Nearly Wordless Wednesday

This kid kills me.  He does the funniest things.

Hey Mom, want some hot chocolate?

You left the bathroom door open.  You got a problem with that?

Daddy's desk may be the most interesting thing in the whole house.

And he likes pickles.  Fruit? Pasta? Anything else for that matter? No.  But yes to pickles.

Watcha doin'?

I love how he sucks his lips in when he's thinking.

Hey Mom, I'm cute.  Just so you know. 

Thoughts on Motherhood

The media/online uproar about Ann Romney being a stay at home mom got me thinking a lot about motherhood, life, what I want, and why I do what I do.  I have a jumble of thoughts running through my head and I’d like to share some of them. 

My life these days revolves around my husband, my son, my as yet unknown second child, and all the minutiae that goes with keeping our life running, as well as the external things like church assignments, keeping up with family and friends, etc. It turns out that running a household, raising children, trying to make ends meet, working part time to fill in the gaps in the free moments I have when said child is asleep, and being my husband’s partner, cheerleader, friend, and lover takes quite a bit of time and energy, and very little of it has anything to do with me and my needs.  Yet I love it.  Every day is not perfect, far from it, but when I look at my life as a whole, I am happy with where I am at. 

It’s funny because for 26 years minus four days, my life revolved around me and what I wanted and needed. I spent my time figuring out how to enrich myself, enjoy myself, learn, grow, and generally meet my own needs.  Three years and change later I’m in such a different place.  It’s not the easiest place to be, but it’s a good place. 

See, as I see it, being a stay at home mom who happens to work a bit on the side is my ideal.  I could drop the work thing and it might be even better. It hasn’t come without sacrifice.  I agree wholeheartedly with my friend who once commented that it has taken her years and several children to be able to say she’s a stay at home mom when somebody asks, without clarifying that she has a master’s degree and teaches at the university on the side. I don’t know that I’ve reached that point yet.  I too have a master’s degree.  I have a job I can do from home that helps ends meet in our current state as a student family. I have plans in the future to do more with the things I learned in that master’s degree. Why am I not pursuing those goals right now? Because I don’t feel that is the best use of my time.  The work I want to do will be contract work, consulting, things of that sort.  That takes time and energy to build a business out of, and right now I have much more pressing needs at home looking at me from a 15-month old’s eyes. He needs me.  He needs my time, my energy, my attention, and my love.  My husband needs those things too as will this next baby.

Do I feel like I am stagnating, like I should be out working and making a difference? Sometimes.  My masters degree is a professional degree. It lends directly towards working in the public sector, and I found incredible fulfillment from the opportunities I had there. But most of the time I don’t feel that way.  Most of the time I believe that what I’m doing in my own home has a larger effect on the world than anything I could to in the workplace.  I am blessed with the opportunity to stay home, and so I make that choice and then choose to be happy with it.  Because I can make that choice, working outside my home has become something that is for me.  It is for my own growth and development.  I see nothing wrong with that, but I’ve learned these last three years that many personal goals get pushed aside, morphed, and redefined when raising a family is the main occupation.  I don’t know what the future holds, and I hope many of the things I want to do will happen in time, but if some of my goals never come to pass, I think I’ll be okay with that.  I’ll be okay because other goals and joys and fulfillment will take the place of those particular goals. 

Motherhood takes my best self.  Like I said, I spent 26 years taking care of me.  Now I take care of me only after everyone else’s needs are satisfied.  That’s a potentially dangerous path to walk.  I still need care too, and I’ve found that if I don’t fulfill some of my own needs, I am not the best mother I could be.  However, the fact is that my sleep gets thrown out the window when Spencer is sick and wakes up four times throughout the night. 

I remember when I had a full time job.  I found fulfillment there, but not in the same way.  My job never truly got the best out of me.  I didn’t need to give me best self to do a good job.  It was just what I did during the day so that I could do the things I really loved at night and on the weekends.  It’s funny that motherhood is not that way. For one, there’s no such thing as nights and weekends off.  Even if I do have a babysitter taking care of Spencer or am away and Bill has him, he’s still on my mind.  When he took a three hour 40 minute nap this afternoon, while I thoroughly enjoyed the time to get some things done, I had to resist peeking in his room to make sure he was safe and still breathing.  I used to think those kinds of comments were so cliché when others said them, yet now they are the genuine thoughts of my heart and it doesn’t even matter to me if they are cliché or not. It is beyond ridiculous how much joy I get when he comes running up to me just to get a hug on his way to more playing. 

There are numerous things I love about being a mother and particularly being able to be a stay at home mom, but one of them is the ability it gives me to create.  Though I am never truly off, at the same time I have flexibility to do things that were never possible when I was working full time.  I wholeheartedly agree with President Uchtdorf’s talk about how humans are meant to create things and that we each need to find a way to do that.  I think that is the root of some of the things I find so fulfilling about being at home.  I love the ability it gives me to cook meals that align with my health objectives. We have a tight budget, so when we need an item for our house, it gives me the chance to build it myself.  Yes, I save money, and that was the initial reason the hobby even started, but the creation part is what I love.  I can plant a garden.  Something about seeing life grow is very fulfilling. I can sew and craft and generally do things that were not thought to be cool when I was in high school or college. I remember being at BYU and the home ec major, sorry, can’t remember the exact name, but that major was totally looked down upon as not being very worthwhile.  Dang, I wish I had taken some of those sewing classes!  It would really improve upon my current skills.  And the best part of being a stay at home mom? I get to introduce little people to all these things I love.  I feel like I’ve reached a point in my life where I’ve experienced so many things that it’s almost a bit surprising when something comes along that is genuinely novel. Yet with kids in tow, it’s like everything is brand new again because I get to see it through their eyes.  I love that.  I hope I never get tired of that as my kids get older and harder to deal with at times.

I wish it weren’t so hard for our society to value the important aspects of said society.  Good parenting is one of the most crucial aspects of a healthy society, yet we downplay and downgrade it.  It’s the same with teaching.  Where would we be without good teachers, yet it drives me crazy when I hear my teacher friends talk about what they deal with every day at school with the way they are treated as employees.  Not every country in the world is like that.  I was totally floored when a Russian friend of mine presented in our grad program that in her country mothers are given three years paid maternity leave with a guarantee they’ll have a place when they come back.  Three years!  I can’t even imagine! I just wish it were not so hard to value the things that are most important to a healthy society.  Parenting and motherhood are at the top of the list for me.

My last thought is I wish we didn’t tear each other down so much.  I hope comments like saying a stay at home mom has never worked a day in her life and obviously doesn’t know anything about economics don’t happen very often. I referenced earlier that I’m not sure I’m quite to the point where I can honestly say I am a stay at home mom when asked and be proud of that alone.  I’ve spent the last several pages talking about everything I love about it, but it still comes down to that I appreciate recognition as much as the next person and saying I’m a mom doesn’t get me that.  That need for recognition is one of many reasons I blog and post on Facebook.  I’ll be honest, I like sharing what I’ve done so that others besides just me know I’m doing something worthwhile. I hope over time that will change and I can be more secure in my identity and be happy just for me.  We shall see.  I hope we as a society can treat each other better.  I have my doubts it will happen, but our society is made up of people, and we all have the ability to be a little better. I know that’s my goal and motherhood is speeding that process along.   So here’s to another day and another challenge and doing this thing that stretches me to the extreme.

Where did my baby go?

I was looking at my iPhoto and realized I haven't taken any pictures of Spencer since the beginning of March.  Oops.  Don't worry though.  I took a few today. :)  It made me wonder where the heck my baby went and where this toddler came from.  He's being so cute these days.  Okay, I always say that, but it's still true. I figured it was time to give an update on what he's up to.  It's been a while.

He inherited a bunch of shoes from his cousin and today he was sporting a pair of Nike high tops.  People, they are sweet and he loves them.  He stomps all over the house when I put them on and just loves it.  Shoes mean going outside in Spencer's head, so he absolutely loves it when I put them on.  This kid LOVES being outside.  I'm sure he's going to be so tanned by the end of the summer.

Look at this close up.  He looks so old!  He's getting his canines all in this week. Hopefully those will push through soon so he'll be happier.  When they arrive he'll have his whole mouth of teeth minus his back molars, but those shouldn't come in for like six more months. 

We went to DI for a youth activity tonight and he got a little tired by the end, so I laid him down in the cart.  I couldn't believe he actually stayed there for a minute.  This kid is a mover, so anytime he sits still is a surprise to me.

 He's talking up a storm these days, though what he's saying only he knows. Mommy, daddy, and boo are understandable, but nothing else. He babbles to himself, me, and anybody who will listen all day long.

We have a Winnie the Pooh pack 'n' play with a totally useless mobile.  Well, it was useless when he was little.  Now those stuffed animals from it are his absolute favorite toys.  Until he latched onto them, he's never had any kind of lovey item.  But Pooh Bear, Piglet, and Eeyore are his absolute favorites these days.  They mostly stay in his crib, though sometimes he pulls them through the bars.  When we put him in there, he always laughs when I hand them to him and calms right down.  It's so nice.

Spencer has always hated being restrained.  He likes to cuddle, but not be cuddled, if that makes sense.  I do a lot of exercise videos these days and whenever I lay down to do the ab parts, he takes that as his personal invitation to run and flop on me and cuddle for a minute.  I'm not going to lie, sometimes that is enough to get me motivated to workout.  I love cuddling with him. :)

He's eating better these days, but he's still pretty picky.  It's all good though.  We'll get him to realize how awesome food is one of these days.

He's recently discovered how much fun it is to shake his head no.  He laughs and laughs when I imitate him.  In fact, he laughs most of the time.  He's got a really sunny personality.  I love it.

Okay, it's getting late and that's plenty of details.  We love this kid!  Oh, and we find out what we're having in a week, so that's cause for great excitement too.  Woohoo!

I want to write on my blog but I can't think of anything to write about.  Things are just moving along.  The job hunt is happening, grad schools are being looked at, the child is being adored, etc, etc. We just bought a tent and a bike trailer.  This summer is going to be awesome now. :)  We always need another tent, right?  Spencer loves the bike trailer, and it has an attachable front wheel, so now we at least have an option for toting two kids somewhere in a few months.

I did just see this article on my friend's Facebook page and it really made me smile. It's several years old, but timeless. Enjoy.

Deja Vu

So it's the 13th of March and it's feeling a lot like it felt this time last year.  Bill had what he thought would be a totally sweet internship at a company he really wanted to work for coming together only to hear on Friday that for some unexplained reason they don't even want to interview him.  What?!?!  It feels a lot like last year around this time when a bunch of potential internships didn't come through.  So here we sit, a month from the end of school and no internship or job in sight.  Oh joy.  Last summer a job never was forthcoming.  We did odd jobs for family and friends and somehow made it through.  We are hoping and praying that that part of the deja vu doesn't repeat itself.  It wasn't that great.  I will say we were really blessed and have made it through this last year despite that.  So if you happen to know of anyone hiring or have any job connections, we're all ears.

Aside from the very present need to find summer employment, this turn of events has really made us rethink where we're headed.  Bill only has one semester of school left and we've been looking at grad school options.  With this super sweet internship we thought we had, it was looking really good to stay put here, do grad school at BYU, potentially have a job waiting afterward and we'd go along our merry way.  Tons of our family lives here.  How could that not be a good solution?  The funny thing though is that I've been feeling lately that we really aren't meant to stay in Utah.  I didn't have any basis for the feeling since everything seemed to be falling into place, but with this turn of events, suddenly it doesn't feel so strange.  So we shall see how the future goes.  I don't think we're destined to stay here, which is just fine, though definitely uncertain.  There's so much to do.  A job to find, the GRE to take, schools to apply to, and lots of decisions to make.  Who knows, maybe this time next year we'll be in another state.  South Carolina is looking pretty good.  Or maybe Pennsylvania or even Oregon.  We shall see.

Christmas Stockings

I know it's March, but this is a project that was slow to happen after Christmas.  My mom made a super cute stocking for Spencer last year and I decided to make stockings for the rest of us to match.  I came up with four patterns, so there's one for me, one for Bill, one for the new baby, and one for a future child or a friend that comes to visit or something like that. :)  They're not completely sewn together, but they're as far along as they are going to get until I get names embroidered on the top.  I really like how they turned out! I crocheted the snowflakes to go on them and freehanded all the rest from ideas I got online.  It was a fun project.

Abu!

Spencer loves to play peekaboo.  For weeks or months he's been initiating it himself.  So cute.  Anyway, he's just starting to mimic what we say if we ask him to.  And tonight he finally got across to us that he knows how to say boo himself.  Except he says it "abu!" It totally makes sense when you think about how you always take a deep breath before you say shout boo! at someone.  To a one-year old, that's naturally part of the word.  I love it. :)

Goodbye First Trimester!

Here's to being 1/3 of the way through my pregnancy!  If it was my last one, I would be rejoicing because the morning sickness would be leaving, but since I haven't been sick this pregnancy, I'm just happy to be a little bit further along.  Here's to easy pregnancies!  I finally had Bill take a picture of me this morning after I came home from running. And then I cropped my head out of it because it was rather scary.  Ha ha! 

 And for comparison's sake.  Apparently my head was scary last time too :) :

I'd say I'm bigger, but maybe not as much as I thought.  I'm still running and doing workout videos, so we'll see how it all goes down in the end.

Switching Rooms

We've had so much fun having Bill's dad living with us for the last four or five months.  Unfortunately for us they closed on their new house last Friday so he moved up north and we don't get to have him around every night.  As a result though, we were able to switch around Spencer's bedroom and our office so that we could put two beds in his bedroom.  The office was the bigger room before, so now we've switched.  A couple months back we reorganized the living room too and as a part of this we moved the bookshelves out of there and into our office so that room looked a little less cluttered.  I like how it all turned out.  Here's the results.

The Office 

The Front Room

Spencer's Side of the room 

Spencer's other side of the room :) Soon to be the new baby's

Spencer's Toddler Bed

I guess we could have gone straight to a twin-sized bed, but I have to say, this toddler bed I made is absolutely adorable.  And it fits in the bedroom we have with the crib, so that's another plus.

Needing Spencer's crib in about six months for the new baby was a great excuse to get out my tools and build something again.  The finish turned out pretty nice.  It's always my least favorite part of building because I've had several pieces turn out not so great at that step.  I'll figure it out sometime.  This one was mostly a winner.  If you get close, you can see some of the mistakes, but who looks for those? :)  And you know what the best part of this bed is?  It cost me about $60 to build.  That's after a $10 mistake of cutting a bunch of boards too short.  I love being able to build things I could never afford to buy.

Beds, Playing Outside, and our own little Quasimoto

I've slowly been building Spencer a toddler bed that he can start using sometime between now and when the next baby is born.  Mostly it's spent the last month sitting outside built but needing a final sanding, staining, and to be assembled.  Bill's mom was in town this weekend, so I got it sanded and we decided to put it together and see how Spencer likes it while everyone was there.  It's not stained yet, but otherwise it's done.

We put it together in the living room and dragged Spencer's crib mattress out to put in it.  The second it was in, Spencer came running over and jumped on it and then started rolling around playing all over it. He loves it!  It was so cute to watch.  He's certainly not ready to sleep in it, as he won't actually lay on it for more than about half a second at a time, but he sure loves playing on it. The plan is to switch our office and his bedroom and then set both it and the crib up in the new room, which is much bigger than his current one.

