Happy Monday! I’m linking up again today with Becky at Choose Happy for her Currently series. Join us, and just let us know what’s up with you currently! It’s a great way to find fun new blogs to follow, and to find friends. I love it!
Enjoying || a relaxing day after a super busy Easter week. Everyone slept late this morning, and we don’t have anything on our schedule. Hopefully it’ll be a day of catching up on chores and maybe taking a nap!
Thankful for || a wonderful Easter weekend. It was full of good church, wonderful family, and sweet friends. The Lord is risen, and we couldn’t be more grateful!! There were so many celebrations we could barely keep up… We were so busy we literally didn’t get a single picture of everyone in their cute outfits! Here are a few instead of an actual “Easter photo”:
Cousins on a couch!Elsa’s Easter outfit. What Easter dress would be complete without the Ice Queen’s crown?Bunny love.He was getting better at caring about the eggs by the end…I snapped this one from behind the piano right before the Good Friday service… my favorite night of the year, I think.
Looking forward to || my mom’s arrival this afternoon! She’s staying through next weekend to help us get cleaned up, organized, and set up for guest hosting and party throwing! And of course to snuggle the sweet ones.
Excited about || my college girlfriends having a slumber party at my house next weekend! We haven’t gotten all together since our super fun weekend in December, and I’m glad we will be together again! It’ll probably be full of milkshakes and laughter and not staying up as late as we used to, but it will be much-needed time to catch up, love on each other, and store up time together for the next few months till we do it again.
Decorating || the basement! Finally! Cleaning crew comes in this week to make it really move in ready, and today I got a fabulous rug for the living room down there! Just have to find a car big enough to go pick it up – ha!
Found this rug at Homegoods – for a steal, obviously.Snazzy custom handrail, all finished up! Now to patch the wall and floor, and build a baby gate! (Please ignore the pile of laundry at the bottom of the stairs. It rarely goes away.)
Well, that’s what’s going on in my life! Thanks for reading, and I can’t wait to hear what’s going on with you!
This weekend, in addition to the obvious choice of being at an Easter Sunday church service, I was also a part of a good Friday service. Y’all, this is my favorite service of the liturgical year.
As the pastor pointed out while we were chatting after the service, it’s all about doing Good Friday with correct theology. It’s not all about me and woe is me and my burdens that I’m bringing to the table. It’s about Jesus, his suffering and sacrifice, and his enduring the wrath of the Father instead of me. But it’s also about Sunday – the glorious day of His rising up from the grave and becoming not only whole, but holy all over again. His reuniting with us and with the Father, and that in this act, he has forever united the Father with us.
What better news could we have than this? What better reason for me to rise with the sun tomorrow, and worship the One who made my life shame-free? Jesus is risen! The veil is torn! He has made a way, a perfect way, a way for me and for the world!
That moment when my toddler plugs her headphones into the freshly painted wall.
That moment… you know the one… that moment when you can laugh, or you can cry.
That moment when you get home from work, and your adorable son is just waking up from his nap. You, still in your nice clothes, rush in to scoop him up for some snuggles. That moment when he’s giggling, glad to see his mama, nuzzling your neck a little bit. That moment that for some reason, you decide that instead of the normal post-nap diaper change, you just want to carry his sweet self around for a few minutes. (You can see where this is going.)
That moment when you think you’re a little damp. That moment when you realize damp isn’t covering it. That moment when you realize it isn’t just pee. That moment when it’s a whole lot of everything, including breakfast and last night’s dinner, on your arms. And your dress. That moment when you peek back into the crib, and it’s all up in there, too. That moment you realize you’ve gotta do some serious laundry, but you and your adorable, sweet, snuggly, smelly son need a shower, NOW.
I’ve written posts before about how my son can go from adorable to covered in some sort of bodily fluid in less than two seconds. Zero to sixty in no time flat. But what is more indicative of motherhood than that? Like when your toddler is being so cute, having a little pretend tea party, but throws a tantrum when her request to switch to real tea is denied. Or when the switch goes off in your kid’s brain, from “I’m having a great time at dinner with my grandparents!” to “I’m really tired. Get me out of this high chair, let me run out the door to where the car must be, and home into my bed, and I MEAN NOW!” Those moments are bound to happen, and of course at the least convenient time. It’s just a passing moment. It seems like a serious situation when you’re in it, but it’s gone and forgotten as soon as it came.
If it wasn’t for moments like these, I wouldn’t have hilarious things to write about, or to post on Instagram or Twitter. I wouldn’t have anything to compare the cleaner moments to. I’ve got a messy, keep-me-on-my-toes sort of motherhood I’m working with, and I wouldn’t want it any other way.
my two chunkers, with their buddy Styles, who refused to smile 🙂 As a continuation of my breastfeeding journey with EK, my journey breastfeeding J was much easier. Already, I knew the pain I’d feel in those first few days – and I was prepared mentally this time. So that was less of an issue. He had a MUCH better latch than she did, and so we started off much better. My milk came in more quickly (while I was packing to leave the hospital, in fact!) and so he got the full effects of that more quickly.
However, he was a sleep-nurser, which in turn made him a little less efficient. Therefore, he didn’t gain as much weight, so the pediatrician was worried about him, so I was worried about him, and we went through everything we could think of to keep him awake, get him to eat instead of pacify, and get him to gain some weight. That basically turned into me pumping and giving him some bottles more often (he’d finish a bottle without stopping, just not nurse for very long without sleeping) and eventually supplementing formula.
