Happy New Year!

2012 is here, and we’re wasting no time jumping right in and embracing change and new events in the household.

This week we’re all adjusting to a new daily routine now that Liam has started daycare. It was hard letting go and having him stay with people we didn’t know for the first time, but we got through it somehow. His teachers are all very kind and caring, so that helped. They also seem pretty tolerant of all of my questions, which I appreciate. I think they must be used to dealing with new parents leaving their kids for the first time, eh?

liam's first day at daycareBefore the week started, I was thinking that Liam switching to daycare wouldn’t be any different from my perspective than when he was at home with Lucas; I wouldn’t see him any less, right? But so much time is spent in the car or getting ready to go, and by the time I get over to pick him up and get him all ready to go and we drive home, it’s at least an hour before I really get a chance to sit down and interact with him when we’re not trying to go somewhere. And by the time we get home some nights and get through dinner, Liam is ready for bed already and I feel like I’ve barely seen him all day. It’s been hard on me. This week he’s been ready for bed so much earlier since he’s getting up earlier, not to mention that daycare wipes him out. I hope this is just a brief adjustment period and that once we all get into the groove, it’ll be better. We’re just not quite there yet, so it’s been a bit of an emotional week.

However, getting home and the three of us spending time together, even for a short amount of time before Liam goes to bed, is the best part of my day. I’m finding ways to make the most of every second I have with my boys.

Speaking of, we’ve spent this first weekend of 2012 doing all kinds of things together! The boys put the barbecue together yesterday, and we grilled steaks and asparagus for dinner last night, which was delicious. I finished a bunch of soap orders now that the store has re-opened, and I even found time to make homemade candles to give Liam’s daycare teachers as a thank you gift for helping us get through his first week successfully. We finally took the Christmas tree down, and I made homemade ice cream using our new Kitchen Aid ice cream maker attachment. Throughout the weekend we’ve enjoyed lots of snuggle time together and read books; I love how much interest Liam is showing towards books. Especially ones that squeak or that have different textures on the pages, like That’s Not My Dinosaur. (His current favorite.)

And speaking of dinosaurs, I’m finally getting around to putting art back up on our walls, including all of the dinosaur art in Liam’s room. Our original plan when we moved back in October was to get the walls painted right away, so I held off on hanging anything. Now that we’ve decided to wait until the spring to paint, I figured I could start putting things up. Not only am I tired of bare white walls that lack personality, I also realized that the holes I create when putting up art will still be visible after we paint anyway, so what was the point of waiting? I digress. With the Christmas tree gone and art on the walls, it’s beginning to feel even more like home.

What else this week? Liam is now up to three new foods – sweet potatoes, which he likes; bananas, which he loves (funny, right?); and green peas, which he doesn’t seem to really like. While he’ll gobble up two tablespoons (or more) of sweet potatoes and bananas easily, he makes faces the whole time we try to feed him peas. He’s barely eaten more than a teaspoon of peas on every occasion we’ve tried, and sometimes the icky face is accompanied by a whole body shudder, which is kind of (totally) hilarious. Next on our list will be either pears or apple.

Have I mentioned yet how much I absolutely love making our own baby food? (Sarcasm there for those that are tired of hearing me talk about it.) I think it has to do with the way that I associate cooking and baking for my family as being one way I show how much I love them. For example, this weekend I was craving more family time with my boys after a long and busy week. I was drawn to cooking up a big homemade breakfast, grilling steaks and asparagus for dinner, and making ice cream from scratch with them. FOR them. The idea of steaming fresh veggies and fruit and making baby food for Liam myself really makes me feel like I’m doing something good for him. I love it! (And I know the Baby Bullet is totally gimmicky, but seriously… I adore it so much, it has made making and storing all of Liam’s food fun and easy.)

Oh! And I almost forgot. We started a “Project 365” photo project on January 1. The idea is that we take at least one photograph a day every day for a year. I’ve been posting the photos in our Project365 gallery every day so far, and over time these will create a visual timeline of our life in 2012. I really like the idea of journaling everyday life through photos to see how we all grow over the course of year. I’ve decided that keeping up with our Project365 is my 2012 New Year’s resolution, because it takes some work to post each day, not to mention remembering to photograph something each day. And some days it feels like there’s nothing exciting worth photographing, but I’m trying to use this project as an opportunity to try new things with our fancy DSLR camera, too.

With so much jam-packed excitement in only the first week of 2012, just imagine how much more we have in store to look forward to! Wishing you and your family all the best in 2012.