Spencer loves, loves, loves being outside.  He'll just sit at the window or the door and stare outside.  The other day I took him outside to wander around.  This is what he did the whole time.

 Played with his truck.

 Walked all over our back and front yard.

And pushed this little scooter around that is our downstairs neighbor's toy.  He even got on it once, but promptly fell off and decided that wasn't the best idea.

So last thing.  Yesterday morning Spencer woke up with his eye almost swollen shut.  We had no idea what caused it, since it wasn't like that when he went to bed.  It got better throughout the day but when he woke up this morning it was all swollen again.  Today though, we figured out what caused it.  Spencer woke up this morning but then quieted down for a few minutes before we went in and got him.  When Bill opened the door, he was leaned against the corner of his crib, totally asleep, pressed against his eye.  Crazy kid!  Here's how it looks.

Flopping

Bill's siblings used to wake each other up by running in and jumping on top of each other.  That might be the worst way I can imagine to wake up, but really funny if you're the one doing the flopping, as they called it. Spencer has decided he also likes to flop people.  He started running up and falling on us a few weeks ago and I finally got a video of sorts.  He's not flopping anyone, but he's also started swan diving on the bed whenever we put him up there.  So funny.  When he flops us he does the same thing, just on us. :)  It's so funny.  This kid has such a great sense of humor.  I love it!

Growing, growing, growing

I'm hitting that phase in my pregnancy where I'm thicker around the middle, but not enough so anyone would dare ask if I was pregnant.  My clothes are starting to fit a little weird and mostly I think I just look like I'm getting a little tubby.  This is all fine and dandy except I don't hit 12 weeks until Tuesday.  People, I am going to be huge!  I was barely even showing at all last time at this point.  Remember this shot?  I think that's a few days before I delivered.  

I look at that picture and I can't even believe that's possible.  Can I really get that big?  Sure can!  At least I shrunk back to normal size afterwards.  That's every girl's fear and I'm glad it was unfounded for me, with plenty of help from exercise and eating well of course.  But I'm pretty sure that besides the fact that I can already tell I'm carrying this one high while I carried Spencer super low, that I will hit this phase long before I am ready to deliver.  Ah well.  I feel good and I'm almost done with my first trimester, so I'm not really complaining, just marveling.  My only real wish is that this time around my face maintains some semblance of being an adult rather than reverting to pimply teenagehood.  Here's hoping!

Homemade Bagels

Have you ever made homemade bagels?  If you haven't, you really should.  They are so ridiculously easy and they turn out so amazing.  My mom makes them all the time and has them for breakfast nearly every day, and she shared her recipe with me a long time ago.  I don't make them very often, though I don't know why, since they are easy and don't take that much time to make, but I don't.  However, this morning I was seriously craving some bagels, so I made some!  I had blueberries in my fridge and craisins, so I made half blueberry and half filled with craisins.  I would have used wheat flour but I didn't feel like getting my wheat mill out, so these are delightful white flour bagels.  That's totally a treat, right? :)  I thought I'd share the recipe so all of you can enjoy some yourselves.


Bagels
1 1/2 c warm water
2 1/4 tsp yeast
3 tbsp sugar or honey
1/2 tbsp salt
4 1/2 c flour

Pour warm water into a mixing bowl and sprinkle yeast on top.  Add sugar and stir. Let sit and foam for a few minutes to check your yeast.  Add salt.  Slowly flour and knead to make a soft dough.  Knead for 10 minutes by hand or use a Kitchen Aid, etc. Dough should be fairly stiff. Cover and let rise in warm place for 15 minutes.

Punch down dough, working out air bubbles, and pinch off about a dozen balls.  Let them rest a couple minutes, then work a hole in the center with both thumbs.  Let rise 20 minutes.  While dough is rising, fill a large pan with water and 3 tbsp sugar and heat to boiling. Drop 4-5 bagels into the boiling water. Boil 1 minute, flip over, then boil for another minute.

