12 in 2014: Our Year in Review

What a year 2014 has been for our family!  There have been SO many changes and we have grown so much in our faith, our marriage, our family and in learning to focus our true priorities.  Here is a glimpse of our year!

January

I turned 30 years old in January and I was thoroughly spoiled by my husband and children!  I had a lovely and relaxed day with my family and started the year off with fantastic new goals for the year for my own spiritual life, our marriage and family!

February

We were living in Minnesota for part of the year (July 2013 - July 2014) as my husband completed a one year Emergency Medical Services Fellowship.  There was a LOT of snow, but we still had a lot of fun!

 

 

March

In March we traveled with all 3 children on an airplane for the first time as we went to Texas to visit my in-laws and celebrate my husband's great Aunt's 90th Birthday!  It was great have the chance to celebrate the life of a wonderful woman and get to see so many family members!

 

 

April

 

We had a special Easter this year and were so blessed to have found such an amazing parish while we were living in Minnesota.  We deeply miss St Thomas Moore parish and their wonderful priest Father Weiss!

 

May

May was a crazy month as we sold our first family home and bought our new house in Omaha, Nebraska in anticipation for our move back in July!  It was an emotional time and kind of crazy to be doing all of the buying and selling when we were not even living in the same state as the homes, but it all worked out in the end!

June

My husband completed his fellowship training in June in Minnesota and I have NEVER been more proud of anyone in my life!  We started dating when we were both in undergraduate school and went through the journey of my husband taking the MCAT's, applying for medical school, 4 years of medical school, 3 years of residency and then finally 1 year of medical fellowship together!  It was not always easy, but we learned how to make time for our marriage and family and also how to really communicate our needs.  My husband is truly amazing, and is such an asset to our community as an Emergency physician.  I am so thrilled that we are moving on to the next phase of his career!

July 

We moved back to Omaha, Nebraska in July and enjoyed the summer.  We are so blessed to have such a wonderful community of family and friends in Omaha and are thrilled to be back!

 

August

At the end of summer we started our journey with homeschooling!  We have been having so much fun and are loving our time together exploring the world and learning new things.

 

September

We had a great fall getting to relax and enjoy our life slowing down a little bit.  Our favorite fall activity is going apple picking as a family!

October

We went on a family trip to Wisconsin this fall and our little guys fell in love with the Packers!  Having not grown up watching football as a little girl it was a WHOLE NEW WORLD for me!  I am loving the energy and excitement of watching football games with our family.

 

November

My husband and I took a much needed trip away to New York City in November.  Even though I was very anxious about leaving our children for 4 1/2 days, we had a FANTASTIC time and really enjoyed being able to have some adult time to reconnect and put our marriage first!

December 

We took a nice break from our formal homeschool lessons during Advent and really slowed down and took in the season.  We had a wonderful Advent and Christmas celebrating Jesus's birthday!

Thank you God for blessing us with such a wonderful 2014 and we are so excited to see what is in God's plan for our family in 2015!

New Years Resolution - Take care of yourself Momma!

I know one thing that definitely changed once I became a wife and a mother was that I immediately started to put the needs of other people above my own.  That is what I was being called to do in my vocation right?  Well, kind of.  But what I forgot is that I am a BETTER wife and a BETTER mother, when I make sure to continue to take care of myself.  As the New Year approaches and I know that we are all starting to make new resolutions for ourselves I want to challenge you to make sure you do something for yourself!

When I had our third son our oldest child was 3 1/2 year old, and our middle son was 19 months old.  I had quit my job two weeks prior to the birth of our third son to pack up our house, because we moved out of state when he was 2 weeks old!  We then lived in that location for one year before we sold our previous house, bought a new one and moved back to our home state!  WHEW!  It was a whirlwind year, so in my mind I had lots of reasons to not be feeling "great".  I was having these symptoms:

• Fatigue (I had 3 little kids, one still was getting up every few hours at night)
• Thinning, brittle hair (which I had always lost my hair postpartum)
• Not losing postpartum weight (which after my other two pregnancies I pretty easily lost)
• Increased moodiness (again, postpartum with 3 little kids and different support systems always moving around)
• Sensitivity to cold (I moved to Minnesota, so it was naturally freezing!)

This is how I commonly felt!

All of these symptoms I justified with one thing:  Being a mother!  I know you are supposed to have a yearly physical (which I did before I started having children), but then I was visiting my obstetrician at least yearly during pregnancies and postpartum so I had lapsed in visits with my family practitioner.  Thank goodness my husband (who is a physician himself) finally reminded me I should go to my regular yearly physical this past September.  I went in to Sancta Familia, which is an amazing Catholic healthcare center here in Omaha, Nebraska and my wonderful nurse practitioner's first question when I reported how I had been feeling was "Have you ever had your thyroid tested?" 

