Category: Life

2 kids, 2 dogs, 2 cats, and 1 husband – life isn’t perfect, but it is what we make it

The End of Summer

Published by dee on September 19, 2012

I had to actually scroll back a couple pages to see when the last time I actually wrote something was – two months ago. I honestly have no idea how time moves so fast. I used to sit around wishing for the weekends to come and the weekdays would seem so long. Now I wish even the weekdays would slow down.

So, summer ended and the school year began. Zach is in 2nd grade this year and so far things are going really well. He has a male teacher, which I was a little worried about because he seems to have issues with male authority figures. He also happens to have a young female student teacher who will be with his class the entire year, so I think that is adding a buffer that has been very good for him. I haven’t heard any complaints so far, other than the basic “I don’t want to go to school because I want to stay home and watch TV” type of complaints.

Evie started preschool this year. She was very much ready for this change, even though I worried unnecessarily about the transition. She was slightly hesitant the first day when I dropped her off, but on the second day she ran off to play without even telling my good-bye. She is really enjoying it so far, although she did tell me that I take too long to come back.

Summer went by so fast that we didn’t get to do a lot of the fun things we had planned, but we did squeeze in a little more fun. We finally made it to the Missouri State Fair this year and the kids had a blast! They loved riding all of the rides and were so sad when it was time to leave.

We also made our yearly trip to the lake over Labor Day weekend. It was Caleb’s first trip to the lake with us and while he wasn’t a fan of his life jacket, he did seem to enjoy the boat rides and swimming in the lake. It rained the first day we were there, leaving the water quite chilly, but he didn’t seem to mind. He was having way too much fun splashing to care!

Caleb is growing and changing so fast. I’ll save the details for another post (coming soon! I promise!), but he has basically gone from sweet little baby who eats and sleeps to semi-mobile baby who wants to play, play, play! He does not want to sit still for any reason.

Life is moving to fast for me to sit back and reflect much these days. I’ve had some fantastic photo shoots with some beautiful families. I love photography more and more every day. Sadly, my own photos are sitting on my computer waiting to receive some love because I haven’t had the time to sort them the last couple months. I’m weeks behind on laundry and housework, but I’m spending every spare moment I have snuggling on my last baby before I blink my eyes and he is grown.

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Writing about not writing…or something

Published by dee on July 18, 2012

via Instagram http://instagr.am/p/NO139Ck-Re/

You know what I miss? The good old days of blogging before my life was crazy and chaotic. I’d sit down either in the evening or the beginning of the day and just write. It didn’t have to be anything important – just a few sentences here and there about what was on my mind. I didn’t know or care about page views or SEO. I had a handful of friends that read and commented and it didn’t matter because it was fun. I posted about the most mundane things that now I would only post on twitter or facebook.

These days I feel like most of what I have to say isn’t worthy of a blog post. There is no way I have the time to sit and type out my thoughts when I can barely even find the time to think them in the first place. So instead, I post a quick thought on Facebook (or Twitter if I’m really feeling the need for interaction). Most of those posts only go up because I have my iphone handy. My laptop sits dusty on the shelf at home. It was once my constant companion. Now it gets cracked open maybe once a week or so, sometimes less often than that.

Many of my old blog friends have stopped writing too. Their blogs sit stagnant. I miss their words. I miss the connections. I miss the conversations. I keep up with a few of them on facebook. I watch as their lives change, their babies grow older, and updates become fewer. I miss these friends, who were there for me when I shared the news of my first pregnancy, when I was going through difficult times, when I wanted to celebrate, when I “came out” and made my blog public. They were my community, my support, when I felt like I had no one else to turn to.

Times change. Lives change. I sit and look at my family, my three kids – when at one time I wasn’t sure I would be able to have children. The story of my life belongs in a completely different book now. My world revolves around those three amazing little people. I snap photos because I want to remember every second, every little smile, every giggle, but there is no time to write. I wish I could write it all down to read when I am older and my mind is losing the details, but life is moving too fast right now. I’m too busy living it.

This isn’t meant to be a good-bye post. I’m not closing up shop. Just something that has been on my mind the last few days.

(Since I’m not writing, I have added my Instagram feed to the blog to fill in some gaps. If it gets annoying to the few of you who are still reading, let me know.)

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Summer

Published by dee on July 2, 2012

Today kind of feels like the first day of summer for our family. Summer school is finally done for Zach. Evie and Caleb are done with day care for a while. For the first time ever, my kids actually get to know what it feels like to have a summer off and get to stay home. The idea of putting all three kids in full time day care for the summer nearly gave me a heart attack, so my awesome sister agreed to keep the kids for the rest of the summer. My in-laws are coming up to cover about a week and a half while my sister has other obligations, so that only leaves about a week at the end of the summer for us to figure out.

I’m not even sure when this became such a big deal to me. I mean, sure, it saves me some money in day care costs, but it isn’t just that. I’m genuinely excited that my kids get to be at home. They can sleep in, watch tv, play, and just enjoy being kids – all of the things I wish I could go back and do again. The only hard part is that I don’t get to be there to enjoy it with them. I find myself wishing, yet again, that I would have followed my own plan and continued to pursue becoming a school guidance counselor (I could never be a teacher!) so that I could have summers off too. I didn’t realize what I was giving up when I let my life change course.

I shouldn’t let myself do it, but I keep finding myself daydreaming about the things I could do with the kids if only I were home with them during the week. We can only cram so much into a weekend and I feel like they deserve so much more than I can give. Plus, splitting my time between 3 kids is way harder than splitting it between 2, especially when 1 of the 3 demands my attention the majority of the time. I feel like the older kids are really missing out right now and it just plain sucks.

