four years

four years ago jeremy and i married each other. it was a joyous day...funny that the weather was very similar to this anniversary day four years later...some sun and some rain.

since that day, we have gone through a lot of life together. two of our parents have gone to be with jesus. we had two precious babies and have begun the adventure of parenting these two little ones together. we have lived in michigan and temporarily in california. we have gone through potential moves to other states and still find ourselves living in michigan. jeremy has graduated from seminary twice. i left my nursing job and began working as a full time mom. we have lost friendships and made new ones. we have been part of five different churches. we have experienced frustrations, joys, struggles, excitement...and life goes on.

i am so thankful to go through this life with jeremy as my husband. he is the person i most love spending time with, the one who understands me best, and the one who makes me laugh more than anyone. he also willingly does all of our laundry, washes most of our dishes, takes out the garbage, and is usually the one to do the vacuuming around here. he is also usually the one who initiates a resolution after we have a disagreement and he patiently puts up with my slowness to forgive. he is a wonderful daddy and brings so much fun and play into our home (i'll be honest...this mama is just not as fun as he is!).

jeremy so often shows me he loves me. yesterday was a perfect example of a creative thing he did that made me feel so loved and appreciated. he had a 7:15 am meeting and i was anxious about getting both kids up and fed on my own. i came downstairs to post-it notes scattered all over the house...

...on the way downstairs, "my grace, thanks for your hard work with the kids. i tried to make it a bit easier. just follow my notes. i'll be home soon. i love you!"

...on the kitchen counter next to two spoons and two bowls of cereal he prepared, "just pour the milk and eat! you're doing great!"

...in the fridge by a sippy cup he prepared for our girl, "juice for her! keep breathing!"

...on the kitchen counter next to a pot full of coffee he made and a mug he got out for me, "COFFEE!!! pour and be woken by my love and appreciation for you."

...next to the dirty dishes by the sink, "i'll do these dishes later! deep breaths...love you"

...a note stuck to the bathroom mirror, "you may not feel it, but you look good!"

...and even a note for our girl, "good morning sweetie! daddy will be home soon. i love you!"

such a practical, thoughtful, and supportive expression of his appreciation for me. and seriously...every little thing that is done in advance makes things easier when carrying a baby in one arm! i appreciate that jeremy takes the time to do these little (but big!) things to show me he loves me. really, i couldn't ask for more.

i'm so thankful for four years and look forward to many more!

a hot and humid day

it was in the high 90s and so humid today.

jeremy was working for a good part of the day, so the kids and i were home. right after jeremy left this morning, both kids were screaming. i could still see that jeremy was outside (someone picked him up and they were sitting in the car talking right in front of our house before they left), but he couldn't help me! it was time for a few deep breaths, and things quieted down shortly after that.

i successfully took both kids grocery shopping by myself for the first time. it was more complicated and took longer than it used to, but it went okay.

we spent some time in the backyard this afternoon. our girl swam in her kiddie pool and played with water balloons. i stuck my feet in the pool - the water was really cold and it definitely cooled me down a bit.

some friends brought us a delicious dinner tonight - it was so nice not to have to worry about dinner. dinnertime is always the craziest and most stressful part of the day, so having the meal delivered to our home is quite the treat!

tonight we did another round of cold showers before our girl went to bed and now jeremy and i are enjoying the air conditioning in our bedroom. we only have one chair in our room, so jeremy has brought his camping chair up here and has been sitting in that. it's so nice and cool in here it's hard to even leave the room to go to the bathroom! i'm so thankful for an air conditioned bedroom, especially since nursing a baby in this hot weather is more sticky and uncomfortable than fun. it says it's still 86 degrees outside right now, and it's still so humid. here's to hoping that the weather forecasts are correct and some cooler weather will come our way during the night.

reality

the reality is that our days are not always filled with peaceful time spent as a family, expressions of our love for each other, and reflections on how precious these days are. they are often full of two year old tantrums, a crying baby, and sometimes tension between us as we try to adjust to this new life as a family of four.

he's still pretty cute even when he's crying - don't you think?

today i gave my first time out while nursing the baby.

there were a lot of tears in our home...including a few of my own.

our floor was covered in toys for most of the day.

i just cannot keep up with laundry these days...as evidenced by the laundry which seems to be scattered all over our home.

my patience was challenged repeatedly today, and i didn't always respond in the way i should have.

it was really, really hot and humid today (still is!), which did not make anything easier.

but...here we are at the end of the day. jeremy and i are still talking to each other, and we even still love each other! we spent a fun evening with farm animals at church - our girl had so much fun! she also had her first snow cone, and she went to bed knowing that she is so very loved. i am cooled off after taking a cold shower and our boy is sleeping on me as i write. we are in our air conditioned bedroom, so i don't have to think about the heat. i know that despite the challenges of some days, i wouldn't trade this for a different life.

precious smile

oh my. this boy has stolen his mama's heart.

