101 Things I am Thankful for Today.

Over the past week I have debated back and forth about whether or not I would write this post.  On the one hand, I have a lot that I am thankful for and I should recognize some of those things.  On the other, I am very lazy.

But then something happened that reminded me of how incredibly blessed I am and I should do more to recognize that.  I'm not going to go into the incident, just suffice it to say that I am so grateful for all that I have.  I give you permission to not read this incredibly long post, but I feel like I need to express a lot of gratitude right now.

So without further ado, 101 things I am grateful for this Thanksgiving (in no particular order, mostly just how they come to me):

1. Lewis.  He is the perfect man for me.  I can't imagine my life without him.

2. Jack.  All he does is eat, cry, and poo but I love him more than life itself and even beyond that.  He is incredible.

3. My mom.  She is for reals the very best mother out there and the reason I am the person I am today.

4. My dad.  He can beat up your dad.

5. My sister.  She is an amazing example of faith, courage, and unconditional love.

6. My brothers.  They make me laugh.  I know that anyone who hurt me would get a swift kick in the rear from all three of them.

7. Lewis' parents.  I am so glad that they are Jack's grandparents.

8. My siblings-in-law.  I feel like I can just hang out with any of them.  They're good people.  I just need more on my side.

9. My grandparents.  They're cool.

10. My aunts.  More like extra older sisters.

11. My uncles and cousins.  Can't imagine the Hirschi Olympics without them.  The Madsen ones are pretty stinking awesome too.

12. My nieces and nephews.  I especially appreciate how good they are with Jack.

13. Pumpkin pie.  I know I said that this is in no particular order, but I think this deserves a place right after my family, know what I mean?

14. My iPad

15. Facebook.  I keep up with so many people because of that site.

16. Skype.  I love that Jack and I can talk to my parents in freaking Uruguay.

17. Google.  What up.

18. Pinterest.  This site has inspired me to be a cooler person.

19. My blog.

20. Books.  What else would I do all day with only soaps on the TV?

21. To Kill a Mockingbird.  This book will always have a special place in my heart.

22. My sewing machine.  I finally feel like I have a talent that I am developing.

23. My bed.

24. Our cars.

25. Our home.  I feel particularly blessed about this what with the economy being what it is.

26. Public education.

27. Higher education.

28. My bachelor's degree.

29. My teaching certificate.

30. Lewis' job.

31. The fact that Lewis makes enough so that I can stay home with Jack.

32. Pacifiers.

33. Rocking chairs.

34. Car seats.  I love knowing that Jack is safe in the car.

35. Cloth diapers.

36. My blender.

37. Christmas.

38. Footie pajamas on babies.

39. American Fork Hospital and all the nurses and doctors that took care of Jack and me during labor, delivery, and recovery.

40. My OBs who made sure I had a healthy pregnancy.

41. The pediatrician.

42. Walmart and their price matching policy.

43. A high efficiency washing machine.

44. Our camera.

45. The fact that my mom asked me to send a picture of Jack every day so I take a picture of Jack every day.

46. My former students.

47. College football.

48. BYU and the mighty Cougars.

49. The Holy War (that's this Saturday, right?)

50. Contact lenses.

51. My KitchenAid.

52. Bountiful Baskets.

53. Disneyland.

54. Reese's Fast Break - best candy bar ever.

55. My talents.  I'm still trying to figure out what they are, but I appreciate the ones I have and I am working on developing more.

56. The blinds in our bedroom.  Jack could look at them for hours.

57. Checking the mail.

58. Painted toenails.

59. Having Lewis point out different constellations at night and different types of clouds during the day.

60. Adoption.

61. Being warm when I sleep.

62. The seat heaters in my car.

63. Tunak.

64. Yellowstone.

65. Camping.

66. S'mores.

67. Crunching leaves.  I will go out of my way to step on one.

68. Hiking in the mountains.

69. Running.  I wish I could do it more often.  There's nothing like a good run in crisp air.

70. Having different seasons.  Summer is my favorite by far, but I love stuff about all four.

71.  Summer vacation.

72.  Online banking.

73. Getting up early enough to see the sunrise.

74. Playing catch with a football or frisbee.

75. Running barefoot in the grass.

76. Driving up to Park City in early autumn when all the trees are different colors.

77. Seeing Christmas trees in people's windows.

78. Pandora radio - especially the Lullaby and Polar Express stations.

79. Jack's smile.

80. Toothpaste.  I love brushing my teeth.

81. The fact that I can meet my baby's needs.

82. Having photographs to decorate my home.

83. Watching Lewis play with Jack.

84. Weekends.

85. Having enough - even when it's barely enough.

86. Flowers.  I love flowers.

87. The fact that there are still things for me to aspire to, and there always will be.

88. My memories - good and bad.

89. Hindsight.

90. My many friends who have supported me over the years.  I would give a shout out to specific ones, but there are lots.  Sorry guys.

