Clean slate

2011 was a humbling year - soul-changing. Beautiful. A little rough in patches. Rather than recap it redundantly, as I do every month, I thought I'd look forward to this year we just started, which has gotten off on the right foot so far.

Tomorrow, at 5:15, I will wake up and ready myself for my first workout of the year. I was supposed to start weaning so that it would be a little easier on me. I tried, I really did. But, I'm not ready. She's not ready either. We ain't ready. But I'm going to be there anyway.

Here's what I'm ready to do:
-face 6 am for the foreseeable future, followed by my reward: the sauna.
-be extra, extra grateful for my husband who happily helps me have this "me" time each morning.
-eat healthily almost every meal. A few cheats on weekends and trips don't count. Ever.
-be kinder to myself. let the stupid perfectionist stuff go.
-return to my twice a week Ashtanga class, because it's good for the soul
-make at least one good, throw in the grass, toss in the wash, scrap quilt.
-refinish my dining table, chairs, and chandelier - oohlala.
-babyproof the house. It's not long now folks.
-cook more. I plead the fifth on the amount I cook now (other than for the baby). Thank goodness for all the healthy eats there are in this blessed town. This one may take a couple of weeks as I adjust to the new workout routine and I'm ok with that.

Here's what I'm saying I'm going to do, but let's all be honest my rightbrained-ness only ever gets me so far each year (though we DO usually make a little progress...):
-Keep my car more organized. So tired of wayward receipts, water bottles, toys tumbling out whenever I open the door. It didn't used to be bad but it's true what they say about babies.
-Stop being such a scatterbrain. Complete more tasks/thoughts. Not really sure how I'm going to go about tackling this one, but
-Stay on top of the laundry.
-Not leave cabinets open. Babyproofing doesn't really do much good if the cabinets are left open in the first place.
-Organize my time better so that I'm not blogging at 11 12 a.m. the night before my 6 a.m. workouts.

I actually feel like we are doing pretty good with the baby. She's wonderful and I think we'll just resolve to keep her out of trouble in the new year. I am in. LOVE. with her.

So, I'm not good at many things (like weaning/doing laundry/shutting cabinets), but it turns out, I'm pretty good at keeping New Year's resolutions.

I love a nice, clean slate. Maybe that's why white is my favorite color (Miller has a very tasteless joke about this preference for white. He finds it hilarious. I don't.) White, while terribly impractical if you have two dogs and a baby as I do, is so crisp and clean and makes all the other colors pop. It's a beautiful backdrop for whatever colors you want to really highlight. Similarly, a clean slate holds new promise for a better you to shine through. Ridding yourself of old habits. Tackling something new. Growth. Pop.

Four years ago, I resolved to learn how to use a sewing machine and work out. I joined a 6 a.m. bootcamp and a beginner sewing class. Three years ago, it was learning to crochet, taking a photography class to figure out my new Nikon, and mastering the basics in the kitchen (I read the Joy of Cooking a little each night. Highly recommend this - it is the Bible of the kitchen). I'm not a wonderful cook or seamstress or photographer but I conquered the fear, and somehow, it made me more confident in my ability to try new things. Going for it. And my lofty pursuits awakened a new creative energy in me that hasn't really quieted since.

Two years ago, during our 4-month European gorgefest travels I decided to eat and drink whatever I wanted while we were gone, and resolved to take care of the damage when I got home. By summer 2010 I'd gotten myself into pretty great shape, with a dedicated health regime of healthy eating, working out daily, and Ashtanga yoga that I followed religiously. Then, in September, I got pregnant. I kept myself in excellent shape during my pregnancy, but my body fell apart postpartum and I've struggled to get this bowl full of jelly off by conventional means - walking, eating healthy. Not eating anything. Eating small meals throughout the day. Breastfeeding (this, for me was a total myth; though I know women who ate cookies all day and breastfed and went below their pre-pregnancy weight by 5 months, so don't lose the hope, ladies). Everything except dedicating 1 hour of cardio a day at the gym, which I just did not have the energy or the time to devote to in the first 6 months.

As it turned out, I had an issue with my thyroid (called postpartum hypothyroidism) that was making it much more difficult to get the weight off, and was also causing my severe lethargy and some off and on depression. Fortunately, this has largely resolved, thanks to time and some holistic treatments that worked almost overnight. At some point, maybe around month 5, we'd worked through the other symptoms and I just decided to not worry about the fact that I still looked a smidge pregnant when all my friends were already slim and trim, Angelina-style. I decided to focus on the baby for now, and work on myself when I felt ready. I knew I'd get back here eventually. So now, she's older, and I'm ready. It's me time, people!

