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Sunday, June 30, 2013

And we've entered...

...the phase of WHY?

"Whatcha say ________ for?"
"What's dat?"
"Why you go dat way?"
"Whatcha doin' mama?"
"Why _____?"

It crept up very slowly and this week I began to realize we're there. It was probably when I was trying to get us out of the house, Olivia spit up all over me, her, and the floor. The phone rang. All as Lauren followed in toe asking why I was doing everything I was doing and why I said everything I was saying and asking who was on the phone etc. Looking back I laugh and smile at her sweetness and inquisitive nature- but in the moment my response was "Lauren Shea, if we ever want to get out of this house, mommy can't keep explaining everything going on. We're already late." Oh my poor baby.

Am I the only mom that feels like one minute my stuff is together and all my little ducks are in a row and then all I have to do is blink, sneeze, or even have that thought and then BAM! pure chaos happens an instant later? This whole week felt like that movie Groundhog Day- and the scene depicted above just kept replaying over and over. It was a busy week and I'm looking forward to the slower one that lay ahead of us.

After a busy week though, my weekend was next to near perfect. Matt and Lauren took a daddy-daughter trip to the pool Friday night after dinner, while Olivia stayed home and chilled with me. Then Saturday after our pancake breakfast Lauren, Olivia, and Matt headed out to Home Depot, Lowe's, and to one of our favorite restaurants to get lunch and a sweet ice cream treat. Mommy got some well needed down time at home. I took that time to start planning out our school for this fall. We're doing the alphabet, one letter a week. We also have one bible story a week too. But more to come on that later. Once everyone got home it was pretty much nap time, so I got even more down time and then we just played around the house all evening. 

Sunday was laid back. We enjoyed going to church, where Lauren spent her first Sunday in Sunday School- with the big kids! I'm so happy for her and she did a great job. During the summer they just have a "one" classroom set up, since it's so touch and go with the number of children in town on any given Sunday. So it was her and two other kids- both school age and she did wonderful. She was so proud of the craft she made of Jesus walking on water. She hung it up on the fridge as soon as we got home. Gotta love that girl. Looking forward to her being in the preschool room this fall!

We all took a nice afternoon nap after lunch and then enjoyed dinner and a trip to the pool. The dark rain clouds chased us home sooner than we'd hoped but it was a wonderful ending to a wonderful weekend. Isn't that what the weekend is for? Taking us from exhausted and tattered to rested and whole? Although I volunteered in the nursery today and missed the sermon- I still feel like going to church, focusing on God, and being around "family" helps to center me and prepare me for the week ahead. 

Ready to enjoy a slow week, that has a wonderful holiday in it. Matt has July 4th off work so it will be so nice to spend an extra day with daddy. We've got plans to go to a local farm/park and enjoy an "Ol' Fashion" 4th of July celebration. Then this Friday evening our church is holding it's first Family Night- which will be game night with a Ice Cream Sunday bar. Oh so much fun ahead!


 Look at this cutie!!
 And this one too!!
 Olivia Love
Lauren being funny, dressed up in daddy's blue shirt (her favorite).

"I have been crucified with Christ and I no longer live, but Christ lives in me. The life I now live in the body, I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me." Galatians 2:20

Monday, June 24, 2013

Suburban Camping

We were FINALLY able to set up camp, and enjoy the outdoors. The outdoors being our backyard! We've been talking about camping in our backyard since last fall. This spring it was on our must do list. Well, the springtime always fills up fast and to top it off this spring has been very rainy. So this past weekend was the first time our schedules and the weather (sort of) aligned to allow us to pitch the tent, throw some logs in the fire pit, and pull out the s'mores. 


 While the girls enjoyed an afternoon nap we set up the ol' tent. It had been some time since we had this baby out. But it didn't take us long.

 I got the all important s'mores tray read to go.

All the sleeping gear ready to head outside.

