Christmas (Part III : Wisconsin)

On Christmas morning we got up bright & early at 4:30...well, it wasn't actually that bright outside, pitch black in fact, but it was freaking early...to head to Wisconsin. Joy & Peter were supposed to be at our house by 4:45 so we could load up the car, squeeeeeeze us all in, and pull out by 5am. At 5:30 we had left several messages on both of their cell phones and hadn't heard anything from them. We decided to drive over to Joy's house, but her car wasn't there. We had no idea what was going on, so we went ahead and started our trip up north to Wisconsin without them. We were on the highway by 6am. Around 8:30 or 9 we eventually got a phone call. Joy had overslept, but didn't know that Peter didn't make it either. Later we got a call from Peter...he had also overslept. Neither of them had heard their alarms or their phones ringing when we called. So the two of them met up and headed up about 4 hours after we had already left.

Sophie did really well in the car. She got a little fussy with about 2 more hours to go, but luckily Matt has family in Rockford, IL., so we pulled off the highway and hung out with them for a while. Thanks Ken & Diane!

We arrived in Brookfield, WI, at Matt's grandparent's house, around 2pm to this:

Talk about a white Christmas!! Nearly 2 feet of snow! We relaxed the rest of the day, waited for Joy & Peter, opened gifts between the immediate family, and celebrated Christmas with the whole family the following day on the 26th. Matt's aunt & uncle & cousins all came over to his grandparent's house, and once again there were many jokes & much laughter! Lots of fun! Saturday was spent relaxing a bit and checking out some after-Christmas sales at the mall & at Crate & Barrel. All too quickly we were up at the crack of dawn & back on the road again on Sunday morning. It was a wonderful trip, but was too short! The ride back was long, but Sophie was a champ & didn't fuss at all.

Here are some pictures of our trip:

Sophie with her Great Grandma! She's wearing an adorable dress given to her by her great-grandparents!

Sophie with her Great Grandpa!

Joy & Peter with their little niece. She's wearing a shirt that says, "Snow Angel," I thought it was appropriate under the circumstances. :)

This was taken Christmas evening after Joy & Peter arrived and we opened gifts. We were very blessed this Christmas on all fronts, and very excited about our new video camera from Matt's dad!! Once I figure out how to upload videos, we'll be sure to post a few on here!

Somehow we managed to forget to take pictures on the 26th when the extended family came over. So sad, because it was a great evening with lots of photo-opps.

Coming soon to a blog near you: Christmas Part I & Part IV. (Part IV hasn't happened yet.)

Christmas (Part II)

You might be thinking that you missed Part I. Well, we're doing things a little out of order this time around. The reason for this crazy adventure is because apparently we forgot to take pictures on my camera during Christmas with my side of the family...which was first in the order of events. We celebrated with them on Saturday the 21st, and then my sister-in-law stayed in town with Poppy & Oskar until the 23rd. So...I'm going to wait to post about all of that until I can steal some pictures off of my mom & dad's camera.

Anywho...We enjoyed our first Christmas together by first going to church Christmas Eve evening. It was a nice service and so special to hold our baby girl singing hymns of our Savior's birth. She drifted off to sleep at the end as we sang Silent Night by candlelight (one of my favorite things about the Christmas Eve service), and tears were in the corners of both of our eyes as we held her and each other. Such a wonderful memory to treasure.

We came back to our house to have Christmas with Matt's mom; her boyfriend, Mike; and Matt's siblings, Peter, Joy, & Mitchell. It was a fun time had by all! Lots of jokes, laughter, and smiles! It was very relaxed, too, thanks to Matt's mom who brought over dinner. Here are some photos of the evening:

Our first family Christmas photo

Proud Grandma

Mitchell & Peter

Joy, after rocking her niece to sleep. So cute!


Mike & Diane

Mommy & Sophie
I can't help it. I love this picture of us!!

Merry Christmas, everyone...albeit a little late. Parts I, III, & IV coming soon...but who knows in what order! Admit it, the suspense is killing you!

It just stinks.

Many of you know that I started back at work on December 4th. People have asked how that is going and I'm never quite sure what they want me to say. "Oh, it's WONDERFUL! I just LOVE leaving Sophie at 7am so I can miss the best parts of her day when she's all smiles and giggles! It's great to pick her up at 4pm when she's tired and I'm tired and we only have a couple more hours together before she goes down for the night! I love 'watching' other peoples' kids all day so that I can pay someone else to watch mine." I feel like the answer should be pretty obvious, but I know that's just me being cynical & rude. I know that the people asking are just trying to be kind and show that they care. And I know that they do.

So while that's been running through my head, my verbal response has been pretty much the same to everyone: "Luckily, I'm good at compartmentalizing, and when I'm at work I can focus on being there. The hardest part is walking away from her in the morning, but once I get to work I do okay." And I do. But I can't wait to get in my car and zoom over to whoever she's with for the day (she's been staying with family & friends until Christmas break) and grab her in my arms and smother her in kisses. And I do. Maybe if she weren't so stinkin cute it wouldn't be so hard and I'd shed less tears every morning. But she is...so the tears will keep coming.

People say "It will get easier." I'd like to be able to go back in time so I could remember who said that to me, because either they were lying to make me feel better about the crappiness of it all OR they never had to leave their baby in the arms of someone else every day and have no clue what they're talking about. Every single working mom that I've talked to has confirmed that it does not get easier. I know I've only been doing this for about 2 weeks now, but I can say that it only gets harder every day. The reality of it sinks in more and more, and it just stinks. In fact, that's a good way to sum it all up, and maybe it should be my new response to those who ask:
"It just stinks."