Baby Introduction and Changes!

This is a little delayed but it's been a crazy month!!

Holy cow, she is already a month!! Who ever said that having a third child is no harder than your second was down right lying.... Sadley, several people were trying to convince me of this. Maybe they were just trying to be nice? It's way harder than I ever imagined.

Here she is folks....

Penelope aka Penny

She is just as precious as she looks! Such a sweet little baby and a great sleeper! She is actually quite the miracle baby! We were preparing and expecting for our little one to need heart surgery in her early days. It turns out she is completely fine! I can't even begin to describe the out pour of emotions I felt when the doctor told us the good news. I had been holding in months of emotions that were all let out in a matter of minutes. Let's just say... I was a mess. 

A good mess. 

I will say that this being my third c-section, it was actually the one I recovered from the best. I have felt stronger and the pain was much more manageable this time around. There was still the expected freak out on the operating table that I fully anticipated. There is something about surgery while completely conscious that just doesn't seem okay to me. Thankfully my amazing husband came into the room and jumped right into a conversation about our landscaping issues. HAHA! It's exactly what I needed to take my racing mind off of the current situation. By the way, we need severe landscaping help that, with the arrival of our LO, will not get done anytime this year. So if you are looking for gardening updates... that's not going to happen:)

So things are definitely crazy around the Dela household these days. Getting myself and the girls ready seems nearly impossible but I am managing. At the chance of avoiding any post-partum depression, which I have battled with my past two, I have really taken the time to put things into perspective and take a hard look at where I see myself and my family in the next year. 

After praying long and hard and reading a wonderful post I stumbled upon at the perfect moment, I've had to let go of some expectations and commitments. If you are a new mama or have recently had another child I strongly recommend reading this post by 

The Better Mom

 titled

"What God Really Wants for Moms with Young Children"

. It was a message from God that hit me right in the heart as I was going back in forth in my mind about things, things I felt so passionately about and I knew I had to give up at this stage of my life. As soon as I accepted that I was okay with these decisions the pressure lifted off of me and I began to feel happy and stress less. 

Gentleness

is what we need and I plan on giving my little babies a lot more of that!

With all the shifting of things, I have not given up on my blogging. Despite the fact that I haven't done much of that in the past 6 months, I will be stepping things up! I feel a new direction coming upon this area of my life and I am excited to share and see where it takes me. So thank you for reading along even in this drought and I appreciate you for sticking with me! 

You have truly amazed me and I'm excited to meet all of the newest readers that have recently subscribed!

Our Christmas News!

Third time is the charm.

It's what I've been told lately, that the third time is the charm. The third pregnancy is what they are referring to. I'm official outing myself and my pregnancy:)

The reason for the "charm" is that the first two were brought with challenging circumstances and more anxiety than I could imagine. My first child was born with multiple heart defects and had heart surgery when she was only 7 days old. With second baby my water bag tore at 28 weeks and I was on bed rest for 3 weeks until we finally had to deliver her early.

I'm so blessed that they are both with us today and are doing very well! So the third time is hopefully the charm, right?

After the first, I was convinced that number two had to go as planned. How could a momma be thrown into this kind of circumstance twice? I was very wrong. So for this one, I'm very cautious and apprehensive.

My very first prenatal visit was a long one. An hour and a half talking with the doctor, explaining each previous pregnancy in detail so she could understand. Then we had to discuss what came after the pregnancies... the thing that most women don't want to admit or even talk about..... Postpartum Depression. Doctors always monitor this closely and there tends to be an extra eye on your emotional well being throughout and after the process. Normally I would have lied to avoid this stigma but I knew I might need help again after this one. It's easier to be asked "how are feeling" rather than having to choke it out yourself and admit to the doctor that you are not okay.

I was then educated on all the extra procedures, shots, and screenings I would need to do with my high risk pregnancy. The doubt started to set in. I could feel the anxiety building in the pit of my stomach. Fetal echo cardiogram. Progesterone shots. Special monitoring....

I was feeling excited until this visit. Now I'm just slightly nervous. I am excited, however, to announce to all of you about the pregnancy as I have been almost bursting trying to keep it a secret from everyone this long. I'm not very good with secrets and when I have news this exciting it is sooo hard to keep it to myself.

I wish you all a very merry Christmas!

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A Third Child?

I don't know if I'm ready for it and I'm not sure about it in general. After your second child, with two girls, people ask you "are you going to try for a boy?" I used to think I wanted a big family, with lots of kids and lots of love. I equated the amount of children you had with how fulfilled you would feel. The NUMBER started at 5, than crept down to 4. After my second, the hubby and I finally agreed upon 3... maybe.

Our first child was easy. We had it made. Despite the fact that at 7 days old she had heart surgery and we experience a tremendous amount of unexpected stress, which I'm still in therapy for today, we had it pretty dang good once the dust settled. She slept through the night at almost a month old. She never had any feeding problems, was in good health otherwise. She grew up to be the sweetest little girl, only occasionally testing her parent's limits. She followed directions and hardly threw tantrums....

That's when number two came along. That is when all hell broke loose, including my water bag at 28 weeks. I was on bed rest for 4 weeks while we held off the labor and she came at 32 weeks. Ryleigh was a preemie but didn't look like it since she was a large baby, 5lbs! We thought, since again we experienced tremendous unexpected stress, that GOD was granting us with another easy baby. We were terribly wrong.

Don't get me wrong, I love my children so much, but number Two has been more of a challenge than we expected. In addition to a new baby my oldest started having more tantrums. I remember looking at my husband, with two screaming/crying children and thinking what the hell happened to us. I have learned to laugh through the tantrums and the outbreaks, although I'm not sure it's helpful on the children but it keeps my sanity. I know that this too is a season and will pass.

So here we are, 2 and a half years later, confronted with the idea of having another. Ryleigh still drinks a sippy cup of almond milk before bed (it's the substitute for bottle we were supposed to wean her off of at 12 months) but we are trying. We have done everything wrong with our second and I feel insecure with our parenting decisions. I am sweating through answering another question about the third.

So do we shoot for a third? I don't know anymore. It changes on a day to day basis. It doesn't necessarily have to do with the kid's behavior.
I think about how we could be done with diapers soon.
I think about not needing a minivan, although it would be nice.
I think about just being over that baby stage.

But then I think about how warm and wonderful it felt to have a little someone inside of me and how wonderful it would be for Bella and Ryleigh to have a little brother or sister.

I will just have to wait until I know. Do you ever really know, though? Can someone please let me know how they knew when enough was enough?

They are so precious together!

Healthy Weight Loss Update

I wanted to give an update on how The Fast Metabolism Diet: Eat More Food and Lose More Weight
is going... extremely well! The first couple of days were hard to kick my caffeine addiction but this week has been really enjoyable.

I had amazing results last week that I am almost intimidated to post because most people will say it's too much for one week. I promise I did nothing but eat healthy and according to Haylie's plan. I lost 10 pounds in the first week!! I really couldn't believe it myself.

Read the book for yourself and see if this is something for you. Find the book here...

I'm still a little insecure to post full on pictures of the progress but I'm working myself up to that:).


*This post contains my affiliate link that helps support my family. The opinions and experiences expressed are entirely my own.

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