I am sorry in advance

You are going to have to forgive me over the next couple of months. Life is about to get super crazy and I am sure my blogging will suffer! Lets start off with April.

About a month ago, Ben and I started discussing moving to a bigger place because our little guy is outgrowing this one. We thought we could last here longer but why suffer. Miller is into rolling around and there is nowhere for him to go in this house. We started looking with the intention of moving before Miller turned a year old. Well I started looking and in a few days I found a great place. Our current condo is 2 bedrooms, 1400sqft, carport, small kitchen, living room, dining room, 2.5 bath. This new place is 3 bedrooms, 2200sqft, 2 car garage, bigger kitchen, living room, dining room, 2.5 bath, 2 patios, small yard and a family room. Yes, much bigger! I am sure I will be posting a bunch of pictures at some point. We turned in our lease and deposit last week and are moving in 3 weeks (OMG....yes 3 weeks!). So we are going to be super busy packing over the next few weeks and I am super nervous about how to get this all done with a baby.

Before that happens, while we are packing, next weekend we have plans on both Friday and Saturday night ("Hunger Games"girls night out for this momma). The next weekend is Easter which just entails dyeing eggs, making Miller's Easter basket (I mean, helping the Easter Bunny), church and brunch. Then the next week, Miller turns 6 month so we start solid food, our 6 year dating anniversary so we want to go on a date and we move so rush to pack, clean and hold on tight to our sanity.

I am hoping I might have a little help while I unpack but either way, that is what I will be doing the week after the move. The weekend of the 21st I will probably be going to Knoxville for a week. The first weekend in May is the lone weekend of nothing to do. I am sure it will be errands and still unpacking.

On the 10th, I am packing up with Miller, my grandparents and mom and going to Oklahoma for my cousins wedding. The next weekend we are going to Knoxville for my college friends wedding. The following week we are going to Memphis to visit with Ben's family and his best friends wedding.

In early June I have my cousins wedding, and a shower that I am helping plan (which I have to manage to do in there somewhere).

I am seriously so overwhelmed that I want to cry. I know it will all get done somehow and I will probably feel better once the move is done. Please pray for me and be patient. I will try to do my normal posts.

Trusty Family St Patrick's Day

So St Patrick's Day is a big deal to me. While yes, my family is Irish, but isn't everyones?  That is one reason we have always celebrated but it is also because my high school was the Fighting Irish so we always made it a big deal.

Like all holidays, I took some pictures of Mr Miller. 

On Saturday, I made green pancakes. These are mine that have chocolate chips in them. 

Our little green family. We were out all day like this and at the first store I saw other people in non-green and I wondered if they thought we were morons.  Then I saw a mom and her two kids in all green, then another family, then another. I felt better then!

Ben's green beer my Bailey's chocolate milk.

 

 For dinner I made shepherds pie. 

We had Irish Cupcakes for dessert.

 

I hope you all had a lucky St Patrick's Day!

Miller: Month Five

How is my baby one month away from being a half of a year old???? I am in shock! I am so happy that he is where he is but I am so sad for the time that is passing by. I wish I could freeze time for a bit. There are days when I want to pull my hair out and runaway for a while, but by the end of the day, when I put him to bed, I am a little sad because I want to spend more time with him. I can not believe how much I love him. I am trying to look forward to watching him grow, rather than dwell on where he has been.

*These measurements are ours so they may be off from last month when we were at the pediatricians.

Weight: 17lbs 12oz (+9lbs 10oz)

Height: 27" (+ 6.5")

Head: 18.5" (+3.5")

Sleep: Maybe we should not open this can of worms. He is still only taking 30 minute naps. I can count on both hands the times he has taken a naps longer than that in the past 6 weeks. Somedays he takes 4 naps, others 2(!!!!) for a grand total of 1-2 hours a day, then by the end of the day, he is deliriously tired. At night, sometimes he sleeps 7 hours, eat, goes back to sleep for 3 but most nights he is up 3 or 4 times. Most times, he is barely eating if he is at all. The past few nights he is just waking up to fuss. Last night I got so frustrated and went to the bathroom. When I came back, Ben and Miller were about 2 feet away from each other, holding hands and both sound asleep. I keep thinking, is there one thing that I might be doing wrong that could make everything fall into place?

Eating: Another can of worms. I have been trying to keep him happy and hoping filling up during the day, might help him sleep better at night. Obviously not working. Right now, I am on a 2 hour schedule with him, which I think is a bit excessive. I was assuming at this point we would be closer to a regular 3 hour schedule.

