Motherly Instinct

When I first found out I was pregnant with my oldest I knew there were going to be a lot of opinions and unwanted advice thrown at me. I also knew that it would be hard for me and my husband to sift through the information and figure out what was in the best interest of our children and what worked best for us. It was a long hard lesson and we made many "mistakes" along the way that have made us both more confident and better parents. Needless to say, this second time around we are the ones in control and refuse to be swayed by others.
It is hardest when you're doing differently what your family is telling you how something should be done. Granted, this really hasn't happened too much as we've been blessed with support from both sides, but still I'm sure there are things that I have done as a mother that have left family rolling their eyes or disagreeing with me. We've learned that this is ok though because they mean well and give advice out of love (or at least I think). Maybe the advice they gave wasn't wrong when they went through this but it doesn't mean it's right for us. My husband and I struggled a lot in the beginning. As adults we had to realize that we were ADULTS. We are well-educated and continue to do research, not just on the internet but from many sources and weigh both the pros and cons with everything. I think except for breastfeeding we seriously sought out every option and considered it before figuring out what we would do...and we changed things as we saw one thing or another work or not work. I think it's important to admit when maybe it's time to try something else.l

Adding a blog button

You know those little blog buttons you see on the side bars of people's blogs? Well I've been wanting one for sometime but the thought of figuring it all out completely overwhelmed me. After 2 full and frustrating days of googling instructions and trying to upload it with the picture showing, I have finally done it!

Here are easy step by step instructions:
Thank you to Musings of a Housewife for her (finally!) easy-for-anyone-to-do instructions!

• First you'll want to create your button.

Use either Picasa or Photobucket.
For mine, I used Picasa to create it, but then uploaded it into Photobucket for the URL you will need. At least for me, this was the only way I got the button to show up without hyperlinks.
Make sure that when you create it, it's a square. At the end, resize it to either 125x125 pixels or 150x150 pixels. Save it and upload. Like I said, I saved it on my computer in my pictures folder, then uploaded it to Photobucket.
You can use different software and pay to get images, but I had an image already so didn't bother.

• For the button only. Replace the Web Page URL with the link to your blog. Make sure you keep the quotation marks! Replace the Image URL with the IMG code (for Photobucket). Delete the brackets [IMG] before and after the URL. Make sure you don't delete the quotation marks!

<a href="Web Page URL"><img src="Image URL"></a>

• For the button with the drop box for the code (This allows others to snatch your code to put on their blog. This is an easy way for others to go to your blog, by simply clicking on your button in someone else's blog!)

This is what mine looks like (replace all of my info with yours, using above instructions for blog and image URL):

<a href="http://lifewellloved.blogspot.com/%22%3E%3Cimg src="http://i1131.photobucket.com/albums/m555/created2bholy/myblogbutton.jpg" border="0" /></a><p><textarea
2 class="tiny" name="1" rows="3" cols="18"><br /><a href="http://lifewellloved.blogspot.com/%22%3E%3Cimg
3 src="http://i1131.photobucket.com/albums/m555/created2bholy/myblogbutton.jpg" border="0" /></a></textarea></p>

Voila!

Thank you!

 

 I received my 1st blogging award yesterday from my sister-in-law! She began blogging a few months before me and after seeing how she and our other SIL blogged as a sort of journaling it sounded like a good idea.

There are rules for me to follow in posting this so I'm going to jump right into it:

1) Tell who gave it to you. My sister-in-law, one of my closest friends and supports in motherhood. She and I grew up together. I love that our little girls will grow up together and I love that she and I are mommys together. It makes the tough times easier when you have someone who thinks the same way you do and is always encouraging- this is what she is for me. Check out her blog here!

2) Link back to their blog.

3) Pass it on to five more bloggers. 

• A Gift Universe
• The Guggie Daily
• Feels Like Home
• Raising Olives
• Unschool Preschool

4) Name someone who has really affected you in some way. Well I always seem to mention my husband, so this time I'll choose my mom. She is my other rock and support. I trust my girls with her completely and know they're always in good hands when with her. On top of this, she one of my best friends and we often do things like "gym dates", and when time allows coffee and movie dates. She's fun to simply hang out with too- we both love to talk so the conversation is always flowing. (I think my husband and dad like it because all they have to do is listen...or maybe not...we might not notice if they're ignoring us, but I don't think they do ;) )

If you've been awarded today, here's how to add it to your profile:

Click on the picture and save it to your computer.

Upload it onto your blog anywhere you'd like. 

Some people have separate pages for awards; others display them using a gadget on the side.

Next, spread it to 5 other people!

Let them know you've given it to them. :)