Motherhood: An Eternal Partnership with God

I have mentioned before how I have struggled with motherhood. How I haven't adjusted to the roll as well as I thought I would. The last couple of months have been especially hard. Late last night I felt like I needed to go to the temple, so this morning I woke up really early and headed to the temple. As I sat pondering and reflecting, the topic of joy in motherhood and rejoicing in motherhood kept coming to mind. As I continued on with my day I tried to keep these thoughts in mind. I did pretty good, until Julian decided to wake up at 11:00 pm right in the middle of my movie and much needed down time. I struggled to get him to go to sleep but he was content throwing a fit on the ground whining crying, throwing himself on me, then throwing himself on the floor when I tried to pick him up. I started to loose it. Then Jamie came home from work, and took Julian to bed. I decided to go in my room and do some more pondering about motherhood. I found a great website called power of moms then I found a Mormon Message, which are great uplifting messages posted on YouTube, and I came across this amazing message about motherhood, I completley bawled during the entire thing. but I love the message so much. It was exactly what I needed to hear. I just wanted to share it1

4 years

I was trying to decide if I should make mention of this, since this year we just didn't have the time, energy. or money for that matter to make a big deal of it. But I decided that either way being married for 4 years is a big deal and I should make note of it.

Four years ago on November 23rd Jamie James and I got married, Love ya babe!

First Hair Cut and Halloween!

What did that say? Did that say first Hair cut? I couldn't have cut my baby's amazing locks that I love so much could I have? Unfortunately yes. For months Jamie has bugged me about cutting Julian's hair, and I was not going to do it. But the other day Julian and I were at the laundry mat, and this girl saw Julian in his very "boy" clothes and said, Oh SHE is sweet! That was the last straw I couldn't let people continue to call Julian a girl, so Monday morning we headed to a barber (Jamie wanted to do it, but I wasn't letting him near my child's head) lol. I thought the process would go slow and I could take it in slowly, but once that women started cutting she didn't stop, and that was probably best because it took Julian all of a few minutes to decide he was done with the whole process. Luckily Jamie was there and helped hold Julian still while I tried to distract him. I would be lying if I didn't say that I really had to hold back tears as I saw the hair on the ground! He still looks very cute, but he looks so much older and grown up, but at least I wont have to wash his hair several times a day because he constantly has food in it!!

Halloween was very low key this year. I decided not to go all out on a costume for Julian, when we went to the library reading we do every week, they got to wear costumes and I had him wear the monkey suit we wore last year. But for our ward trunk or treat I had just bought a three dollar shirt that was a skeleton with candy in the stomach and it glowed in the dark!

Like I mentioned we went to our ward trunk or treat, where people park their cars in the parking lot of the church and decorate their car trunks and pass out candy. I wasn't sure if Julian would get the concept of going to each car and getting a piece of candy, but boy was I wrong! That boy totally new what to do and would run up to each car and grab one piece of candy out of the bowl and would put it in his bag, which I was holding for him, and then he would run to the next one! I don't have many pictures because he was having so much fun running around I couldn't get any pictures of him, well at least many that weren't the back of his head! Halloween night Julian had a slight cough, and Jamie was working so I decided we would just stay in. I only had like four kids come and get candy, that was disappointing! Overall though Julian had a great time with the events we did participate in!

Music

It's so interesting the power music has on the mind!Did you know that with Alzheimer's ( and many brain injuries/health problems)music is the last memory to leave. I think I have told this story before, but I will never forget the day, when I was working at the adult day care for those with Alzheimer's. There was a very sweet man names Jack. When you would talk to him he would not say more than two words, and if you asked him a simple question about his life ( how old are you, whens your birthday) he would sit there staring trying to remember, and then would just look you in the eye and say "I don't know" Later in the day I would get on the piano and play some classic songs very popular in the 20's, 30's and 40's. I remember sitting at the piano and beginning to play "Alice Blue Gown". Jack immediately sat up and to my astonishment he sang every word of that song, and every song after it with out missing a beat!

I always find it fascinating how I can hear a certain song, or band, and I am immediately thrown back to a time in my life.

Example: Natasha B. bring me to driving in the car with one of my first roommates when I first heard her song, my roommate blasting the song while we stopped at Sonics just for a cup of their amazing Ice!! Anything "Tegan and sara" or Gold Digger brings me to late nights with Megan T. talking about our "BOY" issues. She pretty much introduced me to the indie music. Imogen Heap instantly reminds me of Louise, and how much I miss her and her accent! Any kind of musical drags me to High School, senior year were I felt on top of the world as my first lead in the school musical! Brazilian music reminds me of my first date with Jamie who played a popular Brazilian love song, and translated it for me.

