I Knew You...

I was going through my pictures, and looking back at some of the ultrasounds and it made me smile because her ultrasound looks just like her! It's kinda funny because before she was born and I had seen the ultrasound pictures, I still wondered WHAT she would look like. Come to find out... I had already seen her! :) It also amazes me how she still does things that she did while she was in my belly. I found three examples. We always know when she's getting sleepy, because she puts her arm up to her ear like that!

 

 

 

 

  

I look at these, and I just think to myself that God knew exactly what he was doing. It makes me stop and praise God for who He is and what He has done for me! Even though I don't deserve any sort of grace or mercy, he is faithful, forgiving, and full of grace. I like this verse below. How comforting and uplifting it is to know that God had a hand in her creation and that he has known about her!? Even though our miscarriage we had, he KNEW that Sara Nicole Lawyer would be a part of our family. And He has set her apart! What an amazing God he is!?  She's a miracle! Knitted together in MY BELLY! It's just insane!!! I'm just in awe of what God has done!

Having a baby around sure does make life a little harder. Especially my spiritual life. It's almost like God just takes the sideline because I'm always so worried about what Sara is doing, what I need to be doing for her, or how I can help her stop crying. And then when I finally do get some time to do things, I feel like that time is dedicated towards cleaning, organizing, or just sitting doing something mindless. Even with church, yes we go.. but how often does my mind float to think about how she's doing in the nursery, or watching my phone to see if the nursery calls me because she's hungry. I guess I'm just really trying to find my place with God in all this. It's hard being involved in church because I feel like we just go straight to the nursery afterwards, pick her up, and by then she's hungry or sleepy so we don't hang around much. So if you think of us, or as you finish reading this, just say a prayer that Jason and I can figure this whole thing out to not only be great, godly parents, but also that we wouldn't lose sight of what we believe in. 

That's all. :) For now...

To Ohio... and BEYOND!

The week after Spring break seemed to be a little bit harder to come back to then when I came back from maternity leave! It was also hard because no matter how hard we tried to keep Sara on California time... it just didn't work. And with her getting back into Daycare, we've all just been a bit of a mess this week. Even though it was SO much fun spending time in Ohio, it was also a little exhausting. So this weekend, we have just been doing pretty much nothing but resting and cleaning the house. She did choose to roll over for the first time while we were in Ohio, so that was fun to share with the family!

Sara did pretty decent traveling all around. It kinda sucked because in order to use our free Southwest tickets, we had to drive all the way to LA. Our plane left at 1:00 pm, so we had decided to leave around 6:30 am just in case. So not only did Sara have to put up with a long car ride, but she had two plane rides to get through too. The first leg to Atlanta wasn't bad. She slept a lot and loved looking out the window. But when we landed, we thought we only had time to get from one plane to the next. Unfortunately, we ended up sitting on the plane for an HOUR!!!! It was very frustrating. It was a very long day.... poor baby. The return flights were a little better. She freaked out a few times because I think she was just overly tired, but people loved to look at her and tell her how cute she was. hehe

Some things we learned about flying with a baby (for those of you who are interested).
1. Obvious one... keep the baby sucking on something. One decent, Sara was very unhappy and as soon as we landed, she was fine. But it helps their ears.
2. We really loved having our baby carrier. I got to "wear" Sara and when we went through the security it was SO easy. We were watching a family in front of us who had so much stuff with them! And we were happy to just have been carrying two bags and the baby girl.
3. If possible, find someone where you're going who has a car seat! If we had to deal with all that, and a stroller... it would have sucked. Especially with a layover as short as ours.
4. Use leg warmers! We put Sara in a long sleeve onesie and leg warmers! It made changing her diaper quick and easy.
5. If it's their first flight, ask for their "First Wings". The whole airplane crew signed a little certificate for her and she got little SouthWest Airline wings. It's pretty cool.
6. When people give you dirty looks... give them dirty looks back. Grrrr It's like they think I'm purposely making her cry to tick them off. But mostly, I was just more uneasy about not being able to make Sara comfy.
7. Ask if the flight is full. We lucked out on one flight and left our bag on the middle seat so no one would sit there. So Sara got to sprawl out for that flight.
8. Be patient. Flying sucks! And things happen. So just try to go with it and just be as calm as you can! I found that when I started to get tense, it only made things worse.

Ohio family was so much fun! She got to meet her cousins for the first time, who just loved on her so much! And we surprised Aunt Jama at school, and she loved laughing at her Uncle Kar. She did SO well with all the new faces we came across. She would smile and talk and just be happy with anyone who held her. But, by the end of the trip, I think she had had enough. Rightly so. We put her through A LOT! She was such a trooper though. I'm so proud of her. We took Sara to her first baseball game! Honestly, I don't even know what happened during that game! Ha I was either nursing, changing Sara, or hanging out with the nieces! But the atmosphere was nice to be around in. Then we also were able to spend Easter with the Ohio family. Sara wasn't much into decorating eggs, nor was she into sitting in the Easter basket. hehe This girl also really loves her books... and eating her toes.

It's always so hard to leave family though. We think of all the people who she gets to play with her here in California and it's just sad that our families aren't around. Obviously we LOVE the people we do get to spend time with, but there's only so much we can share through blogs, pictures, and videos. That's just the hardest part of this whole thing. So we always have to remember that God has us here for His purpose and to do His work here in Cali.