91. Our ward.

92. My visiting teacher.

93. The fact that my marriage is eternal.

94. The gospel.

95. Being able to take the Sacrament each week.

96. The Temple and the blessings I have received there.

97. That I live among lots of temples that I can attend regularly (perhaps in theory).

98. The law of tithing.  So very many blessings have come from us living that.

99. Having a living prophet and modern revelation.

100. The scriptures and the fact that I can read them each day.

101. My Savior, Jesus Christ, and His atoning sacrifice.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone.

Future Tight End

When we first found out that Jack was on his way, I naturally started thinking about what he would look like. Would he get my monkey feet? What about Lewis' pointy nose (which I love)? Would his hair be curly? What color eyes will he end up with?

Eventually my thoughts turned to his stature. See, I have a... unique body. My torso is quite short. Like whoa. But I'm also 5'7'', which is on the taller end of average. This is due to my legs being ridiculous in length. Allow me to illustrate: My husband has a good five or six inches on me and our legs are the same length (mine might actually be a little bit longer).

While Lewis has legs of an average length, his torso is quite the opposite of mine: long. This provides for an abundance of stature possibilities for our spawn (okay, maybe not an abundance, but whatevs). I felt confident that Jack would end up outfitted with either long legs or a long torso; no way he would end up with a double whammy of both. That would be just silly. How would he fit in any of his clothes?

Guess what he ended up with. No, really. Guess.

Our little booger is in the 97th percentile for height. If he keeps growing at this rate, he will end up at 6'2" or 3". I see an athletic scholarship in his future, so long as he moves beyond that 50th percentile for weight; this would be ideal cause college is expensive and we are public educators.

Jack fit into the little bath attachment thing here for about a day.  Good thing he doesn't seem to mind having freezing legs.

I was reading some random blog about some random six month old. The child in question was being touted as super long at a whopping 25.5 inches. Jack is half an inch shorter than that and he is only two months old.

Ahem.

On top of his lengthiness, Jack wears cloth diapers. We love 'em, but they do add another inch or so to his torso length. And when his wardrobe consists mostly of onesies, you can imagine the trouble this might cause.

So what does this all mean? It means I am really grateful for all of my loved ones who gifted us baby clothing in a plethora of different sizes. I am beyond relieved that my child will not go naked this winter just because he decided to add four-and-a-half-plus inches to his head-to-toe measurement in two months flat. Because it's obviously his fault.

This is a 12 month onesie.  The only area where it doesn't really fit is the head hole cause his head is just in the 25th percentile.  We've concluded that he has adult proportions.

No wonder he's so fussy. You would be too if you grew nearly five inches in two months.

Question.

Baby clothes are adorable, that's for sure.  Jack looks darling in anything we put him in.  But I have a bone to pick with the greater baby clothing industry:

Why all the pastels?

When did that become a thing?  Babies don't even like pastels.  You put two objects in front of a newborn, one pastel, the other a bright color, and they will fixate on the brighter colored object every time!

Also too, all of my favorites of Jack's clothes are of the non-pastel variety.  I think he looks even more adorable in non-pastels.  Don't get me wrong - he's cute in pastels too.  I just like normal colored clothing better.

My favorite of Jack's jammies.  If they still fit, I would still make him wear them, even though Halloween is over.  He looks good in black.

Part of that may have to do with my third and most important point about wondering why pastels are a thing.

The poop.

Babies poop and they poop a lot.  Diapers are not always able to hold poop in.  When diapers fail at this their most important function, do you know where the poop goes?

Well, everywhere, but since clothes are often the closest thing to the diapers, the poop usually starts there.

Now if your baby is wearing, say, dark gray and forest green, this is not a problem.  Treat the clothes and wash them of course, but you don't have to worry about a noticeable stain.

Poop is not a problem in this outfit.

But if it's something like baby blue and duckling yellow, well... Let's just hope you don't mind adding splotchy mustard yellow to that color pallet.

White?  Okay.  That's bleach-able.  But not even a good scrubbing and an overnight soak in Oxyclean will remove a most stubborn poop stain from those darling pastel pants.

Thank GOODNESS the poop came out of his blessing outfit.

 Oh well.  At least baby clothes are cheap.

New Habits

Yesterday during church I found myself steadily rocking back and forth, back and forth trying to keep my sleeping baby in that condition.  And then I remembered that Lewis was holding him.  There was nothing for me to rock.

Not five minutes later I found myself doing it again.

Then today after Jack fell asleep I went about cleaning the kitchen.  Jack made a noise like something had startled him and he was shortly going to wake up.  To prevent this I started tiptoeing around, loading the dishwasher as quietly as I could before I remembered that Jack was in his room sleeping and the noise I heard was through the baby monitor.

I might need to get more sleep myself.