Not enough hours in the days!

Gosh! The time just continues to fly. It feels like forever since I've posted on this blog, but I guess I wrote the day before my birthday, so it's only been about 2 weeks. It's been a whirlwind of events since then, though!

My birthday wasn't the greatest of days. In fact, it was probably one of the worst actual birthdays I've had, I think. It's in the past now, though, so I'm not going to go into a lot of details about it. One very important detail (and one reason I was not so happy) is because I had to feed Josiah formula for the first time. Formula is not the most horrible thing that could happen. Many people feed their kids that and they thrive perfectly. I just know that breast milk is the best and I think that every mom feels a sense of failure when they can't breastfeed their kid. It's like you are failing at a fundamental part of motherhood (kinda like infertility!). I had just been so busy with everything that I hadn't been able to pump as often and my supply was slightly lower. And then the motor in my pump burned out. And with Josiah ever-growing, I fed him what I had and he was still fussy and hungry afterwards. So, I pulled out a can of formula that we received for free in the mail and I made him a bottle. I cried the entire time, and he ate it like it was no big deal!

After I recovered from the disappointment, I realized that it is actually a big relief to not be his only source of food. It means that I don't have to pump that very minute to make sure he has enough. It means that if a bottle isn't already made, it can be made in a matter of seconds rather than 30-45 minutes. I'm still not ready to give up completely and succumb to only using formula, but it's a nice possibility.

I also started a new blog on my birthday to chronicle my life in a year. I take a picture every day of something that depicts my life and I'll post it on my blog. I'm doing "My 25th Year". You can check it out here.

After my birthday, I continued to immerse myself in everything for my mom's party. I spent every waking minute that I had free arranging centerpieces and painting decorations, etc. I was working into the wee hours of the morning and then getting up early after not having enough sleep. In between there, sometime, was Thanksgiving. Normally, we celebrate at my aunt's house along with a few aunts, uncles, or cousins- somewhere around 10 people maybe. But this year, we tried to extend the invite to our large family (all members included) so we moved our shindig to the church building. Then we invited anyone from church who needed a place to go. We had no idea who would actually be at our dinner! Less people came than we anticipated, and it was very different than previous years, but turned out fairly nice. I think that Thanksgiving just showed up so quickly and we were feeling so unprepared for it.

 

After eating with my family, we drove out to Jesse's parents house. Josiah met his great-grandparents for the first time (Jesse's stepmom's parents). We had a nice visit with them before heading home to continue working on my mom's upcoming party.

(Jesse's dad and brother)

Josiah meeting his great-grandma

Finally, Saturday came around and it was time for my mom's party. I arrived at the venue at noon and was there until about 11 pm that night. It went pretty well. Everyone said they had a good time and I thought it was fun that people dressed up.

      

(My mom and her sisters)

 

(My aunt, her husband, and 4/6 of her kids)

 

(My family, along with my brother who is in New Mexico and my mom's cake)

Once the party was over, it was a big weight off of my shoulders. But then I dove right into working on Christmas plans. This year, my family is doing Secret Santa's, but this year the idea is to make a hand-made present or do a service for your person. I can't post anything about it right now for anonymity sake, but I've been working my butt off on making a variety of gifts for my person. I'm pretty excited about it, though. I love to give gifts because I try to put a lot of thought into it and I look forward to seeing the person's reaction. Most of my free time has been spent putting these gifts together. Now my upcoming week is filled with fun and festivities!

Last Sunday was one year since I found out I was pregnant.

I had no idea how much my life would change in the course of one year!! It's not perfect or easy, but it's everything I hoped it be and more. I love my precious little boy and am thrilled to be celebrating this year with him. I'll get a picture of us together soon to show us one year later.

Tomorrow my brother is coming into town. I'm so excited to see him! He moved away the first week of September and I haven't seen him since. I'm excited for him to be around Josiah again too. So tomorrow I'm off to the airport to pick him up. Then, the next few days will be filled with baking lots of Christmas goodies. I plan to make several batches for my neighbors along with a batch for my upcoming Christmas party. My Christmas party is Saturday and it's an Ugly Christmas Sweater Party! The idea is to wear the ugliest Christmas sweater you can. We'll have a prize for the ugliest one. We're also doing a White Elephant gift exchange and playing some Christmas games while eating some treats! After the party, a group of us is driving over to the coast and staying in a condo for the weekend. And then Monday, Jesse and I are driving to another local coastal town to visit his biological mom's family. They haven't met Josiah yet, and I love that family, so I look forward to seeing them again. It's been well over a year- maybe 2 since we've seen them all. We'll come back Monday night. Then Josiah has his 4 month wellness check up on Wednesday. Thursday we celebrate Christmas Eve at my house with our parents and siblings. And Friday is Christmas Day at my aunt's house with my cousins and aunts. It's all very exciting!

