Sleep Struggles and A Mantle of Love

So Grayson's 4 month post is up next but I still need to take pictures...and write it. :)

 

In the meantime, I 'd thought I would post what has been going on with us lately so I think I'll do a little random bullet point post today.  It's pretty much going to be all over the place so if you can't handle that I completely understand.

 

*We've been going through a bit of a sleep regression (or growth spurt...I have no idea) around these parts.  My sweet baby boy had previously been sleeping through the night (from 10 PM - 7 AM) since he was 7 1/2 weeks old.  He turned four months old last week and for kicks wants to start waking up in the middle of the night again.  His naps have been a little rough too.  Not so sure what to think about this and I'm hoping and praying we'll be back to his regularly scheduled sleeping soon. Please baby boy- mama needs her sleep or I might just start looking like this soon. ;)

 

 

 

* I decorated our mantle for Valentine's Day.  My husband might think its a little ridiculous but I don't care....I love it.  I made the heart garland from red scrapbook paper that I had and floss.  Our wedding invitation is framed inside the wreath.  Coming down the stairs and looking at our mantle just makes me happy in the morning. 

 

*I am really enjoying going out to dinner one night on the weekend with my little family.  We have pretty much dropped Grayson's 4th nap of the day & it's so fun because he is such a little people watcher (he takes after his momma ;) and so happy when we go out.  At the end of the week, I need to get out of the house too so I'm happy my hubby understands this and I don't have to cook!  Here are some pics of our latest family dates from the last several weeekends.  The picture of me and G is my favorite!  He was being such a little ham and smiling at his daddy.  Oh my goodness, I love that boy.

 

 

*I am so excited to be planning a baby shower for my sweet friend Cacey.  She's having a baby girl (another contender for G's future wife) in March.  Tonight we are having a planning session at my friend Erin's house and I can't wait to let our pinterest ideas come to life.  Cac is the one in the stripes...I don't have a pic with her preggers but she's pretty much adorable and has a tiny little bump.  I love my sweet friends and love that G has built in friends already.

 

 

*This is kind of something I feel like the Lord has put on my heart but I'm kind of still processing it.  For the longest time I couldn't WAIT until I could stay at home with my boy.  And it is a BLESSING.  I know that so many moms wish that they were able to stay at home with their littles. I am so very thankful that I don't have to miss anything and am really trying to soak up every second and remember every little thing about Grayson right now.  Being his mom is wonderful.  The housewife part though is not my favorite.  When Grayson goes down for a nap I think, I should go get dressed.  Well, I'm not really going anywhere so I don't really NEED to.  Plus I need to vacuum even though I just vacuumed two days ago and clean the bathrooms so really it would be silly to get dressed and ready if I'm just going to get dirty again.  Before I do that I'm just going to sit down for a second and look at blogs and instagram and  facebook and then I'll get up and be productive.  The next thing I know, it's two hours later and he's getting up from his nap.  MAJOR FAIL.  Then at the end of the day I'm wondering other than feeding and playing with my boy, what did I accomplish?  I feel super unproductive and also sometimes feel like I am lacking my purpose in this season.  I know that my main purpose in life is to glorify God through being a wife and mom and that God calls me to do that in the mundane things like cleaning, but I feel like He might be pricking my heart to serve him in a specific way during this time.  I'm not quite sure how it looks with G, but I know that if this is something God wants me to do, he will make everything work and I just need to trust him.  What is it, you ask, that I think he might be calling me to do?  There is a Christian non-profit pregnancy center close to our house and they are always looking for volunteers to counsel and talk to newly pregnant women who are confused, feeling alone, and not sure what to do.  I feel Him calling me to be a volunteer.  Part of me feels inadequate, too young, like I'm not able to relate or understand to them, but part of me feels SO very excited about the possibility and what God can do.  When I have the feelings of doubt and if I should even call and apply to be a volunteer, I think about Moses and how he was a man with a speach problem, and the Lord used him to deliver His people out of Egypt.  Moses was obedient, and I want to be obedient.  So I'm still praying through this, but felt like I needed to get it off my heart today.

 

*I just have to end with this (which is a major switch from my last bullet :)) but everytime I think about it it makes me laugh. 

 

"Tierra, you have a sparkle and don't let those girls take your sparkle away."

 

 

Don't worry, Tierra, you aren't going to lose your sparkle. ;)

Who's watching this season? :)

 

Happy Hump Day Friends!

 

 

Recapping the weekend & what's going on this week :)

We had a low key relaxing weekend.  I love having Matt home on the weekends and not having anywhere to be or anywhere to go.  I also love watching my boys be together.  My husband is SUCH a good dad and loves his son so much!  It's so precious because on the weekends Matt just can't hold him enough, play with him enough, or kiss his little head enough.  I know it's hard because he really doesn't see Grayson much during the week because of work, so we just treasure the weekends.  On Saturday, it took Gray a little while to settle down for his nap and after a while it was quiet so I looked on the monitor and he wasn't in his crib.  I went upstairs to see this and it melted my heart. :)  

 

Here are some other pics from last week, the weekend, and the beginning of this week...

My sweet blue eyed boy...looking just like his daddy :)

 Gray loves to stand now and "walks" with our help.  It's pretty precious.

 Hey Mom!  I like sitting up with pillows behind me.

 Who doesn't love a sleeping baby? 