The fact that music does this can be a blessing and a curse. Sometimes those memories make you miss the way things were, or at least the people and the connection you have. Or it brings a smile to your face as you remember a funny joke or instance related to the music.

Either way, music touches the soul And I just cant loose that loving feeling I have for music!

Dreams

I am one of those weird people, who has very vivid dreams. In fact hardly a day goes by that I don't remember one or two dreams I had the night before. I read once that this is because my body doesn't get into a good deep sleep. Not only do I dream, but I often have frighting, or down right weird dreams! I have many dreams of people dying,getting blown up (sorry shirl, or people trying to hurt the ones I love. Sometimes my dreams are weird, like the other day I had a dream that I was leading a group of people who were attempting to attend Marin Luther King JR. Funeral to sing "Amazing Grace" But the government had sent the army to cut off our path in an attempt to cover-up his death, to not let people know... Weird huh??

I would even venture to say that I have had spiritual dreams before. Once in high school, I had a dream that I was sitting in our high school gym during a prep rally of some sorts with the whole school there. I remember that I was sitting with people I recognized as friends, but not specific people (that happens a lot where there is a relationship but not a specific face)I look across to the other side of the gym and there sitting in the middle of the crowd of teenagers, was Jesus Christ. I remember being in awe, and then turning to my "friends" and asking if they see Christ, they looked at me weird and then kinda ignored me. Then I heard Christ's voice speak to me saying that they could not see him, but that he loved all of them. I have this dream written down in one of my journals, but right this moment I cant remember all that was said, but it was a dream that had a big impact on me. I have had a similar dream a couple years ago this time involving my mom and a family friend. Needless to say I think that we can have spiritual moments even in our dreams.

I have been thinking about this because I had a dream last night that was so vivid, and I felt such joy and peace in the dream, even though craziness was happening all around me. I will start off by saying that in the first months of my pregnancy with Julian, I had a dream that I was holding a little boy, with curly dark hair. And then Julian came out with that head full of his precious dark hair (so much so the nurses joked that they could have pulled him out by his hair) Now I am not sure that dream really meant anything, I mean I had a 50/50 chance of the gender for goodness sakes, but I also don't believe in just discarding it either. So to get on about my dream last night. I had a dream that I was in a hospital with our good friends the Colvin family (by the way Colvin's this was the first time you have been in my dreams, welcome to the club! LOL)The whole family was there for the birth of someones baby, and I was pregnant as well. While there I went into labor and it was early and it was happening fast, in fact I ended up having the baby before I was in an "official" room, and out came the most precious baby boy. What was so distinct for me, was how vivid this dream was. ( I usually have some fuzzy parts of a dream)but this one I saw everything this little boy had a face similar to Julian's but his hair was a golden light brown, almost like he had blond highlights. And when I held him I was at such peace. I also had an indescribable feeling of love as I got to introduce Julian to him.

This dream was interesting to me on many different levels. As I thought about the dream today many things stuck out to me. Things about my life now, that perhaps I have been struggling with.

1) We were in a hospital with the Colvins, meaning to me, that we were still living in Utah. I have really struggled to accept that fact that we still live in Utah, with no exit in sight. When I was growing up, this just wasn't the place I wanted to spend forever, or raise my kids. I find my self having a love/hate relationship with Utah. But in this dream it felt like such a place of love, and it gave me the feeling that we are going to be here at least a few years longer so I better strive to have that loving feeling.

2)I have told Jamie from the beginning, that if we had two boys in a row, then I was done! I just couldn't imagine the risk of having a another one after that (I am pretty sure I want three children) and three boys would be just too much for me! However, I have never felt quite a feeling like I did in my dream, when I got to introduce Julian to his little brother. I remember in the dream thinking that this was a good things, and had such love for these two little boys.

3) I would be lying if I didn't admit that there have been many times in the last year where I have told myself, that I am done having kids now! I am just not cut out to be a mother, this is not working the way I had planned! I have really struggled with this concept. Growing up I was the person EVERYONE called to babysit, because I loved it, all ages. I played imaginary house way longer than the average girl does (or probably should for that matter) I have always felt like my gift would be in raising a family. However, lately I have felt that this couldn't be further from the truth. And when I think about it, it's not really about my feelings, but what I would be doing to the children messing up their life, and them having to go to therapy, because mom was not meant to be a mother!

