That Married Couple

Quiet in the midst of chaos

2011-12-01T08:47:00.000-05:00

I think we've finally recovered from all the visiting and driving of two Thanksgivings and one Christmas celebration last weekend.

Now this weekend is my husband's birthday.

Next weekend is Miriam's birthday.

The following weekend we're hosting my dad's whole side for Christmas.

The weekend after that is actually Christmas.

And the weekend after that I'll be struggling to stay awake 'til midnight. Maybe I'll just go to bed and set the alarm.

So yeah, it's a busy month. I'm trying hard to keep things simple and focused in the midst of BUY!BUY!BUY! all around me. Part of my effort to step back and enjoy this season will include a little blog break. I hate that I haven't been able to keep up with all of your blogs, and my own posting has become more of a chore than a joy. Most importantly, instead of putting out more words, I really want to make time for The Word.

So I wish you all a peaceful Advent and a very joyful Christmas. See you next year!

No Plain Pony November Wrap-Up

2011-11-30T14:42:00.000-05:00

We made it!

One thing I learned from all this? Although my hair is very pretty when it's long, I don't think it's the most flattering look for my face. So I finally got up the courage to get my hair cut the other night! And for the first time in ten years I even got (gasp) bangs! Okay, they're long enough that they're probably always going to be tucked behind my ear, but it's a start.

The other thing I learned from this month? It is actually possible to shower (almost) every day and make an effort to look nice. On the flip side, now when I wear my hair in a ponytail I am going to claim that it is due to my lack of skill with bobby pins as opposed to me just being lazy.

Thanks for sticking with me through this month - I know the posts were a bit boring, but it was good accountability for me. And special thanks to Joy and Knowledge Hungry for taking part all along! Any closing remarks from anyone else?

Keeping out the plastic junk

2011-11-25T09:16:00.002-05:00

A few thoughts for your Black Friday.

1. If you're reading this you must not be out shopping. I'm not either - even if I wanted to, my husband forbid it. He's good at keeping my consumer tendencies in check! This year we're spending the day with family that we didn't see yesterday, but in the future (when they don't make it in) we plan to do our own Green Friday instead.

And have you heard about Shop Small Saturday? I love the idea of supporting your favorite small businesses instead of the overcrowded big boys!

2. Here are several great ideas for clutter-free gifts! I love gifts like this. Last year we got my brothers tickets to their first NBA game. Last month we got my mom a trip to the theater for her birthday. For Christmas we're giving my mom and grandma homemade vanilla extract. And when Miriam is old enough, we're seriously considering asking the grandparents to pay for horseback riding lessons as one of her gifts. Wouldn't that be cool?

What are your favorite clutter-free gifts?

3. Have I mentioned that we really don't want a house overflowing with stuff? Some of it is fine, but we're terrified that since Miriam's birthday and Christmas are within a couple weeks of each other, our house is suddenly going to explode with it. But this article reminded me that saying "Don't buy her plastic junk!" can be a bit offensive.

Whoops. We've said loudly and frequently that we don't want too many toys, but I don't think we've said it tactfully or charitably. It's hard because gift giving is neither my husband's nor my love language and sometimes we forget just how important it is for other people! So this is a reminder to myself to allow other people to express their love for her (and us) without wondering how quickly I can donate it.

4. Speaking of excess, we're having a second full turkey dinner today. I plan to go into another food coma and sleep for the rest of the weekend. See you next week!

No Plain Pony November - Week 3

2011-11-23T12:38:00.001-05:00

Anyone else a bit tired of this topic?

It's not that I'm tired of wearing my hair down - I think this challenge is successfully achieving the goal of getting me in that habit. It's trying to find new things to do with it. Especially since, as I mentioned last time, I am not skilled at bobby pin insertion. Give me a pony tail holder and I'm fine. But anything else and the results are not pretty. So that inspired a different challenge for this week: adding accessories to my hair.

Initially I had big plans to try things like barrettes and a flexiclip and maybe even flowers! But I'm afraid I'm too cheap to buy things that I'm not sure will work.

I still want to try one of these flexiclips, though.

So instead I used things we already had and basically tried different varieties of headbands. I apologize in advance for the pics - you really can't see much.

First I did a simple ribbon. I thought it was fairly cute, but my husband informed me that it was too young. Seeing as I had indeed bought the ribbons for Miriam, and seeing as she looks much cuter in them, I reluctantly returned them to her closet.

Next I tried a lace headband. It had been sitting in an untouched accessory bag in the bathroom closet for approximately nine years. I liked that it was red and something a little different. My husband was indifferent to the look.

There are a lot of pretty headcoverings, including lace headbands, at this site. I haven't bought any, but I'm really tempted to get the one below. Isn't it pretty?

Finally I decided to try using a scarf. I kept seeing the image below all over the internet, but of course didn't think to actually use the accompanying tutorial when it came time to tie my own scarf.

This was my favorite of all the things I tried, probably because I just got this pretty scarf on clearance and am in love with it. (Unfortunately you can't see much of it in the picture.) My husband thought I looked a bit like a hippie, but it wasn't a dealbreaker.

There were two mornings I resorted to buns. One day I did three low buns, which turned out surprisingly okay. (It probably would've been prettier if I'd used bobby pins instead of hair ties, but oh well!)

Another morning I was short on time and even shorter on sleep, so I did go with a plain bun that morning. (I justified it by showering later and wearing it down the rest of the day.) And here's where the accessories really came in handy:

I put them on Miriam.

Because when you put a ridiculously large bow on your baby, nobody's looking at your hair.

How's No Plain Pony November going for you? If you're in a slump with wearing your hair down, your additional challenge this week is to try adding accessories!

And Happy Thanksgiving!

The one who actually does it all

2011-11-21T14:57:00.000-05:00

The only reason I can use cloth diapers with Miriam is because my husband helps fold the laundry every other day.

The only reason I can cook homemade dinners each night is because my husband empties the dishwasher in the morning, sets the table when he gets home, and does the dishes after supper.

The only reason I can get any sewing done is because my husband puts Miriam to bed every night.

The only reason I can frolic and play with Miriam all day long is because my husband is out there working his tail off.

So when people caution me that "It's not possible for a woman to do it all," I nod vigorously in agreement. The only superhero I know is my husband.

Quick Takes (80)

2011-11-18T14:17:00.000-05:00

A few days this week I worked hard to actually get some housework done before getting online - and it was amazing what a difference it made! I didn't spend my whole time at the computer trying to avoid eye contact with my to-do list. So relaxing! Now if I could just get a handle on the email situation.

Speaking of housework, I think I'm going to give in and make a homemaking notebook. I've toyed with the idea but never had enough motivation to actually put a binder together. (Yes, that's been the biggest thing stopping me.) Today, however, I went to a moms group where they gave us binders and stuff to decorate them and I took that as a sign from God that it was time I got serious about this whole homemaking thing.

But now I have to actually put stuff in it. Do you have a home management notebook? Do you have any good links to posts about starting and organizing one? Please share!

So in addition to taking pictures of my hair each week for No Plain Pony November, I initially toyed with the idea of also participating in What I Wore Wednesdays. If you haven't seen this before, you essentially take a picture of what you wear throughout the week and then post them on Wednesdays - the idea being to actually make yourself get dressed and even try to look good, since you know The Internet will see you and not just the grocery store clerk.

I decided not to post the outfit pictures because my hair posts were already long enough, but I have to say this was a really helpful exercise. In addition to making me get dressed and not just lounge around in sweats, taking a picture of myself every day was helpful as I try to figure out my personal style (and I do use that word loosely!). I just finished reading a couple of style books and it was so helpful to be able to see what those books were talking about. I could really appreciate the whole ensemble better by actually looking at a picture as opposed to looking in a mirror. For example, one book talked a lot about The Almighty Line and how you need to look at the whole effect of an outfit and what it does for your shape. I could only kind of make it out in the mirror, but when I looked at the picture of it I was able to really start to see what she meant.

One evening I asked my husband which of two routes would be quicker. He responded with a different third route, which I immediately dismissed, since it went through a neighborhood and of course that would take longer. And of course after trying all three routes, his suggestion was the clear winner.

The thing is, instead of being annoyed that he was right and I was wrong, I really relished the fact. Is that strange? That I could love my husband being right? Perhaps I subconsciously think it makes me look smart, to choose such a smart husband?

Darn you boy scouts! You have to be such cute neighbors and make me want to support your fundraising, and then you sell things like cookie dough. Which is somehow frozen and yet soft enough to eat by the spoonful. I might have to take cookies somewhere just to get this stuff out of my house.

If I were one of those good moms I would have adorable Christmas cards like this. (Well, and if my husband wasn't anti-naked-baby-pictures.)

Instead we had my mom take a couple pics (on Halloween weekend no less - I'm becoming one of those people I hate for skipping important holidays like Thanksgiving!) and ended up with shots like this.

Maybe we'll just do regular cards instead of photo cards this year.

Have a great weekend!
And for more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

No Plain Pony November - Week 2

2011-11-16T15:57:00.000-05:00

I ran out of mousse this week.

This inspired me to add an additional challenge for this week of No Plain Pony November: try a new styling product.

I've got this half-full jar of coconut oil sitting on my bathroom counter. The coconut oil lovers out there tout its many benefits, including as a hair gel. But after my homemade deodorant debacle, I wasn't sure whether I could trust coconut oil. Should I really risk putting it on my scalp? I decided to throw caution to the wind and go for it.

And it was a success! Well, if you consider the fact that my scalp did not break out to be a success.

"Why is your hair wet?" was my husband's first question.

"It's not wet. I'm trying coconut oil instead of mousse. What do you think?"

He touched it. "It looks crunchy. But it's not."

"I know. Weird, huh?"

"And it looks really dark. You look ethnic. Like a peasant who just returned from getting water."

Here my hair is wet.

Here my hair is not wet. You can hardly tell, huh?

My husband was unimpressed, though not appalled. Overall I was unimpressed as well. The coconut oil was a really heavy hold, not a light one like I was used to. Because of that, the curl in my hair was pulled down into more of a wave.

I tried it for a few days, thinking that perhaps since it was so heavy it would allow me to go longer without showering. But it looked a bit greasy the next day, although it didn't feel greasy. If anything, I do have to say my hair was really soft to the touch. But when it came to washing my hair - yikes. If you're not familiar with coconut oil (as I wasn't until I first bought some about a month ago), picture Crisco shortening. Okay, now picture rubbing that between your hands until it liquifies and then running that through your hair.

Yeah. So it felt kind of gross when I tried to rinse it out in the shower.

If for some reason I wanted to go for a crunchy look, a wet look, or a darker look, I would use it again. But since those aren't really my style, I predict the jar of coconut oil will remain unused on the vanity for the next several months.

What's that? The only reason you're still reading this is to see another updo failure?

Most of the week I wore my hair down, since I was experimenting with varying amounts of coconut oil. But lucky for you, I did attempt two more updos. They weren't the outlandish failures of last time, but they were failures nonetheless.

First I tried the Gibson tuck. It looked pretty and simple enough. I saw a video for it here and a tutorial here. This is how it's supposed to look:

Somehow I couldn't get it to twist without one side of my hair getting poufy. I would've taken a picture, but in addition to bobby pins I was also juggling this:

Since that wasn't working out, I tried to do a French twist. That's a classically beautiful hairstyle, you know? And this tutorial even said it was easy. Well, it was sort of easy to put up.

But it stayed in for less than five minutes. I think I've discovered the problem with me and updos. I am incompetent when it comes to bobby pins.

We were both having a bad hair day.

Finally I threw in the towel and went for the old standby that my girlfriend (hi Maria!) reintroduced to me a few months back. Do you remember doing this in middle school? (Or high school or elementary school, depending on your age.) Pull into low ponytail, make a hole, shove ponytail through. Done. Yes, it was a ponytail, but at least it wasn't plain!

So there's this week's update. How's your month going so far? Have you been able to go without that plain pony? And are you up for the challenge of using a new styling product? I'd suggest trying out your girlfriend's before you pay money for a product you aren't sure will work!

Related:
I just discovered that Peanut Butter in my Hair also doing a no ponytail challenge this month!

You can call me...

2011-11-14T15:59:00.001-05:00

What do children call you?

