Breastfeeding

To put it simply, breastfeeding is hard. I envisioned myself while I was pregnant as breastfeeding beautifully with a huge supply leftover in my refrigerator so I could take luxurious naps and we would always have extra milk.

I’m sure there are plenty of people out there who can do this and I may be able to some day but the first couple of weeks, I couldn’t. I remember it took about a week for my milk to come in and when it did it came in slow and I never felt like Henry was getting enough. We would nurse and nurse and nurse and he would just cry and I felt helpless. I would read countless forums and websites telling me that the first two weeks were the hardest and I just had to make it over that hurdle. I talked to so many different people and they all told me Henry was fine but I never felt sure of myself. He was having plenty of wet diapers but not many dirty diapers and he was sometimes going three days In between them. Everyone would tell me this was normal but Henry would be so uncomfortable that it always made me uneasy. I would sometimes nurse him and cry to Alex that I was failing and I couldn’t handle it. I felt so lost and helpless. I wanted to breastfeed so badly and I couldn’t let myself give it up.

So, I didn’t. I let him nurse. And nurse. And nurse. Sometimes it felt like the entire day was spent nursing and that was okay. I tried to keep my spirits up about it and I kept fighting for it.

Then at week three, I had milk. Henry could eat and was satisfied after 30 minutes or so and the dirty diapers started happening more frequently. I had a lactation consultant come over just for a final “everything’s fine” kind of meeting and Henry had gained a pound and 2 ounces in two weeks which is amazing progress.

I felt so much relief. For the first time since Henry was born I had faith in myself. The best way breastfeeding was described to me was that it takes 85% determination and 15% ability which makes total sense.

I had to fight for my milk, a fight I never thought I would have. I’m writing this because I feel like there’s a whole other side to breastfeeding that’s hardly talked about. I feel like so many women give it up because it seems too hard but they just don’t have the support or answers they should.

Breastfeeding used to be the most terrifying and stressful thing I did and now it’s one of the best and most satisfying. I get to feed my son the way I always dreamed of doing and it’s amazing feeling.

 

A few breastfeeding tips I learned that basically saved me and I wish I knew prior to having Henry:

Let him nurse. And nurse. And nurse. It will basically feel like the only thing you do in the beginning but it helps establish your milk supply so it’s a good thing. For us we spent a few days in bed, doing nothing but breastfeeding and skin to skin. It was definitely hard but also some of the best few days of us figuring each other out.

Water is your milk supply. I’ve noticed a definite difference in my milk if I had a lot to drink that day or not enough.
Don’t read forums. It’s just moms going back and forth on what worked for them and what didn’t and that doesn’t necessarily mean those things will work for you. Go straight to the source. Kellymom and La Leche League were the best places for me to get good advice.

Talk to someone. Breastfeeding is hard because you’re the only one who can do it and that feeling can be deeply overwhelming. I talked to everyone I could about breastfeeding gaining as much information as possible and comforting myself. I would also talk to Alex about all my concerns which really helped because he could put things in a different perspective that I may not have realized.

Get support. If you feel like something is wrong or you’re just unsure of how things are going, make an appointment with someone who specializes in breastfeeding. Hospitals have great resources and most pediatrician offices have lactation consultants on their staff. There are also lactation consultants out there who you can call or will come to you directly.

Don’t let yourself drown. It’s hard. Sometimes it’s a fight to keep your head above water but it’s so worth it. During week two I could have easily given up and just given Henry a bottle of formula. It would have been so easy and the thought crossed my mind way too many times. But I’m so thankful I pushed through because I’m so happy with where I am now.

It gets easier. It does. It may not seem like it but your body does figure it out and your milk supply evens itself out. It takes 6-8 weeks for your milk supply to be established and I’m not even there yet but I finally feel like I’m on the right track.

