Flipbook

Our lives are rushing by.  Looking at the photos on my phone make me feel like I am looking at a flipbook.  I want to just grab a day and hold it, and hold my two babes, and savor God's goodness.  But the days don't want to be held.  

A taste of my flipbook.

3rd Day of Retirement

Boy, do I have a lot to catch up on!

Now that I am retired, I hope to catch up on all my journaling.  But lets be real...I am good at finding lots of things to fill my time.  So the Sparknotes version will have to do for now.

And as a disclaimer, I want to apologize to my future self, who is looking back on these entries to remember how simple life used to be and is finding poor documentation.  I wish I had a better camera, created a more lovely blog, and wrote with more wit.  I don't, but don't let the ihpone pics fool you.  We live a cheery life.

Life flew by the last several weeks.  I graduated (more on that later), Emmeline got huge and brilliant and beautiful (stop growing baby!) and we still have made no medical school decisions (WHAT?)

Taylor and I have been looking forward to retirement - the end of school - so he could actually have a wife and Emmeline could have a mother.  Truthfully, though, I was really nervous.  I think I escaped a lot of the difficult post-partum stuff because I had to jump back into school and work and life so quickly.  I worried that if I had such a drastic change of being busy and social and productive and feeling important, to staying at home with a babe all day, I would get a little...restless.  Well, so far it is Day 3 of retirement and I have not felt like that.  I am having SO much fun with Emmeline, and I am bursting with things I want to do to fill my time!  I have so many goals, and not enough time to accomplish them all!

Days 1, 2, and 3 I spent working at American Heritage (wrapping up a few last things), cooking, working on Uncle John's resume, and learning how to do Family History.  I am a novice, but I LOVE it!  Emmeline and I spent hours today at the Family History Library at BYU.  She was perfect...until at the every end, when she told me she was ready to go.  Loudly.

Here is a visual representation of retirement, according to my iPhone:

 

 Turns out our little Emmeline is good at sleeping in.  We do a lot of snuggling...she is a sleepysleepy head.

 

We went to the Sacred Gifts Exhibit at BYU to see the life of Christ depicted - beautiful.  And we get lots of ice cream.

Hanging with Great Grandpa Hardy.  We did family history, went to the museum, and listened to Rush.

Learning to do Family History at the BYU Library.  SO FUN!

Emmeline's Four Months

When I look at my big babe with beautiful chunky rolls and a budding personality, I wonder - how has the time gone so fast?

When I think of this semester and all the work I have done, and all the work I still have to do, I think - wow, four months is a long time.

Its crazy how time is so relative.  But life is wonderful and we are happy.  I love my babe, I love my husband, I love my classes, I love work, I love my family.  I am grateful.  

Here are a couple updates:

Emmeline turned four months on Sunday!  Happy Birthday, now stop growing! 

- Emmeline is a dream baby - Heavenly Father's gift for a full time student.  She is pleasant and happy and shares smiles with everyone.  

- She wears lots of cute clothes (thanks grandma) which are now all stained green - she is a great pooper.  

- She sleeps all night long (so long as she is wrapped tight in the straightjacket). 

- Emmeline is a good eater; she eats her hands, anything within distance of her hands, me, my hair, her dad's arm, her feet...oh, and bottles and binkies.  

- Emmeline still has no hair and clams up in front of the camera.  

- She loves to SING and TALK and and LAUGH.  

- She likes to stand and has great leg muscles.  

-She hates to be put down, sit by herself, or be otherwise ignored

- Emmeline loves to be with her Auntie Morgan and Auntie Jane, an anyone else who will give her loves.

I graduate this month!  Yay!  If I can finish all my assignments before then, that is.  I am grateful for my sister and sisters-in-law and coworkers and team mates and every other person who has helped me balance school and baby.  Poor Taylor has worked hard to help me graduate.  He helps with my assignments, takes care of the babe, works on projects alongside me, and puts up with microwave burritos for lunch and nachos for dinner.  I love my MPA friends and am learning so much in my classes.  I have daily meltdowns of how I can balance motherhood with my career goals, but that is a good dilemma to have.

Taylor works full-time in a BYU immunology lab - the perfect job for this year.  We are so grateful for the experience, the paycheck, and the faculty parking...though Taylor jokes that he gets a little lonely in his "cubicle within a cubicle."  He played four intermural sports this semester and is training for a marathon. He is still trying to decide where to go to medical school...we may just never decide.  Again, a good dilemma to have.

