NAPTIME MEETINGS

If it’s Important, You’ll Find A Way

I’m a firm believer that we make time for that which we find important. Rather than saying “I don’t have time for [insert here]…” I’ve working on phrasing it “I don’t want to make time for that” or “I won’t make time for that” because, in reality, that’s exactly what I’m saying. We all have the same amount of time in every day, so what do we choose to do with it?

With splitting my time between working and being a mom, there are certain things that used to be my #1 that have fallen down the list of things I will make time for. Most days I don’t make time to go to the gym, but I still try and get a workout in at home. Although I love physically going to the gym, I don’t make it a priority to go like I once did, because that is an extra hour I’m away from Kallie and right now, that’s not worth it to me. I like a clean house. I think we all “like” a clean house. I have to take a few steps back realize that some days it is more important for me to spend one-on-one time with Kallie and Josh rather then worrying about doing the laundry or cleaning up the family room and being OK with it not looking like a house out of a magazine.

By changing the wording of how I view what I will make time for, I have been able to take an ownership over what I am making a priority in my life, and to pay attention to what I deem to be important (and what I need to stop deeming to be important, i.e. simplify). We all have the choice of how to spend our time. If it is something that is important to us, we will allocate time to make sure that it happens. I see this at work all the time. Day in and day out I am helping people find new jobs and opportunities. When people aren’t at a spot where they are ready to make a change, they may take a day or two to return my call, or they won’t be able to find time to do an interview with a company, or they aren’t able to break away to come and meet with me face-to-face. When circumstances change and they’re ready to finally make that transition, it’s surprising how much time they instantly have available and how eager they are to do whatever it takes to make a change. Because people will make time for that which they find to be important. Is it easy to find time to do everything we want to do? Absolutely not! When we are ready to make a change, or when something is truly important, we will find time to make sure that it happens.

What do you do to focus on spending time on what is important to you?

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Wrapped Up In You

The moment I heard that Garth Brooks was coming to SLC, I was determined to go. I have been a diehard Garth fan since I was 8 and I had my new Christmas stereo that I would play his CD in over, and over, and over, while I would belt it out. When Josh and I were dating we would pretty much do the same thing, but in a car while we were driving. Needless to say, Garth holds a special place in my heart. And it was a great excuse for a Date Night. I always forget how important it is to make time for date nights because I always want to bring Kallie with us, but it is definitely necessary for Josh and me to have time to enjoy being together. This was the perfect night for it too.

We wanted to get down to the Delta Center (OK, I guess it’s now the Vivint something or other arena, but it will always be the Delta Center to me) early so that we could eat and beat any lines. By the time we ate our Costa Vida and got through security, we still had a good hour and fifteen minutes to spare. We decided to go check out our seats to see how truly bad they were. We hiked up the stairs to make our way to the upper bowl, started walking to our gate while trying to hide how heavy we were breathing from the climb, when a man in a black hoody stopped us to ask us a question. Josh and I both were slightly annoyed because we thought he was trying to sell us something. He asked us where our seats were and we kindly let him know they were clear in the heck at the top. He coyly smiled and said, “not anymore!” and handed us two tickets for the SECOND ROW! Dumbfounded, we just kept staring at him, then the tickets, then back at him asking him how this was possible. He said, “I work for Mr. Brooks, and he likes to take care of his fans.” I had full body chills, the biggest grin I could muster, and told him I wanted to hug him.

We stumbled our way to our seats, still in shock, and couldn’t believe this was really happening. We were waiting for Ashton to pop out saying he punk’d us. But it was real. And it was amazing. I still get giddy thinking about the entire night. We were so close and he sounded so good and all of my life dreams came true. I felt like Garth and I were BFF by the end of the night and I’m sure he felt the same. He sang every song that I loved and I belted each one out with my off-tune voice. Between the singing and the screaming, my voice was gone by the end of the night. Yep, I was that person.

During the show and much to my surprise, John Stockton showed up on stage to present Garth with the banner for him selling the most tickets in SLC ever. I think John got a bigger cheer than Garth did. To top the night off, while Trisha was singing “She’s In Love With The Boy” they were doing a kiss cam. I was half watching it while watching Trisha, when I looked up and saw two very familiar people. Wait a minute! It was Josh and me! I’ve never been on the kiss cam before! Luckily a few friends in the crowd were able to snap a quick picture while we were on the screen. I didn’t want the night to end. It was so fun to spend a night with Josh and I still am reminiscing over everything! Thank you strange man in the black hoody, Garth, John, Josh, and the camera man for truly making it a night to remember.

