four kids, two rooms...

welcome!
i thought it would be fun to participate in kelly's "show us where you live" tour!
this is my first shot at showing one {tw0} of our rooms.

here is a glimpse of our children's nurseries/rooms!

we have four kids {2 girls, 2 boys} and they share two bedrooms
the girls share a roomand the boys share a room!
in 2000, when we moved into our "spacious house" {3 bedrooms, 3 baths}
as a newly married
couple, we thought the house was so big !
quickly we filled up the bedrooms with our precious children!
so almost ten years later our house is overflowing and busting at the seams!!
with little children
and lots of love!

boys' room:
{joshua & jesiah}
let's start with the first nursery i did when i was pregnant with our first son in 2000!
we didn't know if we were having a boy or a girl, so i did a classic pooh theme.
i loved painting and decorating this room!
this was our first son, joshua's nursery.
this is the view when you walked into the room:

in 2006, when our third child, jesiah (second boy) moved into this same room,
joshua was almost six, so we began creating a big boy room!
here is the view when you walk into the room now:

we still need window treatments and to hang some things above the dresser,
we used this dresser as a changing table when the boys were babies.

i painted this mural on the wall to go with the classic pooh theme for joshua:

when we madeover the room, i painted over the mural with stripes...

it was one of the hardest things i ever had to do!

with two kids in each room, i use lots of creative storage,
double layers of hooks on the backs of their doors to hang whatever and everything.

here is their bunk bed:

room # 2
girls' room
{jordyn & jaelyn}

jordyn was born in 2003, and i made a very girly nursery for her! pink and lavender! when we found out in may 2008 that we were adding another girl to our family, i was so excited to have two girls sharing a girly girl room!!

i was going to give the room a complete makeover and repaint and change up everything. until we found this on craig's list:

i had been looking for a loft bed for jordyn and this was so cute and so cheap! it matched the existing paint colors already and i decided, happily at 9 months prego, not to repaint the room and stay with pink and lavender, b/c the bed worked perfectly!

and yes, her bed has a slide!!!!
it is a princess castle bed and we put her name on the wall above!
she loves it.

so then we added the crib for jaelyn, the crib was jordyn's! and we bought new sheets and a new bumper, but are using the same dust ruffle and quilt from pottery barn that was jordyn's.
we put jaelyn's name above her crib.
hanging from each of the girl's "J" in their name is a little sign that says little princess.

having two girls in one room means creative storage and lots of it,
so i use bins and baskets everywhere!

this dresser i painted for jordyn and stamped the matching print from her pottery barn quilt, now it is a dresser for the girls to share and a changing table for jaelyn too.
the shelves hanging above are also stamped with the same prints!

there are still several things i plan to do with their room, like a few things to hang on the wall plus i need to get the girl's one of those super cute bow holders to hang on their closet door!

thanks so much for stopping by and looking at our children's rooms!!

please leave a comment and let me know you stopped by,
i love comments and meeting new bloggy friends!!
come back soon!!!

i just can't get enough of her...

always on my mind...

i guess you can say, in a way that my blogging break is over. kind of. i think i went one whole week without posting a blog. during that time, i enjoyed having no pressure on myself to post anything.

except for this post, i have been pulling things and publishing them from my drafts. so i haven't really been writing anything "new" just catching up on the "old". i will probably continue to do that for awhile, not that you would know the difference. i may even take another break because it is going to be pretty busy around here over the next two weeks.

the big kids only have 5 and a 1/2 days of school left! they will finish up next friday with a noon dismissal!! we are all counting down the days until summer vacation begins. we don't have any big plans for the summer. guaranteed we will be spending lots of days at the waterpark. but first, i have to go swimsuit shopping. that i am not looking forward to!

i let go of a lot of volunteer responsibilities over the last year. but i have continued to volunteer with safe journey through elevation, i serve on the planning team. safe journey is a program through cis (communities in schools) for teen mothers, it is to encourage and support them while finishing school. it is one of elevation's outreach partners. it is near and dear to my heart! the graduation ceremony we plan is for the girls in the program who are graduating from high school. we have a huge celebration to honor what they have accomplished. so we are putting the finishing touches on the event. we are in the final stretch and i am looking forward to seeing all of our planning be put into effect next thursday.


