Vacation 2010 (picture heavy)

As some of you know, our little bird Cori has been under the weather for four days now with a very high fever. I took her to the doctors again today and the poor kid again started crying and saying "no shots! no shots!" - it just breaks my heart. So I thought I'd try to cheer myself up by looking at pics of her where she is her healthy, adorable self. And since I owe a post on our vacation, I am going to multi-task for a bit.

We went to Rehoboth Beach Deleware for our summer vaction this year, and it was our year to take Grammi Lois (Dave's mom). We did have a really good time and spent some great quality time together. Cori was a good tropper in the car thanks to the DVD player, though poor Grammi probably saw Toy Story 2 a few too many times along the course of the trip!
We rented a townhouse a few miles from the beach, and the home was absolutely immaculate and tastefully designed. Really, I told Dave I'd buy the townhouse outright if it had a 4th bedroom. Even Mr. Anti-townhome liked it! I drooled over the little reading nooks, the awesome kitchen and master bath suite! The place had a fitness center and pools that were open until Labor Day, and that was a big hit with Cori (the pool, not the fitness center).

Unfortunately the pool closed on Labor Day and Cori kept asking daily to go back to the "big pool". We went to the beach one day and Cori rushed to the water but then the sound of the waves crashing scared her. She wouldn't go in the water after she felt the way the sand moved beneath her feet when the waves went back out. While she played in the sand the rest of that day, we didn't have any such luck at the beach any other days. Actually, all subsequent attempts resulted in her screaming loudly "I WANT TO GO HOME!!".

Upon suggestion from ever-knowledgable, world traveler Aunt Kacey, we tried a small beach at Cape Henlopen State Park which was near by. The inlet had a lot of sand bars, so there weren't many waves and the water wasn't very deep. Grammi and I were a little freaked out at not being able to see as clearly though the water - more than once I went to pick up what I thought was a shell and it was a live hermit crab!! And my feet were really cut up by the end of the day. But this worked out much better than the beach. Cori got used to the water slowly and the place was so private, it felt like it was our own beach!

We ran though the water...

We chased the seagulls...

I love how you can see Dave running in this shot - a true action shot!

We splashed...

We drew in the sand....

We hung out...

We made a pilgrimage to Dogfish Head Brewery as well, which is Dave's personal version of Heaven I think. I have to admit though, that this MGD64 girl fell in love with a really dark beer that tasted like chocolate (Chicory Stout) which shocked the heck out of me! We always joke and ask Cori if she wants a beer; she will always reply "yes!" We didn't let her do anything more than sniff it, but it seems she wasn't all that impressed with the beer.Overall, we really did have a relaxing time and it was great to spend time together as a family. I wish Cori would have taken to the beach more, but we'll try again next year. And as we say goodbye to summer today, I leave you with this picture of the beach, and my very favorite picture from vacation.

Updated House Pictures

I still need to do a post with pictures from our vacation, but I thought I'd post a few pictures of the house. All the dry wall is up and they've mudded it all (not shown in the pictures). Next is the trim and the flooring. They are still on course to complete the house early, but we still think we're going to do an early December close for financial reasons.

Front of the house

Garage (will it ever look this clean again?)

Family Room

Living Room

Master bedroom

Go Steelers!

How did my little baby get so big?!?

I'd like to think this is her lucky outfit and helped secure an OT win.

My sweet girl, fall & football - sigh. Life is good!

House Progress

When we got back from vacation we stopped by the house to see how things are going. It is looking great! The concrete is poured inside and all the insulation is up. The drywall is ready to be hung as soon as we have our walk through with the builder. Things are still on schedule to be done mid-November!!

Our walk in closet and sitting room (tons of room - can't wait!)

Master bedroom with all the drywall supplies ready for use.

I also grabbed a shot of the master bath tub. It's been in a while, but I never had the camera with me.

One side of the basement showing the poured floor, the fancy water system and the bathroom rough-ins.

Cori the Explorer

Lately Cori has taken to getting out of her bed very stealthily. A few nights ago my mom woke up to find Cori laying on the floor next to her bed, asleep. The baby monitor never made a peep - most likely because Cori didn't either I guess.

The next morning I was working at the dining room table; I had checked on Cori not that long before and she was sound asleep. About 15 minutes later, I heard "Hi!!" and turned to see Cori standing at the bottom of the steps. My own fault for leaving the baby gate unlocked, but still! Stealthy I tell ya!

Oh, and did I mentioned how she just walked out the front door at daycare last week? Oy!