Enjoy it. When we were fighting for milk, sometimes it started to feel like a chore instead of it being a bonding experience between me and my baby and I hated that feeling. It was so easy to get wrapped up in my insecurities that I was forgetting to see the big picture. He will never be this little again. It was such a better experience for us when I remembered to take a step back and remind myself what it was I was actually doing.

 

Women are absolutely amazing. We grow this this person, birth them and then can sustain them with Just our bodies. I have such a bigger appreciation for women after going through this amazing journey.
Just know that with breastfeeding, you are not alone. It may feel that way but there are always people out there to talk to and to help.
I hope to do updates on this subject because I feel it’s something that is constantly changing and evolving. If you have any questions or just need someone to talk to, I’m all ears! This has easily become one of my favorite subjects because of how passionately I feel about it. Never be afraid to talk to someone or to ask a “stupid” question. I’ve asked handfuls of people plenty of questions I thought were silly and they never treated them that way.
Breastfeeding is absolutely beautiful. But it sometimes takes work and can be extremely stressful to come out on the other side. But I can almost guarantee that all the women that do don’t regret how hard they had to work for it. I know I don’t.

19 weeks!

 

 

As of yesterday I am officially 19 weeks! Crazy that we are almost halfway there! We’re having our 20 week ultrasound soon and I’m really excited but can’t help but also feel worried. It’s the ultrasound where they check out all the baby’s features, organs and brain function. I’m definitely staying optimistic but sometimes those bad thoughts creep up. We’ve only had one ultrasound so far at eight weeks when the baby just looked like a bean so I’m ecstatic to be able to see all the baby’s features. The little hands and feet and that sweet sweet face, I can’t wait!

I finally invested in some maternity jeans and I am in heaven! I had been doing the hair tie trick for far longer than I should have.  I found the jeans at Old Navy and they are too awesome.

It’s been crazy to catch my reflection in the mirror and see this bump looking back at me. I’ve also been feeling really good! Nauseous very rarely which is awesome after the 1st trimester. I am constantly craving jalapenos and have seriously just been eating them out of the jar. The soft pretzel craving is definitely still there too. I’m also trying really hard to get my veggies in. Since I got pregnant I’ve been totally turned off of them. I try to just add them into things where I can’t really taste them or fight my way through some veggie juice. Fruit cravings are definitely strong so at least that’s something, right?

Can’t wait to share our pictures and gender next week!! So ready!

I Married a Gamer

I married a man who once made an entire home star runner video series using toys and a very good imitation accent for all the characters. A man who has insanely high levels on his diablo and Starcraft game. A man who has more games on his phone than I even knew existed. A man who sometimes spends his lunch break at a local arcade(eating a grilled peanut butter and jelly sandwich) and always stares longingly at the ones in the mall.
This has always perplexed and amused me over the years. I’m not a gamer. Sure, Mario kart is my jam but I’ve never been a consistent player of a game. I’ll download one on my phone, likely one Alex has talked me into playing, play with him for a week or two and then never open that app again. It’s a vicious circle.

Men always get a bad rap. It’s childish to play games. It means they’re not ready to grow up or be a man. They’re too stuck in a fantasy world to enjoy what’s really going on around them. This made me nervous when Alex and I first got together. Over the years everyone would say he would grow out of it and it couldn’t last. He would get a fancy job and just be so busy he couldn’t even think of games. No dice. It never dulled or faded. I started getting worried, is this okay? Are we going to be sixty and still trying to see how far we can go on a zombies map?
But then something shifted. I started to see a side of it that wasn’t clear to me all this time. You know that look in a child’s face when you give them something they’ve always wanted and they just light up? Somewhere we lose that over the years and I don’t know why because it seems so detrimental to happiness. My husband still has it.

