The Pate Place Update

Well, I'm a nervous wreck, but we submitted an offer yesterday!  We'll see what happens...I'm not very confident that they'll accept the offer because of how much we asked for, but we're hoping to build a Walnut floor plan home in The Parks at Brighton Creek - four bedrooms and 2.5 baths downstairs with a bonus room and another half bath upstairs.  It would have a covered patio and be on one of the premium lots in the neighborhood (still not huge, but larger than most and backs up to a green space with no one building behind us).  Here are some sketches of the exterior elevation and the floor plan.

We'll know by tomorrow!  I'll be sure to update what is going on. :)

The Pate Place

A new home for the Pate family? Maybe!

A little history.  We moved down to Bentonville almost SIX years ago.  That just blows my mind.  After a very short stint in Rochester, Jarrod was encouraged to come down here to work at the Home Office.  I was hesitant.  I did not think he would like working in an office setting, but it seemed like there were some advantages we couldn't pass up - mainly working 'regular' hours, not retail.  Plus, when we looked up housing here and compared it to UNY, we could get SO much more here.  So, we jumped in with both feet BUT I made sure he knew I didn't want to buy a house here.  I wanted to make sure we liked it here first.

So, for the same monthly rent as our two bedroom apartment in Rochester, we moved into a beautiful 4 bedroom house here in Bentonville.  And, we ended up loving it here!  Ideally, I wish I could take Bentonville and physically move it closer to Ohio (can't we just swap places with like Kentucky or something??) but overall, this has been a really great place for our family.  We started to look to buy a house, but I was still hesitant to own two homes (since we still owned the home in Miamisburg).  Well, back in 2011, we were shocked to learn our tenant had vacated our home, leaving us high and dry, and we went through a very stressful short sale.  Because of that, we couldn't buy a home here for many years.  Thankfully, we were in a great rental home with fantastic landlords and didn't have a real need to move anywhere.

Fast forward to last fall...our schools went through some major changes, which included eliminating our much-loved year round calendar and a major rezoning.  That triggered us to see if we could go ahead and buy a home so we could get close enough to our current school to avoid switching schools.  Good news - we were told we COULD in fact apply for a loan now.  Bad news - the homes near our current school have increased drastically in price over the last couple of years and no longer in our budget.  After a LOT of stress, I finally came to peace with the idea of switching schools and we decided to look in a different part of town near another school.

So, after a lot of looking, we stumbled upon a sign for a brand new neighborhood that is just getting started.  While we haven't decided to 100% go forward with this, I have spent countless hours over the last two weeks, staring at the lot map and comparing floor plans, making list after list after list of pros and cons.  Typical Jen, right?  And whether this is the route we end up going or not, I want to make sure I document the journey here for us to look back on.

The perks of being in this new neighborhood are really appealing.  We'd be just under a mile from the elementary school, middle school and junior high (assuming we don't get rezoned again...which I've learned I can never assume anything with our school board).  Finally, we'd be in a neighborhood with kids for Gav and Riley to play with.  Yes, it's brand new and I don't know that for a fact, but Riley did make a friend while we were just meeting with the builder's salesperson at another model home and they're also building in that neighborhood.  I have a feeling Riley and Sydney are going to become close friends if we go this route. ;)  The neighborhood will not only have a pool and a playground like I've always wanted for the kids, but also a dog park.  Seriously?!  Oh, and the POA is responsible for all lawn mowing.  We wouldn't even have to cut our grass.  Jarrod's not so sure how he feels about that, but I've assured him we'd still be able to do yard work and it will give him more time for running.

So, the cons - the lots are not going to be very large, and in keeping with most of the new neighborhoods here, the houses are going to be pretty close together.  Not ideal, but probably something that we can deal with if it means a better neighborhood for the kids.  The floor plan we are leaning toward is a bit more than we want to spend, and it will most likely mean that I will need to do some part time work when Riley starts kindergarten to help with our budget, but again, I think it will be worth it.  And of course, since it is BRAND NEW (meaning the model home isn't even ready....they just poured the foundation actually), we aren't able to walk through floor plans and make sure what's on paper is actually what will work for us.  Kinda scary for someone like me who is very hands on.  I really wish I could walk through a few homes first.