My husband and I decided that we'd like to be called Mr B- and Mrs B-.* We decided this because we expect our own children to call adults by their last names. But we didn't realize just how difficult this would be!

First you have the parents who don't instruct their children to address you any differently than they do. They may feel like Mr and Mrs is too formal.

Then you have the kids who just assume they can call you by your first name. This is the case with some of the kids in our neighborhood. It's a bit comical when a ten year old rings the doorbell and asks, "Can Greg come play?" I feel like he's asking if my son can come out and not my husband! Luckily most of the neighborhood kids don't call us anything (with the exception of my husband's basketball buddy) and so we've mostly dodged this one.

[I feel like that's how I handled it as a kid - I never knew what to call adults (other than teachers) and so I just awkwardly avoided addressing them. I would rather that not be the case for our children. My husband grew up knowing that he was supposed to call adults Mr and Mrs and that was that. So much easier!]

Then you have the families that call you Mr or Miss Firstname. I can understand this because sometimes last names are really hard to pronounce. Miss Elizabeth is certainly an improvement, though it also makes me feel like a daycare teacher again.

Finally, the toughest of all are the adults who don't want to go by Mr or Mrs X! I carefully make sure to get their last name so Miriam can call them by it and then they say "Oh, she can just call me Sally." I'm sorry, Sally, but we'd actually prefer her not to. You're not her playmate - you're an adult and we'd like her to treat you with a bit more respect.

But is that being disrespectful to Sally? Is that being hypocritical of me, to prefer to be addressed one way in spite of what the other adult usually does, but disregard their own preferences? Or do people just slide into whatever mode of address is used by the people around them, and they don't care either way and I'm just overthinking everything?

So far our strategy has simply been to instruct Miriam to "Say hello to Mr Doe," "Say thank you to Mrs Smith," etc. Obviously she can't actually say any of this yet. But it conveys to other adults how we'd like for her to address them, and hopefully subtly indicates how we'd like to be addressed as well. It hasn't worked perfectly, and I'm still debating how or if we should say something in those other instances.

What do you prefer to be called? How do you handle it if children call you something different? And are we stodgy old stick-in-the-muds for wanting to be addressed as Mr and Mrs?

*I suppose I could also go by Dr B-. But I'd rather people not be confused and turn to me in the case of a medical emergency! So Mrs B- it is.

No Plain Pony November - Week 1

2011-11-09T12:16:00.000-05:00

I haven't worn my hair in a ponytail for just over a week! That's a record, people!

The first day was by far the hardest. See, the thing is for my hair to look good I generally need to shower and put some stuff in it. But that is very tricky to do when you only have an hour between when the baby wakes up and when you need to make it to morning mass.

(At this point pre-baby me would smugly wonder, "Why can't this lady just wake up before the baby and shower then? No big deal." Oh, pre-baby me. You have yet to learn that when a baby still doesn't sleep through the night, every minute of morning sleep counts.)

So what did I do? Brought Miriam in the shower with me. Oh yes, I did. She loves bath time but was not such a fan of the shower spraying on her, and eventually just played with the rubber duckies at my feet (I was in her tub, where the mat is really good so there'd be no danger of slipping). Am I the only person who has done this? Do you have any suggestions of some other way to get my bedhead to look better in the morning? I tried a spray gel a few times before but my hair was so gross and sticky by the end of the day that I'm reluctant to buy it again.

Anyway, on to the pictures. Most days I just wore my hair down with nothing special or in a headband.

Regular day with my hair down. (Sidenote: How do people manage to take pictures of themselves in the mirror? It's so awkward!)

A few days later I decided it was time to attempt one of the hairstyles I'd linked to previously. I had a little bit of extra time before my mom arrived to watch Miriam (but not enough time to shower), so I decided to try this.

Pretty, huh?

Pretty impossible, that is. At least for my extremely limited hair styling skills. My mom came in the door to find me with half of my hair haphazardly twisted, half of it hanging in my face, and Miriam alternately trying to climb my legs and the stairs. I hurriedly finished and glanced at the back of my hair in a mirror.

"Oh my gosh, I can't go out like this!" I cried in horror. "I'm just going to pull it back into a bun!"

"It doesn't look that bad," my mom assured me. "Just go ahead and go."

I should have known better than to trust my mom. It's not that she would intentionally lie about how I looked. It's that she's my mother and she always thinks I look beautiful. I'm sure I'll be the same way with Miriam. But hopefully I will be able to recognize that her walking out the door like this is unacceptable:

You might be thinking that's not so bad. That's because you haven't seen the back yet.

And believe it or not, it gets worse.

And yes, I did actually leave the house like that. I'm shuddering at the recollection.

The other gals in my moms group were kind enough not to recoil in horror. But when I took a bathroom break, it was all I could do not to run screaming at the sight. It was starting to fall down and looked even worse than the above pictures. I had to do something, and fast.

I recalled a very simple double bun style from this video (the second style she does). I did the best I could and figured at this point anything was an improvement.

When I came home I was pleasantly surprised. In spite of the fact that it was starting to fall out, it was actually kind of pretty!

But apparently that was some sort of fluke. Because when I tried to recreate it, all I could come up with was this funky look.

After all this drama, I was tempted to never try a new hair style ever again. But a few days later I mustered up the courage to attempt this.

And lo and behold, it worked! And I loved it!

Excuse the poor quality. This was all I could get before Miriam attempted to go headfirst into the toilet. Oh and also please excuse the fact that I'm wearing a plaid shirt. I'm still working on that whole dressing well thing.

Not only was it pretty, but it actually stayed in all day long. I liked it so much that I wore the same style again the next day. Here's a picture of it after being in for ten hours, surviving both the rain and rolling around on the floor.

Nice, huh? It felt good to have a success after the fantastic failure of a few days before.

And now I'll leave you with a few new inspiration styles for this upcoming week, with a strong word of caution: try them at your own risk!

Oh, and Joy and KnowledgeHungry are also taking part in No Plain Pony November - check them out! If you're also doing it, feel free to leave a link in the comments! And even if you aren't up for a whole month, if you do something neat with your hair I'd love to see it, so please link to that, too!

How to make a massive menu plan

2011-11-07T22:08:00.000-05:00

I find menu planning to be extremely helpful when it comes to running my household. However, for the past couple months my menu planning has been off. I got out of the habit when we were in the moving process and hadn't gotten fully back into it. I was still planning for most weeknights, but I hadn't been including the weekends, so we were often running out to pick something up. I also needed to reevaluate the best time to do my grocery shopping. I had been doing it on Monday mornings, but that wasn't working because we started swimming lessons at that time. I'd also realized that the produce I was getting was still picked over from the weekend and wasn't really great by Friday. I needed a change.

So when I saw the 6 week long Plan It - Don't Panic menu planning series at Keeper of the Home I was inspired. What if I made six weeks of menus to cycle through?

That wasn't their specific challenge, but I decided it needed to be mine. I read some great posts on the topic of larger menu planning, and two in particular inspired me to plan for more than a week at a time.

Menu Planning Resources: Two Week Rotation (from Simple Mom)
Simplifying Grocery Shopping and the Benefits of Monthly Menu Planning (from Passionate Homemaking)

So I pulled out my cookbooks and started a spreadsheet. It was time to take my menu planning to the next level. (You can read through my drawn-out process here, or just skip to the simple solution below.)

Three Steps to Creating a Massive Menu Plan

1. Know what works for you and your family.
I know some people are great about using the internet for all their recipes and even for their planning. I am not one of those people. I make such a mess when I cook that my computer cannot be anywhere near me, and I don't want to keep running back and forth to the desk to see how many teaspoons of which spice go in this? But if that works for you, more power to you! There are lots of posts out there on how to make the most of that.

When I was evaluating our family's eating habits, I noted the following things:

Our end of the (shopping) week meals will probably need to have frozen or canned produce instead of fresh. So for example if I decide to do the grocery shopping on Wednesday, Monday and Tuesday night's veggies are probably not going to be fresh.
I get bored having the same meat a couple nights in a row, so I want to make sure and mix up the meats so we don't end up with chicken three nights in a row.
We do vegetarian Fridays. So not only do I need to plan a bean-based meal for Friday night, but I also have to make sure we have no or very few main dish leftovers from Thursday night's meal.
I don't worry about planning breakfasts or lunches. I tend to either make a ton of waffles on the weekend or muffins during the week and that gets us through for breakfasts, along with fruit. Lunch is almost always leftovers; sometimes on the weekend it'll be salad and macaroni and cheese or grilled cheese. No need to plan that.

An un-staged glimpse into our pantry. You're supposed to be looking at my cookbooks, but I got a kick out of looking at the shelf above. Do you like how the chocolate hard shell is blocking out all the organic veggies? I've got a long ways to go.

2. Go through your cookbooks and pull out your favorite recipes, along with any new recipes you'd like to try.
This part took me the longest - I have a lot of cookbooks and enjoy slowly paging through them. I compiled the recipes in a spreadsheet that noted the main ingredient, whether it went in the slow cooker, and most importantly the cookbook and page number.

3. Start putting weekly menus together.
Now is the time to decide if you'd like to do a weekly rotation like the ladies I linked to above suggested. This would make it pretty simple. At first that's what I was going to do.

But then when I started to put the menus together, I found that to feel more restricting than freeing. So I scrapped that and just started pulling out our favorite meals and tossing them onto different days and weeks.

It was fairly easy to fill in the first three weeks, but I found it tougher to fill in as I went on. I thought about going back and spacing out our favorites by inserting several new meals to try. For now, though, I just condensed the menu from six weeks to five. If I feel like mixing it up and trying something new, I can easily replace one of our stand-bys. But seeing as the holidays are coming up, I think it's in my best interest to stick with foods we love (and I already know how to make) for the next ten weeks. Come January, perhaps I'll spice things up with those new recipes on the spreadsheet.

The Easy Way
Now is where I have to confess that I got sidetracked and a bit overwhelmed at step two above. For (wince) six weeks in a row. Perhaps going through all my cookbooks was overdoing it just a bit. More importantly, after all that I later realized there was an easier way to make several weeks of menu plans. Just do your menu planning one week at a time, as usual, and (this is the important part) keep those scraps of paper that you wrote the menus and grocery lists on. After six weeks, compile what you already have, and voila! Your massive menu the easy way, complete with shopping lists!

Here's my finished product. (Sorry it's tough to see - click to enlarge.) You may notice that I did leave Saturdays blank. That's in case we want to go out to eat or visit family or something. If we are home every night that week, I'll just pull something out of the freezer. (Or give in and get grocery store fried chicken. So unhealthy. So tasty.)

Have you ever tried planning more than a week of menus at a time?

For more menu planning goodness, go check out six weeks of menus at the Plan It - Don't Panic series.

Quick Takes 79

2011-11-04T10:49:00.000-04:00

It's time I inform you of the sad state of my armpits. That homemade deodorant I made did indeed work to prevent stench. Unfortunately, within four days it also worked to make my armpits completely break out. It was bad, folks. Red splotchiness everywhere.

I then had to go four days without putting anything on my armpits so they could recover. And the smell? AWFUL. I wondered if I'd somehow accidentally caused my armpits to try to detox. My husband wouldn't cuddle with me, even when I'd taken a shower only a couple hours before. And he claimed that the smell was physically rubbing off onto poor Miriam.

Needless to say, we were all happy when I finally went to the store and bought some more deodorant. That's the last time I try to make our own body products.

But what do I do with the coconut oil now? I had all kinds of plans for it, from cooking to hair styling, but now I'm a bit nervous. If it did that to my armpits, perhaps I shouldn't ingest it.

Actually, I later heard that it was probably the cornstarch that caused my reaction and not the coconut oil. Which once again leads me to muse, if it did that to my armpits, perhaps I shouldn't ingest it.

You may have heard the world population passed the 7 billion mark this week. Hopefully you didn't fall for the overpopulation myth ominously underlying practically every story on the subject. (Except for this one.)

As a brief review:
Poverty = True
Hunger = True
Overpopulation = False

And here's a great short video about the numbers:

I am now soliciting birthday gift ideas for my mother. My dad's suggestion: have another baby so when the two of them visit they'll each have a grandchild to play with and they won't have to fight over Miriam. Since that's not going to happen in the next two weeks, I'm looking for other ideas.

