Cleaning and Bunnies

So I’ve been struggling a little lately in my housewife role. I’ve always loved having a clean house and from a young age, my mom made me do my part in the cleaning. Like scrubbing toilets, dusting and vacuuming. Not just picking up or making my bed (which, by the way, she never made me do) So, cleaning is something I’m used to and really don’t mind much doing. However…… lately I feel like I work so hard to clean and pick up and organize only to have it back to a pig sty the next day. It takes me 2 days to clean the house with 2 kids, sometimes longer, and I’m not the type of person that can do just 1 little thing each day. I like to do everything at once and have it all clean at the same time. And I do this every other week. Maybe I just need to lower my expectations and realize that I have 2 kids 2 and under and that it’s just not realistic to have a clean, mess-free house. I mean I don’t expect it to be perfect, but I’d just like to be able to see the floor in the living room every now and then.

We’ve talked about getting a cleaning lady, but I just can’t bring myself to spend the money. I stay at home and feel like that’s part of my job description. I know that this really isn’t that big of a deal, but it’s been a major source of frustration for me lately. I also know that this is just a season and that I need to enjoy the messes my kids make now, because they will be much worse when Fischer is playing sports and leaving sweaty socks and jock straps on the floor.

I just feel like I spend so much time and energy cleaning. It’s wearing me out! I wouldn’t trade it for anything though, and I know that is just comes with the territory. Hopefully I can find a peace in the messiness and figure out a cleaning system that keeps me sane. I want my kids to enjoy their childhood and not worry about making Mom made when they make a mess.

In other news, Matt has taken this week off to do some work around the house. It’s been awesome having him home and he just told me he realizes how much I do during the day and that he’s glad he’s not here. Haha. That might also be part of why I’ve been stressed out with the cleanliness of the house. When you add another person in the house all day plus cooking another meal, it tends to get messy faster. Plus we all know that boys are not the cleanest. That being said, I have to tell a story about him…

One of his big projects while he’s home is to clean up the outside of the house. There are just piles upon piles of JUNK and tree limbs. It’s been driving Matt crazy so he got after them yesterday with the tractor. Well, I guess he uncovered a nest of baby rabbits that was in a big pile of tree limbs. Before I go any further, our dog has been known to kill baby rabbits just by licking them. He just loves them to death and we call him Lenny. So Matt uncovers this nest and feels bad, so he catches one that had run off, covers them back up with some grass and leaves them there thinking that they really won’t last long with Lenny around. Today he went to take out the trash and was gone for a while. He comes back in and says that he just had to move the baby rabbits. They were still there all cuddled up and shaking so he put them in a big can and covered them up with their grass hoping that would give them a better chance at surviving (mind you, we have no shortage of rabbits around here.) He said he just couldn’t bear the thought that he had uncovered them and that they might not make it because of that. I said, “Well, they’re just rabbits.” And he said, “But they’re babies.” I know…stab me in the heart….So hopefully Matt saved the baby bunnies and they’ll grow big and strong and eat his garden down to stumps.

I love that I married a man that has a tender heart and can only pray that that quality is instilled in Fischer as well. That quality is how he takes care of me and the kids the best. Yeah, he works hard and brings home the bacon and does the manly stuff, but he also loves us and cares for us 1000 times more than he cared for those baby bunnies. I am so blessed to call him mine.

Random Thoughts

Just a brain dump post...

• I was doing laundry today and you know what I noticed and what really bothered me? Why do they put actual back pockets on little kid pants? That material always just gets bunched up and wrinkely. Add that to the diaper and serious ghetto booty occurs. What are kids going to put back there anyways? You would think they could cut costs by just doing fake pockets....annoying...
• I'm making a quilt for Piper. It's my biggest sewing venture yet and I'm excited! I noticed that the only blankets we have to put on the floor for her to play on are Fischer's. So I wanted her to have a girly one. Hopefully it turns out good and she will love it for years to come.
• We have been invaded by moths. We think they are coming from the attic through various holes that are still in the ceiling from our house not being fully finished. Matt went crazy last night and murdered about 20 in the kitchen. There were dead bodies everywhere. They are pretty much only in the kitchen and our bedroom. I wake up every night to the sound of wings hitting the window. Not fun. For some reason when I kill one I always think of the movie Monsters vs. Aliens where there's the giant moth. These are not as cute....Especially when they fly out of the cabinet at you when you are just trying to fix your breakfast.
• I am still trying to lose the baby weight. I didn't really worry about it for 5 months because I was breastfeeding, but now that I'm not, I just can't get my butt in gear. I'm stuck at the same place I was after Fischer. I started weight watchers then and lost about 12 pounds, before I got pregnant again, but this time I just can't stick with it. Then, Matt was on the rig and it was easy to stay on the program because I wasn't worried about cooking something for him. Now, I cook for Matt and Fischer and it's just harder. I'm trying to make an effort because I hate the way I feel when I get dressed, but I still find myself eating whatever I want. I'm getting really frustrated. Especially with summer coming. Ugh....
• I really do love living out in the country. It's so peaceful and private. Matt has been working hard on his giant garden and I'm so excited to have TONS (and I do mean tons...we might have to open a road side stand) of fresh vegetables. Fischer loves riding the tractors. Miles loves roaming around. It's just so quiet. Oh, and Matt borrowed a pellet gun for me so I can shoot the black birds. So far him and my dad have been hogging it, so I've only shot it once. I will tell you that that one time I shot it, I hurt myself. I've never shot a gun with a scope on it and didn't know you were supposed to have your eye further back from it. Well, I had my eye right up to the scope and shot the gun and the scope popped me in the eye...I still have a headache, but thankfully no black eye.
• Matt bought me a new car!!! I am so excited and cannot wait for it to come in. We needed something bigger and my car is already 8 years old. It's been a good car and if we just had one kid, it would still have worked, but it is just too cramped. Just 4 to 6 more weeks!

Well, I think that's about it. Congratulations if you have made it this far. And hopefully I'll keep up the more regular posting.

Fischer- 2 Years

Well, we officially have a 2-year-old! We combined his birthday with the Easter festivities and it was so fun. (Pictures below.) A family friend made Fischer’s cake and it was amazing! Fischer loved it and even blew out the candles all by himself! He had a blast and, of course, didn’t get any presents.

It’s amazing to see how much Fischer has grown this past year. It seems like the first year is all about physical development and the second year is cognitive. His vocabulary is huge and he understands more of what we say than we realize. (We find this out too late, of course.) He can’t sing his ABC’s by himself yet, but he will fill in the blank for you while you’re singing them. He counts pretty well, but skips a few numbers every now and then. He can recognize a few written numbers and letters. My dad got him a John Deere DVD and he now knows the differences between tractors, combines, scoop tractors, excavators, and bull dozers. He is obsessed. We watch that movie every day and he got some more for his birthday. I think I’m already John Deere’d out. He loves to sing. His favorite songs are the ABC song, Jesus Loves Me, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star, and Ring Around the Rosy. As I’m typing this, he is in bed singing his ABC’s. He just finished and said, “Yay!” Cracks me up.

He makes us laugh now more than ever. He just comes up with the funniest things, and is also starting to get that little kid call-it-like-you-see-it frankness. The other day he was on the floor. I knew exactly what he was doing and asked him if he was pooping. He sat there for a second, smiled real big and said, “Surprise!” Yes, Fischer, you did have a surprise for me in that diaper. Not my kind of surprise though.

He really is at a fun age. Temper tantrums and all.

Piper-5 Months!

 Our Piper is 5 months old!

I can’t believe how fast she is growing up. She is still working on rolling over, but she’s also starting to sit up better. If I try to prop her up on the Boppy, she tries to pull herself up to a sitting position. She really works those abs! She has tried rice cereal and apples and does not think much of either. The apples made her gag more than the cereal though. We’ll keep trying. I didn’t have to try this hard with Fischer. He was all about the baby food. She has gotten herself on a pretty good schedule since I have stopped breastfeeding. We don’t think she was getting enough, so I went ahead and started her on formula. Much happier baby! She wakes up around 7 or 7:30 and takes her morning nap from 8:30 to 10:30. She eats around 12:30 or 1 then goes down for a nap until 3:30 or 4. We put her to bed around 8 or 8:30. She is pretty predictable and I really appreciate that.

She is just the sweetest thing and we are getting to see more and more of her personality coming out every day. Her hair is staying dark, but could still lighten up some. We will see. We put her in the jumper and she loves it, but hasn’t figured out how to bounce yet. It took Fischer a while too. She’ll get it and love it just like him. Speaking of Fischer, she is entranced by him. She never takes her eyes off him. Now that might be because he whacked her pretty hard on the head with a water hose attachment the other day (and yes, he got the worst spanking of his life), but for the most part she smiles and talks to him while he plays. He still shows little interest in her (except for the head whacking incident) but always asks about her when she’s not in the room. Hopefully they will be pretty good buddies.

We just love this little sweetheart and can’t wait to see her grow up. But I’d also be ok with her staying little for just a bit longer…

Things are getting pretty busy around the Dunnihoo household so I should have some more blog material soon. I'd like to post some recipes and share what's been going on with our house. There's been a lot of work done around here but there's still so much more to go. We've also got Fischer's 2nd birthday coming up, so it should be fun!

Two

First of all I want to thank everyone for your kind words and encouragement on my last post. It’s so nice to know that I am not alone!


