Catch Up

 

Wow! So, it's been awhile since I've posted anything. Let's see...what have the Gumula's been up to over the past month? For starters we (finally) sold our house! We had had a contract on it for a couple of months but we didn't really think it would go through. Why should we? We had 8 contracts over the last year and a half. A very good reason to be sceptical if you ask me. We have talked about moving to Tampa for awhile now so we thought that this would be a good time to make the move if we were ever going to do it. So we weren't exactly looking for a place to live here in Orlando. Closing day approached quickly! We may have had a small house but we managed to pack in a lot of stuff! It took us a couple of weeks to pack and in the meantime we asked work if we could keep our jobs but work remotely from our St. Petersburg location. Thankfully, our good friend Tim let us move in with him in the interim. We got the approval from work so we started looking for a house to rent in Tampa. Just two weeks after closing we found a place and moved! Let's just say it was an adventure. And we have a lot of crap. We managed to fill an entire 26 ft U-haul and still didn't get all of our stuff over. John had to make 3 trips total over the next week to get all of our things. We were also very lucky to have tons of help from both our parents and many of our friends. Connor loved every minute of it, especially getting to see his grandparents every weekend!


Let's load her up!

So we found a place to live. Next up? Daycare. We were so sad to have to take Connor and Addison out of Howell Branch Academy. We loved that place as did the kids! For whatever reason there is not a market for infant care in South Tampa. This was so stressful for us! Not only to find quality care for our kids, but trying to juggle working from home and unpacking our stuff at the same time. Yes, it was almost impossible. We would watch the kids and do what we could around the house during the day and then catch up on work in the evenings. We couldn't start in St. Pete until we found daycare. We would either come across a good school but they wouldn't take infants, or they would take infants but didn't have availability. As of Tuesday they are both finally in school but we had to split them up :( Addison and Connor both took a few days to adjust. I'm not sure who cried more, me or them. Addie has now been at her place for almost two weeks and seems to be doing ok. Connor has only been at his school for 3 days. His teachers said that he is acclimating better than most kids though which makes us feel better but it is still heartbreaking to leave him crying in the morning. He didn't cry today though so that is a good sign. I'm sure being home with us for the last couple of weeks didn't help. We're just glad they are finally situated so we can start to get back into a routine.

Connor and Addison with their HBA family

Addison also turned 5 months old. She is now rolling over from both tummy to back and back to tummy. She can also sit up all on her own! Connor didn't do this until he was 6 or 7 months old so she is very early on this. She is finally in her own room so we could start working on her (bad) sleep habits. She was getting to where she would wake up and want me every hour. So we turned to our trusty sleep solution which is basically the cry it out method. The first night was rough. She cried for 55 minutes before she fell asleep. But then she didn't wake up again until 4 am where we let her cry again, this time for only 20 min, and then she slept until 7 am. Every night got better and now she will only cry for 1 min if at all and sleeps for almost 12 hours. Her bedtime routine consists of a bath and then a bottle and she is usually out by 7 pm. She watches us very intently while we eat so we thought it was also a good time to start her on solids. Her first taste of rice cereal was this past Monday. She didn't hate it....but I wouldn't say she liked it either! Connor was so excited about eating he scarfed up every bite and always seemed excited to eat. Addie is still a dainty little eater and I can tell she isn't going to be anything like Connor in those regards. She is also teething. EVERYTHING goes into this girls mouth. She also loves loves loves her jumper. She gets so excited when she sees it and loves playing with every single toy on it. Connor is very fond of his sister now. The week he was home with us and she was in daycare, he would ask about her all day long. "Where is Addie?" "Let's go get Addie." Super cute. As soon as we get home from picking them both up he wants to hold her. He also wants to help with everything, from feeding her to bathing her...even putting her to bed. It's so sweet. 

 

Addie found her feet :)

First feeding!

We celebrated John's birthday on the 1st. It was a busy day. We were scheduled to start in the St. Pete office that day but hadn't yet found daycare for Connor. Thankfully John's parents were able to come over and watch him for the day. We got to work only to find they weren't exactly ready for us. We didn't have phones and couldn't connect to our PC's in Orlando. Not a productive day work wise. The day before John had gone back to Orlando for work. Connor and I made Daddy a birthday cake and painted him pictures with finger paint while he was gone. We had a great day together. I didn't realize how much work goes into taking care of 2 kids until I only had 1 to look after! LOL We also checked out Gymboree that day. It's an indoor play area built just for toddlers. Connor had fun but kept asking to go to the outside playground. Anyway, we celebrated John's birthday at home with Papa and Grandma with BBQ ribs and cake :) Connor had a great time with it. He loves singing Happy Birthday and had even more fun with Daddy's new power tools!

Making Daddy's birthday cake

Connor helping Daddy blow out his birthday candles



Power tools!

John's birthday also means football is in full swing! We kicked off college football with our friends this past weekend. So excited to welcome football back into our schedule. Monday we took a trip to the beach. Beautiful day but super windy. Our tent threatened to take off so we rented a cabana type tent. I've never seen the West coast so choppy! Overall not the best day for the beach but it was nice to break away from the house and enjoy the outdoors for a change. The house is starting to come around. We still have a lot to do and things to unpack but we're making progress. I'll take pictures once we are all settled in. Click here to view my pictures. Don't freak out but there are A LOT of pictures for me to share....an entire month's worth! :) Now that I have a computer again and we're starting to get back to "normal" you can expect to start hearing from me more often. I kind of went through Blogger withdrawal myself ;p

Have a great weekend!