My husband, after a rough night with Miriam: "I went to the bathroom this morning and saw a flashing red light. I thought the aliens had come to take me. Then I realized..."

"You realized it was just the stick your wife had peed on!" I finished with a giggle.

All that to say, we're pretty happy with using the Marquette model to observe my fertility postpartum. Although I do trust my bodily signs more than the monitor. Which is a good thing, in my opinion.

This new line of baby product fabrics at JoAnn's almost has me wanting to try my hand at sewing my own cloth diapers. Almost. Until I remember that PUL is a bear and we're perfectly happy with our current diaper stash.

After reading this fabulous review (seriously, if only all product reviews were this detailed!) I bought this steam mop with my birthday money. That's how you know you're old and boring, in case you were wondering. I'm still so excited about it that I am going to go use it again right now. That's twice in three weeks that my floor is getting mopped - definitely a record in our home!

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!
Have a great weekend!

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T21:15:00.001-04:00

This is Miriam's first Halloween!

She helped sort the goodies. Look, she prefers the pretzels and raisins!

Bring on the trick or treaters!

The scariest part of the day: Miriam's new favorite game is to climb up the stairs as fast as she can before I can catch her. The girl can make it to the second floor no problem. Aghh!

Happy Halloween from the cat and the mouse! (The cheese is taking the picture.)

p.s. Don't forget No Plain Pony November starts tomorrow!

The War on Sweets Begins

2011-10-28T14:50:00.000-04:00

I'm reading a book that makes the case for not allowing your child to have sweets before they're two years old. (I haven't read the entire book yet, so don't consider this a wholehearted endorsement.) His claim is that your child learns their comfort foods before that age, and then they're rightfully suspicious of new foods after that - so if they're used to eating lots of healthy foods and green veggies at every meal, they won't be so crazy for processed sugary foods later on. He does note that our bodies are hardwired to like sweet foods, so it's not like they'll never eat them, but it's not like they'll refuse to eat anything but them.

We really like the concept of not giving Miriam any sweets before she's two... but is is really possible?

I asked my parents if they thought it was possible. My kind mother raised her eyebrows and said "Well, I think that would be challenging." My blunt father said "No. She's got to eat her grandma's chocolate chip cookies!"

And my father-in-law? Has recently taught his fiance's grandchildren to demand dessert after every meal. The four year old keeps asking for tiramisu.

Does anyone else get the feeling that the grandparents are going to be the hardest part of getting your kids to eat healthy?

Okay, I guess I could be part of the problem, too. I've got to curb my snacking. I recently was ~~shoving my face with~~ munching on some craisins when I glanced down to see Miriam staring at me and moving her mouth like she was chewing. Pressure is on, folks. She's watching!

Since I know it's not realistic to never have treats, I'm trying to figure out how to make healthy treats more appealing. I've decided those Sunsweet Ones are just the thing - individually wrapped prunes! It's like candy!

Okay, you might be rolling your eyes right now. But I've been buying them for a while, and it's starting to work on both my husband and me. He'll toss a few in his lunchbox, and when I'm trying to avoid temptation I'll pop one in. If we act like they're a yummy treat, surely she'll think they are, too. Right?

But I don't know that the trick-or-treaters will agree. I decided this year we should hand out a healthy snack. After all, if I'd like my daughter to receive something other than candy for Halloween, surely other parents would, too. So I announced to my husband that we would be distributing raisins for Halloween. And maybe we could get bouncy balls or some other cheap Oriental Trading junk that wasn't even edible. And he announced that we may as well just turn off our lights and not celebrate Halloween at all. Ahem.

So the candy basket at our house is now a compromise consisting of raisins, pretzals, Crunch bars and M&MS. What do you think we'll run out of first?

The other sweet I've been dreading? Birthday cake. I've worked so hard to make sure Miriam eats healthy foods for this first year, and the thought of suddenly giving her cake and (even worse) frosting just makes me cringe. I was racking my brain trying to figure out what to do. Do I make a cake with whole wheat pastry flour and cream cheese frosting? That would be a bit better, but let's be honest - whole wheat desserts are just not the same. Do I do that for an individual cake for her and make an unhealthy one for everyone else?

Finally I voiced my concerns to my husband, who had a great idea. Homemade ice cream sundaes! He'll make homemade vanilla ice cream - while it does have sugar, I feel much better knowing that the only other ingredients will be good quality milk and cream and vanilla. I'll make homemade chocolate sauce and brownies for the other guests to use with their sundaes. And we'll provide a variety of fruit for everyone to add. Giving Miriam a little ice cream topped with colorful bananas, strawberries, and blueberries will still seem festive, and it won't be quite so obvious that I'm turning into one of those crazy "my child can't eat that" mothers.

Confession: With all this talk of sweets, I just swiped a mini bag of M&Ms from the Halloween basket. It's naptime, so she doesn't have to know.

Okay, it was two bags.

My daughter is doomed.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

Can I live without a ponytail?

2011-10-27T07:52:00.002-04:00

I wear my hair in a ponytail almost every day. It is not a cute ponytail. It is a "I pulled my hair back when the baby woke up so I could nurse her without it getting pulled and then forgot about it for the rest of the day" ponytail. It is not a cute "messy" look, but simply sloppy. And when I look in the mirror, all I see is some frizz around my ears.

This is disappointing, because I really love my hair. And it's time I do something about it. After all, this is the easiest and least expensive way for me to look pretty. My goal for improving my wardrobe is for it to be a natural evolution, as I find a piece here and there, so it could still be a while before I feel pretty in all my clothes. In the meantime, I at least want my hair to be pretty. And that means my frizzy, bumpy ponytail has got to go.

I know what I need to do - a No Plain Pony November!

Would you like to join me?

The Challenge: Don't wear my hair in a plain ponytail for the entire month of November.

I'm not giving up on wearing my hair up period, because that would just be stressful. The point is not to wear my hair down no matter what, but to try to look pretty - and I would not feel pretty if my hair is down but all stringy. That's why it's no plain ponytail - a nice up-do might make me feel just as pretty and not necessitate a shower.

Starting Tuesday, my hair is going to be down, or half back, or in a pretty headband, or in some other style that is not a plain ponytail. (Caveat: When I'm working out, it will probably be in a regular junky ponytail. But until I hit the road or get to the gym, it has to be down or done. Otherwise I'll wear it in a plain pony all day with the excuse that I'm "about to" work out.)

Below is some up-do inspiration that I found, for when the month and my enthusiasm are waning.

30 Hairstyles in 30 Days. Anyone want to buy me the ebook?

Gibson tuck tutorial, with video.

Head scarf tutorial.

Twist and Pin, with video. If you're really brave!

Three easy pretty styles.

Ten quick and easy styles for long hair.

I'm not really into braids, but I like this second style.

Twisted Sister tutorial. (Click to see original large version.)

Knot Your Average Pony. (Click to see original large version.)

Are you inspired yet? No Plain Pony November starts Tuesday!

I feel... pretty?

2011-10-25T18:13:00.000-04:00

In the past couple years, I've worked hard to improve my closet. I threw out my old skanky college clothes in an effort to dress modestly. I've pared down the excess so that everything fits easily in the closet - no having to switch out for fall, spring, or maternity.

And yet, I'm still not there. I thought that only having clothes in my closet that I actually wear was supposed to be freeing. No shuffling through a lot of junk just to find the same top that I always wear. And while that's true to an extent, I still usually end up standing there moaning "I don't have anything to wear."

Or lately, "I hate my clothes."

Recently my husband was lucky enough to watch me try on outfit after outfit and bemoan the state of my wardrobe. Finally he shook his head and said, "We need to spend some money and have you buy some nice clothes. A few go-to outfits."

Naturally I jumped on that opportunity! But I know myself - I needed some guidance. So I turned to the one person whose opinion matters most to me, especially when it comes to what I look like.

I turned back to my husband.

After all, he's the one I care most about looking good for. And he is a good dresser himself. When we first started dating, I confessed to my friend, "He dresses better than I do!" It wasn't that he was really snazzy or hip or anything. It's that he always wears a button-up shirt, nice khakis, and good shoes. It always looks good. On the days where he dresses down, it's a polo. Now I know that part of the reason this works is because he's a guy, but surely there's something I can learn from this. Something about sticking to the classics and sticking with what works? I'm still figuring it out.

Anyway, I turned to him and asked what I should do to improve my wardrobe. We discussed it a bit and finally my husband said, "Just wear clothes that you feel pretty in."

I was actually speechless at the thought. Clothes that I feel pretty in?

It's been two weeks and I'm still digesting this. Clothes that I feel pretty in? He said this like it was a no-brainer. But it was a revelation to me. I racked my brain trying to remember the last time I got dressed with the goal of looking pretty. I went back YEARS and couldn't remember a single instance. There were plenty of times I tried to look "nice" and on my wedding the goal was "beautiful." But pretty? Hm, maybe at some point in high school?

Seriously, I think that over the years I've tried to look everything but pretty. I've tried to look sexy and I've tried to look sweet. I've tried to look skinny and I've tried to look curvy. I've tried to look professional and I've tried to look sporty. I've tried to look stylish and I've tried to look modest. But I've never tried to look pretty.

What a pity.

Why is it that I don't get dressed with the intention of looking (or at least feeling) pretty? Is that just not my "style" or that it's not necessarily what clothing stores push? Is it even realistic to try to look pretty as a mom, when you don't know what stain is going to land on you next?

As I reflect on all this, I'm also musing over just what it is that makes me feel pretty. This question was actually asked over at Betty Beguiles recently and at the time it didn't even register with me. The only thing I could think of was "I feel pretty when my hair is down." No clothing choices sprang to mind. Should it maybe have sent a little alarm off in my head that I simply dismissed the question? That the idea of looking pretty was so easily shrugged off?

It is time to Bring Pretty Back. (Is Justin Timberlake replacing West Side Story in your head now?) Before I hit the stores, though, I'm trying to carefully evaluate what I'm looking for in clothes that I feel pretty in. Below are some things I'm keeping in mind. Obviously each woman is different and would have different preferences.

Colors. I feel pretty in pinks, purples, blues, and white. I also feel happy in yellow and reds (with a purple undertone, never an orange one). I do not feel pretty in oranges or olive green.

Noticeably absent here are black, brown, and navy. If I need a plain color to balance my look, I prefer a white or cream. I'm not sure how that will work in the winter - maybe by incorporating tan instead of the really dark colors? Or just somehow adding my pretty colors to the dark?

I should look into that whole seasonal color thing. I've realized that I don't feel pretty in autumn colors. I think I might be a spring color person, but I should check with my grandma - I think she has a book about this somewhere. In the meantime, I am only going to consider clothes in my pretty colors.

What would my husband think? My husband can be an opinionated guy, and I've been a bit surprised by some of his thoughts on my clothes. It has definitely been worth it to pick his brain on this topic. (Note: Be sure that your husband is in a good mood when you try to discuss this.)

Pencil skirts leave him unimpressed. I like them because I think I look good in them (now that I dropped the baby weight), but he just thinks they make me look like a schoolteacher. Since they aren't really the most practical choice for chasing after a baby, I will not buy them anymore. Since I do like them for church once in a while, I will not get rid of the ones I have.
He wants me to dress my age. I am 29. I still have a few pieces that look like a 19 year old should wear them. They're out. I am a mother. That doesn't mean I need to dress frumpy, but it does mean that, for me, anything super stylish needs to be avoided. I can't pull it off and it's not pretty when I try.
He thinks below the knee is a good length for skirts. And when it comes to the flowing skirts that I feel pretty in, he is right. I probably won't limit myself to this length for all my skirts and dresses, but I am going to consider the length carefully in the future. That said, my casual everyday skirts will probably always be simple knee-length A-lines.

Specific features. As I was browsing through my closet, there were a few other details that stood out to me.