What are some fun date nights you do?

What crazy things have happened to you at a concert?

: Tickets changed to 2nd row

: Dumbfounded

: Selfie #1

: GARTH!

: So close.

: Seflie #2

: John Stockton <3

: Selfie #3

: New BFF

: Kiss Cam

: After the Kiss Cam. Bashful

: So in love

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Workout When?

Between getting to work around 6:30-7:00 am and coming home to play with Kallie and Josh, my time for working out seems to have been eliminated. Pre-baby, I was one of those annoyingly consistent 6 days a week worker outers (maybe one day I’ll get back there). Now I need to try and fit my workouts in when I can and have to get creative. And I’ve had to learn to be OK if I miss a day too. In no way am I a fitness expert, and I may not have perfect form, but I love to be active. Here is one of my favorite workouts to do with Kallie – my nice 30 lb weight (yes – she is 15 months and weighs 30 lbs)! It allows me to play with her at the same time I’m getting my work out in.

50 jumping jacks (Kallie likes to dance by me)

50 baby-weighted squats

50 baby-weighted lunges (25 each leg)

10 baby lifts/tosses

1 minute plank

Repeat 3 times. Remember to have fun with it!

Kallie dancing while I do lanky jumping jacks

Baby-weighted squats #2

Baby-weighted squats #1

Baby-weighted lunges #1

Baby-weighted lunges #2

Baby lifts/tosses #1

Baby lifts/tosses #2

Baby lifts/tosses #3 (this one is her favorite one)

1 minute plank while Kallie monitors form.

What are some of your favorite workouts to do with your babies?! I love adding new tricks!

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Where to Work?

Going into the professional world, I always assumed that when I had kids I would work from home for at least part of the time. I held onto this assumption even for a few weeks after I had Kallie. I surprised myself by ultimately deciding to work everyday in the office (although on a somewhat flexible schedule of getting in early and leaving a little early). Luckily, my work was great with me and wanted to work with me on the option that would make the most sense re-entering the workforce post baby. I’ve been trying to have a lot more focus on being present which played a big part in my decision. It all boiled down to: when I was at work, I wanted to be at work. When I was at home, I wanted to be home.

I know that a lot of people work at home and do it very successfully. I love having the option to work from home when I need to or if I need to finish some things up after Kallie goes to bed. With my personality, it would be hard to work from home continuously. When I start something, I like to do it until it is done [insert Netflix binge watching] or until I have a dedicated time to stop. I felt that if I worked from home, I would never feel like I was giving either work or home life the appropriate amount of attention and would never feel “done” (and I would just want to play with Kallie all the time). Granted, I don’t think we ever feel as though we allocate enough time to our responsibilities at home because there are always things that we can be working on, but it would be so much harder for me to feel like I was being there for Kallie even though I would be home. I would be in every sense of the word “even when you’re here you’re not here”.

Love when I get to spend time with my Kallie.

By compartmentalizing these two huge components of my life, it has allowed me to be a better me at work and a better me at home. During my time at work I can be completely focused (albeit our 12:00 Diet Coke runs), and when I get home, I can more easily flip the switch to “just be” with Kallie. I try to put my phone to the side and focus on her. There are obviously times when I need to take phone calls at home or login to finish something, for which I am grateful I have the ability to do work from home, but overall I appreciate the separation of work and home.

What is your setup and what have you found works best for you?!

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I’m on a Boat

A few months back, a group of our friends were planning a cruise to the Western Caribbean and we thought it would be a great idea to go and get away. As the trip came closer and closer, it hit us harder than we thought it would at the time of booking: we have to leave Kallie. I had traveled a couple of times for work but those were just 1-3 nights at a time where I had full FaceTime capabilities to still see her everyday. This was going to be 8 days in the middle of the ocean with spotty, overpriced internet. I started to panic. I wasn’t ready to leave my baby that long. Everyone assured me it would be fine, and I knew she would have the best care, but it made me sick to my stomach at the thought of not seeing her for that long.

The cruise turned out to be great, but I missed Kallie even more than I thought I would. The second day we were gone, we got a text from her babysitter Paige that Kallie was running a little bit of a fever and they were taking her into the doctor. My heart sunk. Josh and I had all sorts of parent guilt because we were out basking in the sun while our baby was at home sick and on an antibiotic. She needed her mom to hold her and snuggle with her. We were lucky she had my mom and Paige to give her a lot of love while we were gone. We tried the best we could to not stew over it, I may have shed a few tears about it, but there was nothing we could do about it.

