Unsolicited Advice to New Moms

Everyone I know is currently knocked up. All I want to do is rub all your bellies and gloat over how beautiful you all look!!! After counting off the top of my head, 10 of my friends are going to be parents in 2016!! Another one of my good friends told me that they were pregnant yesterday and she was asking me some mama questions so I figured, ehh what new mom doesn’t LOVE unsolicited advice??

When people play the Name Game with you, tell them to go to hell. Your kid, your name. This is the one time in your life you get to be mean and not have to have feelings about it.

Buy yourself some maternity clothes asap. Buy them big because you will get big. They are comfy, happy, and make you and tiny look awesome.  I secretly wish I could still wear some of my pants and shirts from when I had my huge belly. When you are done buying clothes, go grab yourself some rainbow chip frosting because you are pregnant and that shit is amazing.

If you can, workout during your pregnancy. I truly believe that is what made the delivery and recovery so easy on me. Walk, run, lift, do what you do just keep moving with the approval of your doctor.

You get one flip out at work. One. Use it wisely. I had a super ugly, Kim Kardashian cry in my bosses office---not my finest moment and I felt like I wasted my flip. You are allowed to have psycho emotions so use it to your advantage.

Do NOT feel bad if you don’t immediately feel head over heels for this tiny alien creation that just popped into your life. It is honestly terrifying, scary and awesome all at the same time. It is a super hard emotion to process. If we are being honest, I needed time due to my Postpartum and it was around the time of Aubins first smile that my heart was stolen.

Magnesium Citrate-Its gross but that first poop after you have pushed a human out of your nethers is just not fun. Mix this devils concoction with some sprite and give yourself 2 hours. It will be the most welcomed diarrhea that you have ever had!! Trust me, you will thank me.

However you decide to feed your kid is the correct way. You will have so many people tell you about this. YOU HAVE TO BREASTFEED, YOU SHOULD USE FORMULA. This is one of those times that you can use your work flip out if necessary. It doesn’t matter who this person is, you are allowed to tell them to F off. Whatever works for you and your baby is the correct way of doing things.

The sooner you do Crying it out/Ferber method/shut the hell up and go to sleep child the more sleep you will get. This was the hardest for me. We tried Ferberizing Aubin at 4 months and 6 months but I just couldn’t do it. Her screaming just pierced my heart and made me want to die. Its like it just rung in my head screaming “You suck and you are a terrible mother, she is going to be messed up and have parent issues when she grows up” UGH. Well apparently my heart has gone cold in the last week because I just needed sleep so badly that we just let her cry one night. I was so frustrated and crabby that I just couldn’t. Cry tiny sister cry. Then cry some more. 25 minutes later she hunkered down and passed out. Well damn that was okay. The next night, 6 minutes. 6. My sleep tracker said I got 7:59 hours of sleep. That is almost 8 hours…of sleep. Praise newborn baby Jesus.

what a creep :)

All you mamas and mamas to be are just so awesome!! Enjoy this because it goes by fast. As with all unsolicited advice, feel free to disregard anything that you have read. Do what you do because it is your kid and you will have mommy instincts. Just love on that muffin and get all the baby sniffs in before they have oreo all over their face and smell like dirt!

Do Great Things and Happy Holidays!!

Lindsey

Come on, Get Down with the Sickness!!!!

I am pretty sure that there is some form of the plague going around. Definitely the black plague to be exact. Everyone in our home has had it, and it is coming back around. My sickness started 5 weeks ago with a beautiful bout of pink eye. I think my system was below par and then wham bam, death. I was absolutely dead in my tracks. I of course went to the doctor and he said, welcome to winter-goodluck!! I asked him for an inhaler because I had a CrossFit competition the next day and was pretty certain I was going to die. (sidenote we would have placed had I not been a loser---sorry Katherine-I couldn’t breathe) 

I thought we had made it out of the woods and only I had gotten down with the sickness, but noooooOOOOO. After two weeks my poor princess got it.

Check out my snot bubble!!!

Not only did she get sick but she had Croup. It was so awful. She barked like a seal being cut by a chainsaw. When babies have Croup it is beneficial for them to breathe cold air to help reduce the inflammation in their lungs. We sat outside and went for plenty of walks in the cold!! 

