Elsie has cut two more teeth. I think they are molars, but I don't know anything about baby mouths. Visualize this: she already had her four top front teeth, and now, if you skip a space to either side, it's the NEXT tooth on both sides that cut through this past week. And that brings her teeth total to...(drum roll)...eight! She is a little off balance, though, because now she has six on the top and only two on the bottom. Probably the only time in her life she'll be top heavy. Haha. (Little inside family joke...right sisters?) Progress.
And she's firmly associating "mama" and "daddy" with us. The other morning it was still too early to get up, but Elsie was awake (of course), so Eli went and got her and put her on our bed, in between the two of us. She looked at me and said "Mama." I said, "Good morning," or something like that. She said "Mama" again. And then she turned to Eli and said, "Daddy." It was sooo cute. She also will repeat "Elsie" but it sounds like "Eh-see" and Oscar sounds like "Uh-guh" (not to be confused with Uga, the UGA mascot). Progress.
On a family front, the month of October has been busy indeed. The first weekend of October, right after Eli's surgery, he had drill. In March we had purchased tickets to see Dave Ramsey LIVE in Atlanta for the same weekend, so I found someone else to go with me--JMS. My FAB-U-LOUS friend JT offered to watch Elsie while we took Oscar. I don't think she knew what she was getting into, but I was/am so thankful for her willingness!
The DRL session really reignited my desire to get out of debt and stop spending money on stupid stuff. Basically, it was FPU in a nutshell: a good refresher for alums and a good preview for newbies. I'm so glad we went!
Well, here's the good news: tonight, after Eli gets home from work and we post the payment together--MY STUDENT LOANS WILL BE PAID IN FULL!! WAHOOOOOO! This is really going to get the Debt Snowball a-rolling! The loans are from undergrad and graduate school that I consolidated in 2006 into a new, low-interest, 20-year loan. I just got paid for my summer job with NWP, and that lump sum will take care of the low, low balance--SIXTEEN YEARS EARLY! PROGRESS!!
In housing progress, Uncle R came from SC this weekend and installed built-in bookshelves in the sitting area of our bedroom. It was just a big empty wall, but after he was done with it, it looked like this:
And then, after we were done with it, it looked like this:
(You can click for a close-up if you really want to see what books we have.)
We desperately needed cabinets to store linens, so that's what's on the bottom. Plus the cabinets keept the bookshelves from being a stepladder for a toddler. As you can see, we have very little room to grow and keep our books on these shelves, so this weekend was a good exercise in thinning down our book collections. "Do I really need this?" and "Will I ever look at this again?" and "Did I even remember that I had this before just now?" were key questions. As a result we have three boxes of books to donate. Yep. Three. Progress.
[The original design allowed six shelves in each case, but our books are bigger, so we have only five shelves in each case--and four extra shelves sitting on the floor. We may have to commission Uncle R to build another bookcase for Elsie's room so that we can use those shelves and shelf pins.]
The introduction of bookshelves to our bedroom introduces, well, our bedroom floor to us! Tons of square footage no longer covered by piles of books. And we'll be able to move our entertainment center where it goes, and then get the TV off of the night stand and back next to the bed. Progress.
Finally, on a happy note, Friday night the new Auburn basketball arena was opened and we went to the pep-rally thing being held to celebrate. I know, I know. We're Alabama fans. But, we're also Globetrotter fans, and it just so happened that this famous basketball team was present to help celebrate. It was awesome. I wish my students could have been there to see it!
Okay, time to go continue making progress around the house (and go get groceries) since today is Fall Break for me, and the kids are at the sitter. Teehee. I'm getting things done around here (dishes, laundry, cleaning out the car) and it feels good. Progress.
Cheers!
3 comments:
Wow about the student loans! I bet that feels amazing! And those shelves are pretty fabulous, too! Makes me brainstorm...
The lack of student loans for Erin is indeed amazing! Now we're down to a (relatively) small amount of consumer debt, my loans, and a mortgage. If the snowball rolls along, we should be down to my loans and a mortgage by next summer.
The shelves are awesome. My uncle custom-built them without ever having seen the space into which they were going to fit, too!
The shelves are a-mazing! And congratulations on getting that snow ball rolling!!!!!
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