Ch-ch-ch-changes

Things have been a little crazy around here lately, in case you were wondering why I've been so absent from the online world. There are some major changes coming up for us in the very near future - and I couldn't be more excited about them!

About a week before Christmas, Forrest was offered a job at a new company that would allow him to work much better hours and spend so much more time at home with our family. He accepted and just started his new job this week. His time in public accounting was good to us, but we were so ready for the change and I can't even begin to explain how excited we are about his new opportunity!

When Forrest accepted the job, we realized it was time for us to move so that we could be closer to his work. We had also promised each other that the next time we moved, it would be into our own house. All the stars aligned and we were able to find the perfect home for us, very close to Forrest's work and in a great area. We are now under contract to purchase the home and are hoping to close at the end of next month. After renting apartments for 7 years, we could not be more thrilled at the prospect of owning our own home and having space for all of our stuff!

And in the midst of all this, I am nearly 34 weeks pregnant with our little munchkin. The week we close on our house is also the week of my due date. Sometimes Forrest and I think about things and wonder why in the world we always choose to take all of these life changes at once. We moved to Utah 5 weeks after the twins were born. And now a job change, buying a house and moving, and having baby #3 all at once - I know we are a little crazy. But the changes are all so good and I am so looking forward to everything.

The hard part about the upcoming move and the baby coming soon is being in limbo about preparing for baby. All of the clothes, bassinet, burp cloths, bottles etc. are already packed up in storage containers and ready to move. I would love to leave them like that until we are in the house, but what if the baby comes early? Who knows what we'll end up doing. My rough plan is to get everything washed and ready and put into an easily accessible bag that we could use whether we are in our apartment or the house when the baby comes.

Wish us luck!

CA vs. UT

Eight months ago we moved from SoCal to Utah, where we are originally from. We had lived the previous 3 years in California and we absolutely loved it, but with the twins coming and me needing to quit my job to be home with them, we felt the need to be back in Utah close to our families and where the cost of living was a little more reasonable. Though both Forrest and I grew up in Utah, we've lived half of our married lives in California, and half in Utah (with a short stint in Vegas, but we don't really count that). After experiencing life in CA and then coming back to life in UT, there are certain things about both states that I LOVE, and also things about both that I really don't like. This is CA vs. UT, the good, the bad, and the ugly. (Note: CA is coming first solely because it comes first in the alphabet.)

California                                             Utah

The good: clean air                                         The good: four seasons

                  the beach                                                        UT ghetto = nothing compared to CA ghetto

                  Disneyland                                                      not expected to work on Sundays

                  mild weather                                                   traffic = bliss

                  excellent Mexican food and produce               cost of living

                  fantastic entertainment                                    DMV 

                  great shopping                                                wide open spaces (Dixie Chicks anyone?)

The bad:    people aren't very friendly                              really friendly people

                   so many people                             The bad:   long way from Disneyland and the beach

                   takes forever to get anywhere                       hot summers

The ugly:    the DMV                                        The ugly:   post-Christmas winter

                   the cost of living                                               inversion

                   traffic                                                                

If I were to make this more personal, I would add awesome friends and extended family to the CA good side and immediate family and "home" to the UT good side. Truthfully, I couldn't say that we like living in Utah more that we liked it in California, or vice versa. Each state was right for us during that time of our lives. And right now, what we need is to be close to our family, and be somewhere with a low cost of living. Utah is my home and it always will be, regardless of where we live. But we absolutely LOVED our time in CA and I wouldn't trade it for anything. Being able to ride my bike or run to the beach anytime I wanted was something amazing. And we made friends and grew close to family that will always be close to my heart. So which state wins? Neither. Or both. However you want to look at it. 

PS - This post is coming now because tomorrow we are taking a vacation back to California to visit family and friends, go to Disneyland and compete in a triathlon. So excited! Three adults and three kids on a six day adventure.. Wish us luck!

The First 5 Weeks

The first 5 weeks of Charlie and Caroline's lives were some of the hardest of mine. They were also some of the most rewarding/exhuasting/joyful/stressful/exciting/terrifying... you name it, I probably felt that emotion. 

In the hospital, I tried tandem feeding but it was just so hard. So the first week that we were home, I was feeding them one at a time. And when it took them sometimes up to an hour to get a full feeding, that meant that more than half of my day was spent feeding babies. Absolutely exhausting! And when they need to eat every 2-3 hours, it often seemed like I would finish feeding one, then the other, just to find that the first was hungry again. Things improved significantly (feeding-wise) after that first week, when I figured out how to properly feed them at the same time. Then we encountered a new problem. 

By this point, they were both on different eating schedules, especially at night. In the daytime they did fine, but oh how I dreaded the nights. Getting them on the same schedule was so important to me (because of how much feeding time it saved), so that meant that when one baby woke up to eat, night or day, I woke the other baby to eat too.

I remember delaying going to bed as long as possible because I didn't want to face another night. It seemed like staying awake and not even trying to sleep was just easier. I remember laying in bed trying to sleep after finishing up a feeding, running on 45 minutes of sleep and being so tired that I couldn't allow myself to relax enough to sleep. I remember being so excited when I'd look at the clock and see 3 or 4 AM because it meant that it was almost daytime, and the relief I felt at making it through another night. I remember watcing Wreck it Ralph, DuckTales and Tail Spin all night long, and listening to Forrest play Monster Run on the iPad. We found that it was easier just to stay awake all night and try and nap during the day.

I have been extrememly blessed to have a wonderful husband who was so helpful duing those times. We were so fortunate that his work allowed him 6 weeks off after the birth so I didn't have to endure the difficult times alone. We were also lucky to have my fantastic mom come and spend the first two weeks with us. I am 100% confident I would not have kept my sanity through those times without Forrest and my mom.

In addition to the sleeping/eating difficulties, we were also in the midst of a big move. When Charlie and Caroline were 5 weeks old, we moved from our little 1-bedroom apartment in SoCal to a 2-bed in Salt Lake City. So having newborn twins in our tiny aparment that we were in the midst of pulling apart for the move - ya that was stressful.

Getting settled in our new home in Utah was the start of my sanity returning. We were able to set up their cribs, move them into their own room, and start getting settled. Finally at 6 weeks, the kids started sleeping and so did we. By 8 weeks they were sleeping through the night, Forrest was back at work, and we started adjusting to our new normal. 

Thinking back on those first 5 weeks, it seriously makes me terrified to think of having more children. But as hard as they were, it was all worth it! I am so blessed to have such wonderful family and friends, and such beautiful children. Despite the difficulty of it, we survived! Hooray :)