Number one - Let it Out
Letting go. Seems so simple and yet can be so confusing, difficult and, yes, in the long run, absolutely necessary. I am now learning to let go of what I'm holding on to and I'm really hoping that finding other avenues to de-stress will help me find some peace of mind and a more lasting contentment. One way I figure to do this is to make lists. I like lists, but I'm not too much "into" them, but here's the first list anyway:
Other ways to de-stress
1. Meditate. Long or short, in depth or not, it's a perfect way to disconnect from the stressful and get back in touch with your body and spirit.
2. Incorporate the Spiritual. Getting in touch with something bigger than yourself.
3. Talk to other people. Friends, Family and/or Therapist.
4. Get the thoughts out of your head. Writing or talking or both.
5. Exercise. Whatever you can do to keep moving, move more when time and energy allows.
6. Take quality time for yourself. Even a couple of minutes at a relaxing pastime (no distractions) to let your mind wander without limitations - daydreaming, planning, reflection, fantasies, etc. I like to sit with a quiet cup of tea.
7. Put things into perspective. Experience helps with this. Put yourself into the future, meditate on death, meditate on gratitude, etc.
8. Treat yourself to something that makes you happy and is just for you. Buy yourself something nice, do something with just yourself, enjoy a few moments doing something that brings you joy.
9. Keep your mind occupied. Learn something new, challenge yourself, push yourself just slightly beyond what you think you are capable of - you grow from this.
10. Develop other aspects of yourself. Find those areas of yourself that bring you joy and find a way to nurture them.
Saturday, May 14, 2011
Sunday, August 23, 2009
Been a while!
Jonathan’s been quite a busy little boy lately. He seems to pick up new words everyday; so far we’ve been able to identify about 30 that he uses somewhat consistently. The ones he uses most frequently are “outside,” “binky,” “garage,” and “snack”. “Outside” is probably his favorite, as that’s all he wants to do now. He doesn’t understand yet that it’s 105 degrees outside. “Yo-yo” is probably the cutest, as he pronounces it “wo-wo.” I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of that one!
He’s into everything, always curious about new things. He’s not quite running yet, although he moves pretty quickly when he wants to (like when I go to change his diaper). He’s starting to get the hang of “chase.” He’s always understood when I chase him, but now he’s starting to understand chasing me. He also loves jumping on the bed, and he’s at the point now where he can slide off the bed when he’s ready to get down.
Eating is still a huge mess, but it’s a lot of fun. He’s starting to get the hang of the spoon, although he usually puts it in his mouth upside-down, so anything that’s not sticky falls off the spoon. Oatmeal works well for this; cereal, not so much.
We’ll let him watch about 15 minutes of Sesame Street a few times a week, and The Count has quickly become his favorite character. Not sure if it’s because he’s purple, or the cape, or the counting, but he just loves him. Jonathan will grab the remote control and do The Count’s signature laugh (“Ah Ah Ah!”) whenever he wants to watch him.
He’s got three front teeth on the top (a fourth one slowing coming in), four on the bottom, and some molars coming in. They were wreaking havoc with his sleep a few weeks ago, but that seems to have settled down a bit. We really hope it stays that way! When he’s teething, he’ll wake up anywhere from 5:30 to 8 am. He’s just so unpredictable when he’s like that.
Speaking of sleeping, he’s down to one nap a day. We try to hold him off to about 1pm, but sometimes he’ll go down as early as 11:30 if he’s really tired. We’ll definitely miss the naps, but there’s just so much he wants to see and do now. He’s such a little boy now; it’s amazing how quickly that happened. We got him a little Black and Decker baby tool set, and he loves hammering on everything. He’s still trying to figure out twisting, so the nuts and bolts are still mysterious to him.
He’s into everything, always curious about new things. He’s not quite running yet, although he moves pretty quickly when he wants to (like when I go to change his diaper). He’s starting to get the hang of “chase.” He’s always understood when I chase him, but now he’s starting to understand chasing me. He also loves jumping on the bed, and he’s at the point now where he can slide off the bed when he’s ready to get down.
Eating is still a huge mess, but it’s a lot of fun. He’s starting to get the hang of the spoon, although he usually puts it in his mouth upside-down, so anything that’s not sticky falls off the spoon. Oatmeal works well for this; cereal, not so much.
We’ll let him watch about 15 minutes of Sesame Street a few times a week, and The Count has quickly become his favorite character. Not sure if it’s because he’s purple, or the cape, or the counting, but he just loves him. Jonathan will grab the remote control and do The Count’s signature laugh (“Ah Ah Ah!”) whenever he wants to watch him.
