a little bit of this and that

1. Our Thanksgiving was wonderful! We had not spent the holiday by ourselves since we were first married. I think now that Madison is becoming a real person, our family is feeling more like our own. She understands so much more and she is not just a baby with no awareness of her surroundings. I decided I wanted to do some kind of service as a family. We visited an assisted living facility, in hopes that Eliza would brighten their day. It was really casual and it was only an hour of our time, but I enjoyed doing an act of service together. We then played at the park and had a great conversation with a dad who was keeping the kids out of the house while his wife cooked. We went running. Then we grilled steaks once the children were in bed.

2. I am still training for the half-marathon in Galveston on December 22. I only have two more long runs left, a nine miler and a ten miler. It is supposed to be in the single digits this weekend so my long run might just have to be on a treadmill, eek. 

3. I have almost finished Christmas shopping. The majority of my gifts were bought second hand, mostly from here or made by me. I have been trying to make more of an effort to minimize the clothes in my wardrobe and also to buy almost all my clothes second-hand. There are some wonderful resources for buying, barely used, name brand clothing. I just feel its one way to stop the consumerism disease. 

4. I have one more week left of classes this semester. It has been difficult to go back to school, but I still managed to push through. I still have one more paper to write, so I am not totally clear yet. I still wonder what school would be like if I could devote my full attention to it, but it will just have to continue to take a back seat to my other, more demanding responsibilities (ahem, Will).

5. I should not even mention it, but Eliza gave us two nights of wonderful sleep. We attempted to sleep train her again over Thanksgiving. She cried for two hours straight on Friday night. Then on Saturday and Sunday night she only woke up once, it was glorious. We were crossing our fingers it was going to be a new trend, but last night she cried for another hour and a half. We will see what tonight holds. The problem is that I was hit with this strange sad feeling when she slept well those two nights. Its like I love misery and I am upset she will be spending so many hours away from me. Its so odd this constant pull of wanting her to sleep, but also knowing that when she does sleep, we will be out of the newborn days for good. I know that the really hard times of parenting will be the times we look back on with the most fondness.

6. I do not write much about Madison anymore, but she is just at such a great age. She has her moments of pure two year oldness, but overall, she is so entertaining and sweet. I am amazed at how quickly she transitioned into being independent. She gets herself dressed in the morning, puts her socks and shoes on, takes herself to the bathroom, and so much more. She loves kitties and Elmo. She can make Eliza laugh in a way that no one else can. She is a girl of order and cleanliness. She loves her dad something fierce. Is more confident in her communication, but still shy in new situations. She has a memory that often takes me by surprise. I just really enjoy her company and all that makes her Madison.

And with that, all my kiddos are up from their naps.

five months

Time is slipping away from me. Eliza turned five months old a week ago. I just have not found the opportunity to sit down at my computer in a while. With Will getting his wisdom teeth taken out and my mom coming in last week, these past two weeks have been a bit busy. I can hardly believe it is almost Thanksgiving, goodness. Hopefully I can find the time to do a bit of a life update at some point, but any free time will likely be spent finishing up my assignments for graduate school.

Here is what Eliza is up to at five months:

* Lets just get it out of the way, she is still not sleeping. I still have moments where I think I can not handle another night/day of constantly trying to get her to sleep, but I like to think I am handling it better. I still think she is up roughly 3-5 times a night, but I pretty much have stopped counting. She at least is giving us some decent napping days. I get really worn out the days where she won't sleep longer than twenty minutes, its just a lot of work!

* She is rolling all over the place. She has made her way across our living room by rolling. She is pushing up on her arms and can scoot herself backwards. I am afraid she may crawl before she can sit up. 

* She is generally happy most of the time, unless her sleep deprivation catches up to her. I can barely get enough of her smile. It is just the greatest.

