Never Gets Easy

I hate this day. I hate that this is the worst day of my life and its so close to the best day of my life, Owens birthday, April 4th. 13 years ago today we lost my brother…and I’ll have to say in 13 years I always dread this time of year….and it never gets easier.  End of March is just so depressing…and unfortunately that gloominess runs right into April until after Paul’s birthday on the 19th. Sometimes I think that God purposely sent Owen so early so that we had something wonderful to think about during such a sad time of year. Yosh said it today “Owen was the best thing that happened to this family”…and it most definitely was. He brings the smile to our faces, even on sad days like today! I swear its like Owen just KNOWS when people aren’t feeling happy…and he knows how to make us smile. Say the cutest things, act perfectly and just be the happiness we need.

Today we spent the afternoon visiting Uncle Paul. Owen knows that we go there…and Uncle Paul isn’t really there, he’s with God but he doesn’t mind going, visiting, talking and just spending time there. He also loves visiting with the ducks on the way out. It was a picnic day again (seems to be what we do every year on his anniversary). It was a beautifully sunny day and a perfect day for Little Sister to get to visit her uncle for the first time.

I hate that Ella has to visit her uncle like this. Same for Owen…it’s a hard thing to explain to my kids. And when they are really old enough to understand I dread the day I have to give them the deals of what happened.  I know that’s many many many years from now, but that day will come soon enough. One of them will probably ask and I’ll give them the story…or maybe have them read my blog and give the other details as needed.

I still feel my brothers presence around. Some people believe in all that spirits and ghost stuff and some don’t…but I surely do. Around this time of year things go missing and then are found right in front of our faces. Mom’s earrings, Owen’s toys. I know its him. I love feeling him around. I love dreaming about him.

May my Angel Rest in Peace Paul Patrick Gallagher April 19, 1979 to March 24. 2000

I’ve said it before…how now having a son of my own I view my mom’s grieving in such a different way. I look at Owen and just THINK about something happening makes me cry. I couldn’t imagine that becoming a reality.
Owen and Ella kept my spirits up today…its easy to let them make you happy. I had a rough start to the week emotionally…sometimes being in my old neighborhood does that to me. Makes me sad…makes me miss Paul so much. And being hormonal 7 weeks after child birth…its been difficult. Mom posted this picture today…it made me cry…like really cry for her!

And her caption on fb was:
“Another hug sure would be nice. He is missed soooo much. May he rest in peace.”

My heart hurts for my Mom…I couldn’t imagine the pain of not getting another hug from my son.  I will admit her posting this made me hug my little man extra hard tonight and I’m sure many others will as well.

You are greatly missed brother. I wish you were here with us everyday.

St. Paddy’s Day

I’m behind in my blogging…I hate when that happens.

Our St. Patrick’s Day was MELLOW….like the mellowest we’ve had…ever! I guess having 2 kids will do that to your drinking holidays…especially when one of your kids is 6 weeks old! lol

We spent the afternoon in Redlands with Papa and Mya…

Papa was so excited…first time he’s held Ella without crying!


Owen in heaven with Papa playing blocks. He adores that man!

Then headed to Fontana to spend the evening with Nana and Granda…

Went home from our day of visiting and headed to bed…wow…exciting right?!

Just hanging out spending quiet time with our families is great, don’t get me wrong but it’s a tad depressing when you realize that your life isn’t about going out, drinking, and acting “young” again! This might be the first Paddy’s day in a LONG time that I wasn’t drinking…I’d say the last Paddy’s day I didn’t have a drink was when I was prego with Owen. And I know many of you are probably thinking…your just breastfeeding, why not pump and dump, give the baby a bottle…yeah well my DARLING DAUGHTER will NOT take a bottle. BUT I’ll save all that for another post…talk about stressful!

video memories

I made this 7-8 minute video of Ella’s arrival and her first month of life. It was hard for me to cut it down to only this short!!
the amount of love and joy that she has brought to our family is amazing and its noticeable in all these pictures! And I’m not just talking about to us as her parents but also to her big brother. Every morning the first thing Owen asks me is if his baby sister is awake…and wants to immediately see her. He has finally stopped asking if we are bringing her with us whenever we go places, and now realizes that she’ll be tagging along for quite some time!

