Agh!

Woah, I am so behind.

The Bean turned 5 months a couple weeks ago and I still haven’t had time to write that update. I haven’t had time for anything! Since the beginning of the month, I got sick, Cameron got sick, we signed a lease on a townhouse in Denver, I got sick again, the baby got sick, we’ve been trying to pack up the house and make some minor repairs, prepare for renters, and moving day is Saturday and the house is still in shambles.

I need a drink.

Please accept these pictures as compensation.

Denver Bound

Last Friday, we signed a lease on our new place in Denver. We get the keys on the 11th and will probably be moving in over the weekend of the 18th, though that still has to be locked down for sure.

Yahoo!

We were fairly sure we’d end up with an apartment, mainly because that’s about all we could afford in lower Denver, but we got extremely lucky and ended up signing a townhouse in the same complex that was our favorite on the list. It was in the perfect area, only about 10 minutes from Cameron’s new store and in a safe location with lots of stores and activities/parks nearby, and when we called to schedule a tour, the price we were quoted on a 2 bed 2 bath apartment on the 7th floor overlooking the city was out of this world perfect. So when we showed up, the leasing agent took us up to the unit and it was great. Perfect size, nice open layout, fireplace, GIANT balcony, amazing view. When we got back to the leasing office and he looked up the rates, though, it was about $300 more a month than we had initially been quoted over the phone, which put us just out of reach of our budget. I mean, we probably could have done it, but I hate the idea of stretching every month. We were both visibly bummed, and a little annoyed that the price was so different. He explained that their prices change daily based on supply and demand of units and residents, and the price we were quoted over the phone was only locked in for 3 days. (This was never pointed out to us.) So we figured, we’ll still fill out the application anyway and go to the other tours we had booked later that afternoon and see if any work out. While we were sitting there filling out the application, the leasing agent started poking around on his system looking for other units (I think he could see we were about to walk out and not come back) and he said, “Have you guys considered a townhouse?” And I said no, because the prices we’d seen online were a little too high. Well, he says, I have a 2 bed 2 bath that just came open yesterday and it’s currently being offered at cheaper than the price I quoted you for the apartment. It was also about 400 square feet larger than the apartment and had a washer and dryer in the unit (the apartments only had laundry on each floor), so I said, done and done. We ran to the bank to get a money order for our application fee and when we came back he said he couldn’t show us the actual unit because it wasn’t clean yet, but the one right next door is about the same (except it was a 3 bed) so we can go see it and possibly peek in the windows of the unit. We head over there and toured the 3 bedroom, and noticed that the maintenance guy was in the other unit painting, so the leasing agent poked his head in the door and asked if we’d be a bother if we walked through really quick. (He wasn’t supposed to do that, but I think at this point he was trying to make up for us being so pissed about the other agent not divulging the info about the quoted price.) So we walked through, went back to the office, and submitted the application and all the other paperwork. Done! We never even went to the other tours we had booked that afternoon.

I’m really pleased with the place. It’s 3 floors with a finished basement that has a wood-burning fireplace in it. It also has a utility room with a washer and dryer in it which will come in handy for storing stuff (and it means we won’t have to get a storage unit). There’s a small fenced patio area out back big enough for our grill and our patio furniture and the front looks across the complex’s courtyard with a nice pond/fountain. It’s also on the back side of the complex, which means it’s about as far away from city traffic as it could be, so very quiet. We’re only losing about 150 square feet altogether, which is not bad considering our third floor we only use as storage anyway and our 3rd bathroom is pretty much negligible anyway. The rent we’ll be paying is still less than what we’ll be getting from the renters moving in here, so we won’t be stretching ourselves too thin.

