Instagram Uncut Unedited

Y'all, I have another instagram account. It's affectionally known as "real life". I'll be the first to admit I can view and use social media in an unhealthy way. "Cute picture! She looks so happy. Wonder where she got that dress. I'd probably be happier if I bought that dress. I miss shopping. I need to go shopping. Oh GAP is having a sale! You gotta spend money to save money. Should I get coordinating dresses for the girls? If I do 1994 Olan Mills might call. But really, how is she so happy? Wonder how her skin is so clear... that Rodan and Fields stuff is convincing. Meh I'll just stick with the dress today." A glimpse into my brain is unsettling I know. As my husband used to say, "you are not well in the head". This was before we were dating so it's ok.  I digress. As long as my heart is in check quite frankly I enjoy looking at beautiful photos of hippie children galavanting in the woods at dusk and enjoy posting the one good photo out of 72 blurry toddler photos.

So today I give you my instagram and then I give you the other 99.9% of my daily life.

Instagram Says: Toddler using her skills to climb on a tray table and pretend hand sanitizer dispenses goldfish. Wow my kids have great creative and for that matter physical potential. 

Real life says: We are never above technology/TV to distract and we use it in way more than just "emergency situations". 

 Instagram says: One-year-olds posing sweetly for their 1st birthday picture.

Real life says: Diaper check on isle four. Taken seconds after the above 'gram. We spend approximately 0 minutes frolicking daintily around in smocked dresses. Take the dresses off IMMEDIATELY before they drool goldfish on them! 

Instagram says: Trendy toddlers mean hip and put together mom.

Real life says: Most days this is the best we can do.

Instagram says: Wild and unruly toddler making terrible life choices.

Real life says: Wild and unruly toddler still making terrible life choices.

Facebook says: Awww Easter sunday picture.

Real life says: Wait you seriously gave your 15-month-olds 22 donut holes? I did. I really did.

Facebook says: Toddlers hugging really do make the world a better place.

Real life says: Most days hugs lead to tackles which lead to tears which lead to bribes like 22 donut holes and Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood. 

Facebook says: Toy piano. Fire going. Stockings hung. Looks like a lovely Christmas. 

Real life says: It was lovely in a Maisie-is-recovering-from-a-terrible-winter-cold-and-could-snap-at-any-moment-don't-you-dare-give-her-a-new-baby-doll sort of way. 

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So next time you see a picture I post, just know that I probably bribed my children (and RD) with donut holes. ;)

The New Normal....

Well, we are officially one month into our new normal. I'm back at work. My husband is back at work. My baby is in daycare. (daycare posts to come)

I'd like to say I'm a super mom and it hasn't been a struggle every.single.day since it started but that just wouldn't be true. Being a working mom can be tough. Correction. Being a mom is tough.

First of all, Knox wakes up (fingers crossed) around 7:00 am each morning. I have to leave for work at 6:50 am so John gets baby duty in the mornings. I try to be exceptionally loud around baby's room when it gets close to time for me to leave in the hopes of waking him for a little kiss or snuggle before I'm out the door (don't tell John). Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't.

Leaving before your baby wakes up is so hard. Talk about mommy guilt. Everything inside of me says I"m the only one who can wake him up, dress him, prepare him for his day...and somehow, if I don't do these things, I fail...

John takes him off to daycare and then heads to work himself. I travel a million miles down the tollway, walk across two sky bridges, and then sit down at my desk and turn into SLP mode. The next 8 hours go like this....

"I wonder when he last ate?"
"Did he take a good nap?"
"Will he be in a good mood when I pick him up?" 
"Did I leave any extra clothes in his diaper bag?"

Trying not to think about your baby at work is like trying not to breath. indefinitely. I feel guilty for leaving him with someone else. I feel guilty for enjoying my time away from him. I feel guilty about feeling guilty. 

Finally, I'm off work. Then the real fun begins. It's a mad dash to the Tollway in an attempt to make it back to the burbs before the real traffic hits, and then decide what happens next...

1. Target. (There's surely something I need there on any given day. food. formula. curtains. hard to say.)

2. Workout. (who are we kidding? this is really #10,000 on the list. although it should be moved up. baby weight is real and upsetting.)

3. Go straight to the daycare because you can't stand another minute without him.  (cue additional guilt)

4. Sit in your car for an hour in the driveway of the daycare to "rest my eyes" without interruption. (cue additional guilt)

The options are endless.  

Typically, I decide to immediately pick up my son. He's smiling, happy, talking, and generally had a great day without me as far as I can tell. We go home and I soak up 2 hours of Knox time, granted this is still his witching hour(s), until he's back in his crib and I'm already waiting to wake him up again in the morning.

It should be noted that trying to enjoy the witching hours is no easy task. He's tired. I'm tired. Stopping to enjoy the moments we do have can be so hard. I find more guilty feelings for "not doing more, teaching him more, loving him more" and so on....

The next several hours consists of running around like a crazy person to ensure the next day of daycare, work, and life are in order before crossing my fingers that we all sleep before the whole thing is put on repeat.