This may seem like a cooky analogy and I apologize if I seem like a crazy person but I love that my husband plays games. He has this light and easy side of him that I don’t have and I think will be crucial to raising our child. He’s never going to be too busy to throw a ball around in the backyard. Never going to be annoyed by a child countlessly asking him to tell him a story he has to vividly make up with his imagination. Never going to mind playing on the floor with them for hours with building blocks or Legos or anything else you can think of. Because this is an area he strives in, among countless others. He still has that glow. That wonder and excitement from something as small as playing a game.
I realize not all men who play video games share in what I see in my husband but that’s okay. His playing shows me how creative and imaginative he his. How he can spend hours at something and never tire shows such stamina I lose somewhere down the line. I love knowing that this child is coming into the world where I know their father will always listen, always play, always laugh and play games and have fun! Fun, something so very important that seems to get pushed to the sidelines now a days and honestly it is what I want to be the in the forefront of raising this child. And with Alex by my side, this will be more than easy. 🙂

My favorite healthy meal

About a year ago when I first started eating healthy I was ALWAYS hungry. And when that happens, it makes it easier to eat something not so healthy. I would prepare this whole meal, eat and feel satisfied for like ten minutes, then hungry. Every single time. On top of that a lot of what I was eating was taking a really long time to prepare and to still feel that hungry after eating it? The whole process started to feel worthless.

But, I am happy to report now I have figured it out. I have the perfect meal I eat almost every single day (sometimes twice a day, seriously) and I can’t get enough of it. And when I’m finished it feels like I just ate a MEAL. I feel full! It’s honestly the best thing, and did I mention it’s one of the easiest and quickest meals to prepare? Sold!

I start with this Power to the greens mix.

 

Then I add these chopped veggies. I LOVE them.

Then I top both with hot quinoa.

And about half a cup of this salsa. I LOVE this stuff. I think it pairs perfectly with the quinoa and the veggies.

I also add a little but of this dressing to the rim of the plate, probably about two tablespoons.

 

Sometimes I add chicken, goat cheese, avocado, roasted sweet potatoes, etc.

I normally eyeball all the ingredients but here’s about what I use:

2 cups greens.

3 cups veggie mix

1 cup quinoa

1/2 cup “cowboy caviar” or black bean salsa

2 tablespoons balsamic vinaigrette.

Layer all ingredients on a plate, then I mix it together as I go along.

 

 

And that’s it! Anyone have any favorite healthy recipes to share? Let me know!

One year

This past Sunday was our one year wedding anniversary. One year! I can’t believe it. This has definitely been our best year yet. We decided to have a weekend long celebration starting Friday night. We walked to Oba in the Pearl District to try out their happy hour.

^^ Prickly Pear margarita, so so good!

The next morning we were woken up for the third day in a row of Oscar being sick so we decided to take him to the vet. Everything was good, he just ate something that didn’t agree with him. After a strict diet of rice and chicken, he’s good as new!

Afterwards we decided to stop at Blue Star Donuts and Barista for coffee and donuts.

Alex’s favorite is the Maple Bacon which is fantastic, but I LOVE the Dulce de Leche Hazelnut one. A lot of people say Voodoo Donuts is where it is at but I definitely disagree. Voodoo is good, but once I tried Blue Star I could never go back.

That afternoon, we picked up some food from Lucky Lab, and headed to the waterfront. The weather on Saturday was too good to pass up. We also brought our wine from our unity box from the wedding.

On Sunday we grabbed brunch at The Daily Cafe. I got their eggs benny and LOVED it. Their poached eggs are amazing.

 

When we got home, I moved our cake from the freezer to the refrigerator and a few hours later it was time to cut into it. Honestly, I didn’t expect much from our cake. Everyone had told me it would just taste like a freezer, be stale and not good at all. I really only kept it because everyone tells you its what you do. So, when we moved here we packed it up in a cooler and its been taking up too much space in our freezer ever since. And I’m so glad we did. The cake was amazing! Even better than I remembered it on our wedding day.  It was so awesome to have that moment with Alex again, too. Definitely one of the best decisions we made.

^^ It was a bit beat up, but so delicious!

And with that, our anniversary came to a close.

Alex, I love you more today than I did yesterday and I’ll love you more tomorrow than I do today. You breathe light into my life and I can’t imagine a minute without you. I’m so happy to be laughing through life with you. I like you and I love you.

