Crazy Week

Well... I started off my week with yet another kidney stone attack. This one lasted for 14 hours and pain meds did nothing... Probably because I kept puking. By Monday at 4am I was feeling "better", though my body ached like crazy. I sure wish they'd just pass already, rather than just put me in pain all the time! Nonetheless, I was able to go play for about 12 students at district solo festival and they all did pretty well. Jayna was a champ being towed around everywhere with these high-schoolers. They all absolutely loved her and mauled her so much that she kept getting a little over-stimulated. I'd have to remind them to back off a bit, but over-all she did really well.

Then, late Tuesday night, I noticed that little miss thing had a tooth that had broken skin. I thought she had been the most amazing teether ever until today... she was CRANKY! I guess it's worse once they break through? Makes no sense to me, but she sure has been in pain today... Orajel was not her favorite thing.

She has been eating oatmeal and is doing quite well at it. She, of coarse, sucks it off of the spoon, rather than  letting me put the spoon in her mouth, but gets the job done either way.

We weighed her again the other night because everyone has been commenting on how much bigger she looks just in the last week. This time Scott weighed her and she was only 14 lbs. I believe this weight more than the 15 I weighed her in at a few weeks ago. I think the scale is more accurate with less weight, so we'll have Scott weigh her from now on. Her 6-month appointment is in a few weeks, so then we'll know for sure where she sits... I hope she hasn't lost weight the last week!

Scott is now sick with a sore throat and we're praying that Jayna and I don't catch it. I've got a busy month in March playing for high school concerts, festivals, and judging scholarship auditions and don't have time for illness. The thought of almost having to cancel because of my kidney stone attack stressed me out enough.

We get to go to Twin next weekend, which I'm excited about because we haven't seen my fam since Christmas. Before having a baby, that didn't seem like so long, but in baby years 2 months is a long time!
We're hoping all illness and pain will subside by then :).

6 Months of Being a Mommy

I honestly cannot believe that as of today, I've been a mom for 6 months. It seems so short, yet can't really remember life without Jayna either. We love our little munchkin so much and can't believe how much she's grown! In fact, she's gained 3 lbs in the last 4 1/2 weeks. She started wearing 3-6 month clothing about a month ago and is now already too long for them. We weighed her on our scale last night and it said exactly 15 lbs. I can't believe it! She's no longer small for her age :(, but :) at the same time.

• She's starting to get a lot more dark hair in... we actually comb it for church now. Haha! 
• She loves to sit up, but can't quite do it on her own yet. You'll see examples in our little "photo shoot". 
• She's semi-consistently holding her own bottle. She's great until she gets tired. Haha! We're going to start her on cereal this next week; we've been trying to get her digestion figured out on formula first.
• She is very mobile (on her back). She still doesn't really like rolling over because it ends her up on her tummy, but she still does it on occasion anyways.
• She's obsessed with her hands and is constantly staring at them and wiggling them.
• She's distracted by EVERYTHING... especially when she's eating or trying to nap.
• She sleeps a minimum of 12 hours a night, which is so wonderful! However, she is not a napper. She's exactly like her mom and dad in this aspect. Neither Scott nor I like to nap... I guess she's an early learner. :)
• She's very vocal - she loves doing the vocal "fry" (sorry, don't know how else to explain it. This is a vocal term though.) She loves squealing, spitting, and talking to herself. Scott says she's learned all of this from me, but in reality, I just copy her... or maybe it's all the voice lessons she sits in on ;).

I'm amazed as I look back to her newborn pictures how much she's grown and changed. The rest of this blog is going to be our little 6-month b-day photo shoot.

This is a picture of Jayna when she was 1 1/2 weeks old, so you have a comparison shot.

... And now...

 ...tipping over...

...unhappy that I'm taking her pic instead of feeding her...

... everything goes in the mouth (in case you didn't already notice)...

...Fell over again. This time onto the tummy and pulled the bow down on the way down...

... with mommy...

...and daddy...

I had to put this one in because they both get ridiculous red-eye with every picture! Jayna definitely has daddy's eyes (and everything else).

...This is how we normally look. Jayna gets my hair ALL the time and she's not easy on me!...

The best self-family portrait we could get.

Pictures to boot!

I realized I haven't posted any pictures in quite some time. I've been thinking about pictures lately because I've been reading all sorts of posts/articles on Facebook about how we shouldn't be ashamed with how we look... that our children need to see pictures of us with them... how we are the only ones who really notice our faults. Then I realized that I've only taken a couple of pictures of myself since Jayna's been born because I'm so ashamed with how much I've let myself slide. In fact, I won't even have family pictures taken because I don't want to see any pictures of myself. That's so pathetic!!! So I've gained a bunch of weight... does it make me less of a person? No, but for some reason I feel like seeing myself in this state just solidifies my failures in my health journey.

I've been feeling particularly fat and ugly this last week (probably because I'm not moving as well as a 95 yr old person), and have been going through the whole thought process that I can't believe Scott would stay with me looking like this, even though he didn't marry me for my looks in the first place. So, in my desperate attempt to get motivated, yet again, to have the desire to work towards my weight-loss goals, I decided to look through all of my pictures to find some to motivate me. Let's just say that did the trick! Not to brag, but looking back on my pictures of when I was at my thinnest, I have to say that I'm a pretty hot chick! I'm going to post pictures on here of me at my thinnest and me now, mainly for journaling purposes, but also to remind myself how quickly things can slide if I let them and to show the world (ok, just the few people who read my blog) where I am, so I will be more motivated.

This is me Nov '10

 April '11

 ... and today

Aaaagggghhhh! I must say, other than my weight gain, I look less healthy, less happy, and my eyes are squinty... again. I used to think I just had squinty eyes... until I lost all my weight and realized I had big, pretty eyes. Time to find those eyes again!

Ok, enough whining and complaining. I'm the one who allowed myself to get this way, so I will take responsibility and get back to work! On the up side, I have adorable little Jayna and Scott who make my world better :). 

Jayna is just 1 week shy of being 6 months. I can't believe it! I know I say this all the time, but she is just getting cuter and cuter every day. Her little personality is so fun! We were at Walmart the other day with big ol' long lines, so I entertained myself by making Jayna giggle. Well, she got the major giggles. She was laughing sooo hard, hiccuping, and squealing... it was so dang cute! All the people around us were entertained and people were saying how adorable and precious she was. Seeing as my self-esteem is suffering, I soaked up all of the sweet compliments and loved every minute of it!

Here are some of my favorite pics of her over this last month:

Love her little belly

Haha! I love how uncomfortable she looks, yet she didn't move for an hour.

So, this is when I was on the couch with a hurt back. Scott had to go to work for 1 hour only and I truly couldn't lift Jayna. In that hour, she was the most active she's ever been. She made her way off of every side of the area rug and even rolled over (for only the 2nd time). I would scoot myself onto the floor and shimmy her back onto the rug... ridiculous. Oh, and she's naked because she also had a blow-out in that hour and I could barely change her diaper, let alone her clothes.

Hehe! We find her like this in her crib often. She won't sleep unless her head is in the corner (usually with her face up against the bumper pads) and she's always finding a way to shimmy out of her pj's. Girl just wants to be naked!

Love her expression in this one... it was taken today.

Finally enough hair for a little mohawk. Daddy doesn't like it, but I have to show that she has hair. :)

I LOVE MY CUTE LITTLE GIRL!!!!! Can't imagine my life without her! Okay, I love Scott too! ;)

Back to basics

Today is the first time I've been able to sit since Saturday, so I'm just now updating my blog. Smarty-pants, here, wasn't thinking clearly on Saturday and tried to move things along too quickly. You see, I've always had back issues and they got really bad just after I got married... mainly because I was trying to introduce orthotics and a heel lift for my right side (which is 1/2" shorter than my left). I need these things to correct my overlying issues, but they cause extreme short-term discomfort. Well, just after my body had adapted to them, I got pregnant... and had extremely swollen feet. I have huge feet anyways and my shoes were a tight fit with everything in them before. Well, needless to say, I couldn't get my shoes on and ended up taking everything back out.

So, here we are, about 8 months later and I'm just starting to train to walk a half marathon in May. Little was I realizing that just starting to walk more could cause discomfort in my back. But then, on top of that I think, "I should start introducing my orthotics and heel lift again." NOT SMART!!! I got home from my walk on Saturday and took a shower. As I stepped out of the shower, my back completely seized up and I could hardly even get dressed. I went in an laid on my bed for a minute to see if I could get it to calm down, but no dice! Here we are, 4 days and a chiropractic adjustment later, and I'm just now getting to the point I can sit. Oh, the joys!

The hardest part has obviously been the amount of quality time I've been lacking with Jayna. I hate it!!! I haven't been able to sit up and feed her, haven't been able to sit on the floor and play with her, haven't been able to hold her and cuddle, and I haven't been able to put her to bed or go in and get her out. My favorite part of the day is when I get to go into her bedroom in the mornings to get her out of her crib and she immediately smiles and giggles when she sees me. Scott has had that luxury the last 3 mornings, and I must say I'm jealous. I have one more adjustment from the chiropractor tomorrow and then hopefully I'll be better, for the most part. Then, I'm bound and determined to start practicing yoga and make it part of my life. That's the one thing everybody has sworn to me would be the most help, but I've avoided it because I'm the least flexible person in the world and yoga is ridiculously hard for me. Yes, I know it will help make me more flexible, but I'm really impatient :).