The only downside of it all is that we won’t be able to bring Brody with us. The complex has a 2-pet limit and we have the two cats. I hate feeling like I’m picking between my favorite children, but the fact is that my parents, who offered to take him, have a big back yard and a dog of their own, so he’ll be better off there anyway. They also have two cats who are pretty territorial, so it just wasn’t an option to have one of the cats go live with them. (Cats are snippier than dogs when introducing them to new animals, I’ve found) Anyway, at least this way we’ll be able to see him whenever we want, they can bring him to visit, and it won’t be forever. When we are able to buy a place in a little bit, the Brodes can come back to us.

So, the countdown is on…under 20 days till we get keys and move. Urp.

The Bean got to hang out with Meme and Papi while we apartment searched. Days at grandma and grandpa’s are exhausting!

The Bean Family is On the Move

Yahoo!

We finally have a date and location for our big move back to civilization. Before the end of April we’ll be back in Denver. A little farther south than we’d originally anticipated, so we’re looking for places in the Cherry Creek area, instead of the north metro suburbs, but I’m still super excited. We’ll only be about a half hour from my parents and right next to downtown and all it offers. Hooray!

Now, who wants to help me pack? The baby is cute but she doesn’t work too fast.

Snow Day

To start off with, I am thinking about the folks down in the Atlanta/Birmingham area and their winter woes right about now. I am pretty stunned at all the video and pictures I am seeing and I can’t stop thinking about the stories of parents trapped for hours with infants in the car and no way to feed them. Ugh, it just gives me the shivers. Pretty sure I will be packing up an emergency kit with water and extra formula in the back of my car post-haste!

As it happens, we are also in the middle of wintry weather here, but thankfully we are used to this kind of stuff and are prepared! Unfortunately, the traction control system seems to have gone out on Cameron’s car this morning while we were pushing it out of the driveway (stupid ice!), so for the time being we are a one-car family. I’m hoping the problem is related to ice or rocks stuck up in the wheel shaft, but I guess we’ll have to see what happens when the snow melts down enough to get some traction on bare pavement. Unfortunately I don’t think that will be happening any time soon, since we are apparently in for another round of snow starting tonight that some reports are saying could bring us 16 inches or more. I’m never one to complain about the snow because we really need the moisture, but I would be lying if I said I wasn’t ready for spring so I can get the baby out of the house once in a while. (Also ready for spring so that we can get out of wind season! Yesterday we had 50+mph gusts and it was just wretched. When I was trying to put groceries in my car last night the wind grabbed the car door and pulled it right out of my hand and now I have a horrible pulled muscle in my back. No thank you!)

Anyway, the other day we got about 7 inches (we were only predicted 2-4, murr) and the next day it was warm enough (relatively speaking of course) to bundle up the Bean and take her out for her first time in the snow! As you can see, she was a little less than thrilled.

It was a little too close to nap time I think so she wasn’t really having it. We put her down for a nap and tried again a little later that afternoon. She tolerated it a bit better and she even got to go on her first sled ride!

As you can see, she was so excited. I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt of only being 3 months old and hope that next winter she might be a little more interested.

In any case, we are just waiting for this next round of snow to hit. I have a chicken in the slow cooker and don’t have to be at rehearsal for the rest of the week so I am happy to sit tight and watch the snow from the inside. I am crossing my fingers that the roads will be okay by Sunday so that we can get to my mom’s for Superbowl Sunday (WOO BRONCOS!!!), otherwise I will be one slightly unhappy camper.

By the way, this little girl is 3 months old next week! When did this happen??

Some Changes

You might have noticed that this blog looks a little different…different theme, different title, different address! Well, it felt necessary to introduce some changes since this blog will, very soon, no longer be broadcast from High Elevation. (I mean, still pretty high elevation, all things considered, but not 7,522 feet.)

