Bringing Home Baby Girl👶🏼💛

On April 5th 2022 our beautiful Caroline Beth House came into this world at 7:35pm. The world wind of emotions I felt is undescribable as her little scream belted out and she was placed onto my chest. To say I was speechless was an understatement, I was in awe of her. Every part of her, from her tiny hands and feet to her beautiful head full of hair. She was perfection in its purest form. 💛

Our Story

On April 4th (our two year anniversary💕) I headed to my Dr. for our 38 week check up. We did an ultrasound to measure how baby girl was doing, she had been on the smaller side my whole pregnancy so we checked on her every month. To my surprise though we found out that we were needing to be induced and needed to head to the hospital that night. Apparently she had officially ran out of room in my belly and wasn’t going to have enough fluid to last her the next two weeks! Such a scary moment as in my head I knew this day was coming but to have it happen right then and there, my stomach dropped.
We got to the hospital at 6pm and started the process of getting everything set up. I had nurses in and out, pocking and hooking me up for at least an hour and half.😳 My husband and I shared our anniversary meal/last meal just us two and then the fun began! Ha…fun😐

Chick-fil-A to the rescue😂


We started the inducing drip at 7:30 and 24hours, almost exactly, from the start of the inducing we welcomed our beautiful Baby girl Caroline Beth House into this world 🥺 5lbs 10oz and 19in long! She was so perfect in every way and we couldn’t believe how lucky we got.


The whole experience was so crazy and surreal, been expecting baby Girl to come for 9 Months and now she was actually here!!🤯 Our perfect little bundle of joy was here and we couldn’t put her down!

One of my absolutely favorite pictures of them🥺

Delivery overall wasn’t as scary as I thought, definitely not easy, but I had such an amazing team of nurses and my husband that never left my side (besides to go get us food😂) that I felt so relaxed and empowered going into delivering her. We stayed two nights in the hospital just to make sure baby girl was good to go and then we finally got to head home!

Our first Family picture👨‍👩‍👧

BEING HOME

We’ve been home almost a month now and adjusting to new parents life has definitely been a learning curve. I believe we got extremely blessed with Caroline as she really is so sweet and not a super fussy baby (right now at least🙃) but we are working on figuring out sleep schedules and our new home life.

Seeing her grow over these last few weeks though has already killed me. I want her to grow and can’t wait to see the beautiful girl she grows into but I also don’t want her to get any bigger! She is my little Care Bear🐻 and I want her to be itty bitty forever!!😭

I am so excited for this next step in our lives, the greatest adventure we could ever go on is going to be raising her and getting to have our family grow.

Here’s to the small moments of having dreams really do come true!💕

Top Baby Gifts 👶🏼

Over the last few weeks we have got and received so many wonderful gift from our baby shower, friends and family surprising us, and we ourselves stocking up on wanted items. I wanted to share a list of some of our favorite gifts we have received as I know I have a few expecting mommy friends, and if your anything like me, having a list is always helpful! These are great baby shower gifts or if you know a Mamma that would love one of these share this with her! All items below will have links to where to buy as well🥰

First Gift:

Changing Station Diaper Bag – Hands down best Diaper Bag out there😍
No more having to change baby on those nasty restaurant stations, or worrying if your at someone’s house not having a spot! This bag is perfect for any Mamma!
It is super easy carrier, has so much space and sooo many pockets to help keep organized!
Insulated bottle pockets, four deep pockets on the inside, and even a pocket on the back for wallets and other important items!
Also, it can charge your phone🤯 it has a built in outlet to plug straight into your phone and charge on the go!
But the absolute best part… it’s a changing station!!! 😍 It has a pop out station that is super easy to put together!
If your a Mamma looking for a diaper bag or know one that needs one definitely look into this one!! Ours was a gift off Amazon and hands down one of my top favorite gifts!!💛

Second Gift

Baby Brew Bottle Warmer – This product was seriously mind blowing! It’s a portable bottle warmer that can heat breast milk or formula bottles anywhere anytime! 🍼 It is so small and compact that it fits perfectly in virtually any diaper bag! It has an 8 hour charge life and can heat a bottle in about 5-7 minutes! 😆 That is huge for any Mamma on the go trying to hurry and get baby that yummy foods! It has temperature settings specifically for breast milk, formula, and other liquids too! 🌡 While I only got the warmer, Baby Brew also has a formula dispenser that puts the perfect amount of formula in your bottle with just one little push! One thing to keep in mind though is the warmer only fits certian bottle brands buy itself, like I have found it fits Avent bottles just fine but if you use a different brand you will need to get an adapter. Their site has a list of all the adapters they currently have in stock, most are all common bottle brands but definitely want to check that before purchasing!!😘

Third Gift

Medline Thermometer – I know a thermometer doesn’t sound like an exciting gift but this was so cool to me. It is a head and ear thermometer that talks out loud to you, buuuut it also reads food!!🤯 You can put it up to any bottle and it will let you know how hot it is. This is amazing for trying to heat those bottles in the middle of the night, being half asleep, and then worrying if it’s too hot or cold for baby. Definitely a great baby shower gift!