But...that's where we are right now.  Still figuring things out with which lot we'd go with and for sure which floor plan we'd choose.  Jarrod's been gone most of the last two weeks traveling for a new club opening and YBM, so I'm hoping after Friday we can really make some headway because kindergarten registration is next week and I want to try everything I can to avoid the kids being put on a waiting list for their new school.  I'll keep you posted on the Pate Place! :)

Our 2016 Snapshot

A month or two back, I saw that my amazing friend, Amy, did a 'snapshot' on her blog and loved it.  When I told her about it, she said that she realized when she went back through her scrapbooks, she liked seeing pictures of how their house looked, etc.  Right around the same time, I read a parenting article written by an empty-nester that mentioned how we tend to document big milestones, like first words and first days of school, but one day, we'll forget what the kids' rooms looked like or what we talked about at family dinners.  It made me realize that the little things deserve to be remembered, too.  And with a move on our horizon, I figured it would be a good time to start with our yearly snapshot since it may be our last year in this house. 

Gavin Jack

{I did a project for Gavin's class last week about how to make the world a better place and this picture is from that photo book.  He just thinks we need more free stuff!}

Height: 4'

Weight: ~ 50lbs

Current sizes: 7/8 in most clothes and a size 1 shoe

Lost tooth count: 4

Gavin is creeping closer to his EIGHTH birthday.  Somehow, he's getting older everyday....not sure why he thinks that's ok.  He's in Ms. Behnke's second grade class at Elm Tree, and loves going to TREC every Tuesday, where he's studied money and currently in the 'experimentality' unit where they're doing all sorts of fun science experiments.  Spring soccer is about to start soon, and he'll also sign up for Running Club again as we train to run a 5K together in May.

This kid lives and breathes Minecraft, xbox/ipad, and Legos.  It's like all he does.  I'm not sure why we even have any other toys for him (though we really don't have much more for him...he's weeded out most other things.)  He does love to read, too, and goes through about a chapter book a week with Daddy at bedtime.  Every now and then, you'll find him drawing in his sketch book, and he's just started getting into music (but, of course, they're only Minecraft songs).  

His room is so dark, and it's one of the things I'm looking forward to most in a new house...being able to paint and lighten up his bedroom.  Of course, I snapped the photos of the bedrooms on a day we'd just finished cleaning, but to be honest, his room is typically littered with dirty laundry, used tissues, and legos covering every surface.

He's still pretty quiet most of the time, but slowly but surely, he's coming out of his shell, and we get glimpses of a goofy kid that makes us so happy.  He LOVES to take silly selfies when he gets his hands on my phone, and seeing him with his friends shows us a whole different side than we're used to.

We love you, Gavin Jack.

Riley Savannah

Height: 3' 5"

Weight: ~ 41lbs

Current sizes: 5/6 in most clothes and about a 10 in shoes 

 Oh, sweet Riley.  This little four-and-a-half-going-on-fourteen firecracker brings us so much joy every single day. She's thriving in her Tiny Tots pre-K 4s class with her new teacher, Ms. Tricia and learning to read.  It's so exciting to watch her put things together and see it click...you can literally see her brain working.  So cool!  On Wednesdays, she stays after school for Jitterbugs, which she loves, and she's also in her third month of gymnastics.  She's officially pre-registered for kindergarten, which has been really hard on me to accept since I thought we were going to hold her back a year. I can't believe she's old enough to go to school already!

