Calyn Started School (Keto Day 3)

You guys!!! She did it! Calyn started school yesterday morning and it was a success!!

She started off her morning with some breakfast and FaceTime with Nonna.

Then it was time for the photo ops before we left the house. Grandmother came over to see her off and get a picture with her.

Then of course it was selfie time once we got in the truck!

She was more interested in telling me all of the colors in the crayon box and which animals were on the curtain than smiling for her picture!

And then we dropped her off in her classroom where she was super excited to play with some toys and the other kids! She never even batted an eye when we said we were leaving!

When I got there at 5:00 to pick her up from after care she wasn't ready to leave with me. She wanted to stay at school! I guess that means that she had a great time. They did inform me that she's very strong willed though. Lol, yes we know. I'm so happy that she had a good day and was so happy to be there! She came home reciting Genesis 1:1 and was so proud of herself that she could say all of it. I think choosing Louisiana Christian School was the best decision we could have made for our baby girl!

On another note. Keto day 3 was a bitch! After some research and talking with some people on a Facebook group I came to the conclusion that I had an electrolyte imbalance. I had a headache, my muscles were super tense, I was having some pain near my kidneys, and my muscles kept getting cramps. I was consuming a lot of sodium, but I was also drinking way too much water and was flushing out even more electrolytes, than my body could handle since keto also flushes out your body. I was also not consuming enough potassium. After I picked up Calyn we went pick up some spinach and some tuna pouches and I had me a little spinach salad and I am feeling sooooo much better. That made a huge difference!!! So if you're going to attempt a keto diet then I definitely recommend eating spinach daily to help with that and to only drink if you're thirsty. I am now down 6.2lbs though, so it was worth it!!

Keto on my peeps!

Setting ourselves up for success (Keto-Day 1)

Cody and I spent about 3-4 hours yesterday meal prepping for our first week of keto. We aren't doing "true" keto right now. We don't want to overwhelm ourselves too much in the beginning. We're doing more of a "Lazy Keto" or what a lot of people refer to as "if it fits your macros." We're only checking to make sure that things fit within our daily allotment of carbs, fats, and proteins. Once we get better acclimated then we can attempt to go "true" keto. This is going to be a pretty big adjustment for us, but we are super excited!

These are the things we cooked (I totally forgot to take pictures of everything #bloggingfail):

-Sausage and Kale Soup
-Cheese Stuffed Bacon Cheeseburgers
-Buffalo Chicken Jalapeno Popper Casserole
-Low Carb Zesty Chicken Nuggets
-Keto Bacon Burger Bombs

All of these recipes come from ruled.me! Great website with some great recipes and information. So far today I've had some keto proof coffee and one of the keto bacon burger bombs and it's 2:15PM and I'm not hungry. I've also had around 50oz of water and I plan to get 100oz in before bed tonight. Cody texted me at lunch and said that he couldn't even finish all of it. I know it's only day 1, but I'm super proud of us and hope that we can stick it out!!

Also, on another note, tonight is orientation for Calyn at her new school! She starts on Wednesday!!!!! Where did the time go????? My baby girl is about to start school and it's all that she can talk about. She is SO excited and I'm excited and super sad at the same time! *tear*

This will definitely be a week of major adjustments!

Keto (will be) Life

I FINALLY got my husband to do his own research and look into the keto lifestyle and he's totally on board! I'm super excited about this. It's super hard to make any type of lifestyle changes, but still have to cater to your old lifestyle and not partake. At least it's super hard for me. Ain't nobody got time fa dat!

We're going to start try to do some meal prepping on Sunday and officially start keto on Monday! I can't wait! We both have really bad diets and need to make some changes and think that this is going to be really good for both of us :) Wish us luck!!

Diet Stuff

So those who have actually read all of my posts may be wondering why I haven't posted any diet or weight loss updates...well you see...I kind of have not lost any more weight. I even briefly GAINED some weight. This not eating what I want stuff is really starting to get hard. So I've decided to try Keto. Again. I briefly tried keto a couple months ago. It lasted about 3 days. Calyn got sick and I used that as an excuse to quit and never started back up again.

I'm going to start super simple and not try to overdo it. Bacon and eggs for breakfast with coffee. That's all I've got so far. I'll let you know how the planning goes. I may just go ahead and start it next week. This week I'll focus on getting all of the "bad" stuff out of the house. Wish me luck on this grueling task!!! 

