Holland's First Month in Instagrams

In Holland's first month she:
{In conjunction with this post}

She went on a trip up to Flagstaff. During her first week of life. 

She was blessed by her daddy.

She hated her first bath and has yet to have another. 

She LOVED her first shower and now showers are her go to for cleaning out all her cute rolls! 

She moved up to Idaho. {She survived the 18 hour car ride!}

She loves to watch her mom get ready for the day!

She turned one month old and was not too excited about it! 

Three Months.

Dear Holland Girl,

Another month has flown by! This last month was filled with lots of new adventures for you! You went on your first airplane flight with your mum to visit family in Arizona. The trip to Arizona you did wonderfully {slept the whole time other than eating on the take off and landing} but the trip back to Idaho you were super squirmy and talkative. Cute as always but a little louder and definitely more awake than before. And you refused to eat for the landing so I attempted to have you suck on my fingers as you stared out the window at all of the exciting airport lights.

You went to the doctor this month and you weigh 13 lbs. 10 oz. {75th percentile} and you are 25 inches tall {95th percentile}. Your Grandpa Olmstead pointed out that you are already almost half as tall as your mom! Only five more inches to go little one!

Here are some of the exciting new things you are learning this month:

• You roll over but mostly just when you are mad. 
• You grab at anything and everything and bring it straight to your mouth to chew on. 
• You LOVE chewing on your fists. {This might have been last month too but you love it still!}
• You still smile all. the. time. and we love this about you! :] You make a lot of people happy because you smile at them! 
• You do not like the car at all anymore but I'm thinking that might be changing in  your fourth month now that you have toys on your car seat to grab at. 
• You think it's the coolest. thing. ever when we get water out of the dispenser in the fridge. 
• You think you can't sleep anywhere other than in bed with Mom and Dad. 
• You got to wear about a billion and one Halloween costumes and you looked adorable in each and every one! 
• You giggled for the first time! And now Mommy can get you to giggle on a pretty regular basis and it's a blast! 
• You sit in your bumbo like an old pro! 
• You realized you have a tongue and stick it out all the time. Licking things is your new favorite!

We love our three month old Holland girl! It is so much fun to watch you learn and grow! Life is crazy and sometimes stressful but we always have your sweet smile to cheer us up! 

Love, 

Mom and Dad

You got a beautiful new bracelet from Gram Ashby! 

You have the cutest itty bitty fingernails I ever did see. 

Your long fingernails are one of the only things you got from your mom. 

You make the cutest faces.

You are already almost too big for the laundry basket! Silly girl!

Three Months. 

Two Months.

 One Month.

P.S. Your Uncle Stuart picked out your bow for these pictures!

One Month.
Two Months.

Two Months.

Dear Holland,

Another month has gone by! We are loving watching you learn and grow and you are smiling more and more every day {although you have always been a smiley baby}! We're still working on your sleep schedule because for some reason you never want to go to sleep before 2am! We keep you up for hours on end to try and get you to fall asleep at a decent time but you just won't have it! Someday we'll get this whole thing figured out. Until then we'll just all sleep in and cuddle when you wake up in the morning. That works for me!

This month has been much more laid back than your first month of life. We are enjoying life in Idaho {with lots of family walks and hanging out with your cousin} and this month you got to meet your Great Grandma and Great Grandpa Hogan over conference weekend! Other than that we are trying to figure out what our plans for the future are. They keep changing which makes things confusing but we'll figure it out eventually! Your daddy got a couple job offers BUT....they were pretty dead end jobs that he would hate soooo....we're actually going to do something we've talked about before--your daddy is going to try to get into law school! This is a whole new, different kind of adventure but we'll see where it leads us! The next month and a half to two months will be filled with lots of studying for the LSAT and lots of Mommy and baby time so Daddy can work on that! We don't know if this will work out but we're going to give it all we've got and see where it leads us!

Now, onto some things your daddy and I have noticed about you this month:

• You LOVE standing up with the help of someone {usually Mom or Dad}. You've got some strong legs! Oh, and mommy can balance you on her hands while you're standing up. It's a pretty nifty trick. One of these days we'll get a picture of it!
• You still hate bottles and pacifiers but you have started sucking on your fists. Not your thumb or a couple fingers--the WHOLE fist! It's pretty hilarious. And sometimes you get both of your fists up there and sometimes you suck on Mommy and Daddy's hands. It's pretty cute. And super slobbery! 
• You spit up ALL. THE. TIME. It's pretty gross and it will probably stain all of your adorable clothes. Looks like I need to go buy some Oxiclean! 
• You smile ALL. THE. TIME. This makes up for the spitting up all the time and the going to bed ridiculously late. 
• You are the happiest in the mornings. Although you really are a pretty happy baby all day. 
• You fit into some of your 3 month size clothes! You are a little chunker and we love it!
• You love hearing Mom and Dad's voices. The other day you listened to Dad on the phone and were just so smiley and happy to hear his voice. It was so stinkin' cute! 
• When we're trying to keep you awake in the evening and you sneak in a nap it is so hard to wake up up! We have a video of your daddy and I poking and kissing and bugging you and you are just OUT! It's pretty funny. Even though we don't want you to be asleep just yet.  
• You hang out on your little playmat and kick it so that your toys make noise and wiggle over your face. It is so nice to finally be able to set you down for a few minutes! Although I honestly don't end up getting much done just because you're so fun to watch.  
• You are kind of getting  on a nap schedule. You take two pretty good naps during the day which gives Mommy time to get things done. 