He’s got three front teeth on the top (a fourth one slowing coming in), four on the bottom, and some molars coming in. They were wreaking havoc with his sleep a few weeks ago, but that seems to have settled down a bit. We really hope it stays that way! When he’s teething, he’ll wake up anywhere from 5:30 to 8 am. He’s just so unpredictable when he’s like that.
Speaking of sleeping, he’s down to one nap a day. We try to hold him off to about 1pm, but sometimes he’ll go down as early as 11:30 if he’s really tired. We’ll definitely miss the naps, but there’s just so much he wants to see and do now. He’s such a little boy now; it’s amazing how quickly that happened. We got him a little Black and Decker baby tool set, and he loves hammering on everything. He’s still trying to figure out twisting, so the nuts and bolts are still mysterious to him.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Halloween, Rolling Over and Solid Foods
We had so much fun for Halloween. Jonathan got to dress up twice! He was so cute as a pumpkin and he also tried on Ethan (and Lauren's) old Halloween lion costume. We got some great pics and had a lot of fun at Jeff and Kim's neighbor's house for a cookout, then off to a friend's house for a hell of a good wine filled game night (with Grandma Karen watching after little J, of course!).
He doing all kinds of new things! He has just gotten the hang of rolling over both ways (even though he started doing it at 4 mos), I guess he just didn't want to do it much after that. Now he does it all the time! When he should be taking a nap, when he's being changed, dried off after bath... you get the idea! He makes all kinds of new sounds too - ba-bas are a favorite right now, along with gargling and growling. Also, pouty-angry face (not really either, just looks that way) where he breaths through his nose and pouts his lips as he squints - it's really very hilarious. There's a pic of it on the blog. He's also eating solid food like a champ and will graduate to chunkier food and meats pretty soon. Probably in time for Thanksgiving.
He started his first day of day care today! Only one day a week for now. Mommy is using the time to write this blog! Also to get some work done and have a day to breathe and be a better mommy. It was probably harder on me than on him! He has all kinds of kids and babies to play and look at and we really like our day care. The woman who runs it is a friend and I feel very content knowing that she is looking after him.
We are looking forward to Thanksgiving and all the family and friends that will be here. We are going to have a full house this year! Will post pics of that coming up next month.
Take care and bye for now!
Monday, September 8, 2008
Labor Day and 5 months
Hi Everyone!
We're all doing great down here and Jonathan is growing like a cute little weed. He had his 4 mo. check up at the beginning of August and at that time he was 25 in. and 17.4 lbs. He's one big, healthy awesome boy! He got all his shots and did fine with them except some expected fussiness for a couple of days. He's doing all kinds of new and great things. He can now touch his toes and grab his feet, and it's funny because you could see him working it out over the last several weeks. He'd start at his calves, get up to his ankles, and then finally, last week or so he's been able to grab his feet and start to play with them! That should keep him occupied for a while.
We also think that he is teething. He is showing a lot of the signs (drooling, interruption in sleep patterns, fussiness, irritation, and wanting to bite down on anything!), haven't seen any signs of a tooth yet, so we'll see if a tooth pops up here sometime soon. He's also found out how to scream - shrilly and very loudly. Oh joy! He is making other sounds as well - b sounds, blowing raspberries, and other vowel combinations like ah-ooh, etc. He is laughing more too. Just this morning he thought me saying poo, poo, poo was the funniest thing in the world. And I don't think is going to change much as he gets older!
He's getting pretty mobile too, well as mobile as you can be and still be in one spot! At 4 months he rolled over, but really hasn't done it since. But he is showing signs of it again - mainly from his back. He likes to do back bends and side twists and really push up with his legs. I think it's going to be literally any day now before he's rolling over again. He's also found a way to wriggle out of his chair - it's pretty funny actually! (Of course we've starting buckling him in it now) We've also found that he loves music, and right now "Itsy, Bitsy Spider" is his absolute favorite. He also really likes the water. This Labor Day we went to the lake and he had a great time swimming with us and being outside. We are hoping to go to the beach this weekend, but Ike may force us to make other plans for Kevin's 4 day weekend/minivacation. We'll have to see what direction the hurricane is going to go and if it comes near TX, we'll have to find somewhere else to go - Maybe some local lakes/parks.
