Birthday Number 25

Ben and I in NYC, summer 2009

Another birthday has come and gone in our house, this time it was mine. Twenty-five seems like a bit of a milestone, but I really have just spent a lot of time reflecting over the past five years. When I turned 20, Ben and I had only been married for a few months, and two months later I would be pregnant with Adelaide. A year later, at 21, Adelaide was 2 months old and we decided to move to New Jersey for Ben to pursue writing software again.

Ben, Rachel and Adelaide
January 7, 2009

My dad died that May, which sent my world into a bit of a spin. That was when I started this blog, to help me sort through my feelings and emotions.

My dad with Adelaide (8 weeks old)
February 2009

Next was my 22nd birthday and we were in the process of moving from New Jersey to Virginia, another job change for Ben. It was only weeks after my birthday that we found out we were pregnant again - this time with sweet Charlie.

Ben, Rachel and Adelaide (15 months old)
Easter 2010, the day after we found out we were pregnant again 

My 23rd birthday was uneventful with life in general and I was still adjusting to life with two kids (Adelaide was 26 months and Charlie was 3 months).

Adelaide and Charlie, 2011

Last year's birthday was another exciting one as we were pretty certain we were pregnant (again). Kerry had just announced to us that she was expecting and we had to wait a couple of weeks to take the test to confirm ours. Ben was also in the midst of another job change and would start working from home. We were making plans to move back to Nashville.

Kerry w/ Emaline, Adelaide, Me & Charlie
My birthday 2012

This year - 25 - we have our three kids and are back in the home we started in several years ago. We have reconnected with old friends, and have made a lot of new ones as well. My birthday was very special this year. A week early, my family was here and we had a joint party with my big brother, Jimmy (a post on that visit coming soon).

Enjoying GiGi's cupcakes and ice cream at our family dinner

Oma and Mali

The night before my big day, Ben and I had a beautiful dinner with just the two of us while our good friends loved us well and watched the kids. Saturday morning (my birthday), Ben took the kids to the Farmer's Market where they purchased a sausage, egg and cheese biscuit (yum!!) and donuts and brought them back home to me so I could eat breakfast in bed :)

 

Adelaide, Charlie and I enjoying the beautiful weather on my birthday
2013

The weather was absolutely beautiful on my birthday and we spent a lot of time playing outside. Adelaide came to the salon with me while I enjoyed getting my hair cut (a 5 minute head message is absolutely amazing). And then that night I got to have a girls night out for dinner and half a drink. Such a rarity, but so needed! Sunday was topped off with a cookout with our Village, some of our dearest friends. So thankful to have these new relationships in our lives.

Dinner with my good friends - Chelsea, Jenni, me, Lori, and Brittany
2013

I can't complain about a thing. Thank you Lord for my many beautiful blessings - in the forms of family and friends. And to think - the best is yet to come!

Like A Child

Yesterday, I messed up. I made a mistake with my children and I'm hoping to learn from it by remembering it.

Charlie and Adelaide, playing with cousin, Emaline

No one got physically hurt. I didn't lose my cool and raise my voice. No, this mistake could be easily overlooked. But I'd rather not sweep it under the rug and pretend it didn't matter, because to my kids, it really did.

For as long as I can remember, I have been a stickler about being on time (or early) for everything I do. My personality serves this need in me to keep to a schedule and I have learned to respect others' time, which I think is generally a good thing. Sometimes though I lose sight of what is most important - sticking to a schedule or living with an ounce of sanity by savoring passing moments.

Me consoling Charlie at dinnertime. This is a regular scene. 

