Crossroads Lion

Updates

2009-02-18T14:35:00.000-08:00

Let's see...

Isabel is nearly 2.5 years old. Leo had just turned 5.

We are starting to look at schools for Leo. Which we must do quickly, as lottery deadlines are approaching. We are considering Ridgeview Classical Schools, TR Paul, Liberty Common, and Olander, the latter being our neighborhood school.

There is a lot to think about, and I'm not sure I even know what questions to ask at this point. RCS is the only one of them that is a K-12 school. I like that my kids would be with the same administration, peer group, and culture for their entire school career.

Olander is a good school. We attended the presentation on Kindergarten a few weeks ago and were impressed. We think it would be a good fit for Leo and for our family, and it is not far away. If they had a K-12 program, I may not be looking elsewhere.

What I am concerned about is what comes after Olander. Blevins Jr. High and then Rocky Mountain High School. They are in the Poudre School District, and that alone is a good recommendation as we have some of the best schools in the state. But how do they compare with Ridgeview?

I want what we all want for our children: healthy, productive, happy lives. I want them to make good choices: morally, financially, economically, socially, and with respect to education and career goals. I want them to have enough perspective, experience, skills, and education to have as broad a view as possible of their choices. Some parents would say they want their kids to go to college. I do not. Rather, I want my kids to be able to go to college, should they so choose. I want them to have the perspective on life and skills to be able to judge for themselves the best course. Trade or vocational school? University? Medical school? Military or military academy? Some vagary I cannot currently imagine?

My friend, J, philosophizes that her daughter may choose to be a lawyer or a florist, but with no way of knowing, she must be given the best education and so she may choose for herself from there. I tend to agree, but now we are faced with determining which school will offer that.

Reading?

2008-07-31T21:32:00.000-07:00

Leo told me today that the word 'truck' starts with a 'C'. I corrected him, then opened a text document to type into so we could talk about the letters and their sounds. I started with 'truck' and we broke it up into the letters and made all the sounds and then read the whole word. Next I asked him if he remembered 'ee', to which he answered 'ee, like eel'. So I typed that up for him, with the 'L' and sounded it out with him. Then I added a 'T' and we sounded that out together. He seemed to understand that because we had just done 'truck'. Next I randomly chose an 'M' and stuck it in front of the 'eel'. I asked him what sound 'M' makes and we both practiced 'mmmmm'. Then I asked him what this word sounds like and was just about to help him sound it out when he responded: 'Food!'

Seasons

2008-06-20T16:02:00.000-07:00

Spring is done. I just pulled out the last of the bolted spinach to make room for seed potatoes (thank you, Ed!). The sweet peas are visible through the living room windows and I think we've about finished that harvest for the year (especially as we are going to be out of town for the next two weeks). I have the green beans coming up in front of the sweet peas. I should have started them a month earlier than I did. Oh well. I'm sure we'll still get a ton, as usual.

2008-06-20T15:57:00.000-07:00

I've been doing a lot of purging, sorting, and consolidating in the house the last week. I got rid of a ton of boxes and junk and such. But I also came across these chalkboards my mother painted years ago. I never knew what I would use them for, but they were so pretty and my mom made them, so I kept them. Now my kids have a use for them. And I'm VERY glad there are two of them. :)

Thanks, Mom!

Paint

2008-06-19T18:40:00.000-07:00

Co-op today. What a gawdawful mess. And a lot of fun.

Talking more

2008-06-17T15:05:00.001-07:00

Isa is talking and signing a lot more in the past few weeks. She and Leo both have been watching a lot more Signing Time videos and they're both very keen to use their signs. It's helping a little with her whining and screaming, she's just starting to understand when I ask her not to cry, but to sign.

Tagalong

2008-06-17T15:02:00.001-07:00

We just found a tagalong bicycle for Leo at the annual Quail Hollow neighborhood garage sale event. We were actually looking for a dresser for Sharon, but couldn't find one. We lost one of Isa's yellow rain boots during the bike ride down there. Oh well. The tagalong ($30!) was a great find.

Leo loves it and keeps asking for more bike rides. :) Now I just need to get a basket for the front of my bike, as I have no storage for grocery trips.

Crow

2008-06-17T15:00:00.001-07:00

Found a baby (fledgling) crow in my herb garden this afternoon.

We've been seeing it out on the front lawn over the last couple of days. I have no idea if a parent is caring for it. I put some water and meat out for it. I suppose the wildlife police will come tell me not to. :)

testing KK movie

2008-06-09T19:59:00.001-07:00

testing KK movie

Spring garden

2008-04-05T10:59:00.000-07:00

This is from several days ago. The little garden space in front of the living room window. It's all even bigger now!

Bok choy in the foreground, spinach and lettuce in the background.

Spinach cotyledons.

Sweet peas and spinach.

Cupboard

2008-03-04T08:30:00.000-08:00

Gary is working on a new cupboard for us. He moved the door to the garage and put it at the top of the stairway. This is a much more logical location for the door, as now we can actually use all the of the dining area floor space.

The new cupboard is a pop-out, built into exactly the same frame as the former doorway, and framed and insulated. He covered the inside with oak plywood and tiled it with marble. It looks very nice. He still needs to add the wall trim, the slotted plate rack and shelves and the recessed lighting, but it's looking good so far!

Remember, if you need a home repair and remodeling professional, call GTO Projects! 970-219-2512 gtoprojects at gmail dot com

Garden

2008-03-04T08:28:00.000-08:00

I got the snap peas and the greens seeds in the ground yesterday. I started sprouting the peas on Friday afternoon, and they were ready to go in the ground yesterday, Monday. It felt good to get out the rototiller and amend the soil and get it all nice and fluffy. Felt even better to put seeds in the soil.