Our trip to Texas

Recently, we took a short trip to Texas for my moms wedding. Our friend Justin graciously offered to fly us there and back using his buddy passes and it would cost us nothing. Awesome, right? So we packed our things, called a cab and we were at the airport by 4:30 Thursday morning to catch the 6am flight to Dallas.

Except the flight was booked and we were flying stand by. Not just stand by, but the lowest tier because we weren’t employees, relatives or paying customers. So we waited. Three flights, seven hours and being told our best chance was to come back tomorrow had us feeling defeated. Our plan to get in at four, and have dinner with both sides of our families turned into spending another night in Portland. To say I was sad was an understatement but we tried to be hopeful about the next day.
Friday morning, 4:30am, back at the airport and shocker… The flights are all booked. After talking with the gate agent we decided it would be best to fly to Chicago and try to catch a flight to Houston or worst case scenario, a flight from Chicago to Arkansas and Arkansas to Houston.

So at 6:50 we board a flight to Chicago hopeful for better luck flying out of a bigger airport. We even got to see Frozen on the plane and I thought it was pretty cute. Once we land, we checked a flight to Houston and of course it’s all booked. The Arkansas one looked pretty open so we decide its our best bet and at 1:30 we were on our way.
When we landed there were two Houston flights and they were both pretty full with a lot of stand bys. We ended up in a pretty small airport so those two were really our only options. When the first one boarded there was around 20 stand bys which didn’t get on and got rolled over to the second flight. That put us as 22 and 23 on the list.

So after a day of failures and a day of flying to nowhere we needed to be, we were defeated. Seriously. I never felt so low. it was my moms wedding and I had no idea how I was going to get there.
After going through our list of options we went with the only thing that would definitely get us to Texas that night- renting a car and driving six hours to our destination.

Yep, after two failed flights and being stuck in Arkansas we rented a car and started driving. Thankfully I have a husband who, after a monster, is totally cool with driving. And six hours later, a little past midnight we were pulling up at our hotel for the night.
My mom, Sara and her boyfriend miles were staying with us as well. Being able to hug them the second I got out of the car made the whole trip worth it. Plus I was so damn ready for that day to be over with.
Our hotel was… Interesting. I’ll spare you the disgusting details and mention that the bed was a lot more comfortable then I thought. The next day was crazy busy trying to get everything ready for the wedding.

Other than a ton of rain, the wedding was really really beautiful. I was so glad we were able to make it in time!

That night we headed to Alex’s parents to spend the night with them. It was so awesome to be able to pull off seeing both sets of families in the three days we were there.

Going back to Texas for the first time since we moved was so surreal. We drove by our old apartment, our old jobs, the old stores we would shop at. It felt so weird that everything was exactly where we left it and the only thing that changed was us. It even felt like I could walk into our old apartment and everything would be there, exactly as we left it.

Walking into Alex’s parents and my moms house felt really good though. It was so.. familiar. Definitely one of my favorite feelings. I knew walking through Alex’s parents door they would be there, sitting on their gold chairs(that sounds so fancy, doesn’t it?) exactly where they were when we left and exactly where I knew I would find them.

Getting back to Portland was a lot easier than getting out and we were so thankful for that. We got home, went to Lucky Lab, picked up Oscar and then slept for about 16 hours.  Living the life, I tell ya.

I never know how to end these things, so here’s a picture of our beer from that afternoon. The end!

Trader Joe’s gets me.