i feel like once we get through these to big events, i will be able to breathe a little easier! so if my posts are far and few between, that is why!!

bible study...

part of our evening/bedtime routine is attempting to do "bible study" as a family.
sometimes it is very tricky to get everyone settled down and ready to read.
but when we do, it is a sweet time.

here, everyone was ready to go and each had their bible.
i had mine too, although i put it down to take this photo!
see it is there in the vera bradley (mod pink) bible cover!

believe me when i say it is not always this picture perfect,
but here this one night it worked out well!!

the full story

when my oldest child, joshua, was just a little guy, i thought that i would homeschool him. i seriously couldn't tell you why at that point, but i knew i wouldn't send him to school. by the time joshua got to the age that he could attend kindergarten, he would have started at age four and turned five in october of that school year. we thought this was too early and decided to put him in a transitional kindergarten program at the school he went to for preschool. that was a great decision for him. when the next school year started the thought of homeschooling him was a distant memory. at this point i had three kids all under the age of five years old. my life was just not at that point to take on that responsibility. and i most certainly did not feel the calling whatsoever.

joshua enjoyed being in school and i enjoyed having him there. between his kindergarten year and his first grade year, we were switched schools, due to rezoning. i was not happy that he would be leaving the school we planned for him to attend which is right down the street from our house. it was the school my husband attended as a kid. we were being moved to a brand new school. i was very unsure of that, so i decided to try our "luck" at a charter school. knowing it would be very hard to get him in, i put his name in the lottery. and when he was the second name drawn for the waiting list (there were no open spots for his grade) i knew he would be attending union academy. we got the call that he would be going there the week before school started. joshua had a great year in first grade. he loved his new school and his teachers.

fast forward to last summer, jordyn had been enrolled to start kindergarten at the end of july and i was so sad about her going off to school. i was seven months pregnant with baby number four and told my husband that maybe i should homeschool jordyn this year. as fast as that statement came out of my mouth it was forgotten. how in the world would i balance a newborn and that responsibility.

jordyn has had a great year in kindergarten. she has learned so much and come so far. she loves being there and loves her teachers. joshua has done very well in second grade and likes his teachers. although, there have been a few bumps in the road we have had a good year.

so why in the world did i decide to homeschool? well, i ask myself this just about every day. and every day i have to remind myself of my answers!

being in a school, my eyes have been opened to a lot of things that have brought us to this decision. having two in school had having two at home has brought about a set of problems in our home. it is really hard for me to make that transition. i feel like when the big kids get home, i become a drill sargeant because we have so much to do in such a short amount of time before it is bedtime. there's homework, reading, dinner, clean up and bath/showers. and this is all minus any kind of activities in the evening. the kids haven't done any kind of sports or dance, and we haven't been able to get to our adult small group either. we realized once we get done doing all we have to do, there is little time for us to enjoy our kids, read the bible with them or have any kind of fun. not to mention they are really tired and pretty grumpy for most of the afternoon. not so much fun around here.

that brought me to the realization that if we aren't able to be able to spend good quality time with our kids, who is? their teachers get to spend more time with our kids then we do. they are getting the best of our kids and we get them when they are exhausted. who is breathing life into them? not us as their parents. teachers and other adults whom we barely know are the ones who are with them all day everyday, five days a week. somewhere, we lost the control of who they are around and what they are hearing. that made me realize that i really really miss my kids and that i feel like i barely know who they are anymore.

it broke my heart to realize that. i realized i wasn't enjoying my kids. the little afternoon/evening hours we have were so hectic and left no time for enjoying each other. we are all tired and miserable. and some how, we are responsible for getting homework done with each child. which combined can take close to 2 hours, that includes reading time.

once i began to realize all of this combined was making our family a wreck, i decided i could do something about it. that i had to. that is when God started placing the idea of homeschooling on my heart.

at first, i ran from it. i ran fast and hard, the idea of having all four kids home all day every day terrified {terrifies} me. how in the world could i, would i do this? well, God wouldn't let me run very far, because every time i did, he placed something or someone in my life that was representative of homeschooling.

when i first approached jamil with the idea he was against it. so i asked him to pray. secretly hoping that God would show him it wasn't the right decision and then i would be off the hook! well, when God works, He sure does work in unity.

when i told my friend, amy, about what i was thinking, she was so supportive and didn't tell me i was crazy. little did i know, God was working through her to give me the encouragement i needed. she encouraged me to pray about it more and begin to make a pros and cons list. and write down some things. so i did.

one night, jamil came home and said we needed to talk about this idea of homeschooling. just a few days before, i made that list of pros and cons. her support was so reassuring. that night, i presented it to jamil. honestly, the only thing represented in my "cons" column were fear based. and we realized if fear was the only thing holding us back, we had to give it a try and let go of the fear. now, jamil was so on board. he was all for it. wow. God had changed his heart. and God had really begun to open both of our eyes to what our family could become if we would just let Him do His work. but first we had to take this big step!

i made a list of friends and people who i know who are homeschooling. my list was so long!! i began to make contacts with some of these homeschooling mamas!! i was encouraged by so many of them. i was able to sit down with two of my friends and talk about their experience thus far. i was also invited to a group of homeschooling moms at our church. knowing that i have a support of friends making the same decision, is so reassuring.

once we made the decision, we just began to look at our kids so differently and things just seemed to go so much better at home in the evenings. i knew we made a decision that was honoring God and the plans He has for our family.

to this day, i am still feeling nervous about the decision. but i am excited too. it is just fear of the unknown right now. but i am going to take a leap of faith and trust God on this journey. and not let fear hold me back.

two years later

two sundays ago, not only did our family celebrate mother's day, we also celebrated our two year anniversary of being at elevation church! i will never forget that day, walking into a brand new church and not knowing at all what would lie ahead for us. we were so uncertain of just about everything. we were still feeling so much loss from the weekend before.

and now, two years later, we feel so much joy and a tremendous amount of gratitude. we are grateful for the pain we had to endure because it has gotten us to where we are now. we are so thankful for our church. we have learned and grown so much in our faith. we are a part of such an amazing move of God. and we have been blessed to be able to experience from a front row seat!

we are so thankful for where God has brought us from and for where He is taking us. and we know without a shadow of a doubt that the best is yet to come!

can't leave home without a....

HAIR BOW!!!!

it is just part of my nature, part of who i am as a mommy of two girls. yesterday, i felt like i was forgetting something as i was driving to visit a friend. and then i realized, i forgot to put a bow in jaelyn's hair. oh no.

i just love putting hair bows in my girls' hair. unfortunately, jordyn is getting to the age {almost 6} where she sometimes wants a bow and sometimes not. she has a bad habit of taking them out of her hair and misplacing them. at school. we have even lost a few of our favorite hairbows this way {aarrgghhh}

both of my girls have worn bows in their hair as newborns and ever since. i love bows on little girls!!!

a few months ago, my friend stephanie referred me to this bow making momma!!

and she is doing another giveaway!!

so much fun!!

i am going to enter the giveaway and if you like bows you should do it too, make sure you told her i sent you, please!!!

i had a fabulous experience with sara beth bows!!! what i love about her business is that she is using the proceeds from her bows to put towards adopting a baby girl!! she is so helpful and so easy and fun to work with!!! she will mail the bows to you or if you live in the area, you can pick them up!! her bows are awesome!! go check out her site!!!

her giveaway is through may 31st and there are detailed instructions on her blog!!!

distractions...

ok, first let me say, thank you thank you to those who left a comment on my last post giving me some ideas of what to write about! i am not posting the comments, so that i can save the ideas for some fun new posts!!!

next, even though i have over 10 posts in draft form, i am taking a little blog break. {sigh} {sob}

it isn't for my lack of words or ideas, in fact i have lots of them now. i am taking a break from blogging and reading blogs for awhile and this is why. it has come to my attention that my time on the computer has become a little much. hmmm... perhaps obsessive.

i can get overly obesessed with blog reading and writing, facebook and twitter, plus "screen shopping" and researching everything under the sun. we live in such a high tech world that everything is at our fingertips, which is awesome. but when it is consuming too much time, it isn't so awesome. it is becoming a distraction from the things that matter more!

i am taking a break so that i can establish some priorities back in my life.

my life is also full of other distractions right now too:

like looking for my daughter's school shoes this morning for almost an hour. we still have not found them.

