Cold.

As I am sure most of the country knows, we in Wisconsin are experiencing a polar vortex.  I saw someone post on Facebook that it was colder in Wisconsin than in the South Pole or Antartica.  Our pipes in our upstairs bathroom are frozen, and the bathtub won't even drain.  

Needless to say, my kiddos have been out of school due to the cold.  So what have I been doing in this weather (besides picking up their endless piles of construction paper)?  Well, it's too cold to go outside, but LUCKILY I have access to the finest restaurant in Milwaukee.  It's so exclusive that your name has to be on "the list" to get in.  

Luckily for me, I was on the list that day. And the menu serves locally sourced food.

I am not a foodie, so I didn't order the snacka.  I do recommend the "derzerts" and "other stuff like that".  Very decadent.  And served with very chic sippy cups.  

It's been a nice couple of days to hunker down at home and eat soup and drink coffee but I am certainly ready to get out of the house and get back to society again and do exciting things like look for sectionals and get groceries.  

Go away, polar vortex.  Go away.

                     

Celebrating

Greg & I took the two little kiddos to a new cafe in the third ward this past weekend to celebrate the one year anniversary of Luciana's adoption.

It was nice to think about the past year, how full and adventurous it's been.  We adopted Luciana, purchased and renovated our home and now we have Marielle: two kiddos and a new home all in a year!  

No wonder I needed coffee.  

It was a lovely morning. I hope you all had a great weekend as well.

                         

Marielle

My little toots is two months already.  She's sleeping about the same as she always has, but she is doling out more smiles now.  She really makes you work to get the smile though!  

Such a sweet little monkey.

Lately

Autumn is my time of year.  Not only because I enjoy the cooler weather and fall colors, but also because I get the opportunity to display my vast cardigan collection.  

First, a family update:  Marielle is doing well and we're adjusting to our new life schedule.  She's up about every three hours or so at night, which means that after we get the kids in bed, I lazily flop onto a bean bag chair (for lack of seating in our tv room) and don't move until my back starts to hurt (typically 1-2 hours).  The girls are doing well at school, but with school comes homework.  Our home is not a fun place to be at 4pm: while I am trying to entertain/pacify/relocate a newborn and three year old, I cook dinner and help two [incredibly distracted] kiddos with homework.  I found that yelling a lot helps me feel better during homework time, but strangely, the children do not respond well to this.  I will have to experiment with other methods.

We have been cooped up a lot this week, so today was a lovely day to be outside, fly homemade kites, and drink vats of coffee.  

I also got a mini-date with the hubster this week.  I say mini-date because it involved bringing along two of the four kiddos, but we will take what we can get.  We dined on a rooftop.  It was lovely and I also got the chance to wear a cardigan and escape the after lunch clean up.

Our house update: our master bath has been tiled.  I love, love, love the herringbone floor.  I chose a porcelain tile that looks like weathered wood and it turned out nicely.  The carpenter began laying down the trim in our room as well and the floor got its first sanding.  The vanity and recessed medicine cabinet were also installed.

The carpenter also rebuilt the linen cabinet and we have the door put back on.  I have begun painting the trim and hope to get a few more doors painted this weekend. 

The countertops also arrived today!  If a person can develop a crush on a piece of rock, just consider me smitten.  It replicates marble well and I love the polished finish.  The fabricators did a wonderful job  matching up the patterns on the seams and carrying the patterns up the backsplash and down to the sink.  I'll have better photos down the road when I have the backsplash installed, but wanted to post these tonight.  

Also, this is a small thing, but we discovered that our old microwave fits into our appliance cabinet.  

I just love it when even the little things work out, no?  

Thankful.

Oh, hello blog. 

The past couple weeks have been a blur.  We packed up our apartment and moved (again) into our house.  (The first move was in June to load most of our belongings into the basement).  Our house isn't done yet, but we had to move in because our apartment lease was up.  We don't have our kitchen installed yet, or our bedroom, and lots of plumbing/drywall/electrical work has yet to be completed, but we're just happy to be home.  We're still living in sawdust mess and lots of people in and out, but it's all supposed to be completed by the end of the month.

In the weeks before moving, we had so much help and I am so thankful for it.  People helped us paint, watch our kiddos, assemble bunk beds, brought us food, cleaned and scrubbed, tore out old fencing, remove stumps from the yard, clean windows…I can't even remember all of it.  Thank you, thank you, thank you.

We moved in on Saturday, August 24th and on Tuesday, August 27th, we were introduced to this little babe:

School began on September 3rd, so we got to sneak in a family outing to the zoo with the babe before the start of the school year.  The girls have been asking all summer to ride the train and they finally were able to.  They loved every minute.

On the evening on the 3rd, we went with Marielle and our friends to the Mumford & Sons concert.  I know that some people would call me crazy for taking a newborn to a concert (especially because it turned into a late night), but you just have to understand how I feel about Mumford: their music is the theme song of my life (okay, that was a bit exaggerated, but you know what I mean). 

Now we're settling into our "new normal", with two kiddos in school and two at home.  The girls love Marielle, but I can't get any of them to change her diaper (yet)!  I'm working on that.

This week, the crane is loading the drywall for our bedroom in through the back dormer and next week is the kitchen cabinet install.  So excited for that.  In the meantime, there's the dull jobs, like painting ceilings and cleaning up sawdust mess that's been keeping me busy.  The only room that I can say is done is the babe's, which is ironic because it's the only bedroom we aren't using right now.  She's in our temporary bedroom with us until  our bedroom is completed. Here's her room:

The electricians are here today hanging the remaining fixtures.  I am loving the hall light fixture and will have photos of that one tomorrow....

Birthday Girl

Yesterday was a special day in our family.  We got to celebrate this little girl:

Luciana is now three!  This is the first birthday that we've been able to celebrate Luciana's birthday as our daughter.

Greg & I were licensed as foster parents in June of 2010 and in August of that year, I received a phone call from social services indicating that they had a 15-day old infant girl who needed a home.  I asked a lot of questions of the social workers and wrote all her answers in the margins of a piece of junk mail that happened to be sitting on the dining room table.  After hanging up with the social worker, I called Greg and told him everything that she had told me (which, frankly, wasn't a lot of information).  

Greg came home from work immediately and discussed it.  We decided to go and pick up the babe.  We went into the basement to retrieve the infant seat, buckled it into the car and left the house to go pick up a baby.  It was a rather surreal experience.  

We arrived at the office and two workers brought out a newborn baby girl.  We sat in a conference room for quite some time, holding her and asking more questions.  

We drove her home where quite a crowd of friends & neighbors has assembled to welcome her.  And she was held and kissed by her sisters.

We were foster parents for Luciana for almost 2-1/2 years before we were able to adopt her. There were many times during this period when we thought we'd lose her for one reason or another.  But on December 6, 2012, we were able to finally adopt her into our family and we are so thankful.

We love you, kid.