Fall Updates

It's been waaay too long since I posted anything. Seems to be a theme lately. Oh well, this time I probably have the best excuse I've had in a while....we've moved! We sold our condo and bought a house in Pflugerville. It's been quite a ride the last few months but has been well worth it!

Early September we finally got an offer on the condo. The first one was horrible, but less than a week later we found ourselves with two offers (a second from the first people that made the horrible offer) and another more reasonable one. After the typical negotiations we reached an agreement on the condo and had a contract meaning it was time to start looking for a place to buy! I think we went under contract on the condo on a Thursday, were out looking for homes on Friday and Saturday and reached a final contract on our new home the next Wed or Thurs (so a week after getting the contract on the condo). We had some time before closing (thankfully!) and closed on both the condo/house on Oct 15/16 (that was a MAJOR fiasco not worth writing out but it was NOT a fun experience and we are really thankful to be done with it!) and moved Oct 17.

Our new home is in the Blackhawk neighborhood in Pflugerville and is 2 miles and a 5 minute drive to Point of Grace. We have great access to the toll roads which makes it easy for me to get to and from work the two days I head out to Del Valle. Shopping continues to pop up nearby too. And we LOVE the neighborhood. There are several pools, playgrounds and amenity centers. The closest pool and playground is less than a 5 minute walk from our house. And when it comes time for Noah to head to school (which will probably be quicker than I realize) the elementary school is about 1 mile away! We're slowly meeting neighbors and are finding out there are LOTS of other little kids nearby which will be great for Noah.

We love having more room in the house. It's a huge open floor plan with the living/kitchen/dining areas all open and connected to each other. Noah just runs circles around the living room. When we get home from being out he says, "Mommy, run?!?" and then takes off. I had no idea how limited he was in the condo. The house is one story so I don't have to worry about him falling down stairs which is nice too. It's a 3 bedroom, 2 bathroom plus an extra "flex" room that we're using as an office (it has a closet so could technically be a bedroom but is only separated from the living room from a set of french doors so we'll not use it as a bedroom unless that's needed sometime down the road). We still have lots of settling in and decorating to do but are making good progress so far. We really are so blessed to be in this home and really feel like this is the place that God wanted us at this time in our lives.

Noah's doing great...talking more and more all the time. He's putting 2 and 3 words together often. We understand a lot of what he says and he easily repeats new words as we teach him new things. It really seems like each new phase with him gets more and more fun. He's exerting some independence of course too which can be challenging. We have a time out rug that we use at home when needed which thankfully isn't very often. Apparetnly at day care they use a corner and he's put himself in the corner a few times (for no reason, I think just to show me the time out corner) which has been pretty funny...he just walks over to the corner, stands there with his nose in it and says "time out". He loves cars, trucks, dinosaurs, Elmo, Mickey Mouse, blocks, books, and tools.

Poor Noah had the flu...twice already this fall!! He and Mike both got H1N1 back in late September and then he started getting sick again right before we moved. I figured it was just a bad cold but took him to be checked out just in case (since we would be busy moving over the weekend) and he ended up testing postive for the flu again! Best we can determine he probably had an early case of seasonal flu that time. Poor little guy. He was a great trooper through both cases and thankfully had no additional complications or secondary infections either time. Mike survived his case too...he was pretty miserable for about 24 hours and then wasn't too bad after that. Amazingly I've remained flu free both times (thank goodness!).

Mike is doing well at Point of Grace. I can't think of anything super crazy with his job there lately. Still meeting with the highschool group on Wed nights and college group on Monday nights. It's amazing to think that when we started volunteering with the HS group 6 years ago I think there were 6 or 8 kids that first Wed night. Now he regularly has 40 or so kids on a Wed night. Wow! He's gearing up for the holiday season which is traditionally busy around the church and is planning some big events for the spring.

I've been busy with the house stuff and started another 1/2 semester teaching the pediatric clinical group at UT in the school of nursing the Monday after we moved. So I have my clinical group on Mondays, and work at the clinic Tue/Thur. I've spent a decent amount of time grading this semseter which has taken a chunk of time on the weekends. Mike and I have also led an Alpha group together at church this fall on Sunday evenings. It's been a good way to be connected again (for me) and has been wonderful to share the faith journey with some new people. I've also been blessed to be able to start meeting regularly with a group of women to talk and pray together which has been awesome for me. Oh and we have UT Football season tickets again and have been to most of the games this season which has been fun (none yet for Noah though he does like to watch them at home, knows Bevo and likes to sing the Eyes of Texas). It's been a busy time but a good time.

I'll post pictures of the house and more updates when I have time...likely not till my semester is over in December.