It was crazy (or silly, I can't remember) sock day at school. CC wore her magic moose socks from Alaska. Thanks Granddad and Grammy Roz!
a little blurry.
Henry figured out that he can turn the water to the bathtub on. I let him play with it until I got nervous about the utility bill.
My dad came over and watched Henry so Brian and I could go on a date. B brought bagels, we stopped for coffee and we were of to shoot all of the guns! We will categorize this as a 'for Brian' date.
CC has had a loose tooth for months that finally came out:
This picture is after she was happier about it.
Initially, she was a little traumatized.
And we went to family night/breakfast for dinner/pajama party with our small group. We haven't really been able to attend since Henry was born, so family nights are good to reconnect. You know what picture I have? The meat muffins (eggs, turkey sausage, and cheese) I made!
Sometimes your baby wrestles you for an hour before going to sleep. And you want to eat an entire tray of brownies, but you are trying to be healthy...so you put m&ms on Greek yogurt.
Maybe should've taken a pic before I scarfed it down.
(I started this post two weeks ago - must be more disciplined about the blog posting.)
Well, not a promotion in the conventional sense of the word. But this one's been a long time coming. Or it feels that way. Ready for it? On July 11th, I bit the bullet and resigned from my full time job. So, my promotion is home to be with my kiddos.
These are the ones.
For a while now (since March at least), Brian and I have been looking at options that would allow me to work less and be home more. We kept having conversations wherein one of us would say, "we can't keep up this pace." or "we don't have any time margin." but we couldn't find a work situation that made sense to us.
When we just had C.C., it was hard for me to be gone from her and I often felt like my time with her was not enough. Adding in Henry has multiplied that feeling. I know there are plenty of women who work full time - I've told myself this several times throughout the past seven or eight months. I've tried to tell myself to buck up and look at the positive - my current job is only four days a week and it is a job that I can truly leave behind when I go home. But I kept longing for something different.
I believe that God has called me to be a mother - that it is my primary task and ministry to train the children in our home. Part of that will be foster care - we aren't done with that. The other part will be loving the children who are forever in our home.
Anyway, after a particularly rough night of sleep (or lack of), on a Thursday which is my last work day of the week, Brian and I put our heads together. In practice, we weren't playing to our strengths. On the days that Brian wasn't working, he was at home with Henry and also trying to do housework. Meanwhile, I was at work wishing to be home. That day, we decided to take a hard look at the budget and see if we could make do without my income. Since you're reading this, you know that we did figure out something satisfactory to us. It's not without it's sacrifices, but I think it will ultimately work better for our family.
So, here I am, in my last few days of full-time work (for the foreseeable future) excited to shift gears into my other job. For now, I'm going to be working one long shift a week and running the house the rest of the time. I am not naive enough to believe that I'm choosing something easy - it's just a different hard.
Imagine with me if you will...I'm giving the kids a bath. The same one I posted about on Saturday (yep, no baths since then). I'm combing conditioner through CC's hair and trying to keep an eye on Henry so he doesn't flop over.
We'd had a little discipline earlier and always after a consequence, we say "when do I love you?" To which CC knows to respond, "all the time." I'm thinking that's what got her on the following train of thought:
CC: Mom, you love my body.
Me: Yes, I love all of you.
CC: You love my privates?
Me: (feeling like this is a weird question, but not wanting to be shaming) Sure, honey, God made your privates.
CC: Does God have privates?
Me: ...
Oh the joy and entertainment of such an inquisitive little mind. I can't remember exactly what I said - - maybe something about God not being a person. How would you have answered?
Today started with Henry wiggling and fussing a little before six. Brian got up a little bit after that and started getting ready for work.
We had a later night than normal on Friday, so I was hoping that both kids would sleep a little longer. With some prayer, and a good bit of patting on his back, Henry went back to sleep. Except for a brief nursing interlude (in the bed with me) around 7:45, he slept until 8:30. Yay for glorious sleep!
CC was stirring by then too. She had spent the last two days with her cousins Carter and Ella, so she had to catch up on some sleep.
Once everyone was dressed and had breakfast, we headed to the gym. I'm grateful that both kids do great in childcare at the gym. I did some ab work, 2 miles on the treadmill and then 20 minutes on the elliptical. This was followed by some much needed foam rolling - it hurts so good.
Brian met us at the gym in his work SUV and we all went to Starbucks.
Ever get a glimpse of what your kids might look like when they're older?
Henry fell asleep in the car on the way to the grocery store, so we stopped off at the bank/ATM to make his nap last a little longer (call me super mom). After feeding him in the car (who knows how many parking lots this kid has nursed in), we hit the grocery store where Henry sat like a big boy in the cart for the first time:
His expression cracks me up! My friend, Marta, gave us a nice cart cover, but in my hurry to get to the gym before childcare closed, I left it at home. He did well through most of the store. Towards the end, he started leaning to one side.
We came home, unloaded groceries and had a late lunch. Henry and CC had whole wheat noodles with veggies and cheese. I had a wrap. We all split a couple of plums. In the past couple of days, we've been changing over to table food for Henry. I'm a fan - he is too.
