Slice of Life: August 28th, 2019

I really thought once the girls were back in school that I’d have more time to sit down and share on this blog. FUNNY JOKE! That has been far from the case. Here is a screenshot of a post I tried to work on last week that QUICKLY was interrupted by my sweet baby girl. 😉

In my kitchen I constantly have two to-do lists: a daily one and an ongoing on. When I make my daily one, I usually try to grab at least one task from my ongoing one to knock out.

But you know what ends up happening with my daily to-do list? I end up re-writing almost the exact same one for the next day because so little is getting done around here besides laundry, dishes, and keeping everybody fed. 😉 My to-do list feels like “whack-a-mole”, and that I can basically pick one thing during Jillian’s morning nap time to tackle, and THAT’S IT! Everything else will have to wait until tomorrow, or the next day, or the next week, or never. Whatever, man!

But you know what? We’ve been having so much fun!! Since we are juggling more with adding Jillian to the fam, we have been trying to seize quiet moments and just have fun! Playing games, browsing stores just for the heck of it, going out to dinner with friends, lots of hang time with loved ones, watching movies… it’s all been keeping us sane amidst the absolute MAYHEM that July and August have been.

But we’re in a very sweet season of life right now and I feel very hashtag blessed. 😉 We all know that life’s ups and downs come and go constantly it seems (gracious knows we have our share of chaos and hardship from time to time, many that I don’t share here), but in this moment, we’re feeling pretty good. Because things can change on a dime, I always want to stop and thank God for the moments of calm when all the puzzle pieces seem to fit together.

I have so may pictures on my camera roll that I’d love to share, so here’s a first batch. I’ll hopefully hop on to share another batch tomorrow to stay caught up. I mean, this blog does serve as my kids’ baby books, so I can’t fall behind, ya know?? 😉

Slice of Life: The first 10ish days of August

The biggest events from the beginning of August revolved around the girls going back to school (I wrote a whole post about that here, including Hadley’s first day of Kindergarten), but here’s a slice of our lives with other happenings too.

My sister’s family is still here in Madison while my brother-in-law has some time off work, and we’ve absolutely loved spending time with them. They’ve been busy and we’ve been busy, but when we’ve been able to spontaneously get together for a meal or hang time for the kids, it’s been the absolute best.

One of my dearest friends Jenna (the knock out in white pants and striped gray top) moved to Birmingham last week, so recently a group of us from church went out to lunch as a little send-off. During the meal, Jenna shared with us that she’s expecting a baby after a long infertility journey (that we have all walked through with her), and it was the BEST MOMENT EVER. (She is public about all of this, by the way.) We all gasped in sheer disbelief as she was about to say it, and the entire table started crying with shock and happiness. It was the most unexpected, joyful moment shared with friends that brings tears to my eyes just typing about.

I love walking through life with this group of women and am just so thankful for how the Lord placed them and their families in our lives last year after we moved here.

Plug into your church, friends. It can be uncomfortable and not fun at first, but put yourself out there. Say “yes” more. Attend a life group. Serve. The connections you’ll make with other believers is SO WORTH IT.

This girl will kill me for sharing this, but having a neighbor bestie who genuinely loves babies and wants to hold yours every time you’re together is AMAZING. We adore our “Miss Ah-wiss-a”. <3 She is the best.

My sister snapped this picture of Jillian and me with my grandmother, and I treasure it. I don’t have many pictures with her because rarely do we stop to snap them during ordinary moments together, so this one is special.

Two nights before school started, we had a little “Family Night Out”. We walked around our beautiful outdoor shopping center, ate dinner at Red Robin, and pierced Sadie’s ears! Did you see the video on Instagram? She didn’t even flinch! It was so crazy. I think it’s saved in my “Sadie2” highlights! The girls also made wishes for the school year. Hadley wished for lots of new friends, and Sadie wished to pierce her ears… which we had already done two hours prior. Go figure!

Watching the cousin relationship blossom between my kids and Jennifer’s kids has been incredible. Seeing how much Hadley and Sadie LOVE being with Luke and Carly makes us all very happy! It’s funny how they all know they’re not just friends, but family. It’s honestly amazing how kids can differentiate these types of relationships. So sweet.

Hadley rides with Jamie to school, so while they get one-on-one time, I get some time with my littles before taking Sadie to school. We’re slowly finding new morning routines and liking them! Easing into the day with Sadie while Hadley is already at school is nice.

A few weeks ago I brought my kids over to my friend Erin’s house to have a cookout with her family while Jamie was away for the weekend at his best friend’s wedding (it was at the beach and obviously there was no way I could swing that kind of trip right now). When I walked in, Erin told me that her husband decided to go out with a friend and that she’d called one of our mutual friends Cara to come over with her girls. I squealed because I knew it was about to be the best. night. ever! Three mamas + eight kids = a TON of fun!

Do you remember when Teddy had back surgery last July and our vet became my friend? That’s Erin, who is now one of my closest friends here. Life is funny!

Getting Hadley off the bus in the afternoon is a highlight for Sadie! My niece Carly and my mom have come a couple of times to see her off the bus and hang with us, and it makes Hadley so happy!

Also… Sadie is going to be the death of me when it comes to her interest in dressing herself. I might as well throw away 75% of her closet because she only wants to wear a few things, including these Hello Kitty rain boots. Oy. This girl!!!

My sweet friend Heather and I both got this picture from our daughters’ teachers. Hadley and Raley were so pumped to be twinning in their Annie the Brave scientist dresses! Hadley wore her Under the Sea dress the next day, just in case Raley wore hers. 😉

By the way, did you see that Annie the Brave just released four new prints? I am FREAKING OUT because they’re soooooo GREAT! Continually so proud of my girl Chelsea and her mega hard work building her brand.

Alrighty, we’ll call it quits there! If you like keeping up with these random little updates, come back tomorrow! I’m going to do my best to have another load of pics and stories dumped here. 😉 Have a great Wednesday!

Let’s chat!

If you have a favorite back to school tradition, I’d love to hear it!