Before moving to portland, our grocery shopping options were limited. Normally we would end up at Wal-Mart which never makes for a pleasant experience. Everyone is miserable, it’s way over crowded and someone is always standing directly in front of the one thing you need in an aisle with no intention of moving. Plus, the vegetable and fruit sections are pretty sad and organic is no where to be seen.
So when we got here we vowed to never go in Wal-Mart again. Luckily Portland makes this easy considering the closest one is about 30 minutes away and on the east side. But ruling out Wal-Mart meant it was time to try something new.
At first, I was set on Whole Foods. We went a few times and although I love it, it was just too expensive. Definitely a good place to pick up a few things, grab lunch or find some really awesome organic products but I knew weekly shopping trips there would result in us way over spending. Plus there was only street parking and a parking garage, both of which you have to pay to use. So I kept looking.
Next we came upon Safeway which definitely won us over for a while. And the at home delivery?! Amazing. AMAZING. I will never get over the fact that I can have bananas and beer delivered straight to my door. We also became Safeway members so I receive a lot of free delivery coupons in my email. Safeway would be one number one place and it’s definitely a good back up but…
Trader Joe’s.
Trader Joes is magical to me. This may sound silly but I am head over heels in love. The selections are great, good vegetables and fruit, always a ton of beer, and mostly everything is all natural or organic.
Plus it’s so cheap. SO CHEAP. We normally end up spending around 60 dollars a week and that’s with getting random things we don’t need as well. Everything I’ve tried so far I love and Alex does too. It’s also under a mile from our apartment And they have a parking lot. Sold.
Here’s some of my favorites so far.

Multigrain triple berry oatmeal. I love this oatmeal. It comes in single seeing packs and it’s super delicious.

Just the cluster chocolate almond cereal. I ALWAYS have this cereal on hand. It’s like eating dessert for breakfast in the best possible way. I could eat this every single day and never tire of it.

Dark chocolate peanut butter cups. Dude. I have to get at least two packs of these each time I come in. They’re only 99 cents and incredible.

Dark chocolate covered almond toffee. I’m a sucker for anything toffee and these definitely don’t disappoint. Another thing I always grab a few of for a quick snack.

Powerberries. These are addicting. Seriously.

Dried strawberries. Tastes exactly like eating a fresh strawberry. I like adding them to my salad.

Organic movie theatre popcorn. I honestly think this is the best popcorn I have ever had hands down. The flavor is so so good and it’s such an easy snack to have around the house.

Veggie mix. I love this stuff. I just put some baby spinach on a plate, add some of this and some dressing and I’m good to go. It’s also awesome mixing in with some quinoa.

BBQ chicken salad. I tried this for the first time recently and was HOOKED. comes with two types or dressing, ones like a ranch and the other a BBQ sauce that mix so so well together. Plus it has tortilla strips, cheese, corn,black beans, and chicken all for 580 calories?! I want to eat it every single day.

Pancake syrup. Best syrup. Seriously, so so good.

Buttermilk pancake mix. Made super thick and amazing pancakes. Definitely the best mix I have ever gotten. Plus the box has a ton of recipes for other things you can make with the mix. Worth keeping a box around.

Kung Pao chicken. Alex and I normally have this at least once a week. It’s a super easy dinner and it’s so good.

Sweet potato gnocchi. This is another staple in our house. I am a sucker or sweet potatoes and gnocchi and this does not disappoint.

Mutligrain mix with veggies. Love this for a quick lunch.

Chicken and Cheese tamales. Alex adds cheese and hot sauce to the top and they are SO GOOD.

Hashbrowns. So good, so easy.

Mochi Ice Cream. We recently tried these at Boxer Ramen and loved them so when we saw them at Trader Joe’s we decided to pick them up and they did not disappoint.

 

Mandarin Orange Chicken. Love serving this with a side of rice. Mmm.

Coconut Milk. This was my first time trying coconut milk and I LOVE it. Normally I drink almond milk but I am happily converting.

 

Organic greek yogurt. I use this to make smoothies.

Alex’s food picks.

Frozen crab stuffed flounder. I think this May be Alex’s favorite thing from trader joes. He cooks it the same way as the halibut and loves it. You will definitely always find one of these in our freezer.

Pizzas. Simple personal sized pizzas. Alex always adds more shredded cheese.

Cinnamon rolls. These are too good. The size is great and the icing is perfect. Alex loves being able to grab one before work.

