I’m up after a loooooong nights sleep (guess I needed it!) still sitting in the dark in my room while Verity sleeps. She needed it too. You see, when she was trying to explore the possibility of biting my nipple yesterday, I had to pop her off and react to the pain to convince her to not try that again. She got wigged out. For about 5 hours she cried and wailed and started to nurse but then remembered my reaction and pushed me away. We laid in bed at midnight, her wailing, tired and hungry, while I just tried to coo at her and pray for her. Finally she fell asleep and so did I. When she woke up through the night, she nursed like a champ. She just needed a little sleep to ease the pain and confusion.

It works that way for us adults, too. The random thoughts and fears that my fatigue surfaces is often long forgotten when I wake up in the morning. Mercies are new.

I’m not enjoying the start of this year, I must admit. It’s put so much on my plate that I am really missing the simplicity of our days – doing some lessons, play, crafts, baking bread and working a few hours when Ethan goes to bed. The predictability and daily rhythm we were beginning to achieve at the end of last year has be upset by the upheavals that planning and moving creates.

An impending move away from Portland weighs on my mind. Part of me wants more time. I want to watch the tulips come up in all my familiar places. I want to sit outside working during the summer while Ethan and Verity and Caleb and Malachi play in the dirt and kiddie pool and get toasty. I want to crunch the leaves when we go trick-or-treating at familiar neighbors. I find such healing in the changing of seasons (something Florida did not offer me) and I hope that our “next place” will feel like home, and quickly! I am determined to put myself “out there” when we move. Ethan wants to know who our neighbors will be, and dog gone it we will bake them something and go introduce ourselves. We’ve already contacted a church we’d like to check out and are searching for home school groups, counselors, etc etc that we will have to find to keep ourselves from being “new” and isolated.

I tell myself it will be just a couple of years. I will look forward to seasons changing in a different area of America. It’s not that big of a change. Serenity tells me to accept, but my stubborn and fearful heart constantly quivers about starting over. Being present with my concerns helps, but sometimes I crave a distraction. Simply NOT thinking about it is a lofty goal

More work has come in this week, which helps. Work reminds me that life is still happening in the margins of all these big plans. Having something to focus on, and finish, is it’s own meditation.

The family and I took a break yesterday and went to see “The Princess and the Frog” – was way cute to see a Disney fairy tale set in New Orleans and the bayous (where my families are from and mostly still reside). While I am not a fan of Disney (at all!), it was nice to just go be entertained by a Cajun musical with Ethan while we split some popcorn. He loved it. I threw up the popcorn later but all in all it was a good outing. (My body was just pissed that I ate so much junk.)

Speaking of eating – oh my – this has been a pleasant moment or two to my days. I haven’t been able to pick up the knitting so reading is my next best escape. I’ve devoured some amazing books on nutrition and cooking. I don’t even know where to begin about that but yeah- let’s just say that I can’t wait til we move (there’s that word again!) and get settled in so I can start cooking my little heart out.

Now that I’m thinking of food, my tummy rumbling is reminding me that I haven’t had my tea and eggs yet. Must go!

More details soon, as plans shape up…

Everyday I work out the kinks of my life;
Breathe into them, feel them loosen.
It’s hard work, all this working.

Sometimes I grumble and complain.
Sometimes I boast in my own capabilities.
Sometimes I just fall over and give up.

I work out the kinks of my career,
learn new things that make my brain want to POP.
I work out the kinks of my heart,
learn new things that make my soul want to POP.

Even rest often feels like work:
taxing, stretching, challenging, moving, producing.

