Avery: 4 Months

Avery is already 4 1/2 months old! So, I thought I'd update you on all the wild and crazy things she's doing and saying these days. Oh wait...

Anyway~ we had her 4 month well visit yesterday so here are some stats:
14lb 13oz = 75th %
25 inches long = 75th %
Head circumference 40 1/4 inches = 25th %

Proof that her eyes are blue. (Please stay blue, please stay blue.)


She is such a sweet and active little lady. She has recently started screaming a lot, out of joy or boredom or loneliness or sadness, which is pretty annoying. I'm not a huge fan of loud noises. Luckily if I smother her with kisses or just hold her she stops. Her cry is really loud, too, and she just screams out of anger and I don't love it.   Jonathan told me today that I'm a good mom for having patience with her cry because he can't stand it. Hopefully she learns to talk soon! Ha. She rolls over all the time and then of course gets mad about being on her belly.  She chews on everything! Addilyn did not do this, so I'm not used to it.  I wonder if she's getting teeth, or is just going to eat everything (besides food) like Amelia. (Amelia still eats her crayons.) She has regressed on her sleeping, so she and I are going to have a little chat (and a little sleep training) here pretty soon.  She goes to sleep great, it's the waking up 4 (or more) times in the night that's killing me. The Doctor told us we can start her on rice cereal now, so I'm looking forward to moving out of milk-machine mode.  I think she looks a lot like me and my brother Eric as a baby, Kirsta thinks she looks like Elsha as a baby, and a friend told me she looks like my mom, so I'm thinking she's got a lot of "Smiley" genes in her. We're so excited to watch her grow.

I could literally take a picture of her EVERY time she sleeps because I love it so much.

getting old

There are few things I don't love. One is getting older. Another is pregnancy. I find myself being resentful of both those things. Mostly because things happen to your body that you can't change.

A few years ago my cousin told me that she had perfect vision until she got pregnant and after that she had to wear contacts every day, all day.  WHY is pregnancy so annoying?

Over the past couple months I've noticed that some things were starting to be a little blurry.  Just little things like when I'm sitting at our kitchen table and I look at the clock on the microwave I can't tell the difference between a 3 and an 8. Or when I'm reading the ticker tape along the bottom of our small tv in our room it has a little fuzzy sheen around it. This wasn't anything I was too worried about. No headaches or anything so who cares, right?

Then I started to notice that every night when I was reading my book I had a small black dot in front of my right eye.  This was very obnoxious because then as I'm reading, the black dot is moving back and forth with my eye and then I just start to follow the black dot and then I forget what I'm reading because I'm thinking about the dot.  So, I figured since it's been about 15 years since I've had my eyes checked that this was the perfect time to go.

It was definitely an eye opener, no pun intended.  When they popped up that screen with the 4 sets of 2 letters, I could only make out the top row! They switched out the lenses about 100 times and asked which one I could see better out of, which is pretty fun! After they made everything perfectly clear they said, "Here's your normal vision" and took it away, and i couldn't believe it was so blurry!

Turns out my right eye is 20/25 and my left eye is 20/30. So I got these bad boys:

They're only for driving at night (with 3 little ones I don't drive at night) and for watching tv, to make things crispy clear.  

So, I don't know if my bad vision is a result of pregnancy, or just getting old, but I'm going to continue to resent them both. :)

5 years

Today is Jonathan and my 5 year anniversary. Time is such a funny thing. On one hand it feels like yesterday, and on the other I think 5 years is nothin'. We're babies in the marriage world.  At the same time, a lot of peoples' marriage fall apart around/by 5 years and I'm happy to say that we have never even fought. ;)
I wish I could have a wedding re-do.  Mostly because HOW FUN ARE WEDDINGS? Especially your own?! I would absolutely love to do all that planning again, pick a new dress, and have all my friends and family together to celebrate us. Also because I still feel guilty about who I invited (or didn't) to our wedding. I know you can't please everyone, blah blah, but I got married at a very in-between stage in my life where I didn't really have any close friends and I had abandoned all my true friends.  Looking back, I wish I would've thought, "We were friends for about 10 years, I should probably invite them, regardless of how long it's been since we talked." So, I'm sorry to all who were left out. (Whew, hopefully that guilt will go away!) Anyway, moving on.

For our 5 years, I thought I'd list 5 great qualities about Jonathan:

He's motivated and hardworking.  Often to the point that I'm annoyed that on his days off we don't really get to hang out because he's working on one project or another.  I have to step back and realize how lucky I am that he doesn't spend his days off laying around doing nothing or leaving me at home to go golfing or something.

He's funny. Sometimes it's embarrassing when I laugh so hard I cry and get that super high pitched laugh that's not really even a laugh.

He's helpful. He works a full time job and then comes home and helps around the house full time. After dinner every night he either cleans up the kitchen or bathes the kids. He's always asking me, "What can I do to help you?"  Awesome.

He's honest. I've been trying for 5 years to catch him in some sort of lie, and I can't!

He loves his daughters. Often, at the end of the day I'm ready to throw the girls in their beds and yell, "I love you" as I'm running out the door to have some alone time. Not Jonathan. He always takes time to play, read stories, share snacks and hot cocoa, and lay down with them for a few minutes if they want.  I'm pretty OCD about a schedule and when Amelia doesn't nap her bedtime is 7.  Sometimes even 6:45. Jonathan has done her bedtime routine with her since she was born, so when it's her time to go to bed I just go downstairs to read my book or watch Dancing with the Stars, leaving them to their own devices.  I can always hear them upstairs eating, talking, reading, whatever, until well after 7 and I'm tempted to march up the stairs and yell at both of them, "It is way past her bedtime! Enough is enough!"  Until it dawns on me that he genuinely likes spending time with her. He could just toss her in bed every night with a story and a kiss and call it good, but he doesn't.  Their bond is immeasurable. When we got Addilyn on a bedtime routine and her bedtime was 6:00 he was sad that he didn't get to see her very much since he didn't get home from work until 5:30, so he switched his schedule to work from 6-4 instead of 7-5 every day. So sweet. Last night I even asked him, "Should we try one more time for a boy?" And he said, "Nope, I'm perfectly happy with my 3 girls."

I could go on and on, but then you guys would probably start to think that I'm making this stuff up.  NOPE, he really is that great! Many more happy years to come! Oh, and in case you think I forgot, we're taking our annual Botanic Gardens trip at the beginning of July, so I'll post our 5 year picture then.

Wah wah wah

Well, all your hopes and dreams of me blogging more now that I have a laptop have gone out the window.  I've concluded that the real reason I don't blog anymore is because I don't have anything to say.  I mean, a lot goes on in our life, but I tell people about it in other ways than blogging.  Most people I know have Facebook and I write some updates on there.  My brother who doesn't have Facebook has Instagram so he sees my life in pictures, and I don't think he read my blog anyway.  My sister and my In-laws who don't have/check facebook live in the same city as me and don't need to read my blog to hear our stories.  My parents gets plenty of pictures/texts/phone calls from me to hear/see everything that we're up to.  Therefore, my blog is pretty much null.  Now I'm stuck between not blogging and not really wanting to delete my blog.  I think I'll keep it for a while just in case there is a story that just HAS to be told on here.  Otherwise, I'll continue to get on every day and check other peoples' blogs! So keep posting. :)

Let's compare: Sleep

The thing about sleep is that you can do everything the exact same with each kid, and each kid will sleep totally different.  I'm learning this so much more now that I have 3 kids.  And I'm just going to throw it out there that if your child is a great sleeper from the beginning, you got lucky, it's not because of your parenting. Sorry.