* She had some trouble gaining weight earlier this month, which left me even more stressed out. We tried to feed her even more than what I was and give her formula free of allergens. She hated the formula and I grew exhausted from constantly feeding her. I also cut out wheat after this appointment thinking that she may have an allergy to that as well. So I have been gluten and dairy free for a month now. We still do not see much of a difference in her behavior, but she is gaining weight now. I am beginning t othink she may not have an allergy any more, but I am too nervous to introduce dairy and gluten again. 

* She lets Madison treat her like a rag doll. It is amazing the affection Eliza already has towards Madison. I think younger siblings are born worshiping the older ones.

* She really is most content when she is cuddling with me or Will. She enjoys being close to us much more than Madison ever did and often spends most of the night in bed with us. Even though, I get frustrated that she does not sleep in her bed all night, I am thankful for the closeness. I know how quickly those snuggles come to an end. 

* She has discovered her voice and ability to makes noises. She has started to blow bubbles with her lips. She is giggling a lot. She has tickle spots that really get her  giggle going. It is the start of being able to really interact with her. 

Even though this month we were thrown another little curve ball in regards to Eliza's well-being, we are still hanging in there. I think I am just growing more and more comfortable handling both children. I still run out of steam most days, but I am able to handle having a kid to tend to all day every day. I am learning to really let go of any remaining desire to be selfish with my time, I just have to save all my time alone for the weekends. 

I can feel we are in the home stretch now. Eliza is nearly six months old which is the start of them gaining some independence. She will be able to sit up, crawl, then walk, all of which allows them to be a little less frustrated and helpless. I am just thankful I get to experience every moment of my children's life, even if I can barely see straight from exhaustion.

I think if Eliza gets any cuter, I might just eat her up. I reach a point every day where I can hardly handle the love I have for her and Madison, its just too much.

Breckenridge

We went to Breckenridge for the weekend. It was an impending trip that we had planned for two months.  I have had this Breckenridge trip in the back of my mind when Eliza refused to sleep, when I could barely function from no sleep, when finances were getting a bit tight, I just kept thinking, should we be doing this? Well, it turns out the trip was beyond worth it. 

We went with a family that I met when we first moved to Denver. Their oldest daughter and Madison met when they were both three months old and now we have both added another girl to the group. We booked a house that was two blocks from downtown Breckenridge. We pretty much just did our everyday shuffle, nap times, lunch time, play at park time, but nestled in a mountain town. Vacationing with another family with kids was so wonderful. There was no pressure to go out and do much because we all had a mutual understanding that we were fairly limited with four children.

It is amazing what driving a little over an hour and staying for 48 hours can do to my mindset. I needed this trip to help me see beyond the walls of my house and the babies that do not sleep. I felt recharged and more accepting of our life circumstances right now. I am continually being reminded that we are in such a fantastic place and living a life that is exceeding all the dreams we had hoped would happen.

Now, we just need to get someone, anyone, in our family to buy a place in a mountain town for us to escape. 

Getting four people to look at the camera and smile is nearly impossible.

We rode the gondola up to the base of the slopes. We were wildly out of place. Every one else on the mountain was decked out in their snow gear, killing it on the slopes, with out a care in the world. We also found it amazing how many "ski bums" drive Audis.  I am sure some day we will make it all the way up the mountain with our girls, but I was more than happy to just watch everyone. 

This was a perfectly timed trip because on Thursday Will is getting his wisdom teeth taken out. I want to be a good nurse for him, but worried my two helpers might not make that possible. Lets all pray for a quick and speedy recovery, he is my wing man.

halloween

First, lets talk about my first craft project I have done since Eliza was born, the bat shirt.

 My idea came from this blog. 

After going to the store three different times to get freezer paper, I finally was able to do this incredibly easy shirt. 

Here is my result:

 and here is my attempt at posing just like all the other fashion bloggers: 

I may need some work... 

Now onto Halloween, we had a little Elmo. Madison really disliked being in this costume and we would catch her trying to take it off constantly through out the night. I think her favorite part was giving out candy to the trick or treaters that would come to the door.

And here is one of two pictures we have had together as a family of four. Not our best, but I will take what I can get.

 

This post was brought to you while Eliza screamed because she refuses to sleep.

the time warp that has been the last four months...