In the dream, the moment I looked at this new baby in my arms it just felt "right" like this is what it is all about, this is what life is all about. I was reminded in the dream that it wasn't easy (soon after introducing Julian to his brother he managed to stick his head in the toilet I think??? ) But even though it wouldn't be easy I could do it, and I could work on being a great mother.

The dream was really magical to me. No I am not pregnant, and don't plan on being anytime real soon, but this dream gave me lots to think about. And even if my next child is a girl, and looks nothing like the child in the dream, I still think this dream held significant meaning in my life. Perhaps, a "turning point" of some sorts.

Confused

I really don't know what to write exactly, I just feel the need to write! My mind has been bogged down quite a bit lately with a myriad of thoughts and feelings. Usually just writing helps me sort everything out, but as I sit here nothing is coming real easily. When I went home last I was at lunch with my dad and I was telling him about how I am not happy with a lot of things right now. He told me that over the years one things he has learned is that you just have to be happy with the NOW in life. Interesting enough Dieter Uchtdorf said almost the exact thing at the Relief Society broadcast last month. Since coming home I have really tried to keep that in mind, but I have to admit I am not doing to well at it. Can I give you exact reason why I feel so strongly about certain aspects of my life right now? No, not really, and even if I could I am not sure how many would be valid reasons. I just know how it makes me feel, and I don't like it.

Summer 2011- picture over load

Fall is finally coming and I couldn't be more excited! I LOVE Fall. I love it better in California because it last longer than here in Utah! Now that Summer is come and gone, I thought I should do a re-cap. Like I mentioned in my last post, my computer often has issues with loading pictures, but today it was working, so I decided to not stop until I got all the pics up that I wanted or the computer stopped working. Therefore we are in picture over load. This post is already really long so I will keep the descriptions short!

The first pic was when we went to the zoo with friends! I was so excited for Julian to go to the zoo and see the animals. I thought for sure he would love it. Turns out Julian was terrified of everything!! All except we got to the playground and they had these egg like things for Julian to climb in. This is pretty much the only picture I have of that day because he would not get close to anything!! Oh well

The next couple are of Julians 1st birthday. The theme was trucks! He has a shirt with trucks on it and wore overalls. We have friends, family for a BBQ and I made the cake!! I was so proud of myself. It was the first cake I have made like this! As you can see from Julians face he enjoyed it as well!

The picture with Julian with only his diaper on, was taken because Julian had taken my sandal, and spent a good five minutes trying to figure out how to put his foot in it like I do. When he finally did it he was so excited and scooted around the house showing off the shoe! I had to take a picture!

Uncle Shaun will leave for his mission this month, and this could be the last picture taken for two years!! Julian had fun with Uncle shaun, and just next month he will meet Uncle Spencer who comes home from his mission!!

The next several pictures are from our trip to California for my mothers 50th birthday! On the day I was packing to leave Julian decided he wanted to travel in the luggage! LOL I think Julians favorite part was playing with the cousins. Julian is so use to be the kid that chases others and gets a little rough, but he had a blast being chased my cousin Kaliea and Luke! This picture was of Luke and Julian saying good-bye!

While in California, we had to go on the lake!! Julian had so much fun, I knew he liked water, and swimming, but I wasn't sure how he would do with the boat and more importantly the life jacket!! He fought the life jacket at first but when I put him in the water and he realized that it let him float on his back, he was in love. On the boat he was laughing and yelling "Weee-Weee" When my dad would go fast! His hair had just has much fun if you cant tell from the pictures. My mom had him sit in the driver seat and he got a kick out of that! The food at the lake it always good! Chicken with nanna!!

Like a mentioned earlier, we went for my moms 50th birthday! We had a huge party with all kinds of friends and family! Julian made a big mess of the birthday cake! Julian also got to hang out with his second cousins!!

The last two pictures are from our ward camp-out! Julians first time camping and he had fun, besides the fact that he kept wanting to run into the fire!! The last picture he had taken his water and dumped in on his head!!

Well that's all for now! Hope everyone enjoyed their summer!!