Remove from water and cool for a couple minutes on greased cookie sheets.  Bake 30 minutes at 350 degrees.

Variations:

Cinnamon raisin: decrease salt to 1 tsp and increase sugar to 6 tbsp. Add cinnamon ( a couple of tsp or to taste) Knead in raisins after dough is desired consistency.
Whole Wheat: Just substitute half the flour for wheat flour. Add wheat flour first and let it sponge or foam before adding the other flour.
Other options: Blueberry, poppyseed, herb-garlic, cranberry, oat bran, cheese & onion.  For ones with berries, just need them in after you've gotten the dough all ready.


And wha la!  You have amazing homemade bagels.   Mine are currently in the oven and I can't wait to bite into one!  Oh and small warning.  They get bigger when you boil them, and get even bigger when you put them in the oven, which I forgot about, so you will end up with some pretty huge bagels if you don't start them sort of small.  See my picture?  Good times!

And for all you Spencer admirers out there, here's what he was doing while I was cooking. 

Wistful Thoughts

Have you ever wanted to be done with a stage in your life?  Who am I kidding?  Of course you have.  I'm to that point with where I'm at.  I try so very hard to be content with what I'm doing and how things are going and find the good in everything.  There really is a lot of that.  I love my friends, my calling, my 1-year old, where we live, having my FIL living with us, being pregnant with another little one, etc, etc.

Yet still, I really think I'd be okay with a change.  Like Bill being done with school and getting a job.  I'd love to have my kids be a little older so we could introduce them to all those fun outdoorsy things that Bill and I love so much and don't do at all at the moment.  Heck, I'd just take Bill having a little more time in his life so that he could actually finish his work and have free time.  I pine for the day he comes home before 6:30PM and doesn't have any homework to do on the weekends.  Then I don't think I would care whether our kids were really little.  We'd both be able to put our minds to planning how to do fun things with them despite their age. Oh, and what would it be like to not at least partially live off of student loans?  That will be a blissful day when it arrives.  Making money again?  What is that like? I'm so used to this school thing, but I could really get unused to it.  What if going on a campout didn't immediately bring to mind how much gas will cost or whatever random food we choose to buy.  What a novel thought.

You know what else I could really enjoy?  A dishwasher.  Even a bad one.  I'll rinse the dishes.  Just give me somewhere to put them to finish them off.  That might be the one downside to our house.  Speaking of houses, I really want to buy one.  You know, someday.  I just wish someday were getting closer, like we were actually saving for a down payment or something great like that.  Remember that whole living on student loans part I mentioned? Yeah, no down payment right now.

So I really do have a lot of amazing blessings in my life.  I could name so many things that are fantastic and another time I will.  But right now, I could do with a change.  Too much to ask?  Maybe.  All those changes will come soon enough.  Today I'm just not feeling so patient about waiting for them.

Crafting

I have New Beginnings on Sunday.  As the giveaway we are giving the girls a "Standards of Personal Worthiness Survival Kit."  I got the idea on a website somewhere.  I can't remember where.  I was putting it together this week and wanted to make a little bag to put them in.  Pinterest saved the day and I made the cutest little bags.  See? :)  I'm feeling pretty proud of how they turned out.  They weren't that bad to make, especially since I was making 15 of them.  Good times. 

First Haircut

Spencer got his first haircut today!  Funny thing about it?  He hardly even noticed we were doing anything except when we did his neckline, then he kept cringing.  It was funny.  Since he's a blondie, it's kind of hard to see the difference, but here's before and after:

Oh geez, this kid is cute.  Yay for finally growing some hair!

Belated Birthday Pics

Spencer loved his birthday cupcake.  It took him a bit to get started, but then he was all over it.  We didn't really get a very good picture of how covered he was, but he ate every little bit of it he could. 

 Spence got a bunch of books for his birthday plus a dragon my sister made.  That's right, she made it!  So talented.  Spencer loves it, as you can see. :)