Home/ Beauty Products.

Tea tree tingle shampoo and conditioner. These are so cheap and I can’t get enough of either of them. The smell is amazing plus, like the name, it tingles while on your scalp leaving it feeling fresh and super clean.

Laundry detergent. It’s all natural and smells amazing.

Lavender dryer sheets. I use one for every 10 loads and they work perfect. My clothes always smell so good when I pull them out of the dryer.

Face Wash. Very awesome.

Annnnnd thats it! Any suggestion on things I might be missing out on? Let me know!

 

Daryl and Macy visit Portland!

One of our closest friends, Daryl lives in Missouri and although we don’t get to see him often we’ve always been able to stay close. So a couple of months ago when his girlfriend, Macy planned a surprise trip for them to come visit Portland and stay with us for a few days, I was all over it. Daryl is seriously one of the best friends Alex and I have ever had. Good times always ensue when he is around so we were way too excited to have him and Macy come visit us for a few days

The day they landed, the weather was too perfect. It was the first day that actually felt like spring so they had perfect timing.. for that day at least. It ended up being cold and dreary the whole weekend, but we made the most of it.

I’m so glad they were able to visit, it was good for the soul.

Alex had to do some work so the three of us walked a few blocks over to Vivace. It’s this really great crepe and coffee place in an old Victorian house. It’s really cozy and the food is too good. I always get a crepe with bananas, nutella and sliced almonds while Alex’s favorite is the raspberry and cream. Both are consistently good and never disappoint. They also serve Stumptown coffee but I always get the tea because I am too in love with their jasmine green tea.

    

We stopped in one of Alex’s favorite places, Boxer Ramen and it was AMAZING!

 

 

 

   

^^^Some photos from Barista downtown. I’m partial to the one on 23rd but we ran in this one because it was close to where we were eating lunch. The coffee is awesome and can we talk about that tiling?! Amazing.

 

 

 

^^Ace hotel.

 

 

 

^^We decided to check out Pittock Mansion for the views of the city but unfortunately it was too foggy to see anything below us. It was really beautiful regardless and we can’t wait to take another trip up there.

Daryl and Macy, I’m so glad you guys could come visit. Can’t wait to do it again!!

That time we met B.J. Novak and other ramblings.

Hey, Hi, Hello. Does this thing still work? I haven’t blogged in a while because my laptop had an unexpected fall and I learned very quickly I needed a rug in my living room. But, other than that things have been.. fantastic.

Today the sun is shining, SHINING! It is 60 degrees and I can see flowers starting to bloom on the trees across the street. We moved here in the dead, dead winter of Portland and it is exactly how everyone said it would be, brutal.

I haven’t seen a leaf, a clear sky, the sun for longer than a second and my own skin in the sun in about three months. Everyone keeps telling us “Don’t worry, it gets better.” And right as I started to doubt them, here it is. And it is glorious. May or may not become serious Portlanders soon when we buy some bikes.

In other news we have had a great couple of weeks. a couple of weeks ago, one of my old high school friends flew up to stay a few days with us. We also ended up driving out to Beaverton to see B.J. Novak(plays Ryan from The Office) at his book signing. Alex and I are huge fans of The Office(How do you think Oscar got his name?). We have seen every episode at least five times(Yikes) and we still have no desire to quit watching it. So yeah, meeting B.J. Novak was like meeting George Clooney to us.

And we bombed.

He was great. Read a few stories from his book, took questions and was overall a very funny guy. I bought the book, and we decided I had to get it signed. Neither of us are very good with people we don’t know so it was… interesting. First off, the people before us quickly became best buds with him. They kept shaking hands, laughing and he was even taking pictures with their freakin baby. How the hell was I supposed to follow this?!

So we walked up, giggled nervously the whole time and I managed a “It’s really great to meet you.” While Alex followed with a “Great performance.”(which if you remember correctly, was a book signing. There was literally no performance of any kind.) To which B.J. Novak awkwardly responded “Yeah. Thanks.” And gave us a look that I’ve seen him give to Michael about a thousand times on The Office. So yeah. Bombed.