I put them all in the bed in front of the living room window. Now I need to get the soaker hose laid out so I don't have to water them by hand with a wand.

Scratch

2008-02-26T17:19:00.000-08:00

My definition of 'cooking from scratch' is slowly changing. I used to consider any cooking that I did myself to be from scratch, and that idea changed eventually to refer to certain ingredients being from scratch. But I still 'exempted' some ingredients, like cheese, bread, broth, pasta, and such. Tonight we had breaded chicken breast cutlets and potato and veggie casserole with a cheese sauce.

The chicken was breaded with our own homemade bread crumbs (ground by Leo in the Cuisinart) made from our own homemade whole wheat bread (made by Leo and Mama yesterday). It was mixed with some store bought herbs and some homegrown herbs and some dehydrated bell pepper powder (homemade from local organic bell peppers last Fall).

The potato and veggie casserole was a mix of various veggies (all store bought, alas this time of year I can't grow these ingredients) and a cheese sauce. The cheese sauce was made from Smart Balance spread and whole wheat flour for the roux, and homemade vegetable broth (made yesterday from our weekly vegetable scrap hoard) for the liquid. The cheese was a spicy herb cheese spread that I made myself from local, organic non-homogenized milk, bell pepper powder from bell peppers I dehydrated last Fall (picked at a local organic farm), and various other homegrown or store bought spices.

It feels very good to be cooking with whole foods. With foods that were not processed before they entered my home. I can point my finger directly at the foods that came to me processed: milk (pasteurized); Smart Balance (concocted in a lab); whole wheat flour (ground); chicken (boned and skinned). I can understand exactly what happened to my foods during processing and understand what the nutritional impacts are of that processing. In these cases, minimal. The only thing that I could have done differently was use butter for the roux. I'll think about it.

Another thought for later: I don't know of a way to make pasta without a pasta maker of some kind, I will have to do some more research on pasta.

Smock

2008-02-07T09:42:00.001-08:00

These pics were taken before I added the spider embroidery on the chest, per Leo's request.

Sorry, this last one is a bit fuzzy, but it shows the pockets on the front.

Next time I make one of these, I am going to skip the binding and just turn and topstitch.

Window Garden IV

2008-02-04T19:29:00.000-08:00

Beans

Greens

Still not much spinach. I'm trying to overhead water more often to see if that helps the spinach to germinate better. Still not dill and no more basil. The basil is growing VERY slowly. It must be that it isn't warm enough at 68deg.

NOCIRC

2008-01-30T09:13:00.001-08:00

Craig has updated the Colorado NOCIRC page. It's looking great, and it attracts more and more visitors every day. With such up-to-date, thorough information, we are slowly ending infant circumcision. More and more parents are coming to realize that it's unnecessary and damaging.

If your physician or midwife is recommending it to you, remember that circumcision is an elective, cosmetic procedure and as such it is extremely unethical to perform on a non-consenting individual, even if the individual is too young to understand what is going on.

From Doctors Opposing Circumcision:
"George C. Denniston, M,D., MPH, President of Doctors Opposing Circumcision,
commented, “This new study provided further evidence of the permanent and irreversible
lifelong injury of non-therapeutic neonatal circumcision and raises grave ethical
questions regarding the continued performance of child circumcision. We call upon the
American Academy of Pediatrics to defend children from this practice.”"

Piano II

2008-01-30T08:52:00.000-08:00

Here are the piano photos. Gary just finished installing plexiglass in the cameo panels so we could see the mechanical works inside. He also installed LED lights inside the compartment, I need to post photos of that, too.

Shoe beadwork

2008-01-30T08:28:00.000-08:00

Just finished embellishing Isa's Isabooties. Yes, I know, I already have enough shoes for her. I bought these over a year ago and have just been waiting waiting for her to grow into them.

Isa Climbs the Tube

2008-01-29T18:41:00.000-08:00

Today Isa climbed the Big Yellow Tube all by herself. We have never helped her to do it before, we just let her fail because we really didn't want her getting up into the loft. Today when I climbed up to play a game with Leo, she was ticked off and decided to climb up, too. So now I'm wondering how I'm going to keep her from getting into the paper books and magnetic toys.

Window Garden III

2008-01-29T18:26:00.000-08:00

The beans are taking off, there is already a second tier on a few of them. The tomatoes are creeping along, but still progressing. The mixed greens are doing nicely, but rather thin in the middle of the patch. I've seeded some more. The spinach has only sprouted three seeds, just like when I try to grow it out doors. I'm not very good at spinach. I wonder what I'm doing wrong?
The basil has finally started to sprout, and the onions are also doing okay. The dill is doing nothing.

Beans

Tomatoes

Greens

Bok Choi

Basil

Flexible shoes

2008-01-22T19:40:00.000-08:00

I'm on a hunt for flexible-soled kids' shoes. I expect thermoplastic rubber soles (TPR), but I might be surprised to find other materials used to make sturdy, flexible soles.

Here's the brands I know of currently, let me know if there are more I am missing.

Pedoodles
See Kai Run
Pediped
Robeez Tredz
Eleven (a division of SKR, these shoes are for older kids, sizes 9-1)
Pediped Flex (Pediped shoes for older kids, sizes 6-12)
Primigi
Umi Elefanten
Preschoolians
Stride-Rite (have to look, some are flexible, some are nott)
Komfort Kidz
Merrill (some are flexible, some are not)

Window Garden II

2008-01-21T19:35:00.000-08:00

Here's how the garden is doing so far.

Yay!

