Having My Own Thing

Have you seen the hashtag #postcardsformacron around Instagram and Twitter? Apparently the French President, Emmanuel Macron, said "Present me the woman who decided, having been perfectly educated, to have seven, eight, nine children." Lots of highly educated mothers of large families have, in fact, presented themselves! 

Seeing mothers of many from around the world who are successful professors, judges, lawyers, doctors, politicians, artists, and writers has been undoubtedly very inspiring. I have no regrets with my decision to have children immediately after earning my bachelor's degree and stay home with them instead of pursuing a career or advanced degree. I feel very grateful to be able to make that choice - I love having so much time to connect with my children and I think having one parent at home makes our family life much less stressful. 

But, this whole thing has reminded me that for my first several years of motherhood, I had a lot more time to invest in my own interests. Up until my oldest daughter turned four and my third daughter was born, all of my children napped for a couple hours every afternoon and went to bed very early. I could easily take the stroller out for a walk after naptime, to get some exercise and listen to an audiobook. I had plenty of time when my children were sleeping for reading, writing here (my favorite creative outlet) and working on sewing or house projects. 

Yesterday, I took my kids to the library and the park, homeschooled them, and took them to ballet. Three years ago, one of those activities would have been perfectly sufficient. I'm literally doing three times the activities with twice as many children. My almost seven and almost five year-old daughters can be pretty helpful (bathing themselves, making their beds, putting their laundry away) so I'm starting to see a glimmer of hope there, but life is still much busier now. 

Ten years ago, I was nineteen years old. I had so many interests! I loved studying history, literature, and French, my internship in fundraising at a history museum, playing the clarinet, and learning more about my Catholic faith through bible studies, talks, and retreats at the Newman Center. Of course, what I wanted most was to marry the boy I had already loved for quite a while and have a family with him. 

I know I've kept learning since graduating from college. I've read hundreds of books. I taught myself how to sew and knit. I can even make buttonholes! I've conquered so many recipes that I used to find very intimidating. I know how to roast a chicken and make chicken noodle soup from the leftovers. I know how to make a great pot roast and turn the leftover meat and potatoes into cottage pie. I know to how to make cinnamon rolls, eclairs, puff pastry, and homemade ice cream. I've learned about gardening and home improvement and personal finance and, obviously, a lot about caring for and educating young children. 

The other major difference in my life since college graduation is that I now own a smartphone. My four children do keep me very busy, but I spend a significant portion of my free time on my phone in not the most productive manner. Every day I read to the kids while they eat lunch and then they usually play happily for a bit while I have my own meal. I should spend that time reading a real, physical book, both because I love to read and because I want my kids to see my reading! (I almost exclusively read via the Kindle app on my phone while nursing the baby.) Instead, I usually spend that time looking at Instagram...

So, that's the first small thing I'm resolving to change in order to foster some of my own interests again. I feel like I've transitioned to a new stage of motherhood, from having only little ones to having both school-age children and little ones. I hope to be in this stage for quite a while, so I'd like to get a better handle on how to still be "me" in the midst of it all. I want my kids to know that I love them and being their mom, but I also love my book club or playing tennis or teaching a class at the coop or singing in the church choir. Just hypotheticals! I'm not sure what this will look like just yet but I'm hoping to take this next six months before I turn thirty to figure it out.

P.S. I'm not quite sure when I'll be back (I've got a first birthday quilt to finish!) so I'm using this an excuse to share our new family pictures with you. They're from Jen Sanders Photography.

Looking Ahead to 2017

The first thing on my agenda this year is making Betsy's baby quilt for her birthday at the beginning of February. I've finally got all the fabric cut out, so now it's time to actually start sewing! 

In February, we plan to switch the girls' rooms around. Currently, Claire and Maggie sleep in two cribs-turned-toddler-beds in the nursery. Betsy sleeps in a pack-n-play in what we used to call the guest room because it has two twin beds. For a while, we would just move the pack-n-play into our room when we had guests, but for the last couple months Betsy has done terribly when sleeping with anyone else. We've just been limited to air mattresses in the living room or playroom when we have visitors and our bedroom situation doesn't make a lot of sense. 

Claire and Maggie will move into twin beds and Betsy will move into a crib. We'll just leave the other crib in the nursery, set up as a toddler bed. Mostly because we have nowhere else to store it and we'll probably need it again in the future. But also we're hoping that at some point Betsy will sleep much better with others and we can have Claire and Maggie bunk with her when we have guests. One could sleep in the spare toddler bed and one could sleep on an air mattress. 

Anyway, along with this room switch-up I want to hang some art on the blank wall in the big girls' room and hang some different art in the nursery. This will also mean changing some art in the playroom and redecorating the mantel. I realize that means nothing to anyone except me. 

Lent starts on March 1st. Two years ago, I spent Lent deep cleaning our house, tackling one room a week. And...it hasn't really been deep cleaned since. (I'm talking like dusting base boards, scrubbing out the fridge, washing the exterior windows, etc.) So I plan to tackle that again. Claire's fifth birthday is in March as well. She's decided she wants a "Little Mermaid singing party." 

During the Easter season, my sister will be visiting from her orphanage in Honduras! I'm ridiculously excited to see her. In May, we've got our big trip of the year planned. We're going to fly to Denver to visit some dear friends, drive to Tulsa for Adam's sister's college graduation, drive to Houston to visit his family there, and then fly home. I may also be ridiculously excited to visit the Pioneer Woman's new restaurant while we're in Tulsa. 

We have so many other trips we'd love to take over the summer. Too many! It would be really fun to be in Victoria, British Columbia for Canada Day, since this year is Canada's 150th anniversary. There's going to be a total solar eclipse visible from Salem, Oregon at the end of August. We should decide if we can attend either of those events really soon, because I'm sure accommodations will book up quickly. There are also a couple out-of-state weddings we'd love to attend. Most importantly, we want to visit my parents in Eastern Washington at least twice. Maybe for Claire's spring break in early April, Memorial Day, Independence Day, or Thanksgiving? We're committed to taking our kids camping at least once. We haven't been camping since we were small children, so we want to keep it very low-key to start with - just an overnight at a state park thirty minutes from home.

Project-wise, my next priority is making our yearly photo book and Betsy's baby album. We also have two half-finished projects in the garage that we really, really, really need to complete because our garage isn't that big! We've got the wood frames built and the batting/fabric cut out for some pelmet box window treatments for the main living areas - we just have to assemble and hang. We've also removed like 80% of the chipping paint from the kids' picnic table - next up is stain and poly. Other projects I'd love to tackle...

- Replacing the black IKEA dresser in the nursery with the white version
- Picking up another dining chair while at IKEA so we have an even number again
- Repainting our kitchen and bathroom stools
- Repainting our coffee table
- Repainting our end tables
- Planting more flower bulbs

Well, hopefully we'll get to at least of couple of those. I'd love to work on a few sewing projects too. I really enjoy making dresses for the girls and I have enough fabric leftover to make a dress like this for Claire in a larger size, so all three sisters could be matching. I also made these cute little dolls for Claire and Maggie when they were one. They were fun to make and turned out really cute...but the girls don't play with them much. Should I make one for Betsy?

I have a Pure Barre class pass that expires at the end of May. I need to go at least once a week until then to use it up. My local studio stopped offering 8:00 pm classes, which makes attending on weeknights challenging. I'm going to try the 8:30 class tomorrow morning instead. When Betsy transitions to one nap a day (which I hope isn't until preschool ends for the summer) I plan to join the Y again. Our location has two childcare rooms - one for babies and toddlers and one for children over three. I hope Betsy doesn't mind being separated from her big sisters! She is by far our most outgoing baby though and, honestly, her sisters spent most of their playtime trying to keep away from her admittedly destructive behavior.

