mid-Jan?

Well hello there, how've you been, we're great, thanks for asking! I guess I have been busy/lazy/procrastinating. Its not like I haven't thought about you, I have, I have even had several posts in my head that actually haven't had an opportunity to get things out. We have now painted the living room/dining room, its all the same room, so we had to do them both! It took a little bit to adjust to the color, but I think we like it. It is so nice to have it painted, this house has not actually been painting since it was built 10+ yrs ago. And, since you know it was the builders special, it was just flat paint and scuffed. And then, to be crazy, we started hanging stuff on the wall, like we actually want to live here and make this place our home! Eric is now addicted to the prettying up of the place and wants to do more. But, since school starts today and we don't have anymore gift cards, we are out of luck for a while.
I think I also may have mentioned that Eric and I were given the opportunity to get out of dodge without the kids! We played it cool and were like whatever, if you want to stay home with the kids Grandma, good luck to you! I don't know who enjoyed themselves more, Grandma, the kids, or us? It was fun being without the kids, we drove several hours to the Biltmore. Eric's never been there and so I thought it would be a nice place to go. They had the place all decorated up for Christmas, apparently it was the busiest time of the year and there was a LOT of waiting at the winery, and elsewhere. And since we didn't have the kids, what did we care if we had to stand in line!? And when we were standing in line we found out a "wine & chocolate" special tour thing they do, so we signed up, and it was fun learning about the wines and chocolate pairings. Eric, being an overachiever tried all the wines from the winery, well, except for the "premium" wines, you had to pay for those! (If you are counting that is 20 wines!) I on the otherhand am not that dedicated, mostly though because I don't like white wine at all! But I had several of the reds 2x! We did the special candlelight tour and the regular tour. It was fun! We even met this couple that took our picture: we took their picture for them. But, I kind of like this picture of us better.

We stayed in a B&B and I spoke to my first Canadians, I think. They were heading for FL and they weren't pleased with how cold it was! For breakfast we had creme brulee french toast! YUM!!! It was lovely, so if you ever need a name of a place, let me know, I'll pass it along.
But, fortunately for everyone who lives with me I came back refreshed, and better able to cope with 2 kids and 1 husband. I even called a neighbor and scheduled a play date, that we went to yesterday! We had a nice time, I got to speak with the Mom, the kids got to play with some new toys, we will have to have them over to our house to play.
I have been procrastinating on Gwen's preschool forms. :( The pre-K is part of a K-8 school so their forms are a little intense for the 4 year old set (I think!) Seriously, it has made me ignore it, until Sunday, when I sat down at Church (next to the Principal!) Yesterday I made some phone calls and today dropped off the medical form before grocery shopping, which the practice had finished for me by the time I finished grocery shopping! Awesome! So now that's done.
I have also started looking into more of the Moms groups here, my Church has 1 and had some info in the bulletin, so I have contacted them and another group. I have learned one thing in recent weeks, I need someone local to talk to that isn't Eric! I also need to get exercising in, but have realized that it is too cold for me to take the kids out. They had so much congestion in the beginning of the winter, but now that I am no longer running, they are not having that problem. I have been doing indoor exercising, not necessarily a lot of fun, but I have got to start being more active.
We have also started working as a family to keep the house cleaner. I don't make resolutions, it is too depressing to fail at something at the beginning of the year, but we decided that if we work as a family to clean the house, it doesn't fall to 1 person always picking up. So far, 2 weeks in, I think it is going well, the house is staying cleaner and we aren't stepping on things and neither Eric and I are angry at each other for things being left out and messy, I hope this trend will stay, because our quality of life has improved, which is always a good thing! ;) Hopefully it won't be another 10 days before I get to updating again! I guess I should pull out the camera and start taking pictures of the kids again!