Thanksgiving 2017

Finally getting around to recapping our Thanksgiving last week! It was very low key, which isn't the norm for us. We're usually traveling either up to South Dakota or down to Oklahoma to spend it with family but with Baker's surgery quickly approaching, we thought it was best to stay home and keep everyone as healthy as possible.

We (and by "we" I mean Justin...) cooked up a whole Thanksgiving feast for our family. Just the five of us. Fifteen-pound bird included.... That's a whole lotta meat for basically two people. We still have some leftover in the fridge!

The kids got up early so we made breakfast and watched the Thanksgiving Day parade. The girls were very concerned that they'd miss Santa at the end and spent the entire morning asking when he'd show up.

Photo {Almost} Every Hour | Tuesday

This is kind of a sorry excuse for a blog post because my "Photo Every Hour" didn't pan out the way I planned. Actually, I take that back. This post very accurately depicts our days around here...

I start out strong...

6 AM | quick snack for the babe

7 AM | up for school with minimal whining

8 AM | preschool drop-off fuel

By 9 AM, I'm feeling good about life and set Leighton up with her songs while Baker naps and I try to work for a bit. She's been super into watching music videos on YouTube. Sometimes they're inappropriate (which is why she watches in my presence so I can reroute if I hear an F-Bomb or two...) and sometimes it's "Shake It Off" over and over and over again...

9 AM | show me how you werk werk werk werk werk

That lasts approximately 17 minutes until I have my assistants helping me send emails...

10 AM | sup bro

11 AM is missing because it involved leaving to pick up Gracyn from school and returning home to quickly shove lunch in the girls' faces before B and I left again for his evaluation with the therapists at our local infant development center...

12 PM | finally got the little dude dressed...

1 - 2 PM? Also missing, but the evaluation went great! Time to scoot home and pick up the girls (we're SO thankful for our neighbors who've stepped up to help me out more times than I can count!)...
 

3 PM | tired boy

Uh... what time is it now? Between afternoon snacks and tantrums and no naps and work I don't even know what I'm doing half the time. But LOOK! Another picture of the baby! Let's call it 6 PM...

6 PM | first bottle in 10 days!

^^ Silly boy has been boycotting bottles the last week or so. It's cute except when mama has a Saturday night out planned and spends the day worrying if he'll starve while I'm gone. No worries, though, we both survived but I'm still not sure why he stopped taking them all of a sudden. Homeboy must realllllly like the boobie. ;)

Life after 6 PM on this fine Tuesday? I had lost all control. We did the dinner-time hustle, the girls REFUSED to help me clean up the playroom which resulted in them being "grounded" for the first time in their lives, Gracyn asking if I still loved her (I do) and Leighton calling me a "mean mommy!" We had a talk about being good listeners and bad attitudes which I'm sure I'll have to revisit in the morning when they start asking for tablets and phones and television and forget the whole grounded part of the conversation...

I won in the end, though - the girls were in bed by 7:25 and I got caught up on a few things while watching the news and eating ice cream.

Wednesday, I'm ready for ya... :)

Hey Friday

One of these days my life won't feel so crazy, right?! My blogging game has been seriously lacking recently but by the time I actually get to sit down at night all I feel like doing is watching TV or mindlessly scrolling through my phone until I pass out. That, or I have Baker attached to me which isn't conducive to typing out a bunch of random thoughts.

{ONE}

via

We officially have Baker's open heart surgery scheduled. Our sweet boy will getting his repair on December 11th at St. Louis Children's Hospital. I've been trying to keep it together but I've been pretty emotional this last week with most of my feelings coming across as stressed to the max.

I had a rough day with the kids on Monday afternoon following a long appointment for Baker and ended the night feeling very overwhelmed. I've teared up several times when I'm not expecting it - driving in the car, answering an email for work, etc. and have to stop myself from thinking negatively.

We'll visit St. Louis the Friday before surgery for Baker's pre-op appointments and consultation with the surgeon. We expect Baker to be in the hospital for at least 5 days (although some warriors are out in as little as 3 days!) and we'll be hoping and praying we're back home in time for Leighton's birthday on the 17th. The most important thing, of course, is making sure Baker recovers well so we can get him home as soon as possible.

