Life Updates from the Gish Fam

Apparently it's time I started blogging again, per my sister. I guess that's true considering in the time that's passed between my last entry, we've moved to a new house, we went to Disney (again), I got a new job (again), and Abby's continued growing and changing at an alarming rate. I never even wrote her 2 year update- all of the details of which are now long forgotten and have been replaced by thoughts of "how do I handle the fact that she calls me by my first name?" and "potty training isn't actually required, is it?"...

We DID successfully detach her from the pacifier although it took a little white lie (isn't that all parenting actually is?) about Mickey Mouse needing it for some babies that didn't have pacifiers. And sometimes she still brings it up... and I'm slightly worried our next trip to Disney will consist of her marching up to Mickey, folding her arms/stomping her foot and demanding he return her paci immediately.

So where was I... oh yes. The house. We built a house. We sold our old house and we built a new one... like from dirt and wood and stuff. Well WE didn't build it...but we paid someone to do it and I picked out (and subsequently stressed about my choices) all of the details. Then we moved in, unpacked, and put a bunch of boxes in the basement where they will sit for the next 10 years. We also put in a fence and are fiercely debating between a deck and a patio.

Then we went to Disney World. We were super excited to take Abby to the Halloween party and for her to see the parade that she watches endlessly on YouTube in person... but Hurricane Matthew ruined all that fun. We ended up coming home early.

Then I decided to shake things up by getting an awesome job offer and leaving my job of less than a year. Between that, Joey's golfing and Abby's ballet lessons, we've been busy this Fall.

Thanksgiving came and we bravely offered to host both my and Joey's families. We only ruined one turkey in the process and other than that little mishap (tip: don't take your turkey out to thaw and forget about it...for a day) and the fact that I bought twice as much food as we needed, I'd say we were successful.

So here we are. It's Christmas time now and we are doing all the Christmassy things like making gingerbread houses and visiting Santa at the mall. It's going to be weird this year without Dad, but we have the memories and we have each other. 

Abby is starting to get Christmas (or at least, Santa) and I tried explaining the Christmas story to her when we visited "Baby Cheezus" at the living nativity at our church.... (all she remembers is that there were goats). Maybe next year...

I hardly blogged this year but maybe 2017 will be different. Or maybe it won't. I can at the very least assure you that we won't be moving next year. Or ever again.

Hope it's a very merry one for you and yours!!!

~SG

"I love you, Mommy"

My big girl turned 2 on August 13th and we had a little cookout with some family, friends and Mickey Mouse cupcakes.

 I need to do a whole write up with her stats and all the usual survey stuff but I'm busy now with work and oh yeah, we're buying a brand new house next week.

I just wanted to document somewhere (since her baby book is packed up) that on Sunday August 21st, Abby wrapped her arms around me and said "I love you, Mommy" for the very first time. It was the sweetest thing I've ever heard and of course I was choking back tears when I said "I love you too sweetheart!"

She has actually said "I love you" unprovoked before, but only ever to Chloe.... It is actually just as sweet to see her wrap her arms around Chloe and say "I love you, Chlo Chlo."

I'll be back after moving madness to finish her two year old write up, and maybe give a little house tour (maybe).

Hope everyone is enjoying the last of summer!!

~SG

Progress

Building a house, much like buying one, is a big emotional roller coaster. After signing, we drove out to our lot every weekend to see nothing but a bunch of grass and then finally, dirt. Things were slow moving for a while, but we finally "went vertical" (industry term, apparently).

Right now, the fun things are happening like cabinet and ceramic tile installation, painting, and doors on the inside. And on the outside, they are working on our grading, driveway and sidewalk.

Every time we do a drive by, we take pictures. So I thought it would be fun now that we're officially official to show you some of the progress on the outside of the house.

Enjoy!

Hooray!

I know I've been avoiding the subject for a while but I owe you guys an update. So here it is: We sold the house.

In fact, let me tell you how it all came to be because you are going to be like "Whaaat?!".

Remember when I wrote this post? I was feeling really stressed and worried that things weren't going to work out. I decided to just be honest about it because the situation was completely out of my hands. The day I wrote that post, I recognized both internally and then publicly that the process was out of my hands and that there was a chance it could not work out and that it was okay. 

