Cheyenne Mountain Zoo

The weather is perfect today, so we went up to the zoo. Damon and I couldn't sleep last night because we were so excited to take Abby to the zoo. It's only about 10 minutes from where we're staying, so we bought a family membership so we can go anytime we want. It's the only mountain zoo in the country. It's literally about halfway up Cheyenne Mountain, so the views were amazing.



We bought that hat in the gift shop in the entrance. She took it right off once past the giraffes and I never could get it to stay on again.







For $1 you can buy 4 "giraffe crackers" to feed the giraffes, so they're not shy about coming right up to you.

The Newest Grotegut

Congratulations Rachael!!! I'm sure Gavin will be a terrific big brother.

Pictures!

The first couple were still on my camera from the old house. Abby eating Cheerios.






Damon's Grandma Wava made these two blankets for Damon's future children long before he was ready for babies. They're the perfect size and weight, so one of them is always in Abby's crib with her. Lately, she's been carrying at least one of them around with her all over the house. She'll pick it up and cuddle it like she does Po. She has both of them in the living room with her today because she immediately grabs the one in her crib when I go in to get her.





Linus

We're Here

We're all doing well. When we first walked in the door, the first thing Abby saw was the coffee table. I have never seen someone so happy to see a piece of furniture! She settled back into her routine pretty quickly. In fact, she adjusted to Mountain Time on the way here, so we just had to deal with Daylight Savings Time, but that went smoothly too. The second day on the road was better than the first. She did get fussy right away, but at least she was entertainable. She did really well the third day. She even took a nap in the car without a fight. She was feeling so out of sorts, though, in the hotel rooms that neither of us could leave her side. If either Damon or I left the room for any reason, she became inconsolable. She's doing so much better now. She hasn't even been crying when Damon goes to work in the mornings.

Thoughts from the road, Day 1

Why did we ever think that driving for 3 days with a toddler was a good idea? We still have 2 more days to go. We're never going to make it!

Really, Abby hasn't been that bad. About an hour into our trip this morning, she started getting fussy, so I handed her everything I could to buy us a few minutes of peace. She quickly lost interest in toys, so we moved on to cell phones, wallets, sharp knives...anything. It didn't help that it's been raining since we got into Montana, so we couldn't stop anywhere to let her run. Our plan was to stop in Missoula. We barely made it. She was fine once we got her out of the car. Luckily, it wasn't raining there, so we were able to let her walk around outside Cracker Barrel to burn off some energy. Once back in the car, though, all hell broke loose. After a fullblown meltdown that lasted about a half hour, she finally fell asleep. For 45 minutes. She was only a little fussy the rest of the way, though. We'd decided to stop in Bozeman, MT, so we've only travelled about 350 miles today. We stopped for the day at 2 in the afternoon. Abby flipped out when we got her back in the car to go out to dinner because she's had enough of our road trip. It's going to be a long couple of days!

Our furniture is gone and on its way to its new home now. The guys packed us up yesterday and loaded us today. We were supposed to keep our bed until tomorrow, but the weather is supposed to get bad through the pass into Montana and Jack didn't want to risk it, so we'll be sleeping on the floor with no bedding tonight. At least Abby has her Pack-N-Play. She's been taking naps in it today and has been sleeping really well. She took a 2-hour nap this morning! That's the longest nap she's taken in a long time. I was really surprised because there was so much noise in the house with the guys hauling the furniture out. It gave me a chance to vacuum as much as I could before it got loaded on the truck. It's so strange to walk through our empty house.

They had a farewell get-together for us at Damon's work this afternoon. The first one was in the lobby of the Assisted Living building. Abby was completely overwhelmed by all the people. She clung to Damon until the end. Then she was finally comfortable enough to walk around a bit. Even then, though, she was still really shy. Next, we walked over to the Independent Living dining room. There, we couldn't hold on to her. She was a completely different kid! She completely stole the show running between the tables, squealing "DA!" and pointing at Damon whenever she came by him, and just being the adorable toddler she is. I couldn't keep up with her. I had to keep an eye on her on the way home because she was exhausted. She fell asleep a couple times, so I'd tap on her shoe to wake her up. At one point, she took her shoe off, but fell asleep while trying to take her sock off. We made it home and she's now crashed in her Pack-N-Play again.

Tomorrow is Damon's last day of work here. He'll put in a full day at work, then we'll just stop in Coeur D'Alene for the night. It's only a half hour away, but at least it's in the right direction. We don't want to drive through the pass at night, particularly if the weather is going to be ugly. I need to finish cleaning the house tomorrow and I need to pick up the garage door opener. I forgot to take it out of the Tercel when they picked it up on Friday. Oops!

A Sad Day

It's been a very emotional day. Firstly, this morning we signed the closing papers on our house. Our house is officially sold. Our realtor came over right after and took the lockbox off the front door. We don't move until next week, but there was something about the lock expiring on Sunday so we had to sign today. We'd originally made the appointment for 4 this afternoon so Damon could just get off work early, sign the papers, then go out for a celebratory/farewell dinner. The title company called to reschedule, though, because the buyers needed to be funded today, so off we went first thing this morning. As we're getting out of the car at the title office, the buyers called with a couple house questions. They also mentioned that they wouldn't have their deposit until first thing Monday morning. Without their deposit, they can't get funded. The buyers are only financing 25% of the house; the rest is being paid cash, and I guess they weren't able to withdraw such a big amount today after all. It's too bad because it would've been nice to have been able to go out to dinner right after. Oh well.

This was the first house that Damon and I bought together. When I met him, he was in the middle of buying a condo, and I eventually moved in with him there. It was a special place because that's where Damon proposed. That's where we came home to after we got married. Still, it always felt like I was living in his house, you know? Damon was wonderful about making feel at home, but it never felt ours to me. On the other hand, I was the one who found this house. We went through the whole process together from the beginning. We furnished it together, and made it ours. Most importantly, we brought Abby home here. This is Abby's hometown, and that made the decision to move so hard.

Secondly, the towing company came by to pick up my Tercel this afternoon. We weren't planning on taking it with us anyway, but right after we accepted this offer in Colorado it broke down. Damon barely got home that day, and it's been sitting in the garage ever since. That clinched it, so we called a charity that we found in the newspaper to come pick it up for donation. This was my first car (well, second. I drove a Renault for a week, but it was so old and almost dead that my mom took pity on me and bought me the Tercel) when I was 16. I've had it almost 12 years. It's been through so much with me; we've been everywhere together. The stories she could tell you! That car went to more proms than I did! Part of me wanted to tell the guy that I changed my mind and I decided to keep it. We could use it as a lawn ornament. I know it was time to let go, though. If I'm having this hard a time saying good-bye to my old car how am I ever going to let Abby go?

P.S. We signed up for a Flickr pro account, so I'm adding a ton of old Abby pictures. Just click on any picture in the sidebar to see the rest of them. I'm only through February right now. This should keep the grandmas happy until we get settled in Colorado.