Tai 4 1/2 Months...I Give Up!

We made it pretty dang far with Tai being only breastfed. And then it just got too hard.
Not because of the pumping, but because with working and everything else, I was not producing enough milk to completely satisfy him. It was getting stressful to the point where I was always drained, he was always hungry and I was almost upset everytime he wanted to nurse because I didn't have anything else to give him. He had a growth spurt and I just couldn't keep up anymore.

So we have started supplementing with formula. I don't necessarily like it, but I don't have another choice. I was taking 12 pills a day just to be able to keep my supply up and it still wasn't anywhere near enough. He was eating tons of rice, lots of apple juice, and tons of baby food just so he wouldn't starve.

I definately don't like how much he spits up, or the way his breath smells. His burps are nasty, the formula smell grosses me out and he has had so many blowouts in a week that I think his carseat is permanently ruined.

It happened 4 times in one day. The first time I just thought it was gas and then I looked down and it was on his face, his hands and his mouth, (and yes, it happened while I was trying on a wedding dress at someone's house.)

An hour later we had an employee at a store tell us we spilled our coke. We weren't drinking coke. Yes, he had a blowout so big it went through his clothes, his blanket, his carseat cover, his carseat, the shopping cart and onto the floor into a puddle so big it looked like we spilled a huge coke. Sick.

We have had to wash our sheets every single day for a week. (Mattress cover, undersheed, duvet cover.) He basically is confined to being on a towel wherever we go. Us not paying for diapers for 4 months went down the drain after this week, because all of our diapers are in storage (freaking apartment) and he went through the supply so fast we couldn't keep up.

I hate formula. HATE. I miss being able to put a bottle by the bed and not have it go bad in an hour. I also don't know how to prevent an inch of pure bubbles. Any help?

It has tripled our expenses: Formula, diapers, wipes, clothing. Grr..

Anyways.

I am still pumping and breastfeeding as much as before, he just has a little of everything. I don't think I ever wrote this, but I got a brand new pump. Not just any pump but the Medela Freestyle. I feel like there should be lights and sounds going because it was so incredibly awesome and I love it SO much. Also, the person who got me this pump shall remain unnamed, I don't want her to get in trouble with the big boss ;) Let's just say it showed up at my door, and I wasn't expecting it, and I full on starting crying and jumping up and down. (Not a pretty sight.) I.Am.In.Love.

I want to pump for another 5 years just so I can spend lots of time with this beauty. Okay, no, not 5, but it has kept me motivated to keep pumping AND I will have another baby just so I can use this. Colton says that's fine. Ha.

SP. Tai is eating 4 times more than normal and has gained at least two pounds in the last week, his face is really starting to fill out, and he is going from a string bean to a chub.

I'm loving it.

On a happier note, he is now giving kisses. They are so adorable and I ask for them over and over again till Tai gets bored and refuses. He is also blowing bubbles, giggling, and moving his legs like crazy.  Everything in his reach he grabs. Everything that he grabs goes in his mouth.

So it begins.

SO freaking big, he overtakes Grace.

Kisses For Dad

Lawn Mowin With Grandpa

First Visit To The Dairy Keen. Hating the French Fries.

Budget Wedding

We are officially, completely and totally PLANNING A WEDDING.

We are getting married on August 4th, 2012! (Less than 6 weeks away! AHHH)

We bought our rings, (that was an adventure) but I have nothing to show you because Colton still hasn't "officially" proposed. He is just hiding that little gem away to torture me. Men.

A few things about our wedding:

We WON our venue, from the beautiful new Allyse's Bridal Event Center.

(I love facebook competitions.)

My wonderful best friend Katelyn, and her husband Mike (both amazing photographers) are going to do our photography as a wedding gift.

Another great friend of mine, Briana Smellie, is going to make our cake! She also has a bunch of great decorations in our colors that we are borrowing, seriously we are so lucky!

My great friend Micah Gogan is going to DJ our wedding. He is great, and a lot of fun, so we are stoked about that.

And I found my dress. The dress. On KSL for $150.00.

It fit PERFECT. (Minus the alterations.)

Thanks for the advice guys!

So yes, it has been extremely budget friendly. I try really hard to make it fit in the budget and I really appreciate everyone who has helped make this a reality. We literally would not be able to do it without the amazing friends we have in my life.