I was still thinking all of these were just "symptoms" of being a mom!  Well, I had my thyroid tested just in case and sure enough just a few days later I got the call that they wanted me to come back in to run a more intense thyroid panel because they thought I had hypothyroidism.  What?!  Not feeling good is because something is actually wrong with my body?  This was completely new to me, as I have been so blessed to have never been diagnosed with anything medically in my life (other than my pregnancies!)

They are still trying to determine if I have what is called Postpartum Thyroditis (which can start 4-8 months postpartum and continue for 10-18 months past diagnosis) as I am currently 18 months postpartum, or if it is Hashimoto's disease.  I have started a treatment plan that I have been following for a few months now which has definitely helped to feel better.  The biggest improvement though has been the simple realization that I NEED to take care of myself.  I need to eat well, take time for physical exercise (even if I can't work out by myself I need to go on a walk with the kids, etc) and get as much sleep as possible! 

So mommas, as this New Year starts, my advice to you is to definitely make those resolutions to make more time for your faith life, go on date nights with your spouse, spend more quality time with the kids, but also don't forget about things specifically for YOU!  You are important, you are worthy, and taking care of you will make you the best Wife, Mom, Daughter, and Friend that you can be!

Ephesians 4:24

Happy 5th Birthday Ryan

My dearest Ryan,

What a year this has been!  You continue to surprise and bless me every day and you make our lives so much fun.  As we celebrate your 5th birthday I want to take time to reflect on lots of the fun things that we did this past year!

We started the year off with a big treat as you got to ride the Zamboni at the Minnesota Wild hockey game with your Dad!  You have always loved Zambonis and hockey so this was an amazing experience for you!  You were beaming and had SO much fun.

 

 

We were living in Minnesota until July of this year and we survived the Minnesota winter together.  There were many days that were -40 F in temperature and LOTS of snow until April, but you made the best of it and always had so much fun!

 

 

We actually had a lot of fun living in Minnesota for the year and your favorite parts were getting to hang out with your Great Grandparents and other extended family, going to the lake and also the Mall of America!

 

 

We had a very special Easter this year and it was so much fun to also watch you learn about and take in the Easter story.  You love Jesus so much and asked so many great questions about what happened to Jesus.  You even asked why a doctor like Daddy didn't save Jesus why he was dying on the cross!  We explained to you that it was in God's plan for Jesus to die, because he loves us so much!

 

This spring you had your first time under anesthesia for your ears.  It made me so nervous, but you and your Daddy went together and you of course were a rock star.  Plus you looked pretty adorable!

 

 

 

Spring continued to be a crazy time for all of us as we sold our first family home, the home that we took you home from the hospital in!  It was really emotional for us all (especially Mommy), remembering all of the special things that happened in that home, your first steps, first Christmas, so many firsts!  You still talk about our "Pinkney House" often and I hope you have lasting memories of it.  Thankfully, you also love our new home and I look forward to all of the fun memories we make as a family together in our home.  This past year has really taught us that it is not the physical house, but the people who make it a home!  The moving process this summer was pretty hectic, but you always made it lots of fun and were our big helper! 

 

 

One thing that I love about your is your amazing imagination and also your memory.  You love to play dress up, and anyone who you see you want to be JUST LIKE THEM!  You love mailmen, doctors, firemen, UPS men, priests, construction workers, janitors, etc!  You wore your mailman outfit for probably 7 months straight since you got it on your 4th birthday.

This summer was lots of fun and you spent most of it on your bike or playing outside.  You have so much energy and are so much fun to play with!  We also got to go on a fun camping trip as a family for the first time!

 

 

 

We started homeschooling at the end of this summer and you continue to simply amaze me.  The speed at which you learn things is remarkable and the questions that you ask are so much fun.  I was so worried to teach you to read, but you are doing fantastic and it is our favorite thing to do together now!





 

You also started taking Tae-kwon-do at the Homeschool Learning Center and it is your favorite activity.  You are so much fun to watch and take it so seriously.  I cannot wait to see you continue as you get older.

 

 

You love being active and all sports, especially football.  When we went on a family vacation this fall to Wisconsin and you learned about the Green Bay Packers your little life changed!  You are a mega fan of Aaron Rodgers.

 

We had such a fun fall!  One great thing about homeschooling is that we can adjust our school schedule to allow for other fun activities.  We started going to monthly plays at the Children's Theater here in town, went apple picking and had fun at Vala's pumpkin patch many times!  You also were a fireman with your brothers for Halloween this year!

 

You are the best big brother and do such a great job helping take care of your brothers and teaching them new things.  I think God knew that you were the best one to "lead our pack"!  Your brothers are your best friends and favorite playmates!

 

 



 

You love God so much and love learning more about Jesus, the Saints at the Church.  You love to dress up as a priest and lead our family in prayers or a decade of the rosary.  I cannot wait to see your faith continue to grow as you get older.

 

 

Happy 5th Birthday to our sweet, caring, charismatic, independent, hilarious, loving little boy!  I look forward to seeing what adventures await for you in the coming year!

Love,
Mommy