and uh, yeah, having a dead cell phone battery last night when i really, really needed my phone.
.....and this is the second time that has happened within a week. (btw, i got a new phone after the first one died - long story for another post!)

not to mention it seems as if something has invaded my house and taken over my big kids, they are out of sorts and really off their routine. they are tired of homework and tired of school right now. they argue a lot and like to resist authority.

speaking of house invasion, it looks like a tornado has gone through my house, everything is out of place and the laundry has taken over. there are projects started and not completed.

seriously, these are just a few of the things that have me so distracted. throughout most every day lately, something little will cause an unforeseen distraction.

i don't deal well with this and you know what....

satan knows that! God is moving big time in our family right now. we are making big decisions and taking huge steps toward Him in so many areas. satan knows that and he is trying to throw us off course. he will not win. God will reign over all.

in order for me to focus on God's will, i am removing the distractions from my life and ignoring the ones i can not control.

so for right now, i am taking a little break from my blog. i will miss it and miss reading yours, but i will be back soon. i just need a few days to reprioritize my life for Him!

in the meantime, please be in prayer for our family and for all the things that God has been revealing to us. please pray that satan will remove his grip from us, and allow us to keep in the forefront of our minds that God's grip is tighter. and that we will carry out His will. thank you so much for your prayers!



But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. 2 Corinthians 12:9

what can i say..

sometimes i feel like i have lots to say and lots to write about and then other times, i just feel wordless. i have lots of ideas but i am have a hard time putting them into words. there is a lot going on around our house these days, but i just can't seem to narrow down my ideas into easy reading! all that to say... it may be a little quiet around here for a few days.

unless of course, you would like to ask me a question or give me an idea of something you'd like to read about... go ahead, don't be shy, ask away...

it was a good weekend...

i feel so blessed to be a mommy to these four!
i feel so blessed to have a husband who celebrated me all weekend long!

it was a good weekend!

mother's day weekend...

basically whenever a holiday comes our way, i love to celebrate it for a couple of days!! it has taken awhile for jamil to realize that in our family it isn't just a birthday it is like a birth-week or weekend depending on what day it falls. and if it is father's day or mother's day it isn't just celebrated on that day but throughout the weekend. so today is the beginning of mother's day weekend!! we have a fun one planned. here is what is going on at our house...

this morning, i went to jordyn's classroom for "muffins for mom". it was so sweet. i will post pictures later. tonight we are going to have a family fun night!! we are going to eat pizza and wings, hang out and play games!

tomorrow, jamil has to be out early but when he gets home, i am going to do a little shopping for myself. tomorrow night, we will be eating dinner at our friend's house. and another couple will be joining too! between our three families there will be six adults and twelve kids!!! so much fun, i am sure it will be wild and crazy but we can't wait! we are looking forward to it!

and then on sunday, of course the highlight of our day will be going to church! i am so excited, pastor steven's wife, holly, is going to be preaching! i know she will be delivering such an awesome message on mother's day. i can not wait to hear the words she will be speaking, they will be straight from her heart and inspired by God. not to mention, i know she will just look absolutely beautiful!!! and that afteernoon we will celebrate my mom and jamil's mom too.

and i will be back at the end of the weekend, until then have a fabulous mother's day weekend!

tucked away...

before i was a stay at home mom, i was an elementary school teacher. i don't talk about it much because it was for such a short season in my life. i moved down south from pa, leaving my family behind, for a teaching position in an inner city public school. i taught for two years. i really didn't enjoy it too much. it was a tough school and i didn't enjoy it at all.

then i had our first son, and didn't return for my third year. i did teach at a private preschool for about 6 months when josh was a baby. so, i guess you can say that i am a teacher by trade.

i have been asked a dozen times or more if i will return to teaching when all of my kids are in school. i guess that is what stay at home moms do once their kids go to school, they go back to work. i have pretty much always answered "no way, not a chance, i will not teach at a school again."

and this is why...

ever since having our children, God has placed an undeniable passion in my heart for pregnant moms, moms with new babies and babies. i have been able to direct this passion into a long term goal i have set for myself.

one day i am going to be a nurse midwife.

i have held it tight in my heart for a long time.

when my second child was a baby, i applied to nursing school and i got accepted. with some mentoring from a nurse and an older mom, i decided the timing wasn't right to start school. so i tucked the dream away. it wasn't time to make it a reality.

then a few years later, the timing was right, so i applied and got accepted again. two years ago to this date i was finishing up my first semester in an excellent nursing program at a nearby university. i loved being in school. i took one semester of classes, finishing with a 4.0 and was planning to return in the fall. i would have had a full clinical schedule. i was so excited, until it didn't work out.

schedule,
childcare,
classes,
none of it worked out.

for some reason, i was to put it on hold again. so i withdrew from the program. i was so sad, but i knew it was the right thing to do at the time.

i put my dream on hold for the second time, tucking it away in my heart again, only this time i had made a step closer than the first time.

i still hold that dream tight in my heart, knowing one day, if it is still God's plan for me, i will make it a reality. i will go back and finish my degree and become a labor and delivery nurse, then work towards a nurse midwife certificate.

i have no idea when or how i will fulfill my dream, i just know i will, one day. i don't know when or how or what it looks like but until then it is tucked away in my heart, waiting for God to show me how and when to make it a reality.


For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. Jeremiah 29:11

all dressed up but...

no where to go!

but a big reason why...
today jaelyn is seven months old!

this dress was given to me by my best friend, amy,
for my baby shower for jordyn!
jordyn wore it as a teeny baby and then
amy's twin baby girls were able to wear it last year
and now it fits sweet jaelyn!

so i thought how fitting to wear it on an occasion such as this...
seven months old.
in the life of a baby that sounds "old"
but in the scheme of things she is still so little!

jaelyn continues to be such a happy and such a sweet baby.
she brings so much joy to me and to our family.
it is crazy to think that a year ago,
i was still pregnant with this little blessing and
we hadn't even found out if i was having a boy or a girl!
now just look at her!

it is so hard to believe that she is seven months old already.
i could just cry because the time is going so fast.
and she is getting so big.
but that is a good thing too.

jaelyn is very healthy and doing all kinds of "firsts".
i am so blessed to have her and i feel especially
blessed to have such a healthy little girl.

God has been so good to us and i do not take for granted
this sweet baby He has blessed us with.

she is doing all kinds of things these days,
for an update on jaelyn please visit her blog!!

3:00 am...

it's three o'clock in the morning, i have been awake with the baby, trying all kinds of things to get her to sleep. it has been a long night even though it is morning. finally, i settle into bed, yes, with the baby. she doesn't want to sleep with out me. and that is ok.

i hear the sound of footsteps approaching our room, it is our sweet five year old daughter. hubby says, "care bear, get back into bed". care bear takes her thumb out of her mouth and replies in her sweet tired voice, "someone forgot to put my clothes out for school."

such a mommy's girl, worried about what she is going to wear in the middle of the night.


(update: this happened last week, jaelyn has been sleeping through the night after letting her cry it again. you can read about it here.)

what works best

when our first born was just a few weeks old i remember devouring baby books and trying to do the parenting thing the "right" way. i read all kinds of books just looking for the perfect way to be the perfect mommy. one night i was in tears because i had finished two different books that had two complete different philosophies. if you have ever read babywise or any book by dr. sears, you will agree the two couldn't be more different. i was very stressed out because both books offered two different prescriptions for the perfect mommy i was looking to be. which one was right, which would work best?

it has been quite a journey, but i have learned that being a parent, being a mommy, is doing what works best for you and for your family. what works for one family may not work for yours. what works for your first born may not work for your fourth born. over the years, i have developed my own style for how we live our life and raise our family. we do what works best for us. i have knitted together an eclectic style of child rearing. i do a little of this and a little of that.

i wear my baby in a sling, and i love it, but sometimes if it works better for where we are i put her in her stroller.

i try to let her cry it out at night and if it doesn't seem to work, i bring her to bed with me and we co-sleep, because a rested mommy is what works best.

i used disposable diapers with my first three and now i am using cloth diapers, because they are best for her.

when it comes to school, my first born did two years of preschool, my second did a half of a year, my third did a few weeks and my fourth will do none. my first born did kindergarten at a public school and then first and second grade at a charter school. my second did kindergarten at the same charter school, next year they will both be homeschooled. it is just what works best for us.

when my first three were younger, i did everything and went everywhere, my schedule was busy and hectic, i had a lot of commitments. my fourth has slowed me down and i am taking time now to focus and build our family on a slow paced schedule, and it is working better. better for us.

