green machine.

i think i'm becoming addicted to making baby food. our freezer is bursting at the seams and i have 3 recipes that i've been wanting to try... i'm crazy. i know i am, but they are just too easy to throw together, relatively inexpensive, and my little toots needs to eat... so... it kind of have to... maybe just not the quantity that i've been whipping up, though!

back to the food...

i like to make sure that Lu has a bit of green in every meal and this is one that's on continuous rotation. blanch some greens, toss in some fruit, a little coconut milk to thin it out, and BAM! you've got yourself some green machine baby food. i think i might start playing around more with the addition of herbs. i used to use more spices, but have kind of tapered off for some reason. oh well! 

you can tell this was a daddy day, as it was probably 5 o'clock and Toots is still in her pjs. such a cheeky little monkey!

so hungry! i'm pretty sure this is beets, blueberries, and spinach.

blend that ish up! i like to put everything in a baggie to make it easier to transfer into the ice cube trays.

i let my daughter do this step... no. no i didn't. i'm just really precise...

when all cubes have frozen, i like to write the ingredients and due date on a baggie to store. it just makes things easier when you're in a hurry, or if someone else is feeding her and they have allergies- ie. my mother in-law watches Lu 3 days a week and is allergic to squash and zucchini. this way, she won't go into anaphylactic shock when feeding her granddaughter... yikes!

 

 

  Green Machine

1 pack of frozen peas

1 bag of fresh spinach

1 bag of frozen green beans

1 bag of frozen peaches

1 can of coconut milk

 

dump bag of green beans into boiling water for about 3-4 minutes

transfer directly to ice water

blend all ingredients together

taa-daaaaa!!!

 

from there, you can either feed yo baby right away, put it into the fridge for up to 4 days, or freeze for up to 4 months.

 

**fyi...i am not a fan of the peach flavor. i've made this before with apples and it turned out much better. it's not terrible by any means and i'm sure Lu doesn't even notice nor care, but i do, damnit! i will never use peaches again! well... not in the recipe that is.

baby growth.

we've been watching lucy grow from the day that we brought her home from the hospital and from not being able to hold up her head to sitting on her own to now crawling… in circles… crawling none the less we knew that it was going to happen in the blink of an eye, but looking back through old pictures is unreal and almost heartbreaking. my big toots was such a teeny tiny little toots! now she feeds herself and thinks it's funny when she pulls my hair… even when i sternly tell her, "no, that hurts momma"… that's normal right? and not a signs of news headlines to come, right??

SO!!

knowing that this time was going to fly, i wanted to visibly document her growth and so i've been taking pictures of lu next to her kitty and gotdamn! this is my bitty baby at two weeks old.. dimple and all <3

 awwwww! she's not much bigger than kitty! and those teeny, tiny legs and those teeny, tiny toes and those teeny, tiny every things! guh. kill me now i'm in love.

and here's toots just last weekend at seven months old:

oh my word. i'm meeeelllllting!

my big baby! it really is astonishing. she still feels like my little baby, but then looking at these pictures and seeing the amount that she's grown… it's exciting, it's sad, it's fun, it's scary, it's so many different things, but mostly, it's an honor. it's an honor to be given the responsibility of raising this sweet little thing into an independent, caring, loving, strong, funny, amazing woman. wow.

how cool is that?

baby gap.

honestly, my addiction with this damn store is nearing fanatic. i check the website several times a week and have filled lu's drawers and closet to the top with stuff. that's all that it is! stuff. ugh. i need to stop... but i can't! i mean look at these... how could you say no??

these are all in my cart along with many... many of their friends just waiting to be scooped up once the friends and family sale starts. which... I'm not sure why they even have. i swear there's a new discount code every other day. one of my girlfriends and i were talking about that and wondering how they manage to make money when they're clothes are always going to their sale section within weeks of being brought on and on top of that, at least once a week there's a 35% or 40% discount going. oh well! more clothes for my baby!

talking about loss.

i see myself as a pretty open and honest person. there aren't many topics that i'll stray from or avoid... really only including admitting my actual weight, telling my husband the amount i spent at baby gap, and saying how much i drank last night, which is typically only because i can't remember... but talking about loss, that one's different.

recently i've had a good handful of people ask me if and when we're going to start trying again and i almost feel like i'm lying to everyone when i don't answer the question, "well, i actually just miscarried... so... there's that", but at the same time, i feel like i would be bringing the mood down or that mentioning it would make people pitty me and like i've said before, although i am sad and probably always will be, i am at complete peace with everything and how it all happened and i don't mind talking about it.

so how do you ?

i know that the easiest thing to say is, "just be honest", but as in the aforementioned paragraph, i think that the hardest part is not wanting to make other's sad or feel awkward or i don't know. it's just strange. miscarrying is such a private loss and something that is not easily talked about. i was exactly 10 weeks. we had just told his family and had told my parents a few weeks prior. we were at the stage where we were talking about how we were going to set up the nursery, were we going to find out this time (we didn't with lucy), how we were going to tell everyone else. and then bam. it was over.

so how do you bring up something that was so private, but so close to being so public. no one other than our immediate family knew and yet we were at the cusp of everyone knowing. i don't know. i'm rambling. i still haven't told a few of my best friends merely because i don't know how to bring it up and maybe that's a me thing. maybe i'm not as open as i think i am or at least not as open when it comes to being vulnerable or fear i may being pitied.

