Mexicans in my Bed

We have officially "broken ground or maybe broken roof?"  on our upstairs addition.  We've been officially under construction for the past 10 days after finally getting our building permit from the city after 10 long weeks waiting. We started drawing up the plans for this project last January, and after our encounters with the GPNA historic committee, the Atlanta Urban Design Commission, and then the City of Atlanta permit office we are finally cleared almost 1 year later to begin construction. 

   We are learning to exercise patience everyday as there is a steady stream of workers in and out of the house, and nonstop noise. My SIL, Susie introduced us to the concept of type 2 fun many years ago, and this life adventure certainly fits in the category of type 2 fun.  Kind of like traveling with kids, not exactly enjoyable while it's happening, but when you look back on it you see that it was worthwhile afterall.  If our life wasn't completely chaotic before, it's now in total upheaval-they were laying support beams yesterday and the whole house literally shook for hours it was so loud-we even broke some wine glasses in the cabinets and picture frames on the wall.   The kids are getting used to the crew that is here from sun up to sun down 6 days a week-Hank asks every morning when Oscar and Randy are arriving and Lucy waves hi and bye every single time they walk in and out of the house and her new favorite phrase is "what's that noise?".  Our yard is completely full of materials, we have a dumpster on the street, no roof (well does a huge blue tarp count?), the power flashes and surges on and off all day, and my favorite-the crew listens to telemundo style music all day that makes our house downstairs sound like we're having a mexican fiesta.  Lucy, our music lover, dances along a good bit of the day helping to keep up smiling.  This will certainly be one of those life experiences that we look back on, and wonder how the heck we survived.  

So how is June handling all the chaos? Well, fine considering she had a near miss when one of the crew came crashing through our bedroom ceiling onto our bed inches from her crib.  Don't worry-all is well, and we're already laughing about the whole day. The day was one of the windiest days of the year with huge wind gusts happening all morning that resulted in the tarp being blown off the roof a about 10 in the morning-did I mention the crew didn't show up that day until 1:30?  So, I was here with all 3 kids, and with every wind gust we got a showered through the attic and ceiling fan hole with various insulation, acorns, leaves, and halloween candy wrappers. Hank exclaims, " It's like camping in the house!", well not exactly because at least when you camp you have something covering your head.   With one particular gust, I see our building plans fly off the roof and through the back yard.  I fear losing the plans that took almost a year to get drawn up and stamped by the city, so I take off running after them in the yard-I think I'm carrying a baby or two while this is happening.  After a variety of nasty texts to Johnny to the tune of "where the hell is the crew?" "I'm moving out" etc.  they finally show up at 1:30 in the afternoon.  I breathe a sigh of relief and figure the afternoon should settle down from here.  

I finally get June down for a nap in our/her room (because remember we are out of space in the house and Johnny, June, and I all share a room currently).  I shut the door, and start working on cleaning up the disaster in the rest of the house.  Not 20 minutes later, I hear June start fussing and at the same moment Johnny comes in from work the door to grab his phone charger from our room.  Johnny bikes over to the office, so he has his helmet on as he runs into the bedroom to grab his phone charger.  I follow behind him to check on June, and when he opens the door there are two crew members in the room, one standing over June's crib-I say "what are they doing in there?" and Johnny looks at me like I know what is happening.  I walk into the room to see a huge hole in the ceiling directly above our bed and my baby sprinkled with all sorts of debris.  And here comes my husband, with helmet on to protect him from any falling debris running into the room uncertain of what has exactly happened.  Pretty sure the crew made fun of him for a while after that.  

I pick up the baby, ask what happened, and the guy with minimal English responds with "new guy" June suffered no permanent damage that we know of-maybe she'll need therapy later in life from the trauma, we now have a skylight above our bed, and laugh pretty hard every time we think about the whole situation.  While this was playing out, Lucy who is constantly battling for center of attention now, throws a glass vase at one of the workers that shatters all over the floor at his feet, and almost simultaneously the power goes out.   Hank, who loves to be captain obvious, continuously points out that there's a huge hole in the ceiling and ponders out loud how we are going to fix that.  

That my friends, is the story of mexicans in my bed....we are now on edge with every bang and boom waiting for another hermano to come flying through the ceiling-maybe we should all start wearing our bike helmets in the house.

Enjoy the pictures from the first week of construction.  

Demo complete-no roof on the entire back half of the house

I have a hard time picturing this being transformed into 800 sq feet of living space for us, but man I am so excited about it.

This will be Hank's room

This is looking from Hank's room down the hall at what will be the bathroom, playroom, and girl's room on the other end

This will be at the top of the staircase, looking into the bathroom.  

 June after dusting off the debris--no worse for the wear, she's a 3rd child-has to be tough, right?

 Someone call jefe!  Ironically, the boss (jefe) is Jeff...we do nothing without jefe's approval around here...

