Celebrating my Children (Weeks 6 & 7)

I am so sorry that I didn't post week 6 this past Sunday. Life got super crazy overnight with the holidays fast approaching. I've been caught up running around everywhere, so I will combine the past two weeks.

Mister Mason has had an eventful couple of weeks. I want to praise him for never complaining when he is dragged along for all of his brother's appointments. He is the very best of the best. While there are no right words to really help him understand...I know some part of him does. I'll also congratulate him on losing his first tooth. Well...not really. He broke his tooth off. I won't go into details, but this little man was very brave. He didn't even flinch when I took him to the dentist after it all happened. How did I get so lucky? He is also super excited for Christmas, and helped Daddy pick out our tree. He helped me decorate it. I constantly hear him saying things like "Happy Christmas" or "Christmas is coming soon". That innocence is just so priceless. 

Mister Logan is just the cutest thing. He spent a week away from speech therapy over Thanksgiving. When he went back he had a rough time, but bounced right back. He's making lots of progress. Baby steps. Lots of them. I have recently heard him saying what sounds like "one, two, three". He's not quite saying the exact word, but you can hear the attempt at the sound. Then, today he was trying to sing "clean up, clean up". It is just the most adorable thing, and it makes my heart happy to see that someday I will hear "mommy" or "I love you". It may not be today or tomorrow, but I'll hear it. He's also getting very good with signing, so now we're trying to make him sign phrases like "more please". He's done that a couple of time. I'm excited for him and I'm excited to see progress. 

What have your littles been up to?

Family Meals

Growing up having dinner together every night, and breakfast on Sundays was a big deal. We tried very hard to alway keep up with this. Of course we all grew up and had our own thing going. However, family meals was a value I took with me when I began my own family. 

We work contradicting schedules and all meals don't always happen as a family. I have eaten plenty of meals alone on the table, or over the kitchen sink while browsing Facebook or Instagram. Now that we have our own place and are settling into home life once again we make it our business to have AT LEAST one meal a day as a family. Somedays it's breakfast others dinner, and other days it may not be any because one of us is missing. 

I find this time though very sacred. Our phones are not in site, and the TV is off. Some music may be playing, but for the most part we just enjoy each other. We talk and laugh about the silliness of our boys, but that time brings us closer. I hope that like me, my boys take this value with them when they decide to begin their own family.

Starting Over

"I guess I expected things to be different." Those are the words that came out of my mouth this afternoon as my honey got his schedule for his morning job. "Things will get easier babe. We're starting over of course they are hard." Thats what he said to me! I hold on to that saying if it was easy everyone would do it. 

I don't regret our decision. We are happy here. Happier than we've been in a long time. I just wish even if just for a little while that it wasn't so rough. The couple of days have been really hard home with the boys. I'm not sure where I stand as far as keeping my job or quitting. I'm very torn. The hassle just doesn't seem worth it to me. The only thing we're sure about right now is that the boys won't be going to daycare. Its an unnecessary expense that would cost twice as much as I would be bringing home. Not worth a dime when they could stay home with me. 

We have tons of things to figure out. We are starting from the bottom and working our way up. We have to find a home, I am going for a doula workshop in a couple of months, he has two jobs, I have one, our almost 3 year old will be starting some sort of homeschooling this upcoming fall and we have to get another car at some point. Staying home, carless is getting to me. I live in area right now where we could walk everywhere yet I'm limited because my oldest son will only walk so far before he asks to be carried. Its not staying home with them all day that drives me nuts. Its the not having anything to do that does. There are mornings that I can keep the car and go to the mall and play or walk or whatever, but there are days when he has to go from one job to the next right away. Its the lack of time. The no time spent with the boys on his behalf because he gets home and they are in bed and leaves again when they wake up. Its the fear that our communication will suffer. Breaks my heart honestly. I don't want this for my family! 

Its rough. We are extremely fortunate to have a roof over our heads thanks to a very dear friend to us. We are fortunate to have found work so quickly. We are truly blessed. I just need that extra dose of strength to keep pushing and fighting for what my family deserves. Rough days are not a sign of weakness but a sign that I am human. We all have them. 

I leave you with this. "If God brought us to it; He'll bring us through it." Amen.

See You Later

For the past few days I have been staying at my mom's house. No matter how crazy she drives me nothing gives me comfort quite like being close to her. At one point we even lived next door to each other. Throughout my second pregnancy she was always with me. Then we decided to move away and as the day to turn over our apartment keys nearned I began to keep my distance. I kept my distance because I thought I was doing myself good by not getting too close that way when the time to leave arrived saying good bye would be easier. 

I managed to not come around too often until about a week ago when all the feelings from the realization that I was 9 days away from leaving rolled around. I missed my family and I was tired of where we were staying. As I gave things deeper thought I realized spending a few days with my family was only fair. After all, they deserve to be around my boys too, and even if I wanted to get away from everyone we would still miss everyone.

The day to leave draws near and my mom keeps commenting that she doesn't want to say good bye. She told me I need to leave while shes not here. I am respecting those wishes, but as we embark on this journey I want everyone to know that I don't want good byes. I want see you laters. We have chosen to do this for the better of our family.

We aspire greater things and more out i life that are just not possible here where we are. We feel stuck. We want change and in order to achieve what we aspire risks had to be taken. We are ready to face the challenges and the victories that will come with our adventure. So, as the day draws near...see you later we are out of here! 

Adapting

I can't say much now. However, we have made some decision for our family and as we all know things don't always go as planned. Things were planned out to happen differently and then our car broke down. I hoped and prayed it was an easy fix. I prayed so hard that we would be capable of fixing it and still pay our rent and bills. That wasn't the case. The car needed a new transmission and the costs of everything was a combination of our rent and bills. 