All I can say about my ring is that we had it custom made to exactly what I wanted, and its totally a real diamond (which I did not think we could get.) We love Fred Meyer Jewelers. They have some super amazing stuff, and a lot of it is extremely affordable!

Jobs, Work, Work, Work.

Our transition to Heber has been good but also really crazy. Colton had a lot of different job offers and it really came down to who he was going to have to let down, and what positions worked best for our family. He was offered a great position at a really nice Assisted Living Facilty, and with his experience his pay was a lot better. He accepted the grave yard position, (it paid more and allowed him to work around my schedule) and started the night he was hired.

He LOVES it. They are going to pay for his schooling (and then up his salary when he gets certified) and he is finally doing what he loves full time. He is also working Walgreens part time, which is his play money, I am also working about 25 hours a week. The best part is that we have opposite schedules so Tai is always with one of us, and doesn't have to be with a sitter. If a sitter is necessary, my mom is five minutes down the road, so the situation is really ideal.

It was tough for the first couple weeks, we put in over 100 hours in the first week alone. I started to feel like I was never seeing Colton or Tai, but the routine is a lot better now.

Colton doesn't know anyone in Heber, and that has been hard for him, but he works so much and hangs out with my family, so I think it keeps him from being lonely. His family is only a 40 minute drive away, so that keeps him happy too. He wishes there was an MMA gym (of course) close by, but we are settling for something...similar. :)

I love my job. It's really easy, and I enjoy my coworkers a lot. I'm at the railroad, so we really only have people around for two hours in a 9 hour day. The rest is pretty quiet, and I like being out and having the time to myself. I like feeling like I am contributing and helping our family.

With both of us working, we are saving up for a honeymoon, and paying off debt, which is great! Hopefull in the next couple of years we can become debt free and get into a house. That is the goal.

New Town

In May we decided that the best thing for our little family would be to move to Heber and be closer to both sides of the family.

We got approved for a brand new subsidized housing complex in Heber. YAY. That means new wood floors, walk in closet...our own bathroom. WASHER AND DRYER! A cute little porch :) We are so excited, Heber was just a little out of budget for us, especially compared to Cedar City, and this allowed us to move in. We thought there would be a huge waiting list, but apparently there wasn't because no one was passing the credit check to actually be able to live in the new apartments. They were shocked when our credit passed because they have had to deny so many people.

The bad part of the new apartment complex is that they are still building it. They told us it would be ready by June 1st. We moved up a week in advance so I could start working and Colton could finish interviewing and training for his job. I packed for a week, thats it.

We have been here now for a month, and still haven't heard anything from the land management people. It is so frustrating. They have paved half the parking lot (the half that has all the unfinished buildings by it.) Which makes NO sense to me. And it looks like this could get dragged on for a long time.

Meanwhile we are at my parents 3 bedroom house. With 9 people. Its really, really cramped. I haven't lived with my parents in YEARS, so it's hard to be here and add a whole different family to the mix. Not only that but this house is so small, when Tai wakes up and screams (his new favorite thing to do) it wakes every single person in the house. Add in a growth spurt and make it multiple times a night, plus different work schedules and it gets really hard.

So I hope that their promise of "no later than July 1st" is genuine, otherwise we might not be able to take much more. I love my family, we just need to get into a better routine and Tai having 4 mom's is not helping much. I would also like to be able to let him scream for more than 10 seconds without panicking about waking everyone. I know. Horrible mom, right?

I also would like to have more than 7 outfits, and his nursery and different rooms to sleep in.

My Little Pasty Gangsta (as my mom calls him)

Starting to sit up.

Our New Place!!

Four Months Old!

Our little boy is FOUR MONTHS OLD!

We have officially made it four months of him being completely breastfed.
A huge feat for me, (it has been super difficult and time consuming, but worth it!)

We celebrated by eating baby food, which he devoured and was totally ready for.

He loves sweet potatoes.

He is getting so smart and I can just see him changing every single day.

He now holds his own bottle, and is very insistent on that, and is starting to be interested in toys.

His hand eye coordination is amazing, and he is always putting his pacifier in and out.

He loves sucking on things, and will chew on whatever body part he can get ahold of while you hold him.

