Rummaging

I'm stuck doing another one-handed post today (not that I'm really complaining--I love me some baby cuddles!), but that's alright because it doesn't take very many words to say I heart rummage sales. Especially neighborhood rummage sales that allow me to hit 15+ sales within walking distance of my house.

It worked really well this year to put William in our Ergo carrier and carry my purchases in bags, but I think I might need a wagon next year (or maybe just better self-control!)

Alumni Weekend

So I've got quite a bit of catching up to do since I pretty much took all of last week off. Almost two weeks ago we took William on his first major road trip to the hoppin' town of Waverly, Iowa. He was a trooper in the car, sleeping except when he was hungry or wet. And he even did well in Waverly; I was super nervous about the hotel stay but he slept like a champ and didn't scream out once!

We made the trip to Waverly because the Wartburg Soccer Program had arranged a game for the alumni against the current squad. Even though I wasn't planning to play (I was only five weeks postpartum at the time!), Darrell and I still decided to go to hang out with some of my former teammates and (of course) show off William. We didn't end up taking very many pictures (that's been pretty par for the course lately--between juggling William and all his stuff, the camera just doesn't make it out as often), but I did manage to snag one with one of my classmates and her super cute son Caiden.

Of course, we couldn't leave without snagging on family picture on campus--after all, without Wartburg, there wouldn't be a William!

The (Rainbow) Bridal Shower

I've got some recipes and crafts to post from my sister's bridal shower, but I figured that I should first share some pictures of the event. My sister has always loved rainbows, so I decided that instead of throwing her a shower in the colors of her wedding or some other theme that I would make it a rainbow party. With the help of some plastic tablecloths, it was easy to turn the venue into a bright, colorful environment.

Even the food table got in on the theme--it was fun coming up with ways to incorporate a rainbow into the food display!

I can never resist an opportunity to make my Grandma's sugar cookies and icing!

We played a few games, my favorite of which was "Guess the Bride's Age". I found a bunch of pictures of Amanda throughout her life (the more awkward and embarrassing the better, of course), and the guests had to guess how old they thought she was in the picture. We made my sister play along as well, and even she only got 13 out of 24 right!

It's hard to believe the wedding is less than forty days away, but I'm definitely looking forward to it and excited to "officially" welcome Nick into the family!

Mom and her daughters (and soon-to-be daughter in law!)

We Survived!

Well, our crazy busy weekend is over and I'm happy to report that we all survived. However, someone is apparently feeling the effects of the weekend and is being extra needy today. So that means I won't have an opportunity to upload any pictures, and I'm going to keep this post short because typing with one hand is a pain. Hopefully I'll be able to pass little bugger off to Daddy tonight so I can work on some actual posts. Fingers crossed!

Apologies

So I don't admit this very often (and it's a good thing Darrell doesn't actually read this blog so he doesn't know I've admitted this), but Darrell was right. I bit off way more than I could chew with my sister's bridal shower this weekend. I apologize, but I will be on blogging hiatus for the week, as I am busy baking, crafting, and cleaning (and, you know, keeping a newborn alive). However, I have lots of great stuff to share starting next week: some book reviews, a few new recipes, and hopefully a couple successful crafting projects (and, inevitably, pictures of William. I can't resist!).

Hope everyone's summer gets off to a great start!

A Little Suspicious...

So either someone in our neighborhood thinks really poorly of us or William is already sneaking out of the house and hanging out with the wrong crowd because the other day we walked out of our house and found this written at the bottom of our driveway:

Maybe they got the wrong house? The people a few houses north of us are definitely more questionable than we are...

William: One Month!

It's hard to believe it's already been (just over) a month since William was born--but the calendar doesn't lie!

William and Wagner the Bear: One Month

Overall, it's been a pretty good month. Darrell was home for the first two weeks, which was wonderful. And even after he went back to work, things weren't too bad. William is a pretty good baby most of the time; in fact, Great-Grandpa Will insists that we need to start carrying around a set of pinchers so we can periodically give him a poke just to make sure his lungs still work. Rest assured, though, his lungs work just fine; he gets plenty of practice in with those during diaper changes and if I don't feed him quickly enough (and some times, it seems he just wants to cry all day for no reason in particular). He also gets gas occasionally, which makes him uncomfortable and fussy as well. Most of the time, though, the gas is his own fault. He's what one of my books calls a "barracuda" nurser, and sometimes he gets so excited and sucks so vigorously that he swallows quite a bit of air. I've tried telling him he needs to calm down and slow down when he eats, but it's like he doesn't even listen when I'm talking.

William lasted about a week in newborn clothes and diapers, and is already starting to fill out some of his 0-3 month outfits. At his two-week appointment, he weighed in at 9 lbs 9 oz (up from his birth weight of 8 lbs 7 oz), and although we haven't been back to the doctor since then, Darrell and I wouldn't be surprised if he's close to eleven pounds by now (we use the not-so-accurate method of standing on the scale and then picking him up to get an estimate of his weight). We also don't have a current measure on his length, although from birth to his two-week appointment he grew from 20 inches to 21 inches, so I'd imagine he's probably 22 inches by now.

So far, William hasn't figured out the concept of a routine. He's pretty unpredictable about when he wants to eat (sometimes he'll go three hours between feedings, other times just an hour) and when he wants to sleep (some days he'll spend most of the day napping, other days he'll be awake for three hours straight), but I think Darrell and I are to blame for that a little bit. We haven't exactly given William an opportunity to get into a routine; since the day we left the hospital we've had him out of the house nearly once a day (and never at the same time: some mornings he'll run errands with Mommy, some afternoons/evenings we'll head out to baseball games, Sundays we head to church and sometimes lunch afterwards, even a two-hour trip to Kimball for his newborn photos, just to name a few). For the most part, though, he does well when we have him out and about. I'm not shy about nursing in public if I need to (but not so brazen that I'm willing to expose anything; Darrell is great in assisting me to make sure I maintain my decency), and once he settles down to sleep he can sleep through almost anything.

One thing that he's had figured out from the start, though, is his days and nights (woot!). Even though there are nights where he wants to get up and feed three or four different times, he does a really good job of going back to sleep after nursing and never fully wakes up (unless we change his diaper. But even then he settles back down pretty quickly). And since he nurses like a barracuda, he's usually done eating in ten minutes, so Mom and Dad can get a decent amount of sleep, even on the nights he's nursing every two hours (we're pretty sure he was going through a growth spurt a week or so ago; I swear he wanted to do nothing but eat around the clock. Thankfully, we seem to be past that now).

Personally, the hardest thing I've had to adjust to is accepting that I'm not (and don't have to be) Super-Mom--at least not yet. The first few days after Darrell went back to work I was trying to do it all: the laundry, the dishes, the cooking, the cleaning... The list goes on. And of course, I was trying to do all that, on minimal sleep, while keeping William alive and happy. Needless to say, I burnt out really quickly. Darrell finally told me that I need to treat motherhood as a full-time job right now and pretend that I'm not "working" at the house. He assured me that he has no issue helping with the household chores in the evening and weekends, because that's when we did those things when we were both out of the house all day at our jobs. I'm sure his expectation on that will change as William gets older (and hopefully more predictable/self-sufficient), but for now it's been much better being able to lay around and cuddle and nap and not feel guilty about it.

And, just for fun, I have to share one of the out-takes from his one-month photos.

William was a little nervous about sharing the chair with a massive bear  :)

My First Mother's Day

This weekend brought with it the celebration of my first mother's day, and it was, well, unremarkable. Not in a bad way or anything, but I still don't actually feel like a mother most of the time, so the day didn't really have any special significance. Maybe I'll feel more like a mother once William is a little more interactive and actually smiles at me... Or hugs me... Or calls me "mommy"... Or says "I love you"... But for now, I spend most of my days feeling like a milk machine/foreign language interpreter (or rather, I attempt to do the latter. I know William's cries mean different things, but I can not for the life of me figure them out. He might as well be crying in Greek), not necessarily a mother.

But, that didn't keep us from doing a few special things to commemorate the occasion. Since we had plans with my family on Sunday (brother's baseball game and family dinner after), we had a small celebration at our house Saturday night. And by "celebration", I mean that Darrell cooked me dinner (which he does most nights) and William decided to get fussy right as we were ready to sit down to eat (which he does most nights). It was still really nice, though, and Darrell even lit some candles to celebrate the event!

Nothing fancy... Just our Jack Daniels Steak, a potato, and roasted green beans. Oh, and of course, wine  :)

And since the whole point of the day was to celebrate being a mother, Darrell and I were sure to get a picture of me and William before church on Sunday.

We're still working on getting him to look at the camera... But he's cute nonetheless!

I know the role of "mother" still seems a little surreal at times, but I truly am blessed to call this little boy my son. And I'm equally blessed to have two wonderful mothers in my own life to look up to. Hope all the mothers out there had a wonderful day!

More Pictures!

So in tracking down the photo of my sister with William, we also found a handful of other William pictures that I had forgotten about. And even though they are all taken back when we were in the hospital (a month ago!), I'm still going to share them. Happy Friday!

First Family Photo! Please disregard the puffiness of my face; sadly Darrell couldn't photoshop that out  :)

Proud Daddy

Snuggles with Mama

One day later = much less puffy. Woot!

Ready to go home! And for the record, William had outgrown that outfit in a week. Our "newborn" didn't stay in newborn clothes (or diapers!) for long

Meeting the Fan Damily

Okay, so I know I'm really late in getting these pictures posted (nearly a month!), but better late than never, right?

William and Grandpa John

William and Grandma Sherry

William and Uncle Mike

William and Aunt Macy (and yes--she's officially "aunt"--my brother finally put a ring on it two days before William was born!)

William and Uncle Nick

William and Great-Grandpa Will (and yes, the name connection is intentional. Although the older "Will" is actually Wilbur, not William. We were a little more fond of William than Wilbur though)

William and Great-Grandma Doris

Darrell assures me that there is a picture of my sister holding William for the first time, but apparently I'm just not intelligent enough to find it on his computer. I'll have to post an update once I track that photo down.

