part of today was that Aunt Carrie was able to come to Grammy's house. Aunt Carrie is always fun to play with. First some Play-Doh.

Then kids yoga on YouTube.

I really wish we could have Aunt Carrie over all the time.

Fun in Philly - Day 2, Wednesday

November 6

Grammy had to go in to work today, so it was just me and Emily ramming around the house while Papa slept.

A little sidewalk chalk coloring:

A little Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood during lunch (don't forget your safari hat!):

And a little playhouse construction:

My mom made this playhouse for us when we were kids. I have a lot of fond memories of it. She made it to look just like our house at the time. Yellow siding, brown door, cat sitting in the window and red flowers.

Originally, it went on top of our shabby folding card table. That table is long gone and apparently they make card tables a different size now, so the playhouse has been folded up in a box for years. This past summer we worked together to figure out a solution. We settled on a cube made out of PVC pipe. It's easy to build, easy to take down and easy to store.

It even has a see-through window!

Chimney.

Another generation of fun!

After Grammy got home, we walked up to the playground in the middle of their development. She refused to take a nap earlier in the day, so she was sort of grumpy at first.

So Grammy and I played for a little while until she decided to join us.

Once she finally started playing, she had a great time. The funniest thing was when she started awarding medals. Grammy put together this Instagram collage:

Later we went to Wegman's (a regional grocery store) for dinner. On the way, Emily took this awesome photo of the countryside: