New Years

No blog is complete without the writer's New Years Resolutions. Maybe you disagree. Eh.

The big resolution around our house this year is "SAVE MONEY" Not so much because of the national recession, though its a good idea in general to learn to be more content with less and trim the budget, but mainly because we want to buy a house and need to save up a down payment. So we have resolved to
A) Not buy fast food at all - If we can go a month without buying drive-thru food, then we will reward the whole family by going out for one meal at a restaurant.
B) Buy only the groceries that we NEED, which means not buying food at the store just because we are having a craving or the item would save 2 minutes with a chore.

These are 2 little things that have already made a HUGE impact on our budget! I have spent less than $200 on groceries this month so far, which is about what I spend in a week normally. I know, its only 2 weeks into the month, but imagine that if I can keep that up, we can potentially save $4oo just from trimming the grocery bill! And if you add the impulsive drive-thru purchases to that, it probably comes closer to $600 saved in one month. Pretty impressive.

Yesterday we did a social studies project that required no prep on my part and made my children a more involved part of our goal. I asked each child to tell me the difference between need and want (the 3 year old chose to go play in his room, as he is not required to do all projects yet). I then asked the oldest 2 to go look through all the cupboards and cabinets, refrigerator and freezers to see what we have in the house to eat. They named off all that they could. I then asked them if we "needed" to buy groceries, or do we have enough in the house to eat? It was good for them to see that we really do have an abundance of food in our house and Im hoping it will help them understand that just because you want something, does not mean you need it. Edward made the observation that we have enough food to last a month in our house. And he is right! I could probably go a month without buying food. I would have to get REALLY creative with meals, which is always challenging but doable. For instance, last night for dinner we had pizza, but I didnt feel like going under the house (where we have shelves) to get tomato sauce, I didnt have any mozzarella cheese and there was no pepperoni, so our pizza went something like this:

1 lb boule dough (recipe here: http://www.motherearthnews.com/Real-Food/Artisan-Bread-In-Five-Minutes-A-Day.aspx) , or other pizza/bread dough you have on hand.
1 1/2 tbsp butter
minced garlic (out of a jar)
basil (in the winter, I use herbs that come in the tubes, keeps for a long time, no time to chop)
1/2 zucchini
1/2 summer squash
5 sausage links (the kind that is frozen, pre-cooked. This time it was Banquet, which my husband chose, but normally I buy Johnson Farms frozen breakfast sausages - no BHA, BHT or TBHQ or other preservatives)
3/4 cup shredded cheese - I happened to have used a Southwest mix that was pre-shredded.

1. Preheat oven to 450 F
2. Roll out dough onto parchment paper that has been sprinkled with cornmeal (or hand toss if you are that good)
3. Mix butter, garlic and basil. Spread evenly onto crust, leaving the edges butter free.
4. Slice zucchini and squash into thin slices. Saute with olive oil over medium heat for 5 minutes.
5. Slice frozen sausages, add to squash mix. Continue to cook for 3 or 4 minutes.
6. Scatter squash mixture onto pizza crust. Top with Cheese
7. Bake for 15 minutes or until cheese is melted and starting to golden. Serves 4

Not hard, is it? You could totally add any veggie or meat to that and it would work. Kids tried some new stuff, we didnt spend any money and it was great!

The last thing we did for school was discuss where food comes from. There are 6 ways to get food: Hunting, Fishing, Grow it, Keep animal (chickens, goats, etc), Forage and lastly, the grocery store. We also discussed how the food/money cycle works between us and the farmers that grow the food. The most important part of our discussion was focused on those first 5 ways to get food. Most of them cost us no or very little money. It is these things that will be the focus of our children's education. We live in Alaska and there is very little excuse for not being able to feed yourself. And what's an education if you learn no skills for caring for yourself? I want my kids to be able to provide for themselves if needed and not be burdened with the modern "convenience" of money and wasted food. Providing for yourself also builds confidence. Its just the beginning to becoming a sure-footed adult.

So our kids will hopefully be more willing to help us meet our goal. They all agree we need a little more space and that means a bigger house. They are getting better at eating what is given to them without complaining also. If we can stick with it, we could have the down payment before summer. It does mean that I wont get to take any trips outside this year (major bummer, since I really wanted to go to Ireland this year) but if I have to choose between a new house or a vacation, I choose the house!

I have an ongoing list of the foods in our house. I may occasionally post recipes I come up with and Im open to recipes you might want to share.

Wrinkles!!

My 30th birthday is coming up. About 2 months off. Last week I noticed wrinkles under my eyes and this morning I see that there are two little lines around my mouth, one on each side of my smile! I dont think that Im just hyper aware about things like that right now, but that they have slowly made a permanent home on my face and are now significant enough to bother me. There must have been a message sent out to every cell that Im going to be 30, we can let things slide! At least they are wrinkles from smiling and not frowning!

