Thoughts about life/afterlife

Hey guys,  remember me? Sorry I haven't "blogged" in a while. I've just been living life. Creating memories. Reading books. Trying to figure out the meaning of life. Ya know, the usual. I just started a new book: The Fault in Our Stars by John Green. It's a captivating novel. I'm almost done, but my mom's in town right now so I am spending more time with her than my book recently. There are so many hilarious and also poignant lines and concepts in it. The death-anxiety part of me is loving it, but it's not just philosophical - it's also about two awesome cancer-fighting teens falling in love (obviously everyone knows about this story, right?!) so my teenage-girly heart is loving it too.

Do you believe in an afterlife? This is one conversation that they have. Read the book to hear it (and/or to have your heart explode). We are all looking for the meaning of our lives, and how we can create meaning within them. What will my verse be? Hmm.

I do believe that there is something for us after death. And going through death brings us closer to God. I believe there is a Supreme Being who created me and loves me. There I said it. Sounds crazy, right? It's becoming less and less popular and intellectually-sound to believe in God these days isn't it? Well I never was very popular. I am young but I've been through some crappy things in my life. I haven't had to deal much with death, though. And now I think about it every day. Why? Because it scares me. I have little children. I have never had to feel this way about another human, until I created two that are now a part of this earth. There are parts of my body that are now living beings walking around that I love so dearly that if I think about it too much my heart seriously might explode. I sacrificed my existence so that I could create life. I could have died delivering them. I would die for them without any hesitation. And that's scary.

But we do things that are so scary because that is how we form connections, understand God, and create meaning. The things you aren't doing because they are scary are so often the best things. We are all dying like people fighting cancer, just not as quickly. Sorry if that was too blunt - what I'm saying is, let's really live our lives the way we really want to live them! That means different things for every person: for some it is seeing the whole world, for others it is simply spending more time with the people they love. Anyway, all this is coming from the thoughts and questions in my brain recently. What do you think about all this? I am trying really hard to be a better person which starts with loving people unconditionally and not thinking about myself as much. A lot comes from that I think and there are so many adventures waiting to be had so love yourself and everyone and live life with courage and purpose. That's a lot to ask for... Well, it helps to sit, meditate, and reflect. Then make a list of ways to create a better quality of life. Think about how you can create it every day. I would show you mine, but I simply want to keep it mine.

I suppose I will tell you one, though:

Keep social media off my phone so that I can be present and available with my kids.


I would love to hear your thoughts whether you did it or not.

Tired Saturdays

Shirt: saltandpeppertees Shoes: lifeslittlethrills

Today is a cloudy, rainy day just like the one above, except Dave works and we are not going to an awesome breakfast place or seeing a fountain with blue water. Saturdays are usually hard because even though Dave gets off earlier than most days of the week, it's the weekend and I'm tired. My plan today is to go walk on Main and find a coffee shop or diner where we can get some food. The boys (and I) NEED lots of adventure and new things so one of my new year's resolutions was to go somewhere new every week, even if it's on the same block I've been on plenty of times. I haven't done it every week. Most times it's not intended; I don't keep track. But just having that goal written down pushes me to think creatively.

Saturday is the usual day that the poke in the eye or the kick in the crotch is extra annoying. Most things like that are accidental, but that doesn't make it any less annoying. Saturday is when I'm too tired to do the dishes or run around with my kids. Our play time involves a whole lot of me lying on the floor singing badly to them or dying slowly from punches and body slams. It's a day when I hear them crying and hate everything - including myself for being so imperfect. Or today - David wakes up from their nap after only 30-45 minutes each time and leaves me with lots of unfinished things and uttering the words WHY IS THIS HAPPENING TO ME. And then I change one diaper while the other baby takes out all the wipes or finds the one thing that's most harmful in the room for them so I have to stop what I'm doing and take it from him so he can cry and the other one can get away butt naked. Despite all the extremely frustrating, exhausting, and painful things I go through day to day, I still can't get over how cute they are or how much I want to pinch that little butt trying to get away. Yes, I have plenty of days I fantasize about not having kids and all the glorious things I would do with my time, but I can still do most things if I put my mind to it. And I plan on sharing lots of adventures with them as they get older, because they're my best friends. I think moms with young kids have the hardest job out there. I don't know what it's like having older kids and I know there are lots of older people who would quickly rebuttal "Well you JUST WAIT till they're (insert age group hardest for them to parent).
But I am not them! Everyone has different challenges, and I am excited to have conversations with my little friends when they're older. I feel like I'm just talking to myself most of the time.

Hope someone is living it up somewhere new today.

P.S. My kids are screaming at me as I finish this post. 

Eight Months

My boys are seeming less and less baby-like. It helps that they don't have a lot of fat (David just looks like a little kid with his skinny little abs)...

