DELIVERANCE

As soon as I found out I was pregnant, I calculated when the little babe would be born. I used an app to track my fertile window and figured out almost to the day when my due date was before going to the OB. Sure enough, when we went in for the first ultrasound I found out our little jelly bean was due the first week of June. I was ecstatic to be pregnant but I was a little frustrated at the timing. My birthday, my husband's birthday, and our anniversary is at the end of May and I knew it was very possible to deliver before the due date. 

Fast forward to May. Our anniversary and Stephen's birthday passed. Then on May 23 (the day before my birthday) I started having real contractions. (I calculate realness of contractions on whether they are painful or not.) They lasted off and on all day until I went to bed that night but weren't consistent. At that point, I assumed it would happen on my birthday or within a few days of it. 

Tired of playing the waiting game, I started drinking the red raspberry leaf tea and upping my physical activity. People would give me their advice on what worked for them and I would do it and think "Okay, this is it!" then nothing would happen. On June 1st, I was completely over being pregnant in every way. Everyday five new lines would appear on my belly. I decided it just wasn't going to happen unless I kicked it into high gear. The full moon was coming and I just knew this baby was going to get out one way or another on June 2nd. 

My mom was in town waiting for the babe to make an appearance so we walked all around downtown. I thought it would surely get something going, at least some Braxton's. Nothing. So that evening I turned on Just Dance and moved my groove thang. I found "Sexy and I Know It" and decided that if anything was going to put me into labor, dancing to that song was it. I gave it all I had until I was too exhausted to move. 

Around 11pm when everyone was in bed, I started contracting. This was it. I didn't tell anyone because I didn't want to jinx it. I stayed up all night to time the contractions. They started to get painful and five minutes apart around 4 am so I woke my mom and Stephen shortly after. 

On the drive to the hospital, the pains were becoming intolerable. By the time we checked in, I was blinded by pain and definitely wanted the epi. (Up until the hard contractions I was going to try au naturale.) 

ISAAC'S FIRST PICTURE

They gave me the epidural around 7am. People say you can't feel it but you can, it just isn't as bad as the contractions. The worst part about the hospital experience was the IV. I am so squeamish when it comes to blood drawing or anything vein-y. Everything happened so fast and felt like a dream because I had been awake for over 24 hours already. It was a little before 11am that I started pushing. The OB wasn't there yet but I did three solid pushes and the nurse made me stop because it was only going to take a couple more. 

The head was nearly right between my legs. I wanted to meet my baby so bad that it seemed like forever before the doctor finally came in. I gave about three more pushes and little Isaac made his appearance at 11:23am. 

He was all gooey and puffy. I didn't cry like all the other mothers do when they hold their child for the first time. I was in disbelief. I could not believe he was actually here and I was going to take him home and care for him. I quieted his screams by shushing him and kissing his tiny, slimy head. He finally calmed down and I lead him to my breast to nurse. He latched immediately. I expected it to be awkward but it was just perfect. I was in love. 

DADDY AND ISAAC

I'M BACK!

I cannot believe it has been over a year. AGAIN. The past year has come with a ton of changes, most of them were very time consuming. I started a Dental Assistant job in January of 2014 and was there full time until the end of May this year. A year ago this month, I found out I was expecting my first child and I also started yoga teacher training.

As of June, I am now a stay at home mom and have more "freetime" to blog. (Yeah, right. Freetime doesn't happen often with a 3 month old.) But, I now have a plan for this blog and have many posts lined up to come out on Fridays. I am excited to have some consistency and something to put my mind to other than child rearing.

You can look forward to many different posts I have planned out. They range from religion to minimalism to mom-hood and everything between. Next weeks post will most likely be about my labor and delivery experience.

Cheers!

I can’t believe it’s been a year since I have posted anything on my blog. I felt very passionate about it at the beginning, but somehow I must have forgotten how important it was to me. Once I read the prompt from Delightfully Tacky’s blog post on what is keeping her from achieving her dreams, I realized it was the perfect way for me to get back on the blogging track. 

There are many roadblocks that are keeping me from achieving my dreams. For one, I am not completely sure what my dreams or goals are. I have so many that, one day a certain goal will be the most important to me while the next day it’s something completely different. 

My goals feel quite lofty to me. I have a true dreamer’s dreams. I want to write a book and get it published. I want to become an advanced yogi. I want to have a popular YouTube channel. I want to become proficient at playing the ukulele. And I want to have a successful blog. These are just the biggest of my dreams, I have plenty of smaller ones. 

I know I am capable of accomplishing these dreams of mine, but I also know that I am in my own way. I am scared of success and failure. If I succeed, then I have to keep on succeeding. There is a lot of pressure that comes along with success. And being scared to fail speaks for itself. I am, also, quite lazy. I have a full time job now so once I get off work the last thing I want to do is work some more. That is the biggest hurdle I have to get over to reach the finish line. I have slowly started working to get over it, but I do have set back days. 

Since I am aware that I am in the way of my dreams, I have been taking baby steps to fix my problem. I have made myself decide what goal is the most important to me right now. And being me, I didn’t just pick one, I decided on two: blogging and becoming an amazing yoga instructor. Then, I decided that after work I must devote a little time to at least one of these daily. 

I have a long way to go, but I know I will never get there if I don’t let go of my insecurities and laziness. 

7: A Book Review

Recently I read the book 7 an experimental mutiny against excess. I had never read anything by Jen Hatmaker and didn’t quite know what to expect from her. I honestly thought it would be mostly deep jabber about a spiritual journey. Boy, did it take me by surprise. This book was inspiring, hilarious, embarrassing, and God-filled. I loved every moment of it and was sad when it ended. 

