The world is everlasting, It's coming and it's going...

Regina Spektor - Ghost of Corporate Future

Things have been craaazy at our house and at work lately. Due to some issues at work, I was not able to get any weekdays off. I was able to do some shopping at local stores in the evenings after work and found some really cute clothing essentials for SweetPea at The Gap, Children's Place, Old Navy, and Target (I love, love, love Target.) I have to admit that I thought that when we started getting lots of new things for SweetPea that The Bean might get jealous... But, the Lord works in mysterious ways, and The Bean had a divinely timed growth spurt which required that she replace almost all of her pants, shorts, and shoes.
D and I almost forgot, but Friday night was the much anticipated Regina Spektor concert. We had almost thought it would be canceled again. But, alas, she did come through this time and the concert was absolutely wonderful. Only Son was her opener and he was fantastic. I hadn't heard of him before, but was quite impressed with his performance and his music is right up my alley. Now I have to comment on something that I noticed. I haven't been to a concert in many years, and the behavior of the crowd was a bit of a shock to me. They stood there, unmoving during the entire performance. There was no indication in the body language of the majority of the crowd that these people were actually hearing music. There were no head bobs, or even a hint in dancing in overwhelming numbers. There were the few (very few) in the crowd who did slightly sway or bob their heads, but they were a minute minority. All of this is vastly different from the last concerts I attended in high school and while in the military. I miss the days of the mosh pit but not the broken bones and teeth (IE. collar bone, front teeth.)
Anyway, when Regina came out the crowd livened up a bit and began to quietly sing along and clap when appropriate (there was still no body movement that indicated these people were listening to music.) Regina was fantastic. She sounded absolutely amazing and the acoustics of The Tabernacle were second to none. She did her first set which was really good, but she blew me away on her encore. She finally played my favorite of her songs, Hotel Song, and it was so cool. Only Son provided the only instrument used in the performance which was his excellent beatbox, and Regina sang the song like no other. Why couldn't I have been born with a voice like that instead of the dying frog singing voice I now possess?
Then Saturday started off with a rush. D and I picked The Bean and Cait Nard up from The Nards house and we rushed to the first soccer game of the season. D is coaching again, and the team is made up of like 90% ringers. So, as usual, the girls rolled over the other team with no problems. D had to ask the girls to quit scoring so much in the second half and had them concentrate on passing.
After that we had to do get The Bean some new cleats and get ready for a birthday party for one of the neighbor boys. That went fairly well at one of the local pizza joints, but the kids from our neighborhood are wild... really wild. They were so loud at times, I thought we would get kicked out.
After the party we drove 45 minutes to the Ikea in Atlanta. Now let me state one thing to those of you who are not blessed with a local Ikea:
Ikea + Weekend + Tax Return Season = Absolute Nightmare
I had really tried to get Friday off to go then, but to no avail... Anyway it really was horrendous. We weren't able to get there until around 7PM and the store closes at 9PM; so we were in a mad rush. Luckily we had a pretty good idea of everything that we wanted. We still need a few things, which we hope to go back and get Tuesday when we have to go up that way to the travel clinic for our yellow fever vaccination orientation (oooo that rhymes, maybe I can make a song about it.)
Sunday The Bean and I went to a baby shower for the fourth little Nard who is due in May and D stayed home to work on the girls rooms.
We have decided to pass on The Beans old furniture to SweetPea. We figure in a year or so, when SweetPea has settled in, we will let her redecorate her room anyway she wants. That is what we have done with The Bean, and the results are not exactly what I expected. I do not have girly-girl so here is the unfinished product:


We still need to get her new shelf and get things organized, so I'll post new pictures when it's finished.

SweetPea's room is almost finished. I still need to find her a toy box and a dresser (we always put those in the closet.) I think D did an amazing job on the paint.



Things, all in all, are moving along nicely. D and I are so busy, that time is passing very quickly (please accept this as a valid excuse for no blog updates.)