It turns out, you never get anywhere if you don't try.

So tomorrow, at 5:15, I will wake up and face the day. And I will be thinking of my grandfather, who reports for a pretty serious, intensive surgery in Houston at the exact same time. He was in high spirits when I talked to him tonight, and is ready to face his big day tomorrow. I have no doubt they will take wonderful care of him so that he can live to Eliza's graduation day, as he proclaimed a few days ago. I haven't talked about it much, but he has been heavy on my mind these past few months; he's terribly important to me. His optimistic outlook toward the whole scary ordeal is inspiring. To be sure, meeting my trainer at 6 a.m. is nothing close to the fear he faces tomorrow. But I'm hoping it will give us both a clean slate to start from in the year ahead.

Night night friends.

...And may all your Christmases be white

Early Christmas morning, we opened the curtains to a surprise - a little dusting of snow falling from the sky. Not much - about the amount Austin gets in a good February - but they'd predicted only a slim chance of the dusting in the first place, so we were pretty pleased with our white Christmas. We shuffled upstairs, opened presents with the baby, celebrated our powdered sugar-covered wintry scene. Around 9, I put the littlest elf down for her nap, snagged a little warm cranberry bread and coffee, and settled into some stockings and presents with the Miller clan. Then, around 10:00, the scene changed. Wonderful, fat flakes started drifting downward from the heavens. It snowed...and snowed...and snowed. For the rest of the day. No blizzard, very little wind (a rarity on the Amarillo plains). It was beautiful. We had no choice but to stay right where we were - in our PJs, fire roaring, Christmas movies on, with a warm Christmas mug of coffee in hand - and enjoy the snowfall.

Later that afternoon, we bundled up our little lady (baby it was COLD outside) and introduced her to snow:

It was a bit of an arctic tundra out there. We didn't stay long.

But the next day...well, the next day was really perfect.

Snow, in case you didn't realize, makes dogs frisky.

Maddie has always been a snow dog. She was just a few months old for her first winter in Lexington, Virginia, and she bounded through that stuff with gusto, even though she was the size of a guinea pig. At 9 years old, she doesn't miss a beat (though she has slept pretty soundly since we got home).

Georgia's first snow day. As usual, she keeps her sentiments closely guarded.

Meet Clarence, my and Eliza's first-ever snowman. He has a carrot nose, yucca pod mouth, and two eyes made out of milk-bone dog biscuits. We've been sent a few pictures of Clarence in the days since we built him. Snowmen, I've learned, don't age gracefully.

Goodnight, pretty Christmas plains. Thank you, Daddy Jack and Cita, for a wonderful Christmas. And for letting our dogs, our baby, our baby stuff, our Christmas stuff, our stuff stuff, trail all over the house while we were there. It felt like there was no containing the toys/baby shoes/clothes/whathaveyou that were shed, collected, deposited elsewhere as we traipsed in and out of the house, up and down the stairs. And thanks for ordering up that beautiful snow just for us - a magical first Christmas for our new little family of 3.

May your days be merry & bright (pt.1)

Merry merry friends far and wide! I hope you all had a lovely holiday.

We sure did; it was pretty much the perfect Christmas. This year, we were headed to West Texas for a nice Christmas break. Before we left, little E. had her own very lovely Austin Christmas at my mom and stepdad's house. Lots of WAY too generous presents for all three of us, more vino, delicious food, and 3 sets of grandparents and great grandparents doting on her every second. This little girl lives a very charmed life.

(rare headband appearance...I generally prefer her to rock her sweet little bald head, but I loved this one. It came with this precious outfit from her stepgrandmother.)

Eliza's least favorite gift: the babysitter money - a gift of a "night out" from my mom to us.

Everytime my grandmother sees Eliza: "Ohhhh, you PRECIOUS thing"

The nice thing about a Christmas away is, you get it all done early and once you leave you can just enjoy the season. Of course, the morning we left was a true low point in our marriage (as most mornings before we leave for big trips are). We are very different creatures - 95% of the time to our advantage as a couple - but packing for trips is one area where we are just flat out NOT compatible. Maybe that's something we can work on in the new year. Once we are in the car it's always as if it never happened, but let's just say at 8 AM on December 22nd the Christmas spirit had been sucked right out of the Miller house.

