It drives me nuts when I think of all these things I'd like to write about on the blog when I'm nowhere near it, then can't think of any of them once I'm sitting here. Rrrrr. Well, I'll do my best. Will and I had a great time in Utah. He caught on really quickly to the art of navigating around my parents house, and seemed to develop a good case of separation anxiety. He wants me to cuddle him or carry him around ALL THE FREAKING TIME. Not fun trying to break him out of that. I'm okay with doing it some of the time. In fact, I really love that he now gives hugs and even kisses sometimes. But 24/7? That just doesn't work for me. We had to come back a few days earlier than planned because my grandma Dorothy died and we needed to be here for her celebration of life. It's not called a funeral because she was cremated. It wasn't at all unexpected, since she was 96, had been in an assisted living home for 18 months, and in the hospital/hospice for several days. Still. Actually, mostly I only feel relief. She never wanted to lose herself the way she did the past few years. She talked about that a lot when I was living with her when I first moved down to San Diego. But now, as I'm writing this, I miss her. She taught me that if I didn't stand up for what I wanted or didn't want in my life, I wouldn't get it. She had a very dominating personality, and she loved to run the lives of the people around her. I didn't want to go to church with her every Sunday, get paraded in front of everybody she ever invited over, or learn to play bridge. There were plenty of other things she wanted for/from me that I was completely fine with, so I grew a spine and put my foot down. I think I'm a better person because of it. It's amazing that I can say this one person changed me in a profound way, and for the better. Wow. And, of course, if I hadn't moved down to live with her, I would not have ever met Steve or had Will. So, double, no, triple wow.

   After cutting his first eight front teeth, Will seemed to decide that teething sucked and he really didn't want to do it anymore. Nada for months. Then finally, while we were in Utah, he started cutting a molar. Then two more. Poor little guy. I guess he figured if he had to be miserable, might as well get it all over with at the same time. He's got two on the top (one on each side) and one on the bottom coming in. He's drooling so much that he can get to slinging it pretty dang far. You definitely have to watch out for that. He still has never been really sick. He's had a runny nose a couple of times to go along with his teething, and he had a slight cough and red eyes in Utah, but that was because the air quality was so bad. I was coughing myself. As soon as we got back to the blue skies of SoCal, we were both right as rain. Or sun, in this case.

  Steve and I have decided that if he doesn't get the Portland job he's interviewing for tomorrow, then we're going to stop trying to leave San Diego. He has a general forecaster position pretty much waiting for him here in April, and we're so, so ready to be done with this bidding out process. We've been doing this since last April, and without result. That's disheartening, and really frustrating, especially for Steve. So. We're still going to leave Julian, however. We absolutely need to get out from under our house. We like it, and like living in Julian, but we need a big change in our financial situation and that means selling our house and buying a much less expensive one. We are planning on moving back to Oceanside and buying there. Doesn't seem like it would make sense, does it? Leave the less populated mountains to live in a cheaper house in a much more populated area? Well, thanks to all the foreclosures and such going on, there are at least fifty houses in our price range in Oceanside itself for sale. Enough said, right? Being in Oceanside will put us right next to the ocean, and Steve said he wanted the ocean if he couldn't have the mountains. We'll also be very close to Steve's family and some friends. That will help out our (especially my) social situation and that's very exciting. Not to mention (although it's absolutely worth mentioning) that it won't take me half the day anymore to go grocery shopping. Ahh. We have too much we want to do with our lives in the near future to not make a big change like this. We want to start trying for our next baby before the year is out, and we need to have a bigger vehicle by the time the next one comes along. We want to do some traveling, and buy some things we just can't afford right now (like a new camera for Steve!). So my current focus is on finishing up all the projects around the house to get it ready to sell. Whether we go to Portland or Oceanside is up to fate, and the management of the NWS. God help us.

So I planned a two week trip to Salt Lake with Will to visit my friends and family via a plane. I was pretty dang nervous about it, considering all the ear problems that run in the Vanderburg family. Will has not shown any signs to date of any problems, but a plane is the ultimate test. I had visions of him screaming at the top of his lungs, doing his fish-out-of-water impression with his body, receiving really nasty looks from all the other passengers, having my seatmate cringing away from the epileptic child and his evil mother. Yeah. Fun, fun, fun! Very happily, that was not the reality. He had zero problems with the descent, slept most of the trip, and I didn't even have a seatmate. Best case scenario all the way around! He's been having a great time in Utah, going shopping and visiting and eating out. And, let us not forget, exploring the grandparents house. It is a maze/obstacle course/let's-pull-everything-off-its-shelf-and-make-a-mess kinda place. Very exciting for a one year old.