Before I know it, September will be here and Claire will be starting kindergarten. (More on our schooling decision soon, once we've officially got everything figured out.) No matter what option we go with, our life will certainly be more scheduled than it is now. Maggie will turn four in October - she's already dreaming of an "Alice in Wonderland tea party." Her and Claire already have our family Halloween costumes figured out too - characters from Peter Pan. We shall see if they change their minds about either of those in the coming months. Sometime next winter (maybe over Christmas break?) we'd love to spend a couple days at Suncadia, a resort in the Cascades that has ice skating, snow tubing, sleigh rides, etc. Oh, and perhaps the most exciting event of the year will happen at the very end - Allison will be done with her two years of missionary service! 

Looking Ahead to 2016

This year will be much slower than 2015, which is definitely a good thing! We'll be welcoming a new baby. It will also be the last full year before Claire starts kindergarten and we transition into life with school-age kids. I want to slow down, snuggle my newborn, and relish life without the restraints of a school schedule. 

I'm sure January will be busy trying to cram in as much as possible before Betsy arrives and also trying to coax her out! She'll arrive by mid-February at the very latest, Adam will start his paternity leave, and we'll all hunker down at home. 

In March, Claire will turn four, Betsy will be baptized, and we'll celebrate Easter. Adam will go back to work part-time towards the end of the month. In April, he'll be back full-time and I'll be on my own with three little girls. 

Hopefully we'll sneak out for a couple date nights to celebrate our birthdays, his in April and mine in May. Maybe we'll drive to my parents' house for Memorial Day weekend, especially if it's warm and sunny there but still cold and gray here. 

Although I want to make plenty of visits to the lake, the pool, and all the wonderful playgrounds in the area, I really want to make sure we take it easy this summer and spend plenty of time just playing in our own backyard. Allison will be back for a visit sometime during the summer months and I already cannot wait. 

In August, one of my cousins is getting married at a resort on B.C.'s sunshine coast. We'll probably turn it into our yearly vacation and spend some time in Vancouver beforehand. Unless we can afford to visit my grandma in Ottawa - we'd probably still combine the two and fly out of Vancouver because there's so many more direct flights to eastern Canada from there. But we really need to make lots of progress towards saving for a house this year, so our travel budget will be taking a hit. 

Summer will be over all too soon and fall will arrive with Maggie's third birthday, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and hopefully another long weekend at my parents' house at some point. It will be my last school year leading the church playgroup, since I'll pass the torch on when Claire's in kindergarten. 

Before we know it, Betsy's first Christmas will be here! By that point, she'll be on a good sleep schedule, eating finger foods, and crawling all over the place. Maggie will be potty trained and sleeping in a toddler bed. Claire will continue to be more independent, getting herself dressed completely, buckling her own car seat, etc. 

I really want to tackle a few house projects over the year: 

- window treatments for the living room, play room, and kitchen

- refinishing the coffee table, end tables, and kids' picnic table

- removing the peeling paint from the front porch 

And I want to continue our tradition of hosting a liturgical year themed party. We won't be doing anything big for Mardi Gras this year (or probably at all anymore, since it will always be so close to Betsy's birthday) but we should feel up to it by the late summer/early fall. So maybe Michaelmas or Mother Theresa's canonization or an Assumption barbecue - it would be nice to throw a summer party so we could have it outdoors and invite more people.  

I also want to make getting in better shape a big priority. Three pregnancies has taken it's toll on me. I think 2015 showed us what doesn't work in terms of exercise (getting to the gym during the day with the kids) and what does work (taking a class in the evening - the accountability of signing up for a session really helps me). It's not really about losing weight, although I'd be happy to drop ten pounds, it's just about being more active. At least Adam can easily fit exercise into his day with biking to work, so we both don't have to schedule time at the gym. 

Hopefully by the end of the year we'll have confirmed with our landlords that we can renew our lease for another couple years. Or if some reason that's not the case, we've found a great deal on a four bedroom rental home that's in good shape and still in the same location? And hopefully we'll also be nearing a decision about what do for kindergarten, either the parish school or homeschooling. Whether or not Betsy's born via c-section and the resulting family planning implications will give us a lot of insight into that decision. 

Here's to a great new year! 

2015 Resolutions: July to December

 And we're back with my resolutions for the second half of the year!



July and August:

- Enjoy the summer of no babies. This is our first summer in Seattle with no babies or big pregnant bellies and we want to make the most of it. We have lots of visitors coming, we're finally going to make it to Mt. Rainier and the Olympic Peninsula, and we're spending a weekend away for our fifth anniversary.

- Finish a lot of little house projects, both inside and outside. Mostly lots of quick painting projects I've been waiting for warm, dry weather to tackle. 

September and October:

- Make pelmet boxes for the living room, kitchen, and play room. Full-length curtains won't really work in those rooms, but it will be nice to have some sort of window treatment up.

- Plant tulips and daffodils in the Mary garden. An hour spent planting in the fall for a beautiful garden come spring.

- Build some toy cubbies for the living room. We want some toy cubbies for under the window in our living room, but the Ikea Expedit dimensions don't quite work. We're planning to build something very similar that will fit the space perfectly.

- Celebrate Maggie's second birthday. We'll throw her a little party, of course, which will hopefully not be Frozen themed. I'd also like to make her a name pillow and a baby carrier.

- Make a quick trip to West Virginia for a wedding over Halloween weekend. A good friend is getting married and Adam's family will all be there for a quick reunion. It is fairly complicated to get from Seattle to small town West Virginia, but thankfully we were able to cash in our air miles to join everyone. The wedding is on Halloween, so I'm not sure if we should just skip it completely this year? Our toddlers won't know the difference...

November and December:

- Deep clean the house again. I spent all of Lent deep cleaning our home room-by-room and since then I've gone back to my just-the-basics weekly cleaning schedule. Next spring will be pretty busy for us, so I'm planning another deep clean in November instead. Maybe this time we'll actually finish organizing the garage.

- Build Claire and Maggie a "multi-purpose stand" for Christmas. We want to build a copycat of this Land of Nod play stand to go with the girls' kitchen, their big gift from last year. It can be a grocery store, puppet theater, or many other imaginative possibilities.

Other: 

- Throw an Assumption or Michaelmas party. We try to throw a liturgically themed party twice a year. We had a Mardi Gras party in February and a Michaelmas party last September. But Assumption is on a Saturday this year and it's date in mid-August means we could throw an outdoor barbecue, which is both easier to pull off and allows us to invite more people.

- Get in the habit of going to the Y in the late afternoon. I've recently renewed my Y membership now that Maggie is perfectly happy to play in the childcare. In the past, I've tried to go in the morning before running errands, but it was just too much going on. I need to get in the habit of going from 4:00 to 5:00 in the afternoon, between naps and dinner. Also, I really, really need to bite the bullet and stop faking Claire's age so she can go in the under-three room with Maggie.

- Spend less on going out to eat as a family and more on date nights. We want to go to the symphony and to see the new version of the Nutcracker (designed by Ian Falconer, author of the Olivia books!) this fall. Which means less trips to Chipotle and Chick-fil-A as a family. 

- Schedule a regular time for one-on-one play with Claire. Starting in the September, Claire will be in Catechesis of the Good Shepherd for two hours, one morning a week. Which means one-on-one time with Maggie! I'd like to get some quality solo time with Claire too. I think I'll let her skip nap/quiet time once a week (maybe Friday?) so we can play board games, bake, or do a craft.

