Snow Days & 3am Prayers

There is definitely something more magical about the snow when you have kids. Actually, most things in life become more magical when you have kids. You get to see things with fresh eyes, and experience everything all over again with them.

It's been snowing the past two days here in our little town and June has asked to go outside both days! I was so surprised the first day that she wanted to go out that I happily obliged and grabbed my camera without even putting my own coat on! June ran up and down our sidewalk, stomping in the puddles, trying to catch snowflakes on her tongue and did it all with such excitement and joy.

Genuine joy.

That is something I've been praying for lately. In fact, I've been praying for a lot of things lately. Because, I'll tell ya something --- having a newborn who cries wayyyyy more than your first kid ever did makes you question a lot of things about life at 3am.

If I'm totally honest, there was a stretch of time in the last two months where my prayers sounded like "God make her stop crying." "Jesus please let her sleep all night long, so I can sleep." "Please make June be miraculously well behaved today and potty train herself." I was praying to my "genie-Jesus" begging for everyone else to make adjustments, and change, and wear their big girl pants (literally), but not asking for actual help, joy, or strength for myself. "Hey everyone else! Feelings update: you change, cause I'm too tired too. Ok? Cool thanks bye."

On the little bookshelf next to the chair where I nurse Sunny, there is a devotional book my friend Heather recently gave me called "5-Word Prayers, Where to start when you don't know what to say to God." I picked it up one day while sitting there, not because I was feeling desperate, but simply because I wanted to read something while nursing. And wouldn't you know, the prayer I read for that day was these five words, "Please give me strength now."

And that's all it took. That's when it hit me. I don't think I've ever prayed that in my life. Maybe once, while in unmedicated labor with June (ha ha!), but I'm certain I didn't have the word "now" on the end of it. How simple that prayer sounded and how powerful I was certain it would be over my life. And so I prayed it. All day... and all night... for a few weeks.

And before long, my fears and bitterness about the season of life I am in were lifted. I find that my thoughts and heart are in better place throughout my day when my prayers, even when short and desperate, are about gratitude for my little family and a request for genuine joy and strength through this season.

That same little devotional went on to say this...

"Many days a desperate, searching heart has prayed to God, please give me strength now. We need God's strength to withstand the winds of life that threaten to blow us into a place of skepticism and despair. We've prayed it in the quiet of night, lying on a pillow that never feels soft enough to grant us rest. We've prayed it in our car, driving numbly down this street and that, sitting in the tall grass, watching children play and wishing we could be so carefree, clutching our memories beside fresh graves, begging for our hearts to stop breaking the whole way through. Only the strength of God can console our weeping souls. ..... The Word of God promises, over and over, to give us the strength we do not have in everyday life and great times of struggle." - Lisa Whittle, 5 Word Prayers

So now, I ask for help --- and my 3am prayers sound much more like "Help me to be patient in all circumstances." "Help me speak more gracefully to my girls." "Thank you for this little life." "Give me energy for tomorrow." "Please give me strength now."

And, "Thank you for snow days."

Keeping Busy on Cold Days

Does anyone else feel like a total crazy person when you have to be inside all day with a toddler!?!? There's no way it's just me, right? Last week we had this unusually warm spurt for February weather in Pennsylvania. It was crazy warm. Like, June and T.J. were wearing shorts warm. Like, we played with bubbles and went for walks all hours of the day warm. And it spoiled us all!

It's cold now, like normal winter weather, and we're stuck inside all over again. My neighbor/friend Kim text me and was like "I know its only been a week, but I can't think of anything to do with Clara now that outside isn't an option." 😂 But... f'rills.

So, June and I have been stretching everyday things -- like brushing our teeth and reading books --  into much longer activities. For as creative as I can be, playtime with June is not something that I'd say comes naturally to me. That's T.J.'s department. I will make the house out of cardboard, and then T.J. and June will play in it. #teamwork

But I'm getting better. Learning to play with June in ways that come more naturally to me, and show myself some grace when I literally can't think of a single. thing. we could do.

June loves to read books, so one of my favorite things to do is pile all of her favorite books onto our bed and let her "read them" to me. 😂 Which sound a lot like, "Apple. Fall. Boom. Ohhhhh. Tacos. Dog. Click, clack Moooooooo!"

We've also been brushing our teeth together, simply for something to do. June has learned to climb up and sit on the back of the toilet, so she can reach the sink. We wet our toothbrushes together, put on the toothpaste (her favorite part) and "brush, brush, brush!" for like 15 minutes. She's also learned to "spit" in the sink, mimicking me when I brush, and it's so funny. She's not even spitting anything out, just making a spit sound in the general direction of the sink!

Also, note her "crazy eyes" below. 😂 She does it all the time now!

Too often I can be someone who thinks "This shouldn't take so long!" or "This is a waste of time." But, being a parent has gotten me (honestly: forced me) to slow down, and not feel like I need to be in a hurry all the time. On these cold winter days I literally have no where else I need to be, so brushing our teeth for 15 minutes is a perfect use of our time. 💕 Or when she wants to sit on her changing table and count her toes 800 times in a row, I don't feel like I should be doing something else anymore. This is it! This is life and parenting and it's awesome. Highly repetitive at this age, but awesome nonetheless. 😉

June and I also spend lots of time playing with the kitchen she got for Christmas. She pretends to cook eggs for me, and often serves them with mustard and a stick of butter. She'll place things in her microwave and then go "beep beep!" when they're "done cooking." It's so fun to watch her play and mimic what I do in the kitchen - which I assure you isn't serving eggs with mustard and a side of butter. 😂

The other thing we do is use our bathtub like a ball pit! T.J. ordered a bag of cheap "ball pit" balls from Amazon last year and they're so much fun. (They're easy to clean up and store in a big trash bag too!)