I have always said that I wouldn't be upset about growing older. I'm happy that I've survived my twenties! And I love birthdays, mine especially. I am looking forward to turning 30, but who knows - maybe I will be more overwhelmed by it later, maybe not.

I have lived a lot of life before turning 30. I moved away from home at 18, only to come back 2 years later at 20. Since then I have married, had 4 kids, learned SO many new skills (a list would look like Im bragging), moved 7 times, had 7 cars and FINALLY have a bed that doesnt hurt my back. Ive lost a total of 110 pounds and gained a total of 150 (not so proud of that one). I have finally learned how to apologize, how to control my temper and control my tongue. I can save money! I have grown in a lot of ways and learned much more about God. I have had to say good bye to family and friends who have died. Ten years is no small amount of time.

I have a few more things I want to accomplish in these last 2 months, however.
First, I want to take a Hunter's Education Class and get my hunting license. Second, I want a passport and to FINALLY apply for my Irish citizenship. Those are last on my list. Not even weight loss ranks above those.

As for the next decade, I'm already planning and I'm excited. Not so excited about wrinkles, but I'll try to wear them as a badge. I will not accept gray hair yet. Try me in 10 years.

LAST attempt..... seriously

Okay, I lied. About half thru the night on January 1st, I had a change of heart on the quitting nursing thing. It would be best for Liam's stomach if I nursed exclusively, so Im going to give it one more week. Im going to do everything as close to perfectly as possible and if things still arent working, then I have to surrender.

Is it so lame that some part of my identity can be so damaged at failing at this?

oh well



UPDATE, January 14:

Im still pumping off and on, but it looks like my supply is finally up! It seems to slack after a day or two of only nursing, but it is easily fixed by pumping when I have time. For the first time ever, I have milk in the freezer thats from me! Im so proud, its silly. 'Bout time!

Two Months

Well, a lot has happened (and a lot has not) in the last month. Liam is now 2 months and today is New Years Day. The last post, I wrote about my frustrations with nursing. That very afternoon, I found someone who was willing to donate breast milk to me and loan me her electric pump. She even gave me a list of supplements to take and really good instructions on how to get my supply up. So I have spent the past month trying to adhere to those instructions, putting aside many things (and neglecting my other 3 children) in an effort to get my milk supply up. I was determined.

Thats why it makes me terribly sad to say that I have decided today that Im done trying to build up my milk supply. Im really disappointed with myself, but I realize that after struggling with it for so long, I have to choose: the rest of my life or continue to pursue nursing exclusively. There is only so long that I can neglect my other children, husband, home and school for and it is really starting to take a toll on my overall satisfaction and sense of accomplishment. Every waking moment of my day was consumed with nursing, pumping, taking supplements, drinking tea. If the baby slept, I had to choose between feeding my children, attempting to get some schoolwork done with them, or cleaning to keep the house in a state of semi-order. And the baby only sleeps twice a day for an hour or so! There isnt much time in there for anything resembling a schedule. And I dont deal well with chaos.

So as I put away the Christmas decorations today, wash the last pot from dinner last Friday(!) and promise my husband I will get his laundry done this weekend some time, it is a bittersweet decision I make to not pursue this anymore. My baby will still be healthy and I will have time and energy to put into being a better wife and mother. And I can stop calculating my self-worth based on this one aspect of my life.

I am going to keep up with my supplements. And I did learn that I dont have a let-down reflex (for all you who speak lactation-ese). That is terribly important when it comes to milk production. I really wish I would have had someone to guide me thru all this with Baby #1. Or 2, or 3. But I am coming out of this with more knowledge and a goal that if I ever have another baby, I will use all these techniques to get my supply built up in the first 2 weeks of nursing.
And hey, if I make it to 7 months nursing alongside the bottles of formula, I will have beaten my last record of 6 months. Maybe someday I will get this down.

One Month

Today our baby is one month old. Today is also the first day I have given him a bottle, with formula in it. It was not an easy decision to come to. The last month has been wonderful, but also full of fussing and a never ending demand to feed. It has been, at times, completely overwhelming and frustrating. There were days that I literally spent 90% of my waking time with a baby attached to my chest! And that makes for a grumpy, hungry mom, especially when the baby doesnt seemed to be satisfied after all that work.

Now, as I type this, he is sleeping peacefully on the bed next to me. There has not been a time when he has slept this soundly, at least not in the last week or two. At the beginning of this nursing adventure, he had days when he would sleep for an hour or two. Recently it has only been when he is in the car seat while we are running errands. I cant believe I waited this long to give him what he wanted: more food! I really wanted to exclusively nurse this time though. The last 3 babies have all been bottle and breastfed, at the advice of my doctor who decided that they were just not gaining weight at a good rate. Then there was the suggestion that maybe my doctor was just a "formula pusher" and my milk would have been enough if I had just hung in there a little longer (not that I quit nursing when I started bottlefeeding). So this time I held out, taking all the nursing advice I could, convinced I could do it. Apparently, I cant. The determining factor was that today, at one month, our little guy is not back up to his birth weight. I am thankful that my husband helped to make this decision and has been encouraging this whole time.

