I have rediscovered Pop Tarts. It was circa 1984 the last time I had one of these amazing rectangles of awesome and boy are they delicious. This could be a very, very, very bad thing.

Thanks to a certain Hulu Plus, I am all caught up on One Tree Hill. There was a time that I wondered how it would survive without Lucas and Peyton, but now I wonder no more. It is freaking fantastic.

Two words that I couldn’t spell if my life depended on it (this how I would spell them without the help of spell check)- Nessisary and Nessisarily. I just can’t seem to get it right!

I am loving NBC’s The Voice right now. Although, I could really do without Cee Lo Green’sequined jumpsuit and creepy white cat. It’s just plain weird.

Also? Is Christina sort of a cartoon character? I want to see her once without make-up. Survey says that she would look at least a zillion times better. Plus, when a gal wears that much lipstick doesn’t it get all over her kids face when she kisses him all day everyday?

Anyway, back to how I can’t spell. What about disentary? I realize that this is a word that you would only see when playing Oregon Trail back in 1991, but still, I would love to know how to actually spell it.

I cannot express to you the joy it brings me to find tiny little princess shoes scattered throughout the house. There is something so beautifully heartwarming about finding Bitzy’s pink ballerina slippers in my closet. I’m so grateful to have a little girl.

Then, tonight as I was folding clothes (my least favorite chore), I matched two itty bitty baby boy socks and told Zach, “I can’t believe that there is a person so tiny that lives in this house who can wear these wee little socks.”

Another word? Fanactical.

I want another pop tart.

I confess that these two exhaust me in a way that I never thought possible…but I confess moreso that I have never been more in love with these tiny little humans than I am right now.

Have a fun Friday ya’ll!

I know what you’re thinking. I think he is too. The cutest kid ever, right? Right.

Not only is he strikingly handsome, he’s quite agreeable as well.

It also really helps that he’s a Mama’s boy through and through. I don’t mind this one little bit.

But I gotta be honest with you.

Teething? It’s about to put me over the edge.

My sweet, laid back, angelic baby boy has been replaced by a non-napping, whiny, fussy alien child. I know, I know, he’s in pain. I should be more sensitive. And I was, I really was, about 3 teeth ago. Now that we’re working on tooth #5, I’m ready for a break from this teething nonsense.

You see Bitzy cut her bottom 2 teeth around 6 months and didn’t cut any more until she was 13 months old. Then she got 6 teeth in one month. But really it wasn’t so bad. She handled it like a champ. And then the incisors came…OUCH. And we’re still waiting on those dreaded 2 year molars, but the great news is that Bitzy’s teething journey is coming to a welcomed close while Brother’s has just begun.

Do they really need teeth anyway? Why must it be so painful?

Also? I’m not so great at the whole whiny baby thing. It makes me nuts, like literally a little crazy. Perhaps you are one of those parents who don’t mind crying/whining and can carry on normally while your baby melts down. Me? I can’t handle it. And it’s not even that I’m so caring and sensitive and all of that, it’s more that it drives me bananas. So needless to say, over the past month of Brother cutting these teeth and being subsequently miserable, this Mama is ready for my happy boy to return. I miss him.

But there have been some smiles through the painful cries of my wee one.

Take a look:

Even through the tears, the endless amounts of Tylenol and tired eyes, he remains the sweetest little thing ever. I’m smitten indeed.

Happy Monday everyone!

This picture has absolutely nothing to do with this little story. Just thought I’d share some eye candy.

Ha! You thought I was going to say that I just started running again didn’t you?

Now THAT would be very sad story.

Because friends, that means that I would have died.

I think I’m too old to run.

That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

Anyway, my sweet little precious ones have given me a run for the money this week.

Between Brother teething and Bitzy struggling with being very off schedule since Christmas and trying to get back on schedule, it’s been a doozy of a week.

This Mama is very excited for Daddy to be home with us this weekend.

But then, in the midst of the exhaustion, as I nursed and rocked sweet Brother bear to sleep, as his eyes got heavier and heavier he unlatched, locked eyes with me and smiled the most beautiful smile. Almost as if to say, “I love you Mama, goodnight.”

What a gift.

And then, as I tucked Bitzy into her crib with her blankies after rocking and reading, she sleepily whispered, “Goodnight Kanga, I love you.” And I smiled and said, “Goodnight Sweet Roo. I love you.”

And that my friends, is what it’s all about.

Have a great weekend friends!

The culprit

My very first post about poop was many moons ago. Read it here.

It’s sweet that I thought I was a Poopologist then. Ha, aha, ahahahahaha. Since then, I have earned several doctorates in the subject. In fact, almost every single day I wake up with a nice stew of pee and poop all over me.

Nice, eh?

You see, my sweet Brother bear has gone from being the best little sleeper ever, to, well, NOT the best little sleeper ever. Sure, he’s no Bitzy. He doesn’t hate sleep with the sincere hatred that she did as a baby, but still, I feel like we’re on a slippery slope.

{more to come on that later}.

All that said, he normally wakes up ready to eat, snuggle, cuddle around 6:00am. If I just feed him and lay him down in the crib he’ll scream his brains out, however, if I bring him into bed with me (Zach is long gone at this point) then he’ll eat and go back to sleep for another hour or two.

And clearly I don’t mind the snuggles, not one bit.

What I do mind? Him waking up every 3 hours during the night. You got that right. The child is 7 months old and he goes to bed at 7:00pm and wakes to eat every 3 hours until 6:00am.

What I mind more? The fact that his tiny little size 3 diapers simple cannot hold the massive amounts of excrement coming from his sweet little booty. I’ve tried double diapering, bigger sizes, changing him during the night…nothing works.

No matter what, ever single morning as I breathe him in and try to memorize the way his chest rises and falls, I also smell the sweet smell of baby poop as it oozes all over me.

Yummy, no?

Ah, motherhood.

Someday when I’m old and grey I will miss many things about my babies being tiny…but I have a feeling I will not miss being pooped on every.single.day.

There are many things about this picture that I love…and then some others that I find extremely disturbing.

As I always try to find the silver lining, let’s start with the positive. In fact, my friend Bethany has taught me the rule of PNP (Positive, Negative, Positive). So here we go:

Positive: Bitzy is having a blast. She’s a sucker for the playground. And the swing? Around 8 months old she began her love affair with swinging. Then, as suddenly as it started she banned all swings everywhere. Just the sight of them started her saying, “No, no, no!” Just recently she has shyly ventured back in. We’re starting slowly but surely. Kids are so strange and funny about things…

Negative: Will you look at me? I look like a frumpy Mommy. I may as well have on mom jeans. If I ever needed some motivation for Weight Watchers this is it. Well, and maybe a makeover from What Not to Wear. And I look old? When did I get so old?

Positive:  The owl hat. The cuteness just makes me die and go to heaven. Whoever came up with the concept of the owl hat needs a Nobel Prize. It just slays me. In case you need more evidence, here’s a picture of Brother wearing his too.

My Mama, AKA: Gammy got the sweet owl hats for my babies for Christmas. If you’d like to order one go here. (Linda has no idea that I’m doing this, so, SURPRISE Linda! I love the hats!!!).

Bitzy is a baker!!!!

Every single day I wonder why in the world God has blessed me so incredibly. I am selfish and prideful and rude and arrogant and many more horrible sinful flaws. I do not deserve these little angels.

They are so perfect, so innocent.

They rely on Zach and I for everything. In a way it’s incredibly comforting to know that I am able and willing to provide for their daily needs, but also their need for love, comfort and encouragement.  But in another sense it scares me to death. I am not qualified for this position! I didn’t take a test or study for this job. Somedays I feel so unprepared.

Brother all snuggled at the park!

This week as Zach has been on “staycation,” my job as a stay at home mommy has been exponentially easier. Right now we’re playing a man-to-man defense which is WAY easier than my usual zone defense Monday-Friday.

To tell you the truth I’m so nervous for Monday! Including the weekends he’s been off for 9 whole days!!!! Even though we didn’t go on a fancy vacation, it has been amazing.  We went to the park (even in the freezing cold), the zoo, the science center, and even had a few PJ days (my personal favorite).

An added bonus was that Brother decided this week that he hated taking naps. So, unfortunately we had a few days that he screamed his ever lovin’ brains out for an hour. If I were here without Zach I cannot promise that I would have let him cry…but with Zach I was strong, and yesterday our sweet baby boy slept for 3 hours straight for nap!!! Amazing.

So tomorrow to further increase my nervous nerves we’re heading back on the Weight Watcher train. It’s been a full month of debauchery, but it’s time to get back on the system. And, in case that wasn’t enough we’re going hard core on the Dave Ramsey Financial Freedom plan.

I’ll be writing more this week about all of these fun things:).

Hopefully I’ll still be in my right mind to write!!! Ha!

Have a happy Sunday!

I’m a little late to the party on the whole 2012 thing.