Resolutions Revisited

Let's check in and see how I did on my resolutions for the first half of the year, shall we?

Before Lent (January to mid-February)

- Rename and redesign my blog. Almost. I renamed and redesigned, but I still need to transfer to my own domain name.

- Make two photo books: one for the previous year and Maggie's baby book. Check! I love adding new photo books to our collection.

- Update my recipe binder and master grocery list. Halfway. Master grocery list done, but haven't touched the recipe binder.

- Work on a present for Claire's birthday. Check! We added some extras to the play kitchen - a window above the stove and a mailbox and corded on the side.

- Throw a Mardi Gras party. Check! We invited twenty-five people over for shrimp creole, red beans & rice, crawfish ettoufee, and king cake.

During Lent (mid-February to April)
- Completely deep clean and de-clutter our house. Almost, almost check. Everything's been deep-cleaned and de-cluttered, but I still have to finish touching up paint.
- While organizing the garage, add a workbench and an upright freezer. Nope. We actually didn't quite finish going through the garage shelves. And we decided to buy a sewing desk and an electric piano instead of a workbench and freezer.
- Celebrate Claire's third birthday. Check! We had some of her friends over for a Frozen-themed birthday and we took her on a solo outing to see Snow White at the ballet.
- Enjoy a girls' weekend in Portland with my sister. Check! Allie came to visit for Claire's birthday and while she was here we spent a really, really fun long weekend in Oregon. The next weekend, Adam and my brother, Scott, took a quick trip to Pittsburgh.
- Sew something for the girls for Easter. Check! I made a cape for Claire and a doll for Maggie. I also just finished making them some sundresses.

After Lent (April, May, and June)
- Really get to work improving the landscaping in our front and back yards. Getting there. We've made a lot of progress. We planted lavender, peonies, roses, gardenias, rhododendrons, ferns, and hostas in four previously empty flower beds. We turned one flower bed back into grass and put up a chicken wire fence to keep kids out of the backyard pit.
- Sew curtains for three of our six windows. Check! All of our bedrooms now have curtains.
- Start working on a bed/headboard for our anniversary. Nope. We haven't started on anything yet, but I think our next woodworking project will be some toy cubbies for the living room.
- Go on a week-long just-for-fun trip for the first time ever. Check! We had the best time in San Francisco. It felt so luxurious having a whole week to explore a new city.

Marriage
- Go on a date at least once a month. Check! We went to the parish valentine's dance and Cirque du Soleil. We saw three movies in theaters (The Imitation Game, The Women in Gold, and Far From the Madding Crowd).
- Wake up before our children. Nope. We have periods when we do pretty well at this, but its definitely not a habit. We love our alone time in the evenings so much that we always stay up too late.
- Watch Symbolon videos. Nope. When we don't have a tv show to watch, we've been reading aloud instead. We finished Brideshead Revisited and started Rod Dreher's "How Dante Saved My Life."

Parenting
- Wean Maggie and limit her to pacifiers only while sleeping. Sort of. Maggie stopped nursing at fifteen months and most of the time we're really good about limiting the pacifier to her bed. But it's always so tempting to pull it out when she's super whiny and sometimes we just cave.
- Transition Claire into a toddler bed. Check! Claire transitioned really easily to a toddler bed right after her third birthday in March. We've had the girls share a room every night since we got back from San Francisco in May. And Claire also potty trained really easily at the beginning of June.
- Start reading them both longer books. Sort of. Maggie has transitioned into real picture books, although she doesn't quite have the attention span of Claire at her age. I meant to read Winnie the Pooh and Beatrix Potter to Claire, but we've been listening to the audio books during lunch instead.
- Really ramp up the art projects when Maggie can participate. Check! It hasn't been happening every day, but we've already done play dough and finger paint a few times this summer. We've also been pulling out the markers and crayons more frequently.

Health
- Actually wash my face before going to bed. Nope. I'm still really, really terrible at this. I take a shower every other evening, but on the opposite days I hardly ever remember to remove my make-up before getting in bed.
- Lose fifteen pounds by the end of April. Not really. That time frame was significant because it's when our eighteen-months-before-more-babies restriction was lifted. I think we made a lot of good habits, like eating dessert a lot less often and getting some exercise every day (usually just pushing the double stroller around our hilly neighborhood) but I didn't quite see the results I wanted.

Faith
- Make Easter just as big a deal as Christmas. Check! We did a pretty good job celebrating the Tridiuum (we went on a church tour and had a "last supper" meal), we went to the Easter Vigil, and Claire helped make confetti eggs for our Easter egg hunt. We found lots of good Easter books at Goodwill, but I still don't have much in the way of Easter decor.
- Celebrate feast days, particularly Epiphany, Candlemas, and the Annunciation. Check! We had friends over for gallette de rois on Epiphany and crepes on Candlemas. I dropped the ball on making waffles for the Annunciation, but we did have a really cute May Crowing play date. 
- Commit to abstaining from meat on Fridays. Getting there. We get thrown off a lot when we have visitors, but on normal Fridays we've done a pretty good job of remembering to abstain from meat at lunch. And we've switched our weekly pizza night to Fridays.
- Serve when I can. Check! Of course, I could always do better, but we made four meals for the homeless shelter and signed up to bring food boxes for low-income families over spring break. We're getting in the habit of scanning the church bulletin for service projects we can accomplish with small children and then actually signing up.
- Wrap up my first year leading mom's group. Check! It's definitely been harder than I thought and, honestly, I'm already looking forward to stepping down when Claire's in kindergarten. But I'm trying my best to encourage community among new moms at our parish.

2015 Resolutions: January to June

So here's what I've got planned for the first half of 2015. I find it too hard to make goals for a whole year, but six months seems much more doable.



Before Lent (January to mid-February)

- Rename and redesign my blog. I asked Bonnie for a blog consult earlier in the year and I'm finally ready to implement some of the changes she suggested.

- Make two photo books: one for the previous year and Maggie's baby book. Oh, this is always so much fun. And addicting! I'm a really big fan of Blurb.

- Update my recipe binder and master grocery list. My master grocery list is just every item I like to stock in my fridge and pantry, divided into the stores I normally shop at. I alternate between Costco and Whole Foods once a week, with occasional trips to Target and Trader Joe's. Before I head to the store, I just print out the necessary list and highlight the items I need.

- Work on a present for Claire's birthday. We're thinking we'll add some extras to the play kitchen, like a back behind the sink/stove area, a mail center, and an old corded phone.

- Throw a Mardi Gras party. We used to invite friends over for dinner once a week, but occasional parties work much better for us now. Adam's dad is from Louisiana, so we have a great love of Cajun food that we're excited to share with our Seattle friends.

During Lent (mid-February to April)
- Completely deep clean and de-clutter our house. Our home could really, really use some organization and extra effort in the cleaning department. We're going to make a plan and do a little bit each of the forty days. I imagine this will mean I will be doing more scrubbing and less blogging during naptimes.
- While organizing the garage, add a workbench and an upright freezer. Now that we've moved the entertainment center (now play kitchen) out of the garage, we'll have room for those items.
- Celebrate Claire's third birthday. We are planning to invite several of her friends over for a tea party. I know she would die of happiness if it was Frozen themed. We're also planning to arrange a sitter for Maggie and take her to her first theatre production - the Pacific Northwest Ballet is doing an hour-long narrated performance of Snow White aimed at kids about her age.
- Enjoy a girls' weekend in Portland with my sister. Aunt Allie is planning to visit for Claire's birthday, and while she's here, we're going to head south to Oregon for a long weekend. I can't wait!
- Sew something for the girls for Easter. I'm thinking either dresses or maybe a doll for Maggie and a little-red-riding-hood-esque cape for Claire.

