Big Changes

I have been slow in posting recently because we have had a lot of big changes recently.

First, my maternity leave ended Philip's baptism weekend, so I am "back to work" now.  Back to work means that I am working 10 hours a week from home.  I am so blessed that my company is willing to let me work such few hours from home.  So far, it has been doable, but of course it limits my free time quite a bit.  Luckily, my return to work has coincided with Philip getting on a steady afternoon nap schedule which consists of 2.5 hours of sleep!  I usually try to get my work in during the afternoon just so I know it is done for the day, but if that doesn't work out, I get my time in after Philip has gone to bed. 

Speaking of, Philip has a decent bedtime now.  During my leave, he was always a night owl and would go to bed anywhere from 11:00 pm - 1:00 am.  Now he is usually asleep sometime in the 9:00 hour.  I thought once Daylight Savings hit, he would transition to a respectable 8:00 bedtime, but he wasn't fooled by the time change.  That is okay I guess because going to bed early means he wakes up early and I am not adjusting to that very well.  I need to move my bedtime earlier too!

We are also in the process of buying our first home!  Once Philip was born we knew we needed some more space.  At first we started looking at rentals in the area, but eventually came to the realization that it would make more sense to buy.  Of course, that means we needed to commit to staying in the area for at least a few more years. We never imagined we would be in this area for more than a couple years, but we have already been here 7 years!  So a variety of factors came into play and we decided that we could make the commitment to staying here.  It will be so nice to settle down!

We found a home the week after Philip's baptism.  It has been beautifully updated and will give us the space we need right now.  We are very excited, but of course a lot of things have to happen before we can call it our own.  Inspection went well last week and we hope the appraisal turns out well too.  My days have been full of working with the lender, realtor, insurance agent, browsing furniture, etc, etc, etc. Our closing date is scheduled for December 16, so we will be adding to all the Advent/Christmas craziness with a move this year. 

In other news, we celebrated Andy's birthday a few weeks ago, Philip turned 4 months last week, and Andy's brother/sister-in-law and kids are coming up to stay with us for Thanksgiving this week.  It is going to be crazy and fun!

One last tidbit.  After we had Philip, one of my friends from college who happened to move to the area last year contacted me.  She is starting a photography business on the side (I don't know where people find the time to do this stuff) and offered to take some photos for us so that she could add to her portfolio.  Of course I said that I would love it, but since we got some great photographs taken at the hospital I asked if she would be willing to do it this fall so that we could get a great photo for a Christmas card.  She agreed and last weekend we did our photo shoot.  We are still waiting on seeing the full set of pictures, but here is a sneak preview.  She is giving us the photos for free and we can print them out on our own. 

Happy Thanksgiving!