"Mommy, my hands are sharp." For some reason it took me awhile to figure this one out but I finally clipped his long nails!
"Mommy, I flushed a washcloth, I flushed it down!" WHAT!!! Yes, I think he did actually flush the washcloth that was on the back of the toilet. Miraculously, the toilet still is in perfect working order so hopefully it stays that way and the washcloth made it's way out of our plumbing.
UGH!!!"Ah, you're not going to cuddle me for sixteen hours!!!" (If you'd lie still for that long son, I'd cuddle you!)
"Mommy, I love jicamon." (Is that like in Jamaica when they say ya mon?
"Please Mommy do not speak to me like that please." (Amidst such laughter it's difficult to strangle a small boy.)
(singing)"Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all of 'em."(All of who?)
This yeast cleanse diet has been putting us all to the test and for some reason I haven't prayed much about it until this morning when I stumbled upon this verse:
"Seek the Lord and His strength, seek His face always." 1 Chronicles 16:11 (emphasis mine)
It seems so obvious now to seek the Lords strength as David did and not try to do this all on my own.
Amazingly, last night at dinner we all happily ate plain sweet potatoes and realized just how sweet they actually are on their own. (Previously we'd been adding cinnamon - no sugar or sweeteners, just cinnamon for flavor.) I never thought I'd see the day when my husband said, "You know, I'm not even craving ice cream tonight!"
Granted, we are taking one day at a time but I'm very happy that we've decided to do this - I'm sure we are losing weight as well, an added bonus! We don't own a scale - I don't really feel they tell anything. Personally, I've always weighed more than it looks like I do, probably dense bones run in our family and heavy muscle mass. My son weighs more than some other kids his size too. Even still just weighing less to me isn't an indicator of the "in shape" factor so I find having a scale around annoying! Now that I've gone way out on a tangent here...
I do have to say shame, shame, shame on you food industry. I've been reading and researching and I don't like what I'm learning. Processed food items have sugar and other sweeteners hidden in them - almost all of them. Today, I wanted to save a little time by purchasing store bought chicken broth instead of making my own. Only one brand did I find (even the natural/organic ones) without sugar or cane juice or some sweetener. The food industry is smart, very smart, and all about their bottom line. They know if there is sugar or sweeteners in food we will eat more of it - and that means more $$$ for them and more pounds, weight and health issues for us. I've seen this first hand in my family, we are all getting full faster and staying full longer eating more whole, less processed foods.
The food industry isn't going to change on their own, it's going to have to be us that does the changing. The average American eats (I've found conflicting numbers here) from 20 - 40 teaspoons of sugar a day. (Even if it's just 20 that's 300 empty calories a day). To give you an idea how fast it adds up, a 12 ounce soda contains about 10 teaspoons, a 2 ounce package of candy contains about 11 teaspoons of sugar and frosted flakes cereal provides more than 4 teaspoons of sugar. By the way none of these number include the sugars naturally occurring in milk or fruits.
We've started using stevia which is an extraordinarily sweet herb -- 200-300 times sweeter than sugar. It has a slight licorice-like flavor that is only evident in bland recipes and we are getting used to it's sweet flavor. It is almost calorie-free, does not cause tooth decay and is a ZERO on the glycemic index so it does not trigger a rise in blood sugar. You won't get a sudden burst of energy followed by fatigue and a need for another "fix." Most importantly, it does not feed yeast or other microorganisms, and it increases energy and aids digestion by stimulating the pancreas.
The yeast connectionis a good place to start if you are wanting of more info. this link explains a simple saliva test that you can do at home. If this is more information than you ever wanted to know about sugar or Candida (yeast) please just ignore!!!!
Sometimes while I'm nursing my daughter my son will bring me his "amaganadoodle" and we'll write stuff together. He really likes it when he thinks of words for me to write, then as I write them he says each letter. (It's really helped him to learn the lower case letters better.)
This afternoon we were writing words and letters and he drew a happy face. He's drawn them before but you see he frustrates easily. Generally if it doesn't look like what he thinks it should he gets frustrated (we are working on this). He giggled as he drew a big HUGE smile inside the circle. Then he added two little eyes and a nose, his own eyes filled with pride. With each addition there was more giggling and "Mommy look,(what) I can do." After ears, hair, and appendages he was just glowing and I don't think I have ever seen him be so proud of what he could do.