This sums up our pre-Christmas travel meltdown nicely:

(Actually, she didn't cry much at all the whole 8 hour drive...until we got to Amarillo, and then every time she was placed in the car seat thereafter she looked like this. Pobrecita.)

A few snippets of our Panhandle Christmas:

Over the river and through the woods, to grandmother's house we go:

Mulled wine and a little shoe eating over at Auntie Em's new casa

Playdate with Lisle, E's Amarillo friend (just 6 days younger). They hold hands.

Christmas Eve is my favorite Eve in the whole year. I just love it, and I become a total sap; I've been known to drag my very own Saint Nick to two Christmas Eve services in one night. I am so overcome by the joyful music, the celebration, the singing choirs of angels, the sweet Silent Night. Last year during Christmas Eve service, I was tearing up listening to the music, thinking of the baby I was just starting to feel wiggling around, and prayed for it/her to be safe and healthy. One year later, with my happy, healthy baby girl wiggling restlessly in my arms, chewing anything she could get her chubby little fingers on, I counted every single blessing, prayed for each little and big worry on my mind and just burst into tears, almost beside myself in the middle of the service. In other words, a blubbering Christmas fool. Overcome with emotion, and all the many blessings and people I am thankful for this year.

{especially this}

------

I didn't get as many pictures as I wanted of Eliza's first Christmas morning. While I love attempting to capture the little every day moments of our life with my camera, sometimes I need to be IN the moment. Thus, I totally neglected my camera and I'm really kicking myself now. Mama fail. But it felt right at the time, so, c'est la vie. Thank goodness for the iPhone, and our new video camera - one of Eliza's Christmas presents from us. She'll thank us one day!

Ah, Christmas Eve: a time for little ones to stay up way past their bedtime in their fancy Christmas best.

And for parents to stay up even later, enjoying too much just the right amount of delicious champagne, festive food and vino at the Millers' annual Christmas Eve party...

Ho Ho Ho. Party winds down. Watching It's a Wonderful Life. Santa makes an appearance. Ho Ho Ho. More wine? Don't mind if I do...

Ah, Christmas morning: Managing the repercussions of the previous night's poor judgment, clouded by festive merriment making, is slightly easier with a wide-eyed baby. Even if they are the reason you don't ever. sleep in. again.

Wrapping paper. Score.

Surrounded by the haul. She has no idea what it all means, but as witnessed at her playdates and parties, girlfriend loves her some new toys.

This is where I add in my obligatory disclaimer that Christmas is, obviously, TRULY, not about the haul. My wheels have been turning on the best ways to introduce giving to those in need into her Christmas traditions when she gets a little older. But this Christmas was all about our families coming together around the new baby, and I'm very proud of us, and all our families for keeping the "haul" under control. With four sets of generous grandparents/great-grandparents, and the first baby on all sides' first Christmas, I was bracing myself, imagining an epic IKEA run on December 27th, returning home with numerous new toy storage solutions for Saint Nicholas to put together while he watched bowl games.

Oh, and it also took a LOT of self-restraint on Santa's part; I heard at one point he actually returned a large plastic thing or two to the North Pole, citing a lost mind as the reason for return. The mantra of the season: Babies do not need one bazillion plastic things to keep them busy! Repeat.

Anyway, she received SO many sweet, thoughtfully chosen, timeless gifts she will have now and much longer from now, and of course, plenty of nice new toys too. But we are not overrun and our living room still looks like a living room, while still providing hours more fun for the sweet gal of the moment. Thank you, thank you to our wonderful families for all her precious gifts!

Christmas with your own little baby, and your family, is an entirely new experience. So special. So different than any Christmas before it.
And hard to put into words. But, it looks a lot like this:

(Reading our big Christmas gift - an Eliza photo book from us to our families).

A magical first Christmas, from start to finish.

Hope yours was equally wonderful. Part 2 coming as soon as I can get the rest of the pictures uploaded; camera is being finnicky...just finish off the song in the title and you'll know where it's headed. This little lady really DOES lead a charmed life - her first white Christmas right out of the gates?! I waited 30 years for a proper white Christmas.

Wishing you all many merry and bright days in the new year ahead! xo