What a surprise, I know.

You see, Zach is on “staycation” this week, which is honestly the greatest, greatest, greatest thing ever. Why must he work I ask? Why can’t we just live on love? Why can’t be heirs to a bazillion dollar inheritance?

Questions for the ages I tell ya.

That said, things like writing a little story have been far from my mind. I’ve been too busy playing peek-a-boo and tea party. Which in my opinion are activities far more important than writing.

Does that hurt your feelings? Don’t take it personally.

So now that I’m officially four days overdue in writing the obligatory New Years Resolutions blog post, I figure that I’ll just skip it. I mean, clearly I want to lose weight (who doesn’t?), pray more, love harder, be better. Of course. But, resolutions just seem so, how you say, cliche.

Last year at this time I wrote this post. While we haven’t written a children’s book (yet!), we have successfully accomplished all of our other goals which makes my heart happy.

Some highlights from 2011:

We birthed the worlds most precious son. He is truly a blessing straight from the hand of God. To say that we are in love with him doesn’t do our deep love justice. He is truly amazing.

Our Bitzy has grown and changed so much in the last year. She is incredible. Last year at this time she was grunting and pointing, now she is singing songs and counting to 25. She’s simply a miracle.

In the past year our house payment has doubled and our income has been cut in half, yet we have still managed to not go into debt. This to me is a major accomplishment.

I have begun what I like to call, “The Great Coupon Adventure” and I love it. It’s saved us a bundle and it’s very, very, very fun.

But more than anything, I am grateful that in 2011 God taught me so much about who He is. About what a loving Father He is, how much He loves us all and how available He is to us. I am so amazed that I get to be His daughter.

So friends, as we begin the journey into 2012 I wish you all good health, happiness, and more than anything, love. Sweet precious love.

Thank you all for helping make 2011 amazing. Here’s to making 2012 even better!

Classic Bitzy.

Me: “Hey! I have an idea. Let’s go downstairs and eat bacon and read books!”

Bitzy: “UMMM…MAMA, DO ME A FAVOR AND MAKE ME SOME OF PIGLETS HAYCORN COOKIES FIRST. AND MILK AND BOOKS. OKAY MAMA? RIGHT MAMA?”

Me: “Sure thing! I just made you some, here they are.” (we are playing pretend you see. In fact, we’re playing pretend about 95% of the time).

Bitzy: OH MAMA. THEY ARE DELCIOUS MOMMY DARLING. YOU GOOD BAKER COCO. MAMA IS YOU NAME COCO MOMMY?”

Runs in the other room laughing.

Me: “Yes! My name is CoCo for sure. Mommy CoCo needs you to come downstairs and eat bacon. I know that baby CoCo is hungry, right?”

Bitzy: “MINE NAME IS NOT COCO. IT’S PRINCESS DARLING DARLING. RIGHT MAMA?”

Me: “Okay Princess Darling Darling, would you like to eat some royal bacon?”

Bear in mind that I am pushing bacon harder than the meth addict at the Wal-Mart because…

A. Bacon is awesome.

B. Brother is fussy and ready for a nap. In order to feed him and give him said nap, I need for a certain 2 year old to be still for about 6 minutes downstairs while I get Brother to sleep upstairs.

C. She is starving even though she doesn’t know it. A sure fire way of knowing that she’s hungry is her incessant begging for milk. She’s ALWAYS been a milk addict, but when she’s hungry it goes from “I WANT MILK!” to “I WANT MILK MAMA, MILK, MILK, MILKY, MILK!” And if she’s really starving it goes, “I WANT BRUDDERS MILKY MILK. I WANT HIS CAKE.” You see, she insists that “Brudders milk” tastes like cake. Granted, she has barely eaten cake in her short life, but really? My milk tastes like cake? Maybe I should market my magic cake milk.

And I digress. Back to the story.

Me: “Listen baby, we really need to go downstairs because Brother is fussy and Mama needs to put him down for a nap.”

Bitzy: “NO WAY MAMA. MY BABY IS NO SLEEPY. HE IS HAPPY BOY! HE MY BABY BOY, BABY BOY, BABY BOY. BRUDDER AND SISSY ARE BEST BUDDIES. MAMA! I WANT MILK. MILKY MILKY. PWEASE MOMMY, I NEED MILKY. BRUDDERS MILK. NOW MOMMY PWEASE!”

Me: “Baby, let’s have a happy day, not a sad day, OK? Don’t make me put you in time out. I’m going to ask you one more time to go downstairs OK. Do you understand?”

