A Peek at the Poulsens

Seriously though, how cute is she? She's been dying for a pair of sunglasses and Target finally had a summer display with lots of choices - Natsby was thrilled! She likes that they are "like Mommy's." It's rare that we make a trip to my parents' house without playing on the deck, no matter how cold it is. They love playing with basketballs - it's funny to see them pick them up and not know what to do with them except drop them and then go pick them up again, ha. I desperately needed an outing and some exercise the other day, so Natalie and I braved the cold one day after Daddy got home and we had a great time! She had hot chocolate in her sippy and I put music on for us to jam to and it was just what we needed. On our typical loop we get to a certain point where I usually let her out to walk, so sure enough we got there and she was excited to get out and "walk wiff Mommy!" It was fun girl time. : )  Also, as girls we got t...

I'm a couch-sitter these days. I'm getting enough sleep (if that's ever possible) but my body has less energy to work with lately. So, I sit. At least, that's what I always feel like doing. If I get up, it's for a really good reason. Today, that reason was relocating to the floor to play with the kids. It didn't really take THAT much more effort, I mean I was sitting on the floor instead of on cushions. But it made a huge difference for my children. They were more active, more excited, and more bright-eyed with Mommy on their level - they loved that I was clearly there for their benefit instead of distracted doing other things on the couch or in the kitchen. We played Mommy Mountain (Natalie climbed up on me, I "avalanched" her off), Princess Knee (ha, we put the princess crown on different body parts and pretended it was royalty), lots of peekaboo and hiding under blankets, and just fun together time, wrestling, laying, and enjoying. I loved being ...

Austin joined a student bowling league with guys from our ward, and they bowl every Thursday night for 8 weeks. He is having an absolute BLAST, which is great, but for some reason I always feel a little forlorn when he leaves for this particular activity. Last week to get rid of my malaise I did our taxes (nothing like a fat refund to cheer me up!) and today as I was thinking about what to do while Austin was gone and the kids were sleeping I remembered the long-lost t-shirt quilt project I started two years ago. I borrowed a sewing machine (thanks, Aly!) and put the kids to bed aaaaaand now I'm sipping orange juice, smelling my DiGiorno cooking in the oven, and definitely NOT sewing. Yet. It only makes sense to wait until after I eat the messy pizza, riiiight? I've been in my longest "literary lethargy" yet the past month or two - I haven't been able to really connect, be inspired by, or just truly enjoy any book for a while. I've tried nonfiction, short bo...

Sometimes I wonder what my mom did with all of us little kids every day before we were school-age, so every once in a while I like to blog about what a typical day is like at home with my little kids. This is mostly for our records, so feel free to skip if you're not interested in our daily goings on. Here's what we do with a 28-week-pregnant Mommy, 2.5 year old Natalie, and 16-months Stockton: 6:30 - Natalie wakes up (I haven't been sleeping very well, so I'm usually ready to get out of bed at that point anyway. Still, we kind of just veg on the couch until the others wake up.) 7:00-7:30 - Stockton wakes up some time in there breakfast (fruit, cereal, oatmeal, yogurt, cream of wheat, waffles, pancakes on the weekend, cold pizza, etc) 7:30 - Daddy leaves for class the kids have nakie time, I try to eat my breakfast in peace, we get jammies put away and clothes put on 8:00-10:30 - this is our outing time. we don't always go out (actually it's pretty...

We took advantage of a warm morning before the snow melted to do a little backyard sledding with our friends (thanks for the idea, Birdsalls!). It was actually really successful!  Stockton was hungry so unless he was sledding, he wasn't very happy. I put him in a quarantine box in the picture on the top left for some quiet time...it didn't really work. What DID work though was using the lid of a big storage bin for another sled, at least for the lightweight kids. I recommend trying it!  Stockton LOVED sledding. I got my workout fetching him from the bottom of the "hill" and bringing him and the sled up in the slushy snow 100 times. Natalie mostly just played in the snow, having "snowball fights" with herself haha. Renetta made it farthest down the hill! Next time it snows, you can bet we'll be back there sledding away again!

This morning I woke up and Baby #3 was doing some of the most extreme acrobatics I've felt out of any pregnancy so far - I had Austin roll over and put his hand on my bouncing stomach, and we lay there like that feeling close to each other and our newest child. It was a lovely way to greet the morning, and it's been on my mind all day. I don't often actively think about what it will be like when this baby is born since I mostly feel normal with this pregnancy and I have two other children to keep me occupied. I don't have the pregnancy apps on my phone or keep tabs on the "April Due Dates" group online, I forget when my appointments are until the day before, and other than, you know, this growing belly that gets in the way, life is mostly the same as it has been for a while. When I was pregnant with Natalie, I did the opposite of everything I just listed: I knew which fruit she was the size of, I could have told you the exact day of my gestation, I counted d...

I've had a lot of mommy thoughts chasing each other around my head for a while without an easy way to adequately or organizedly express them, but I want to get at least some of them written down before they morph into whatever is next. Morphing: isn't that what we do a lot as mothers? Always adapting, changing to the next set of needs for our children. Being who they need when they need it - friend, coach, encourager, disciplinarian, hugging post, reader, nurse, chef, chauffeur. None of those titles seem to do our job justice though...I think MOM describes it best.  ON GUILT Does it ever go away? I've felt guilt in all stages of motherhood so far: pre-pregnancy (am I putting off having children for selfish reasons?), pregnancy (wow I really shouldn't be eating so much junk, my baby needs better nutrients), nursing (putting off using formula/bottles because I felt guilty not solely providing the "best" nutrition), exhaustion (I LOVE YOU SO MUCH BUT ...