It makes my chest hurt (both figuratively and literally) knowing that I just cant provide enough milk to sustain him. It shouldnt, but it does, make me feel like the littlest bit of a failure. On the other hand, I had the joy of sitting quietly with my infant, who was smiling and cooing, after taking 2 oz after nursing, and seeing the complete change in his disposition. I thought he was just an angry baby... He must have been hungry! And now he is sleeping.

I have several drafted posts from the last 6 months waiting to be published, some complete, some started and then forgotten. I will catch up someday. But let me at least say thank you for all your prayers during this pregnancy and delivery. They did not go unheard and my prayers were answered.

New Baby

So while my newborn is sleeping, I have managed to find a few minutes to let everyone know what Im up to and where I am in my walk. If I hurry, I may even get this done in one sitting!

It has been months since the last post. I dont think that I posted it before, but I was pregnant for the majority of this year. We kept is a secret until April, at which point I was past the first trimester and into the second. As pregnancies go, this one was great. I was able to be fairly active this summer, and in the end, gained about 35 lbs. Not bad, but I started out heavier than I should have been also. But thats another subject all together....

Well, now to announce the arrival of our newest son, Liam! He is nearly 3 weeks at this posting and a lovely little baby. He cries ferociously, eats ferociously and thankfully, sleeps very well at night! Maybe we should have named him "Lion" ;)

What I really wanted to share about this pregnancy and delivery is the many ways that God has answered our prayers! It has been trying, but amazing, to see God's hand in all of this.
First off, my blood pressure, which went up and was acting erraticly after having the last baby by c-section, leveled off at perfect readings in the third trimester! When does that happen?! Usually, blood pressure gets WORSE the further into your pregnancy. So that was an answered prayer!
Second, I was able to VBAC, which is so awesome and Im so happy I didnt have to go thru another c-section. No breech baby. The recovery from that was awful and just not the way I prefer to deliver children. So second prayer answered!
Third, labor was just not progressing, so I had to have pitocin, which is not normally recommended with a VBAC, but my doctor was confident it would be fine for me under the circumstances, so he insisted we go forward. The baby came VERY quickly, and in fact, I strongly believe that they could have cut the dosage by 75% and it would have been plenty. Liam was born in under 2 hours from the first of the pitocin and I would say that I was barely having contractions before, so from 0 to 100 mph in 2 hours is FAST!!! Had he been a 10 lb baby like the last 2, we would have both been seriously hurt I believe. But praise God, he was my smallest baby yet, weighing in at only 8.6! So delivery, while fast and frenzied, was still relatively easy! What, thats 3 answered prayers? WOohoo!
On top of those MAJOR things that we had been praying about, there were other things that we were concerned about and that God took care of. We were worried that he would have the cord wrapped, just like ALL of his big brothers (thankfully, the first two it was not a problem and the third it actually prevented him from turning and resulted in the c-section) but he was NOT wrapped and in fact the doctor commented that his umbilical cord was short! Before that, we didnt get lab results back for the Strep B test and that was something that had caused a lot of digestive and diaper rash problems for our 2nd, after having antibiotics in utero, and since we never got results back, we didnt have to have any antibiotics.

There we so many ways that God revealed Himself in this pregnancy and delivery. I have struggled with wanting to honor God by submitting myself completely to him, all aspects of my life, and reproduction is certainly a big part of that. I can see that He did all this for His glory and Im awed by it. I want to be obedient in this and to me, that means accepting the possibility of having a BIG family. Im okay with that. I just hope that I can use it to minister to other people and to lovingly accept their criticism, chastisement, and generally rude comments.

I hope you will find something to glorify God for in this story. Or at the very least, to stop and look at things in your life and give thanks for the things that came to be by the way God worked.

What to do with burned brownies...?

Well make chocolate bread pudding, of course! Earlier this summer, I made my favorite brownies but substituted natural sugar for the regular white sugar. You wouldn't think there would be a difference, but boy was there ever! They just wouldn't set up! They were oily, hard and way darker than they should have been. I considered them completely inedible, not even good enough to chop up for ice cream add-ins. Then I decided that I should try to use them, not dump them, and thought that maybe they would work in a bread pudding, if I let them soak a REALLY long time in the batter before baking. And hooray, it turned out great! WARNING: This should NOT be considered a breakfast food. It is far sweeter than a regular bread pudding and SUPER chocolately. This would make a great dessert to serve to company - custardy, chocolatey and with a scoop of vanilla ice cream!

Brownie Bread Pudding