9 months!

today my baby girl is 3/4 of a year old. 9 months has flown! it is so hard to believe that after her 9 month check up on friday, the next time we will see dr. fraser is at her ONE YEAR check up!

bella joy holding her moose.
so big!

standing in her cradle :)

at 9 months, our girl is doing new things each day. she never sits still! she is always crawling somewhere or pulling up on something. she says more sounds each day. she even knows how to click her tongue! it is the sweetest thing! she still loves her bath time more than anything. her favorite toys are her push toy, ball popper, little people nativity, and a little phone that her auntie amanda gave her as an early Christmas present. she gets super excited when you show her a picture of her self and when puppies are around. when i sign eat to her, she gets excited and smacks her lips! it really is the most amazing thing to watch her develop.

on saturday, bella's awesome "auntie" jj came to hang with her for the night while adam and i went to his work Christmas party (where we won a 32 in flat screen tv!!). she had had a rough nap day so i rocked her for a while and sang to her while she napped in my arms. as i sat and sang hymns with my girl, tears came to my eyes. i wish i could have bottled that moment up! as i sang songs of thankfulness to my awesome God, i prayed that bella joy would know Jesus and follow hard after Him. i think that 30 minutes is probably (and may always be) in my top 3 favorite moments of motherhood.

a lot has happened in our lives over the past few weeks. we grieved with some of our dearest friends as they said goodbye to their sweet baby girl. we had water issues. we lost power for 3 hours. bella joy enjoyed her first snow. and we got stranded in that same snow. God has used each of these things to show me that He is indeed in control and that in all things i must trust Him. but more on that later.

happy 9 months bella joy! we love you, more than you'll ever know!

how God showed up

tonight i spent the evening with some other sweet momma's at our mops cookie swap. we ate cookies, chatted, and listened to the sweetest Christmas story. afterward, i took my baby-less time and headed to do our two-week grocery trip. i made it home just before 10 and when i came in, adam said "something is up with our water, it isn't clear". i immediately asked why he didn't call me since i had just been at the grocery, where i could have gotten some bottled water to make bella joy's bottles until our water is normal. adam and i debated about what to do. should i go back into town, or should we just wait til morning and call the water company. i thought that i would text my sweet friend lisa who lives less than a mile away to see if she was still up, assuming that she wouldn't be since it was about 1030 by this point. well, she called me a few minutes later and said "you will never believe this! i usually go to bed at 9 or 930 but i was up late shopping with some friends and just pulled into the driveway. i'm on my way to your house now!" a few minutes later, she pulled into our driveway. i went to the dining room to get my jacket and noticed that i could see her head lights in the garage. i was about to go to bed with the garage door opened! so i went to the door, nearly in tears, and received a wonderful gift of a nearly full case of bottled water for my baby girl.

God knew that our water was cloudy. He knew adam wouldn't call me to buy any. He knew i left the garage door opened by accident. He knew lisa had plenty of bottled water. He knew she was up later than usual. He knew she would pulled into my driveway which would show me that my garage door was still opened. God works things out. all the time, He is good.

so tonight, i am going to bed with clean water for my baby girl and closed garage door. and a thankful thankful heart.

from the jochims

Peppermint Bliss Christmas 5x7 folded card

Make a statement with custom Christmas cards at Shutterfly.

View the entire collection of cards.

8 months!

bella joy is 8 months old today! this past month she has just been developing and learning right before our eyes. i mean, i guess that has been the case every month, but it has been even more WOW this month!

see, i'm 8 months old!

as of november 15, 2010, you are:

• eating 3 meals a day and 4 bottles a day. your favorite thing to eat is any kind of fruit and butternut squash.
• wearing less 6 months attire and more 9 months attire.
• taking 2 naps a day! waking around 6 am and going to bed around 730 or 8 pm.
• going from sitting position to crawling position and back to sitting again.
• moving forward. still scooting, but moving forward.
• pulling up. you love to sit facing momma and pull up using my clothes and body.
• saying mama, dada, baba, dede. you are making so many sounds and really sounding like you are having a little conversation. it makes us laugh every day!
• love love love bath time. you splash and splash and splash, so much so that your cousin lylah looks at you like you are crazy!
• have 4 teeth. 2 on top, 2 on bottom.
• making little giggle noises as you play. this also makes momma and daddy laugh a lot!
• get super excited when daddy gets home from work. you also get very excited when momma or daddy walk into a room that you are in.

