Oh Crap II

The house on which we made an offer--you may remember from the last blog post that it was a short sale--has "anti-miraculously" gone off the market. We will probably not get it, although there is a non-zero chance we still could. Thus we have our first gloves-off encounter with the wild and crazy world of real estate. Also known as competitive back-stabbing.

Bird was crushed. We have self-medicated to some degree. Katie went on a shopping spree for Evi; true to Bird form, however, she got everything like 75% or more off the retail price. The clothes are super cute. She is also in planning overdrive for Evi's 2-year birthday party. As for myself, I convinced my good friend to drive down from Seattle and accompany me to Newport, OR where I was playing with the local symphony. After rehearsal, he and I went to Local Ocean and ate a GREAT locavore seafood dinner and then spent some quality-time at the Rogue Public House where we tried many, many samplers of their draft beer and spirits (such as hazelnut rum--delicious if a bit too sweet!), most unavailable at stores up here. We bought two gigantic Dungeness crabs and took them back to the fam. Katie's sister, Courtney, and I cracked the crabs and we had a seafood feast that night. I plan on using leftovers to make crab bisque tonight. Okay, enough obsessing about self-medicating through food.

Now it's back to house-hunting and preparing for Baby Girl #2, who is scheduled to arrive in early January, but who, if she displays her mother's penchant for financial wizardry and economy, will be born on Dec. 31 to take advantage of the tax credit that parents get for having children.

(Wow, only a week between posts...who knew we'd be so quick to post again after the last one? Not I!)

Oh Crap

Man, we just never post here any more. Luckily, we are very diligent about posting new stuff to our flickr account every couple of weeks or so for the three or four of you who actually care enough to check in on us from time to time (or have an RSS feed). But I feel I have to write SOMETHING, since my cousin just started a blog about her Spanish study abroad and put a link to our blog on hers. D'oh. All her friends are going to think we're totally lame....if they even click through, which they probably won't, since they are all busy college students and majoring in either Applied Apathy or Comparative Anatomy and too lazy or busy, respectively, to actually follow the link on her blog.

Anyhooo...we just had a very pleasant visit from some NYC friends. We never miss the city itself, but we DO miss our friends. It is great for them to visit us here, especially since it is becoming increasingly difficult for us to travel. Especially since Katie is pregnant. Now, there are two reactions a person can have after reading that last sentence. If yours was "HOLY CRAP!! HOW LONG? WHEN'S THE DUE DATE?! WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME?!?!?" then I am sorry that you had to find out this way. We are bad friends. But you'll be happy to know we are having another girl and everything is going well so far. We both read a hilarious (an hilarious? ...what's the proper article here?) book recently called "Waiting for Birdy" about a woman with a kid who is pregnant. Witheringly funny. But raises some good questions about how to prep the current kid, who is at the moment the center of the universe, to become something like Pluto AFTER its demotion to not-a-planet. I hope Evi likes TV, because she's probably going to watch a lot more of it come January. She'll probably also have a subsistence diet of flat Coke and day-old mac and cheese.

Our cat, Ringo, is becoming quite the porker. Recently, we learned from our Chinese neighbors that "Ringo LOVES Chinese food." Evi says this like a mantra now. It's pretty cute, but slightly socially awkward at the mall when we are around other Asians.

I am playing several symphony concerts in the next few weeks. Yay. My multi-tens-of-thousands-of-dollars graduate degrees are paying off! Time to start debt repayments! Katie is working a lot (refer to last sentence). And, oh, we're buying a house. Oh wait! You didn't know that either?! Go back to the last paragraph and re-read the sentence that says we are bad friends. The house was a short sale, which means we get it as is, so there are a few cosmetic things to do to it before we move in, and it took the seller's bank like 3-4 months to get back to us. So, we're looking at a fun few months where we buy and renovate a house while simultaneously flying to Hawaii for my brother's wedding (lemme guess...you didn't know about that either?) and then have another kid. FUN TIMES. I'd hate to see what busy people's lives are like. If I never post again, you'll know it's because Katie took a heavy-gauge nail gun to my ocular cavities during home renovations.

So that's the current post in a nutshell. The rate we're going, regarding our sporadic blog posts, check back next time for a report on Evi's high school graduation and the latest news about our state-of-the-art, laser-guided pig farm. Did I mention the pigs will play symphonic music while harvesting hazelnuts? Oink.
















