Blah blah, Random Year End Stuff.

Ellie's afraid of monsters right now. Anyone else have a toddler with this issue? I honestly don't know where this came from - true monsters are not really something she's been exposed to (ala Monster's Inc), but she can't sleep without the lights on and hides her face a lot from the "monsters" and comes into our room a lot earlier than she used to in the middle of the night. Just now, I went downstairs to grab her a diaper (because she's in underwear and was FREAKING OUT for a diaper, refusing the toilet, etc) and she burst into sobs. I was gone literally 3.5 seconds. What a funny kid. But really, it breaks my heart a little.

Dash slept 3.5 hours straight last night. That's a HUGE deal for us. Bless his heart, he knew he was thisclose to being sleep/crib trained so he gave me a break. He's still teething his front two teeth - they're yet to pop through, but his little gums are so swollen with teeth. It looks incredibly painful. And while he can't really crawl, he's starting to master the art of getting around somehow, despite this limitation.

I honestly didn't remember it was New Year's Eve until just now. Show's how much planning I put in to ringing in the new year. :) That's how it goes with little ones, but that's perfectly okay by me. If I could plan an ideal night, it would be everyone going to bed without fuss at 8pm. How's that for exciting? But, that's where we are this morning.

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The last couple years I've done a year-end recap, and a "wish list" of sorts for the coming year. I'm not going to do either this time around. But, I will say this: 2013 was probably one of the most difficult years of my life. This year was filled with an incredible roller coaster of emotions, but one that I will hopefully remember as incredibly precious and keep dear to me always. 2013 held some scary times that required some pretty significant leaps of faith for our family, but also a million tiny fleeting moments of pure joy. We faced unemployment - unemployment while Very Pregnant at that, a tough pregnancy, a premature baby and subsequent NICU stay, a car accident. All things that were stressful and tough to maintain composure throughout. But - we welcomed our son. Our beautiful boy, who we love more than we thought ever possible. We stare at him at night and marvel at his perfection, his beauty and his strength. We are so incredibly lucky. We also watched our daughter grow into an amazing kid. She's strong, funny, smart, beautiful, strong-willed, thoughtful and a huge joy for us. And, of course, we have each other - our marriage that keeps getting put on the backburner while we learn to juggle, but we love each other and power through the days with a smile (usually!).

Welcoming a second baby and learning to juggle the demands of two, starting to figure out how to keep a household running and four people's needs mostly met was not easy for me, but I believe this will be a constant work in process. I found that while having one child puts your needs on low priority, having a second keeps meeting your needs at next-to-no-priority. It really is a major reality shift to almost never have time to focus on yourself anymore. Parties aren't about socializing - they're about tag teaming and chasing kids. Dinner's out aren't enjoyable really, and even being around family sometimes feels like you've become a burden. Not that people don't enjoy the children, but let's be real: no one enjoys two year old tantrums left to fester while mom's busy breastfeeding. :) Toting one kid around is fairly easy, even spontaneous road trips are possible. Two is much less easy, and I'm much more likely to simply stay home than the ordeal which is sometimes getting everyone ready to go out, and then actually GO out. If I've forgotten an ingredient, the chances are next to zero that I will bother to go get it. We do without.

But, this is not about reflecting on the difficulty which having two young children has brought to my life. Because the highs have been way, way more than worth it. Yes, it's been a year where I've often felt pretty isolated. But, in the little bubble which we have built there is more joy than I thought humanly possible. So 2013 was beyond good to us when all is said and done. The first year with my baby boy, Ellie's third year. A year well lived, with the wrinkles to prove it. :)

As for 2014, my wish is for two parents with jobs that are stable and make us happy, and two kids who are happy and healthy. And that's really all I need, ever.

(note: it took me all day to write this. note, also: guess what I did for the first time today? ran out of an ingredient, looked at the clock and realized Eleanor was not going to fall asleep for nap anytime soon, and thus would be up too late, bundled up the kids and ran to the grocery store for said ingredient. first for everything!).

I leave you with some recent pictures of my joy. :)

morning sharing

post nap selfies 

the joy of the family bed

they really do find comfort with each other

she tucked herself in for a movie

no caption needed 

seconds later, he was asleep

Holidays and time off

Here's a picture of my baby boy, all stressed out and maxed out tired and super sad about me trying to get him to take a nap. 

I won't take a picture of myself, but imagine that imagine, only on the face of a thirty year old mom. 

That would be me. 

