So this is pretty much how my day is going today....Jakob keeps bringing me his chocolate chips (his reward for going potty) but he doesn't want to be patient enough to go potty, he just wants chocolate! I'm going to have to hide them somewhere

Tonight at dinner time Jakob was really hungry. Following me around the kitchen as I make plates hungry. I told him "o.k., it's time to eat" and as he does at almost every meal he ran over to his chair and waited for me to pick him up and put him in his chair. As I put the tray on he folded his hands and started babbling. It took me a couple seconds, then I realized he was praying. Those are the moments I wish I could capture on video and watch it over and over again...forever. It was so sweet. Small glimpses of my little man doing great big things :) I love it!

7 years!...

Today we celebrated 7 years of marriage. That's right, I said 7! Seems like such a long time, but then sometimes it doesn't seem long at all. I couldn't find my camera all day today, so there's no nice dressy picture. Just some t-shirts and a blackberry pic. More like real life (lol). We ate at Red Lobster today and it was so yummy. Especially the chocolate chip hot fudge cookie thing we ate at the end :) Anyways, I am so thankful that God brought Jeremy into my life. We were talking about it yesterday and all the hard things we've been through have only made our love for each other stronger. Life has not been perfect, but obviously it's God's perfect plan for us.

Life with an 18 month old...

Putting wood chips in the gutters

Sliding on slides ( all by himself!)

Lots of scrapes and scratches (mostly from running a little too fast :)

Wii golf with daddy...

Sometimes at night we'll sit with Jakob and help him play the wii. He plays sword fighting and ping pong but after a few minutes he's mostly done and just wants to watch mom or dad play. He really loves the wii fit. If the balance board is out in the living room he'll grab the wii remote and go and stand on the balance board. He likes the soccer game on there. Usually if we praise him for doing something good he will stop right there and want you to give him a high five :p 
Recently he has started picking up the remote and trying to play by himself. It's so cute!

Psalm 103:1-14 -

•  Bless the LORD, O my soul: and all that is within me, bless his holy name.
•  Bless the LORD, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits:
•  Who forgiveth all thine iniquities; who healeth all thy diseases;
•  Who redeemeth thy life from destruction; who crowneth thee with lovingkindness and tender mercies;
•  Who satisfieth thy mouth with good things; so that thy youth is renewed like the eagle's.
•  The LORD executeth righteousness and judgment for all that are oppressed.
•  He made known his ways unto Moses, his acts unto the children of Israel.
•  The LORD is merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and plenteous in mercy.
•  He will not always chide: neither will he keep his anger for ever.
•  He hath not dealt with us after our sins; nor rewarded us according to our iniquities.
•  For as the heaven is high above the earth, so great is his mercy toward them that fear him.
•  As far as the east is from the west, so far hath he removed our transgressions from us.
•  Like as a father pitieth his children, so the LORD pitieth them that fear him.
•  For he knoweth our frame; he remembereth that we are dust.  

 

Blessings...