I cant even begin to tell you how much puke has been spewed on my face, chest, legs, her chair and carpet. Oddly enough, Levi has seemed to come out clean as a whistle on the puke front. Go figure. On top of the Croup, she had a 103.9 fever, an upper respiratory infection, bi-lateral ear infections, is cutting her top two teeth, and is going through a leap. Johnsons apparently go hard.

On top of her being sick for 14 days, I had to leave for a work trip to go to Boston. Levi was awesome and stayed home with her for a whole week because she couldn’t go to daycare. What a trooper he is. Taking care of a healthy baby all day is exhausting, let alone taking care of a sickly one!!

She is finally getting over the mass quantity of crud she has been dealing with but I on the other hand, STILL am jacked up. My ears hurt, I cant breathe out of my nose and I have nasty coughing fits. Here is to Levi staying out of the line of fire and a healthy Christmas for all!!

Do Great Things!!

Linds

The Most Beautiful Christmas Angel Ever

Ever since I can remember Christmas was never my thing. It lost is luster for me when it became all about stressing over the perfect presents and spending more money than I have. Don't even get me started on dragging all of the damn red and green decoration rubbermades from out of the attic. That shit if for the birds. Evil takes a form in assembling the Christmas tree. Lights, ornaments and sticky candy canes for animals and babies to break...not to mention cuts all over my hands from the fake plastic needles. Aubin seem to like it though. 

Well this year the tides are beginning to turn.  This tiny princess is making me love all things red and Santa! I mean LOOK at her!! How could you not be excited for this madness??

   

I have the great fortune of knowing an awesome guy from the gym whose wife is an amazing photographer. We set up a mini session to get some photos of tiny done for Christmas cards and some family Picts. We had to decorate the house BEFORE thanksgiving (the cardinal sin of all thanksgiving lovers) I went Pinterest crazy and had a whole countertop of props, a shit ton of outfit changes and a lighted backdrop. We used her deer head in her nursery for some super cute mistletoe pictures too!!

In two hours I could not have been more happy with the photos we got. I have no idea how I am going to pick my favorites out of all these!! Aubin should basically be a baby model. Here is the link to all of her pictures!!! 

If you need a GREAT photographer look up Three Regions Photography here! She does amazing work and has really decent prices as well!! 

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Do Great Things!!
Linds&Aubin

Rules to taking a tiny person trick or treating

Halloween is a pretty great holiday if I do say so myself. You get to dress up and be whatever you want to be, and then people give you food for it. And not nutritious food, but junk that rots your face hole. What could honestly be better??

Here are my rules to taking your child trick or treating

You MUST have a ridiculously cute costume. Extra bonus points for a couples costume.

a.       Aubin and her boyfriend El decided to be an old couple. They kept holding hands and just looking at each other like their baby hearts would not beat if the other wasn’t there. The cuteness was overwhelming.

     Don’t be an asshole

a.       If your child is capable of walking, there is no reason to drive your child from house to house. If you do, the world hates you. You are already getting diabetes from all the candy and now you aren’t even getting any physical activity from running from house to house. I really don’t even think that pouring rain is a good excuse-you want candy? You better buck up champ and bring an umbrella.

b.      “But Lindsey, I am not able to keep an eye on my kids when they are walking, that means I have to walk too!!” …Remember that time you were a responsible adult and took care of your children and actually engaged with them??  Get over it and walk.  

     Try your best to plan naps during the day.

a.       There is about a 100% chance that your bedtime routine will be jacked up. Not only was our bedtime schedule messed up, but it was also daylight savings time. Talk about your ultimate F you to the parents. Let’s keep your kids up, give them sugar (if they are old enough) and then have them wake up an hour early because their bodies don’t get it. Just bullshit if you ask me-pure bullshit.

     Get the neighbors involved for optimal candy distribution.

a.       We truly bought our house because we met our neighbor at our first showing. He said that there were families that all had babies under 1 (now they are 2 and 3) and sometimes they meet in the cul-de-sac and drink beer with the baby monitors. Done- the Johnsons are all over that. All of our neighbors are absolutely amazing. So for Halloween we all got together in the cul-de-sac and paraded our kids around so everyone could see their awesome costumes and get oodles of candy.

                                                               i.      We also have some random college renters that went above and beyond and gave our full size candy bars and then gave beers to the parents. Yes, college kids- you make my heart full and I love you.