After Lent (April, May, and June)
- Really get to work improving the landscaping in our front and back yards. We're hoping to work with our landlords to finish the last side of the privacy fence. Obviously, we need to do something about the treacherous pit of weeds are backyard descends into. We have lots of empty beds that could use flowers. We'd especially like to carve out a spot for a Mary garden.
- Sew curtains for three of our six windows. I'm planning to start with the guest bedroom, since that's where Maggie naps and we could really something to block out the light in there come spring. While I'm at, I'll probably do the other two bedrooms as well.
- Start working on a bed/headboard for our anniversary. The traditional fifth anniversary gift is wood, so we're planning to upgrade our basic metal bedframe and finally have a headboard.
- Go on a week-long just-for-fun trip for the first time ever. We've always devoted our long trips to visiting relatives, adding in a few just-us weekend trips here and there. We're planning to celebrate five years with a family vacation that's more than 1.5 days long.

Marriage
- Go on a date at least once a month. After finding a new babysitter, we've gotten a little carried away with date nights the last month or so. Our budget is begging us to scale it back to more like once a month unfortunately.
- Wake up before our children. We won't have any babies in 2015, so this is the year we're going to stop using our children as alarm clocks!
- Watch Symbolon videos. Our parish got a one-year subscription to this amazing video series produced by the Augustine Institute and so far we've only watched one. When we don't have any new episodes waiting for us on Hulu, we're going to watch one of these instead.

Parenting
- Wean Maggie and limit her to pacifiers only while sleeping. Claire stopped using pacifiers around six months and switched to sucking her thumb instead. Maggie, not so much. We want to resist the temptation to give her one whenever she's whining and cut it back to just in the crib.
- Transition Claire into a toddler bed. She's still completely happy to sleep in her crib at home, but she's officially way too big to sleep in a pack-n-play while traveling, so we're planning to transition her to a toddler bed (aka take a side off her crib) before our vacation. We're going to take her lead when it comes to potty training. She doesn't really need to be out of diapers until school starts next September, so there's no rush.
- Start reading them both longer books. I'd like to read our collections of Beatrix Potter, Winnie the Pooh, and nursery tales with Claire. Sometime this spring, Maggie should be ready for beginning picture books like Maisy, Little Critter, and Mo Willem's pigeon series.
- Really ramp up the art projects when Maggie can participate. Come April or May, Maggie should be able to join Claire in coloring and painting. I see craft time happening a lot more often when it's something they can do together!

Health
- Actually wash my face before going to bed. Yep, I'm twenty-five years old and I regularly go to bed with my make-up on.  It's time to learn how to spend two minutes with soap and water before falling asleep.
- Lose fifteen pounds by the end of April. That time frame is significant because it's when our eighteen-months-before-more-babies restriction is lifted. I'm basically at the weight I was before ever getting pregnant, but if it would be wonderful if I could start the next pregnancy a little lighter. I'm planning to limit sweets to weekends and get some exercise in everyday, even if it's just pushing a double stroller around our hilly neighborhood.

Faith
- Make Easter just as big a deal as Christmas. This is going to be an ongoing process, for sure, but more specifically, I'd like to acquire more Easter decorations and check out as many picture books on the subject as I can find. I think we'll also try dyeing eggs with the kids for the first time.
- Celebrate feast days, particularly Epiphany, Candlemas, and the Annunciation. We already have friends coming over for gallete de rois on Epiphany, but we also plan to extend invites for crepes on Candlemas and waffles on the Annunciation. We'll do something for Valentine's Day too, of course, and we've got three out of four baptism days. We're planning to celebrate Adam's and mine this year as well.
- Commit to abstaining from meat on Fridays. We used to be pretty good about abstaining from dessert on Fridays instead, but we fell off the wagon a while ago and now that we're trying to limit sweets to just the weekend, it doesn't really work anymore. So Friday is going to become the new pizza night around here.
- Serve when I can. There's not a lot of service projects that I can do with two toddlers, but there's still more than you might think. I often see notices in our parish bulletin asking for donations, like blankets for a shelter. I think, "Oh, I could do that!" but then I promptly forget. So that's going to change. I'm going to order whatever it is on Amazon right away or add it to my grocery list, and bring the items with me when I'm at the church for playgroup later that week. See? Not that hard.
- Wrap up my first year leading mom's group. Hopefully, I can get some feedback on what is/isn't working at the end of the year. And we'll recommit ourselves to attending daily mass beforehand. I have this idea for adding in a "letter of the week" craft component for the preschoolers next year, just for a portion of our meeting time, so I plan to see if there's interest for that and get the ball rolling for the fall.



Resolutions Revisited

Before we really get started with 2015, let's check in and see how my resolutions for the last six months of the previous year went. Shall we?



Marriage:
- Celebrate our fourth wedding anniversary. Check! The traditional gift is fruit or flowers, so we gave each other two botanical paintings by Emily Jeffords. Oh, and we went out to dinner.

- Finish reading Brideshead Revisited together. Not even close. We're committed to making significant progress over the rest of Christmas break though.

- Go on at least three dates. Check! After our babysitter went to college this fall, we found a couple new sitters and have been enjoying lots of date nights. We went on three dates in December alone.

Claire:

- Actually place picture books on hold for her at the library. Check! This has become a regular part of my weekly routine and we've all really enjoyed discovering new picture books.

- Do a basic art project with her at least once a week. Nope. It's just too hard to find the time with a baby sister around who eats crayons. I'd say art projects happened more like once a month.

- Get her potty trained, except for naps and nights. No again. We tried a three-day potty training boot camp right around her half-birthday and it was a miserable failure. The potty just really stresses her out right now.

Maggie:

- Celebrate her first birthday. Check! We threw her a first birthday party. I made her a quilt and birthday banner with the fabric from her monthly photos.

- Get her weaned. Not quite yet. We're down to just before nap and bedtime right now.

- Transition her to just an afternoon nap. Check! Although we really didn't have anything to do with it. She gave up morning naps on her own at eleven months old.

House:

- Improve the landscaping in the front and backyards. Maybe? We didn't really improve the landscaping, but we did manage to stay mostly on top of mowing, weeding, and raking. We also acquired a barbecue, picnic table, and a few more outdoor toys.
- Hang art. Check! Our walls are no longer bare.

- Get an oval coffee table. Check! We found a lovely oval coffee table on Craig's List. No more sharp corners for small children to injure themselves on.

Crafts:

- Make a play kitchen. Check! After sitting in our garage for quite a while, we finally turned our $25 Goodwill entertainment center into a play kitchen as a Christmas present for the girls.

- Make doll bunk beds. Check! For Maggie's birthday, we bunked two doll beds from Ikea and painted them turquoise.

- Make Halloween costumes. Basically? I didn't actually make anything, but we dressed up as Wizard of Oz characters for Halloween and were pretty darn cute, if I say so myself.

Health:

- Join the Y and go at least twice a week. Not really. If you averaged out the whole six months, I probably went more like once every two weeks. July was great, but in August and September Maggie developed really bad stranger anxiety and hated being left in childcare. Things got much better in October and November, but I didn't go once in December. All of a sudden Claire and Maggie got much better at playing together at home and I felt bad making them leave the house earlier in the morning so I could go work out.

- Actually make lunch for myself. Check! I've made a habit out of sitting down for real lunches, even if it's just a peanut butter sandwich, rather than grazing the entire afternoon.