    We are still waiting to hear about interviews for both Portland and Boise, although it shouldn't be long now. Steve and I recently decided that if he doesn't get a job before the forecaster position comes open in San Diego in April (which, at this rate, seems likely), then we're going to sell our house ourselves and move down the mountain. That will solve our financial issues by having cheaper housing (either rent or mortgage) and we'll be able to pay off some of our debts as well. We'll also be so much closer to family and friends and we'll be able to have more of a social life and it won't be a half day excursion for me to go grocery shopping or to run errands. It isn't a perfect solution, of course, but nothing is. This will certainly work, though. So, we'll see. Of course, now that we've made that decision, he'll probably get one of these jobs he's applied for. It would so be something fate would do to us. And that would be okay, too. We'd have the added task of making new friends, but that's something I'd hope we'd do no matter where we are. I'm really glad we've come to this decision, just because it means that we won't be in limbo either way anymore. That is going to be such a nice thing! By April, we will have been bidding out for a full year. Way longer than it really should have taken someone like Steve to get a job. So, either way, it sounds like I need to finish up the projects around the house to get it ready to sell. I don't really have all that much left to do; I need to finish painting the deck railings, refinish the exterior screen door, and get the garage cleaned out. Those are the biggies. Well, stay tuned for the next adventure in the life of a Vanderburg. 

I hope everyone has a wonderful holiday. Will seems to be enjoying all the get togethers we've been doing; change of scenery, new things to play with, people who entertain him constantly. What's not to like? Okay, before I forget, Corinne, the name of the magical high chair is a Fisher Price Space Saver high chair. We bought through Walmart's website for $50. And I think you're right, it probably is a hazing thing for parents to get noisy toys as gifts for their kids. But don't think we're not paying attention to who is giving us what! We shall have our revenge!! Maybe.  Someday. Of course, Will does really like his noisy toys, especially if they light up too. He'll gather several toys around him, then hit all the buttons so it's a symphony of songs all playing together. He's always delighted by it. It's really cute, but I think I'd like it better if I had earplugs in when he does it. He's getting a veritable library of his own books; we're going to have to give him a designated bookcase. He likes to play with them, and have us read them to him, but only the really simple ones. Like the Kippy's book of Weather: each page has one type of weather on it. I.E. rain, with a picture of it raining on Kippy. Then sun with him sunbathing. Etc. The ones with actual stories he's not quite into yet, but it won't be long. He is, after all, only a year old. There are times when I see newborns or hear my sister talk about what my little niece is doing at only three weeks old that I want one NOW. But then I come to my senses as I'm chasing around my little tyke as he's running (yes, running) away from me or just chasing the dogs. Especially when he's throwing a temper tantrum because he can't get what he wants. It's so hard to be one, apparently. Yeah, then I'm okay with waiting on the second one.

Will has been getting better about the whole walking thing. He still crawls a lot, but he continues practicing the two legged race. He'll start walking somewhere on his own, and a big grin will light up his face because he's doing it, and he's proud. As he should be. Walking is a tricky biz. With all the noisy toys he  got for his birthday, he's driving me insane. He will put two or three toys together and hit the buttons on all of them so they all start playing their individual songs at the same time. Happy, happy, joy, joy. Mostly he really likes seeing the lights on 'em. He has one toy that has a button on the top that lights up and plays music. He routinely will stop by it while he's walking around, hit the button and immediately stand up and walk away, letting the music trail after him like an annoucement. Now that he's hit the one year barrier, he gets to try all sorts of new foods. So far he's enjoyed all of them, without any problems. I was actually kind of worried about cow's milk because I'm mildly lactose intolerant and so is my sister. But it doesn't seem to bother him one little bit. We had to buy him a new high chair because the one we were using was not able to restrain him enough. He'd pull a Houdini from the seat belt then attempt a Superman. Crazy kid. The new high chair has a five point safety harness, so there's no gettin' out of it. It makes me want to laugh villanously. The new high chair will also convert to just a booster seat when he's ready for that. It even has a recline feature for feeding young babies just learning to eat solids who don't hold themselves up very well yet. So you get all your needs met from one high chair. Not bad.