For those of you who are not familiar with keto...let me explain it in super super simple terms. It's basically a high fat, moderate protein, low carb diet. When I say low carb like I'm talking no more than 20g of net carbs per day. Net carbs are the carbs minus the fiber. So if you have something that has 5g of carbs, but has 3g of fiber, then it only has 2g of net carbs! There are a ton of resources on the internet and a couple of facebook groups that I'm a part of. I really want to lose weight, but most of all I want to feel good again. I want to see people that I haven't seen in a while and not feel the shock and disgust on their faces. Because believe me people I can actually feel that look on your face. I feel it all the way to my bones and I don't like it, so please stop doing that. Thanks! 

I've still got a lot of research and learning to do as far as keto goes, but I'm definitely wanting to give it an honest try. Let's see how I can do in a month. If I start next Monday, then that'll be on the 7th. I'll give you guys an update on September 7th and let you know how the whole keto thing went down. 

I've still been going to the gym and people have been telling me that it looks like I've lost so maybe that's helping, but the scale hasn't budged lately. Maybe some keto and some gym will make Milly skinny and healthy again???? Who knows!

It's been a little minute

It's been a few days since I've posted anything. Sorry about that.

Calyn is spending a few days with my in-laws before school starts and she was beyond excited to leave with my mother-in-law yesterday. She's never had an issue leaving us. There are times when I want her to miss me, but at the same time I know that this is setting her up for later in life and I couldn't be prouder of her. 

I got this picture from my mother-in-law within minutes of them leaving. Also, in case any of you were curious where my child gets her curly hair from...just take a look at the picture...lol.

Also, I just want to thank the person that gave Calyn that dinosaur excavation thing-y for her birthday. I wish I would have remembered who she got it from because I would have called you to come and clean my kitchen after we were through with it!! Calyn loved it by the way!!

There was white chalk dust EVERYWHERE!! I couldn't take any more pictures because I started to help her with it and I became covered in dust and I didn't want to get anything else more dirty than it already was! My girl had a blast with it though and was super excited to find a brachiosaurus in there. Next time though, buy one for your own kids. Let's keep Milly's kitchen clean. K thanks bye!!

And here's a cute picture of Michele just because! You're welcome!

Always Have Faith

I woke up this morning super stressed about something and not sure how I was going to make it work. I decided to listen to KLOVE this morning, which is super unusual for me because I don't listen to the radio. Like hardly ever. The closer I got to the babysitters house the more static there was on the station. Which is also super unusual. I've never had static issues with this station before. I started scanning through the stations and found another christian station talking about the exact issue that I was concerned with. I knew it was God telling me that everything would work out and not to stress.

Everything worked out. I'm not stressed. I'm going to trust in Him more.

Sick Baby Girl, Tired Mommy and Daddy

So Calyn woke up during the night throwing up. Again. She first started doing this around 18 months old and it happened about 4-5 times over the next year and then it had stopped until this past May where she woke up throwing up again. Her doctor thinks it's reflux, but we haven't been able to prevent it from happening. I haven't noticed any patterns or anything that is consistently causing this. 

Last night she woke up around 10:30 and of course it was the one night I had actually gone to bed at 9:30 and was actually going to get some rest. I should have known better. This time she only threw up about 3-4 times. Usually it's for at least 3-4 hours and every 15-30 minutes. We had some zofran that the doctor prescribed in May and I think that's what helped her to stop as quickly as she did. I of course didn't fall back asleep until after 1:00am and I kept her home today just in case it is some type of bug. I hate seeing her like that and I wish there was something that I could do to make it stop. 

Well I'm tired and I think I need a nap.

High or Low Ponytail??

So this morning started off perfectly. There's no sarcasm there. Like it for real started off pretty good. Michele didn't wake up until I went in to get her. I have her her bottle (which she now holds on her own) after I changed her and she took it without any problems. Calyn woke up faily easily and let me dress her without any issues. Axl went outside and came right back in. 

