TIGF - Family

Hosted by Ashley, Nay and Laura

Since we're heading into Thanksgiving week here I felt it would be appropriate today to celebrate my family since I did a post dedicated to my friends last week.  I am so grateful to have a wonderful and supportive family - both my own and Nate's.

I mentioned in an earlier post this week that I am an only child.  I think that led me to have a very unique relationship with my parents - they are not just my parents, they are also my friends.  We enjoy spending time together.  I am beyond blessed that my mom is able to take care of Oliver for me every day, it gives me such peace of mind that he's with someone who loves him as much as we do and I love that I work so close that I can spend lunch hours at their house - I did that before Ollie too, it is nice being able to see my parents every day.  On days I'm not over there I still call and talk to my mom because I like being able to talk to her every day.  My dad is amazingly helpful to us too, he is a master builder and has helped us in countless ways at our house fixing up things or building things. He helped Nate build his basement bar, he has helped us replace doors, windows, electrical things, the list goes on and on.  My family may be small in number, but it's large in love.

I am also blessed to be a part of Nate's family.  From the moment we started dating, they were warm, welcoming and friendly.  I never felt like I didn't belong or out of place.  I know so many people who end up not liking or getting along with their in-laws.  I'm so thankful I'm not one of those people.  We have a lot of fun with them and are lucky to live close to them as well.  My mother-in-law still works so isn't able to help with Oliver much during the week as much as she'd love to so we offer them all our weekend opportunities for babysitting and they are always more than willing to help out.  They've even re-arranged plans for us before which is so kind of them.  And hey, they raised a wonderful man who has been the most amazing husband in the world, so I am pretty grateful to them for that!

I've mentioned on the blog before too that I am blessed to call Nate's sister a friend.  There was definitely weirdness early on in my relationship with Nate, when we were still in high school, because I was really friends with his sister before him.  We eventually got past it and I'm just so thankful to have her in my life, especially given the fact that I don't have siblings, I feel like thanks to being a part of Nate's family for pretty much the last 16 years that she's pretty much become my sister too.  She's a great auntie to Ollie.  And we just have a lot of fun together, we are both pretty crazy and we definitely laugh a lot!

Both Nate and I have very large extended families and sadly do not get to see a lot of them as often as we'd like, but I am thankful for all of them as well.  Nate is lucky enough to still have two living grandmothers.  I have a couple of aunts I am very close with, one of whom is the backup babysitter for Ollie if my mom has an appointment or anything and I'm grateful to have them in my life as well. We each have cousins we're close with and even if we don't see them often, we keep in touch on Facebook or things like that.  Overall I think we are just so blessed to have pretty awesome families and I never take that for granted even for a second!

Thrift Style Thursday - Coats

Well today's Thrift Style Thursday is certainly timely!  I saw something that said almost all of the lower 48 states are suffering some sort of bitter cold snap right now and today we're featuring thrifted coats!  And let me tell you, it's been cold here!

Today I'm sharing a coat I thrifted at an adorable consignment shop in St. Paul called My Sister's Closet.  I love, love, LOVE the retro/vintage feel of this coat.  It's by Nine West though, so I don't think it was actually vintage!  I just know I got a great deal on it!

I snuck out late in the day yesterday to take pictures outside at my work, there's a great area by the city offices that are next door to us and it seemed like a great spot to showcase this coat.  And as you can see, yep, we have snow.  Don't even get me started.

I love that this coat is long, it is great to wear on a day that I'm wearing a skirt or dress because it covers so much of my legs!  It doesn't quite cut it on the sub zero days though, those are days that I reach for more of a parka!

I have a bit of a coat fetish really, I think I got it from my dad - you just ask my mom how many coats he has, I swear.  I'm not as bad about my coats as I am about say, oh my purses, but I definitely have a few!  I figure though when you live in Minnesota and it's winter nine months out of the year, you can justify having a closet full of coats right?
Head on over to our Thrift Style Thursday page to see what the other thrifty fashionistas wear to keep warm in the winter!

One and done

So apparently Wednesdays are my days to get real on the blog.  So I'm getting real again today. This is a post that's been on my heart for awhile now but I haven't wanted to write it because it's a bit of a hot button issue and I don't want to be judged.  I've read a couple of articles recently though that re-affirmed my feelings so I decided it's time to share. 

The long and the short of it is, as far as having children goes, we are likely one and done. And now you're like, what does that mean?  It means, Oliver is probably going to be an only child.  We aren't making any true, permanent decisions until he is at least two.  We'll be close to 35 by then and wouldn't want to be much older than that if we were to choose to have another one, so that is another reason while we'll wait until then to be sure.  And we certainly could change our minds, but we're not likely to.

I am not anti-siblings.  I am not anti-big families. I have total respect for anyone who has more than one child, almost all of my friends do or plan to.  I see nothing wrong with that at all, it's just not what we feel will be right for us and our family.

We have heard it all as far as why we should have another one.  My favorite is "you need to give Oliver a sibling."  I need to give him a sibling? Um, I can think of plenty of other things I need to give him - a roof over his head and a safe place to grow up, food on the table, clothes on his back and all the love and support he needs - those are the things he truly needs.  I do not like the mindset that I'm basically scaring him for life by not having a second child.  Guess what people - I am an only child.  And I don't feel that I suffered for being one.  I loved it.  I thrived and survived.  I have a fantastic relationship with my parents.  I was not spoiled - but I will say I did have opportunities that maybe other kids didn't get to have.  I had many cousins around so I got the sibling experience with them and overall I feel had a great childhood.  I just don't feel like I'm lacking in not having a sibling.