Enjoy the video! Makes me SMILE.

Learning

Things are starting to really fall into place around here. We are learning about Ella…and all she has to bring to the table. She’s a different baby than our Owen was…she is a bit more needy! hah…I know ALL our friends are loving that…they wanted us to experience what a “real” baby was like! Well…wish has been granted. The evenings are our rough time…and her “fussy time” is RIGHT around dinner! Always fun! Sometimes her “fussy time” lasts 30 minutes…sometimes its 3 hours. Either way I have learned to deal with it…and just do what I can. Walk, Rock, Bounce, Sway, Bathe, Shhh, Nurse, whatever.

I’ve learned the REAL meaning of multi-tasking…bathing Owen, while dealing with a screaming baby, or TRYING to get dinner ready while Ella is screaming…good times! Daddy has been trying his best to be involved too…holding her whenever she’ll let him! But surprisingly I’m not stressed about the crying…we just roll with the punches and pray that she’ll soon sort herself out and our “rough evenings” will be a thing of the past!

This week there are changes happenin’…I read the book “Baby Wise” and am pretending to start to kinda think about their methods during the days! They say we should feed babies with both the clock and hunger ques in mind…so that’s happening. Also they say feed, then change diaper and keep them awake for a bit THEN sleepy time. So my goal is to try and NOT nurse her to sleep…which is difficult since the lil booger won’t take a pacifier.

I’ve also started the dreaded pumping to get myself prepared to go back to work (booohooo April 8th will be here before I know it) And our little girleen wouldn’t take a bottle on day 1. Day 2 was much more successful…she drank 1.5oz then another .5oz. Day 3 she refused it again…so it’s a work in progress for us.

Sleeping has been going great at nights…some nights she’ll go 5 hours…and others she’s up every 2 hours. Usually she sleeps her long stretch in the beginning of the night and then up more frequently in the early morning hours. I’m not complaining…its working out great. The only issue is Yosh’s snoring (and mine too from time to time)…its been waking her up. She’s a light sleeper. I was hoping to get her in her own room/crib by 8 weeks (some of my friends doubted me!)…but I’ve surprised myself…I had her napping in there today…and currently as I write this, she is asleep in there for the night (well at least the beginning of the night).

Yes I moved the camera angle after nap #1.

Today it worked out great…I had her upstairs and was able to really hang out with Owen…not having to worry about him waking her or anything. So we started some pre-kindergarten prep work…I’m determined to get Owen writing his letters!

He wasn’t a huge fan of it…buuuuut I’m sure it’ll grow on him!

So life is moving on nicely…not complaints…heck my girl has started smiling at me…who could possibly not fall in love with that??

One Month

Seriously…its already been a month?!? Time if FLYING by…and it feels like I JUST had our little Ella yesterday BUT at the same time life feels like we have always had her around! We had a few (yes I just said few) photo shoots the other day (on her ONE month birthday)!
Pinterest can be a BAD thing sometimes…giving me TOO many ideas…and making me want to take MULTIPLE monthly pictures. So yes…the other day we did a bunch. I KNOW they all won’t last the full year but for our first set of monthly pictures I kinda went overboard! Sorry I can’t help that I LOVE taking pictures of my little lady!

 

By the end I was losing daylight (hence the blurry pics and my camera being on the WRONG mode)…and losing Ella’s patience! She was SO OVER it at the end I actually started feeling a bit guilty! Sorry Baby Girl…you like them when you are old!

But I wanna do some comparison pics of Owen and Ella…people are saying that Ella looks JUST like Owen…What do you think??…

They are definitely related!!