Puffy sleeves. I don't know how often I will pull a shirt off the rack, especially a pretty one, and realize that the puffy sleeves make my shoulders look way too broad. A little gathering at the top of the shoulder is good, but if there's gathering at the sleeve edge too, it doesn't work for me. I feel like an evil stepsister - decidedly not pretty.
Lace and ruffles make me feel pretty. I love lace and have far too little of it in my wardrobe. I also like a little ruffle. The ruffles that are popular now are a bit too much for me, though - I like them a bit more subtle. Plus I'm afraid if I buy all these ruffly shirts now that I'll be wearing them five years from now and look so 2011. So I guess I'm looking for understated ruffles in pieces that will last.
Accessories? What accessories? Actually I do know the exact style of earrings I like, and do enjoy wearing those. Instead of running out and trying to buy a necklace that I think will work with multiple outfits, I'm just accepting the fact that (a) I don't usually wear them and (b) there would be little hands pulling on them if I did. I might try to incorporate some scarfs, though.
Know where to go for help. I stumbled upon this series on developing your own "comfortably dressy" style and think it's really helpful, even if I ultimately decide to make some different choices as my personal style evolves. I did actually print out the "Should I Buy This Shirt?" guide and it is now in my wallet. I also pulled out some books at the library and will let you know if I actually find any of those helpful.

What clothes make you feel pretty? Or are you like me and have never even contemplated such a thought?

Pins of Note (Quick Takes 77)

2011-10-21T10:56:00.000-04:00

Have I mentioned that I am newly obsessed with Pinterest? Today, for your viewing pleasure, I bring you seven of my favorite pins. (All photos linked to original sources.)

Totally doing this for Miriam's room - I can match the fabric to her curtains and quilt!
You know, when I get around to making her curtains and a quilt.

Or I might do this for her room instead, and use the fabric hoop idea downstairs.

Dream library loft.

Should I buy this shirt?
I desperately need to print this out and carry it with me.

Very easy quilt. The one I'm going to make. When I finish the curtains...

Even I am more likely to eat my veggies when they're a skeleton!

Dream playroom. If you'd like to transform our basement into this, please be my guest!

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

Here we go

2011-10-19T16:53:00.000-04:00

A quarter cup cornstarch...

A quarter cup baking soda...

Six tablespoons coconut oil...

An empty stick of deodorant...

Let me know if you can smell me.

Quick Takes (76)

2011-10-14T10:18:00.000-04:00

I came up with an awesome Halloween costume idea: the Flintstones! However, my husband informed me that he was too skinny to be Fred and it would be too cold for Miriam to be Pebbles. So I thought I'd at least share the idea with you, in case you have a bigger husband and/or warmer climate.

What are your thoughts on growing your own herbs? For some reason I romanticize the notion, but seeing as I've never actually cooked with fresh herbs, I don't know that it's the most important thing I could be doing with my time. Is there a good reason to use fresh herbs instead of dried? The little dried containers are just so easy.

I finally joined Pinterest, and as expected, am obsessed. However, part of me thinks I may be too practical for it. I see beautiful things, like rooms done in all white, but realistically I know there is no way I would ever have an all white room (even if we didn't have a child - I couldn't be trusted in one), so I don't bother to pin it.

Never gonna happen.

I know most parents are supposed to think this, but I'm pretty sure my daughter is the smartest baby ever. Evidence: I gave her an empty vitamin container to play with and in less than two minutes the childproof cap was off!

Wait, your child doesn't spend a good part of her day playing with the recycling? How do you keep her occupied when you're trying to cook?

I'm reading a book that really stresses having your child try as many green vegetables as possible before she turns two. So in the canned vegetable aisle the other day, I noticed collard greens and decided it was high time for Miriam to try them. Now I realize that they likely aren't the healthiest because (a) they were canned and (b) they were preseasoned, but seeing as I know absolutely nothing about collard greens, I decided this was a good place to start.

Turns out, Miriam really liked them! However, we decided she would never eat them again, because (a) we didn't like them and (b) they stunk up the whole house.

But then she was willing to eat them for her lunch the next two days in a row. This from the baby who loves carrots but never eats them as leftovers. So collard greens may be making a few more appearances. The can just holds soo much, though, that I'm toying with the idea of making them from scratch. What do you think?

I tried on a couple different outfits for my class reunion last night to get my husband's take. His conclusion? That I need to spend some money and revamp my wardrobe. Coincidentally, I had just been thinking the same thing when I finished reading Jen's article about aprons and thought to myself "Now if only I could remember to actually wear a decent outfit underneath my apron instead of gym clothes."

So while that does me no good at all when it comes to what to wear tonight, it is nice to know I have my husband's blessing to go clothes shopping! Before I go I think I need to finally sit down and figure out my style and all that stuff. My husband and I discussed it a bit last night, but you know how I like to research stuff before doing anything. Do you have any good book suggestions on the topic? I know Hallie and Sarah have mentioned some before, but I haven't searched their archives yet.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!
Have a great weekend!

What should I wear??

2011-10-12T16:52:00.000-04:00

Help! My 10 year class reunion is on Friday night and I am at a loss as to what to wear!

We didn't have a 5 year reunion, so there's no precedent here. Two of my girlfriends are doing "jeans and jewels" with high heels, but I don't think I'm trendy enough to pull that off. My other girlfriend is doing nice work-like clothes, but I don't have much of a work wardrobe to pull from.

My wardrobe runs along these lines. These aren't my clothes, because that would mean I'd actually accessorize or do stylish things like that.

I imagine most people will be somewhere along the spectrum of jeans to nice skirt. (Which is a pity because I have a little black dress that I found on clearance at Target that I would love to wear!) So I'm thinking skirt. But what kind of skirt? And what kind of top? And should I actually consider donning some sort of jewelry for once?!

I totally should have planned ahead and splurged for a personal shopping consultation, but it's too late now. I am limited to what I can find in my closet or perhaps at the mall. (Any good sales going on right now?) So I'm turning to you in a desperate plea for advice. What should I wear to my class reunion? What do you wear to your reunions?

Proof that you're a better parent than I am

2011-10-10T11:23:00.001-04:00

Miriam got sick for the first time this weekend. We're still not sure if it was some sort of stomach bug or a reaction to the flu vaccine she got on Friday (either way, she's not getting the flu shot again), but what we were sure of was that our poor baby was not well. She was burning up and it was determined that we should take her temperature.

At this point I should mention that I have never cared for a sick baby. Actually I've never cared for a sick person, period - I don't ever get sick and when my husband gets sick he just wants to be left alone. But I'm a mother now, and caring for a sick baby is in the job description. And certainly something as simple as taking a temperature is part of that.

After searching through two bathrooms twice, I finally found the baby thermometer. I took it out of the package and looked at it dubiously. There were no instructions. Maybe I should test it first? I stuck it in my mouth. It took forever, but finally the numbers stopped changing. Something still didn't seem right about it, but I ignored that and cleaned off the thermometer.

My husband held Miriam as I tried to stick the thermometer in. She writhed and cried, and I pulled back.

"I can't do this!" I said, on the verge of tears myself. "This is too big! I can't - I don't - agh! There's something wrong!"

"Just stick it in far enough for the numbers to change," my husband frowned, trying to keep her pinned down.

I bit my lip and pushed the thermometer in, just far enough to register. The numbers finally stopped at 99.5 and I pulled it out. I wrapped my poor baby girl in my arms to soothe her as my husband took the thermometer to go clean it. My soft words of comfort were interrupted by my husband's exclamation.

"Elizabeth!" He stood in the doorway, something in each hand. "You didn't take the lid off!"

I gaped.

Yes, my friends, it is shameful but true. The woman with the PhD... the woman who took her own temperature (orally) every day for a year before conceiving this child... the woman who has read dozens of parenting books... this is the same woman who tried to take her baby's temperature without taking the lid off of the thermometer.

Needless to say, we did not try the snot sucker.

Please tell me I am not the only one who's done something completely stupid like this.

Edited to add: Don't worry, I'm not completely scarred by this experience (and neither is Miriam). I just thought it was a ridiculous and entertaining episode that highlights the fact that, no matter how confident I may seem, I actually have no idea what I'm doing :) I imagine I'll be laughing at this story for years to come!

7 Quick Pics (75)

2011-10-07T08:23:00.000-04:00

Who wants to look at a camera when you've never seen a giraffe before?

Miriam has usurped my husband's position as Cricket's best friend.

We're so happy that the weather is nice and we get to play outside that we don't even mind the dead lawn!

The training begins.

It's no big deal, Mom, I'm just climbing the stairs. (!)

Finally a good shot of all three of us.

Miriam celebrated my birthday by standing unsupported for the first time!
Cricket is rightly alarmed.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

If you want to hear God laugh

2011-10-05T13:26:00.000-04:00

My plans at 18: Go to college, immediately meet my future husband, get married after finishing undergrad, get my master's in education and become a teacher.

At 20: No husband in sight. Plan to do student teaching at a base in Germany. Plan to meet future husband there, surrounded by all those handsome men in uniform.

At 22: Skipping the master's to go straight for the PhD. Plan to go to grad school in Texas and then become a professor in the midwest. Decide to avoid disappointment and not plan for the whole future husband thing.

At 23: Realize the world doesn't need another linguistics professor and decide to actually do something practical with my degree. Enroll in Arabic and plan to become a forensic linguist. Plan to move to DC and work for some sort of intelligence agency. Plan to meet future husband there.

At 24: Realize I'm dating my future husband. Inform him of the new plan: get engaged in two years, married the year after that, work for a year or two and then have babies while still working. Don't mention the part of the plan where he becomes Protestant.

Around my 25th birthday

Today I turn 29. I'm a Catholic stay at home mom, something I never could have planned. And I love it.

So now I'm done planning the big things. Sure, I've got a lot of ideas of the way I'd like things to go, particularly when it comes to expanding our family. But I've found that it's best to just pray for guidance and "Thy will" and go with it. Sometimes He'll give me a glimpse of what's coming and sometimes He won't. Either way, I rest assured that it'll be a much better plan than anything I could come up with.

The Mystery of the Missing Pee

2011-10-03T11:01:00.000-04:00

I'm still figuring out how to practice elimination communication with a mobile baby.

Back when rolling over was a big deal, going diaper free was not a big deal. Naked time on the (waterproof) blanket was a regular and pleasant part of life. But now Miriam is on the move and if anything being diaperless just allows her to crawl faster!

For about two days I thought I had it. I'd sit her in front of a basket of books and she'd be occupied enough to get in some naked time. But she quickly moved on to bigger and better things - maybe pausing long enough to pull each book out of the basket but more often spying a cord or piece of lint or dog that needed immediate investigation. So diaper free time pretty much went out the window.

But then a few weeks ago we noticed her first ever bit of diaper rash. "It's not even a rash, it's just a tiny spot of irritation," my husband corrected, but I was dismayed. Clearly the only cure was naked time, that very day! That afternoon I stripped her down to a onesie. She had peed on the potty just a little while before, so I decided it was safe to let her just play wherever she pleased.

Miriam had a grand time crawling all over the (less than a year old) carpet, throwing books and blocks and babbling happily. After a while she crawled over to me and as I loved on her I was shocked to discover the front of her onesie was soaked.

"You peed!" I cried in astonishment, my head swiveling in all directions. To my surprise, there was no obvious wet spot. I felt the flap on her onesie again.

"Yeah, you peed," I confirmed, and stood up to scour the room. I still couldn't see where it had happened.

"Did you pee?" I asked, starting to doubt myself. Miriam grew bored with me and crawled away to play as I assumed a crawling pose myself. I crawled on my hands and knees over every inch of the carpet. No wet spots anywhere. I doubled back over the room again, carefully rubbing my hands around and around. Nothing.

I pulled Miriam's onesie off her to make sure I wasn't going completely crazy. She had definitely peed. So where was it??

That's when I realized she had returned to the scene of the crime: the vent in front of the window. I couldn't find the pee on the carpet, because it wasn't on the carpet. It went down the vent.

Nancy Drew would be proud of my mystery-solving skills. Although she might raise her eyebrows at me allowing Miriam to go diaper free again the next day, only to pee on the actual carpet this time.

7 Quick Takes (74)

2011-09-30T12:15:00.000-04:00

Question of the week: How can we encourage femininity in our daughter while discouraging materialism and vanity? In particular, how can we do that when one side of the family is trying to teach her to say "Buy me diamonds," the other side of the family has bought her enough clothes to fill up a walk-in closet when she can't even walk, and on the opposite end of the spectrum her mother is a complete slob who hasn't worn makeup in years?

I got to meet Kate Basi and two of her beautiful children yesterday! They were coming through to go to a doctor's office and so they came here for lunch. It was delightful! Unfortunately I forgot to take a picture. It would have been darn cute, so I guess they'll just have to come again so we can take one.

I've still got nothing for Miriam's Halloween costume. My husband fears she won't have one if I don't start soon. Something about the fact that I've been talking about sewing her curtains for the past two months and there's still nothing up.

The Hunt for the Perfect Sofa is on! Actually, it's been on for over a month and nothing has come of it, so it's morphed into The Hunt for a Sofa That is Cheap and We Don't Hate. Here are some of the highlights from the eight furniture stores we've been to so far.

We love the formal look. We don't love the formal price tag.

This doesn't look like it'd be expensive, but the sales lady wouldn't even tell me the price. Just that it was out of my range.

Right price, right style, wrong color.

There's something we both like about this, but how would you find blue chairs or recliners to match?

We really wanted this to be the one, but don't care for the loose pillow back.

Someone else please tell my husband how impractical a white or cream sofa is.

The only one we've seriously considered, but my husband has yet to sit in it.

Looking at these images reminds me, I still haven't signed up for Pinterest yet. I fear for the sake of my to-do list if I do.

Actually, I've been very proud of myself lately. When I get ready to sit down at the computer, I have been asking myself first "What is the most important thing for you to do right now?" Usually the answer is shower (because I can't remember the last time I did that) or take a nap. Sometimes it's even do something from that to-do list!

I haven't showered much lately because we've been going to the pool twice a week, and don't you know that means you're already clean and don't need to bathe? I tried to explain this to my husband, so he could understand why we only need to give Miriam a bath once a week while she's taking these swim lessons. He was not impressed with my argument.

For more Quick Takes, visit Conversion Diary!

Four important questions for you

2011-09-26T13:23:00.000-04:00

1. Should I get a steam mop?
I have no problem sweeping every week, but mopping just seems like soo much work. Since we've been married I've mopped maybe once every 3-4 months. Okay, really more like once every 5-6 months. And that was using a swiffer wet jet - not even hauling around a mop and a bucket.

And before I got married? My track record for mopping was approximately once every never.

But! Now I have a house and a baby crawling all over the floor and I think perhaps it is time to buck up and mop more often. And a few months ago I heard the lovely ladies in my women's group talking about these steam mops and now I'm thinking maybe if I had one I would actually keep our floors a bit more sanitary?

2. What should we be for Halloween?
We are now taking suggestions for family Halloween costumes. This would preferably be some sort of theme so that we would all match. So far our only idea is for my husband to be Peter Pan, me to be Wendy, and Miriam to be Tinkerbell. We contemplated Miriam as Captain Hook, but weren't so sure about putting a hook on a ten month old. We're still looking for other ideas, as I'm also pretty sure when push comes to shove my husband will not be donning green tights.

3. What are your natural body and cleaning product recipes?
I know I just said the other day that I haven't gone off the deep-end with this whole natural thing, because I'm not making my own cleaning products... but... I'm almost out of deodorant... and the doctor said to use natural products for Miriam... and the fancy natural skincare stuff is so expensive...

Apparently I need a baby-safe glass cleaner.

94% biodegradable. Which makes me wonder what the other 6% is? Isn't shampoo mostly water anyway?

So I'm toying with the idea of making my own deodorant. I fully expect it to be a complete failure because I am a sweating machine and normal deodorant can barely contain me. But I figure fall is the best time to try this little experiment, since I'm not quite as sweaty as the dog days of summer or the frigid days of winter where you're wearing ten layers and the heat is cranked all the way up. Have you tried this before? Do you have any tips or recipe suggestions?

And do you even call these things recipes?

4. Do you compost?
I'm pretty sure we're going to start composting, but I'm not really sure the best way to go about it. Is it easier to compost with worms or in a pile outside? Would I have to buy one of those plastic bins or just put something together with old pallets from the farm? Would you be grossed out if you came into my kitchen and saw a worm-filled compost bin? How do you get enough brown materials when all our waste seems to be green? If you include paper, do you have to shred it first? Clearly I have some more researching to do on this.

And yes, these are the most pressing questions on my mind lately. (Besides the ever present "How can we get more sleep?!", which deserves to be a post of its own.) Your answers are quite appreciated.

Money, meet mouth

2011-09-21T15:03:00.000-04:00

Sometimes I talk a good game.* I can go on and on about how I want to live intentionally and support worthwhile causes and so on. But it's another thing to actually spend the money and put those plans into action. That's one of the reasons that I like putting things out here on this blog - it holds me accountable. And I'm very excited to report that the rubber has successfully met the road lately!

Sienna Mobile Phone Service
If you run around in any NFP or pro-life circles, you've probably seen the advertisements for this. The Sienna Group is a cell phone company that donates 5% of your monthly bill to the pro-life charity of your choice. I must admit that I saw their advertisements for months before I finally got around to looking into it, and then waited another month or two before I finally switched. But I'm really glad I did, so I figured I'd save you the time and tell you all about it here so you can go ahead and switch, too!

Basically they have the exact same coverage/service as Verizon. If you have a Verizon phone, you can keep it and continue to use it. If you have a number you like, regardless of carrier, you can keep that as well. Their plan costs are very competitive with the other big guys. As in, almost exactly the same. In fact, a month or two after I signed up, I got a letter from Sienna saying that the plan I had chosen had just gone down in price by $5 a month! How often do you see that?!

My favorite aspect so far has been that you don't have to sign any contract. I've already changed my plan a few times - first because I decided I needed fewer minutes, then because we added my husband so we switched to a family plan. Oh, and tied for first place for my favorite part? When you call them, a real live person answers the phone. A person in Ohio. A person who doesn't transfer you around, but takes care of all your questions themself. Awesome.

Having 5% going to charity is like the icing on the cake. It doesn't have to be a specifically pro-life or Catholic charity - I chose for ours to be One More Soul. You can search for your pet charity at the bottom of the screen (or if I link this right, this is a full list of the charities they donate to). If your favorite charity isn't listed, you can contact them to see if they'll add it!

They also offer free phones, which my cheap self took full advantage of. They also have a very limited selection of better phones. The free ones are extremely basic. Probably my only complaint so far has been in my cheapo free phone's terrible battery - but as soon as I called Sienna, they directed me to the right person at Motorola to call, and a new battery was in the mail. Problem solved!

I am so excited to be supporting a company like this, all while spending no more money than before and getting the same service (and better customer service)! If you've been on the fence about switching, or even if you haven't thought about it but your current contract is up soon, please do consider joining The Sienna Group!

Oberweis Dairy
When we moved here, I noticed something strange in the dairy aisle of the grocery store - milk in glass bottles. Oberweis - what was that? There were no tags or descriptions on it, but it looked pretty expensive, so I ignored it initially. Then we discovered an Oberweis ice cream shop, and we are not ones to turn down ice cream. While enjoying our treats, I thumbed through some of the brochures, getting more and more excited as I went.

"Hey honey, their milk is hormone free. Oh, their milk comes from family farms with about 80 cattle each! Ohh, there's a reason it comes in glass bottles! Wow, it really does sound even better than organic! And they do a home delivery! How cool is that?!"

To which my husband responded: "Done. Sign us up. Easiest decision all day."

I went home and did a bit more research, as I'm too ~~wishy-washy~~ inquisitive to just make a snap decision like that. Yes, their dairy products really did seem to be as good as they said. I wavered for a bit, as this is a more expensive choice. (Although you can find coupons or just call customer service to get a promotional code when you first sign up - but it's still going to be more expensive.) In the end, I was won over by the fact that (a) not just their milk but all of their dairy products (butter, cheese, ice cream) are going to be hormone and antibiotic free** and (b) we're supporting small family farmers. My husband was won over by the fact that they deliver it to your doorstep and we'll never run out of milk again.

Our first delivery arrived this morning. I'm thrilled!

Also on the money meets the mouth docket is buying more of our meat from a local farmer and hopefully buying an American-made sofa. While both of these choices might require a bit more work initially, I am finding that they are not necessarily more expensive - score!

I know there are still more ways that we can spend with integrity, though. Tell me, what conscientious consumer choices do you make? What other companies should my buck back?

As usual, I'm not receiving anything for telling you about these companies - I just like them and want to share!

* Actually, I'm not really eloquent at all in real life conversation, but I pretend like I am when I write on here.
** If I was really going all out with the real foods thing, I'd be looking for raw milk. But that still makes me a bit nervous, and good luck convincing my husband! Milk from hormone-free, humanely-treated cows seems to be the best option for our family right now.

7 Things I'm Loving Lately

2011-09-16T12:56:00.000-04:00

Store-brand organic items. Because even if I have become that woman, I'm still cheap.

Magazines. It took us over a month before we even plugged in our television, and it's been wonderful. It is so nice to relax with a magazine or a book at night, as opposed to staring at a screen of some sort. Magazines also have the bonus of being easy to read while watching Miriam play - I can read bits here and there without worrying about losing my place or my focus when I have to jump up and stop her from going headfirst into the fireplace or pulling the bookshelf over on herself or eating the dog. My favorites lately have been Country Living, as I search for decorating inspiration, and Natural Home and Garden, which I picked up on a whim and am really enjoying.

Living so close to family. You know, if you consider an hour and a half close. After living 1000 miles apart, 87 miles door to door feels like nothing! We've gotten to see my family every week and it's been wonderful. We won't be seeing them quite so often as we get settled and make friends here, but it's nice to have that option.

The doctor of my dreams. I took Miriam to a family practitioner for the first time last week. This woman is fantastic. Breastfeeding? She's a La Leche League member and happens to be an expert in treating tongue tie. (Turns out Miriam has upper lip tie, which is similar - that's why nursing was so extremely painful in the beginning.) Waking at night? "Well, why did you move her out of your bed?" Elimination communication? "We started my son at 10 weeks."

If anything, she'll be urging us to more crunchy choices! She instructed me to get rid of the classic yellow baby shampoo we're using, because "it's full of chemicals." OB-GYN recommendation? She'll do my pap smears and give me the name of a midwife when the time comes "and it'll probably have to be a home birth, but that's actually safer than a hospital. Both mine were at home."

Since I know she's coming from the same place, if not a more extreme position, I give a lot more weight to her recommendations. We had dismissed our previous pediatrician's propositions of vitamin D supplements and flu shots, but since Dr. Granola suggested them we are reevaluating those decisions. It's so cool to find a doctor that doesn't just tolerate our choices but actually affirms them.

My husband. Well obviously he's something I'm loving all the time and not just lately. But lately I've been especially thankful that I have him to balance me out. I can get a bit carried away at times and when I start to let an idea run away with me, it's good to have him there to give me perspective, and sometimes to put his foot down before I try to take our family too far off the deep end. Just another reason why I love my husband!

Two new potties. First I heard from another ECer about the BecoPotty, which is a great size for babies (low to the ground) and a great price for mamas (half the cost of most others). And it's biodegradable. You know, because I was hoping to find a potty that I could plant in our garden when we were done with it.

"You're gonna do what with this?"

See, it's half as tall as a normal potty.

Then our upstairs bathroom toilet seat broke, and when I was out looking for a new one I found one with a child-size seat built in! I am way too excited about this one!

It goes up and down - so cool!

Miriam clearly shares my enthusiasm.

Miriam's (Ugly)(ish) Doll. There were several things Miriam got when she was born that went straight to the donation pile, and this doll was almost one of them.

And yet there was something about this ugly doll that I couldn't quite part with. And within a matter of months, it was my favorite! I love the fabrics and I really love the size. It makes the perfect lovey for her - the other stuffed animals were too big, the teething rings were too hard, and the blankets were too much of a suffocation risk. (Sidenote: When can we let her sleep with a blanket?) This doll is just the right size for Miriam to hold onto, just the right size for her to chew on, and I can't think of any way that this could pose a safety risk. Luckily, she seems to like it, too.

As always, loving Jen for hosting this week's 7 quick takes.

What are you loving lately?

Where my girls at?

2011-09-13T16:45:00.000-04:00

"Your top priority right now is making friends."

This is what my husband told me the other night. (And that is why I'm the luckiest woman on the face of the earth.) He knows that one of our priorities is in becoming part of a community, and that sometimes I need a kick in the rear to get on that. It took me a good two years to make friends back in Pennsylvania, and this time we are not willing to wait that long.

Searching out a village
One of the biggest reasons we moved was so we could be closer to my family, and it has already proven worth it in my book. And yet, "close" is a relative concept, as we are still an hour and a half drive from them. While that can provide us monthly or even weekly support, it is still not the day-in day-out nearness that a close community can provide.

I love the whole "It takes a village to raise a child" and really do believe we were designed to live in community like that. And yet I haven't quite figured out how to make that happen.* We women aren't all squatting around a communal fire to make supper - we're in our own kitchens, miles away from each other. We aren't washing our clothes in the river together - we're tossing a load into our personal washing machines. How can we do our daily work and raise our children together, without turning everything into child-centered playdates?

It's not that playdates are bad; it's just that we would like our children to see that their mother's lives don't completely revolve around them. Mostly, sure. But there's other work to be done and a parent's mission in life is not to provide entertainment. I have no doubt over the next several years there will be plenty of specific playdates on our schedule. But along with that, I want some village time. I want to spend the day with my friend Brooke learning how to make cheese and can tomatoes while our daughters - well, while our little girls do whatever. They can play, they can attempt to help us - I imagine they'll bounce back and forth and do both. And that is exactly how I want it to be.

Which tribe to join?
Before I can implement the (admittedly romanticized) village notion, though, I've got to make friends! In my quest for community, I made a list of all the ways I could think of to meet women like myself. Here they are:

Hang out with old college friends. I'm really excited to be near some of my girlfriends from college. But again, "near" is unfortunately a relative term. It's a good half hour to get to them, and when your child hates her car seat, it seems even longer.

Start in your neighborhood. We moved into a wonderful neighborhood. It's like 1950s picturesque suburbia with kids running around and little boys playing touch football through the backyards and big boys playing basketball in the street and girls talking under the trees. All their parents have been quite nice as well. And yet, they're all at least 10-15 years older than us, with their youngest kids still five years older than Miriam. They're in a different phase of parenting than we are. Now in a village of course there are a variety of ages and stages, so this isn't really a bad thing. But while I hope to learn a lot from them, I'd still like to do some seeking for mothers that are closer to my situation.

Church! Seeking out friendships in your church is, to me, the best plan of action. So I'm forging full steam ahead on that count, contacting the leaders of the women's group and actually introducing myself to other mothers I see at daily mass, as opposed to shyly smiling and waiting for them to talk to me. I do wish Catholics had Sunday school, so that my husband and I could make Christian friends simultaneously, but separate men's and women's groups will work. One of my prayers right now is for not just community, but a community that can help me, my husband, and my daughter to grow in holiness. What better place to find that than in the holy space of your church?

La Leche League and other mothering groups. Breastfeeding groups seem to be a natural place to find village-minded women, and I'm hoping to be proven right when I attend one next week. And yet I have to confess that I'm a bit nervous because now that Miriam is 9 months old, we no longer toe the tight LLL line - she's no longer co-sleeping but is in her own crib and she nurses on a routine (practically on a schedule) as opposed to on cue. Nonetheless, I'm going to assume that these women will welcome us with open arms.

Similarly, I discovered to my great delight that there is an Elimination Communication group in our area! But immediately doubt crept in - do all their babies run around naked at the meetings? I know we do EC, but what if we don't do it enough? Will they let us in even though Miriam is almost always in a diaper? I'm working hard to brush silly doubts like these aside and to think of these women as valuable resources and friends, as opposed to extremist experts who are going to judge whether or not we are doing the natural parenting thing "right." Of course I don't know how to manage EC with a mobile baby - I haven't had any examples! That's where this tribe can step in and help!

Continuing education courses. Am I the only one who enjoys looking through the adult education section of the local community college courses? I spied a "Home Maintenance 101" course specifically for ladies a few weeks ago and signed right up. Perhaps I would meet other new homeowners while learning how to put together a toilet! Unfortunately, apparently only women 60 and older decided to take this class, so there went that idea. I haven't given up hope yet on this count, though. I looked at our county extension website and saw some gardening classes I'm interested in, and will keep an eye on the continuing ed classes. Even if I don't make friends through these, I'm at least learning something!

Daughters of the American Revolution and other local clubs. Apparently I am an old lady at heart because I cannot wait to join DAR - and judging by the pictures, I'll be the youngest member by at least 20 years. But I'm keeping my fingers crossed that if I'm interested in genealogy, there must be at least one other young(ish) woman out there who also likes drawing family trees. Somewhere?

The local gym. I'm quite excited to be starting a mommy and me swim class next week - Miriam and I get to play in the water and hopefully make new friends at the same time! While I haven't found individual working out to facilitate friendships, group fitness classes have more promise. So as soon as there's one that doesn't fall smack during Miriam's nap times, I'll be getting my zumba or cardio blast or aquacise on!

Intentionally creating community
Above all, right now I'm just trying to be intentional about forming friendships and establishing our village. I imagine it just gets tougher to get out and meet people with the more kids you have, so I'm trying not to complain about having to work around Miriam's naps to make it happen! Do you have any suggestions for how to go about creating a community? How have you done it? Is there anything I'm missing?

* While blogging really does feel a void and provide an important sense of community, it is unfortunately inherently lacking in the real life bring a meal over or watch your kids physical way.

And suddenly I'm that woman

2011-09-08T12:06:00.000-04:00

I bought organic cheerios yesterday.

Really, Elizabeth? Organic cheerios? As if breakfast cereal could actually be healthy anyway. Two years ago I would have shaken my head in disgust at this. Organic was for pretentious people with money to burn. I actually cried at the thought of going into a Central Market because I found the whole thing to be a pretentious and intimidating show. Seriously, I cried.

And yet somehow it happened. I became that all-natural-craving mama who wants to petition her subdivision to change its rules to allow residents to raise chickens. I'm buying natural bug block bars and quizzing local farmers on how big of a deep freeze I'd need to store their grass-fed meat and perhaps I'll try my hand at making my own vanilla extract while I'm at it and oh you say there's a webinar on culturing your own dairy products? Sign me up!

I suppose it was a natural progression, from NFP to breastfeeding, to cloth diapers and alternative vaccine schedules and a host of other crunchy choices. And then if you're being so careful about what you're putting on and in your baby's body and she's about to start eating the same food as you, of course you have to reanalyze that! And somehow I slipped from being the skeptic who was going to research everything first to eagerly browsing the grocery store's organic aisle. Slow down, sister!

It's just that the little bit of reading I did made a lot of sense. Without time to do further research in the hustle and bustle of moving, I decided maybe we should play it a bit safer. And trust the research that people like Katie of Kitchen Stewardship do, seeing as she has a similar worldview and approach as I do (ie, she's an NFPer who researches the heck out of everything before she does it).

That doesn't mean I'm sprouting grains or making my own cleaning products or completely ridding the house of sugar. I haven't gone completely overboard. I suppose what it does mean is that my skepticism has shifted.

And as long as those organic cheerios are on sale, we'll have them in our pantry.

Until I replace all our breakfasts with homemade yogurt and soaked oatmeal, that is.

Related:
How One Woman Became "One of Them"

Our broken record

2011-09-05T16:43:00.000-04:00

Him: "Miriam, can you say dada?"

Her: (pause) "Mama."

Him: "Miriam, say daddy. Dada."

Her: "Mama."

Him: "No, Miriam, not mama, dada. Say dada."

Her: "Mama."

Him: "DADA."

Her: "Mama."

Him: (to me) "This is proof that all you do all day is cuddle and practice saying mama!"

Well, he's right on the cuddling count.

Quick Takes (72)

2011-09-02T10:41:00.000-04:00

It feels like settling into our new house is taking forever! Then again, considering the fact that I actually spent hours agonizing over which kitchen cabinet to put our plates in, I'm doing pretty well.

I was going to ask your opinion on decorating, but I haven't unpacked my camera cord yet. In lieu of showing pictures and asking your specific advice, I'll just ask if you have any favorite decorating websites, blogs, or pinterest boards that might be helpful?

I finally got a pair of wedges the other day and was all excited about being so stylish. (Apparently I've been reading too much Betty Beguiles!) Yesterday after wearing them for the first time, I left them downstairs while I put Miriam down for her nap. I came back 15 minutes later to see that the dog decided my wedges were her new chew toys. It is truly a wonder that I haven't gotten rid of that stupid dog yet. I don't know of any greater testament to how much I love my husband.

It also helped that I got them on clearance for $7 at TJ Maxx.

I'm having a hard time discerning which parish we should join. We're right on the line between two of them, and either one would be fine. But the one we technically should belong to is a bit, um, touchy feely? Well, as touchy-feely as a Catholic church can be. It's not like everybody's hugging each other or anything, but the homilies have all been more about feelings and being nice than about the gospel or anything else. I need a little more meat than that. The other parish seems a lot more orthodox, so I'm very drawn to that. They both seem to have active groups for moms, which is great.

So basically it comes down to the question of where we'll want to send Miriam to school five years from now. If it's our parish school, then I think we'll need to be within our boundaries. If it's the public school that's a five minute walk from our house (or the super-expensive super-orthodox private Catholic school of our dreams that's a five minute drive from my husband's office) then we could join whichever church we wanted.

Any tips for discerning which church to join? I've been praying, but haven't received any clear answers yet.

I'm not pregnant, just in case you were wondering after my nap comment the other day. Miriam's still nursing too much for that to happen! I keep meaning to write a post about using breastfeeding to space your children, but I'm certain that as soon as I do my fertility will return and I'll realize everything that I wrote was wrong.

Miriam does the following exciting things now:

Waves
Claps
Says "mama"
Bounces
Chases the dog
Rips any papers mama is looking at
Rolls over and tries to crawl off the changing table

Photo courtesy of Miriam's grandma. Please focus only on the adorable baby and not her unwashed mother wearing old soccer shorts from her high school days.

In other exciting Miriam-related news, I think we are ready to transition from a diaper bag back to a purse! I'll be keeping the diaper bag handy in the car, but just not hauling it into every store with us. I think we're pretty much there (my husband would say it's overdue), with the exception of maybe when we'll be sitting somewhere for a while and she may need something to occupy herself. Although yesterday at the DMV she was fine with simply crawling all over the dirty floor and banging the one teething ring I brought on everything. And then sticking it back in her mouth, of course.

Check out Conversion Diary for more Quick Takes!

And then I vanished

2011-08-31T13:03:00.000-04:00

Well that was unexpected. I just dropped off the face of the blogosphere for a few weeks there.

It all started when we stayed with my parents for a few weeks. Their country internet connection was painfully slow. And then my dad informed me after I'd been there for a while that they only get so much time per month, and then it slows down even more. So perhaps I shouldn't just leave my browser open all day every day like I'm used to doing!

I still tried to persevere. But the internet became more hassle than it was worth. And oh yeah, wasn't the main reason I wanted to move so we could spend time with family? So instead of sitting next to Miriam with one eye on her and one eye on my laptop, I started taking her next door to visit her great-grandparents whenever no one (she or them) was napping. And instead of jumping online any time my dad got a break from the farm and came inside, I sat around and shot the breeze with him. In the evenings after Miriam went down, I hung out with my parents (and brother and SIL if they were around) and watched whatever bad tv they had on. It was quite refreshing. (Well, the tv shows weren't refreshing. They simply confirmed our choice to not get cable. But the time with family was nice!)

Once we moved into our new house, though, I was ready to plug back in. But the previous owners hadn't cancelled their internet service yet, so I had to wait for that. And then wait another ten days for someone to come out and hook it all up.

In the meantime, Miriam started crawling! Which is adorable. And which requires constant supervision, as we haven't baby-proofed yet. And since she is attracted to cords like a moth to a flame, and since my laptop battery won't hold a charge (never let anyone tell you Macs are invincible), her play time and my computer time are no longer compatible.

That leaves her two naptimes, since I try not to get online in the evening when my husband is home. Okay, really just one naptime, since I've gone back to taking a nap every day, too. So that's an hour and a half (sometimes even uninterrupted) to unpack, search for Dr. Right, deal with the paperwork du jour, do whatever chores need done, and squeeze in some internet browsing (usually searching for furniture or mapping out our afternoon errands).

At one point last week, I atually wondered the unthinkable: was this the natural end to my blogging? And then I got a few spare minutes to catch up on just a few of your posts, and remembered how much I love hearing what you all have to say! I can't quit that!

All this to say, I miss you. And I'm not sure how you other mothers do it! I thought I had this whole blogging with a baby thing figured out, but it turns out that's a very different prospect from blogging with a mobile baby! Do bear with me as I get the hang of it. And in the meantime, if you have any advice on how to manage it all, I'd love to hear it!

In the past week...

2011-08-15T12:51:00.000-04:00

The movers finally delivered our stuff.
We unpacked approximately 120 boxes. Only 30 or so to go!
We had my family over for the day to see the new place. Two home-cooked meals for ten, coming right up!
I was surprisingly tickled to see neighborhood kids traipsing through our front and back yards like they owned the place.
Miriam had her 8 month birthday.
Miriam’s fifth tooth poked through.
Miriam started CRAWLING.
Miriam said both “dada” and “mama” on the same day.

So yeah, it was a big week around here. As to what happened in the rest of the world, I have no idea. We are still without internet and television. (This is the first time I’ve been online in a week – that has to be some kind of a record, right?) So what have I missed? Anything important in the world or exciting or interesting in the blogosphere?

How to buy a house in 4 days

2011-08-09T13:06:00.001-04:00

It took an extra three weeks to close... it took an extra week for the movers to actually deliver our stuff... it's going to take another week and a half to get internet hooked up... but the actual house-hunting trip? Only four days! Here's how...

Beforehand

Scour house listings on the internet for a month or more, until you've come to terms with exactly what you can afford and exactly what is within an acceptable commute range. Put your favorites into a detailed spreadsheet (because TMC loves spreadsheets).
Have wise friends tell you what areas to avoid.
Find a realtor by scanning local church bulletins until you find a parishioner who has used her company to sponsor a church event.
Have your brilliant and savvy husband look after all the mortgage details.

Day 1

Wake up at 3:00 am to make your 6:15 flight.
Meet your realtor and start looking at houses by 10:30. Look at 12-14 homes by suppertime.
Crash into bed by 8:00.

Day 2

Look at a few more homes, then go back to check out your favorites.
Decide on your favorite home and be really excited to make an offer the next morning!
Remember that a blogger comment recommended you to check the state sex offender registry and casually do that. Be stunned to discover that THERE IS A SEX OFFENDER LIVING IN THE HOUSE RIGHT NEXT TO THE ONE YOU WERE ABOUT TO BUY.
Remain in shock for the next twelve hours. Clutch your baby fiercely.

Day 3

Go to church and thank God for making your discovery before you made an offer.
Get another shock when a layperson reads the Gospel and then she starts to preach about South American dances to the four winds. Wonder if you are really in a Catholic church.
Inform your husband that if you buy the house that has now been bumped to the top of the list, this would be your parish. Bump house down.
Get nervous about this whole house-buying thing and decide to go look at still more. Make poor 6 month old go through yet another day of driving around in the car seat, her most hated place in the whole world.

Day 4

Look at two houses one last time and decide to buy one!
Have realtor write up the entire offer, only to get cold feet.
Take a break to freak out and try to figure out what is wrong with this perfect house that you could be getting such an amazing price on it. Beg realtor to find out exactly why they're selling.
Discover the sellers seem to be nice people who are simply up-sizing. Make the offer!
Get a call that evening that your offer has been accepted - you just bought a house!

Who wants a landline?

2011-08-01T11:39:00.000-04:00

I'm pretty sure I do.

My husband and I each have a cell phone. I had figured once we got married we'd get a home phone together, but it never really seemed like a necessity while we were renters. Once we bought a house, though, surely we'd get a landline. But as people our age did without and people our parents' age started ditching theirs, we figured maybe we really didn't need one.

But I kept feeling a tug to get one. Really it was more of a romantic notion - how can a house be a home without having a landline shared by the whole family? Memories of my younger brothers answering every phone call with "Hello, this is the Gentry's" floated through my head. Had times really changed that much? Back in college we still had house phones, and that wasn't that long ago. But now people always seem surprised when I answer my husband's cell phone or he answers mine. Is the idea of a shared phone line already that obsolete?

The thought of getting a land line started out as more of an idealistic thing, but I've come up with several valid reasons to consider getting one.

To be prepared. 911 operators are better able to locate you if you call on a landline. Also in massive catastrophes like 9-11 and Katrina (which I do not at all expect here in the heartland), cell phone service may be jammed or wiped out. (Of course, landlines may also be unavailable in a major disaster like that.)
To get better reception. I have never lived in a place that had excellent cell phone service. Even in places where my phone shows all four bars, I still find myself wandering around in search of clearer reception. This is probably my number one reason for wanting a landline.
To annoy our children. Okay, not really to annoy them, but we do not want our kids thinking they need a cell phone when they're like seven years old. Yes, we plan to be those lame parents who make their kids wait and wait even though "everybody else's parents let them have one!" Their friends can call them on the house phone - that way they won't be asking to use our cell phones all the time and we can still monitor their phone use.
To be inaccessible. Now I'm going to sound really old-fashioned, but I kind of like the idea of not being available at every second of every day. When I get a call on my cell phone, I feel obliged to answer it, even if it's not the best time or place. Many times I will ignore the call, and feel guilty in the process. But then there are those in-between times where it's not specifically rude to answer (like it is when you're out to eat) but it's not really an opportune time to talk. For example, I don't actually want to chat while I'm grocery shopping - I want to catch up with you in the comfort and privacy of my home. Requesting that people only call on the landline would solve this problem - if I'm not there, I don't answer it, as simple as that.
To cover my absentmindedness. With a landline there are no worries of batteries dying or phones being misplaced.

The thing is, all these points are moot if it would cost too much to get a landline. But in my perusing of internet options, I've discovered that I can get an unlimited house phone line for only $15/month more on top of our internet. At first I thought that was way too much to justify, but then I started doing the math with our potential wireless bill.

With unlimited landline minutes, we could make the vast majority of calls from the house - no worries about long-distance charges like with traditional landlines and no worries about using up daytime minutes like with cell phones. If we did this, we could get the family cell phone plan with the fewest minutes, saving anywhere from $20 to $40 off our monthly bill. So in the end, going with a land line would save us at least $5/month and perhaps up to $35/month depending on the number of cell phone minutes on our plan.

So right now I'm leaning towards getting a landline. What do you think? Is having a landline worth it? Do you still have a landline or just a cell phone? Do you wish you had something different?

Happy NFP Awareness Week!

2011-07-26T08:55:00.001-04:00

This year NFP Awareness Week happens to coincide with My Husband Starts His New Job Week and We're Closing On Our New House Week. It also falls squarely in the several week saga of We're Staying With My Parents Who Live In The Country And Therefore Have Painfully Slow Internet.

So instead of hearing me go all hearts and flowers about Natural Family Planning like I usually do, how about a change of pace? Other smarter and wittier people have more interesting things to say anyway!

It's Time to Talk Honestly about Natural Family Planning (Simcha Fisher)

"But if you don't talk to someone, you're going to jump in front of a train. The truth is, sometimes NFP stinks."

Bad at NFP and Proud! (Jennifer Fulwiler)

"Instead of seeing pregnancies as precarious, once- or twice-in-a-lifetime events that require extensive planning and hand-wringing, they seemed to see pregnancy as a natural part of married life. They joked that that some of their children were more expected than others, and made passing comments about sometimes being surprised by seeing two lines on pregnancy tests. And here was the crazy part: None of this seemed to ruin their lives. In fact, they seemed pretty happy!"

And I am quite excited to read the series Rae is posting at No Wealth But Life:

NFP Awareness Week (Rae)

"But someone out there decided that we needed to raise awareness of NFP as if it were a disease, rather than celebrate it and its great advances. And since I always go along with what someone out there once decided, I am here to raise your awareness!"

Liberator of Women (guest post by April of My Feminine Mind)

"I’m going to say something surprising and perhaps somewhat shocking. So be prepared. Here it comes: As the former queen of negative self-talk, (mixed in with some actual self harm) I firmly assert that NFP healed me from seven years of childhood sexual abuse."

The Man Your Man Could Chart Like (guest post by Josh - be sure to watch the video first!)

"Anything is possible when your man charts like a man."

Be sure to check back there every day this week for what I am sure will be more fantastic guest posts!

A week in review

2011-07-13T11:24:00.000-04:00

Thank God for movers doing the packing and lifting!

Thank God for Grandpa letting us stay with him!

Thank God for cool rest stop bathrooms!

Thank God for Uncle Steve helping to drive and entertain!

Thank God for visiting blog friends!

Thank God for giggles with Grandma!

And THANK GOD that in spite of (because of?) all this excitement, Miriam is sleeping alone in a crib for more than 30 minutes at a time!!!

Pique my Pinterest

2011-07-08T12:30:00.002-04:00

Okay, I'm about to give in. Pinterest looks like so much fun! I don't even know exactly how to use it, but I want to learn.

Quick, someone talk me out of it! Or tell me everything I need to know about it so I can join in the fun. And send me an invitation if I need one. And tell me your account name or whatever so I can follow you there (if that's even how it works). And tell me where you find your awesome images.

Because clearly, with a bunch of errands to run today and moving across the country tomorrow, this is what I need to be spending my time on. Oh temptation!

No help from the binky

2011-07-06T08:34:00.002-04:00

Last week in a moment of sleep-deprived desperation, a lightbulb went off. A pacifier! Yes! Everybody uses a pacifier to help their baby sleep! As wary as I had been of them, I was now certain that a pacifier would solve all of our problems.

I dashed to the closet and rummaged around until I found the bag of freebies that the hospital had sent us home with. Jackpot - a pacifier! Oh, even an orthodontic kind - whatever the heck that meant. Hopefully that it wouldn't screw up her teeth, I guess. At this point I didn't really care what her orthodontist bill would be - I just wanted some sleep.

I brought the pacifier out for Miriam to get used to during her playtime. I eagerly stuck it in her mouth.

She pulled it out and looked it over...

... and promptly decided this made a wonderful teether and started gnawing on the side.

I gently pulled it out, properly reinserted it, and waited for the sucking to begin.

She pulled it out and again started chewing the side.

We repeated this cycle once more before I decided to give up, mourning the fact that I was all too successful in my goal of my daughter not becoming attached to a pacifier.

Miriam, on the other hand, was quite delighted with her new teething ring.

Traveling with a dog: Any advice?

2011-07-05T07:40:00.000-04:00

We're about to drive halfway across the country. With a baby. And a brother. And a beagle.

That last part is what has me nervous.

Cricket the Regal Beagle

Really, she's a good dog. Her wimpiness makes her very manageable. But we're looking for any tips you may have to make the trip smoother. How often do you make pit stops on the road? Any places that are or aren't good to stop? How do we handle food stops? How do we handle spending the night in the hotel?

Wish us luck!

Semi-attached parenting (7 Quick Takes - 71)

2011-07-01T11:43:00.001-04:00

As I've discussed before, I'm really attracted to the concepts of attachment parenting and some of those more crunchy parenting choices. To me the biggest draw seems to be that they're more "natural," as in that's how babies and parents were designed by God to live.

And then I remember that we don't live in a hut in Bali.

So as we settle into parenting, I'm realizing that we won't ever follow AP principles totally to the letter - and that's completely okay. We're slowly figuring out what works for us. And that means...

Exclusive breastfeeding... but not really "on demand."
I tried to do cue feeding at the beginning. But that basically resulted in me shoving my breast in her mouth every time she cried. I soon segued into nursing her every 2 hours, because I knew she couldn't be hungry more often than that. That eventually segued into 2.5 hours, then 3, and now 4. We got into our routine, and while I was never into that "She eats exactly at 7:45" I was and am very into "It's been 3.5 hours since she last ate, next time she cries I'm going to nurse her." The only problem with this is that I never really learned to distinguish her "I'm hungry" cry from the others, mostly because I've never really let her cry. I'm still working out how best to address this, and the conclusion I seem to keep coming back to is that I really like the eat - activity - sleep routine. You know baby is hungry when she wakes up, and that makes it easier to differentiate her other cries.

