Walking Again

After one month, I finally feel like I'm ready to work out again!!! I'm daydreaming about going running again (okay, and maybe a little inspired by the new workout clothes and shoes I got yesterday at the Camarillo Outlets, yay!)

Ashlyn and I have the privilege of spending some time with Papa and Gigi this week, which means while my mom was finishing up the school year we got to go on a walk by the beach! 

I had a hat for Ashlyn (I'm so excited it actually fits), but I borrowed a hat from my mom.  I picked a purple Cal Poly one because I knew Tim would like it.  

Shameless selfie of his girls that I sent to Tim

We went down to the end of Linden and I parked and put Ashlyn in the "roo pack" (as Tim has named it).  Ashlyn doesn't seem to mind cuddling with her Mommy, but the way her feet hang right in front of my hips makes it hard to walk quickly, which the doggies don't like.  

"Mommy, walk faster!"

Like three trains went by, and the doggies weren't too sure about them.  Cole always wanted to run to where he could see it, and they would both twist their ears so they could hear better.  

Kensi watching the train

This is where I get to walk in Carpinteria.  How lucky am I???  The doggies don't mind it either, though I'm sure they would rather be playing on the beach than walking on the bluffs!!!

"Beach, please, Mommy?"

This was Ashlyn's first glimpse of the beach...I'm pretty sure she slept right through it!

We got to the end of the trail where we turn around, and the doggies didn't want to drink water, so on the way back, they hung out their big, fat, pink tongues.

Little dogs, big tongues

I felt like we walked forever, and the roo pack totally makes me sweat, but it was so worth it.

Holding hands

Adjusting.

Everyone says everything changes forever when you have a baby.

Daddy's girl.

Mommy's world.

And I believe it.

Family photo on my first Mother's Day (2 weeks)

But its not  quite as much change as I expected.  Here's why:

• I started being a "stay-at-home-mom" at about 20 weeks, so by now I'm used to staying at home, doing house chores, and hanging out with the dogs. No anti-social shock.  

Ashlyn's first cuddles with the doggies

• Ashlyn has been a relatively good eater.  She usually goes about 3 hours before she wants to eat again, so I do feel like I can get out and go run errands or do something around the house.  (Except in the late afternoon, she just wants to hang out and eat and be held, aka, take a nap on Mommy...this may become my blogging time!)

Wiggle-time on the couch!

• I wake up less times at night to feed Ashlyn than I was getting up to go to the bathroom during pregnancy.  Win.  Too bad it takes so long to feed her.  

Ashlyn after her first bath (5 days).

• I feel bored because I made so many freezer meals.  I've been being really consistent at meal planning and grocery shopping only once a week, that now my Mondays seem empty and we just keep eating leftovers! I'd rather just make dinner.  

Cuddles with Mommy

• I'm back to walking the dogs (who are out of practice at leash-walking, grrr).  

Family walk with the rest of the Paulsens out
in Montana de Oro

• Ashlyn sleeps in her own room at night, there isn't a big Pac'n'Play clogging up our room. She sleeps in her room because she's noisy, and we don't want to listen to her little grunts and squeaks all night long, and then I can change her and feed her in the middle of the night without totally waking Tim up (we have decided this is best for us due to the nature of his job).  

One of Tim's favorite pictures of me and Ashlyn

Sweet girl at 2 weeks

Ashlyn Deane: A Birth Story

Ashlyn Deane Paulsen

April 28, 2013 at 6:23am

7lbs, 6oz; 20in

Some people call their birth stories, "labor stories".  This is definitely not that.  It's a birth story.  

Ashlyn after her first bath

Tim has been working a lot, meaning, all his Fridays off, most Saturdays, and he was supposed to work Sunday.  We had been looking forward to Miracle Miles for Kids on April 27th for a while (hoping we would have our baby by then, but also so that Tim and Drew could go kayaking).  Tim found out he had to work, and I decided to go up to Cayucos for Miracle Miles for Kids with the dogs anyways as a way to be distracted and not sit at home by myself all day.  

At 12:30am (Sunday now), I woke up with cramps and started watching the clock to see about how far apart they were, and at around 1:30am I woke up Tim when they were about 5 to 6 minutes apart with, "I don't think you're going to work today!" We started using an app on my phone to time the cramping, and got up to have something to eat, thinking we were in for a long day.  I ate some greek yogurt, and Tim made a fried egg, and sat down to write an email to people at work detailing what he was currently working on.  The doggies woke up (thinking it was morning) and wanted breakfast, and Tim actually did give them a snack (and gave Cole his morning dose of antibiotics for his ears).  Tim put the last of the things like phone chargers and the dog bed in the car.  