Faith:

- Do a good job of leading mom's group at church. Check! At least, I think so. Our once a week play group and monthly book club have been pretty well attended. Our family's goal was to attend morning mass beforehand, but we fell off the wagon in mid-October, when Adam got really busy at work and could no longer come with us. Maggie is at that stage where she can't make it through a whole service sitting in the pew, so there's not much point taking the girls by myself if we're all just standing in the narthex.

- Make Thanksgiving and Christmas meaningful for Claire. Check! For the most part, at least. With the Jesse tree, Advent wreath, and lots of picture books, Claire definitely understood the gist of Christmas. Thanksgiving, not so much. We did a "thankful leaf" project whenever we could in November, but it was harder to explain gratitude to a toddler than I thought.

 

Adventures:

- Visit a Seattle attraction at least once a month. Check! I definitely felt like we got to explore our city more, especially once Maggie cut out her morning nap.

- Maybe visit my family in China? Nope. We briefly thought about going in November, when we found out my dad's contract would be up a little earlier than planned, but ultimately we didn't feel comfortable leaving Maggie for a week at only thirteen months. Plus, after a solo long weekend trip for the Edel Gathering, I realized that I would miss the girls way more than I expected to. 

2014 Resolutions: July to December

And we're back with my resolutions for the second half of the year!



Marriage:
- Celebrate our fourth wedding anniversary. The traditional gift is fruit or flowers, so we want to get a real painting featuring one of those things to start our very own art collection. We're planning to stick to a $100 budget. Right now, I've been eyeing the work of Emily Jeffords and Hilary Butler on Instagram lately. And I just stumbled upon this one on Etsy...

- Finish reading Brideshead Revisited together. We started reading Brideshead Revisited aloud together last fall when Maggie was a newborn and we spent our evenings on the couch cuddling a baby. Now that she has an early bedtime and we can be productive in the evenings again, that's pretty much what we always do (and then end the night with our sitcom + dessert ritual).

- Go on at least three dates. We already have two date nights planned for July (our anniversary and a soccer game with Adam's department) and we hope to plan two more over the next several months. Probably for Adam's company Christmas party and sometime in September/October?

Claire:

- Actually place picture books on hold for her at the library. Usually when we go to the library, I just look for my favorite authors (Tomie dePaola, Kevin Henkes, Mo Willems, etc) and pick out five or six books for the next week or two. It's time to branch out! I have a flyer from our library with the 100 best books for toddlers, so I think I'll start there. And I've started writing down all the picture books Janssen recommends on Instagram, since I generally love the adult reads she chooses.

- Do a basic art project with her at least once a week. I'm talking really, really basic here, like watercolors or finger paints. She loves doing that kind of stuff, but we rarely do anything more than crayons or markers. She usually goes to bed later than Maggie (as long as afternoon naps keep happening) so that window between their bedtimes seems to be the best art time for us.

- Get her potty trained, except for naps and nights. I'm planning to start potty training in September, when Claire is two and a half. Ahh! I want to hold off on naps and nights for a while though, because it would be great to keep her contained in her crib until she's three.

Maggie:

- Celebrate her first birthday. We plan to throw her a little party and make a video of her first year. I'll sew a banner and quilt for her. The question is, should I do the same pattern as Claire's or try something different? I'll also make her a photo book of her monthly pictures and stats.

- Get her weaned. After struggling a lot with Claire thanks her time in the NICU, nursing Maggie has been such a positive experience. She'll be 14 months by the end of the year, though, and I think I'd like to be done by then. C-sections make avoiding necessary for us and avoiding is a whole lot easier when your regular cycles are back.

- Transition her to just an afternoon nap. I'm hoping Maggie will be ready to switch to just one nap a day around 14 months as well. We'll be able to get out and do so much more in the mornings!

House:

- Improve the landscaping in the front and backyards.  I think you'll probably remember that our yard could use some serious work. It stays light outside pretty late here in the summer, so we finally have time to do yard work while the kids are asleep. Since we're just renting, we don't want to spend a lot of money on landscaping though. We'd also like to acquire some more outdoor toys. Two balls and a bucket of sidewalk chalk aren't really cutting it.
- Hang art. We're all unpacked now, but we don't have a single picture hanging on the walls. That will change by the end of the year! We actually have less empty wall space than our old apartment, since we have so many more windows. Not exactly a bad problem to have.

- Get a oval coffee table. Our current coffee table is pretty banged up. Claire also got a black eye from it's corners twice when she was first learning to walk. It wasn't as bad as it sounds, but still something I'd rather not repeat. So before Maggie's walking, we'd like to upgrade to a more kid-friendly oval coffee table instead. Maybe this one from Ikea?

Crafts:

- Make a play kitchen. Way back in January, we bought a $20 entertainment center at Goodwill to turn into a play kitchen. It's currently in the garage with all our wall art stacked on top. So once that's all hung up, we hope to start on the play kitchen, for either Maggie's birthday or Christmas. We've vowed that if it's not happening for Christmas, we're just going to Craig's List it and buy one instead.

- Make doll bunk beds. For either Maggie's birthday or Christmas (whichever one doesn't have the play kitchen), we're planning to buy two of these doll beds from Ikea, paint them a fun color, and bunk them. Claire has a doll quilt that's a smaller version of here's and I'm planning to do the same for Maggie.

- Make Halloween costumes. Since Halloween is ten days after Maggie's birthday, I'm looking for something easy. Maybe Wizard of Oz characters? Claire could be Dorothy and Maggie could be the lion (I'd definitely buy Maggie's and probably Claire's too). Adam and I could pretty easily pull something together to be the scarecrow and the tin man.

Health:

- Join the Y and go at least twice a week. I'm planning to join in August, when our summer finally calms down. Adam gets a free gym membership through work and we picked the Y because it was the only one around with free childcare. It's $50 a month to add the rest of us. I've wanted to join since we've moved here and now I actually have a chunk of time where all my kids are old enough for me to feel comfortable leaving them in childcare and I'm not heavily pregnant!

- Actually make lunch for myself. I'm usually so focused on getting the girls down for a synchronized afternoon nap that I don't end up eating my lunch until they're asleep. Which is fine, actually, because it makes me prioritize reading a chapter of my book. (I like to read, but have to set certain times throughout the day to do it, or it won't happen.) But, I rarely have the energy to make myself something good for lunch and end up having an apple with peanut butter instead. And, surprise, surprise, I'm hungry again a few hours later.   

Faith:

- Do a good job of leading mom's group at church. Honestly, I'm not so much the leader as just the facilitator who makes sure to send reminder emails and put announcements in the bulletin. But I want to do a good job, regardless. When Maggie is old enough to start going without a morning nap, I'd like to go to morning Mass before play group. Adam can take the bus to work right from church, so he should be able to join us too.

- Make Thanksgiving and Christmas meaningful for Claire. This is the first year Claire will start to get what Thanksgiving and Christmas are all about, so I want to make it meaningful for her. We'll start pretty small though. Maybe we'll write down something we're thankful for each day of November leading up to Thanksgiving. And do a Jesse tree or unwrap a new (library) book to read each day of Advent. I bought a 12 Days of Christmas ornament set and book on clearance last year, so I'd like to do that each day of the Christmas season and celebrate Epiphany somehow.

Adventures:

- Visit a Seattle attraction at least once a month. We want to take the water taxi to Alki Beach sometime this summer. In September, we'll probably go to the state fair, in October we'll go to the pumpkin patch, and in December we'd like to get a real Christmas tree for the first time. (Although I'm worried I might be allergic since I tend to be allergic to nature in general.) I know Claire and Maggie would get a big kick out of the aquarium too.