Adelaide is taking a gymnastics class for a few weeks, a little birthday present that we got for her via Groupon. Yesterday was her third class and it is just about 10 minutes from our house. I was working on getting all of the kids in the car about 25 minutes before the class would be starting and it is quite a process to get the three kids ready to go and in the car by myself. Adelaide and Charlie asked if they could open the garage and head out to the car and I said yes, since I was coming right behind them. Instead of hopping straight into the car, they wandered behind the car and found about a dozen worms spread across the top of the driveway where the garage door opens. The worms were tiny little things and were all living. It must have rained sometime in the night and drove them all out. Just a couple of weeks earlier, there was a worm struggling on the driveway and I picked it up and threw it into the garden and explained to the kids that worms need to live in mud.

Adelaide playing with cousin, Emaline

Adelaide ran to me when she saw all of these worms and asked if she and Charlie could rescue them and put them back into the garden. I had one thing on my mind - getting in the car and going where we needed to be. So I told Adelaide, no, not this time. We would see if the worms were there when we got home and we could tend to them then. While I was buckling her in she said with sincerity that she just wanted to take care of God's earth, by caring for the worms.

Charlie enjoying some popcorn at the church's Easter egg hunt

I should have stopped there. She wasn't being defiant, she was living to her purest nature of wanting to help these tiny helpless worms. And Charlie was learning from her - he was just as passionate as she was, even though at 2 years old he couldn't understand it the same way she did. But I preceded to get everyone loaded and tried not to think about the little worms.

My niece, Emaline, playing dress-up

When we got home, the first thing that the kids did was check on the worms. And what did they find? Dead worms. Every single one of them. The sun was out, and not surprisingly, the worms didn't make it. Adelaide and Charlie were crushed. Adelaide felt like she had failed these worms. She even talked about it again later last night, about how she was just wanting to take care of God's creation.

Adelaide playing her favorite thing - dress up

I apologized to her. This was a big deal to her, and all I could think about was a class that doesn't matter very much and we still got there with time to spare. I want to learn to create more margin in my life. I want to leave room to care for others, even helpless little worms. I don't want to stop respecting others' time, but I do want to chill out sometimes. I want this to be a reminder for me to sometimes see like through the eyes of my sweet children, who are silly, and reckless. Beautiful and spontaneous. Who laugh at the smallest things and whose hearts get broken by the smallest things. I want to have a heart like a child and a faith like a child.

Back in the Kitchen

Charlie and Adelaide enjoying a beet smoothie, recipe below. Jan 2013.

My 2 little 'chefs', Feb 2013

The last 6 months have been... hectic, to say the least. We moved house and had a baby, have had several bouts of family come and stay, and then the past 3 weeks or so have been plagued with sickness. It has gone from the smallest to the biggest, thankfully just colds, but inconvenient and annoying nonetheless. I was the last one to get hit with the junk about 2 weeks ago and it is finally coming to an end. Between all of the busyness I haven't been able to spend as much time in the kitchen as I would like (cooking that is, not cleaning it). But this past week or so I have finally been able to spend ample amounts of time cooking good food for the family, and occasionally baking a special treat. Here are a few of the meals that have been going around our house lately:

Caramel Salmon with baked sweet potatoes and brown rice (much to my surprise, both children loved this salmon! I went light on the sugar, and it was still delicious.)

Homemade tortillas with Carrot fennel soup

Toasted almond muesli (Ben's favorite breakfast granola - we sub the dried blueberries for cranberries and use coconut oil in place of the vegetable oil)

Beet Smoothie

Fudgy No-Bake Cookies (again, sub coconut oil for vegetable, and up the oats to about 1 2/3 cups)

The website that I refer to the most as of late belongs to my sister-in-law, over at Tea For Six. Natalie is from Australia but currently living in the US, and has four lovely kids (my nieces and nephews!), whom test all of the wonderful recipes. I highly recommend checking out her blog sometime.

Charlie (with mama and Malachi) on one of our Whole Foods breakfast dates ;) Feb. 2013

3 months

Mama and Mali, 12 weeks old

Our sweet little Mali (a nickname we have had for Malachi since he was born, originally coined by Adelaide,) turned 3 months old yesterday. I keep saying it in my head - 3 months, 3 months - and yet, I don't believe it. I look at that picture (above) of the little sweetie that a friend took of us last week and he looks huge to me! I'm not sure why I can't see it in person, sometimes I feel like he is still my little 7lb baby that I brought home from the hospital. I haven't weighed him in a while, but he will have another check in one month, so I'm eager to see what he is up to.

