Photo Week #42
Things enjoyed this week:
- Junie and I stayed at my parents' house this past week while Jeremiah was on his company retreat, and we hosted Justine and the Won boys for dinner one night. It felt like a treat for everyone. (Plus for dessert we had Trader Joe's mini ice cream cones which are really the perfect size dessert.)
I also stopped pumping this week - not sure if I count this as something that should go in the "enjoyed" section... it's definitely bittersweet. I'm free from pumping!! That's the great part. I have enjoyed how easy it is to just bring water and formula for bottle feeding when out and about, and not have to worry about keeping breast milk in the cooler bag or worry about finding hot water to heat the bottle. But it does add a lot of extra things we have to bring and plan for, rather than just breastfeeding directly - but then again, maybe we'll be successful weaning her off a bottle and formula around one year anyways, which is just in a couple of months from now. So this too shall pass. I took a photo of the last bag of frozen milk, the last bottle of pumped milk, and tried to get a photo of Junie drinking that last bottle... but it was all pretty anticlimactic, haha. I don't know what I was expecting.
On social media, I often hear this phrase of "romanticizing your life" getting thrown around - is that still trendy? I feel like it's supposed to be a way to celebrate and appreciated the small moments in life, which sounds good, but... social media makes it seem like it's just about the aesthetics of the moment. Maybe that is too harsh of me to think. Maybe I need to put in more of my own effort to make it more about the moment and less about the aesthetics. Parenting and motherhood are easy target topics for this sort of romanticization - there are just so many moments, big and small, that should be appreciated.
It's probably just a me thing, haha. I think I feel disappointed when the small moments don't seem as special or fun as they should be, and so I go too far in the other direction where I don't want to even try because I don't want to be disappointed, and then I feel guilty again as time continues to pass since obviously, you can never go back. The vicious cycle of disappointment, apathy, and then guilt. Which is why my October goal was to try and enjoy things again, since I was in that pit of apathy. Not sure yet how successful this experiment was, since it seems like the things I've enjoyed the most has just been... good food.
So anyways, after those two paragraphs of word vomit trying to reason with myself about whether or not I should try to make every moment meaningful, I will just admit - I am disappointed that ending this pumping/breastfeeding journey was anticlimactic. I am glad we went to the pumpkin patch and did the whole thing of dressing up and trying to look like fall, because we did get cute photos.
I am still on the fence of whether or not I should try and plan a first birthday party for Junie. Currently my feeling is no because I doubt I will enjoy the planning and worrying about it - and it's hard to say whether or not I would enjoy the actual event itself. But then I think - Would Junie have fun? Maybe? Should I plan something so that other people (ie grandparents, relatives, family friends) have fun? Do I have a responsibility for other people's fun? Is it selfish of me to deprive someone (Junie or otherwise) of a first birthday party?
And so then I feel selfish and start to think I should just plan a first birthday party. I guess stay tuned.
Sorry this post is all over the place - I am just tired and also don't want to do actual work so... decided to spend extra time attempting to put into words all these feelings I feel. Life is hard!