Fourth Gift

Travel Highchair – Not going to lie, this was probably one of the first gifts I added to our registry and we wound up getting it ourselves cause I wanted it sooo bad!😂 It is a travel highchair that you can take to restaurants, friends or family members houses, or just use at your table. It latches onto almost any table and tightens to keep it in place. Definitely make sure you check the tables before you use and put baby in, some round tables they advised against using it and the table itself needs to be thick enough to really get a good grib. Of course always make sure it is latched and secure before baby goes in as well! 👶🏼 We tried it on our counter and it worked perfectly though and seriously would not budge at all!!

Fifth Gift

Nanobebe Bottle Starter Set – This was the first and only bottle set we had on our registry. It comes with so many great goodies and I love that it is specially designed for breast milk! The bottles themselves are so small and compacted that they are great for travel and great for storage. This set also comes with a bottle warming bowl so you can set the bottles in it to heat up instead of having to run under a faucet! The starter set comes with a few breast milk storage bags but we also purchased the Breast milk storage container. Its a shelve that goes in the freezer and is amazing too to help to stay organized and keep all your packs together. If your looking for a great little bottle starter set I definitely recommend checking them out! ☺️

Sixth Gift

Mommy Hospital Bag – So this was definitely something I bought myself😬 what can I say I needed a little spoilness, but this would also be an amazing baby shower gift! A lot of people don’t think to get the Mommy anything for the actual hospital trip or for postpartum but I promise she would absolutely die to have something just for her on the side💛 This bag was my top choice as I have seen other moms pack and use it and the amount of items it holds is absolutely insane! Now while we will have baby girls clothes separate in her own bag this thing definitely could hold all mine and her’s, plus more, no problem! Highly recommend getting you one cause it’s not only perfect for the hospital delivery, it makes for an amazing vacation bag!

Links to Gifts Below:

I would love to hear your feedback on any of these products!! Please feel free to message me anytime on here or on any of my social media sites! I put links to them below so you can follow along with us on this beautiful journey🥰

https://www.instagram.com/malmariehouse/

https://www.facebook.com/PeaceOut121310

Keeping Mommy and Baby Happy and Healthy

There is nothing more ever mother wants than for their babies to be happy and healthy, specially while in the womb. The not being able to physically see them for those nine months is agonizing, there is constant worry and hoping that everything is ok and baby is growing the way they are supposed too be. Of course we have check ups but if your anything like me then the knot in your chest before the doctor says, “everything looks great”, is always there right before those appointments.

I can’t help it, I’m a worry wart! I’ve always been that way but specially since this is my first pregancy and EVERYTHING I am going through is completely new to me and honestly a little overwhelming at times. I don’t just worry, I overthink. I know, not a good combination to have for a new Mom. Thankfully, I haven’t reached the googling every symptom yet so there’s a relief there, but I do think about everything I do, everything I don’t do, everything I eat or drink, everything I haven’t planned ahead for, just all of it!

I try really hard to make sure to calm myself down and know that, one, everything I’m feeling is normal. Two, the more I stress, the more baby stresses so breath. And three, ITS OK! I don’t have to be 100% perfect for this pregancy. If I slip and eat a deli sandwich, which I do try to make sure is fresh at least, its okay. If I wind up drinking two cups of coffee and then some sweet tea all in the same day, it’s okay! I don’t have to constantly keep track of every single thing, and you shouldn’t either! We will drive ourselves mad trying too!

Now, yes it’s important to know what you do and put into your body! It’s important to make sure you are giving baby all the good nutrition they need to grow healthy and happy. They may not be here yet but our jobs as mother’s starts the day we find out about them. So with that I do try and make sure I am eating good proteins, vegetables, and fats. I try to make sure I stay active throughout the week, cause as much as I love my job, I sit and stare at a screen all day for five days a week, so definitely not the best for you in the being active department. Every week is different and it doesn’t always go according to how I want, but I try, everyday I try, cause it’s not just me it’s our baby girl that I have to be healthy for. It’s knowing that if I can push myself now and do this for her there’s nothing stopping me for making this a life style and being better for her when she does get here.

