The Breuers: California

It is crazy that we've been here for one month already! It has been quite the whirlwind settling in.

The biggest news is that we found a house! I'll post separately about that and try to download the photos from the listing. We are so excited, and also relieved that we don't have to keep looking - house hunting is exhausting.

Lola has been doing much better at school. She is fine during drop off and is always excited to see me at pick up and show me her projects from the day. We aren't sure how much she is interacting with the other kids, since she doesn't talk much about her friends (she always talked about her friends at her school in Atlanta). But I can tell she likes the teachers, so that's good. Thomas is doing great at school - he's a baby and doesn't know any difference :)

However, we will be switching the kids to a different school next month. We picked their current school, Tomorrow Montessori, because it's near Willow Glen, where we thought we'd be living. But our new house is in Santa Clara and the school is just not convenient. I researched schools near the house and toured three, and luckily I found one I liked that had openings. It's called Happy Days and it's only about 2.5 miles/10 minutes from our house. It's also close to our temporary housing, so I'm looking forward to a shorter commute!

We have spent time with Joseph's coworkers a few times now. First, Netflix had Waffle Day one morning, so the kids and I went there for breakfast and met a few coworkers. Then his coworker Pippa hosted a cookout for his group as a welcome for us - it was really nice of them, and I enjoyed meeting all of his coworkers and their families. Most of his group have young children too, so it we fun for Lola to play with them. Finally, the Product Development department had a picnic at Saratoga Springs Park last Friday. It was a huge event with lots of food and games, and there was even a swimming pool there (which Lola loved, of course).

Joseph is getting in the swing of things at work and still likes his job - so that's good! I got all of my office gear delivered from the movers (monitor, keyboard, printer, etc.), which is helping me be more productive.

I went to Wichita for the annual property tax conference July 24-28. I really didn't want to go because I've never left a nursing baby, but my partners and I thought it would be good for all of us to be there. I didn't want to leave Joseph alone with two kids while in a new city and at a new job, so I flew my mom in to help him. They said everything went well, which made me feel better, but I was still very excited to come home to my family. In addition to just missing them, it was a lot of work to pump all the time while gone. I didn't want to deal with the hassle of transporting the milk home (we transported my freezer stash to California and had to get dry ice to keep it frozen), especially since I had a long travel day with a layover and was worried it would melt. So I ended up donating it to a mom in Wichita that was in need of breast milk, which made me feel really good. Now I hope to not travel for a long time!

I think that sums it up for now. I'll try to post more regular updates. Now here are some photos!