She is changing sooo much!

Anna is now 8 weeks old and last week she started smiling! :-) This is one of my favorite stages. When they are finally able to respond to you talking to them. I love it when after I feed her I say "hi baby girl" and she grins from ear to ear.... no matter what kind of day I am having it instantly improves at that moment! I can't wait till she starts talking in that baby voice..... she is starting to do that a little bit.... but I know in the coming weeks it will be more and more.... Going to try and savor each moment....

We were made to crave....

Ok...... time to get a little personal......In my lifetime I have started and stopped trying to live a healthier lifestyle more times than I care to admit. I never had a "weight problem" when I was younger however I remember being in 9th grade and I was 5'6 and probably 125lbs and I was playing volleyball with the school team. I remember when we ran before the game in our game shorts feeling self concious, and I have no idea why. No one had called me fat, however as I look back I remember even in junior high some of my friends being obsessed with how they looked and how much they weighed, but until then it hadn't really affected me.

I remember throughout high school at different times trying to starve myself, and even throwing up once in a while but my love for food always would override any temporary fix I was trying to do. Although I wasn't overweight, food still was a focus and a way for me to try and control anything that was going on emotionally. I could only do things for a little while before I would just start eating again, whatever I wanted.... whenever I wanted. Fortunately I had a high enough metabolism that I didn't put on weight in high school and for the most part I was a happy go lucky teenager.

The blow came right before my freshman year of college. My mom and I were working at the same place and we drove to work together. One morning I decided to drive and we were in a near fatal car accident. We hit the median and rolled 3 or 4 times. I looked over to see my mother unconcious. My mom almost didnt' make it and was in a nursing home for several months with doctors fearing she would never walk again. Severe guilt came into my life at that moment. After all I was the one driving! God being the gracious and awesome God he is, healed my mother and she was able to come home and she also was able to walk, however the accident did change her in a lot of ways as far as health and as a 17 year old it changed me as well.

I floated through college that semester and failed and dropped out of most of my classes and along with that I began to eat.... alot. I blamed it on being in college and always being on the road but the truth is food made me feel better. I went to Mcdonalds once or twice a day and by the end of my first year of college I had probably put on 15-20lbs. Through again God's graciousness he worked on my heart and I was able to forgive myself for the accident, after all it was just that, an accident and I couldn't feel guilty about it and I had to move on. However emotional eating for me never changed, it only grew worse. My sunday ritual in college was to go to church, then to Sonic then a nap. So needless to say after my 3rd year in college I was 200lbs and at 5'6 that is not a good weight at all. I looked to food as my entertainment... my companionship... my reward for working hard.

I went away to college my junior year and I was so homesick that food became really important to me. I remember ordering pizza and sitting in my room by myself and eating the whole thing! I remember making jokes about how much I loved food.....and people would laugh but inside I was so unhappy with the way I looked and felt.

This is the only picture I could find on my computer of my college years. You can tell in my face that I was putting on weight.

When I met my husband in April of 2001 I was 200lbs and he made me feel as if i was 145. He told me all the time how gorgeous I was. I tried a pill called T-burn while we were dating and it worked, I lost 50lbs! I was at 150 and felt great. Then a year later...we got married... I got pregnant.... and well... I couldn't take t-burn.... and emotional eating crept back in. Well truthfully I never changed the way I ate, but T-burn had ephedra in it so it didn't matter. Only now nothing was killing the calories and so I gained almost 60lbs with my first pregnancy. With all 4 pregnancies I have put on a pretty good amount of weight with each one, losing some temporarily in between using weight watchers or other diets but I still CRAVED and still gave in to my cravings time and time again.

Mike and I when we first started dating. I am at my heaviest here.

After going on t-burn and losing 50lbs.

This past week I started a bible study called "Made to Crave" and I am praying it is the answer. Im ready to stop the cycle of losing... gaining... losing... gaining.... and all the emotions that go with that cycle.

The first chapter I was almost in tears especially when she said how she "ran to food more than she ran to Jesus". That is exactly me.... no matter how I'm feeling instead of taking it to God I turn to food.She told us in the study we were made to crave.... we were made to crave GOD! Another statement that hit me is "God loves us just the way we are but he loves us too much to leave us this way". He does think I'm beautiful the way I am however being overweight and unhealthy isn't how he wants me to live because it takes away my joy and my ability to fully enjoy this life he has given me! The author who we were watching on a DVD closed the session with telling us to feel EMPOWERED instead of DEPRIVED. That was my focus and will be my focus throughout the next 6 week as I take the Made to Crave journey. I don't know if I will lose a ton of weight but my prayer is that I will grow closer to Jesus and begin running to him before I run to the fridge. "With man this is impossible but with God ALL things are possible!!!" Matthew 19:26

Jonathan is 3

Well I'm behind so I'm doing 2 blogs back to back, hope no one minds. :-) On April 12th Jonathan turned 3! With each child... with each birthday... you just can't believe as a mom that they are getting so big... that another birthday has come.... that with each birthday they are looking less like a little baby and more like a big boy or girl.... and it's as true with child #1 as it is with child #3 or 4..... It is hard to believe that just 3 short years ago my jonathan looked like this....

And over the years he has changed soooo much....

He is my big boy now.... makes me sad and happy at the same time.... and if you are a mom... you know exactly what I am talking about.....

A new addition..... a new season

Well as you can tell when you look at my last blog entry date, I'm not very good at being a consistent blogger. I'm ok with that though because I mainly write for me. I mean I do hope that others read my blog and get encouraged or inspired or maybe seeing how I don't have it all together and how I'm just a normal mom maybe makes them feel better too. Im not here to impress or be fake, I just enjoy writing about my family.... about personal struggles and victories and just about life. Having said all that.... something pretty amazing happened on Feburary 27th, 2012........

My first (and maybe last) little girl was born. Anna Elizabeth 8lbs 15oz at 5:11pm and 20inches long.

She has added so much joy and happiness to our lives and her older brothers absolutely adore her!

I'm looking forward to the future and how her brothers will continue to interact with her as she gets bigger. They are already her protectors. Time is flying too... as I'm writing this I realize that tomorrow Anna will be 8 weeks old! She started smiling 2 weeks ago. I hope it slows down a bit.... I'm trying to savor every moment! Well that's all for this one... hope to blog again soon!