 Trying out our 3-6 month jeans and a cute hoodie from our Aunt Sarah

 My sweet boy and I after church on Sunday...he was a little sleepy :)

This week I am attempting a couple of DIY projects...one's big (for me) and the other is a little smaller but I am very excited about them and will show you the finished products when I'm finished.  Here's a sneak peak Instagram post I posted yesterday. :)

It's a dreary day with tornado warnings so we'll probably just be hunkering down at home even though we were supposed to have a play date at the park with some friends so I'm bummed about that!  

Happy Hump Day to everyone! :)

I'm Back In Action

I know I have never been a super regular blogger but I love that I can look back on events that have happened over the last several years and read about things we did or just what life was like.  I'm so happy I created this little blog and for the sake of baby Gray and our future kiddos, I really want to do a better job of recapping our lives, even just the every day routine that we are in now.  

My day pretty much consists of feeding, putting down for naps, playing with, and loving on my precious angel (with a little bit of cleaning, laundry, errand running, and hanging with my hubby too) but I LOVE it.  I am so blessed to be able to stay at home and so thankful for this stage of life we're in.

I really want to do a better job of capturing our lives- the really fun events, weekends, and trips, but also just the simple day to day life....The Garlich Life. :)

So hopefully you'll be seeing a lot more of me regularly.  I'm going to try to post several times a week instead of once a month. :)

Hope everyone has a happy hump day! :)

Three Months!!!

Oh my goodness.....it's pretty much ridiculous that Grayson's monthly birthday was on the 4th and I am just now publishing this on the 22nd.  Absolute travesty.  In my defense, I have had it written for several weeks now but our computer is in the middle of dying a slow death and I tried to post via the blogger app on my phone and the iPad but it just was only messing it up.  Much to my surprise, I turned on our computer today and it worked!  Anyways....here's our sweet baby's 3 month post.

Three Months :)

No height and weight stats because we didn't have a monthly check up this month...he's still a precious chunker though. :)

I will probably say this every month, but I can't believe my little tiny is 3 months old!  I just read my birth story the other day and it seems like that was just yesterday.  Life is speeding by like a bullet and I'm just trying to soak up every day with my sweet baby Gray. 

Life with this little one is SO FUN!  He is learning and growing every day and it's so fun to watch his little brain work hard to understand every thing around him.  This month he celebrated his first Christmas, New Years, he went to Gigi & Papa's house for the first time (my grandparents), he started doing little mini baby pushups and liked tummy time a little more, he rolled over for the first time! (well, 5 days after his 3 month birthday but since I hadn't finished the post yet I'm counting it towards 3 months. :)), he started batting at toys and "tried" to put them in his mouth, and he found his hands and LOVES putting them in his mouth.  This was a pretty big month for my little angel!

Grayson is eating about every 3 - 3.5 hours during the day.  He is starting to be awake for a little bit longer periods.  Instead of just an hour, he is awake between 60-80 minutes at at time and then goes down for a nap.  Now instead of him not being able to sleep in his crib between 5 & 7, he sleeps great!  I think the "witching hour" is officially over.  This little man is thriving with his schedule but does so good when we have to run errands, hang out 
with friends, or go to church and has to be awake a little longer than usual.  Just the other day Gray and I went shopping and had lunch with my old coworkers and he just smiled and 
laughed and hardly got fussy until right before we left because he was hungry.  I just LOVE this little man and probably kiss his head 5 million times a day.  No joke. :) 

Gray is still sleeping through the night except for two nights this month when he was going through a major growth spurt right before he turned 3 months.  He woke up around 4 and was starving both nights but has gone right back to sleeping through like normal. 

At the end of this month Gray picked up on a lot! He started to really enjoy his play 

gym and started batting at his toys! He is "talking" a lot more and now likes to chat with his little lion, elephant, giraffe, and monkey friends. :) He can sit in his bumbo (but he's still a little bit of a bobble head) and is a pro at tummy time-keeping his little head and chest lifted for a long time!  He rolled over once even though his daddy doesn't call it a real roll- it completely was!  I rolled him from his back to his belly and then his little arm was underneath him and as soon as I rolled him over and let go, he rolled right back over!  It was so very exciting! :)

 

Likes this month: 

Sucking on his hands- ALL the time!

Trying to sit up- he feels like such a big boy Bath time-loves loves it
Having his cheeks squeezed or kissed (this is easy for mommy to do :))
Mommy singing to him
 The "hands hands feet feet cheek cheek" song that daddy has made up
Daddy moving his little arms and singing "Keep rollin rollin rollin"
Putting up his hand to his cheek while saying "Why are you hitting yourself?" over and over

Dislikes:
Having a burp right after he eats that doesn't want to come up
Waking up early from a nap and can't quite get comfortable enough to go back to sleep
Eating from a bottle (Oh no- we've got to work on this one! We hadn't used a bottle in a while and Matt tried to feed him the other night when I went to go see a movie and he wasn't feeling it and hardly ate anything.  We've got to work on this!)

Grayson Patrick,
Oh my sweet sweet sweet angel baby how your daddy and I love you so! I love watching you learn something new it seems like every day! Your precious smile warms my heart and your sweet little body is so wonderful to have right next to me! You are such a gift and I never want you to forget that! I am so thankful you are a healthy boy and that you have such a sweet little personality. Life with you is so blessed and your dad and I thank the Lord for you every day. I am so excited to watch you grow and see what new fun things you'll do next month! We love you!
-Mommy and daddy :)