One Year Ceck-UP

I have so many pictures to post, but for some reason, my computer struggles to load them to my blog, I have no problem with Facebook, but cant seem to get them on here. So I apologize for the lack of pictures. Julian had his one year check up this past week. It went well, we discovered that Julian has eczema, which is why you find all these lighter patches on his body (especially his face)luckily the doctor said that with some medicine cream the body will often correct it at this age! As for the regular charts he now weighs 21 pounds which is the 10th percentile and is almost 31 inches long (about the 51st percentile, and his poor little head isn't even on the charts, in fact it hardly grew at all it was the .01 percentile. We talked about that with the doctor, and he said at this point there is no concern as long as he doesn't go down in the charts then it is ok if he is small. And with all the "talking" Julian was doing in the doctors room, he said it doesn't seem to be effecting him. He watched in amazement as Julian lifted a toy as big as he is with one hand and carried it across the room like it was a rag doll. When the doctor left, Jamie weighed the toy to see how much he was holding and the toy came in at exactly 3 lbs.

Anyone who has a baby knows that when you to these "well baby" check-ups they usually have you fill out a survey answering yes, sometime, or no, to questions about development. The questions are focused on what is "normal" for that stage of development for the child's age. So anyway I was sitting there and filling out the form laughing to myself because the question they were asking were things Julian was doing at 6-8 months of age. Like... Holding on to furniture when bending down to grab a toy, and standing unaided. Julian started standing unaided by 6 months and was bending down to grab toys by himself when he was 9 months old. The doctor was so impressed with how advanced Julian was that he said it was pointless to come back for his 15 month check up since he is already past the stage and just make an appointment for 18 months! So needless to say Julian is cruising right along

I am going home in a little over a week for my mom's 50 birthday, so I am excited for family to see Julian, Unfortunately Jamie has to work and once again can't come, so we are sad about that. I am really worried about traveling with Julian this time. Last time he was 2 months and it was a breeze, but Julian doesn't sit still anymore, and this could be a challenge. I think he will do fine for most of the plane ride, but I am more nervous about the lay over in Vegas!! I think I might get one of those leashes they have for kids, I know that sounds bad, but I can't risk it. Vegas is a small airport but crowded and because it's Vegas, often a lot of wierd, or drunk people are around (or both for that matter). In fact every time I have a creepy situation with flying it was when flying into or out of Vegas. Julian is a fast little critter, and I just cant risk him running off, so I will have to resort to more drastic matters.

Well I guess that is all for now, I will keep trying to load pictures up hope all is well with everyone!!

Wow I have really gotten behind in my blogging, and I really don't have a good excuse! The last month and half has been a fun and exciting time!

June 21, my sister, Stacy, and her third child, a boy named Shane! It was exciting because they didn't know what they were having, nor did they have a name picked out until he he was almost through his first day of life!! He is very cute and I am excited to have another nephew!

I am now going to show a few pictures to show what a loveable but crazy child I have!! Julian gets into everything, and I know people say that's what kids do, and especially how boys are, but I swear Julian is on a whole other level! Just to give you a taste, yesterday in the matter of about 30 min julian.... pulled out every CD (about 40) out of the basket, unloaded the Tupperware drawer, pulled all the toys out of the toy box, and then pulled out all 50 of his diapers and threw every single one along with a few toys in the Pack N' Play!! And I am pretty sure there were a few other things, I just cant think of them right now. Needless to say I never get anything done with Julian. But he does make me laugh. He loves to explore and go out side, and has the best facial expressions. His idea of dancing is moving your feet really fast, and swaying your arms back and forth. Since it has been summer, he has gotten quite a bit darker, except for his face, which I am pretty sure is only a shy darker then when he was born. He loves the bathroom, especially the plunger, so that room is kept closed at all times. anyway here are a few random pics...




JUlian loves to take the stuff out of this cupboard and then crawl inside, the only problem is he hasn't figured out how to get back out!



Just a cute picture of Julian in a bubble bath.




One thing Julian does that kinda drives me nuts is he hangs on me when I am trying to cook dinner. So one particular night I was mixing some flour in a bowl, with Julian grabbing my legs. As I try to move I trip over Julian and dump the bowl of flour right on Julian, who happened to be looking up at me at the same time, by the time I got the camera ready, he had rubbed most of it off, but it was funny still!

I have birthday stuff and more to share, but that will have to wait for now!!

Easter Weekend

We had a great Easter Weekend. My sister in law, Ronna, flew into town for a quick trip and brought her son Xanyae. Xanyae was born in December of 2009 just a little over 6 months before Julian. The cousins have never met, so it was really exciting to have them spend Saturday night and Easter morning with us. Xanyae wasn't use to having a baby around since he is the youngest of three in their family, so Julian kinda scared him. Unfortunately I didn't get too many pics of them together, but we all couldn't believe how much they looked alike! It was great to chat and spend time with family. Jamie and I miss having family around. Julian got an Easter basket from Nanna which he loved (despite what the picture my elude to). Then we had our dinner up in Alpine. The Colvin family is so kind to include us with their family. Overall it was a great time to remember the savior and his atonement and resurrection. And no better way to celebrate that he lives, then with family and friends.





