Still Alive

Still kickin. Still giving you the lame excuse that I'm busy. But in my defense, I really have been busy. As I am sure you know, we are having a yard sale. I decided it was a good excuse to clean out and organize my entire house. That's right folks. Every room and closet has been emptied, cleaned out, organized, and put back together again. It sucked to do, but the end result is so worth it. The whole carport is filled with stuff to sell or donate. All we have left to clean out is the shed and hopefully all the grunt work done by Monday. Then next week, I just need to focus on the marketing and move on to my next project, coordinating the 2nd annual Neighborhood Lawn Party for our church. Luckily, my good friend Ginny, organized it last year. So I am basically just filling in the blanks and delegating tasks for this year. The party is August 16th and school starts back up the next day! Also, I have another church project due at the end of August that I would really like to have completed before classes begin. Then my brother gets married over Labor Day weekend. So it looks like this little Mama is going to be mighty busy until the Fall. Speaking of Mamas, my son has learned to eat cereal puffs by himself. He's getting to be such a big boy. *Sigh* First, he's feeding himself and then he's off to college! Harvard...natch.

Cats Are Funny

Apparently, babies think that cats are absolutely hysterical. We noticed that Owen has been paying more attention to Wrigley the past few weeks. Now whenever the cats walk in front of him, the laughter ensues. Enjoy!

Controling The Clutter

Ever since I started being a stay-at-home Mommy, I have felt like our house is closing in on me and is not as clean as I would like it to be. I am sure this is brought on by the fact that I am now spending all (if not most) of my time at home and have become acutely aware of how small our living space is. I know I pretend to be a neat freak, but the reality of it is: our house is definitely lacking in some key areas of cleanliness. I am very good at picking up "stuff" and putting things away, but it always leads to overstuffed closets and dust bunnies behind the furniture. My goals were: to weed out the closets, give the house a deep cleaning, and begin utilize our small space more effectively. Once that was done, I promised myself that I would keep the house generally picked up and choose one room a day for a good cleaning. That way the house was always looks semi-presentable and I wouldn't be killing myself having to clean the whole house in a day. Three months later......I have started to make good on my promise. And the best part is that we are having a yard sale to try to make some money before everything gets donated to Goodwill. We are going to sell some stuff on-line, but most it will be going directly to the yard sale. I have already decided to use whatever profits we make to buy ourselves a leather recliner for the living room. We really need a nice comfy chair that will hold up for a while. I keep telling myself that we need a bigger house with more space and then the problem would be solved. The fact of the matter is that we do need a bigger house, but it isn't happening for a while. So in the meantime, I need to make better use of the space we have and it starts by clearing out a whole lotta stuff that someone else can use. Honestly, as I go through the stuff, I kinda feel like a hoarder. I mean, who knew we had so much junk? I have cleaned Owen's room and gone through the closet in his room. It was literally spilling over with stuff and sometimes the door wouldn't even shut! I have also gone through most of the living room (VHS tapes, really?) and Jason has started working on the laundry room. Everything that is yard-sale-able has been priced and boxed up. We still have tons of work to do in the bedroom, kitchen, laundry room, and shed. It's starting to feel like we're making progress and that feels nice. Don't forget that one man's trash is another man's treasure and come see us on August 8th!

Nine Month Checkup

Yesterday we went to see Doctor Davis for Owen's nine month checkup. I was excited to find out what he weighed and because there were no shots involved. For someone who wants to be a nurse, I still hate seeing my baby get shots! The wait was long (lesson learned to keep our AM appointments) but the visit was quick. By the time Doctor D had arrived, Owen had already destroyed all the paper covering the checkup table. Anyone with nine month old can relate to them wanting to touch EVERYTHING and subsequently put it their mouth. Owen weighed in at 20 lbs 1.5 oz, is 27 3/4 inches long, and has a 46 cm head circumference. Basically, your average size kid with a huge noggin! Doctor Davis checked Owen out from head to foot and pronounced him healthy. I had a concern because he has been tugging at his ear lately, but apparently I am over reacting. We have been so fortunately because we haven't had to visit the doctor other than the well-check-ups. I am knocking on some serious wood as I type. We talked about crawling (or lack there of) and getting Owen some more time on the floor. Doctor Davis doesn't really consider crawling a milestone since most kids are crawling, creeping, standing, and walking at different intervals between now and about 15 months. He gave us the green light to start stage 3 foods as well as some soft table food. Since Owen has 4 teeth, we will begin to brush them twice a day. Hopefully we won't have to see the doctor until after Owen's first birthday party!

Cha Cha Changes

After much consideration, I have decided to make this a Beale family blog instead of letters I write to Owen. While I love and cherish the letters I wrote to my son, it seems time to switch it up and be able to write about all things Beale. Perhaps my loyal readers will enjoy keeping up with my thoughts on the whole family as we grow and expand. Some of you might recall another Beale Bits blog that is now defunct. I haven't quite decided the fate of that blog, so for now I am just stealing the name (it's OK since I thought of it) and giving this blog an update look and feel. My goal is to keep an more up-to-date journal of our little family's life experiences. Happy reading!

Sorry Mommy

Dear Owen,
You might be upset with me since I haven't written in a while. OK, more than a while. The sad part is, I don't really have a good excuse. We've just been busy. It's been a crazy summer and it's only half way over. I don't really have the energy right now to catch you up on all the details, but I am going to promise to write more often. I am going to *try* a daily update, until I can get back in the swing of things.
I will write soon and I love you,
Mom