Anyway, when Amelia was a baby we put every once of our being into getting her to go to sleep.  We swaddled, nursed, rocked, bounced, made sure she was in the perfect position, and then if she woke up when we laid her down we did it all over again.  Even after getting her to sleep she woke up every 2 hours until she was 10 months old! After that her sleep stretches got a little longer but I wrote in her baby book that the first time she slept through the night was at 14 months! We sleep trained her to fall asleep on her own around 5 months but I could never let her cry in the middle of the night because I think that's mean. She always slept in in the morning though. When she was my only child we never got up before 10. As for naps, she went down at 10 and 2 and would sleep for 2 hours each time. Ahh, that was the life. To this day she often wakes up in the night and will wander around the house or choose a different location to sleep, but is almost always the last one up in the morning.

Then there's Addilyn.   I don't think she ever woke up every 2 hours, not even the night we brought her home. This was my first glimpse at how the sleep depends on the child, not the parent. Addilyn always slept way longer at night, and it really threw me off! I'd often wake up and go check to see if she was breathing. By about 5 months she slept 13 hours straight through every night.  Getting her to go to sleep was tough, so we tried to sleep train her, thinking it would be just as easy as Amelia, and boy were we wrong.  She was just going to show us that the more we ignored her the louder she would cry and the more riled up she would get.  So we rocked, and rocked, and rocked her to sleep until one day we just set her in her bed, said goodnight and that was it. No rocking from us, no crying from her.  13 hours is awesome, except that it was from 6pm to 6am, and if you read the last paragraph you'll remember that I was used to getting up at 10 with Amelia, so early mornings were a RUDE awakening. Especially for the 4am and 5am phases. And as far as naps, she sucks. WHY did I not take advantage of Amelia's great napping when she was my only one? I tried and tried to get Addilyn on a 10 and 2 schedule and she was NOT having any of it.  Finally after months of trying and her just wailing (and getting more riled up) and me threatening mean things to her and to Amelia (poor child got the brunt of lots of my frustration) I gave up and was lucky to get one 45 min nap a day out of Addilyn.  Great night sleeper, lousy napper.

Now we have Avery.  She started off waking up every 2-3 hours for her first couple weeks. Then her first stretch gradually got longer and longer, and last night it was 8 hours!  I'm so happy, except that she goes to bed between 6-6:30 so 8 hours in for her is not 8 hours for me!  But I hope she continues to be a good sleeper. Also, she goes to sleep on her own! OMG, the first time I laid her in her cradle awake and came back a few minutes later to find her asleep, I thought it was a total fluke! Then it happened again and again and I'm just so thrilled that I might not have to sleep train this child. Right now Avery sleeps from about 6-7, waking up about 3 times to eat. I still feel tired some days but I try to go to bed early enough that I'm not too crabby. Also, I'd take this kind of tired over pregnancy tired any day.

Three children, three completely different sleepers.

Sorry if this was the most boring post ever, but I've been thinking a lot about how each one of my children sleeps so I thought I'd "think it out" in writing.

Easter

For Easter this year we were in Grand Junction!  We hadn't really made that the plan until we were looking at Jonathan's vacation dates a realized we were planning on being in Junction the whole week prior to Easter, so we decided to stay an extra day! On Saturday the cousins dyed eggs:

Sunday we went to church and then had a delicious Ham lunch.  Then the kids got their baskets which each had a chocolate bunny and a book.  Then the dads hid their eggs for them and they had a great time finding them! Of course I didn't do my motherly job and get lots of great pictures so a few in our dresses will have to do.

Happy Easter!!

Best brother-in-law ever

You might recall a while back I mentioned that one of the reasons I don't blog very often is because I never do anything at our desktop computer, and the iPad can't post pictures. I had thought about asking for a laptop for Christmas but decided it was too much money for the small amount I'd be using it.

This past week we went to Grand Junction because my mom was on spring break.  While we were there my brother-in-law, Brian, called me over to the couch to show me a picture on his phone of the new 13 inch MacBook he was getting. I was a little confused, but happy for him.  Then he told me that since he was getting a new one I would be going home with his "old" 15 inch Macbook. I am MORE THAN THRILLED!  Hopefully this means I will get around to blogging more since I can now upload my pictures to this computer and blog from the comfort of the couch!

What has your brother-in-law done for you lately?? :)

THANKS, Brian!!!

