How we spent the past two years:

We got married.

I climbed some English walls.

Trav waded through some Scottish waters.

I got pregnant. (Peter)

We went to some movies and, overall, had a lot of fun.

We bought a house.

I got pregnant again. (L)

We remodeled the house, which we're actually still doing.

I gave birth.

I learned how to can.

Travis became a Grey Ghost.

We had our first Christmas with a 7 month old.

It was a good two years. I love you, Travis. Thank you for asking me to be your wife!

Happy Anniversary!

The Other Side of the Glass II

Oops! This video was supposed to be with the post below. Sorry!

The Other Side of the Glass

This looks really interesting - I'd love to see this film. It makes me so grateful for my homebirth and the role Travis played during my labor, delivery and L's immediate care.

Saw this video here: http://home.earthlink.net/~birthnews/

It's a good site with some more info on the Home Birth Saftey Illinois Senate Bill that will create a system in our state to license homebirth midwives, making homebirth available to more women in Illinois in a safe and legal way. (IE - Currently homebirths may only be attended by certified nurse midwives and my understanding is that outside of Chicagoland there are only two CNMs in the state with Bernice, my midwife being one of them.)

Celebrating Christmas - all December long

First we went to my brother's house. He and his wife would be with her family in CO for Christmas so we got together to celebrate in early December.

This is the gingerbread cake I made. It was supposed to look like a castle, but ended up more like a ruin. Oh well.
The razor Grandpa made for Karl, who "holds his razor too far away from his face".


The next few are some random pictures leading up to the big day.My adorable daughter wearing her Christmas hat, knitted by a family friend.

Playing with my present.

Christmas Eve with my side of the family.

We started the day by going down to Dad's cousin's to shoot his new rifle.

We celebrate Christmas with a bang. Ha. Ha.

Mom's beautifully set dining room table.

L wearing the stockings Grandpa gave her.

Playing with Uncle Karl.

This is the gift basket I made for K & M. Coffee, clementines, biscotti and some home made granola.

Christmas Morning

What am I excited about?

Welcome to this century, Bonnie.

Christmas with Travis' familyTrav, my guitar hero.

She never really got opening presents.

I love that woman in the red turtleneck.

Merry Christmas!

Legal Homebirth in Illinois

Okay everyone:

Please help support midwives and homebirths in the state of Illinois by encouraging your state rep to support the Home Birth Safety Act. The doctors in America hate homebirth and are trying to stop licensing midwives for homebirth. If this happens it means no more homebirths in IL!
Giving birth to L at home was a wonderful experience for me and Travis, and we're so glad I was at home rather than at a hospital. I feel fairly confident, after hearing women with similar labor stories, that had I been in a hospital I would have ended up with lots of interventions and probably a c-section. Good health care provides options for women, including the option for a home birth.
Please go to http://ilga.gov/ to find your legislator and give them a call! Please! This is me begging!
Merry Christmas and thanks for your time!
Love, Bonnie

Below is the message I got informing me about the bill. I modified it slightly for easier reading.
Today (12/24) most Illinois legislators will receive a position statement from the Illinois State Medical Society against the Home Birth Safety Act. It is a strongly worded criticism of our bill. This means that the opposition is already aware that our bill will be voted on in January. They even told our co-sponsors that, "Physicians at the Illinois State Medical Society are extremely disheartened with your cosponsorship and support of Senate Bill 385, a bill that we believe is a dangers step backwards in health care and will jeopardize the safety of women ad newborns."

Contact your Illinois state representative asking their office, "Now that the nurses are neutral, will you (or the representative) support Senate Bill 385, the Home Birth Safety Act?"

Go to ilga.gov to look up your state reps so you can get the phone number. Now is the time for EVERYONE to do EVERYTHING they can to support licensing midwives in Illinois! NO HOLDS BARRED!

Thanks you, and have a warm and happy holiday!

Colette Bernhard

Legislative Chair

Coalition for Illinois Midwifery

Spa Treatment

Today I had my massage. It was a Christmas gift from last year and the gift certificate expires tomorrow. I don't know why I put it off so long. I changed into a spa robe and slippers and waited in a room with a chocolate fountain. My masseuse had me fill out a little questionnaire about my job, how my body carries stress, any pains I may have, etc. He then did an awesome job on my upper back and he worked on my hips, which have bothered me since I was pregnant. He told me my upper back pain wasn't just stress buy because my pecs and shoulders aren't strong enough and with carrying/lifting L all the time I'm stretching out the shoulder blades. (Or it was something like that, he told me how to fix the problem.)

I loved it, but I honestly think I'm so stressed I never relaxed like I could have. Which sucks.

Updates on the Dump

The entertainment center and Travis' old computer desk (which had been sitting in the dining room serving no purpose but to look shabby) were recently swapped. This takes our games and my stereo, records and CDs and puts them in an area of our house where L does not play. She had formed a tendency to beat on the glass door of the entertainment center, pull out my CDs and records. Not good.