as for discipline, i don't do it by the books, but rather specific to each child and what works best for them. sometimes it is time out, sometimes it is a spanking, sometimes it is both. it just depends on what works best.

i have found out there is no "perfect mommy". i have found out that being a parent is ever changing; constant growing and stretching. as our seasons change and our lives change and our situations change God is molding us to be the parents and people He desires us to be. He is the only constant in our lives. only He is perfect and only He offers to us what is perfect. so i have given up on trying to be something perfect. and wow that takes a lot of pressure off of me.

announcing my new job...

never in a million years, would i have thought this is what God would have me to do!

and there is such an amazing story behind what He has called me to do.

i am going to bring my kids home to do school!

yup, i am going to homeschool my kids starting next school year.

isn't that so fitting with all the clues that i gave you in my previous post ?

oh, how fun! so much fun, to have you all guessing at what my new job is going to be. it was so fun and encouraging to read your comments. for those of you who read blogs through google reader or bloglines, you were not able to see the "clue" i left on my post; one of my labels gave it away to those who read straight from the blog itself - oopppss!! anyway... it was still a fun post! thank you for your comments (and phone calls!) - i love getting them!!!

on the other side...

i wonder if there will ever be a time when we stop reflecting and thinking about this day, the first sunday in may. it has been two years since we walked through what has been the most painful time of our lives. on this day two years ago, we were part of what we call "the funeral". it wasn't the death of a person. but it was the loss of a very important part of our life at that time.

it was so hard to imagine life without the church that we were leaving behind. a church that we had been a part of for six years. the only church our kids really ever knew at the time. the church that we helped build. a church that we served at, giving our time, money and energy to. we had family at this church. there were relationships and there was community. everything there we thought was good. until the weeks leading up to "the funeral".

"the funeral" took place with the kids from our youth group, their parents and our volunteer team. we listened and said nothing as they were told that it was our family's last sunday. we weren't given a chance to say good bye in our own words. in fact, the letter we wrote to the rest of our church family who weren't there was never delivered or even read to them. i witnessed tears of sadness and grief as the kids learned the news that their youth pastor and his wife were no longer going to play that role in their lives. nor would they see us at church. i saw sweet teenage girls crying and hugging each other tight. i saw big high school football players with tears in their eyes, sobbing. it was like a funeral. really. it was the hardest thing i have ever had to go through. and to think, why?

it is never easy to say good bye. but we had to. God was calling us away from our church. He used people and different situations to make us go. people we thought we could trust, we could no longer. situations that were suppose to work out, we couldn't. it was beyond our control. He was calling us away from what was so unhealthy and what was potentially going to suck the life out of us. He slammed the door shut on that season of our life.

this pain that we went through is part of our story it is part of who we are. we have chosen to forgive and move on. but, i don't think we will ever forget.

today, i didn't want to think about where we were two years ago, or what we were going through, but it is part of who we are. it is what makes us so grateful for where we are and who we are today. it is hard not to reflect. and reading this, what a wrote a year ago, i realize how far we have come since last year. i have already forgotten some of the painful details and let go of so much bitterness. and i have seen God work in mighty ways in our life.

we have come so far. God called us to an amazing church, where we feel alive and we feel God's presence. we know He is working and we get to be a part of what He is doing. we are so grateful for what we went through, the pain we endured, because it brought us to where we are now. God turned something awful and painful into something so good. our lives have been forever changed by the way He shut the door to that season of our life. He is so faithful, He showed us He has something so much better for us on the other side of that door.

a new job...

(this post wasn't suppose to be here today, after a mistake on my end realizing those with google reader and probably bloglines could read it and some errors on blogger's end, it went up anyway, so i am going to keep it up, even though it is two long posts in one day!)

a few weeks ago, i applied for a job.

the person i applied to, who ultimately is in charge, my boss, thinks i am a perfect candidate for the job. after several interviews, basically led by me, he doesn't see how i could say no.

even the person i would work the closest with, next to my boss, thinks it is a perfect fit. and we would work great as a team. we already have.

me, not so sure. i feel inadequate. i feel unqualified. i am consumed with fear.

but...

the job description is ideal, i would be using a lot of skills i already have and i would be learning a lot of new ones. especially when it comes to patience and relationship building.

i have plenty of experience for this position. that is a given. i have a degree in this field, although it is not necessary to have one at all. a lot of love, dedication and commitment can take you far in this line of work.

i can not complain about the location, it is oh, so convenient. i could reach my destination in a few minutes while drinking a much needed cup of coffee.

the hours will be long and hard at time, but very rewarding. although, i must say, our schedule would actually be so much better than it is now.

the salary, to most, would be undesirable, to me it is not a raise or a pay cut, it is what i am used to making.

the benefits are, well, honestly there are so many, i can think of one it will not have, it is all there, unless my selfish nature takes over and i choose not to see them for what they are worth.

the reason for me taking the job is so important, their are little lives and little souls at stake.


so really, how could i turn this opportunity down?

i won't turn it down, i won't let fear push me to say no.

with all that said, i am so excited and a little nervous to announce...i am taking this new job.

wanna take a guess what it is??

a baby girl and her dozen of diapers...

jaelyn with her rainbow colored assortment
of her dozen cloth diapers!
she is so happy about them!!
and so is mommy!

cloth diapering part 2...

during the weekend of testing out the 5 bum genius diapers from my friend beth, i started figuring out when, where and how we would invest in our own collection of diapers. i found a local business that sells them!! so i thought that would be a great way to start. i contacted baby booty wear. i was able to speak with the business owner, laura. she is awesome and so helpful!! she was out of the bum genius diapers but was getting a shipment soon. she suggested that i try another brand while i wait for the bum genius to come in.

i had figured out that buying 12 diapers would be a great start. i think 18 would be ideal. but after looking at our budget we could do 12 plus some supplies (wet bag, laundry bag & special detergent). what a blessing that we were able to do this!! God always supplies our needs!!

so, i did some more research and with laura's suggestion, i decided to try the happy heiny's cloth diapers, they have more colors and are rated pretty close to the bum genius. so i ordered 6 happy heiny's and 6 bum genius from laura. i was able to get the 6 happy heiny's right away and was waiting on the 6 bum genius.

at first, i was frustrated with the happy heiny's they were leaking. but then after talking with laura, i just needed to figure out what would work best for jaelyn. i had to get a good fit on her and use a second insert. once i figured out what worked best for her - i really like them!

then a few days later my 6 bum genius came in!! yeah!!! now i have 12 diapers to make this cloth diapering really work.

in the midst of getting my diapers, i did have to do a lot of research on caring for the diapers. apparently, if you use the wrong kind of detergent it can create a build up on the diapers and they do not absorb as well. there is all kinds of stuff on the internet about caring for the diapers. and i found a lot of mixed opinions on what works and what doesn't for different people.

i decided to use the country save powder detergent on our diapers. it was recommended by laura and several other sites recommend it too. it is inexpensive. and it is free from all of the stuff that could leave build up. i did find that you can remove that build up by using original dawn liquid dish soap in your wash load.

it makes me laugh to think that at one time, i seriously said i would never ever do this and thought it wouldn't work for us. and now i can not believe how much i love it. i seriously could talk about cloth diapering all day. sharing birth stories and talking about cloth diapers, it can't get any better than that, can it?

i have found that jaelyn wearing cloth diapers attracts many people's curiosity!! i have been able to share my passion a few times already in just the two weeks that we have been wearing them. on sunday, when i picked jaelyn up from our church nursery, i was able to talk to a few of our fabulous volunteers about our adventure. it excites me to be able to share this with other moms. one of our volunteers doesn't have a baby yet. her and her hubby are in the planning stages and the fact that the cloth diapers can save money is exciting to them! as it is to us, it is weird not to have to buy another pack of diapers!! although, i am going to try to build up to 18 diapers over the next few months. but after that, the cost is next to none!!

i plan to post more about our adventure. i have barely touched on the actual products i chose and why i chose them. something that i think would be helpful to others that may be considering making a switch or starting with their newborn. i know it was so helpful to me to be able to read other blogs and websites. there is a ton of information out there. it is amazing.

oh and jaelyn's bottom is completely healed, it is back to normal!!! although, there are a few marks, almost like scars to wear the skin was peeling. hopefully in time that will go away too!

please feel free to leave a comment if you have any questions or want to know more!