We've made it 7 months!

I know folks, I'm as surprised as you are!!! Ok not really, we have been doing really well lately! Brynlee is getting so stinking big! Not in actual size, but in the things she can do. She is so good with her hands, she can sit up like a pro, she is pretty much on her way to crawling (I say that because it has been like that for almost 3 weeks now...she just can't figure out how to use her arms!), and she is loving more solid food.

Here are some picture milestones from month 6 :)

Brynlee started riding in the cart at the store! It keeps her so much happier and I love being able to talk to her easier :)

We went on a date to Chuck E Cheese and Brynlee pooped out of that cute outfit. Silly girl, we had so much fun though!

Do you think she likes the stroller??

We have loved going on walks at different parks!

Brynlee usually takes her morning nap in my bed. If she is tired but won't go to sleep, I prop her up like this and turn on either Handy Manny, Clifford, or Strawberry Shortcake. She usually looks like this 10-15 minutes later :)

Brynlee went down the slide!! Well, she kinda got stuck, but she looked cute doing it.

Brynlee's first time eating stage 3 foods. She just loves food so much, it was an easy transition. They are a lot messier, but that messy face kills me every time! She also has loved eating graham crackers!

We started giving Brynlee baths in the regular bath. She has way more fun, and even though it's a little harder to wash her, it makes clean up much less work.

I mean look at that bum....I can't even take it.

Brynlee loves eating avocado...too bad it's SO MESSY!! This was probably the messiest she has ever gotten. She had so much fun though so I think I'll let it slide!

She always finds herself in the weirdest places. Lately it has been stuck under the couch or climbing under the bed skirt and trying to eat it....silly girl!

I have come up with this awesome invention called box of random things. I have that pink box, I put random things in it, and it keeps Brynlee entertained for so long! Once she takes them all out and starts fussing, I just put them all back in and it's like she has never seen any of it before! I love that little chubba wubba!!

We are happy as can be! She is sleeping good, eating good, playing good, and we are excited for her to finally learn how to crawl!! She is so stinking close, it's so frustrating for both of us. For her, she just can't move. As soon as she started trying to crawl, she gave up rolling all together, so if she gets tired or frustrated, she just sits there and cries (hence the frustrating for me).

We are excited for Easter because Grammy bought Brynlee the prettiest Easter dress!!

We are excited for the temple dedication on Sunday!!

We are excited that Brynlee is still not teething! I am hoping that she gets a little older before she starts that...I'm thinking it will make it easier since she will be a little bit more able to tell me what's wrong...? Maybe I'm nuts?

We are excited that our little girl has some hair! She went from bald at Christmas to almost as much hair as she had when she was born!

We are excited that we are all still alive, with all of our limbs, and pretty darn happy!
Here is to 7 months of joy, and a billion more months of a billion more emotions!

We love you Brynlee Lynn! <3

Carnival

Spencer and I took Bo and Katy to their school carnival this past weekend. It was pretty fun, but seriously exhausting! I am not ready for three kids yet!!!!!!!

That being said, it was fun taking Katy around to do all of the fun things that she isn't too big for yet. About 40 minutes after we got there (with only 20 min left until the carnival was over) I couldn't find Bo. We looked everywhere. Finally I decided to check in the game van *they have a van set up with two xbox screens inside and two wii screens outside*. There he was. I asked if he had done anything besides this the whole time and he said no. That little weirdo. He was playing minecraft...something he does EVERY SINGLE DAY!! He wasted his carnival time doing something he could do at home. Anyways, they spent the rest of their tickets and we took them home. It was a beautiful day outside and I loved spending some time outdoors (I have kind of become a hermit since Brynlee was born). I love that I am a big sister to those two, but also a little bit of a mom figure. I hope that when they grow up they remember spending the night at their sister's house and me always making them a fun breakfast and playing UNO with them.

Spencer got to go in the "wrecking ball" with Bo and his friends because they were the last ones and needed a 4th person. He enjoyed it way too much! :)

Katy's face paint. She told me she was going to get a heart and then came over with this! What is with the whole mustache thing??????? Oh well, cutest mustache girl ever.

Katy doing Spin art. I'm not going to lie, I was tempted to use a ticket and do it too....

Bo and Katy enjoying their snow cones

Blue and white hair paint!

Bo getting out of the human hamster ball. Both of the kids thought it was awesome, looked kind of boring to me!

Life Cleanse

This post is going to be a bit lengthy because I thought I would share with the world the struggles of being a mom and being married and trying to find your identity in those roles.

Honestly, I love being a mom more than anything in the world. Every day I get to see my sweet daughter growing, learning, and gaining her own personality. She is mine. I made her, I am raising her, and I will always be her mom. One of the things I have had a hard time with, though, is what my purpose is. I know that my purpose is to raise my kids and to build a good home, but that's a hard thing to see happening day to day. All of your life you are working towards something. When you are little, you are learning your letters, learning how to write your name, getting excited for every year that comes because you get to do something new. As you grow, you are working on school, having a job, or doing sports that literally give you something to do every single day. You are working towards graduation. Once you graduate, a lot of people go to college. You are working on a college diploma and have classes and homework and projects to keep you busy. You are also working on finding the person you want to spend the rest of your life with and getting married. Once that happens, you are working on developing your relationship, lots of times still working on school or your jobs, and working on starting a family. Once you have a kid though, it really seems like there is nothing more to work towards. I am still struggling with this a little bit because even though every day is an accomplishment in raising Brynlee, what do I have to show for it? I spend days at home where, by the time I go to bed, I feel like I got absolutely nothing accomplished. How is that working towards something? It's hard for me to look at my life and see that I have pretty much reached my peak and my life is now a strait line. I have always been someone that works hard to get things done. I like checklists, projects, and goals. What are my goals? What are my projects? The only things I am checking off of my checklist is writing blogs, cleaning the bathrooms, and taking a shower (sometimes...). I have decided that I am going to come up with some goals to keep me motivated.

• I am going to try to serve more. I feel so much better and don't feel full of self pity when I am thinking of others and making sure someone else is happy instead of myself.
• I am going to try and get Brynlee's scrapbook moving. I have almost all of the supplies, I just need to get her pictures in the mail.
• I am going to work on my cooking and getting organized. I thrive on organization and structure.
• I am going to work on making new friends (more on that later)
• I am going to look away from the screens and spend more face to face time with my husband and my daughter.
• I am going to work on visiting teaching. 

 I am writing this to keep myself accountable and to let other moms struggling with this know that there is always someone else out there going through the same thing.

I have also been having a hard time making new friends. I have a very small circle of friends, and almost none of them live within visiting distance on a regular basis. I have been in this ward for a year now and know very, VERY few people. I don't know what happened. I used to be such an outgoing, friendly, and confident person. I am not that person anymore. I feel so uncomfortable around people I don't know, and would rather stay at home alone and mope instead of putting myself out there. My mom said that I'm rusty. And maybe that's true! I am an adult. I have a child. I am allowed to have other mom friends, and go to play dates, and go on walks with people in my complex, and go to relief society activities. I am ready to be an adult in my ward and get involved. I have awesome visiting teachers and when they came to visit me on Sunday, they really helped me. Randa somehow remembered that I had told her I was going to better at visiting teaching and asked me about it! Even though I hadn't quite gotten on it yet, I was so impressed that she had listened remembered, and was keeping me on track. She even texted the VT supervisor and got my companion's name and who I visit. She rocks!

I am going to make some new friends. I need friends. It is not productive or healthy to sit at home all day alone and do nothing. If I am going to be happy and successful, I need to get a little bit of 'old Chelsey' back and get my butt in gear.

I have also been feeling like I need a money coach. Someone to whip me into shape and show me how to run our financial lives. After a really amazing talk with my parents a couple of weeks ago, Spencer and I decided to start with a budget and go from there. We sat down, wrote out our budget, and made a plan. It was really amazing because the morning we were going to do our budget, a blog I follow posted a "Family Binder"on her blog. I looked at it and found a link to none other than a " Budget Binder ". It was exactly what I needed. It lays out finances so perfectly and has really put everything into perspective. She also had a checklist that I printed out. I was so grateful for this and it has already made a big difference. I am so much happier. I have actually been thinking about money and thinking about where it's all going and what I can do to use our money more effectively.
(She has a ton of free printables on her website, check her out! I love her!)

Basically, I needed a life cleanse. I needed time to start over with diet, money, friends, sleep, a clean house, and a refill of patience. Unfortunately, that isn't ever possible. I do feel like we have gotten off to a good start though, and I encourage any of you that are reading this to re-evaluate your life and make changes that will help you be in a happier place. If you feel sad and lonely, go out and find someone to serve. If you are having financial trouble, put it down on paper and figure it out today. If you need a friend, be a friend. I can't tell you how many times I have said to myself, "I just really need someone to come to my door, ask me if I am ok, invite me to do something, and give me a hug". What I have realized is that if I want friends to come to my door, I have to be a friend to them first.

I hope any part of this is helpful to someone. I really have been so much happier since I started moving in a direction. I feel like I have more purpose (even though I'm not sure what it is yet) and feel like I am becoming a better person instead of sitting stagnant waiting for someone to come help me out of my rut. I'm helping myself, and it feels amazing!

Puzzles

Lately one of the only things that has been keeping me sane is doing puzzles. I love the way puzzles make my brain work. I love using problem solving skills to put the colors, patterns, and shapes together to make one beautiful picture. It's frustrating at times, but I can literally (and do literally) sit for hours on end just putting in one piece at a time.

My grandma and I have made puzzles sort of our thing. We always have a puzzle going and when I go over there is is pretty much the only thing we do (And watch Ellen, of course). I love it. I hope when I am 100 years old my brain will still be 21 because I worked it out so much that it refuses to get old!! Wouldn't that be awesome?? :)

Teething

I know what you are thinking, no. My baby is not teething. Who is? ME!! I know. Weird right?? I am growing my wisdom (tooth, that is). It has been a long process. Like a month long process. It hurts for a few days and then is good for a couple of weeks. Then, because it must not be growing in strait, it starts to hurt again for a few days. And when I say hurt, I mean....OOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWCHY MOMMAAAAAAA!! I know that sounds dramatic but I'm not kidding. Luckily I only have one growing in so it's not multiplied by 4, but I'm kind of confused.

How come when we are growing in our baby teeth, it hurts so bad ( I now understand the pain that Brynlee will be feeling and have figured out the best tips to make it stop...Ibuprofent) and then when we are growing in our big teeth it doesn't hurt at all, but growing in wisdom teeth is like the worst thing ever. What changes??

Anyways. I'm in a lot of pain. Spencer says that I wake up multiple times in the night yelling "Ow, ow, ow, ow!!" and then go back to sleep. Every time I move my jaw it feels like there is a knife being stabbed into my poor little gums. I couple of nights I have woken up and needed to take medicine to keep me from waking up in pain.

I think it is all the way through now...it barely bothered me at all today!! Hoping that it doesn't get worse, but I'm pretty sure I am going to have to get it removed sooner than later. Dang it.

Mom's need a break

About a month ago I had a serious breakdown. I was so worn out and I just felt like I needed a break from my baby, but I felt bad about wanting a break from my baby because (even though I know this isn't true) I shouldn't want a break from my baby!! She is my baby and I love her! It was a serious struggle in my brain. It eventually turned into me bawling my eyes out. That weekend I had a baby shower to go to so I decided to take Brynlee with me to the shower and then if she behaved herself I would keep her with me for the rest of the day. If not, I was leaving her with Spencer and Grandma and I were going window shopping or something. She ended up being really good and I felt much better by the time I got home.

There was a lot more to this story, I'm sure of it. Luckily (I think), I have blocked it out and only see it as a rough day. It was a lot more emotional than that and I'm sure it will come again, but I am writing this post so that in the future I can look back and see that...

IT'S OK TO TAKE A BREAK FROM THE BABY. YOU NEED A BREAK FROM YOUR BABY!

It took a while for me to figure that out, and I'm still having a hard time, but I am so grateful for the support from my mom and grandma, from my sweet husband, and from my Father in Heaven who puts people in the right place at the right time to help them through a trial. Having kids a kid is hard. It just is. And some days, it's ok to feel overwhelmed, that just means you need some "me" time...now to find out exactly what that means...

Christmas Pictures

It has been two months exactly since Christmas but I never got around to posting Brynlee's Christmas pictures. So here they are, for your enjoyment, but mostly for mine :).

Sorry for the overload! I just think they are all too cute not to share! Plus I edited them all myself so I am pretty proud of the way they turned out! MERRY CHRISTMAS!