Crazy

The last few days have been a roller coaster. To be honest, I guess the last few years have been a roller coaster.

One of the critical reasons it's so hard to understand motherhood from the outside is that so much of motherhood happens on the inside.



Two pink lines on a piece of plastic and you are suddenly a different person. Chemistry changes, biology changes, hormones change, instincts change. Your perspective changes and all you want to do is mother -- raise this baby the best way that you know how, giving them every opportunity you can.

You have mood swings, morning sickness, weight gain, stretch marks, fatigue, cravings and aversions, and overwhelming motivation to protect the life inside of you and to create a safe place for that little baby once he or she is born.

Then you have labor, which I have learned from my two children can range from totally doable to comparable only to the cruciatus curse from the Harry Potter series.

After that you're monitoring baby's weight gain, accepting that you can never have exactly the body you had before pregnancy, learning how to breastfeed, coping with sleep deprivation, writing down feeds and poops and pees and trying to get your baby to sleep while often dealing with continued mood swings as your body adapts to not being pregnant anymore.

One of the most difficult things about all of this for me has been the fact that, after 3 years of total partnership, Jeff cannot completely go with me on this journey. Sometimes I've felt alone in my pain or stress or exhaustion or moodiness and this weekend was one of those times.

Women are thrust head-on into the experience of parenting, but men have a choice as to how involved to be from the moment they get the news of the pregnancy. And some choose to take no role at all or only a very small one.

But Jeff has proven time and time again that, free to choose, he will walk this road beside me no matter how hard it gets or how crazy I get. He proved that again this weekend by showing me that I am important to him, that I am a priority, and that I'm not alone, no matter what. He is my hero!

I say it all the time, but I am so blessed to have this family. If I could pick any 3 people to spend my days with it would be them.

Happy Thanksgiving.

Prescott and Parade

I haven't posted pics in a little while so here are some fun ones.

When Jeff's folks were here we had the opportunity to go up to Prescott with them and see Jeff's Aunt and Uncle. Well, Aunt Lynn has a *way* with babies and Evan just conked right out on her. It was so cute!


However, in his waking time he's making quite a show of the whole holding-up-his-head thing.

One of my favorite aspects of this time of year is our town's big parade. It's such a fun family treat! This was our second year, but Lilia was so much more engaged with it this time around. It was very cool.
Jeff wore Evan in the carrier part o the time and I can never resist taking pictures of the hot babywearing Daddy!

Sometimes I still can't believe how blessed we are. So fun to hang out with our little family!

Things I Say Every Day

I thought this would be an interesting window into my life to look back on down the road. As anyone who has ever spoken with me on the phone can attest, I am certain that I say each of the following at least once a day:

• I love you. (I think I say this 400 times a day. It overflows.)
• Big girl!
• Hi, Son! Are you a happy boy?
  
• Can I keep you forever?
• Okay, but Evan has to finish eating first. Can you wait?
• Oh no! Wherrrrrre's Lilia? Oh! There she is!
• Mama needs to cook. Do you want to help me or go play in the front room?
• Are you pooping?
• Where do big girls go poopie?
• Can you please put your pants back on?
• Baby, Auntie Aca is nigh nigh. We can't Skype with her right now.
• No Nemo today, Baby. Why don't we play with your toys?
• Who's Mama's favorite son/daughter?
• No, that's Mommy's phone/water bottle/computer/food/juice.
• Can you use your words please?
• Can you think of a nicer way to say that please?
• Do you want to sing your ABC's?
• Gentle!
• Aaaah booo booo booo booo! (Getting progressively closer to Evan's face)
• Do you have a kissy for Evan?
• Lilia, if you do _____, Mama will take that away.
• It's nigh nigh time in ___ minutes.
• We don't throw our food on the floor.
• Mama needs to go pump. I'll be right back.
• Oh thank you for the snuggles! Mama loves snuggles!
• Which book do you want to read?
  

Bonus post! Before I forget....

She stopped leaving out numbers, so now she officially counts to ten. Growing up way too fast!

Points of Light

We've had a difficult few weeks in that Evan has not been sleeping well. As all of my real life and blogging friends know, I am not good with sleep deprivation. But we march on.

A few things have really gotten me through all of it. I thought I would memorialize those.

• Jeff's encouragement. We watched a movie together on Sunday night ("Date Night." We loved it.) and had a chance to just chat. It was amazing. I told Jeff I was feeling discouraged because I've never had to work so hard just to "make par" at anything in my life as I have with parenting. He told me he doesn't think I am just making par. He told me he thinks I'm the best mom he knows. He said how much he appreciates that I always seem to know what the babies need, and how compassionate I am with them, and how seriously I take teaching them things. I could go on that for a year! Wow.
• Lilia's compassion. Lilia continues to have such an inherently kind heart. I love it so much! If I bonk or say "ow," she says, "Mama! Owie! Kisses!" until I let her kiss my owie. She worries about Evan if he cries. She misses us when we're gone. She snuggles the animals and pets them gently. She shares. It really keeps me going to see her be so loving.
• Evan's smiles and snuggles. His face just completely lights up with joy when he sees me and I can't help but smile back. He's trying so hard to talk now, gurgling and cooing and smiling and thinking hard. And he just snuggles into me with his whole body. It's the most wonderful feeling in the world.
• Great friends. Today I was going on about 4 hours sleep, plus the chronic sleep deprivation of the last two weeks, but I went to a play date with some friends from church and felt so much better. It's lovely to be in the same boat and share joys and frustrations with other moms. I also still greatly, greatly appreciate the incredible friends we made in our small group. It feels weird to call them friends because at this point they are family members. Thank God for cell phones and texting because sometimes they are a lifeline.