David is not quite crawling yet, but he is dragging himself fast enough to disappear within a minute. He's definitely an explorer. We always have our gate (and our guard) up now. His hair is still a mohawk but it's getting longer...

Harrison is just learning how to crawl and is still perfecting it.  He is already pushing himself into sitting position and trying to stand. So that's scary.

He's just a sweetheart younger brother and I love it.

Thanks Auntie Serenity for the cool mustache shirts! They've used them well. (This is the only picture I could get that wasn't blurry...sorry David won't show his)

They are finally on a great schedule that I hope lasts a couple more months. They take two naps a day, they sleep about 11 hours at night, and they have 4 bottles and 3 meals a day. They have caught up in weight and height and they are learning fast. I feel pretty good and actually proud of myself for having them on the same schedule - and a good one at that. 

Honestly, it's hard as a mom (just as it is in most experiences in life I think) to know what you're doing right or if you're doing ANYTHING right. 

The main thing I have to remember as a mom is to not compare myself or my kids to anyone else (or anyone else's kids). That always destroys my confidence and consistency. When I start to stress about them learning this and that it becomes forced and I can actually see my boys picking up on my stress. The flow is gone. They learn when they are ready. I am not an uptight person and sometimes I wonder if I need to be that type of person to get more things done. But it's actually the opposite! I get more things done when I relax, and if I don't, I'm not freaking out about it. I have to remind myself that I can only do well being myself. Everyone benefits from that. So that has been my main focus recently between all the goals I have and ways I want to live my life. 

Be yourself, be yourself, be yourselffff....

On another note: I am so done with all this snow and I gladly welcome all the birds and bees and rabbits and chipmunks. I just want to go outside with my kids!!! It's pretty hard to take two little boys that don't walk yet out in the snow. So thanks snow, come again... just kidding, don't.

Four Months: Learning

The boys are four months old today. They have grown a lot. I hardly ever pick them both up at the same time because they are getting so heavy and strong.
They are starting to be awake during the day much more than asleep now, and it's really fun, but my everyday is now much busier.

My daily To Do list usually looks like this:

>Make bottles/feed babies (on repeat)
>Pump (on repeat)
>Eat breakfast
>Spend the morning exercising them and playing with them
>Do a load of laundry
>Get dressed and brush teeth at some point...
>Take them for a walk or drive
>Read
>Try to eat lunch
>Play with them some more
>Do the dishes
>Work on my online courses
>Clean/organize something
>Exercise them some more
>Try to exercise myself!
>Try to eat dinner

The most enjoyable things on that list are reading, online courses, going for a walk, aaand playing with them is pretty fun, too. It is not as fun when they are whiny and just want me to hold them.
It's a lot to do! And that's just the basics! Just tryin' to live my life! And it's not easy to get these things done.

Harrison sitting in his chair

Happy David

Harrison being shy about smiling.

They are learning new things and I love watching them. They are grabbing things, rolling over on their backs, babbling, starting to laugh (a sound almost as beautiful as hearing my first born's cry for the first time), trying to hold their bottles when they eat, sitting up in their Bumbo chairs, and Dave and I both swear they say "mum" and "mumma" now when they cry. Just sad cries, not tired or hungry. Other people have heard it and mentioned it! Whatever, whatever, I don't care if it's on purpose or not, I like it. I've been saying the word "momma" to them constantly since they were a month old so I think they at least understand that somehow it represents me, whether they moan it or not.
Now I have started doing the word "mom" and others in sign language while I say them.

Today we listened to Mozart on the record player. It seems to be one of their favorites. These are all our records:

These are some other favorites. Okay okay, the Billy Joel one is for me, not them. The bottom right one is Animal Collective...for when I'm feeling wild. They love Andrew Bird; it's very peaceful for them. Coldplay is soothing as well.

I wish I could spend as much attention on them EACH as I do with both of them together. I have three men to show affection and love for. It's a wonderful life and I wouldn't do anything else, but some days I am worn thin. I won't pretend like my life is hard, but some days are difficult. Baby David won't breastfeed anymore and sometimes it makes me frustrated and sad. I still give him my milk in bottles, and every once in a while I try to nurse him again. It doesn't work.
As a mother, I have learned to love in a different way than ever before. When you're a mom, you can't stop. It is the definition of full time. If you're feeling sad you either fight through it and do what you have to do, or let yourself cry. Today I let myself cry. My babies are very intrigued when they see me cry. Sometimes we cry together. It's okay to cry. I want them to know that. It feels much better than not crying.
So go have a good cry! Just kidding. I mean, you can! If you feel like it. Okay that's all.

One Month

My sons are a month old. It was official two days ago but I was too busy and tired to write anything... They are over 7.5 lbs now.

One of my craziest experiences so far was last week when I was alone with the boys in the house. 

I was watching TV (something I hadn't done in a while) and one of the boys started crying. It was David.