    Get candy for babies that obviously can’t eat it.

a.       Here is where I was torn. My kid looks cute as hell but there is no way that she can eat any of this candy. I felt like a loser taking her and Eli to people’s houses that I didn’t know and asking for candy. Trick or Treat?!?!- Mama only wants Milky Ways, and Twix Bars!!!! Aubin ended up getting just a small amount of candy which was perfect because we ate it all and totally didn’t need any of it.

    Take millions of pictures

a.       DUH look at my kid! Of course I am taking millions of pictures and I am going to shove them down your throat via social media and you will like it. 

Do Great things

Linds

Sleep is a thing of the past

Sleep: a condition of body and mind such as that which typically recurs for several hours every night, in which the nervous system is relatively inactive, the eyes closed, the postural muscles relaxed, and consciousness practically suspended.

Sleep when you have a child: Just kidding that definition doesn’t exist.

We never really had a bad four month sleep regression but it definitely reared its evil head at 5 and a half months. Baby doll has been waking up 4 to 5 times a night and eating two of those times because I don’t know how to calm her and get her back to sleep. Against my better mom judgement, usually around 4am when we have all had enough, we bring her in our bed and co-sleep with her. She zonks out...mainly because I think she digs on the Tempurpedic mattress (she is a princess after all).

Selfies in mommas bed

At first, she was teething and that sucked. I can only imagine how terrible something poking through your baby gums feels. Then,once her two teeth came in she had no excuse. We even have a super solid bedtime routine too--pick up from day care, play until 6:30, eat some solid food, bath time, book, boobs, and bedtime. What happened to my baby that only woke up at 3 am to eat for 15 minutes and then would peacefully sleep until 6:45?? I can hack that, this up 400 times stuff has got to go.

Bath Time 

Now that she knows how to crawl and pull up on things, sleeping has become a thing of the past. And why not, you can do laps in your crib like Mario Andretti and then use the mesh bumper as a spring board. Really cool Aubin.

Basically, we are haggard and homeless looking every day. We are still drinking mass quantities of coffee and have super short fuses all the time. If we are jerks to you, don’t judge us. It is only a matter of time---she will eventually sleep right!?!?

__________________________________________________________

Update: the day after I wrote this draft, miss perfect decided that she didn’t want to disappoint us anymore and finally slept from 7:30-5:30!!! I feel like a brand new woman!! I'm sure it was a onetime event but lets all cross our fingers and toes that she keeps it up!!

Do Great Things

Linds

Baby Teeth are the Work of the Devil

I am fairly certain that baby teeth are the work of the devil. God was creating these perfect little humans and the big D came in and had to put his nasty sprinkle of awfulness into the mix. Poor tinygirl has been cutting teeth for the past week and she is no less than super pissed.

She is pretty normal during the day—happy, playing and crawling. But when it comes time for bedtime, ho-ly crap, she is not a happy camper. I have tried every trick in the book. Cold teethers, Orajel, teething tablets, baby motrin, sophie, cold things in her mesh teether—basically whatever I can get my hands on to help her not be miserable at night. 

The only thing that semi calms her down is bringing her in bed with us. I really don’t want to start doing that and getting her used to it because, well, I like my bed, and my husband. I also want to continue to sleep like a starfish and not have to worry about rolling over and pancaking my child. [I know co-sleeping works for some people—that’s super cool—I am just not one of those people, no judgement do what makes you happy]

Also, 2 weekends ago we went to the lake with our friends. We had a ton of fun but when I got home I noticed that tiny lady had these crazy bumps on her!! We took her to the doctor and they said she had Chiggers!! Meeehhhhh. After putting Hydrocortisone on them, I did some research and people had been saying, “put clear nail polish on them-it will suffocate the chigger and then they will heal” I thought that was crazy but hey it worked. 

I am hoping that right now we are just in the perfect storm of her sucking at sleeping because honestly, I am exhausted. We are all exhausted. We may be getting about 3-4 hours of sleep a night for the past 2 weeks. I don’t know about y’all but I don’t operate that way. I have been living on 4 cups of coffee and broken dreams. I am just hoping she pops her little self right out of this torture soon before we all go berserk. Any thoughts on how to help tame this tooth beast that is hurting my princess?

Do great things!

Linds

Making Tiny People Food.

I find it funny that Levi and I ate a whole pound cake covered in chocolate the other night but I will only feed Aubin organic veggies. It kinda makes you think and reevaluate your own health---if it is what I want her body to have, why wouldn't I want my own to have it too?? At least she will be healthy!!