In a short while, I’m excited to say, Cameron and the Bean and I will be moving back down the hill to live closer to my parents. The time has come for us to depart Estes Park, and we’ll be moving somewhere into the north Denver suburbs hopefully near to where I lived since I was a kid. We are currently waiting to find out where Cameron will be transferring to, and when. It’s going to be a bit of a rocky transition at first, since I have no idea when we are going (it could be next week and it could be in 4 months) and where. The good thing about that area, though, is that it’s fairly well condensed and there are many Starbucks stores in a small area, so we can probably plan to move close to where my parents live and not have a huge commute for Cameron. Our original plan was to immediately buy another house and rent out our house in Estes, but since we are looking at such a short timeline, we are now anticipating renting an apartment for at least six months while we get settled and then buy a new house. We’re still renting out our place here, and are pretty sure we have a great set of tenants, it’s all about the timing now. I’m not really looking forward to making two moves in one year, but we’ll do what we have to do and it will all work out in the long run.

The truth of the matter is, I have been wanting to leave Estes for some time. I was excited when we got here over 2 years ago and I did feel lucky to be here. But as time went on it became clear that it wasn’t for me–and, now, isn’t for us. We had planned on being here for a good 5-10 years in the beginning, and that timeline got shorter and shorter the longer we were here. It never felt like home to me. I kept waiting for it, and it never happened. After the flood, I knew we couldn’t stay here much longer than another year or two. And after the Bean was born, I knew the time was up. I just couldn’t deal with having a new baby and postpartum depression and being so far away from anyone or anything. It used to be that an hour away from civilization wasn’t a big deal, but it is when you have a cranky baby who cries the whole time you’re in the car.

There are some things I will miss about Estes. I will miss the quiet, the clear starry night skies, the wildlife, the cool summer evenings, being close enough to the National Park to just go off on a hike whenever. I’ll miss the people. I met some great, kind, generous people here. But unfortunately there’s an even longer list of things I will not miss about Estes. The isolation, the tourists, the tourist traffic, the wind. The small-town politics and everyone knowing everyone’s business. There’s a lot of things. Estes is great as a place to visit, and for some people it’s a good place to call home, but we’re just not in that group. Frankly, I’m looking forward to coming back to visit and actually enjoy it the way it’s meant to be enjoyed, because right now I just resent it, and I hate that.

So that’s that. I am ready to embrace the new, and so far our new year is full of newness and change and I am trying my best to remain positive and present. So of course I will continue to update this blog with all things Bean-related! I am not really ready to start packing up this house and figuring out what to do with all of our crap, but the end result will be worth it. Estes Park will always be here (floods be damned) and once I don’t live here anymore I can actually enjoy it again. And who knows…maybe I will actually be able to find the television remote that has been missing since a week before Christmas….

Goodbye, 2013.

It’s sort of difficult to look back and reflect on this year. It seems to have been impossibly long and impossibly full of both good and bad. I’ve heard from many people that 2013 lived up to its reputation of being bad luck and ended up being the worst year in memory. Not many people seemed to have enjoyed this year, and I can’t particularly say that I blame them. Obviously, this year brought us amazing goodness, but it was unbelievably hard, too. Cameron, his father, and both my parents spent time in the hospital. I seem to have lost touch with most of my friends. The flood. Oh, the flood. What happened in September this year put a huge crack in me that has forever altered the way I see the place I live–through no fault of its own–and I don’t think it will ever be fixed. I spent more time this year battling my depression and anxiety than probably ever before. Not to diminish the beauty that is my daughter, but her arrival brought with it almost 5 weeks of daily crying and some of the worst self-doubt I’ve ever had.

But there was beauty and wonderful moments this year, too. I celebrated my 25th birthday and Cameron turned 30. We spent three whole weeks in Hawaii, something I think about almost daily. We traveled to North Carolina to witness the union of two of our most wonderful family members. I started working on a new book with my agent, which was exciting despite how challenging it was. And, even though many of my friends seem to have fallen away from me, I grew closer than ever before to my best friend–my husband–and to my parents. Of course, most beautiful of all, my little girl. I cannot wait to see what this year brings us and I am so excited to watch her begin to learn and grow. I know 2014 will bring new challenges but it will bring new opportunities too, and I’m looking forward to it. I’m eager to see 2013 go into the record books and hopefully 2014 will not be repeating any of its bad habits.

