celebrating my first mother's day

it was a lovely day! tyler made the bed, cooked a delicious brunch, got me gorgeous flowers and rockwell was adorable, as always. we also got to celebrate with my mom and she loved her gifts! it's so fun to get her grandma gifts now. i love watching her be a grandma to rockwell. he loves her so much and it makes my heart so happy. happy mother's day to all the mothers out there! there are so many wonderful women who have blessed my life, i wouldn't be the person i am today without the help of so many talented women!

 love my boy. so glad he made me a mama!

 so glad i got to celebrate with my mom and sister! we missed kimberly though!

and danielle & greg made chocolate lava cakes for dessert, SO yummy!

mother's day

from the moment i saw the positive pregnancy test i became a mother. i fell in love with my baby. then i met him and that love grew. each and everyday i wake up to his prefect little face and my love for him grows even more. i love laughing with him, smiling with him and experiencing life with him. he is such a sweet boy and i feel so blessed to be his mother. rockwell, i love you. thank you for choosing me to be your mama. i am the luckiest girl in the world!

i have days where i feel like i don't measure up. i feel a heavy burden to be the best version of myself so that rockwell can learn good things from me and sometimes i fall short. luckily, rockwell loves me no matter what and i can repent, try again and improve. i want to do my Heavenly Father proud and raise a good son. i want to do my best in this role as a mother, this sacred calling that i have been given. i know that this is what i was meant to be doing. i know that rockwell was meant to be mine. he is such a blessing. he is such a joy. he is my world. my light. my everything.

tonight i nursed him as he fell asleep in my arms. i held him a little bit longer tonight, thinking about how much i cherish the opportunity i have to be his mama. the fact that Heavenly Father has blessed me with this sweet spirit weighs heavily on my heart. it is the reason i exist. i love it. it makes me so happy.

thank you rockwell for choosing me. i will always do my best for you. i love you with all my heart.

my life in instagram: motherhood

"These words have been weighing heavily on my mind lately. With all the demands of life, I often feel like I am coming up short, as if I can never accomplish everything I want to. Making dinner, buying groceries, my church calling, showering, friends, family, cleaning, laundry, poopy diapers, more laundry, 4 am feedings, exercising, time with Tyler, time with Rockwell and time for myself... Something always falls by the wayside. I am realizing that I HAVE to set a new standard for myself. I cannot compare myself to other women who seem to have it all together while they and their children are looking fabulous and rested. So here I am, with no make up on (probably smelling like spit up) while my son nestles into my cheek with his drooly hands around my neck. This is my new life. This is my "glamorous". And I remind myself every single day that there is nothing more important than my sweet baby boy. There is no other chore or vacation or fancy outfit that will be more rewarding and joyful or more important in the eyes of God. I might not have time to do anything but tend to my boy all.day.long. And that's more than okay, it's what God gave me time for. #rockwellbradyrex"

i posted these thoughts along with this photo yesterday on instagram. i wanted to post this here, on my blog, so that i could remember it. my hope is to someday print this blog into books so that i can have a record of our lives. i especially want to remember days like these. i hope that in some small way i can help other mothers out there who are struggling as well. although i post a lot of positive things here, i want people to know that this life isn't all sunshine and rainbows, but that doesn't mean it isn't amazing. it truly is a blessing to be a mother and care for my son. but life is hard sometimes and i don't want to lie about it or hide it. 

i think sometimes we walk a fine line between being positive, but also being real without complaining about things too much. at least that's how i feel...

i want people to know that being a mother is wonderful, but it's not easy. there are things about motherhood that i didn't expect. like i didn't expect to have a child that HATES his car seat. or i didn't expect to be so affected by the lack of sleep. i didn't expect to have a child that wants to be entertained constantly. obviously some days i cannot just hold him and play with him all day long, but i need to make that more of a priority when he needs me. instead of being irritated that i couldn't cross more off of my to do list, i need to remember that no matter what i didn't get done, i kept my son alive, fed and as happy as i could. 

on the other hand,  i couldn't have anticipated the feeling of overwhelming heart bursting joy i would feel when rockwell smiled at me, looked into my eyes and then proceeded to hold my cheeks in his chubby baby hands for the first time. yah, that happened today after i changed his diaper and tears of happiness filled my eyes. it is tender moments like that that remind me that this is a divine calling and i need to remember that when things get hard. what if i wasn't paying attention to rockwell after that diaper change? if i hadn't looked down at him and smiled i never would have had that experience. i could have just grabbed him, plopped him down on his play mat and continued to "get things done", but i would have missed out. i am SO glad i took the time to play with him today. i am so glad that he loves me  and that he brings me more happiness than i ever thought possible, more joy than any other way i spend my time. 