Bitzy: “SURE MAMA. BABY COCO DARLING DARLING LOVES BACON AND BABY SOOOOOO MUCH. AND CINDERELLA TOO. WES BEST BUDDIES.”

Me: “Great! Let’s go Darling Darling.”

Bitzy: “NO NO NO NO NO NO! MINE NAME IS SISTER BEAR, NOT DARLING DARLING. YOU SILLY MAMA.”

Clearly, my method isn’t working. I try a different approach.

Me: “Oh Bitzy! I think that Santa may have left a very special prize for you last night. Let’s go downstairs and get it!’

Bitzy: “OH SANTA! I LOVE HIM. HE IS SOOOOO NICE! HE GOT RUDOLOP AND ELF TOO. HE IS SO SWEET MAMA! OKAY LET’S GO MAMA!”

Me: “Great idea! Let’s go!”

Meanwhile I scan the room for a toy, book, crayon, ANYTHING that she hasn’t played with for awhile and may have forgotten about, but I got nothing.

So we get downstairs (finally) and she says, “OKAY! WHAT MY PRIZE MAMA?”

Me: “Guess what?! Santa brought you a baby brother! Sweet Santa! He brought you the best Christmas prize ever!”

Bitzy: “YOU SNEAKY MAMA. YOU TRICKED ME AGAIN! HOW ‘BOUT BACON TIME?!”

Clearly, this ain’t our first rodeo.

Dear Brother Bear,

In the big scheme of life you’ll come to realize that time is tricky. Sometimes time flies (mainly when you’re having fun- like when you’re on vacation) and others it drags on like molasses (like in Geometry class). I can tell you honestly that the past six months have been a mixture of the most challenging moments of my life, mixed with the sweetest, most amazing moments as well. And for you, my love, six months marks the entirety of your life. For it was only six short months ago that you entered this great big world.

And guess what?

The world got a whole lot brighter the moment you made your entrance.

I’m not just saying that because I’m your Mama, ya know. You truly are a light. A beautiful shining light.

You have always been mostly happy. Sure, you have your fussy days, but overall, you’re extremely happy and compliant. You smile at me, your sissy, your daddy, strangers, Christmas trees, the TV, basically any old thing is your best buddy.

Today I took you to your 6 month well check up and when they gave you those nasty shots you didn’t even cry.  I’m sure it’s because of your yummy delicious chubby legs! Not one tear, I tell ya!  You continue to amaze me with your resilience, laid back nature and outgoing personality.

The other day as I held you and snuggled with you God gave me a very beautiful insight…He reminded me that even though I wanted you, and loved you long before you were born, I could never have imagined how amazing you would truly be. Every prayer, desire, and hope I had for you has been answered more beautifully than anything I could have hoped or imagined (Ephesians 3:20).

You are absolutely my dream come true, love. I never want you to doubt how loved you are.

Not now, not ever.

I am so proud of you baby boy, already.

I love you to the moon and back,

Mama

Some days I feel as if I could sit down, put my fingers on the keys of my laptop and words would burst out of my soul. I would write beautiful, smart, witty things that would inspire and provide laughter to the masses.

But shockingly, a 22 month old and 3 month old really don’t care about said minute and demand my full attention.

Hence, I guess we’ll never know if those words truly would pour out of me.

Probably not.

I would get distracted by People.com or the mountains of laundry that need to be folded and put away and then those words would be bottled for another day.

The real truth is that when the babies are finally asleep I am far too exhausted to spell my name much less write anything that is coherent, much less meaningful.

That said, the utter exhaustion that I am experiencing is the most precious place that I’ve ever been. These sweet babies are growing so rapidly that I can hardly keep up.

Bitzy’s language development is tripling by the day and my sweet baby boy now weighs 17 pounds! Amazing how they grow isn’t? What a wonderful way to spend my days.

Someone much smarter than me once said, “How you spend your days is how you spend your life.” So true. I feel overwhelmingly blessed to spend my days picking up toys, kissing boo-boos, changing diapers, reading books and loving on these two sweet ones. Even with Bitzy’s new term, “No way!” for everything I ask her to do, which results in time-outs and tantrums, and with Brothers new desire to only sleep in my arms (which clearly I LOVE), I am amazed that I get to be with them all day, every day. It is a gift that humbles me.

So, at this point in my life no profound words will be written anywhere but my heart, as I desperately try to memorize the moments that are flying by.

Maybe when I’m 50 I will write something fabulous.

Until then, this is all you get.