Window Garden

2008-01-09T10:27:00.000-08:00

Just getting started on the window garden. I used three beds, made from Sterilite storage boxes. After racking our brains trying to figure out how to do a tray, G finally had an epiphane: buy three more boxes and stack them, and that makes both a tray and a self-watering reservoir.
So I drilled drainage holes in the bottoms of the dirt boxes, and a watering tube hole as well. Then I threaded 100% cotton butcher's twine through the holes to act as wicks. A clear plastic tube in the watering hole and a bit of wire to secure it, then we were ready for the dirt.

I used a mix of FoxFarm Frog dirt with tons of microbes, perlite, and FoxFarm starter fertilizer.
I planted a lettuce mix, spinach, and dwarf pac choi in the first box. Basil, dill, and green onions in the second. And a small bush tomato and bush beans in the third. I don't know if the tomato and beans will be able to do anything useful, it's an experiment!

Next we need to hang the light. I got a sodium & halide combo light. It needs a real shield, though, so water from the sink doesn't spatter and make it shatter from thermal stress. We're not willing to pay the $150+ it will cost to get a real shield, so G is going to see about buying a sheet of tempered glass to hang under it instead.

Leo's Fire Monkey

2008-01-07T18:38:00.000-08:00

Today Leo and I made a stuffed animal. Leo calls it his Fire Monkey. He drew the shape, being careful to include arms, legs, ears, and a head. Then we cut out the shape, and Leo chose the cool fire flannel fabric. Leo traced the pattern shape onto the fabric, then Mama cut it out and sewed it all together. Then Leo and Mama stuffed it full of stuffing. Then Mama sewed shut, and Papa and Mama and Leo sewed on its cool button eyes. And now Leo has a homemade Fire Monkey.

Piano

2007-11-15T10:45:00.000-08:00

We have inherited Cousin Mike's piano (he's still among the living, just tired of the piano). It's a lovely old thing, from 1902 or thereabouts. Gary took the panel off the harp so the kids can see the hammers banging. He is planning to install plexiglass into the cutouts of the panel so we can keep their fingers out and retain some of the beauty of the panel.

Image to follow soon....

Walker

2007-11-10T10:43:00.000-08:00

Isa is walking! She's been tottering around a step at a time for awhile. Being very cautious about the whole affair. Now she's up and walking and loving it! It's a joy to see her getting around better and able to follow her brother around more and more. She can get right into the middle of things and play how she wants. It's great.

Crawler

2007-06-27T18:33:00.001-07:00

Isa started crawling about two weeks ago. She gets better and better everyday, and she's now cruising a bit and really using crawling to get where she wants to go.

Good work, Isa!

Swimmer

2007-06-27T18:31:00.000-07:00

Leo has been in swim lessons for almost four weeks straight. This last week he has started to think about swimming. Today he really swam. It's the dog paddle, but it's getting him from point A to point B, and he does it with his face completely immersed. He's very proud of himself and is wearing his goggles everywhere.

Good work, Leo!

Pox

2007-05-29T11:05:00.000-07:00

Leo showed spots on May 2nd. Isa had no symptoms. He had only a few spots, and they started to heal up before he got full-blown pox on May 7th, a full week later.

By the 14th, he was all crusted over and done. Still no symptoms in Isa.

On the 23rd, I noticed Isa's first lesion. A day later there were a couple more, and by the evening of the 24th, she was covered in pox.

Hopefully that will do it for both of them.

Pox

2007-04-23T17:11:00.000-07:00

We flouted convention and yesterday attended an antiquated sort of social gathering: a chicken pox party.

When I called the doctor's office last week to ask about the safety of exposing my not-yet-seven-month-old baby, I requested a callback from a RN or MD, rather than the doctor's "nurse", who is a medical assistant with no formal training. I got a call from the medical assistant, who knowledgeably informed me that I should not expose either of my children to chicken pox as they had not had the vaccination, and were therefore likely to contract chicken pox. Yeah. Thanks for the info. Can I talk to a doctor, please?

She was rather confused, I wanted to expose my children to chicken pox? She'd have to talk to a doctor and get back to me. Yeah, you do that.

She called back sometime later to tell me that the doctor really recommends we get the vaccine, as chicken pox can lead to life-threatening complications. I asked if it is any more dangerous for an infant than for a preschooler. She said the doctor said it was not, but still advised against any exposure without the vaccine. I thanked her and hung up.

So we went to the pox party on Sunday. K rather thoughtfully brought margarita mix for the grown-ups and lollipops for the kiddos. To swap. The healthy children were encouraged to share their suckers with the vector children. Yuck. Lots of snotty kisses and hugs, exchanged foods, etc.

We had a good time, enjoyed hanging out with all the families (five families came, not including the host family), then went home and had meat and potatoes with K and family.

Hopefully, a successful day. We'll find out in 10 to 21 days.

Does anybody think it's odd to recommend a vaccine for a disease that is rarely serious in young children, but these same doctors will perform circumcisions on healthy newborns for no other reason than cosmetic preference? They expose children to serious complications from the procedure, and a 100% chance of reduced sexual sensitivity as adults, but then they turn right around and say that it's too dangerous for a child to be exposed to chicken pox.

If we're really trying to minimize all risk to children....STOP PERFORMING NEONATAL CIRCUMCISION.

Kitchen

2007-04-21T13:17:00.000-07:00

We are building a play kitchen for Leo. We were inspired by another post on the web about using an old entertainment center.

To see the progress so far, visit our Picasa web album.

Link

2007-04-13T15:35:00.000-07:00

I just added my first link to the blogroll. I found One Tenacious Baby Mama through Navelgazing Midwife. Coming from a science background with very little education in social thinking, and having grown up in a very homogeneous community, I really don't understand a lot of what OTBM is talking about, but she has me intrigued and I'll keep reading and visiting her references. She's getting me to think outside my experience, which feels very good to a slightly bored at-home mama. :)

I guess I'll add a few more links to the blogroll while I'm at it.

Sleep III

2007-04-08T16:11:00.000-07:00

I guess my expectations have changed. Her current pattern is to go down at 8:45, up at maybe 11 (last night I woke her to nurse at 11 when I went to bed), then up at 1am, then at 3am, then at 5 or 6am, then at 7 or 8am. I feel pretty foggy.

My goal would be for her to sleep from 8:45 to a nursing at 10:30 or 11, sleep until 4 or 5am, then nurse again and sleep until up at 7 or 8am. She did this pattern for almost a week back in mid-March. Now we're back to getting 1.5 to 2.5 hours of sleep at a time. It's crazy-making. I acknowledge it's a lot better than every 45 minutes, but it's still not restful.

Supervillains

2007-04-08T14:18:00.001-07:00

Leo is Yuckyman. Bad Yuckyman. Power to make things gooey. Or yucky.
Mama is Dr. Shrinky. Power to make things small. Or tiny. Together, it is our goal to steal the key to the world. We are super-villains.

Papa is Captain Hammer, power to build anything.
Isa is WeatherWoman, power to change the weather. Together, it is their duty to keep the super villains from the key to the world. They are super-heroes.

Now I will admit that Leo did not invent all of this himself. It is from Backyardigans. But the imagination he uses because of this inspiration is quite commendable. He is always making things 'gooey', then getting a towel to clean up his invisible messes. He's always asking me to shrink things for him (never Yuckyman, he gets pretty upset if I shrink him), and loves when Captain Hammer 'builds' something to thwart him.

It's a lot of fun. Yesterday we spent half an hour running in circles searching for 'the Forest of Darkness, bwahhahahahaha').

He also 'surfs' on the couch, or when he goes outside he'll find a likely-looking scrap of wood to use as a 'snowboard'. He rides on the wooden horse and pretends he's a cowboy. He and Papa play polka together, Papa with his real tuba, Leo with his invisible accordion.

He found a magnifying glass in a store and became "the world's greatest detective", searching for footprints. He found a large hook in a hardware store and became a pirate with a hook for a hand. He found a pair of binoculars I bought him last year and became a lifeguard, searching for Tiki Beach. He found a piece of wide elastic and uses it as his super-villain mask. All of these treasures go into a box in the living room at the end of the day, and he delights in rediscovering them the next day, assuming one fantasy after another throughout the day.

Most often, he calls out for "Dr. Shrinky" to come make him a sandwich, or "Dr. Shrinky, I'm thirsty please!". Only sometimes am I 'mama' anymore. :)

Backyardigans is not educational in the strictest sense of the concept, but it is doing wonders for Leo's power of imagination, his curiosity in the world, and his joy of play.

Cold

2007-04-08T14:16:00.000-07:00

It's cold again. We had some time of warm weather, in early and mid March. Now it's cold again. Snow yesterday, snow today, snow tomorrow. I have a lot of the cool-season seeds in the ground, the peas are even sprouted and were doing well (not quite to cotyledons) before the cold snap.

I hope they're okay.

It's good to remember that Easter is a cold time of year, even when preceded by warmth.

Sleep II

2007-03-19T19:16:00.000-07:00

The last two nights have been much better. Three to four night wakings isn't great, but it sure beats heck out of 10 night wakings.

She goes down pretty easily at 7:30, and is up again maybe around 9, maybe not until 11 or 11:30. Last night she was up at 8:45, when G went in and patted her, sat her up to make sure she didn't need to burp, and then patted her again. She resettled and slept until almost 1am. Then she nursed well, spitting out the nipple after I gave her the second breast. She slept until 3:30, when she cried for a couple of minutes, I patted her, but she cried more, so I tucked her arm back into her blanket and rolled her onto her other side. She immediately went back to sleep and slept until 5am, when I nursed her. G got a wakeful babe at about 5:30, they chatted and cooed and caressed until about 6, then she slept cuddled next to me until 9am. Really not too bad of a night.

Garden and Spring

2007-03-17T16:22:00.000-07:00

Or Spring and Garden?

An amazing day today. It felt like summer (only comfortably warm, not hot). We got so much done, it feels great. Most of the backyard garden is tilled, but we do have more compost and peat to put in.

Gary hung the air-chairs, it feels like summer...

Sunday....
The back and front gardens are tilled, only three areas left to do: the front strip, the back strip, and the area under the front windows. The back strip and under the windows have to be started almost from scratch (at least they are bare dirt, no grass or landscape rocks), then tilled, soil removed, walls built and compost and peat added. It's a lot of work, thankfully they're going to be summer beds rather than spring beds.

We hope to get compost and peat this week, and I can get the spring plantings done before the end of the week (cross your fingers).

Weather

2007-03-17T10:04:00.000-07:00

I guess I should record for the sake of posterity (or myself, down the road) that the last few weeks have been mostly quite warm and lovely. Week before last, we had our mama/kid playgroup down at Fossil Creek park on Friday morning and it was really quite nice. The week leading up to it was even lovelier, and this past week has been so-so. Some days very warm and nice, some days cold and blustery and overcast. It seems like the general pattern is to have cold, overcast mornings with some wind, and then have it burn off and be warm and pleasant in the afternoon and evening. The weather is still rather fickle, but overall it's been a great change from the cold, wet, dreary winter we've had. Thankfully.