June 2 months

2 month stats:

Height 23.25 inches 91%

Weight 11 lbs 45%

I mean is this a beautiful baby girl or what?  My sweet June bug is now at that adorable, squishy, smiley baby stage-not that alien, old man look that all newborns have complete with flakey skin and baby acne.  I already can't even imagine our family without Junie.  We seem to be coming over the hump of the new baby adjustment period-Hank has really done pretty well, but Lucy has had more trouble accepting her middle child status.  It seems that the random 2 year old, flailing on the floor, screaming fits seem to be calming down for the moment...while they are hilarious to me, the decibel level in the house is now at max so high pitched screaming over the wrong color fruit snack isn't always welcome.  Lucy has recently warmed up and started "petting baby" and loves to label all of June's body parts-"yook mommy, baby eyes" poke poke poke in June's eye sockets followed immediately by "yook mommy, baby crying". They'll learn to love each other eventually- I even caught Lucy trying to color June the other day, "crayons on baby, mommy". Progress, right?

June appears to be our brown eyed baby, and seriously has the roundest head and face imaginable.  She is still keeping the title of my best sleeper-the past 2 weeks she's been doing 10-12 hour stretches at night AND she's started putting herself to sleep which is so dreamy.  I don't believe in any of that Babywise nonsense, they get it when they get it and I've done my time with bad sleepers, so thank goodness for this nugget's good sleeping skills.  She's super smiley, and started really cooing recently. She loves to play on the playmat, with lots of kicking and batting at toys.  Hank claims she's already rolled over, but I think he may have pushed her over in an effort to "help".  She's got awesome head control, and is already working it in the Bumbo chair.  She doesn't love the carseat, unless we are in constant motion.  Loves her baths, binky, glow worm, and swaddle.  All in all, she's a pretty mellow little one that is just along for the ride most of the time.  I'm almost sad that she sleeps so well at night, because that was our quiet time alone...ALMOST...

Happy 2 months Junie!

Happy Hallowiener

I LOVE Halloween.  It is one of the best holidays with kids-lots of fun with no gifts to buy or meals to prepare.  Endless candy? yes please.  Now that we have two trick or treaters participating in all the festivities it is seriously double the fun, I cannot imagine once June is old enough to appreciate the festivities.  First up is the annual Grant Park Halloween Parade which is hands down the most popular event that the parent network does in our neighborhood.  There aren't actually any spectators in the parade its just all the kids in costume walking around the park with the high school band and fire truck leading the way followed by dinner picnics in the park.  This year we had a spiderman, a pig, and a pumpkin in the house.  Hank wore his costume 24/7 for about 4 days, Lucy screamed anytime the pig head came near her for a few days, and June just looked at us all like we are crazy folk. 

 I couldn't get it together enough this year to have costumes for Johnny and myself; however we did make it to the Mothball this year, which is another Grant Park tradition-basically think adult prom/costume party with better food and drinks.  This year's theme was Hootenanny, so Johnny and I got ourselves all done up and had a night out on the town with some awesome friends--plenty of fun was had by all!  I'd like to mention that the combo fu manchu/mutton chops hung around way too long until I forced him to shave them off for our family photos this past weekend threatening to shave them in his sleep if he refused.  

Pig down! Probably having a fit about not being allowed to eat non-stop candy.

Back up and on the candy trail! 

Seriously guys? 

Our fav halloween story--not sure if it's because of our household favorite food on the front or the fact that it says the word wiener repeatedly...

See ya next year halloween! This is one holiday I'm actually sad to see go...

June Bug 1 month

How we're stacking up:

height 22.65 inches 98th percentile

weight 9 lbs 10 oz 53rd percentile

Sweet Junie Bug, as I write this you are about to be two months old--your mama apologizes in advance for my tardiness, but as you know our house is in a state of chaos 99.9% of the time.  This does not in any way mean I do not adore you, because you are such a sweet, precious little one that I cannot get enough of!  

My third baby, it is so crazy how your outlook on raising children changes from those first few weeks with your first baby.  With Hank, I remember counting the weeks because everyone kept telling me it would start to get easier around 6-8 weeks.  With him, I felt like I'd been hit by a bus everyday, the days dragged on, I often wondered why in the world did people have children?  6 weeks came and went, and he still fussed, cried, kept me up at night-everyone lied to me clearly.  I hate getting and giving parenting advice, and I find that lots of moms and dads seem to think that simply because I have 3 children, I have a clue what I'm doing so they ask me all sorts of questions.  Believe me, I'm no expert on anything, and what really bugs me is the "mommy wars" we read and see all the time.  I don't get why moms are in constant competition with each other-seriously dude these are the trenches of parenting, it is rough more often than it's sweet.  For every sweet thing one of my children does there are 3 non-desired behaviors that preceded and followed.  Moms and Dads need support-and once you've had a 3rd child, you need A LOT.  

That said, my PSA that I tell new parents it never gets easier, the parenting demands change as your child gets older, but it is always challenging in a new way.  If you want a humbling experience in life, have kids.  Now that I have an almost 4 year old, a 19 month old, and an 8 week old it is abundantly clear that my 8 week old is the easiest and most pleasant of my children.  The days with her are flying by and I wish they would slow down.  I cannot get enough of the sweet, snuggly, sleepy newborn stage and never want it to end (mostly because I know what's coming-lord help me, I have to survive age 3 with 2 more kids).  So, for all the parents who have told me along the way, "it gets easier" (and man there have been a lot)-I disagree strongly, parenting is NEVER easy. 

