It’s been a tough week. Right when we thought Isabelle was only going to be getting up twice a night (3:00 a.m. and 6:00 a.m.) we were hit with her getting up constantly. I have the easy job, I’m usually only requested to do one of three things: change the baby’s diaper, put her pacifier back in her mouth, or rock her. All three of which you can pretty much do while in a half-sleep state.

The main project I’ve been working on is building a giant sandbox for our play gym. Once the play gym was installed, it was pretty obvious that it wasn’t level because of us having to put it up on bricks. After talking to a contractor to level out the backyard, he suggested building a giant box in order to put sand into in order to level it out. So, I went to Home Depot on Tuesday and bought the supplies. I then spent all day Wednesday, Thursday, and the first half of Friday building the box. The toughest part was getting all the boards level by digging into the ground and stair stepping the boards around the yard. It wasn’t until the whole thing was built that you can really see how un-level our backyard is. The box has one board on one end and seven on the other. The next step is to get the contractor to move sand into the box. The problem is our neighbors. They are not very happy with our play gym and they’ve even complained to the home owner’s association, which is on our side by the way. Unfortunately, in order to get a Bobcat tractor around the house with the sand, we are going to have to cut into their yard by two feet. I tried to get permission from them yesterday, but they were either not home or not answering the door. They are only delaying the eventual installation of a hedge which will block their view of our play gym. So right now we are at an impasse. We are going to call the home owners association on Monday and at this point the only thing we can think of doing is leaving a note on their door. If you have a suggestion, leave a comment.