That evening, I got a call for a showing around 5pm, which is what time I usually get home from work. Instead of going home, I drove down the street past our house to my in-laws' house.  When I drove by, I got a look at the family that was viewing our house. It was a Mom, Dad and two tween girls. They were outside talking with our neighbors, who also have two tween girls, and who had fortuitously set up a Lemonade stand. And their neighbors, who ALSO have two tween girls, who were helping them work the Lemonade stand.  And I had a feeling.  Right then.  I knew it. 

So I went down the street and told everyone this, and my phone rang and it was their realtor calling to tell me the house was beautiful... and that was it.  He said he had shown them a TON of houses but that our house showed really well. I was so defeated because we had been getting this type of feedback over and over. "The house is great but..." and no offer.

Monday rolled around and Joey was traveling for work and I had just gotten home for the day and was wrangling Abby and the dogs when the phone rang.  It was their agent. They wanted to come back for a second look and they would be there in 20 minutes! I grabbed Abby, threw some dirty dishes in my purse (ok not really, but I probably did something like this at some point), leashed the dogs and we all got into the car and drove down the street again. I prayed and positively visualized and chanted "under contract" like a crazy person. It worked.

The next day they put in an offer.

I don't know if it was my prayers, my acknowledgement that things might not work out the way I wanted them to, divine intervention, luck, standard real estate proceedings, or lemonade stands... but the moment I saw them I knew they would buy our house. And the moment I accepted that this process was truly and utterly outside of my control (which is super difficult to do as I am a control freak), we got what we'd been hoping for.

Yesterday we went to settlement.

I am so happy for the new homeowners. I hope they enjoy all of the hard work, blood, sweat (Joey's) and tears (mine) that went into making that house a home. I hope they enjoy their new neighborhood and their new neighbors. I'm just so happy for them.

And now I'm really happy for us. Because now, for the first time since all this insanity began.. I can get 100% EXCITED because holy crap... we're building a house!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Abby Lately!

Abby is growing and changing so fast that I can barely keep up with her. I should do a complete update as she is almost 22 months old, but ain't nobody got time for that...

I wanted to capture some of the funny or super smart things she has been doing/saying. Like how overnight she went from referring to Mickey Mouse as "Mimi" and started calling him "Mickey". (Majorly sad face.) Thankfully she still calls balloons "maynoons". In fact, the other day she drew a circular pattern with her crayon, pointed to it, and said "maynoon". OH! Speaking of drawing. Abby uses her left hand 99% of the time when drawing and also often when eating. Most things I read say that handedness isn't really determined until they are 4. So we will see, but it seems to me that she is a lefty! Strange because none of our family members are, except Joey's Grandfather who was a bit ambidextrous. 

Cuhyur-ing!

One of the funnier things that happened lately is we were driving out by our new house (we stalk it on the reg) and she starting Hooting like an owl.  Joey and I are like... wtf and start looking around.  Well sure enough, we are at a red light next to a Hooters. I basically died of laughter. It reminded me of the time Joey said the word "whore" and Abby started neighing (like a horse..). Love her.

Porch swinging with Dad

She's recently become obsessed with watching Disney Parks parades and shows on YouTube (thanks to her Dad) and now requests a "rade" nightly. Her current fave is the Halloween "Boo to You" parade, which she knows by heart. She tells me "Tick Tock coming!" and "Clarabell coming!" before you can even see them on the screen..... So she should be well prepared for our next Disney trip which, of course, is coming up this Fall. :)

Chillin, watchin a 'rade'

Abby is doing really great with speaking in (short) sentences and communicating to us what she wants or needs. She's not so great at understanding when she wants something and can't have it. Or understanding that just because you say 'please' doesn't mean you can have a "pop-it" (lollipop) before dinner or bedtime... Speaking of pop-its, they are so gross and sticky but I am trying to use them as special treats/distractions to wean her off of the pacifier. This is a somewhat terrible plan (but we do "bruh teef" every night!), but I'm trying my best so she doesn't go to kindergarten with a paci in her pocket...

