Another thing that started this week was the re-tiling of our bathroom. I found water underneath the tile in our shower a couple of months ago and since we were going to have to re-tile the shower, we decided to go ahead and re-tile the entire bathroom. We hired a contractor and Jennifer used her discount at Pro Source to get the tile. It’s looking good. First they spent the first couple of days this week tearing out all the old tile. Then, they spent the past two days putting the new tile in. Once it’s all in, I’ll take some pictures and post them on the site. Won’t the home improvements end?
Abby and Emily are getting pretty restless, but it’s their last week of freedom. She goes back to school on Monday and she is going to start going every day Monday through Friday. Emily is also going to start going to pre-school, but she is only going to be going on Mondays and Wednesdays. Jennifer can’t wait.
It’s been a very busy week for the French household. First, Abby and Emily attended Vacation Bible School at our church each day this week. It was pretty tough because we had to be up and out of the house by 8:15 each morning. It’s not so hard for me because that’s around the time I leave for work, but for Jennifer and the girls, it’s quite a chore to get them up and going that early in the morning. They had a great time up there and we are going to hear Abby sing at church tomorrow.
The sand arrived for the play gym this week. Abby exclaimed that it was like being at the beach and they ran to the garage to get all of their beach toys. So, the play gym is still in pieces and there’s a ton of beach toys in the sand pit. Unfortunately, they didn’t bring enough sand to make it entirely level, so they are coming back this week to put more in. On Thursday, the other guys are coming back to put the play gym back together. The end is in sight for the play gym installation. (yippee)
Our next project is getting the tile replaced in our bathroom. A couple of months ago I discovered water underneath the tile in shower of our master bathroom. (I have a knack for finding water underneath our floors.) We pulled up some tile and discovered that water was getting underneath and the shower needed to be “re-floated”. So, we’ve hired a contractor and Jennifer ordered some tile. We are going to go ahead and get the whole bathroom re-tiled since we are at it. We’ve never like that tile, so we thought it was a good opportunity to go ahead and get it done.
Sorry it’s been so long since I’ve posted my last updated. Between Isabelle and work, my plate has been full. At work, this weekend is the end of our Production period as we entering Alpha. This is the time where we switch our focus from creating new features for the game and just fixing the bugs in the features we’ve been creating for the past several months. So, this past week and this weekend are pretty busy for me at work.
Very good news on the play gym front. Our homeowners’ association has approved our play gym for the full height of 11 feet 3 inches. That means the whole this will be going up intact! Yea! Last weekend was spent buying big crape myrtles to block our neighbor’s view of the play gym once it goes back up. I tried to pick them up with our Sequoia, but they wouldn’t fit. I would have been dragging them all the way home. So, that was no good. I had to borrow a friends, truck in order to haul the home. I dug giant holes to bury them in and all was good. We also bought some plants to put along the fence line in order to grow into a hedge row. Next, we’ve hired someone to bring in sand and put it into the sandbox that I made. That will happen on Thursday, weather permitting. After that, we will call the play gym people and they will set it back up.
Last weekend I also bought a friend’sPlay Station Portable (PSP). I rented a few games from work, but I spent most of the weekend trying to get videos to play on the device. I bought a case and I’ve been mainly using it as an MP3 player until a really good game comes out for it. So far I’m really enjoying it. I’m going to try and get into some Podcasts which are out there. Podcasts are radio broadcasts recorded to an MP3, which you can download and put on your player and listen to them any time you want. The main one I’ve been listening to is This Week in Tech, which is hosted by some guys who used to host a show called The Screen Savers which was on TechTV before it got sold to G4 and was shut down. I think I’m going to search for some other similar Podcasts once I get some time.
Isabelle has been doing well. However, Jennifer and I are running low on sleep. Me because of work. Her because of Isabelle getting up at 3:00 and it taking her two hours to get her back to sleep. We are surviving, but it hasn’t been easy. Between Isabelle, the two other girls running around the house, and Austin, we really have our hands full right now. Abby and Emily are going to be going to some Vacation Bible School next week, so hopefully that will get them out of Jennifer’s hair for a while so she can get some peace. Even if it’s only for a couple of hours.
Rough Isabelle night last night. Jennifer was up with her most of the night and I was even called into duty a couple of times last night.