5/10 Update: Found it!

William and Aunt Amanda--who was a little uncomfortable holding such a tiny baby, but she's already gotten much better

New Friend

Well, the weather has finally been nice enough for us to get outside, so you can bet we did just that this morning. I intended for our walk to be a short one, hopefully just long enough to get William to fall asleep so I could get some stuff done around the house when we got back. About halfway through our walk, though, this little cutie came scampering across the street toward us, looking for some loving and someone to play with:

I gladly obliged, assuming the owner would be following shortly behind. But no one came. So I played with the puppy some more. And still no one came. I knew I couldn't just walk away and leave the puppy alone in the street, so I called the veterinarian's office listed on the dog's tag. They quickly confirmed the dog's identity, and promised to put the owners in touch with me so they could retrieve their puppy. Unfortunately, I had no way of knowing how long it would take to get a hold of the owners, so I had no choice but to bring the puppy home with me.  All I have to say about that experience is that Darrell and I will never be getting a puppy so long as there is an infant in the house. I definitely had my hands full. Thankfully, the owners called about thirty minutes later, and before long I was back to just one fussy baby in the house.

Definitely ended up being a lot more eventful of a walk than I had bargained for; hopefully they don't all turn out that way!

Who Knew?!?

It's no secret that breastfeeding has many documented advantages, both for mother and child. While most are well known (helps mother lose weight, free, full of anti-bodies for baby, etc), I discovered a new advantage to breastfeeding last week that I was completely unaware of: it can get you out of jury duty. Yes, that's right, if you are a breastfeeding mother of a child under one year of age, you can file for exemption from jury duty. And you can bet I did just that when my notice for jury duty showed up in the mail last week. First time I've ever been summoned for jury duty, and I don't even have to worry about showing up. Awesome.

(For the record, yes, I realize that I am fortunate enough to live in a country where the justice system includes the right to a fair trial by an impartial jury. I also realize that as a citizen of this country it is my duty to serve on that jury when called to do so. And had I not had a legitimate reason to file for exemption, I would have gladly served. But I'm secretly grateful to have had a reason to be exempt because serving on a jury intimidates the heck out of me.)

"They" Don't Know Anything

"What great timing," they said of my pregnancy.

"Spring babies are the best," they said.

"Think of all the nice walks you'll get to go on," they said.

Ha. In the twenty-three days that William has been alive, there have been SIX days where the temperature has been over fifty-five degrees. SIX. For comparison, it has snowed on approximately TEN different days since William was born. Ridiculous? I think so.

And yes, I understand that I live in South Dakota and that my children will inevitably be exposed to freezing and sub-zero temperatures. But I was not prepared to battle weather like that with a newborn (at least not this time around). We certainly don't have the clothing or accessories for me to feel comfortable taking William out in this weather--and have subsequently been pretty much stuck at home. What I wouldn't give for weather that would allow me to take my fussy newborn out for a walk.

Gone Girl

At our book club meeting at the end of March, we were debating what book to read for our gathering in April. Thanks to my dear sister-in-law, I happened to have Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn sitting around my house, and pulled it out as a suggestion. After reading some reviews on it and a brief synopsis, we reluctantly agreed to give it a shot.

Why, you ask, do I say that we "reluctantly" agreed to read it? Well, as we were looking up information on the book, the things we were reading made us a little nervous about what we were going to be getting ourselves into. Here is just a sampling of some of the reviews/comments about this book:

"Marriage can be a real killer"
"[Flynn's] work draws you in and keeps you reading with the force of a pure but nasty addiction"
"Gone Girl's toxic mix of sharp-edged wit and deliciously chilling prose creates a nerve-fraying thriller that confounds you at every turn"
"Compulsively readable, creepily unforgettable, this is a must read for any fan of bad girls and good writing"
"An ingenious and viperish thriller"
"Burrowing deep into the murkiest corners of the human psyche, this delectable summer read will give you the creeps and keep you on edge until the last page"
"[Flynn's] most intricately twisted and deliciously sinister story"
"Gone Girl is a dark, satisfying, psychological thriller"

I could go on and on, but I think you get the point. Lots of references to "dark", "thrilling", "psychological", "creepy"--you can understand why we were a little unsure about picking this for our book club selection. Especially since not all of us were thrilled about the prospect of a book that would keep us up at night. The final verdict, though? We LOVED it. Yes, it's definitely dark, thrilling, psychological, and creepy, but not in a "there's a serial killer lurking outside your window" kind of way. Of course, it might still keep you awake at night, but only because your thoughts will be so consumed by how disturbing and dysfunctional this couple is that you won't be able to sleep. But at least that's not nearly as traumatizing.

I don't really want to say too much else about the book because it would be hard to go into any more detail without giving away some of the twists and surprises. So I'll just end by saying that you should definitely read this book. And be prepared to be blown away.

Happy May Day!

May Day greetings from South Dakota everyone!

Yes, that picture is for real. Gotta love South Dakota. I think this little meme sums it up best: