Nursing: The End

I've always made it to 12-13 months with nursing each child. I don't have a dog in the nursing fight. While breast milk is shown to be healthier, I trust that the Lord is sovereign over everything and if a mom does formula, I wholeheartedly support that. My personal reasons for nursing are two fold: a. it's free and 2. I love the sweet time. 

Over Christmas break, Lark was getting too distracted and busy to nurse well and I was constantly telling John, "I'm not sure that he's going to make it until his birthday." My predictions came true, unfortunately, and he stopped abruptly midday. Just stopped. On his own!?! My kids have never done this before, so I was a little offended. 

John told me with encouragement, "well you're done making and nursing babies!" and I burst into tears. It's been such a sweet season! I couldn't remember any of the demands and only remembered how much it meant to me. I'm very thankful that my body has carried,  delivered, and fed four babies, and I will always look back on the time with love. 

Later that day John showed up with flowers, because he knows a fragile mama when he sees one. 

Now I am free! My body is my own, and John and I have already noticed an increase of my energy level since I stopped. The barn door is closed on all that work and I'm happy to continue to the next chapters of parenting. 

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Phone Dump!

Hello! How's everyone doing out there? We are going on our third straight day of cancelled school due to weather, but we don't have any weather to show of! It's like fake news over here, but I'm not complaining. I love having them home with me, but they have a lot of energy and not a lot of things to do with it. We're all a little:

Crazy but happy! I don't have anything special to share, so I grabbed some special pictures off of my phone to post here. 

Here's one of Fern and her sweet teacher. Fern loves school and adores her teacher. We do too! Fern looks up to her in all the ways, from writing in her journal to style to enthusiasm, Fern is inspired by her teacher. 

A trip to the kids' museum with all these children of different ages is insane, but we found some common ground in the mechanical room. Burl is engineer minded like his dad, so the circuits drew him in quickly. I could not imagine a more engineer like picture of a seven year old. 

Having two little boys at the same age has proved so special. A trip to the playground was made exceptional when they found a teeny tiny slide puddle! 

Burl has been saving his money for a long time to go laser tagging. Joseph's schedule allowed him to take Burl, and Burl's world was transformed. Joseph treated him to the whole night, so Burl got to save all that money! Joseph has researched and perfected his uncle responsibilities and it's not lost on the children. (Thanks Chloe for the picture!) Ps. Burl looks like a teenager here-I join the chorus of everyone we know, "Burl is so tall!"

More on this later, but Lark is changing so.freaking.much. and I love him more and more everyday. We can't get enough of him. 

We've found refuge in our public library. Computers for babies to bang on and cheek improving headphones? Yes please! Let's all remember sweet Fern at the same age doing the same thing. 

There's a short update of some day-to-day nonsense of my children. This time is so short and special to me and I love sharing them on my blog project. Stay warm, people!

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14 Years!

Two weeks ago John and I celebrated our 14th wedding anniversary with the best, most expensive meal of our lives. 

We stepped away from the madness of nighttime hustle and indulged ourselves fully. This marriage feels magical and special, and I love celebrating this gift with John. 

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Gas Station Lunch

What an exciting time for my simple children! They've been watching the creation of a new gas station near our house. (The underground work it takes for a gas station to operate is amazing!)

They spotted the sign that said "cafe" and begged to go. For weeks. Luckily the gas station started sending mailers to our neighborhood, and I collected $20 worth to use at their cafe. I splurged on cokes for everyone. 

We walked there, ordered our food, and ate at the only four chairs that they had. The kids said it was the best food ever, and we have to come back with Daddy! Later Burl said, "it's not that tasty after you eat it for a while." His accuracy rang true. 

This outing scored me a lot of mom-points for saying yes to such fancy requests!

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