Being Mrs Jones

So.  This weekend was Mother’s Day weekend, as i’m sure you know.  I had ONE main request. I wanted to update our big portraits in our living room, to better represent our family.  Currently, they are pictures from our wedding, 5 years ago!  We’ve had two babies since then, so I wanted a family portrait.  So, we dressed the kids, went outside…..and the kids wouldn’t cooperate.  Zoe just wanted to crawl around and play, and Izzy kept either scowling, or scrunching up her face, or just making silly faces in general. We ended with ONE picture that we almost just went with, but Izzy was giving the CRAZIEST smile.  We had another, that somehow our heads were cut off.   And NONE where Zoe was looking at the camera.  So, being who *I* am, I decided….you know what?  I’m going to MAKE THIS HAPPEN.  I took these pictures:

and created THIS:

Zoe’s head looks  little big I think, but hey, it works!

Here are are a few more from the day:

I’ve known my husband for six years. Married five. Gave birth to two babies. Over these years, he has purchased many things for me as gifts. Some expensive, some not so much. But never, ever, the ONE thing I’ve been talking about since we met. Until today. FINALLY. Finally!!!!! He walked in and handed me this ice cream maker. And rock salt. And ice cream mix. And CASH. Because Sunday is Mothers Day, and he thinks I’m awesome, and we never can wait until the actual holiday to give each other gifts. I can’t wait to make some ice cream!

Breastfeeding, that is.

Seriously.  With the exception of the first maybe…two months, I have been struggling with my milk supply for the entirety of this round of breastfeeding.  I have sinus/allergy issues that won’t resolve themselves without antihistamines.  Antihistamines dry you out, and my milk supply isn’t immune from it.  I’m one of the *ahem* lucky women that resumes her cycle immediately after giving birth, despite full time breastfeeding.  So every.single.month, there’s another hit to my milk supply.

Imagine me, guzzling water like a maniac, drinking Mothers Milk Tea, popping Fenugreek like breath-mints, always attached to a baby or a breast-pump, AND taking those disgusting More Milk Plus drops, only to barely sustain a supply that’s not even enough milk for the baby. Even with all of that, we needed to supplement with formula!

So, Thursday night.  I’ve on the tail end of a nasty sinus infection.  Baby has woken up to eat, at about 1am, like she always does.  I’m nursing, switching between sides for about hour, longer than I ever have to be up with her, and I can’t figure out why she’s still so incredibly fussy.  I fix her a bottle.  A big one.  6oz of formula.  She guzzles it like she hasn’t eaten in days.  And it breaks my heart that my baby was that hungry after nursing from both sides.  After she finishes the bottle, she passes right out.  Super content, and I go back into our bedroom and start crying my little eyes out.  And when I was done crying….I was over it.  No more pills, no more drops, and I’ll be damned if I hook myself back to that machine.  I.am.over.it.  And as luck would have it, I came on my period the next day.  x_x

With Zoe being 6, almost 7 months old, I can’t think of a single benefit to continuing to stress myself to death trying to breastfeed.  She’s definitely not ready to wean yet, and I’m not even considering that, but she will be getting formula on a pretty regular basis from now on.  She makes it obvious when she wants to nurse, and I won’t deny her.  We’ll still nurse at night, because it helps her back to sleep.  But when she’s hungry?  No more hesitation to fix that bottle.

So, at 6.5 months, we have intentional, forward crawling. A bit shaky, but she’s on it!

(There’s a CUTE new look on the blog, swing by and check it out!)

Well, she said her line, without going off on a tangent.  Now if only she had actually put her mouth up to the mic….

Ok. So. I’m not here for Mellie. Despite the fact that she read Fitz for every.single.piece.of.his.life (AND some of mine) and she only told a couple of lies, I’m STILL not here for her ass. And that’s not to be confused with rooting for the mistress (even though I do love Liv,I HATE her and Fitz ….and I hate Fitz), I dislike Mellie for who SHE is. A damn snake. And if you don’t know who these people are…..why the hell NOT?

So, I just painted my nails, for the first time in a good….5 years. Yeah. I got my nails done for my wedding, and not again since. My nails feel heavy. Or something.
The color is “peach daquiri” from Essie, with some gold glitter polish that I found.  I do feel rather fancy though, so I may keep it on. And maybe fewer coats.  Cause this Essie….the coverage isnt that great. What (reasonably priced) brands do you ladies use?

This stuff…

Is so super gross. But it’s working, so, hey.

I did Izzy’s hair like this:

Sunday afternoon.  It’s holding up ok.  Not sure if I’ll just refresh it for Easter or try something else. Something new.  We’ll see.

Speaking of hair, this:

Is all of the products we’ve bought/tried over the last few months.  And I’m not that thrilled with ANY of them. The shea butter that I ordered finally came in today though, so I’m going to see if any of these give me better results once I blend with shea butter.

Izzy loves playing with her little sister.  I can’t wait to see how they interact when Zoe is “really” old enough to play.

Byron called himself “helping Zoe learn to crawl”O_O

And I clowned him that night, but look at the next day:

She’s practicing!  How cool is that?

I suck at working out.  And eating well.  And hair regimens.  And skin regimens. And all forms of routine.  And taking good care of myself.  I’m gonna do better though.  Seriously.

Anyway.  It’s #ScandalThursday!  Are you ready?

Wow.  It’s been 3 weeks since I last posted, vlogged, anything.  I don’t aspire to a be a “big” blogger, and that’s probably good, because I would suck at it with these posting habits.  Anyway, life for me has been….chaotic.  But I don’t know that it’s any different than where I left off before.  Since I’ve been away:

I turned 26, on March 13th. The actual day….wasn’t that great.  But I had a great birthday weekend.  I had a drink!

Zoe turned 5 months, on March 17th. She can sit up on her own for a short period, and she is an EXPERT roller.  And she weighs about 14lbs.  I get a lot of comments about her being petite, which I really don’t understand. Zoe is quite juicy to Byron and I, and my wrists and back have been complaining, so…. but whatever.  She gets plenty to eat (drink) and she is totally healthy.

Izzy got a line, the FIRST line, in the Easter program at church, and I HOPE, hope, hope, that she just says her line and steps back.  When we practice her line with her, she unfailingly goes off on a tangent about flowers and rainbows and toys….in a skit about the resurrection of Christ, so….

I STILL don’t have my car back.  But I’m supposed to get it today.  We’ll see.

I’ve ordered Jamaican Black Castor oil and Shea butter for my little naturally curly family.  I think it will be beneficial for all of us, and I’m curious about if the castor oil will help Zoe’s little baby bald spot.  I know it’s gonna grow back regardless, but it can’t hurt to try to help it along a little.  I’m already very excited to be feeling my little “springs” again in my hair.  I had forgotten how much I loved them!  Now, if I can just get this moisture problem in line…

I have been a clean-eating (for the most part), running, biking, working out machine, and the scale was NOT moving.  In fact, it seemed to be going up.  Well, this morning, I had a bit of a breakthrough, totally unexpectedly, and I’m feeling motivated again!

My milk supply…..is dwindling.  Well, maybe not dwindling, but it’s not good.  I am on fenugreek, pumping, nursing, chugging water like a maniac, and it still seems like it’s never enough.  I would like to a freezer supply, but it doesn’t look like that’s going to happen.

Izzy recognizes about 80% of her letters now!  Even if she can’t do preschool right now, the learning will happen!

Speaking of learning, registration for my college courses in fast-approaching. I’ll be taking the compass next week,because my ACT scores are too *ahem* old. So, I did a bit of studying, taking practice tests, and that math….now that it’s been nearly 10 years since high school? Lawd. I’ll just have to retake the classes, because I probably need them anyway.