{TWO}

I recently signed up for Grove Collaborative to receive all-natural household cleaning supplies via a monthly shipment. I'm not big into monthly subscriptions or anything like that but I snagged a deal and a trial for free shipping so we're giving it a whirl! You can try it, too, by clicking here and getting $10 towards your purchase when you sign up! You can choose from a variety of brands like Seventh Generation and Mrs. Meyer's and prices are comparable to good old Target. Most importantly, you can control your shipment and cancel at any time. I'm most excited about the holiday-scented hand and dish soap heading my way just in time to start decking the halls!

{THREE}

I did it. I went all Chip & Jojo for Christmas stockings for the kids. They'll arrive just before Thanksgiving and come November 24th, we're getting all sorts of festive up in this mother.

Here are the three I got... now I just need to decide which one belongs to each kid!

1 // 2 // 3

{FOUR}

I have a date with my cousin on Saturday night for some much needed girl time sans husbands and kids. Sorry, peeps. We love you but PEACE OUT. For a few hours, anyway...

via GIPHY

{FIVE}

We're staying home for Turkey Day in an attempt to keep Baker and the girls as healthy as possible leading up to surgery. It'll be nice to lay low but we have every intention of cooking up a bird and all the fixings!

via GIPHY

Oh, and I might just start blogging and communicating via GIFs only - there is literally one for any scenario in life. Ha!

Happy weekend!

Friday Things

What a week!

{ONE}

Potty training might the worst part of motherhood. We originally tried potty training Leighton back at the beginning of September. I really wanted to try and get it done while I was on maternity leave but girlfriend was just not having it. We made it one awful day with tons of accidents and zero successful trips to the bathroom. 

I still think she was ready at that time but she is one stubborn little girl. We put her back in diapers and spend the next two months psyching ourselves up to train FOR REALZ ahead of her third birthday. 

We were running low on diapers so we decided to start the process again last Friday. We've had several battles back and forth since, including Leighton's lowest point in life on Monday morning (she screamed at me for a diaper for a good 30+ minutes, dancing around and in physical pain because she had to pee so bad yet refused to sit down and go..) but I'm so happy to report that she's doing great now! We've had very few accidents and she's using "but I have to go potty!" as an excuse to get out of bed at night so I'd say we're on the right track.

Leighton, I love you, but I never want to potty train you again.

{TWO}

Chip and JoJo are at Target, ya'll. Have you seen it?! Did you go!? I haven't been to Target in, like, 9 days or something absurd like that so I have yet to browse the collection in person but I've been eyeing somethings online, mostly holiday decor that Justin refuses to acknowledge before Thanksgiving...

Of course I don't need any of these things but it's Magnolia! I need to get something..

{THREE}

One of the things I wanted to do after Baker was born was say “thank you” to my doctor and her staff for not only catching Baker’s heart defect but for also offering up resources and knowledge and support when it came to dealing with a prenatal Down syndrome diagnosis.

We had a very positive experience but unfortunately, that’s not always the case. So many women I've met, either online or in person, describe receiving their baby's diagnosis - whether prenatally or at birth - as a very sad, scary, horrible experience. It breaks my heart to hear their stories so I’m determined to do my part to change the conversation.

My doctor's practice features families on their own blog from time to time so I had reached out to them and asked if they'd be interested in sharing our story, hoping it'd be a way for other mamas to feel connected should they find themselves in a similar situation. I also wanted to let my doctor know that she had my permission to share my contact information with any mom or family she had in her office receiving the same news we heard back in May. Read the interview here. :)

 {FOUR}

 This video was shared in one of my Facebook groups and I loved every second of it...



{FIVE}

Because it's Friday and I went a whole blogpost without posting a picture of my kids... An "outtake" from our family pictures. It might be my favorite...

Happy Weekend!

Baker :: Three Months Old

Baker Dee is 3 months old, officially out of the newborn stage and just a regular old baby now. Cue all the mama tears! Why does it go so fast? I usually tend to agree with the phrase, "the days are long but the years are short" but this time around, even the days are flying by.

The second half of last week was a little tough so I definitely still have my moments when I feel D-O-N-E - the kids bonkers thanks to some lingering Halloween highs and we all had a few rough days attitude-wise - but I blinked and we had miraculously made it to another weekend. Just like that, Baker was another week older.

Halloween 2017

Finally getting around to recapping Halloween! It was nice and chilly this year - it reminded me of trick-or-treating in South Dakota as a kid - so we weren't out too long but the girls still managed to get buckets full of candy.

My parents were in town so they stayed back at the house with Baker and handed out candy to the kiddos that stopped by. Our very own Waldo had a great first Halloween, napping away in the swing...