Vision Board

So, for the last 4 months, I've been completely into being a momma. My world revolves around my adorable girl and every day is focused on her. I want to give sweet Julia all my time, but I want to make time for other things in my life that are important like my marriage, relationships with others, personal goals.

I was on FaceTime with my momma the other day and she mentioned that she was doing a vision board and I thought, What a great idea! I had been thinking about how I wanted to grow mentally to become a stronger mind who focuses on goals and enjoys the process. Speaking to my hubby about it (who's career focuses on improving the mind to aid performance), we decided that we would make our individual vision boards and share with each other.

THEN, as convenient as it sounds, my awesome cousin posted a podcast with her hubby about determining your family values. We both listened to it and decided it was a great exercise to participate in. We are going to adapt it to create a family vision board to go alongside our individual ones. You can find this great podcast here.

Now to the point. I want to share my vision board with all of you! I want people to know about my goals and what I'm focusing on. Some things are personal so I've opted to leave them out, but you can have just a sneak peak into my plans for the year ahead:

A Canadian flag. Our close friends and family know that we have been in the process of moving back to Canada for just under  a year. We are still waiting for Hubby's Permanent Residence visa to come through, but we know it's being processed now. We have paid the final fee and sent in the last documents, so moving to Canada could happen any day (week, month) now!

Strong Family Bond: Having Julia has made me really think about how bonded I want our family to be. An ever-ongoing endeavour, our family unit will be grounded, strong and dependable.

Eat Real Food: As most of you know,  I ate non-processed foods prior to getting pregnant, but have been struggling since having Julia due to my baby-led days. I know, no excuses! Well, here we go. I will eat only real food.

Positivity: Sometimes, I catch myself being too critical or too hard on myself. I aim to find a positive in every situation to not only be a better example for Julia, but to also improve my mental clarity and happiness.

Yoga: I was very into yoga pre-baby and I have just gotten back into it. It feels great! The best part is that this yoga class allows babies, so Julia gets to come along and meet other babies! I aim to take yoga more seriously so that I can improve my practice. Thoughts have already entered my mind on whether I want to train as a yoga teacher by the end of the year...

I've left out the one about my marriage. I am very happily married, but having a baby shifts your focus. Both hubby and I have decided to make time for each other, but our marriage goals remain private.

Julia is being babysat by her Pops on Friday, so Hubby and I are going out to work on our family values board! Stay tuned!

Have you created a vision board or something similar?

Julia is 4 months old!

Wow. Four months ago, our sweet Julia made her entrance into this big, wide world. I can't believe she is already four months old, but at the same time I can't believe she has only been here four months!

Julia's personality has really flourished this last month. She's such a loveable, cheerful baby who is always open to giving hugs and kisses! She's discovered more of her voice this month and enjoys talking to anyone or anything. It's not uncommon to hear her talking to her stuffed toys or even her hands! More recently, she has begun to coordinate her eyes with her hands to grab toys. She's started to try to grab items that are far away, so we bring them closer to her so she can feel the object.

Here's Julia's 4 month update:

Things she's doing:

- grabbing objects and bringing them to her mouth

- yelling/talking to anyone or anything

- laughing at mommy and daddy

- getting so excited that it shows in her whole body movements

Things she's learning:

- showing some signs of trying to grab something while on her tummy

- coordinate her movements with what she sees

- shuffle on her back around her playmat

What she likes:

- attention from anyone - she loves to socialise!

- putting things in her mouth

- grabbing her stack of clean diapers when getting changed

What she dislikes:

- staying on her tummy for too long

- being left with one toy for too long

I keep saying this, but everyday gets better and better. Seeing Julia's changes and developments is one of the best life experiences we have both had. We can't wait to see more!

Four Month Sleep Regression

When I was reading up on baby sleep during Julia's first days, I felt overwhelmed with the things that I thought I had to do to make sure that Julia slept well. There was so many sleep trainers out there, all advocating a different method and story.

I worried about this. A lot.

Eventually though, we fell into our own groove. I never forced anything on Julia, including a strict schedule. I don't wake Julia up at a prescribed time and I don't have certain times that Julia takes a nap at. Even her bedtime is slightly varied - although I am more strict with this. She generally bathes and goes to bed between 7.45 and 8.30, depending on how tired she is. She's gotten into a good rhythm - she's a very cheerful girl and displays her sleepiness very easily, so it's easy to see when she needs to go to sleep. She still only naps about 30 minutes each time, but she wakes up happy and ready to go. There have been a few times where it has been clear that she was not ready to wake up and I've spent time getting her back to sleep.