So all in all it really hasn't been too bad, going through this bout of sleep deprivation. It really doesn't take long for me to remember how very blessed I am. Hopefully sleep will come soon but I'm so glad I'm not missing out on these precious relationships in the meantime.

They did it again.

Grew, I mean. Overnight.

I did not tell them they could do this, yet they persist.

Evan is now holding his head up all over the place like it's no thing, continuing to have complete conversations with anything with a face, and now trying to crawl.

Lilia has learned to say the whole word for Skype, and she's just.... well, big. She's big. We kept telling her she was a big girl and now she is one and I sort of wish I could take it back.

There are no words to describe how I just want to drink it. Parenting at this stage is so hard, so exhausting, that it sometimes makes me forget who I am. It's disorienting. I'm sleep deprived and broke and often worried I'm just doing the whole thing wrong.

And yet when I imagine these years slipping steadily away I just want to cry at the thought. I really don't take a minute of these babies for granted.

It's Not Supposed to Be Like This

(Be forewarned that this post is pretty raw.)

I went to a funeral yesterday. Pretty sure it was a 24 inch casket, all decked out in pink flowers. My neighbors' precious, innocent, beautiful, 2 1/2-month-old baby girl died in their arms Monday.

It's not supposed to be like this.

Oh, but it is like this. It's excruciating. I've recently prayed for another beautiful family who lost another beautiful baby and a friend who suddenly lost a long-time friend who had only just become his girlfriend.

As this amazing mother who had only 16 days with her son wrote, "When I consider the collective weight of grief people are bearing, I am amazed that the world does not sink under it."

I've heard that "everything happens for a reason," that somehow we should be okay with this. People are uncomfortable, I suppose, with the wrongness of all of it. They want to make it cleaner, make it somehow okay.

My feelings are too much to articulate. So I will only say this:

This is not the way it's supposed to be. Say what you want about death or grief, but don't try to make it okay. People are walking around with these gaping wounds left on their souls when loved ones have gone. It is not okay.

Parents should be able to raise their children. Lovers should have a chance to build their lives together. It's just not supposed to be like this.

Gratitude

Every night when I close my eyes to pray, the first words out of my mouth are "Thank you, Lord." We are so blessed. We have been so blessed.

Jeff and I married 5 years ago today. Lest you (my one reader) forget, I came thisclose to a disastrous, abusive marriage and was saved by the grace of God. Then I went to counseling, learned a ton about myself and found that the love that I'd always wanted was not "out there," but up. God had loved me madly the whole time.

And the partner He had for me had been under my nose for almost a decade.

It took so much for me to see what I already had, but now I "get it" every day. Jeff is a rock. He is a better partner than anyone I could've imagined for myself. He is compassionate, hilarious, responsible, genuine, and of course... hot. :)

Side by side we've grown so much in the past 5 years, planted so many seeds and seen so much fruit.

We have a marriage that is deeper and more solid than either of us ever imagined. We have many close friends who know us well and share our lives and allow us to share in theirs. We have families that love us. We own our first home. We have enough money to squeeze by on one income so we can invest the maximum time into our kids. We have two running cars!

Most of all, we have two happy and healthy babies that have taught us so much and given us so much love.

Thank you, Lord.

The Farm!

This last weekend Jeff's parents were in town and we got a chance to go to Vertuccio Farms, which is always fun. They have these awesome little pedal cars that you can drive around, plus a corn maze (I think there was something wrong with it this year! Seemed really sparse.) a barrel train and a bunch of farm animals. A good time was had by all. Even Evan, who pretty much chilled out in the Pikkolo the whole time. :)

The Fair!

Maybe a month ago Jeff and I took the kids on a walk and discussed the next few months -- what we wanted to budget for in terms of Christmas gifts and fun things to do. I was all about farms and corn mazes, Jeff really wanted to go to the fair.

We went on a day that offered free admission for a donation for a local shelter (this days' donation was deodorant) and we had a wonderful time. We didn't ride anything, but we looked at all the animals and went in the petting zoo and ate fried food.

We were really excited to discover that the act that was playing the fair that night (free!) was Montgomery Gentry. Since moving to Phoenix we've really started to like country music and it was great to be able to see them for free.

We feel so blessed to enjoy hanging out as a family so much. The best part was just to be together for the whole thing and see the kids having a good time. Even Evan was just staring at all the lights for a lot of the time. It was great!

Fall, and all that that entails.

It's Fall. Honest-to-God Fall. Those of you in other, less scalding parts of the country may not understand the depth of this reality.

How could you, really, when you've been casually wandering the great outdoors in your double-digit temperatures all summer?

It's like the recess bell. Or, better yet, the last bell of the school day on the last day of school. Everyone outside! Now! For months!

And it's so much more fun with two little people to share it with. October brought a wonderful outside party at a local farm with Lilia's beloved "Joshie." No, we didn't put them up to this picture.



Then, the next day we picked out a pumpkin

and then went to our church's Harvest Festival, where they had a bounce house without a bunch of big kids in it. So Lilia was able to go in a bounce house for the first time! It was so cool to see her warm up to the idea. She also played a ton of games and pretty much picked necklaces for every prize. She was very serious about the whole thing. :)


Where was Evan in all of this? Asleep in our wonderful Pikkolo carrier, of course. :) Or nursing or just looking around and taking it all in. Generally on the person taking the pictures. :(

Next post will be about the fair and we got several cute ones of him there. His personality is coming out so much and we all fall more in love with him every day. Especially these days.

Happy Fall. :)

***THIS JUST IN***

He rolls. :)