 Then it was time for dinner. And this is where the weather got bothersome. It had be nice and sunny all day. Then late afternoon, and into early evening it just started to drizzle. I was so bummed, but Matt kept a positive attitude and said it would slow up. I was addicted to checking the radar on weather.com. It did slow up and eventually stop. But we had to take our picnic dinner inside.

 We all enjoyed corn on the cob- such a summer food! Lauren got right into it with us.

Olivia was excited too!

 Little story behind this chair. Matt bought it way back when we were dating and we use to go camping. Now he only bought one, so it was always a game to see how got the "good" chair. I dubbed it the "Queen Bee" chair and declared it mine- just cause I'm goofy like that. Well when I pulled the ol' tattered chair out of the shed, to what did my surprised eyes see- a dead bumble bee- lol. I couldn't wait to tell Matt- who was giving the girls a bath. The bee is the brown blob dot in the middle of the seat.

 After dinner and bath the tent was all set up and Lauren enjoyed playing around inside. She loved her bed and how it had the little pouch next to it.

 Olivia enjoyed it too. Especially when Lauren was bouncing around on the air mattress  causing her to bounce around too.

 Bouncy baby!

Sister Love! Excited for camping.

 Lauren watched as Matt got the fire going.

 Check out our campsite, and notice the house in the background.

 Loved putting my feet up and breathing in the lovely campfire smell! (Campfire smell is by far one of my favorite aromas)

Lauren chomping down on her first ever S'more and toasted marshmallow for that matter. She loved them. 

It was such a fun experience to watch her enjoy all these things for the first time. We called it our practice run, since we'll be camping- at an actual campground- this fall with my sister and her family. We're skipping the tent part and we rented a "rustic cabin" since that will just make life that much easier. 

She had so much fun, but she wasn't into 'watching the fire' with us. She asked to go to bed around 9:30 so we read a book and said prayers out at the fire and then daddy tucked her in. Olivia was already fast asleep in the pack-n-play and slept like she was in the house- even slept through Lauren playing/sleeping for over an hour while Matt and I enjoyed the fire for a little longer. By the time we snuggled in it was past 11 and Lauren was still joyfully playing in her 'bed.' We're pretty sure we both fell fast asleep before her. 

The rain picked back up sometime after that, and we enjoyed the pitter-patter of the raindrops on the tent as we periodically awoke in the night. At around 4:30 Lauren crawled onto the air mattress with us since she was getting wet. Matt had gotten a few drops on him as well- guess we'll have to put some waterproofing spray on the tent before we use it again. 

Sunday morning had us all up by 6:30-7. We headed to church and Sunday School before heading home to relax in the air conditioning. We waited until Sunday night to take everything down- no where near as fun as setting it all up. We're very glad we got this one in and plan on doing it again in the fall when the weather cools back down.

"You will eat the fruit of your labor; blessings and prosperity will be yours." Psalm 128:2

Thursday, June 20, 2013

A Dash of this, A Sprinkle of that

So the busyness I know as our life just keeps going. Summer is always filled with lots of stuff to do and that's the way we like it. This week has been no exception. So today we are tired and sleepy. I managed to clean up the kitchen before needing to sit down and take a rest while I can- since both girls are currently napping.

This past weekend I had the joy of making some dinners for Esther and family, since her little baby boy was born three weeks early! I told her she hangs around me too much and look what happened. It was funny sitting at her house yesterday as we chatted about Evan, love the name, and how yesterday was her due date- and there he was just chilling in his bouncy seat, sleeping away. They are such wonderful friends! 

Matt spent the majority of Saturday doing yard work, while I spent it cooking. I made her a freezer meal, and made us two of the same. Then I also made a meal ready to eat that night, which I did the same meal for us that night too- mighty convenient. Both Matt and I were pretty tired after all that so we enjoyed a movie night to help us wind down. We watched Dumbo- um not sure what to think of this movie. It had been ages since Matt or I had seen it. It starts out okay but gets weird towards the end and goes off plot for a good twenty minutes. Lauren seemed to enjoy the better part of it before she started getting restless and ready for bed.

