Ticket to freedom

A stroller.  

That is my ticket to freedom.

Having a baby in winter is hard.  You're even more confined to the indoors than "normal" after giving birth.  We/I took Rosie on several walks, bundled up in her car seat that fit nicely in her other stroller, but that wasn't good enough.

The other stroller meant I still, somehow, needed to try to find a separate time to work out.  That was getting really compromised with all the other daily duties and I was getting increasingly frustrated.  I was tired of being a prisoner of our house and the baby weight wasn't coming off as quickly as I hoped.

Then our BOB arrived.  When it showed up on our front porch I felt like it may as well have been a giant Publisher's Clearing House check sitting there.  Suddenly, I could do whatever I wanted!  I could get out WITH Rosie and incorporate her into my workouts.  I wouldn't have to give them up because of Todd's schedule or her nap time.  

We took it on an inaugural outing over the weekend and I could barely contain my excitement.  

This weekend, with the weather finally warming up, Rosie and I will definitely be hitting the open road!  

Good egg

I desperately want chickens.  I want to get up in the morning and gather fresh eggs for breakfast and baking.  I want eggs laid by chickens that are raised more naturally. However, I can't have chickens yet.  Our yard is so small it can barely support us and two large, active dogs.  In spite of this, I can't help but pick up magazines like Hobby Farm and Mother Earth News when they feature articles on "the right kind of chicken for you," or, "the best coop for your needs."

One day, when we move out of town, I will have chickens.  Until then, I need a supplier.  I have been searching for someone in the Casper area to fill this role, but surprisingly, this "egg hunt" hasn't been easy!

Right before we moved from Cheyenne I had an egg dealer all lined up.  For some reason, finding a dealer in Casper hasn't been as easy.  I've read the classifieds of the small local and ag papers, have gone to Murdoch's to see if anyone posted about eggs on their bulletin board, and have asked friends who have ranching connections...all with dead ends.

At Todd's office Christmas party last year I got a lead.  A former agent used to have eggs.  She was no longer raising chickens but she knew someone who was!

I called ol' Rob on Thursday last week and in five minutes he had me lined up for a Friday delivery.  He told me he had green and brown eggs, which would I like?  I had never heard of green eggs except in Dr. Seuss' book!  Rob thought this was funny and said that's what he'd deliver.  Apparently, Americana chickens lay green, blue, yellow and brown eggs.  Who knew?

We sampled the eggs this morning and they are just...better than store bought.  Look at those bright yellow yolks!

At $3 a dozen I think Rob might be a tiny bit steep, but I'll take what I can get for now.  Since getting my eggs on Friday I have discovered that another person I know has a dealer too.  I need to find out their price and compare.

It appears I just might have "cracked" the seemingly secret world of fresh eggs in Casper!

Once upon a child

In looking at the piles of clothes we had for Rosie before she was born we thought for sure we wouldn't have to buy a stitch until her 1st birthday.

Now that I've organized the clothes by age and have them in storage boxes and her dresser, I can see there are several holes we need to fill.

Enter the secondhand baby story Once Upon a Child.  

It's an awesome concept: people sell them their gently used baby items and they sell them to others at deeply cut prices.  There are some things I want brand new, sure, but for the most part, baby clothes don't fall into that category.  It's really hard to justify buying all brand new clothes that will be worn for only about a month.  

Rosie is in desperate need of 3-6 month-old footed sleepers, some tights, and a few long sleeved onesies.  I also have wanted to find her an Easter dress; some plain, colored onesies and a few hoodies.  

Apparently, most stores have started turning over to spring/summer wear, so I struck out on footed sleepers and long sleeved onesies.  

But I did get an Easter dress...

And some hoodies...

At Rosie's age, I really want easy zip or snap-up sleepers, but I couldn't resist these pj's with the frolicking unicorns!

A close up of those cute unicorns...

Even though it won't fit her now, I found this super cute 6-mo dress.  About that time we will be in D.C., for a friend's wedding and I just imagined Rosie romping around the nation's capitol in this (it comes with matching bloomers!)...

Parlez-vous...?

When we walked through our 1920s house before buying it, we asked the owner about the three large doorways into the dining, living and sun rooms.  It looked as though there had once been French doors on each.