She loves to dress up (and dresses herself most days...and I don't usually fight with her over her choices, as you can probably tell in photos of her!), play with makeup, and play pretend.  Her favorites are to pretend to be a baby, or to pretend to be an animal of some sort.  We play 'pet store' almost daily!  She also loves to help me cook, and really enjoys doing dishes.  When she has iPad time, she loves to watch YouTube Kids videos, and Sofia the First is definitely a favorite tv show right now.  We love seeing her creative side, too.  Drawing is definitely one of Riley's talents!

Her room is currently a hodgepodge.  She decided she didn't want her flowery comforter anymore and we picked out a new one together during the Christmas sales, but the comforter she liked didn't come with matching bed skirt or shams, so it's kinda all mixed together.  When we do eventually move to a new home, her room will come together more.  When I took pictures for this Snapshot, it was close to Valentine's Day, when their doors were covered with hearts.  Also, if you look closely, you'll see a little word wall on her closet doors, which I love.  Just a couple months ago, we started that because she was asking me to help her learn to read words. <3 font="">

The six month period from age 2years 9months to 3years 3months was really rough.  Riley was trying to deal with big emotions, and everything made her REALLY happy or REALLY mad.  Slowly but surely, we started to make progress.  I started reading more parenting books, and changed the way I dealt with her meltdowns and tantrums.  Silly as it might sound, her tantrums at 3 were just so scary for me because I just kept thinking about when she was 13, 14, 15...  I knew I needed to work on creating a stronger bond with her NOW so that we can get through those tween/teen years.  There are still days when we have BIG issues.  Like tonight...when I 'just maker her mad' and I'm 'so bossy' that she 'just doesn't want to see me anymore.'  But I'm determined to keep working on her emotions and mood swings so that we not only have a great relationship in the future, but so that she knows how to be a better friend and treats her peers appropriately.

The Parents

Well, here we are about to celebrate our 10th wedding anniversary.  Crazy! I honestly hate how fast time flies.  

Jarrod is in his 15th(I think!) year at Sam's Club and currently working with new clubs opening up.  Almost two years ago, Jarrod was introduced to the world of triathlons and got hooked quickly.  After doing a Half Ironman 70.3 last spring, he committed himself to another one this year as well as a full Ironman 140.6.  Crazy.  He's so dedicated...I don't know how he does it, honestly.  He runs 6 days a week, swims two mornings at 5am, and currently does one long bike ride a week, all this on top of working 50-60 hours a week.  Told you...he's crazy.

I'm kind of in a transition phase.  I stopped coaching with Beachbody last year and I am not doing much with Tastefully Simple anymore (actually...I'm probably going to lose my consultant status after this month, but I think I'm ok with that.  Feels like the end of a chapter in my life after 7 years as a consultant.)  I started a blog, but lost momentum with that for some reason.  I constantly am reminding myself that I only have five more months with Riley not in school full time, and I'm going to take advantage of every minute that I can.  When Riley heads off to kindergarten, I do plan to do something - I'm not sure what yet, but I have time to figure that out. ;) 

This is our room, that we currently share with Phoebe.  I'm still so in love with our headboard that we made last year.

This isn't a great picture of our living room, but for the sake of getting this blog post done, I'm going to use it anyway.  Our living room looks pretty much the same as it has since we moved into this house to be honest.  Over the years, baby and kid things have come and gone, including the pack n play and our little blue table.  Now, a trampoline sits in the corner that the kids use a ton, but all other kids' things are kept behind closed door, safe from puppy teeth. :)

Thanks for the idea to have a 'snapshot' of our lives, Amy.  I'm looking forward to doing this yearly and see how we change.  Our days may be long, the years are short and I want to remember every little thing.

Riley in February

After blogging about Gavin's fun times in February, I wanted to at least share a few pictures of Little Sis.  She's getting so big, slowly maturing and learning to deal with her emotions better. We love her big!

She has such a great smile, and grows more beautiful everyday.

For her Valentine's party, she once again wanted to sleep in curlers and she was very impressed with how it turned out.  Haha!  She couldn't stop looking at herself in the mirror that morning.

