Penelope is FIVE.

I don't remember a whole lot from my pregnancy with Penelope, but I remember being so excited she was coming. The last couple of weeks were rough, but on the day she was born I was ready. And at 10:52 p.m. Penelope was here.

She was the largest (and still is) baby I've birthed but I think her birth was my favorite one. I had the most fun during that, which is odd to say, but its true. I know I had post-partum depression and really struggled being alone at home with her. By the time she was six months old I was already pregnant with Lucy and that was really tough. 

Penelope is easily, hands down, the hardest child I have. She isn't bad or anything, she just challenges me in way none of the other kids do. And that's OK. By the time she was one year old she was absolutely certain what she would and would not eat, cupcakes and other baked goods were always acceptable. She was walking, babbling away, and had the softest hair. 

Age two was rough but she really developed her personality. I think this was a hard year for her because just when she really needed a lot of attention and support, Lucy was born and kind of stole her thunder. Penelope has always made sure we knew she needed love too, and even now she will say, "I need some loving, too." and I love that about her. I love that she is always able to tell us exactly what she needs. 

By three we learned she is for sure left handed, loves art, and is incredibly smart. She started a 3K program and did so very well. We also learned that she is terribly shy, which was bizarre for us because she is the exact opposite at home. She's bossy and demanding here, totally quiet at school. 

Four was a pretty great year for her. Challenging a lot of the time but man. She is such a neat kid. She always brings me to the brink of insanity but always makes me laugh, too. She really is so stinking smart, and it's obvious her brain works differently. I feel like she really is the classic middle child a lot of days but when she gets in the zone, she's a dynamo. 

She doesn't listen worth a dang at home though. She tests boundaries far more than any other kid and when she decides she wants to do something, she will do it. Traits that will be great as an adult, but also really awful as a four year old who has no issues running into a road. This was the year a fence went up in the yard. Ha! 

She looks like me so much and it's so great to really have a mini-me. My mom says I was just like Penelope and if that's true I'm so sorry, mom! But also, how lucky were you to get me? ;) 

Her favorite things are candy, swimming in the pool, being outside, jumping and running like a maniac, 

Trolls, princesses, playing dress up, and UNICORNS. In 4K this year she got to pick one of the animal units and she picked unicorn. Her teacher is so amazing that she absolutely went with it and Penelope was so incredibly happy. We also learned that what we thought was just normal shy is a bit more. She's really painfully shy and it was heartbreaking to see her on the playground at school, in tears, holding her teacher's hand. Her teacher said it seems like it is really a fear of rejection that holds her back. Which bums me out because she's such a cool little kid. 

Having her turn five seems so weird to me. A lot of the times I feel like I missed so much with her because I'm trying to treasure my time with Olivia and Jackson, but also Lucy because she's my absolute last, and Penelope gets shuffled along. I don't know how parents of more than four kids do this and feel like everyone is getting an even amount of attention.

I tell Penelope every day that she is my favorite Penelope in all the land, that if there were a million Penelope's, she would be my very favorite. I give her lots of hugs, snuggles, and kisses. I am trying so hard with her. I hope she knows that. 💗

Closer, Progress, and Chuck E. Cheese

I know I said today was going to be a Sara's Favorite Things post but I'm over it. I don't know what my favorite things are anymore. I mean, my bed. Chocolate. Water. Books. There you go.

I wanted to give you a weight loss update, though! So I weighed myself on Friday and I'm down to...

204! I'm pretty excited. I'm so close to being under 200 and I just want to get there already. I've really cut down on junk food and soda, so I'm sure a lot of this is from that. Also, I have almost no appetite. Ever. So I'm trying to stick to the "eat when you're hungry" and that seems to be going OK. Next week though I get my labs done for that weight loss doctor, and apparently an entire pile of paperwork to complete before my actual appointment which is December 13. I'm totally nervous for it, so that's weird.

Last week I posted about my depression making a strong comeback and a few people suggested I find something I can do at home that relieves stress. Which is totally reasonable.

So I decided I would start wrapping Christmas presents.

As you can see, there is no order to my top secret closet and I really wish this was a little wider because to get yourself in here is a nightmare. Needless to say, this just made it worse so even though I got five presents wrapped, I fell in here once and since added a few more boxes. So that was a bust.

But I did leave the house this weekend and went to see my brother, sister in law, and my niece and nephew. My niece was turning five and we were going to her birthday party. Which, I shouldn't have told Penelope and Lucy about until the day we left because they LOVE their cousins and asked me EVERY SINGLE DAY multiple times when we were leaving. Rookie move, mom.