baby girl, we love watching you grow. and you are growing fast, not that i'm complaining, but i don't think anyone can deny that it is happening quickly!! you bring us so much joy every day. we are so thankful to God that He has entrusted us with the responsibility of being your momma and daddy. bella joy, we love you!!

anniversary getaway

yesterday afternoon, hubby and i left our baby girl with her bebe and poppy and made the trip to nashville for our 2nd anniversary getaway. we were so so blessed to have some incredibly generous people offer to pay for our trip. we thought we were going to have to pay for gas, but then my mom and dad actually had us drive their car so they could have ours to transport bella! God is so in the business of providing!!

anyway, back to the getaway. we started our evening with dinner at pf changs. we laughed and talked. it was wonderful! then we headed over to hotel indigo to check into our room. it was AWESOME!!! after we took a peek at our room we headed to jackson's for the most wonderful dessert i've ever had at a restaurant, the cookie dough egg roll. DELICIOUS! then we headed to green hills and killed some time in the mall. when we left my hilarious husband made the comment "too bad the only people that can afford to shop here crap on gold toilets." oh adam.

then we headed back to the hotel for some rest and relaxation. another wonderful way God provided on our weekend is that the little man that checked us in to the hotel gave us complementary breakfast and free parking (which should have been $19!).

we had such a great night. we missed our baby girl greatly, but it was so good to getaway and reconnect. we had great conversation, laughs, and slept til we woke up...no alarm! so good.

now my exhausted baby girl is sleeping in my hubby's arms as we sit on the couch and watch extreme makeover: home edition. life is so so good.

as i previously stated...

i love photo cards. we used this one for our sweet baby girl's birth announcement. we got a fun thanksgiving card. and i'm already eyeing this card for our little bella joy's 1st birthday invitations!

i've never been more excited to send a Christmas card as i am this year! what a fine time to share our first year as parents with our friends and family!! and, as i said here, i am so excited to share intentionally. i don't want to send a Christmas card just to send another card, but to share our blessings from 2010 and to share our thankfulness for the birth of Jesus, our Savior.

there really are so many many different Christmas cards that i love this year!! we can count our blessings. we can talk about every good and perfect gift that is indeed from above. we can wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year. and we can even send a Christmas letter in the form of a photo card! the possibilities are endless!!!

the best part is, you can get 50 photo cards for free!! shutterfly is giving bloggers the chance to share and save! you will have to pay tax and shipping, but what a steal! i can't wait to see our finished product!

do you plan to do a Christmas card this year?

Christmas is coming!

the holiday season is quickly approaching!! the jochims are so excited to intentionally celebrate the holidays that are coming. we have our thankful tree set up to remind us to talk about what we are thankful for through thanksgiving and then we will begin preparing our hearts for Christmas by celebrating advent. we are so excited to begin these traditions while our baby girl is young so we will continue to do them as she grows! we are so excited to celebrate what Christmas is about rather than what americans have made it about. and with the Christmas season coming, we (ok, when i say we i mean me) are very excited to send our first card as a family of 3!

and shutterfly is having a wonderful deal this year! you can receive 50 free* holiday cards!!! so i went to check out the many wonderful cards they have this year and was floored at how hard of a decision it was going to be!!!!!

how fun is this one!?!?!
as i said, i really strive to be intentional with our holiday decor/cards, so i really love this one!

we have so many wonderful blessings to count!

i like the idea of including a letter, so this one is wonderful!

and just points of what was great about the year...this one is great too!

yippie for the holiday season! and for our Savior's birth!



*bloggers are eligible to receive 50 free holiday cards. free cards are for 5x7 folded or flat stationary cards. offer ends december 31, 2010. taxes, shipping and handling will apply.