- Maybe visit my family in China? My Dad, who's an engineer at a big oil company, received a temporary assignment to Shanghai for three years. They just wrapped up year two. We were planning to go to China next May for Scott's graduation, right before they moved back. But, they just got word that they'll most likely have to come back in December instead (which is a major bummer because Scott will have to finish his last semester of high school somewhere else, I mean, the same high school he went to in ninth grade, so it could be worse, but he'd much rather stay with all his friends in China at this point). We're crossing our fingers that they'll actually be able to stay for the whole school year, but if not, we're hoping to visit them in November or December. My sister (who's already visited them there) generously offered to watch Claire and Maggie for the week.

Resolutions Revisited

Let's check in and see how I did on my resolutions for the first half of the year, shall we?



Adam:
- Went on four dates, for Valentine's Day, both of our birthdays, and a bonus date of a quick dinner and holy hour while my sister was visiting in March.
-  Threw a pierogi party for his birthday, which happened to coincide with the canonization of St. John Paul the Great. 

 

Claire:
- Signed her up for a Saturday morning gymnastics class through our community center to get us through the dreary winter months.
- Celebrated her second birthday with small party and a "just Claire" date to get her first hair cut. We also made her a little video to commemorate her second year and appliqued a pillow with her name on it using the fabrics from her monthly photo project.
- Made an effort to play more kid-friendly music in the car and just throughout the day.

 

Maggie:
- Did some minor sleep training to get her to go down to sleep quickly and moved her into the nursery at night. She still wakes up once per night most of the time and ends up in the pack-n-play.
- Started her on solid foods at six months.
- Made an effort to read books just for her.

House:
- Moved into a lovely rental home at the beginning of March.
- Changed addresses with various institutions and sent moving announcements.
- Got mostly settled in by the end of May, although we still don't have any pictures on the walls.

 

Crafts:
- Made our yearly photo book with Blurb.
- Sewed an Easter table runner and twelve cloth napkins.
- Didn't start Jesse tree ornaments yet and am beginning to doubt they will happen at all this year.

Adventures:
- We didn't have any goals to venture out of our suburb for the first three months of the year, with dreary weather and a tiny baby.
- But in April, we went to the tulip festival and in May we went to Volunteer Park in Capitol Hill.
- Then, in June, we went on a two-week trip to visit relatives back east in Ottawa, Montreal, and Florida. It went way better than we hoped! But it was also ridiculously expensive and unfortunately won't be happening again for a few years.

 

Reading:
- Read a few spiritual books, like Jennifer Fulwiler's fabulous memoir, but not the one I originally planned on. I definitely want to finish the Little Oratory before the end of the year.
- Didn't read a history book yet. Right now I'm eyeing "The Professor and the Madman" a supposedly fascinating account of the creation of the Oxford Dictionary.
 

 Other:
- I got a physical with a NFP only family doctor. We ordered prescription sunglasses from Warby Parker and we finally updated our will.
-  We still need to do some annoying financial paperwork we've been putting off forever, like moving some money out of a retirement fund we got while working at a community college day camp in high school. I think that's been on our to-do list as long as we've been married...
- Didn't make much progress on grocery savings. Right now, I alternate weeks between Costco and Whole Foods because they both have double shopping carts. I try to get as much as possible at Costco and just pick up a few essentials, like produce, at Whole Foods. Since moving into our house in March, we get all our dairy products delivered and we thought about joining a CSA this summer, but ultimately decided there was too much of a risk of the veggies going to waste.

2014 Resolutions: January to June

Let's check in and see how I did on my resolutions for the second half of 2013:

Take a baby swim class with Claire. Check! We took swim lessons at the Y during July and August. Was it necessary? Absolutely not. But did it give us something fun to look forward to each week? Definitely!

Update my recipe binder. Check! It was something I'd been meaning to do for quite a while and actually only took one weekend nap session to bang out. 

Finish decorating our apartment. Almost, almost check. I have a few pieces in our hallway gallery wall that I need to update (the ones with important family dates and our hand prints) now that we've added a new member to the family.

Assemble our Halloween costumes. Check! We dressed up as Peanuts characters. I wish we'd gotten some better pictures, but it was only ten days after Maggie's arrival, so things were just a tad crazy that evening. Oh well. 

Finish all of our Christmas shopping. Almost, almost check. Usually my goal is to finish Christmas shopping before Advent, but this year I tried to have it done before Maggie arrived. I made our parents an "instagram a day" calendar, but I didn't quite make it to 365 pictures in time, so that one had to wait until November. 

Have Maggie baptized. Check! Her godparents and our good friends, Joe and Alex, came to visit for the affair. It was such a great day. 

Celebrate a very low-key Thanksgiving and Christmas. Check! I'm so glad we kept things pretty simple for the holidays this year, because even with our low-key festivities all the excitement was too much for Claire. Major meltdowns were had on both days.

Read one history book and three spiritual books over the year. Not even close. I finished the history book, The Penguin History of Canada, in the first half of the year, but I only read one spiritual book, Saints for Catholic Moms. I am way too embarrassed to admit how much of the book I read on New Year's Eve! 

And here are my resolutions for the first half of 2014. It's going to be a good one!

Make some seasonal decorations. At the top of my list are an Easter table runner and napkins. I have festive table linens for every other major holiday, but I haven't gotten around to Easter yet. I think because it's been hard to find fabric I really like. I'm hoping to get started on Jesse Tree ornaments with the goal of having them completed by the beginning of Advent. Oh, and my craft project to-do list also includes making a photo book documenting the previous year, of course!

Make a birthday present for Claire. For a long time, I've had the idea of finding an old play kitchen on Craig's List and fixing it up, but I'm not really sure if that's a feasible project right now. Besides the time, where could we hide that from her while we're working on it, you know? So it's looking more like we'll just buy her a play kitchen as her big second birthday present. Maybe I'll make her something with her monthly fabrics instead, like a pillow with her name appliqued on it to go with her first birthday quilt. We'll see. We definitely want to make another birthday video and also take her for her first hair cut to celebrate turning two. 

Sign up for a little Saturday gymnastics class through our community center. Winter weekends with small children cooped up inside can be, um, not the most fun thing ever. So, I think this gymnastics class will be the perfect solution - it'll get us out of the house and it will get Claire the exercise she needs to take a nice long afternoon nap! But once spring hits, I'd like to make sure we get out and explore Seattle again at least once a month. In April, we want to visit the tulip festival again for sure. And maybe in May we'll finally take the ferry out to Bainbridge Island.

Move into a bigger place. It's looking like we'll be moving into a rental home at the end of February! We were originally planning to move sometime over the summer, so it's a little sooner than we were thinking, but we happened upon a place that was exactly what we were looking for. I'll definitely share more details as soon as things are finalized. Besides the whole unpacking thing, we'll also need to update our address with various institutions and send moving announcements.

Have the girls share a room. This will most likely involve teaching Maggie how to sleep through the night and get on a good nap schedule, which I think we'll do around six months. Unless she just decides to do that on her own. There's always hope, right? We were originally thinking we'd have to move Claire into a twin bed to make this possible, but now that we'll have a guest bed room, I think we'll just buy another crib for the nursery that can be turned into a toddler bed when she's ready for it.  While we're on the subject of kid milestones, I guess I should mention starting Maggie on solids. I want to make sure to give myself grace if I just don't get around to making all of her purees.