Sunday was a wonderful day. We started going back to Sunday School that morning. We had taken a short break since Olivia was born- some Sunday's getting to church and home was more than enough for us. But now we've got a better handle on this family of four thing, so we're back. We also enjoyed celebrating what a great dad Matt is.  He got to pick out dinner and a desert so after everyone, including Matt, enjoyed a nice afternoon nap I went to work on making my first pound cake. It turned out pretty well and so we got to enjoy a yummy Taco Salad and Strawberry Shortcake after we got back from swimming at the pool. Yeah- you heard me swimming! We are very excited this year to have a membership at a local pool. I saved my "Brooke Pennies" and now we get to beat the heat in the water this summer. Sunday was the first chance we were able to make it and we had such a nice time. I know we will enjoy it all summer long!

Monday was filled with chores and Tuesday with errands. Wednesday we made cookies for Esther (didn't get around to them on Saturday like I had hoped) and then headed to the library and a new park to take a walk. It was such a wonderful day- not too hot, not too cold, and not humid! After our nature walk, it was off to Esther's for a wonderful play-date. We missed out on one last week, since poor Olivia came down with Pink Eye. Yup, your read that right. My four and a half month old got Pink Eye. I have no idea where she got it. The only way I can think of her coming into contact with it was last week Wednesday we had her four month check up, so maybe at the doctor's office? Other than that, she didn't come into contact with anyone who had it. Oh I spent the better half of last week doing laundry load after laundry load and using Lysol wipes like I was being paid to. Thankful it did not spread to anyone else, and the fact that it is so contagious made this a miraculous feet. 

Today Lauren asked to go for a walk again. I told her we could do one around our neighborhood. Well this brought us a nice blessing. On our way back home we happened to run into a neighbor. We had met her like a year ago on a walk too. She had her boy and we had Lauren. We chatted briefly but hadn't seen her since. Today as we passed her house she was unloading her groceries. She had a new sweet 7 week old girl and I introduced sweet Olivia to her. This time I was sure to give her my email address so that we could meet up again. I'm so glad to have run into her again. She was telling me she works part-time so she's home during the daytime two days a week. Her kids will be in the same grade as both of our little ones, and they live right down the street. I loved having friends in my neighborhood growing up, and it will be nice for the girls to enjoy that too. Plus, knowing someone to sit with on the bus once they head off to school will be wonderful as well. It was such a blessing to run into her. Of course it was also the day I decided to leave the girls in their pj's and did nothing with Lauren's hair so they looked like a couple of rag-a-muffins but I'm sure she understood!

Oh well, not much else going on. Oh except for injuries. Well, sort of. You see two days ago it all started. I went to pick something up off the floor and didn't think past my nose- BAM hit my eyebrow on the corner of the nightstand. Then I hit my ankle on the corner of the TV stand door. Oh, I also ran into the corner of the table. And Lauren looks worse than me. She has like five mosquito bites the size of a half dollar on various parts of her body- and a deep black and blue mark on her arm not sure where she got that. Today she slipped on a wet floor and hit her head and butt. Then coming in from the pool she turned around and rammed her head into the door lock thingy on our fence. I think I need to wrap the both of us in bubble wrap and call it a day...lol. Yup, a bunch of beat up crazy ladies here. At least Olivia is looking healthy- now that her eye is all better. 

Tis' the days of our lives!! This recipe God is cooking up sure is a good one! Making sure I thank him for all the blessings, even sometimes the bruises. 

"Look to the Lord and his strength; seek his face always." 1 Chronicles 16:11

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Cloth Diapering 102 - Remediation

So I recently wrote a post about my excitement with using cloth diapers on my second little girl. I'm writing an update since I've learned some more since getting underway.

I mentioned in that post that I did not start using cloth diapers with my older daughter, Lauren, until after I started staying home, so she was about 7 or so months old. So diapering Olivia starting at around 3 and a half months was new territory for me, even though I had used them before. So here's what I've learned so far...

*Baby poop, from a breastfed baby, is water soluble and disappears in the wash. This is amazing to me. There is no need to purchase the sprayer,  something I never did, since you toss them in the wash and they're as good as new once the wash is done.

*You need more diapers with a little one, then with an older child. I have 24 diapers but it's not enough. With Lauren I was able to do a wash load every other day and have 4-6 diapers left over while the dirty ones were being washed. If I wait to do wash at the end of day two now, I'm left with maybe 2-3 diaper for the next day. This is not cool, since I don't want to be rushed the next morning to get those diapers stuffed and ready to go. Plus, this time around I'm enjoying hanging them on the clothesline outside- adding extra time to the process (mind you I 100% recommend doing this so keep reading to find out why). So I've had to add to my stash. I just purchased 7 more diapers. I was going to do it before vacation but after talking to Matt, decided to wait. Well God throw in another life lesson here, I feel like he's always doing this to me. You wouldn't think that one week would make a difference but it did! They just added new colors to the One Size Elite FuzziBunz. The switch must have happened last week some time. Well they got rid of the bright pink color I really wanted to get- Crushed Berry. I was really good about getting the "gender neutral" packages with Lauren, but this time I really want to put my little girl in some girly colors. So I had decided I would get all girl colors this time. If I end up with a boy next go-round then I just have to worry about that then. So when I went online to purchase them I wasn't finding the Crushed Berry on any of the retailers I had scoped out before vacation. I even called the retailer nearest me to see if they had any, which of course they didn't. So you're probably wondering where the Godly lesson is. Well in my desire to find pink I started clicking on a bunch more retailers they list on the FuzziBunz website, in doing this I found a retailer who was selling them at $17.95, instead of $19.95 like everywhere else I looked. Plus, they were still offering the 50 cents off per diaper if you purchased six or more. Plus, they had all the colors I wanted and free shipping!  I ended up getting 7 diapers instead of the 6 I intended on purchasing. All girl colors - 4 Crushed Berry, 2 Cotton Candy, 1 Grape. And it only cost me an extra $6 to get the 7th diaper, compared with other retailers. I'm hoping that this will give me just enough to keep me only doing laundry every two days and giving me a few to have on hand and in the diaper bag ready to go. What a blessing it was. Amen for listening to hubby.

*If you don't have a clothesline or a drying rack- get yourself one! I didn't when I cloth diapered Lauren, and man did I make a rookie error there. First, the big bonus to line drying them is that you're not running the dryer, saving money right there. Second, the sun bleaches them making the inserts a more brilliant white, and killing any bacteria that might still be there. Third, they smell like a warm spring day when you take them down. Now I don't want to gross you out but when I dry them in the dryer I give each insert a quick sniff test before stuffing it to make sure that it was indeed fully clean. I would occasionally have to rewash some with Lauren because it would still have that pee smell. Now I have yet to find one insert that hasn't smelled fresh off the line. This might be because Olivia's pee isn't as strong since she's still just a breastfed baby, we'll have to see on that one. But hands down line drying is better!

Those are the three things I've really noticed different this time around. I'll be sure to update if anything else new arises. Until then, happy cloth diapering!

"My God will meet all your needs according to his glorious riches in Christ Jesus." Philippians 4:19

Just my sweet girl jumping around, she's getting so big.

Sandy feet and chlorine smelling hair...

Yes summer is here and we were blessed this year with a wonderful vacation at the beach with Matt's family. It was great seeing everyone, visiting, and sharing the girls with them. Lauren loved the beach even more this year than last and she was quiet the little fish swimming around in the pool. Olivia enjoyed the water as well, but enjoyed the beach mommy style with naps each time we went. Here's some of the hundreds of photos we took. So many wonderful memories made!

