Slice of Life – January 25, 2016

Good morning and happy Monday! I hope you had a good weekend and maybe enjoyed a bit of snow! We got about five inches last Wednesday night/Thursday morning, and my little snow bunny has thoroughly enjoyed frolicking in it the last few days.

Shoveling snow was one of my bigger concerns going into this deployment because I assumed that I would need to hire reliable help to clear my driveway and sidewalk each time, and shelling out the money for this kind of thing felt like such a waste. I just couldn’t envision how to juggle shoveling snow late in my pregnancy while also keeping my eye on my two year old. I know these aren’t huge problems, but I was still a little curious how it would all work out.

Turns out Hadley absolutely loves running around in the snow and watching me while I shovel! Doing my driveway and sidewalk only took about 30 minutes each time (had to split it up into two different days thanks to terrible snow drifts) and it wasn’t nearly as “tough” as this Southern girl thought it would be. 😉 De-icing salt is an amazing thing!

As for what we’ve been up to the last few weeks, I don’t have much to report! I love January for this reason. It’s just a good month to curl up inside and rest.

I may have mentioned before that my personal parenting motto to rid dumb mom guilt is to get Hadley out of the house once a day. I don’t care where we go or what we do, but as long as we’ve brushed our teeth, gotten dressed, and gone somewhere for at least an hour, I call it a win. Though some days have been busier than others, for the most part we’ve stuck to just getting out once a day and then spent the rest of the day snuggled up at home. She plays with toys, watches TV, colors, and follows me around, and I’m either blogging, cleaning (it never ever ever ever ends with kids – wow), playing whatever game Hadley asks me to play, or doing some kind of Sadie preparations. I’ve been living in lounge clothes and kind of love it.

Here are a few pics I grabbed off of my phone from the last few weeks. 🙂

We’ve been spending a lot of time at Target. Like, a lot. It’s just my happy place to walk around, grocery shop, and browse.

This momma loves our new washer and dryer, but the pedestals have taken away Hadley’s ability to “help” me with the laundry. She loves transferring the clothes from the washer to the dryer, so now I try to “accidentally” drop a few on the ground so that she can still help!

 This phase of sitting in her bed and flipping through her books every night is my new favorite thing. It’s precious! The last week or so I’ve caught her awake as late as 9:30 still reading her books, but then she throws an absolute fit when I turn off her lamp and tell her that it’s time to go to bed. Her tears are always short-lived and she crashes within a couple of minutes.

Breakfast might be messy, but my formerly terribly picky eater is coming around to yogurt. BIG DEAL!

My friend Faith won Hadley forever when she took her to play this claw machine game. My friends are the best!

Can we talk about those teeny bowling shoes?! So cute! Hadley was super excited to bowl for the first few frames, but we lost her attention halfway through our first game to the nearby arcade and candy machine. 🙁

Cold weather has resulted in more frequent indoor playdates with our friends. Hadley loves sweet Kate and Lauren! I can’t wait for her to have a sister.

This phase of being a comedian and carrying a blanket around on her head everywhere she goes was cute for the first week or so, but she’s hurt herself approximately 4,000 times this month because of this and I’m kind of over it. 😉 In this picture she’s blindly pushing one of her chairs over to the stove to see what I’m cooking. Blanket on her head + standing on a chair + hot stove = disaster waiting to happen. No ma’am!

Parent confession: I have a love/hate relationship with paint. She loves loves loves to paint and wants to do it all the time, which is great. I’m just a little lazy sometimes and don’t like cleaning it all up. 😉

I LOVE this easel though. Hadley got it for her birthday from Jamie’s parents. It has a chalkboard, white board, and the roll of paper. It doesn’t come with any art materials though, so his parents also included the Melissa and Doug Easel Accessory Kit of extra paper, paints, markers, chalk, and erasers. Wonderful gift if you’re looking for one! This one will last us forever.

Pictured here is also the Melissa & Doug Artist’s Smock and drop cloth.

I’ve still been trying to run every once in a while. My goal was to run at least a mile once a week (super lofty goal, right?), but temps in the single digits and teens have made that a bit challenging. We’ve gotten out a few times though. Don’t let Hadley’s face fool you; She loves few things more than riding along during my runs.

We’ve also had a few 50 degree days sneak in this month, and the local parks have been packed on these days! I love these two kids.

We’re in a major hand-holding stage with Mommy and I don’t hate it. 🙂

I hit 27 weeks last Friday, but I’m feeling more like I’m closer to 35 weeks! Excuse my silly face – this pic was for my mom and sis to see how suddenly Sadie has started growing. Oy, the scale.

For Sadie’s nursery we’re going with a mint and gold theme with light pink scattered throughout. I’m in love already! I have a long wish list of things I’d like, but I’m trying to take my time to find the best deals before making any big splurges. Nursery decorating is one of my favorite parts of pregnancy! (foot pouf: Land of Nod crib: no longer available)

These two. If we’re home and relaxing, they’re on top of me. Always. They drive each other totally nuts, but they’re also completely obsessed with each other too.

That’s our slice of life! Click the “Slice of Life” tag below to see previous posts like this. 🙂 Have a fabulous week! xoxo