 We have known for a while that we needed to replace our larger car (taurus). Thankfully this year we are able to pay off the civic and last Saturday we decided to go "look" at cars. We had done a lot of looking on the internet and basically had determined we were going to have to drive out to Miami to get the kind of deal we were hoping to get. Our biggest request of a vehicle was that it gets decent gas mileage since we drive about 30 miles one way to church 3 times a week. Secondly we hoped to find a vehicle with as few miles on it as possible since we do have to drive alot to get anywhere (living in the boonies!). We stopped at a couple car lots in Ft. Myers and the first one basically said we have nothing in your price range. I was glad they told us that instead of trying to talk us into something. I am super strict on the budget these days (I think everyone has to be) so we knew what we could afford and weren't going over. The second place we visited the salesman was a jerk. He wanted to argue with me about whether the car was big enough for us. Another thing I really wanted to look for was a car/small suv where Jakob would have enough leg room as he gets taller. In the taurus his little legs touched the back of the drivers seat. He would often kick the back of his daddy's seat while he's driving and Jeremy didn't like that too much. We weren't expecting the best car ever, but we were willing to wait and find the right car, even if it meant driving a couple hundred miles to get it. We were basically just looking anyways because we hadn't paid the civic off just yet. Mostly just trying to get an idea of what we could afford. The third lot  we met the salesman and he was so nice. Laid back. We told him what our price range was and he showed us a couple cars. Inventory was low there because they had just been bought by a bigger company so there was basically two cars in our price range. One was a Toyota, it was only a couple years old, but when Jeremy got in it and fixed the seat for himself there would be no room for Jakeys legs, so that one was a no. The second car was a Mercury Milan. It had 18,000 miles on it and still had a 100,000 mile power train warranty on it. This car gets 31 miles per gallon. When Jeremy sits in it Jakob's legs can't even touch the drivers seat. The car was very reasonably priced, but still out of our price range. It was everything that we had wanted in a car, and it was cute. I was pretty much resigned to the fact that I would have to settle for a good car that I didn't really like the way it looked. Anyways, long story short we got the car! We are very thankful we got a good deal and it basically just fell into our lap. Definitely a blessing from God. Another blessing I received was Wednesday at church. I was once again reminded that I am not the "sun" in the middle of the universe. God is the "sun" in the middle of everyone's universe. When I get self absorbed, only thinking of me I can start to think life isn't fair because things aren't going the way I want them to. What I have to remember is that the universe is God's and I am just a small thread in the tapestry he has put together. My trials in this life will help me to be a comfort to others going through similar situations. Whenever we get our eyes off of God and on ourselves we will feel fear, depression, a desire to escape. It's good to be reminded that God is in control. These are all things I know, but sometimes I just need a little reminder. There was a verse read where Paul said something about why would I fear death when I know the God who raises the dead? It is so comforting when you know the God we serve and know he has a great big plan for each individual life. I don't know if I explained that very well, but it sure was a help to me. Anyways, those are just some of the blessings lately. Even my little son is a blessing to me. Let me tell you what we've gone through so far this week...The other day Jakob came to me and he was fussy, I think he wanted to eat. He smelled like poo, really strong. He had a long shirt on (which is why I think I didn't notice) but I grabbed him and said Jakob you stink, let me check your diaper, and my hand touched bare skin. My heart stopped beating for a second. I hurried through the house looking for his diaper. It was in the living room, closed up on the floor. He had taken it off himself because it was poopy. Thank the Lord in heaven he hadn't felt the need to paint the walls or anything like that. Wednesday night we walked into the nursery to pick Jakey up and there were pencil shavings from a pencil sharpener all over the floor. Yep, my baby boy got a hold of the pencil sharpener and dumped it all over. (Jeremy wondered why they would have a pencil sharpener in a nursery, but it is a daycare all week long and my 2 year old at NA used pencils also). Yesterday morning I heard my phone ringing, but it wasn't my ring tone. I had left my phone in the diaper bag so I grabbed the diaper bag and fished the phone out and I was like, o.k., what's going on, my ring tone changed, and my wall paper changed. Then I noticed it wasn't my phone. Thankfully I knew whose phone it was when I looked at the pictures on it. I called the girl to let her know I had her phone. Anyways, I was a little happy to see that other people can't keep him out of trouble either. I was beginning to feel like a bad mommy. Jakob's making sure there's lots of stories to tell when he is a teenager :) Hope you all have a great weekend.

This is for you Amber!

Weight loss...

So my weight loss has been gradual. Gradual is a good way of saying really slow! So far I have lost 8 pounds, but I thought I'd be losing much faster than this. I eat so much better than I ever have in my life, which I assumed would lead to losing weight quickly. Not so much. I know I need to exercise but walking on the treadmill is so boring and running hurts my knees. This week I have decided to try using the wii fit for what it was actually made for -exercise- instead of just playing the games on it :) I have started doing yoga for about 30 minutes a day. I'm not burning a ton of calories, but every morning when I wake up I can feel my muscles have been getting worked out. The Wii also keeps track of my weight, so as long as I use it every day or every couple of days I will see if I make any progress. We'll see if this helps speed the weight loss along at all. A good diet and moving more should help right?  I've only got 5 pounds till my pre-baby weight!

What's going on with me...