I wanted to include the link to my favorite online workouts, its completely free, and the instructor is seriously amazing! She is my goals for keeping healthy and happy while having little ones.

https://youtube.com/c/PregnancyandPostpartumTV

Her channel, which is on YouTube, has a variety of different workouts for prenatal, pregancy, and postpartum Moms. She has fitness workouts, yoga classes, and a whole lot of tips and tricks on delivery! She even has a nutrition guide to help for meals. Her workouts aren’t crazy either, there are different ones for each stage of pregancy and most with little to no difficulty!

I would highly recommend checking her out and seeing all the different ways to stay active during your pregancy. Rather it being getting a good class in once or twice a week or even just taking some time for yourself to go on a walk each day. Staying active is key to keeping yourself and baby healthy and happy!

Below are a few of the videos thats are my go to for reference!

Catching Up – A lot Has Happened

Oh gosh…as I look at my last post, from August mind you, I realize I absolutely suck at keeping up with anything! Specially now days when everything seems to be going on at once and when one thing is done another thing pops up.

I told myself I wanted this blog to be my outlit, my go to when I needed to escape from everything else. I wanted this to be an Oasis for others to come and feel understood. I wanted this to be a fun and exciting “just mine” project that I grew one day into something more…Well when you never update anything it’s kinda hard to have that, isn’t it?? 🙃

I suck at keeping things up. I always come up with these awesome plans or creative ideas but my follow through is almost non-existent. I mean, I could sit here and blame it on work, or family, but we all know those are just excuses we tell ourselves to help make ourselves feel better.

I will say though these last few months definitely have been some of the craziest we’ve ever been through…and we just bought a house six months ago…

We are expecting our first little Girl next April!!

This is something we have been wanting for a while now and we found out in August that she will soon be here!! The level of excitement we have is seriously indescribable! From praying and wishing she would come to the day the doctor walked in and said, “well your pregnancy test came back positive,” we haven’t stopped smiling.

We had our gender reveal last month and found out our little pumpkin was going to be a sweet baby girl!! 🥰

So yeah, we’ve been a little busy with all the excitement and the parties and the constant planning of what to do next…which is still a work in progress, and one I’ve been told is never ending, but I know I haven’t taken the time for myself here, for all of you, and I do hope that I can get back to it. I hope that I can squeeze just a little bit more of me into my day and focus on this place of mine that really does bring me joy. So I hope you stay tuned and as always feel free to reach out anytime!

Can’t wait to update you again with all the holiday fun we will have this year!! 🎄 Blessed Be!

A Little Better Everyday

It only takes one moment, one second, of your day to make it better. Sometimes life feels like an overwhelming mix of to-dos and emotions. We forget that we essentially are in control. We go through life thinking that everything has to be done now, or how we feel about something is the only way we can feel. This is simply not true. You have the power to change your perspective. You have the control to decide what is allowed in your life and your mind.

If your feeling down, find the things that make you smile and do it! If your feeling sick, find what helps and do it! If your feeling tired, do what is best for you and find your rest! No matter what it is, no matter if its weird or crazy or unconventional, do it! Never close yourself off from finding the things that bring you happiness or peace or health due to anyone or anything! You matter! Your thoughts matter! Your health matters! Your peace matters!

Words are important, so say it with me…YOU MATTER!!

Do whatever you need to prove that to yourself today!

What To Write About When You Don’t Know What To Write About

Laying here I keep wanting to write to you about Motivation, or Hope, or give you some kind of inspirational words to help you through the day. Honestly I got nothing right now though. I know writers aren’t supposed to tell their readers they have nothing to give them, but really all I have are these words.

I promised myself I would be consistent in my writing though and I would push even when I’ve lost motivation. I promised I wouldn’t loose the confidence I found in myself when I got the courage to start this blog.

So here I am.

Pushing through to make sure I can say, “I did it”, at the end of the day!

And I can!

I don’t know if you will find motivation, or hope, or if it’ll help get you through the day, but these are the words I have for you.

Sometimes having nothing to write about can be a great thing to write about.

My Hope For You

My hope for you is this….

I hope you wake up with the most energy you’ve had in years!

I hope your body feels amazing and any pain you feel vanishes!

I hope you look into the mirror and smile when you see yourself in the mornings!

I hope you yell how amazing and beautiful you are to yourself! Cause you are and words are important!

I hope you take a moment for yourself today and just reflect on everything you have overcome and everything you have been blessed with!

I hope your mind finds peace and you breath knowing you are okay! You deserve to breath!

I hope the stress you have melts away with every passing moment!

I hope you find comfort in knowing that you are loved and needed for this world to grow! Never believe anything less!

I hope you know you are not alone! I am here for you.

My hope for you is to simply be happy, and to find happiness in every moment you need!