A little piece of heaven.

I had the most incredible moment tonight.

These moments come ever so often, but tonight I just felt the need to reflect on it. It was the kind of moment where you take pause, look intently, and try to soak it in with the hopes of never forgetting it.

After dinner, I was sitting across the family room from Liana and we were watching one of her Baby Einstein videos. I looked up to see her sitting next to Bauer on the couch, petting him, holding her baby, and watching ever so intently.

And in that split second, I felt my heart just melt.

I looked at her and all I could think was, "How did I get this lucky?"

Two years ago, no one could have ever prepared me for the seriously intense emotions of motherhood. No one could have prepared me for the pure joy I feel when I look at my little girls face. For the pain I feel when she's sad or hurting. For the fear that lives in my heart knowing that I won't always be able to protect her from the evils of the world. And no one could have ever prepared me for how amazingly proud of her I am.

Just about every time I look at her face, Taylor Swift comes to mind.... "You are the best thing that's ever been mine."

Because she is. She is the most wonderful gift I've ever been given. She is the biggest blessing in my life. She keeps my feet grounded. She keeps my heart beating. She gives me the strength to take on the world because I want it to be better for her. My heart aches for her when we're apart (even though that time is well-needed by both of us) and feels instantly whole when she's near me again. I love her so much that it scares me to my core at times. She makes me feel vulnerable in a way I never imagined I could.

This little girl has changed me in ways I never knew possible. Her being here has made my whole life worthwhile.... at the ripe age of 27.

I am so honored to call her mine. So blessed. So happy. So madly in love. So really, truly, thankful.

My heart is overflowing.

Tonight, I wished I could bottle her up and keep her 22 months forever. Because Liana Grace, at 22 months, is my little piece of heaven on earth.

I am SO smitten with this child of mine.

(Too bad she couldn't look AT the camera with that smile, huh?!) ;)

Words of Wisdom Wednesday.

It is not easy … to wait. Waiting is what the hunter does, and the poet and the slugger. He waits for the moment of inevitability and fate and then he swings, or shoots, or takes up the pen to put down a line. They don’t teach us to wait in America; they teach us to grab. But waiting is what we do when we are looking for something beautiful, when we are looking for an end to our sorrow. Nothing is infinite in life, not even sorrow. You just have to wait. -Cary Tennis

Whatever you do in life will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it because you can't know. You can't ever really know the meaning of your life. And you don't need to. Just know that your life has a meaning... Every life has a meaning, whether it lasts one hundred years or one hundred seconds. Every life... And every death... changes the world in its own way. Ghandi knew this. He knew his life would mean something to someone, somewhere, somehow. And he knew with as much certainty that he could never know that meaning. He understood that enjoying life should be of much greater concern then understanding it. And so do I. You can't know. So don't take it for granted, but don't take it too seriously.Don't postpone what you want. Don't leave anything misunderstood. Make sure the people you care about know. Make sure they know how you really feel, because just like that... it could end. -Remember Me

Not much to report...

Wow... two weeks since I last posted? I guess not much is going on over here.

December was a tough month to get through. You know how they say that sometimes things get worse before they get better? Well I'd say that's the truth. November, I was numb. December, I was most certainly not. Everything hurt.... all the reminders.... and the fact that we would've found out the baby's gender at the end of the month brought everything to a head. I just found myself missing so badly what would've been.

But now January? January seems to be looking up. I still think about our baby every.single.day. But, the pain is less. I just hope that the rug doesn't get pulled out from under me again because the moments in which it does are the most paralyzing.

Grief is such a tricky thing to maneuver, I tell you. So I'm just very hopeful that I'm coming out of this "funk" and really, truly, finally taking steps forward without taking any back.

Liana is doing amazing things these days.... talking in 3 or 4 word sentences. Able to clearly articulate what she wants almost all the time. Turning into a little domestic diva (where in the world she gets that from, I'll never know!) as she "cooks" for us in her kitchenette set she got from Nana & Papa for Christmas. She's taking more and more interest in the potty, though just short of the point where she'll actually take her pants off to sit on it. She's a little helper with one of her favorite things being to help unload the dishwasher each day. Last weekend, Mike took her sledding for the first time and she LOVED IT! And to top it all off, she's a mama's girl through and through right now... daddy is good and all, but mommy takes the cake. I struggle with seeing her call for me when Mike's standing right there trying to fill whatever need she has at the moment but I know that this will pass.

It's just so amazing to see my baby girl turning into a little girl right before my eyes. To see her personality flourish. I've said it before and I'll say it again.... every stage she reaches seems like the best. But then she moves onto the next and I'm in love all over again.

My personality has always been the kind that's more excited for what's still to come rather than being focused on the here and now. But not with her. While I'm so excited to see what she'll be like when she's three...four... or five... I love this little girl that stands before me today. With every fiber of my being. Some days, I want to keep her 22 months forever. But the reality is... I want to see her grow. I want to see the little girl she's destined to become. Just not too quickly.

