Weight loss update.

I figured that I would stop losing weight (and maybe even start gaining) now that Brentley doesn't breastfeed as much, but I weighed myself, and I'm down to 133 lbs!!! I wanted to jump for joy! Seriously!

I haven't weighed that since I was about 16! I think breastfeeding has helped me to learn how to listen to my body and eat only when I need it. Not because I'm bored and such. And also, I eat/drink so much better because I breastfeed. I just have to keep these habits after our breastfeeding journey ends.
Also, having two very active little ones helps, too!

My goal initial goal was to get to 135 lbs, and I always said that I would love to get back to 125. I never thought I would see that day, but now that I am only 8 lbs away from that, it really seems plausible! I'm going to have a break between my classes next semester, so I think I'll spend that time in the gym on campus to hopefully lose those last 8 lbs and tone up!

Just wanted to do a little comparison here...

The first two pictures were taken before my Senior prom. Grace was about 5 months old, and I was at my heaviest weight around this time. I have lost the pictures my mom took beforehand because I hated them. I refused to post them because I hated the way I looked. These are from where my friend tagged me in them way back when.

Here's another, showing my face more directly. Grace was 6 months old here. (Wasn't she just adorable??)

This one is from earlier this month... I didn't realize how much my face alone has changed!

And these two were from today. I got to go on a kid free shopping spree with my gift cards!  

Thanks to Target's handy-dandy double mirrors, you get to see front and back lol. 

I'm really not trying to brag. I am just overly excited! When I gained weight, I got rid of all my clothes because I was certain I would never fit in them again. Man, I wish I hadn't done that! I had about ten pairs of AE pants, which are the ONLY pants on this planet that fit me correctly height wise straight off the shelf... curse my shortness! Lol. And those pants are not cheap :( 

Anyway, it feels amazing to not only be back down to what I was when I got pregnant with Grace, but to now officially be smaller! I literally feel so much better. I have so much more energy, and I don't sit around obsessing over how I look. 

Also, while I was searching for those prom pictures, I found a ton of pictures from my high school days. I think I'll do a post of those tomorrow just because it was fun looking back through those :)

Christmas 2012!

I know, I know... I'm slacking. We've had a couple of lazy days since Christmas, but I'm finally getting around to posting! 

On Christmas Eve, we went to (basically) the great-grandparents house, then to Chris' mom's house. 

Then, on Christmas morning, we had our own family time together. Around noon, we went to my mom's house, then we went to my dad's around dinner time. 

I'm not even going to to attempt to name all the things the kids got because that would take about four hours. They are overly spoiled at Christmas between us and the rest of the family lol.

I got a Kindle Fire from Chris' mom and a Northface jacket from my mom. I was not expecting either of those things!! My dad mostly got me gift cards. I'm going shopping! :) I also got lots of Hunger Games stuff and some of the Harry Potter movies... Yes, I'm a fangirl/nerd/geek/whatever you want to call me lol. 

For some reason, the pictures aren't in order. Never had that problem before, so I"m not sure what's up. Sorry about that!

Before "Santa" came.

After "Santa" came :)

Grace checking out her new bike.

Brentley riding the rocking horse that we went to heck and back for lol.

He got a wagon from Chris' mom, and spent about an hour pushing and pulling Grace around her house by himself! My little strong man!

This is when he first saw the wagon. He was drawn to it lol.

Opening presents at the great-grandparent's house.

Great-grandparents house again. I love this picture! They were reading a book :)

Chris' mom's house again. She loves this Dora doll!

Checking out his cars from my nana. 

She was extremely happy to get an umbrella! 

I like this one a lot!

She also loved her Dora pony playset!

Brentley trying out his violin.

Trying out the ice cream set and play food lol.

Eating the real breakfast.

At my mom's house.

Also at my mom's house.

At my dad's house. She got a pillow pet, which she is in love with.

Also at my dad's house.

And another at my dad's house. He really enjoyed unwrapping presents!

My Hunger Games stuff :) You guys don't even understand how happy this makes me  lol. I may be a mommy, but I'm still only 20 :p 

 Christmas has been great this year! Grace was so much fun because she was really into the idea of Santa and being excited about presents and such, and Brentley did great unwrapping! They don't really have a favorite toy. They have been playing with EVERYTHING. I'm convince a tornado tore through our house lol.

We have my extended family Christmas get together tomorrow. I'm going to try to get a good picture of all of us together since I didn't get one yet. Wish me luck! Lol.

My mini me.

Grace looks nothing like me. She never has... even as a baby. The ONLY thing she got from me was the brown eyes, and I don't even have brown eyes anymore... they're hazel now.
However, she looks a lot like Chris. And, she is almost identical to Chris' youngest brother (on his dad's side). Don't get me wrong. I think she's absolutely beautiful! She just doesn't take after me lol.

People who have never met Chris tend to say she looks like me, then when they meet Chris, they always say they were wrong lol.

On the other hand, I have always thought Brentley favored me.

My mom put together some collages with some of my baby/kid pictures...