Best Moment: He is so smiley lately! I will be doing something around the house, stop to look at him and he just beams. I love that he is doing this for other people too. I worry about his social skills since I am staying at home with him but hoping this is a sign he will be a social butterfly.

Milestones: He is rolling over both ways now. He mostly likes to roll from back to belly and hang out there, but then gets mad because he is not sure what to do while he is there. He is learning to get his knees up under him, yikes! We are also working on sitting up. He is a bit wobbly from side to side but doing pretty good.

Monthly Wisdom: I am majorly freaking out about his sleeping but my friends assure me that he will regulate soon (hopefully!!!).

Goals for the Upcoming Month:
-Always working on the sleeping. We are hoping that when we start solids in the next month, it might aide him sleeping through the night. We will reassess after a month of that.
- As I mentioned, starting cereal and other solid foods in a few weeks. We have given him a few tastes of things but we will be full on feeding him soon.

Things Miller is doing
-He is into flailing his arms. Sometimes his hands out his sides, other times he is holding his hands and doing it.
-He hoots. It is the cutest thing because he sounds just like and owl. He will do it for 10 minutes straight.
- He is becoming so social and smiling at everyone. Him and Ben have started becoming buddies. He laughs and smiles at him as soon as he sees him.

Miller Week 20 and 21

Back to pictures. These are from the past few weeks since I have been slacking.

Bath time at Ninny's.

"Mommy, it is my turn with your camera".

One day in Knoxville my parents decided to take Miller and I to some daffodil fields that were on the side of the highway to snap some pictures. I love them!

This is an outtake at the end because he was so over it.

This is my absolute favorite picture that we have of him.

Miller helping daddy build a computer for the first time.

This is the smile that melts my heart over and over again, day after day. I love being busy doing something, looking at him and he gives me one of these.

"Mom, seriously, it is my turn!!"

He turns 5 months today and I will post that update sometimes this week.

Where do I live again?!?!

I have not forgotten weekly pictures, I just have not had time for them. As I said before, I was in Knoxville last weekend for Ben's nieces birthday party and I stayed the week. I was supposed to go home on Monday but I got a cold and was so miserable I could not drive until Wednesday. It was awful because I felt trapped there. While I miss family, I am so happy to be home.

On that note, I know that I normally just post updates and pictures on here but do you all mind if I vent for a minute (even though I am not even sure who all reads this)? As you notice, I go back to TN quite a bit. It is for a number of reasons.

1) As pretty much an only child, when I thought of family, it included my aunts, uncles, cousins, and grandparents. It pains me that I am not raising Miller with family. Since I am only 3 hours away, I am taking advantage of the fact that I am a SAHM (stay at home mom) and spending some time each month up there.

One side of my ginormous family

2) I love my husband and I love that he will do whatever he has to, to support our family. That includes him working 60+ hour weeks. This means I spend a lot of time alone with Miller and going to TN gives me some extra hands to entertain him.

Photo by J Henderson Studios

3) I have made some of the best friends here who have become our little GA family. Since having Miller, everyone has gotten so busy (and a few of them pregnant) that I hardly see anyone. I am so happy for everyone and understand, but going to TN gives me people to talk to besides a 4 month old (almost 5 month....eek!!).

Yes, all three of other ladies in this picture are pregnant. Fertile water down here.

I feel so conflicted because I feel like I belong in both places. While in TN it is nice to be with my family and have other people to play with Miller. I got to go out a few times by myself and Ben and I got to go out twice without the baby when he was there. I feel like going there is important for my sanity. Not to mention, it is great that Miller gets to be around other people besides myself. For the first few days, he was a little crabby with others but by the end of the week, he was smiling for everyone.

In GA, I have my husband and friends, but I hardly see any of them lately. I have tried to join a few moms groups but whenever we have meetings, something comes up (baby is sick, meeting cancelled, I get lost, etc). In the 2.5 months since I joined them, I have been to a grand total of one event.

I know I could suck it up and just stay in GA full time but I believe that I could go crazy and that Miller and I would be so isolated. I also think my family would kill me. I know that Ben and I are a family but he knew well before marrying me, that he was marrying my whole big family. It is important for me to include them in our life.

Thank you for listening if you have made it through this. I just needed to get that out there. Back to our regularly scheduled program tomorrow.