PS. After reading over this post, I now firmly believe I should always post after drinking a couple glasses of wine (as I have just done). Stream of consciousness blogging is so much more random and spontaneous. All hail the unfettered authorial Id.

Major update--Spring 2010

So we haven't posted for a very, very long time. Since last September actually. We have been regularly updating our pictures of Evi on flickr though (see the flickr badges at the side and bottom of our blog?). So we aren't entirely leaving you out in the cold here, people. But I thought it might be nice to write an update about life here in the Pacific Northwest, especially for you New Yorkers and other out-of-staters that miss us so terribly. A lot has happened. I'll try to keep it brief. I'll try.

Evi is having an explosion of language. It seems like she is saying 3-4 new words a day. She knows almost all of her letters, colors, and numbers. She counts like this "1....2.....3.....9..10" We're still working on 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8. She says "ABCDs" like one word. She's also growing like a weed and definitely looks like a little girl now and not a baby anymore. She's still signs when she talks, which is really cute. And also helpful--juice, shoes, and chase all sound like "shooose." We're also starting to potty train Evi. So far, so good. It is really nice not having to change poopy diapers anymore. She is doing a pretty good job of telling us when she needs to go. She has a funny habit of looking into the training toilet after she goes #2 and saying "biggie!" It's hilarious. She also read the word "diaper" off the side of a plain brown package that she had never seen before. She didn't know what was inside and hadn't seen us take anything out. Yikes! We have been showing her DVDs called "Your Baby can Read" but we didn't know they would work so quickly. We'll let you know when she starts reading Dostoevsky.

Katie is still really liking her job, and has occasionally even worked at the clinic location right by our house (3 minute drive). You may recall that it was at this location that we were told she would eventually be working regularly, but that has not come to pass--other locations (15-20 minute drive away) have been her regular posts. Still, after NYC commutes on the subway or bus, a 15 minute drive with no traffic seems super easy and often enjoyable.

Dan has gone back to NYC for a couple of gigs, and also started making contacts out here, playing several concerts here and one, this past weekend, out at the coast at Newport, OR. A beach-side homestay and free food were part of the package. Fun times! He also recently won a fugue contest at Mannes college. A fugue is a type of composition where a melody, stated by itself at first, is repeated with variations in three or four different voices. There are certain rules one must follow. Every spring Mannes posts a fugue subject on its website and contestants have 2 weeks to write an entire fugue. This was Dan's first attempt and he is very happy to have won, especially since there was a pretty nice cash prize attached (too bad winners can't compete in succeeding years). We included the audio clip below so interested people can listen to it.



We also got a CAT, kitten really. His name is Ringo...we had a Facebook contest to name him, but Dan ended up getting the winning entry (the contest was totally rigged, but some front runners were OJ, Rufus, and Fang). Ringo has orange and white rings on his tail, and his name also pays homage to the Beatles drummer. Evi and he are learning how to live with each other; they are both very fond of one another but occasionally have bouts of sibling rivalry and try to maim/kill each other. Time outs for all!

It's also getting very nice out here in the Northwest. Spring is Dan's favorite season and he's going to try to grow chives, basil, and tomatoes (and some flowers--we'll keep our fingers crossed). Evi helped him plant stuff last weekend. Ringo watched with keen interest.

Come visit us! We have a guest room. With a queen bed and your own bathroom! That is all for now.

Signing Time

Ah, the Signing Time videos. They are terrible. And amazing. Evi loves them, but the adults are all a bit scared of the host, Rachel, who is, well...scary. But Evi loves these videos which we let her watch a few times a week. She is getting really good at signing and has added about one sign a day for the last week! Here is her list (ooh, a list!) of current signs:

1. food (this is her favorite)
2. more (2nd favorite..she was signing "more food" in her sleep the other night)
3. cracker (we are seeing a trend)
4. banana
5. dog
6. bath
7. baby
8. fan
9. water
10. milk
11. Daddy
12. Grandma
13. book
14. tree

Slap!