I don't think I've ever been more proud of him either and then in a split second it was gone as the fickle three year old fingers swiped knob to the opposite side of board saying, "Let's do it again!"
What a blessing it is to stay home with my kids, here's a picture from last week - going exploring! Yes we were still in our jammies at noon - another blessing of staying home!
This picture was closer to four months old!
Since I didn't make an official entry of her stats last month (The first week of December) she was 16 and a half pounds - the first week of this January, she's just over 17 and a half pounds. Since we've made an educated choice not to vaccinate either of our children thus far, we don't do the whole well child check up thing. We do go to a mommy - baby group once a month at the birthing center they were born and they let us weight our babes! It's nice to sort of keep up with her growth still, otherwise, I'd have no idea!
Click the following links to see how much I've changed:at birth, at a few days, two months, three months.
My darling, gorgeous little one, you've found your hands and your feet. You love exploring with those tiny fingers and it's cute to watch you figure out how to get the part of a toy you want into your mouth. You try many times before crying out in frustration but you mostly succeed! You especially like to chew on a favorite pink block's corner.
Your first Christmas!
Your big brother gave you the hiccups the other night by "sneezing." He's realized that when he says, "a-aaa-aaa-aaaaaaaa-chew" you giggle like crazy. We all think it's a very adorable little giggle. You are enamored with your Daddy and always give him this wonderful little grin - it melts his heart every time.
While baby feet are my favorite I just adore the pudge on your forearms, it is SO soft and squeezable - and very KISSABLE! We are so grateful for you what a blessing!
Love, Your Mommy
Five months with your cutie toes!
NOTE: I am in no way criticizing any other parents choices regarding vaccines. I do feel that each and every parent should take the time to educate themselves and then make an educated decision. Each family is unique and each parent needs to make decisions that meet the needs of their own family.
A month has past as a marble rolling down my driveway - all too quickly.
It's more a lack of time thing than a lack of things to say, I miss my writing outlet. But it has been a nice break. Happy New Year!
I totally wanted to blog about my son's first Christmas program performance - signing I love you to me during a practice he just about melted my heart and falling in the front row while singing, he brought me to hysterical tears.
And his first time really enjoying sledding, and arranging all the figures in the nativity scene to huddle and be "close to Jesus." I spoke last year of a tradition my Mom did with hiding Jesus for us to find on Christmas eve then singing "happy birthday" to Jesus. When I hid Jesus, my son was very concerned saying adamantly that "Jesus wants to be with his family."
Currently we are all on a yeast cleansing elimination diet. We are on day 8 (it feels like month 8) without ANY sugar or sweeteners, wheat, yeast, corn, dairy, soy, fruit or eggs. Since I have been struggling with thrush since my son was an infant we decided to get serious. We are eating more veggies than we ever have and surprisingly my son has eaten almost everything I have offered him. We are treating the protein of the meal more as a side dish and having seconds of grains and veggies instead. The first day was the worst day skipping my handful of carob chips in the afternoon I don't miss them anymore. I'm still fighting with a sweet tooth in the evenings and would love to puree some fruit to top amaranth or barley pancakes.
We are going through a "die off period" currently where the yeasts are dying off and releasing their toxins into our blood stream for our body to filter out. We are fatigued and a bit depressed. Last night I had night sweats - and comparatively we don't eat a lot of sugar. We don't ever have candy in the house (Halloween excepted) but sugar is hidden in EVERYTHING. Including the "all natural"- no nitrate sandwich meats. We do eat a lot of fruits (more so than veggies especially for snacks) so yeast also feed on those simple sugars. We should be able to add them back shortly but I feel like the most horrible Mom saying no to my son that he can't have an apple.
Since breakfast has been my hardest meal of the day (we can only have oatmeal once every four days) today I added eggs back into our diet without noticing any setbacks so that will at least add some texture to our baked goods and a nice snack.
Let's see, I hope to have some pictures to post shortly, and I'll share some recipes just for fun!. Oh and my daughter's five months old so I'll need to write about that soon too!
