Before Abby was home, I wondered, “Is it harder to have a baby in the NICU or to have a ‘newborn’ at home?”. The answer to that questions is definitely having a baby in the NICU.

However, it’s still hard to have a newborn at home. The primary difference is that, while living in NICU survival mode, we didn’t do anything but eat, sleep, and visit Abby. Now that we’re all together at home, we’re back to our usually activities: cleaning, laundry, exercising, keeping in touch with family and friends… And, to be completely honest, I just can’t keep up.

Our Christmas tree is still up. I’ll excuse that by saying that my parents are coming this weekend to do our own little Christmas. But really, we just haven’t had a chance to take it down.

We never finished moving in. A lot of generous people helped us move, unpack, and even organize. And in our four months in this apartment, I haven’t changed a thing. Our bedroom is a mess, and we can’t find the things we need when we need them. For a routine-thriving-place-for-everything mom like me, this gets really annoying. And I can’t keep up with the messes. I struggle to clean up Lydia’s messes. I struggle to clean up Abby’s messes. And I struggle to clean up Dan and My own messes. We have messes everywhere!!!

But most of all, I can’t keep up with these little ones. With all my time going to the cleaning of messes and searching for missing items, I don’t get to spend much time with my girls.

For all of these reasons, and probably more, I will be cutting back on the blogging starting next week. Not a lot, but a little. For anyone who caught on to my pattern and checks this blog every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, please have patience. I’ll settle into a new pattern, probably twice a week. And with the extra time I’ll be tackling some of those messes and spending more time with our little munchkins.

10. Wasted Seasons

This is one of Dan’s favorite posts of the year.

9. Anniversary Date

A sweet story of a special date just days before Abby was born.

8. Suffering and the Sovereignty of God

Some thoughts on the lessons I’ve learned this year about suffering.

7. Ten Things I’ve Learned in Three Years of Marriage

An anniversary post.

6. Abby is Home!

This was the highlight of our year!

5. A Letter from Abby

Abby hijacked my blog one day and wrote this sweet letter of thanks.

4. Abigail’s Birth Story

A detailed account of the day Abby was born.

3. The Birth Story I’ll Never Tell

In this post, I shared why we will never have the birth story we had always hoped for, and how God helped us to accept the situation.

2. Abby Update: 66 Days Old

This is the day Abigail was transferred from St. Joe’s over to UofM Mott’s Children’s Hospital due to her excessive spit up and weight loss over the past several weeks.

1. Introducing Abigail Faith

Was anyone surprised? This was the first post published after Abby was born announcing her early birth at just 28 and a half weeks.