Sunday, June 5, 2011
Kate's Dance Recital
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
Swim Lessons
Kate and Clark have been taking swim lessons from my sister Heather for the month of May. I am so happy with how much they have progressed and how they are ready for the summer! Now I get to just have fun and play with them in the water and practice what they've learned. Thanks Heather!
Three Months Old Today
Every day we sing a little song to Charly (that I stole from my sister Bridgett) that goes like this;"Hello Charly, how are you?
Hello Charly, what you gonna do?
Hello Charly, I love you,
You are three months old today."
And of course we change the last line as she gets older and older.
Three months is the phase where you finally feel like, ' I can do this'. You get more sleep at night, you're starting to figure out a schedule and best of all your baby can see you and smiles when she sees your face. I must say I am able to just sit and enjoy Charly so much more than I was able to with Kate and Clark. With them it was purely survival. It truly is amazing the love you feel for your child- it's something that you can not express in words.
Charly is our chubby girl. Every where we go people comment on her cute chubbiness and how they just want to squeeze it! (and I do!) Most of all are her cheeks. They are so heavy they just hang off her face! She has a very sweet personality and doesn't like it when Kate or Clark cry or when I yell at them. (Which is more frequent than I'd like to admit) She loves to lay on her play mat and just in the passed few days will fuss when I'm holding her and will stop as soon as I lay her on the mat. She hates the car seat and cries as soon as I put her in it. Unfortunately with swim lessons, she's been in the car a lot! She loves her Daddy and wants him to take care of her when he is home.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Catching Up
Blogging has been on the back of my mind for weeks now, and as more time passes, it gets harder and harder to sit down and catch up on all the things I've missed. Sometimes I feel like it's this daunting task that gets bigger and bigger the longer I put it off. And to make matters worse, our internet has been very temper-mental for 2 weeks and sometimes its up and when I want to get on and use it- it's down. So here's my attempt to catch up for the things I've missed.
First was Easter. Sadly I didn't take pictures. I've been really bad about that lately. I take it with me, but I end up holding a baby the whole time and don't get a chance to take pictures. We went to my parents house for dinner and an egg hunt. The kids made out like bandits. Easter morning we did something a little different this year. I had the kids decorate their own egg carton with paper, stickers ect. and Ryan and I filled 12 eggs with candy and put them in their carton. It has worked out really well, the candy just emptied into carton and I can just close the lid and put it up somewhere, instead of having a basket out for weeks on end. We really didn't talk much about the easter bunny, as it really bothers me. I just feel that it is ridiculous for kids to think Easter is about a bunny and not about Christ. I mean Christ's Atonement and Resurrection is the MOST important thing that has happened on earth and we mask celebrating it with a bunny? Really? I know, I'm a kill joy, but I feel it is against my knowledge and testimony to teach my kids that Easter is about candy and a bunny. So I'll have to find that delicate balance, so that I don't ruin Santa and all that too.
Second was Charly's two month. She had her 2 month check up with Dr. Hayden and unfortunately had to get shots. (Yes, we believe in vaccines) She weighed 12lbs 13oz and was 21 inches long. She is starting to get fun. Now that she is a little chub, it's fun to hold her because you can squeeze a little bit. She is also smiling and cooing. I have tried numerous times to get a picture of her smiling, but whenever I get the camera out- she looks at the camera and not me, and gets a very serious face. Hopefully soon. She is doing pretty good at night too. She usually takes one 6 hour, eats and then goes another 4. Sometimes she goes 8 hours and Sunday night she went 9 and 1/2 hours! She is her own person and has her own schedule. She is usually awake most of the day and only cat naps- but if that means she'll sleep at night- I'll take it!
Third is my 30th Birthday! Yes, last Friday the 29th I turned 30. It really was a great day. Charly slept 8 hours the night before- so I felt rested. Ryan got the Tahoe detailed for me, something that has needed to be done for along time. I usually wash it twice a month myself, but since Charly was born, I haven't done anything. After a trip to Fathers and Sons, and 2 months of crumbs, it was pretty nasty! I also started my first day of 'Insanity' that Ryan got me for my birthday. (if you don't know what insanity is, just look for the infomercial late at night. It's a workout video program.) I've really been trying hard to loose the last few lbs from having a baby, and wanted some new workout videos to help me out. Which by the way, they are really hard and kick my butt.