For all the non-facebookers

I'm always posting pictures and videos on facebook, not remembering that my parents, Jonathan's parents, and Kirsta don't get on facebook, and maybe I should blog them too.  So, for all the non-facebookers, here is a video of Amelia singing "All the Earth is mine", one of the Joy School songs.  Sorry that it's dark and that her robe is falling off :)

Avery is 3 weeks old now, and so far things are going smoothly. She's been sleeping in our room (or our bed) so far, but that will change soon because it's causing me to miss out on some much needed sleep.  She's our biggest baby yet and is actually on the charts!  She's in the 50% for weight and 70-90% for height!  I'm just waiting to see how long it takes her to fall off.  Or maybe we'll actually have an "average" size kid this time.  I'm feeling a little sad about this being our last child (NOT that I want more), just that I need to make every second with her special.  Actually, as I write this I'm bouncing her in her bouncy chair, and I'm feeling guilty that I'm not holding her because she's getting older by the minute.  I just want to snuggle her and kiss her all day and I DON'T want her to get older.
My Mom came and stayed with us all last week which was awesome.  We did a lot of sitting around relaxing, which was so great to have another adult here to talk to.  And SHE did a lot of cooking and cleaning and more laundry than I would ever think to do in one week. My Dad came over on the weekend to pick her up and of course he was the life of the party for all the grand kids. We're getting ready to go to Grand Junction in a couple weeks and I can't wait to see them again and take Avery on her first "vacation".

3 kids doesn't feel like much of an adjustment for the most part, except getting out of the house.  I have gone to Walmart once with all 3, but 95% of the time I think, "Go somewhere with all 3? YEAH RIGHT!"   But when we're at home it's pretty much normal, and maybe even better than it was because I have more patience and motivation than when I was pregnant!
Anyway~ so far, so good.  I'll keep you posted on whether or not it stays that way.

Labor #3

The truth of the matter is I wasn't even in labor when I went to the hospital.  I snuck myself in to my own delivery.

Let's back up. 

Wednesday 2-13-13:  I had my 39 week check-up/ ultrasound. The ultrasound was to check fluids, since apparently gestational diabetes can affect fluid levels, and if they get too low it would be cause for induction. Doctor said fluids looked great, baby looked great, everything was great.  She cervix checked me and I was at "A good 4" and she said she, "Messed stuff up in there" in hopes that the baby would come that night.  Then she said, "So, my question is, do you want me to help this along?" and I said, "No." She said, "I didn't think so, but that being said, I'm going out of town in 2 days and won't be back for 5 days."  Dang it. This means we'll be 3 for 3 on not having my doctor deliver my baby. Of course induction sounds tempting, but then I remember that I'm against unmedically necessary inductions, and there's absolutely no reason for me to be induced considering my doctor JUST told me how good everything looked. But I was already at "A good 4", so all I needed was something to push me over the edge, right?

Thursday 2-14-13: I woke up in the morning sad that I hadn't gone into labor in the middle of the night. Kirsta called to see if I was still up for teaching Joy School and I was, because it was just a normal day, right? I just kept thinking that if I had that tiniest push over the edge, this baby would be here fast.  Remember my last labor?  As Jonathan was leaving for work around 10:30 he suggested I call my doctor and see what she thought. So I called her and she said, "You're a lunatic! I told you to go in this morning to be induced and you told me no.  So what we're going to do is we'll sneak you in to the hospital.  Go in, tell them you feel yucky, you're contracting, that you're at 4 cm, and that your doctor told you to come in and get monitored."  So I did. Here goes nothin'.

12pm: I cannot tell you how ridiculous I felt driving myself to the hospital, casually drinking my Diet Coke, getting ready to lie my way into a hospital bed.  The nurses were pretty confused as to why I was there too, but they got me all checked in, hooked up to the heartbeat and contraction monitors, and then as I was answering all those ridiculous questions like, "Do you feel safe at home?" I started contracting! It was meant to be! They weren't regular, but they were real and I was excited! In the midst of this, Kirsta arrived, Yay!