The old computer desk no houses some misc. books and the tv. You can't really see it because it's black and kinda blends into the tree. We also moved the bookshelf, which I think looks really nice in its new home.

I also finally bought my own curtains and I love them! Martha Stewart from KMart. They are striped with blue, yellow cream, white and a tanish gold. They are perfect.

Travis lowered the kitchen window for me (a couple months ago) and I love it. He also hung another cabinet. I've rearranged my cupboards (now that there's no more mice) and I am one happy cook.

The old stairs were really steep, dark and creepy. These are lovely and will be even better when the railings are put in. And while MVV is living upstairs they are a great place to store things. Like diaper bags and drills.

Happy Feast Day to you... and then to me

Our Lady of Guadalupe's feast day is today. So happy feast day to you all.


Let's be honest here, Mary, as wonderful as she is and as much as I loved her before I gave birth, is no longer my go-to woman. As I'm freaking out, stressed out, tired, resentful and ticked off about my loss of time, self and space due to my high needs baby the last thing I want to do is talk to the Immaculata about parenting her Son, God. I'm sure Jesus is none too pleased with me about this and the Holy Spirit wants to give me a firm talking to.

But all I'm saying is that at this point the Church doesn't offer us a lot of canonized moms, in fact Mary, Monica, Gianna and now Therese's mother are the only ones I can even think of. And from what I know about them, their problems weren't like my problems. Which brings me to this conclusion, I am just going to have to step up my game so that when I die I go straight to Heaven, start getting some miracles and am canonized myself. Seriously, we Catholic moms need a saint who had frustrations with NFP, struggled with the baby blues and emotional eating and had a hard time embracing her vocation and body. I could be the patron saint of moms, NFPing moms, fussy babies, parents with demanding babies, eating disorders, people who worked for the Church, home births, short engagements and therefore planning a wedding in 6 months, people with tempers, and people who frequently put their foot in their mouth. In fact, my prayer card could show me with my foot in my mouth. It would be perfect.

I'm completely serious about all of this, and it's a good thing I have spiritual direction/reconciliation scheduled for this Tuesday: I've got a lot of work to do.

Can you come out and play?

About a week ago I met a woman at a Catholic Moms' Group; I'll call her M. I was really struck by M, her humor, story-telling and the way she carried herself. I asked for her number (feeling like a creepy guy at a bar), we ran into each other at KMart, we found each other's blogs and Facebook pages and today L and I went to her house to drink yummy chai tea and hang out with her and her twin 4 year old girls.

It was a lot of fun and not as awkward as one might think. (at least it wasn't for me! Maybe the whole time she was hoping we would leave! I hope not.) I hope we can spend more time together after the holidays and get to know each other better. (I feel like such a dorky loser saying all this.)

The truth is, I crave companionship with other Catholic, stay at home moms. I am very fortunate to have a good friend nearby who is a sahm and a lot of fun to be around. And I have a very good friend who is single and a great Catholic woman. The friendships of these two women are priceless in my life, and they are wonderful, astounding ladies. But I have been craving an all-in-one friend, and unless the one friend converts (which I don't think she'll do) or the other gets married and pregnant soon (no pressure) I'm not gonna get it. That's why I asked for M's phone number and recently bribed a another Catholic, mostly-sahm friend in B/N with lots of free food. I want you in my life! To swap stories and ideas about how to raise kids in the Church; to share the joys and frustrations of NFP with someone who completely understands; to have a mom fraternally correct me.

Oh Mother Mary, pray for me!

Christmas is coming

Jolly Old St. Nick - Part II

Yesterday The Dark Knight came out on DVD. St. Nicholas must have been watching out for this release date because when Travis came home from work there was a gift bag on the kitchen island with it inside. He is a very happy man.

PS I cried through the whole thing

Netflix offers are perfect example of how Travis and I sometimes differ in taste: last two movies we got were Rambo and PS I Love You. You can probably guess which one was mine. PS I Love You was a pretty good movie. We both laughed a lot while watching it (yes, Travis did watch it, but only after I told him that Gerard Butler was King Leonitis in 300.) but I also cried through the whole thing. I would be laughing and crying at the same time. Why? Because, as I told Travis while he laughed at me, there is nothing worse I can think of than losing my husband early in life. Just the hint of the thought made me bawl.

Jolly old St. Nicholas

Saturday was the feast of St. Nicholas. Last year I wrote a little post about this awesome saint. This year I'm going to tell you what an awesome man I am married to and how great my mom is.

After a couple of secret conversations between the two of them for a couple of weeks I knew something was up, I just didn't know what. And then this happened:

L had stayed the night at my Mom's (reason #1 she's awesome). I woke up at 6am with the need to pump. This woke Travis up and he asked if I was up for good. No, I said, I wanted to sleep some more.