Throwback to Adriana being just a few days old and I got to snuggle her for two hours.  

Her party was at Chuck E. Cheese and Penelope and Lucy went to one of these last year for Adriana's party so they were SO excited to go again. The only game I like to play is Skee-Ball because I'm super good at it, but it was more fun because I ended up on a broken machine that wouldn't stop giving me balls to roll. I got to play like 20 games in a row and spend no tickets. Needless to say, Penelope and Lucy cashed out and bought a ton of candy. Yay.

A big hit was the dance pad. Fortunately, the money I spent in dance classes for Penelope and Lucy is well spent because they went to town on it. 

I completely love that these three are so close in age and get to grow up together. I didn't have cousins growing up, I'm a lot older than all of them, but Olivia and Jackson only have Adriana and Mason as cousins, but they still like to hang out with them. 

Lucy was IN LOVE with Chuck. Penelope mostly was into feeling his hand to see if it's furry. 

Oh, and the edible design on the cake was new for Lucy, who wouldn't turn down food ever, so she kept showing it to us. 

I finally got an updated photo of my brother and I. It's so weird how old we look. I realize we ARE older, but I always think of us as 20somethings.

I mean... this is like 2009 sometime. Ooh.. 10 year challenge! HAHA! I didn't even realize that. But this was when we went to Florida. I don't really remember most of that trip. Huh. Weird.

Anyways. 

We played pretty much every game there was and the kids all had a really good time. I love that picture because neither girl was playing anything but they both thought they were going so fast. HA!

So after the party we went back to their house and I've kind of become crafty Aunt Sara. Every time Adriana comes up here to visit, I've always had a cool craft for the kids to do. I like doing it and sure enough, as soon as we got to their house Adriana asked if I had any things to do. I definitely did. 

I should have taken a picture of the kids with their finished ornaments but I completely forgot. They ended up making three different ornaments which were all cute and killed about an hour. Then I had brought books and I read for a little while to them. 

I didn't get many pictures of Mason this time but I managed to get a quick one of Mason and Jackson!

At bedtime I told the girls I would slumber party with them in the basement last time. So we got everyone set up. 

Little girls on the floor next to each other, 

big kids on the recliners, me on the couch, and Matt on the floor by the outlet for his phone. It didn't last long because Penelope was crabby so she snuggled with Matt. It was kind of sweet because I was up a lot and one of the times I saw Adriana sitting up and Lucy scooting over and Adriana was saying, "You can hold my hand, Lucy." and sure enough- they held hands. It was pretty cute.

Our drive home was long, but totally worth it. I'm glad we got to see them. I think the next get together is probably around Christmas. No plans are in stone yet but I better start looking for some winter crafts so I'm ready!

Lucy turned 3 and we all got through it.

I have SO many posts for you coming up and you're going to just be so overwhelmed which is only right because I am super overwhelmed with life right now so here we are. We are fresh from our trip to Missouri (more on that another day) and right before we left we celebrated Lucy turning three. My rationale was that if I did her party and then we immediately left I wouldn't have time to dwell and be in my feelings. 

And that worked for a few days and then it's all kind of waited for me so I'm still not sure if that was the best tactic after all, but I guess we'll see. I'll give it time. 

Anyways. 

On her actual birthday we just did a small party among our little family of six. 

We played in the yard for most of the day, and she had a really good time.  

 Birthday tradition says the birthday person picks our dinner and no surprise, she picked spaghetti. So that's what we had and she couldn't have been happier. 

 We only do cupcakes on that night because it's cheaper than a cake and we usually have a cake during our all family party. 

 But she didn't mind. 

 She gets a present. I usually only give them one gift on their actual birthday and maybe two or three on their party day. 

On party day we were really lucky because my brother and his wife and two kids were able to come up (they live five + hours away). 

 I found these spray bottles at Michaels with liquid chalk on clearance and the kids decorated my patio area. 

 Thankfully it was washable because they got it on themselves. 

 We had a BBQ lunch and the kids ate their weight in blueberries. 

 Anytime you ask Lucy to smile, this is still the face you get. I'm kind of hoping she grows out of this soon. 

 She really loved her cake. She's a huge fan of Toy Story and though we haven't gotten to see the newest movie, the bonus is that all of the stores have toys and stuff for it, so she got a Toy Story cake. 

 We opened presents. Her cousin Adriana helped her out. 

 My mother in law got her a Baby Shark that plays the song and Lucy absolutely LOVES IT. 

