The 1st day of Summer turned out to be a memorable one, as we welcomed a new baby into the Vargas Family; my nephew Andrew Garcia Vargas was born shortly after 11p on June 21, 2014. At 7 lbs, 14 oz 21" long he is my sister-in-law Melanie's biggest baby yet :)
In the days leading up to Andrew's birth Melanie was feeling pretty miserable, suffering with virus-like symptoms, so I was suspicious that she might be going into labor sooner rather than later. While her actual due date wasn't until June 27th, her ultrasound showed a due date of June 23rd, so when her water broke on Saturday morning I really wasn't surprised!
Jim and I had spent the morning outside with the kids in the pool and were planning on heading to the park in the afternoon, since we had to be out of the house by 2:30 for the house showing, but we rearranged our game plan so that we could help out Melanie and David with their kids. We ended up going over to their house for the rest of the day, where the kids had a blast playing together on the trampoline and in the pool. We ordered a bunch of pizzas for dinner and then Danielle, Melanie's sister, arrived with her husband to take over the evening shift for us. It all worked out perfectly! I went to the hospital yesterday afternoon to meet my newest little nephew. He is perfect in every way! Melanie is sore and tired but doing well. She will be discharged with Andrew later this morning.
I implemented a new bedtime routine for the girls on Friday night and much to my delight it seems to be working MUCH better than the old routine! Thank god for small miracles, right? :) I have been putting Savannah up to bed about 20-30 minutes before Bella. If she's not completely asleep by the time I bring Bella up, she's pretty close to it, so she doesn't have the energy to get out of bed and cause trouble.
As far as we know, the second house showing went well. We haven't heard anything yet, but expect that we will at some point today. We are supposed to go look at a house on Wednesday but if a bid doesn't come in between today and tomorrow then Jim and I have agreed to cancel that appointment and take the house off the market. I already have a mental list of things I'd like to get done around the house should we take it off the market - especially now that the dining room is *completely* finished (hooray!). Last Fall Jim installed a beautiful glass front door, but now we don't have a screen door, so that's at the top of our "to do" list (Jim will make one). We also want to get a new refrigerator, something that's been on our list for quite a while but we've been procrastinating, not knowing if we would buy a house that already has the kind of appliances I'm looking for. And then there's just some little things I want to do - hang pictures, decorate Sebastian's room, etc etc.
We continue to make the most of these gorgeous days we've been having lately...spending as much time as possible outside in the backyard! We've already gone through 2 full bottles of sunscreen, a sign that the sun has been shining down on us more often than not these days! Today Kyle and Bella even did a little "learning" work outside; Kyle did one page of math while Bella did one lesson of reading and half of a page of math. Tomorrow they will both work on their penmanship skills, as they received multiple letters in the mail today from various family members. It's really important to me that they keep up with their letter writing, not only because it helps them to keep up with their writing skills but also because I want them to understand that the meaning of a handwritten letter is far more significant than that of an e-mail. In a world overcome by an immeasurable amount of electronics it's nice to resort back to the basics whenever possible.
Speaking of electronics, Kyle has been using his remote controlled toys quite a bit lately! He loves to go to the Rec Park to fly his airplane and, when we're inside, he enjoys flying his helicopter. Just today, for the first time ever, Jim and I allowed him to ride his bike over to the Rec Park by himself. When he asked to go Jim was already at work and Savannah was napping so we gave him permission to go alone, providing he wore his watch and paid attention to the time. The park is only about 5 minutes away but even still, I was nervous! I shouldn't have been, though. He was home 10 minutes early! It's hard to loosen the chains but I know it's a necessity..not only for him, but for me as well. I've always been just a little too over-protective. He needs to be able to experience things without always having someone by his side. And it helps that he is SUCH a good, honest kid. He is a leader by nature, but he has no problem following rules.
VBS starts up later this week, which I'm really looking forward to for both Kyle and Bella. I'm very hopeful that they will make some new friends during class, more so Kyle than Bella. I know how much he would love to have at least a couple of friends who live close by! Once again I was kind of saddened to see some pictures posted on FB over the weekend that showed a bunch of local kids together at a birthday party. I knew most of the faces in the pictures; they were all kids Kyle has played with at one time or another. Looking at the pictures reminded me of how few birthday parties Kyle is invited to, and how he always seems to be the kid that is left out of things that happen within our community. Sometimes it bothers me, sometimes it doesn't..
No comments:
Post a Comment