Politics, Stories
Sarah Holland
Campaign Update: March

"How's the campaign going?"

It's the question I get most often. It's also the question I'm never quite sure how to answer.

Good? ... Great! ... Your guess is as good as mine. ... We'll see May 17th!

The truth - I suppose - all depends on what you're measuring. 

Campaign Update: March
Celebrations
Sarah Holland
Felix's Winter ONE-derland

This weekend we hosted a Winter ONE-derland party in honor of Felix's first birthday. Considering this child was born during a snow, it seemed like an appropriate theme. Well, the weather had other plans and it was 70 and sunny! I could have hosted the dang party outside! 

Felix's Winter ONE-derland
Stories
Sarah Holland
Ruby

For my 30th birthday, I created a list of 30 things I wanted to do. One was to write a historical fiction short story. This is the story and as Ruby keeps calling to me here lately. I thought I'd share it here. 

Ruby
Food
Sarah Holland
Nicholas's Freezer to Crockpot Meals

One of Nicholas's New Year's resolutions was to try freezer meals. He'd prepped meals for the week on and off through 2015 and wanted to see how it would work to prepare an entire month's worth. Then, we could just pull a meal from the deep freeze, throw it in the crockpot, and on a busy day dinner would be waiting for us.

Nicholas's Freezer to Crockpot Meals
What I Learned
Sarah Holland
5 things I learned in January

Dear 2016, Slow. Up. I just picked my word for the year and finished off my New Year's Eve champagne like five minutes ago and now it's two days until February!

Whew.

5 things I learned in January

labor and delivery

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My Postpartum Paradise (or why you should always accept help after giving birth)

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After Griffin was born, we stayed at my mom’s house for two weeks. At the time, it was a matter of necessity. We had been living with my parents for several months upon moving back to Paducah and had not yet moved in to our new home.

My mom is a public school librarian and she was off for the summer. So, I basically had around-the-clock care even after Nicholas went back to work. My mom brought me water while I breastfed, did the laundry, cooked our meals, and held the baby while we slept.

It was glorious. 

Felix's Birth Story

The word STORY seems a bit of a stretch for something that took less than two hours but nothing about this child's arrival fit the mold so we'll just go with it. 

Let's begin at the beginning. Both of my other births began in the morning after a nice full night's rest. Not this one! I woke up around 12:35 am with a hard belly. I thought maybe I just had to pee but knew it was odd because I almost never have Braxton Hicks contractions in the middle of the night. On the walk back from the bathroom, I realized the hard belly was accompanied by the slightest bit of cramping. 

So, I laid down and waited to see if I would have another one. Sure enough, a few minutes later the hard belly made another appearance - this time with WAY more cramping. I decided to download a contraction counter app and call my midwife. 

"I can't get out of my driveway," she replied when I told her I was in labor. 

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