Today my work looked like this:

The challenge of getting myself and two young kids
ready to brace a chilly Fall morning, then
– catch the MAX, transfer to the bus –
Go to a yoga class,
Have a work meeting through lunchtime,
Carry my 20 pound baby 4 miles home because we don’t have change for the bus.
Break up the cock fights that burst forth every 2 minutes between Chris and Ethan,
Convince everyone to be civil,
Lose my civility by the 3rd mile (survival now: LET’S JUST MAKE IT HOME!)
Home for dinner: feed the baby, feed the preschooler, feed the husband, feed the mommy.
Get Ethan showered, Get baby showered, Get mommy showered.
Read 2 books, kiss Ethan goodnight.
Nurse for the umpteenth time today.
Work another few hours on random projects that have been on the backburner for friends.
Try to get to sleep at a decent hour…

Tomorrow work might look different:
a 9am – 2pm shift on the laptop,
learning things that make my brain want to go POP.
Followed by
grocery shopping,
cooking,
hosting a Harvest Party for our newly forming homegroup…

The next day, work will look different again, and then again…

Mixed through all of this work is internal work: prayers, self-talk, counseling, relationship building…

Even sleep is work: I work away the tensions of the day, I wake to nurse several times, I soothe a stuffy nosed baby, half-asleep rocking upright on my bed until she falls back asleep…

This is a season, a season for lots of hard work. They come, they go. Maybe winter will be restful: lots of painting, journaling, knitting, naps…

Update on Verity!

She’s roughly 4.5 months and weighs 18 pounds (gained 10 pounds since birth). She is also verifiable sitting up all the time now (one step closer to being able to ride my bike again!!!) I just grabbed the camera to capture this mile marker, as well as her hand/mouth coordination with grabbing her toys and stuff. She will be running around with her brother in NO TIME!

She still nurses whenever the heck she wants to, is worn 99% of the time, sleeps right next to me, and sleeps about 11pm through 4am straight most nights, wakes to nurse frequently in the early morning but stay asleep until about 9 or 10am. She then cat naps all day, literally only 20 minutes at a time sometimes. She is very similar to Ethan at this stage; loudly verbal, curious, and strong.

(sorry about the spit up in the video and the fact that its sideways! lol) This is kinda long and boring and there is no sound so basically if you are a grandparent, eat your heart out; all other readers, you can pretty much skip this entire post

Since my internet connection has been rather spotty tonight, I wasn’t able to get you some pictures of our camping trip due to long uploading times. One of the things I thought about a lot while camping was the way in which intentionally eating well was HARD. Camping, I found out, is considered by many to be like vacation or holidays- as in, no holds bar on crave eating, lol. I had brought only healthy things that for the most part adhered to my “whole foods” diet, (and some creamed raw honey to curb my sweet tooth!), but I still felt at the end of the trip like I was a bit bloated just from the bread for sandwiches, etc. I found people were curious as to why eggs, butter, sausage, etc was okay for me but not things like marshmallows or diet coke or french toast, so I had the opportunity to share how I’m trying to eat to get healthier (losing weight a plus). Aside from what I thought was a pretty healthy diet already, I’m doing more to add nutrient-dense, whole foods and cut, well, the opposite! In addition, I’m going to be using herbal teas to support my vital organs (to clear out and support things like my liver, hoping to also see my skin acne improve).

Anyway, with all the curiosity I decided to post something I had come up with to give me meal plan ideas and so on. It’s an example of what foods would be consumed on an ideal day in my diet. (And I don’t mean diet as in “South Beach” or “Watch Watchers” but in the traditional sense of the word- i.e. “the food I eat”.) I’ve done an okay job with some of these for about a year now, and I’ve gotten more focused about it in the last week or so. This week I plan to be truly intentional because I’m feeling my body saying something like, “I need support; mayday, mayday!”

Example of my ideal diet:

Breakfast:
• 8 oz. homemade raw milk kefir smoothie blended with organic frozen fruit and 1 tbsp of raw unfiltered local honey
• 1 slice of bacon cooked in coconut oil in cast iron skillet, a poached farm-fresh organic egg (yoke unoxidized / runny) on top of a bowl of quinoa and kale, along with a variety of seasonal sautéed veggies(squash, mushrooms, green beans, onion, sweet potato, etc.), sprinkled with nutritional yeast (for a vitamin b complex, etc) and topped with local hot sauce (peppers are anti-inflammatory)
• 6oz. organic fair-trade coffee, 2 tbsp’s whole raw milk

Lunch:

