It’s finally Spring!

I am so excited that today is the first day of Spring! It has been such a long winter, full of more colds than usual and more snow than I can remember in recent years. I am so thankful that we are looking ahead to warmer temperatures, summer vacations and will end the beautiful summer with a beautiful new addition to our family.

This weekend was both fun and miserable depending on the minute I choose to remember. On Saturday, Josh had plans so I decided to take JT to the park because it was beautiful out. I had this beautiful picture of having fun watching JT play, pushing him in a swing, going down the slide, feeding ducks with him clapping his hands and smiling–the perfect picture in my mind. When we got there, I buckled him in the stroller and headed to the playground–the sun was out so his eyes were bothered (as usual) so I tried to keep him shaded as much as possible but he didn’t like his hat. We get to the playground and I let him out, thinking he’d run to play. He just looked up at me as if he was asking “do I really need to go do this?” I walked him over to one of the jungle jims and he didn’t really seem interested in touching it, climbing on it, or even crawling under it. So, I tried a swing. I put him in, facing away from the sun and it was instant tears! The poor guy…the slide was no better, you’d have thought he was being tortured by being told “let’s go play!” Finally we went down to feed the ducks and he just sat there looking completely bored, I at least had some fun at this point but we quickly left so he could go home. He went to sleep pretty quickly at home (though his last nap ended about 1.5 hours before this point, so I was surprised), I put him down and decided I needed a nap too after all that. This–would be the miserable part.

The fun parts were watching Jonathan play with his ball popper very enthusiastically. He responded well to my cheering and clapping as Josh caught it all on video. He was filled with so much joy as he played indoors–such a sweet memory. We also had fun going to the McNeelys do discuss an upcoming trip to Gatlinburg. I’m very excited to get to go back to the mountains this year–we absolutely love it there and will be fun to experience with friends. Josh took JT home early because it was bedtime, good and bad thing about bedtime routine is that JT goes down super easy most of the time, but he needs to go to bed when he wants to or he is miserable and fusses. I think most kids do this too probably, but we never let him go on, we always just put him to bed and let him get his sleep. I just wish he’d go down easier at other places, he only likes to sleep in his bed for the most part:-/

Sunday evening was a good evening at home. I enjoyed watching Jonathan play and it was bath night. Bath night is always fun because it involves “freedom” and letting JT run around the upstairs before and after his bath. He is so cute when he walks now, I just love to see him explore new things and walk around like he’s in charge.

So there it was, mostly a good weekend despite Jonathan teething and wanting to sleep more than usual. Can’t wait to get out of this teething round and enjoy my little boy again!

Motherhood

My favorite quote of the past year is this: “parenting is about long days and short years.” I find a great deal of truth in this statement and it can be applied to other aspects of life too, I suppose. I absolutely love being a mom, but it has it’s challenges, almost daily. A lot of my personal challenges as a mother stems from the fact that I am a working mother and now that I no longer feed Jonathan in the mornings, sometimes I don’t see him until 5 when I get home. Sometimes he likes to nap as late as 5 or 6 and then go to bed at 7:30 or 8 so I end up with 2, max of 3 hours with my son. During that 2-3 hours, I am also getting dinner ready for my family, seeing how my husband’s day was and thinking of the tasks I need to do to get ready for the next day. Those hours don’t usually go that quickly either, sometimes they can feel like a whole day. But that’s the mantra behind the “long days” quote. Yet, I look back and the year, actually now 13 months has gone by very quickly. Hard to believe he is walking around, making new discoveries every day and growing increasingly independent. I LOVE to watch him grow, and cherish every second I can because I know he won’t be this little forever.

He is already in bed now, went down at 7:45 actually. His day was like this: up at 7 for a bottle, back to bed until 9. Up at 9 for breakfast and playtime with daddy til 10:30, nap 10:30-1:30, up for lunch and playtime then back to bed at 3:30. Woke up around 5/5:30 for dinner, more playtime, batch time and then went to sleep at 7:45. He loves to sleep! Maybe he’s just going through a growth spurt right now? I suspect so. This type of schedule makes it hard to play a day and make it to church. If he slept anywhere, it wouldn’t matter but since about 9 months he is very particular about where he sleeps so we have to adjust.

