We Won the Lottery!

We won!  We won!  We won!  I am so excited because I never win anything!  We have been on the waiting list to purchase a home in University Hills.  We have been waiting and waiting and no houses have been offered us yet.  A little over a month ago, though, David received an email that we were eligible to participate in a lottery drawing for 22 new homes being constructed in University Hills.  We were asked to rank the 22 homes in order of preference.  The housing office would then draw a name and offer that person the house at the top of their list.  The next name chosen would be offered the highest ranked house available. 

We have been praying that we would be offered one of the new houses.  Of the floor plans, we liked the single story with three bedrooms and two bathrooms.  In the 22 homes, there were only two with this floor plan.  This week, we were offered our top choice, which we accepted almost immediately! 

The house is scheduled to be completed in October and escrow will close October 15.  Yay!  Yes, this means we WILL be moving TWICE!  We will be renting a two-bedroom apartment (in University Hills) for three months.  That means we are going from a 2500 square foot house to a 1200 square foot apartment.  There actually is a loft as well, which will be the girls' bedroom.  I am actually really excited about this.  Space is such an American phenomenon!  In most places in the world, families live in less space than we will have in the apartment.  I am hoping that being in such close proximity with one another will bring about the refinement that we all need!

So, you may be wondering why we want to live in University Hills?  Is it like Beverly Hills?  No, it actually is just affordable housing (if you can consider any housing in Orange County affordable).  The land is owned by UC Irvine, so you buy the house and lease the land, which helps control the price.  Oddly enough, because of the way that appreciation of property values is calculated, the new homes are less expensive than the older homes.  Another great aspect of the new homes is that we will have some say in some of the design.  We're not really sure exactly what we will have a say about, but we are imagining things like the floors and counters, that sort of thing. 

We are still trying to sell our house in New Orleans (know of anyone looking for a beautiful four bedroom, three bathroom home?).  We have had two offers so far.  One was less than we paid for the house and quite a bit less than our asking price.  The other fell through because of family disputes.  Lately, though, there has been quite a bit of interest.  We had a showing on Thursday.  We will have two showings tomorrow also.  I actually talked to the first potential buyer because he was snooping around the property.  The family seems really interested and have told our real estate agent that he will write an offer tomorrow if he and his wife like the house.  Our prayer has been that we will have a contract before we leave which is in 10 days, July 10!  PLEASE PRAY WITH US THAT GOD WILL PROVIDE THE RIGHT BUYER FOR THIS HOME!

Now, I know I started off this post saying "We won!"  Of course, that's not entirely accurate.  We give all the credit to God, who provides for all of our needs, physical and spiritual.  He has provided us with an affordable home through this lottery!  We also trust that He will provide a buyer for this home as well!

Our Last Beignets!

Today, we had to leave the premises for another broker's open.  (Yes, we are still trying to sell our beautiful home, which I worked so hard to redecorate!  Please pray as we have a showing tomorrow and one either on Sunday or Monday!) 

Maggie

Mary

I took this opportunity to pick up some N'Awlins gifts for Aunt Alicia, Uncle Steve and the cousins.  Since we were really close to the mall that has a Cafe DuMonde, I treated the kids to beignets one last time (whimper, whimper)!  The pictures are really not very good because in all the chaos of trying to make the house look spotless (ha, ha), gathering the twenty or so library books (we went to the library afterwards), preparing lunch and drinks for everyone, and changing dirty diapers, I forgot the camera.  Fortunately, I was able to figure out how to take pictures with my phone on the fly. 

Jonathan

Matthew

I don't know if you can really get a sense from these pictures, but the boys were covered from head to toe in powdered sugar even though I dumped most of it off beforehand!  While I was trying to photograph the messies, Mary picked up a handful of powdered sugar and stuffed it in her mouth.  She is still wide awake! 

While the boys were still munching on their beignets, the girls played on the platform and watched the waterfall.  All the way to the library, they kept telling me, "That was so much fun!" 

Even though I am not much of a fried foodie, I am definitely going to miss a few New Orleans hot spots. 

1. Morning Call--I prefer the beignets from Morning Call over Cafe Du Monde because you have control over the powdered sugar.  Also, it is so much easier to park!  
2. New Orleans Food and Spirits--I don't think that I would categorize this restaurant as fancy, but I love it because you get great food for a great price.  A lot of the food is creamy or fried, but I always order blackened tuna and have never been disappointed.  The other plus is that it is such a kid-friendly place.  We already have plans to order food from there on July 9, our last night here. 
3. Surrey's--This place stands out for its delicious breakfast and uniquely New Orleans ambiance.  Also, kid-friendly, I don't think we go anywhere that's not.  They also have excellent (and pricey) freshly squeezed juice.  
4. Mona's Cafe--This is one of a few restaurants on the regular lunch rotation for David's department.  Excellent Middle-Eastern food.  Humungous portions, too.

These restaurants are not normally listed on typical "Best of New Orleans" lists, but I don't think I would classify myself as normal anyways:)

My Creative Niche

At last, I found my creative niche!  My husband introduced me to some software that he uses for his work.  It's called OmniGraffle.  He does computational drug discovery work, and I'm not exactly sure what he does with this software, but I like to use it to make cards.  I am not an artistic person at all.  I struggle to draw a straight line with a ruler.  But, I do get algebra and geometry and could spend all my "free" time playing with OmniGraffle.  At this point, I think David is wishing he never introduced me to OmniGraffle!