Every once in a while Evi has a bad night. She will usually go right back to sleep in the middle of the night with a little bit of milk and a soothing butt-pat. Not this night. She was fussy and wiggly and frustrating! Luckily we have a great baby carrier that serves to soothe the wild beasty. I wrestled it on in the dark, in my sleep-deprived state, then proceeded to wrestle Evi into it as well. Success! She calmed down immediately, snuggled her head onto my chest and fell asleep. The (very slow) time ticked away and I was thinking I might be able to take her out and put her in her crib. At almost this exact moment, Evi suddenly pushed herself away from me, looked me in the eye, swung her hand back and SLAPPED me across the face! WTF?! She immediately snuggled right back up to me and fell back to sleep.

End of Trip, Beginning of New Chapter

So, we are sorely behind in our blogging. To recap:

1) We finished our trip by driving from Bloomington to Oak Ridge, TN to visit Dan's Uncle Mike and family. Many games were played, cliffs were jumped off of (into deep, refreshing lake waters--after which muscles were sore), great meals were eaten, three cousins were seen one of whom just graduated from high school and just went off to the US Air Force academy, more games were played, waters were skiied and wakeboarded, more games were played. Awesome.

2) Then we flew to Austin, TX to see Dan's sister Gayle. It was like an oven down there...over a hundred degrees every day we were there. I (Dan) played as a sub for Gayle's softball team as the DH (so I "warmed" the bench when the team was out on the field, but since it was so hot, I was probably more of a "bench cooler" than a "bench warmer") and went 2-2 and scored a run. Evi maintained a cool acquaintance with Gayle's cat Peaches, neither were really sure what to do with the other. Many games were played here too. Katie and I had never been to TX, outside the airports, so it was neat to explore downtown Austin (heard a free concert in the park one night) and drove down to San Antonio to see the Alamo and the River Walk. Very fun.

3) We flew back to Portland, OR and stayed with Dan's parents for awhile before we found a wonderful house to rent in north Vancouver, WA. It has 4 bedrooms and 2.5 bathrooms (one for me, one for Bird, and, since Evi is so small, a 1/2 bath for her), a small but nice yard and...we are paying the SAME RENT as our dinky Brooklyn apartment! Love it. Although we hated the whole time-consuming process of unpacking of boxes and moving of incredibly heavy furniture bit. I am slowly mastering the manly art of outdoor grilling, which was sorely neglected in the concrete jungle of NYC. Yum. I am also loving all the readily available, super tasty microbrews from here in the PNW. I do miss me my Brooklyn Lager, though. Katie starts her new job at the clinic soon, and I will be working on my dissertation. It is great to have family (my parents, Katie's Dad and sister, grandparents, aunts and uncles, cousins, etc.) close by. We are very happy.

4) Lastly, since we no longer live in Brooklyn, I restyled the look of the blog as you will plainly notice. Brooklyn Blogger is dead, Long live Dan and Bird's Pacific Northwest Journal!

We have already posted many pictures and videos of our trip at flickr, and will be catching up even more in the coming days, including pics of our new house, and videos of Evi, who is cutting 3 new teeth in her upper gum! Stay tuned, and, as things fall into normalcy and routine, look for more frequent updates (I hope).

Illinois and Indiana Fun

We're here in Indiana now, after spending some time in Chicago with our friends there. We saw all kinds of cool stuff, like the Institute of Art with all it's famous paintings and sculptures. Evi did great there, happily vocalizing as we meandered through the galleries. I'm not sure how much she enjoyed the art, but lots of the patrons enjoyed interacting with her. We also went to the Shedd Aquarium and Evi was really interested in the fish there. That was such a cool place...so many cool aquatic animals!! Really good food in the food court, too! We also walked all around and saw the Cloud Gate, which most locals call "The Bean" a giant, reflective, curvilinear form. Neat...see our flickr pictures if you want to actually see what I am writing about.

Then we went to Plainfield, IN, a suburb of Indianapolis, where we spend some time with a family of four, whom we knew as a family of three in Brooklyn. Evi was really interested in the doings of the two kids, 5 and 1. The one-year old was "Evi's boyfriend" according to his 5-year old sister. So cute...again, see the pictures at flickr. Now we are in Bloomington, having got a tour of the IU campus from our friend who teaches there. He and his wife have a super cute 2-year old girl, who, again, entertains Evi to no end. We are having a lot of fun just relaxing now and hanging out with friends.

Family next...Dan's uncle and aunt and family in Tennessee and his sister in Austin. Updates from those places. As much fun as this trip is, we are really excited to return to the Pacific Northwest!! Yay!