Best.Day.

Dear Life,

Emberly and I had the.best.day. Yup. It was exactly what we needed - a day at home to just be together and get back into our daily routine and cuddle and play and get laundry done. LOTS and lots of laundry. It is now 9:15pm and every single piece of clothing (minus what we are wearing currently) has been washed, dryed, folded, and put away. Phew!

I decided this morning after waking up with my sweet little pumpkin 5 times last night that we needed to do something about her sleep schedule. Anything. She just won't nap and has these terrible crying fits at night lately. It is painful. For me mostly.

So today was Napping Bootcamp Day 1. She woke up at 8:15, I fed her, we played, she played while I got ready for the day, we played some more. About 10:15 she was sleeeepy again. Rubbing the eyes and fussy and in need of some rest. Soooo... I fed her, changed her diaper, and layed her in the crib. Then I went and dryed my hair so I didn't have to hear the screaming. Oh man it was torture. Well after sputtering and crying for what felt like an eternity (probably about 8 minutes) I went in and consoled her, layed her back down, and she fell asleep! Yippee! She slept a woppin' 15 minutes. When she woke up, I let her babble until she started crying again and let her cry for awhile and we just battled until I gave up and put her in the swing maybe an hour later. She slept for 25 minutes in the swing. Minor napping bootcamp failure - but maybe a step in the right direction.

Afternoon nap went MUCH better. At 1:30 she slept for an hour without any of the scream-o! I cannot even tell you another time that she has slept for an hour in her crib during the day. Seriously. It has never happened. THERE WAS MUCH REJOICING. Plus in that hour I made a pot of soup, folded laundry, stuffed the diapers, responded to some emails, made some phone calls, and even went to the bathroom completely uninterrupted! WOOT!

She was a happy sweet child the rest of the afternoon. Yay naps! I am an advocate.

Tonight we had another bedtime crying fest - but she is now asleep. I would be too after crying that hard and that long (while my mother was holding me, mind you). I found two gray hairs last week. Coincidence? I think not.

Anywho - that is our epic bedtime/naptime battle we are currently fighting with all forces. If you have magical tricks, please feel free to come try them on my child. I will be napping downstairs.

A few other things you may or may not be interested in knowing (my-o-my I am behind in blog-tracking!):

1. E got her first tooth last Sunday! (Feb. 12)

2. E purged the pacifier. They are gonzo forever. She just stopped sucking on it - she would only chew on it, and if we offered it to her when she was upset she went a little ape. SO after offering and regretting it with a "never mind, sorry we offered!" approach... we stopped offering. We're a little slow, but we caught on eventually. I'm pretty positive the transition is harder for me than it is for her. I feel a little bit like I'm learning how to soothe my almost 6 month old for the first time... and I feel completely at a loss when I'm driving and she's throwing a little "I hate the car" tantrum or being super noisy in a not noisy place. Oh well. It had to happen eventually.

3. At her 5 month appointment she was 17 lbs and 7 oz and 26 inches long which is the 90th percentile for both height and weight. Good grower, E! She also handled her shots WAY better this time around... in fact, I think she cried more when Dr. Vetter was trying to look in her ears than she did when she got her shots.

4. A long nap is 30 minutes. But we're working on that! (Read above)

5. Her food samplings include rice cereal, carrots, avocado, banana, sweet potato, and prunes! I've made all of them - except the prunes. Those are just special to help my sweet dumpling be a little more regular. Call me crazy, but feeding her "real food" is pretty fun to me. Like a new hobby. Plus she makes the best faces! :) She pretty much gobbles up everything we feed her. She just gets one little ice-cube size serving each day.

6. Bath time is still a highlight. She gets SO excited when I set her down on the rug in the bathroom and turn the water on. Oh-my-word, so excited.

7. She rolled from her back to her tummy two days ago! Now she has rolled from her tummy to her back... once. And from her back to her tummy... once. But I think we're onto something now - the wiggles are really starting to be noticeable and she is super strong and throws herself all over. Look out world - this girl is gonna be moving soon!

Ok - that's all. I must go to bed now. Tomorrow is Naptime Bootcamp Day 2.

