2011 was really a great year. Of course we had some bumpy spots and experiences I really hope to NEVER live over again. All in all we have nothing to complain about. The Good Lord continues to bless us far beyond our worthiness and I couldn't ask for anymore.
I'm sure my memory will fail me a little and I wish I had access to all of my memories from the year but when you read September's memory you will know why our external hard drive that holds our pictures is still not working. (we are sending it to our favorite tech guy this week! Look for it in the mail, Kim!)
We do have some on this computer....hence there are some included here.
January:
We started out the year with jet lag as we returned from Italy on December 31st. I don't wish to ever change time zones with my children again. If I do- I do not wish to return home with them alone and pregnant. We were awake at some very odd times at the beginning of 2011!
Andrew swung on the trapeze in gymnastics and Emma tapped and pirouetted in dance. We spent cold evenings with friends and cold days in the house doing schoolwork. We joined our homeschool co-op Grace Academy and fell in love with the people there! After 5 months of driving the nice mid sized family SUV I decided my husband was right all along and I should have bought the mini van- and so we joined the throngs of mini van driving and loving families!
February:
Had some much welcomed outside play days after a VERY cold January. We did have our only bit of snow. The kids were thrilled to play in it and I was thrilled that it was gone pretty quickly. I passed my pregnancy record when I reached 32 weeks pregnant! I was thrilled everyday to be pregnant and spent a lot of time hoping to be pregnant when Mike came home. Hillary came in the middle of the month to take some pressure off of me and I was able to sit with my feet up. She was an immense help and I'm sure I made it some of those last weeks pregnant because of her.
March
Aunt Hayley arrived to help until Baby Brother was born, Andrew turned 4 and Mike came home from Italy. (all in the first 8 days of March- whew!) We were thrilled to have Mike home without another departure date looming before us. We had a super fun fire truck birthday party for Andrew and another fun welcome home/going away party for Mike and a friend of ours about to depart for a 6 month deployment. Mike built our trampoline on his first day home and the kids LOVED having him here. I faded into the background for a couple days and truthfully- it was lovely. Uncle Seth came to visit for Spring Break and Aunt Hillary went back to Boston and we were left looking at one big event coming up: the baby was going to be born soon! On the last day of March Mike was in a car accident that totaled our Santa Fe. We were sad and didn't really want to replace the car for another 2 years.....but oh well. Mike zoom zooms around in his Mazda 3 now and it is quite a fun little thing to drive.
April:
Due date month! In my wildest dreams I never thought I'd make it to my due date month! I had spent 3 times a week at the doctor for non stress tests and appointments and by April I felt like I was ready to have a baby! I never felt like that before! On April 6 at 37 weeks and 5 days our baby boy Scott was born at a whopping 6 lbs 6 oz! I was home less than 48 hours after he was born which is pretty impressive since I had a c-section. By this time I feel like a pro at c-section recovery and even with a bigger baby this was by far my "easiest" surgery recovery. I know Easter was in April but truthfully I can't really remember many details of the month. Thank goodness for pictures! We sent Aunt Hayley off to New York to marry her soldier when he returned home from Afghanistan. Mike went back to work and I looked around at my new life- with 3 kids! Whew!
May
Mike took Andrew on his first camp out with our ward for Father's and Sons. Andrew was beside himself with excitement. Emma was devastated to be left behind but cheered up when I let her paint my nails purple and returned the favor. We watched Daddy play a couple of softball games. The kids played outside....a ton and I was thankful like crazy for our trampoline as I quickly became the mom who couldn't get herself together enough to take the kids to the park. We started a little garden which we were VERY proud of! We took our first trip to the beach for the season and spent Memorial Day playing with some of our favorite friends: Jon and Jan. I felt like I spent every waking moment pumping breast milk and wish I had never read all those darn Dr. Sears books about the benefits of breasmilk.....
A friend of mine (who's oldest two children were adopted and formula/bottle fed) said to me: When I had my 5th child I had 2 who were adopted and 2 natural children and when my 3rd natural child was born I was able to look at the breastfed two and the formula fed two and I realized the breastfed two weren't any smarter than the formula two so I said- forget it you're getting formula to the baby. I was grateful for comic relief like this. I needed it.
June:
Blessed our baby boy at church and it was lovely. He barely fit into the same outfit his big brother was swimming in when he was blessed 4 years earlier. I found a carrier Scotty liked and wore it for many many hours- Hotsling. Worth its weight in gold. We spent some time at the pool and outside playing long into the evenings. We LOVE summertime! I turned 31 and I'm afraid my age is catching up to my gray hairs.....and it shows no sign of stopping.
July
We took our first trip to the Nauticus and visited the USS Wisconsin Battleship and our kids were terrified the giant guns would go off! We had a lovely 4th of July which ended in a HUGE thunderstorm cancelling all local fireworks.. AND, we're just lame enough that we were happy about it (just Mike and I- the kids were devastated. They're not as lame as us.....yet). We visited the zoo where Andrew picked up a lovely skin fungus in the fountain (yuck!). Scott started giving sweet smiles to me and we got him an exersaucer to help quench his thirst for standing. Mike visited his brother Tim in Washington. They hadn't seen each other for 10 years! Big kids started swimming lessons and loved every second of them except for the first day when they had to jump in and then sit on the side of the pool in the shade for 20 minutes. Grandma Scott came to visit and fell for Scotty. We took her to the beach....a lot and she floated and swam and I wished I could take her there everyday. Hillary came back to visit- cause who can stay away from the Greenstreets?!? No one! Once we get you to visit once you'll be back- we guarantee it! A developmental pediatrician told us our 5 year old had Aspberger's Syndrome. We looked high and low for a therapist we wanted to leave her in a room alone with. We found one and made some changes to her diet....and she is still Emma but a much more manageable version!