• canned tuna or wild caught salmon (with bones and skin) on salad of leafy greens and veggies, with homemade dressings like EVOO and vinegar, etc
• a fermented cod liver oil supplement – dosage to provide me with at least 20,000 IU vitamin A (needs for nursing women) and comparable vit D support (5-10,000 IU)
• Strong tea of dandelion leaf and root, red clover, red raspberry leaf and nettle (which is a liver, kidney and uterine tonic for hormone balancing and gentle cleansing – as I can’t do a full on liver detox while nursing)

Dinners:

• Stews (bone broth, veggies, pieces of chicken, etc), quinoa bowls (soaked black beans over sautéed kale and quinoa, etc), baked or sautéed meat and veggies (curries!), stuffed peppers, soaked legumes/beans/grains in moderation (quinoa or brown rice, lentils, etc)

Light or In-between meals and desserts:

• a baked sweet potato with skin and butter and raw honey on top
• celery with all natural no sugar peanut butter (ingredients should be peanuts, with or without salt), or raw tahini (almond butter)
• handful of mixed nuts (esp raw almonds)
• stove popped popcorn in coconut oil with nutritional yeast and sea salt (“real salt” brand for minerals)
• steamed edamame in the pod with sea salt
• Occasionally a small baked good, made without refined white flour or sugar.
• Kale chips (kale baked in extra virgin olive oil and sea salt)
• Seasonal variety of fruits and veggies (carrot sticks, sweet bell peppers, cucumber, baked sweet potato “fries”, etc.)
• Fresh, plain whole yogurt with some fruit, cinnamon, and raw unfiltered honey
• raw milk steamer (raw milk warmed on stove with raw honey, cinnamon, cardamon, nutmeg, cloves, fair trade organic powdered cocoa and homemade vanilla extract)



Not allowed:

• sugars– which is in everything from cereals to bars to breads to ketchup to peanut butter these days… (oh, and this includes every type of sweetener except raw honey – and even that can be too much of a good thing — I have to remind myself! lol I have been using Xylitol in small amounts here and there as well, like if I want a touch of sweetness to my coffee)
• refined processed foods (most things that are prepackaged, preprepared, etc fall into this category)
• empty carbs (refined white flour pastas, breads, scones, bagels, fruit juice, yogurts, baked goods, white rice, etc – this stuff WILL mess with your insulin and WILL make you store fat. Period. Tip: If something says “fat free” or “light” on the package, its a good idea to puke on it. Or put it back on the shelf, whatever.)
• trans fats (like hydrogenated vegetable oils) (fast food is a duh)
• foods with soy and corn additives (high fructose corn syrup, soy lecithin, so on)
• basically anything that is not a “whole food” or was not made with strictly whole, natural foods. If you can’t read the ingredients, you are better off not eat it (this includes “healthy” cereals, salad dressings, you name it). Look at nutrition labels and know what you are eating. Bonus: eating whole foods (organic or fresh and local when you can) is NOT more expensive than prepackaged NON-food when you actually look at it pound for pound unit comparison.
• In summation, give your body what it was made to consume. Food. Just food. Kinda easy to remember, heh?

of course, plenty of water is always a good idea as well

To add to my nourishing diet I am hoping to strengthen my body physically. This week I have 3 practice jogs for 30 minutes each before the big race (5k, lol) on Sunday for Race for the Cure. But my goal is to also begin to develop a backyard obstacle course with things like ropes, tires, a soccer ball, orange cones, so on, that I can run through several times a day with Ethan. In addition, I’ll be starting a yoga class.

So if my connection cooperates, I’ll be posting the pics tomorrow, stay tuned!

Well I’m at it again: researching my brain out for the health of myself and my family.

A few weeks ago I reported on my son’s cavities and what we were going to do to help support him. Since then, however, I’ve been reading and reading and I wanted to share a bit with you readers but I hadn’t gotten on here to formulate the post yet.

