Don't Believe What They Tell You

I am the type of person that likes to keep my house clean. Not just picked up. Dust-vacuum-mop-sanitize clean. I don't judge you if you are not this exact type of person like me, it's just how I like my house to be. Obsessive Cleaning Moment Confession: In the weeks before I had Eva I realized that after I had her it might be a while before I could get back into a weekly cleaning routine. So in the last few weeks of being greatly pregnant I made a habit of doing one big cleaning task each day (dust, vacuum, etc.). With this pattern my whole apartment would be thoroughly cleaned approx. every 4 days, meaning that it never actually got dirty and that whenever I went into labor I could rest assured that we wouldn't be coming home to a dirty house. Yes. I care that much. (Remember I said that I wasn't judging you, so you better not be judging me right now.)

I have followed the orders of others and let go of my home a bit since coming home from the hospital. I truly believe that resting and spending time with my little girl is way more important than having a perfectly clean carpet. A few weeks ago my awesome mom even came up and cleaned for me so I wouldn't get cleaning crazy before I was really up for it. Notice though I said a few weeks ago... today the house was ready to be cleaned again. Since Ryan was gone working on church stuff I decided to tackle the cleaning while Eva was napping.

Have you ever heard the old advice, "Make lots of noise when the baby is sleeping. Vacuum while she sleeps so that she gets used to loud noise. Even vacuum under her crib." Don't believe what they tell you. It is great in theory, especially because we do need Eva to be able to sleep with noise so that we can take her to youth events and let her sleep there. My experience, however, makes me wonder....

As I was cleaning I was thinking about the vacuum quote. I thought, "Hmm, I do need to vacuum. But I DON'T want her to wake up yet. What should I do?" I decided to clean other things until I committed one way or another. I dusted the living room. I walked in our bedroom where she was napping in the pack and play. I peered lovingly at my peacefully sleeping daughter. I sprayed one pump of dusting spray on my nightstand. And then "WAAAAAHHHHH!!!!" The loudest baby cry. Over one tiny spray. Are you kidding me? She was fully awake. I rocked her back to sleep. I figured that it was better to quietly clean the toilets far away from her and save the vacuuming for a time when she is awake and Ryan can play with her.

On a completely unrelated topic, check out the baby jeans I got for her at Target this week! They are really cute with a little ruffle at the bottom. They are newborn size but are still huge on her! We call them her gangster pants.

By the way, my tiny baby isn't so tiny anymore. At her one month checkup she weighed 8 lbs, 12 oz. This is a normal weight for a baby to be born at, but it shocked me because she gained over 2 lbs since her 2 week checkup. I guess she isn't starving. I will leave you with a cute family pre-bedtime self portrait. Cosby was on the couch with us and if you look at the bottom right hand corner you can see white from his head. That was as good as we could get. Happy Saturday!

Happy Birthday, Ryan!

Ryan turned 25 years old today!!! As someone who has been 25 for almost 3 years, I was excited for him to finally join me at this quarter of a century turning point. We started our celebration on Saturday with a family birthday party for Ryan and his brother Greg who just turn 33. There was lots of cake and lots of silliness from our nieces!

Keirsi and Kayden made Ryan a poster for his birthday instead of a card. It was really cute how they cut out letters (kind of like a ransom note!) and they wrote his name on it several times. I love that they are learning letters and how to write. They are such smart girls!

More cousin love! Guess who happened to be asleep again? I think Eva looks like a baby doll in this picture. We missed cousin Mallory being with us and look forward to taking a picture of all 4 cousins someday soon.

Family photo: Daddy (almost 25), Eva (exactly 1 month), and Mama (ageless beauty)

This morning my mom came up and stayed with Eva while we went to see a movie. Our first time to leave Eva with a babysitter. I figured my mom probably knows something about taking care of babies since she raised me and has been a nanny for almost 12 years. Of course, that didn't stop me from telling her exactly how to take care of my baby. There are a lot of weirdos out there and you want your babysitter to do things the right way. Don't worry, Mamy, you did a great job! And I only cried for about 30 seconds when I had to say goodbye and leave Eva.