Being a working mom can be tough. We are still learning our new normal. What i do know is:

I am thankful for a job that I love and am passionate about. I am thankful God has blessed me with a skill that can help other moms on a daily basis. It's ok to love my job. It's ok to leave my baby to do my job. He's in good hands and I am able to serve others with a gift I've been given. I will not allow mommy guilt to cripple my love for my job.

I am thankful for a husband that supports and helps. I am thankful that we are a good team and that this baby thing is getting a little easier everyday. He leads our family well and I am able to enjoy my baby at night because of all of the help and assistance he provides.

I am thankful to have a crazy, smart, and chubby little boy who makes coming home from work a little more fun each day. His smile, his laugh, and his ability to make me melt make coming home so very sweet.

I am thankful for a God who loves me. The wife me. The mommy me. The speechie me. 

This is our new normal and I am thankful.

Formula Feeding 15 Months Later

A while back, I wrote a post about formula feeding for my favorite twin blog, Twin Talk Blog. Here are the cliff notes of that post.

"I'll nurse if I can, but no worries if not! Secretly thinking, I'm totally not using formula. Oh darn, the twins aren't nursing well. Oh yikes I have no supply. Try everything. Tears. Formula. Tears. Poison. Tears. Expensive formula. Tears. Baby Brezza Formula Pro. Miracle. Tears. Come to Jesus moment. He is better than formula. No guilt no shame needed!"

So 15 months later and bottles filled with formula are a faint memory. They weaned easily and quickly and were done by their first birthday. And my dishwasher rejoiced! A sweet friend recently asked for the link to that post, so I revisited it myself and thought of my perspective now that I'm an old washed up mom.

What surprises me the most 15 months later is what triggers to this day can still set off emotions of guilt or bitterness. Facebook is awash with great and terrible content. Cat memes always fall under the great category. Political posts of any kind are terrible (I vote for no-politics-allowed Facebook in 2016). Babies in costumes = great. Dogs in costumes = great. What is Your Lord of the Flies Name Quiz is and will always be absolutely terrible.

Just last week there was an article about the benefits of breastfeeding, pretty common and should be harmless. But I found myself clicking it, reading it, and resenting it. A mom nursing in public (covered or uncovered is a topic I dare not address) can set off these weird emotions. I was at a cafe when a group of moms with one baby each came in and sat down. They were happily discussing nursing and all that goes with it, and I found myself boiling up with said weird emotions. I felt like I had to justify myself to these strangers. I tried my hardest and it just didn't work! And you know what formula is okay! My babies know what the word somersault means!! I'm not a bad mom! You're not a better mom! Just leave me in peace to drink my latte and eat my scone!!!!!!

Don't judge. We all have moments that rank very low on the "most proud" list. Anyway turns out the problem for me isn't breastfeeding advocates, although some of them should take the same sedative I needed to take in that cafe. The problem isn't moms who are nursing in public. Or talk about nursing in public. The problem is my heart. It always is! In this particular circumstance, the root of those emotions is that I lack trust in who I believe to be the author of life. Author defined by my pal Trip Lee "just take my pen, here, you create my rhymes".  I can feel so guilty for "losing control" of nursing.  When the truth is that God wrote in the script the circumstances that led to formula in my babies lives. I ignore this and I often believe that breastmilk would have made a big difference in their life and justified me as a good mom.

If I zoom out of Maisie and Camille's nursery, and zoom out of my house, and zoom out of Wisconsin, and out of the United Sates, and zoom out of earth, and if I gain a greater perspective... things start to fall in their right place. It's not breastmilk that's going to make the biggest difference in Maisie and Camille's life, it's the saving grace of Jesus that's going to make the eternal difference. Case closed. The more often I reflect on the reality of that truth, the more equipped I am to keep my real but often wrong emotions in their proper place.

So every time that I feel a sting of emotion that isn't in check, I want to use that sting as a reminder to zoom out of my circumstance, and to gaze upon what I believe to be true.

My husband is a better stay-at-home mom than me

Tonight marks the end of 4 weeks of paternity leave for my husband. We switched roles and he became the stay-at-home parent for our little man. We were very blessed that his company provides paid time off for dads, especially when I had to go back to work.

I would like to think I'm pretty good with kids, especially babies, as that's kinda of what my job pays me to do everyday...feed babies. But I've decided there are just some things that a dad can do better. In case you've ever thought, man, he's better at this....or if you ever want to experiment with your new dad....these are my findings.

1. Cry it out. Think of what you will about cry it out, but we believe in it in the Lee household. Knox is always fed, dry, and warm when he goes down for what we call "taking a little break"...There's no reason to panic. At least you would think that. Knox loves to sleep, he sends me signs that he wants sleep, he sometimes begs to sleep. He has however decided that the first 60-90 seconds of nap time is meant for releasing all prior build-up stress from a hard day of eating, playing, and pooping. This consists of bloody murder screaming which is like nails on a chalkboard to me. My husband however can listen to this for hours (ok, maybe, like 20 minutes max) without flinching.