Yours Truly,
Molly

Oh! P.S. E got to ride in the Ergo on my back for the first time last week! We went to Bismarck to help Jordan's parents with a little moving/unpacking fun (which actually was fun... I just love those organizing things - and Jordan just loves a project!). Anywho... I was working on something and we decided to try her on the back instead of the front. Yup... here it is documented in picture form:

Diaper Lotion Potion

Dear Life,

After visiting my South Dakota bestie/former awesomest roommate of all time/cloth diapering guru friend this week, I do believe I drove the hour home with a smile on my face. You know how you just have those friends in life that really "get you?" She gets me. We had a texting conversation once I got home that went something like:
R: I'm sorry I talked about myself the whole time. I feel like I didn't get to hear enough about you.
M: Are you kidding?? I was just thinking the same thing. We must be very used to being doormats, because we don't know what to do when someone actually asks us about ourselves and listens!
Yup. She is wonderful. And her son is going to marry Emberly. When we asked him if he'd give baby Emberly a kiss, he just leaned over and gave her a smack right on the lips. It was pretty adorable. Of course we didn't quite capture that particular kiss on camera... but here is another sweet one of Dayton giving Emberly some love and sharing his kittie with her. What a little gentleman.

ANYWAY... I ordered some kissaluvs cloth wipes a few weeks ago and have used them as washcloths since they've arrived. Not as wipes. I'm not really sure why, but they scare me. I know what to do with cloth diapers... but cloth wipes? Intimidating.
But I left my cloth dipering bestie's house with a renewed enthusiasm for making wipes. She makes her own with paper towels and Kissaluvs Diaper Lotion potion. It smells heavenly. And I did the math today. Big money saver. You know how much I love a deal.
So I ordered me some Diaper Lotion Potion today, bought a pack of paper towels, and am ready to make a batch when it comes. No more Pampers for me. The homemade paper towel little buddies are for the "messy" diapers. That way they can just make their way into the garbage never to be seen again. Still cheaper than Pampers, still just as easy. I will attempt to use the cloth wipes also, just for the average diaper change. Use it once, toss it in the diaper pail with the wet diapers, wash them right up, and use them again.
Hmm. I might be convincing myself this will work...
I will let you know.
Thank goodness Sweet Bottoms Baby Boutique is speedy in their deliveries because I want to experiment!
Yours Truly,
Molly

Weekend Getaway

Jordan's weekend actually fell on a weekend... so we galavanted off to the lake for some R&R and other random adventures. Here are a few snapshots:

Teething, anyone?? Sweet girl is a non-sleeping, chew and lick everything, little monster.

Good thing we happen to love this variety of monster... or we'd be in trouble.

Snowshoe adventure day one. Yup, that's my baby-wearing lumberjack of a husband. I love him. Emberly was passed out most of the journey (see above) but woke up happy and loved looking at the trees and smiling back at grandma and grandpa behind us (see below).

Who says 5-month old bambinos are too little to go sledding?? Isn't this just the greatest thing you've ever seen? She was too little for the baby sled, so we improvised with a box. Gotta love boxes. They solve all sorts of problems.

Handsome baby-wearing husband on Snowshoe Adventure Day 2

Warming up those pink cheeks after a long walk on the lake. Yes, that's right, I was brave enough to walk on the ice. Yikes! (I just kept telling myself it was a nice open prairie.)

AND... on an unrelated note: Steamed Carrots + Magic Bullet = first tastes of carrot puree

Mmmm...

5 Months

I'm not really sure how this happened... but Emberly is 5 months old today.

Yikes! Slow down little one!

Goals

Dear Life,

Well I guess telling people your goals really does increase your motivation to accomplish them. Some of my goals are super measurable (pass or fail) and others are a little more gray. The gray-ish ones I tended to slack on more. Funny how that works, isn't it? But either way... here is my goal update.

1. Write to our compassion kiddos each month. January: pass

2. Lose remaining pregnancy pounds (eating healthy/working out): mostly fail... but working on it! I have spent a large portion of my day today planning out meals, figuring out what healthy calories look like, and figuring in our budget how we can spend more on fresh produce and less on packaged convenience foods. My new mantra from the Less is More book is, "I have more time than I have money!" which means I can shop around more, plan more, and cook more. *Bummer* :)

3. Read one book each month. January: pass (I finished Living With Less so your Family Has More and would HIGHLY recommend it. It's a little cheesy in written form, but the content is practical and challenging. It will probably be a re-read each year.)