this kid...

be still my heart. i seriously LOVE this boy. rockwell is my little buddy. we hang out all day, errday and i wouldn't have it any other way. lately he has been so much more interactive and life with him around is getting more and more fun. he smiles at me and laughs and uses his cute little voice to coo at me. i think he's going to be a talker like his mama.

i am so blessed to have this little boy. some moments are tough, but then he falls asleep in my arms and i melt. even when he will only take a 30 minute nap, when i go get him out of his crib, he greets me with a humongous grin. how can i be mad at him??? sometimes i just cry when i hold him and thank my Heavenly Father for blessing me with a healthy, happy son and ask for forgiveness for getting frustrated when things don't go as smoothly as i'd like. i feel overwhelmed with gratitude at this new role of motherhood and try not to be negative about it, because it really is a privilege. a great privilege.

life is beautiful and wonderful and i am a lucky lady.

mother's day

mother's day was beautiful. we had a delicious breakfast with tyler's parents and then headed to church. afterwards we headed down to laguna beach and visited shaw's cove. it was SO nice. i     wanted to jump in the water SO bad. it was nice to spend time together and enjoy the beautiful california weather. i am so grateful for the mother's in my life. i have many women who have influenced me for good and i am blessed to have them guiding and supporting me through my life. 

i also thought a lot about my new role as a mother. soon i will take on this new challenge of mothering a precious little boy. words can't really describe how blessed i feel that Heavenly Father has entrusted tyler and i with this little soul. i can't wait to meet him!

 

 

on my heart: some thoughts about parenting

just a few more days until i head to utah and then rexburg to visit family and friends. i am super excited to see this cutie and my nephews! this is a photo of her when she turned two back in august. that girl is so spunky and hilarious. don't get me wrong, i love my nieces and nephews on the rex side, but there is some sort of connection that i have with brylee that i just don't know how to describe. i think it was because kimberly and i became so close while she was pregnant or maybe because i was able to photograph her birth story and feel the tangible love fill the room when she was born. it was as if heaven existed in the room, for just a moment.

sometimes i think about becoming a mother and i feel an overwhelming joy and peace come over me. other times i feel a bit nervous for the future of carrying a child to term, staying healthy and delivering a healthy baby, raising a family and providing for them temporally and spiritually. there is so much that goes into being a parent and sometimes that scares me. but then i think about brylee. i think about the day she was born, how we all waited for her and prayed for her to be healthy and strong when she came to earth. i think about embracing my brother in law as we both cried in awe of how perfect she was. it was love at first sight. we knew she was special as soon as we saw her. i didn't know that i would feel so attached to her, but i did. i would visit her and my sister all the time. it was so fun to watch my sister and her husband become parents and to help them when brylee came.

since that day 2 years ago i have grown to love brylee even more. she has taught me so much about love. i love her so much that i could just play with her all day. hearing her call my name "eh-my" through the house just melts my heart. i never knew that could happen, to feel this crazy overwhelming love for another human being just because they say your name. i love that girl so much i would change her poopy diapers over and over and over again. watching her giggle, smile and learn is so rewarding and as an aunt i just get a tiny piece of it. seeing what i see and feeling the love i do, i can't even imagine how it feels as a parent. it must feel like you could burst at any moment.

but things about caring for a child aren't often very glamorous. sometimes i see these mommy bloggers and think that they make things seems so perfect all the time. parents and children dressed like they stepped out of a gap commercial, their nurseries decorated like a catalog and their husbands supportive and happy all the time. but that isn't reality! life it tough sometimes. with the sweet comes the bitter. sometimes there are blow out diapers and puke stains that come with the beautiful moments in life. but i wouldn't trade a poopy diaper if it meant one less smile or laugh. i wouldn't trade a whine or a tantrum for the sound of my name echoing through the hallways.

i know i have such a small glimpse of what it is to care for a child. my body has never given birth to, breastfed or watched over a child. but i know what i know and from my view the sacrifices, whether they be fashion, body fat percentage, money, time or sleep in no way amount to the joys of becoming a parent. so when you are nervous about being a first, second or fourth time mother, just remember that heaven that you feel when a baby is born. remember how your heart feels like it's going to burst when that baby says your name. remember how your world seems right somehow when those chubby hands wrap their hands around your neck.

for me, when the time comes, i will do my best to remember that no matter how many hard moments there are... all the precious ones are worth it.

they are all worth it.