Hanging with Grandmom and a pop-it

Last thing (for now), is that she recently took a liking to the book, "If you Give a Mouse a Cookie". I don't know if they read it in school but suddenly she wanted to read it every night. Which we did, and after a week or so, one night I decided to leave off the last word of every sentence in the book. And Abby filled in 100% of the words correctly. I immediately texted my family that she'll be going to an Ivy league school on full scholarship.... Kidding, obviously, but maybe we need to get some new books because after that she sat down with her pile of books and started "reading" them to herself.  "Goose Needs a Hug" is my favorite one. "Uh Oh! Goose sad!" I have also noticed she likes to point out when characters are sad on tv or in books. I'm glad she is aware of others' emotions but I really hope she is not a total empath like me. 

Side walk chalk!

Anyhooo..We are getting ready for a nice little beach vacay with my brother, SIL, and niece (and some Grandmom too!).  I'm excited to get to the beach for a little bit before things get crazy. Hope everyone is enjoying their summers!!!

~SG

Nerves

This is a safe place, right? I'm in the tree, in the nest....

Guys? I'm freaking out. How am I supposed to get super excited about our new house when we haven't sold our current house? What if we don't sell it? What if it's Fall and the house is built and nobody bought this one and we can't close? We accepted this risk 100% when we dove headfirst into this adventure. But that doesn't completely invalidate my worries...

Lately I have been thinking about how lucky we are to be even doing this at all. How fortunate we are to have a beautiful home to sell. A safe neighborhood to live in. Family living nearby. I have been focusing on the fact that whatever is meant to be, will happen. Whether that's moving or staying. I think I'm on the brink of an important life lesson. Whatever the outcome is has yet to be identified.

I'm tired. Tired of Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest. Pictures of beautiful things that I want to have. Jealousy, that evil green monster. Why can't I see the beauty in what I already have? Why do I need things? After all, they are just things. I have always maintained that experiences are more valuable (um hello, best vacation excuse ever).  Perhaps this experience, in itself, will become a valuable memory for us.

What is going to happen? I don't know. What is that quote about the journey being the destination?

Life on the Market

Selling your house means that people will need to come look at it in order for them to decide to buy it. (Duh) Knowing that people could come by the house at any time means that it needs to always be sparkling clean.*

*Note to self: This would have been much easier without 2 dogs and a toddler.

Since we never know when somebody may call us and/or pop by, we have to leave the house in pristine condition every day when we go to work.  That means adding stuff to my morning routine that I didn't do before like making the bed (sorry, Mom), emptying/refilling the dishwasher (or hiding dirty dishes under the sink.....), turning on lights in the basement, opening doors, etc. etc. We also have to lock up the dogs so they don't go making friends with everybody, or, you know, scaring them away. :-/

Having people coming and going all day also means dealing with their aftermath- they turn off the lights (leaving the dogs in the pitch dark), leave the doors unlocked or open, use our bathroom and leave the toilet seat up (sooo grooosssss), sit on our furniture (I can see your butt marks!), etc.

It is also creepy coming home after a long day of multiple showings. Checking every closet and behind every shower curtain is a MUST.

But the worst part, IMO, is the agents that can be rude and unprofessional. I absolutely loathe the last minute calls, waking Abby from her nap, throwing the dogs in the car, and driving around for an hour just to find out they never even showed up.

But there have been some positives to this experience as well. For example, I never thought I could live in a sparkling clean house. Side story - I have a girlfriend from high school who lives in a gorgeous, huge house. She also has 3 boys. I have always been jealous of the fact that there is never a thing out of place at her house. It's like magic. Like even with a cleaning lady I thought my house could never look like that.  But having to put EVERYTHING back where it came from every single day, and keep things put away out of view has taught me that yes, with a little bit of effort, my house can stay that clean and surfaces that empty! Maybe this was just common sense but..... it has been so nice to come home to a clean house, crawl into a made bed at night, and have to do minimal work to keep it that way. (Am I finally becoming an adult?)

SO Anyhoo... if you live around the DC area you know that Mother Nature has been less than kind this Spring. It has pretty much been raining nonstop since we went on the market, which is super great because pretty much nobody wants to go house hunting when it's raining. I'm not freaking out (yet) (ok maybe I am a little), but this is just part of the process and we're going to have to ride it out!

Ohhh and if you made it this far, I guess I should reward you by telling you we totally went against your fan vote and picked cherry cabinets for the new house. :) 

Happy Friday everyone!!