Then I also began feeling down about my baby weight. I’ve been running and not one person on our team of 5 has lost one pound. Luckily, I live with some one who was a fitness trainer for 4 years! So last night she sat with a gal from church and I and went over why running alone will not keep you healthy and what to do instead. She talked to us about pylometrics and how to have a workout that is not just going to make you thin, or ripped, but HEALTHY.

What I’m realizing over time is that the best diet and exercise is about supporting the body – about using the body you have and helping it be disease-free, injury-free, agile, powerful and energetic. Who doesn’t want that, right?

I wouldn’t say I have ever “struggled with my weight”, at least not on the outside. Because I am petite and have small bones, my weight usually looks normal on a scale. My body fat percentage, however, is another matter. My cholesterol? Also another matter. The leanest I’ve been and healthiest I have felt has been when I was supporting my body. In my first year married, I remember reading “The Good Fat” book and discovering the benefits of eating nutrient rich foods and good fats like unrefined coconut oil. I took vitamin supplements and mineral supplements of the highest grade I could find, like some special calcium supplement from the sea and fish oil, etc. I learned around the same time of my dietary intolerance to milk, which might have curtailed my further exploration of the road I was headed down towards optimum health.

Jump ahead, oh my, 6 years. Going pescatarian for a year was good for me. It taught me to use healthy ingredients and look more at what I was eating. It’s when I began again to rid my pantry of juices, boxed and canned things, all the processed gunk that plugs me up and doesn’t support my body. Instead we ate lots of legumes and whole grains (brown rice, quinoa, oats, etc) and then I began the adventure of sprouting beans and seeds and soaking grains and WHEW what a rush! lol

I managed to gain 15 pounds less with Verity than I did with Ethan, yet I was eating at least 2 eggs a day, butter, coconut oil, kefir smoothies, occasional meats (usually grass-fed, farm-raised) and so on. I began gaining towards the end and I believe its because I was unhappy internally, waiting around for the baby to come, and not taking my health into consideration. In short, I ate lots of cookies. LOL

Let me for a moment get back to Ethan’s dental issues, which has played in the background of my life these last few weeks.

I would have thought that trying to get Ethan away from anything with sugar would have been hard. Not that he ate candy and junk food, but I’m talking ANY refined sugar in ANYthing. Go out to the coffee shop and you will be hard pressed to find something with no sugars in the bread, peanut butter, etc. At home, he can have plain yogurt or fruit. No breads with added sugar, no cereals, nothing like that (not that we carry those things at the house anyway- except for Seth that is, lol. He has “special” dietary needs that I’m pretty sure includes Kix )

I was pretty inspired by Ethan’s willingness to give up sweets. He would tell some one offering him a cookie, “NO, I can’t have that, I have 3 cavities and THAT is sugar!” LOL

And because I was so aware of the sugar in these things, I began to make different choices too. Why would I sit around eating a sweet in front of him while he eats a piece of meat, or an egg, or a slice of bread with cream cheese? How unfair!

So I started weaning myself off my sweets too. Not even intentionally. I still love me some Coconut Bliss and Immaculate Baking Company, but I could go without it – especially to lose these last 15 pounds of baby weight. (Yep, that’s right – I have not lost ONE pound consistently since Verity was born four months ago.)

Okay, so combine the sugar-weaning with the losing-no-weight-running (that has also injured at least 2 of us so far with rolled ankles and skinned knees and so on! lol) and then my roommate showing me pylometrics and giving me tips about my individual body structure and which muscles I rely on too much (ahem- calves- ahem) and which ones I do NOTHING with (ahem-butt and belly-ahem) and ALL THIS AND MORE adds up to my getting a little more intentional about losing this weight and getting healthy!!!

SO, I leave you with this interview I read recently when doing our Azure Order this week. They interviewed Sally Fallon, author of Nourishing Traditions, and includes the basics of the traditional diets studied as well as a lot about tooth decay and flouride and so on. I learned a lot, and hopefully you will learn a lot too!

My plan? I’m going to be following the recommended eating for nursing women on the Weston Price website (including nothing refined and adding cod liver oil to my diet) and doing an exercise regime that supplements the running and yoga with high energy “play” movements in the backyard with Ethan a couple of times a day (the only way I can really find the time to do anything like pylometrics AND be a busy mom!)