As many of you know, we took her out of her swaddle at the beginning of January. She transitioned successfully after about 2 weeks. Her startle reflex was INSANE when she was transitioning, but introducing the soother at this point really helped.

Where are we now? Julia goes to sleep at night in her sleeping bag. I nurse her to sleep, but there are times when she doesn't go to sleep. I give her the soother and put her down in her crib and she usually goes to sleep.

She wakes up once for a feed at night and then again at about 5am. She still comes into our bed at 5am for more sleep until whenever she wakes up!

Anyways, back to the focus. I've read about this four month sleep regression wherein babies become more fussy and hard to put down at night. They wake up more frequently and their sleeping patterns are generally uncharacteristic of their pre-established sleeping patterns.

Julia is 4 months old this week and I haven't seen any of this (yet). There are elements that I have begun to see, being that Julia is much more interested in playing during the day, so doesn't feed as efficiently during the day. The result of this has been that when she gets up for her 2am feed, she has been feeding longer.

Will I see the 4 month regression? Who knows! I'm really starting to enjoy the ever-changing nature of motherhood. As the days go by, I find myself becoming more and more flexible in Julia's changes. The result? I'm not (at this moment) planning on doing any sleep training with Julia as I figure that when Julia is physically and emotionally ready to give up her night feeds, she will do it herself. She's done this for her other night feeds, so we will see if this happens for her 2am feed.

Will I change my mind? It's possible. I'm waiting to see what happens to her sleeping patterns when she starts baby-led weaning at 6 months. Until then, we will carry on!

Have you seen evidence of the 4 month sleep regression?

Post-Holiday Catch Up

Whew! What a few weeks it has been! This holiday season was super busy for us, so I found little time to actually sit down and get my ideas out. I've got a few more ideas about topics now that Julia is 4 months old, including the so-called '4 Month Sleep Regression' (which will be my next blog post). Since I'm using this blog to also document Julia's childhood, I want to give a quick rundown of what our holiday season looked like.

We alternate Christmas/New Year with our families, since Andrew's lives in Britain and mine in Canada. This year it was Britain's turn! Woo! Because we alternate, our activities vary year to year. With this being Julia's first Christmas, we decided to set up some new Christmas traditions that could follow us anywhere we are.

Christmas Eve we went to Andrew's dad's house. It was a great time as Julia's cousins were there and she just loves them! We had a nice dinner and Julia got to play (watch) her cousins play with their new toys! I also found the time to make Julia a Christmas Eve dress, which will be a new tradition for her every year.

Tradition 1: Make a Christmas Eve outfit.

Julia in her Christmas Eve dress! We even got to wear matching headbands (because I'm cool like that).

Christmas Day we spent at home. I always travelled on Christmas Day, but a few years ago I stayed home the entire day and loved it, so I want Julia to have that experience. We spent the day in our (matching) Christmas PJ's and Andrew's mom came over to celebrate! We got to FaceTime my family (Thank goodness for technology), but I didn't get a picture. 

Julia say in her Snug chair for a few minutes during Christmas dinner. She was not as amused as we were by this, so she quickly moved to her rocker while we ate dinner. Hubby makes a fantastic dinner!

We spent Christmas night just sitting around talking and laughing about the year that's past. What a lovely time it was!

On Boxing day we went to Andrew's brother's house for the Cousin Christmas. Again, Julia loved watching her cousins play with toys and REALLY loved it when her cousins would dangle toys in front of her face!

Boxing day was super fun as we also went to the airport to pick up Jodi! She came for a week and we loved every minute of it. While at the airport, Julia decided she wanted to talk to EVERY person that passed her, so she 'shouted' at each passerby. The cutest thing :)

Fast forward to New Years, we had Jodi and some more friends over. We watched the Canada vs USA World Juniors hockey game and were overjoyed with Canada's performance. Go Team! The rest of the time was spent playing card games and eating ridiculous amounts of chocolate.

Overall, Julia's first holiday season was fabulous. We enjoyed spending all the time with family and friends. It's this season that really makes you appreciate and love your family even more. 

 Andrew loved his present from Julia.

 Julia having a ball in her snug chair during present opening.

 Jodi just couldn't wait to meet her goddaughter, Julia!

 Auntie Jodi always brings Canada attire when she visits.

'Just trailing behind'