Paparrazi

I am the first to admit I know absolutely nothing about photography. 

I usually get my friends and family to take the pictures and then send them to me.

We bought a fancy camera last Christmas and I have yet to read the instructions or learn the basics.  I do use it.....I just don't really know what I'm doing.  Then I use Picasa and make it all "instagramy" and that's good enough for me!

Call it lack of patience.  Call it lack of initiative.  Frankly, it's not something that interests me.  I would rather leave that time to things I enjoy.  Re-arranging my house, reading blogs, eating.  Oh, and taking care of children.  That too.

 

I have enjoyed having these little photo shoots with Lil at each of her monthly birthdays.

All these pictures below were taken right after she turned 5 months old.

And I will tell you something, she loves having her pictures taken!  We probably played around with clothes and accessories for an hour and she smiled for me right on cue everytime. 

 

 

Look what Santa brought me!

 

 

 

 

She is such a joy!  Who does she look like?? 

 

This is one of my baby pictures and I don't think we look anything alike.  My head was huge.  I looked at Marc's baby pictures and she doesn't look like him either.

 

 

 

Wait!  I know.  She looks like Harper Beckham!  Is there resemblance not uncanny?!  I hate to break it to Marc this way, but David Beckham's soccer team might have been in town last October...so....



 

 



And it's not creepy at all that I have celebrity baby pictures on my blog?  Nah, not creepy at all.

 

Love,

Lynds



Trick or treat!

Here are some pics, again courtesy of Kellye Arning, of our awesome time at her Halloween party.

Henry enjoyed Halloween so much this year!  We had fun making smores and playing with his buds, Charlie, Chase, Colby, and Max before we headed out trick or treating.

 

He has been playing with (and eating) his candy for three weeks now.  He takes the bucket everywhere and is so proud of all his loot.

 

Henry was a construction worker.  The hard hat lasted about a minute.  Lily wore a cute little Halloween tutu outfit and I was a cowgirl wearing an Australian tuxedo (denim on denim).

Cutie!

 

Lily soaking up all the activity around her.  She loves to observe all the kids!

 

                                                                     Me and my girl

Baby's first Halloween

Mummy wrapping game with toilet paper. 

This is not my best look.  Looks like cowgirl couldn't find a bathroom.

 



 

They were so eager!  It was so fun to watch them trick or treat!  Best Halloween yet.

 

Love,

Lynds



Catching up

I am not sure if I will ever blog regularly again.

By the end of the day, I either collapse in bed or mindlessly surf the interwebs. 
Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest.  Oh Pinterest, how I love thee.  But the uncontrollable crafting urges are hard to control.
"Cover your whole house in burlap!" 
"If not burlap, chalkboard paint!"
"Everything is better dipped in nutella!"
"Make anything in a crockpot!"
Great for inspiration, but now I don't have any time to complete anything.  And sometimes I get a little too ambitious.
I decided to make my own curtains for our entryway windows.  You know, considering we're on a busy street and I seem to always be in a state of stripping off spit-up stained tshirts. 

It's like the old skit with the angel on one shoulder and the devil on another.

Devil- You don't know how to sew.  Angel- You can use fabric glue!
Devil- You have a 4 month old baby.  Angel- You can do it while she's sleeping!
Devil- You have a 3 year old who likes to "help".  Angel- You can do it while he's sleeping!

Always so enthusiastic that angel.
Well, the curtains are actually done and I'm happy with them.  They took three months but they're done!

I digress.  Back to the blogging conundrum.  Even when I do have an idea, I am not able to translate it to the page. 
My thoughts are actually quite complex.  But when I write it down, it comes out like caveman language.

"Me Lyndsey.  You reader.  My son Henry.  My daughter Lily.  They do funny stuff.  The End."

My 4th grade teacher actually thought I would become a writer when I grew up.  I thought about it for about thirty minutes before the model/actress/singer/comedian quadruple threat dream took hold.
That really worked out according to plan.