Mali, 2.5 months old, Feb 2013.

Charlie and Malachi, post-bath time. Feb 2013

Mal is such a smiley, happy baby. He coos and laughs often, each day. His personality - happy, chill, patient. He only cries when overtired. I have mostly figured out his schedule (although it is ever-changing), and so long as I get him in his bed before being overtired, he goes to sleep without a peep. This morning his first nap was 2.5 hours when I finally woke him up to eat, and now he has been sleeping for another 2 hours. He will still take another big nap today, and then a catnap around 5pm. That last nap of the day has been the trickiest - I'm struggling to figure out his waketime for that one. The rest of the day he can be up for 50-60 minutes, whereas a month ago he was still only at 35 min! A big leap.

Cowboy Malachi, 2 months old

Sadly, nighttime sleep has backtracked a bit. Malachi was regularly sleeping 9-10 hour stretches at night until about 3 weeks ago. Since then he has only made it past 7 hours a handful of times. I have heard this could be normal so I am trying to wait before having him cry in the middle of the night. I could be wrong in this, but I think I would rather wait too long to have him cry than make him cry before he is ready. To add to this, I have had a bad cough/cold for the past week and have been taking lots of cough drops and kids' cough/cold tea, only to learn that all of these things can decrease milk supply. (To see specifics, check out kellymom.com) So since yesterday I have been taking more milk plus, a supplement from Whole Foods, as well as drinking Fenugreek tea. Can I just say that I absolutely loathe the taste of fenugreek? I'm pretty sure though that just in the past 24 hours I have seen my milk supply pick back up, and I am hoping this will help Mali sleep better at night.

2 months old

Malachi loves to lay on his baby gym, but his favorite activity is being talked to. He isn't picky about who talks to him - sometimes Charlie; if Adelaide is awake she isn't too far from his side; Ben is very popular in the morning and evening hours; and mama, of course, loves to talk and cuddle with him all day long. He loves to suck on his hand and may have even found his thumb today. I'm not sure how I feel about this as we still have two other thumb-suckers in the house. Mal stopped taking a dummy (paci) a just recently. Cloth nappies are also going well for Mal, he even wears them at night without any leaking. He wears mostly Grovia's hybrid system, and occasionally a prefold inside of a cover. I had never used prefolds before but my good friend Laura send me about a dozen of them so I gave it a go. They work really well, as a nappy or as a burp rag! If I keep one in the nappy bag, I have a spare nappy or burp rag, in case of emergencies :)

8 weeks old

Adelaide entertaining baby brother

Mal loves to stare at the ceiling, which he is doing right now next to me on the bed. The air vent particularly interests him. He doesn't get the hiccups as much anymore. He is so ticklish! He loves bathtime and I don't think he has ever cried in the bath tub! He is still sleeping in the pack n play in our closet, but occasionally will nap in his crib in his/Adelaide's room, whenever I remember to put him down in there.  He will fall asleep in the car seat, too, but only randomly does he get a good, solid nap in the car seat. Usually he wakes up soon after we get out of the car. I must also mention how good Ben is with the kids and how he takes care of so much when he isn't working. Each night around 7, I am in our room feeding Malachi and putting him to bed while Ben is arranging baths and getting Adelaide and Charlie ready for bed, too. Let me say that on my end, it is much more peaceful :)

Bathtime, 2 months old

Malachi and cutie, Lennon. First play dates. 

I am loving the baby stage so much, maybe because it is going so quickly. I feel like all of my kids are running through life and I would rather they were crawling! I truly love it though and feel so blessed to be their mom and get to spend my days with these little joys.

Adelaide, Charlie, and Malachi (6 weeks)