2pm: The nurse cervix checked me and I was at 5cm. Progress!  Just sitting there doing nothing I was progressing. How exciting.  She called my doctor to see what she wanted to do with me, and doctor said since I was progressing that she would come up (or send up someone in her practice) and break my water! We called Jonathan at work and told him to come at 4pm.

3pm: Dr. came up and broke my water. No turning back now!

Let me go ahead and tell you just HOW concerned I was that this time I get an epidural. If you'll remember with Addilyn I wasn't able to get one because things progressed so quickly, and call me crazy, but natural birth was not something I ever had on my top 10 list of things to do. This was about 95% of the reason I was up for going to the hospital before I was actually in labor..  Worst case scenario: They'd send me home. Best case scenario: I'd be there in time for an epidural!  Through this whole process I kept asking my nurse, "Ok, now how much longer until I get the epidural?"  After they broke my water she told me she'd check me in an hour and if I'd progressed a cm they'd get the epidural.

3-4pm: Contractions were coming harder and stronger and longer with every passing minute. Kirsta was faithfully rubbing my back and reminding me to breathe.

4:15pm: Cervix check- 6cm, epidural was ordered.

4:25pm:  Jonathan arrives.  Kirsta leaves to nurse Ethan, who was being watched by a friend, assures us she'll be back in 30 minutes.

Here comes the craziness.

4:40pm: Epidural arrives, and I already feel like I'm dying. Like, GET THIS THING IN ME RIGHT NOW! It took 25 minutes to get it in. That's a lot of epidural-less contractions.

5:05pm: Kirsta runs back in the room just as they're telling me to lay on my back in the bed or the epidural won't start working. I lay back on my back, nurse cervix checks me and says, "You're complete!" My response, "Shut up." (In that sarcastic valley girl kind of way)

Seriously, WHY does it only take me 25 minutes to progress from a 6 to a 10?  What happened to being at the hospital early enough to get an epidural and relax while my body progresses?

5:10pm: As soon as I was on my back I felt the urge to push and then it was CRAZY madness with nurses and people running around, yelling at me NOT to push, calling my doctor, yelling at me to breathe and pant and hold the baby in. One lady even came in and HELD THE BABY IN for 10 minutes while we waited for my doctor to arrive. I mean, I did want my doctor to deliver me, that was the other 5% of the reason we did this, but really, holding the baby inside me might have been a little extreme.

5:22pm: Doctor clocks in at hospital.

5:22pm: ONE push, baby is delivered.

What started off as the most relaxing waltz in, turned into as much madness as my last labor. My epidural was good for taking the edge off the last couple contractions and my one push.  What it mostly did was make my legs numb for the next 2 hours, give me the crazy shakes, and give me a back ache for the next 2 days.  You win some, you lose some I guess.

I think it's safe to say that we're done.

It's a good thing I'm head over heels in love with our sweet new baby

What a wonderful Valentine's present for us. Which, by the way, was 0% of the reason we did this on Thursday, but what a great bonus!

Dropping

Dropping is one thing this baby is NOT doing.  And actually, I'm not sure that either of my other girls really "dropped" significantly, but I was looking in the mirror yesterday and was thinking, "I'm not sure if this baby could sit any higher!" I had Jonathan take my weekly picture and sure enough, the baby is getting higher! ;)  Check it out :

                                                             35 weeks

                                                          36 weeks- what the heck?! it's like a basketball!

At my ultrasound last week they said my fluids and everything look fine, and the baby is somewhere between 6 and 6.8lbs. She's head down and facing the right way, thank goodness, because I never want to be in as much pain as I had to watch Kirsta be in with her "sunny-side-up" labor. Tomorrow is my 37 week OB appt and I'm sure nothing has changed.

January 2013

The beginning of this year has already been filled with some ups and downs.

Up: Elsha was here to kick off the new year with us, so we got crazy with some sparkling cider and Tetris Attack.  She stayed until the 6th, which was awesome because 1) We had an awesome time, and 2) By the time she left we were already a week into January!