Ha!

When I’m in the midst of a millions beautiful moments I continuously vow to capture them in my mind and lock them in. I can’t imagine ever forgetting the tiny details that seem to make up my every day.

But then, I did and I do.

I forgot all about newborn cross-eyes.

How could I forget this? It’s just about the cutest thing ever. My little sweetheart will be looking around smiling away and the next thing you know his sweet little eyes are crossed.

I forgot all about newborn squeaks.

The yummy sounds of contentment from a precious new life.

I forgot all about spit up.

Yup, I sure did. No worries, now I am very familiar.

I forgot about burping.

The first two weeks of my darlings life I didn’t burp him once. How could I forget this detail? I dunno, but I did.

I forgot about the tininess.

Even though I birthed a big boy, his features are still so tiny. His adorable little toes, fingernails, button nose, and wrinkly little tushy. In fact, Bitzy named him “Tiny” the day he was born. She met him and said, “Tiny Baby” and ever since if you ask her his name she says, “Tiny.”

I forgot about the intensity of the love.

With Bitzy, I have had 20 beautiful months to fall head over heels in love with her. I know her likes and dislikes. I understand her broken English, I can read her moods. I know her. In fact, I know her better than anyone. She is my heart. My precious gift, my miracle.

But with Brother I love him just as hard as Bitzy amazingly enough. How did my heart grow a million times bigger when I met him? Can a heart explode from loving too much? I hope not because I am seriously smitten. Don’t get me wrong, I knew that I would be. But I forgot about the intensity…the amazing gift of a mommy’s love for her new baby…I simply forgot how it felt to experience it.

But don’t worry, it’s all coming back.

Life is so good.

*Thank you to www.kathlynparrottph​otography.com for the beautiful photography!

I’m gonna go ahead and warn you, I’m full of all sorts of post-partum lovey dovey hormones, so if you aren’t in the mood for a lovefest then I suggest that you stop reading here…

Because friends, I gotta tell you, I’m in love, I mean IN LOVE, with my “station” in life at this very moment.

There is truly not a day that goes by that Zach and I don’t talk about how blessed we are to live this life. How absolutely incredible our Bitzy is. How miraculous it is to have a new tiny human, Brother, that has entered our family and has integrated so easily. How beautiful it is to watch our babies grow each day, learning and experiencing new things.

This life, it’s a miracle.

A beautifully blessed miracle.

Today while Brother was taking one of his epic 3 hour naps (amazing I tell you), Bitzy and I were playing in her room after she woke up from her nap (yes, they were both sleeping at the same time, thank you Jesus). Before I put her down for her nap we read the Golden Book version of Alice in Wonderland. After her nap she wanted to read “ABBIT, ALICE, AGHEEN,” translation: Rabbit, Alice, Again. So we read it again and then she hopped off my lap and started looking under the ottoman and saying “ABBIT, HOLE, TEA, COOKIE, HAT, ALICE!” At first I couldn’t figure out what in the world she was doing, then when I got in the floor to look  under the ottoman to see what the world she was babbling about, it dawned on me. She was playing pretend that Alice and the White Rabbit had a hole under the ottoman in her room where they went to the tea party with the Madhatter.

SERIOUSLY? My 19 month old is in an imaginary world and is allowing me to be a part of it. Have I ever had more fun in my entire life you ask? Nope. Never. We played Alice in Wonderland in her room for a solid hour, just me and my girl. How in the world am I so lucky to live this life?

And my baby? My tiny little precious baby boy is 4 (whole) weeks old. He’s always hungry and growing like crazy, and he’s healthy. Amazingly, beautiful, miraculously healthy. This fact is not lost on me. I think of all the sweet people that spend their days in the NICU with their littles and how incredible it is that I had a healthy pregnancy and a healthy baby. It honestly brings tears to my eyes that he is so beautifully healthy.

I’m not gonna lie, the past 4 weeks of having a newborn with a young toddler hasn’t all been easy and sunshiny. There have been moments where both the babies were screaming, I’m carrying them both up the stairs while the phone is ringing and someone is at the door and I am about to hyperventilate from the stress of it, but for the most part, it’s been a beautiful transition. We are continuing to grow and figure out what works and what doesn’t, but all in all, we’re enjoying one big lovefest up in here.

(This would also be a good time to give a shout out to my amazing husband, my partner and my love: without you, this family wouldn’t work at all. You are the cheese to all of our macaroni.)

I’m still not sure why and how I get to live this life, but boy am I thankful.

What are you thankful for today?