Sleep

2007-03-17T06:57:00.000-07:00

I'm getting to the point where I just can't handle the every 45 to 90 minute wakings all night. So I've gone back to reviewing Pantley's No Cry Sleep Solution. I am going to give it more of a fair shake this time, and stick to it for at least a month before I say it doesn't work. I am getting the baby more regular naps, and she's starting to get a bit better at taking them, and will even go down with just patting rather than just nursing down. Sometimes (every second or third day) she will even take a two or three hour nap. That is amazing.

She is going to bed at about 745pm now, which is a huge change (from 10 or 11pm). The first week we did this, she started sleeping very well, from 8pm to midnight or so, and then almost until 4am, and then again until almost 7am. It was unreal and I felt so rested! This week we are back to old patterns. She sleeps from 745 to 845 to 945 to 1045 to 1130, when I nurse her, then she sleeps until 130am to 2am to 3am to 4am, when I nurse her, then she sleeps until 6am if I am lucky, and nurses almost constantly until 7 or 730.

I have come very close a couple of nights to losing my temper. It makes me so angry to get no sleep, and the baby isn't even hungry, she just doesn't know how to settle herself. Well, she obviously can figure it out, b/c the first week she did so well.

Last night I came to bed at 9pm so I could get some rest before she woke up, but I just couldn't make myself sleep, waiting for her to wake up. And she did, every 45 minutes or so. I nursed her at 1130, then she slept until 1am, when I patted her back down and went to get Papa for his shift. He tells me the baby slept from then until 215, when she screamed until 415 (I'm sure he was patting her and singing to her), when she just *poof* went to sleep until 7am, when he came to get me. Poor guy, he took a 1 hr nap and got up at 8.

I will keep at it, keep giving her good naps (as good as she will take) on a schedule, keep putting her down to bed at the same time, keep putting her down 'amost asleep', keep nursing her every four hours (or when I hear the special nursing cry she makes when hungry), and keep patting her down to sleep when she's not hungry. We'll see who survives. Bleh.

Organizing

2007-03-17T06:55:00.000-07:00

Our neighbor just couldn't stand our house any more. She decided that in return for my giving her some beading lessons (circular flat peyote), she would do a chore or two for me. Sounded perfectly fair and reasonable. But a chore or two turned into reorganizing our living room. It is SO much better and more comfortable now and G's desk is downstairs in 'his' room along with his instruments and the guest bed. We have unpacked 3/4 of our books and this gives us room for other boxes to be opened and reorganized (and purged!) and stacked down where the book boxes were. G is working on cleaning up the garage now that we have got rid of a lot of boxes and assorted junk that was in there.

We hope that soon the garage will be a tidy (or at least tidy-able) space. I want to get the back patio cleaned up for summer, as well, so we can enjoy the space comfortably.

Bounce

2007-02-28T07:32:00.000-08:00

Bounce is one of our favorite places to play during the Winter. We take snacks and drinks and stay for a few hours. It's a good time and a lot of exercise. We haven't tried Fit for Fun yet, maybe we'll try that this week, too. The weather has turned crappy again and we're going to be stuck inside the rest of the week, I think . Bleh.

Whole Foods and the Mall end up being exciting excursions.

Three!

2007-02-12T10:46:00.002-08:00

We had a terrific party yesterday. The F's came, as well as the R's (J, G, and R). Also A and E and their baby and boy. R&T of the H's came accompanied by their Mammy. My folks came up from Trinidad on Friday and we had a great weekend together. Their friends from Cheyenne came down to visit for Saturday afternoon (after a morning of fun shopping with my mother) and we all went out to HuHot's for dinner. Leo (and all of us) really enjoy that restaurant and he always eats a big dinner there.

Mom reorganized my sewing area in the basement and it is SO much better and more efficient, and there's a lot more space for playing and other activities now. Thanks, Mom!

All in all, a good weekend.

Our thoughts and good wishes for the H's and little M today as he recovers from a bout of GI ickies (and ER incompetence).

Things you never thought you'd hear yourself say...

2007-02-12T10:46:00.001-08:00

"Don't put the mac and cheese box on your penis"

Jet Plane

2007-01-16T14:13:00.000-08:00

All of our friends already know about our crappy jet-plane experience, but I thought I'd record it here for later remembering.

The bare-bones are that we took off from DIA at about 5pm on a Tuesday. We circled the airport for about 2 hours, then experienced and emergency landing. We sat at the gate for 1.5 hours, during which time no one was allowed to deplane for food or any other reason. Then we took off again, circled DIA for another 45 minutes or so, and then flew to Portland. What was supposed to be a two hour flight turned into about seven hours and of course our connection was long gone. We had to stand in line to get our coupons and such for lodging and food and to make travel arrangements. By the time we got to the front of the queue, it was 12:30 at night (1:30 MT) and the kids were wired like cattle prods. Leo did endless frenetic laps on the moving escalator and Isa hung on the front of me with big red exhausted eyes and an occasional, forlorn wail. The airline offered us a flight at 6 am, meaning we'd have to make the airport at 5 am, meaning we'd have to wake up at 4am. Assuming half an hour from the gate to the hotel, and half an hour to get our children settled into sleep, that's a whopping 2.5 hours of sleep for our 3 year old and 3 month old. We politely told them to shove it and rented a car for the last leg of our journey.

We woke up when the children were ready to (still not much sleep, but better than 2.5 hours) at about 9am, got breakfast, then spent the rest of the morning (and early afternoon) visiting with a friend in town we hadn't seen in several years. It was very pleasant to see her and her kiddos.

The return trip to Denver was much more straightforward and our little ones fared much better.