4. Send one fun card to someone each week. January: pass (although I had to double up last week to catch up!)

5. Read through the bible in a year. January: I averaged 3 chapters daily. In order to finish the bible in a year I need to read 3.25 chapters a day. I am kicking it in high gear through the rest of Genesis to catch up. Jordan and I have read through Matthew, Proverbs, and most of Genesis. The best part of this is that before I would turn to the bible with (*don't hang me out to dry, I'm being really honest) not much charisma. I felt a little bit at a loss with what and where to read and felt like I was doing my daily duty in order to check it off of a list. This time, though, it is completely different. I am not as maxed out at the end of the day or so early in the morning so I am able to focus on what I am reading and through God's grace and a lot of prayer, I can figure out what I am reading and how it applies to my life and what God intends me to understand through it. And I'm enjoying it. Yikes - I have been asking the Lord to change my heart, and I can tell he fully intends to provide.

6. Spend money wisely. This was not an original goal, but Jordan and I have been working on this, so I figured I would add it. We have been sitting down and budgeting out every penny each month and man-alive it is hard and it is awesome all at the same time. Thankfully we didn't get super used to my full-time income considering I only taught for one year... but even in that year (and in our lives in general) we have been so used to just buying whatever our eyes lay on that we desire. Yikes. We actually had a conversation this week that went something like, "It's actually kinda fun to live with less money. It feels like a challenge to ourselves to see what we really need and don't need, and it feels like we're setting healthy boundaries in spending that we'll teach our children about what is really important in life." Um... never saw that coming.

So there is my update. February means more of many of the same things. I. can't. wait. I just love my life.

P.S. - I got a sewing machine for Christmas and it is the bomb-diggity. I mean... I know I'm in my 20s and a sewing machine isn't the *coolest* thing a person could get for Christmas... but it is practically my new hobby. I tell Jordan that it's my form of hunting. Or working on cars. Or guns. Or something.

Anywho... I made some bibs for a baby-shower gift... and then I just couldn't stop. So I made this little buddy this week:

Almost too cute to drool on, isn't it?

So... you should probably start having children if you don't have some already. And then I can make you baby one too. That is, if you invite me to your baby shower. Just saying.

Yours Truly,

Molly

Love

Emberly got the giggles after her bath tonight. I LOVE when she laughs. It seriously made my whole day. If you're wondering about her unorthodox outfit... I was in the process of putting her PJs on when the laughing spurt developed. Don't judge. :)

I also LOVE when Emberly...

1. rubs her little nose all over my shoulder. I *think* it's how she gives me a hug and tells me she loves me.
2. licks me or starts gnawing on my fingers. Teething anyone??
3. gives the "baby in the mirror" giant smiles.
4. sleeps 6, 7, or 8 hour stretches at night.
5. babbles and talks to us. This is pretty much a constant lately.
6. plays with her toes.
7. rubs her eyes to tell us she's sleepy.
8. does pretty much anything.

Recap on the working world

Dear Life,

We made it through the week last week in spite of the fact that Emberly and Jordan both had nasty cold sickness all week. They are both still on the tail end of it, but I believe they are in recovery mode.

I had a love/hate relationship with working... depending on the moment and my mood I will tell you that I had a blast or it was lame. Well... a blast might be a stretch because I read the same tests all.day.long to K and 1st grade students. But it was fun to be in the schools and work with students. Believe it or not, I honestly believe that it is easier to be away from home than it is to be a stay-at-home mama. You may disagree, but it's a little bit of an escape and I know exactly what my job is and someone gives me feedback and I get to talk to adults and I don't feel like I'm constantly guessing. Being home with Emberly (though wonderful) does not produce the same results. I'm at her whim. And I'm happy to be. Easier isn't always better. And though it was *easier* to be at work, it didn't make coming home any easier. I felt awful for leaving her when she was sick. I felt really behind all week. Plus I missed Miss E something terrible.

Yours Truly,
Molly