2 years!

two years ago today, adam and i officially started our lives together. what a wonderful day that was. never ever would i have imagined being where we are today. you know, having to get a babysitter if we wanted to go out alone for our 2nd anniversary. but i couldn't have dreamed up anything better.
richard had us repeat these vows:
i (adam/emily), receive you, (adam/emily) to be my wedded (husband/wife). i accept you as a precious gift from God. i love you with a love only Christ Himself could place within my heart. i promise to give myself to you as Christ gave Himself to the church. (Adam/Emily), i will never divorce you. i wish to have and to hold you from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish as long as we both shall live, according to God's sovereign plan.

we danced the night away. laughed. cried. i hung out with a bunch of kids. and with my favorite grown up girls.

tonight we will celebrate 2 years by spending a couple of hours alone together, likely at dairy queen because we have a buy one get one free blizzard coupon. my wonderful bff jj is going to come play with bella joy and we should be home in time to put her to bed ourselves. this weekend my awesome momma and daddy are coming to spend the night with b so we can head to nashville for a one night getaway that wonderfully generous people have paid for in full. like really, we may have to pay for the gas, but 2 meals and lodging is being covered by others. we are so so so so thankful. we love our baby girl more than we ever thought possible, but we are so excited to sleep in and to spend some uninterrupted time together to catch up on each others lives. that may sound crazy, but its hard to have a conversation with a (nearly) 8 month old around! she's so cute and fun that we want her to have all of our attention!!!

anyway, happy anniversary, hubby. thank you for providing, caring, loving, understanding, being oh so patient, and leading our family. you are one terrific husband!

if you want to read the story about how adam and i began, go here.

a year ago today

last year on this very day, adam and i were joined by our parents at st. mary's in evansville to get a peek at our tiny bundle of joy. on that day we saw her (clearly) for the very first time. and we learned that indeed she would be a she and she would be isabella joy elizabeth jochim.
i dressed my belly up for a fun way to share the news with all of our friends and family. i had blue tissue paper for back up :)

today our nearly 8 month old girl joined us at the operation christmas child packing party at lhbc. she enjoyed some pumpkin for dinner and smiled at every new face that walked in. when we came home she started scooting forward instead of just backward. she also waved (ok, maybe it was a fluke, but i sure looked like a wave!) at her "auntie" ashmill and her "auntie" carly as they were leaving our house.

my word, a year makes a big difference. i wonder if i will ever make it through another halloween without getting all weepy about my first halloween with this sweet baby in my life. oh goodness, i love her so much.

fab five friday

it's been a while since fab five friday has happened here. but the night was so wonderful that i thought i would end it with some things that have made my week fab.

1. RADICAL by david platt
this book is rocking my socks off. i think i'm a little over half way through it. and it is a joy to gather with like-minded women each wednesday morning to talk about what God is teaching us through this book.

2. izze sparkling pomegranate juice my sis and i had a wonderful (baby-less) date tonight where we talked over this fabulous drink. except lara had sparking blueberry. both tasted wonderful. 120 calories, 0 grams of fat, and it claims to be all natural :)

3. barnes & noble (please don't sell!!!)

b&n is where said date with my sis took place. we looked at craft books and chatted til we got to sleepy to chat anymore. we decided that we hadn't had a just the two of us hang out time since well before babies...and maybe since college....but that can't be right! we also decided that we will indeed make a habit of hanging after the babies go to sleep!

4. avocado!

i guess pre-baby i never thought about how fun it would be to share one of my very favorite foods with my child! i love to cut an avocado in half, smash one side up, dice the other, and then enjoy it with my baby girl. so far, it really is her favorite food. and i love it. someday i'll add some tomato, lime juice, and garlic and we'll share it with tortilla chips!



5. my mei tai baby carrier

ok, so it isn't the actual mei tai, it's a knock-off. but it is wonderful. i still love my (knock-off. no. handmade.) moby wrap, but this "mei tai" is so good. you can see by the look on b's face that she thinks so too. seriously, i will promote baby-wearing until the cows come home. even now that we have a happy baby, wearing her makes shopping trips so easy!

how about you? what has made your week fab?!