We have had such a fun fall this year!
Here it is in a nutshell...TBD...maybe (see post above).  I might get to it in 2 years.

Henry turned 3 and had a little birthday party while we were at Folly Beach.
I might need to do another whole blog post about our beach trip and his birthday.  What a great time! 

 

We've been to lots of birthday parties!  Here's some pics from his friend Chase's birthday party.  Chase's mom and my friend, Kellye, is an amazing photographer.  I am so lazy that I don't even take pictures when she's around.  She's so much better at it! 

 

 

We visited our favorite pumpkin patch, Hodges Farm.  Henry's favorite part was the hayride!  Lily's favorite part was wearing her pumpkin dress and sporting really spiky hair.

 

Lily is now 4 months old and in the 95% weight and 75% height percentiles  Big girl with the exact same stats as her big bro!  She's still such a sweetie and is starting to laugh and roll over. 
And by starting to laugh, I mean laughing maybe twice at random things.  I can get everybody to laugh but my own daughter.  She's a tough crowd.
She loves to be in the middle of the action now and is starting to grab and bang at everything.  Including my face.  I awoke yesterday to her giving me some playful slaps in the face.
No longer is she the infant that likes to sleep all day.  It's getting a little harder to be out and about with her and Henry at the same time since she's becoming more active. 

She has become a lot more vocal just this past week, cooing and making spit bubbles and screaming.  Like she's gotten tired of Henry making all the noise and she's ready to join. 

Latest Henry funnies:

Halloween thoughts

He wanted to eat all his candy, but Marc told him he only needed to eat one piece a day so his teeth wouldn't rot.
His reply.  "Daddy, I want to be dangerous."

His response after eating a mini Snickers.
"Mom, I love chocolate all day long."

More updates coming soon, I promise!
I must go to bed now :)

Love,

Lyndsey

The Story of L

Our little girl, Lily Isabelle Maldoff, was born nearly 2 weeks early on Saturday June 23rd 2012 at 4:05am.
She weighed 8lbs, 3oz and measured 20" long.

The day started out like any other day, but ended up being one of the best days of my life.

My doctor's appointment earlier in the week had given me a clue that I might be having the baby very soon.  At 2.5cm dilated and 75% effaced, she told me to go ahead and get that bag packed!  Since the fam lives so far away, I started calling all my neighbors and friends and scheduling times they could come over and watch Henry if I went into labor.  That was really what worried me most.  The unpredictability of it and who would be watching Henry. 

Of course I called my mama and we debated back and forth if she should go ahead and get on a plane.  We decided against it, since Henry was a week late....maybe this one would be late too. 

WRONG!

The Friday I went into labor I felt particularly tired and worn out.  I decided a glass of wine...or maybe a glass and a half was needed and deserved this late in the game.  I then promptly passed out on the couch at about 8pm.  Lovely. Keeping it classy my friends.

After I awoke from my drunken stupor, for whatever reason, I thought packing my bag might be a good idea.  You know, since I was about to have a baby at some point.
After that, I thought a shower sounded nice.

And this is when it starts to get interesting.  When Marc scared the baby out of me.

Let me set the scene.  I'm in the shower and Marc is at his vanity, like shaving or something. 
We're keeping things light and romantic as always by discussing the Jerry Sandusky trial.  You know, real pillow talk. 

So while we're talking, I think he's standing over at the vanity.  I'm washing my hair, so my eyes are closed.  I open my eyes and he's standing right beside the shower!  I screamed like a maniac!  Every horror movie seems to have an awful shower scene where you open your eyes and there's a killer right outside waiting for you.  What in the world was he thinking, creeping up on me like that? 
And then I couldn't stop laughing.   Scared to death and then non-stop laughter.  I'm no stranger to hormonal mood swings.

Shortly after the freakout, my water breaks as we're settling into bed around midnight.  I called the doctor and she told us to go ahead and get moving even though I hadn't had any contractions yet.  Right after I got off the phone with her, contractions started.  And boy, did they start.
We called our friends Brian and Amy to come over and spend the night with Henry and we didn't even wait till they pulled in the driveway. 