However, after the pumping I was hungry and we decided to make pancakes. (Reason #1 Travis is awesome.) After breakfast we went back to bed - he has to keep me warm, he's seriously a space heater. After I was warm he got up and said he needed to take care of stuff in the kitchen. To be honest, I thought that was a little fishy, because I had just done the dishes and we'd already had breakfast, and then when I heard him opening things I got really suspicious. But I told myself, "Bonnie, you're too damn nosy. Just stay in bed."

And I'm glad I did because when I came got out of bed a little bit later, tucked between the ottoman and sofa was a pair of (knock off) Wellies filled with PB MnM's, Dots (my fave candies), chocolates and an itunes gift card. The Wellies were from my Mom, everything else came from Trav.

But all Travis said was, "Looks like St. Nicholas was here!"

My Christmas Present from Trav

I have a new vacuum!!!!!! I've been using hand-me-downs which, just weren't cutting it. This Hoover Windtunnel Cyclonic is FANTASTIC!

This is the story as to why I got it early:

Travis bought it on Black Friday but this past week it was still in the trunk of his car. I was going to use his car to run an errand and because of the snow, I wanted to put a little shovel in the trunk to dig myself out if needed. As soon as I opened the trunk I saw the box, slammed the door and put the shovel in the back seat. Fast forward a couple of days and Travis is driving home and starts thinking about the shovel in the backseat. "No one puts a shovel in the backseat... She saw the vacuum."
When he came home that night he asked if I had gotten into his trunk.
"Maybe."
"Did you see anything?"
"Maybe."
"What did you maybe see?"
"I might have seen some sort of carpet cleaner, but it was an accident and I didn't want to! I wasn't snooping!"
He asked if I wanted to wait until Christmas; I told him it was his decision. He asked if I would use it right away and when I answered in the positive, he got it out of the trunk.

Big shout out to my husband, he put a lot of thought into this gift. He used money from scrap metal to buy it and spent a lot of time researching the best vacuum and the best price. He ended up at Menards where it was $1 cheaper than everywhere else. :)

Wedding

Okay, if any of you happen to know my younger brother, you might want to check out this website. There's pictures and a really great video from the rehearsal - reception. The video / website was a great collaboration between my sister-in-law and her sister who video taped everything, my older brother who created the website and our friend, Jolene, who took additional footage and created the video.

Highlights:
-the background music is Duncan playing the pre-wedding music, which were songs from Nintendo games, mostly Zelda.
- Karl and the bridal party singing along to Duncan playing Journey's "Don't Stop Believin"
- The Father of the Bride's speech - it's really good.
- Karl singing "I Wanna Grow Old with You."

Sneak Peak into our family life

I'm fighting off Christmas

Because it's Advent, people!

When Travis and I first got married we decided that our Christmas tradition would be to keep the liturgical seasons as best we could. Therefore, right now the only seasonal decorations in the house are generic winter ones and our Advent wreath. On the 3rd Sunday of Advent, Gaudete Sunday, we rejoice by cutting down our own tree, decorating it, getting out the nativity scene and playing the Christmas CDs. But the Wise Men, they're on the other side of the room. We keep the decorations out throughout the Twelve Days of Christmas, which lasts until Epiphany, January 6th. That's when the Wise Men get to the Nativity. It's the weekend after Epiphany that the decorations come down.

Before we did this I always found myself done with Christmas before I even got to Christmas. I was all Yuletided out and the joy, glory and awesome significance of the day didn't matter.

Now, when I'm in the car I will allow myself to listen to 1 Christmas song per trip and I have done my Christmas shopping, but otherwise we're really trying to focus on Advent so that when the real Christmas gets here we can celebrate.

This is Advent

Day 2.

"The glory of God is man fully alive," wrote Irenaeus. I've heard this line many, many times but it never really struck the chord that it did today.

This morning as I prayed with L, I asked for the graces to live out my vocation, to embrace the crosses of mundanity and sacrifices of my time. I prayed to no longer view my role of a stay at home mom as a loss of self, but rather as a progression to the fullness of who I am intended to be.

For sometime I have felt like I am treading water, occasionally enveloped by a wave. It's time to move past that and live a life that brings glory to God. It's time to act on the nudge I've been feeling and call the local nursing home and see if they need a volunteer visitor and her adorable baby. It's time to allow myself to really celebrate that when my husband heard the line, "Long as you got me you won't need nobody" in a song he thought of me, instead of worrying about making him happy. (I am making him happy!) It's time to start identifying the demons who are attacking me and tell them, in the Name of Christ, to get the hell out of my house. (Literally.) It's time to get up. To wake up.

Because, I think the message I got today is that I have the life I want, I'm just not living it.


Fr. Blake's Sunday sermon, which inspired me to write this post, can be found here.