2. Cleaning. So when I was on maternity leave, cleaning really fell to the wayside... I wanted to clean, I wished I could clean, but my little tiny human had other ideas of what I should do with my time. John (*getting baby at 12 weeks old) did all the laundry, mopped with floors, and dusted the house on day one of being at home. He started strong and was completely exhausted, but he did it instantly putting my cleaning skills to shame.

3. Sleeping in the crib. Let me preface by saying, Knox has a nasty case of reflux and had a never ending cold that kept us from the transition to the crib initially. He adored the rock n' play and has a flat spot to prove it. He had no desire to make a change. I worried and avoided it for weeks. Cue John's paternity leave. I went back to work on Monday and by that afternoon I was receiving pictures of my sweet little boy sound asleep....IN HIS CRIB. Dang it, John. From that day forward, the kid takes all naps and bedtime in the crib, no questions asked.


4. Transition to 5 bottles. We love Babywise in the Lee house and Babywise said it was time to transition to 5 bottles. I had no idea how to do this and frankly was nervous because Knox didn't exactly wait his 3 hours for each bottle so I didn't know how taking one away would work. Again, in the matter of a day or two, John somehow stretched out his feedings into a workable schedule without sending Knox into a tailspin. (I have a feeling it had a lot to do with #1)

5. Resale shopping. John and I both love to shop. We knew having a baby would be dangerous, especially with baby Gap. A couple days into his paternity leave, I started getting texts like, "alright, Kid-to-Kid is a treasure trove of clothes" and "Just went to Buy and Buy and got onsies for $2!" We are now officially addicted to re-sale baby shops. A baby needs 10 different Ralph Lauren onsies, right?

All in all, although I want to be super mom and be the best at everything I do, my husband seems to be pretty good at this whole early parenting thing. It's an important lesson to learn. Teamwork is key to raising a tiny human. He's completely capable and sometimes way better than I am at taking care of our little man.

I'm extremely thankful for him, his willingness to care for Knox, and bonding time they were able to share in these 4 weeks.

Friday Favorites!

1. Pottery Barn Chairs 

The girls LOVE these! From when they began to crawl it was a jungle gym, and now they walk over, grab a book and sit down, or wrestle... usually just wrestle. Basically adorable. We bought the regular size on sale for $79 each.

2. Chick Fil A

Every Friday. And these Baby Bjorn bibs, they catch all that misses the mouth and the girls love to discover what is leftover for second lunch.

3. Sunshine and these spring jackets from Joules 

4. Better Homes and Garden Skillet Dinners Magazine

This issue is GOLD. Have cooked 4 recipes from it already and every one was quick, easy, and delicious. 

Twins 1st Birthday Party: Winter Wonderland

Happy 1st Birthday Maisie and Camille! After we survived "The Days Which Shall Not Be Named", I began thinking about the girls 1st birthday party. It was a hard year, a blur of a year, and a beautiful year. While I'm not quite ready to re-live it, I did want to live it up at their first birthday party!

 I like planning parties, but I'm a not a perfectionist and easily distractable so this isn't your pinterest perfect party, but our family friends were there so it was our perfect Winter Wonderland for our New Year's Day birthday babes! I like to get my craft on, so months before the birthday I started doing little bit here and there during nap time. Great creative outlet and reminded me of how much I need those. It was a toss up between "Winter Wonderland" (or One-derland if you wanna be cute) and "The Wonders" (As in, I *wonder* what happened to the O'Needers?).  But because we live in Wisconsin I thought a Winter Wonderland would be fitting. 

Photos by Beky Smith Photography and I'm linking up with my favorite blog in all the land, www.twintalkblog.com. 

Without further ado, our babies Winter Wonderland 1st Birthday Party!

The Decor

(I snapped the next four photos before guests arrived)

The other stars of the snow were the edible snowy pinecone snacks. "I can't believe these don't have any calories!??" -Michael Scott (Recipe here)

The Birthday Babes
My mom made the girls dresses. She has a lot of talents (including Cute Little Cakes) and these dresses were exactly what I envisioned, whimsical and classic and wintery. Thanks mom :)

What's a first birthday without a cake smash??

Happy 1st Birthday Maisie and Camille! We love you through and through.

Next morning, the party never ends! 

Little Recipes: Zucchini Pizza

This recipe is straight from Super Baby Food by Ruth Yaron. I referenced this book multiple times a day when the twins first started eating solids. She's so comprehensive in everything you need to know about feeding solids. And now that I have toddlers (wahhhhh) there's hundreds of EASY recipes. 

It's literally as easy as it looks and seems silly to write it down but I always need exacts when I first try a recipe. 

Zucchini Pizza Bites

1 zucchini 

Marinara sauce 

Mozzarella cheese 

Slice zucchini to 1/4 inch or so, line them on foil lined baking sheet sprayed with cooking spray. Top with marinara and cheese! Bake at 350 for 15 or until the zucchini is soft. If I remember I'll sprinkle some wheatgerm or flaxseed on before the mozzarella for a healthy extras boost.

I was too slow getting a picture of the finished product but Camille says "it's a pizza mama delicioso!"