Ryan also took me out to dinner to the Keg and then gave me money to go shopping with. So for the remainder of our date, I got to buy myself some new clothes. So thanks to Auntie Jenny for babysitting all three kids for us!
Fourth and finally we got our roof re-done. It has been needing it for at least 2 years, and we finally decided we needed to just bite the bullet and get it done. It has truly been a blessing that we haven't had any leaks, but we didn't want to push our luck through another monsoon season.
So there you have it. All my catching up. Now if I can just stay on top of it........
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| Matching skirts Grandma Johnson made |
Second was Charly's two month. She had her 2 month check up with Dr. Hayden and unfortunately had to get shots. (Yes, we believe in vaccines) She weighed 12lbs 13oz and was 21 inches long. She is starting to get fun. Now that she is a little chub, it's fun to hold her because you can squeeze a little bit. She is also smiling and cooing. I have tried numerous times to get a picture of her smiling, but whenever I get the camera out- she looks at the camera and not me, and gets a very serious face. Hopefully soon. She is doing pretty good at night too. She usually takes one 6 hour, eats and then goes another 4. Sometimes she goes 8 hours and Sunday night she went 9 and 1/2 hours! She is her own person and has her own schedule. She is usually awake most of the day and only cat naps- but if that means she'll sleep at night- I'll take it! |
| Even my heart rate monitor wished me happy birthday! I had a little picture of a birthday cake all day. |
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| Before |
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| After |
So there you have it. All my catching up. Now if I can just stay on top of it........
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Charly's Blessing
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| Josh and Ellen Haws, our third family |
Sunday was Charly's baby blessing, and my first day back at church after a six week sabbatical. I tell you what, it's a good thing that church is at 1pm, because it took me all morning to get me and 3 kids ready! (Ryan leaves for meetings by about 10am, so he's no help!)
I won't give details of Charly's blessing here, but I will say that it was a beautiful blessing and I am grateful for a wonderful husband who gave the blessing.
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| The Haynes Family |
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| The Johnson Family |
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Charly's One Month
This post is a few days late- but everything seems to be that way right now! I can't believe it's been a month since Charly was born, but it gives me hope that we already have one month under our belt. Ryan and I have done a lot of talking to figure out what we can do to make life more manageable, and he has so graciously volunteered to help out with feeding at night. He will take Friday and Saturday night, so I can at least rest up on the weekends. I have decided to let go of breastfeeding and am "weaning" myself right now. Hopefully more sleep will ease some of the anxiety and I can go back to feeling "normal".
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| Here's Charly at one month |
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| This is Kate's one month- I think Charly looks almost exactly like Kate |
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| Here's Clark at one month- doesn't even look like him! |
Monday, March 21, 2011
Treading Water
My life the last few weeks has felt a bit like treading water with a 10 pound brick - at first it doesn't seem so bad, but as time goes by you get more and more tired and feel like you are drowning instead of treading water. There have been many moments over the last few weeks where I feel like I am on that delicate line between treading water and drowning. If it wasn't for my wonderful husband and good friends and family, I couldn't make it.
I'm going to take this post to vent about all the things I feel like I'm barely 'treading water' with, so feel free to skip to the end to see some updated pictures.