We're eagerly awaiting the arrival of my best friends baby this month. But to be honest, no one in this house is more eager about it than me. I keep waiting for the "Oh my God Haley, I'm in labor for real this time!" call. These last few months have been full of babies being born.... baby Easton in November, Austin & Dylan in December, and now baby Kranz this month. I'm truthfully joyful for my friends as they welcome their little ones into the world. And I know that at some point, they'll be joyful for me too. But for now, I'm content and happy with the life that I have.

Aside from that, life is pretty mundane around the Kadzban household these days. Which isn't necessarily a bad thing. :)

I'll leave you with some recent pics. Until next time!

 Snuggles with mama in her crib are amazing. Just don't mind my lack of makeup and nasty hair. ;)

 Loving the snow!

Wheeee! My little adventure seeker :)

2010.... in pictures and words.

Welcome to my favorite post of the year!

If you've been following my blog for some time, you know that this post has become a tradition for me. We may have a new URL this year, but the tradition continues. Enjoy. :)

January

We rang in the first month of the new year with high hopes for the year to come. "Domo 2k10" was our theme... just as it's been for the past two years! Our smiley baby starting pulling herself up on Christmas Eve 2009... and perfected it throughout this month. She also popped one tooth after another which made for some difficult days. Grandma VanKlompenberg passed away quite suddenly on the 15th  - a loss that was very difficult for the entire family. Liana also said her first word this month, "mama!", which melted me to my core. And finally, FINALLY, she sleeps through the night! Hallelujah!

February

Liana turned 11 months old near the end of this month which left me asking, "Where has the time gone?!" She took her first steps on February 15th and once she started walking, she never crawled again. She and I took our first trip of the year to the east side of the state to visit with the Kranz’s and celebrate Lily’s first birthday at the beginning of the month. After almost 2 years of having an empty formal dining room, Mike and I decided to make it into a playroom... the best decision ever. :) The kid added a few more words to her vocabulary this month - "Dada" and "Bow" (for Bauer, or any other dog).  We celebrated our first Valentines Day together as a family of three by doing nothing special at all seeing as I had to work all day. Towards the end of the month, I started to realize just how much working weekends was starting to wear on me but for the mean time, I stayed put.

March

My *new* favorite month of the year!!! Liana Grace turned 1 this month and I was in heaven with my angel baby. She changed so much in just a few short weeks… walking in full force, hair growing quickly, teeth coming in left and right, and chatting up a storm! All these new things made me fall even more deeply in love with my little girl than I already had… something I didn’t think was possible. Liana's birthday party fell on Saturday the 20th this year and we celebrated by having around 50 of our closest friends and family members over. The house was packed to capacity!! But our pumpkin did great and REALLY enjoyed her birthday cake. I spent the last day of the month cuddling up to little Liana as much as I possibly could so that I could get my "fix" in for the week to come....

April

Heaven on earth, here we come! After agonizing for months about leaving Liana, Mike and I took off on a jet plane and were headed to Jamaica on April 1^st. We spent 6 days with around 20 of our closest friends on the beautiful island in the sea in celebration of Jyme and Jessie’s wedding. While I had been so scared to leave Liana out of fear for how much I would miss her (amongst other things), I was too busy enjoying myself to care much once we were actually there. 

May

Welcome, warm weather! Oh how we Kadzban’s missed you. May wasn’t a great month for us Kadzban’s as I quickly realized following a Mother’s Day mishap (in which I was working… of course) that being on the weekend shift was no longer best for myself and our family. As a result, I asked my office to find me a position during the week and was quickly told none would be available. Frustrated and hurt, I began my job search which lasted for the next three months. The end of the month brought us a day spent together as a family, which Liana, Mike and I basked in. Liana and I joined our playgroup this month… something that became a HUGE blessing to us throughout the rest of the year. Mike ran in his third 5/3 Riverbank Run and finished better than he had hoped to. Kate and Marty announced this month that they were pregnant with baby #2 and while I was slightly jealous at first, I quickly found myself feeling pretty good about Kate once again taking the leadership role and becoming a "mommy of two" before I did. :)

June

Liana turned 15 months old at the end of the month... which reminded me of how crazy my mom must've been to have have TWO babies within this amount of time! (It really was never a "choice" as Brittany was a "wonderful" mistake... hahaha!) I celebrated my 27th birthday this month and knew from the get-go that 27 was gonna be no big deal. Liana and I soaked up the summer sunshine and loved every minute of it.

July

Like usual, Mike and I spent the first day of the month celebrating our anniversary… four years this year! The Fourth of July was especially fun this year because we had the whole day together and were able to do all the fun things I missed out on last year while I was working. The end of July brought some fabulous news to two of our closest friends.... Erik and Ashley learned they were pregnant with twins!!!

August

After months of serious stress and much anticipation, my office offered me a part time weekday position this month!!!  As Mike and I had been waiting to see what would happen for me professionally before starting to "try" for our second baby, this job offer gave us the green light to go ahead and do so. While I was quite nervous about having 2 children 2 years apart, my heart told me that things would be fine and that by the time May rolled around, I'd be ready. So, we took a leap of faith and decided to go for it. Also this month, Liana finally finished teething... at least for a while. She went from 4 teeth to 16 teeth in just 6 short months - slight insanity, if you ask me. Thankfully, my kid is a champ!! She ran her mama ragged to as she found her independence... which she exerted by getting into everything and climbing on top of everything!