It is about a woman and her family’s 7 month sabbatical journey. Each month was devoted to something different. By the end of it, I was left wanting to do something similar but it takes a lot of guts and planning to do a sabbatical that intense. 

The seven categories were: clothes, shopping, waste, food, possessions, media, and stress. I understood immediately what the clothes and food were about because they sounded like the hardest. Basically, during the food month she could only eat 7 food items. She picked chicken, eggs, whole-wheat bread, sweet potatoes, spinach, avocados, and apples. Which is very close to what I would choose if I were going to do it. Same concept with clothes. The other months were set up a little differently but still very important. 

Each month came with its own difficulties and set-backs. I recommend reading this book because if you give it a chance, it will change you. It doesn’t even matter if you are a Christian reading it or not, it will make you look at your life in a different light. 

Side note: 

Funny story, at one point in the book she started talking about her appearance and I decided to Google her and see what she looked like. I realized that the first picture that popped up looked very familiar. I grabbed my women’s bulletin from church and sure enough, it was her on the cover. Jen is going to be coming to my church early in 2014 to do some kind of woman’s conference! I’m definitely going. 

Ruts and Stuff

Being a woman or I guess a human, I am definitely prone to depression once in a while. I’ll go probably a whole month or more feeling ecstatic and happy with life but then it will all come crashing down. 

Lately, I have been completely absorbed in the world of Netflix. My emotions are up and down and left and right. I watch shows like Revenge and The New girl, wondering when my life is going to get interesting. Same thing when I read blogs and watch YouTube videos. It seems like everyone is busy living their lives and I am over here wasting my time watching a screen. 

I know there isn’t a specific point when life begins (except when you are born/conceived) so I can’t say what I am waiting for. I feel like at this age I should have a ton of things going on and should be spending time with people but I am actually just spending the majority of my time alone. 

There is mental block in my way that I can’t see through or get around. All I know is what I do, and I do what I know. I need a change. 

I didn’t realize that being a newlywed would completely change my social life. (I did to some degree, though.) Not just being married but maturing over the last few years has caused me to be completely irritated at spending time with a room full of college students. 

I have two classes to finish before I graduate in December and I will finally be free. I am hoping that, that is the point where life begins for me and it will become a lot more interesting. School makes me feel extremely tied down. 

I’ve made small efforts in trying to get out of my life rut, but they are things that will take time to progress in the right direction. At this point, I am in the downhill slope looking up at something that seems completely impossible. But I know it’s just an optical illusion from where I am standing and soon I will be on top of the next hill. 

Run it, Work it, Do it

So if you know me, you know that I absolutely despise sports and I am probably the least athletic person ever. But about two months ago, I decided to go on a fitness journey to get toned up. My goals are to be able to do at least one pull up, run a 5k without stopping, and gain enough strength to change a tire on my own. And maybe if it results in some abs, I won't complain. 

Running has always appealed to me for some reason. I knew that if I became a runner, I would feel like I had accomplished something. But I was that kid in school that when that dreaded day of P.E. came where everyone had to run a timed mile, I was within the last 3 or 4 kids to make it across the line. I became a cheerleader in high school, yet my running abilities never became better despite being forced to run laps. 

I felt weak. I felt like a failure. I would run on a treadmill when I started college but couldn't keep up the pace for very long. Now I realize I have been approaching it wrong all along. About six weeks ago, I started the couch to 5k program. I downloaded the app that tells me when to run and when to walk. The first week was so easy. but the second week, I was afraid I wouldn't be able to finish. The other day I finished week 6 day 3 with a bang. I really didn't think I could do it, but I ran for twenty-two minutes straight! Not only that, but I felt fine afterwards, well more like ecstatic. 

To some of you, this probably doesn't seem like a challenge. But I know plenty of people that would love to be fit enough to even run a mile. I'm very proud of myself for sticking with this for as long as I have. Two more weeks and I will be done with the C25K and then I can work on speeding my miles up. 

Think about something you want to accomplish. It could be doing a pull-up or it could be baking a cake from scratch without burning the house down. Challenge yourself. Go do something. 

Where is our home, sweet home?

Stephen and I have been looking at houses for almost a month now. It has been a really fun process so far. But it is super easy to get our hopes up about something we see on the internet for sale and once we get there it looks terrible. We fell in love with a house a couple of weeks ago but it needs a lot of work and will be pushing our budget. Call me spoiled but I really don’t want to live on ramen noodles for the next ten years. 

But yesterday we finally made it to the bank after weeks of avoiding it. We had to make sure we could even afford a house. And sure enough we were approved which was super exciting. We rescheduled a house viewing so we could look at it sooner. It was in a great location with an amazing price. And adorable. 

We arrived way before we were able to go in so we could look around and make sure the outside was functional. We were there about 45 minutes before we could even go in so my excitement was peaking. As soon as our buyers agent showed up and opened the door for us, I fell in love with the house. All of the floors were hardwood, it had three bedrooms, and a cute kitchen. It was exactly what we were looking for. 

Bad news bears, though. Someone had already made an offer on it and was in the process of negotiating with the seller. Our buyers agent told us there was still a chance to get it though if we put our offer in quickly and demanded an answer by 9am the next day. So we filled out the papers for our offer and we were sure it would blow the other offer out of the water. All we had to do was wait until the morning to find out what the verdict was. 

Unfortunately the buyer decided to take the negotiated price, but there is still a sliver of hope if she can’t afford it. The buyer has until wednesday to go to the bank and get approved for a loan. Amidst praying for the woman’s financing to fall through, I realized it didn’t feel right to pray for someone else’s misfortune so we could have something we wanted. But at the same time the house is absolutely perfect for us. It is really tough for my control-freak self to let it go, but I know that it is in God’s court now.