Nicolas {ONE}

 Last year at this time I was still enjoying the honeymoon postpartum period. Many people struggle immensely in those first few weeks, but I've always been blessed that despite recoveries that are no walk in the park, most of my post part experiences have been enjoyable and normal. Mom was here keeping the whole house running, my sisters-in-law and Mom-in-law were lovingly caring for the older kids so I could focus on the baby and recovering and meals, treats and gifts were flooding in from friends. Pretty much all I did was hold Nicolas and rest, something I've become an expert in after regretting doing too much after Brooklynne was born.

 Fast forward to now. An entire year of firsts have already come and gone--cooing, reaching for toys, sleeping through the night, scooting, new teeth, crawling, pulling up on furniture, and now babbling constantly and even saying several words. Even though I guess he's technically not a "toddler" because he's not walking, he acts like it. He is extremely responsive to everyone--my little social butterfly. His favorite word is "hiiii" and he says it to just about everyone. 

 He says uh oh, more, all done, love you, and the names of all his family members. Nate and I look at each other in surprise every time he says a new thing because he just seems so little to be saying so much! I guess that's what happens when you have 3 older siblings talking to you constantly!

  

 I've learned more and more how to truly cherish my babies. The Babywise book, while full of great principles, robbed me of truly enjoying Brooklynne and is way to strict in my opinion. Now I don't worry about spoiling them, because really you can't spoil a baby! But holding and hugging and cuddling as much as I can in those first few months doesn't last long as they grow bigger and become more independent like he is now. It goes so fast, and I try my hardest not to miss any of it.

It's amazing how one year of newness and bringing us hoards of joy, culminates into one piece of cake--or in this case, a cupcake. It's the great American (?) tradition. Every baby I've ever known has been surrounded with family--if not a huge crowd--while everyone watches to see what they will do with being allowed to consume a huge amount of sugar. My fourth baby did not disappoint, as he knew exactly what was expected of him. haha!

Happy first birthday to our dear Nicolas Jay. You are the light of our home right now and the center of attention and we love you so hard!

The Game On Healthy Challenge {my experience}

Ive mentioned a few times here (I think) that I've really struggled losing the baby weight this time around. It's always been something I had to work at, but this time it really hung on. I think nursing actually did the opposite that most people say it does for me--it made my body go into "starvation mode" and want to hold on to every ounce to provide milk for baby. Which selfishly made me want to quit nursing, but obviously I knew that the fact that I'm able to breastfed without any problems is a gift and I would not give it up just so I could lose weight!

 Anyway, I happened upon a Facebook page called "no diets allowed" a few years ago, mainly for the recipes. She would always post about "game on health challenges" but I didn't pay much attention to them. However, one night I saw that it was the last chance to join this challenge round that would last 6 weeks. It cost $20 to join and I impulsively made the decision to sign up at the last minute.

The main rules were simple:

1)Choose a healthy eating plan and stick to it every single day. I chose calorie counting, along with avoiding white flour and sugar.

2) Exercise 6 days a week for a minimum of 20 minutes. I found some great YouTube videos, as well as little running, ab workouts and my elliptical machine. All in all I do about an hour a day of 2 different workouts--cardio plus a little core or strength

3) Drink 70 ounces of water per day--no pop or diet pop (or alcohol, but I don't drink so that wasn't a problem ;)

4) Get 7 or more hours of sleep per night

5) Only weigh in once a week (I hated this part of it! ;)

 There were also other healthy habits that I wrote about here, and there were many choices in that category. We also got bonus points for communicating with our team each day and reporting our scores early each Monday morning. A perfect score would add up to 700 points, with up to 30 bonus points available.

 ok.....

 So the results!

 I lost 5 pounds and 3+ inches.

 Honestly, for as hard as I worked it could have easily been 10 pounds, which is frustrating. Since I already eat healthy and work out daily, this just upped it a notch so I'm happy with that. I think someone coming from a junk food/non exercising lifestyle would lose a ton. However, that is 5 pounds that I've been holding on to for close to 6 months, so I am thrilled with that. I am fitting into my normal clothes much better now and my stomach has really firmed up a lot. Yay for progress!

 I'm actually in the middle of the 5th week of a second round of the challenge right now, and still seeing more progress. I am finnnnnnalllllyyy within 2 pounds of pre-baby weight and feeling much more like my normal self.

 Anyway, if you made it through this post, I wanted to say that I did not in any way write this to brag on myself. I just know for certain that there are other Moms out there who struggle in this area and it's always nice to read what other people did and how they did it. At least I know that I enjoy reading other people's stories.

 I highly recommend this program. It's not a fad or magic. It just highly promotes healthy living and gives major accountability because you don't want to let your team down! Plus, I love that you can choose your eating plan, wether calorie counting, THM, low carb, weight watchers, etc. As long as it's healthy you're in. I also love that your score depends on how well you did with all of your healthy habits and not necessarily how much weight you lose (because I would totally lose big time).

 If you're interested, check out the Facebook page here and the website here. The next round starts in a little over 2 weeks and if you need a little extra push to stay motivated, I highly recommend it!

Summer Photo Dump

Clearly, I am way behind in blogging, so I wanted to do a photo dump of our amazing summer trip to see my family. We didn't do anything extraordinary, but we don't have to--our little shopping trips, swimming, dad's pizza, singing together and a sunset on the beach (plus all the little things in-between) made it more than perfect. We also gave my sister her bridal shower while we were there which turned out elegant and gorgeous-just like her-so I'll be posting about that soon!

A family night for dinner and ice cream (Abotts custard is to die for)

After spending the day working on shower preparation. Sister time is precious to me.

My Mom's side of the family had a reunion while I was there. Grandma and a great-Aunt led many rounds of BINGO ;)

Looking far from glamorous while baking the best-ever chocolate chip cookies (as in, 4 dozen were gone in an hour)

Why do all of our pictures involve food?! Anyway, my dad's pizza is an unspeakable gift that must be documented. It's perfection.

Like I said. Perfection.

This guy cut 4 teeth all at once while we were there and wasn't even fussy! He's such an easy going baby. I'm so blessed!

The cousins played outside all.day.long. for hours and hours. Clothing and shoes optional.

These 2 became much closer this year

Greg let Nate use his corvette for a few days and the guys were loving it!

Shopping, lunch, coffee, sisters. Nothing better!

Pretty crazy to see all of the little boys together (even crazier to hear them all together, I can assure you), especially with my parents who were surrounded by 99.9% girls their whole lives. haha!

My Mom is such an amazing Grandma (Nonnie as the kids call her). They love her so much and she cherishes them each individually.

A few days before we left, we had our family pictures taken at the beach. I've seen a few previews and they are stunning... I will definitely be sharing them here once I get them all! My sister took this while our photographers were taking some shots of Nate and I and I just love it!

There are so many more I could share but I didn't want to blast you after so long of not blogging! We have enjoyed our summer immensely; between 2 of my sisters visiting and obviously our nice vacation to visit them, we were surrounded by family and it was so special!

 We start school this next week. We'll be homeschooling this year so I have 2 in school for the first time. We'll be doing the Abeka dvd's which will give me a little bit of time and sanity in-between to work with Nathan on pre-school (very light) and keep up with the house. This will be a big change for Joe who had a few hours of Kindergarten last year and was free the rest of the day. I'm hoping that he will do ok sitting for that long. We shall see! :)

 I'm hoping to be back soon to share my sister's bridal shower, and Nicolas' birthday.

 Have a great week!