Basement Living

We've been living in Erie, Colorado for a month already!  We are starting to figure out how to get places and how to all live comfortably together in the basement.  We are fortunate to be living with an awesome family and Logan has enjoyed spending time with the "big" kids Ella and Riley.  Their basement we have been staying in is more like a small house haha.  We have a lot of space and really the only thing different from usual besides the size of the kitchen is sharing a room with Logan at night, but luckily it has been going very well and his sleeping schedule hasn't been affected, phew!  The house hunt begins soon as we closed on our house in Tucson last week on Dom's birthday, what a present ;).  We are looking forward to finding something we both like and hopefully somewhere in either Erie or Lafayette, those seem to be the cities we are most drawn to.  Here's hoping the house buying experience here goes as well as the selling part did in Tucson!  Can't wait to have a place of our own if only to have our animals back!  We miss them!  Luckily I have made a little kitty friend here to keep my company :)

Calla my furry little friend (they have another cat, Cassie but she keeps to herself)

Here's a look at our basement living:

Enter the basement and to the left we see the girls' toys, Logan's are back behind the pool table too.  He's enjoyed all the new girl toys he's never played with!  The door to the left is to the bedroom.

Here's the bedroom, queen size bed and dresser, it's a big room!

 to the right across from the bed is Logan's bed (luckily they had a crib we could use as a toddler bed!), chair and another dresser.

 Exit the bedroom and to the right we have the rest of the "toy room" with our computer on their desk.  The door open to the left is the bathroom.  To the right is the living room and kitchen area.

As you can see in the picture above, this is a close up of Logan's new train table I found at a garage sale for ONLY $12!! It came with all the tracks and some trains too, Logan is in heaven!  And I was super excited to find one for such a deal!

 Bathroom, don't need much more then this!

 Living room- I want this couch, it's super comfy! Our little card table we use for meals and take down when we are done and to the right of the room is a giant screen for the projector, we are being spoiled living with it! You can see the bar separating the kitchen area.  (oh and there's Logan reading a book!)

 Sink and counter space in the kitchen

 Fridge and a stack of food!

We are lucky to be able to stay here and everything has gone wonderfully so far.  Amanda comes to visit in a few days for Memorial weekend and we are looking forward to showing her around...atleast what we know of it so far!  It's been fun exploring and finding new restaurants and fun places to go.  And we have so much more to find still!  

Time warp

What grandiose plans I had thinking I could catch you all up on everything since Logan's 2nd birthday! It all just kept piling up with even more memories being made which made the dreaded task of catching the blog up on EVERYTHING since October very overwhelming and so I have been avoiding it hoping some magic elves would come along and do all the posts so we wouldn't forget anything.  I have come to face the facts, it's just not happening.  So instead of trying to catch you up, we are moving forward.  Because A LOT has changed since the last post and better to just go through the black hole time warp and bring yourselves up to speed with Logan and our lives at this moment.

How about a quick run down of 2013 thus far (haha)

January

-Seems like years ago already but Dom and I had our first weekend away (sans Logan) together at Star Pass in Tucson.  Granny Mo was nice enough to watch Logan for us while we spent the days sleeping in, relaxing, reading books, watching football in a bar, drinking and making S'mores.  It was perfect and well timed because a few days after we got back chaos began!...But mind you, very very good chaos!

-January 14 Dom got a phone call about his dream job in Boulder at Ball Aerospace.  He had sent in his resume for a few positions that had opened up in November and we had kind of forgotten about it after that.  The phone call was a pleasant and very welcome surprise and after a phone interview, Dom flew out on the 25th for the "real thing" interview.  After that we anxiously awaited day after day to hear if he got the job or not.  All signs were pointing to yes, but no official word came until we had what felt like gray hair and wrinkles from all the waiting.

-Dom and I went to Phoenix to watch a Suns basketball game, which was Dom's Christmas present from Amanda.  So while Candi and Charles babysat Logan (he got chocolate donuts, hot chocolate, animal crackers and pizza- the key to a happy Logan haha), Dom and I got to go down town and eat, drink and watch the basketball game vs the OKC Thunder (who smoked the Suns) but Dom got to see his favorite player Kevin Durant.

February

-Starting in February, we had started doing little projects around the house in hopes that we were going to be able to sell it and move to Colorado soon.  Dom decided to paint the trim in our bedroom and while I was in the living room I hear an "OH SHIT" (I knew what awaited when I went in there!) and there it was a crap ton of white paint all over the carpet!  I googled and Dom did lots of water and scrubbing and wet-vacing to get it all out, 1.5 hours later it was good as new haha phew!

-We went to Phoenix for the weekend to watch Amanda do the Tough Mudder which turns out you can't actually spectate unless you want to pay mucho dinero, lame.  So we spent time at the Renaissance Festival instead with Mimi and Papa, Logan wanted to ride the rides which I thought he'd be afraid of (he didn't even like the little quarter ones you see at stores once they start moving!).  He went with Papa on a giant rocking horse and had a blast, then he went all by himself on a little butterfly ride that he sat in a chair and spun around in, we were so happy for him and proud!