Good news: Today our fence was completed. Bad News: Austin can slide between the bars and get out of the back yard. Fortunately he’s still a growing puppy so, we just need to feed him more and that should stop his escaping.
It appears that Isabelle has picked up a runny nose from Emily, so we may have a couple of rough nights ahead of us.
We had our Executive Review of Madden NFL 06 Xbox 360 today. It sounds like it went well, which is a relief. We are now two weeks from going “Alpha”, which is our main bug fixing mode. This is technically when we are supposed to be feature complete and we are only working on fixing bugs, but there’s going to be many features that aren’t quite done yet and so the first three weeks of Alpha may still be feature work for some folks.
Today’s picture is from when my parents were in town a couple of weeks ago when Isabelle was born.
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.
Another rough Isabelle night. The girl is definitely more awake at night than during the day. During the day she’ll just sit in her bouncer or swing and sleep away. The occasional cry for more food will go out, which will get fulfilled and back to sleep she goes. Apparently at night is when it’s time to look around. At night the cry will go out and food will be brought to her. Then, I will sit in the rocking chair with her for about an hour while she just looks around at nothing in particular.
Sitting up with Isabelle wouldn’t have been so bad if I didn’t have to get up at 5:15 this morning to take Nana and Poppy to the airport. It was poring down rain as the outer bands of Tropical Storm Arleen were hitting Central Florida. Nana and Poppy made their flight and made it back to Shreveport with their luggage this time. Thanks Nana and Poppy for coming to visit and watching Abby and Emily while Jennifer and I took care of Isabelle.
Today’s picture is from the big bike swap a couple of days ago. Emily is happy to be up and going on Abby’s old bike.
It was another rough night last night. I was up several times and ended up rocking Isabelle for about an hour trying to get her to go to sleep. Then, I was up at 6:00 when Isabelle’s crying woke Abby and Emily up. So, not much sleep is happening in Frenchville.
After lunch Poppy, Abby, and myself headed out to The Adventures of Shark Boy & Lava Girl in 3D. It was a pretty corny movie, but Abby seemed to like it. The 3D effects were fairly lame, with only a few good areas. Also, after a while, the 3D effects were giving me a headache. After the movie, Abby and Emily ran around the house with the 3D glasses on pretending they were Shark Girl and Lava Girl.
After dinner I took Nana and Poppy up to my work so that they could see the new building we moved into at the beginning of the year. They were amazed at how much we had grown since I gave them a tour a year and a half ago when they were here last.
Today’s picture is from when we were in the hospital the first day when Isabelle was born and Nana and Emily were visiting.
Our first night home wasn’t too bad. Isabelle was up at 1:00 a.m., but actually slept through to 4:30 a.m. Nana and Poppy took Abby and Emily to the mall and entertained them while Jennifer and I took care of Isabelle. It’s been nice having them here. We are not looking forward to Saturday, when Nana and Poppy go home.
Last night wasn’t good. We were up several times last night. Jennifer didn’t get much sleep and I awaken several times last night for my duties, which was mainly changing diapers.
Last night Nana and Poppy brought Emily and Abby up to meet their new sister. Abby was very interested in taking care of the baby, but Emily could really care less. She was more interested in jumping on the bed.
You can tell Isabelle has her days and nights mixed up. She’s doing a lot of sleeping during the day and then she’s up looking around at night. Last night I did a lot of walking around to comfort her while Jennifer tried to get some sleep. We had a horrible night last night, but not because of Isabelle. The walls in the hospital were very thin and between the new parents next door with the baby that cried every fifteen minutes and the guy on the other side of us that was snoring, we got no sleep. Isabelle was great. Our neighbors were horrible.
We kept insisting to the nurses and doctors that we were leaving today. With Emily we were in the hospital for four days and with Isabelle, it was only one day. Almost exactly 24 hours since she was born and we were headed home.
Meanwhile at home Nana and Poppy have been taking care of Abby and Emily. They went to the store and bought a Slip and Slide. They had fun getting all wet in the back yard. They’ve been doing a lot of swinging on the new play gym as well. Today we decided to switch bicycles between the girls. Emily’s legs have been too small to reach the tricycle’s pedals, so Abby took Emily’s big tricycle and Emily started using Abby’s bike. Emily took to the bike like a fish to water. She was pedaling down the street like a pro. The only problem was that she didn’t like wearing her bicycle helmet.
Frenchville 