The top left of the top one and the bottom right of the bottom one... look just like Brentley! I never realized how much he looked like I did until I saw these pictures! Lol. 

Funny how they have the same mom and dad, yet they look totally different. If we ever have other children, I wonder who they'd look like?? 

What a day!

Grace wouldn't tell us what she wanted for Christmas, so we just went with general things that we knew she'd like. Well, when she visited Santa, she told him she wanted a rocking horse. I didn't think much of it, but ever since then, she has been talking about wanting a rocking horse. I tried mentioning other things she "might" get for Christmas, and we always ended up back at the rocking horse.

So today, I unwrapped one of her gifts and headed to Toys R Us. Ohhhh my. It's right next to the mall and every other shopping-worthy store around, which of course means that EVERYONE in the world was out there today. It took me 30 minutes to go a mile, and there was a cop directing traffic at every red light.

Anyway, I finally made it to Toys R Us, and managed to exchange the other gift for the very last pink rocking horse they had. It's not as tall as I would have liked it to have been, but it will have to do. I was not about to let my little girl wake up and not have the one thing she asked for multiple times. So she will be getting her rocking horse on Christmas morning :)

Needing some advice...

I'm becoming increasingly less and less thrilled with the gym that Grace goes to for gymnastics. We pay $112 for 10 weeks, and they can't even manage to inform us of when they are having the ribbon ceremonies or the pictures. Even Grace's teacher didn't know about the pictures. The only reason we knew is because my sister's teacher told her, and my mom told me. Also, Grace would be moving to the next level in January, and parents aren't allowed to go with them for that class. I think Grace would do fine, but I have watched other classes where parents aren't allowed, and it's chaotic. The teachers can't keep up with all the little ones, and they certainly can't give them the attention they need.

We're considering putting her in dance instead. I know that it would still be little kids with one or two teachers, but it won't be in a huge gym full of stuff to potentially get hurt on and bigger girls to potentially tumble over you. And the teacher can stand in front of everyone and demonstrate instead of having to help one kid at a time.

They also do so much more. Mall shows, parades, recitals! We don't get any of that with gymnastics, and we pay more!!! Yes, dance is cheaper, and she would get to do more.

We are really leaning towards switching her. I asked her today if she wanted to do gymnastics or dance, and she said dance. Then, she was talking about "ballet" for the rest of the day.

I really think she would get more out of dance, but I am worried that I am bias. I danced until I was 14. Plus, the fact that it's cheaper doesn't hurt either.
What would you all do? Switch her or leave her in gym?

Christmas time is here!!

Sorry for my lack of posts lately. iPhone and Blogger hate each other. There is no better way to describe it. Every time I try to post something with the Blogger app, it doesn't post for some reason or another, so I just gave up trying to post with that. I will just have to settle with occasionally hooking my computer to our tv. And, because of that, I am going to bombard you all with everything Christmas in this post!!! ;)

I have officially finished my Christmas shopping, and I have almost all the presents wrapped. There are about 50 presents all together, but I grouped them all by where we're going...
Glen's (Chris' step-dad) parents' and then Chris' mom's on Christmas Eve.
Our own presents on Christmas morning, my mom's in the afternoon, and my dad's in the evening.
Then my extended family on the 28th.

On Friday, we went to the PAT Christmas party. The kids had a blast! They decorated cookies, had hot chocolate, colored pictures, talked to Santa, made ornaments, and opened presents!

And today, I took Grace on the Polar Express. I let her watch the movie today before we went. She was glued to that movie! And she was super excited to get to ride on the train! 

(Yes, she's wearing the same thing she wore to the Christmas party. It has been washed since then.)

"CHEEESE!"

They had lights like this outside along the train route.

Grace made a friend on the ride. They played together the whole time.

My only complaint is that they should have had cup holders! They gave us hot chocolate in these cute cups, but we had to hold them. Grace and I were looking out the window, and all of a sudden my seat felt very warm. I looked down, and Grace had set her hot chocolate down. It was spilling all in my seat. I was wearing a brown and white skirt, but there was no more white after that lol. Grace had a really good time though! She did get upset at Santa. Apparently he was hard of hearing. He asked her what her name was, and she said, "Gracie." After that, he kept calling her Tracy. He said, "What would you like for Christmas, Tracy?" and she looked at him and said, "GRAC-IE." He never did get it though. He just kept saying Tracy over and over. Other than that, she loved it!

We're having a Christmas party with Brittany, Sami, and Jessie on Wednesday. And we have a couple of other Christmas activities before Christmas coming up as well!

The WRONG message...

I have been seeing this one thing over and over... "This happened because God is not allowed in schools." This really irks me.  I try not to discuss religion and politics and such on here for two reasons... One is that is not what this blog is about, and the other is that I'm not entirely sure where I stand. I consider myself to be a Christian, but many Christians would probably tell me I'm not. Maybe that is why I don't understand how Christians are spreading this like wildfire.

My first thought is how dare someone say that at a time like this. People are not considering what this is saying to the families of the victims... When I read this, I read that God turned his back on innocent people because of something they have nothing to do with. Yes, there's a chance that some of the adults could be in line with separation of church and state, but I can guarantee that none of those precious babies were "keeping God out of schools." When this is spread, it is telling families that God turned His back on their loved ones. Whether this is true or not, that is NOT the message the need to be hearing right now.

