"The Twins..."

Remember when I posted about NOT calling the babies "The Twins?" Well, we have had some suggestions about what to call them. But I think my favorite is one that I came up with myself. So far everyone seems to like it -

The Triflettes

Let us know what you think!

A Done Deal!

The closing went extremely well.... only took about an hour. We now own 2230 Evening Sun Road! (AND 415 Hickory Drive - oh joy!) Our walk through was extremely easy. We didn't find anything except a few things that needed to be touched up with paint. That was to be expected. The painter will come on Monday to take care of that. Today is moving day! Robert spent the night with Grandmom and she will bring him to the new house tonight. I can't wait to show him his new room and his new playroom!
Ready for my favorite part of yesterday... NOT the King Crab Legs I celebrated with at dinner, and NOT the 5 complete minutes I spent envisioning how my clothes will hang in my new walk in closet... my favorite part was when we got down to the final numbers at the closing... (Bobby and I did ALOT of number crunching before we considered building/purchasing a new home. We needed to make sure that we weren't biting off more than we can chew and that it was an investment we really could afford. We came up with different scenarios- i.e. if the mortgage is X dollars and the the taxes are Y dollars, and we sell our current home for Z dollars, this is how much our mortgage will be. We came up with an ideal number. It was higher than I had liked but certainly not unreasonable - A very comfortable number. The ACTUAL number would remain a mystery until the closing, when everything was in print.) We expected our monthly payments to be higher than our estimation. It was. But only by $4.01! I was so happy about that! AH, its the little things...

Time for me to go... there are so many little things that need to get thrown into boxes before the crew gets here to start the move! Lucky me, I get to go sit at the new house and wait for the refrigerator to be delivered!

Public Service announcement: if ANYONE reading this is ever considering building in the Lehigh Valley, we STRONGLY reccommend TUSKES HOMES. They were honest, thorough, fair and FAST! We are so impressed with the quality and construction of our new house. Hope you can make it by for a visit! :)

elaboration on the last post...

So, as you can plainly see, we're having TWINS! (why is it that whenever I type that word, it has to be in all caps???) We are both shocked and delighted. I have always wanted three children. Bobby has always said he wanted 2, but he was warming up to the idea of three. I got my way... again - And there is nothing Bobby can do about it! Life is good!

On to the questions everyone has been asking... "Do twins run on either side of your families?" Well, the answer is yes. I have twin cousins. However, they are identical. Identical twins are NOT genetic. Our twins, it appears are fraternal (two eggs meet two sperm becoming two sacs with two placentas. Identical twins share a sac and a placenta and are formed from just one egg that splits in two) On the Trif side, we just found out that Bobby's great great aunt had fraternal twins. It's unlikely that Bobby's genetics plays any part in the fact that we have twins, since it appears that it was ME who released two eggs when we conceived -this is called hypo-ovulating.
I, on the other hand, have my own theory... As many of you know, this pregnancy was a surprise. I stopped taking the pill in June. I thought maybe we could start trying for another little Trif in the Fall, and I wanted to give my body time to get back into it's natural cycle. Well, we got pregnant 2 weeks after I stopped the pill. My personal theory is that my body was playing 'catch up' and that is why 2 eggs were dropped.
Regardless, we are overwhelmed, surprised, anxious, and excited all at the same time.
We need to pick 4 names, 4 godparents, get another crib, another carseat, a double stroller, and probably a new car. (Ugh, the thoughts of driving a mini-van...) And as for the new house, well we managed to fill up all 4 bedrooms, and we haven't even moved in yet! Thank god the house thing was taken care of of I'd be freaking out even more!
We are almost positive we will be finding out the sexes of the two tiny Trifs. We've been surprised enough this time around! We will find out in November.

And help me out on this one if you will ... Please do NOT call them "The Twins!" We have to think of something better than that!

..and then THEY found 2!!

Yep...

Our (my) Kitchen

Minus some cabinet doors and appliances... The kitchen is coming along. Under the cardboard on the floor is hardood, and and island will be installed in the middle.
The house is completely painted inside, and flooring has been laid in the bathrooms as well. The banister on the main staircase has been installed and stained to match the hardwood. We're waiting on appliances, carpets, and bathroom fixtures... and we're just about finished!



(master bath-yay!)

Robert at the park.... sooo much fun!

Robert

Haven't had one of these for awhile...

Sided and Stoned

We were at the house today... siding and stone work are complete. Inside is taped and spackled, and ready to be painted this week. The banisters, cabinets, and fixtures will be installed soon, as well. Sidewalk is poured and the walkway (leading from front door to garage) will be poured too. Everything is coming together very quickly... it won't be long before we're in!

interior: view to Family Room, take from kitchen

Changes are everywhere!