Happy 2014, everybody.

Merry Christmas

We had an excellent Christmas week with Caroline. On Sunday, we went to my parent’s house to watch football and finish our shopping. Monday, they took us to dinner at HuHot Mongolian Grill for Cameron’s birthday, and then they got us a hotel room to spend a nice baby-free mommy daddy night, also for Cameron’s birthday. (He turned 30 on the 20th!) The hotel was AWESOME and Caroline had a sleepover with MeMe and Papi while we enjoyed nearly 12 hours of continuous sleep. Ahh. We went out to breakfast the next morning (Christmas Eve) and then went back to my parent’s house to help them set up for my mom’s party. That night some of our family and close friends came to visit and spread some holiday cheer. The next day we got up early to open presents, had breakfast, and hung out until Cameron’s family arrived. After a casual dinner with them we headed back up the hill and the next morning had Christmas round 2 with his family. So many fun presents! Caroline made out like a bandit in the toy department. Cam’s family heads off to visit with some other friends and family later this afternoon, so it was a short visit but really fun. Needless to say I am looking forward to just relaxing again…it has been a busy week! Caroline has her 2 month appointment and vaccinations on Monday, and Cameron returns to work on Wednesday, so we have a big week of transition ahead of us. Anyway, in lieu of a blow-by-blow of our Christmas week, enjoy some photos instead. I hope you had a fantastic week and were able to enjoy fun times with your family and friends. 🙂

Meeting her Grandpa Bruce for the first time

My new espresso machine

1 Week

Our little bean is a whole week old! Woah!

It really has been an amazing week watching her start to grow. Already, she isn’t this frail tiny little 5 pound flopper. She is putting on weight and starting to chunk up and every day I can see this amazing change in her. It’s crazy! She’s finally starting to get those chunky little cheeks and her hands and feet aren’t so wrinkly anymore. At her pediatrician appointment on Friday, she weighed a whopping 5 pounds 7 ounces (when she left the hospital Tuesday she weighed 4 pounds 14 ounces) and she took in an ounce of milk while we were showing her latch to the lactation consultant just to make sure we were doing it right. Her jaundice is almost unnoticeable now and the doctor was really impressed. I was worried she wasn’t getting enough milk (since it’s so hard to tell exactly how much is going in) but apparently she is just fine. She nurses like a champ especially since my milk came in on Wednesday/Thursday.

She has really been the most mild-mannered baby. She sleeps about 3 hours at a time at night (Friday night she even slept for 4 hours, I was shocked when I got up and looked at the clock) and snoozes peacefully in her bouncer chair most of the day. We decided that we would only swaddle her at night, so that she associates it with sleep/night time, and so far it seems to be working. When we go to bed at night, I feed her, give her a change, and burrito wrap her and she passes right out. Only once or twice has she given us a fuss to go down, and I think part of that had to do with the fact that I was really stressed and emotional and she was probably feeding off of that energy. When she wakes every 2-3 hours, she never cries, just makes little fussy noises that are usually enough to wake me up. At first she hated getting her diaper changed, but she doesn’t seem to mind it nearly as much now and is very accommodating with getting her clothing changed too.

She isn’t displaying a ton of personality just yet, but a couple quirks are becoming apparent. For example, she usually double poops–one about 5-10 minutes after the first–so we have learned that when we hear her poo, we have to wait a little for the rest of it or else we will have to change her twice. I swear if we do it too soon, she gives us this devious little smile like “oh just wait, Mom.” She loves to wait to pee till she’s on the table too. She is learning how her arms and legs work more and more now too. She loves stretching those looong skinny legs out when she’s in her bouncer. Sometimes we’ll look over and see her feet way up in the air waving around. Last night I was trying to get her calmed down after a feeding and she was practically flailing her body around. It’s a very positive sign to see some more control over those muscles since that was one of her lowest scores on the APGAR.

