The last couple of weeks have been very busy. I’m two weeks away from a major upgrade involving our ILS. We’ve spent the last six months making sure that the upgrade won’t break anything and now the end is almost in sight. During the upgrade and, at a minimum, the week afterward, I will change from working part-time to full-time. There’s just no way I can manage an upgrade unless I’m completely available.

At the same time, I’ve been very busy at home. As I mentioned last time, we’ve been thinking about selling our house in a couple of years. From an interest perspective, I’d like to do it now. I’m still flabbergasted by how low mortgage rates are at the moment. It almost makes me want to buy/sell now. However, I don’t think this is the right time for us. First of all, we haven’t figured out our long-term location plans yet. I’d like to move back to the northwest at some point but I’ve really liked the stability Jaeger has at his current job. Second, we don’t have a big enough down payment for the area we’d want to move to. Third, I don’t want to move Calvin from his daycare yet. I’ve been very happy with his daycare and would prefer to wait till he’s preschool age before moving him.

Even though we don’t plan to move for a couple of years, there is a lot of work we have to do before the house would be ready to sell. We need some major de-cluttering/organizational work, fix up some minor things such as repair paint scratches, and probably double check there isn’t any major repairs. In addition, we both like the idea of hiring someone to come stage our house. I’m particularly baffled by what to do with our living room. I know when we start showing the house the TV will have to go but other than that I’m clueless. My piano takes up about half of the living room which makes room configuration tricky. Most people with grand pianos have larger houses than we do

Perhaps because of all the activity at work and home, I’ve been happier than I remember being since Calvin was born. I think it’s because I have a personal goal now: get the house in a state that it can be easily sold. Before Calvin was born I had a goal of losing weight in order to be ready to pregnant and then learning as much as I could about how to have a healthy pregnancy. Since Calvin has been born, I’ve been at a loss for my personal goal. I read parenting books but they’re all so nebulous and depend so much on specific children and situations that I’ve almost given up on them. Anyway, I hope my optimism continues and this isn’t just some anomaly.

Calvin Moment
Calvin and I often go to the Carbon Valley Library. I may be biased since I work there but I think it’s one of the nicest libraries for children. They have a lovely play area that provides the kids lots of different ways to play. Calvin is particularly fond of their little trucks but is also starting to show interest in the puppets. Of course, there are lots of books also. However, it’s nice for Calvin to be occupied while I pick out the next batch of books we’re going to take home.

Anyway, on Monday we had gone to get out of the house and also stay out of the wind storm. At first, Calvin didn’t want to go in the library because he liked the wind. However, it was too chilly for me. Calvin had a coat but I had forgotten one for myself. Eventually, he decided to stop pouting and enjoy the library like he normally does. He was playing with his favorite trucks when a boy around 3 and a girl around 5 approached him and started “playing” with him. Basically, they pretended they were dogs and they chased him all around the children’s section. It was very interesting to watch. I was a little nervous because the girl was so much bigger than him but it all turned out well. The kids would get on their hands and knees and scramble towards Calvin while he would turn and run as fast as his little legs could carry him squealing in glee the entire time. Calvin obviously was having the time of his life.

Simplification

• I’ve been working on simplifying my spice cabinet. There’s a couple of reasons for this. First, it’s extra clutter that I’m pretty sure won’t be allowed when we try to sell the house. Second, it’s pain to keep it dusted (or, more precisely, I’m getting tired of feeling guilty when I don’t take the time to clean it properly). Third, Calvin is fascinated by all the multi-colored spices in the jar. At one point he managed to unscrew and dump out my turmeric which is not a spice you want floating around randomly. For the most part, I’ve convinced Calvin to leave it alone but every so often I get careless and he starts playing with the jars. Anyway, I went through my other cabinets and mapped out a plan for how I can fit the spices in the other cabinets without making everything look cluttered. During this process, I also cleaned off most of the top of our refrigerator.
• I cleaned our bathroom today. I do clean our bathrooms on a regular basis. However, I don’t pay as much attention to the details as I always should. Today I spent a lot of time on the details.
• Cleaned out the mirror medicine cabinet in Calvin’s bathroom and threw a lot of little bottles away.