 I catch myself telling people how old Eliza is, and it causes me to pause a minute. A four month old? Four month seems like such a long time, yet I can not really account for those four months. We have been taking everything day by day. Because of this approach, every day pretty much feels the same. I see no difference in a Wednesday or a Saturday. I try to think of what I did last weekend or the weekend before and I draw a blank. This bothers me because I feel upset that our precious, fleeting life is just vanishing into the abyss. However, I know that we are just doing what we need to do in order to survive. 

We have a four month old who wakes nearly every two hours at night and is not a dependable napper. She is struggling to gain weight, which we just found out last week, and we are trying everything we can to get calories in her. She is what I call, a full time job. Yet, we have a two year old, a house to maintain, a boss to please, graduate school to attend, groceries to buy, and a marriage to work on. Everything falls on just our two shoulders and we have not had any reprieve from it all in these past four months. 

I will catch glimpses of the fog clearing, only to have it followed by another overcast day. I thought we were truly finding our groove and things took a turn again. I desperately want out of this survival mode we are in, but do not exactly know how to do that. 

I had several moments last week where I thought we surely are not going to make it out, but here we are. Another week, another month, we are somehow making it through. My approach has been to just keep doing it day by day. I have started to mentally make a  note of what I want to do today and find a way to make that happen. When I start to get ahead of myself, I become overwhelmed. 

Maybe today is not such a foggy day because I felt inspired to make something for the first time in a very long time. I am going to make a little something for myself for Halloween. I am also going to try and turn some boot cut jeans into skinny jeans.  Maybe these two projects will spur on a blog post that is about something other than our struggles. Either way, Halloween is tomorrow and we have some plans to take Madison trick or treating. I am looking forward to sharing in the joy of watching her experience new things.

four months

Well, we made it another month. I still wish I could say we reached a real turning point in Eliza's sleep and fussiness, but I am afraid that just ain't happening. 

So I will try to keep all of her highlights from this month some-what positive: 

* I just took a quick look at the photos from the other months and it seems that Eliza is losing her hair. It is quite funny because Will got his haircut last week and now they have identical hair styles.

* She is pretty much rolling from her back to her tummy. She will arch her entire body over, but only commits to the roll occasionally. 

* She can scoot towards toys when she is on the floor. I can not believe she is already at the stage where I can leave her in one place and she will have moved by the time I check on her again. 

* She still has the most enchanting smile. She definitely knows who her family is, she greets all of us with the biggest smile (especially Madison). 

* This is probably related to the sleep issues, but I am pretty sure she still has another allergy. I am hoping to figure out exactly what her allergies are this week with a homeopathic allergist. She has improved slightly, but has still so many symptoms of an allergy and it is pretty miserable. 

* She now refuses to sleep for longer than two hours at night and usually does sleep longer than twenty minutes at a time during the day. We tried to let her cry it out last weekend, but that resulted in her screaming for hours on end without ceasing and still no sleep. Now our sleeping arrangements are essentially Will and I in separate bedrooms. Will sleeps with her the first half and I sleep with her the second half. We are kind of losing hope that there is a solution, but I am trying to just accept this as our situation and just deal with it.

* She is a drooling machine and we have to change her clothes pretty frequently. We are now putting her to sleep with out a swaddle so when we get her up she has usually drenched both sleeves from sucking on them. 

* I have done several more outings with both girls by myself. We are still running together (even though Eliza screams most of the time) and I have run a couple of errands with them. I still have not attempted a solo grocery shopping trip yet, maybe next month. 

I really had hoped that we would have had our act together by now, but oh well. Despite the lack of sleep, Eliza is incredibly adorable and have moments all day where I just want to eat her up. I just wish we could figure out what has been bothering her so she can have a chance to be a happy, well-rested baby, I know that she wants to be.