Note to self: Always bring REAL food on the airplane with you, especially if you are traveling with children. (The airline did not provide any real food (only mini-pretzels - about an ounce - and sodas) to the coach passengers during our 7 hour ordeal, even the children. If we hadn't had real food to give our boy, he would have been in trouble.)

Family

2007-01-16T14:09:00.000-08:00

I've been avoiding blogging since we came home from Oregon b/c there is so much in the forefront of my brain that I want to write about but don't feel like I can share, just in case the family ever discovers this blog. I don't want this to be an excuse for divisiveness or pain. But on the other hand, this is a place for me to record what happens in my daily life and to vent out feelings and explore my way.

So maybe for the moment I'll just say that I wish I could get along better with G's sister. Sometimes we can have a lot of fun, but it's rather fair-weather: when there are things we both enjoy, we can have fun together. When things aren't rosy, then they're black.

Ah, family. I'd like to get together with T&C sometime in the summer, and G&K&D&M another time this summer. Separate groups would be best.

Progress

2007-01-16T14:01:00.000-08:00

Leo has made some new connections the past couple of weeks. He is suddenly able to understand how to use the computer and can count to ten. Or rather, he can recite up to ten and sometimes twelve. He can count three objects, and I haven't tested that further.

What to do for his birthday? My folks will come up to visit, maybe we'll go out to HuHot's? I'm not sure if we should do a party with some friends over or just the grandparents and the family. It would be nice to have Aidan and his family over as we went to Aidan's party in December. And we haven't seen the Schafer's since sometime in early summer.

There are things I want to get into doing soon...projects and long-term/recurring activities I'd like to start: the 2007 garden; weekly playdates with TH/RH at our house; library story time; attending the health club;...anything else?

Gary's business is doing better and better all the time, with more clients in the wings. He is raising his rates as he is substantially under-charging (both in terms of what the market will bear and what we need to simply pay our bills). You can check out his up-and-coming website at gtoprojects.com.

Snow

2007-01-16T13:59:00.000-08:00

I'm not sure how I feel about the snow. I thought I would like it, but it's mostly just cold and wet and very dirty. Snow spreads dirt and nasty mud like nothing else. Maybe I'd feel differently if I didn't have a cream-colored carpet. I'm just not used to dressing against the snow, it's much harder to deal with than just cold air. The snow creeps in at the edges and gets everything wet and chilled.

Leavin' on a Jet Plane...

2007-01-02T11:05:00.000-08:00

...Don't know why I volunteered for this.

Lots of packing and organization. Will we need this, that or the other? Are we allowed to bring this that or the other on the plane? Do we check both car seats, or carry both on? Do we check one and carry one? How many carry-ons do we bring? Gary's philosophy is to carry on EVERYTHING so that nothing will get lost by baggage handlers (who must all be incompetent, you know). I have gone along with this in the past, but now that we have two babies, there is no way we can bring all the bags and the children onto the plane with us. We're just going to have to have some faith in the airlines/airports. Either we check the bags or the babies. I won't offer him that choice, I may not like the answer (or like it too much).

Gary's family is very nice. We're really looking forward to seeing them. His brother and sister-in-law and their two boys, his dad and stepmom. His sister. His folks have 40 acres outside Eugene, OR. Lots of trees, lots of moisture, lots of grass and green growing things, even in the dead of winter.

14 lbs

2006-12-27T17:29:00.000-08:00

At my folks' house she weighed 14 pounds on Christmas day. Today I put her into a Wonderoo set on the smallest rise setting and it seems to fit okay. I guess I'll have to think about switching over the stash to just using our Wonderoos. That will make Gary very happy.

Sibling

2006-12-13T20:56:00.000-08:00

Leo loves his baby sister. He talks to her and shushes her and wants to hold and kiss her. He really loves having her around. Really.

When I leave them alone together, I leave the room with two happy, smiling and content children. Two minutes later there is inevitably a scream of bloody murder from the baby. This afternoon I left Squishy asleep in the car to carry in the groceries and Leo chose not to leave the car just yet even though I unbuckled him. Just as I set down the groceries I heard Isa wailing and wailing. I found Leo just climbing back into his seat and when he saw me, he said "Oh no, what I did?". But he wouldn't admit to anything so I just sent him into the house. Later this afternoon, Squishy was happily sitting up against our pillows in bed, looking around and I left the room to get some water. I soon heard bloody murder screaming, the kind that is high-pitched and soon becomes frantic. I came into the room and her face was bright red and she was screaming so hard she was making no sound. Leo was beating a hasty retreat to the edge of the bed and again said to me "What I did?". I asked him what happened and he just told me that Squishy was crying. I then asked him if he should go stand in the corner. He quietly said "Yes" and got down and went to the corner himself. There are no marks on the baby, but he was guilty of something.

I guess I need to stop leaving them alone together for awhile.

Music

2006-12-08T12:41:00.000-08:00

As it is Tuba Christmas season, Gary is practicing his euphonium. Leo loves playing music with Papa and excitedly gets out his harmonica to play along whenever Gary practices. We are encouraging this as much as we can as we'd like to get him into brass as soon as he's able.

Weight Check

2006-12-08T12:39:00.000-08:00

12 pounds 8 oz at 10 weeks of age!! Yay Isabel! She's exclusively breastfed, so should be compared only to other breastfed babies, which puts her higher on the growth curve than when she's compared to artificially fed babies.

She's doing great, so bright-eyed and alert, loves nursing and smiling and being held. She's a great joy to us.