As far as Josiah goes, because he's the real star of this blog, he continues to grow ever bigger. I took him to the doctor about 2 weeks ago for a little cough and he was 15 lbs, 10 oz. I don't know any percentages or height, though, because it wasn't a normal visit. He continues to smile, giggle, grab at things, stand and kick, etc. I'm so excited to be celebrating the holidays with him this year, and I imagine next year will be SO MUCH FUN! I'll write more about him after his wellness visit next week.

Finances are a little better. We got rid of some of our big debts and arranged payment plans with our hospital bills. I just realized, though, that my lack of substantial income is finally catching up with us. We make enough to pay our bills alone, but when you throw in gas, groceries, diapers, etc., the money disappears quickly. I have the opportunity to take on two more daycare kids, but I don't know yet if it'll be possible because it might interfere with taking care of my cousins (as I already do).

The friendship problems I mentioned before have gotten so bad that I'm pretty much over trying to mend them. In the past 3 months, there has been a pumpkin-carving get together, girls nights out, 6 birthday parties, a bridal shower, lingerie shower, bachelorette party, wedding, a dance recital, 2 upcoming Christmas parties, and a weekend coastal retreat that have all been avenues for these disputes to come about. I don't want to be friends with people who don't care enough about me to invite me to their functions despite the fact that we have been friends for nearly 10 years or that I have always made a point to support everyone in their life events over the years. I don't want to be friends with people who plan things and discuss them and invite everyone to them but me while I'm sitting right there. And I don't want to be friends with people who purposely plan their parties when they know I'm busy so that they don't have to invite me and then try to convince other people to skip my parties and attend their functions instead. I don't want to be friends with people who leave me out of their get-togethers saying that they can only invite so many people but then invite people that they haven't talked to in years, have only known a few months, or usually talk bad about behind their backs. My feelings have just been REALLY hurt by these so-called friends, and I realized that it's been happening week after week for nearly 3 months now. It's not worth it anymore. So, I've decided to focus on friendships with people who really mean a lot to me. I've got a husband who loves me with all of his heart and a mom who is my best friend. And a best friend who is so genuine and has such a generous heart. And another couple who Jesse and I get along with great and I want to see us hang out with them more. And I've got a wonderful group of cousins and aunts who I love deeply and really enjoy being with. So, I'm going to celebrate these relationships and put my efforts into developing them more deeply.

Well, I need to go now because Josiah is actually in bed before midnight for once and I've already wasted almost an hour of good sleeping time... plus Jesse is waiting for me to get off the computer. Uh-oh! Josiah's starting to cry... so much for sleep!!!

A little bit of everything

It has been WAY too long since I've posted anything! I've got to be really careful to try not to overwhelm you guys with too much information. So let's see how concise I can spill my guts...

Josiah turned 3 months old Sunday.

He is now smiling and laughing all of the time.

He squeals really loud when he gets excited, and "talks" all of the time with grunts and coos and squeals. He still loves to stand up and kick his feet.

(taken last night- 11/23)

He's learning to use his hands and learning where his feet are. So he will stare intently at his hands and grasp them together and grab his feet or swat at his mobile.

He sucks on his arm and fist all of the time, or will put his first two fingers in his mouth at once. He chews on anything his mouth can reach, including your hands or his shirt collar. He started rolling over from his back to his side.

(first time to roll over- taken with my phone camera)

The first few times he then started screaming because he got stuck. More lately, he'll just lay there until you nudge him over one way or the other. His sleeping habits keep going back and forth. He was going to bed between 10-11 pm and sleeping until about 5-7 am, but when Daylight Savings Time ended, he started going to bed an hour later (which doesn't add up), but sleeping solidly until 7-8 am- even then eating once and going back to sleep until about 11 am. The later night was fine by me (except that it left no alone time with Jesse), especially because I could sleep as late as I wanted. But then the last two nights he has gone to bed by 11 but gotten up at either 4:30 am or 3:30 am. He is learning to put himself to sleep. We've been laying him down when he's awake, if possible, and he'll fall asleep on his own.

He even is going in his crib for naps, if we're home, which us a new habit. He is still eating well, and we have just accepted the fact that he is a spitter-upper. We now carry 2-3 changes of clothes for him wherever we go (if we were smarter, we'd take a change of clothes for us too!) and we take at least 2 burp cloths. He still spits up on everyone and everything. Add that to the constant drooling (possible teething) and you've got a wet, soppy mess!