We're looking forward to celebrating Mommy's birthday next week, Mother's Day a little time after, then Daddy's birthday after that! Sara has been sick with a stuffy nose the past couple days, so we've been trying to help her feel better with that. Poor little girl! Last story... at daycare the other day, her teacher was telling me about one of the boys in her class and how he kept trying to hold Sara's hand. hehe I guess Sara wanted nothing to do with him and kept throwing her hand in the air and tried to get away from him. ha Good girl! Enjoy all the latest pictures!

Spring Break! WOOO!

Considering it has almost been two months since I've last posted, it's safe to say that I've been very busy. Busy wouldn't even actually begin to describe it. If I had to sum up the last couple months... I would use one word: EXHAUSTION! So here's a peak into what we've been up to.

School

Life in 5th grade has been going well. I can't believe I've made it to Spring Break! It seemed unreachable.. but alas! We're here! It's been pretty hard to keep myself in check and with sleepless nights... I've had to work really hard to keep myself happy and calm during the days. In the last couple weeks, I've been really trying to focus on the positive with my students and for some reason I'm just realizing that focusing on the positive is a lot more work than just snapping at the kids. But ever since I started all the positiveness, I've been a lot happier at work and so have the kids. I've noticed that interacting with them is just like interacting with Sara. When I get stressed... She gets worse and that's the same for the kidos... When I start getting stressed and frustrated they got much worse.  So calm and collected are the key. We're having mucho fun in our class. We're going through a Historical Fiction unit for reading and writing and it always gets me so excited when I can mesh the two subjects together. I feel like a nerd.. But it's so cool that I can use what were doing in reading as an example for their writing. We also did a March Maddness Book Bracket. A few of the titles were super close! But overall, Harry Potter won... Imagine that. Haha I've also been busy with Student Council. We're going to hold Spring Earth day pictures, of which I volunteered for!, and we have the talent show to look forward to. The year is rapidly approaching a close and it's just crazy how fast the year has seemed!! It's going to be a VERY busy last couple months

 

Church

We recently started attending a new church. It's not 100% what we wanted but we've felt like it fits us for now. After about four or five weeks in the "cry room" we figured we would give the nursery a shot. So she's been hanging out in there with very few problems for the past month.  It has been hard to find our place there because we always have the baby and I feel bad if we leave her in the nursery for too long. Eventually we will start getting more involved.

Jason and I also had the brilliant idea of going to a drive in movie and Sara slept in the back of the car. We watched "Noah" and we were both really excited about it, but as the story progressed we were a little let down. And not just because it didn't follow the real story of Noah... But even if you took away the Christianity part of it it was just lame. And I was super pissed about the girl getting caught in the trap and being trampled. That was stupid. Anyway, it brought up a lot of questions and thoughts. I went back and reread the story of Noah and it made me remember how powerful our God is! It's a little scary to think about Him wiping out ALL living creatures because they were so sinful. It makes me remember that this life is not my own and makes me think about why I'm here and how can I live my life to glorify Him above all else. It also made me wonder just how many people WERE alive at that time. It would have been jaw dropping to witness the whole event.

Jason

He's been hard at work fighting one spreadsheet after another. I'm very thankful to have such a hard working husband. It make me proud when I talk to people who know of him and they tell me that ta hard to find such hard working men who know what they're doing in the Air Force. He grumbles about the work sometimes, but his work pays off. Lately, his drive has been towards the backyard. He's done a great job getting the grass to grow in the backyard and even set up a lemon tree for us! He even turned his work into pleasure and made himself some lemon water. And of course he loves playing with the little girl and his goal in life is to make her laugh. He's a fabulous little Daddy.

Baby

I think this stage in her life has been our favorite so far! She's sitting up better, she's more fun to entertain, she likes to talk, giggle, and cuddle. It has been so much fun taking her to new places. I know she won't remember them, but I know shes soaking it all in and has been learning more about the world because of it. We've celebrated a couple "big days" since the last time I wrote. St Patty's day, Pi Day, and her "First Day of School". She's doing well at daycare. It's one other girl, 6 boys, and her ranging from 6 weeks to 12 months. Since she loves being around people and being active, she's doing just fine. I was anxious about the sleeping arrangements there, because they don't swaddle... but nope, she surprised us all and will take three or four naps while she's there. They also do little art projects with the babies, I don't know HOW they get that done, but it's really cute to see. She's been enjoying many of the new toys and things we've gotten her to play with, and we got a new "highchair" which we thought was a good way to go. We are slowly being overtaken by baby furniture, so a big high chair seemed stupid for our little space. But she likes to sit in her chair while we eat. By far, our favorite thing to do with her is make her laugh. It's so much fun.

Other News

I chopped my hair. Not because she kept pulling on it, because she still does now that it's shorter, but because it was just TOO long. Bleh! It feels good. I like it. We took a trip up to San Luis Obispo for some BBQ and a trip to the Botanical Gardens. We weren't impressed by the gardens but the BBQ was AAAAAAAmazing. We've been to a couple little restaurants and Sara has been a trooper! I'm glad we've been able to get out of the house with her. Tuesday we head to Ohio. I'm a little anxious about the plane ride... but in the end, a LONG day of travel will be worth it once we finally get to share Sara with Jason's family. We're very excited. Then when we get back it'll be time to write up Sara's 5 month update!!! Crazy!