I didn't think that adding one more child to life would be that difficult, but it has totally turned my world upside down. For those of you who know me, you know that I like to live in a box. Everything has it's place and is organized and every day has routine. Of course with a new baby, there can be no box and no routine, and that has left me feeling insecure. There is no comfort zone. Although I love my little Charly, she has become more and more difficult as time goes by. She has become colicky, and when she is not eating, she wants to be held all the time. If I try to put her in the bouncy chair or swing, it's about 60 seconds before she starts screaming bloody murder. As soon as I pick her up- she's fine. She does take naps, but usually one is while I carry her in a baby bjorn backpack, one is in the car while we run errands and the other is on my bed. While she sleeps just fine at night in her crib, she doesn't like it so much during the day. So while most of my daytime hours are devoted to her- not much else gets done. My house is picked up, but not clean. ( Although Ryan spent all day Saturday cleaning the kitchen floors, the table and chairs and deep cleaning our bathroom. Thanks honey.) I know you are thinking- you just had a baby, who cares if you're house is dirty. But in reality it would drive you nuts too if your kitchen counter never got wiped down, there was toothpaste on the floor in the kids bathroom and your piles of mail, bills and laundry just kept getting bigger and bigger.
I think what is really hard for me, is with the first kid, it's totally normal for you to be a hermit for at least 6 weeks, never shower or do your hair and not run any errands. That's how it was with Kate and Clark. I lived in a cave for at least 3 months. I didn't even leave the house with them until they were 4 months old. The only time I ran errands was when some one came to my house to give me a break. This time around I got 2 weeks to be a hermit- that's it. Now I have to get back to all my regular duties, plus take care of a baby and all that without sleeping more than 2 consecutive hours at night. Plus I have 2 other kids who are starved for attention and act out in every way possible just to get some recognition. They totally have cabin fever, so thanks to Nana, Grandma and Bethany Minor for taking my kids for a few hours to get them out of the house.
Another issue is breast feeding. I was doing really well the first 2 weeks and then Charly was wanting to eat every 2 hours. Eating for an hour and sleeping for an hour all night long just does not work for me. I am a 8-9 hour sleeper and it's killing me to get about 5 1/2. So when she did that, and I only got 4 hours of sleep- something had to change. I started pumping to see how much milk i was making- to see how much she was really getting, and came to find out that I was totally inconsistent in my milk supply. So no wonder she was eating all the time. Once I started pumping, it was much easier to feed her with a bottle and much quicker too. So I thought I'd feed her with a bottle at night, because she would fall asleep on the boob, not get a full feeding and want to eat all night long, then I would nurse her during the day. Well that lasted about 2 days. She didn't want me anymore! After about 20 minutes, I'd switch sides and she would freak out. The milk would be spilling out into her mouth and she's scream. As soon as I put a bottle in her mouth- she was fine. UGH. So now I am just pumping and supplementing with formula ( because I'm still not making enough). So I want to just quit the breastmilk all together. I do not want to be tied to the pump like I was with Kate and Clark. However, now I have guilt associated with not pumping. One is the money issue- it's just one more thing we have to buy and two, I know that breastmilk is better for babies and I want to give the best to my baby.
All of these little issues just pile up to one big heap of anxiety. For those of you who know me, I have struggled with anxiety and depression in my life, but have learned to control it because I know what my triggers are. Well can you guess what my triggers are? Lack of sleep and lack of exercise which lead to bad body image. So since I cannot exercise and I'm not getting any sleep, the fact that I still have to wear pregnancy clothes creates lots of anxiety. And guess what I do when I'm anxious? I eat. That does nothing to help my situation, in fact it just makes it worse! So instead of loosing those last 10 lbs, I'm just adding more to it. I know it will eventually work itself out. In a few weeks I'll be able to exercise again, Charly will hopefully sleep more at night and I'll eventually be able to fit in my clothes again. Too bad I can't just be a hermit until that time!
So there you have it. If you actually took the time to read that whole thing- wow. You are a better person than I am. And for those who didn't- here's some updated pictures as promised.
I'm going to take this post to vent about all the things I feel like I'm barely 'treading water' with, so feel free to skip to the end to see some updated pictures.