Santa Claus

2006-12-06T19:05:00.000-08:00

I bought a copy of "Polar Express" today and Leo and Papa just read it together. It's a sweet, sort of sad book. Gary and I just had a conversation about Santa Claus and where the myth fits into our parenting. We are agreed that it is a good idea to have Santa Claus as part of Christmas. We both see it as being a multi-functional myth, in that little children see him as being a real person who brings toys at Christmas, and older children see him as a silly and fun fairy tale and adults see him as the spirit of the season and the spirit of giving and of unconditional love of children. It's all useful and good.

I also see it that the same people who would disapprove of Santa for children wouldn't enjoy a good fantasy/sci-fi novel. That is, fairy tales help to teach children to imagine and dream. I know my mother and father struggled a bit with the idea that they were lying to us. But they decided to teach us about Santa Claus anyway. I really enjoyed Santa as a small child. I remember the cookies and milk and the wonder of the new presents under the tree. I can't pick out when I started to realize that he wasn't real, but was just a story. I remember that for several more years we put cookies and milk out for him and I just knew that Dad ate it. It was still a fun ritual and was fun to pretend.

Salad Spinner

2006-12-04T16:54:00.000-08:00

Apparently, Grandma should have sent the larger spinner. Duck doesn't fit in it.

The days go by

2006-12-04T11:36:00.000-08:00

With each passing day, Isabel is more aware and interactive. Smiling and laughing and reaching for faces and things. I greatly enjoy our nursing relationship and love watching her change and grow in such an intimate and personal setting. I can see so much emotional and personal detail while we quietly snuggle and focus on each other. I try to carry her as much as possible throughout the day, but sometimes she just fusses and cries so much that I put her into her swing out of exasperation. Much to my surprise she is learning to enjoy the swing for naps. Which means I can get some housework done and spent one-on-one time with Leo.

Leo is growing too. His vocabulary and understanding of the world changes throughout each day. Gary bought him some preschool workbooks yesterday and we're starting to explore critical thinking skills so necessary for such learning. He's learning his alphabet and already knows about half of the letters and is also learning to count. He can now count to three, and with some help can count to four and five. He's looking forward to going to Grandma and Grandpa's house for Christmas, having been told they'll have a Christmas tree. I'm not sure what to tell him about presents, I'd rather that the emphasis be placed on the tree and the visit to the G's; the traditions and the family continuity being more valuable than gifts and toys.

I returned to work this morning. There are about 56 hours left in my project budget for me, then I will be completely done with it and will just be an at-home mom. I'm just doing two hours per day until the hours are gone. That way Gary can go to work after me and our income isn't compromised.

Gotta run, Gary is home for lunch.

Food Poisoning

2006-11-26T17:43:00.000-08:00

The day after Thanksgiving, we met the H's at the club as their guests just to sit and chat and we put Leo into the daycare with their kids. After we bailed out the kids, we all went into old town and had Mexican food and margaritas (none for the ninos). Then onto the toy store where Leo peed on himself. We had no extra clothes, b/c Gary had packed the two diaper bags separately and we had only Isa's stuff. So he wrapped him up as well as he could into A's extra shirt and carried him back to the car.

The men took the bigger kids back to the H's house and A and I took Isa down to the fabric store to buy knitting needles (I'm making K an alpaca hat for Christmas).

We came home and hung out with the H's until about 9:30 and then took our children home. We ate turkey ghoulash ala K and watched TV (a rarity for all of us to sit and watch TV for so long) and had a lovely warm fire.

Saturday was Uncle B's party in the city, so we took our kids down there to see the family. There were the usual cousins and aunts and uncles and a zillion kids. We had a good time. Note to self: look up the Chacon family as being a first family of Colorado.

Leo urped once at the party but it was no big deal and he felt fine. I later attributed it to the sour milk that the bartender gave him (I tasted their milk after Leo had had 8 ounces of it), but he spent all night puking. Bless G for being up ALL NIGHT with him, even though he felt cruddy, too. I puked a few times. I pumped as much extra milk as I could and when Leo started holding down liquids, he drank about 8 ounces. I think it helped.

In the morning, G called the H's and found that they had food poisoning too. Was it the Mexican place? Was it the turkey ghoulash?

We're still recovering here, but for food poisoning, it was fairly mild. I am glad it was so mild and didn't interfere with my milk.

Helmet

2006-11-26T17:36:00.000-08:00

We went to WalMart to buy some elastic and to kill time before the puppet show at the library. They didn't have any good elastic, only the stuff that fails quickly under strenuous diaper use, so we just moved on and started to wander the store. We headed over to the toy section to buy Leo a MatchBox car. On the way, I spotted a good sale on bike helmets, toddler sized. So I offered him a choice and he picked the red-hot flame helmet, very excited (he loves accessories). It was a good deal: $7 from $18. We bought the little car and went to the puppet show.

He LOVED the puppet show. It was a very good time and there were lots of kids, singing and laughing. We will be sure to try to go to more story hours at the library.

A few days later, we were at a party at our friends' house with many toddlers. The evening was a lot of fun, lots of chaos and toddler tussles. During one shoving match, Leo got knocked over into the corner of an end table. There was a loud and sickening thump and Leo fell on the floor crying. I picked him up and held him, shushing and calming him and removed his helmet. He was not hurt, just scared, but his helmet had two large divets in the brain stem protection foam. He wore that helmet all evening, and of all the kids, he was the one to have an accident. I don't know how much protection the helmet gave him, but it was truly a fortunate blessing he was wearing it.

Isabel's Birth

2006-11-26T17:23:00.000-08:00

We had a fairly short labor, although I started having prelabor/early labor contractions Friday evening. They kept coming and going Friday night through Saturday and into Sunday. I got a nap Sunday afternoon when they were gone again and I was sure I still wasn't really going to go into labor. My doula decided to visit me briefly around noon on Sunday and chose to stay because I was working through the contractions, even though they still felt putzy to me. After my afternoon nap, we all went for a nice long walk and that really helped to get things going. That was about 5pm.