Oh, and I love love love watching her facial expressions. I know most of them are involuntary at this point but some of them are hysterical. She scrunches up her face like she’s about to start bawling and then just relaxes, but it freaks out people who have never seen her do it before because they’re sure she’s about to have a fit. She seems pretty chill about being in her car seat, she has barely cried in the car even though she’s only been in it for about 10 minutes. This weekend we’re pretty sure we’re going to go down to my parent’s house, which is about an hour drive (now that a highway is open! YAY!) so that will be the real test. She wasn’t super excited about being in her stroller the one time we tried to take her for a walk around the block, but I think she was also pretty hungry and fussy when we went out, and it was really windy, so we’ll try again with that one soon. I brought her outside with me to fill the bird feeders the other day, and she seemed to like the fresh air. I’m excited for her to get big enough that I can put her in the Baby K’Tan and take her outside with me for easy walks without the stroller. (The instructions say they are only rated for babies 8 pounds and up, so I probably have a little while to wait.)

The animals are doing pretty well with the new addition. The dog is nervous around her, and I have a feeling he recognizes that she’s a member of the alpha pack and automatically above him on the totem pole. Hopefully when she starts getting bigger and isn’t always in the chair or crib he will start to come around. The cats were sort of aloof at first, but as you can see from the picture above, it didn’t take Sherlock too long to get comfortable with her. Whiskey is relatively indifferent, but he was the first to do that face rub thing on her, meaning he obviously accepts her even if he doesn’t pay her much attention.

Cam is doing great. He is willing to change diapers (even the really gross ones) and get up with me at night to feed and change her. He was stoked to give her her first bottle yesterday (which she took like a champ) and every day I can see him totally embracing his daddyhood. Today he is going to build a ramp off the front porch so that I don’t have to lift the stroller off the steps by myself once he goes back to work. Mostly he has been a rock for me, since parts of this week have been challenging emotionally, and that is invaluable to me.

On the subject of me, this week has been a pretty wild roller coaster. Physically, I feel great. I’ve dropped almost 25 pounds already (which seems hard to believe) and since I am getting an average of 6-8 hours of sleep a night, cumulatively, I feel pretty put together most of the time. Most of my days are great and I feel upbeat and happy and positive. Most nights, though, I end up in tears at some point. Over the weekend I started feeling like all I had done since coming home from the hospital is sit in my chair and wait for the next feeding time, so Cameron made me go out to breakfast with my mom yesterday so that I could get out of the house a little. I started getting it in my head that our house was this safe little bubble where I knew what to do and I felt comfortable here with the baby, so the idea of taking her out and about with us was freaking me out a little. My parents said we should come down to visit this weekend and I sort of panicked thinking about all the things that could go wrong and how scary it would be to not be inside our house, our little bubble. I have to remind myself that I can’t stay in here forever and I need to try to trust myself and be confident that I have the resources to be able to take care of her when we are out and about. Today we are going to take her out to the library to pick up her complimentary book bag and find out what the storytime schedule is so that I can start going out and meeting other moms which will be especially important once Cameron goes back to work. After the library we are going to go to Starbucks and visit his employees, and then as long as everything goes well we are thinking we will go out to lunch too. It’ll be really helpful for me to get out and interact with other people and escape the bubble for a little and see that it’s not as scary as I have built up in my head. Everything gets a little easier every day but I have to remind myself to take it a day at a time and not panic about the next week or the next month or the next six months. I also need to start doing things around the house when I am just sitting around, which will help me feel more structured and that I am doing something other than sitting here waiting for the next feeding time. I think I’m going to pull out my knitting loom and get back to work on that, maybe make a baby blanket or something like that. I’ve also been cruising Pinterest for craft ideas especially now that Christmas is coming up. If I keep myself moderately busy, my days will not feel quite so “empty.”

In the meantime, it is awful nice just to spend time snuggling this little bean. 🙂

Happy Halloween!