On a related note, I can’t really do ANYTHING with my body right now because I have a pretty intense whip lash stiffness in my neck that has been there since I went to bed on Friday night. I feel pretty immobile and ridiculous that even typing on the computer hurts, so pray my neck loosens up SOON!

Here’s us at the Michael Jackson Remembrance Fest – slash- greatest hits video sing along that was hosted by the gals at our nearby community house (the White House? What are they callin themselves these days?). It was a fun little backyard gathering to honor MJ, filled with, oh, 15-20 Evergreeners primarily. We aren’t really big MJ fans, well, at all, actually! I read somewhere the description that summed it up perfectly; “genius musician – sucked at being a human being.” (Though, well now see, I take that back. One might argue he was great at being a human being, because in many ways we are all pretty much one “bad”, crotch grabbin, skin diseased mess of a species.)

And – yes, okay, FINE… I’ll admit it! I AM trying to dance in this shot…

Speaking of this shot… one of these days I’m going to put together an album of the most random places I have been pictured breastfeeding my daughter. LOL! In front of a waterfall, berry picking, and now THIS!

P.S. We started our 5K Race for the Cure training tonight! Misty, Amy, Lindsey and Vivian: out to heal the world one breast at a time! (Speaking of breasts, this breastfeedin’ mama needs a better sports bra if she plans to do ANYmore running ANYtime soon…)

I’m sorry but… maybe I’m crazy but…

Sometimes I think that TWO has been easier than ONE!

Who else could entertain baby with a live performance while I drink my coffee to ensure higher level brain function? (Bonus: check mark the “music education” portion of the homeschooling day… could this get any easier?!)

And, we are reaching some major new milestones – Verity is grasping for her little knot doll and knitted bunny I made her while pregnant and sucking on them! WOO HOO! (this gives my boobies a rest, you see…)
Oh the baby chub is adorable!

Last but not least, Verity is, at just 2 months, quite the dada’s girl. The cliche could never have been truer than when this kid lights up as soon as she hears him come in the door from work!

It’s on, baby.

Since posting will motivate me and hold me accountable, here goes:

My friend Amy and I (possibly Misty?!) have plans to follow the 9 week couch-to-5k program in order to run in the Race for the Cure 5k at the end of September.

YEEK!

I ran cross-country in a past life, but otherwise you’ll find I’m not the most athletic person in the world by any stretch of the imagination. BUT I’m excited to get started, maybe lose these 10 pounds of mid-section pregnancy fat, AND race for a good cause. Since I just found out this weekend that some one who, along with her husband, “discipled” Chris and I during our courtship 7 years ago just passed away from breast cancer /related (the stuff just seems to spread and spread) and left behind 4 beautiful young children, I will be thinking of her the whole time.

The Race for the Cure brochure

The Couch-to-5K Program

Wish me luck!

I mentioned last week that I’ve started reading “Mothering Without a Map”. It’s been very interesting, and hard for me to read without putting it down to sit and think on it before picking it up again. Clearly, I have mother issues, lol. (I guess most of us do!)

Having been raised by my father, a construction worker single dad of two, my “roadmap” for motherhood was a bit confusing. I had gleaned many mothering techniques from mother “figures” in my life, even purposefully studying them from a very young age- learning how they packed a lunch, kissed goodnight, or cleaned the bathroom. But I never saw a mother of an infant, never saw a woman give birth or nurse. Can you believe it? 100 years ago that was probably so commonplace. Nowadays, many woman, maybe most, in America have never seen these things.

Except that I almost always had a cat who had kittens. I remember well the hour I spent stroking my cat while she labored through increasingly intense surges until she at last pushed out 5 little amniotic sacs of kittens. She was in “labor land”- faraway and focused — just like I was in my labors. She had them and immediately began to build the bond of touch; licking … nursing … purring. As the kittens grew, she continued to allow them free reign of her poor 8 nipples, ravaged by their little kitty claws kneading feverishly at them for milk. She played with them, but not too much, as she also had to take the time to take care of herself. She had to stand up and leave them “mewing” at her while she got food, drink, or a potty break. If one got out of hand, she wasn’t timid about giving them a little growl to keep them in line, either.