29!

i turned 29 on saturday. my birthday started as every day does at this stage of my life - groggily nursing a hungry little babe in the early hours of the morning. as i sat there, i found myself reflecing on this past year of my life. 28 was quite a year, with it's share of ups and downs. i don't want to spend too much time focusing on the downs, but the ups...oh, there were many of those...some of them i want to record here...

...experiencing the breathtaking beauty of big sur on our trip with jeremy's dad last summer.

 

...perfecting my honey sweetened lemonade iced tea drink. yum.

 ...whale watching, and seeing dolphins, sea lions, and seals in the wild. 

 ...falling more in love with jeremy as the year went on.

...our road trip home after a summer in california. 

...jeremy's birthday morning when i took a pregnancy test and was totally shocked when it was positive! and the look on jeremy's face when i asked him if he wanted his first birthday present, he said yes, and i pulled out the pregnancy test and showed him. what joy!

...spending each tuesday morning in study and fellowship with a wonderful group of girls who are also married to seminary students. so thankful for that support system in my life over this past year.

...the day we spent at an orchard as a family last fall. watching our girl carry around the baby goats

and hearing her talk about it for days afterwards.

...the murder mystery event we planned for our youth group.

...finding so much joy in watching our girl grow and being able to start having actual conversations with her.

...finding out we were going to have a baby boy! watching my belly grow and feeling his little kicks as he grew.

...a romantic cabin getaway with jeremy in january.

...making a rainbow cake with our girl for her second birthday.

...the everyday joy of watching our girl grow. introducing her to new things...ice cream bars, water balloons, sledding, snow angels, finger paints, amusement park rides, acorn collecting, and kiddie pools.

...seeing jeremy graduate from seminary.

 2 days before our little guy was born - very pregnant!

...reaching my goal of having a natural birth at home! my biggest life accomplishment to date (and potentially ever).

 ..seeing our little guy for the first time and then falling in love with him in the days that followed.

...introducing our girl to her baby brother.

...taking our girl on her first train ride.

...realizing how much i love being a mom - even more now that we have two.

 a year full of blessings, i would say!

my birthday celebration really began on friday evening. some kind friends from church ordered us a pizza and we had pizza, beer, and birthday cake for dinner. our girl was really excited about singing happy birthday to mommy, and of course, eating cake. on saturday morning, she eagerly wished me a happy birthday. i headed out for a haircut in the morning. it was a nice quiet hour of time to myself. 

it was a hot day, so after i got home, we decided to pack up and head to the beach. we stopped at panera for delicious strawberry poppyseed chicken salad (a favorite of mine!) and made our way to the lake. we had fun digging in the sand, wading in the water, and watching our girl play in the waves. a thunderstorm blew in about an hour after we got there, so we headed for home. we all had showers, read some books, and put our girl down for bed. after she was in bed, jeremy picked up indian takeout, we shared an order of yummy, but spicy, chicken tikka masala, had a glass of wine and some leftover birthday cake, and watched our show online. i even got a birthday back rub!

(lest you think the day was perfect...our girl had some digestive issues which ended up resulting in quite a bit of laundry, and our little guy was spitting up a lot - including twice straight down my shirt! that contributed to the laundry as well. by the end of the day, jeremy and i were quite ready for a break from poop, pee, and spit up, though we did agree that it made for quite the memorable day!)

ANYWAY...i am excited to be entering another year and am eager to experience this new year of life. i am so thankful for my life and the people in it. i am most thankful for God's grace that carries me through each day (especially as i adjust to mothering two little ones!), and for the assurance that he is with me always, through each year. here's to 29!

chugga chugga choo choo!

on wednesday, we took our girl on her very first train ride! she was so excited and we had so much fun with her. the historic ride was an hour and a half long...the perfect amount of time for a two-year old to ride. it went from one town to another, and then back again.

my dad loved trains and our girl seems to have inherited some of his love for them. of course, we missed my dad as we thought about how excited he would have been to take her on her first train ride.

(it happened to be jeremy's first ride on a real, full-sized train as well!)

all aboard!

ready to have her ticket punched by the conductor.

watching the engine switch to the other side of the train to pull us back to where we started. very exciting!

brother and i were there too. he was definitely much more interested in eating and napping than he was in the train ride.

there was the cutest and sweetest conductor who sat with us for a bit.

this one was all smiles!

ever since the ride, she has been playing with her train ticket and talking about the ride. she will say, "so...so...member twain wide?!" what a fun adventure.

two weeks

this photo totally captures our little guy! we think that he is the most handsome baby boy in the whole entire world.

he had his two week check up today (gasp - already?!). he weighed in at 10 pounds 13 ounces, and he was 22 5/8 inches long. he gained a little over an inch in the last week! we kinda thought we could literally see him growing on sunday - we were right! we are so thankful for a healthy, alert, calm, and beautiful little man. i am thankful for a baby who loves his mama best - i think i got my wish for a mama's boy.

we are enjoying jeremy's week off. we have a special family day planned for tomorrow and have just been enjoying the extra family time. we both have plans to take our girl out for some one-on-one time within the next few days. i think that time will be good for all of us. it's been really nice to have jeremy around - he helps so much with the kids and around the house, and we have been enjoying seeing each other more during the day.