I'm doing great. I've started to work on a book for Jonathan and it's been a lot of fun coming up with a story and drawing the sketches for the illustrations. It will most likely be something that I do for him, and not any thing career related, but it's just been fun to do some art work again in any case! It's giving me something to do right now and saving my sanity! I don't have too much time to work on it, just between naps really, but it's nice to have something for myself and my future. I may think about an illustration path for my career, which would be something that I can do at home, but I've just decided to have fun with this for now and worry about my professional career later when Jonathan is a little older. Some of you know that I was in a car accident several months ago (everyone was fine), and not too long ago we finally decided on a 2002 Toyota RAV4. We were able to find a private buyer and everything went very well - we really love it!
Kevin's doing great was well. Work is going fine, but not keeping him too busy. Sun Microsystems is doing OK for right now, but, along with everyone else, we're slightly concerned about the economy and how the high tech industry will fare given the current state of things. Right now we're just focusing on Jonathan and making sure that our relationship stays strong! Some awesome friends came to babysit Jonathan for a couple of hours this Sat. and we got to go see a movie! Yea!
Hope everyone is doing great and we'll write more as time permits!
Lots of Love,
Anna, Kevin, Jonathan, and Sam
We're all doing great down here and Jonathan is growing like a cute little weed. He had his 4 mo. check up at the beginning of August and at that time he was 25 in. and 17.4 lbs. He's one big, healthy awesome boy! He got all his shots and did fine with them except some expected fussiness for a couple of days. He's doing all kinds of new and great things. He can now touch his toes and grab his feet, and it's funny because you could see him working it out over the last several weeks. He'd start at his calves, get up to his ankles, and then finally, last week or so he's been able to grab his feet and start to play with them! That should keep him occupied for a while.
We also think that he is teething. He is showing a lot of the signs (drooling, interruption in sleep patterns, fussiness, irritation, and wanting to bite down on anything!), haven't seen any signs of a tooth yet, so we'll see if a tooth pops up here sometime soon. He's also found out how to scream - shrilly and very loudly. Oh joy! He is making other sounds as well - b sounds, blowing raspberries, and other vowel combinations like ah-ooh, etc. He is laughing more too. Just this morning he thought me saying poo, poo, poo was the funniest thing in the world. And I don't think is going to change much as he gets older!
He's getting pretty mobile too, well as mobile as you can be and still be in one spot! At 4 months he rolled over, but really hasn't done it since. But he is showing signs of it again - mainly from his back. He likes to do back bends and side twists and really push up with his legs. I think it's going to be literally any day now before he's rolling over again. He's also found a way to wriggle out of his chair - it's pretty funny actually! (Of course we've starting buckling him in it now) We've also found that he loves music, and right now "Itsy, Bitsy Spider" is his absolute favorite. He also really likes the water. This Labor Day we went to the lake and he had a great time swimming with us and being outside. We are hoping to go to the beach this weekend, but Ike may force us to make other plans for Kevin's 4 day weekend/minivacation. We'll have to see what direction the hurricane is going to go and if it comes near TX, we'll have to find somewhere else to go - Maybe some local lakes/parks.
I'm doing great. I've started to work on a book for Jonathan and it's been a lot of fun coming up with a story and drawing the sketches for the illustrations. It will most likely be something that I do for him, and not any thing career related, but it's just been fun to do some art work again in any case! It's giving me something to do right now and saving my sanity! I don't have too much time to work on it, just between naps really, but it's nice to have something for myself and my future. I may think about an illustration path for my career, which would be something that I can do at home, but I've just decided to have fun with this for now and worry about my professional career later when Jonathan is a little older. Some of you know that I was in a car accident several months ago (everyone was fine), and not too long ago we finally decided on a 2002 Toyota RAV4. We were able to find a private buyer and everything went very well - we really love it!
Kevin's doing great was well. Work is going fine, but not keeping him too busy. Sun Microsystems is doing OK for right now, but, along with everyone else, we're slightly concerned about the economy and how the high tech industry will fare given the current state of things. Right now we're just focusing on Jonathan and making sure that our relationship stays strong! Some awesome friends came to babysit Jonathan for a couple of hours this Sat. and we got to go see a movie! Yea!
Hope everyone is doing great and we'll write more as time permits!
Lots of Love,
Anna, Kevin, Jonathan, and Sam
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Overdue for an update
I know it's been a while since we had an update, so below are some recent pics. He's getting much better at grabbing things, although he still needs to work on the holding-on part. He's smiling a lot now, and starting to coo and babble. He really has things he wants to say, but just can't say them!
Very comfortable:
My friend Keith on his first visit to Austin:
At the Oasis on Lake Travis:
Starting to get the hang of tummy time:
Hey!
Very comfortable:
My friend Keith on his first visit to Austin:
At the Oasis on Lake Travis:
Starting to get the hang of tummy time:
Hey!
Sunday, May 4, 2008
Friday, April 18, 2008
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