And a blessed Samhain too!

Not a Halloween costume, but close enough! From way back in 2007…

Trick-or-treat happens in about 9 hours and I still haven’t decided exactly what I’m going to dress up as. Whoops! I’m a little mad at myself for that one, too, because there were SO many great things I could have done with the bump. For a while I thought it would be hysterical if Cameron dressed up as Tom Hanks in Castaway and I dressed up as Wilson…but unfortunately I just didn’t sit down in time to figure out how to pull it off. Of course, having pretty limited resources for costume making didn’t help either. I think I’ll end up rustling up some buccaneer garb and going with that. Nothing too special but whatever.

In Estes, trick-or-treat happens downtown at all the businesses on Elkhorn Avenue. This year is particularly special as of course it is one of the first “normal” community gatherings post-flood, and it will be great for everyone to start feeling back to normal. Normally, businesses provide their own candy to hand out, but some amazing people in town found a way to get $9,000 worth of candy donated to the town from candy companies, which is awesome! (It comes out to something like 141,000 pieces of candy, or so I read. Yum!) I’ll be stationed at the Starbucks handing out candy.

Here was last year’s costume:

Zombie chef!

Gosh, look how long my hair was…..

I LOVE gory makeup. Miss when I used to get paid to do it!

As it turned out most kids were TERRIFIED of me…I kind of forgot it was a “kid” event and not a haunted house, which I worked in for a number of years….whoops. But I had fun, so.

The year before last, I went as a Tim Tebow fan….also known as a mindless zombie. I really could not help myself.

Anyway, I suppose I will figure something out for tonight. Probably will be harder to figure out what Cameron will dress up as! I so wish Caroline were here so I could dress her up as something that she wouldn’t complain about…next year I suppose!

Hope you all have a fun and safe Halloween! Eat lots of candy!

The Best Library

It should come as no surprise that one of the greatest things I cherish is the value of good books. My library is very special to me and I am definitely one of those people who will pick up MORE books even if I haven’t finished the one (or six) I’ve already spent time reading. When Borders went out of business (sniff) I haunted that place like a bad case of fleas and I probably ended up taking home a couple hundred dollars worth of books to add to my library. I love books! (Don’t get me wrong, I love my Kindle too, but there’s just something awesome about real, solid books. A lot of times I’ll buy a book on my Kindle and then buy it again in hard copy because I feel like it needs to grace my shelves.) I can’t wait to pass on my love of reading and exploring to my daughter.

Last night some wonderful friends of mine threw me and Caroline a second baby shower because nobody was able to make it to the first after the flood. What a fun time! We laughed and played games and I think the whole thing was especially therapeutic because there just haven’t been that many chances to let loose and be silly and laugh amongst friends since the flood. We specified that there should be no gifts, but naturally there were, though I was pleased that the majority of them were….books! Caroline is well on her way to a wonderful library and I am so excited!

Just too appropriate after the flood! I think his name should be Rainy. (Or do you think it’s a her? For some reason I tend to inherently see teddy bears as male…)

Are these not the cutest damn things you’ve ever seen in your life?

Sophie!

Books, books, and more books!

More owls!

Definitely THE coolest! It belonged to a friend’s grandfather and was printed in 1905. If there’s one thing I love more than books, it’s old books. I have a mild obsession.

And though I forgot to take pictures, everyone decorated blank bibs, onesies and socks for Caroline which I thought was just the cutest. I also got a basket of bath goodies, because everyone knows Mommy needs to be pampered too. And a 2-year subscription to Parents (Parenting?) magazine! We had such a fun time and had some great food (one of the girls made a pumpkin spice cake with maple cinnamon frosting, OM NOM NOM) and played games…including one where you had to place a large potato between your knees and waddle over to a glass jar on the floor and deposit the potato inside. It was hysterical. Mostly I was glad to have some time to spend with friends, a few of whom I hadn’t seen for quite some time. Caroline will be well loved indeed!