Hopeful Journey

This post comes with much thought and, at a few moments, stress. As I look forward at this new year and what I imagine it will bring, I am filled with excitement, uneasiness, stress, calm, and wishing someone would invent a pause button already. All this range of emotion, and I have no idea what 2015 will bring.

While I've never been one to stick to my New Year's resolutions to lose weight or eat healthier or get better at staying in touch with friends (I believe most of those require lifestyle changes...more than a "resolve" on a piece of paper), for the past two years I have chosen one word to define my year. Last year my word was "fresh"- I was newly married, newly a mommy and all the world felt fresh. It helped me keep that sense of novelty throughout the entire year, remembering that each day was indeed a fresh start.

The "word" can be a goal you set for yourself, where you see your year heading, or just a simple word of encouragement that you believe will be beneficial to you this year. The "word" should be thought hard about, and prayed about harder. I've found that, when taken seriously, this one word can set the tone for your year and help you better yourself and your outlook. If any of you are choosing a word this year, pleasepleasepleaseplease tell me what it is! I would love to hear how you all apply this challenge in your lives.

My "word" for 2015 is technically a phrase. I couldn't find a single English word that encompassed the entire meaning I pictured in my mind. Hopefully this isn't breaking the rules too much. If you can think of a word that means what I describe, let me know! Thesaurus.com did nothing for me.

Before I reveal my word/phrase/thing I want to elaborate a little bit on why I chose it. I picked my phrase to be an encouraging reminder to myself throughout all the changes this year will bring. A few of which will be- meeting baby #2 (!!), buying our first home (hopefully), becoming debt free, learning more what it means to be in a sacrificial/loving marriage, and did I mention having two babies under the age of two? Thinking about it raises my stress levels more than I'd like to admit. I honestly have no clue how I'm going to take care of two babies and a big part of me is dreading the no-sleep-living-with-your-eyes-half-open-newborn phase so soon after we outgrew it the first time.

But there is another part of me that is ecstatic. I can't wait to do it all over again, as paradoxical and absurd as it sounds. I want to face this year with all its pain (childbirth.....ugh), joy, tears, goals and dreams with hope- embracing every single moment.

That's why I chose hopeful journey as my phrase this year.

Hopeful. Journey. Separately, the words have their own significant meaning, but paired together, it will be impossible to forget that there is hope, always, and that life isn't a straight line, but a journey.


Hope: 
"to look forward to with desire and reasonable confidence."

I want to always look forward to change and embrace it with confidence. 

Journey: 
"a traveling from one place to another, usuallytaking a rather long time; trip:
passage or progress from one stage to another"

Life goes in stages, always moving forward, though it often seems static and uneventful. Remembering life as a journey helps keep my sense of adventure and expectancy- instead of drowning in day to day monotony. 

There you have it! My word for 2015. I will try to post updates on how I'm doing throughout the year, so check back often. And again, please let me know your "words" for the year! 

E's 12 Month Update

Happy 2015! I can't believe 2014 is over...so much happened this past year. I need to sit down and process it all. I'm working on my "word of the year" post to share with you all (here is my word from 2014, if you're interested) and would LOVE to hear about your one word you choose to define your year to come. It has been an awesome tradition for me these past three years, so keep an eye out!

That said, how ever you rang in 2015, I hope it was memorable and spent with wonderful people. 

I want to write a little update on miss E, since it has been a while since my last. I've been doing monthly  updates, but now that she is over 12 months, I'm not sure what to call my posts. I don't want to be one of those moms who say "Oh, she's 17 months"....when "just over one year" works just as well. Its a personal problem...I'll work through it.

But for now, monthly posts will have to do.

Evie is a ball of constant energy and motion. Its getting harder and harder to keep up with her, especially now that she has been taking steps on her own! *applause welcome*

Likes:
- Being on couches and beds: She LOVES bouncing and diving and rolling on our couch and in bed with us. Not very relaxing and a constant battle to make sure she actually stays on the bed.
- Pulling all of the books and movies off the shelves and then moving on to play with something else: Need I explain more? This happens 5 or 6 times a day.
- Kissing everything: She still loves to kiss all of her toys and/or complete strangers that we walk by in the mall.
- Thinking everything is cold: Since it's been so cold lately, she picked up that "brrrr" means cold and now she says it about everything. She likes to touch everything in the fridge and say "brrr" after each item.
- Coconut milk: Now that she is completely done breastfeeding (bittersweet for me, but it is nice to only be sharing my body with one baby now...) we were giving her cows milk before bed and a few times throughout the day. However, she had a pretty severe diaper rash that just wouldn't go away no matter what we did. About four days ago we switched her over to coconut milk and the rash was gone the next morning! Milk sensitivity is pretty common for babies, but I am hoping she outgrows it at some point. For now though, she's loving coconut milk.

The aforementioned "game" she loves so much

Opening her cookie set on Christmas Eve

Roxy continues to be her best friend

Dislikes:
- Teething: Remember that "mommy phase" I mentioned last time? A few days ago I noticed a big molar broken through in the back of her mouth....that couldn't have been fun. I would want my mommy too.
- Sleeping past 5 or 6 am: This has been a rough week for sleeping in. No more nursing in the morning means no more falling back asleep :(

Firsts:
- Walking!: She took her first unassisted steps the other day and has been getting better and better at it since. Look out world, Evie is coming for you.
- Signing "eat", "please", and "all done": For anyone with a little one, I HIGHLY recommend teaching them at least a few basic signs. It makes communication so much easier.
- She has also learned how to say "yes", "no", "cheese" (it sounds like "chee!"), "more" (like "moy!), "brrrr", and "good" (or at least the "G" part).