My pregnancy is going very well, I am feeling very well and haven’t experienced much back pain (yet.) That was the hardest part of my first pregnancy and I was feeling it by this time. Hoping it stays away, especially as I now have a toddler that already likes to play with his little sibling by climbing all over me and my expanding belly. This week, I will be 15 weeks so it seems appropriate to be switching my wardrobe over to maternity! Yikes, I really need to get to work on that! Clothes are starting to not fit or not fit right and I can’t wear my over sized jammies to work, unfortunately.

Sorry if this is a boring post, just wanted to capture a few things.

14 weeks along!

This pregnancy sure seems to be moving! We’ve known now for almost 10 weeks! This makes me so happy, while I want to enjoy my pregnancy, I’m not too upset if the time goes quickly. I am really looking forward to my maternity leave to spend more time with Jonathan and see what it’s like managing a household with two little ones.

We’ve all had colds lately and Josh’s and mine are still lingering a bit. Nasty coughs and lots of congestion have plagued our household for about 10 days now. I am really glad JT is doing so much better though. It’s amazing how different his personality is when he’s sick. It’s very difficult to deal with (though I realize he is a very healthy child overall, not complaining here one bit) and very hard to see your child so miserable. He cut two more teeth at the same time so that woke him up quite a bit in the middle of the night :-/ But, now that’s he’s better he is soo happy! It’s so fun to play with him and watch him discover new things. Lately he’s been getting into all of the kitchen cabinets and wants to reorganize the pantry. We still need to work on getting new latches and moving the cleaning products to a different sink…

Life has been full of storms lately and I just weather them one at a time. I am pretty confident in what the future holds for me/us and I really look forward to that. Just need patience to get there.

Feeling Movement!

So, for those that hadn’t seen it on Facebook or heard directly from us–we are expecting baby Maag #2 late this summer! We are very excited to welcome another child into our family and thrilled that God is blessing us again. Today, Jonathan woke around 8:00 (5:30 for his first bottle but then back to bed) and it was my turn to get up with him and feed him/play for a bit. While we were downstairs and he was climbing all over me I felt a bump in my tummy. I have been feeling what I thought could be early fetal movements for over a week but wrote it off as I wasn’t sure. This morning, I was sure! As Jonathan was climbing on me and his little brother or sister, his sibling wanted to play back and I felt the thump. It’s very light so early on, but very exciting to me nonetheless. This past Monday, we heard the heartbeat for the first time at the DR. office. So simple yet so amazing and miraculous at the same time. The baby was very active (170 beats a minute) and kept moving away from the DR–JT did this too. It’s so neat to know this little being is already bouncing around inside of me and I look forward to feeling more and more each passing day.

Please continue praying for a healthy pregnancy and healthy baby–also, Jonathan has eye surgery tomorrow to open his blocked tear duct. Please pray for a successful surgery and very quick recovery.

Time for an update!

I suppose I should catch myself up and get back into blogging again…very hard when everyday life sucks all the energy from you.

Today was a very difficult and emotional day for me. Found out my sweet son took his first steps! How amazing! Seeing him grow every day and learn new things is such a blessing, I’m sure every year is special but the early years seem especially sweet as they change so quickly. I am so sad that I wasn’t home when this happened, my mom called me and told me the news. After hanging up I thought, did I really miss my son’s first steps? And for what? Work? I cried. This is not what life is about…I will get through this but not sure I won’t have regrets about this past year. I have a timeline and a plan and God willing, that will work out and I won’t always have these feelings or be in this situation. When I look at the date on the calendar, I pray for patience. I don’t want to wish myself into the future, but wouldn’t mind if it comes rather quickly.

I was really touched by the story about Dax Locke, for those not familiar with the story, google “One Last Christmas” by Mathew West. Warning: you will cry, hard, especially if you’re pregnant. By reading about his entire journey, I also learned about a little girl named Elizabeth who also passed away from cancer when she was 2. Today would be her 4th birthday…that makes me pretty emotional too. However, after reading about these stories, I have a new perspective on life and the motto “Cherish Every Moment” is very dear to me. When I have difficult times with Johnny, I stop, thank God for him, his health and the blessing that he is and know I won’t always have him home with me so these moments I cherish, good and bad.