August:
Grandma left to go back to Arizona and I really really really wished we could keep her. Scott rolled over the day she left! Mike took Andrew's training wheels off and he was a two wheel rider about 5 minutes later! He's been buzzing around the neighborhood ever since. Scotty ate his first solid food and yet still sleep eluded me. We visited the new Children't museum and I was feeling quite accomplished doing it with three kids by myself. Every successful outing feels like an act of Congress.....so I celebrate them. I finished my first 5k VERY slowly- but I crossed the finish line and I actually kind of wanted to die and run another one all at the same time. We escaped hurricane Irene by visiting western Virginia and didn't even have one drop of rain. We really had a lovely time and it was nice to have a quick family trip away from dishes and laundry. (of course we were paid back in full about a week later!) On the last day of the month Aunt Hillary left her life in Boston behind and joined us in Virginia Beach. We've loved having her while she is finding her feet!
September:
We found out about a week after we got home from our little trip to escape the hurricane that we brought home something extra....bedbugs. IT. WAS. AWFUL. I do not wish bedbugs on my worst enemy. Four weeks of treatments. EVERYTHING made of clothe bagged up, taken to the laundry mat, washed, dried and put back in bags and left in a heap in the garage for four weeks. VERY itchy bites. Luckily they liked me and no one else got feasted upon. We melted our curtains at the laundry mat and had to buy a $95 cover for our mattress. I still have a little PTSD from the experience and haven't been able to sleep in a hotel since....and I may never again. We shall see. This truly dominated September. The kids played soccer and we were embarrassed more than once by them. Emma running off the field, Andrew clothes lining people. We were left scratching our heads or hiding in our sweatshirts more than once. Mike started teaching seminary. No question in my mind he was a good man- but one who gets up at 4:50 a.m. everyday to teach scripture to a bunch of teenagers......well I just hope they let me in on his coat tails. We took the kids to the temple for Primary Temple day and Scotty started to scoot his way around the floor causing all kinds of rukus. The kids started back up with our homeschool group and because I have nothing to do with my free time (insert hysterical laughter here) I said yes when asked to take over position as director of our group. I've been gasping for air ever since.
October
Mike and I went to a formal event. I am reminded how NOT fancy I am when I do not really enjoy these things at all. I am irritated by dress shopping with three children and spending money on a dress. We wento to a ball that was basically mandatory for him to attend and when I suggested he go without me I got "the look." Mike wasn't impressed by my suggestion. It was lovely to be out together and (of course) we had a nice time together. I prefer NOT so spend $150 on dinner BUT- since it was the 100th anniversary of Naval aviation....we won't be alive for the next mandatory ball. We took a trip to Philadelphia and enjoyed one of our favorite places on Earth- Linvilla Orchards. We loved visiting with our friends and partaking in real autumn joys! Leaves! Apples! Hay mazes! Every minute was great. Mike went to Pax river for 5 days and our kids acted like he'd never left before in their lives. It was an awful goodbye and I'm glad we're not doing that again for a while!
November:
We started the month celebrating Hillary's birthday and discovering our favorite new restaurant: Whitner's BBQ. If you come visit us we will take you there....it is just great! Scotty got up on his hands and knees to crawl, learned how to climb up the stairs and tried to climb on everything that would hold still. We finally explored Colonial Williamsburg and it was lovely! We celebrated Emma's 6th birthday with a VERY fun Mario Party. Hayley came to visit for two weeks and my sisters were serious super heros! They were sister party planners! I came up with ideas and they created them. At the end of Hayley's visit was Thanksgiving and I (finally!) met my new brother in law- Dugan. We love him and we're so glad he is in our family. He passed the "kid test" meaning by the end of his visit our kids liked him more than they like us. Steve also came for Thanksgiving and Seth flew in to surprise Hayley. Our Thanksgiving table was full of people and happiness. Much Just Dance was played. Football was played. Thanksgiving morning we ran a 5K! Of course since we had more visitors we visited our favorite BBQ place more than once. We also found out at the end of the month that Mike got a spot as in instructor pilot here in Norfolk which means three more years here for us! We were VERY excited!
December:
The end of the year- my goodness this went by fast! In December we decided we were sick of living on base- although we had decided that about 20 different times throughout the year. we decided since we were staying in the area we could/should/would buy a house. We looked. We got a mortgage preapproval letter. We found some houses that would work for us. BUT- in the end we decided that we are renters not buyers- at least for the duration of this Navy thing. We had such a lovely Christmas and Christmas Eve. We celebrated constantly in December. I along with my new teammates successfully had registration for our Spring Semester with our homeschool co-op! We have 32 families involved in our co-op and I was drowning in emails and class lists for a little bit but I've come out alive. We ended the year together and loved watching Emma ride on two wheels on the last day of the year.
Can't wait to see what 2012 has in store!
3 comments:
These posts are the best kinds of posts! Isn't it fun to look back and reflect on all the good (and sometimes bad) memories of the year? Your year sounds like it was fun and busy and just great. Each day, I wish I lived closer to the Greenstreets. Your lives are full of so much laughter and good times, can't wait to mare more with you! Love you big sister. Happy 2012.
Thanks for sharing your family history. Sorry about the bed bugs, what a pain.
Wow, I had no idea you got bedbugs. I feel horrible for you and I'm now terrified to stay in a hotel ((shudder)). Reading this post just makes me realize how badly we need to get together sometime. Our kids need to play together, our husbands need to go shoot things together, and we need to laugh together. ASAP.
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