Tidbits

Little Bits of Updating

I wanted to post a generic, how-we're-doing post, but I really wanted to put some pictures up, as well (my posts feel incomplete without pictures these days). So I snapped a few shots of what we're doing around the house right now. This picture is Vincente inspecting the package that is my new desk. He thought it was a bed... not sure why. He likes to help us put things together (like our bed frame, any furniture we bought that needed assembly, etc). His favorite thing to do is use the tools. Heh, when he was helping with the motorcycle the other night, he dropped a random screw into the motorcycle. Russ had to reach in there with a screwdriver and knock out the little stow away screw.

This is most of what Russ does in the evenings - he studies Chinese. You get a nice little view of the desk and hutch we bought him so he would have a comfortable place to study. He looks so intense! Part of their homework is to record themselves doing a reading assignment in Chinese, and they upload the assignments to their Blackboard site for their class, and then their teacher can listen to it. Russ said today his laoshi (pronounced "lao sure" - it means "teacher") was listening to someone's recording during the first part of class this morning and she started laughing. Everyone was like "Oh, I hope she's not listening to mine." You know, thinking that she was laughing because they butchered something and it sounded funny. Anyway, someone asked who she was listening to, and she said "Russ" (well, she said Russ' Chinese name). Later Russ found out that she laughed because she could hear Vincente saying something in the background. Hey, at least it accurately portrays Russ' study environment! We put a fan in the office for him so he can drown out the sounds of us playing in the rest of the house, but I don't think he has it on while he's recording. I particularily recall that last night Vincente was standing at the door of the office, calling for Russ. Little kid loves his Papai.

And here is me, keeping Russ company in the office (I think at the moment he snapped this picture I was actually starting this post). He likes me to be in the office while he studies and does his homework, but I don't really like to sit and watch him, of course, and if I don't busy myself with something else, I end up distracting him. So, I occupy myself with my blog, Facebook, and now I've started messing around with my digital scrapbooking program. It actually looks really really neat! I'm excited to play with it. I'm trying to decide what to scrapbook first - maybe Vincente's first year. Then I'll move on to his second year - try to get those done before Little Sister comes.

I was incredibly productive today, and so proud of myself for it. I found out that I'm not through with the runaround of health insurance craziness... I'll probably get in to see my OB next week, but sorting out the madness that is Tricare is starting to give me a headache. It's like doing some crazy manuevers through that little contraption in Kung Fu Panda with all the spinning things with the sharp things sticking out of them... okay, that probably didn't make any sense - my point is that it's complicated, but as long as I move at exactly the right time, I'll get through unscathed. Okay.

I also got a quote for car and renters insurance, since our insurance company doesn't insure in CA. That's a headache, mostly because it's more expensive here, but we'll only end up spending about $40 more each month for the exact same coverage... except, it's CA, so everything is more expensive... :6

Heh, okay, now for the amusing story about us moving. Every time we've moved in the past, I have done a "family" foward for our mail with the post office. Well, that was all fine and dandy, until we moved out of the house where a bunch of Rowleys were still living... I didn't realize my mistake until we got some forwarded mail that was addressed to Marv (my father-in-law) and I was like... "Oh, man, this could be very bad." Anyway, I called the post office that day and stopped the family forward, and just today I went back to the post office to set up the forwarding for me and Vincente. Yeah, so if you live with your in laws and you move out of their house, make sure that you do an individual forward for each person in your particular family, instead of a "family" move. Hee. Then everyone will still get their bills. I also sent my in-laws all of their mail, so hopefully they don't get anything too late. My SIL's ACT scores came to my house. She probably wants those.

So that's what we're up to. Oh yes, and potty training. Vincente was scared to death of sitting on the big potty, plus he's too little to be able to climb up to it himself, so we've decided to give a potty chair a try. We bought one today, and he seems to like it okay (he hasn't sat on it to actually go potty, he's mostly just playing with it). We're going to give him a little break, since he was so traumatized by us trying to sit him on the big potty (we had one of those cushy baby-seats, and he didn't mind the potty once he was actually sitting on it, it was just the act of getting on and getting off that scared him). I'll let you know how it goes, once he really starts pottying. He did pee in the big potty yesterday! Three times, actually. The first time it was because he was crying so hard about being put on the potty. The second time it was purposeful, but I got so excited about it that I startled him into stopping :) hee hee. The third time, I was really careful not to get too excited, and once he realized how happy I was, he looked down to see exactly what he was doing, and I think it made him really happy to see his pee. It was a new thing for him, I'm sure, since I don't think he's ever really seen his pee before.