Ok, time for something upbeat! Jonathan recently turned 1!! Wow! I can’t believe I am the mother of a 1-year old! So exciting! We had a big party for him at our house…well, technically it was “small” as we only invited close friends and friends with kids but it ended up being over 40 people when you add up the kids and adults. When I picked up the balloons from Party City I was really excited to bring them home to Jonathan. He loves balloons and I knew he would love these. Sure enough, he was swimming in them! Josh would hold him up and he’d bat at them and screamed with excitement over being surrounded by all of the balloons. What a sweet-heart! Seeing him filled with joy warms my heart and makes me smile. I was very thankful that day to have so much help too so I was able to enjoy his party. Julie (Josh’s mom) was able to fly in to celebrate with us! And she was a huge help getting all of the food together as were my parents. Beth and Casey helped decorate and Beth took people’s coats for me and helped me greet people…this became a big task with how many people came to celebrate with us! After an hour or so of eating and watching clips of Jonathan’s first year we let Jonathan have his cake. I think he was very overwhelmed by all of the people because he barely touched his cake and wasn’t too in to it. Luckily, he was very excited for his presents and helped open them. People were way to generous—this kid doesn’t need any more clothes or toys until next fall/winter and even then he might be good on the toy frontJ

That’s what I’ve got for you right now…stay tuned for some new news and BIGGER updates coming soon :-)

small update

So, Jonathan and I were playing on the floor tonight and he kept laughing and laughing. I would laugh and then he would laugh and on and on. It was such a sweet response from such a wonderful little boy. I also tickled him and he shrilled! He’s getting really ticklish on his sides:-) I also noticed he looked a bit thinner today. He went through a growth spurt recently but he grew taller so his legs and belly don’t look as chubby. His little muffin top is smaller!

I never knew I could love anyone/thing so much. He fills my heart with joy every single day and that love just gets stronger and stronger as the time goes by.

Jonathan’s 6 month appt

Well, today was a pretty great day. Jonathan had his 6-month appt and he is 18 lbs 5.5 oz and 27 in long. Not quite doubled in birth weight but getting close. His head was 17in but I don’t trust that measurement, he was squirming the whole time and wanted to play with the tape. He was cute…he is very healthy and his hydroceale is almost gone! This means we’ve avoided the surgery, so incredibly happy about that!

I am sooooooo blessed to be his mama! I just went into this room and held him. Yes, he is asleep and has been for over an hour but I wanted to hold my baby. He stayed asleep for the most part but still didn’t lay his head on my shoulder, he just stuck it out. He definitely doesn’t like to cuddle. I will have to tell his future gfs about this:-) I held him for a few minutes and put him back in his crib. Some days I am gripped with fear that something may happen to him…it’s pointless to worry but I can’t help it some nights. Some days are definitely stronger than others, tonight was a strong one. I am so incredibly thankful that God lets me be his mama everyday, we are blessed beyond words.

**I love you more than the sun loves the moon, more than the moon loves the starts** Sweet dreams little one. <3 Mommy

My Johnny is 6 months old!

Yesterday was Jonathan’s 6 month birthday and we celebrated way more than we probably should have. Oh well, it was fun. We planned to go to my parent’s for dinner but didn’t realize when we made the plans that it was Jonathan’s 6 month birthday. The day before I had bought him a few toys and sippy cups from Target with a gift card I received from work. I decided to give them to him for his 6-month birthday since that was the next day. I didn’t wrap the gifts or anything, but I did pull them out one by one and put them in front of him. He also received his very first laptop from Grandma and Grandpa- how exciting. The sippy cups seemed to be his favorite though, go figure. My parents (mainly mom I’m sure) also got him a cake! We cut him a piece and let him just go at it and with my help, he had a mouth full of icing way too quickly. That was pretty much all he was going to get as I didn’t want him to really eat that much and I didn’t know he’d react that way. We’re in trouble for his 1st birthday! It was really fun though, Casey and Tahnee were there too and got to share in the experience.

These past 6 months have been the most rewarding, hardest and unbelievable months of my life. I feel so blessed everyday to have my sweet little boy!

The latest Johnny news:
Weighs 18.2 lbs, height ~26.25 in
Sleeps 8:30/9-5:30-6 most nights
Eats Green beans, sweet potatoes (a favorite), corn, carrots, mashed potatoes, avacado and rice cereal; today he also ate bananas!
He sits up really well on his own and loves to play with toys, grasp rattles and pull mommy’s hair (hard!).
He doesn’t like most cameras but he loved getting his picture taken at JC Penny, was such a little ham the whole time laughing it up!
Blue eyes and blonde hair that is starting to grow back (cradle cap is going away!)

The latest

Well, this past month has certainly been eventful. Jonathan made it through most of June without needing a late night feeding and towards the end he didn’t wake at all! Josh would occasionally need to give him his pacifier but overall his sleeping has dramatically improved which has helped me immensely. The past two nights though he has needed to eat in the middle of the night, growth spurt perhaps?