tonight we were talking about how quickly this time goes and what a treasure these days are. we know that in ten years, we would give a million dollars (if we had it) to go back to these days when our kids are so small and precious. we're soaking them up...every minute.

time for some red wine

she may look happy in this photo...

but she certainly wasn't happy today. there was a lot of crying, tantrums, and drama at our house today. little brother pretty much slept through it all. it's hard to be a big sister sometimes.

jeremy is putting our girl to bed right now. i hear a lot of crying and stomping going on up there, with the occasional laugh thrown in.

as soon as jeremy comes downstairs, we have a date to eat sushi, red wine, and blueberries while we sit on our couch with little guy and relax. it will be my first taste of red wine since having the baby. hurray! and i have a feeling that jeremy will be ready for a big glass of wine by the time he gets our girl down for the night.

family of four

we are having so much fun as a family of four. there are stressful moments, like last night when we sat down to eat dinner and big sister decided to scream, throw food, and put up a fuss while little guy decided he needed to eat. so...there we sat...trying to be consistent and enforce discipline with the older one, while i sat nursing the little one and eating with one hand. our looks, smiles, and hidden eye rolls to each other across the table and jeremy's winks in my direction communicated what we were both thinking..."wow, this is our life now."

we have been a great team throughout this transition - amazed at the new connection we feel to each other. we credit the birth for much of that. spending a day laboring at home together and then going through the birth gave us a new love and appreciation for each other and we have certainly been feeling the effects of that experience throughout the past eleven days. it's wonderful.

we have really been enjoying getting to know our little guy. we are having lots of fun! i got my wish for a baby who loves to snuggle. he will often be sitting in his car seat or bed and start fussing, but as soon as we pick him up, he snuggles right in and is content. we both realize how quickly this time goes, so he gets held most of the time. i think that's the way it should be. he does sleep in his little bed, and aside from the first few nights when he and i slept together in the lazy boy, he is content to sleep in his bed during the night. he has slept really well the past few nights, getting up once or twice to eat and then easily going back to sleep. last night was amazing - he slept from 10 pm to 6 am!

he has very alert times throughout the day and is content to sit and look around most of the time. he seems to be a pretty laid back little guy.

breastfeeding has been quite a saga. i had a really hard time breastfeeding our girl...she was not interested in nursing and did not want to do it. i struggled with a low milk supply. i nursed and supplemented and pumped and went to lactation consultants and even ordered medication from canada to increase my milk supply, and nothing made a significant difference. after our little guy was born, he started nursing really well. we spent most of his first week upstairs in our bedroom nursing. i was hopeful that things were going to be different this time around. over the weekend (the holiday weekend, of course), he was not pooping and was hardly peeing and it became clear that he was not getting enough milk from me. i talked with our midwife every day, sometimes twice a day, and spent a lot of the weekend in tears. on sunday, i talked with our midwife and we agreed that we needed to supplement with formula. late that night, i initially decided that i was just done breastfeeding him. i was not willing to go to heroic lengths to try to increase my milk supply, as i knew that was not successful the first time around anyway. however, i realized that i really missed nursing him. i decided to nurse him at the beginning of each feeding, and then give him a bottle. i am not stressing out about the amount that he is getting from me, but instead am enjoying the special time with him and knowing that at least i am giving him some of what he needs. he is currently getting organic formula, but as soon as all of the supplies arrive, i will begin making raw milk formula for him, just like i did for our daughter. i feel really good about the raw milk formula and think that it is the next best thing to breastmilk. i was hoping to be able to exclusively breastfeed him, and it is disappointing that i can't, but i am thankful that he is a good nurser and is easily able to breastfeed and drink from a bottle with no confusion. i am also thankful for the cows at the farm who provide good milk for my babies when i can't. so...that's the scoop on that.

our girl has been doing pretty well with the transition. of course, she has her moments. today, however, is a really good day with her. i took her out for a quick special little outing this morning, which made her day. my mom and sisters were here for a quick overnight visit on wednesday. my mom gave her a large cardboard playhouse, which is now occupying a significant part of our living room. she loves the house, especially the mail slots. jeremy and i have been delivering mail to the house on a regular basis. it's quite exciting.

i've had two afternoons this week where i've been on my own with the two kids, as jeremy has had class in the afternoon. it's a whole different way of doing things with the two kids, especially since i can't let baby out of my sight when our girl is up (she could strike at any time!). the afternoons went okay, and i know that i will eventually settle into a new routine that works well with two. physically, i'm feeling pretty good, so that has been nice this week.

so...that's what's going on around here these days. we are soaking up our time together and enjoying being a family of four. our little guy fits right in and it feels like he's always been a part of our family. it might sound cheesy, but adding a fourth person to our family has made it seem like there is so much more love in our lives. yesterday, when i was gazing at our boy, i felt like i could feel some of the pieces of my heart healing. after losing jeremy's mom and my dad, i have experienced a lot of grief and sadness. this new life doesn't take away the sadness, but it brings more joy, which fills my heart and makes me feel a bit more whole. what a blessing.