~SG

Easter Fun

For Easter, we went up to my Mom's and had a nice little break from the craziness of getting the house on the market. We also got to meet our new niece, Julia (heart eyes)! She is, of course, perfect.

The weather was pretty nice, and Abby got to play outside with sidewalk chalk and ran around my parents' backyard like I used to do. While she was running around, I noticed our old plastic blue elephant slide from the late 80s sitting under the back deck, where it has been for oh, 20 years probably. Collecting spiders, bees, dirt, and who knows what else. Well, Abby LOVES her slide at school. I've never gotten to see her play with it so the lightbulb went on and I crawled under the deck (spiders and all!) and dragged this nasty, dirty, muddy old thing out into the daylight.

The first thing that happened is my Mom's dogs freaked out because WTF is that. The second thing that happened is I had to crawl under the remains of a collapsed storage tent (that fell down in the heavy snow) to get the hose, which had been placed there for safe keeping. Finally, I was able to spray the slide off but the old elephant needed a little more elbow grease. I scrubbed it not once, but TWICE with a scrub brush and dish soap, until it was clean enough that I wasn't totally grossed out about Abby playing with it.  As I was drying it off, Abby was playing with her Dad and I heard her ask "Pease?" "What do you want, Abby?" "Pease? Slide?"

Needless to say, the slide was a HUGE hit. It still needs more TLC but the part Abby was playing on was fine.  On Easter Sunday, we went to the sunrise service at church and my Mom cooked brunch for our family and some close friends. Abby even had her own little Easter Egg hunt! My sister brought out my Dad's super nice camera, and got some great pictures. Here's a little snapshot of our springy Easter weekend!!

Proof that I attended the weekend's festivities 

My Mom filled the eggs with puffs and crunchies (baby snacks) so they were slightly healthier ;)

Shortly after Uncle Alex taught her how to smash the crunchies under her shoes. Thanks, Uncle Alex. You can see my Mom scolding him right behind me. 

So we're building a house...

So there is only one reason I am writing this post and that's because I need you guys to help me choose what color cabinets we go with, but then I realized I owe quite a bit of explanation as to how I got to the point where I am picking out cabinet colors so let me re-wind slightly and get you sort of up to speed on what is going on....

So yeah. We decided to move. We had a location in mind, and upon looking at all of our options we decided to build a house. It's crazy exciting and crazy expensive. (Damn... where are the emojis, Blogger???)

Why are you moving?
1. Location. My 25 mile commute will now be 10 miles. Unfortunately, Joey's will still be really (really) long. But hey, at least one of us will have a short commute amirite?

2. Location. The school district in our new place is highly rated and much more so than the schools in our current location.

3. Location. It's a little less river and a little more mountain (and low flying airplane), but we'll be surrounded by wineries, horse country, and all kinds of new and fun things to explore.

There are other reasons too but this is a public blog so I don't want to go talking about my house when I'm trying to sell it!!!

What are you sad about leaving behind?
1. Being able to walk to Nana's house.

2. Abby's daycare. I LOVE it. I will be writing rave reviews and recommending it to everyone and I will probably cry on her last day.

3. Our doctors offices, favorite local haunts, uber rides, etc.

Getting the house ready to sell has been an eye-opening experience in itself. Polishing up the old girl made me realize how nice she really is. And how we've been neglecting her. We vowed to never make this mistake again. Advice: Every 6 months or so (heck, at least once per year), you should take a look at your house and think what you would need to do in order to sell it. Do you need to fix that broken drywall? Get rid of that nasty old carpet? Re-decorate the living room? AND DO IT. Trust me, you won't regret it.

Joey has also become extremely handy over the years. He has become quite the skilled carpenter/plumber/electrician. Definitely going to keep him around for a while ;) He has been doing a great job getting us ship shape and I have been struggling with clearing out 5 years of junk and staging our rooms so they are Pinterest-worthy.

So enough about the old house, what about the new one?