Play more kid-friendly music for the girls in the car and just at home during the day. We usually listen to either the Christian or classical stations while driving. We also have a radio in our kitchen, so we switch between those at home too. But I have a car adapter for my phone and I can also play it through that kitchen radio, so I really have no excuses for keeping things so boring. Just this week I put the Sound of Music soundtrack on my phone and it's made car rides completely free of whining. And in the whole being a better mom vein, I want to make sure I read books just to Maggie, rather than only ones her sister likes, starting around six months or so.

Get a physical. I've seen lots of the dentist, optometrist, and obstetrician, but I haven't been to a family doctor since I stopped going to the pediatrician. I'm turning twenty-five in May, so I think it's probably time, at least so we have someone to call if and when we do get sick. I just found out there's a NFP-only doctor in our neighborhood, so I'm pretty excited to meet with her. And on the subject of doctors, Adam and I both need to go in for an eye exam and finally get some prescription sunglasses. I only need to wear glasses while driving but, man, I am so tired of squinting! 

Update our will. When Claire arrived, we downloaded some forms and wrote one ourselves. But now we have access to legal services through Adam's company and we have another baby, so it's time we got that squared away. Along the same lines, we just have a whole bunch of grown-up paperwork-type stuff we've been putting off, like moving some funds into Adam's 401k from a retirement account we got while working at community college day camp in high school. 

Spend less on groceries. We live right across the street from a grocery store right now and also within walking distance of Trader Joe's, so we pretty much just frequent those two spots with occasional trips to Costco. But once we move, we'll be closer to a couple different grocery stores and we'll have more space to buy in bulk. Maybe we'll even invest in another freezer? Some price comparison is definitely in order.

Go on at least three dates. We'd like to have a night out for each of our birthdays (in April and May) and at some other point earlier in the year. Our go-to babysitter is graduating from high school, so we really need to ask friends for recommendations and find someone else to call too. Oh, and speaking of birthdays, Blessed John Paul II is being canonized on Adam's birthday, so I'd like to throw a little Polish-themed party to celebrate!

Visit our relatives in Florida and Ottawa in one big trip back east. Adam's family is having a big reunion at his grandparent's place outside Orlando in June, which should be a really great time. While we're there, we thought we'd save the cost/time of an extra plane trip and visit my grandma in Ottawa too. Montreal is only two hours away and somewhere we've always wanted to visit, so I think we'll spend a few days there in between. Since we'll actually be flying into Canada this time, we'll need to get passports for Claire and Maggie.

Read one history book and one spiritual book. This resolution applies to the entire year. Since I tackled Canada last year, I'd really like to head south and learn more about Mexico this time. And I've heard so many good things about Saintly Solutions that I think it'll be my pick for the year. 

2013 Resolutions: July to December

 My resolutions for the second half of the year fall into two camps - before baby and after baby.


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Before Maggie Arrives Around October 24th:

Keep up some resolutions from the first part of the year. Continue sending birthday cards to friends, work on cooking from scratch more, finish my spiritual reading goals, explore Seattle at least once a month, schedule a date night at least every other month.

Take a baby swim class with Claire. I like mom-and-baby activities. They're a great way to meet people and get out of the house. During the school year, we usually have music class, church play group, and library story time.  But, both music class and play group are out for the summer right now. So, we signed up for a swim class at the Y for July and August. Claire seems to like the pool, so I think it'll be a fun experience for us.

Update my recipe binder. Right before Claire was born, I compiled a nicely organized recipe binder. I still use it all the time, but I've yet to add any new recipes. No more searching through Pinterest or blog archives to find that one recipe again as I'm scrambling to get dinner ready!

Finish decorating our apartment. For the past year, I've had a running to-do list of home projects to tackle. We are very, very close to crossing every item off.  Then Adam will get a good eight month break before we move next summer and he has to hang all our frames on new walls!

Assemble our Halloween costumes. Even though Claire is still a little young for trick-or-treating, I just love dressing up for Halloween. Since Maggie's due date is one week before Halloween, I need to think of a family costume that will work if I'm pregnant or not and if she's here or not.

Finish all of our Christmas shopping. I usually try to get our Christmas shopping done by the first Sunday of Advent. This year, I'd love to have everything bought and wrapped by mid-October. I'd also like to make a gift for each of our girls. I'm thinking these dolls really need to happen.

Prepare for Maggie's arrival. Of course, I have a long baby prep checklist as well. Perhaps that's a story for another post. You know, setting up the car seat and swing. Washing and organizing all the newborn clothes. That kind of thing. Besides the usual prenatal appointments and choosing her name, we haven't done a thing!

After Maggie Arrives Around October 24th:

Have Maggie baptized. I also plan to have family photos taken and send birth announcements.

Celebrate a very low-key Thanksgiving and Christmas. With such a tiny baby, not to mention a twenty-month old, we won't be traveling for either holiday. We celebrated Thanksgiving on our own last year, but this will be our first time not going home for Christmas. My family is coming to Seattle to meet Maggie, though, so I'm really looking forward to hosting them! I know they'll definitely be on board for keeping things super simple.

Resolutions Revisited

2013 is already halfway over! That means it's time to check in with my resolutions for the first half of the year...

Well, actually, let's back up to the stuff I didn't quite finish from the last half of 2012. 

Get a new license plate. Check! After we paid off our car and received the title, we got ourselves a Washington license plate. So, I guess you can say we're officially moved in.

Finish Claire's Christmas present. Check! I finally finished the six remaining felt alphabet magnets at the very end of June. Good thing she didn't miss them at all. 

Alright, moving onto my resolutions for the first half of 2013. 

Visit our friends in Pittsburgh. Check! We visited our friends in Pittsburgh over the MLK long weekend in January and had the very best time.

Make a photo book for the previous year. Check! I made our first family yearbook, Claire's baby book, and re-did our wedding album. So, now our whole life is documented via photo book.

Teach Claire some baby sign language. Kinda check? So far, she only knows the sign for "all done." We definitely had trouble being consistent with this, just like I predicted. We did tackle our other big parenting challenge, though, and successfully transitioned her from formula to whole milk and from bottles to sippy cups.

Send birthday cards. Check! I sent birthday cards to all of my friends, as well as some homemade birthday gifts to Claire's baby friends.

Get out and explore our new city. Almost check? We missed January and May {not so coincidentally the months we went on cross-country trips} but were successful the other four months. In February, we went to the MOHAI and Adam climbed Mount Si. In March, we went to Pike Place Market and I went to Victoria. In April, we went to the tulip festival. And in June, we went to Snoqualmie, Pike Place Market, and the Chihuly Museum.

Make Claire a quilt for her first birthday. Check! I used the fabric from her monthly photos to make a quilt, doll quilt, and birthday banner.

Build a desk for our bedroom.  Check! We finished this project just under the wire and are completely thrilled with how it turned out. 

Visit our family in Houston. Check! We spent two weeks there in May for both of our sisters' graduations and also got to visit Adam's grandpa in New Orleans.

Make more things from scratch. Kinda check? In particular, I wanted to work on pie crust and pizza dough. Morning sickness threw me off for a few months, but I'm doing really with the pizza dough. Although I found a recipe I really love for pie crust, I often still take the easy way out and use a store-bought crust.

Hire a babysitter every other month. Check! We actually got out for a date night every month besides January. In February, we went out for Valentine's Day. In March, we went to the movies. In April, we celebrated Adam's birthday. In May, we celebrated my birthday. And in June, we actually got to spend a night at a hotel. 

I also made some reading goals for the whole year, so let's see my progress there.

  
One history-related book. Check! I read the Penguin History of Canada and learned so much about my native land.