I'll be taking a break from blogging as we're beach bound for nice long, relaxing stay. Here's hoping the Earl doesn't hit! Until then....

Idlewild

Saturday was our first trip taking Cori to Idlewild. We had a great time in spite of the really hot temps! Cooling off in the pool after the rides was a big hit.

Kennywood!

Our first trip to Kennywood with Cori!

I've known Jen for 30 of my 36 years ; she is one of my very best friends. It was so much fun to share Kennywood together with our daughters! How awesome it is to see our friendship extend into our daughters' growing friendship.

Toddler Inconsistencies (a Cori update)

When Cori was an infant, probably one of the hardest "lessons" for us to digest was that "learning" wasn't linear. It was more like a Texas two-step - few steps forward, few steps back, twists and turns, etc. For example, she'd be able to sleep really well for a few nights and we'd think we hit some sort of new plateau. Our child can sleep through the night well! Then we'd be bombarded with a few nights (or weeks) or restless sleeping and wakings. Same thing with physical milestones of crawling and walking and even eating. It was frustrating because we knew she could do it, but she didn't always do it. One of my friends put it best to say that babies do not follow linear progression in what they do, and it's something that I try to pass on to new moms (Kacey, Leslie - I'm thinking of you!)


Here we are again with the inconsitencies. Just when we think we've made progess, we hit a few road bumps. Cori has been doing really well sleeping in her "big girl bed". So much so that she doesn't want to be rocked anymore (this really makes me sad; where is my baby?!?). She just wants to lay in bed and fall asleep. Good right? Well, she will only fall asleep if her mommy and Um-ma (grand-ma) lay with her. So we have to sneak out once she is asleep. I KNOW KNOW KNOW that this is wrong - it goes against everything in the sleep bible I believe in (see book to the right. This book is THE ONE BOOK I'd recommend to any parent. We actually own 2 copies!)


I know that it would be much better for her to learn to fall asleep without us, because when she wakes and we aren't there, she'd be able to put herself back to sleep without any fussing. But instead we're teaching her that she "needs" us to fall asleep. When she wakes and we aren't there, she cries out for us. We have to come in and repeat the process. And lately, Cori has been waking a lot when she enters the light phase of sleep (about 3-4 hours into her sleep). The other night she slept 10 hours without as much as making a peep, and we made the mistake of thinking things changed. I guess we needed a reminder as the past few nights have been really rough.


And then there is potty training... Cori can clearly go on the potty when she wants to. And she knows when she has to go. But getting her to put those two together.... it's not all the time. I think we are partly to blame - again with the inconsistencies. Between 3 different caregivers during the week (4 if you count us!), she just doesn't get the consistent reinforcement to keep potty training going right now. Her daycare for example - Miss Donna at the in home place is too busy to really work with Cori on it. She has 5 other kids (2 of which are infants) and can't reinforce much. I understand, but can I again say how much I am looking forward to the new daycare Cori is going to be attending?? And with her Grandparents, Cori is often busy visiting and playing and out and about. It just isn't really practical.


We had a day this week where Cori was really agreeable and kept going on the potty. So much so that we put her in "big girl underwear". After explaining that she had to tell us when she had to go pee, and she can't pee in her underwear... we had 3 accidents in 4 hours. I know that is to be expected, but yet I thought she'd do better. I feel like a lot of it is that she was too busy playing to stop and go (even though we kept asking). Apparently the stubborn apple doesn't fall too far from the tree! But we've had to take a time out from PTing as Pop-Pop accidentially left the essential pink potty at his house yesterday. And then we're going to Kennywood, so that means another evening in diapers, etc. See - we can't be consistent!


Here is your "cuteness of the day" shot. This is Cori helping ME to brush my teeth in the midst of me helping her. God this kid makes my heart melt!

House, house, house

By the end of Friday (so 4 days in) the house was framed, both floors, and all windows in. These guys are fast!! All the doors were in except for the front door & garage door. We even got to walk through the house as the subfloor is down.

Without further ado, here's 115 Brighton Lane! ETA Dec 10th
Here's some inside shots. Kind of hard to visualize but since we're familiar with the floor plan, we have a slight advantage.

Here is the shot looking into the living room and family room.

There is a 6 ft opening between the rooms.

Looking into the kitchen from the family room. The door leads to the garage.

Looking the oppostie way, from the kitchen to the family room. No walls between; all open.

Half of the basement; we plan to finish this eventually.

The other half of the basement. Will be a bathroom & storage. Door leads to back.
Amazing view from our kitchen window!

View from the sliding glass doors / deck.

Without stairs, it's hard to get shots of the second floor!