I wonder when this year will stop feeling like a total blur…maybe when I’m less sleep deprived? Basically ever since Naomi’s unexpected early arrival at the end of April and everything that’s happened since, I feel like time is flying.
The biggest news for June was that we were able to finally bring Naomi home from the NICU on June 8th, one day shy of her original due date. We were there nearly six weeks, and boy did it feel good to be back. Since getting back home, the goal has basically been to adjust to our new life as a family of six and to get routines and habits in place that will help us in this super busy season. We’ve taken our foot off the accelerator with the flower farm this season and are just doing our bouquet subscriptions and a few other things here and there, which has allowed time for me to take care of the baby and other kids, continue on in our quest to drastically minimize our possessions, and make a fun family memory or two while we’re at it 🙂
All in all, the older kids have adjusted very well to having the baby home. Hyrum had a hard time for the first couple of weeks and definitely acted out a bit more, but since he himself has been the baby for so long, that could only be expected. He totally loves Naomi though, as do the other two, and all three of them regularly dote on her during the day, squeal with excitement whenever it’s “tummy time,” and are forever giving her kisses. They don’t even whine or complain the least bit if we ask them to get us a diaper or a burp cloth or something — quite the opposite. Truthfully, other than the actual NICU part of this particular newborn phase, I’d say this is by far the easiest transition I’ve had to adding another child to our family.
The other two big news items for June was that Mathias turned five, which he’s been looking forward to for months, and Raven got baptized. She was originally supposed to get baptized in May, but we had to postpone it because Naomi ended up being born right before and we just couldn’t swing the original date. Her baptism was such a beautiful, special day, and it’s one I will cherish forever. (For more about our beliefs on baptism, you can click HERE.)
Here’s how the goals went last month:
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June Goals
Bring Naomi home!- We were finally able to bring Naomi home from the NICU just one day shy of her original due date, after being there for nearly six weeks. Such a happy day!!
- Order second base for car seat + install
- Matt and I talked it over and decided to just make do with one car seat base for now. Our money could be better spent elsewhere.
Celebrate Raven’s baptism- Raven got baptized the first Saturday in June, and it was one of the happiest days as a family. The only thing that would have made it better would have been if the baby could have been there with us! We were so pleased that so many family members were willing to make the long drive out to our house in order to participate.
Celebrate Mathias’s 5th birthday- I talked about this a bit in one of my weekly frugal wins posts, but we had a really fun day celebrating Mathias with visiting grandparents and pulling out our new pool that we got for a steal at just $40.
- Cut Raven’s hair
- No, and we really need to — it’s basically down to her waist now! Rollover goal.
- Cut Matt’s and the boys’ hair
- Rollover goal.
Sign the kids up for swimming lessons- I didn’t know if the city pool would be open for swim lessons this year since it was getting some major work done on it, but they finally opened and I was able to set this up for July. The kids are excited!
Plant the rest of the dahlias- Bless Matt — thanks to him and generous family and friends, the flower farm has somehow kept going this year. Matt did all of the work for this, including clearing the weeds, putting down the landscape fabric, and planting the tubers.
Install laundry doors- Matt put them up to surprise me while I was gone at an appointment, only to have me come home and find out that I’d bought the wrong color of paint (*insert face into palm*). So now “paint laundry doors again” is now on July’s list…
Publish Summer 2023 Reading List- I finally got around to doing this, and you can find it HERE.
Publish blog post on Naomi’s birth story- Sure did, it’s right HERE.
- Finish three books
- I finished two — The Secret Garden (our family read aloud), and The Secrets of Happy Families (which was excellent–highly recommend).
Now that we’re in more of a routine(ish), I’m definitely feeling motivation to do all the things again, mostly just because 1) it’s a lot easier to get things accomplished when I’m not pregnant, and 2) it’s a lot easier to get things accomplished when I’m actually living at home 100% instead of driving back and forth constantly to the NICU. I’ve also definitely reached a tipping point in my minimalism/decluttering journey so that I can clearly tell a difference in how easy our main space now is to maintain, and it’s just lit a fire under me to keep on going so that the rest of the house is the same way.
It’s also kinda nice that we’re forced to stay close to home for the summer because it’s giving the older kids tons of bonding time together, and I’ve been feeling extra homebody vibes lately just because I was away from home so much while I was basically living at the NICU for a month and a half. All that’s to say that I’m enjoying homemaking and newborn snuggles and just time all together as a family right now 🙂
It’s been a good summer so far.
July Goals
- Get insurance situation sorted out
- Adding Naomi to our health insurance shouldn’t have been an issue at all, but it’s turned into a gigantic mess based on an error on their end from the beginning. Basically it’s meant that she’s showing up as uninsured, which has been all sorts of fun with all the medical specialists we’ve seen so far and the six-week NICU stay, lemme tell you… I’ve called so many times I’ve lost count, but hopefully the 12th or 15th or 27th time will finally be the one that gets this all sorted out. Fingers crossed.
- Plant shrubs
- I’d originally taken the line item of buying shrubs for the flower farm off the goals list for the year, but then we ended up finding exactly what we were looking for at a good price from Home Depot, so we snatched them up. Now we just have to get them all in the ground.
- Install drip irrigation
- Since the beginning, Matt has watered our entire flower farm by hand every other night. It’s exactly as time consuming and ridiculous as it sounds. We finally put aside some money this year to get some drip irrigation supplies so he can gain back several hours a week, but he does have to do all the upfront labor first, which will take awhile.
- Get quote on deck, kitchen flooring
- Our next door neighbor is a handyman as his full-time job, and the last time we hired him, he was extremely reasonably priced. We’re going to see if he’ll give us a quote on a few odd jobs that have been on our list forever to see if it’s worth us just hiring him rather than trying to add it to Matt’s ginormous honey-do list.
- Repaint laundry doors
- Ugh.
- Completely declutter master closet (my stuff, anyway)
- My massive decluttering journey continues, and we’re making serious headway. Just wait until I post pictures!
- Take another load to the donation center
- See above.
- Cut Raven’s hair
- Rollover goal.
- Cut Matt’s and the boys’ hair
- Rollover goal.
- Publish 3-part series on our NICU stay
- I’d originally just planned one post, but then realized it was going to be insanely long, so I’m breaking it up into three parts. I’ll be super impressed with myself if I manage to publish all three this month.
- Finish 3 books
- Because surely the seventh time’s the charm?
How are you doing now at the midpoint of summer? Any fun goals for the month?