I've got to get back to basics when it comes to my health... walking regularly, yoga, and healthy eating. I'm getting there, but I know I can do better. Hopefully my body will rebel less if I do these basics.

Where do I begin?

It's now 3:30 am and I am not asleep because of so many epiphanies/thoughts/emotions going through my head. Today (I guess technically, yesterday) I had so many little things happen that led to some massive self-reflection, that now my brain is completely jumbled with it all. I'm hoping that by typing, I'm able to make some sense of it.

It all started with a voice lesson. I have a student singing a very depressing song, which contains a lot of rests. Well, during the rests, she would completely tune out. She's a very expressive singer, so it was very noticeable that she was tuning out. I started to explain to her that the very best performers are those that can communicate well, especially during the silence. In fact, the silence is what leaves room for both the performer and the audience member to soak in and feel what has just been sung.

After saying this to her (something I had heard many times from my mentor teacher, and decided to embellish on), it took me back to a performance I was in, in 2002. This performance was the world premiere of a song called O Jerusalem, written by Robert Kyr. This performance had a huge impact on my life for one reason... silence. Kyr had written this piece in response to the 9/11 attacks. Before we sang it we had a minute of silence for what had happened... this was not the moment of silence that made the impact. After the 12 minute song (incredibly written, by the way), there was a complete hush over the crowd for about 3 seconds (even quieter than the minute of silence before). After that 3 seconds, there was an immediate standing ovation and not a dry eye in the cathedral. I feel that the standing ovation was due to what was felt in those 3 seconds more than it was about the performance or the piece.

The reason I bring this all up, is for a number of reasons:

• I realized after a week of complete lack of motivation (not only for weight-loss and exercise, but for life in general), that I have stopped feeling. I think this is due to all the many trials that I feel have bombarded my little family's life the last year and a half. Rather than dealing with them the healthy way, I chose to turn off reactions, vulnerability, and sense of feeling.
• Every performance I've gone to has seemed mediocre, even though other's have raved about the same performances. 
• I've not been able to find anything that satisfies me.
• Most of all, because I realize that I have created a lack of silence in my life.

I know this sounds like a classic case of depression, but please save your comments and hear me out. Last week in church, there was a talk about 'why we attend church'. I thought it was a very strange topic, and honestly only heard about half of the talk because I was distracted by my child (or rather I distracted myself with my child). However, after today, I really thought about it and realized I was only going because I'd always gone, and that's just what I do. Why have I lost my zest for church? Because I've lost feeling, Heavenly Father's most powerful source of communication.

Scott and I had a long conversation about how we no longer feel anything just before he (emphasis on he) went to sleep (which really got this jumble rolling), and all I've been able to think to myself is that Satan has us exactly where he wants us. In our conversation I remember saying, "It's funny that we are supposedly more powerful than Satan, but somehow he seems to have gotten the better of us."

In that same conversation, we talked about how we're both the kind of people that hate down time, so we always fill it with something. Why do we hate "down time" so much? Is it because we think too much (for us, this could be a large part of it)? Though I realize too much downtime is a bad thing, I realize that we are making a bad choice to block out silence, the prime time for Heavenly Father to communicate with us.

It all came to an emotional point tonight, when I had an incredible 'tender mercy'. At one point, while all these thoughts were swimming through my head, and I was tossing and turning, Jayna woke up screaming. I went in, somewhat annoyed, to pick her up and console her. As I was sitting in silence, rocking my beautiful gift from Heavenly Father, she looked up at me and stared deep into my eyes for a while and then smiled the most loving smile I have ever felt. I never knew I could feel such a deep connection of love! Then, I realized, in this incredible moment of silence, that it was Heavenly Father communicating His love for me. He loves me so much that he trusts me with this incredible spirit that seems so much more advanced than me. He trusts that I will raise her to be a strong, faithful woman in a world with so many issues.

Heavenly Father knew that this was exactly what I needed and he was just waiting for the right moment of silence to communicate it to me. I'm going to try to remember that I need to cherish these moments of silence and keep myself open to feeling so that I don't get dragged down by all of the trials of this life. I'm going to do my best to be a good mother, wife, daughter, sibling, and friend. I'm going to remember that Satan is the one who wants me to fill the silence with clutter and to not feel anything. Why am I letting the being that doesn't love me win me over? No more!

Motivation?

This post is mainly going to be about my "eating right" woes, so if you're not interested, quit reading ;).