So...my baby boy is fast asleep in bed, my hubby is outta town for a couple days. It feels really weird to be sitting here alone. I don't really like it. It does however give me a little time to think, and then blog. I have so many times where there's something I want to blog about but whenever I sit down Jakob comes to me and I get right back up and leave. When Jakob naps I work, trying to get everything around the house done, so usually there's not much time for blogging then. I am enjoying the age Jakob is at so much lately. He loves to read (which can be a little much at times!). He will bring me book after book after book to read to him. He brings me the book, places it in my hand (if my hand is shut he will open it himself) and then turns around and plops down in my lap. Sometimes he wants to turn the pages himself, so we don't get to read every page, or even a whole page. I try to encourage his reading, even if that means reading 50 books in one sitting. I am glad he enjoys books. Every morning when Jakey gets up I take him to sit on his potty. He was doing really well with going pee-pee every morning on the potty, but the last couple mornings he hasn't. I pretty much quit taking him potty every hour during the day because I just don't think he's ready to potty train yet. I will continue the every morning though. When he gets up of his potty chair he always looks in the bowl to see if there's any pee in there :) Jakob has also just discovered how much fun it is to run around the yard barefoot. During the last month or so I would take him outside every day and he would fuss and want me to hold him. Now (that it's 83 degrees and humid) he goes to the screen door and waits for me to open it. He just runs around for 30 minutes and I follow behind him. Jakob has also noticed things in the sky. When birds fly by he points at them and smiles. The other day he even said bird (I still don't think he knows how he did it though).

Whenever he hears an airplane (there's a small private airport near our house) he stops whatever he's doing and looks all over the sky to see where it is. 18 months is a great age. My son brings me so much joy.

Now I'm going to change subjects and talk about myself for a few minutes. Here's a little background:

Our church has a million little kids in it. Most of the girls my age are on their 3rd or 4th children. We have so many baby-3 year olds that we are building a new nursery. That is a good thing. I already love every child in that nursery, they are all special. I had nursery on Sunday and I think we had about 30 children. 5  or 6 of them were little babies. We need nursery space. Sunday night they had a little dedication for the property the building will be built on. The Pastor was talking about the blessing of children and how proud and happy they were that there was a need for a new nursery. Any time someone talks about the blessing of children I agree, but it also brings up feelings and questions that I know cannot be answered in this lifetime. I always wonder if anyone else realizes that not everyone can have children easily, if at all. I wonder if there's anyone around me who's going through what I went through. I have not been very forthcoming about our IVF at this church. At Harvest I had no problem telling people how Jakob came in to our lives...but at Harvest one of the first girls I met was pregnant with triplets. I knew instantly that there was someone who had felt what I felt. She was just like me. Here at GRBC there is not a married girl my age (or even older) who does not have a few children. I look around and there are just babies everywhere. If a girl in my Sunday school class does not have a small child then she is pregnant with one. I am not saying I want more children to keep up with everyone else. I'm saying I feel like I'm the only one in my situation. It feels very lonely sometimes thinking no one really understands what I've been through. Most of the time it's not a problem. When people don't know you very well they just assume you're not ready for another baby yet. On Sunday night after the dedication people were standing around talking and Jakob ran by some ladies and they said something about "maybe you'll be next" and that old familiar pain hit me. I just smiled. I know that people don't know what I've been through. I know they just assume that every woman can have a child, but that doesn't make my situation any less hard. The funny part is I don't even think I want a baby right now. The feelings I am having are not from desiring to have another child. They are just there. I am reminded of infertility every time someone tells me "I'm next" or asks if I've been sick because I might be pregnant. When I think of IF right now it makes me very emotional. I don't know if it's because I'm surrounded by extremely fertile (lol) people or what, but I cannot even fathom sharing these feelings with the people in my new church. I don't know what it is. I don't know how to deal with this. So I just pray, and try to hold back the tears and the emotion. I am not an emotional basket case, I don't want you to think I walk around church all the time on the verge of a break down, it's not like that, but recently it's been easier to just not think about IF. Jeremy reminds me that people don't mean any harm, and I know that. I just don't understand why I feel so...I guess I don't exactly understand what I'm feeling. If you would, whenever you think of me, say a little prayer for me. I don't really know what I need, I just need a prayer. When you have a baby you feel like these feelings will be gone, but they don't go away. They are masked by the happiness you experience. IF is a reality in my life and always will be. I need God's help to accept and embrace that fact. 

How did you know?

Yes, I do have a mobile toddler. How did you know? Is it from the bleach spots on my carpet??? Yes, Jakob took my mop out of my recently bleached shower (while I was in another room) and even though the mop was rinsed there was obviously enough bleach to ruin the carpet :/ Yikes! I guess we just lost our security deposit for this house (lol) I called Jeremy and told him about it and he said "Shauna, we have a toddler and that's what they do" I honestly was not neglecting my son, I was getting laundry out of the dryer. The door was closed, but he can open them. Oh well. When I took these pics the carpet was still wet, it still looks bad, but maybe not as bad now that it's dry