I let June play in our bathtub a lot, especially when I'm getting ready. It keeps her in one place, where she can still be in the room with me, but not near my makeup or hot curling iron! She loves to point out all of the colors of the balls and play with her trains and cars along the edge of the tub. And I love watching her play, while I paint my nails or pluck my eyebrows for the first time in 3 months. 😳

(Notice the cat toys that are mixed in with all of her toys below. 😹)

Hopefully there aren't too many weeks left of this cold windy weather, and before we know it we'll be outside again, playing on the front porch, and sippin' iced coffee in the sun. 

What are some of your current activities for toddlers when it's too cold to be outside? I'd love to know!

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This post was sponsored by Primary -- an amazing clothing company for kids featuring brilliant basics that play well together. While this post was sponsored, all opinions are my own. There isn't a day that goes by where June isn't wearing an item from Primary. We really do love, and wear, their stuff all the time! 😍 

Balance | with Amazfit

Balance has meant many different things to me over the years. When T.J. and I were fist married, it looked a lot like trying to live within our smaller budget, working hard at our wedding photography business so T.J. could quit his day job in a warehouse, and spending time with friends/family.

Fast forward 7+ years and over time we had to learn how to balance two full time businesses, friendships, employees, family, church, quality time together, having a BABY, staying fit, and a million other things. Like vacuuming all. the. time. because we have four cats.

But honestly, it's only in the last year and a half that I can say I've actually found some sort of balance in my life. T.J. has written about this season of our lives quite a bit on his blog, with my two favorite posts being Throw Away All The Things (when we found balance by, well, like he said.. throwing out all of the things) and, Balance Is A Moving Target (where he talks about balancing less things as a whole, and not always in a 24 hour mindset.) 

For me, my days all look a little different. I work at our walk in love. studio twice a week when my parents watch June.  Sometimes I have extra photoshoots for friends and family throughout my week. Or playdates with Junie and her friends. But most of the time there are always several categories I work hard to keep balanced in my daily life - food, family time and fitness. The latter certainly being the hardest for me. 😬 I mean, c'mon... running? It's the worst!

Balancing family time often looks like reading books to June in her room and choosing to stay off of my phone. June loves to read. Her current favorite book is this silly little book with all black and white drawings of animals and things. She makes all the sounds they do and sniffs the page with flowers on it every time. (See photo below 😂.) Not that the page actually smells good or anything... she just thinks it's what you're supposed to do.

When Amazfit, an incredibly stylish fitness tracker, reached out to me about partnering for a post, I felt incredibly comfortable saying yes. And I have loved having a way to track my steps, calories and sleep over the last several weeks, all while stacking it like a bracelet next to my other cute accessories.

It has been fascinating to track my light sleep and deep sleep, and how they correlate with how I feel the next morning. My goal, of course, is to always feel as happy when I wake up as June does while reading her books. #goals

One of my favorite ways to find balance in food is our snack trays. No joke, we eat them all the time. (You can see my recent Thanksgiving one here.) It's just a simplified, fast way to eat things that we love, coupled with the things we "should eat more of" on a daily basis. Aka: it's how we justify eating a lot of cheese.

A close second to our love for snack trays though, is quesadillas. I did not grow up making them at home, but with T.J.'s family being part Mexican, they certainly did. Back when I was 22 and all the things were smaller, I'd load it up my quesadillas with cheese and bacon and chicken and eat every single slice. Nowadays, I seek to find balance by first loading it up with tomatoes, peppers, onions, avocado, black beans and corn... and then add the cheese. And honestly, it's so much better than the ones I used to make.

Note to self: do a recipe post on the different quesadillas we make, cause that sounds delish.

Lastly... fitness. Ugh. Working out is not my favorite thing to do. I have gotten better over the years, for sure, and have learned what I do and don't like to do, along with what does and doesn't work for me. But for the most part, it's the little things that all add up. Choosing to walk to work instead of drive, jogging with the stroller on sunny days, and continuing to remind myself that it's all a journey. Oh, and that being able to make humans is an incredible thing, and that I shouldn't be too hard on myself for weight gained in the process.

I'd like to tell you that I always look this put together while working out, but that's simply not the case. Just last week I started walking at 6am with my neighbor/friend Leah, because at some point in her "I haven't worked out since 1999" thinking, it seemed like a good idea. Trust me, when I meet Leah at the corner of our two streets, my sweatpants are all but duct tapped to my ankles to keep the wind out, and I've got four very unflattering layers of heather gray on. But hey! At least I'm walking 3 miles. #balance 😂 Leah, if you're reading this, please burn this well-lit, posed image of me in cute workout clothes into your mind, and think of it when I see you Wednesday morning in the dark. Thank you.

If you'd like to get an Amazfit for yourself, you can use the code MYAMAZFIT to save 40% on your purchase. In the first photos, I am wearing the Moonbeam tracker, which looks a lot like a super cute watch. In the last images, I am wearing the Rainbow wristband, with the blush colored metal details! You can also take out the ceramic tracker and wear it as a necklace. 😍 They also have loads of other styles and wristbands (for guys too!) on their site, so check them out. So really, there is no excuse to not track your activity anymore... cause you no longer have to compromise your personal style to stay healthy.

This post was sponsored by Amazfit. As always, all opinions are my own. Thanks for supporting my blog and the awesome people who sponsor it.