Merry Day-After-Christmas and an Announcement You Already Know About

Happy Friday, friends! I hope you all had a magically peaceful Christmas and were able to spend it with people you love. Our Christmas was exactly that- we spent the day at my parent's house with my brothers and new sister-in-law. AJ cooked his family's famous authentic Italian spaghetti and meatballs and my mom went all out with other Italian side dishes. Having "themed" Christmases is becoming a new tradition over here and I'm not mad about it.

It was awesome to see how much our family has grown since the last Christmas I spent at home; we gained three new members! Soon to be four, actually....

Which brings me to the main event of this post. If you're friends with either AJ or I on Facebook or in real life, I'm sure you've heard the news already, but I wanted to officially share it on here so that I can post updates as we go along. Yep, you guessed it. BABY #2 IS COMING! 

We are unbelievably excited (with a fair share of nervousness/howwillweeverhandletwokids thrown in)  and can't wait to meet this little one due to arrive on July 9th of 2015. 

I'm 12 weeks along and am SO excited to be past the horrible hump of the first trimester. Hopefully the morning sickness I've been dealing with (which has been SO much worse than with E) will start to subside and I'll start feeling happy/energized pregnant instead of shut-up-don't-talk-to-me/let-me-sleep pregnant. 

I wanted to share a few of the announcement photos we had taken that sort of double as our holiday/family photos for the year. E had her one year shoot as well, but I'll share those when I write her 12 month update :)

 

These were all taken by the incredibly gifted Amy at A Moment Photography. She is THE best at capturing special moments. I've loved every single photo we've had taken by her. 

#FoMO - an ironically timed post on my struggle with contentment.

I don't know about you all, but for me, Christmastime seems to be a time of extremes. In either a positive or negative way, the season seems to take the feelings we are already feeling and multiply them by 100. If you're prone to giving, you'll give above and beyond. If I'm feeling crafty (which of course, I am), I'll spend every second of free time crocheting or painting. If spending money is second nature, watch out. If you're struggling with depression or loneliness, the holidays set those feelings into overdrive. If you're stressed about finals, moving into a new home, or having relatives come to visit, this season can push you over the edge.

found here

I'm not sure what it is about Christmas that exaggerates these already present feelings- there are probably a multitude of reasons. Whatever the cause, one of the biggest struggles for me (and I'm sure I'm not the only one), not just around Christmastime but all year, is contentment. Which is ironic, because isn't the whole point of the holidays to be thankful?

Its not that I want more things or that I'm ungrateful for what I have- I'm not. I feel incredibly blessed. What I struggle most with is contentment with where I'm at.

This digital age that we live in has made it increasingly easy to access each others' lives and with that accessibility comes comparison. I find myself seeing photos of friends or even photos of myself "pre-mommy" and "pre-Nebraska" and envying where they are at in life or what they are doing.

And then comes the pressure- "if I just take Evie to do more "fun" and "Christmas-y" things I'll feel like a better mom" or "if I looked like I actually spent more than five minutes on my appearance, maybe I'll actually want to post a selfie" or "if we took that vacation to Colorado maybe I wouldn't feel so homesick (or self-sick?)". On and on and on.

An article I recently read from Darling Magazine (my newest obsession) titled "In One Place at a Time" summed it up best, I think:

"We see what our friends are doing in this moment and we wonder if what we are doing in this moment is as great or as 'post-worthy'. Hyper-aware of what everyone else is doing as we scroll down our screens, we either become numbed to the life that is actually in front of us or worried that we need to go find something better to do" 

I read that sentence and was knocked out with a proverbial ton of bricks. Is is possible that my discontentment is rooted in comparison? Just over half a year into our move and I've already found myself longing for our old home and our old stage of life. I could just write it off as pregnancy hormones, which is the easy excuse for everything right now. (Sorry, AJ). Or I can dig a little deeper and look at my heart. Its not that my life is any less valid, exciting or fulfilling as the next, its just that my contentment- and therefore my gratitude- has taken a nose dive.

With the pervasiveness of Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest...its easier than ever to fall into the trap of "missing out"- something the article quoted above referenced as #FoMO or fear of missing out. We envy, oftentimes subconsciously, the lives of our friends, believing that the party they just attended or the concert they Instagrammed, is more important than the homemade dinner you just cooked or the paper you just spent hours on.  But guess what?

We are free to miss out.

The lives everyone else lives, with their own unique beauty, adventure and challenges, are not mine. And "becoming numb" to the life that is right in front of me just because my house isn't "pinterest-y" enough or I'm feeling a little nostalgic, is a low that I never want to hit. Embracing our freedom to miss out awakens a brand new person. I can celebrate with others the beauty and excitement of their lives without jealousy or comparison. I can embrace my own life with joy and gratitude, knowing that even in the most monotonous, un-post-worthy of days- where I've changed 98 poopy diapers and shared half the desert that I made for myself and still don't have dinner on the table by 8- I can be thankful and satisfied.

In the midst this season of craziness and comparison, if this is something you struggle with as well, I encourage you to just BE.

Be where you are with your whole heart, even if where you are isn't thrilling or new. Learn to find beauty in monotony. And be grateful for the little things. And maybe log off Facebook for a little bit....that could help too.

found here