Good gracious, having young kids is hard. I know that a lot of things in life are hard, and I don't want to play the pain olympics or anything, but this is not a walk in the park. This phase of life is tough though, which is such a shame, because it's also so sweet, and so fleeting. So, so fleeting. My baby turned 8 months old the other day - EIGHT months! I literally feel like I've blinked, and poof - gone. On the other hand, I know that I didn't blink, because that means I've closed my eyes, and Lord knows that's hardly true. 

I try to keep the holidays relatively low stress and low key. But, even for the most committed to that ideal (and I'm not just paying the "we keep things low key" phrase lip service. We really do.), things get busy and schedules get jammed. I'm desperate to make sure that my family knows that we're centered at home and good, fun things can come from being at home, but still - we go out, we try to have fun, there are parties to go to and people to visit with. We hit bottom last weekend with a disastrous trip to our cabin. Really, it was the worst I've had in the 30 full years of cabin-ing. Lots of screaming, no sleeping. My body feels like a tightly wound ball of stress, like I could crack in half with any more pressure. 

So, I'm taking the day off today. I really don't ever do anything like this, but I called in the reserves today (ie, my mom) and made a frantic, last minute call to the acupuncture clinic for some much needed time to myself. After acupuncture, I plan to do something  - anything - solo. Probably, it will be running errands, maybe even errands as unpleasant as mailing packages the week before Christmas. Either way, I'll be by myself. Sweet solitude. 

Why is it that taking time away just feels so..wrong? Knowing that I'm doing something for myself when there are a ton of other things that I should be doing feels unnatural. I don't want to be a martyr, but even if the kids were taken care of by someone else, there are a lot of things I should be doing at home. There's always a mess to clean, and with company coming soon for a week, there's a lot of stuff to prepare. And the kids aren't easy and both are especially attached to me, so I know that when I'm doing something for myself, I'm actually causing someone else to be doing additional work. It would be one thing if taking time off simply meant that that the other areas of my life simply stayed neutral, but to know that my having something positive makes something else suffer negatively makes me very hesitant. But, I've hit the bottom and I'm tapped out, so.... that's that.

In the meantime, we're hanging in there. Ellie's on her second episode of Frosty The Snowman this morning, after having seriously woken up on the wrong side of the bed. Dash is napping, and the dishes are calling me, but I'm avoiding the mess in the kitchen like the plague, and thinking of adding to the mess by making cookies. Baking has become a release for me, as has eating, and somehow I'm still managing to lose weight. Thanks breastfeeding, for that Christmas miracle. :)

Are you doing anything for yourself this holiday season? 

Under The Tree

2011

2013

Life lately, in pictures

Sorry for the lack of interesting posts lately. Lame, first world problem excuse: my pictures are no longer streaming directly from my phone to my computer. What gives? Sooo... I went ahead and did it the old fashioned way, to satisfy curious minds as to what we've been up to lately. 

Short answer: nothing. And, everything! Our days are busy, and routine. We're living the happy, simple, intentional life over here. I've been purging our house of stuff, slowing the pace down intentionally, and keeping the kids home a lot more lately. I want to raise my kids to be happy staying put, to find ways to entertain themselves with what we have in our home, and to recognize get-togethers and playdates, and activities as special and fun. So, that's what we're up to lately. I've been focusing my energy on finding ways to entertain the babes at home, cooking a lot and being mindful of our many blessings.

(How's that for a Thanksgiving weekend sequitur?)

*and for a non-sequitur: my grandma came over this morning and I told her I was making Roasted Squash Bechamel lasagna, and she told me that I should throw my whole squash into the oven without chopping it up at all. She promised it would roast nicely, and be way easier to handle. No surprise: Grandma, the former home-ec teacher, was totally right. Score one for making roasted squash even easier, as if that was even possible!*

Okay. Back to life lately. Here's what we've been up to:

Starting each morning with the kids lined up, watching Daniel Tiger. Note Eeyore nestled between my other two babies. :)

Playing blocks together

Decorating for Christmas. First artificial tree ever. Three days in, and I'm never going back. No needles > needles on the floor

Snuggling with my boy. 

Failing at our attempts to... clear out his intestinal tract 

Ellie plays with playdough, Dash eats

Swinging! 

Block building with daddy, a daily pre-bedtime ritual

Nursing our babies

Admiring our thighs

Melting down at Target over God-Knows-What

Picking on poor baby brother

Peeing in the tub. On the potty, in the tub. Awesome.

Cutting my hair. Before:

After!

Rocking my big girl. Love, love.