Moving up in the world...

So, we've moved!

We've moved more than a few times in our marriage, but not since our babies came along! 

We were actually in the process of moving into our last apartment when we got those two little lines that meant Evie was about to become a reality (seriously, I took one test at our new apartment, and confirmed it with another at our old place while we packed more stuff!).

Our apartment on Cherry Lane is the only home either of my children has ever known!

Other than sentimental reasons and missing people in the ward, I can't say that I'm sad about leaving... It was a fantastic little apartment while I was pregnant with Evie, and even while she was little, but recently, it has been kind of a nightmare! With two kids and Karl working from home, our little two-bedroom place was QUITE the squeeze, but then we've had Graeme living with us since June-ish. Let me tell ya, that place was NOT meant to hold that many people!

We had no air conditioning, and with that many people, it was SO hot! Plus there's the fact that we had no dinning space/table, so our little living room/kitchen combo was kind of it. With Graeme sleeping on the floor in the living room, he was basically right in the middle of half our living space. It wasn't so comfy!

We are so much happier in our new place! We have three bedrooms, but soooo much more living space in general, and my little ones have a real table at which to eat their meals for the first time in their lives; I feel so civilized ;)

Moving was... horrible. I never want to do that again!! Lol! We've accumulated a lot of stuff, and with two little ones who constantly need something (Declan's been super clingy...), it was difficult!

It's just so much work!

Evie has been mostly ok with everything, and Declan, being only 6 months old, is pretty oblivious. As long as mommy is there, he doesn't much care where he is, haha! 

Evie has had a couple moments where she has just wanted to go back to the old house, but it's mostly when she's supposed to be going to bed. After we turn off the lights she'll ask why we moved here, and tell me she just wants to go to our old home. 

Most of the time she likes it here though. There are lots of little kids around, we have a playground and a pool, and a fenced area where she can play. I was a little worried about nursery, since she was not so happy about going alone at our last ward, but this ward has like a whole room full of toys! She walked in the first Sunday and was like, "ok... you guys can go", and when we tried to get her to leave she said she wanted to stay there forever.

The first little bit was overwhelming, with trying to get things unpacked and put away, recover from the move, and get everyone settled and back onto their schedules. I thought we were never going to figure it out! But things are getting put back together slowly, but surely, and we are so much more comfortable and so much less stressed now!

I don't know how long we'll be here, but we are so happy, we don't much care ;)

Declan K. is 6 Months Today!

We've had half a year with this kid already, I can hardly believe it! 

I don't know why, but unlike with Evie where I was so devastated every time I realized she was growing up, I'm so excited for Declan to get bigger and bigger and do new and fun things (and so is he, lol)!

Since it's kinda like my thing now, let's just take a quick look back, shall we?

This is Declan six months ago! All 6 lbs 15 oz and 20 inches of my cute little string bean :)

And THIS is my handsome little man today:

Ahhh! He's so big, I love it :)

Declan now weighs a whopping 18 lbs 4 oz and is 27 inches long!

He's just getting his first teeth in, which means he's been SUPER cranky and unwilling to sleep at night, like at all... So mama is tired!

 Following almost EXACTLY in his big sister's footsteps, Declan decided at around five months that he NEEDS to walk. He's always grabbing our hands and trying to get us to stand him up, or climbing on things to get into a standing position. He's convinced that walking is the only way to go, which is incredibly sad because just before that he had started working on crawling! He was doing this cute little inchworm-army crawl-roll combo, and I was SO convinced he would go for it... but no, lol. He still rolls all over, which is something Evie never did. He now cries every time we put him in crawling position, but he's really close!

 At our 6 month appointment the doctor watched Declan walking around (holding our hands) and said he's very strong and his walking skills are advanced ;)

 Declan is really into his hands... Which sounds weird, but he just loves his hands! He'll sometimes just hold his hand in front of his face and open and close it and turn it back and forth. He likes to hold things and hand them back and forth between his hands (a trick he learned from Graeme). His fine motor skills are good, which I think I just notice because Evie had no interest in fine motor at all!

 

Speaking of Evie, he absolutely loves her. I love it when he looks at her and giggles, and she laughs so he laughs harder, and then they're both just looking at each other giggling hysterically.

He so wants to do what ever she's doing. He wants to run and play with her. He's not as driven, personality-wise as she was, but he is very determined to be able to do everything with her!

He also loves his uncle Graeme. He thinks he has really cool hair, lol. The first time Declan saw him after work in his subway clothes, visor/ponytail he looked at him like he was a stranger. As soon as Graeme put his hair down he got that huge grin on his face that he always gets when he sees Graeme.

Annnd speaking of strangers, he is starting to get stranger anxiety and is getting super clingy. Yay

He doesn't really babble yet, he just likes to make these yelling, squealing, and coughing noises. I know he can make other noises, he just doesn't want to I guess. 

Declan loves the "hushabye" song (our version of "All the Pretty Little Horses"), if he's fussing, resisting sleep, or waking from sleep and I sing it and he calms down. It's really amazing ;) I wonder if it's because we sang it so much while I was putting Evie to bed during those early months?

As far as personality goes, baby boy is happy and fairly calm. He's a silly little one, kind of shy, but loves to smile at people. He loves to stare at people with a huge grin on his face until they notice him and smile back, then he hides his face in mom's shoulder. It is pretty cute :)

Declan is a cutie, I am so grateful we have him in our family! These last 6 months have been extremely tough, exhausting, and difficult for me to figure out. I thought for sure that being an experienced mom now it would be easier this time around, but there are so many more challenges. I'm so happy that we have waded through the challenges though, because things just feel so much more complete with Declan in our lives. After Evie, I still felt like there was someone missing, and I'm pretty sure we've found him ;)

Love you, baby boy!