Annnnyways, it’s always so cool and refreshing to reconnect with an old friend. I actually spent four years disconnected from my very best friend from high school and we were able to kind of bring it back to life back in December when he and a friend visited Portland. So weird that we were able to mend a friendship four years later all the way in Portland. Since he is now a flight attendant, he came back to see us and spent a few days with us and it was really really good. We spent too much time looking at our old Myspaces and laughing at our old pictures. Here’s a fun one(Sorry Justin):

 

Too good right? Really working the angles and the black hair. I can’t believe this was seven years ago.

Anyways, here are some not so embarrassing pictures from that week.

This is way too tiny, but we were actually asked to leave this parking garage because a bunch of people thought he was going to jump. Oops.

  

This is the building Alex works in, the “Big Pink” ^^^

 

^^ Fun fact about this picture, that parking lot in the bottom right of this screen was where we had to park the very first morning we arrived in Portland. I made the mistake of booking us at a hotel dead downtown and we couldn’t park in the parking garage because of our trailer so we were told to find street parking. So, at 7 am after nearly 24 hours of driving straight we found ourselves here. The first steps we took in Portland were right there. I’m so glad I got this picture when I did because they have since changed the billboard.

Annnd thats it! We actually had more friends visit the week right after this so I will be back with that soon!

 

Our First Couch

When we decided to move across the country, we started looking into moving costs and realized a very consistent thing throughout all the options- it’s expensive. Like ridiculously expensive. We spent months trying to find the cheapest option before settling on having a trailer hitch installed on Alex’s car and pulling a small trailer behind us. It was half the price of renting a U-haul and then we wouldn’t have to drive one through the mountains. Win win, right?

Well, the only downfall was that we couldn’t really bring a lot of things. After much thought we decided everything we had were more like starter pieces. We had ten dollars end tables, a particle board TV stand and desk, hand me down couches which were also falling apart, etc. So, aside from our mattress, TV and coffee table (to put said TV on) we sold most of it and the rest went to my sister for her future endeavors. When we finally made it to Oregon and unpacked we realized just how empty our new living room was. This big beautiful room just sat unused for almost two months.

And honestly it didn’t bother us at first. We had the things we needed but after a while I was longing to just be able to relax in our living room, and not spend all our time in the bedroom. We’re talking meals, laundry, and anything else you can think of. After some time, it was time for a couch. 

Fast forward to Thursday to when we finally decided it was time to invest in that couch. Neither Alex or I have ever bought one. When we moved into our last apartment we got lucky when a friend of Sara’s got new couches and were getting rid of their old ones. Those couches definitely did what they had to and we were so grateful for them but we never really loved them. They were kind of just a placeholder.

I’ve had the couch I’ve wanted picked out for like three years. Just tucked away in my brain for when the time came. So, we did the math, Alex said “oh, yeah it will definitely fit” and we decided to head to Ikea on Friday.

Spoiler alert- it didn’t fit. Then were just standing there, in the parking lot looking at a huge box hanging out of Alex’s car wondering “what the hell do we do now?” After much deliberation and verbal support from a fellow Ikea shopper, we decide to open the box and see if we can fit it that way. It fit by like a hair, literally. I had to drive home crouched over my legs because there was a sofa cushion taking up half my seat but hey, we did it.

Silly picture, but this is what getting cozy with a couch cushion looks like.

 

Fast forward half a Justin Timberlake album later and were sitting on our beautiful new couch(The words OUR and NEW in that sentence make me so giddy). And seriously, I’m in love. It probably isn’t normal to have such strong feelings for a couch. But when you sell all your things, move across the country and have to stare at a blank room for almost two months it feels like Christmas morning and oh so wonderful. It’s so refreshing to walk into our home and see a living room finally coming together and not just this empty space. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again- it’s normal.

And right now normal is so comforting.