-We got our first proof that Logan had gotten out of his big boy bed (which he started around Christmas time) after we put him to sleep at night.  The next morning he was looking for a new firetruck toy he had gotten the day before and wanted to sleep with but we had put it on his shelf before bed.  He told me it was in his bed and I looked on the shelf and it was gone, only to find it under his pillow, sneaky guy got it after we put him to sleep but luckily crawled back into bed and fell asleep without a sound, thank God!

March

-March had come and we went to the Festival of Books at the UofA, it was slightly raining and therefore really nice out haha.  Logan got to meet the mouse from one of his favorite books, "If you take a mouse to the movies" and he had fun pretending to be Wilbur the Wildcat with a mask on :)

-March 13 we accepted the offer for Dom to have his dream job and for us to finally move to Colorado, it was all very surreal that it was actually happening after so many years of wanting it! We had one month until we moved, Dom's first day was to be April 15th!

-March 14th, the very next day after we accepted, Logan decided he was ready to be potty trained and so we went and he picked out Thomas the Train underwear and Diego pull ups for night time and we spent 2 days at home working on using the potty chair and he was all in to it, barely any accidents, he even pooped in the potty the first day of wearing big boy undies.  We were so proud of him!  (I was not going to push the potty training until AFTER we moved since I didn't want to add more to our plates but Logan thought we were up for the challenge I guess haha)

-Somewhere in between here Dom and Charles had a triathlon at UofA and we had to say a temporary goodbye to Maya bear who went to live with Candi and Charles and her friend Annie until we have a new house in Colorado for her to come live in, it was emotional but we know she was going to have so much fun with Annie and were glad she had a familiar place to go during all the moving chaos!

-March 23 was our houses first day on the market, we had two showings that day and both put in offers, one was full price from the first people that had seen the house so we accepted their offer and were to close on May 15th.  We were prepared for our house taking forever to sell and had no idea we could get as much as we needed to pay what was left of the mortgage off so we were over the moon about how perfectly everything went!

-Dom had a goodbye party with his friends from work, so on the way there he picked up Amanda (who was in for Easter) and she was the DD for Dom's last night of fun with his coworkers...I hear there was lots of drinks and Dom on the roof waiving the UofA flag ;)

-Easter weekend we stayed in Tucson and Mimi, Papa and Amanda came in town.  We had fun coloring eggs, hunting eggs and eating brunch at Trail Dust Town.  We had to say our final goodbye's since we wouldn't see them again until after we moved, tears were shed but it was a great weekend to spend together in Tucson one last time!

-I can't remember the exact time, but Dom found a new home for LeeLu with a lady from his work.  We took her to a park for them to meet and do a test run to see if LeeLu was a good fit with her family and current 2 dogs.  It was horribly sad and emotional to say goodbye to her and even Logan was saying "I want LeeLu to come back" which made it even harder but we knew this was best for her and for us.  The time had come that she needed a home that was quiet and didn't have crazy little kids running around terrorizing her ;)  She went to a home with loving people, 2 dogs, cats and lots of land to run.  We are happy for her to spend her days at her new home with people who care about her.  But I will always think of her!

-We went on our last double date with Will and Laura while Grandma Julie watched the kids.  We went to Creative Juice where we got to paint and drink, always a good combination!

April

-April comes around and Dom has another goodbye BBQ party from work, a more family friendly one ;)  Logan didn't end up staying long because he has been having problems going poop in the potty...or at all and he gets understandably really grumpy because of this haha

-We had one last hurrah with our game night group friends (without the kiddos).  We went down town and ate tapas, drank sangria and then headed to a bar with a couch (dom's weird request haha) and then to the Hub for some ice cream.  We decided it was time to karoake at a final bar where we closed the night singing All you need is Love together.  We always have fun together and this night was no exception, there were a lot of laughs and good memories!

-April 7 Will and Laura held a BBQ going away party for us at their house.  Dad, Ash, Nicole, game night group, Tyson, Ada and Shane, Nick, Brenda and Aurora all came.  We had Will's famous ribs, played a game where everyone wrote memories of us and we had to guess who said what.  There were also balloons with pictures tied on the strings hanging from the ceiling of all our great times together (the kids had fun with the  balloons!) it was a lot of fun but the first time it really felt like we were having to say goodbye for good and reality was starting to set in!  One more week in Tucson!

-April 9 and 10 Grandpa babysat Logan while the house was packed and then loaded.  That last night we met up one last time with game night group at Zona 78 for dine out for safety and then we went to get gelato and all came back to our hotel (ash and Nicole came too) to stay late, share memories over Jack Daniels and harmonicas ;)  It was a good send off and the final good bye.  You know you have great friends when saying goodbye is so hard it takes 3 goodbye parties ;)

All the stuff to take in my car to CO! holy moly!

The movers let Logan sit in the cab, he was thrilled!

