The House

Moving into a furnished house is tricky.  You basically have to grow to like what you have because there is no other choice.  In other places I might go to Home Goods or Pier 1 and find things to make the place more our style, but here you have to go with what you get.
I’ve managed to add a few things to personalize our house, but like all things to do with living in the Bahamas; it is what it is and it ain’t what it ain’t.
My pictures leave something to be desired, though!
We took down the curtains that were mounted on the doors to let in more light.  It’s still dark, but it is better.

I painted these 2 to go in the living room.
 
We got another canvas from the Canvas People.  I love their work!

It may be hard to see, but I got another one done last year and it hangs on the other side of  the Entertainment Center.

We added a runner to contain some of the sand as it enters the house.  It is always crooked.
 
Added curtains in the kitchen.

Did I ever show you these?  I am smitten with them.
About a month ago Miller opened the coffee and dumped a scoop of it into the Cheerios.  What’s the opposite of smitten?  Dumping out food is not high on my list of things I like to do.  See last post!
I tried to do another gallery wall.  It didn’t work so well.  We have concrete walls and we couldn’t nail, so I tried to use the Command hook Picture strips, like I have in lots of other places.  For whatever reason they didn’t work here.  Then I tried to hot glue them.  They still fell off and took part of the wall off.  I think we will just live with it for a while.

The boys are sharing this room.  Lucky for us it was already painted this way.  It is a nice change from all the other cream colored walls.

The boys’ bathroom.  See?  I added a towel.  Fancy, huh?

The hall.  I love the floors and ceilings in our house.

In our room we only added bedding and my craft and sewing stuff.  That’s why you can only see this view.  It is kind of a lot.

We put Allen’s hammock on our porch off our room.  Maybe one of these days he will get to use it!

Command hooks did work for this project.  I love being able to see all my necklaces on the back of the closet door.  Don’t judge.

What were the boys doing while I took all these pictures?

Yeah right!
We have a guest room that usually looks like this.  I fold my laundry in there.  I do clean it off for guests, promise.    Come and check!

Even if our house isn’t exactly how I would decorate it, I still really like it and I think I’m going to adopt my new phrase permanently.  It’s the Bahamas.  It is what it is, and it ain’t what it ain’t!