Either way, I have been a Pinterest queen lately and found a few great pins on how to make baby food. Labor Day was a perfect weekend for me to get my Paula Dean on because Levi was out of town and I could make a mess in the kitchen and not feel bad. Aubin and I did our typical Saturday target grocery shopping but this time she picked out all the veggies she could handle.

I ended up spending $21 dollars on all organic yums like: spinach/kale, peas, butternut squash, cauliflower, peas, sweet potatoes, red and gold beets, and green beans.

The basic recipe is cut everything up, toss it in the steamer and then ninja blend it to smithereens with some water until desired consistency. Once I had all the purées made, I put them in ice cube trays and froze them. The rest of the food was put into bags and labeled for when we run low on this haul.

I was super impressed with the amount of cash flow I spent vs the amount of food I made. Each ice cube is ~2 oz of food. She will usually eat 1-2 of the at a sitting. The Organic Beechnut baby food that I was initially buying her was $1.00 for a 4oz jar---IF you get them on sale. So if you just count up the ice cube trays, I made 35.5 "jars" of food!! The quart baggies of frozen puree will give me about 40+ more jars too!!That is a saving of (rounding to 75 jars of food, and them being on sale) $54!! That is some serious cheddar!! [If the jars are full price ($1.39) it would have been a savings of $83.25]

From start to finish it took me exactly 2 hours, with most of my time being used to watch things steam. I lost my helper along the way---apparently there was just too much excitement for her.

 I can't believe my tiny girl is already eating food. It just blows my mind that she getting so old. Soon it's going to be her half birthday and you can bet your ass in going to have a party for her :)

Do Great Things

Linds

Maxwell's Journey

I did not have the honor of meeting tiny Maxwell, but his story has greatly affected me being the new mother that I am.  Maxwell was only 1 month old when he was diagnosed with Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia and began his fight. His parents provided updates on their page throughout his journey to keep friends and family updated.  Maxwell was 9 months old when he spent his final day on earth where he was surrounded by family and friends on June 4^th 2015.

On his first birthday, August 26, Maxwell’s parents asked that everyone do a random act of kindness to honor him and his memory. Every chance I had to look at the pictures of the RAKs on social media, I did.  So many people did so many amazing things to honor this little boy. People bought random coffees for employees, sent balloons to heaven, had birthday cake, made donations to the Ronald McDonald House, and brought flowers to their own child’s caregivers.  I was brought to tears six different times yesterday as I viewed the acts for this amazing little boy.

Please remember to be thankful for what you have and to try to make at least one person smile every day.  Maxwell, even though I have never met you, you have touched my life and make me so grateful for my family. Rest peacefully little man.

If you donate to CaringBridge in the next day, your donation will be DOUBLED, thanks to a generous St. Paul, Minnesota, couple… please visit to donate

Also, if you would like to do a Random Act of Kindness for Maxwell, please do so!! You may take a picture and post it to social media with the hashtag #Maxwellstrong

Do Great things

Lindsey

Parenting Fails

I feel like LJ and I have been doing a semi decent job at this whole parenting deal. So far our child is a relatively amazing, all around human being. She rolls, laughs, and doesn’t really cry that much, so I say we get an A for effort.

Although some days, not so much. Here are some of our parenting fails over the last 4 months.

I left for work without shoes on my feet. How does that even happen?? I realized I was homeless about halfway out of the neighborhood. It was also a Monday so that could have played a part too.

Stroller fails. This could be a blog post on its own. The thing is a death trap.  This all happened in the same week. I was rushing out of the house to meet Leigh Ann and boom the stroller busted my face so hard I thought I knocked out my tooth. It bled the whole way to the mall. The bruise on leg, was from when I tried to close the stroller and the dumb lock on it scrapped my thigh. This picture is after 1 week so imagine how awful it was earlier!

Sorry for the Lez-Be-Honest picture...
I had to hold my lip up somehow

Ever gotten really engrossed in your work only to not take a break for pumping at your normal time and then realize you forgot your pump parts and bottles?? Yeahhhh. Sorry Aubin, you cant eat anymore because my chest has exploded due to my idiotness.

I felt really bad about this one…Poor tiny was screaming for quite a long time during a storm because I turned the monitor on mute accidentally. Once I realized what was going on, I raced into her room and scooped her up and she was red from yelling, and so sweaty L All her little duck tail hairs were matted on her head.  I crieeeeddd, oh I cried.