I am in love with my husband and my babe.  Learning everyday.

National Siblings Day

All growing up, my Dad would proclaim that all he wanted for Christmas (Birthday, Father's Day, Anniversary, Tuesday) was for his girls to get along.  It was hard.

Now, all I want for Christmas (etc.) is to be with my sisters.  I have the best.  

Happy Sibling's Day.  I love you two.

Sunday Afternoon Walk

Sunday Afternoon Walk...with just a hint of Spring

Today is a day to remember.  Nothing momentous happened, no special event, nothing important accomplished.

But the little things made it perfect.  We were able to sleep in a little, and then lay in bed with our smiley girl.  She loves the mornings, bounces up and down on our chests and snuggles and coos.  I love my family of three.  We went to church and gave thanks to our Father.  We cleaned our little home and ate homemade hummus.  We went on an afternoon walk to visit Auntie Morgan, basking in the crisp golden sunlight.  Spring is on the way, which means graduation.  Hallelujah.

Today was a fresh day.  A fresh start to the week, a refreshed sense of hope, a fresh world around us, a freshness to our marriage.

It was a quintessential Provo-student-newly married-young baby day.  A day I hope to remember.

Come home Daddy

Tonight I just wanted Emmeline's dad to come home.  But after I threw my tantrum, I realized how grateful I am he went away.

So I am a very happy girl, with a charmed life.  I have nothing to complain about.  Even given all our blessings, or maybe because of, I feel pretty overwhelmed these days.  Having a newborn has rocked my world, and getting little sleep has really affected my ability to cope with school and work and motherhood.  I lose patience so easily.  Thankfully, I don't feel irritated with Emmeline.  Unfortunately, I often feel irritated with myself.  The only time I feel like I can focus on my homework or clean my house or just take care of myself is when Taylor comes home from work to be with Emmeline.  I am grateful to have his help while I am in school, before he gets focused in his schooling.

I have a big assignment due Wednesday, and an unusually fussy baby the last couple days.  She has been so restless, and consolable only when I walk around with her.  I feel so guilty trying to do other things, when she needs attention. We FaceTimed Taylor, waiting for him to be done with his experiments so he could come home.  I counted down the minutes.  And truly, when he walked in the door, I was finally able to get school work done without feeling guilty for focusing on something other than my babe.

And then, after just an hour, he left to go home teaching.  I had no problem with that - I am glad he takes his priesthood commitments seriously.  But as the minutes ticked by, and he was gone longer and longer, I felt myself get so irritable.  Even angry.  My baby was screaming, my homework was laughing at me, the dishes were heckling me, the unfolded laundry tripping me, and the emails from my boss staring at me.  Irrationally, I felt abandoned.  He was off, doing what he needed to do, and I was at home convinced that I wouldn't be able to finish my last semester of grad school.  I felt like he was off serving other people, when I NEEDED him at home.  I need to be served! And with my anger, the spirit that his service brings our home left.

I don't want to feel needy, or irritable.  Because truthfully, Taylor is the man I love and admire because of how he respects the Priesthood power he has been given.  I want him to serve other people.  I want to share him.  I want to want to feel that way always.  I remember a Relief Society lesson I sat in when I visited Reno several years ago.  Sister Manning taught on how we can really support our husbands in their priesthood responsibilities.  She shared stories of raising children while her husband was a Bishop. She talked of how he was often away serving others when she felt like she needed him at home, but how their family was always blessed (at least that was the message I took away).  I don't know why that lesson has stuck with me - I wasn't married when I heard it - but it is applicable.  I hope that Taylor has more opportunities to serve, and I anticipate that they will be more time consuming than an hour long home teaching lesson.  But for him to serve, I need to be the wife that supports.  I need to let him serve.  I need to not demand his service for myself, but share.

So I guess I have a little repenting to do.  I am too blessed to feel sorry for myself.  As much as I want him to come home, I prefer that he go out and be the servant that he needs to be.  And I am oh so grateful for FaceTime.

Day of Rest

Today was a wonderful day in our home.  It is Sunday, stake conference.  Our home is clean and warm.  We sat on the couch and stared at our beautiful baby and counted our blessings.  We read books and ate french toast and took a bath.  We are a happy family.

Today is Emmeline's 8 week birthday.  We love you Little Miss.