 

some janky pictures of the patio

As I said in the last post, I was hoping to blog again about sipping pumpkin ales on our new patio. We are not quite at the cozying up by a fire pit stage yet, but the patio is at least finished. I gradually took photos of the progress with my phone, so the quality is not that great. There is, of course, still more work to do (I mean, there is always more work), but the real, tough, hard, labor part is finished. It is sad the finished product does not accurately represent the amount of work that actually goes into building a patio, especially when all that work is done by one person.  I am antsy to get a real outdoor living space set up for us back there, but I am having patience. For right now, I think we will just have the Adirondack chairs and a fire pit. Next summer, we might get more fancy with the space. Will also is going to add gravel and rocks to all the dirt surrounding the patio, so no more big dirt mounds. 

Ok, here are the pictures!

 I am very proud and impressed with Will's determination with this patio. We spent all weekend "helping" him to finish it. He was bent over on his hands and knees slaving away. 

fall fun

Will's parents came into town this past weekend. We found enough energy to head to a free pumpkin festival in Golden. This outing embodied just about everything that makes me happy; no money spent, boot wearing, mountain viewing, and family time. The only downside was the windy chill in the air, but it warmed up fairly quickly. 

The other big thing we have been working on is our back patio. Will has been trying to do it all himself, but it is a huge undertaking. We thought that we could start laying the pave stones on Sunday, but Will realized he probably needed more sand to fill the huge hole he dug. It was a bit disappointing because we were hoping to have the help of his parents to watch the girls while we worked on it, but oh well.

The girls have also decided to not sleep at the same at all during the day. This made the last two weeks really difficult for me. It is kind of amazing how well they have it timed. As soon as I lay Madison down for her nap, I will hear Eliza waking. Then as soon as Eliza is finally back down, Madison is up. I just get pretty exhausted during the day when I have no moments to just sit. This is probably why this is the only blog post I have done in the past two weeks. I am slightly concerned because my class is supposed to start on October 21. I thought that life would have leveled out by then, but I am afraid it is still quite tiring. I am not even going to mention the every two hours we are up at night. But, like I keep saying, I know that all this will get better, and we are incredibly blessed. Blessed, but tired. 

I am probably crazy, but I decided to train for a half marathon. It will be on December 22 in Galveston, when we are in Texas for Christmas. I think I just need something that makes me feel normal, running makes me feel normal.

Hopefully, the next thing I can blog about is our stone patio and how we have been sipping pumpkin ales by the fire pit.

eliza meets grant

I spent all of last week in Texas. My sweet mother, always serving our family, needed me to take care of her for a short bit. So off Eliza and I went to Texas. Even though the circumstances were a bit unfortunate, the time ended up being really great.

 I think the highlight was when my brother decided to surprise my mom and fly in for the weekend. Neither of us have seen him in a year and he had not met Eliza yet. It was wonderful to all spend some time together, even if it was so short. Eliza was great the entire time (well, except for night, she woke every two hours). We even grabbed some mexican food, but mexican food without dairy is just is not quite as amazing as mexican food with diary. 

Overall, it was a much needed time away from my cave I created for myself. I needed the push to leave and this trip was just that. I am very thankful I was finally able to just focus on Eliza and have a chance to really know her. I am eager to get to spend more time with my brother. He is still trucking away on his Special Forces training and will be finished next Spring. I am blessed to have him as my daughter's uncle, he loves them so well.

And this is what Madison did while Will was in charge of her. He did such a good job of caring for her. I think they needed some quality time together. Madison and Eliza are some lucky ladies to have a father like Will.

3 months

We made it to the three month mark, woohoo. While most things have gotten easier, we are still flailing a bit. I think that once she finally figures out the beauty of sleep, we will be golden. 

At three months:

* She is all smiles. I think the first two months were spent trying to figure out how to get her to stop screaming, I sort of forgot to really notice her personality. I am thankful I can really notice her now. She has the most captivating smile.  The toothless, full body smiles, make my heart ache because I  know how quickly they pass, but I am soaking them up now. 

* She is much more content to just be awake now. She has been pretty predictable in when she cries, she is either hungry or tired. I am so thankful for this because the not being able to fix her crying, was awful.