I would say that I pretty much enjoy him all of the time, though. I can't think of any overwhelming moments or times of stress and frustration concerning Josiah since we got out of our "survival mode". I mean, how could you be frustrated with this face?

And, remember Chad and Shelby, the teen couple from our church whose baby, A.J., was born 6 minutes after Josiah? Here the boys were at 4 weeks old and at 3 months old:

A.J. is about 1/2 in. shorter than Josiah and roughly 6 oz heavier. They've stayed consistently this proportionate since a few weeks old.

In other news, my 25th birthday is tomorrow. Whenever I thought about what age I would choose to be if I could skip ahead or go back in time, I always thought 25. In my head, 25 meant full on adulthood (no question about it), still very youthful, out of college, more definite life path (career-wise), and married with a child(ren). It was everything I wanted. My goal was always to have started a family by the time I was 25. In fact, when Jesse and I wrote out our goals for our marriage, this was one thing I had listed. I feel so blessed to be celebrating my birthday this year with everything I always wanted.

Since my birthday is the day before Thanksgiving this year, it kinda gets overlooked in the festivities. Furthermore, since we are celebrating my mom's 50th birthday this Saturday and I'm throwing her a BIG birthday bash, my birthday is getting even more overlooked. It's ok, though. Birthdays are a big deal to me because it's the one day out of the whole year that is in your honor, and when we celebrate it, it says to me, "We're glad you're alive!" I always try to make a big deal about people's birthdays and let them know how much I appreciate them. It's a little sad to me that my actual birthday won't be anything special (especially my 25th birthday). Jesse is not only working, but will be working overtime. Instead, my best friend Jolyn is coming over and hanging out with me during the afternoon, and my mom will probably come over a little later. And, to make up for it all, we celebrated last Sunday with a family dinner. My closest family members and I went out to dinner at my 2nd favorite restaurant (Red Robin).

I ate lunch that afternoon at my #1 favorite (Chili's) with Jolyn. My two favorites in one day!!! My mom treated me to a new haircut- my hair hasn't been done in well over a year!

I got a special necklace that symbolizes motherhood from my mom and Jesse

and Jesse wrote me a really sweet love letter that he literally folded into the shape of a heart.

I also got some cute fuzzy pajamas, the movie "Up" (which I cried the whole way through!), and a candle, and Ipod adapter for my car, to name a few items.

I was very thankful to spend my birthday celebration with my family and best friend. Friendships have been difficult for me lately. I've felt really left out of a lot of events hosted by people who were formerly really close to me. That alone has been really hurtful, but when I heard that part of it has to do with me having a baby now. That just seems really immature and flat out stupid to me. Josiah is a part of my life now and I shouldn't have to pretend like he isn't. I should also be given the opportunity to find a babysitter if I want instead of it just being assumed that I wouldn't want to go because of him. I can't go into too much detail about it before I talk to the people involved, though. Because of it all, I've been really missing out on genuine friendships. None of my formerly-close friends attend church with me anymore (which is where we all met and were close for at least 5 years), so I've tried to see if perhaps young married couples with kids from our church would be a better fit. However, I go to a very small church and I'm not sure, apart from being married and having kids, how many of the couples we'd REALLY have something in common with...There's so much more, but it's too complicated, and a lot of it just needs to be talked out with the people involved. In short, the whole thing makes me that much more thankful for a family and best friend that love me dearly.

Our other difficult situation continues to be our finances. It's basically a matter of getting behind on bills which then compound on top of each other, and then you throw in some unexpected expenses (like Jesse's car breaking down or MORE medical bills). It's been tough the past few months, but I think we're seeing the light at the end of the tunnel! I'm expecting to finally get my check (from the government) for providing daycare and I'm expecting a check from my OB's office for overpayment (hopefully in the mail today). As these things come through, I think I'll be able to get all caught up again. It just all adds a lot of stress, but Jesse and I are trying to trust in God and encourage each other when we're feeling overwhelmed.

I'm very excited about Thanksgiving this week, although I'm still shocked that it is THIS week!!! We're using our church building and opening it up to our extended family for a large get-together. I don't know who all will make it, but I love this time of year. Then Saturday is my mom's 50th birthday. I am doing a fifties decade party and am really excited to see it all come together. I am a little worried about how many people will come because of the holiday weekend, but I know that the people who are there will make it really special. It's been a lot of work, but it's all worth it for my wonderful mom, who is one of my absolute best friends! I'll have pics from the party once it's over.

I can't really think of much else (as if all of that isn't enough!). So, I'll leave it at that. Happy Thanksgiving to everyone. I hope that, no matter what your situation or where you are in your journey, you can find what you can be truly thankful for. Lots of love and well wishes to everyone!