When we called them, they were 10 min apart.  When we left, they were 7 min apart.  By the time we got to the hospital, they were 5 min apart.  I called my mom, my dad, and my brother on the way to the hospital but nobody was picking up their phone.  It was so bizarre because they usually always pick up.  The roads were empty, the hospital was deserted.  I remember thinking that it felt like me and Marc were the only two people in the world, driving into the dark night about to welcome our little girl into the world. 

I was 4cm when we arrived, so they were able to go ahead and get the epidural cranking.  Except you have to wait till you get 2 iv bags of fluid in you before you can get it.  Boy, did that take forever!  I kept asking Marc, "How's my bag?  How's my bag?!"  Because it hurt so much worse than with Henry.

And I soon knew why.  The epidural was in a whopping 10 minutes and I felt this EXTREME contraction.  I remember actually saying, "Whoa" like in slow motion and asking the nurse to see what was going on.  Basically....it was already time to push.  10 minutes of drugs.  That's it!  So, I consider that I did most of the work natural.

And then she was here!  My girl.  And we were overwhelmed.  How could it be?  The girl that I had wished for, hoped for, prayed for.  My future best friend, shopping partner, and confidante.  All my wildest dreams had come true. 
Having a baby is truly a miracle.  I will never forget that day and the absolute pure joy of ushering our sweet Lily Belle into the world.  My life changed in an instant, for the better, forever.

First pic of me and my girl

3 minutes old

3 months old

 

 

 

 

Love, Lyndsey

Almost 3

I know I said in my last post that I would write about L's birth story next.

But first I must vent about H being almost three. As in THE Terrible Three's.

He's killing me y'all. I swear he is Jekyll and Hyde. His mood swings could rival those of any teenager. I'm not sure what happened to the boy that thought I hung the moon and agreed with everything I said. He comes back every once in a while to tease me with a hug and then follows it up with a "No mama!!!" and a fart noise to top it off.

Aw, hell no.

I've tried time outs, spankings, taking toys away, really limiting the juice (thinking it could be too much sugar) and then I realized.......he is almost 3. This is how he's supposed to be right? Some things work some of the time. There's no real logic to it.

I think before this I thought my child was perfect. I'll go ahead and admit it.
Now, oh man, that is coming back to bite me in the arse. Sometimes I get so angry at his behavior it takes all I can to just take a deep breath and reign myself back in.

I'm trying to take a more humorous approach and that seems to be working.
And letting him do more things by himself. Because now he ONLY wants to do things by himself.

I taught him how to fill up his water cup from the fridge tap to encourage water drinking instead of so much juice.
Me- "Henry, can you go get me some water?"
H- "Ok mommy!!"
Marc- "Henry, watch out. Don't step on your truck."
H- "Daddy, I'm going to get some water. That's how it is."

We made cookies together the other day since he loves to help in the kitchen so much.
I had left the chair by the island the night before not thinking.
When Henry wakes up in the morning, he either comes to our bed or will usually go down in his playroom and play trucks. Usually being the key word.
I come downstairs to the kitchen island and the surrounding wood floor covered in baking soda. He had filled up the two kitchen stones and sprinkled a bunch more around for good measure.
In my sleep-deprived stupor, I actually wondered if I had left it like that the night before. It is totally possible.
No.....so then I thought Marc had done something with it.

Me- "Did you pour a bunch of baking soda out on the counter this morning for some reason?"
Marc- "No. I saw that. I was wondering what that was about."

And then I see it. The shovel. His trusty shovel sitting there on the counter. Caught red handed. That boy had just helped himself to the Arm & Hammer out of the fridge.

Me- "Angel, what were you doing this morning in kitchen?"
H- "Mommy, I was trying to make soup."

Well, there you have it.

And can I get an amen that kids seem to act a million times worse when the grandparents visit?
What's the deal with that?!