The other part of this is while I love being a mom and I think I'm a pretty good mom, I also know my limitations.  I feel in my heart of hearts that emotionally and physically (and financially) that we will best be able to provide for one child.  I had a dream pregnancy and delivery with Oliver and that may not be the case with a second.  I could go on and on, but I think these two articles from Scary Mommy also kind of make my point too, so I'll share those links here, I think they're both pretty good:

http://www.scarymommy.com/one-and-done/

http://www.scarymommy.com/reasons-why-i-will-never-have-another-child/

Again, I don't judge anyone else who have multiple children and their reasons for doing so.  I also don't judge those who chose not to have children at all.  I plain just don't judge.  What works for you and yours is your business, not mine.  So I certainly hope that others will treat me the same way.  I just felt that it was time to put this out there, especially as we are getting closer to Ollie's first birthday and the questions are starting to fire up a bit of the "when are you having another one?"  Or you have to love how one of Nate's aunts was just automatically assuming and using the words "when you have the next one." We just kind of smile and nod right now.

Oliver is truly the best thing to have happened to us, he is the light of my world and such a blessing to me.  I love being Oliver's mommy and Nate's wife.  At the end of the day I think that is what matters most - not the size of the family, but instead the love that is in it.  Seems so simple doesn't it?

Pantone Color Challenge - Cypress

One of my favorite link ups each Fall and Spring is the Pantone Color Challenge week that Heidi of Literate and Stylish and Marissa from The Modern Austen host.  While I don't do outfit of the day posts every day anymore I knew I'd want to play along for their Fall 2014 Pantone Color Challenge week at least once or twice!  The color of the day today is cypress so it was a given that I'd be wearing my favorite cypress colored pants (well ok, they're more olive than cypress but I think they work!)

Sorry for the poor picture quality, I went with simple office selfies on my cell phone this morning! Anyway, I just love these pants that my very sweet friend that I met on Instagram sent me.  I've talked on the blog before about my awesome friend Janice (her IG handle is @janhalfsweet - check her out, her girls are so cute, her Emma is super close in age to my Ollie) and how she has very kindly sent me some items that no longer worked for her.  My favorite item from her is still these pants.  They fit me so well right now and I just can't get enough of this color.  The zipper detail - which you'll see more of in a separate picture - is so fun on them too!  I would say these pants are in pretty heavy rotation for me right now, as soon at they're clean I wear them again!

Sweater - St. John's Bay (JCPenney), Gingham blouse - Old Navy (thrifted)

Pants - Old Navy (from the sweet @janhalfsweet), Boots - Target

Jewelry - Mode Boutique (Premium Outlets) 

I took a quick close up of this fun necklace too.  At the mom blog event they were giving out coupons for free earrings at a newly opened up boutique called Mode, so of course we had to stop and get the earrings.  I dug through and found some cute ones and they had this matching necklace for only $4.00.  So of course I had to get that too!

So there's my cypress look with a bit of mustard thrown in too for fun.  I really like all of the Pantone fall color choices this year, they're really nice shades.  I'm not sure if I'll have a chance to link up any other day this week, although Friday's cognac is another one of my favorite fall colors, so I might have to try for that one!  What do you think of this year's Pantone colors?  

Check out Heidi and Marissa's blogs for other Pantone inspired looks!

Roller Coaster Weekend

It was a bit of an up and down weekend at our house.  Overall I'd say I've had better, but we press on! Here's a little recap so you can see what I mean.
Friday I was lucky enough to get out for another Twin Cities Moms Blog event down at the new Premium Outlet Mall in Eagan, MN.  It was a ton of fun, they had free wine, free waxing and lots of swag as always and of course, being at the outlet mall you couldn't not shop!  I snagged some great stuff for Oliver at the Gymboree and Janie and Jack Outlets.  There also may have been a stop in the Coach Outlet and everything in the store might have been 50% off and my enabler friends might have convinced me to buy this purse.

Happy early birthday to me!  It's a great size, shape and color for winter and what can I say, I'm weak. Nate's grandmother in St. Louis always sends us money for our birthdays so I'll just say this was an advance on the check that's coming or something like that!
Saturday we braved the cold weather and met up with Erin from Due Midwest Photography to get our family photos taken for our Christmas card and some fun ones in advance of Ollie's first birthday.  I think she got some cute shots, I'm anxious to see how they turn out!
The rest of the day on Saturday found both Nate and I not feeling the greatest, but we pulled ourselves together enough to go have dinner at his parents house.  While Nate made some soup to bring over there Ollie played his new favorite game, Peek A Boo Taylor.

We had a nice dinner with Nate's parents but headed home pretty early since we were both kind of wiped out from feeling slightly lousy and not sleeping great on Friday.

I slept much better Saturday night thankfully.  Nate still wasn't 100% but seemed like he was doing pretty good, so we got Ollie out of the house for a bit during the day and walked at the mall.  We hung out and laid low otherwise and then had dinner with some friends in the evening and enjoyed some time in their hot tub.  Then after we got home the roller coaster dipped down again and Nate woke up in the night when I was up feeding Ollie and was pretty sick.  So it was a bit of a long night after that and I am dragging a bit today.

I managed to dress Ollie and I in pretty cute matching fox looks today though even being dog tired!  I got this cute new shirt for him at the Gymboree Outlet and I couldn't resist!

I had to wear my favorite fox shirt to match of course!  I didn't manage to get a picture of the two of us together, but I still thought we matched each other pretty well because once again, I am a Mom Dork.  (I should make a new hashtag for that).

Nate stayed home today to try to get a bit of rest and over this bug.  I mostly feel pretty good other than being tired and now we're just hoping beyond hope Ollie doesn't catch it!  We're hoping maybe he had a touch of food poisoning and therefore wasn't necessarily contagious, but I guess time will tell.  So there you go, a good and not so good weekend, but on we go!  How was your weekend?