Here's a sampling of my creations:

This one was for Mother's Day.

This one was for my nephew's high school graduation.

This one was for our dads for Father's Day.

This one was for David for Father's Day.

I made these cards for each of the girls to give to their friends before we move.  This one is for the girls.

And this one is for the boys.

Chop, Chop, Chop

After mowing the grass on Thursday, I filled up the baby pool with water to cool everyone off. I don't know how other families handle the yard work, but my strategy is to put one boy in the exersaucer and one in the jumperoo on the porch. This works well for me, especially since the sisters are constantly buzzing around providing sufficient comic relief! Everyone was really hot and sweaty and appreciated the water. It was Matthew and Jonathan's first swim. Even though the pool was really crowded, everyone enjoyed themselves. The boys were so happy to be able to splash water everywhere--in the pool, out of the pool, on each other. (Keeping the water in the bathtub is a major issue these days!)  Jonathan did crawl out of the pool and got himself covered in grass, since I use a mulching mower!

You might think that would be enough excitement for one week. No way!  Not for us Mobleys.  Mary begged for me to cut her hair again (the day after she said that she wanted to grow it long again!)  She really doesn't like to wear hairbands, so she wanted it really short so that she could keep it out of her eyes without them.  Then, of course, Maggie wanted hers cut, too, but not as short as Mary's!The funny thing is, after years of struggling with Mary and hairbands, we had finally agreed upon a hairstyle, one hairband on each side and then one joining the two ponies in the middle.  Oh, well.  I think the short hair cuts are really cute and at last I am free from the morning torture routine!

Then, I realized that Matthew and Jonathan were looking pretty shaggy around the edges, too, so I got the clippers out and gave them their first haircuts!  I knew they would be squirmy wormies, so I fastened them in their high chairs for the blessed event.  In retrospect a five-point harness would be preferable.  I started with Jonathan.  I just handed him a cheese stick and gave him a five all over.  Then, I did the same to Matthew and the torture session was over.  With the new haircuts, they look more grown up to me (sigh) and they look a lot more alike, since Matthew's curls are gone!

To top it off, I also took the munchkins in for their 15-month check-up.  These boys are such troopers when it comes to shots, especially Matthew.  He didn't even cry at all.  He is our little tough guy.  I am still flabbergasted at what God has done for these boys.  For the first time ever, the doctor gave us a good report and said, "See ya in three months!"  She had no concerns with their weight or development.  What a relief!  Up to this point, the two words that can describe Matthew and Jonathan are LOW and SLOW!  Low in the weight department and slow in the development department.  Although such things should not be a reflection on my caregiving, it has been difficult not to interpret LOW and SLOW to mean that I am a very bad Mama.  After all I am the round-the-clock caregiver.  And, what other performance evaluations do I get?  But, these boys have gone from LOW and SLOW to normal.  They are now perfectly proportioned according to the growth charts, Jonathan at 25 percent for both height and weight and Matthew at 5-10 percent for both height and weight.  Praise the Lord!

The Mobile Mobleys

Matthew and Jonathan have become incredibly more mobile in the past week. They are delighted with their ability to walk holding on to things and will use just about anything to get just about anywhere. The chair, the end table, the vacuum cleaner, the step stool, the rocking chair, even the Lego box, oh, and they also use the actual push toys, too!

Sometimes they collide:

Sometimes they work together:

Sometimes, there are even shrieks when they get stuck in corners!  Such a fun stage of life!

David took this video of our He-Man Jonathan while I was bedridden with the flu:

Our Saturday

We had a pretty exciting day today! The morning started out like a typical Saturday morning around here: I made a double-batch of pancakes, a batch of waffles and one loaf of bread. Then, David took the girls off to the library for the Summer Reading Program Kick-Off Party. The girls had a great time, especially playing in the bubbles! With all the bubbles, one would think they came home clean as a whistle, but they came home happily covered in mud from head to toe!

Then, I took Maggie to Barnes and Noble to buy a book.  Barnes and Noble has a summer reading program also.  If you read eight books, then you can choose a free book (from selected titles).  The program started on Tuesday and Mary had read all her books by Friday (we're talking long chapter books!)  Maggie is too young for the program, but she has been making great progress in her reading, so I told her that I would purchase a book for her if she read eight books to me.  She surpassed this goal in one week!  She read all twelve books from the first set of BOB readers.  I purchased these books for Mary when she was first learning to read, but she never enjoyed them.  Maggie, on the other hand, loves them!  She finds great satisfaction in being able to read a whole book all by herself.  She also really likes the silly stories and pictures.  Maggie KNEW that she wanted to find a Hello Kitty book.  I didn't know if they would have one, but they had this Hello Kitty Busy Book.  It is a story book and also has Hello Kitty figurines and a playmat, too.  It is the perfect sort of book for our imaginative Maggie!  

And here are some pictures of the afternoon excitement:

And this is why you should not let your three-year old have stickers during quiet time.

And this is why you should not let your three-year old play with her brothers after a sticker quiet time!  This is child #3, so of course, I needed to get a picture before taking them away.  I think he even managed to swallow one!

Jonathan is clearly feeling ill.  He didn't even try to eat the stickers.  I think he was somewhat disgusted by them and tried to tear them to shreds!

This picture was actually earlier in the week.  The paper towels were a hit with the boys.  They crinkle.  They roll.  They're soft.