It was just about time for them to eat so I decide to grab him and go to the living room where the most comfortable chair is for nursing (it takes them a while to eat and be full... they are still so little they fall asleep a lot). I start nursing David and after only a couple of minutes Harrison wakes up. Now he's crying.

I realize I did not think ahead...

I now have to maneuver David -who has just started to eat and be happy- off the nursing pillow and in a strong football hold in one arm while keeping him latched so that I can go upstairs and get Harrison without disturbing David's mealtime. 

I successfully make it upstairs without disturbing him. And now I'm looking at Harrison...wondering how to retrieve him. I make several attempts at picking him up with my one other arm, and fail. So I decide it is necessary to detach from David. I quickly put him down next to Harrison in the crib and swoop them both up in my arms. I quite literally laughed a loud, triumphant laugh as I carried them downstairs. 

I haven't figured out how to breastfeed both of them at the same time without someone positioning me first, so I set David in his bouncer and get a bottle of my previously pumped milk out and warm it up (slowly heat it in a mug of hot water - thankfully I have a bottle-warmer now) while holding Harrison in the other arm. David is crying when I get back to him. 

Note: When I am alone during the day with them I usually feed them like this:

And they like it. The folded blankets next to them hold the bottles up. 

But only one of them was eating from a bottle this time so I get on the floor and put Harrison on the blanket and latch David again. Then I realize before I can feed Harrison he needs a burp cloth underneath him because the milk runs down his chin. The burp cloth was across the room. So I have to put David down again and grab it. Okay NOW I'm ready. I get David back on and get the bottle in Harrison's mouth and they're off! 

Then it was great.

It's fun. 

...Seriously. I love them.

Love

Since becoming a mother, this picture means so much more to me. I feel like I know exactly what He is feeling.

Part I: Motherhood; Part II: Being with Dave

Part I
Last night was the first night I really had that "I am going to be a mother" type of feeling not in a vague freaked out way that usually accompanies that realization. I actually felt like a mother. Every night, as I make sure the doors are locked and the lights are all out, the last room I pass before entering our bedroom is the boys' room. And I have that passing thought of "one day there will actually be two babies living in there that will be demanding my work and attention almost constantly." But my thought process is becoming different. Feeling like a parent isn't such a distant blob of anticipation and confusion. It's becoming a reality, something I thought wouldn't really happen until they were born. And I'm sure that it will hit me again in a much more intense way once I see them and know who they are.
Father's Day has actually helped me come to this I think. I woke up early on Sunday and made David breakfast in bed, a tradition from my parents that I happily decided to keep. As his wife I do things for him all the time (and he for me), but in keeping this tradition I realized that I was creating a standard for my own family and what I hope will continue throughout their families. And I thought, next year the boys will be clumsily trotting up the staircase to help me give love and gifts to their father. I felt like a proud wife and mother already, and felt peaceful and excited about the future I could see.

I decided to show Dave this picture I drew of him the day before Father's Day (it is more of a gift for me because this is one of my favorite pictures of Dave and being an amateur artist I had to capture it myself on paper):

Here it is a little closer:

I love this picture because I can see the happiness and emotion in his eyes. In the actual picture you can see his eyes were a little teary.

Part II
It's so funny how we are so different but SO compatible. It was harder while we were dating and would argue about something or not want to go to the same place to eat, etc.  I knew how much I loved him and it freaked me out when our relationship had even the tiniest road bumps like these.
It was Father's Day two years ago when we went to California for our friends' wedding. We stayed in my house and he met my whole family except my brother. It was a moment in our lives when we both understood each other and ourselves in a new way. And I already knew I wanted to be his wife. We were starting the healthiest relationship we had both ever had. But as our relationship progressed we went through a lot of hard times. I wasn't ready for marriage, and he wanted it but wasn't quite ready for it at the time either. We still had people in our lives to deal with and things to work through together.

As many of you already know, we broke up A LOT. I was so afraid to commit to someone who was so different and someone I fought with all the time, that I kept breaking up with him every time something went wrong! I thought, how could this person ever be my best friend?! In those brief moments of being away from him he would write me notes and emails, and leave gifts at my door which just proved how much he knew me. I tried not to think about it and date other people. But like I said, I knew how much I loved him and I really knew I couldn't live without him. It hit me more every time. After that cycle for about 6 months, I decided to love him unconditionally and work through the hard times instead of running away. Our relationship grew stronger and more content. Then the following March he proposed. We were both ready.
I don't regret anything that happened because I believe it was all part of us becoming one and being as strong as we are today. We bugged each other a lot and we still do, but that's kind of inevitable when you're with someone every day isn't it. We are so in love with each other that it's worth it. ...Plus it's kind of fun to bug him now ;) Being with anyone else (especially someone much more like me) would bug me way more. So I am continually grateful for my decision and that Dave loves me enough to go through all that and everything else with me.

Hopefully this helps someone in their quest for happiness. The end.