On the moving issue: Portland has finally come open again, and, of course, Steve will be bidding on it. Boise is also open and we'll also be bidding on that. Hopefully, we'll get one of them. I keep telling Steve that it would be just our luck if Boise was really fast on the uptake and offered him a job, and not know what was going on with Portland. We would really prefer to go to Portland, but we sure wouldn't turn up our noses at Boise. Steve has been getting a lot of kudos at work for the power of his awesomeness lately, so that should help. We will see, like always. So, everybody, keep your fingers crossed!

We celebrated Will's first birthday yesterday. Although we didn't plan to have a "party" for him, that's how it turned out, and I'm not sorry in the least. Of course, he was the youngest person there by about twenty five years. He didn't seem to mind though. He loves people, and enjoys making the rounds. He got lots of lovin' and gave his share as well. Many sounds of "awwww" were made as Will kept cuddling himself into his aunts, uncles, grandparents, and cousin. He even showed off his brand new skill of walking. He's taken abortive attempts before, and occasionally managed to take one or two successful steps, but yesterday was the first time he really seemed to get it down, taking up to six steps unaided. What a perfect way to celebrate his birthday! He got lots of presents. Good heaven, he had a veritable mound of gifts that he didn't have the slightest idea what to do with. He was too overwhelmed to help unwrap anything, so I did it all for him. He was always happy about what was inside, though, except when his silly mother gave him some clothes. Clothes? Honestly? What the heck was she thinking? Everyone else was sensible and gave him TOYS!!! Some of them we've put away to come out in the coming months so he always has a "new" toy to play with. No sense in overwhelming him with all of them at once when there's eleven months of the year without a birthday or Christmas! Of course, it could be worse. I had a very good friend in junior high whose birthday was on Christmas day. Her cruel parents named her Holly. The only thing worse would have been if her middle name was Ivy. Yikes.

As Christmas draws ever nearer, I'm so pleased I have all of my shopping done. I have enough things ot worry about, it seems, so one less things is always appreciated. We can't afford to go to Seattle to see my family this year, so we're staying here and spending the holiday with Steve's family. It'll actually be the first time we've done that with them exclusively, so it's past due anyway. We're certainly looking forward to it, even if Steve does have to work Christmas morning. The curse of the 24 hour coverage. They gotta keep us safe from flash floods and random tornados and all the other stuff that hits San Diego. Like a stray drop of rain. We've actually started getting some decent rain up here in the mountains, with maybe another five inches this next week. That'll be nice; we've been pretty short on our rainfall amounts the past year and desperately need to make it up. Not that we'll have to break out the galoshes anytime soon or anything.

Happy Thanksgiving! We just got home from Thanksgiving lunch at Tami and Ira's. I so love family gatherings, even when they seem like a lot of hassle to put together, I always think they're worth it. So, thanks Tami and Ira for hosting this year! And, of course, I have to give a big shout out to my sister and brother-in-law. They had their baby girl Naia this morning at 12:07 AM. Steve was betting about a week ago that she would be born on Thanksgiving, and he was right, sure as shootin'. So this Thanksgiving they have something extra to be thankful for. Kudos.

    Will really enjoyed his first Thanksgiving. His favorite dish of everything he sampled? Ginger butternut squash soup. Seriously yummy stuff. He even liked some things I thought for sure he'd hate: dill pickles, olives (BIG hit), and artichoke hearts. Interesting. In fact, he didn't dislike anything he tried, which is not always the case. He has some very definite ideas about what he does and doesn't like, just like his daddy. Although, so far, he's not quite as picky, thank you God. When confronted with too many people, or people he doesn't know very well, he'll lay his head on my shoulder for comfort while he sneaks glances at them. It's very cute. It really seems to both Steve and me that this time in Will's life, from about nine months on, this is why we had kids. Newborns are great in their own way, 3-9 month olds are great until they get older and you realize that they didn't do  much of anything and were, in fact, just a little boring in comparison. Not that we thought that at the time. We've always found our son to be fascinating and wonderful, of course, but now...! He makes us laugh everyday, and be proud everyday, and reminds us why we love him so much. Of course, he also makes us frustrated, worried, and/or irritated everyday, too. Trade offs, I guess. That's okay. The baby balancing scale still seems to come down far heavier on the "worth it" side every time. Hallelujah, since I don't think we could return him as easily as a Black Friday clearance item.

