… Chad and Elisa! Yaaayyy! Thank you, Furniture Row, for the $1000 sweepstakes. You picked the right winners. When Chad phoned me and told me I was so flustered that I said, “You’re kidding us!” My own “isms” make me laugh.

It seems like we have been contributing WAY more to the economy than I wish we were. It seems like we are shelling out a large sum of cash every other week (or day). BTW, we bought a Camry last week. We had been looking for ages. With all the out-go and now living in a pretty affluent ward I have become a little money obsessed. I keep saying things to people about money or lack of it, and then thinking, “What are you saying stupid!” I am not really money obsessed, in general, but lately I feel like there is a price tag attached to everything, and it is more than I want to spend.

Eden walks more. She has started to stand up on her own now. She also loves walking towards you, and then she changes direction at the last second, right before you grab her. It’s like she thinks she invented the idea of the feint. She just thinks it’s so funny, and will just laugh at herself. 🙂 She also talks more. She’ll walk right up to you and start babbling and babbling. She gets such an intense look on her face, like she is saying something so important. And her “words” are more rough at that time. At other times they are more sing-songy, like when she is talking to the books. She is so much fun to watch right now.

Eden is a little too courageous out in public. She thinks it’s fine to wander away out of sight of Mama and Papi. It scares Mama. Maybe she will develop a little more fear before she starts walking too fast. The other day I was in line for lunch. A guy was interacting with Eden. He was our age. And then she put out her arms for him to hold her. The rest of the ten minutes I was in line, she had him hold her and wouldn’t come back! He was quite a bit taller than Chad or me. I think she was appreciating the new view.

Elisa and I found an apartment within 10 minutes of my office. I have to work kind of long hours, so we didn’t want for me to spend much time on my commute. It’s a nice place in a good neighborhood. The one bedroom is plenty of room for us while we scope out the area. Eden has taken up lodgings in the generous walk-in closet. Our biggest complaint is that tons of residents own dogs and they don’t clean up after them. YUCK! We’ve been in the apartment for almost a month now. It doesn’t really feel like home. The problem is that we don’t have lamps or tables or a dresser yet. We’re still living out of our suitcases. It took us awhile to get Internet too, and that was painful! We are still waiting for the shipment of furniture and silverware and stuff like that from our last apartment. It was supposed to arrive weeks ago, but it is super late. Instead of getting driven here from New York City like we were told, the shipment got put on a slow boat to L.A. That’s our punishment for going with a discount vendor. We have been going crazy because we have to eat out so often. Finally we bought a knife and a bowl and a can opener, we borrowed saucepans, and we’ll use plastic utensils for the next month. We have our desk that was in storage in Seattle, and our piano that was at a friend’s house. I drove those down from Seattle in a big U-Haul the day before I started work in Salt Lake City. And we bought comfortable couches for the family room that we already love. I think it will be more difficult for me to adjust here than I thought. I miss the green of  Switzerland and Seattle so much.  I am not very tolerant of direct sunlight. 🙂