It wasn't until after I got dressed and told Calyn it was time to brush her hair and teeth. We went from being 10 minutes early to 10 minutes late. She flat out refused to brush her teeth and I then had to bear hug her with one arm and forcefully brush her teeth with the other. Of course she screamed the entire time which just made a mess and then I had to clean up the mess. When we were done with that it was time to fix her hair. She cooperated fairly well for this...until I was finished. She then threw her self on the ground kicking and screaming that that's not where she wanted her ponytail. She wanted it in the back. Wait. What?? "Calyn, your ponytail is in the back, baby." "NOOOO it's not!!" "Calyn, where do you want your ponytail then??" "I want it in the back!!!!!" Oh gosh. This isn't going how I planned. "Calyn, show mommy where you want me to put your ponytail." *Points to the back of her neck.* "You want a low ponytail?? Is that what you're trying to say?" "Yessss! That's what I said!" "Ok. Ok. I'll put it in a low ponytail, child. Chill out." *Move ponytail down an inch.* *Child skips away happy as could be.*

Seriously?? All of that over your hair moving an inch??

Girl Dinosaur Birthday Party

I'm just going to start off by saying that the party was a success!!! The kids had a blast and we got them all sugared up and then sent them home!

I had this shirt made for Calyn!

Cody was up until almost midnight Friday night working on this Tricera-Toss for the party!

Of course we had to have this ginormous pinata that we found at Walmart!

There's nothing quite like beating the crap out of something with a bat!

I'd say that the kiddos loved it!

We put up these really cool dinosaur posters that my sister had bought for Calyn months ago.

Veggies for the Herbivores!

Dinosaur shaped chicken nuggets for the carnivores!

"Prehistoric Dirt" cups, chocolate pudding layered with crushed oreos, with little plastic dinosaurs in each cup!

This AH-Mazing cake that we had done with her favorite dinosaur on it, a parasaurolophus! The cake was done at a local bakery, Champagne's Bakery. I HIGHLY recommend them! The cake flavor was Pink Cookie, which is a flavor that if you're from around here you definitely know what that is. If you don't know what it is, then look up this bakery in Henderson, LA and get some shipped to your house and prepare to fall in love! Or just go by the bakery if you're local and pick some up! 

Some more AH-Mazing sweets were these super cute and ridiculously delicious sugar cookies!!! Macie, thank you so much! They were soooo good and the kids absolutely loved them!!!

Red and green grapes as "Dino Eggs"

Pretzel sticks as the "Dino Bones"

"Lava Punch"
Don't ask me what the recipe is because I have no idea. I forgot to write the recipe down and I was just mixing things up in the bowl as people were walking in. It was damn good though. It for sure had orange sherbet and frozen raspberries and pineapples.

"Swamp Water" which was just water with frozen raspberries and frozen pineapples and a squeeze of lemon juice.

I made a little hat for T-Rex out of some construction paper. I made little hats for some of the other dinosaurs too, but the kids started playing with them before I could get a picture :-)

Picked up these little visors at Hobby Lobby and some foam stickers and gave each of the kids one.

This is one of my favorites from the party. I found this on the internet and printed it on some card stock. My baby girl loves her some dinosaurs. These were all her answers without any coaching from us. I wrote down exactly what she said. I definitely plan to do one of these every year for her!

She got a few different outfits as gifts and we were trying them on after everyone left. We never made it past this super cute dinosaur dress that her Godmother/Nanny made for her! She was in love with it!!

We had an amazing time putting this party together. I want to thank my in-laws for all of their help!!! The kids had a blast! Baby girl had a blast! Thank you everyone for coming and I'm definitely not looking forward to doing this all again in a few months for Michele's birthday!!!!!

Time to Stop the Drama and Do What Calyn Says

So, I realized that I've been super dramatic lately with how tired I am and how hard it is to be a mom. Well Calyn said it best last night:

"Have a break, have a kit-kat!"

I guess Mommy is in need of some chocolate therapy!!

They're Worth It

I struggle every morning to get out of bed when my alarm goes off. I'm so not a morning person. This is why I don't wear makeup. Not because I think I look good without it, but because I just don't have time for it I'd rather sleep! My mornings are hectic and then I spend a full day at work which is always interesting and then I get home and it's the morning routine in reverse! Most days I feel like a failure and like I can't keep doing this. It's a lot of work and there's nothing easy about trying to make a tiny human happy all the time. So I go for at least 70% of the time. That sounds like a good number. Michele is easy. Just feed her when she's hungry and change her when she needs to be changed and that's about it. Calyn on the other hand. Yea, not so easy. Dinosaurs and trolls can usually do the trick, but I can't take Justin Timberlake and Anna Kendrick anymore. Their voices are like nails on a chalkboard for me. "No troll left behind!" Well I say leave them all in Bergentown for the Bergens to munch on when they need a little pick me up! No more trolls!!! And as for the dinosaurs!! We're having her half birthday party this Saturday and it's dinosaur themed. I am so done with dinosaurs too. I have learned more about dinosaurs in the last month than I ever thought I would learn in my entire life!!!