I didn't think that adding one more child to life would be that difficult, but it has totally turned my world upside down. For those of you who know me, you know that I like to live in a box. Everything has it's place and is organized and every day has routine. Of course with a new baby, there can be no box and no routine, and that has left me feeling insecure. There is no comfort zone. Although I love my little Charly, she has become more and more difficult as time goes by. She has become colicky, and when she is not eating, she wants to be held all the time. If I try to put her in the bouncy chair or swing, it's about 60 seconds before she starts screaming bloody murder. As soon as I pick her up- she's fine. She does take naps, but usually one is while I carry her in a baby bjorn backpack, one is in the car while we run errands and the other is on my bed. While she sleeps just fine at night in her crib, she doesn't like it so much during the day. So while most of my daytime hours are devoted to her- not much else gets done. My house is picked up, but not clean. ( Although Ryan spent all day Saturday cleaning the kitchen floors, the table and chairs and deep cleaning our bathroom. Thanks honey.) I know you are thinking- you just had a baby, who cares if you're house is dirty. But in reality it would drive you nuts too if your kitchen counter never got wiped down, there was toothpaste on the floor in the kids bathroom and your piles of mail, bills and laundry just kept getting bigger and bigger.
I think what is really hard for me, is with the first kid, it's totally normal for you to be a hermit for at least 6 weeks, never shower or do your hair and not run any errands. That's how it was with Kate and Clark. I lived in a cave for at least 3 months. I didn't even leave the house with them until they were 4 months old. The only time I ran errands was when some one came to my house to give me a break. This time around I got 2 weeks to be a hermit- that's it. Now I have to get back to all my regular duties, plus take care of a baby and all that without sleeping more than 2 consecutive hours at night. Plus I have 2 other kids who are starved for attention and act out in every way possible just to get some recognition. They totally have cabin fever, so thanks to Nana, Grandma and Bethany Minor for taking my kids for a few hours to get them out of the house.
Another issue is breast feeding. I was doing really well the first 2 weeks and then Charly was wanting to eat every 2 hours. Eating for an hour and sleeping for an hour all night long just does not work for me. I am a 8-9 hour sleeper and it's killing me to get about 5 1/2. So when she did that, and I only got 4 hours of sleep- something had to change. I started pumping to see how much milk i was making- to see how much she was really getting, and came to find out that I was totally inconsistent in my milk supply. So no wonder she was eating all the time. Once I started pumping, it was much easier to feed her with a bottle and much quicker too. So I thought I'd feed her with a bottle at night, because she would fall asleep on the boob, not get a full feeding and want to eat all night long, then I would nurse her during the day. Well that lasted about 2 days. She didn't want me anymore! After about 20 minutes, I'd switch sides and she would freak out. The milk would be spilling out into her mouth and she's scream. As soon as I put a bottle in her mouth- she was fine. UGH. So now I am just pumping and supplementing with formula ( because I'm still not making enough). So I want to just quit the breastmilk all together. I do not want to be tied to the pump like I was with Kate and Clark. However, now I have guilt associated with not pumping. One is the money issue- it's just one more thing we have to buy and two, I know that breastmilk is better for babies and I want to give the best to my baby.
All of these little issues just pile up to one big heap of anxiety. For those of you who know me, I have struggled with anxiety and depression in my life, but have learned to control it because I know what my triggers are. Well can you guess what my triggers are? Lack of sleep and lack of exercise which lead to bad body image. So since I cannot exercise and I'm not getting any sleep, the fact that I still have to wear pregnancy clothes creates lots of anxiety. And guess what I do when I'm anxious? I eat. That does nothing to help my situation, in fact it just makes it worse! So instead of loosing those last 10 lbs, I'm just adding more to it. I know it will eventually work itself out. In a few weeks I'll be able to exercise again, Charly will hopefully sleep more at night and I'll eventually be able to fit in my clothes again. Too bad I can't just be a hermit until that time!
So there you have it. If you actually took the time to read that whole thing- wow. You are a better person than I am. And for those who didn't- here's some updated pictures as promised.
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| For the first 2 weeks we slept Charly in our room in the pack n'play. We keep it cold in our room, so we had to bundle her all up like this. |
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| Daddy's little girl |
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| Bath time! |
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| It's kinda hard to see, but she fell asleep with the pacifier and then spit it out. It flipped around and she is holding on to it with her hand |
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| She is already a thumb sucker! |
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| This was today- all dressed up to go to WalMart. |
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