Tuesday, September 15, 2009

from the mouths of babes...

We're hearing a lot of chatter around this house lately. Some of it has been unwelcome, like Claire's recent (but abating) habit of squealing and screaming when she's in the car. We're working on that one.... But there's been a lot of other fun things coming out of her mouth, too, and we're enjoying all the baby talk! Oddly enough, she often will pronounce primarily the second half of a word, which, combined with the fact that she commonly uses the plural, can make understanding her quite an adventure!

She says:

Yessss
Min - vitamin
nKet - blanket
I Duck - Isaac
Daddys - Daddy
Waters - milk
Muck -milk
Up - down
Down - up (or vice versa :)
Heyabedabe - helicopter
Suck - truck
Dactor - tractors and trucks

And the list goes on and on... It's pretty fun to hear her these days!

In other family news, we're starting in on the process of buying a house. It's a little intimidating, as I'm sure most of you know. Mostly I don't want to accidentally buy more house than we can afford...I've found myself running numbers a lot in my head, and I'm learning that I need to stop doing that. We've talked, run the numbers together, and now I think I need to let Vance and the mortgage banker do the rest. Numbers aren't really my forte, and they stress me out.

Which means I am going to focus on the more fun part--finding a house that meets our needs. Apparently most Floridians have pretty different priorities than we do when it comes down to building houses. That narrows the search down some, which is kind of nice, considering how much inventory is out there. It seems like most people want huuuge one-story houses in thickly-populated developments on little to no land. People also seem to favor new construction over trees. Thankfully, there are some options out there for those of us who need (especially in this heat!) some shade and space for the kids to run around in.

I don't think we'll be buying the arts and crafts home of my dreams here in Florida, (nor the farmhouse of my dreams), but I'm okay with that. I just have to keep reminding myself that we're buying our first house, not our dream house. But boy did we get spoiled in Minneapolis with so much great architecture! :)

The biggest struggle in all this is to think and plan and search enough to be wise without letting "A House" become an idol, and the focus of my days. It's easy for it to get that way with me, because I'm excited about having a home of my own, a place to settle down. But I can't let all of those items on my wish list rob me of my gratefulness for all that God has provided.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Good luck on the house hunting! It's fun, stressful and overwhelming all at the same time! ~SWetzel

Svetlana said...

LOL. Those Clair-isms were very funny. Good luck with House Hunting! We'll be sure to pray you find a great first house. Try not to stress over it too much, it's not good for you or your family.
Have fun!!!!

SMS said...

How exciting to be looking for your first home! Florida doesn't have that fun arts and crafts sort of architecture but there are plenty of opportunities to embrace your inner vintage lover - lots of Floridian ranch houses built in the 60 with loads of character - we always thought we would embrace this era if we ever moved back to FL. Good luck - will be praying!!

Becca said...

sounds like fun to me. And stress. At least you don't have to wrorry about selling first! I can't wait to see the gem that God has waiting for you. He already knows exactly what you need and want!