We went and saw The Ides of March. The movie was good, but my favorite part of the day date was when Ryan and I took turns practicing walking up and down the long movie theatre entrance way doing our "I'm a serious politician/assassin/mafia member and I'm thinking something suspicious" walk. And then we noticed that the movie theater lady was standing there waiting to clean the theater. Oops.

For our evening date, Ryan's parents came up to babysit so we could have a romantic dinner. That's right. I left my baby twice in one day. I deserve a gold star for not being a clingy mama. It was hard but good to have time with the birthday boy just one on one. We had a good dinner at Carraba's. Mmmm, bread, calamari, lobster ravioli...so tasty! I also want to mention that I have had my "little black dress" above since I was 18! I realized that today when I was trying to decide what to wear. I hope it is still in style. Probably not...

At the end of our fun day it was sweet to come home to my favorite little cuddle bug.

Morning Wake Up Call

Each day my morning starts when I wake up to feed Eva. This usually happens sometime between 6:30 - 7:30 am. This morning she surprised me by sleeping in until 8:00 am! I actually woke her up because I realized that we need to have time for me to feed her and get ready to leave on time for our first Sunday back at church. Usually when we have somewhere to be it is either later in the day or I have Ryan's help getting ready. Since he has to be at church way earlier than I do, today I was stuck in a bit of a bind. I decided that since it was my first Sunday at church in a month, a shower would be an appropriate way to bless others. I also needed to eat. And do my hair and make up....hmm. How do I get all of this done in under 2 hours with a baby?!?!?! And a dog.

After feeding her (which takes about 30 - 45 minutes) I put her on her boppy pillow and ate my breakfast on the couch while talking and making silly faces at her. Since our daily pattern goes eat/play/sleep I knew I couldn't just put her back to sleep for a while. I decided that the best way for me to get the shower in was to set up her swing in our room facing into the bathroom so that I could continue to make silly faces and talk to her while I got ready. She did good while I showered thanks to the oh so charming musical tunes that her swing plays. I got my make up on without any glitches. And then of course when I'm blow drying my hair she falls asleep. This would have been fine except that by that point I knew I'd have to take her out of her swing and put her in the car seat within 10 minutes.

Finally we were both ready to go. I open the door and start to walk down stairs to the parking lot, suddenly realizing that it's raining. Pouring. I almost called it quits to have a movie and pjs day instead, but who wants to waste a good shower? So I draped a blanket over her and made a mad (but safe) dash to the car. We made it on time to church. Even early, which is impressive because I'm rarely early anywhere. But it was a challenge. I can't imagine being a single mom and doing that every morning to get kids to school and me to work. If you are a single mom, I congratulate you on getting things done!

1 Month Old

Taken from Letters to Eva (our book to our little girl)

Dear Eva Kate,
Today you are 1 month old. The days pass by too quickly. Our first month together has been so sweet. I love being your mama so much and truly thank God for every day. You have blessed my life and added love and laughter to our family.

Your days right now are spent mostly eating and sleeping. Nursing you takes a lot of time and work, but I actually love it more than I thought I would. I enjoy our quiet moments together and seeing how exited you get when you know you are about to eat. When I put a bib on you, you get a really cute look on your face that tells me you know what is about to happen next. This week we started giving you a bottle once a day.

Daddy and I love you so much. We like it when you sleep well but sometimes we joke around with each other about who gets to wake you up because we both miss you while you are asleep. Right now you sleep in your pack and play in our room at night and take naps in your crib or swing during the day.

You love to be swaddled and rocked to sleep. Sometimes when we want to play with you, you get too sleepy and crash right where you are.

And then there are other times when I know you are tired and I rock you for a long time only to look down and see your bright, wide awake eyes looking right back at me. When you are more awake and alert you like to read books with me and spend time sitting around in your boppy cushion.


We've also started giving you tummy time each day. You don't love it but you enjoy it more when we make it a family affair.

Even Cosby helps! I should have probably started this earlier, but honestly, I forgot until this week. I'm learning to be a mommy just like you are learning to be a baby.

