Early Present For Mommy

It's December 1st and I've already got my Christmas present!!

The following pictures are really a present to myself.  I decided months ago that when I hit my weight loss goal that I would get professional pictures taken of me with my babies.  That would be the three people that I have given birth to.  This doesn't mean that I love Kierstin any less.  This was just something that was important to me.  These three people exist because of me (not to toot my own horn here).  And I'm extremely proud of them!!  I hope that someday my kids treasure these pictures as much as I always will.  The years go by faster the older I get and I want to remember this time in our lives.

Jordan is 12 and should be going though an awkward phase. At least I think I did when I was his age.  Clearly that hasn't happened yet and maybe it won't.  He is just so insanely handsome!  He was such a great little model that day.  I'm so thankful for him.

Delaney is 3 and had her own agenda for these pictures.  It was more like, "Mommy we're at the park and I'd rather play in the dirt than take a silly picture".  She was fascinated by all the peacocks, cats and dogs we kept seeing.  I'm lucky my photographer is so talented that she still managed to capture some great shots.  This kid has so much attitude and sass that I'm terrified for her teen years!

Harper is 10 months old and constantly on the move.  I'm shocked that we got her to sit still long enough to take pictures.  She's such a sweetie pie and I hope she stays that way!  Who am I kidding, right?

Jordan, Delaney and Harper, Mommy is so proud of you!

Food Coma

I'm actually glad to be at work today and back to our normal routine so that I don't continue to eat my weight in food.  My four day weekend started out great with the 5k and then I just got lazy.  I had good intentions of going to the gym on Saturday and Sunday, but yeah, that didn't happen.

Here we are on Thanksgiving.  It was a fun time with family stuffing our faces.  Harper tried pumpkin pie for the first time and ended up with a rash all over her face.  It went away very quickly, but she's obviously allergic to something.  This happens with other foods too.

We lowered Delaney's kitchen so Harper could enjoy it.  She plays with it a lot and I'm happy to get more use out of it.

We put our Christmas decorations up on Friday.  Delaney will not leave the tree alone.  We find her messing with the ornaments constantly.  And here I thought Harper was going to be the problem.  Boy was I wrong! 

 Daddy and his helpers

She's almost ready to start pushing this thing around the house.  Delaney was trying to show her how to do it.  Aren't they cute?!

Harper ended up getting sick on Friday night and continued to be miserable until Sunday morning.  It felt like I had a newborn all over again.  Wasn't I just saying what I great sleeper she is?  I think the lack of sleep for me also contributed to my lack of interest to head to the gym.  Or at least I'm using that as my excuse.

Happy Monday everyone!

Ten Months Old! 11.07.12

Harper you are now TEN months old!!!  In about 6 weeks we will be celebrating a first birthday.  Wait, WHAT?!

You are so much fun!  I love walking into your bedroom in the morning and you're standing up in your crib waiting for me to come get you.  You always have a huge smile on your face and are chattering away.  Can we freeze time for a bit?  I seriously LOVE this age right now.

I also love to crawl around on the floor with you.  You are so happy when anyone gets down on the floor to play.

You also love to be at my feet in the kitchen or helping yourself to whatever is in the cabinets.  One of your favorite parts of the day is when the dishwasher is open and being loaded or unloaded so you can "help".

Sleep:  You are still a great sleeper.  We lucked out with you.

Feed:  You also eat really well and are getting more table foods everyday.  So there's a mixture of formula, jar of baby food and finger foods daily.  You love yogurt.  I'm looking forward to not having to buy formula here very soon.

Weight:  You haven't been weighed since your 9 month doctor's appointment, but I'm certain that you're pushing 23 lbs now.

Length:  Again I have no idea how long you are, but you're outgrowing all of your 12 month clothes.

Diapers/Clothes:  You wear a size 4 diapers and clothes are 12-18 months.

Hair color/Eye color:  You have dark blonde hair and blue eyes. 

Milestones:  You are now furniture cruising!  I think you'll be walking before your first birthday.  You will take steps while holding onto my hands.  The smile on your face shows us you're proud of yourself.  

There's no more funny army crawl going on.  You are crawling on your hands and knees full time now, and you are very speedy!

You love to turn off our TV or computer.  There's something about those bright blue buttons that you cannot resist.  When we tell you no, you look at us and laugh.  Silly girl.

Favorite Toys:  You do not necessarily need a toy to make you happy.  Delaney leaves wrappers from whatever she's eaten and you'll grab those first over any cool toy in the room.  You also love to play with the dogs food.  Ugh.

We recently brought Delaney's play kitchen into the family room and you love that thing.  We lowered it so it's just your size.

Holy smokes do I love you Harper.  Please feel free to take your time on the walking thing.  I'm perfectly content in having you stay my little itty-bitty baby as long as possible.

XOXOXO

Love,

Your Mommy

My First 5k

Running is not something I ever wanted to do.  It's hard and boring.... or so I thought.  Then I decided to try it for weight loss purposes.  It helped me get to my goal before I got burnt out with my usual workouts.  Then I found something I wasn't expecting.  I actually started to crave running.  Like itching at work to get the day over with so I could get home and put my sneakers on.  Who is this girl?