A spiritual book for the mind, the heart, and the soul. Definitely a ways to go. I am halfway through Saints for Catholic Moms and I've read the first couple chapters of Three to Get Married. Adam and I like to keep track of how many books we read per year. So far, his nine is handily beating my seven! 

2013 Resolutions: January to June

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Let's check in and see how I did on my resolutions for the second half of 2012:

Find a new apartment, move in, and unpack.  Almost check. We're unpacked and we've done most of the little tasks that come with moving, but we still need to get a new license plate. Our bank is taking forever to send us a copy of the title. There's a distinct possibility we'll own the car outright before they get around to sending it. {Hooray!}

Celebrate Claire's first Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas in style.  Almost, almost check. We had a pretty cute family costume, Claire even dressed up for All Saints Day, and we cooked our first official Thanksgiving meal, but I haven't quite finished Claire's homemade Christmas present.

And here are my resolutions for the first half of 2013. I'm excited!

Visit our friends in Pittsburgh. We actually already have this trip planned. We're really dreading the long flight {airplanes with a mobile baby are not much fun} but are so excited to see everyone!

Make a photo book for the previous year. The last photo book I made documented our college experience, so it ended with Adam's graduation in April. I can't decide if I should make another book for the second half of 2012 or lump it in with 2013. I think I'll to go ahead and make the pages in Blurb's software and then decide if there's enough for a whole book.

Teach Claire some baby sign language. I know I will have trouble being consistent with this, but I would love to teach her a few signs so we can communicate more easily. We also need to switch from formula to whole milk and from bottles to sippy cups around her first birthday. We have been trying to get her to drink water from a sippy cup for a while without much success. Any tips?

Send birthday cards. I just love getting real mail. Ever since I became a stay-at-home mom, I have been weirdly excited to check the mail everyday. So I want to spread some snail mail cheer by sending birthday cards to friends, rather than texts, emails, or Facebook posts.

Get out and explore our new city. With this winter weather, we have found ourselves slipping into a weekend rut. Between Claire's naps on Saturday, we usually run an errand and grab a bite for lunch. I don't think we've done any exploring since Halloween! We need to get our act together and spend at least one Saturday a month doing a fun Seattle activity.

Make Claire a quilt for her first birthday. I'm planning to turn the fabric from Claire's monthly photos into a very simple quilt. Here's hoping it involves fewer tears of frustration than my last sewing project...

Build a desk for our bedroom. We have been searching high and low for an affordable, somewhat stylish computer desk that will fit in our bedroom. Call us crazy, but we're thinking maybe we should try building it ourselves? Again, we're thinking very, very simple.

Visit our family in Houston. Both of our sisters are graduating in May, two weeks apart, and we would love to be there to support them. Unfortunately, it's a pretty busy time for Adam at work, so we're not sure what this trip will look like yet. But we're crossing our fingers that everything falls into place!

Make more things from scratch. Speaking of doing the same thing every weekend, we almost always have pizza on Saturday nights and pancakes or waffles after Mass on Sunday. I used to be really good at making those things from scratch, but I've turned to Bisquick and Trader Joe's pizza dough ever since Claire arrived. But now that she's nine months old, I don't think I have much of an excuse anymore. I haven't had much success with it in the past, but I'd also like to give homemade pie crust another try.

Hire a babysitter every other month. We had so much fun on our date night last month! We want to make sure we never go four months without getting out as a couple again. While we'd certainly like to have dates more often than every other month, babysitting is pretty expensive and Claire goes to bed so early now that we still get plenty of couple time.

I also have a few reading resolutions for the entire year: 

One history-related book. I was a history major in college and want to keep up with that knowledge somehow. I re-read the whole Anne of Green Gables series last year and it inspired me to learn more about my native land, Canada!

A spiritual book for the head, the heart, and the soul. I found this idea in one of my favorite books about the liturgical year. I'm planning to read Signs of Life {for the head}, Three to Get Married {for the heart}, and Saints for Catholic Moms {for the soul}.

Of course, I hope to read more than four books throughout the year, but this is just to ensure that I read something other than silly, girly books! What are your plans for the new year?

2012: Accomplishments

Image Via

Adam...

Graduated from college.

Started his first real job.
Changed his first diaper and quickly graduated to expert status.
Finally got that dang shelf hung up in the laundry room. 

Read thirteen books.

Caitlin ....

Had her insides cut open and a baby removed.
Unpacked our new apartment while wearing said baby. 

Relearned how to make dinner and keep the house reasonably clean. 

 Sewed her first article of clothing using a pattern.  

Read thirty-two books.

Claire...

Exited the womb in a very alarming manner.
Spent two weeks in the NICU recovering from said exit.
Learned how to smile, laugh, babble, and shout.
Was baptized into the Catholic Church.
Learned how to take naps and sleep through the night.
Took six plane rides and three car trips. 
Celebrated her first Easter, Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas.
Learned how to roll over, sit up, scoot and stand.
Tripled her birth weight and grew three teeth.

We...

Moved across the country, from Pittsburgh to Seattle.
Swam in the Pacific Ocean for the first time.
Traveled to a new province, British Columbia, bringing our total to ten states and two provinces.
Started eating dinner as family regularly and just generally found our new normal as a family of three.

Resolutions Revisited

In January, I made some resolutions for the first half of the year. Let's check in and see how I did, shall we? 

{funny check list from here}

Give the apartment a good spring cleaning. Check! I spent each week in February deep-cleaning a room. 

Read one history-related book. Check! I read nineteen books so far this year, including one by a historian, Supremacy and Survival. It's about the Catholic Church in England from the Reformation to the present day. 

Paint our tv stand white. Check! In January, I painted our tv stand and did a few other little painting projects. 

Create a usable recipe binder. Check! In February, I typed up all my favorite recipes and organized them into a pretty binder. 

Make a photo book documenting our college years. Almost Check. I did most of the book over spring break and finished up the last few pages in May. But, it's a pretty big book {120 pages} and therefore pretty expensive {$50 from Blurb} so I am waiting until we get that first real-job paycheck to order it. 

Prepare for Baby's arrival. Almost Check. We got all the important stuff done, but Claire's unexpected arrival meant that some things didn't get crossed off my to-do list. Luckily, my sister came to visit the week after Claire was born and stocked our freezer with meals. Adam and I did have one last pre-baby date planned {to the symphony and a fancy French restaurant} that we missed out on. Oh, well. That's life, right?

After Baby arrives, send out birth announcements and get he or she baptized. Check! In April, basically every second I wasn't feeding Claire, I was writing thank-you notes and addressing birth announcements. We had some gift certificates to Shutterfly, so we got these ones for just the cost of shipping. And Claire was baptized at our home parish in early June. 

Visit everyone we know on the East Coast. Check! We visited my relatives in Canada in May. In June, we visited our parents in Houston as well as Adam's relatives in Louisiana and Florida. 

Pack up our apartment and move across the country to Seattle. Check!  We are very blessed to have movers coming to pack everything. I just organized Claire's clothes and my craft supplies into a few Rubbermaid containers we had stashed in the basement. {All of this was previously crammed under our bed. I'm really not that organized, just good at hiding stuff.}

My goals for the second half of the year are much more low-key:

Find a new apartment, move in, and unpack. {Along with the dozens of little things that come with moving like updating our address with various companies, finding new doctors, and getting new driver's licenses.}

Celebrate Claire's first Halloween, Thanksgiving and Christmas in style. {I've almost convinced Adam that we should dress Claire up as a hot dog for Halloween and then we can be ketchup and mustard. Also, I really want to make one of Claire's Christmas gifts. I'm thinking this and maybe these.}

And that's it!