Also, from what I know about separation of church and state, in the majority of schools, God is not banned. Children can pray to themselves, bring Bibles, even have clubs like FCA (Fellowship of Christian Athletes). Separation of church and state is there to guard all religions. I know that I would not want another religion's prayer being read over the loud speaker to my children, so I don't expect parents with other religions to be fine with a Christian prayer being read. I may not agree with other religions, but that does not mean that I feel the need to force my religion on others. The way I see it, God has not been forced out of schools. He just has to be invited in by the individual, and seeing as each person has their own relationship with God, I don't see this as being a bad thing.

I know the next question to be raised is, why did God turn his back then? Simply put, I don't believe He did. This man had another gun in his car... A much more sinister gun. This man also took his own life before police arrived. He could have continued his rampage. This could have been much worse. I know that is hard to believe considering the magnitude of this tragedy, but it could have been. And, if you look hard enough, you will see the small miracles... One little boy had bullets flying past his head and a teacher pulled him and another student into her classroom. Those two babies were spared.
I've also seen a story (not sure of it's validity) that one of the teachers hid her students in cabinets and closets and told the gunman they were in the gym. She lost her life for this, but her students were spared. There are some amazing things amid the sadness.

As to why this was allowed to happen... I have no idea. I believe that it could boil down to free will. God gives us free will, and unfortunately, this man used his will to commit an unspeakable evil.

Honestly, I don't know the answer. What I do know is that the families of these victims do not need to be hearing that God turned his back on their innocent loved ones. These are terribly trying times for these families, and in trying times, faith often falters. Hearing something like that could stand to drive a wedge between these families and God (for those who are Christian).

I know that some may not agree with this. I may even lose followers because if it, but I am alright with that because I stand by every word I have just written.

I will continue to pray for everyone involved... Not just the families of victims, but everyone involved. 

My heart feels heavy.

I seriously can't get this tragedy out of my head. As a mother and someone who aspires to be an elementary school teacher, this news hit me hard.

I just can't imagine rushing to see if my babies were ok, and then finding out the worst news ever. When they showed the helicopter footage of the group of parents standing without children, I knew... Those were the parents waiting to hear that terrible news. My heart is completely broken for them.

And to be one of those teachers who had to protect a classroom full of innocent children. I'm not even a teacher yet and I have connected with many of the students I've worked with. Again, I just can't imagine!

How a person can be so completely evil is beyond me. They were just babies! So completely senseless. I will be praying for the families of everyone involved and holding tight to my babies tonight.

Smh...

That last comment... *facepalm!

And I tried to nicely explain that infant seats are not made to forward face, and that there are weight limits, so she could be too big. I also suggested a mirror so she would be able to see her daughter. Her response was that she doesn't do it all the time, and that it's probably time to get a new car seat... You think??

Someone else commented about how they hate seeing kids walking in parking lots without holding their parent's hand, and she commented back that she would NEVER do that because she's too much of a worry-wart.

One would think that if someone is such a worry-wart, car seat safety would be at the top of the list due to the fact that car crashes are the NUMBER ONE killer of children ages 1-14. If she knows it's wrong, she knows it's dangerous. I just can't figure out how someone can know that something is dangerous and then continue to do it!

Oh, and I just now realized that she said her daughter is ALMOST one! Now I just feel like banging my head on a wall. 

Okay. Rant over. 

A little bit of everything.

First up, Blogger is letting me upload pictures again! Which means no more Photobucket pictures that don't fit the post correctly!

Second... Brentley is sick AGAIN. He has a double ear infection and an upper respiratory infection. He is miserable. I feel terrible for the little man. I'm certain that he would rather have the stomach bug again. I snapped the picture below earlier today. I was cooking dinner, and I noticed that he was being oddly quiet, so I went to check on him, and he had fallen asleep by himself. He NEVER does that. 

Then, later, I had him in the bathroom with me. I turned the shower on hot so he could breathe in some of the steam. He had a coughing fit going. He literally didn't stop coughing for 20 minutes. He could barely breathe, and I could tell that it was hurting his chest and throat. And as soon as he wasn't coughing anymore, he fell asleep in my arms. I just want him to not be sick anymore!!

This is the big gift we're going to give my sister. I made her a movie night kit. We got the new Disney Fairy movie for her, and I put it in this popcorn bucket with popcorn, cokes, and candy. I thought it turned out cute!

And lastly, my friend Ashley came over today (she braved the sickness) to help Grace decorate the gingerbread princess castle that she got her for her birthday.  

The castle didn't want to stay standing, so she held it together while Grace decorated it.  

And, well, you can tell it was decorated by a three year old, but Grace it very proud of it 

I love that she is so good with Grace. She was actually with the first group of people (aside from my mom and Chris' mom) who came to the hospital when Grace was born. I'm glad we have been able to remain friends when so many other people, who claimed to be friends, have fallen off the face of the earth.