* She can roll from her tummy to her back. Madison was her biggest cheerleader during this accomplishment. She kept saying, "you did, liza, you did!" 

* She falls asleep on her own in the pack in play. This is huge because Madison had to be rocked for thirty minutes at this age before she would fall asleep. 

* She seems to enjoy her carseat now. This makes car rides and runs much easier on me. 

* She is still waking up quite a bit at night. We have started to give her the chance to fall back asleep when she wakes at night, so hopefully that will help her sleep longer. 

* She pulls all her shirts up to her mouth to chew ont hem. At first, we thought it was accidental, but she knows what she is doing. This causes her shirts to become soaking wet. 

* She really likes to chew on her hands. She is only able to find her thumb every few days, but when she does she sucks on to it with a passion. 

the slow turn

It has been about three months since Eliza arrived. I have made it pretty clear we have struggled to find our footing, but I felt quite a shift last week. I think it is easy to not acknowledge the slow transitions in life, to just let them happen, and wonder how we got to where we are. So I just want to make a note to myself that the shift is here.

I am finding bits of myself again. I am finding strength where there was not any before. I am growing confident in my ability to parent both girls. I have time to think thoughts that do not involve dairy allergies and potty training (well, only sometimes...)

 I really do think the turning point was when I finally worked up the courage to take both girls jogging last week. The task seemed too huge just two weeks ago. The process of getting everything ready, not knowing if they would scream the whole time, wondering if Madison would pee all over herself, prevented me from going. Yet, last week, all of that did not seem so crippling and I just went. Its moments like that I feel I am slowly reclaiming myself. My children dictate so much of my life, to feel like I can take back just a sliver, did wonders for my outlook. I felt like I was owning parenthood instead of the other way around.

I do not feel like I am totally out of the clear. Eliza still wakes up four times a night. I also took the girls running on Wednesday during a monsoon, that did not end well. However, I feel a turn happening. My life is making a bit more sense and life with two children is more manageable. 

something from nothing

I only have a few photos on my phone from the last couple of weeks. So I will stretch those to try and make a blog post. I really do feel like I am slowing finding my groove, but the exhaustion is still a bit overwhelming sometimes. Our two year old seems to want to wake up more times a night than our newborn now, which is just lovely. This new predicament has decreased our sleep intervals even more than what they were, think maybe an hour and a half of continuous sleep for us. It is amazing to see how little sleep we can actually survive on though. 

Despite the exhaustion, we went to pick berries yesterday. Madison really enjoyed picking the strawberries and I delighted in seeing her discovering something new. It was just a lot to juggle with two kids. I am proud that I was able to handle the outing all on my own though. 

And to really wear myself out yesterday, I took the girls running for the first time in the jogging stroller. They did great. It was incredible warm, so we played in the water hose afterwards. I felt some what normal yesterday with all the things I did with both girls in tow. However, I could barely stand once Will got home and was in bed by 9. 

I think tomorrow we might attempt a day trip to Estes Park. We will likely just walk around town and head back home. 

That is all I have for today. The little one seems to be on an eat every hour schedule today, so I am off to go feed her.

over the weekend

My dad came in to meet Eliza for the first time this past weekend. Things have settled down a bit so it was nice he timed his visit when he did. We are still struggling to venture outside of our home, so we did a lot of golf watching, nap taking, and barbequing.  

We did manage to go to the local amusement park that is only a mile away. It was our first time to take Madison to something like this. I was pretty excited to see how she would react to all the rides. Her first ride was the merry go round with Will. She enjoyed the "horseys," until they started to move, then she wanted off. I was nervous she would be miserable the rest of the time, but as soon as she got off the ride she wanted to go again. They have a lot of children rides, but the children have to ride them alone. She did so great though. It still amuses me how such little things make me so proud.

I think my dad had a fun time with us. He even took Madison to the park all by himself two different times. I think he was pretty exhausted after having a two year old crawl all over him for three days straight. He just kept asking me if there was any way we could hire someone to come and help me, ha. 

