Yoga My World...

So I have been going to yoga and it is just amazing, even though I have to get up at the butt crack of dawn. I have lost 2.6 pounds so far and I am sooo excited about my progress. It is really important to me to keep doing it so that I can practice when I am pregnant with my other children. It is interesting to me that I already place so much importance on treating my children equally even though K is the only one already here. I swear all of her yoga classes are much of the reason she is such a happy girl. I think having four pets has been great practice for having four kids. After all, when Baby K came home from the hospital, Patrick said she was a lot like getting a puppy, except slightly easier... which coming from him is a huge compliment.
I have been teaching K sign language and I don't think she quite gets what is going on, but she sure thinks it's funny! She waves her hands around a lot now and people always think she's waving at them, I don't tell them that she just does that all the time- why not let her be treated like a little genius once in a while. I am using a great book called "Baby Sign" that breaks down how to teach your baby starting at 4 months. OH MY GOSH I AM SOO THAT MOM!!! But when she is 25 and knows the sign for sleep and bath, she will thank me. (Oh the delusions of a new mother...)
She has also started trying to crawl, which is very exciting. She does a great inch worm and I am going to enter her into the next season of "so you think you can dance". I love my bugaboo!
By the way, isn't the resemblance between Lacy and K uncanny?

Grateful for Mother No. 1

Today was one of those days where I was so sick of staying in the house that I was actually excited to go to the grocery store because it was an excuse to get out of my pajamas. Then it started to pour and the sky was full of lightning so I stayed home. I kept having these images of Baby K being struck by lightning in her shopping cart in the parking lot- I think that's because every fact patrick uses ends up beginning "you have a better chance of being struck by lightning that..."
I was feeling a little disheartened about motherhood until I read an article on CNN.com about a woman in China who is breastfeeding 9 babies that were orphaned by China's earthquake. I was filled with gratitude to have something in common with an amazing woman like Jiang. Being a mother is truly the greatest honor I could ever have, even if it means that some days I do nothing more than read picture books and eagerly waiting for my little one to poop so I can let her be naked for a while afterwards. What a gift...
I am thankful that K has parents who love her and that we are all safe and happy when there are so many others who are not as blessed. I just pray that there are more people like Jiang who can offer comfort and sustanence to those who are in need, and that I too will be able to help others when called upon.

Ruffing It...

So we went camping this past weekend for the first time in years! I thought it was going to be totally awful and that I was "taking one for the team" but it ended up being amazing! Karissa became a nature baby and it brought Patrick and I much closer together- something I had not anticipated. We went to Juniper Springs up in Ocala and even set up our own tent outside inside of in our living room like I had originally wanted to do. :) Oh, and the redneck contingency was priceless; we tried to start counting how many times someone told their kids they were going to "bust their ass" over the course of the weekend but lost count at around 150... it was like being in our very own episode of King of the Hill.
I went to yoga after looking at pictures of myself from the weekend (if you notice I am only posting pictures of Patrick and Baby K.) It was a little scary and a lot hard the first time back, but people were super supportive. The teacher announced to the class that I was back after taking a break and having a baby and I was sooo proud of myself. It was great to hear my laziness and inadequacy as being framed as merely taking a break. I realized that I need to be much more gentle regarding how I have spent my time as being a mom and wife. Will I ever be a size 6 or 8 again? ABSOLUTELY!!! But it's okay if I am not right now. I thought that I was going to end up eating a big ol' piece of humble pie but it ended up being a pie of acceptance instead, which tastes far better.
We went to sushi last night and when Patrick was holding K, she started saying dadadada over and over- I know that she doesn't know what she's saying but of course I started crying anyway because the joy on Patrick's face was priceless. She has been saying it for weeks but of course never when he was in earshot. She is such a tease!

Give Me Some Zwag!!!

I found the coolest website today at www.zwaggle.com- It's this website where parents can exchange stuff that they don't want anymore. I plan on just giving a ton of stuff away to make room for more, like the nasty doll Baby K fell in love with at Nordstroms yesterday; we were there with Audrey and Dara and all of a sudden K had this look of ecstasy on her face as she reached for "abby cadabby" on the shelf. I have bought her dozens and dozens of blankets and stuffed animals hoping that one of them would be her transitional object (the thing that would help her gain independence from my boobs) but of course she picks a thirty dollar fuschia fairy...
She loves her carseat (the way it tastes, anyway!) Both of her bottom teeth are now coming in and she is super crankers :( But she told me that if I eat lots of pie it will help her feel better- it's a dirty job but somebody's got to do it.
So I am going back to bikram yoga regularly next week because no matter what I do, those last 20 pounds just ain't coming off; I can blame it on nursing but the pie reference above probably doesn't help my case. I miss it and think that it's worth getting up at 5:30 in the morning so I can go. I know that my baby fat will just fall off and the "me" time is good too. This keeps happening where I try to do without and come full circle (I think that's the point of a circle, it just goes round and round and round... and round. Maybe that's the point!)

Jumping for Peas...

I have finally gotten it together enough to start blogging! I figure if I redirect the energy I put into rewriting and organizing to do lists into this, it will be time well spent. (I think that writing a blog probably burns more calories that writing a list, which is another incentive.)
So we had a great Mother's Day- we went to church and Baby K was loud and thoroughly entertained the 3 rows in front of us, and the 2 rows behind! She sings with the best of them, even if she is slightly out of tune. We ended up watching the British version of Planet Earth and everytime an animal was killed- K would laugh hysterically and get a huge smile on her face; apparently she shares her mother's outlook on life...
Her bigger girl car seat came yesterday and it is huge, the freakin' thing better protect her from a nuclear war! I hope she likes it, we ended up getting her the Britax Boulevard because it is safe up to 65 pounds and I had seen a video on youtube about this specific seat saving a little girls life. Most seats only go up to 45 pounds as opposed to her still being in it when she is around 8 instead of 6 or 7. Patrick had this look of horror on his face when it came and wondered at first if I had ordered the stainless steel fridge I've been wanting instead of her carseat.
We got a hand-me down jumper from patrick's cousin and Baby K is jumping in the pantry like world peace depends on the amount of air she can get. What a little rockstar, I hope she's adventerous like her daddy!
But most importantly- did anyone see the six foot cow on the view this morning!?