He continued being a good nurser once he started gaining weight and we were doing bottles as well as nursing. It didn’t take him much longer to find a rhythm, get the benefit of breastmilk as well as formula, and be a chubby babe just like his sister was. He continued doing bottles with breastmilk and with formula while I was working, and nursing while I was home until he was 8 months, when I had stopped making very much milk (I had stopped working by then) and he just weaned himself. He stopped being interested in nursing and just wanted bottles, and my milk dried up. Since he was so old, eating food as well as taking bottles well, and was clearly not having any weight troubles anymore, I didn’t press the issue and let him make his decision.
I don’t have any regrets about this process. I don’t regret giving him bottles and formula to help his weight gain. I don’t regret letting him wean himself at 8 months. I don’t regret a moment of our journey. He’s a healthy, sweet boy, and we have bonded and have a wonderful relationship. I have loved every moment getting to know him more and more, and I know that our initial bonding with breastfeeding helped that along, but isn’t the only thing that mattered in our relationship. Bonding can happen without breastfeeding. Bonding can continue after you stop. Make the best choice for you and your baby, and whatever that looks like, good for you!
If you’re like me, at 29 years old, you’ve been to a billion baby showers, possibly including your own. You’ve known young moms and old, had at least one close friend have a baby, and needed to hit up the local baby store for a set of bottles or a sweet, monogrammed blanket.
This is like a mini-throwback from my shower before EK was born. These are my college girlfriends!
That being said, those gifts are sweet: bottles, blankets, teethers, etc. They’re thoughtful, useful, and probably from the mom’s registry. But there are a few things that, as a mama who’s attended some baby showers, I’ve learned are really great gifts that new parents love, even if they aren’t quite as cute in the gift wrap.
On the heels of the success of my “10 Tips for Soon-To-Be Moms“, here are a few unconventional but awesome baby shower gift ideas.
1. Stain remover. I really love the BabyGanics Stain Remover (find it on Diapers.com) personally, but Shout and OxyClean also are winners. I always include a bottle of the BabyGanics with whatever I get the new mama.
2. Clothes in bigger sizes. Yes, those newborn outfits are cute, and yes, the tinier they are, the cuter, somehow. BUT there are two reasons to stay away from the tiniest clothes you see: 1. Everyone else is buying them, too. While newborns probably have lots of costume changes, no mama needs 59 outfits for the first week of the baby’s life. 2. Babies grow really, really fast. And some babies, like my J, never wear newborn sized clothes anyway. He was a little long and a little porky for most of the newborn-sized clothes I had, so he jumped straight to three months size. I’d love to have gotten more cute clothes in nine months size and up, even all the way to 3T! Kids always need play clothes, and if you’re worried about sizes for the right seasons, just get t-shirts and leggings (girls) or jeans because those are can be worn in every season.
3. Restaurant gift certificates. Whether for a date night before the baby comes, or after, or for take out during the first few weeks where life is a blur, providing a meal is always a good thing.
4. Laundry detergent, dish soap, or hand sanitizer. These are great gifts, because we go through TONS of it in the baby’s first month or two. Dreft or any natural brand (insert second BabyGanics plug) is great for laundry, natural dish soaps (Honest Company, Mrs. Meyer’s, etc) for paci/bottle/teether washing, and hand sanitizer for every single soul who walks through your front door. Sorry germs, ain’t nobody got time for that.
5. Diapers or wipes. Some mamas have a huge bias when it comes to these (brands, cloth diapering, etc) but it’s easy to ask them what their plan is, and offer to contribute to it. Even if you’re cloth diapering, it can be an expensive undertaking. And just like clothes, diaper sizes change often as well, so don’t get two jumbo cases of newborn sizes… go all the way up to 4 or 5 if you want. I promise. They’ll be used.
6. Don’t be afraid to go gender neutral. This is important especially for bigger ticket items. It’s super cute that your baby girl’s carseat is covered in pink flowers, but when your second baby is a boy, and you have to buy a new one, that’s a big bummer. This also applies, in my book, to things like burp cloths, muslin swaddles, crib sheets, bath towels, socks (Yeah, I said it. What’s wrong with white?), and toys. I know, you can get teethers and noisemakers that are all princessy, or all have trucks on them, but why can’t you just get the ones covered in giraffes?
7. Baby food pouches. For the most part, these things stay good a long while, and they’re great even for moms who want to make their own baby food, because you can find things that might be out of season, or that are a little more expensive fresh for the same price – not to mention they are GREAT for being on the go. Choose simple, though, and get pouches that have only one or two ingredients (just peaches, or plain ol’ applesauce) instead of blends, and always go organic. (I like the Plum Organics brand a lot, just by the way.)
8. Housecleaning service. I don’t think it’s too forward to pay for a few hours of a housecleaning service so that mama can worry not about her floors and toilets during the first month or two post-partum. She’ll just thank you later.
9. Wine, booze, coffee, and chocolate. It may sound silly, but after nine months without any (or with very little) of these things, it’s a welcome change to enjoy them in moderation – you know, except the chocolate. Don’t bother moderating the chocolate.
10. Salon gift certificate. Maybe a facial, a massage, or a pedicure, but definitely a winner. If you’re brave, you could add a clause about keeping that sweet little snuggler while she gets pampered!
What else would you add? Anything else super useful that gets overlooked?
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