In order to combat my feelings of inadequacy, we came up with a summer bucket list of sorts of all the fun family activities we want to do…that I now have to also cram into the already full weekends. Instead of taking the time to clean my house, do laundry, and grocery shop on the weekends, I’m taking time out to be with my kids and do something fun with them. I need it just as much as they do. So if you come to my house and can’t walk through the living room? I’m sorry. We’re going to be too busy applying sunscreen, playing in the water, going camping, picnicking, having water balloon fights, and hanging out at the lake to clean it up.

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Seven

Published by dee on June 26, 2012

Zach turns seven today and for some reason I am a mopey mess of emotions about it. My BABY is SEVEN! I’m blaming this crazy emotional state of mine on the residual hormone changes from birthing my last baby (who is already 4 months old!) and the fact that said baby is practically a little mini-me of Zach. The personalities are different, but my two boys look so very much alike that it is hard to look at Caleb and not think about sitting and holding Zach as an infant. Looking at the two of them just reinforces how quickly it all goes by. He may be turning seven today, but I’m pretty sure when I blink my eyes he’ll be 18 and moving away from home. Although, he has assured me that when he moves out he’ll just buy the house next to mine or maybe across the street so he can still come visit a lot. I suppose I can live with that.

Since his party isn’t until Saturday and Daddy won’t be home tonight, we decided to celebrate a little bit last night. We took him out for the dinner of his choice (which ended up being McDonald’s), had ice cream for dessert, and then let him open his birthday gifts from the family.

I’d say he is pretty happy with his gifts. He would have been even happier if I would have let him stay up all night and finish building his new Legos, but even 7-year-olds need their sleep.

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10 Years

Published by dee on June 8, 2012

Just a little over 11 years ago, I bumped into a man on a dance floor. We danced and talked the rest of the night.

10 years ago today I married that man.

He has given me the three most precious gifts I could ever receive.

Sometimes I wonder how we have made it this long, but then I realize I can’t imagine my life without him. That’s really all I need to know.

For our 10 year anniversary, I wanted to plan a weekend getaway. We never had a honeymoon and I can’t remember the last time we spent a weekend without kids. I started saving a little here and there when I could, but God had a little surprise for us. Instead of a trip we had a baby. With him, our family feels so complete. Who knows? Maybe we’ll take that trip for our 15th or 20th anniversary. Honestly, I can’t think of a better way to spend our anniversary than with this amazing little family that we have created.

Happy Anniversary, honey. Thank you for an amazing 10 years. I love you.

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In A Blink

Published by dee on May 24, 2012

I keep finding myself thinking back to when Zach was a baby. Looking back now, it seems like life was so simple then. My world completely revolved around him. There were no other distractions. There was plenty of time to sit and cuddle and get totally lost in his sweet little baby face.

With Caleb being baby number three, I feel like I so rarely get that time to just sit and enjoy his babyness. I feel like I blinked my eyes and BOOM! He’s three months old already. He’s growing and changing so fast.

The mommy guilt? Oh man, is it ever setting in. While I’m trying to savor every minute I can with Caleb, I feel like I’m totally ignoring the other two kids. I see the behaviors coming out and the begging for attention. It is impossible with the limited time we have together at home to give everyone all of the attention they need. The hardest part is when I am feeding the baby and cannot help the other two with what they are needing in that moment. Not to mention the husband who has been feeling totally neglected since the baby arrived.

On top of trying to juggle the new baby while sticking as close as possible to our normal routine, I’m trying to get my little photography business rolling again. Just as it was gaining momentum I had to take a break (due to being massively pregnant)…that turned into about 6 months. Winter would have been slow anyway, but not taking on clients for 6 months was kind of a killer. What that time did give me though, was a lot of time to think through what I am doing and make some changes. I’m now getting a bit of a do-over, or fresh start, and hope to make things better this time around. (Speaking of which, have you seen my gorgeous new logo?) This all takes time though, so I find myself having to choose between the business I want to grow, my family, and sleep. Guess which one loses out?

If you guessed sleep, you would be correct. Fortunately, once I do get to bed I can actually sleep. I just don’t get enough hours in. Caleb is still sleeping through the night, which is a true blessing. He usually snoozes off and on after about 8:00, zonks out completely around 10:00 or 11:00, and then sleeps solid until at least 6:00, sometimes later. Then he nurses and goes right back to sleep. I can deal with that. It does make it hard for me to get up though, because after that 6am nursing session I like to snuggle in bed with him instead of getting up and starting my day.

So, let’s get back to why I originally started this blog post and talk about how awesome my sweet baby Caleb is, shall we?

Caleb turned 3 months old on Saturday and celebrated this amazing feat by rolling over for the first time. He had been working on it for several days with no success. Saturday night he was a little restless so I put him down in the floor on a blanket and sat down to play with him for a bit. He kept trying to twist his body and finally, after several attempts, he made it all the way over from his back to his tummy. After I helped get his arm out from underneath him, he was quite proud of himself and had a huge smile on his face. I cheered and even clapped for him until I realized that I could no longer leave him on the bed by himself.

He has also discovered that he has hands and feet that he can control. He found his hands a while ago, but the feet are a pretty new discovery. Whenever he sits up in the Bumbo or another chair, he will stick his feet up in the air and stare as he wiggles them around.

Over the last couple of days he has also discovered that he has a thumb that moves independently from the rest of his hand. And that he can stick said thumb in his mouth and suck on it. He has taken a pacifier from day one, but suddenly he is spitting it out in favor of the thumb. I’ve never had a thumb sucker before and I’m not sure whether I want to try to stop it now or have to deal with breaking the habit later. He’s pretty intent on having it in his mouth right now. He has sucked that thumb so much today that the tip of it is bright red. I guess he had to throw something new at me though, seeing as he’s nearly perfect in every other way.

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