My Great Expectations (Of Myself)

I am so behind once again! I have so much I want to write about, and I need to get with it soon or I'm never going to catch up. I especially need to finally post about our fabulous vacation to Hawaii in January...its been almost two months since then! I also have a lot of fun things to write about Tommy...I am always wishing I was better at writing down the little things he says and does every day, his milestones and his little habits and tendencies. He is growing up so frighteningly fast!

One thing I will say is that I am stressing out...my due date, April 22nd, is now officially less than two months away and I feel like I have SO much to do! The "nesting" instinct hits me really hard during pregnancy...I not only feel this huge urgency to do all the things to get ready for the baby, but I get this overwhelming, crazy desire to accomplish every little project I've been putting off forever, before the baby comes...organizing and filing papers, re-arranging closets, scrapbooking Thomas' photos, cleaning and organizing the basement, having a yard sale...the list goes on and on! I know 99% of it probably won't happen, and I'm trying to accept that, but it really is hard to fight this urge to just try and DO IT ALL! I remember that feeling being just as strong when I was pregnant with Thomas...even after he was born I still felt that way, like I should be able to accomplish everything perfectly along with caring for a newborn. Of course, that was ridiculous of me. I got pretty discouraged and felt pretty down when I realized it was simply impossible to "do it all." So, this time I am trying to battle against forming too high of expectations for myself. I just want to enjoy our little boy when he arrives and take the time to really soak in those first, few precious weeks of newborn-hood!

Though I'm excited, I am worrying a lot about how I won't be able to spend as much one-on-one time with Thomas after the baby arrives. It occurred to me recently that Thomas is the only child I will ever have had the chance to focus on 100%, all the time. That made me a little sad, realizing that never again will I have that opportunity. And it makes me wish I had done more fun things with Thomas while it was just him. I've never really mentioned it on my blog, because it is a little embarrassing for me, but when Thomas was around 6 months I started developing terrible back pain that stretched out over almost the next year and a half, which I eventually found out was from a badly herniated disc. It was very painful to walk around for very long periods of time, it was difficult to stand up straight a lot of the time and it made even simple things like going grocery shopping miserable for me. I'm so much better now and have been for quite some time, but it breaks my heart thinking about all the things I didn't do with Thomas during that time, just because the pain was hard to deal with...like taking him to the park and the zoo more. I will never get that time back! On top of all of my great plans, I really want to become better at exercising after this baby arrives, not just to lose weight, but also to become healthier and stronger. I never want back problems or anything to get in my way again!

So...I am a little scared about how to find the right balance in having both a newborn and a toddler, and finding a tiny slice of time for myself somewhere in there as well, but I'm hoping things will fall into place naturally and that it will be easier than I think it will. I tend to worry about things to a point that is usually far beyond what is necessary! But I can't deny the countdown is making me more anxious each day...I have 57 days to go, and maybe even less if our baby boy arrives early like Thomas. He was 12 days early! I'm going to try and remind myself repeatedly these next several weeks, to just do what I absolutely have to, then do whatever else I can, and then just let the rest be. And I am grateful to have the advantage of some hindsight this time...thinking back on my first weeks and months with Thomas, I care way more about my memories of time spent with him than I do of how clean my house was...or wasn't!

Sweet Little Baby

....No, not my sweet little baby!

I am way behind on writing about this news, but we have a new niece! My oldest brother Josh and his wife Jenise welcomed their baby girl, Avarie Allene Kotter, on December 26th. She weighed 7 lbs and was 19 inches long. She is their fourth baby, and they were so excited to have another girl...they now have the perfect little family of 2 boys and 2 girls. My niece Anika, their oldest, was especially excited that she finally got a baby sister! This is the second time Jenise and I have been pregnant around the same time...Thomas and my nephew Zander(Alexander) were born just 2 1/2 months apart. When Jenise found out she was having a girl I was hoping I might be having a girl too, and was excited about us having little girls together this time around. Even though it didn't work out that way, I'm so happy our little boy will have a cousin his age to play with!

We got to meet Avarie when she was about 3 weeks old, when Josh and Jeni and the kids came up from Blanding for some meetings Josh had in Salt Lake. Avarie is so darling and I absolutely love all her beautiful dark hair! Thomas was very excited about holding her...I was a little worried about him holding her on his own, so I just let him sit next to me and help me hold her. I had to keep him from trying to tug her out of my arms a couple of times! He was so cute to watch. I was excited for him to see Avarie so he could see a little newborn baby and we could talk to him about how his baby brother would be little just like her. He seems more and more excited about having a baby brother the more we talk about it, and I am sure he will be a great big brother! Holding Avarie got me excited too, about the time when I will have my own tiny little newborn to hold and rock again!

Congratulations Josh & Jeni!