Well I honestly don't want to get into crazy specifics yet.  There is this whole thing that I haven't really talked about where if we don't sell the old house, we don't get the new house. That's the most terrifying thing about this whole process.  Besides potentially losing money, the embarrassment will probably kill me. "So, I thought you were moving? You did a gigantic Facebook post about it." "Uhh... it didn't work out............"  But hey, you don't get anywhere in life by not taking risks. This was a huge one and I will admit, it has been kind of fun. Mostly a pain in the ass, though. ;)

So, back to the main purpose of the post:

In order for the builders to break ground on the new house, they need to know what color cabinets we want. (OK, they need to know a lot of other things too.) But I am having a serious dilemma because which direction do I want to go??? White cabinets are super trendy right now, they are gorgeous, clean, and look beautiful with the contrast of a dark wood floor.  Dark cabinets also look classy, they are timeless, and look expensive next to a nice granite counter top. There are also other options like light browns, black, etc. SO, WHAT DO I DO?? Dearest blog-readers...... now I get to find out just how many of you there still are........ please take my poll located at the top right of my blog!!!

Thank you all and have a lovely day.

~SG

Nobody Blogs Anymore

I was just glancing down my list on The Old Reader, and I counted over 30 blogs that have gone inactive. I enjoy reading people's thoughts and ideas and it makes me sad that nobody really takes the time (or has the time!) to write anymore. And who am I to blame them? Half of my posts start off with "I haven't written for a while..."

In the age of Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter (which I still do not understand), the need for instant gratification, constantly refreshing information, and being able to provide real-time updates on our lives has pretty much killed the blog.

I started off with my own blog to keep my family up to date with what I was doing. It also became useful when I was pregnant with Abby and during her first year to write down weekly/monthly updates which I'm sure I will look back on in the future. I hope to continue writing, however sporadically, because I think it's fun and it will be cool to look back on in the years to come.

I don't know the future of my blog, or anyone else's. But if you are still out there, HI! And thanks for following along!!

This concludes my random thought for the day.

~SG

Making Waves

Let me just say that I have started this post 300 times over the past few years. At the risk of offending my friends who sell products via this method, I want to point out something about it that I recently became aware of.

If you don't know about Multi-Level Marketing then you legit live under a rock. Beauty products, Jewelry, Health/Fitness products, etc. You see it all over your Facebook. You probably have people contacting you that you haven't spoken to in YEARS asking how you've been and oh btw, do you want to join my group and try my products? Of course it takes major balls to reach out to people like that (it's essentially cold calling, so good on you) and it is also time consuming outside your real job (which, all of them have despite the claims that you can "work from home!"). Don't get me wrong, you gotta do what you gotta do. And I got sucked in once too, which is why I'm writing this.

I, too, fell into the trap of "get healthy, make money!". I joined, paid, and after that I realized the products weren't working for me. They were making me physically sick. And I had to keep consuming them in order to make money! I also was not aware that I was signed up for automatic refills and additionally, I had to pay a fee each month! WTF! I ended up severing my ties with that company and apparently screwing over the girl who was directly up the line from me in the process. I felt terrible and it was incredibly awkward for a while.

When I joined, I was invited to join a secret Facebook group of members in this same company (I'm trying to be vague here to protect these people!) and for some reason, I never left the group. It is a group of ~130 women all who report (in some way, shape or form) to the leader who is a ~30 year old single mom. She is constantly sharing her tips on how to get more business (and more money for her, obviously) and one day recently she shared her income.

She said that after working for this company for 3 years, with 130 people working for her, she was taking home $3500 a month. Now, don't get me wrong. That is SUPER impressive for what she and her people are selling. But, if you do the math, it comes out to $42,000 per year. And that's BEFORE TAXES.

I was just shocked (and maybe I am just dumb) that she works SO HARD (allegedly) and has all these people working for her and making money for her; she's always talking about living her dream and being a stay-at-home-mom, and she makes $42K pre-taxes. Ouch. I guess it really depends on your definition of "living the dream", doesn't it? Maybe if you live in the middle of nowhere that salary would be okay. But anywhere I have lived you'd be pretty screwed.

Why am I sharing this? Because it's easy to get sucked into the game. As a Mom myself, I know how tempting it is to be a stay-at-home-mom and these companies LOVE to prey on new moms that are dying to quit their jobs and be with their babies- if only they could afford it! These Multi-Level Marketing companies claim to be the answer but unless you want to be eating table scraps (or moving to the sticks), I suggest you keep your day job.