blurgh.

life is just so damn complicated sometimes! for now... i leave you with my little toots, looking like she's a toddler and wearing the cutest little romper that will probably not fit much longer, so i will make her wear it every.day.:

 

 

romper is from target

 

haaave mercy <3

and just like that...

it was over.

i've been trying to write this post for two and a half weeks (really… you should see how many drafts i started, couldn't find the words for, and then couldn't delete). i just don't know where to start and i guess the best thing to do when you're at a loss for words is to let it all out and see where it takes you.

two and half weeks ago… february 3rd… i was added to the list of members in the club that no woman, no family wants to be a part of.

kevan and i went to our first prenatal appointment in the middle of the work day. i had been in this office twice a week for the last two and half months of my pregnancy with lucy. everything felt so safe and routine. there was an issue with the woman having an ultra sound in the appointment before ours, so instead of having us wait around, we did the second half first… blood draws, pelvic exam, the whole nine yards. when we finished up with that, bobby (the ultrasound tech who i got to know really well with lucy) was ready for us and we went back. they had brought in new technology since we had had our first prenatal with lu and as she was starting the vaginal ultrasound and telling us all about it, her body and head dropped. "this is the bad news that i didn't want to give."

i was pregnant… any test would say i was... but it was a bad egg that had been fertilized. there was  a big, black hole in my uterus that should have been filled with a baby and my mind went blank.

I was asked if I wanted to miscarry naturally or have a d&c and I chose to wait it out.

two and half weeks later and I'm coming to the end. it was tough, it was painful in all ways, but (as cliché as it sounds) it happened for a reason. I don't believe that we are always supposed to understand "the reason", but in this case I do. amongst other things, we needed time. my body needed time. life needed time. and as hard as it was to see that empty sac and feel all of my excitement immediately turn to despair, we needed it.

I may not feel the same sense of peace of this ever happens again (heaven forbid), but in this moment that's where I am.

at peace.

i'm the worst.

the absolute worst at keeping secrets and this is a huge one. I've only told my husband, my parents, and you, the great abyss of internet nothingness. ah! everyday I want to walk into the office and yell, "I'm pregnant!" and what makes it worse is that there are 3 other women... 3!... that are pregnant right now and I desperately want to be like "me too! me too!"... but I can't. and every time I talk to one of my girlfriends or my aunties or my sister-cousin I just want to spill. it. all. spillitall. gotdamn this is going to be a very. very. VERY hard 7 and a half weeks. ugh. ugh for a good reason, but ugh none the less.

in other news... isn't my mushy just the damn cutest?? she looks like such a chunky eskimo baby <3
I just love the little babe with all of my might!

it starts.

how funny it is that you somehow forget all of the bad parts of pregnancy as soon as that cute little cherub pops into the world. I've just been smacked in the face with glorious exhaustion (the kind that is almost painful) and I'm suddenly remembering... yes. this part sucked. the body aching, crawl under my desk, can't hold my eyes open for another moment exhaustion. ugh.

when I look back on my pregnancy with Lucy, it is most definitely through rose colored glasses. yes I was tired, but never that tired. yes I was nauseous, but never too nauseous. all emotions and symptoms came and went with the greatest of ease and then my beautiful baby girl was born. BUT I seem to so easily forget those many days in the beginning that I crawled under my desk and slept for 20 minutes or that time I threw up in my garbage can or right outside of that restaurant or in the bathroom of that other restaurant for 15 minutes (tomatoes... oh the tomatoes.) or the many times I cried and thought to myself, "this is weird. I'm not even sure what I'm crying about" or the countless times I was 2 seconds from my head spinning exercise style because of something my husband said.

wow.

so i'm apparently not very good at keeping up with things. i don't think that i ever have been, but it's glaringly apparent when you go to your blog and the last entry was 2 months ago. jesus! i'm declaring that to be one of my new years goals… follow through. it's one of very, very few faults of mine. possibly the only one ;)
back to the 'wow' in the post title.
so i figure that it's safe to write this here as no one reads this blog and if this post does happen to find eyes in the blogosphere, chances are they won't be those of anyone i know… so… i'll just go out and say it…

i.
am.
pregnant.

again!! unreal. totally and truly unreal. Lucy is just 5 months! how did this happen?? well… i know how it happened, but… how did this happen?? ugh. so exciting and terrifying and grateful. i'm just in shock. it feels a lot like last time. i was supposed to get my period on wednesday and took the test on friday (today) and both times i had a feeling before i even missed my period. call it coincidence, call it mother's intuition, whatever it is, it's kind of awesome.
the only teeny reservation or fear or anxiety that i have is that i have no reference point for siblings. yes, my husband is one of 4. yes, my mom is one of 7 and my dad is one of 8. yes, all of my friends have siblings. but… BUT, i'm an only child. i don't know why, but having another child makes me nervous solely because i don't know the daily ins and outs of living with siblings. will my kids feel loved enough? will i be able to give my everything to all of my children equally? i don't know. it's silly and i'm sure that every second time mom has the same reservations. i just hope that my babies know that my love for them is equal and eternal.
so there! my big wow. i'm going to be buying several more tests tomorrow just in case, but the one i took today was a strong yes.
gah!