We thought long and hard about things. With no savings amounting up to what we needed to spend our decision was evident. We decided to move into a family member's home, turn our apartment in and fix our car. After all, we needed a car to go to work. Maybe there were different things that could have been done, but at that moment doing it that way was the right decision for us.

Going from having our own space to sharing another's comes with great difficulties. We now all sleep in one room and although we are proud bedsharers the boys enjoyed having their own space.    They are having a tough time with this. Adjusting to being under a different roof. Trying to understand that they are not visiting for a bit they are here to stay until we move on to the next step in our lives. 

I won't lie. My heart broke into millions of little pieces when I had to tell my 2 year old we weren't going home. That he needed to sleep at grandpa's because this is where we would be living now. How do you get such a young mind to understand such an adult thing? I know its all things that come with the territory, but I wish with all my might that it was easier on my boys. I wish I didnt have to take them out of their element to make bigger things happen for them. 

If one day they grow up and ask about this the one thing I want them to know is that I know it was hard to adjust, but We did everything in our power to make them comfortable, and I want them to keep in mind that on that day we made the decision that seemed most logical for our situation. We would never make a decision that directly affected them without first considering every aspect.

Adjusting has been hard. They wake up screaming in the middle of the night looking for us even when we are right there. One day all our hardships will be a thing of the past and they will have everything I've always pictured for their life. 

New Direction

If any of you reading this have been following my posts from the start you all know that I started my blog to help me deal with some issues. One of them being my fear of possibly having PPD (post partum depression). That was about 4 months ago. Today I can rest assured that I do not have PPD. However, it is very clear to me that I have major issues with anxiety. It is such an issue that if not dealt with appropriately throughout the day I start to feel as if I have a brick on my chest preventing me from breathing. I went to two therapist sessions seeking help. They both brushed my concerns off unless I agreed to be medicated. Sometimes I still wonder if I will need to be medicated, but I decided to cope with my anxiety naturally in my own way. I wanted to find myself inorder to help me deal with it.

My interest in the natural way of life awakened when my youngest now 9 months old was born. When I became pregnant with him I knew I wanted something different out of that experience . I knew that although I trusted my mom I didnt want her to influence my every decision, and so it all began. I planned to breastfeed until 2 years old, I delayed solids, I research gentle parenting and discipline. I wanted things to change. With that came my interest in natural foods. Organic became something I wanted to try. All I had ever been told was that it was too much money, but never that things were so fresh and rich i  taste. I was brainwashed by society to think that there was no way I could possibly afford clean, healthy meals for my family. 

At first it was only a drink. Slowly, I started cutting out soft drinks, and certain foods. I began to cook differently. I started making my own smoothies to replace meals. I cut out canned goods and replaced them with fresh, frozen and/or homemade. More and more organic products were being purchased and I was staying on budget. I kept researching this way of living I so desire.

So many things are changing. I am growing and taking a new direction in life. I have lost friends over my new path, but the reality is that I am at an age where those things dont matter. At this age you know who will stick around. I have so many plans for the upcoming year. So many things I want to be a part of and projects I want to start. Quite frankly those people who chose to walk away didnt need to be a part of it. 

Next year, I plan on starting training to become a doula. I want to give women the opportunity to make informed decisions on the way they birth and their birth space and to feel empowered by it. I do not want them to allow anyone to shut their instincts out because we know our bodies best. I want to support them in their choices regardless of what those are and I want them to trust in me that I will be there to take care of them. I am a nurturer at heart. With that I also have plans to obtain a lactation consultant license to raise awareness about breastfeeding in the community and provide services to women who cannot afford them. Most importantly with minorities. I am not here to judge. I am not here to say if you breastfeed you're a better mom than she who chose to formula feed. I just want everyone to have as much information as possible on the things they choose to do.

If you had asked me 4 months ago where I wanted to take this blog I would probably have said I just want to vent my feelings. Today I say I can stand by its name...I am going to document my journey! You will still see posts about my family, and I will still brag and rant, but I want to share everything from here on out that is going to happen to take me to where I need to get. 

Every bit of research I have done has changed my view on life. Like I said I am determined to change things. I want to step out of the box for once. You will see recipes I cook up, adventures lots of adventures and I will posts about things I am passionate about. Bare with me as this is a learning experience and I am in for one hell of a ride.

If you're not helping me advance in my journey today I wave you good bye! 👋

Organic vs. Vegan

This will be a short one, ahhh I feel like every time I go shopping I have this discussion with my honey. I have done tons of research and have been making the transition to clean eating step by step. Each time he shakes his head and tells me, "you won't convert me. I'll always be a carnivore." 

I feel like that's close minded. I'm not trying to delete meat from our diet. I want us to eat healthy chemical and hormone free foods. Not only because they are healthier, but they taste so much better. Being vegan means that you eliminate the use of animal products in your diet an life I believe. Eating organic foods means they are free from chemicals, antibiotics and gmo's (genetically modified organisms). 

My biggest switch has been done in meat. Where as before I would scavener hunt for a bargain on meat; I am now willing to pay more money for natural non-altered meat. I also want to cut out processed foods, like canned good. We eat a lot of veggies with our meals, but I want to start buying local rather than from big named brands. 

I know its not a lot, but a little goes a long way. Growing up my parents fed me anything. We ate out a lot. I don't want my kids to be raised that way. I want to make a difference in their lives with what they consume, and I am concernes about what they consume.