Here are all the cousins minus Espen, who wasn't here, and Ethan, who was sleeping

Down: Addilyn and I came down with the stomach flu.  I think we all know how I feel about throwing up, so lets just go ahead and say those were the worst 2 days of January for me.  Addilyn's manifested differently and was a high fever and crazy fatigue followed by a rash, which actually her doctor told us today was probably Reovirus (a gastrointestinal virus followed by a rash.) Needless to say, there was lots of whining and crying in this house.

Up: Addilyn had her 15 month check-up.  She's still sitting pretty in the 2nd percentile. She weighs 17lbs, 6oz, and she is 28 inches tall.  She can sign "all done" "bath time" (both of which she tries to say while signing) "please" and "more".  My favorite thing about her is that she toddles around the house and then will come into the room you're in and say "Hiiii" in the sweetest little voice.  My least favorite thing is that she has this obnoxious, open-mouth, fake cry that's pretty annoying and dramatic.

Down: Our Broncos lost the playoff game. *Tear*  We were SO excited for the game and thought we had it in the bag.  What an exciting game the entire time, and then what a TERRIBLE ending.

 34 weeks

Up: Today Jonathan turns 34!! Happy birthday to my best friend in the world! Every day with him I am grateful that our stars aligned.  For his birthday he requested to wake up on his own, not to an alarm or kids, so we arranged for the girls to have a sleepover with their Grandma and Grandpa Norwood.  We went out to dinner at 3 Margaritas, did a little bit of shopping, then went to Kirsta and Joe's and played games and hung out. We got home late but that didn't stop him from opening the new Netflix-streaming BluRay player I bought him and setting it up to watch a movie. This morning we woke up on our own (wish granted) and had a delicious breakfast at Ihop. And then:

Up:  I had my 36 week OB appointment. I never wrote about my gestational diabetes but that's because I'm pretty convinced it's not actually there. Doctor says it IS there and that I'd never need insulin but that I do need to watch my diet.  I *guess* I watch my diet a little, and by that I mean I don't stuff my face with as much sugar as sounds good, but otherwise I eat like normal and my readings are never high. I'm actually down to 2 readings a day instead of 4 because they were so good all the time.  Doctor said she'd be ok with the baby coming any day now, and even did a cervix check early and said I'm at 1 1/2 cm!  Of course I know that that could very well mean NOTHING for the next 4 weeks, but it does make me freak out a little that things are already progressing... everything except my readiness for labor! I'm FREAKING out, to say the least.  I cried before my first labor because I didn't know what to expect, and I cry now because I DO know what to expect. I'm terrified.  Anyway~ tomorrow morning I have another ultrasound (YAY) so maybe you'll get lucky and I'll write another post about that.

Otherwise, one more week of January and it's on to February 2013, the month of my 3rd child. Hopefully it's a month of all ups!

2012 Wrap up

I stole this survey from Elsha, and thought it would be the perfect way to ignore all the posts I didn't do at the end of the year, and start fresh with January.

1. What did you do in 2012 that you’d never done before?

Jonathan and I were sealed to each other and our kids in the Denver Temple.

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

I never make resolutions, so YES, I did! This year I think I'll resolve to have a baby and get less sleep, so it's a safe bet I'll keep both of those.

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

Both my sisters, one of my good friends from high school, and a couple friends at church. Babies everywhere!

4. Did anyone close to you die?

Fortunately, no.

5. Whose behavior merited celebration?

Jonathan's.  Just when I think he couldn't be a better person/ husband, he gets better!

6. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

Many, many people in the news. Locally and nationally. And Pueblo drivers.

7. Who did you miss?

Both my grandma's. All my family members who don't live here.  Lots of old friends who I wish I keep better contact with.

8. Who was the best new person you met?

My sister's new babies, Daniel and Ethan.

9. Where did you travel?

I think Grand Junction was the only place we went. I can't wait for a couple years down the road when we can take fun, sandy, ocean-filled vacations.

10. What would you like to have in 2013 that you lacked in 2012?

A bigger house. Another baby :) More patience. More sleep. More motivation.