Lauren and daddy on our first day in the pool! 

Grandma and Olivia napping in the sun room. My favorite room in the house, enjoyed reading in there the most.

Family pool shot. Lauren enjoyed putting each and every float we had into the pool even if we weren't currently using them. 

Olivia floating around enjoying the yummy taste of her fingers.

We went to the beach for an evening walk; we didn't make it very far down the beach, because Lauren just started running into the water. The pure joy that came from her squeals is one of the memories I hope never leaves me.

Me and my girls- oh how I love them!


Olivia and I sitting pool side as Lauren and daddy enjoyed an evening dip. She's got so much personality at four months, I can't wait to see what's around the corner with this little one. 

Grandpa B and daddy helping Lauren bogie board!

Lauren at the top of the light house. She walked up all the steps (minus the last two flights) all by herself. Daddy and her enjoyed the view as mommy and Olivia waited at the bottom. Matt said she showed no sign of fear, as mommy noticed when she was sticking her head between the slats to say hi to me.

If you look in the middle of the shadow you can see mommy and Olivia saying "Hi Baby! Be Careful!" from below as we watched Lauren and daddy.

Matt, Lauren and I enjoying the beach fun. Grandpa B, Daddy, and Uncle Chris built this really neat castle for Lauren.

Grandma and Olivia taking a siesta in the beach chair. 

We couldn't have asked for a better week weather wise and the house we stayed in was just beautiful. The pool, sunroom  and how our room shared a connecting bathroom with the girl's room really made the house awesome!  Matt got lots of naps in, while I read a whole book and Lauren played endlessly with her new Thomas the Train set Grandma brought along. Olivia loved that there was seemingly endless people to love on her each day. It was such a great vacation for me, since I only had to cook one night, and yet enjoyed a weeks worth of wonderful food. Matt and I got to get out for a date night too- even though we found ourselves talking mostly about the girls, it was nice to enjoy eating a dinner slowly and without interruptions. Plus, Grandma enjoyed putting the girls down, so we had more time to socialize and/or relax. The week seemed to go so fast. I was nervous Lauren wouldn't remember how to entertain herself and Olivia would want to be held 24/7 once we got back home because we're so not use to all the extra hands and help, but we've easily transitioned back to normal, everyday life just fine. Great memories and a good time with a wonderful family!

"Listen to your father, who gave you life, and do not despise your mother when she is old. Buy the truth and do not sell it- wisdom, instruction and insight as well. The father of a righteous child has great joy; a man who fathers a wise son rejoices in him. May your father and mother rejoice; may she who gave you birth be joyful" Proverbs 23: 22-25

Monday, June 3, 2013

Two Brownies and A second helping

Last week we enjoyed a fabulous vacation with Matt's family at the beach, and it was great. I think a little too great since my butt and gut seem to be dragging today. The vacation worked out perfect with me missing Zumba since there was a break between sessions the week of our vacation. So, being good girl I brought my running shoes, running watch, running clothes, and did a great job at NOT RUNNING! In fact, I didn't just not run, I indulged in yummy deserts, extra helpings, and lots of sitting on my butt (read a whole book, thank you very much)! 

This combination of things has made my first class back tonight a bit of a face slap. Or maybe more of a belly fat giggle. Oh, whatever I call it, it stinks. As I was salsaing, and doing my dance moves to the familiar music I felt like that second brownie was in my blood, still slowing me down. The whole time I was jumping and moving, I was thinking - did I really need the hot dog AND the hamburger AND the... you get the picture.

Oh, goodness. Don't have my pictures from vacation on the computer yet, so the fun picture post of all the greatness that was last week will have to wait for another day. But I'm as glad for the break as I'm glad to be back to moving and grooving to the music! Did I mention I've sworn off all sweets and treats for two weeks?! Pray for me to make it!?



"My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." Psalm 73:26