Obviously NOT from that same day,
but a picture of my burrito babydoll

Levi didn't check her diaper before school and noticed when he took her out of the car seat that she had a blowout at home. It got on the Bumbo, car seat and on his arm---which he didn’t realize until he was driving to work.

Little miss rollie-pollie, rolled right off my legs as I was sitting on the couch and almost ate it hard on the floor. Good thing I had just enough time to grab her and not spill hot shells and cheese on her pretty face.

I know there will be many many more parenting fails along the way :) Hopefully, we dont screw our kid up too badly!!

Do Great Things

Linds

Organization and Planning with a Tiny Person

First three weeks back to work have been rather uneventful. We are starting to get in somewhat of a morning routine. We get up, get ourselves ready, pray to God she doesn’t wake up early, make breakfast and then get her ready for the day at 6:30. If all goes well, we are out the door by 7:06. I will tell you one thing, having to coordinate all the nonsense in the morning has taught me how to be the queen of organization and planning. 

It all starts on Sundays-our meal prep days. I make our breakfasts for the week (eggs, turkey sausage, cottage cheese, and spinach) and put them in little Tupperware so they are ready to throw in the pan  and cook on their own as I let the dog out/make sure he is fed and put work bags in my car. This alone has save us about 10 minutes every morning. My lunch is always ready the night before as well. When I don’t make it ahead, then I just end up saying Eff it and going to eat crappy food somewhere and then im pissed at the calories and the money that I spent.  Lose-Lose I tell ya. All of my clothes for work and my workouts are laid out the night before. If I don’t do this, I am rummaging through the dirty laundry searching for the least nasty sports bra. No one wants that. Empty bottles and pump parts are set out to be thrown in their cooler and all my pills are laid out so I don’t forget. Lord help us if I forget those!!!!

Breakfasts for the week, partial lunches, and Aubs bottles for a day.

I also make her bottles as soon as I come home from work. They are in her lunch box and are ready to grab as we are heading out the door. All of her clothes and headbands are ready to roll once she gets her sleepy face up. She has to be a snazzy babydoll always!!

Good Morning Smootches

Once we get to daycare all my worries actually go away. The first few days were hard. Yes, I cried outside of the daycare, and yes Levi laughed at me. Now its almost a race to see how fast you can drop her off. I figure if I am paying them a mortgage payment, they should watch my kid and I shouldn’t feel guilty. And now I don’t. Her teachers freaking love her. Every time we bring her in, they sing “This girl is on fiiirrreeee” to her because she is always so fancy, and they argue over who gets to love on her first. I will say that picking her has to be the best every because she just lights up when you come into the room!! Hi babydoll!! Mama is here!!

Our lives have become controlled chaos for sure. I definitely would not change it for the world! And of course, you cant leave the house unless you have a little puke on your shoulder!!

Do Great things

Linds

I'm Just Not Ready

I’m not ready. Plain and simple, I’m just not ready. The mere thought of leaving Aubin just makes me sick to my stomach. I never really thought that I would be one of those moms who would actually consider staying home. Too bad that is not in the cards for us right now.

Corporate America and their maternity leave is basically a joke. I was fortunate enough to receive 44.5% of my pay over the course of my 12 week absence—for which I am SUPER grateful. However, some women are not that lucky. This infographic shows how the US stacks up to the rest of the world.

Take a minute to let that sink in to your brain. At least companies like Johnson and Johnson and Google are taking steps to mitigate the short maternity leave that women receive…Don’t even get me started on paternity leave. I’m obviously upset because, I am NOT ready.

Now the time has come and I have to go back to work to help support our family. I have to leave my baby at this place that I will call “school” to make myself feel better. She will have fun, learn, and have little tiny people friends. All things that are awesome for her, but super sad for this mommy. I want to teach her things, and see her roll over for the first time. I want to take naps with her and go on walks with her and Murphy. I am not ready to let someone else spend 40+ hours with my baby.

For the next two days we will just do all of our favorite things. We will go to target and spend at least $50, accessorize to our little hearts are content, do some swimming at the pool, paint our nails, take a shushy on the couch together, hang out in the bumbo and bake, and enjoy some nice long walks around the neighborhood. 

I will go to work on Wednesday, puffy-eyed and stuffied nosed. I will choke back my tears when people ask how she is and if I am getting sleep. I will quickly get my work completed  so I can go home and spend uninterrupted time with her and her dad. Here is to being a working mom!

Do great things

Linds