And now onto the new nicknames you've acquired this month:

• Monkey 
• Da chunky monks
• Chunky Monkey 
• Chunky monk
• Monkey Chunk
• Madame Squeesh 

{As you can tell, they pretty much all reference how cute and chunky you are. :]}

And now your two month pictures in the laundry basket! 

So happy to be two months! {Unlike turning one month!}

And one from when you were one month for comparison's sake! {You're definitely getting chunkier!} 

We love you our sweet, chunky girly! Happy Two Months! We are excited for all the months to come! 

Love, 

Mom {and Dad}

Sweet Holland's Newborn Photos

I am FINALLY getting Holland's newborn photos posted! I won a giveaway on Facebook just after we had Holland for a free photo shoot. I was so happy since we didn't have the money to pay for a photo shoot at the time. It was wonderful to work with Rennai of ten22studio to get these sweet sweet photos of our baby girl. Enjoy!!

Just to be real, this is how Holland was the majority of the time.

I'm amazed that our photographer was able to get any good pictures of our crying little one!

And now onto the exciting news of the day: Race got a job! Along with a bunch of other job interviews! So now he may have a few things to choose from! We are excited to start looking for an apartment and have our own space for the first time since a couple of months before Holland was born! Life is wonderful! {This paragraph had lots of exclamation points. But let's be honest, this is exciting stuff!}

Oh, and we have a new giveaway winner for the modestpop.com giveaway! The winner is #13 Rachel Frakes! Thanks again to all of you who entered! And don't forget that you can get 10% off with the code: RANDE10. I'm pretty sure they have a sale going on right now but it ends soon so check it out!!

5 Tips to Be Happier in Your Post-Baby Body

Now that you all have heard my thoughts on body image I thought I would share a little bit more about what it's like having a post-baby body and what I am doing to be be healthy and to love my body.

Some people seem to get their bodies right back after having a baby. That might actually be true for some people but I'm pretty sure for most of us it takes quite bit of work to get our bodies back to where we would like them to be. After spending a whopping 42 weeks pregnant and getting stretch marks ALL over my body I am more uncomfortable in my body than I have ever been before. But, I have been doing lots of different things to be happy in this incredible body that created a baby. And surprisingly they don't all involve working out like a crazy maniac. Here are my five tips to being happy in your post-baby body:

1. Get out of bed and get dressed. As hard as it can be to get up and get dressed every day I do believe this is one of the most important things to do to feel better about your body. Even if it doesn't happen until four in the evening {as it often does for me} it can still help to brighten your day. Other things I try to do along with getting dressed are the little things like my hair and makeup. And I even bought some nail polish {in a pretty fall color} and had Race watch Holland for a few minutes so I could paint my nails. 

2. Get out of the house. Now this isn't something I have accomplished every day but I do feel that it is important to do and it kind of goes hand in hand with getting dressed. It gives you a reason to put some cute clothes on.  Sometimes getting out of the house just means going on a family walk for a few minutes but it still changes things up which I think we all need. And you get to show off your baby to everyone you run into! 

3. Treat yourself to some new clothes! A few weeks after I had Holland I was really unhappy with my sparse clothing collection. {Most of my pre-pregnancy clothes are still in storage and the clothes I wore during pregnancy I am a little bored with since I wore them a lot the last few months. Also, ALL my pre-pregnancy jeans were packed away.} So I went shopping. We are on a tight budget right now {while we're hoping and praying that Race finds a job here in Idaho} so I just got myself one really nice pair of jeans...that actually fits. They were expensive {at least compared to what I normally spend on jeans} but they are the most comfortable pair of jeans I've ever owned and I am going to make them last for a long time! {Check out Levi Curve ID jeans} Since our budget is a little tight I have started sewing myself things to save on money. I made myself a shirt by making a pattern off of a shirt from Old Navy that I absolutely love {and hides the post-baby bump quite well}. I am still pretty new to this whole sewing thing so it didn't turn out perfect but it hides the bump and I learned from my mistakes so I'll do better next time! I also have plans for some new skirts and a couple of other fun sewing projects to dress my new body. The one other thing I splurged on {using a Target giftcard} were workout clothes. It might be silly but cute new workout clothes definitely helped motivate me to get out of the house and start working on this body! 

