Top Posts of 2016

Yesterday was the epitome of new motherhood. We spent Christmas weekend with family, traveling to and from different houses to celebrate. By the time Monday rolled around, I was exhausted and thought I was coming down with the flu. I think I was just very tired because it never turned into anything, thankfully. But I spent 2 days just resting, not doing much and not leaving the house. Then yesterday, I got up and got ready for the day. As I finished, I went to do what is always my last step of getting ready, putting on my wedding ring. Except, my ring wasn’t there.

Since having Landon, I take it off regularly because I keep scratching him with it when he is feeding. It is always in 1 of 3 places, (so responsible, I know) next to my bathroom sink, on my nightstand or on the coffee table in the living room. I checked each of those spots…no ring. Then, I thought, I must have taken it off on our way home from Eastern Washington and put it in the diaper bag. Nope, no ring.

I spent the entire day searching the entire house, retracing my steps, panicking, being so hard on myself for how messy my house was (as if that was the reason I couldn’t find the ring), and all in between feeding and taking care of Landon. By the end of the day I was stressed, panicked and exhausted all over again. I had taken apart my bathroom sink after looking down the drain and convincing myself that I could see the ring down there. I called my mom panicking, thinking I had left it there when I put lotion on my hands. She even searched her entire house, including taking apart the bathroom and kitchen sink drains!

Then my husband came home from work and I burst into tears as I asked him not to be mad at me and told him what happened. Of course he wasn’t mad. He searched for a bit but found nothing.

All that was running through my head at this point was what a bad mom and wife I am. How disorganized my life had become. How I couldn’t get anything accomplished that I needed to on any given day. Obviously I was overreacting a bit, but I was so mad at myself for losing something so valuable. I decided to give up for the night and try again the next day, with a clear head, to search each room in the house very slowly and from top to bottom.

This morning, for some reason, I decided to search the diaper bag for at least the 4th or 5th time. Guess what I found. Yep. In the side pocket. That I checked each time before! WTH!?!? I was seriously ecstatic to find it. And then I started thinking about all the things that had run through my head the day before. Why am I so hard on myself? Why am I so critical of my shortcomings? I am not a bad mom or a bad wife because the dishes or laundry aren’t done.

Being a new mom has been quite an adjustment. The biggest being the lack of time I have to do all the things I used to do. I’m getting used to it and slowly adjusting but every once in a while, I need to stop and remind myself and I’m doing a good job as long as my little boy is safe, happy and healthy.

Anyway! On to the top posts of 2016! I love that these are the top 5 because I LOVE every single one of them! One thing I learned while looking into this post…I didn’t post a lot in 2016, I think baby prep took over most of my time 🙂

Click the links to check out the original posts and here’s to 2017, not being so hard on ourselves and enjoying the little things!

#5 Crispy Coconut Kale, Roasted Salmon & Coconut Rice