Constant Change

So much has happened since my last post. I realize that might be because my last post was 3 months ago, but still. Where to begin? Let's see... We put our house up for sale. A week later, the house was sold. 30 days later, we moved out. Into my parents' house. Naively, we assumed we would just find a house to buy. No. That has not happened. Somewhere in there, I moved to a different team at work. We went camping for a week. And both Trinity and I had the stomach flu. Not necessarily in that order.

Trinity has never had any sort of stomach ailment before. Aside from spitting up as a baby, she has never thrown up. How do you explain what puking is to a child who's never experienced it? When she starts crying and heaving and you ask, "Do you need to throw up?" She looks at you quizzically before her lunch ends up on your shirt. Next time, you have a bowl ready. So when you see the signs, you hold the bowl to her mouth and tell her to "puke in here." Then she becomes terrified that the bowl you're holding to her mouth is what is causing her to puke, since you put it there every time you see it coming. So she uses her super human angry toddler strength to shove the bowl away from her, splashing out all the vomit in the process, and scrambles up on you to upchuck in your hair. This would be a nightmare on a normal day, but when it's the day before you move, things are worse. All of the extra sheets and blankets are packed...somewhere. Most of your unnecessary clothes (which suddenly seem necessary) are in a box...somewhere. And then there's the impending doom you start to feel, because you know you cannot take on that much vomit and come out unscathed.

Poor sick Beeb. Guido is offering his support

Sure enough, two days later, just as I'm beginning to think I made it, IT begins. I won't go into anymore details, but it's not pretty. Luckily, I was at my parents' by this time, so my mom took care of me and brought me tea while Travis did the final cleaning on our old house. Too bad, I was really looking forward to that...

Trinity has quickly figured out that between Mom, Dad, Gramma and Grampa, she can pretty much get whatever she wants, whenever she wants it. Daddy says no? GRAMMY!! So now if she's ever denied her heart's desire, she cries like you just punched her in the face after lighting her blanky on fire. It's quite dramatic and sad. 

Naps have also turned into a battle royale. If you let her go without one, she stays awake just fine, but turns into a huge B by the time we get home from work, which doesn't bode well for the bonding. I don't get it. She used to nap just fine at home. You put her in bed, read her a book, and closed the door. Now she opens the door and runs out as fast as she can. She's thirsty. She's hungry. She needs the lamp on. She wants the AC on. She knows the monitor is on and sits in there and yells "I'M AWAKE!" She cries. She pounds on the walls. It's a terrible experience and by the time she's asleep, you need a nap too. I'm pretty sure my mom takes one daily.

To get a peek at the level of ridiculousness my life has reached, here is an excerpt of a conversation I had with my dad the other day. To set the scene, I'm on my computer in my old room that I now share with my husband. There is a pile of clean clothes on the bed, and several laundry baskets lined up waiting to be taken down to the washer. My dad comes in. 

Dad: You know what the guy from the Jersey Shore says about girls who can't keep their rooms clean?

Me: Umm...? No Dad, please enlighten me

Dad: He says that if a girl's room is a mess, their life is a mess.

Me: Well, Dad, I'm homeless. I'm living at my parents' house with my husband and our daughter and our dog. I'm sleeping in my old room. I'm 27 years old. I think that pretty much qualifies my life as a mess right now. Good thing I'm not out trolling for a guy from the Jersey Shore and trying to bring him back here.

Dad: Yeah, good thing. He would not like what he sees. 

I'm still confused. Why on earth does he know anything about anyone on the Jersey Shore? And whose side is he on anyways? Try as I might, I cannot remember why we put our house up for sale in the first place. It was an experiment that spiraled out of control. Odd as it is, I kind of miss Albany.

Little water park in Albany we liked to frequent

How cute are they? Trinity and her  4-year-old cousin. My child is a behemoth and my niece is tiny. 

Our yearly camping trip was interesting this year. It was a little easier to pretend we were homeless, since we weren't actually pretending. And we didn't bring as much stuff because we couldn't find any of it. Luckily it was a hot one, because our coats and camping blankets were nowhere to be found. Still, we managed to spend a small fortune to go live in the woods and drive the boat around the lake for a week. If I was debating on having more children, this trip really brought me back to reality. In our group alone, there were 11 kids. ELEVEN!!! Seven of them were 5 and under. It was nuts! Someone was always crying. But, with all of the other kids around, I learned something about mine. She's a bit weird. She's quiet and mostly keeps to herself. She's content in her own company and prefers to be clean. When all the other kids were splashing through the water and playing in the sand, she was sitting in her chair reading a book and eating blueberries. She showed no real interest in wanting to be with the other kids, but she was happy to hang out if they came to her. When Travis and I went out on the boat, or were floating, it was easy to ask someone to watch her. She's in her lawn chair, and probably won't move.Will you keep an eye on her? Thanks!

It took her 20 minutes to walk through the sand. She hated the feel of it.

I'm happy that she's an easy kid, I just worry about her having friends and having fun. According to my parents, I was just as weird and I turned out OK, but that does little to ease my concern. I want her to be better than me; to have more friends, more fun, and more people who like her. Good thing she's cute. That should help. A little boy gave her a flower at the park, and while she said Thank You, she didn't seem super impressed. I haven't even had the talk about standards and playing hard to get, but it seems to be a natural instinct. I'm so proud.

We are continuing our fruitless search for an acceptable house. Between what I want, what Trav wants, and the price of houses here, we may be living with my parents for a long time. And even if we do find a house, the amount we'd need for a down payment plus all of the random loan fees and closing costs is ridiculous! I need an infusion of cash, stat! Trinity is in no hurry to leave Grammy's house, and in fact demands to go back whenever we are out, even for a little bit. Someone might be a little too attached to her grandparents. Maybe it's the pool

I will leave you with some photos of her at gymnastics. She's getting so much better than when she first started. She's not naturally adventurous or a daredevil of any sort, so it's been very good for her.