7 months!

our baby girl is 7 months old today. we did our traditional monthly photo shoot this morning. she measures up to her moose from her grandma j in an outfit from her bebe. (yeah, i'm nerdy.)

even though b has been able to sit up for a couple of months now, i took pictures of her sitting up with her month and moose for the first time today. she is growing so fast!



bella joy, you are 7 months old today! at 7 months you are quickly out growing your 6 month clothing and are starting to wear some 9 month clothing. you are so long!

you are eating 3 meals a day and having five milk feedings a day. we are getting the hang of the eating from a spoon thing and are starting to really enjoy food. so far you have had carrots, butternut squash, sweet potato, peas, green beans, broccoli, avocado, banana, pears, rice cereal and multi grain cereal. your favorites are avocado, bananas, and sweet potatoes. actually, i think you will like any fruit!

this week you have started scooting. you get up on your hands and knees by yourself, but them instead of crawling forward you scoot backward. it is the cutest and funniest thing! i know you will be crawling in no time.

you have your two bottom middle teeth and one of your top ones is pushing through. we are so thankful that teething hasn't made you super fussy. just snotty and cough-y. :) your bottom teeth are big enough now that we see them when you smile and it is, of course, so cute!

you love people and animals. you smile when someone new enters the room and you laugh harder at dogs barking than at anything else.

we can't wait to see what you learn this month!

on the move

bella boo is officially on the move. she isn't crawling. yet. i'm certain that it won't be long. this afternoon i sat on the floor in the living room and ate my lunch as baby girl played on the floor. one second i was taking a bite of my sandwich and the next bella joy had scooted off the rug and onto the floor. then she scooted under the shelf. i couldn't stop laughing! oh boy, the days are about to get really interesting! :)

progress

miss bella joy is napping in her bed right now and has been for an hour and 15 minutes. this isn't the first time she has napped for so long in her bed this week. she is growing up. we are making progress. i am so proud of her, but at the same time, i'm so sad that she is growing up so fast and doesn't need me to nap anymore. ah, bittersweet.

we are also making progress with the solid food eating. this week b has started opening her mouth for the spoon! we haven't had to trick her into it anymore! she still isn't consuming tons of solids, but we are making progress and it is good. she has had carrots, butternut squash (or squtternut bosh for all of you friends fans), sweet potatoes, peas, green beans, broccoli, and she will have avacodo this weekend. then its on to fruits and 3 meals a day! wish us luck :)

and the photo at the top is courtesy of my awesome bff ashmill. she took some family photos of us this weekend and we supported her trip to africa. check out her website and read about her trip. she is an awesome photographer!

solid foods

a couple of weeks ago, we started b on solids. cereal first, which by the first photo, you'd think she really enjoyed. but please, don't let her fool you.

this child hates rice cereal. and have you tasted it!? if you have, you know why she isn't a fan.

so after a week of rice cereal we moved onto carrots. don't you just love her reaction!?

i really thought that since i worked so hard making baby food carrots for my girl, that she'd surely love them! (if you have ever made baby food carrots, you know that it is not hard. not even a little bit. i didn't work hard at all, but aren't they beautiful!?)

yeah, she isn't really a fan of the carrots either. so we are carrying on. trying other veggies and soon fruits will follow. i am hopeful that eventually this girl will love all the tasty treats i put before her!

but for now, i will continue tricking her into opening her mouth and then laugh when she sits in disgust with the food just chillin' on her tongue.

if you have a baby, what was his or her favorite veggie when they started getting solids?

i'm going to jackson's

b had her first trip to jackson's orchard on saturday morning! it was wonderful! the weather was still cool, the crowds hadn't arrived yet, and there were pumpkins galore!!! and our big girl had a good ol' time sitting next to them and playing with the dried grass! we love fall (except the high in bg today was 101...but who's counting!?)

give thanks
lounging in the pumpkin bin

my big girl :)

6 months!!

ok, so i haven't blogged in a whole month! sorry. i'll be better.

bella joy is 6 months (and 1 day) old!! how did my baby get to be a half of a year old!?!? she is growing so fast!

at 6 months:
-you are wearing 6 months clothing. you are still squeezing into a few 3-6 months things, but are almost exclusively 6 months.
-you can sit like an old pro! each day you get better and better. you love sitting with the big kids!!
-you still enjoy your exersaucer and play mat but would rather sit and play with toys.
-you have 1 tooth and another that isn't far behind!
-you roll all over the place. sometimes you roll onto your tummy and you get mad, but for the most part you enjoy tummy time.
-you eat rice cereal...if you can call it eating. you really don't like it so far, but you will be eating carrots and bananas soon!
-you are still part time breastfed, part time formula fed. momma just can't seem to give up our time together and still gets so sad when i think about not having enough milk to nurse you exclusively.
-you love your daddy! sometimes during the day, i show you a picture of him and you get so excited!
-you are napping in your bed more! now if only we could get you to stay napping for longer periods of time :)
-you still sleep like a rock star at night!
-you have started getting on your hands and knees like you want to crawl and i just know you will be doing so before we know it!

