Giveaway

 I'm sure many of you will have seen the Necklace giveaway that I did this Month. I was extraordinarily honored to share in the struggles and pain of the women who wrote to me. It was honestly very hard to read most of them. Twelve women wrote on the first day and as I was reading them and crying, my mom texted me that my grandfather was dying. I think I had to remove myself from a lot of the stories after that. 

The response to my giveaway was so big that I had to cut it off a lot sooner than I planned. I am very sorry to anyone who didn't receive one. I would like to do another giveaway some time down the road. 

I found a really neat poem called Little Snowdrop that I included on my packaging. I think I will keep using these in the future.

I found some more kraft labels to match my business card labels and used them for the finishing touch of my packaging.

They are finally ready to be shipped! It has been a long hard month, but it was very rewarding and I will look forward to doing it again next year.

July Update: I wrote this awhile ago, but have only gotten around to posting it now. Thank you so much for honoring me with your stories. In the last 3 months since I did this giveaway, my business has grown dramatically. I have been honored to listen to dozens of women share their heartbreaking stories and ask me to make them a necklace. I decided to write a little bit of my story on my Etsy listings and let women know that they can trust me and they aren't alone in their suffering. It is difficult to get excited about this new development. For every order I get, my heart breaks even more. I want to give everyone more than a necklace. I want to give them hope and peace. My greatest hope is that my nest necklaces do just that. The only other thing I can give is my tears and a listening ear. The world is full of women suffering in silence and I also hope that the necklaces allow women the honor of speaking about their precious children. 

Thank you again, 

Rachelle

www.rachelle-isms.com

Rough night = _______

I know it has been a long time since I posted anything. I have a ton of pictures taken, but no time to write about them. So here is a quick post.

Last night Anna had a rough night. I think I woke up to her crying 5-6 times. She has this problem of rolling over and can't fall asleep on her back. I couldn't figure out what was wrong, but then this morning .....


HELLO TOOTH #1!!! And #2 is coming in too. :) What a big girl!

I don't have any pics of the tooth because she just cut though last night, but here are some other pics from today. I love her onesie!

Anna is 3 Months Old

Dear Anna, 

This photo was taken the day before you turned 3 months old. Our camera just broke so we are recording your growth with my phone these days. I can tell that you are growing taller and thinning out. Your face is longer and even though your legs are still chubby, your belly is thinner. I don't think you are close to sitting on your own, but your neck sure is strong and you kick your feet constantly. William just started to pay attention to you a bit. He thinks the bubbles you make with your mouth are cool. Your hair is getting so long. I tried putting it in a ponytail the other day, but I guess I was just hurting you. Poor baby Anna. I'm sorry.

I've been thinking a lot about me and Daddy lately. So I thought I'd give you some advice on marriage. Your mommy and daddy aren't perfect and we have conflict that you probably don't see. But some of the things I am thankful for in our marriage is our ability to repent and apologize to each other. Make sure, when you are looking for your lifelong companion, that you look for a man that will tell you that he is sorry, ask for forgiveness and work on changing. Which leads me to my next point. Don't expect your marriage or your spouse to change very fast. In fact, NEVER marry hoping your spouse will change. Accept them for who they are but look to inspire them to be all that God wants them to be. As a wife, you have the unique honor to know your husband in ways that no one else ever will know him. Remember to take that honor seriously and with fear and trembling. With that knowledge you have the ability to either tear him down or build him up. When you are upset and angry or hurt, take as much time as you need think about what you want to say so that you do not lose his trust in you or hurt him out of your own hurt. My greatest wish for you and your brother is to see my need and Daddy's need for Jesus. We are broken, so very broken. My hope for my marriage is that God will be glorified as He transforms and redeems our brokenness.

I love you, sweet girl. You are such a joy to me. I love your smiles and I am praying for you and your future husband. May God bless you.

Your Mommy

18 months old

My Darling William,

You are just about 19 months old as I write this post, but I can't seem to write much these days. I'm sorry this is late. You have just exploded verbally in the last 3 months. Right before Anna was born you started saying sounds for animals ... it started out with cows and dogs, but now you can repeat almost any sound or word we ask you to say. Although, you only say it once. You don't like to repeat yourself. :) I keep a running list of things that you say, but I'm struggling to know how to spell them. You have your own unique way of saying every word. This week, you are saying sentences. You didn't put them together by yourself ... you are just copying us, but it is adorable! You say, "Daddy, where are you?" and "Hmmm ... Let's see"

I am very sad today. I haven't loved you like I should and you are frustrated with me. I need to repent to you. I forget that you are a baby still. I think of you as being so much older than you are because we have another tiny baby in the house. I'm sorry. I can't expect you to understand everything and I can't expect you to entertain yourself all day. I am broken. My parenting is broken. Please forgive me. I need Jesus so much and I hope you can always hear me say that as you grow up. You need him too. You are demanding, angry, hurt, and unhappy. I am praying for you every night. I think of how sad it would be if you never know Jesus and never know that he can redeem all of our brokenness. "Lord, heal my relationship with my son and give me wisdom. Give William the ability and desire to forgive me. Give him your son and don't ever let him go." 

I love you, Will, even though I need to love you more....

Your Mommy

Valentine's Day

Anna's One Month Blog Post

Dear Anna, 

Happy One Month Old Birthday to my beautiful daughter! The time with you is flying fast. Although, in some ways, I feel like you have been in our family for ages! You don't feel new or different. It doesn't feel strange anymore to wake up with you in the middle of the night or to bring you to the store with me and William. You are one of us ... and it feels like you always have been. I love you to pieces and so does your daddy. We are so proud of how you are growing. You just went 6 hours without nursing for the first time the other day. And your neck is growing stronger every day. Your daddy thinks you are a very serious little girl. Won't you give us a smile? That's ok. There is a lot to study and learn about the world. 