Vent over. Ahhhhh......

And then he gives me the biggest hug ever and tells me I'm the best mommy in the world and all is good again.
Love you Hyde. That was the good one right?

Love,
Lyndsey


First day of preschool

Helped put in her paci in and extremely happy about it.

Big guy and little lady!

Mid fart noise with first shiner.  Gotten by running into coffee table.  Not by being punched by Will Ferrell in The Campaign.

House divided reunited by the love of thumb sucking.

Miss Lily Belle is here!

Wow, having a baby sure does throw off your blog writing!  I'm currently sitting here in a spit-up stained tshirt and no pants.  I don't remember why I'm not wearing pants but this is how it goes these days.  I'm trying to roll with it.  My babies are bathed though!  Needless to say, the most crucial decision of my day is whether to shower or nap, so the blog has been on hiatus.  The nap ALWAYS wins.  I need to make sure and write things down or I know I'll forget.  Hence the pants.

Miss Lily Belle Maldoff is 2 months old and I'm just now getting around to writing about her.  She is such a joy!  Lily is starting to smile and coo and her little personality is starting to show, so it's been very rewarding for me.  For a while, I was only getting pooped on so I deserve some smiles!
I'm not sure how I got so lucky (don't want to jinx it) but she is so chill.  And I'm not sure if that's because we're so much more relaxed this go round or if she is just that good.  Maybe it's also having her in the summertime....I swear I was taking her out with Henry when she was just 2 weeks old. 

She does love to be held.  My baby carrier has been put to use, especially when it's just me with Henry and Lily out and about.  She loves to snuggle with me in bed (I was too nervous to bring Henry in the bed), so maybe that's another reason why she's so happy! 
I have never seen a baby enjoy a bath so much too.  What a girl!  Loves to be clean and wear pretty outfits. 
At her 2 month check up, she was in the 50th percentile for height and 90th for weight.  A little chunker! 
Lily has the most beautiful blue eyes and crazy black mohawk hair.  Where in the world did that come from?  Oh wait, me.  I dye my hair to match my son's.  As my sister put it, "The Schroeder is strong in that one."  She looks exactly like Henry did at this age, but her features are more delicate and she's got her daddy's small head.  I think she looks more like her Marc right now overall, but she changes everyday.

Henry has adjusted fairly well.  The first two weeks, he ignored her and didn't want anything to do with her.  Not in a mean way.  He's just a boy and didn't really care.  He finally asked to hold her one day and he has loved her ever since!  He lavishes her with his blankies (sometimes over her head...I can't leave them alone together) and shows her his toys and tries to pick her up (again, I have to watch him).

Having two home with me at the same time has definitely been an adjustment.  It is so much harder than I thought it would be!  But very rewarding.  And full.  When I lay my head down at night, I definitely feel like I've put in a full day!
But I am learning and gradually we're getting into a routine.  As much of a routine as you can with two little ones. 

• I have learned the art of surviving the witching hour from 4 to 6pm.  Coffee, beer, or wine depending on how the day has been.
• It's best not to need to be anywhere in the morning at a certain time. 
• Now is not the time to be potty training.  I knew it was time to stop when I grabbed a squatting Henry out of his room and made a beeline for the bathroom only to have him poop in mid-air.  I was in mid-stride, so yes I did kick the poop with my bare foot.  And yes, it did explode into pieces and splatter all over the bathroom floor.  And yes, my immediate thought was that I was glad I was on the tile floor.  Not for concern over my foot.  Yes, time to stop.  Do these things only happen to me?
• The crockpot is my friend.
• Tantrums are best worked out in their own good time with no interference from me.
• When both of the kids take a nap at the same time, the heavens are shining down from above.  LAY DOWN.
• Calling friends to chat, even if it's just for 5 minutes, helps so much.  Staying at home with two littles that can't have adult conversation can be isolating.  I can only talk about construction equipment so much.
• Meeting up with friends and kids is even better.  We've had a lot of play dates.
• Going to try on clothes when you are not your ideal size is not a good idea when you do get that rare hour to yourself.  But I can't wait to get some colored jeans!  And I only have 8lbs to lose.  YES!!  Ok, that was my bragging moment.
• The dishes can always wait till morning. 
• Taking care of one kid at a time in the easiest thing in the world.  Why did I think having only Henry was hard? 

