Testing patience and pressing forward.

I knew becoming a mother would be the best thing that has ever happened to me. I also knew that becoming a parent would be the hardest thing I have ever done. This season of my life is bringing me plenty of trials. One that I'm currently facing (and will forever face) is raising a very strong willed child. She is  wonderful, fun-loving, and smart little girl.  Then she has her moments that are full of defiant behaviors and that little attitude comes out that can bring my blood pressure through the roof. This morning was the first time she did something that actually brought me to tears. Thirty minutes into our morning gym visit I see one of the Nursery teachers walking in and immediately my heart sank. They no longer come get me because she is crying because she needs me. I knew this time was different. Trust me I saw it all over this woman's face. As I walk with her back into the playroom I see a momma sitting on the floor with her little blonde headed girl who is in tears and then they precede to tell me that my little girl has scratched this girl in the face and pulled a large chunk of her hair down. I of course gasp in somewhat disbelief that Violet did that and when I look down at this other mother on the floor holding her daughter and what I now see in her hair is a little chunk of blonde hair. I am mortified. I see Violet sitting in the corner by herself (which Im assuming is their version of time out). She looks confused and in my attempt not make any more of a scene , I refrain from the urge to beat my childs rear end in front of tons of people. I wait patiently(embarrassed) for them to bring her to me. I calmly take her over to the little girl and ask her to say I'm sorry which she does. Violet gives her a hug and then wants to resume playing. I am in shock, heartbroken, embarrassed and in the same breath Im wondering what the absolute best way to handle this situation. After I quietly remove my child from the gym doors I immediately bust into tears. I in the middle of my sobbing began to talk to Violet and remind her how we are supposed to share and be easy with other kids and that it hurts mommy when she does things like this. I put her in the car and of course parked across from me is the mom with her children. I walk over and tell her again how sorry I am and she reassures me that it is ok and that this just a stage that they go through and all kids do it at some point and its hard to stay on top of all the kids in a room of tons of kids with 2 workers. Took me hours to not want to bust into tears every time i spoke, but in the quiet that these moments that it left me with. I was able to ask God to continue to show me and teach me how to parent this little one. If you know my child you know how rough she can be. She thinks she is 10feet tall and fears almost nothing. I know its my job to teach her to be calm, and practice patience and give her boundaries without holding her back from doing what God is and will call her to do. What a challenge!It would be much easier to brush it off and pretend like that was a one time thing, but I want to use every opportunity to teach her and show her better choices and unfortunately discipline is a big part of that. I just hope she see's Jesus in it when she is older.

Proverbs 22:6

Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.

People raising their babies right.

I heard this on a show and it stuck with me. A constant thing you think about as a parent is am I doing this right?? Should I be doing this? Most always go unanswered. However, I am learning how much easier my decision making is when I spend time in prayer. I may not have the answers and I am so much more confident in my decision making when I know that he is on my side. 

I have my amazing parents to thank for this. When I'm at my lowest or in a time of confusion and chaos,I can hear my sweet mommas voice saying "trust God baby" "he will never leave you or forsake you" I hear verse after verse and specific prayers she repeated to me growing up. This is love. I made my mistakes growing up. Hurt myself, hurt my parents but I was always fed words of encouragement. I was constantly prayed over even when I didn't know. Even at a time of the biggest loss in our life. Losing my brother, my moms first born. I never saw her lose faith. Her faith is constant. Her faith is strong. Her faith is contagious. 

I hope I'm half the mom she is. Every decision I make I pray it is done with the same conviction of knowing I need my Lord and Savior to come first in my decision making. I know I will not be perfect, every decision won't be perfect, but knowing that He has my back and won't fail me I will be able to find peace in that. 

If all else fails I hear the words from my dad saying "well you better get on your knees" :) 

So thanks mom and dad for everything you have done and continue to do for me. For us. 

It's been a minute!

I know I am horrible at keeping up with this blog, but oh well we have been busy. I haven't posted since the beginning of the year and so much has changed. I can't even begin to some up all the things that have gone on over the last eight months.  We have had some good times and some tough times, but overall this year has been tons of fun! Our little Violet has grown so much every week there is something new with her. She is growing so fast that we really can't keep up. She doesn't do anything half paced. Always moving and ready to go "bye-bye" all the time! She is such a joy to be around always keeping me laughing and of course on my toes. It's hard for me to remember she is still just 19 months old. She acts so much older, but we have those moments where I have to check myself and say she is still just baby. Even though there isn't much "baby" about her. I can write all day about how amazing she is, but there will be plenty of time for that later. ;)

As for now, we are busy with summer activities. We are enjoying going to the lake when we can and playing in the pool any chance we can get. School will be starting soon for most children and although we decided to hold Vi back from preschool for another year doesn't mean we won't be doing our own little "learning times" at home. Today I spent most of Violet's nap time working on what our weekly schedule will be like for us starting next week. I did a lot of reading on toddler learning and different preschool curriculums that we can work with. Violet thrives best when we constantly change things up and do things different so i'm sure this schedule will be forever changing but for now I have something we can start with. I will post later about what that schedule will look like.

I don't know if I have said this on here before, but I will say it now.  I am so blessed to be able to stay at home with our little girl. I love being the one that is teaching her all this new stuff and seeing her do all these new things. It never gets old. Staying at home is a sacrifice. My wonderful husband works very hard so that I can stay home. We sacrifice a lot of extra things for ourselves so that we would be a lot easier if I would go back to work, but we both agree that this is more important.