We celebrated his 5 month birthday with rice cereal. He did fine the first try but for the second try he wasn’t as enthused. The next day I gave him some avacado which I’m not sure he actually swallowed. On Tuesday, we went to Lexington to visit my Grandparents and he got some mashed potatoes. I know I shouldn’t have introduced so much so fast probably but he did fine with it all and it was small quantities. The next week he had sweet potatoes and corn and green beans. He did not like the green beans but we’ll keep trying.

We also celebrated the 4th of July at the Crouseys, had a good party, good food and Jonathan swam again. He got dunked a bit this time but didn’t seem to mind. He was much less fussy than he was in mid June. He does really well when we go out- fell asleep at the Crouseys and didn’t wake when he was transferred to the car or crib, then he did well outlet shopping with me and Grammy today and he slept at Jen and Jordan’s during Jen’s birthday party. He was a very sweet peaceful demeanor and is setting the bar pretty high for his future siblings.

I love being a mother….I am surprised at how many of my views and opinions have changed now that I actually have a child. All have gotten better I think, but I have so much more to live for, love, and enjoy in life and its all thanks to my little Johnny.

He rolled over!

This past week was a special week for me. I felt extra close to Jonathan which was an amazing feeling. Someone said you “grow another emotion” when you have a child and it’s so true. It’s hard to explain but I think most parents understand what that feeling is. There was tradgedy in the news this week- two boys, 8 and 11 fell into a creek or perhaps one fell in and the other tried to save his brother. We will never know but sadly, both were found no longer alive. The story absolutely broke my heart to think of that family mourning that loss. I love my little boy so much and dream big dreams about what his life may be like–I know boys are adventurous but man, I don’t know how I’m going to let him be adventurous and keep him safe. Hopefully I don’t turn into an overprotective mom but somehow that will probably happen. My heart and prayers go out to that family.

Ok- lighter topic- Jonathan rolled over this weekend! On Saturday morning I finished feeding Jonathan so I was playing with him on our bed when all of a sudden I got wet. He leaked through his diaper! Grrr, he is ready to move up to size 3 but I am trying to stretch out my remaining 2s! I believe this is the cause for the recent round of leaks…but anyway, since I knew he just did this I decided to give him a little “free” time without his diaper so I laid him on a blanket as this is supposed to be good for their lil bottoms. Anyway, I decided to try tummy time too and as soon as I laid him down he rolled over. He had a surprised look on his face but I cheered and clapped for him so he immediately grinned. Josh heard me on the baby monitor and jumped out of bed to see what was up–I was so happy! I’ve been waiting for this milestone for almost a month so when it happened I was overjoyed especially because the doctor told us it may not happen for a few months. He did it again on Sunday afternoon too and Josh got to see it and share in the excitement!
Saturday night we had Jen and Jordan over for dinner. Josh grilled chicken and we had broccoli, baked potatoes, fruit and a cracker and cheese tray. After dinner we played a game of Settlers which was one of the better matches I’ve ever played as everyone did well. Of course, Josh won (again) but he got to pick his placements last which I think may have something to do with it. We also had chocolate cake and ice cream for dessert..mmm it was delicious. I am working on losing weight again though so I’m not sure why I had seconds. Saturday should be my cheat day I guess.

Sunday we went to the Vineyard and sat in the baby theater. We forgot the pacifier but Jonathan didn’t do to badly without it. He was a little fussy though so before lunch we stopped at Target to get new ones. We then went to Qdoba for lunch with Jen, Jordan, Dan, Beth, Katie and Tony (they got locked out of their car at Northgate mall). After lunch I ended up going to Sara’s after dropping Josh off at home. Jonathan got to go swimming again and this time didn’t go quite as well as last time but he didn’t cry too much. He wasn’t a fan of his raft. I need to get him a bumbo chair so he can practice sitting more. He is excellent at standing but doesn’t like to sit much so he doesn’t sit up very well. I think sitting up will help him in his baths (which last week or so we took away the ramp in the tub) and in the pool. After swimming, I came home and watched UP with Josh and played with Jonathan some more. He is such a sweet natured little boy. He smiles so much now and laughs and giggles, it is the best part of my day when I am home with my men. We skyped with Josh’s parents tonight too, glad they got to see Jonathan again:-)

Now getting ready for another work week….ugh for Mondays.