It amazes me to think that Will is almost a year old! I think I've finally gotten used to the idea that I'm a parent, but it took me long enough. He is SOOO close to walking. He's taken a single (failed) step on his own twice now. He's getting better at standing by himself, but that's still a little tricky. It seems that when he actually stops to think about the fact that he's not supported standing or trying to walk, he shuts himself down. He's gotta learn to go with the flow, not think about the ginormous milestone he's trying to cross, and fling himself into the great unknown. Figuratively speaking, of course. It would be quite disconcerting if he did actually fling himself anywhere. He's a fantastic climber. If you're sitting down, he'll sidle over to you via furniture cruising, smile sweetly, grab hold of your fingers, then proceed to climb up your legs to your lap, then continue straight on up to your shoulders, stomping on anything that happens to be in the way. He loves to climb the stairs, and doesn't even need any help at all. Of course, he's always got backup. He's very much into his privacy; we spend almost all our time downstairs with acess to his room, the laundry room, the hall, the game room/second living room, and sometimes our bedroom. He likes to go into his room and shut the door firmly in our faces, and then proceed to do who know's what. Usually he just wants to poop, but sometimes he wants alone time to pull everything out of the drawers that he can reach. Ah, children. Makes me want another one. I'm sure that'll happen before we know it. I mean, if time has been passing by so quickly, then next thing we know we'll have another little one to adore and clean up after, which of course, are the two most common things to do with children.

We went hiking last Tuesday with Harry. My mom got Steve a child backpack that is great for hiking, and we took it for a spin. It was really nice. Will had a great time. We have some video of it, including him showing off the only word he knows, "mama." Hopefully we can figure out how to put videos on here so everybody can see and adore him.

Even though it's not even Thanksgiving yet, Steve and I have both been really itching to put up our Christmas tree. Maybe because we know we won't be able to appreciate it as often as last year because it'll be upstairs and we are mostly downstairs. So we need more days of catching quick glimpses of it to make up for that. My mom is making some soft ornaments we can put on the bottom of the tree for Will, so that'll be nice. Give him something to chew on.

I thought I better jump at the chance to do a blog now, before Will learns something new. That seems to be an almost daily occurance, though, so this might be a futile effort. At least you'll know what's been going on recently, right? Beetie is SO close to walking. He figured out that if he stands up and holds on to the empty laundry basket, he can walk, pushing it. The first day he did that he kept getting really frustrated when he ran into walls or other obstacles and couldn't keep moving. It only took him one day, though, to figure out how to back up and turn and avoid those things. It's amazing how fast he picked up on it. He practically burns up the carpet with how fast he cruises around here. He's starting to get into his baby babble, and the only recognizable word he says is "mama," but it's indiscriminate. Someday, I'll hear "mama" just for me, not for daddy or doggy or walking or food or toys or just because. At least I hear it. Poor Steve has been working so hard to teach Will to say "dadda." He isn't having any luck yet, but I don't think he's going to give up. Can't say I blame him.

Will knows how to help us dress and undress him by moving his arms and legs appropriately, he's learned to tip his head back in the bath so we can pour water over his hair, he can shake his head "no" and "yes", he's really good at crawling up stairs (even with pillows on them as obstacles), and he knows exactly what the packaging looks like on all his favorite food (like oatmeal). He'll look at it, then look up at you and smile beautifully.

We have had another round of disappointment on the job hunt. Steve was not selected for the SPC job in Norman. Of the six people they intereviewed, he was in the top 4. But that only helps if they have four jobs available, which they didn't. Only two. They told him he had an outstanding interview, and the fact that he made the panel at all for someplace as difficult to get into as the SPC carries some bragging rights. Ah, well. C'est la vie, non? So we get to start all over again with the next opening. There are three coming open soon that we're interested in: Portland, OR (for the 4th time! Come on already!), Medford, OR, and Boise, ID. So, we'll see. He'd be competing with on-station interns at all of them, and they are always hard to beat. We'll stay hopeful, though. At least as much as we can.