 Penelope is especially enamored with her cousin Mason. He's super cute and she's always hugging him. 

 Lucy's "big" gift were a few more Calico Critters so her and Adriana played with those for a long time. 

Before they left I got a quick picture with my niece because she's just the cutest thing ever and I love her so much. Every time she comes up here I always try to have crafty things to do with the kids and this time it was calm down jars and slime. Both were a hit and I'm still finding glitter everywhere. I hope she has good memories of her Auntie Sara when she gets older. 

Overall? The party was fun. It was an OK couple of days and I didn't have a lot of time to dwell and be sad and angry. I'm feeling all of that now but I have therapy on the 19th so I can make it another week. This means I'll have had a three week stretch with no therapy and it's been ROUGH. I'm trudging through though. 

Tomorrow I'll talk about our Missouri trip and share some photos. Hang tight. 

Lucy's First Birthday

The actual day of Lucy's birthday was tough. My plan was to stay as busy as possible so that I couldn't focus on my feelings. Because avoidance always works, right?

The worst part is that the day I gave birth to Lucy had started with me waking up to blood everywhere, that's what cued me to have Matt come home and take me in. Also keep in mind I only get a day or period every few months, in the last year I have only had menstrual bleeding for 4 days total. The morning of her birthday I didn't feel right and when I went to the bathroom to get dressed? Blood everywhere. I seemingly had gotten a period and that was my first panic attack of the day. It was horrible.

Around mid-morning Lucy had her check up appointment at the doctor and I was so flustered I had forgotten to ask about her feet being purple when she wakes up from naps or in the morning. I'm pretty sure she also has Raynaud's Phenomenon like me but I just wanted to make sure. She got her vaccinations and handled them like a champ.

After her nap Matt had come home because the one thing I really wanted to do on her birthday, even if it was emotionally detrimental to me, was visit the birthing center. I wanted to show them that I made it, Lucy made it, say thank you, and show them that their hard work in a scary situation paid off. We brought cookies that my friend Becky made (she made our wedding cake, too!) and it was... surreal.

It's probably best that it was going through a major remodel when I was having Lucy and nothing looks the same. They said my room doesn't look the same at all so it wouldn't bring any memories most likely. I don't know that I could have gone in there anyways. I got to see so many people and even my delivering doctor walked over from clinic real quick and that was a surprise. I have connected with some of these people on Facebook so they've seen some of my struggles this year and though I still struggle every day, I'm trying so hard. I don't want to disappoint anyone.

Our nurses gave me some flowers and had a little gift for Lucy (which she absolutely loves, by the way!!) and it was so nice to visit with them. I was doing alright until we left. I started feeling a prickly heat as we went down in the elevator and walked down the hallway to the front door of the hospital. I remember that walk from the day I left last year. By the time we got into the van I was in tears. I cried the whole way home. The full weight of the last year sitting right in my chest.

When we got home we let Lucy play and took some cute pictures.

She's such a doll. I feel like I'm just now bonding with her.

She loved her balloons, she plays with that doodle board every day and fights Penelope for it.

Our family tradition is that we have one gift for the kiddos to open on their birthday, and one the day of their party. (Except age 9 is the last party we do, family rules.)

Our gift to Lucy was a little Fisher Price instrument set and she loved it!

My friend Tammy had flowers delivered to me and it was so sweet. My friend Andrea had my amazing purse making friend Jessica make a purse I adored.

My mother in law brought me a pretty plant and these are the flowers from my favorite nurses. I had gotten so many texts and emails from people wishing me well and letting me know they were thinking of me. It meant so much to be remembered. I went to bed with a heavy heart, an uncertainty in my future, and a few tears.

That weekend we were having a small birthday party for Lucy and I was doing OK until the day of. My anxiety was high and I honestly debated on calling it all off the night before. I decided to just pull my crap together and do it because it's not about me, it's about Lucy. Lucy deserves everything the other kids have had even if it's rough on me. I'm in counseling, what's another session?

This is the amazing cake my friend Becky made for the party, you can tell we were going with a Dory theme.

Lucy had her first sucker, loved eating all of the cake and ate her weight in baked beans. (You can imagine what a treat those diapers were the day after. HA!)

She had fun with the water table, soaked herself through and through. Bounced in the small jumpy house a long time, and played with her cousin Adriana.

It was a great party. Lucy got some great gifts, we got to see our good friends, and it ended up being a great end to a really rough week.

But Lucy is officially one. WE MADE IT.