I need to give my child new hobbies. I'm looking forward to school starting and her getting some new interests because my girl just doesn't have a very broad outlook on things. She's pretty sheltered. Let's get some Disney in our lives. A little Lion King or what about Mulan?? That's a good powerful girl movie. She can do anything the boys can do and with boobs!! You go girl! I'll even take some more Paw Patrol. I miss Marshall and his clumsy self. What about Shimmer and Shine?? Boom Zaramay (sp?)! I could always bring her outside, but as previously stated this momma just doesn't have enough hours in the day. Maybe on the weekends, but that's cutting into some of my rest time and I need that beauty sleep if I'm not going to wear makeup. 

I started this talking about how hectic my days are and how overwhelming they can be. I'm usually stressed out to the max and have no more room left on my bullshit meter by the end of the day. But when Calyn can walk up to me and say "Mommy?" "What now, Calyn??" "I just love you." **Begin melting heart** "I love you too baby." "Can I have a popcicle for supper?? I'm soooo hungry." "If you're hungry, then a popcicle isn't going to do it for you." "Nooooooo!!! All I want is a popcicle!!!!!" **We had a nice little brief moment there...**

At the end of the day all that matters are those 2 little humans. I just want them to be happy and healthy and safe. Even though they drive me up the wall 99% of the time and it's so not going to get better from here.

I Just Want Someone to Understand

I've posted before about being tired and how I don't sleep well the majority of the time. At least 5 nights out of the week I lay awake listening to my husband snoring and trying to figure out why I can't turn my mind off. I'm always listening for the girls or making lists in my head of what needs to be done at home or at work. I'm always trying to remember if I turned the dishwasher on or if all of our clothes are washed and dried and ready to go for the next day. No offense to my husband, but my mind doesn't turn off because I worry about all of these things so that he doesn't have to.

He doesn't have to worry about packing lunches or washing clothes. He doesn't have to worry about paying the babysitter or making sure that we have formula and diapers. He doesn't worry about what cleaning supplies are needed or making sure that Calyn has the proper snacks. He doesn't have to make sure that everyone's clothes are clean and put away. He doesn't have to make sure that his alarm is set early enough that he gets up before everyone else so that he has time to get everyone out the door. He wakes up 10 minutes before he has to leave. I have to wake up an hour to an hour and a half before I have to leave. He doesn't have to worry about changing diapers or making sure the house is not a death trap for a baby. Or even for a toddler because we all know that they can get into things that you would never have thought possible. He doesn't have to worry about making sure the floors are vacuumed often enough to make sure the dog fur doesn't accumulate. He doesn't have to worry about if he's making sure that Calyn doesn't feel pushed aside because the baby requires more of your attention when it's just the three of you. 

I love my husband more than he can possible understand, but he doesn't know what I have to worry about. And to be fair, I probably don't know everything that he has to worry about either, but sometimes I just want to feel like someone understands what I'm going through. I want to feel like someone appreciates everything that I do for my family. I don't want to hear that I sit behind a desk all day so I can't possibly understand what it's like to be tired. I know what tired is. I know what exhausted is. I know what feeling like a failure is on a daily basis because I gave my child the potato chips that she wanted for supper because I just wanted her to go to bed with something in her stomach. I know what it's like to feel underaccomplished because I couldn't manage to possibly wash clothes, cook supper, feed the baby, dry clothes, wash dishes, fold clothes, feed the toddler, bathe the baby, put the clothes away, put the dishes away, bathe the toddler, exercise, lay out clothes for the next day, and actually get some sleep. These are all things that NEED to be done daily. This doesn't even include other basic household chores such as tending to the dog, picking up toys, emptying the trash, and bathing myself. On top of spending 8 hours at my own job. This all needs to be done from 5:30pm-10:00pm because I get off of work at 4:30 and then have to pick up Michele from one sitter and Calyn from another and I don't even get home until at least 5:30 sometimes later. And I'm the only one who does these things. My husband works a 12 and 2 job where he works for 12 days and is off for 2. That's right, he only gets 2 days off and it's 12 plus hour days. I know he's tired. I know he can't possibly come home in the evenings and be expected to do any of this stuff. I just want him to understand that he's not the only one who's tired. He's not the only one who needs a nap. 