I keep thinking about how you will be in my shoes one day. You will be a mom with a little baby (Lord willing). I think about how hard it will be for you to get used to your postpartum body or the lack of sleep or the constant feeling that you aren't doing it right. But somehow as I hold you now, I know that you don't care about any of those things as it regards me. I am your whole world. And you don't see my stretch marks or flabby stomach. You only feel my softness and warmth and safety. You don't see the bags under my eyes and short temper from lack of sleep. You only know with all certainty that I WILL wake up and feed you at any time of the day. You aren't alone. And you are sure of that fact because of me. And you don't care if I am uncertain of myself as a mom because your needs are always met and that communicates all of my love. One day ... in 20-30 years, I hope that I will be around to remind you of all the things I am learning as your mom. Life as a mom will be hard and it will push your character to grow and stretch every day. I hope I am there with you ... to keep telling you that you are beautiful ... to keep reminding you that you aren't alone ... to keep telling you that you don't need to "get it right" all the time. There is someone else who tells these things too. And you can know with all certainty (because He cannot lie) that they are truth. You are beautiful because of Jesus and His work in you. You are not alone because Jesus promises to never leave you. And you don't need to "get it right" all the time because Jesus did it for you and covers your failures. You are loved, my darling daughter.

And now I need to go because you woke up and are crying for me. I love you, Anna!

Your Mommy

Anna's Birth Story

For some reason, I don't want to talk about Anna's birth. I love reading other's stories but trying to sit down and write this one is not fun. I'm only doing it now so I can put down all the details before I really start to forget them. So here it goes ...

It happened really fast! REALLY FAST! We were not expecting that. I was barely even dilated. I had my 39 week appointment the day before. I was only 1 1/2 cm (the same amount as the week before that!). It was very disappointing to me because I had tons of contractions, bleeding, cramping ... for a week! AND I really needed Anna to come before my brother left to go home on the 19th. We were down to the wire. So I had my awesome midwife strip my membranes and we said a prayer that she would come that night.

Jump ahead to 12:30am, I started getting contractions with cramping. I was uncomfortable trying to sleep through them so I pulled out my phone and started tracking them. They weren't out of the ordinary, but I hoped this would be labor. I got up and walked around ... they didn't go away. I waited impatiently for them to continue for an hour so I could call my sister. At 1:30ish I was pretty sure I was in labor so I called Amy. Sadly, she told me she couldn't come She wouldn't have made it in time anyway.

By 2:30am I was tired of doing it on my own. Read: I was lonely. I woke Isaac up. (I think looking back, I probably woke him when I was in active labor.) It took FOREVER for him to get ready to go to the hospital. At 3:30am, he still wasn't getting me in the car and things were really picking up for me. I started to tell Isaac that I couldn't do it anymore. I was sure that I needed help. I was afraid the doc would say I was only 5 cm. When I was in labor with William I was needing help at that time. I didn't tell Isaac, but I was ready for an epidural. I started walking out to the car without Isaac's help and I was in the car for several contractions while he was still getting ready to go. I still have no idea why he took that long! I was all packed. What else was he packing?

I have no idea when we left the house. I was in so much pain and was completely in my own world trying to cope. I couldn't sit down or buckle in ... I just knelt on my seat and put my head on Isaac's shoulder. I also don't remember a whole lot of the hospital. I just remember everyone talking around me. So many conversations ... The absolute WORST part about my hospital experience was the admitting nurse. Isaac left me to park our car and they wheeled me to her. She was the rudest person I've ever met in my life (or the most ignorant). Moms, you can appreciate this. I was IN transition, I pushed Anna out 15 minutes afterwards and this admitting nurse was tapping on my hand and loudly trying to get me to tell her my name, my doctors name/practice, ssn ... etc. If I could have punched her or yelled at her, I probably would have! But I was almost pushing Anna out! Thankfully Isaac saved me eventually and the nurse from the labor and delivery ward saw me and said they need to stop asking questions and wheel me immediately to the right floor. Thank God! They checked me and ran out looking for the doctor. I think I probably had about 2 contractions on the bed before I started to push.

Did I mention how fast this labor was? Get this! I pushed Anna out in ONE contraction. She practically flew out! I remember with William that the breaks between pushing contraction were longer and restful, but I never got a rest. It was like 5 minutes of feeling a constant urge to push. Every time I took a deep breath to push, the urge was there. And I screamed, let me tell you! Anyone who heard me would think I was dying. I will never have a home birth even if that was my only reason.

Looking back on this labor, these are my thoughts:

1. I feel empowered. More so than with William's labor. I really did it on my own. And I wasn't ready to give up until I was almost done. I know I can do it again next time. I'm not sure I won't be afraid in the future, but I'll know that I have the power in me (Gosh, that sounds SOOOO humanistic to say!) to handle the pain.

2. The downside of doing it on my own was that I was incredibly lonely. I only remember Isaac sitting with me through a handful of contractions. When things got scary, he still wasn't there and when I was in the hospital, he was always talking to someone else. In the future, I will plan on waking him up sooner and asking him to get ready in 15 minutes and then sit with me and not chat with other people. I don't blame him. I never told him what I wanted. But in those long contractions and brief breaks, I couldn't tell him anything. But the saddest part of Anna's birth to me is that loneliness.

3. We need to go to the hospital a lot sooner next time! We only had 20 minutes in the hospital before Anna was in our arms.

It was a crazy experience, but I'm glad it is done. And I love having two children!