On Why I Haven’t Been Blogging

I have to say I haven’t really felt like blogging much lately.  My days are full and I’m tired.  Is this any different than other times before?  Not really.
There are plenty of things to blog about, but getting the pictures downloaded has been a challenge.  Who am I kidding?  Getting pictures taken has been a challenge.
J is home this week for Winter Break and I have been trying to plan fun things for him.  We’re going to pay the cable bill today.  Does that count as fun?
Since I’m usually pretty real on the blog and in real life.  You know I can’t just gloss over something.  If you don’t believe me, I’ll tell you that I cleaned up a puddle of dried urine from behind a chair in my living room this morning.  Seems that someone had to go and didn’t quite make it to the bathroom.  He also didn’t feel the need to tell me.  Don’t just hate it when your husband does that?  I kid!  Pretend I didn’t say that um-kay.  I’m nothing if not real.
I haven’t really known how to bring this up.  I still don’t, but I'll just say it.  I could tell you that life here is great. That is absolutely true.  The thing that I haven’t said on the blog is that life here is also hard. 
Not the kind of hard that people with actual problems have to deal with.  But hard as in yesterday I had to take 2 boys to 2 different stores to find fruit snacks.  Those suckers are a staple of M’s diet.  After the second store didn’t have them, I gave up.  I think I’ll go to 2 more stores after the cable bill.
That’s what I mean by hard.
Nothing is more fun than taking 2 kids to 2 stores after we wait in line at the cable company.
That’s what I mean by hard.
Are you wondering why I don’t just send in a check for the cable bill?  That’s because we don’t get a bill.  You just have to know when your bill is due and then drive 40 minutes to the other side of the island, find a parking space, go stand in line and then give them CASH for your bill.  Forget online bill pay!
That’s what I mean by hard.
The gathering of food is a chore here.  Every week I go to a minimum of 2 stores.  Usually I go to the store many times a week.  I recently joined a food group that buys in bulk from a restaurant supply company.  We buy in bulk then split it up.  It is much less expensive for fruits, vegetables and meat.  Too bad they don’t have Fruit Snacks!
That’s what I mean by hard.
What if they don’t have yogurt that day?  Or what if yogurt is $5 in that store, but I know last week it was $3.50 at another store.  Do I suck it up and pay?  It’s hard to say, but it is like that for most things.  With a grocery bill of about $200 a week, it is just hard to swallow sometimes.
That’s what I mean by hard.
They say you should go to the store and then decide what you are going to make.  That requires a real change of thinking and is totally out of the question when you are buying for kids.  Also, it’s not really practical to run up and down the aisles over and over again buying ingredients for a week’s worth of meals while shopping with a 2 year old.
That’s what I mean by hard.
Have you ever been on a trip to an island and gone into a store to buy something simple like juice or sunscreen?  When you find a store it looks a little shady, but you go in anyway.  Then you find what you need and you see the price and it is like $18 for Coppertone sunscreen.  You think, “I must have picked the wrong place”.  Then you go ahead and buy the thing you needed and think “Well, I’ll make a better choice in stores the next time I’m in a situation like that.”  The thing is that those stores are what I have to choose from every time I shop.  They look a bit shady.  They are all pretty shabby, and the prices are exorbitant.
That’s what I mean by hard.
It takes a while to realize that there is no Target here and this is what I can choose from.  It isn’t terrible, but it is hard.  I keep reminding myself that these are problems worth having.
I don’t want you to think that I am ungrateful.  We know how good we have it.  I also don’t want you to have the impression that we are walking the sunkissed beaches all day.  Life here is good and if I am being honest with you, life here is also hard.
Now that I have that off my chest, I feel better.
So yesterday, while it was snowy in Gaithersburg, I went to the beach.  It was gorgeous.  It wasn’t at all hard!

He did it!

This weekend was the weekend we were going to try taking off the training wheels.  We had tried a couple of other times, but as soon as he fell once he wanted them back on. My expectation that it was going to be a couple of weeks of wailing, crashing and me having to hold firm that he was ready to take off the training wheels.

As it turns out he was so ready.

Like I ran behind him for about 15 steps and then let go and he went about 20 feet.

The hardest part was starting.  He was used to getting on and pedaling.  He quickly figured out that he has to keep a foot on the ground and push off as he pedals.

 

Having Aunt Chele here was so helpful.  She gets right in there and helps out when we need her.

We have a big flat empty parking lot near our house that is perfect for riding bikes.

The hardest part was keeping him away from the 3 light posts in the parking lot.  He was like a magnet.

He looks so big on that bike.  We told him we would get him a new bigger bike when he learns to ride a two wheeler.  My smart sister realized that learning to ride a bike on a small bike would be easier than riding a bigger bike.

Looks like someone else needs a bigger bike too.  Just kidding.  That’s impressive.

Miller took this picture.  He kept telling us to sat cheese.  As in “say cheese clouds” then he’d take a picture of the clouds.

Someone turned two and a half on Sunday.

Now he is working on his skids.  Lord help us!

About A Year Ago

Recently, I’ve been thinking about this a lot.
 

It seems so long ago, but not in some ways.

             
Most of all it just seems surreal that a year ago I felt so cooped up.
Oh, and then this happened!


Now I go for bike rides every morning…and I sweat.

 

I know that there will be other Winters with snow and this Winter without snow is special.  It just doesn’t seem like Winter at all.


(that’s my minivan SwaggerWagon)
I’ll be sure to pull out these pictures again in June when I feel like I’ve been in perpetual Summer for about 18 months, and can’t take it anymore!

The End