Julian



Xanyae

More Julian

Here are some more recent pics of bubba!



Cool Dude!




Decided to let Julian feed himself!



First trip to the park! He loved the swing!


I can explain! Jamie thought when Julian just wore jeans he looked like the guy from Twilight that turns into the wolf (sorry I don't know the series well) so he thought all that was missing was the Abs! This is Jamies attempt to give Julian Abs!

All things Julian

Jamie has been working at best buy part time now, for several weeks. One of the perks of working there is that he gets a great discount. When my lovely parents gave me our new camera for graduations it came with a 2 gb memory card. Needless to say with a new baby, we filled that really quickly! And it was hard to take video's with that small of memory. So Jamie decided to get a new 8 gb memory card. Lets just say, something that usually cost $50 was only $15! So we were excited. Anyway now that we have the new memory card, I thought I would unload all the pictures on the old one. So This post is dedicated to all things Julian!!

Julian is getting so big! He still a lean muscular baby, but he has gotten a lot taller! He crawls really fast. I thought by now he would be walking since he has been crawling and cruising for the last 3 months, but he seems very comfortable getting around this way, and has not even really tried to stand by himself. Which is fine with me, I am still trying to keep up with him crawling, I dont know what I would do with a walker. He still has only two teeth, but I think some others are coming because he is having trouble sleeping and that happened last time.

I cant get him to say momma, no matter how hard I try, but he does say dadda. He is definitely a daddies boy. He loves to hang out with Jamie. I officially have one of THOSE kids that LOVES to get into the bathroom, pull out the toilet paper, and play in the toilet water. Julian also loves music. I can usually get him to quit yelling or crying from singing. Funny thing is that he loves to hear his name to music. So I will often sing his name over and over with some familiar tune!

We are slowly mastering eating. Over the last several weeks he has learned to use his pincher grip and feed himself. He loves to hold his spoon, but has not figured out how to get the food to his mouth.

Well I will just post the pictures now. I might add some comentary with them,but for now enjoy the Julian show!


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I love his smile!



At our friends house Julian enjoyed looking outside and squishing his face against the window!




This is for grandma James. She made this sports blanket for Julain!!

I had more pics but my computer is being dumb, so I will add them later

Food for thought

Over the last year I have really started getting into cooking! I feel it is almost therapeutic. I have really enjoyed learning to cook new foods and learn new terms and the science of cooking. When Jamie and I first got married I struggled with making meals for us, unless it was some special occasion, mostly because I have spent the last several years just feeding myself. And those meals consisted of a lot of Oatmeal and peanut butter sandwiches. So I have really made an effort to build up my recipes and really take time to prepare delicious and healthy meals.

One thing I have noticed through this journey is how I am lacking in kitchen supplies! I never realized how annoying it is to have only two frying pans (one really small), a few good pots, and only three mixing bowls! Plus you also start to realize how nice it would be to have some of those "gadgets" that you see in the Bed Bath and Beyond catalogs! When Jamie and I got married we had a few gift cards to Bed Bath and Beyond, and I remember walking through the kitchen area, and thinking how I could go with out a lot of the stuff there. But I wasn't really cooking then, and now I would love to have many of those cool gadgets! Even if some of them aren't completely necessary. Like take a garlic press for example. Could I just cut up the garlic with a knife? Of course, but when you see how many recipes have garlic in them (and I do love garlic) you start to get sick of always smelling garlic on your hands.
Other things I dream of having... Food processor, a really nice cheese grater, Food thermometer, all those fun pampered chef things you see!

Any way I have decided that I am going to slowly start to stock up on some of these things. I just feel that if I am going to continue to cook,and enjoy it, it is going to require me to have more than one pan... and perhaps a garlic press

Christmas... Finnally!

So I have finally uploaded the pics from Christmas! I will let most of the pictures do the talking, but I will say that we had a wonderful Christmas season! My mom and older sister came to visit, we went to a Christmas party with a polar express that actually pulled us around three different yards and backyards, Julian got to meet Santa for the first time (and was a bit confused), Julian got many great present from family and friends, We had our traditional German Christmas dinner, and just relaxed and enjoyed eachother

Enjoy the pics