This picture is not from today - it is for illustration purposes :)
After lunch, Henry napped (only took 15 minutes to go down!) while CC watched some Disney Jr. Brian commissioned me to make a training plan for him, so I did a little research, threw in some laundry, and made headway on a plan before H baby woke up. Both kids hung out in the bonus room with me while I finished up the plan,
Nursed Henry, then it was time for dinner. We ate salad and homemade pizza - I heart Trader Joe's whole wheat pizza dough. Henry had black beans, mozzarella, and some of my pizza crust.
The kids had another first tonight - their first bath together! Here's a little video that will hopefully not embarrass them forever.
Post bath it was lotion, pjs, a book and bed. Yay.
Our June was largely dominated by track. Knoxville Youth Athletics runs a developmental track league every summer. When I heard about it last year some time, I was excited. I wish I had come to enjoy running earlier in my life - or that someone had introduced it to me in a non-threatening way. This summer, we signed CC right up.
We want her to try lots of activities and see what she likes.
We had practices twice a week every week in June. There were also track meets every Saturday from 8:30 to noon. Pretty time intensive for a five year old - we kept telling ourselves "it's only June."
Track meets were loooong and often hot. We brought a sportbrella for shade and a blanket so Henry wasn't in the stroller the whole time. There was a lot of this:
When all else fails to entertain - take selfies.
And a little of this:
Lining up for the 50m dash
The program was good about gratification - CC got a ribbon for every event she participated in.
The most exciting event for us was the 4x100. The first week, CC was on a team with her cousin, Amari, their friend, Audrey, and another little girl - they got 2nd place. Weeks two and three, they got 3rd then 4th place. Finally, in the last track meet, their team won! Look in awe at the blue ribbon bling:
CC, her cousin Amari, their friend, Audrey, and another little girl who's name I can't remember (oops)
Overall, I'd call it a positive experience. The only real negative for me was the time commitment. CC seemed to have a great time and loved "track days." We shall see if she wants to do it next year.
Henry officially turned 7 months old yesterday. It's been 7 months since I had him. Seven. months. Time is flying by me.
This month, Henry got two more teeth. As it stands right now, he's got his two central incisors and one lateral incisor on the bottom. And he's got two lateral incisors on top. And yes, I did look up dental terminology before writing this post :) One of his central incisors (front teeth) is finally breaking the surface. But for now, we get a hilarious little baby vampire grin:
Bottom teeth.
Henry has also started solids with gusto. In addition to pureed foods, we started letting him eat Baby MumMums while we were getting ready for dinner. He's had some beans too - and cheerios:
Any excuse to post this picture.
He is sitting very well unassisted and loves to stand with help. He
gets a kick out of playing peek-a-boo while we are getting ready for
bed. I'll give him his sleeper while I'm changing his diaper and he'll
put it over his face while I say, "where's Henry?" until he pulls it off
and I say, "there you are!" He giggles and kicks his feet. Henry is
such a happy little guy - we are daily delighted by his emerging
personality.
He hasn't been weighed since his 6 month doctor visit - then he was 18lbs 6oz. Any guesses on his current weight? I can tell he's growing by how long and big he is when I'm trying to nurse him.
I can also tell how much more alert and inquisitive he is. Everything seems to be more interesting than nursing. My friend, Marta, told me that at some point on the breastfeeding journey, I would get a little finger up my nose. That was this month - but it came with the rest of his hand. He likes to pat my face and grab my nose, or lips, or handfuls of my cheek.
Here's Henry at two months (for comparison):
And at seven months:
The only time our happy guy seems to get cross is when we try to put him to bed - especially for a nap. He does. not. want. to. - or he wants to nap while being held and rocked - a pattern we are guilty of creating. So we are in the process of helping him to go to sleep in his bed. No fun, but for a kid who is happy the rest of the time, I'll take it.
Current nicknames:
Teagan calls him: Henry Benry, H Baby, HB
Brian calls him: Biggie Smalls, Big Man
my sister, Tiffany, calls him: Jackpot, Hanky J
I'll wrap up with two pics that were too cute not to include:
Well, hello there. I didn't realize you had a camera.
About once a week, we walk to the playground in our neighborhood after dinner. It's good for that not-quite-bedtime block of time.
CC usually hits the swings, slides a few times, slides down the "fireman pole" a couple of times, and always somewhere in there tries to or three rungs of the monkey bars. She has been too scared to go beyond where she can still reach the platform.
A week or two ago, she decided to go all the way! Here's video evidence:
When we were walking home, I was goofy tear-eyed proud of her. I told her that she was getting to be a big kid and I'm just not sure how I feel about that. She responded by saying, "I'm going to be a grown-up soon, mom." Apparently, all it takes to be a grown up is conquering the monkey bars - I still haven't.
It's been over two years since my last blog post. Yeah. Like it probably does for anyone over the course of two years, a lot has changed in my life.
Where to start? By God's grace I continued to lose weight - until I started looking like this:
We welcomed our beautiful daughter into our home in July of 2011:
I kept running and even completed a half marathon:
Around April 2012, we got a little surprise:
This ultrasound is actually from September :)
September 17, 2012 CC's adoption was finalized:
And November 28th we welcomed Henry into the world:
In the past 6-7 months, we've been learning to be busy family of four.
Now that I've caught up, I hope to blog at least weekly. Mostly because I have a terrible memory and I want to be able to document our life as a family. Here we go!
(Really, I don't know anybody who's reading this who doesn't already know the above details and then some. But there needed to be some catching up - so there you have it)
