I thought I'd kind of recap what our life is like now that we have a 9 month old... as Jackson naps.
Here we go...in no particular order:
1. I type fast these days. VERY fast (you'll note more grammatical errors in my blog - yes, they kill me too but can't help it sometimes) because I still don't know what kind of nap out of the two I'm going to get from Jackson. Sometimes it's a 2 hour nap, and sometime it can be as short as 30 minutes. When we get really lucky, we get TWO 2-hour naps. Score!!!
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| Mom's happy...I'm happy! That's how we roll around here. |
2. I'm actually getting more comfortable leaving Jackson for DATE NIGHTS, or for a couple hours while I hit up the gym, or if I have a baby shower to go to or whatever. Yes, you read the first part right. Date night.
Karl and I went to a wine tasting event last Saturday. 55 wines. Can I get a whoa? Can I get an AWESOME??? Because that's pretty much what it was. AWESOME. Hell yes I'm still breast feeding, but I'm smart when it comes to drinking. I don't need to get wasted (i.e. try all 55 wines), nor do I want to because I need to be alert at all times and can't afford to feel like dong (especially when I bring it upon myself). I still had a blast. Lil' sip here and there and I felt like Karl and I were two kids just having a grand ol' time. We went out for dinner after and I left feeling like I had one of the best nights in a long time. My sister-in-law and brother-in-law watched Jackson. I had absolutely no fears because they are SO good with Jackson and love him to pieces and...well...sis-in-law is a nurse. That helps:)
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| Date night! Can I get a wha? wha? |
But we're back to going to our weekly wine tasting events and Karl is back to bringing home craft beers for us to try. I find this fun. Hey, it's the little things. He's entering a couple of his own home-brew in a contest as I type!
3. I still don't get my 3-5 workouts in a week. Boo. Yes, I hear you. I
could get up early, but Jackson is getting up between 3:00 and 5:00 a.m. still. This mom chooses sleep. I get maybe one or two workouts in during the week, BUT when I do workout, it's serious business. I feel like I workout hard enough that I don't spaz when I only get 1 or 2 workouts in a week like the old Christie would. I'm sure my heart is begging for more, but with the weather 0 degrees right now, I can't take Jackson out. I tell myself winter is a time for reflection and rest. I have all spring, summer and fall to get crazy outside. It's still pretty dark when we get home from work right now. So I chase Jackson around the house and count that as a heart pumping good time. Plus, I try to laugh a lot...makes me feel better. We do a lot of going up the stairs around here! And squats.
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| Better known as the "star" child |
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| Working on my tool bench here. No big deal. |
4. Still a HUGE advocate about healthy eating. I think this helps me not be so hard on myself when I can't get a workout in. I'm fueling my body, as well as my family's, with really good food. I'm learning more about all the good foods out there and what their benefits are and so on. I love educating myself on all the great healthy options out there. Yep, still making ALL Jackson's foods, though I'm starting to step away from only pureeing foods. He's now feeding himself broccoli, kiwi, avocados, pees... Are you seeing a trend here? He has a thing for GREEN food. OK, so we broke apart one of the homemade cinnamon oatmeal pancakes we made and Jackson devoured it. For some reason he doesn't totally enjoy chopped bananas and apples, but loves them in his porridge. Speaking of porridge, I did make some super porridge for him (organic brown rice and green lentils blended and boiled). I mix in kale and spoon feed that to him. We tried adding tahini (sunflower seeds liquefied...is that a word?). OK. I'm all about healthy foods, but that stuff is kind of gross tasting. An acquired taste for SURE. I don't blame Jackson for turning his nose up to that one. Uff-dah!
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| Warning: Healthy Food Ahead |
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| Mmmmmm! |
5. I'm starting to learn that Jackson would much rather play with household items than toys. I gave him an empty oatmeal container and he played with that for days. Measuring cups = awesome. Paper towel rolls and empty wrapping paper rolls = let the fun begin. Pulling every single Ziploc bag out of their boxes = sweet. HE LOVES watching me cook. I think it's the sounds, smells and steam that really pull him in.
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| Love this oatmeal container! |
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| Any way I can make noise around here, I'm in! |
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| Future drummer maybe? |
6. I think one of the hardest adjustments for me was not getting to spend as much quality time with Karl as we once had. We did
everything together. Spent tons of time together. And never got sick of one another. How does that work??? We were simple. As in simply loved doing NOTHING together and making the best of it. Or we'd go on these amazing trips around the world or country and had a blast together. We could be anywhere, do anything, and have the best time ever. But a baby kind of throws a wrench in all that. A good wrench though! There's been a lot of balancing our time and schedules and Jackson always comes first. I wouldn't want it any other way, but it's hard to carve out time to talk about our days or maybe one of us gets the spotlight for the night and gets to talk about their day at work and the other doesn't. Keyword here is: talking. MUST COMMUNICATE.
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| I run this house! You have a problem with that? |
Our Karl and Christie evening starts around 8:30. The thing is, I start to crawl into bed around that time. I'M STILL trying to catch up on sleep. BUT, I feel like we're getting some evenings to ourselves again and I LOVE that. The other night I got a little sad when I looked at the time and thought, wow...we get all but an hour together. Yet, I made the BEST of that hour in my mind. I lived in the moment and soaked up as much Karl time as I could get.
Once a baby comes, every single aspect of your life and how you once operated, changes. But, I promise...all for the better. The reason I say this is because I remember when it was just me and Karl. We'd have our set television shows to watch and our weekends planned out - the friends we were going to hang out with, family we were going to see, trips we were going to take, etc. Yet, things kind of always felt predictable to me. Not to say that was bad by any means. Maybe comfortable is the right word? I knew what to expect and over time there was just a little piece missing. Like I KNEW there needed to be something more there or else we'd get too used to each other or our routine. But wasn't totally sure how to get there... And then came Jackson. There was that piece that made us whole.
Challenging. Crazy. Insane. But all the while awesome. Get what I'm saying here?
In short (OK...not so short): Sometimes we get caught up in the insanity of life. No, there is never enough time to catch up. To have it all together. But there is something bigger going on in our lives. I call it the big picture. And sometimes we just have to throw up our hands and let things fall into place. Yes, we have free will. We get to make choices and decisions daily, but sometimes we're lost. We don't know what to do. We're frustrated. We're at our whits end. What are we supposed to be doing? Are we doing the right thing? Can't time just slow down and we get this sh*t figured out before the next event is thrown in our face? The answer is no. And once a baby comes, those events are slapping you in the face daily, sometimes hourly. They are beating down your door.
My guess is most of us want to try to control everything. I know I do. But it's when we FINALLY put our trust and faith in the words...
everything will work out in the end, we BREATHE for a second. Our shoulders fall. Our jaws loosen. And we live in the moment. We've done it before. We can do it again. When have things not worked out? Or if they didn't, it was probably for the best. Right? Or at least, there was a lesson there. We grew... Maybe spiritually, emotionally, etc. The keyword here is WE GREW!
7. Oh, and I went to Target WITH Jackson. High fives and fist pounds, folks. Just took me 9 months to do it. But I did it. Jackson was in shock. Said "Ohh" to everyone and everything, but I left with an extra hop in my step. I DID IT.
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| Mom. Where the heck are we?? I've never seen such a place! |
Like I said. It's the little things. Pretty sure this mom is going to make it!
