The house hunt - hold on tight - here we go!

It was literally a whirl wind of activity - we hit the ground running on Sunday as my dad drove us through a few of his favorite spots after church.  We had an open house on Sunday and a quick meeting with a for sale by owner.  Monday was a family day and Tuesday was right back into it with a financial adviser.  Tuesday afternoon, back on the home tour - we traveled all through Simsbury and Avon with our AMAZING Realtor Tara (I used to babysit for her girls - hmmm just a few years ago...)  

The houses start to blurr after awhile, but here are the highlights - We found that we really wanted to be in Granby or Canton (smaller towns than Avon and Simsbury)  

We honestly LOVED this house in granby - the owner had her own yoga studio

beautiful sitting sunroom

Awesome rap around porch

so i am torturing myself with these photos as I doubt we will choose this home.  It wasn't fenced and had a pool and pond that we weren't wild about (we want Oma Sue and Goomba to have the 'wow factor' of a pool).  Plus, its a safety and maintenance concern that I wasn't ready to tackle.  

Our second favorite house had a horse barn and walking distance (along a bit of a busy road) to a winery...  awesome too - but no neighborhood and on too busy of a road for the kids...

But I will indulge myself with a few reminder photos

awesome kitchen for entertaining

Didn't come with horses - but isn't he cute??

Time for a break....

Dinner with 1 kid!  Easy when 4 adults are there.

So, the house we put a bid on is this one - mostly for the back yard - I mean how many football fields can you fit back there?!

4 Bidwell farm, Canton CT

I am trying to figure out which boy will let me keep this awesome PINK shag carpet in their room.

I have a feeling that window valance won't stick around long....

gotta leave this photo as its the powder room, but you can catch a glimpse of sweet Tara in the mirror snapping the photo for us (yesterday as we totally forgot what all the bathrooms looked like...)

See, more bathroom fun.

just what I always wanted, A SINK - haha

this photo cracks me up as its a great back yard, but Chris didn't like it as much due to its lack of privacy...  REALLY?  I mean the neighbors are way over there?!?!  Makes me want to snap a photo of our current backyard (its a muddy mess right now and I would saw a 20X20 patch!)

So this is the winner-- fenced in with a play yard too...  o.k, you are right honey.

Yup boys - its EXHAUSTING....and an emotional roller coaster that will continue for the next 6 months....  That is quite the ticket.

Hold on tight folks.
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Coming clean

Who was taking bets at how long the Leadbetters could stay put?? 3 years?? Maybe. We do have some awesome crazy suburbia going on. We have taken taken full advantage of the super proximity of the gym/restaraunts/grocery stores. Not to mention an awesome family of friends in walking distance. They have truly helped me and the boys enjoy these young years.

The crazy thing is--In January Chris's job got REALLY far away. Try Alexandria.... A 1 hour drive if there is no traffic (rare) and $8s in tolls (each way) no tolls is probably a 2 hour drive and mega stress...

With the kids young and Chris being such an awesome dad--this kind of set up was crummy for our family.

We saw this coming back in September. At that point it was time to make a decision, should he research and get another job? (To his credit, he did and received an awesome job opportunity with amazon. It would keep us here in ashburn--but is that even what he wanted??).

Nope

Over the passed years-Chris has experienced a significant amount of government contracting--good and bad leadership (sadly mostly the latter). Lots of time in big companies. He has had time to really appreciate and understand his own strengths. One of the biggest was creating and maintaining relationships and being able to get such different companies to work to mission completion. He quickly picked up knowledge in the IT world of bids, proposals and installation. Time to apply all of this an be more closely rewarded on a different scale for your efforts and talents.

So we are moving--to a very exciting career endeavor. Chris will be the first project manager and soon co-owner of C & H Fire sprinklers. His new boss and future business partner with over 30 years of success in the fire suppression field--Leslie Carlson.


We entertained these thoughts back in 2009--however the job offer from MC Dean to Germany forced entrepreneurship to take a back seat for a few years. Looking back you never know what really influences your decisions nor can you fully appreciate why-but I can now say the last 6 years brought Chris and our family so many lessons and experiences and friends! That we are forever thankful for that path.


Now-as we begin to switch gears--It's been so exciting to watch Chris and my father plan, set goals, have meetings. Things aren't complete yet-we plan to move to CT this summer (yes--that does mean spring break was a house hunting/business trip). We are hoping to live in Canton or Granby CT and will grab a house in due time.

In the meantime we are trying to check the blocks where we can, enjoy the days here that we have and do our best to plan and prepare for something rather unknown for the family of 5.