11. What dates from 2012 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

March 11th, my nephew Daniel’s birth. Meeting a perfect baby boy within minutes of being born, only to soon find out that he had Down Syndrome, and what an impact that would have on Elsha, Brian, and our whole family. And having all the Gustavson kids there to find out together. What a blessing.

12. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Going through the Temple with Jonathan. Honestly, not something I thought would ever happen.

13. What was your biggest failure?

Patience with my kids. Keeping the house organized.

14. Did you suffer illness or injury?
Found out right before the end of the year that I have gestational diabetes. Overall, it was a pretty dang healthy year for me .  Hopefully 2013 is the same!

15. What was the best thing you bought?

My Acura MDX! Finally, a Mom car that I love!

16. Where did most of your money go?

The Acura. But don't you worry, I have OCD about money, so we have about the same as we did last year.

17. What did you get really excited about?

Kirsta and her family moving to Pueblo! Seriously NEVER thought that would happen. Funny how things work out and how awesome they are!

18. Compared to this time last year, are you: Happier or sadder? Thinner or fatter? Richer or poorer?

Happier. I seriously consider myself very lucky in life. Fatter- I'm pregnant. Hopefully by this summer I'll be back to normal and loving it. The same financially.

19. What do you wish you’d done more of?

Saved more money. But that's just because I have OCD.

20. What do you wish you’d done less of?

Beating my kids. Jk, they deserved it. HAHA, JUST KIDDING.

21. What did you want and get?

Another pregnancy.

22. What did you want and not get?

A couple more months until I got pregnant. I really wanted a summer baby, and I'm a little nervous about a 16 month gap.

23. How did you spend Christmas?

For the first time ever, I didn't get to spend Christmas with my family.  We stayed in Pueblo this year with Jonathan's family. I was sad not to be in my childhood home on Christmas morning, but not having to travel (by myself, since Jonathan always works) was amazing. It was zero stress, and I think it's helped me to not  have the January blues, since I didn't have this great and wonderful time away that had to come to an end.

24. What was your favorite TV program?

Dancing with the Stars. I also like Parenthood, Biggest Loser, The Bachelor, and Project Runway.

25. What were your favorite books of the year?

I don't think I did too much reading this year, but in December I read, "The List" in one day. Loved it.

26. What was your favorite music from this year?

Sadly, it doesn't seem to matter what my favorite music is anymore because all we listen to is kids music. Seriously, we can't even back out of the garage with the radio on without Amelia saying, "I wanna listen to MY music." Fisher Price Kids Classics it is.

27. What song will always remind you of 2012?

Jason Mraz, "I won't give up." From the first time I heard it I loved it and I made it Jonathan's ring tone on my phone. Later I asked if we could change "our song" to be this one, lol.  We agreed that our wedding song would never change, but that we could love this song for us just as much.

28. What were your favorite films of the year?

I bet I could count the amount of films I watched this year on one finger. I am SO not a movie person.  I liked The Hunger Games. Not as much as the book obviously, but it's the only new movie I can remember watching this year, haha.

29. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

I was pretty obsessed with Emily Maynard from the Bachelorette for a little while.

30. What political issue stirred you the most?

Obama again? Yuck.

31. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

I turned 27, and I have no idea what we did.  I'm pretty sure I had just found out I was pregnant again, so maybe I slept?

32. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

A long, hot, kid-free vacation.

33. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2012?

Well, the first half of the year I spent being annoyed at my leftover baby weight, the second half of the year I spent pregnant, gaining it all back. So a lot of hoodies and pj pants. Hopefully 2013 will be a year of losing it ALL, so I can get out of these fat-pants and back into something cute!

34. What kept you sane?

My husband.  Even when we were are so annoyed with the kids and we yell a lot, we never get so annoyed and yell at each other.  He really keeps me grounded.  And Pepsi.

35. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2012.

I'm so happy my parents never gave up on me, and that the lessons they taught me FINALLY came full circle.
Parenting is HARD. 
And I really hope my kids grow up to be as close to their siblings as I am to mine.