He's not the only one.

I just want someone to understand. 

I'm tired too. 

I need breaks too. 

But I'm a mom. And this is just part of my job. I totally get that. Like I said, I do these things so that he doesn't have to. Sometimes I want that pat on the back though or at least some type of thank you. Something to make me feel not so much like a failure. I just want my family to be happy and healthy. I would sacrifice sleep everyday if I could guarantee that for them. Moms don't get to take a day off no matter how bad they want to!!!

Michele's Story

I talked about Calyn's birth story so I guess I can go ahead and tell you about Michele's. 

My due date was November 26, 2016 and I had a c-section scheduled for November 23, 2016. Well, my section was originally scheduled for the 18th but my dr was going out of town and they decided to reschedule. I wasn't too happy about it.m, but there wasn't anything I could do. 

Once again I was having a lot of Braxton hicks contractions towards the end of the pregnancy. This pregnancy was soooo much easier than Calyn's. I never got sick or really dealt with any pregnancy symptoms until the last couple weeks. I only had issues with my back which I have back issues anyway and the pregnancy just made it worse. 

On November 17th I was at work and right around noon I started to feel a little off. Almost as if I was coming down with something. A little feverish with some aches and chills. I had a heater in my office and had it in full blast and I was sitting right in front of it. I work at a jail and we have some nurses on staff so I called on of the nurses and asked if she could take my temperature. She came and it was at 98.4. I was feeling worse and worse and still had no actual fever. One of my supervisors came in and told me that I should go home and the nurse suggested that I call my dr. 

I tried to get in touch with Cody and couldn't get a hole of him. I called my dr and they suggested that I go to the clinic to get tested for the flu and strep. I still couldn't get a hold of Cody so I left work around 2 and drove myself to the clinic where my mom met me. I sent a text to Cody's supervisor and told him what was going on and asked if he could let Cody know. Right as I was driving up to the clinic Cody called and I filled him in and he said he would meet us there. 

They tested me for the flu and strep and both came back negative. They told me that I needed to go to the hospital because they thought it could be labor. Especially since I developed a fever during Calyn's labor. I got to the hospital and they checked me and I wasn't dilated but I was having contractions. They were pretty far apart but they hurt pretty bad. They were completely different from Calyn's. These were super sharp pains and they went into my back. They checked me for the flu again and again it was negative. They decided to keep me overnight for observation and put me on Tamiflu. They kept saying that they thought it was the flu and we kept telling them that we thought it was labor. They said that even if it was labor that it was so early that they weren't worried about it. 

Cody wasn't too happy about this, but again there wasn't anything that we could do. They put me in a room around 9 and decided to give me an ambien to help me sleep because I was in a lot of pain. Also, by this point I had actually developed a fever. I think it was just over 100. They gave me the ambien around 9 and we passed out. At 11 a whole team of people came into my room and said that they were taking me in to surgery because the baby was in distress. Every time I had a contraction her heart rate would drop and they still couldn't get my fever to go away. I was so out of it that I barely remember much. They had Cody sign all the paperwork because I wasn't in any condition to sign any releases. 

My sister made it to the hospital about 15 minutes before they started the surgery. Michele Elise was born on November 18, 2016 at 1:07am weighing 6lbs 12oz and 19 3/4" long. I don't remember anything except being woken up and holding my sisters hand in the OR. So even if I would have tried for a VBAC I wouldn't have been able to have one. 

I've come to the conclusion that I just have fevers during my labors. 

Michele Elise

I realized the other day that I hardly ever talk about Michele and most things seem to be about Calyn. I don't do this on purpose at all. I love both my girls the same. BUT...

Michele is just so boring right now!! She's almost 8 months old and is super freaking cute, but she just babbles and eats and sleeps and poops. And, well, that's about it. Calyn on the other hand is always doing and saying something funny or driving me up the wall that I just have to tell everyone about it. 

Do you think I'm setting Michele up for some major issues when she's older? Maybe I should put some money aside for therapy sessions...