You can see the dining and living room doorways here...

The owner looked us straight in the eye and told us he wasn't sure what his dad had done with them.  We were super disappointed someone would get rid of original French doors (what were they thinking?!), but there was nothing we could do about it.  

Shortly after we moved in, our new neighbor (hi Jason, if you're reading this!) was chatting with us about his place and the history our two homes shared.  He invited us to come on in to see his digs and the work he had done to upgrade his old home.

When we got to the master bedroom he pointed out the closet doors, telling us they were actually one of the pairs of French doors from OUR house!  

Todd and I flipped!  We told our neighbor that Rod, the previous owner of our home, had told us he didn't know what happened to them.  Our neighbor said that wasn't right...he had bought two sets of the doors and Rod had helped him carry them out!

I have not one nice thing to say about the lying piece of...grrrrrr...that Rod is.  We discovered he is basically a pathological liar, looking us in the eye and telling us about the "new" roof on the house, or the "upgraded" electrical, or how he didn't realize that one end of the big, pretty fireplace mantel with a matching built-in bookcase to the other end had been removed so a larger window could be put in.  The list of lies goes on ad nauseam.  

We asked our neighbor what he would want for them.  He wasn't sure.  He did, however, think he wanted to move and if that ever happened he would make sure we had first dibs on the doors.   

Recently, our neighbor put his house up for sale and we purchased the doors back from him!  We couldn't be more ecstatic!

Here's Todd, on the left, with his friend Ken hanging the doors in the entry between the living and sun rooms...

The finished look...

The sun room operates as my office, which is one of the reasons we wanted the doors hung here.  This is now my view from my desk.  It's great to be able to shut out the rest of the house for a phone call or just some privacy...

We are soooo happy to have them back where they belong.  The doors have come home and it just feels right.  

Sleeping beauty

The time has come for Rosie to start sleeping in her crib.

We made the decision to have her in our room in the beginning.  She's our first baby.  We didn't know what to expect.  Not to mention we were the typical parents who wanted our baby close to be sure she was still breathing.

We had great plans to have her use the cradle my grandpa Sears made for me when I was born, but that didn't last long.  And by long, I mean it lasted about a week.  We had a lot of problems with the cradle, most of all, the fact that it rocked.  I know that's what it's supposed to do, but it really seemed very sensitive to movement.  Any time she would even turn her head it would tilt and she would kind of roll. Todd rigged it so it wouldn't, but we were always messing with it.  Also, the cradle was cold.  Rosie was pretty tiny when she was born and got cold really easily, and we could never get her warm enough in the cradle.

One day, unrelated to any conversation about the crib, my friend Jonna told me we could borrow their Snug-a-bunny Rock and Play basket.  To be honest, I took it half out of courtesy half to have it on hand just in case.  She said their daughter slept in it for a while before moving to her crib, but it was not at all something I would have considered buying ourselves.

Come to find out - it was a lifesaver!  It was warm and made her feel tucked in.  Rosie has napped and slept each night in it ever since.  The problem is, she's starting to get a little too big for it and it's time to move her out.  Not to mention she simply needs to learn to sleep in her crib and putting it off won't make the transition any easier.

Looking back, I'm happy we did what we did, but I also kind of wish we would have just started her in the crib in the first place.  The crib isn't new for Rosie.  She has spent some time napping in there, but she never sleeps very long or well in it.

We thought we'd start her on full-fledged crib training a couple nights ago, but it was a bust.  She barely napped that day and was overly tired, which meant trying something new was not such a hot idea.

I regrouped and decided that instead of going cold turkey on the Snug-a-Bunny we'd use it at first for nights and all naps would be in the crib.  Once she is more used to sleeping in the crib for any length of time we will begin to introduce it at night.

I feel pretty good about the plan.  What's harder, though, is letting her fuss and deciding when to go comfort her.  I have found so far that given a few minutes she will calm down.  If it begins to escalate then I walk in and try to comfort her.

One of my sisters, Stacey, assures me after a week of training she will be a happy crib sleeper.  Our plan might take a little longer, but I'm also hoping it will be a little smoother.