My contractions stayed about 5-8 min apart all evening, and the doula had her husband come and get our ds for the night. She was more sure that I was in labor than I was. :lol We kept the midwife posted on my status and when I felt like my contractions really were regular and getting more intense and serious, she came to stay at about 10:45. We finally filled up the birth tub around that time and it felt SO good. Not that it takes away the pain, just that it makes it so the only pain to deal with is the contractions.

I kept getting out of the water between contractions because if I stayed immersed too long, the contractions spaced out too far.

About midnight or so, the pain got to be more than I could handle and the midwife kept asking me "Are you having a contraction? You need to calm down and breathe normally between them." But I was in SO MUCH pain between the contractions. My left backstrap and my belly along the left side hurt as much between as during contractions; the pain never went away, and it was intense. I was starting to panic and couldn't cope.

The midwife finally decided something must be wrong (I had certainly thought so) and she and the doula started talking about things. They had me get out of the tub and try walking up and down the stairs swinging my legs out far, they did a special hip alignment technique where I had to lay down on my side on the bed with a leg dangling over, and finally the midwife decided to check my cervix. She was very gentle, not at all like OB nurses I've known. She said she was checking for position, and couldn't feel any sutures to be able to tell the position of the baby. So she palpated my belly to get the best idea she could. At about 2am she laid me down on a blanket on the floor and picked up the edges, lifting me off the floor. She shook me back and forth vigorously, then rolled me onto my left side and shook me some more, then laid me down on my left side and waited. The pain slowly began to subside (a couple of minutes) and I fell asleep. I slept for an hour on the floor and had three contractions which I was able to cope with.

I got up at 3:15 and started to walk around. The midwife had me do the stairs some more, and I found that I was much more nimble and comfortable in my body. I could move and control myself in between contractions without pain or weakness. When the contractions got too intense, I finally got back into the tub and it was wonderful. I was able to sleep between the contractions (still 5 minutes apart). This was about 3:45am.

My doula helped me cope with each contraction as it came and it was wonderful that the only pain was the contraction, no muscle pain like before and the water took away most of the pelvic and belly pressure. Hard to describe to say I only felt the pain of the contraction. They were amazingly intense, each one stretching my pelvis farther and more intensely. Without my doula's eye contact and strength, I might have panicked a bit (dh would have helped me if not her). I checked my dilation periodically and wasn't really very far, I could still feel that the cervix was a bit mounded and I could feel the edges of it easily (I can't tell you how dilated that was, I don't know numbers with my fingers). I started feeling grunty and tested with a bit of a push sometimes but still felt like I had a long way to go. At 4:45 I had so much pressure I knew it was time. I really panicked and told the doula I couldn't do it, I wasn't ready and started really getting upset. It felt like I was going to rip apart, vaginally and pelvicly (is that a word?). She kept my eyes and helped me cope with the intensity and the midwife got up off the couch and headed to the bathroom to pee, but the doula called for her to come immediately. I tried to wait and not push through the next contraction so I could stretch, but it wouldn't stop until I pushed, it was overwhelming and uncontrollable, so I pushed and the head came out, the water breaking with it. The midwife asked me what I was feeling, and I couldn't answer, I held on through the next contraction and she put her hand into the water, and was very shocked to find the baby's head. Then I pushed again and out came the shoulders and the baby.

What a relief!!

So that is how Isabel was born, 7lbs, 1 oz 20.5 inches. I have only a small skidmark and at 5 days PP my perineum isn't even sore anymore. Whew!

In retrospect, I see signs that she wasn't engaged properly in the pelvis, and I really had suspected it for awhile. For several weeks, my evening contractions were made very painful by the feeling of the baby shifting her head around in the pelvis. This caused sharp stabbing pains and I had a lot of this shifting and wiggling pain during the latter end of early labor (Sunday night). It seems that this must have been because the baby wasn't in the pelvis properly.

I am convinced that if I had been in a hospital I would have asked for an epidural, the pain was beyond what I could tolerate. And with no one knowledgeable about shifting a baby or keeping me moving, I would have ended up with a c-section. The midwife demurs on this, and says it's hard to know, but can you picture an OB putting me down on a blanket and jiggling me to move the baby?

Optimal Fetal Positioning

2006-09-01T14:17:00.000-07:00

This has really been bothering me lately.

My midwife and doula (the former I respect, the latter I love) have been giving me a bit of pressure about my posture and the position of the baby. My doula not so much, just reminding me not to use recliners. But my midwife has given me a lot of advice about sleeping on my left side and doing the Cat pose. When she palpates my belly, she frowns and is a little 'concerned'.

The baby is ROA, I suppose. Oh well. It is where it is.

I asked another midwife about this and she told me to quit worrying. Babies are born just fine from ROA as from LOA. Doesn't mean the baby is going to be posterior in labor or birth. I felt better having someone else tell me this, rather than just hearing it from myself or my husband.

Where is the evidence that fetal positioning influences the birth outcome? Or the laboring process? Not that I assume it doesn't, but are there no studies on this? I'd like some real evidence one way or the other.

First Post

2006-09-01T14:14:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure what to do with a blog.

There are many thoughts that fleet randomly across my landscape and I wish I could record them for myself or for others, maybe for my children to read someday.

But having a blog seems a bit self-centred, too. Why am I so special? Who's going to want to read my thoughts and musings?

Well, here it is and it will be what it will be.

I will try to write for myself and not for anyone else. I suppose we shall see what develops from here.