He is constantly smiling, always laughing, and making tons of sounds.

He is not much of a cuddler anymore, much too grown up for that ;)

He loves his Bumbo, especially if you are feeding him in it, and also eats fruit in his mesh munchkin net. (If you don't have one, get one, they are totally great.)

He loves bathe time, and naked time, and thinks the best game in the world is the diaper changing game. We love him so much and he is absolutely spoiled to death.

Being Cheeky.

Officially BLUE eyed.

So big!

Having what his dad calls a "finger snack" or "hand-burger."

Showering with Dad. So funny.

Moving On..Moving Out

We had to make a really tough decision this last month, and decided to move away from our first apartment and life as we knew it.

It has been an amazing and exciting journey in Cedar City. We have made amazing friends, conquered a lot of obstacles, and most importantly we met our little boy.

We made the decision suddenly. We felt like we were very stagnant with life, living paycheck by paycheck, paying bills, but not saving anything. Colton was getting less and less hours at Walgreens, the job he really loved as a CNA wasn't producing anymore hours and 3 jobs would have been really hard to juggle. I wasn't going to school because we wanted him taking classes, but even that was looking out of the question because Walgreens wouldn't work with his schedule and it changed weekly.

He got offered a position to switch to the Heber Walgreens, and also got offered a position working nights at Walmart stocking shelves. The job he wanted most was as a full time CNA at a nice Assisted living home near Heber, but they still needed to interview. I also got offered a full time position working in the gift shop at the local railroad. So it seemed like everything was coming along great. He put in his two week notices, and we let our landlords know that we were leaving.

Within days we were packing up our entire lives and leaving everything that we had built and come to know as a couple in this little town. I really felt sad about the situation. I went back and forth and never knew if we were making the right decision. It came down to staying for some friends we really loved, and being very independent, but far from family, or being near family and trying to make new friends.

It got really hard towards the end. Job offers started pouring in suddenly, and it seemed like everything was going against us to move, but we had to take a leap of faith.

We spent the last days having dinners with friends and visiting everyone. The last night we had a BBQ with our very closest friends the Snyders. They had just moved into a little house and I couldn't help but feel so sad. Whitney was such a good friend to me, a genuine friend who helped with Tai so so much, and was there for me when I needed someone. Mic was Colton's roommate at Snow and Colton really enjoyed seeing him. We would always plan date nights and it became the highlight of my week to go see movies in empty theatres, or play games and eat food. They were the ones we trusted with Tai, and who were at the hospital the first day he was born. Honestly, they out of everything and everyone else made it so hard to leave. Looking at their new little house, I kept feeling like, that could have been us, if it all had just worked out or we had waited a little longer, it would have all worked out.

As I stood in our empty apartment and looked around at the empty rooms, I couldn't help but feel so heartbroken. I thought about bringing our little boy home for the first time. All the nights we spent just staring at him and enjoying our family and our life. I thought about all our firsts. Our first real apartment. Our home. Our stuff. We took down Tai's nursery piece by piece and it really did hurt. You pull down memories. All the anticipation of having him, and bringing him home for the first time to HIS room and HIS window and where he first took a bathe in his little sink. To the little bar where we sat and made dinner, or had date nights with friends.

It was so hard. I think it's always hard to leave that place of firsts. Where our first little boy was born. The place we brought him into. The little two bedroom apartment in the middle of town where we brought him home. Where we called home. MaTai will always be a little Cedar City boy.

As we drove away, I leaned on Colton's shoulder and felt sad. As we drove out of town and onto the freeway, everything seemed so bittersweet. The place where we grocery shopped, the little diner we went on the very occasional date, our best friends home, and the University where I planned to graduate from in May.

It's crazy how life changes, it is such a rollercoaster, but I think that it will be worth it. We are near family, we have amazing jobs, we are making so much more money, and our schedules are stable. I am close to great friends, and the town I called home for 18 years. It is all going to be okay, it's just a transition.

A hard, bittersweet transition.
It will be okay.

Saying Goodbye to the old house..

Our First Kitchen

First Apartment... #42

We may even miss the psycho chain smoker...

View From Our Porch

Tai's Room, all emptied out.

Our Hallway

Tai being a horrible mover. Haha. We could not get him to settle down and resorted to this to be able to pack.