a new year

For the past few years Jimmy and I have spent some time over the Christmas break talking about the past year - all the memories, blessings, struggles, achievments, etc. As well as discuss our goals, not resolutions, for the next year. I like to focus on the year ahead and some things that I can work on to better myself by achieving in that coming year. I think I started our conversation this year with, "what annoys you about me?" Pretty risky huh?! But I think it's a good starting place when reflecting on yourself and things you can do to improve and make life more enjoyable for those around me. Because really when it comes down to it that's what I want people to say/think when they hear my name "joy" "happy" "kind" "loving" - don't we all?!

So, here are the areas in which I'm going to focus some effort in 2012:

1. Simplify our home. I feel like we have so much stuff. Too many clothes, shoes, coats, decorations, picture frames, cords, just everything! With some help from friends (thank you) I have already started on simplifying my wardrobe. I had tubs full of clothes I hadn't worn in years that just needed to go. So I invited some friends to come shopping in my basement. One girl bought 40 items, another got 25, another 20, a few got 10 and I still have stuff left....that should tell you something! But what a great feeling, after a little anxiety, to get rid of unneeded stuff!
2. Focus on health. The overused "lose weight" resolution, right? Well notice how I didn't say lose weight but rather to focus on our health. I feel like we do a pretty good job at eating healthy. I fix mostly healthy meals and eat a salad for lunch probably 5 out of 7 days however, I drink too much diet coke and Jimmy drinks too much pop and we both love sugar. So a little (or alot) less pop and less sugar this year and a little more moving out booty's. Which leads me to my next one....
3. Drink more water and less Diet Coke. Darnit. Anyone who knows me knows I love diet coke. I always have some in our fridge and typically limit my intake to 1 can a day but sometimes that's more and it's never less. So, my plan is to stop buying it and having it in our home. I am going to allow myself it at restaurants, to grab a fountain pop (I especially love diet coke fountain pop) while out and about but I want to make it a little harder to get and a little more of a treat. BTW - I drank the last one we had in our fridge yesterday so today was my first day of no diet coke and I survived :)
4. Spend more time 1 on 1 with Jimmy. Whether this means more date nights, more alone time at night, more weekend overnights, or all of the above I want my relationship with my husband to always be important enough to spend time together. While I love our child so so much I want her, and any future children, to know that Daddy is #1 (after God of course) and that we will always invest in our relationship and one another.
5. Pray Intentionally. I need more focused prayers. I tend to just babble when talking to God, which I think is great because it allows me to just be me and to be casual with God but at the same time I need to think about those that I told I'd pray for them, think about the things I want to pray for for Lily and Jimmy, and other family members daily; I want to bring all the desires, concerns, hardships to Him and allow Him to show me His will. So I want to be more intentional in my daily prayers.
6. Watch less TV. I am a reality TV show junky. I love them all - the Bachelor/Bachelorette, Biggest Loser, the Kardashians, Real Housewives, House Hunters - you get the picture. So I want to have the TV on less this year and give up some of these shows. I have already begun by deleting my Biggest Loser DVR for the season. This will also help with goals 4 and 5 :)

And that's it. Not too many, not too few, enough to be a challenge but not too much to be unachieveable. I really pray that these things will improve in 2012 and that when we look back at our year a year from now we can say we focused on them. Hope you're 2012 is off to a great start!

deck the halls

I love decorating for Christmas. This year is the first in a long time that I felt like I could go all out. Last year in Springfield we decorated but not everything since we knew we'd be back in Iowa for majority of our Christmas break. And previous years was the same story - always traveling back for the holidays. But this year I went all out and add touches of Christmas to almost every room. I love it. I love the bright Christmas colors and all the fun things you can do with decorations  by simply altering the decor you already have around your house. Here's some pictures of our Christmas deocrations this year!

the outside - i wanted lights on all the peaks but my husband didn't want to die attempting

my tulle wreath and present pots (pinterest idea)

little touches

BIG evergreen wreath between informal and formal dining room

nativity - we got this as a gift for our wedding, awesome wedding gift!

the mantle - my favorite part!

our little but colorful christmas tree - we will see if i convince Jimmy to get a real one next year!

informal dining area

more little touches

Lily's tree in her bathroom

 

staircase of christmas cards - another pinterest idea!

formal dining room

downstairs landing

gift from my sister that she made - love it!

christmas 2011

What a wonderful Christmas we had.


Bare with me the next few days as I get caught up on my blogging!


Christmas this year was so much fun. I think it was a combination of living back in Iowa and close to family so we didn't have to spend our whole break traveling back, having a baby this year and being able to watch her experience her 1st Christmas (although I know she won't remember it nor did she really have a clue what was going on), and then an awesome trip to California with my family made this Christmas extra special. Oh yeah, and the fact that it's been in the 40s+ in Dec/Jan in Iowa - LOVE it! Snow, you can skip us this winter and that'd be just fine with me!


So back to Christmas.


Before Christmas we had a fun day of baking goodies at our place with my mom, grandma, sister in law, and niece. This year we made peanut blossoms, sugar cookies, dipped pretzel thins, mint chocolate chip cookies, fudge, and pretzel rice krispie clusters. Yummy! It was a fun day of being together and making some goodies to share! I actually still have some in the freezer now that I think of it.....

Since Lily is still young enough to not really know the difference of Chrimas Eve, Christmas Day, Santa and all that jazz we decided to do our own family Christmas in the afternoon on the 23rd.We had a nice little afternoon at home opening presents with Lily and enjoying our time as a family of 3! Lily loved the toys we picked out for her - we decided to each only get her 1 toy, which ended up us each getting her 2 toys but I thought we did well at not going overboard for her 1st Christmas! Even with just a few things I could tell Lily was overwhelmed, as we helped her open up her toys she wasn't sure which one to play with or where to look!

lily and i looking at her stocking goodies

lily getting into her stocking

present from mommy

present from daddy

Christmas Eve was spent at the Grover's house - we arrived late afternoon and enjoyed some snacks, opened gifts, had a yummy dinner, and then attended their little church's Christmas service. It was actually a very interesting sermon and a spin off of the tradition Christmas service - the pastor spoke about all the instances in the Bible prior to Jesus' arrival that tell us why we needed Jesus to come and save the world - I liked her message. After church we spent the rest of the evening hanging out together and watching a movie.

getting into her big present from gma and gpa

eating ribbon

excitied about the paper

our family after church

lily may

all ready for bed with her 1st pair of cmas jammies

Christmas day we were off to the Davis household for Christmas with my family. My mom made the traditional Christmas dinner that we enjoyed for lunch and then we spent majority of the afternoon outside. Who would have thought that we'd spend Christmas day in Iowa outside? My parents had bought a huge inflatable ball that's made for people to go inside of it and be rolled around. They bought it for the grandkids but I think us adults had even more fun with it! We also got the 4 wheeler out and the kiddos enjoyed rides with grandpa and sledding behind the 4 wheeler - truly an Iowa Christmas :) After all the outdoor fun we went inside to open presents. I was in charge of the evening activities and we played several Christmas themed "minute to win it" games such as - who can get the sugar cookie from your forehead to mouth without using your hands the fastest, who can get the most marshmallows through the wreath into the bucket in 1 min, who can balance the most ornaments on the yard stick in 1 min, who can stack and unstack plastic cups the quickest, and who can get the fuzzy pom pom hanging from a string in your mouth to stick to your vaseline covered nose in 1 min? Needless to say, it was lots of fun and very entertaining!

the kiddos with the big ball

gma / my mom in the ball




opening presents

 

lily and grandpa davis on the 4 wheeler




ready for bed in cmas jammies #2

 Followed by a few days of shopping and getting packed up for California and then the evening of the 28th we were off to sunny San Diego for a week and that was our Christmas this year!

Christmas is always such a fun time of year. I absolutely love the focus of Jesus, time with family, and the time to reflect on another abundt year of blessings. This last picture is my favorite from this Christmas - the two people that light up my world and love me every single day, no matter what - so blessed!

lily and jimmy cmas eve

my heart this christmas

I've mentioned in previous posts about how your heart changes around Christmas time when you become a mom, I think it's inevitable.

I view Mary's role in the Christmas story so much differently now than I ever did before. As a mom you've experienced carrying and birthing a child. To think of Mary and the fear she must have had as a young girl carrying not only a child but the son of God. On top of that, could she really understand and comprehend how this baby got inside her in the first place? And the fear she must have felt telling Joesph, knowing how much she loved him and fulling expect him to leave her. And then there's the actual birth itself and not having anywhere to go. I mean imagine that - feeling your contractions and the pain you experience as you get closer and closer to the delivery of child and being on a back of a donkey! Now I know things were a bit different back then, that hospitals (as we know them) weren't an option but she wasn't even in a warm and safe place - not in a home or in a bed - but riding on a donkey. They had to have been absolutely desperate to find some place, any place. And they must have been to settle for a barn! Another thing I absolutely can not imagine. Now we all know I can be a little high maintenance :) but to think of giving birth in a stable surronded by animals, hay, the whole works - unbelievable! But Mary did it - because she had to, because she was called by God, because she didn't really have a choice - did she? And then the joy, the absolute relief, and the pride that she must have felt in herself and in Joesph - the man that stayed by her side through it all - as she held that little baby in her arms. Jesus. What would it feel like to look into the eyes of Jesus as a baby? Did Mary feel the same as I felt when I felt my baby girl? I think she did. I think she felt that instanteous unconditional love for her child. But I wonder if she felt more because of who He was.

I've played a Christmas song on repeat this year, over and over. It's by a good childhood friend of mine, Alli Rogers and its called Adorn. The lyrics just touch me so deeply. She sings about the birth of Jesus and wonders how the mountains could stay standing and how the rivers could still run. Could our hearts really be ready to hold the holy one? Such powerful words and so absolutely relevant and true. How could everything on this Earth not just stop and pause? She goes on to sing "I like to think there was a pause, I like to think there was a silence" But was there? The reality of it is that there probably wasn't. The world probably went right on about it's busy self. Does anything in this world ever just pause? The moment my baby was born I remember that pause and that silence in my heart as I looked into her eyes for the first time, but did everyone else pause and/or be silent, no. The nurses carried on, the doctor completed her job. But was it the same for the Savior of the World?

Here's her lyrics and the link to listen on youtube. Thanks Alli for writing such a deeply moving song and for speaking so clearly to my heart this Christmas through these words.

I like to think

there was a pause

I like to think there was a silence

when all the wind stopped blowing

all the trees bowed low

sharing in a secret

there must have been a million stars

that must have shaken at the moment you arrived

how could the mountains stay standing

how could the rivers still run

did the earth fall before you

how could our hearts be ready

to hold the holy one

how could we ever adorn you?

the voice of God

in a babies cry

sometimes I wonder how it sounded

and all the angels listened

bet they all came down

wish I could hear that chorus

there must have been a million songs

written at the very moment you arrived

how do you clothe the one who hung the stars

warm the hands that wrought the sun

how do you lift a child in your arms

He who carries everyone

Written and sung by Alli Rogers
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhAUVdPTUqE

santa

This past weekend we took Lily to visit Santa. Jimmy gave me a hard time as I was getting her all dressed up, making sure I knew that this was a lot of work for just 1 picture. But you have to do it for their first Christmas, right?!

She wasn't really sure what to think of him. At first I don't think she even noticed that someone else was holding her, then once she did she just looked at him for a little bit then just sat there. Unforunately we didn't get a great picture of her smiling - but we got a few to document her first visit. Enjoy!

all ready to go

complete with a visit to grandma's

7 months

On Saturday our baby turned 7 months old!


Putting away this last batch of clothes is the first time I've actually been sad in realizing how fast she really is growing up. She is learning new things every day and each stage seems more fun than the last.


This last month she has learned so much. She started eating food and loving it. We held off on feeding her any food until 6 months and she has done great. We started with rice cereal and bananas. Since then she has had sweet potatoes, carrots, avocado, apples, pears, puffs, and yogurt. Her favorites are banana and yogurt.


She still fits in some 6-9 months but is mostly wearing 9 month and 12 month clothes. She really didn't gain any weight this month, weighing in at 20 lbs 6 oz and not sure of her length, but I can definitely tell she is getting longer but not much heavier. But don't worry she still has the chubby legs and cheeks that we love to koose on!!


Other fun things she's learned this month is sitting up from her back, rolling around like crazy, standing up on things, waving, playing "piano", curling her tongue, moving in her crib, pulling up her crib bumper, and "hissing". She enjoyed her 1st thanksgiving and her 1st visit to Santa as well.

I am really looking forward to Christmas with her this year. I wrote a post last year and plan to write another post sharing some of my thoughts this Christmas but I really feel like Christmas takes on a whole new meaning once you are pregnant and/or have a child. The sacrifice God made by sending His only son to die for us is incredible, and I absolutely cannot imagine being in Mary's shoes and birthing the Savior of the World in a barn!

So that's our month in a nutshell - every day we love her more and more and I can't imagine our lives without her.

Lily -
You are the joy of our heart. Your laughter, smile, giggles, playfulness, reaching arms, chubby legs, and sweet breathe (every time I smell your breathe it reminds me of the instant you were put on my chest, it smells the same!) are some of my favorite things. Your dady and I love you so very much and we can't wait to share our lives with you and watch you continue to grow. We pray for you every single day and tell you every day how much we love you and show much Jesus loves you. May you always know the love that overflows in our hearts for you! Happy 7 months sweet sweet girl!

5 things

I got this off another blog I read and thought it was a good idea, so here goes.

You may not know that I

have 2 tatoos (and Jimmy hates tatoos)
have run 5 half marathons and 1 full marathon
played college softball, I was a pitcher
have moved 6 times in 6 years because of my jobs
play guitar

I'm really pretty knowledgeable about

tractors / farming - who would have thought
baseball
excel
everyday fashion
running

I know nothing about

how things work - my husband is completely "wired" wanting to know how things work
and I could usually care less
how to drive a stick shift
techy type stuff and how it all works
movie quotes - when people quote movies I just laugh and pretend I know what movie it's from :)
politics

And I believe

in God and that He truly blesses those that seek Him
that you should always do something you love
that marriage and children are God's greatest gifts to us on Earth
that you should always treat people with respect and kindness
that it's our responsibility to care for those less fortunate, not the government's