Paige would send us a million Snap Chats a day so we could at least see her because FaceTime or Skype didn’t work very well. The highlight of each of our days was sitting around our phones and waiting for each video to load so that we could see a 10 second glimpse of what Kallie was up to, or how she seemed to be feeling that day. I know we sound so pathetic, but it really was our favorite part of every day.

Our cruise went to Haiti, Jamaica, Grand Cayman, and Cozumel (Western Caribbean). Everywhere was gorgeous! The boat was awesome with a Flowrider and rock climbing wall! I was sore for a week after from doing both of those – joke’s on me! Josh took the cake for most competitions won including mini golf, black jack, ping pong, and a few more…such a proud wife moment. At Haiti, they had a big water park full of inflatable toys that we played on (so fun) until someone got stung by a jellyfish and I got bit by sea lice (whatever those are). The rest of the time we decided to play it safe and stay on the beach and soak in the sun.

Jamaica was a blast!! We did a canopy zipline through the jungle and then hiked up Dunn’s River Falls (note – if anyone does this cruise make sure to book your excursion through the ship because all of the places have contracted with the cruise lines and you aren’t even able to go to some if you didn’t do it through the ship). In Grand Cayman, we found a private boat to take our group of 14 out snorkeling and swim with the stingrays. That was such a surreal experience! A couple of the guys, unbeknownst to us, were putting squid on our backs so the stingrays kept on swimming up on all of the girls. It was so scary but cool at the same time. Mostly scary though. I couldn’t stay in the water too long because I chickened out. I jumped in long enough to experience it, get the picture, and peace out. I would highly recommend it, though.

Cozumel was surprisingly one of my favorites. We rented scooters and rode around the town, went to the little shops, and ate at a local, authentic restaurant. It. Was. To. Die. For. Out of all of the exquisite food the whole week, that was our favorite! We just got yummy tacos, fresh guacamole and fresh salsa and it was SO good. I’m salivating just thinking about it. Josh and I really liked this stop because unlike the other ones where we were going, and going, and going, this one we got to spend more quality time together (heart eyes).

By the time the last day came around, we couldn’t WAIT to see Kallie. It was hard to sleep that night in anticipation. When my mom showed up at the airport with her, Kallie had the biggest smile and was so excited to see us. I guess she really does know who we are :). Come to find out, my mom had fractured both of her legs while we were gone, too, and still took care of a sick Kallie before and after work – she is a saint! She didn’t want to tell us because she didn’t want us to worry. Needless to say, Josh and I felt AWFUL once we found out. As much fun as I had on the cruise and loved being able to spend more time with Josh and our friends, I was SO glad to be home with my little sweetie! It is good to take a break from work and the daily grind to get refreshed, but it will be a while before we take our next long vacation sans Kallie!

Did you have as hard of time as we did leaving your littles for a trip?

What has been one of your favorite trips?

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Sunday’s are for Baking

Weekends are always cheat days and Sunday’s are the cheat day of the weekend. Kallie is the best little helper whenever we make things. She’s the taste tester (I know you wouldn’t think she likes treats by looking at her but……she loves em). Today we made pumpkin chocolate chip cookies because it’s fall and they are our favorite so we take any excuse to eat anything pumpkin we can. The best part about these: 3 ingredients. The 2nd best part about these: no eggs so Kallie can eat as much of the dough as she wants.

1 15 oz can of Libby’s canned pumpkin

1 box of spice cake mix (whatever kind is on sale)

As many chocolate chips as you want

Mix. Drop on cookie sheet (I use an ice cream scoop). Bake 18-20 minutes at 350. Eat all in one sitting.

You’re welcome.

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Fast Foods Friday – Italian Roast Sandwiches

Being a working mom (and I think really any mom in general) I am always struggling to find foods that taste good, are decently good for you, and are FAST to make. I’m going to start making this a weekly or bi-weekly post on Fridays featuring a quick meal to help out in a pinch! This week’s feature is Italian Roast Sandwiches. I was first introduced to these by my mother-in-law, Kim. They are so yummy and even a picky eater like Josh (although he will tell you he isn’t picky, he just knows what he likes so why deviate) loves them! Best part – they only require 5 ingredients!