Thus, I learned most about mothering small children from my cat.

Then I had a baby. Ethan turned my world around. We had such a hard time breastfeeding that I came to really value nursing more than I had expected. I longed to nurse and hold my baby, not pump while I watched longingly as some one else gave him a bottle. In those first few weeks, some well-meaning friends gave me the advice that they swore worked miracles for their sister: schedule, schedule, schedule… and above all, let him CRY IT OUT. As they were talking, a knot formed in my stomach and I’ll never forget my thought… “That sounds so… so… unnatural!”

I proceeded to mother my little one on instinct as much as I could. I held him all the time, usually in a baby carrier. I couldn’t go back to work outside the home (when he was 8 weeks old, I tried one day a week working next door to him in a church daycare and I couldn’t handle hearing him cry and not being able to comfort him!) So I started working for myself, first with in-home childcare and later began freelance copywriting which turned into my current job as a virtual assistant. I co-slept with him until he was 9 months. Once we were nursing normally, he never accepted a bottle again- nor a pacifier, or even a sippy cup! I nursed on demand –rather than schedule– until he was 18 months (and grieved giving up our night feedings, let me tell you!) I didn’t spend a night away from him until he was weaned and I cried when I had to (I went out of town for work). The bond I had with Ethan was so strong, he was my little buddy, and I didn’t want to miss the fun, even the challenges, of watching him grow and learn new things each day. This has a lot to do with my desire to homeschool/unschool Ethan and Verity as well (OH, and more on that to come very soon! So exciting!)

It occurs to me now that much of what I did was leaning into the “attachment theory” way of parenting, a theory I now subscribe to and intentionally ALLOW myself to do with Verity. With Ethan, the connection was so strong, and the period of time when he experienced separation anxiety when I left him in sunday school or something was hard on us. But I tried to trust my, again, instincts, that he would be able to stay without me when he was developmentally ready to do so. Then one day, he was. He understood the concept of “coming back” and he flourished into a very independent, confident, and highly (overly? lol) social preschooler. Looking back, I don’t regret the times I held him “too” closely for modern, American standards. We have been able to establish an intimacy that I never had with any mother figures in my life, a gift I longed to give him since I ever dared to think of myself as someday being a… GULP… mother.

Now, there are all kinds of ways to mother, I know that. I have dear, dear friends who love their kids endlessly, who have very well adjusted little buggers, and did NOT “attachment parent”. This post is NOT about the way I did it being “right” or the only way. It’s about a young woman who had no roadmap and found attachment parenting, or what I might just call mothering instinct in my case, a saving grace — both to myself and to my child(ren).

So, a deep thank you to the flea infested, broken hipped cat named Faith, who taught me the very basics of being a devoted mommy (So sorry I had to bring you to the humane society when I left for college!)

Wow.

I don’t know where to begin – Verity and I are doing GREAT and I feel like I didn’t even just have a baby. I’m still stoaked at how much easier this experience has been!

So…

here’s some lovely pics for you from last night…

In a matter of minutes, babies go from…

OH-SO-CUTE (and I just have to point out — this shot looks like baby photos of me! Just peak at the gravatar by the post’s meta info- that’s me about age 2 with some kind of make up on- maybe halloween? )

to…

kinda upset, heh? –>

to…
WOAH! That’s just nasty… (zoom in on the mouth, folks!)

Ethan, (despite all his messes he gets in trouble for All.Day.Long.), is still SUCH a great helper. He says all the time how much he loves Verity, how cute she is, how pretty her outfit is, etc. He calls her “our baby” and so far hasn’t shown any signs that he feels she has “taken his spot”. He’s very respectful of her presence and the fact that mama can’t be with him as much as she used to. I’m so grateful he is old enough to understand and sweet enough to be who he is!!!

That’s all for now! Got work and chores and kids and so much LIFE to live right now… be back when things slow down a bit…