Vacay, houses, work, oh my!

Last weekend we went to Mendocino with the Condit fam, the Lefebvres and another couple who are friends with the Lefebvres. We had a great time! We spent a lot of time at the beach and around the shops in downtown Mendocino. We visited the infamous chocolate shop where we ordered a chocolate & mint hunk of chocolate which was AMAZING, and of course the hunk of white chocolate with real, fresh raspberries in it. At the beach we relaxed, played with James, held the babies, saw a doggie on a surf board, got a good amount of sunshine, and lots of sand in my purse & cell phone (and James' diaper).

The babies got up VERY early so we came back a bit tired, but it was worth it. James woke us all up the first morning at about 20 mins til 7. I didn't want to be up that early but at the same time, I had fun listening to James' cute little voice for 20 mins before I got up. He's so funny lately and he's talking A LOT. I love that little guy so much! Waking up early also got as a good, early start which meant more time during the day to hang out. I was tired though and gave having more than just 1 kid a second thought for a moment. :)

Here's James in his sand "chair"

Here's Joey bundled up at the beach :)



James' SAND sock line from the first day playing on the beach

We saw some horses while we were at the beach. When we pointed them out to James he said "I WANT TO PLAY WITH THEM!" Haha. I pictured him playing fetch with them or something. Seth took him over there and he got to sit on one of them. He was so cute! He kept leaning down and hugging them. It was so sweet.





The Lefebvres & Co. caught up with us at the beach after they went on a hike. Here are their cutie's. Lucy Lefebvre, and Cason who is the son of Ashley's friend Robin.


Aw, what a sweet couple. Orrr, wait... is Lucy already betrothed to Josiah? Or is that Nory? I always lose track.

Joey and James both got to take their naps at the beach. Ryan said that James' legs looked like when the wicked witch of the east got killed by the flying house (see the striped "socks).




We stayed in the Garden Cabin which features a big garden behind it. Lynae took James out there for a photo shoot and he loved exploring. Here he is being a sweet, curious little boy wondering, "what's in here??"

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So, we got a letter in the mail today stating that we did NOT qualify for the CHIP home that we applied for. :( It's kind of a let down since it's something we were looking foward to, and it wouldn't mean house hunting and all that stuff. But if it wasn't meant to be, then it wasn't. We were disappointed but at the same time, we both felt comfortable with the outcome. They denied us based on income. We don't make enough to qualify. I'm guessing that means they compared our income to what our payments would've been and we couldn't quite cut it. I thought that if the houses ended up being more than 200,000 that the payments would be a little bit too high for us. Maybe not if we got the first time buyers loan but I guess they wouldn't take that in to account if they weren't sure that we'd apply. I suppose we'll keep our eye on the mls listings and pray about our options. :)

So, at work we've been looking for a new office to move into and OUT of our tiny, non-creative, crap-fest of an office that we're in now. It's not as bad as I'm making it out to be, but it's definitely not a "creative atmosphere" which I believe is what our designers need. ANYWAY! A few days ago we looked at an office that is up for lease in downtown Chico. It has pretty much EVERYTHING we want in it. We wanted somewhere downtown for convenience sake, we wanted a more creative atmosphere, we wanted something bigger with a few offices within the space for my boss to have her own office and to use the additional offices as meeting rooms. This one has one big area where desks can go, another small area (lounge area?), two private offices in the middle, two private offices in the back, one big area that can be closed off for meetings in the front, and a place for our servers. It's way bigger, and it's SOOO BEAUTIFUL in there! I would MOVE there if I could afford it. :) It's in one of the upstairs buildings in downtown and it has windows that open up toward the street. It has tall ceilings, partial brick walls inside, small back patio, and SKY LIGHTS! It's pretty much amazing. It's also cheaper than most of the other places we've looked at and it's WAY nicer. All of us are in love with it except, of course, my boss. I can't really pinpoint what her problem is with it except for really small, minor details. You have to climb stairs and she buys a couple of bags of groceries each monday that she'd have to lug up there. We'd have to get three additional parking spaces in the parking structure. She said she felt like it was hot in there. There is a thermostat in there so no matter how hot it was we could make it comfy, first of all. Secondly, I saw that it was set to 76 whereas it's usually anywhere between 78 - 80 degrees in our office because apparently she has weird temperature issues or something. Anyway, I'm just bummed that she doesn't like it but luckily she doesn't make the final decision - the owners of the company do. Mark, one of the owners came to Chico today from Mt. View to see the building and take some measurements. I'll have to see what he thinks of it later because I left while they were still over there today. I hope we get it. It's SUH-WEET!

Well, that's about it. I'll leave you with a funny little James story. My mom told me that she sometimes calls my dad "honey". James is over there once a week while Nae & Seth have date night. James was over there the other night and right now he's in that stage where he repeats EVERYTHING! It's also almost like he hears everything, too. Anyway, he started saying "come on, Honey" to my DAD! BAHAHAHA! Hilarious. It's so cute to picture tiny Jamesie calling my dad "honey". :) Kids are sooooo cute!