I had fun at her school party, but I couldn't help but hold back tears, knowing it was my last time watching one of our babies exchanging valentines with their preschool friends.  So bittersweet.

For the second year in a row, Gavin happened to be on break for Riley's party and went with me as my special helper.

Her love of playing dress-up and applying makeup just keeps growing, and she's getting really good at it!  There was a time when I was honestly nervous about not being 'girly' enough to raise a daughter.  Something tells me she's going to be teaching me more than I teach her.

Riley finished off February by being Special Person at preschool and celebrating her half birthday with Krispy Kreme donuts for her classmates.   

And....the biggest news of all from February!  Riley is officially pre-registered for kindergarten.  We go in a couple of weeks to take all the paperwork.  Not gonna lie...I'm NOT taking this all that well.  We're still 5 months away - I don't know how I'm going to make it through July.  :(  A very special phase of our life is almost over and I don't like that.

Second Grade Silliness

February was a fun month to be a second grader.  For the last few months, Gavin's been preparing for the second grade musical with his classmates.  I was so excited when I first read that there'd be a musical this year, way back in September.  When TREC came into play, it was actually one of the things I checked out first, because Gavin is out of the classroom every Tuesday and therefore misses music.  Not that I was expecting him to have a huge role in the musical, but I wanted to make sure he was able to practice and prepare with his fellow second graders.  

Well, the morning of the Granny Awards performance came and I couldn't wait to see him up there.  When we first were told the date and times of the musical, I asked Gavin if he wanted me to be there for both the daytime performance and the evening one, and he said yes, so of course, I made plans to be there.  Jarrod wasn't able to make it for the morning performance, but had plans to meet me at school that evening.  When I dropped Gavin off in the carline that morning, I commented that I would see him soon, and he looked back at me and said, 'You're just coming tonight with Dad, right?'  I reminded him that he said he wanted me to come to the morning performance, and he tried telling me he didn't need me to come anymore.  I just smiled and apologized, telling him I was still planning to be there.  

I was SO proud of Gavin.  He didn't have a part, so to speak, but seeing him in the front row was so amazing.  In true Gavin fashion, he was rather reserved, not exactly singing and dancing like some of his classmates, but he was up there, and he was being brave and not looking at all nervous.  There was a time when being on that stage for Rise and Shine would bring him to tears, but he was awesome.  Perhaps someday he will be more into being on stage in front of his peers and you'll be able to see him mouth moving or his body movements a little more exaggerated, but for now, I was just so proud to see him up there and being confident.

You can watch some clips of the musical on our YouTube site.  www.youtube.com/mrspate22

After the morning performance, Riley and I came home for a bit and then headed back up to school for the second grade Valentine's Day party. It was meant to be a bit low key, but it, of course, was a little chaotic - what do you expect though with 25 7-8 year olds, the day before February break, all sugared up? :)

Treston's mom, Jen, was at the party and we snapped some pictures of the boys and of ourselves with our sons.  These two have been in the same class every year we've been at Elm Tree.  They have such a great friendship, and I wish we'd spent more time together outside of school.  Now that the rezoning of the schools has happened, we're pretty sure we won't be at the same school next year, and I have promised Gavin that we'll do all we can to make sure he still maintains his friendship with Treston.  He's such a good friend to Gav.

And, of course, we headed back to school later that night for the evening performance.  Jarrod and Riley killed time waiting for it to start by doing a bit of dancing.  Melt my heart.

I didn't have the greatest seat to snap pics at the evening performance, but was able to get a few before it all started.

And one afterwards with one of his classmates, Parker.

After the busy day, we were very excited for a week of relaxation.  I'm going to miss our year round breaks so much next year!  We didn't do too much during our February break.  We visited Amazeum, did some shopping, and hit up High Rise for Elm Tree spirit day with Treston and a bunch of other boys.  It was great to have some quality time with him.