Italian Roast Sandwiches:

1 Beef or Pork Roast (I use a lean roast but you could use any kind you have on hand)
1 Jar of Sliced Pepperoncini’s
1 Loaf of French Bread or 6 Hoagie Rolls (open face)
Provolone/Swiss Cheese
Salt and Pepper to taste

Option: put garlic butter on bread first. I generally don’t do this (save on calories) but have before and it’s delicious

Step 1: Put roast and jar of pepperoncini’s in crock pot on low for 8-10 hours
Step 2: Shred meat
Step 3: Put back in crockpot to soak up juices
Step 4: Put shredded meat on bun/bread, top with cheese
Step 5: Broil for 3-5 minutes until cheese is melty. Eat and enjoy!

Leftovers/Additional Options: I use the leftovers or just the meet for a lot of things! I mix it with spinach, parmesan, croutons and olive garden dressing, tacos, put it on a wrap, etc.!

All ingredients

Step 1: Put roast and jar of pepperoncini’s in crock pot on low for 8-10 hours

Step 2: Shred meat

Step 3: Put back in crockpot to soak up juices

Step 4: Put shredded meat on bun/bread, top with cheese

Step 5: Broil for 3-5 minutes until cheese is melty. Eat and enjoy!

What are some fast recipes you have!? I’d love to hear and add to my repertoire!

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I’m Raising a Puppy

The other morning after I’d hit snooze one too many times, I was rushing to get ready in time to make my early morning meeting that I always seem to have scheduled on mornings such as these. I threw on my clothes, put on my left shoe and, alas, my right shoe was nowhere to be found. I hobbled all around the house at 6:02 in the morning looking for my shoe (aka Kallie’s favorite toy) trying to be as quiet and discrete as possible, which can be a task for me – just ask Josh, the more doors slammed and foot stomps the better – yet it was nowhere to be found. At this moment, it dawned on me that I was, in fact, raising a puppy.

10 reasons my baby is actually a puppy:

She chews on everything: my shoes, blankets, fingers, blocks, balls, you name it. If it fits, she will chew.
Her favorite chew toy is my shoe and she moves them everywhere.
She pees on me unintentionally.
She eats food that’s fallen on the floor before I can pick it up.
She gets really excited anytime someone walks in the door and her head perks up to see who it is.
We clap and reward her every time she does a trick.
She’s cute and cuddly and has a lot of rolls.
She follows us everywhere we go.
She loves to give kisses.
She is so lovable and makes everyone happy when they are around her!

What does your baby do that is puppy-esque?!

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Screw Sleep Training

As you can tell from every other post: I like to have a plan. I like to feel like I am prepared. I can alter the course once it’s in motion, but I like to have that initial blueprint. While I was pregnant, I was terrified to have a baby. I didn’t know the first thing about being a mom. I had a dream pregnancy and would have liked to have been pregnant for 9 more months, because I knew how to take care of her in there. I just drank a lot of water, tried not to eat too much pizza and ice cream, and went to bed early. Easy. To try and appease my mind craving the preparation, I decided to read a highly recommended book Baby Wise.

I read it intensely, made my own Cliff’s Notes version so I could regurgitate everything to Josh (not a chance he was going to read it) and felt as if I now understood everything I needed to know in the first few months of having a baby. I felt a small sense of preparedness. For any of you that have read this, you know there is a big section on sleep training and how to get your baby to go down without relying on being rocked or nursed to sleep by the mother. It made great sense to me when I read it and I had plans to execute it to perfection so that I would have a perfectly trained baby by the time I was to go back to work.

And then Kallie was born.

She was so sweet and I hungered to hold her and be with her when she was down. My favorite thing to do every night (and every few hours) was to rock her to sleep. There is nothing sweeter than a sleeping baby. After about a month, I was ready to start this so called “cry it out” method. I figured I’d start while Josh was out golfing because he couldn’t stand the thought of her crying at all. I laid her down in her crib, swaddled with precision, and had the soothing sound of rain coming out of her noise machine. I turned on her monitor, walked out, and shut the door. And that’s when it all went downhill. Kallie began to cry. And cry. And cry. After what felt like an entire one of Josh’s golf rounds, I looked at the clock. It had been 3 minutes. I waited 2 more and couldn’t stand it anymore. I ran in, swooped her up, and we rocked until she was fast asleep.

While on maternity leave, my mind would become blurred to this experience and I tried 1 or 2 more times, but to no avail. Once she was asleep, she did a great job at staying asleep until she needed to be fed. She consistently started sleeping through the night at about 5 months (with a few sleep regressions mixed in there) so I didn’t feel like I was doing her a total coddling disservice.