-April 11 we drove from Tucson to Albuquerque and met up with Auntie Dre before she had to leave for the airport, she knows how to keep her "Sugar Dre" nickname by bringing Logan chocolate sprinkle donuts so he can get "chocolate wasted" haha.  The next day we drove from Albuquerque to Erie where we are staying with Dom's second cousins and their cute kids in their basement until we find a place of our own.

Logan's "maps" we made him for the car trip 

 it's a full car! (cat included haha)

 All packed and ready for day 2 of our car trip to CO ;)

 Dream come true!

-2 days after we got to Colorado we got our first blizzard (in April!) and we had to go buy warmer clothes since we didn't pack anything for the snow haha, welcome to Colorado!

-We are lucky we know some people that live in Denver and Boulder area already so we spent one weekend meeting up with Jenny for lunch, one weekend meeting up with Mike Gray for a muddy hike and some beer, and one weekend with my cousin Kacy and her boyfriend for a nice dinner.  It makes all the difference knowing people around you and living with family to start off with, makes the transition a lot easier!

-For my birthday Dom and I got to go out while Logan stayed with Jeff and Joy.  We went to a bar and got some beer while we were waiting an hour for our rooftop table at the Rio for some mexican food.  We had a lot of beer...or was it the altitude haha.  And Dom gave me an iPhone 5, a nice surprise since my old phone was starting to go crazy!  Once our table was ready we were already buzzed so we drank more on the rooftop haha and had some "mexican" food while signing Amanda up for eHarmony in Boulder so she would move here ;).  Then we spent the rest of the night walking around Pearl Street in Boulder sobering up with coffee and dessert at the Med.

-On the day of my actual birthday we went to the Denver Zoo with Jenny then came back to Erie for cookie cake (mmm!) with the Valania's where Ella threw me a "surprise party" so cute, and then went to Rock Bottom for dinner where Logan had fun making his own pizza.  Logan also learned how to ride a scooter all by himself, what a great birthday present!

 What a beautiful gift from CO for my bday ;)

**We have really been enjoying exploring Boulder and figuring out which city/town we want to live in.  It's beautiful here even though the weather is bipolar!  Logan has adjusted well and is really loving spending time with Ella and Riley, I keep telling Dom we need to adopt an older sibling for him once we move out haha.  Our house is set to close in a few days and Dom's birthday is coming up, busy week ahead!  

Luckily I have been keeping track of random memories throughout the year from Logan that you can enjoy, the kid has a mind of his own and I love hearing what he has to say about everything...he always has a say haha.

January- Dom's reading a magazine and asks Logan if he wants to smell the cologne insert.  After he smells it Dom asks him what he thinks it smells like and Logan says "...Santa" :)

February- Logan is all about shooting hoops in his little basketball hoop.  Once he makes it he claps and smiles for himself.  When you ask him who his favorite player is he says, "Ray Allen".

February- We had a superbowl party and Logan was eating dinner at the table watching Beyonce's half time show.  He really liked the music and was dancing in his chair, licking his lips and saying "this is how you do it", it was hilarious.

after the halftime show, Logan and Stella gave us their own show!

February- Logan's newest phrase is to tell me "I love you so the best", maybe it's because I tell him "I love you so much, you're the best".  Either way, it's adorable.

February- Logan's new favorite thing to do is to have you tell him a story, he gives you an idea of what he wants it to be about and then it always starts like this: "This is a story about a little boy named Logan, he is this tall, has light brown hair and 2 blue eyes.  One day..." Logan knows the intro by heart now and says it to start the story each time.

March- After Logan successfully went potty in the potty chair he was ready to flush it down the big potty and tells me "I flush like daddy doos" as he lifts up his foot up to the handle and tries to push it down with his toes haha thanks Dom!

March- Logan unexplainably calls mustaches "Zurg" (like emperor Zurg in Toy Story...who doesn't have a mustache...) he knows it is called a mustache but I guess he just prefers the name Zurg for it haha.

April- The basement we are staying in has a pool table and we explained to Logan what it was called and what it was for.  Then one day he holds up a pool ball and tells me "Look, I have a swimming ball!" haha, love the associations he makes with words!

**And here's some random pictures from this year!

When Logan is being too quiet, you know he is up to something, found him in the sink one day haha

When Wreck it Ralph came out on DVD we had a pizza and movie night picnic :)

 Happy camper!

An unexpected snow in our backyard in Tucson!

 Logan, Stella and Cleo at play group at the library, playing the maracas

 Happy St. Patty's day with green milk and a chocolate sprinkle donut!

 BFFs holding hands at daddy's soccer game

 ...then ice cream after!

love this set of pictures haha

 learning to "ski" at Melanie's house ;)

Face painting at the mall, Logan picked a tiger and then was acting shy whenever anybody commented on it ;)

 After taking off the tiger facepaint, just the eyebrows were left and he reminded me of Granny haha

 All dressed up for take your child to work day in CO

**That's all for now, hope you enjoyed that time warp through 2013!  until next time :)