To Live is to Learn

Hi All, So this won't be the most fun topic to talk about. But I've decided to blog about it. Mostly because I know not too many people read this and those of you that do I'm fairly close to you and would or probably have told you about it in person. I'm in a rut. I call it a mom rut. I'm told its quite common. I haven't let myself go by gaining a lot of weight but I definitely have with how I look. I've been dealing with quite a lot of negative thoughts about myself and I've found that I just don't feel attractive. Most days I just feel like a dead mommy. Some days I try to dress nicely and I still feel quite frumpy. Don't get me wrong I adore being a mommy. I can't imagine my life without our girl. I do think it's time for me to stop completely ignoring my needs in this way. That being said, I've decided that for the next few months I'm going to set aside money every month that I am going to make myself spend it on me. (I fi...

Well, the months just keep chugging by. Our baby is 15 months and looking and acting less and less like an actual baby. She's so much fun right now. This stage is a blast! She is really into mimicking us now. We say something and she copies us to the best of her ability. She tries to run and sadly at this point she ends up biffing it. She is so smart and I can see her becoming intentional in what toys she plays with and how she plays with them. Just last week she has learned what animal a lion is when you ask her what noise it makes she says rarr! It's so cute! She is also fairly obsessed with belly buttons. She randomly walks up to just about everybody and says bee bttn. She knows where her eyes are and her ears and we're working on her nose and mouth. She loves water and I'm looking forward( sort of) to hotter temperatures so we can play in her pool everyday. She loves to be outside. Her favorite thing to do outside is to eat rocks and dirt. I don't exactl...

Pheww what a month we've had with our girl.  Let's see where to begin. Well, we'll start with everything we've had to move, put up high or close off.  Maggie can now get in the trash can which is why it's in the pantry. She can now lift the lid to the toilet so all bathroom doors are now closed and all rolls of toilet paper are off the holder and on the counter where she can't reach them. Funny after months of us trying to teach her to get off the couch backwards so her feet hit first and she doesn't fall. She just does it all on her own now. What a relief knowing she won't fall off the couch anymore. She has been walking for a few months but now she even runs and is very steady with walking. In an effort to give her a sibling I've gone from nursing her 6 times per day down to 3. She is adjusting quite well. Three weeks ago she refused sippy cups now she drinks out of them. Some days more than others but the fact is she's lea...

And...another month has flown by. Baby girl is 13 months and well on her way to toddler status. She is up to new and exciting things every day. Lets see just in the past week she has begun standing without pulling herself up first. She is much more stable with walking and she also is much more steady in shoes than she was just a few weeks ago. She has learned if she gets on her tippiest of toes she can reach about three inches into a desk and pull whatever she finds down. Which is funny but Mommy is learning how dangerous that can be depending on what is up there. She can now climb. When on the couch she tries to climb up and over onto the floor, Lord help us when she can climb up on the couch by herself. She's a curious little love. She recently discovered the toilet paper and how when she pulls on it, it unravels, ha! She now points to things. We are trying to teach her bye bye and have started with doing high fives. Which she loves to do. She is now walking probably 75%...

One year old! My baby is technically a baby anymore! I know, I know, I'm late, she's 12.5 months old. I do my best but blogging goes by the wayside and I always promise to be better and I'm not so for those of you who still read thanks. Otherwise, I just enjoy writing and if nobody ever reads this it can be a journal entry in Maggie's baby book :) Okay, without further ado, 1. Eesh, this first year went by oh so fast. On her actual birthday we didn't do anything out of the ordinary. We sang to her and then went about our day. Three days later on a Saturday, we had a houseful of all our family. Maggie kept with her good nature, she seemed a little overwhelmed but not too much. She still occasionally smiled. She was very blessed to get a lot of cool gifts and she did eventually dig into her cake. It was a good day had by all. At her 1 year appointment, she weighed 24.6 pounds so she doesn't beat our cousin Sam in the biggest Jacks' baby. Pheww. She gets...

At this time last year, I was writhing through every contraction, anticipating the birth of our baby. This year, I'm beyond blessed by our baby girl Maggie. Motherhood is a crazy thing. Being a wife and a mother is all I've ever wanted to be. Getting my nursing degree was just a side job until God brought the right man. Funny, every moment in my life I've thought that I was humble and then I have the experience happen to me, ie. motherhood or marriage and find out just how prideful I am. For instance, I remember when I was single wondering how come somebody wouldn't just let the baby cry until they went to sleep. No big deal right? WRONG. Now that I'm a mother that was by far the hardest party of mothering thus far this year. I also tried not to have expectations about motherhood which until about 7 months I think I did okay, then we introduced solids and unlike the movies our baby didn't just eat the food and swallow. In fact she projectile vomited every fo...

I was watching our baby girl in the bath last night, splashing and scooting around and realized, she's 11 months tomorrow! EEk! I know I say this every month but truly this year has gone by so fast! One more month and I'll have a one year old. I'm starting to think after 11 months I'm never going to get used to her growing up. Boy has 10 months been more adventurous then 9. She is so mobile. She still doesn't straight up crawl but that doesn't matter, she crab crawls all over the place, pulls herself up on everything and just when I think she can't do that,she shows me she can. She is able to walk assisted quite steady now. She'll even take up to 4 steps toward somebody when she feels like it. However; at this stage she knows it's faster to crab crawl so that is what she does most of the time. She is such a good natured baby, we are so blessed. This past month, Tim had two weeks of vacation off, in that two week time frame we volunteered at ...