Around 3:30 we called Megan because although my contractions were only 30-45 seconds long and not too intense, they were 3 minutes apart.  Megan said I probably wasn't in active labor yet, because I could still mostly talk through the contractions, so to try and stay home and relax as long as I could, but to get to the hospital before I was in transition, because she's heard going through transition in the car is terrible.  

It is. 

Dreams

Talking through our Advent readings and questions this season has gotten Tim and I onto some topics that aren't Christmas related at all.  Last night, we read the passage in Luke 2:1-20 where God comes into Joseph's life in a big way and changes how he thought it would go.  God sends an angel who says "Marry Mary.  This is my Son.  Name him Immanuel."  One of the questions asked was, "Has God ever interrupted your life in a big way?"
The first thing I said jokingly was, "well, I've never seen an angel."  And then we sat and thought for a minute (waiting for our chicken to come out of the oven).  I eventually talked about how it was really big for me when God showed me how I was supposed to drop out of nursing school.  It was something that I had been working toward for 2 years previous to getting in, taking prerequisites and filling out applications.  Nursing school was my dream.
I also told Tim last night, that maybe I hadn't been listening when God maybe was discouraging me not to go to nursing school before, so He had to drop things like a ton of bricks on me to get my attention.  Having to drive an hour to practicum instead of 30min, oh and be there at 6am...getting practicum on Saturday, which would cut into the time we got to see each other...just ending practicum before the wedding...finals the week before the wedding...Tim not having success finding a job in Ventura area...not having friends in the Ventura area.  Mid-November it totally hit me and I remember crying in the car telling my mom (as we drove to look at a possible wedding location) that I didn't think that I was supposed to stay in nursing school, but instead move up to Nipomo where Tim was then.  For me, it was HUGE.
So now I'm asking myself,

what are dreams?  

Do they change? Do we realize we never really had them anyways?  Do we become lazy and satisfied in an "easy" life and not want the hard work to achieve? Do we realize we never really had those dreams anyways?  Do we make new dreams? 

Some of my friends are living their dreams.  Carolyn and Reanna are one semester away from finishing law school.  Holly is in DC in a graduate program for, um, something about Reconciliation in history that I can never remember (sorry)!  The ladies I started nursing school with will be graduating in May.  And here I am, not really doing anything, just cleaning the house and making Christmas gifts...oh and growing a baby.  I guess I find support and reassurance in friends who I have in my Bible Study here who are content (at least in some semblance) to be stay-at-home moms too, and in those friends from Westmont who are married and have little ones at home too (thank you Facebook for making me feel "normal").  So I find myself asking these questions, wondering if I have "given up" on my dream of nursing school, or if I have just learned enough about myself now to know how unhappy I would be as a nurse (or an athletic trainer, or a physical therapist, or any of those other vocations I once dreamed of).   And as God brings me joy in the simple life I live, I realize this:

Not every one's dream needs to be big.   

Sometimes they're small.  

When I think about what I am doing now, I think back to high school, and how I had to write what I wanted to be when I grow up, maybe for the yearbook or something.  I remember probably writing Physical Therapist (ha, I've come a long way from that), but telling one of my best friends that really I wanted to get married and be a stay-at-home mom.  But you know, people laugh at girls who say that, especially ones who go to Westmont, saying they are going for their MRS degree.  But I wasn't that type either.  I barely dated at Westmont, and I didn't meet Tim, who went to Cal Poly instead, until after graduating college.
But now I don't care what people say, especially the feminists who have fought so hard for the "right" for women to have high powered jobs outside of the home and look at it as a privilege to send your kids to daycare.  Even my close friends have said critically, "you aren't going back to work?"  Being a stay-at-home mom is a privilege, too.  Yes, we have to put up with poopy diapers, children throwing fits, and silly dogs all day, but we also get to be there for the sweet moments in development (and I'm so excited to get to go to the women's Bible Study at church).  In this day and age, it can even be a dream for some parents to stay at home.  Not all households are financially stable on one income.  Everyday Tim and I thank God that with his job he is able to support us and I can stay home with our little one coming soon.  It may not always be that way. But right now we can live in thankfulness that God is providing for us, and giving me an opportunity that can never be replaced.