Like Christmas In August

It's been so fun watching Olin rediscover all of his toys that have been in storage for the summer.  He squeals with delight every time he pulls another one out of his toy box and has little interest in leaving his room.  This little boy is such a joy to raise - he always makes us smile.  Hope everyone has a great holiday weekend!

Ugh... Moving

The floor of our new apartment is finally starting to reveal itself as we chip away at all of these boxes.  The movers delivered our things on Monday and let me tell you, unpacking with a toddler is extra "fun".  We have made it a team effort and all have our jobs, mine is unpacking the breakables, Josh's is heavy lifting and assembly, and Olin's is providing levity (and helping Daddy) ...

It's nice to have our things back and we had only a few casualties. The only near problem we had was with our couch - it's fairly deep and after several attempts, the movers were convinced that it wouldn't fit in the apartment. Luckily, this isn't our first move and I have a very smart husband who was able to devise a plan to get that thing (barely) through the door, however, not unscathed. There were no rips, but there is this...

If anyone knows some good tips on getting hundred year old door jam grime off of linen, please let me know!

It could be worse though... this was happening in our summer sublet on Monday while we were working on the new place.  Yep, that's water from the upstairs neighbor's kitchen in our utility closet being held up by years and years of paint!  I nearly titled this post, "I'm glad we don't live here anymore!"  Yikes!

Over The Weekend

This weekend we took a short drive out of the city to Chappaqua, NY (home to Jimmy Carter's friends, Bill and Hillary Clinton) where we enjoyed ice cream (of course) and a stroll through the town's cute main street.  After our small town adventure we came back to the city and found Olin a backpack (in blue, his favorite color, well, the only color he knows) for his upcoming first day of school and then had dinner at Tom's Restaurant of Seinfeld fame (where Olin sat in a booster seat for the first time at a restaurant!). 

On Sunday we moved most of our edited belongings that we have had with us in our summer sublet to the new place as we await the arrival of the rest of our things from Indiana.  We really do hate moving so I am not quite sure why we subject ourselves to it so often.  We definitely need to stop the madness and settle down already!  Unfortunately, we are not there yet because recently our new landlord informed us that they plan to sell our apartment in two years from now, so at maximum we have got a couple years in this place until we start the process all over again.  But, I do have a good feeling that the place after this will finally be "the one"... at least that is what I keep telling myself.

Hope everyone had a great weekend! 

The playground photos above were technically from Friday afternoon, but I thought that they were too cute not to include!

A Love for Jimmy Carter

Olin has this placemat with the faces of all of the U.S. Presidents on it and for some reason he has become obsessed with Jimmy Carter.  He repeatedly points to President Carter's picture and asks "this?" and when we tell him for the hundredth time that it's Jimmy Carter, he gives us the biggest smile.  Honestly, I don't know what it is about President Carter, but he definitely has a fan in little mister.  Once, he did point to Martin Van Buren, but only after I begged him to ask about someone else and then he immediately pointed to Jimmy Carter again.

It looks like we might have to become supporters of Habitat for Humanity.

Cinnamon Rolls for Lunch... Why Not?

In a moment of weakness, I just let my son (and myself) eat a giant cinnamon roll for lunch and we loved every bite!  If possible, I feel like the worst mom and best mom, all at the same time.  I guess this means that I am going to make something really healthy for dinner.   

And Happy Birthday Uncle Matt!  We love you!

We Have A New Home

Yep, it's true - we finally found an apartment!  It's been a long couple weeks of negotiations and the waiting for board approval so we didn't want to say much before now for fear of jinxing it, but on Friday we got the keys!  Excited to see the new place again, we got our Friday night Chipotle to go and had a picnic on the floor of our new dining room.  Olin loved running around the empty space and explored nearly every inch of it. 

The apartment is quite a bit smaller than our summer sublet and we will miss the tranquility of living on Riverside Drive (the new place is right off Broadway, which is not even close to tranquil), but we are looking forward to the arrival of our things and having a place of our own again.   

Speaking of our things, the movers loaded up the truck in Indiana yesterday and they are set to arrive next Monday.  Thanks Uncle Andy and Aunt Brenda for overseeing the loading and Peg and Greg for storing our things, finding our movers and well just about everything.  We are so grateful to you all for all of your help.  I don't know what we would have done without you!

Once our stuff arrives and we get settled in, I will post pictures of our new space.  Until then, wish us luck unpacking!

Over The Weekend

While I spent hours at the hair salon on Saturday doing this, Josh and Olin spent a boy's day together exploring Morningside Heights.  During their exploration, Olin had his first black and white cookie at Nussbaum & Wu and at this point, I think he decided that Daddy is way more fun to hang out with than Mommy who makes him snack on dried fruit or bananas or something equally boring.  This little guy sure does love his sweets!

On Saturday night, our good friends Bridget and Damon came over with their adorable little boy, Hollan.  Olin was beside himself with excitement to have someone his size around and the two were so cute playing together. 

Bridget and I became best friends in Mrs. Troop's 5th grade class so it's a bit surreal to watch our little boys playing together all these years later.  I know it sounds ridiculous, but sometimes it is hard to believe that we are already old enough to have babies of our own even though we are well into our thirties!  Time goes by way too fast!