It's funny to me how different it is trying to lose weight with a skinny-mini husband and baby in the house. Don't get me wrong, the first time I lost all my weight it was really difficult. I never allowed sugar in my house, I would only allow myself to eat out about once every 3 months (and even then I tried to make it healthy), and I exercised practically every single day. Not only did I exercise, but I walked a minimum of about 5 miles a day. Keeping meticulous track of what I burned and ate, it still took me 6 years to lose 116 lbs. That's right, no miracle story of losing over 100 lbs in a year. My body has always seemed to be reluctant to lose weight. Sadly, even though I tried to convince myself and others that my main motivation for weight loss wasn't to draw in men, deep down inside it was. I was lonely, knew I had a lot to offer, but could never get a date because I didn't find myself beautiful enough (and men didn't either).

Now that I've got an incredible husband that still loves me even though I've gained back 70 lbs, I'm having a very hard time finding my motivation. Though I want to be healthy and a good example for Jayna, I just can't get jump started! There are many factors that make it much more difficult now:

• I have a husband who can't gain weight, and to say he's addicted to sugar is an understatement. Needless to say, there's always sugar in the house... Something I have a very hard time combating, though I'm getting better at it. (I make him keep all of his stuff in his cupboard, which I'm not allowed to open.) He also loves to eat fast food... something that never used to tempt me. Sadly, if someone else is eating something, I feel left out if I'm not eating it too. Stupid, I know, but this is something I have to overcome somehow.
• It's negative degrees outside. Walking has always been my way to get fresh air and exercise all at the same time... something I need to feel better and more energized. Before, I would go out in the cold anyways (if you know me, you know I love the cold). However, I can't take little miss Jayna out in this weather and by the time Scott gets home it's dark outside.
• I've forgotten how much less energy I have when I'm heavier. Some days, it feels like I'm lifting 1,000 lb legs... no joke. I know that the only way to combat this is to make myself move so I can start losing weight and gain my energy back.
• Every time I go to set a meal plan and schedule, Jayna has something else in mind. Many days, I don't get around to eating until about 2 pm because my cute little munchkin can be a bit high maintenance. I'm trying to come up with quick fixes that can be eaten with one hand.

I know it seems as though I'm dwelling on the negative, but these are legitimate concerns/problems. I've tried many things to try to motivate myself:

• Looked up motivational quotes and ideas on pinterest.
• Wrote my own motivations down and read one every day.
• Forced myself to exercise when I absolutely didn't want to.
• Tried to get creative with healthy recipes.
• Renewed my BodyBugg subscription so I'm motivated to move more.
• Set a schedule for laundry and housework.
• I'm trying to go to bed and wake up at the same time every day.
• Am trying to be a better wife and mother.

I think that when spring hits and I can get out of the house a little more often, I will feel better and more motivated. Until then, I will continue trying to find indoor motivational tools :s. Yay for the lifelong battle of weight management. If you have a high metabolism, be grateful!

Here and There

There's no specific reason for this post. From now on, rather than calling it "Ramblings", which I stole from my sis-in-law anyways, I'm going to call it "Here and There".

• We finished the lighting in the kitchen and it looks soooo much better! It's amazing how just changing out some old, ugly, big lights makes such a huge difference!

Again, here's the before

 and here's the after.

I like it so much better! 

• Since I've married Scott, he's often joked about me gaining a child rather than a husband. Hilariously enough, I feel like I now have 3 children instead of one. That's right... Scott being my first child, Jayna being my second, and Scott's friend Cory being my third. Think I'm joking? This is what I see just about every Saturday...

I just laugh because they remind me of a couple of 8 year old boys all excited about their football game. Usually Jayna just stares at them, but was actually playing when I took the picture.

• Jayna rolled over for the first time this week (actually second time, but the first time was just an outburst of rage)! Once she got onto her belly, she was so mad that she cried herself to sleep almost instantly... She abhors being on her stomach. It was so funny! I was super excited and was congratulating her and shouting hooray, but she definitely didn't join in on the enthusiasm. She hasn't done it again, I think because she really doesn't want to end up on her tummy. I need to force her to do more tummy time so she can roll over onto her back, but her little stomach is so sensitive that she throws up almost every time I put her on her tummy.
• Jayna must be hitting yet another growth spurt... she has been sleeping all the dang time. I'm not complaining because I can get a lot done, but I must say I miss playing with her while she's asleep. She is so fun right now... she giggles all the time and is so responsive! I just love her to death!
• We got her this adorable little hat to wear out in the cold... well, I think it's adorable. Scott apologizes to her every time we put it on for putting her through public humiliation. You can judge for yourself, but I think there's nothing cuter!

You can't tell me that's not adorable!!!

• I just can't believe how much she's grown recently! I see newborns at church and can't remember when she was that little, and they're almost twice the size she was at birth. Crazy!