Once I went back to work, there wasn’t a chance I was going to try it again. She is 14 months now and I still proudly can say that I rock her to sleep every night. And I wouldn’t have it any other way. I know that at some point I will have to let her learn how to fall asleep on her own and that sleep training enthusiasts are cringing, but right now that is our time together. Because I am not with her all day, that is a precious time for me to be able to hold her and nurture her. I don’t necessarily even do it for her anymore; I do it for me. She’s so active and busy now that this is the time where she still feels like my baby and not the grown up she seems to be being lately. I look forward to our snuggle time every night where I can just kiss her chubby little cheeks and we can giggle and then she can sweetly fall asleep.

I know that sleep training can be a great thing and works really well for some people. For me, I need my snuggle time. And for that – screw sleep training.

Did anyone else have a hard time with sleep training? Does anyone have any good stories with sleep training to encourage the ones like me who could cut it?

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Part 3: I’m an employee…I mean mom…I mean – how does this work?!

It was the morning of my first day back. It was like the first day of school again – I had my outfit picked out, my lunch was packed the night before, my breakfast bar ready to go, and I didn’t get a lot of sleep (but that was mostly because Kallie decided that whole “sleeping through the night thing” wasn’t for her anymore). The first of many freezer meals was in the crockpot and Kallie’s diaper bag was fully stocked, with meticulously pumped breast milk in the fridge. She was asleep which I so appreciated so I didn’t feel like I was “leaving” her.

When I got to work, it was like I had never left but also like my first day all coupled into one. I sat down to over 2,000 emails, a team that was ready to go, and I felt like I couldn’t breathe, let alone know where to start. And right when I started to feel like I was making some progress into my black hole of emails, I had to go and pump. In a suit. In a tiny room. With an apparatus attached to me making me feel all sorts of professional. Ironically enough, I learned to enjoy this time because it was my solitary break where I could take a deep breath, check up on Kallie, and gear up to go again.

The schedule I worked out with my boss of me coming in before the sun even thought of waking up and leaving a little bit early was working out great. Kallie would take 2 naps during the time I was away so I didn’t feel I was missing as much. We were fortunate enough to have my wonderful sister in law and her two very attentive littles watch her Monday, Wednesday, Friday; my mom had her on Tuesdays and my mother in law on Thursdays. They all would dutifully send me multiple pictures throughout the day so I could see my little sweetie. I never had to worry about if she was being taken care of but my heart would still yearn for her.

While I was at work, there was so much going on and I would get so absorbed into my day-to-day that it was able to thankfully take my mind off of me being away from my baby. When I got in my car, I would long to be with her and rush home to do so. I would sometimes feel guilty if I caught myself not thinking about her every second – did this make me a bad mom? I knew she was being taken care of so I would let my mind focus on my task at hand – was this acceptable now that I was a mom?

After my first full week of being back, I was laying with Kallie in our front room and I just started bawling. I had held it together all week and couldn’t hold it in any longer. Josh came in, noticed the influx of tears, and asked if I was doing OK. To which, I responded, “it’s just so nice to be with her all day again.” And it was. It gave me a whole new appreciation for the weekends but also made me wonder how I was going to be able to do that same whirlwind of a week again. Of trying to be everything bundled into one.

As hard as it was at the beginning, the good news is, things got better. I knew Kallie was getting the full love and attention she needed every single day. That was the most important thing for me – that she was being taken care of with love. This allowed me to focus on my day while I was at work and then focus on her when I got home. The funny thing is, my performance actually increased and a new fire was built inside of me. If I was going to be away from Kallie, I was going to make sure it was worth it and that I thoroughly enjoyed it.

We slowly developed our “new normal”. She got to bond with and enjoy time with her daddy in the morning from when she woke up until when he would drop her off. Josh cherishes his time with her and they have formed a great bond because of it. She then would get to go play with her cousins, aunt, and grandmas and develop lasting relationships. I would pick her up and we would play together the rest of the night. When I was with her, my phone would go away, and I would just focus on Kallie and have quality time with my sweetie pie.

The first picture I got at work

Doing such good tummy time

My first Saturday back

How was your experience in going back to work? Were you able to hold it together longer than me? Did you have any of the mommy guilt – or what causes you to have mommy guilt now? What works for you as your “new normal”?

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Who I Am