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Cousin time

We are about an hour away from Wyland and Shannon in Quantico VA and with cousins at a close age it's great to take advantage of simple afternoons together. However--who has simple afternoons?? I applaud Wyland for texting Chris on Saturday to see if he could golf. I am thankful Shannon was excited to open her home to the rest of us to enjoy the afternoon together.

 The boys loved it. I must admit, the girls did too. We enjoyed catching up on so many aspects of life.

Wyland took Nick and Shane on tours of the muddy back yard trails and Robbie educated Drew on train tracks.  Shannon even managed to clear out the tramploine for a moment for this guy

We had a great family hamburger dinner

I wanted to snap a photo of these 2 cousins together as i feel they look so similar

Here the the whole crew - bathed and ready for a sleepy car ride home.

Thanks Shannon and Wyland for a great family day!  

HUGS!

School projects

At some point I will enjoy these-I may never--but I hope they become less labor intensive for the parent.... Kids do love their time in the spotlight- thankfully we had superhero bingo to attend for the class pet. Shane was the first one (of our crew) to get a bingo. So proud of him for running up there to cash in on his winnings..

We had an exhausting weekend and never actually took the class pet with us for fear we would lose him-so nick was excited to capture this photo at the end of the chaos safely in bed with his doggie

In the meantime this was my class project--sometimes u just need a change and I do love linens.

10k in the hood

Last minute registration and buddy participation. It's was a BREEZY morning in Brambleton when Megan and I rolled out with these turkeys. The jogging strollers make great sails;). I applaud Megan's ability to 'just do it'. So we did!

Almost lost a bag of veggie sticks, thanks to a runner a few steps back Nolan had great ride. The last mile was all Megan and all I could do to not lose her! Thanks for the motivation--i didn't intend for her to start looking at 1/2 marathons for us--geesh!

Best post race feast--breakfast burritos and bloody marys!

Press pause to the potty

Who is ever ready for potty training--I mean really? Some say 2 is the magic birthday-some 3, some wait for the little guy to 'want it' with drew in a state of struggling to express himself I figure this might be his chance to show/prove his independence--or make a total mess...

So.... One rainy Thursday morning when I had gone out with my girlfriends the night before, I thought it would be the perfect day to give it a chill shot.

Friday--we had a mops morning and all went well. Thank a weekend of life happened and potty training became a bit of a side bar... He will get it though. Sometime before college.

He did great and we had noting else to do. I was a day of pee and constant resupply.

Some reason drew grew up real big that day--even went to the dentist for the first time!

As an update--I had a feeling over spring break with the adult/kid ratio more in our favor things would become a bit more clear for our pint size peer. Low and behold it was a great bonding experience for him and Om (what he calls Oma sue;)! While a great wolf lodge he even managed to poop--on the floor--but at least not in his pants!!

Baby steps

Choke points....

So how to families of more than one get through choke points....  

My kids are awesome.  

ONE AT A TIME.  

Put them together and its CHAOS.   

So what's a choke point?  when we are ALL trying to get some where or accomplish something at the SAME time.  I should just avoid them - as most days its not worth trying...  

So here is an every day scenario....  lets go outside and play.  Seems easy enough.  

Everyone put on your shoes and jacket - once that is done, I will help you open the garage door and get your toys out.

Nick - I cannot put on my jacket (because last time he took OFF his jacket he opted to pull the sleeves thought making it IMPOSSIBLE to put back on without re-threading the sleeves.  We have this discussion EVERY TIME)

Shane - you would think by the law of averages 50% of the time he would get his shoes on the right feet - WRONG.  Not even close to figuring out the jacket zipper.  Tries every time though - gotta give him credit...

Drew - well we are just lucking is he can find his shoes - in frustration he just irritates his brothers.

So today - a favorite choke point of mind is the after school unwind.  On beautiful days we have the wonderful pleasure of playing with LOTS of kids - right off the bus.  Its wonderful.  So we do that for 1-3 hours.  Literally.  Today - it was windy - so 1 hour.  

We come inside and now its time for homework.  I come in, help said brain children take off and put away shoes and clothes (yes, hooks and baskets designated for little kid ease...)  

I put drew outside to play in 8' walled back yard  while I head upstairs to set nick up on reflex math and Shane on a puzzle book.  less than 5 minutes later I come back downstairs to this........

EVERY pile of poop (only 5 because I cleaned it up the other day THANKFULLY) was stepped on REPEATEDLY, by the 2 feet tall brainless wonder...  He was also knocking at the door to come in - Hmmm - no, you can stay out there...