Our little neck of the woods

So, what have we been up to in our little neck of the woods?

A lot, actually. The house always keeps us very busy. Due to illness and the crazy snow and ice-filled weather, it feels like we have been on house arrest or something. We have some extra time to do some more work around the house, mostly rearranging and stuff like light repair work. I have found some extra time on my hands to catch up with my own stuff, like this blog. We still have boxes yet to be unpacked. There is all the reorganizing, shifting of stuff from one room to another, things that are either brought up from the basement or down. There is the daily maintenance mixed in with remodeling. We also factor in time to tour our neighborhood and the surrounding areas, and to scope out the less expensive places for shopping which are very few. Some may totally believe that I know this city like the back of my hand, but it is just not the case, not exactly. There is so much to see and discover and rediscover. It is super fun to rediscover places and things with my husband and our son. Speaking of which, there is little Liam who needs constant attention. He is an only child, after all.

The house
I won't get into it too much, save to say that we have accomplished a lot and the house is taking shape. It requires a lot of time, money, and creativity (which we think we have a lot of). Little by little we are getting things done. The big news is that we got new windows. I was so worried about braving a winter with the old windows. It was a huge expense, but I'm sure glad we did it, as it will only increase the value of our house. As far as the interior, we are trying to finish one room at a time. Our bedroom is pretty much done, except for the new curtains and shades we want to buy (but can't afford right now). Oh yeah, and a headboard. We still need to work on the baseboards and paint the window frames and doors on the second floor. Get new curtains and shades for Liam's room and the back room. Paint the banister, speaking of which, we need a new banister for the basement stairs. We have bought the materials and all we need is a big block of time to install it. New curtains and blinds for the first floor and install the baseboards. The kitchen and the bathroom are still untouched and will remain so until we have the money to hire out a contractor to renovate them and we don't see that happening in the near future. I do want to, at least, remove the yucky wall paper and paint the ceiling in both the kitchen and the bathroom. As far as the exterior, we need to redo our front stoop. We had the money set aside for that project, but had to use it to purchase airfare for Bill to go to Australia for his mother's funeral. The backyard needs repair work, too. We want to repave the patio and put down some lawn. Like I said, we bought ourselves a fixer-upper and it will take time to get things looking the way we want them.

Our neighborhood
We are having a great time exploring our neighborhood and the shops in the surrounding areas. People have been friendly and welcoming. We are happy making friends in our neighborhood and in our new ward. During the week, Liam and I get together, more often than not, with a couple of the other moms with small children in the ward who are also fairly new to the area. Our local library is a bit of a walk, but not too bad. The parks around this area are great with lots of greenery and full of trees. Membership into the private swimming pool and recreational facility is way out of our budget, so we did the sprinklers at the playground a lot. We also have nearby a farm museum, a marina, a wildlife refuge and an environmental center with various programs for children of all ages. The very large Flushing Meadows Park (home of the U.S. Tennis Open) with its remaining World's Fair landmarks is also not very far. Here are a couple of snapshots on one of our outings to that park. How nice it is to take a moment (right now as it is heavily snowing yet again) to remember the warmth of last summer!

Pointing to where Grandpa lives

Liam
Dear, sweet, little Liam is...
- not so little anymore. He's growing way too fast.
- absolutely thrilled to finally be in Primary.
- four years old as of January 17th and we are hoping to celebrate it very soon. (Done! Jan 29, 2011)
- in karate class.
- into Thomas the Tank Engine, Toy Story, Star Wars (BIG time), and playing dress up.
- still the energetic and funny child that we all love.
- into anything that will make him laugh out loud. He has a tremendous sense of humor.
- no longer wanting his food served on plastic. He wants real plates, glasses and cutlery. (I know! Scary!)
- waking up dry most mornings.
- still calling his mama, honey. (Oh well, it's better than being called "babe", like he used to.)
- growing to be quite the little thinker
- wanting a sibling..... badly.
- very independent as far as accomplishing tasks.
- creative in dressing himself and comes up with the strangest ensembles known to man.
- practically doing his own laundry.
- always eager to learn and to help around the house.
- "in charge" of vacuuming and loves the big messes that he can suck up with the large shopvac.
- loving our kitchen. He loves to "cook" and watch me run around in the kitchen preparing meals.
- inquisitive. The questions are non-stop.
- such a good little boy. We are just crazy about him.

He loves his new friends, and misses his old Brooklyn friends terribly, asking after them all the time. In the beginning, he would constantly say: "This house is broken. I want to take our things to Brooklyn. It's not broken over there." Then, just this week, he finally said the words we thought we would never hear: " I like it here, mama. I like my house and the backyard, but not the mosquitoes." Darn. He still remembers those pesky mosquitoes that gave us a whooping last summer! What a pain in the neck! His dream come true, or so he tells me all the time, is to have each and every one of his friends over to play in his tiny room and in the backyard. Soon, baby. First, we will have to get some grass and do something about the mosquito situation in the summer.