10 months!

I'm almost a week late with Gracelyn's 10 month update. Whoops! She turned 10 months on Thanksgiving so it slipped my mind. She is doing really wonderful and just thriving. She has cut her top 2 teeth in the front and so those are making their way down for her to have 4 teeth total. This go around it is making breastfeeding excruciating. I never had issues with Isaac cutting teeth and breastfeeding so this has caught me by surprise. I'm to the point where I have a sore on my nipple from her teeth. Ouch! Other than that she is saying, "mamamamama" and "dadadadada" occasionally. Not consistently though. She adores Isaac and loves to play with him. We like to play chase. She is a really quick crawler and sticks every little thing in her mouth. She loves standing up and I was thinking she might be walking my Christmas but I'm not sure. She's about 18.5 lbs. She had a good Thanksgiving. She's been sleeping pretty good for the most part and only waking up 1-2 times a night. Just recently 2 times. For the most part she was only waking up once for a few weeks. So that was nice. She eats pretty much anything we give her and tries to drink out of a sippy cup. She still doesn't like bottles. I've tried pumping and giving her a bottle/sippy cup of breastmilk and she was not having it. Just kept pulling at my shirt. Thats pretty much it! Can't believe she will be turning 1 soon!

Thanksgiving 2017

This is a strange year for us. My mom is working. Memaw and Cyndi are in Maui. Papaw is in Heaven. We haven't been talking to Terri or John. And We ate chinese food for lunch. We are making pizza tonight. We'll be having traditional Thanksgiving dinner on Saturday and my memaw will be coming to my mom's new house in Temple.

I have anxiety today. Justin decided he wanted to call him mom. So we are waiting on her to call him back. They've sort of played phone tag all day. I guess I just am fearful of the unknown. We've had their number blocked for a month. I don't know if she's going to be mad or if things will go back to how they were before we blocked them. Either way I'm just kinda freaking out over here.

Father, please take my fears away. I pray for your peace today.

How we used to be.

Since my blog is private I feel like I can really write about my relationship with my Mother in law. I'm really sad that we don't have a good relationship anymore. I miss being able to talk to her. We used to watch the same shows and read the same kind of books. And go to the movies together. I miss that. I feel like I've been grieving that part of our relationship. It hasn't been like that in a long time. And I'm hoping that this break we've had can help restore our relationship. I want her to be well. I just don't want it to be dependent on us.

Too hard on myself?

I can find a hundred reasons to tell myself I'm failing. I'm not a good enough mom. I lose my temper. The house isn't clean enough. I don't have enough sex. I'm not a good wife. No one liked the dinner you made. You're too fat. Your hair is disgusting. You're boring. Not funny. Not interesting. You don't have friends. Invisible.

Some days it feels like I'm just holding back tears all day. I actually wish I could cry but the tears never fall. Instead I end up feeling angry about something and more than likely yelling about something.

failure.
failure.
failure.

Finding joy.

The Holiday season is upon us and I'm struggling this year. I feel like this should be a really happy time. Its Gracelyn's first Holiday season and Isaac is old enough this year that it should be really fun. But I'm struggling to find joy. I'm impatient and easy to get frustrated. I can't pinpoint why. I've been getting more sleep lately. The kids haven't been any more difficult than normal. We haven't had any drama from family simply because we haven't been in communication with them. I've been reading my bible more and praying more. We have a small group that meets up every other week. So I don't know. I want to be happy. I don't want to be stressed. But I'm just struggling.

hard.

I'm having a really hard time emotionally today. It's been a tough couple of days. I am in a funk I can't seem to shake. I feel like I could cry at any moment. It's annoying. I wish I could snap out of it. I'm not enjoying the day and I want to snap out of it before this weekend. We are celebrating Jaxon this weekend. It's Emily's baby shower. I don't want to be in a funky mood all weekend!

Dear Lord please help me!

Jesus.
Jesus.
Jesus.

Deep breaths in and out through the mouth.

Gracelyn 9 months.

Each month passes so quickly. I feel like I just did Gracelyn's 8 month update. Gracelyn is constantly moving around. She's crawling (quickly!) everywhere and pulling up and standing on anything. I feel like we will have a little walker very soon! She is not a fan of being in a walker, or the jumper thing. She doesn't like to be constrained to anything. I'm curious to see if this is something that she will carry with her as she gets older. Baby girl likes freedom. She doesn't like it when I walk away from her. Her face lights up when she sees Justin or Isaac too. It's getting really fun to see how her and Isaac interact with each other. Sometimes he's a little too rough or takes toys from her but he also tries to make her laugh and smile all the time. She is still mostly breastfeeding but she likes to eat french fries, apples, and those teething biscuits. I've slacked off and I don't make baby food like I did with Isaac. I also haven't made baby wipes like I did basically until this year when he potty trained. Oh well. I still wear her when I can and she doesn't mind the stroller as long as its moving. She is wearing size 12 mo clothes. She's somewhere around 19 lbs. It's hard to believe she's getting close to being a year old. This year has gone by so fast.