So after a few months of running I knew I had to sign up for a race.  I found this Turkey Trot 5k in my sisters part of town and it sounded perfect for my first race.  Notice that I just said first because I plan for there to be more. Many more!

My sister made me this sign.  Thanks Liz!  I had my family there supporting me.  Thanks Mom for getting up early for me!  And thank you Rob for your continued support when I need to get out of the house to get my workout in.

I'm ready to go.  Just waiting for the race to start.  My right leg/knee has been bothering me lately and I was worried that I wouldn't be able to run.  But regardless I was going to do this and finish this race.

Part of my sweet little cheering squad.  Go Mommy GO!!

The first mile was hard.  It was uphill, which I'm not use to.  The second mile was more on a downward slope so I was able to get a little bit of a break.  I had horrible side pain and was coughing most of the time, but I was determined not to stop.  I wanted to run the whole race without having to walk and I did it!!

My stupid iPod wasn't shuffling so I listened to the same song over and over and over.  But I didn't want to mess with it because I was afraid it would slow down my pace.

This was me after the race trying to catch my breath.  

As I was running into the finish line I saw Jordan standing on the side holding a sign with a huge smile on his face.  I was fighting back tears.  I hope I made him proud.

I know 3.1 miles seems like nothing to many, but this was huge for me.  And I'm so glad that I did it.  I'm already in search of my next race.  I can't wait to do this again!

Here are the results:

My official time was 34 min and 24 sec.

I placed 419th overall (out of 810 men, women and children)

I was the 189th female to cross the finish line (out of 458 females)

I placed 55th in my age group of 30-39 year olds (there were 127 females in my age group)

I'm extremely pleased with those results for my first race!  Not too shabby.

The Pumpkin Farm

Please remind me to never go to the pumpkin patch again prior to Halloween.  We went last weekend and it was perfect!  The weather was nice at 84 degrees and there were no crowds.  When we've gone prior years it's always so miserably hot (100 degrees) and there are always hundreds of people.  Both of which makes things very stressful.  This year however, we had the best time!

 The whole family minus Kierstin.  It was her weekend with her mom.  She was given the option to come with us, but she chose not to.  She missed out!

Jordan is a huge animal lover.  He got to grind up food for these baby chicks and feed them.

Delaney was not so sure about all the animals as first.

She went up these stairs at least 20 times to go down the slide.

There was a huge bouncey mountain. It reminded me of a giant waterbed.  Delaney needed some help because she kept getting knocked over.

Harper was so quiet and looked around at everything.  My sweet girl.

This girl was in heaven.  LOVED everything about this place.

Jordan got to feed some goats.

 And so did Delaney.  Daddy had to encourage her to do it though because she was scared.

If the train ride didn't cost $2.00 for every ride she would have rode it a lot more than twice.

 Delaney yelled "WOO-HOO" as the train took off!  This was her favorite part.  And Jordan being the awesome big brother that he is, rode it with her.  He wasn't too thrilled, but sucked it up for his sister.

The pumpkin patch was pretty bare but they had plenty for sale up at the entrance.  This picture was taken while the kids were on the train.

All three of my kiddos.  It's still weird sometimes that I actually have THREE kids.

Jordan supervised Leia and Harper playing in the corn.

 I was shocked that she didn't try to eat any of the corn because everything else goes in her mouth.

He loved this horse and said at one point it laid its head on his chest.  So sweet.

 My bestie Jayme and our girls.  It's so much fun having girls so close in age.  They will have lots of exciting adventures together as they grow up.  I can't wait!!

And that pretty much sums up our afternoon at the pumpkin farm.  I can't wait to go back AFTER Halloween again next year!

Happy Halloween

We had a wonderful Halloween!!  

Delaney was a Witch.  Harper was a Strawberry.  Kierstin was Princess Jasmine.  And Jordan has decided he's too old to dress up.  He needs to stop growing up!

A little back story about Delaney's costume choice.  I bought her this beautiful Rapunzel costume from the Disney Store back in September in hopes that it would be a good birthday present and that she'd still love it enough to wear it for Halloween.  That ended up being a big FAIL.  She hated the princess dress and cried when I tried to put it on her.  So I returned the expensive dress and let her pick out her costume.  She decided on this witch get up.  The best part about it was that it cost me 13 dollars!!  Um, okay!  No complaints from this Mama!

 Harper ended up wearing the same Strawberry costume that Delaney wore for her 2nd Halloween.  This was a size 12-18 months and fit her perfectly!  Harper lives in a world full of hand-me-downs.  Good thing her Mama takes such good care of Big Sister's clothes.  Delaney also hated this costume and wouldn't wear the hat which further proves that Harper is such an easy going baby!

We didn't have Kierstin with us on Halloween night because she was with her mom.  But she was with us at the trunk or treat at the church the previous weekend.

We stopped by the in-laws house on Halloween and my mother-in-law was dressed up as Super Mario complete with a rainbow wig.  It was hilarious.  She's such a character and it's where Rob gets his goofy personality from.  He's just like his mother.

Halloween of course was my 34th birthday.  My Mom made this awesome pumpkin cake!  It was cute and tasted sooooooo good.  Thanks Mom!  You're the best!!

Hope you all had a Happy Halloween!!  We certainly did.