Get Up & Vote; The Poll is Out!

Giving into public pressure, we've established a way to guess what the specifications of the baby will be upon her birth. Click the link and follow the directions. LittleLadyCronley is the name of the game.
If you are closest with the date, weight and height of the baby, you could win a free cat! If you get the gender wrong, you win cat litter.

• Click the link
  
• The game name is LittleLadyCronley (no spaces, case sensitive)
  
• Enter a date/time, height & weight
  
• Excitement for everyone!
  

And if anyone was wondering, I do still have a job, but I have managed to squeeze in a little blogging here and there. Thanks go out to Suzanne for finding the baby guessing website!

The Womb is not Empty!

 
Happy Easter to everyone. I hope that little hint clarifies the joke in the title of today's post. Okay onto more important matters.
After careful consideration (mostly on which picture to post) and to satisfy public demand, the growing belly has made it to the Cronley Blog. This photo was taken on Easter Sunday as the California sun set on the land formerly covered with beautiful orange groves-one such tree remains and it happens to be in the backyard of Wendy's home.
Tracey and I spent Easter weekend in Mission Viejo relaxing, cooking and eating. I learned how to barbecue pork ribs and a leg of lamb while Tracey learned to make homemade cinnamon rolls and sticky buns. Highlight of the weekend: comparing Tracey's belly to the rising dough of the cinnamon rolls. Absolutely hilarious.
 

Not Quite Mississippians

We're back in good ol' CA after a trip that started out a little shaky (our video camera and digital camera were stolen from right under our noses on the airplane just upon arrival in Jackson, MS) but ultimately turned out quite fruitful! After our "mishap" on the airplane, we were afraid that we would be hardened by the experience and lose grasp of our belief that people, as a general rule are, "good". Luckily, the people of Meridian, MS and Birmingham, AL wouldn't allow for us to be hardened. Everyone is so nice! We walked up and down many a street and many a neighborhood in our search for a home and everywhere we went, people would wave and smile despite the fact that we must have looked like a couple of fish out of water. One of the best suprises for both of us was how many trees there are in the South! We just couldn't believe it. The land is absolutely gorgeous and I know we got lucky, but the weather was unbelievable! We even got one night of a good thunder storm which, despite losing some sleep over, we quite enjoyed. We owe a special thanks to our friends, Rob and Leea, who graciously put up with us all week long while we basically took over their house for our "house hunting" purposes. It was so great to see them and be there when they brought home their new puppy "Sally" --- who we have already nicknamed "Saint Sally" because she is one of the best behaved (not to mention cutest) puppies you could ever meet!! For those of you concerned about our ability to adjust to Meridian, MS, you'll be pleased to know that the house we have signed a contract on is all of 7 houses away from Rob and Leea. We are so excited about being neighbors and have already started planning the first block party. One funny item to note is that despite the fact that we are 7 doors away from the Myers', we are actually in an entirely different city and have a different zip code --- the street name isn't even the same even though we are on the same road!? Over the weekend we were able to get over to Hoover, AL to visit Sara and Greg. It was so great to see them and their beautiful home and to eat some good barbeque and banana cream pie with them. Greg took us on a quick tour of "The Hammer" (Birmingham, AL for those of you not down with the southern lingo) and showed us just a few of the highlights. As always, the visit with them was too short, but it is so good to know that they are only a 2 hour drive from our new home.
Well, we will certainly have more to share with you about the new house as it gets closer to it's completion and we get closer to moving, but for now, here is the one picture we currently have of it. Please ignore me being totally ridiculous in the picture -- I was doing the Mr. Roboto dance in celebration and somehow Tom managed to capture me looking like a complete lunatic. Well, I guess that's fitting.......

Hunting in Mississippi?

Once again the postcard used for the all important "Save the Date" notice has reared its ugly (and getting uglier) head. It is unfortunate that this digital version will do nothing to reduce the number of these things we currently have stored in our huge apartment. I put it somewhere in the neighborhood of a thousand that remain.
So we're off to Mississippi! We're only going down there for a week to look for homes or as the Navy puts it, House Hunting. We've been looking at homes online for about as long as any sane person could take and now it is time to investigate the old fashion way.
As you might guess, you can get a lot more house in the middle of Mississippi than you can in Southern California. One restored home in particular comes to mind: It looks something like Grandma Sheridan's, but 5,000 square feet and did I mention in is in the National Historical Register? We're going to look at it for the fun of it, but if we lived there, I'd be afraid that all of you would show up every Christmas, Easter, Valentine's Day, Friday, etc. On the more realistic side of things, we've been pleasantly surpised with the variety and quality of these as well. But who knows, that cute little place with the nice yard might have a hillbilly for a neighbor and stink like the Marlboro Man himself lived there.
Finding the right place is just the beginning for us. As this represents our first home purchase, we are totally clueless and I am pretty certain that everyone in the real estate/home mortgage business is excitedly anticipating our financial demise. Truthfully, we are working with some seemingly good and very helpful people who are using really small words so I can understand.
It is still a little confusing. Although every other industry or service has managed to reduce the number of "fees," the money lending world has about fifty of them that should be lumped together and called "Who else are you gonna get this kind of money from?" fee.
The trip is not going to be all work and no play. It can't be: We're staying with our friends Rob and Leea Myers and I don't think they would stand for it. They moved to Meridian back in February and have graciously offered their spare bedroom for us to use as "Headquarters" for the house hunt. We do have a birthday to celebrate. Tracey's birthday is on the 6th (She will be 20) and hopefully I will have scouted out a decent restaurant by then. We're also driving to Birmingham (AKA The Hammer) to visit the Wendts. I haven't been to their place since Christmas of 2000 and Tracey has never been there. The whole trip should be fun, eye-opening and hopefully successful.