4. Eat well and drink lots of water. I really don't know much about nutrition at all but I do know that when you're nursing you need to eat more than normal {more information here} and drink lots of water. My mom always tells me to drink at least one glass of water every time you sit down to nurse. And then you need to be drinking lots in between feedings as well of course. I am not dieting at all right now because I know I need to be eating well to produce enough milk for my little one. And I don't want to be stressing about it because that can also slow milk production. So while I am not dieting I am definitely focusing on eating well and drinking lots of water.
5. Exercise. Right now I am working on running a little bit every day and doing some ab workouts. I am trying to be careful with how hard I go on my body since I did have major surgery but it feels so good to be working out again.  I know that losing weight can take time and it can be frustrating to watch nothing happen on the scale so instead of weighing myself all the time and focusing on that as my working out goal I have decided to sign up for a race in the next couple of months so that I have something else to focus on and work towards. 

While I am working on getting my body back into shape I do think it is important to remember that my body may not ever be exactly like it was before I had a baby. And that is okay. I just try to view these more permanent changes to my body {like stretch marks} as a reminder of the miracle that I was able to be a part of. These five things are working for me and helping me to be happy in this new, different body and I hope that these tips help someone else out there as well. 

Oh, and before I go I do not want to forget to mention my wonderful husband. Race supports me in my goals, lets me go out and buy expensive jeans, and tells me every single day that I am beautiful. He is the best. I love him and I couldn't do any of this without him! 

Dressing 'Le Bebe' {#2} & Giveaway Winners!

I just love getting this little cutie dressed everyday! I also realized a couple of days ago that this little girl has probably never gone a full 24 hours without wearing a cute headband at some point. That's a little crazy but she just looks so dang cute in her headbands--I can't help putting one on her every day! {Side note: I AM going to start an Etsy shop! It is going to take me some time but please email me if you would like to do either a review or a giveaway on your blog once I get my shop up and running!}

Here's Holland's weekend outfit:

Anyway, this was her super cute picnic/BBQ outfit! This little dress is from Goodwill {just like most of her clothes} and I just love that it's a little baby halter top! So stinkin' cute! And the headband and blanket were made by me! Oh, and the dog in the back of some of these pictures is Holland's "cousin" Tuck. He's huge and tons of fun. He just wanted to be a part of the photo shoot!

Now, I know that a few of you are here looking to see who won the giveaway! So, here are our winners!

The winner of the $15 store credit to modestpop.com is Christina Marie!!

The winner of the $5 store credit is Lex!

Congratulations ladies!! Please email me {emsmilesss at gmail dot com} by Thursday otherwise I will be picking new winners Friday morning!

Happy Monday everyone!! I hope you all have a wonderful week!

Thoughts on Body Image

Having just had a baby I think about, and work on getting my body back into shape. Since I had a sweet baby girl I also stress about teaching her to have a healthy body image as she grows up in a world where looking a certain way seems to take top priority. My baby girl may end up being tall and naturally skinny like her dad or she may end up being short and stocky like me, or a mix of the two, or something completely different. No matter how she looks though I want to teach her to love and take care of her body.

I have babysat and/or nannied for various families over the years and I have been witness to the effect parents' views on health, working out, and weight have on their children. Particularly on their daughters. These parents have inadvertently given their very young girls the wrong ideas about body image. These girls {starting as young as three years old} already stress about their weight.

I had one little girl tell me that she needed to work out more because she was getting fat. I'm pretty sure she was five years old when she said that to me. She told me that because she had seen and heard her mom say these things about her own body. This little girl saw how much her mom stressed about her weight so she thought it was something she needed to stress about as well.

I had a family of girls who I would babysit on their mom's day off from a busy schedule so that she could go to the gym for hours. These girls noticed that their mom chose to go to the gym over spending time with them and they often brought up weight and working out with me.

Another family had little girls who were weighing themselves almost every day and telling their mom how much they weighed to get her approval. {I won't even post some of the awful responses they were given when they would tell her their weight.} These children would also comment on each other's weight. With one of the little girls calling her older brother fat. When I told her that you do not call your siblings fat she responded, "Well, Mom says it." How do you respond to that?!

Another girl once said, "I need to work out more so that my daddy loves me." She was seven. This little girl thought she needed to be skinny to have her father's love because she had seen the way he pressured her mother to be skinny.

I am not judging these families because I am sure that they are all trying their hardest to do what is right for their bodies, their kids, their lives, etc. However, I do want to learn from these examples and do my best to teach my daughter {and other future children} to take care of themselves and be healthy, but even more importantly to love the beautiful bodies that God has created for them.

As I start getting my body to where I want it to be {healthy and something I am comfortable and happy in} I am also thinking about how to portray this goal to my children. I am sure that I will make mistakes but I hope to learn from them. I do not want my children to feel like my focus in life is to be skinny. I do not want them to feel like I choose working out {or any other activity} over them on a regular basis.  I want being active to be a part of our family life. Something that we do for fun AND to stay healthy. I hope that I can accomplish these things and that as our family grows we can all be healthy and happy. That's a good goal, right?

P.S. Don't forget to enter the modestpop.com giveaway!

The view on my daily run.

Family walks are a new favorite activity.