bella joy, you are our joy! we love you so much! what a great HALF OF A YEAR we have had! we can't wait to see all of the great things you learn in the next 6 months!!

now and then

my sweet friend jenny did a "then and now" post a few days ago. and i thought it was so fun to see her precious twinsies last summer vs. this summer! so because i am dumb about putting pictures in order on blogger, ours is a now and then post!

first, this is a little family photo taken just this summer (in july actually). look at bella boo stylin' and profilin'.

this is a photo of adam and i just 2 or 3 days after we found out we were expecting (in july of 09) at j-creek!

my how times have changed! life as two was so much fun, but my oh my how much more fun life as three is! b sure does keep us on our toes and laughing!

5 months!

yesterday, my sweet baby girl turned 5 months! really? already!? look how big she looks! i get weepy every time i compare her new monthly picture with her 1 month picture. she is growing so fast!

at 5 months:

• you are wearing 3-6 month clothing, but quickly out growing the 3 months end of that because you are so long!
• you love to play in your exersaucer!
• you love bath time more and more each time. it is so fun to watch you splash excitedly in the water.
• and speaking of excited, you get so excited when you see familiar faces. you get a big open mouth smile and kick your legs like crazy!
• you make real big girls laughs.
• you can roll over, but you don't seem to want to very often.
• you can not sit up unassisted, but you will be soon!
• you enjoy tummy time. you prop yourself up and often times seem as though you are going to stand on your head because your legs are so strong.
• you put EVERYTHING in your mouth! fingers, toys, feet, other people's fingers.
• you are nursing and being formula fed. you watch us like a hawk when we eat. don't worry baby girl, you get real food in a month!

bella boo, we love you so much! we love to watch you grow and learn. i wonder what fun new things we will get ourselves into this month!?

on gisele and breastfeeding

ok, so if you've read my blog in the past 5 months, you know good and well that i have been doing everything in my power to nurse my baby girl and that it is my deepest desire to give her my breast milk until her first birthday. so when i was watching good morning america last week and heard the story of gisele bundchen saying that it should be a "worldwide law" for women to breastfeed for the first 6 months of her baby's life, i was a little taken aback. i wasn't angry. i think it brought my feelings of inadequacy back all over again.

for the first 5 or so weeks of sweet bella joy's life i nursed her whenever she cried. it was around that time that we recognized there was an issue and we went to see the lactation consultant. that is when we discovered the issue with b's tongue. at her 2 month check up dr. f referred us to an ent. we couldn't get in for another month. and then when the ent decided surgery was necessary, he couldn't get us in for another month.

so here we are, 4 months old-starting our nursing journey. i pumped like a mad woman for 4 months in anticipation for this day of surgery. i began nursing my baby girl regularly 2 days after surgery. at first it seemed like everything was going to go wonderfully! but i think b just had some extra healing she needed to do and she just wasn't really that hungry still. when she got her appetite back, we quickly realized that i didn't have enough milk to satisfy our growing girl's hunger.

i do not regret going ahead and having the surgery, as she would have had to have it in a few months anyway, but i am very sad that i can't provide breast milk for my sweet baby girl.

so i know that gisele has taken back what she previously said. and i'm sure she didn't mean it when she said it in the first place. i do agree that "breast is best" and i personally think that all women should give it a go. but man, is it so much harder than i ever expected, emotionally. i wasn't breastfed as a baby, and i turned out fine-so i know i shouldn't feel like an inadequate mother. we are still trucking along and praying for a miraculously increased milk supply :).

thats all. i felt this way before gisele made her grand statement, it just made me want to talk about it.

happy first birthday lylah mae!

last year at this time, i was very sleepily waiting in the hospital with my mom and dad for the arrival of my very first niece! my sister had called at around 230 am to say that her water broke. a few minutes later she called back and told me not to go to the hospital yet, but i was already half way there! :) i met lara and nathan in the parking lot and walked up the labor and delivery with them. i waited. then i went to kroger to get a magazine, a sudoku book, and some disposible razors for nathan. then i waited. then mom and dad arrived and we waited together. what a wonderful day of waiting it was! when we heard brahm's lullaby play, dad and i looked at each other and cried. i'll never forget the first time i laid eyes on that baby girl! i think i was the proudest aunt ever!!!