And it is now my bedtime of 9pm and I must stop.  Next post, I'll write about Miss L's birth story.  This might be when she's a year old but it will happen.  Please excuse if this writing is poor quality.  I fear my brain may be gone forever!  And I'm finally reading Fifty Shades, which is not helping.  Ha!

Love,
Lyndsey

37 week update

I had my last ultrasound today for baby girl to check on her weight and general check up stuff (I really pay attention during these appointments, can't you tell?)

Mind you, she is totally scrunched up in there but she looks EXACTLY like Henry did!  All lips and cheeks.  It's really amazing to look back and see the resemblance. 

All my fluids look good, which is usually the first thing they check when you have gestational diabetes.  Her heartbeat has also slowed down to about 128, closer to my own heart rate.  The nurse said this happens as it gets closer to that time (need to google it).   She's usually around 145.

She is 7lbs, so if she goes all the way to the due date of July 5th, she'll probably be 8 to 9lbs.  3 more weeks.  Wow.

Marc and I are so relaxed with this baby.  It's really strange with the 2nd.  I probably need to make one more trip to Babies R Us to stock up and I scanned through my Baby 411 book to try and get back in the zone. 

Henry joined us for the ultrasound and threw out his usual zingers.

H-"That my brother?"

Me- "No sweetie, that's your sister.  A baby girl, remember?"

H- "Ohhhh....my sister.  She looks like monkey."

Me- "Yeah, she looks a little weird in that picture."

H- "That too bad."

It is unfortunate I suppose.  To have a sister that looks like a monkey.

Love,

Lyndsey

Ready for our girl!

The nursery is done!
Well, almost done.  I still want to get a cute rug and I just ordered a little owl pillow for the rocking chair, but other than that, DONE.
I have decided that Pinterest is not the best thing for a manic nesting pregnant woman.  They didn't have Pinterest when I was pregnant with Henry and I was a crazy nester then too.  Multiply that by ten! 
I loved putting this nursery together.  I was able to use so many of my things from my shabby chic days from my first apartment on my own.  I saved everything thinking if I ever had a little girl I would want to use them in her room.  And now I am!

Here's the view walking into the room! 

My mama bought me the bedding from Etsy and I love it!  Is it weird that I would like to sleep in here?  Yes, that is weird.  I ordered the frame from a photography shop in Concord.  The branch was salvaged from the backyard.

I have had this old desk since I was 14!  I bought some new knobs from Anthropologie (totally need a new one for the middle drawer now that I'm looking at it) to spruce it up.  The desk is too small for a grown up person who is taller than 5ft tall to use comfortably, so I thought it would be good for the changing table.

I think this says it all.

My mama made this for me after Ash and I picked out the scrapbook paper at Michael's.  I have had this window for years and years.  This is hanging right by her closet.

The old door!  Once again, another item I have had forever.  I bought this back when I was in college.  Hmm....I might be a hoarder.



Oh my, look at all the flea market treasures!  Doesn't it just make your heart happy?

My crafty sis knitted the flowers and I covered a cheapy Target lampshade in burlap and hot glued the flowers on.  Easy!  I mod podged an old canvas I didn't like anymore with some book pages and added a few trinkets.

Shutter ribbon holder

The closet!  I am in so much trouble.


I am so happy the room is finished.  I am 37 weeks pregnant and I am literally still in disbelief that I will have a baby girl here very shortly.  How did this happen?  Wait, I think I know how it happened but where has the time gone?
I'll blog more later in the week after we have our last ultrasound on Friday.  Hopefully, we'll have some pics to share!

Love, Lyndsey