Sorry folks... no new pics of the house. We went by on Sunday. The interior was completely drywalled and the siding on the exterior was completely up. We'll take some pics next time we go by. We are really starting to count down... it's getting so close!

Meanwhile, we haven't had any bites on our current home. We had an open house on Sunday. We are really trying to get it rented through the winter. That will, at least, defer some of expenses. We are not looking forward to having 2 mortgages. ugh.

I have started a new job. Same company, new location. I LOVE it. So much so that I may consider going back to full time through the winter. I am working with an old co-worker (whom I adore) which makes it fun. I will talk to my supervisor about full time opportunities once we get settled in the new house. I'd like to help out financially as much as possible as long as we have 2 mortgages. ugh again.

In other news.... Robert is going to be a BIG BROTHER! We found out in July that Tiny Trif will be arriving in March - actually the same date that Robert was due.... March 21st. I have been feeling okay. I have a day here or there that I feel absolutely awful, but 80% of the time I am feeling good. Everyone says "New House, New Baby"

So, thats all from us this week. I'll post pics of the house as soon as I can. We are scheduled to close on September 15th! yikes!

Time Lapse...17 Days!!

July 16, 2006













July 20, 2006















July 21, 2006















July 21, 2006















August 2, 2006

Framing Walk-thru

This morning we had our "Framing Walk-thru." We needed to confirm that all electrical outlets and such were properly placed before the drywall goes up. We expect that soon we will be seeing some exterior changes (stone and siding).

We've been framed!

Front of house
View of back of house
Side entry garage! Taken from end of driveway. To the right is the family room and above that is the master bdrm.

These pics were taken on Friday 7-21. I did a drive by on Monday and was pleased to see the roof being built. Hopefully I will make a trip there again this weekend to see what kind of progress has been made. Enjoy!

Basement and Wood Drop

This past week, the foundation and basement were poured and our wood has been delivered (in the building world it is referred to as the 'wood drop') It appears that we are next in line for framing. Based on the looks of the other houses going up, framing takes about a week.

here is a link to some more (better) pics that I didn't even know that Bobby took!
I hope it works!
New House

some progress... finally!

One of the moms from my class at the daycare lives right up the road from our new development. (in fact she is the one who told us about the development in the first place) She has been asking me for weeks which lot is ours and telling me she was going to go check it out. She was there last week when it was just a hole, and today she told me that she drove by yesterday and the foundation is ready to be poured!
I will probably head down there this weekend to take some pictures.

I have been working a ton this week and have hardly had a chance to sit still. Now, all i want to do is sleep, and I just can't! Insomnia. blah!

We have a hole!

Ground was broken on our new house this week! It was pouring rain when we went to see the lot today. We were excited to see the bulldozer and then... A HOLE! Footers and foundation will likely be poured this week. Progress will be made quickly.
Pictures will most likely follow weekly from this point on... yay!
(top pics: taken from street - facing front of house. bottom pics: taken from back rt corner of 'house' - small raised section will be the garage)

Just a few pics of Robert playing outside - Friday, June 9th, 2006.

Robert likes to take things out of where they belong. Plates and bowls from his drawer or in this case all the wipes from the wipe case! 

Future Penn Stater

We returned to PSU this weekend for Robert's Aunt Stefanie's graduation. We were anxious for two things... Robert's first picture with the Nittany Lion and his first taste of Creamery ice cream. He already has Lion Pride... can't you tell?
Assuming Robert finishes college on a 4-year plan, he will be PSU class of 2027.
(Robert may go to any college of his choice, but we will strongly encourage him to chose PSU!)

2230 Evening Sun Road

This is lot 23... at Eagle's Landing. The lot where we will be building our future home. We have made a settlement date of August 31st. The front of our house will face the road with the yellow lines (its not really a main road - but a main thoroughfare through the development) And our driveway will actually be on Evening Sun Road, just across from the white truck seen in the second picture.

The top picture is a model home... the same style we are building, except we will have a wrap around porch on the left and a stone front instead of brick. We will post more pictures as the project develops. We hope to break land by next week!

It's official... our house is on the market! I'm sad, but excited. We are going to build a new house in Nazareth, PA - about 30 miles south of where we are now. We'll have a sidewalk and a driveway and our own mailbox! I will continue to work, and Bobby's commute will be about the same as it is now.

Oh, and our new house will have 4 bedrooms. Guess that means we have to have more babies! haha - maybe next year!

Here is a link to the builder...
click on Eagle's Landing (on the left) We are building the Courtland model in the Country design