auntie em and lylah mae just a little while after birth
lylah mae with her very first cupcake, one year later.

happy happy birthday lylah mae! you have brought so much joy to our lives this year! you make us laugh. you love your baby cousin bella! and she loves you! and i do too!

we're going to the zoo, zoo, zoo. how about you!?

saturday, we took advatage of some pf changs gift cards and some free zoo tickets and made a little trip to nashville with adam's parents. we enjoyed a lunch of lettuce wraps, crispy honey chicken, and mu shu chicken. and then headed to ashmill's house to head to the zoo! b did such a great job!

b with the elephants!
b with a scary snake! :)

we decided that since we were at the pf changs on west end, we couldn't make the trip to nashville without taking bella joy to the place where her momma and daddy's romance began! so we headed over to centennial park for a few photos with the parthenon.

our family of 3!

the cutest baby girl on the planet with her daddy at the parthenon!

we had such a fun day! we were all stinky and exhausted when we got home, but it was well worth it! and the best of all, it was FREE to us!! thank you west chester, OH pf changs for thinking your services was bad enough to give us gift cards, pf changs for emailing us a free order of lettuce wraps, ashley miller for the free ticket, and humana for making saturday free zoo day for grandparents!

the big day

we started our day at 515 am. i rolled out of bed. i pumped, packed b's diaper bag, packed bottles and accessories into the pump and then got myself ready. we were out the door at 6. adam drove his car into town and his sister amanda, bella, and i rode together. we didn't really say much on the way. when we got to the hospital, we checked in and waited. they called us back pretty quickly. they brought us a teenie tiny hospital gown, check b's heart and temperature. and then we waited some more. we played. we sang. we bounced. pastor jason came in and prayed with us and encouraged us. adam noticed that b's hospital gown said "soooooooooo big!" all over it so we sang "my God is so big" as a family. when my mom and dad arrived, we were still waiting for someone to come and talk to us. b started to get fussy, but thankfully i was able to get her to sleep.
after lots of waiting...at about 805 (surgery was supposed to start at 8) dr. sims came in and asked if we had any questions. we didn't. then the nurse came back in. then the anesthesiologist. we asked him a couple of questions and then they took my sleeping baby girl from me. i cried. when we got back to the waiting room we had two sweet friends from church waiting with amanda (thank you lisa and irene!). it was wonderful to have people there to talk to. if it would have just been adam and me, we would have cried together until they told us our girl was out. we had probably been waiting for about 15 minutes when the sweet volunteer called us to the phone. dr. sims was on the line. he told me that she was out and doing great. he did give her two stitches just to hold the cut. he said that in cases like this he likes to do stitches so that the tongue doesn't just grow back to where it was. he told me that b had 1 1/2 to 2 cm of extension. we sat down and gave everyone the scoop. and i called my sis. then we waited a little longer. eventually a nurse came to get us and we rushed back to the room only to find that it was empty! so we waited some more. :) when they brought us our baby girl she wasn't really crying. when she saw our faces, she smiled and i cried again. i took her and gave her her bottle.

while i was giving her her bottle i noticed blood coming out and i flipped out and cried some more. the nurse assured me that she was fine and she sucked down nearly 6 ounces of breast milk like it was her job!

after she finished her bottle, she smiled and talked to us as if nothing had changed. (minus the occasional blood coming from her mouth).

we love our baby girl so much!

my dad works nights. he got home at about 4am and he and mom left for bg at 5 am. they arrived at about 730 and left at about 915. my dad is at work tonight too. talk about an awesome bebe and poppy/mom and dad!!!!

after mom and dad left, b spit up some nasty bloody milky stuff. the nurse again assured us that she was fine. adam left for work at about 930 and amanda, b, and i were back in alvaton by 1030.

b has had a great day. she is eating (from at bottle still at this point) like a champ. it is VERY hard to keep a 4 month old from putting her hands in her mouth. she has had a little more bleeding this evening, but over all she is doing wonderfully!

we are so thankful that our God is so BIG, so strong and so mighty-there's nothing our God can not do!