I titled this post TWO because I wanted to let you all know that the Terrible Twos are not a myth. We are living them and who knows if we will survive. Just kidding, but I might be going gray earlier than I’d hoped.

Fischer has always been a pretty good kid, he had his moments, but we could always take him to restaurants and things without really thinking about it. Until recently. I know they didn’t get the name “Terrible Two’s” for no reason. I guess I just never really believed it until I saw it with my own eyes. He knows exactly how to push my buttons and seems to get enjoyment out of it. He refuses to let me change his diaper and thinks it’s a pretty funny game to run away from me when it’s time. He asks for something (milk, snack) and the runs away when I try to hand it to him. He screams like a banshee for no apparent reason, and throws himself on the floor when he doesn’t get his way. I know it will get better and that this is only a phase, but how could something so sweet turn into something so crazy? Where did this sweet, innocent, perfect little angel go?

Our main struggle with Fischer right now is getting him transitioned to a big bed. We are down to locking him in his room and letting him scream. Not my favorite option, but I’m ready for some sleep. He’ll get there. All the books and his doctor say it should only take a few nights, and we’re not very far in. Matt is on the rig right now, so it’s just me powering through by myself. Matt is probably happy to be gone right now, but it may be part of the problem. Matt is usually the one to put him to bed and he loves his daddy like no other. I’m just the crazy lady that lives with dad. But we’ll see. I know just like everything else, it is only a season.

Now that I’ve given everyone with no kids a reason to not have them, I will say that Fischer is making us laugh now more than ever. He says the funniest things and is probably too smart for his own good. He knows his colors, is learning his ABC’s and can sometimes count to 4. Two is his favorite number and he will show you with one finger on each hand. Anything that is more than 1 is 2. Even if it is a herd of cows, it’s 2 cows. He is quite the character and even though we are having a power struggle, I know he won’t be 2 for long and I WILL miss these days with him. He’s a pretty special little boy and I love him like crazy.

Even when I’m pulling my hair out and screaming into the pillow.

Real

So I've been thinking a lot lately about this little blog. When I first started, it was mostly for our parents and family to keep up with Fischer since we lived so far away. Well, now that we've moved home and they see him and Piper several times a week, it's not so much necessary anymore. I still want to document our kids' lives for our sake since I am horrible at scrapbooking or even putting stuff in their baby books, but I also want to share more of my thoughts. Make this a little more real and honest than just telling what our kids are up to. Let's be honest...I'm sure it gets a little old. They're babies...they do baby stuff. They're cute, we love them...blah blah blah. I'm not even sure anyone reads this, but since my adult conversations are limited these days, and Matt gets tired of listening to me gripe, I need another outlet for my thoughts. And sure, since I'm a stay-at-home mom, most of my thoughts are probably going to be about the ankle biters, but I also want to try to be honest about my struggles and hopefully some of my successes..we'll see about that one. I am probably the farthest you can get to the perfect mom and wife and hopefully I will be able to gain a little insight on how I can serve my children and husband better. So...here goes.

Honestly, I never really wanted to have kids. I wanted a career first of all and I would think about children later...if ever. I was going to be an architect/civil engineer. Well, that all changed my first semester in college. I figured out architecture was not for me. I started to really think about where I wanted to go in my life and was starting to realize that maybe I did want a family. I started looking at different majors. I didn't want to be a teacher (I wasn't good with kids) I really had no idea. I saw the program for social work and thought "Why not?" I switched majors and that is what I have my degree in. Somewhere in there I came to the full realization that I did, in fact, want to be a stay-at-home wife and mother. That was where I was supposed to be.

Matt and I got married and moved to Hobbs. We had not even been married a year and were not ready for kids yet, but I struggled to find a job that I even remotely liked. I ended up working at the Baptist church for over a year, but hated it. Why is it that people in a CHURCH can be so mean and hateful? That's when Matt and I started talking about trying to start a family and I thought "Finally, I can quit working and start doing what I'm meant to do!"

If I’m honest, the main reason I was ready to have kids was because I was tired of working. Staying at home sounded so good to me. I hated my job and it was my excuse to quit. Although deep down, I knew I was called to be a stay-at-home mom, I really didn’t feel like I would be good at it. I have never been good with kids, and never really WANTED to be around them. That sounds bad, but I wasn’t one of those girls who always jumped at the chance to babysit or ran up to babies ooing and ahhing about how cute they were. I wasn’t one of those women who wanted desperately to have children. I was scared to death about becoming a mom. I knew NOTHING. I had never changed a dirty diaper. I babysat only a handful of times. Kids scared me.

So it comes as no surprise that as soon as we starting “trying”, which was basically not protecting against it, we got pregnant. And thus began my “job”. Fischer was definitely not an “easy” baby. He was a horrible nurser and refused to nap during the day. Once we started him on formula at 3 months, he became a different baby. He was easy to take care of. I finally “got” being a mom.