You are the best, most fun gift I've ever received. Right now you are asleep and it makes my heart smile just to think about getting to see your little face when you wake up!

I have a few more things to get done..... so keep sleeping, baby :)
love,
Mama

Newborn Photographs

My baby is 4 weeks old today! I can't believe how fast the time goes. The nights may be long (or short depending on how you view sleeplessness...), but the weeks fly by. I feel like she gets a little bit bigger every day even though I tell her not to. I just want to cherish every moment of her being a tiny infant. These are a few more of the pictures taken by my sister in-law Amanda when Eva was 2 weeks old. We had so much fun playing dress up with Eva. I love how these turned out and plan to hang some up around our home. I may be biased but I think I have the most beautiful baby ever :)




And lastly a sneak peak of the photo we plan to use for our family Christmas card.....

Speed Racer

The day I turned 16 my parents let me get my driver's license. It was awesome. I even got to get out of school to go to the DPS so that I could use it that night, which happened to be a Friday. Looking back, I may have been a less than stellar driver. I got my license on a Friday, on Saturday I backed up into a car (and didn't tell my parents until Sunday evening because I wanted to be able to drive all weekend). Then there was that time 2 kids on a bicycle ran into me. Make sure that you read that correctly - THEY hit ME and it was declared their fault for driving recklessly on their bike but still not a great experience (the kids were a little banged up but fine). Once when I was driving on the Dallas Tollway I threw my quarters out the window and missed. And then spent the next 5 minutes digging through my purse and an overnight bag for more change while cars honked madly at me (from then on I was hooked on maintaining a Toll Tag). Thankfully I was never in a serious wreck and in my defense never got a speeding ticket.

Now that I'm a mama, I have become the most careful driver in the world. Speeding? No thanks, I'll drive cautiously. Wild stops? My babies little head will fling about! Texting while driving? Are you CRAZY?!?! Having precious cargo in the backseat has made me rethink how I drive. I may get places a bit slower but it's worth it to make sure she's safe. At stop signs or before turning I look both ways 10 times to make sure that no other cars are coming. That's the real threat - other drivers. People who don't have babies in the backseat. So the next time you are driving down the road and you see that car with 2 side window shades and a little car seat poking up over the center, don't honk or make fun of her for being careful. Smile and pray for her sweet child :)

Redeeming the Time

Me (age 12) with my sister Sara Rose Elizabeth

When I was almost 12 years old my parents had a second child. I was so excited to finally have a sibling! A sweet baby girl named Sara Rose, or "Rosie." She was born with Down Syndrome and a hole in her heart. She was able to be part of our family for about a year before she passed away from complications resulting from open heart surgery. Her life and death had a tremendous impact on our family. It was my first real experience with the death of someone I loved and it was heartbreaking.

Sara Rose died on September 11, 1996. For many years after that September was marked by sadness for our family as we remember the anniversary of her death. Ironically, it was 5 years later on September 11, 2001 that the World experienced a different 9/11. That was actually the first time I had gone to school on the anniversary of her death. I remember it as a sad, shocking day.

When I found out that my due date for Eva was originally September 10th, I began to realize the possibility of having her on the 11th. I thought about it and realized that if that happened, it would be special but at the same time I was okay if it didn't happen. More importantly, I recognized how awesome it was for it to be in God's plan for my baby to be born anytime in September.

My baby will never replace my sister, but I feel like God has been purposeful in redeeming the time for my family. My sister will always be remembered, but now September is a month full of joy and excitement. Each year September will be celebrated as Eva continues to grow older. I love that the Lord could foresee this in His wisdom. For many years I don't think my family could ever imagine celebrating at the beginning of September, but for me at least, God has turned sadness into rejoicing and praise. I wanted to write about all of this to remind myself to trust God more in all circumstances. We don't always understand why things happen and the pain of this life is real. But God is good and His love for us is greater and deeper than we can imagine.

My mom, grandma Dede, Eva, and Me - Celebrating Eva's Birth!

You have turned my mourning into dancing.
You removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy.
Psalm 30:11