We are still very much in the newborn fog. I feel like I am not really an active participant in my life, like my body is on auto-pilot and just doing what needs to be done. Will says it is the exhaustion that is making us feel that way and so I know it will lift at some point. I really am loving this job I have as a mother, probably even more than I ever have, but I am still adjusting to this new addition. So I think we both have our sights set on Christmas for feeling "normal" again. 

two months

Eliza is two months old. I want to be my usual sentimental self and say, "oh, where has the time gone, its going by so fast," but with each passing week our little child seems happier. So I am welcoming time passing right now. 

At two months:

*She is smiling when she is awake instead of screaming. She is even borderline laughing. It still takes me by surprise every time I look down at her and she is cooing away. I just love hearing happy noises coming from her. It was truly heart breaking to feel like my baby was in misery. 

*She has done a few eight hour and six hour stretches at night. I think she would always sleep this long if she did not have lingering gas issues. She most consistently wakes up twice a night now and usually falls right back to sleep after I feed her. 

*She is growing more and more content with being put down. She is even falling asleep on her own with out me rocking her during the day. 

*She has rolled over a couple of times when I put her on her tummy. She holds her head up really well and seems quite strong. 

*She enjoys eating a lot more and does not stop mid way through the feeding to scream anymore. She still is not the biggest fan of a bottle or pacifier. The most she has had out of a bottle is an ounce of milk. 

*She fits in three to six month clothes. I think she might end up being chubbier than Madison.

*Her eyes get really large when we make eye contact, like she is totally surprised. After our eyes meet, she usually breaks out in a huge grin.

*She still has that lovely newborn smell. It is something that can not really be described to someone who does not have a child. I think the smell of a newborn and all their silly mannerisms is what I will miss the most.

Overall, this month went much smoother than the last. We still eat most of our meals with Eliza screaming because she is exhausted or we struggle to get her to fall asleep, but overall, so much easier.  This month makes me excited for what Eliza will become. It is so great to finally feel like my baby is enjoying life and has a blooming personality.

an update of sorts

I am really not sure if I will ever be in pictures again. I would rather capture what these beauties look like during this time, than the haggard mom I am during this time. 

I have been wanting to update on this time, but my mind draws a complete blank. These past eight weeks have been a really hard time for us. I struggled with writing about it or talking about it because I feel like I would come across as ungrateful and weak. I just think that God uses these newborn days as a way to reveal all my little cracks and remind me how I must fill those cracks up with Him. 

Will and I agree that with Madison and now with Eliza, the hardness of it all brought to light parts of ourselves that needed some work. With Madison I had to come to terms with how little control I actually have. With Eliza I have had to let go of, well pretty much everything. Having children is a constant reminder that my life is not my own. This is something that God deeply desires me to know, but it is so easy to forget. 

Since I have totally eliminated dairy from my diet, Eliza seems to finally be more at peace. It took sometime to see results and she spend that time screaming. I sometimes can still hear her screaming even when the house is silent. She is finally smiling and cooing and can be awake without screaming, I can hardly believe it. I feel I am still holding my breath though. She still has a screaming fit about once a week, but gosh, once a week is manageable. I can even put her down with out her screaming now, which still takes me by surprise. I do not think I put her down for five weeks straight.

The girls barely nap at the same time, so I spend almost all day with a child close by. I am finally reaching the point where letting Will give me a break is more manageable. It just takes a bit of work to leave Eliza (I have to pump...) and I always stress that its too stressful for him to handle them. Well, today he took them to a birthday party for one of his coworkers daughters. He was gone for three hours and all I did was clean. It is funny to me that during my time to myself all I wanted to do was clean uninterrupted. I then went on a run. So I am probably more tired than I was to begin with, but my mind can rest easy knowing my house is clean.

We are still taking it day by day. Each day is sometimes a little bit better or a little bit worse, nothing is quite predictable yet. We still feel like we are drowning, but I think we are slowly, inching our way closer to being able to grab the side of the pool.