September

This month was joyful for the Kadzban's... one of the very few for 2010. I felt blessed after feeling professionally settled for the first time in four months and after finding out on Labor Day, of all days, that we were in fact pregnant. I joyfully called Kate that morning, not even 15 minutes after I took the pregnancy test, to share our news as she had known all along that we had been "trying" throughout August. And because I have a big fat mouth, I also screamed our news to both my mom, Ashley, and Mo within the next 48 hours too!  Unfortunately, near the end of the month I went to email my playgroup ladies and share our good news but instead found out that Stephanie, one of the playgroup mama's who was 3 weeks farther along than I was, had just lost her baby at 10.5 weeks. So I kept quiet... praying that my fate would be different than hers. At the end of the month, we had a family mini photography session done in celebration of Liana's 18 month birthday. Mike also celebrated his 27th birthday this month. :)

October

This month started off well.... but ended almost as badly as it possibly could have. On the 4th we had our first ultrasound at almost 8 weeks. Dr. LaGrand showed us our baby and assured us that at 8 weeks, we only had a 5% chance of running into any complications. Finally, after weeks of nervousness and hesitation, I began to breathe more easily about the pregnancy. We "officially" announced it to the world on October 18th at 10 weeks and received an overwhelmingly positive response from our friends and family. However, that following Saturday, October 23rd, I began spotting while getting ready for work. After a full afternoon in the ER, we found out at 10 weeks 5 days that our baby had died shortly after our 8 week ultrasound and that my body was now beginning the process of miscarriage. After days of emotional agony, we lost the baby on the 28th. I've never experienced such physical and emotional pain in my life. October and beyond have been rough and sorrowful to my heart. We celebrated Halloween this month with Liana being a sweet little bunny rabbit. While she wasn't quite sure what the big deal was when we put on her costume the first few times, she became quite excited on Halloween night when she finally realized during her very first Trick or Treating adventure that there was something kind of fun about this holiday!! Finally, Mike also started his fourth (and final!) year of coaching hockey for East Grand Rapids HS with some major compromises met. 

November

Liana turned 20 months in November and with that milestone, she began to reach many others. Some of the big ones included starting to speak in sentences, using the potty for the first time, counting to 10, and singing part of her ABC's. November was emotionally brutal for me as I began the process of really dealing with our loss. To add to that, it seemed like lots of other mothers were also dealing with losses or stressors of their own which only compounded my grief. At times throughout the month (and in December as well) it felt like I was "over" the loss of our baby but then without notice, something would remind me of what "should have been" and my grief became raw all over again. We celebrated Thanksgiving with both families and we were thankful for some time with our families. Our friends Lindsey and Matt welcomed their little boy Easton into the world on the 24th and I learned very quickly while visiting that Liana wasn't ready to share mommy and daddy's attention with a new baby quite yet. I worked my last day as the weekend option social worker on November 6th and gained my freedom back to spend quality time with my husband. With this new schedule came a new understanding of just how wonderful co-parenting truly is. :)

December

Oh December... thank you for coming because your presence meant 2010 was nearly over. December was full of Christmas parties and while I love getting together with our friends and family, I wasn't feeling the spirit of Christmas this year. I spent the month being bitter and sad, which really impeded my ability to feel much joy (aside from the obvious joy I feel when watching Liana Grace). Mike and I attended our first Adults Only Playgroup Christmas Party the first weekend of the month and had a blast with the parents of our kiddos. The weekend of the 18th and 19th were celebrated with the Baker's and VanKlompenberg's at both annual Christmas parties. Also on the 19th, our friends Erik and Ashley welcomed their twin boys, Austin and Dylan, into the world. Christmas weekend, once it was finally here, was more joyful than I had expected it to be considering I would've been 20 weeks and finding out the gender of our baby that week. New Years Eve was spent with some of our best friends in the most ridiculous of fashions because, well that's how we do it. :)

I love looking back at the year through these posts... hence the reason it's usually my favorite post of the year. I love seeing where our life has taken us and I especially love to see Liana as she grows from month to month. Last January, I had high hopes for 2010. I hate to be so negative, but 2010 let me down in BIG ways. Yes, I got a new job that I love. Yes, Mike and I grew in our marriage. Yes, Liana is the greatest blessing of all and seeing her grow is the best gift I could ever ask for. But 2010 was one full of stress and grief for this heart of mine. There isn't a day that goes by that I don't miss our baby and where we would've been right now.

2011 is full of promise for us Kadzban's. It has to be. I'm so glad it's finally here and I can say "good riddance" to 2010. I hope that the Lord will bless us with another pregnancy in 2011... and that our third pregnancy ends with a baby in our arms and not just in our hearts. I can't wait to see my friends welcome their little ones into the world. I can't wait to feel professionally settled. I can't wait to see where Liana's third year of life takes her. And us. 

Happy New Year, everyone. May 2011 be full of blessings for us all!