June is a doll baby.  She's got a head of dark hair and her eyes are certainly darker than the other two were at this point-she might actually be our brown eyed baby, which would be nice since both Johnny and I have brown hair and eyes unlike our other two blonde hair, blue eyed children.  She started smiling at 5 weeks which makes her the earliest of my babies to smile.  Both Hank and Lucy held out until 9 or 10 weeks, so I'm loving this super smiley baby.  She's pretty mellow compared to the other two terrorists I have running around the house, fighting nonstop.  She's been a great sleeper-the best of the 3; however that might be that I've just got this baby thing figured out by now-a paci and a tight swaddle and we're set.  She prefers to sleep on her belly-and I let her during the day so she typically takes a a couple good long naps-i.e. she sleeps a few hours in the morning followed by  3-4 hours every afternoon which is dreamy.  At night, she starts in the pack-n-play and ends up in our bed by morning b/c basically mama's gotta sleep, so she wakes up, I pull her in bed to nurse and we both are asleep till morning.  Most nights she's just up one time around 3:00 to nurse and then we're all up for the day between 7-8. Because of our building permit woes with the city of Atlanta we are still not under construction at our house, meaning June is bunking up with Johnny and I until further notice-I'll save those woes for another blog post :)

 She is starting to spend more time on her activity mat, and I imagine will be rolling over soon given all the time she spends on her belly.  If she's having a fussy day, I pop her in the ergo and all is well.  I love how snuggly this little one is, and how her favorite place is nestled up against me.  I am frequently wearing June, and toting Lucy on my hip-my arms are getting quite the work out these days!  Lucy is having some difficulty adjusting to her new middle child status; thus when I am holding the baby she prefers that I'm holding her as well....ahhh transition. 

June loves to be out and about with us; and being the 3rd baby, she's gotta be good at taking her naps on the go; although she's not a fan of long car rides which she lets us know by wailing at the top of her lungs for the duration.   She's slept through the zoo a few times, some birthday parties, lots of playground trips, pumpkin farm, apple picking etc  She's growing like a champ, doesn't demand much but food and some snuggles, keeps the crying to a minimum, and has a perfectly adorable round head :)-I'd say she's a keeper.  

18 months of Lucy

This little girl is an absolute breath of fresh air in our lives.  She is unbelievably sweet and pleasant 99.9% of the time.  She's absolutely precious, and I swear I love her more and more every single day. When she was a newborn, Johnny and I couldn't believe how easy and sweet she was and have always said "this can't last forever", well she's remained both easy and gets sweeter with time.  We really hit the kid lottery with this one :)  If I could bottle her up at this age and keep her like this forever, I would in a heartbeat.   Lucy has this amazing love for life and just enjoys every new experience with a huge smile on her face.  

She's always up for an adventure and will tell me "go buckle go" meaning she wants to get in the car and go somewhere.  Her vocabulary is exploding and she's using all sorts of adorable phrases now like "I see it", "there it is", "where Hankey go?" "baby crying", and our absolute favorite is "that so funny" that she says while giggling all the time after she does something she thinks is hilarious.  She has also coined her new sister "Baby Doon" which has already become her first nickname.  She had her 18 month check up where she scored way ahead of the game both in motor skills and language-she is super coordinated for her age and is always throwing or kicking something-she seems far more likely to be our family athlete than her brainy bro.  At the grocery store she loves to take the items out of the cart and say "catch!" before tossing them out.  

Lucy still loves to eat-she will eat anything and everything I give her; although she's become very fond of sweets.  She wakes up every morning asking for a cookie--meaning she wants to lick the icing out of an oreo before throwing the cookie part away.  It was not surprising at all when she made a huge jump on the growth charts into the 80th percentiles from her meager start in the less than 3rd percentile.  

She's my super independent child.  She will happily play with blocks, puzzles, coloring books, cars/trains, balls, or her shopping cart all by herself for long periods of time. Despite her independent nature, she loves to snuggle with me, and gives me big hugs and kisses all day long.  She tends to be my little shadow, and will run behind me helping me with laundry or sweeping-all with a huge smile on her face.  Another current favorite is anything Dora-she brings me the ipad requesting "boots", and yes she can already navigate as well as Hank on the ipad and iphones.  She loves music and anytime she hears music, she immediately starts dancing.  Her current favorite song is "I'm Just a Girl" by No Doubt (we don't do kids tunes in our house).  

She adores her brother, and is still slightly skeptical of the new baby.  When we ask her if she wants to say hi to baby June she always yells "NO" very loudly.  I think she's starting to come to terms with the fact that this baby is here to stay.  Although with the arrival of June, Hank and Lucy have certainly gotten closer and are really starting to play together more.  

She will have the occasional meltdown, where she methodically lays herself down on the floor before commencing screaming.  These never last long, as something more interesting usually catches her eye (also because she is completely ignored while flailing on the floor).  Usually, it has something to do with not being able to find her "minky" or "bun buns" her two most prized possessions.  

Oh Lucy, you make our lives so so sweet, please don't ever become a sassy, moody teenager " :)