It was going great until….Piper came along. I never could have imagined how hard adding another kid would be. Add in Fischer’s age and penchant for temper tantrums and the fact that we didn't have a house, were living with Matt's parents.....I officially became the Worst Mom Ever. Now I never did anything that CPS would want to know about, but I for sure lost my temper and yelled at Fischer for stupid stuff more than I would like to admit.

Now that Piper has reached that magic 3-month age and things are getting easier with her (and we are in our own house), I look back and am ashamed at how badly I failed as a mother. Hopefully I haven’t scarred Fischer for life. I still lose my cool every day, but am really trying to be better. My kids deserve better. I tell myself this every day. The only way I can do that is with Grace. Without it, I fail. Miserably. The only way I even made it through those 3 months was grace. I remind myself to extend grace to Fischer when he throws a fit or makes a mess. I am in desperate need of grace myself every single second as a mom and I have never been more thankful for it. I’m also not going to lie and say that my relationship with God has been awesome. I have failed at that as well. God pretty much only hears from me when I am about to pull my hair out. Granted that’s every single day, but it’s not enough. To be a better mother, I know I need to be a better follower of Christ. I have a lot of work to do. And hopefully keeping this “journal” will help me get there. This time in my life is so hard, but also so precious and I don't want to look back with regrets. I want to be the wife and mother God has called me to be, not the impatient, frazzled excuse for a mom (and wife) I have been lately. I know I'm probably being a little hard on myself. My kids are fed, bathed, and taken care of. But I want more for them. I want them to have a loving, kind, patient, and gentle mother. And I can't do it on my own. God is starting something in me and I have to get it out in writing. This is the ugly part. This is the part I want to look back on and say "Look how far I've come." So I'm just being truly honest. My posts won't always be this depressing, but from now on, I hope this little blog becomes more real.

PIPER-3 Months!!

Well, she's already almost 4 months, but better late than never, right?

At 3 months Piper is sweeter than ever! She is starting to get into a daytime routine and sleep longer at night. She naps 2-3 times a day with a long nap the same time as Fischer. I'm not going to lie, it's my favorite time of day! I can get things done, or catch up on my trashy reality TV. I love my kids, but seriously...mom needs a break!

Piper and I are getting used to each other and she is beginning to just fit right in with the family. The biggest development has happened this week...she started sleeping ALL night!!! Hallelujah!! We put her to bed around 8 or 8:30 and she will sleep until 6 or 7. She occasionally will wake up one night at 2 or 3 eat and sleep till 7 or so, but her sleeping all night is becoming the norm! This is about the same age as Fischer when he started sleeping all night so hopefully she will be a good sleeper like him!

She eats every 2 to 3 1/2 hours during the day and as you can see, she is not starving. That double chin gives you away, sister!

She has grown out of pretty much all her 3 month clothes and is on to 6 month. She holds her head up so well now and is getting more and more interested in her toys. She loves to hold her hands together and hold onto a blanket. "Fischer" got her a John Deere tractor little blanket when she was born and she loves it. She will just hold it and rub it on her face when she's tired. We still swaddle her at night, but leave her hands up. She loves to have them by her face as she goes to sleep.

The girl can sleep through anything. She is definetly not as sensitive to light and sound as Fischer was. She doesn't have to have her room dark for naps, and she can sleep through her brother's constant noisy-ness. She is for sure more easy-going than Fischer. God sure knew what I could handle in a second child!

I also have to say that she is sweeter than Fischer. Not that he's not sweet or wasn't sweet, but it's just different. Maybe it's because she's a girl, or because we know that she won't be this sweet and innocent for long, but we just love to hold and cuddle her! I have to make Matt put her down for naps...he just wants to hold her! And I'll admit, I do too sometimes.

She has the most precious little squeal when she's happy and her whole face lights up when she smiles...which is not hard to make happen. She pretty much only cries when she is sleepy, tired or something scares her. When that happens, she gets the saddest look on her face, her bottom lip pops out and her eyes well up with tears...then she cries. If I can get to her before the cry she's ok, but she sure is pitiful. I'm sure she will figure that out before too long and start to use it to her advantage.

Miss Piper is just the most precious little thing and the perfect addition to our family. All of us...even her big brother...love her so much and we are so happy God decided to suprise us with her. These 3-4 months with her have been amazing....hard, of course, but so wonderful!

Next week we take Piper AND Fischer to the Dr. for check-ups, so I will update more then. Piper for 4 months and Fischer for 2 years...Ok how did THAT happen? I really don't want to think about that so that post might have to wait a month or so until it actually happens. For now, I will be in denial.