Perry and I are going on our first camping trip this year this weekend. Hopefully, we won't get rained out, but regardless we are going. I'm excited about going because I have never been backpack camping before. Let's face it i've only been tent camping at a state park once that I can even remember. So sad. Perry wants to start hiking the Appalachian Trail in sections this year so we are going to ease me into it by hiking in Bankhead with some of our favorite family members (Nikki & David). I am also going to attempt hammock camping. I will let you know how it goes after this weekend.

For now the little one is waking up. I will post again later!

A new year is finally here!!

Happy New Years!!! 

I am happily welcoming 2014. This year will be a much better year than last. 

I was blessed with many new and great things this year, and some that just sucked! 

I am loving looking back at pictures of my sweet little girl. Lots of fun first this year. Rolling over, crawling, saying her first words, clapping , reaching for me, giving kisses and walking just a few of some of the fun things we got witness. She is such a spunky little girl. I see so much of me in her and a lot of her daddy ;).  Next year will bring more firsts and I can't wait. 

Lots of other great things this year includes weddings and babies and home purchases, but one I won't forget to mention is my most amazing new friends I have made here in Huntsville. They are such a wonderful group of girls. When perry got his new job this year I knew we were here to stay. No more what ifs or maybes about moving somewhere else. We were staying. I finally made an effort and made some new friends. It's hard to live in a town and not have many friends for me. I'm used to my girlfriends back home who are always together and doing things ( I still love y'all too :) ) it's been nice to have friends that are in the same stage of life as I am. 

I'm looking forward to 2014 and all the fun that will come. 

See ya 2013!! You won't be missed!! 

Hers a recap of some of my favorite moments of 2013! Click the link below. 

http://fgr.am/f/pg7bIwGy6i

Weekend Re-Cap

What a great weekend it's been. As much as I love traveling to Birmingham to see the Fam it's nice when we can stay home and enjoy the things we have going on around the house. Friday night we had some friends over we haven't seen in forever over to hang out and grill and catch up.

Saturday morning enjoyed the morning with just the three of us and relaxed around the house. The rest of the afternoon we spent out shopping. For nothing in particular, but just getting out and looking around. We went to a few stores had lunch and finished out our outing with some shaved ice. :) The little one was exhausted we came home to a long nap and played outside for a little bit. We purchased Vi a walker to play in and she loved it. Here are some of the pics from that evening.

 

 

 

Today was another lazy morning followed by a little light cleaning and yardwork (well perry did yardwork) after we decided to load up and go to the pool for just a little while so we could swim before nap time. I love taking Violet to the pool. She absolutely loves water. Kicks her little feet and splashes in the water. Today she was so exhausted she lasted about and her by the time we were getting ready to leave she was already asleep in my arms in the pool. We all took a great 2hour nap after that. We went ahead and went back after nap time swam for a little bit and cam back to hang out outside. She of course played in her walker and was swinging away for what seemed like forever. She was definitely worn out again. She ate her squash and carrots and had a a bath and was out by 7:30.

 

Now I get to do one of my all time favorite things and that's sit here and enjoy some alone time on the porch with my man. Nothing like our porch conversations talking about the things we want to do in the future and talk about our little girl.

 

 

 

That about wraps it up. We are calling it a successful weekend. Next weekend is Violets first fourth so I'm looking forward to all that has in store.

Have a great week!

 

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Growing so fast..

My baby girl is getting so big. Everything is happening so fast. One thing I have learned since becoming a mom is once you think you are on a schedule it changes. She changes every day. Teething aside she is a very happy baby. Over the last few months a lot has changed we stopped breastfeeding at month 5 and are now starting solid foods this week. She loves it! We have tried peas, green beans, and carrots. I did give her bananas once but i have heard that it can cause constipation so we are putting that off for later. Plus I decided to start with veggies instead.  To be the WROST eater in the world solids has been great for us.

My daughter is what you would call a snacker it takes her an hour to finish 4 ounces. She is very distracted and hates to eat.. She eats as much as she can until she is tired of having to work for it and she is done. This is why nursing was a nightmare for me. Hopefully our next one will  be a little easier to nurse and we can get longer than 5 months.

Since we started formula our lives have been sooooooo much easier. I can get out of the house for a few hours with her and not worry about her having to eat every hour so thats nice. We are starting to venture out a little more. She comes to the gym with me and plays in the nursery for an hour. We have also let her start swimming this month which she loves!!!! (picturs to follow)This kid loves to swim she kicks her little feet and splashes her little hands in the water. Hopefully she will be a swimmer like I was.

She is outgrowing most of our favorite things from outfits to our swing. We may have a few weeks left in the swing she is just getting to heavy for it and I don't want it to get squeaky because I want to be able to use it again with the next one.

Also, this week she started making an effort to crawl. I saw her on the monitor crawl from one end of the crib to the other, but when I got her out of the crib and put her on the floor all she would do is bounce on her knees. I will try and post the video of this.

Her 4-6 month favorites:

• Jump-a-roo
• Her Feet
• Swimming
• Her Crib
• Cartoons - she loves miss spider and the backyardagans 
• Our dog jack (she smiles and laughs every time she sees him)

Here are some pictures from the last month or so~! Enjoy..