Three brothers.

Nathan at almost four months.

Micah at almost five months

Jack at five months

Four months.

Gah. Where does the time go?

The new house.

On 12/13/12 we closed on our new house. Most people would say "first house," but that implies there will be a second. I can tell you that after going through this move, I'm planning on dying in this house. My kids can pack all of our stuff and move it out after I'm gone, because I sure as heck am not doing it again!

I kept putting off taking pictures until everything was unpacked and organized (maybe even fully furnished??....oh, silly naive Buffy). Then I realized no one would ever see the house if I did that. So here you have your incredibly honest tour of our new place. I snapped all these pictures in about five minutes (hence the awful lighting in some of them). Boxes, unmade beds, dirty dishes, everything. Just pretend you've come for a visit and I didn't have time to clean up the place before you arrived because I was being an amazing mother to my children instead of worrying about extraneous boxes. Okay? Okay.

Here she is. No boxes in the front yard at least.

What you see when you walk in the door (loft on second story is playroom). We don't want to mess too much with this room because it's so bright and open. We love bright and open.

I turned around and took a picture of the front door.

My favorite corner of the house. Also where we put our Christmas tree.

Supposed to be a formal dining room, but we've made it the music room.  I'd rather have three boys playing piano in here than dripping spaghetti sauce all over white carpet.

Down the hallway from the living room you have the family room (the baby swing is THE most important item of furniture in here).

View of family room from the back door. Just to the left is the kitchen...

eat-in area/laundry folding table (ha!)

I plan on adding a bit of color in here....someday (too tired right now).

Office (we're still downstairs). Guaranteed to be unpacked last.

Our staircase. I'm grateful that it's in sections. Maximum number of stairs that you can fall down equals five. I should know, because I did so just last week. While carrying almost 40# Micah.

View from the playroom/loft. Just scary enough to keep the kids in check.

This was the state of our playroom for an entire month. I just got it cleaned up and organized (oh boy, that felt good). It only took me thirty minutes (that part made me feel dumb that I'd put it off so long).

Master bedroom. We do have sheets. It was household linens laundry day (that sounds very Martha Stewart). But we don't have any other furniture. If I could still do a cartwheel, I'd do cartwheels in this room. For right now, I'm enjoying the vast unfilled space.

Master bath. I love that tub. I could gain two hundred pounds and still love that tub. Off to the right is a room where the toilet is (putting a picture of the toilet on the blog just felt wrong) and a sizeable walk in closet with super high clothing rods. I struggle a bit to reach. It's as if the closet was built for Allan.

Upstairs hall with linen storage. It took me an entire month to get around to unpacking those boxes, and it only took me twenty minutes.

Two older boys' room. They don't spend much time in here as of now. Maybe if I spruced it up a bit it would feel more inviting.

Guest Bedroom, which has much to my chagrin turned into the Lego Room.

The nursery. Most likely to be the second to last room to be unpacked. It's not very motivating to unpack/repack baby clothes boxes when your baby grows out of a handful clothes every day it seems.

Parking for the RV we will never ever own.

The beautiful storage shed. Quite possibly Allan's favorite feature.

The green space. Not too big, but definitely not too small.

Side yard where we will someday have a small garden.

Back view of house with the "tunnel tree," as Micah calls it.

We feel incredibly fortunate to have found our home. I'm still pinching myself. Before we moved in I kept saying "It's not our dream home, but it meets our needs better than anything else we've seen." Once we moved in however, it instantly felt like ours and I realized that my dream home is wherever I can comfortably raise the current and future members of our family. We have such abundance, and I feel quite foolish to have said it wasn't exactly what we wanted.

Come and visit! I'll pick up the Legos off the floor. Promise.

Merry Christmas from The Baileys

Dear Family and Friends,

2012 was…eventful. In order to avoid littering this summary with clichés, we will just let the events speak for themselves.

Allan continues to enjoy law as he enters his fifth year of civil litigation. In August he took an unplanned three-day getaway via ambulance to the hospital where he recuperated from an acute back injury. His mornings are now filled with running and physical therapy. He still carries on his civic duty by serving on boards for two different organizations. Going on his third year as Elders Quorum President, he’s still waiting to discover those magical words to motivate men to do their home teaching. His favorite moments are spent at home with his three mini-mes and his adoring wife. Always the challenge is balancing it all.

Buffy barely remembers the past twelve months due to sleep deprivation. January started off with a bang when she discovered a third VandaBailey was on its way. She whimpered through the next five months of sickness, thoroughly enjoyed July and August, and then waddled through September. As of December 8th, she is now getting a full night’s sleep. Realizing that she didn’t want to cram three children into the back of a Civic, she reluctantly became a minivan mom. Four months later, forgetting about her handy backup camera, she backed that minivan into a tree. See “sleep deprivation” above.

Jack, almost 7, is still the funniest kid we know. Seriously. Buffy has received more than one text message describing his classroom antics.  When his teacher asked the students to tell about their pets, Jack got up in front of the class, stated that he doesn’t have any traditional pets but then went on to explain how he has “made friends with some roly polies.” So far his greatest trial in life has been mastering Four Square (“Machiavelli at Recess,” concludes Allan). He now declares Harry Potter to be passé, and considers Lord of the Rings the ultimate in awesomeness. Jack, a voracious reader, also started piano this year, and has started recognizing the virtues of basketball.

Micah, 2.5, threatens to overtake Jack as the funniest kid we know.  Early on we described his personality as Romantic and he continues to feel things deeply. So deeply, in fact, it’s actually difficult to keep a straight face during his meltdowns. Micah loves to talk, read, scold Jack, play basketball, talk, play with trains, talk, and talk. Micah also speaks in third person. Parents blame Elmo.

Nathan Warren Bailey (or “Ethan” as Micah persists in calling him), 12 weeks, is loved and adored by all. After a vexing two weeks of bed rest and two premature visits to the hospital for Buffy, Nathan very quickly made his grand entrance on September 21^st into the arms of an extremely capable nurse (“This baby is coming! We need a Doctor NOW!!!”). He is named after Buffy’s paternal grandfather and so far has the same special spirit as his namesake.

Adding to our exciting and busy year, we closed on our first home mid-December. We feel very blessed to have more bedrooms, more yard, and plenty of storage (which we’re sure will feel like much less storage five years from now). We’re taking bets for how long it will take us to unpack.

If you’d like our new address, feel free to comment on the blog, send an e-mail, or contact either Allan or Buffy on Facebook.

We enjoy this Christmas season more and more each year as we watch our family grow and change. We can say with great sincerity that we have been tremendously blessed. We know that our faith in Jesus Christ, his example, and atoning sacrifice is what gives meaning to our days and brings joy to our hearts.

With much love,

Allan, Buffy, Jack, Micah, and Nathan Bailey