Do I still love and support my friends who sell products via MLM? Of course. You are all bad asses and I HOPE that you become the exception to the rule and make a million dollars. I truly do. I'm sure the self-help literature that you are required to read will tell you that I am seeing the glass as half empty, but I am just reminding you that there is something in the glass already. Better be careful not to spill it. 

Love you all,

SG

18 Month Update

Well, 2016 wasn't off to a great start but things are slowly looking up. After a relaxing and timely vacation to Disney World (and our first Disney Cruise!), it has been back to work and life. With everything that happened in January, I had not worked a full week since before Christmas. So coming back from vacation to full weeks of work in February has been difficult. We have enjoyed several celebrations like Jason and Lydia's engagement party and Corinne's baby shower and are looking forward to meeting Baby Davis very soon!! While we wait, I thought I would give you an 18 month update on my own baby, who is in full toddler-mode and is quickly turning into a little girl.

Caught with her hand in the cookie jar dog bowl.

How many? 18 months on February 13th. A whole year and a half of Abby!

At the Pediatrician for her 18 month check up!

Stats: 25 lb 14 oz (85%), 33.25 in. (89%). They say if you double a 2 year old's height, it is a good indicator of how tall they are going to be. Good news for Abby as she is on her way to being taller than 5'5. 

I turn my back for 1 minute and there are stickers on the dog.

Diaper Size: I think she is going to be in size 4s until she is done with diapers. I don't see her weighing more than 37 pounds before she is potty trained!!! Speaking of potty training... we got her a Mickey Mouse potty... it's going well.

Clothes Size: She is wearing 18 months and I am starting to buy 24 month and/or 2T for the spring/summer. I am so used to jumping up to the next size so quickly but her growth has slowed down now that she's almost 2. UGH I can't believe I just said that!

Making Valentines with Aunt Lydia

Eating: Abby's school tells us she is one of their best eaters. Hahaha. I don't know if I should be proud or not. She has started to refuse foods at random times. For example, she won't eat meat right now. Wtf.... I'm glad she likes eggs/cheese/yogurt. She drinks milk (of various %s), water, apple juice, and if you want to see something funny, give her orange juice. One of her favorite foods is "sraw sraws" (strawberries) and she will try just about anything as long as it's on my plate/I am in the middle of eating it...

Sleeping: Abby is a pretty good sleeper. No matter what time she goes to bed, she will be up between 5 and 6. So I try to get her down around 7pm. She still uses the paci and I'm looking for ways to ditch it. She also likes to wake up in the middle of the night and yell until someone comes in and re-tucks her in. So, I'd like for that to stop.

Teeth: She has a ton of teeth and is not very good at brushing them. I try, but it usually ends with her chewing on the toothbrush and trying to run away with it :(

Eye Color: Still very gray. I'm pretty sure she got her eyes from my Dad.

Milestones:
Walking- Abby is a champ at walking and borderline running. She is quick! 

Talking- I tried counting her words the other day and I got to 45 and quit. She's on-pace for that milestone so I'm not too worried about keeping an exact list. Her favorite thing right now is telling me "Hot. Don't touch". 

Firsts:

First cruise! Disney Cruise Line is highly recommended if you would like to take children on a cruise, especially young ones. Major bonuses on DCL vs other cruise lines: Swim Dipe-friendly splash area (babies in swim diapers are not allowed in cruise ship pools), Bathtubs in EVERY stateroom, Child-friendly activities, Character meets, Accommodating restaurants/servers (the first night she threw a FIT at dinner and we were able to get our food super fast and outta there, with dessert to-go!), Child Care (excellent, safe, clean) and tons of adult-only places to go on the ship!

Interests:
All things Mickey Mouse...er... "Mimi", Minnie (also Mimi), Donald Duck (Duck), Goofy (Fifi), Daisy (Dizzy), Pluto (??-she has a word for Pluto that sounds nothing like Pluto), Toodles (Oh Too!), etc.

What's Next?

Abby is getting to the age where people start asking when the next Gish baby will come along. And to tell you the truth, I don't know. We had a plan. But it all went out the window when I started my new job. And now, I don't know. As a planner, you'd think that would give me extreme anxiety but instead I feel at peace because there is no pressure. For now, we are just focused on the excitement of Abby's cousin who will arrive any day!!!

Congratulations Uncle Al and Aunt Cori <3