Sticking with routines.
Speaking of routines, why did it take me so darn long to decide to follow one? It's not that AP says you can't - it just says not to live by a strict schedule. But for some reason I took that to the extreme and thought that I'd just follow the baby and she'd eventually settle into her own routine. That didn't really happen. And personally, I love structure. I thrive having a set routine, so why wouldn't my baby? If having a set bedtime routine is so good for her, why wouldn't having a set everyday routine be good for her? Uh, duh - it is. When we come in from walking the dog and I take her out of the wrap, she starts rubbing her eyes - she knows that it's time for her afternoon nap. I love that.

Elimination communication... but not diaper-free all day.
Any success in this field comes only from my baby girl. All I do is give her the opportunity. She's the one who's learned that she'd rather go when I hold her over the toilet or sink than in her diaper. And I should probably clarify that even with all of her poop success, Miriam is really only without a diaper for a couple hours a day. We sit on a blanket on the floor and she plays while I ~~piddle on the computer~~ fold laundry and do other important chores. If she cries out or makes any distressed sounds, I put her on the potty. In that way I'm very slowly starting to learn to recognize her cries that she needs to pee - but this is really the only time of day that I am able to do that. And I still have one eye on the clock - if she just peed ten minutes ago, she doesn't need to go again.

Are you catching a theme yet? As much as I'd like to be a cue-watcher, I am a confirmed clock-watcher. I assume I'll get better with more babies. At least that's what I'm hoping.

Co-sleeping... for now.
Oh, baby sleep. Like any new mother, I could talk for hours about this. I've composed dozens of posts in my head while pacing with my sleepy baby in my arms. But I'll stick with a brief review of co-sleeping itself. I love it. Seriously. I love snuggling with my baby and waking up to her smile. It is the sweetest thing ever. My husband, on the other hand, now hates it. He was good with it at first, but he thinks she should be out of the bed sooner rather than later. And at this point, I have to agree that it would be best for all of us for her to sleep on her own. (And by on her own, clearly I mean in the sidecar co-sleeper. And then in a couple months, in a crib in her own room.)

My husband is of the opinion that co-sleeping is the reason Miriam sleeps so poorly. I am of the opinion that her mother is mostly to blame - shoving a breast in her mouth or a potty under her bottom every time the girl so much as stirred really prevented her from learning how to fall back to sleep. The remaining blame goes to both her parents for their nighttime inconsistency.

Baby-wearing.
Hey, I actually do this one as they suggest! I really love baby-wearing. I wear her when I walk the dog, when we're shopping, and when she's fussy when I need to make dinner. She's so content when she's cuddled up against me. So sweet!

Baby-led weaning... with traditional first foods.
We're really enjoying starting solids using baby-led weaning. However, I haven't been brave enough to start her on our actual table food yet. (This is partly because I've been cleaning out the pantry and we haven't been having the best meals lately!) So far we've stuck with more traditional beginning foods like bananas, avocados, sweet potatoes, pears, carrots, mangoes, and so on - except in chunks big enough to hold instead of pureed. She is getting the hang of picking up and gnawing on her foods, which isn't really easy to do when everything gets slimy!

So there you have it - our "semi-attached" parenting style, which I imagine will continue to evolve. I just wanted to share for the sake of keeping things real, since I was such a cheerleader for AP from the get-go! Have you changed your mind on any of these things? Have your parenting preferences evolved as you went on, or have they stayed the same from the get-go?

Hit the brakes

2011-06-27T09:56:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, after all the hassle of switching over the car seat to the other car, Miriam and I didn't even get out of the parking lot before I knew something was wrong with the car. We went a bit down the street to get to where my husband was and put on the flashers. The brakes were shot. Thank the Lord this happened when it did - just five minutes later and I would've been on the highway with my baby; just a day later and my husband would've been on his way to work; just two weeks later and we would've been driving across the country.

That seems to be how life is going right now. Not that there are any major problems - in fact, everything's going great! But there are no brakes.

It is full speed ahead with the big move! I can tap on the brakes enough to slow down and think about and even pray for a friend, but not stop for long enough to call them. I can tap on the brakes enough to slow down and read other peoples' blogs, but not stop in time to comment. It is phone calls and packing and more phone calls and logistics and then another phone call. On top of why won't this baby sleep more than 30 minutes before waking up and let's just let her cry and this is stupid and doesn't even work and how can I be upset when she's so sweet sleeping in my arms.

Don't get me wrong - I'm not complaining. Things are all going basically as we hoped and I wouldn't change them (well, except for a certain someone's sleep habits, which we're trying desperately to change). We're doing pretty well considering we're going through a heck of a lot of those major life stress events they talk about. And I'm dousing it all in prayer, which obviously helps.

All this to say if I'm not around the blogosphere as often or take far too long to respond to an email, I do apologize. It's going to be one more crazy month before things start to settle down. There will be 6 different roofs over our heads in July. We might have to start chanting "I love the crazy!" But just like with the car's brakes, the timing on all this is actually perfect. His timing always is. And I'm certain we'll come out on the other side not only unscathed, but better than ever.

Miriam's new favorite toy

2011-06-23T08:25:00.000-04:00

There are so many things you can do with a potty besides sit on it!

If they're right about this...

2011-06-17T08:08:00.011-04:00

Part 1 – Part 2 – Part 3

I couldn’t understand the Catholic Church’s prohibition on birth control. It wasn’t like I wasn’t “open to children.” I was! I loved kids and wanted several! And if God wanted me to have a baby on his timeline rather than my own, a little pill certainly wasn’t going to stop him. What was the big deal?

I asked Tim the Seminarian about it. I don’t remember now much of what he said, so it must not have been that impressive. He gave me a CD to listen to. I decided to wait to listen to it until my husband and I could listen together.

The next weekend there were some schedule conflicts and I couldn’t make it to mass with my friends. I decided to go to the Newman Center on campus for the first and only time. At the end of the mass they were making announcements and a girl piped up from the back. I vaguely recognized her as a graduate student, one of the cool ones in fact. She announced that they would be teaching a Natural Family Planning class in a few weeks.

I shook my head at God. Okay, okay, I can take a hint. I reluctantly emailed the girl to see if I could just attend but not buy the materials – it wasn’t as if we were actually going to do it, after all. No, I really needed to actually pay and do the whole thing? Ugh, fine.

I sat with arms crossed through the first class. I hadn’t really heard anything that convinced me why I would want to switch from the pill to Natural Family Planning, despite NFP’s apparent effectiveness. I certainly didn’t relish the thought of abstaining 8-10 days a month, after we’d waited for what felt like ages anyway!

I went home and leafed through the materials they sent us away with. I saw the same CD that Tim had given me, and I figured it was yet another sign. Contraception: Why Not? Yes, that was indeed the question I had. I sent one of the CDs to my husband and asked him to listen to it before the next time he visited. I figured I’d listen to a few minutes of it each day to digest it. But once the woman started talking, I couldn't push stop. I listened in astonishment. This ridiculous teaching of the Catholic Church was starting to make sense. By the end of the CD, I was appalled by what the pill had done to society.

I wasn’t quite ready to give it up myself, though. I needed to do more reading on it. I needed to decide if we could do a few more months of long-distance marriage if our “conjugal visits” might have to be times of abstinence. Most importantly, I needed to see what my husband thought. At his next visit, we discussed it and concluded we should probably not use the pill anymore. (At the time I thought it was a mutual decision; he’s since told me that it was basically me who made the decision!) Two days after he left, I threw out my birth control.

This opened the door to the big question. If the Catholic Church was right about contraception – the teaching it is most mocked for, the teaching that is most reviled, the teaching that the vast majority of Catholics ignore – if the Church was right about that, then what else was it right about?

Shortly after this I was zoning out during an RCIA meeting. The Holy Spirit rustled in and it dawned on me: I believe this. I savored that thought for a moment. I believe this. I started to realize more and more what that meant and welled up with excitement. I believe this! I didn’t think I could make it through the rest of the class without jumping up and down. I believe this! I believe this! I rushed back to my apartment to call my husband.

“Gregory, I believe this!” I was practically shouting.

“That’s great,” he laughed.

“Do you know what this means?!” I exclaimed, not sure he was grasping how big of a deal this was. “I can become Catholic! I actually want to become Catholic!”

And that was it. Contraception had been the watershed. All it took after that was the Holy Spirit moving in me and I was chomping at the bit to join the Church.

I was truly on fire after that. I wanted to understand everything the Church taught so that, when the time came at Easter for me to answer if I believed everything the Catholic Church professed, I could give a resounding yes.

I wasn’t quite there. I needed to get a firmer handle on a few other big things – particularly Mary and the male-only priesthood – before I could really say yes. It was coming down to the wire – a week until I would become Catholic and I was urgently reading everything I could.

And then my mother-in-law had a massive heart attack. I immediately flew back to be with my husband and we spent the days leading up to the Easter Vigil in the hospital with his family. By the time Saturday night rolled around, it didn’t matter that I hadn’t had a chance to discover why the Church taught some of the things she did. I believed in the Pope and the Magisterium, and that meant accepting on faith all that they taught. I would have time later to investigate the reasoning behind the teachings I didn’t yet understand. Right now all that mattered was that I become a member of the Church and get Jesus in me ASAP. I needed all the grace I could get to help my husband through the imminent passing of his mother.

After the Easter Vigil we went back to the hospital. In many ways it was like nothing had happened. There was no party to celebrate. Only one person had ever said they were happy for me, and she was a fallen-away Christian herself. But that was all fine. For once my pride was completely out of the picture. I simply and quietly, humbly and gratefully entered the fullness of the faith.

The proposal

2011-06-15T08:29:00.000-04:00

The final part of my conversion to Catholicism will be posted on Friday! But in the meantime, here's the story of how my husband proposed to me. I love getting to read other people's engagement stories - if you do, too, go visit Betty Beguiles and read lots more! Thanks for the fun topic, Hallie!

I knew when Gregory was going to propose to me. I didn't really need or expect it to be a surprise. And by that time (a whopping two years after we'd started dating), I'd already had a full year's subscription to a bridal magazine. I just needed the ring that I knew he had bought so I could officially start planning our wedding!

He had moved back to his hometown and started working, and I was flying out to visit him. I pulled out every item in my closet and agonized over each outfit. Finally I carefully packed a dress or skirt for each day. I wanted to look good in the pictures when he finally popped the question!

The evening I flew in we went out to dinner. I put on a dress and giggled in anticipation. It didn't happen that night. That would be far too cliche for my beau.

The next day I donned a sweet skirt. It didn't happen that day. How long was he going to make me wait?!

The next day I again pulled on a skirt. But that morning Greg suggested we go for a bike ride. I looked in my suitcase with dismay. The only workout clothes I had brought were a t-shirt and shorts, and it was too cold for that. In all honesty, it was too cold for all the cute summery dresses I had packed, but I was doggedly wearing them anyway!

I borrowed a pair of my husband's track pants and a sweater and off we went. After deciding that it was actually too cold to bike, we hopped in the car and went for a drive. On a whim Greg decided to take me up a tower at a nearby tourist site. At the top we looked around.

"Is this a good time for me to propose?" Greg asked.

"Really? Yes!!" I squealed.

Greg pulled out the ring that he'd been carrying around all week and slipped it on my finger. He didn't even bother asking if I would marry him, as it was a given! I was elated.

And it didn't even matter that I was wearing sweats.

House hunting!

2011-06-13T09:10:00.000-04:00

This was supposed to be 7 Quick Takes, but since we put off (re-)announcing the move, I had to wait. But now we can finally talk about it! And believe you me, I'm shouting it from the mountaintops! We're moving to Missouri! Our own promised land!

I am a woman obsessed. I don't read blogs. I don't read books. I don't return phone calls or emails. I barely play with the baby. I spend all my time scouring the houses for sale!

Seriously, I have devoted hours and hours to searching out our dream home. Just when I think I've exhausted the area we're looking in, I decide to tweak some of the search parameters and start looking all over again!

Unfortunately I've realized that our dream home doesn't exist... at least not in our price range and more importantly not in our commute range. It's been surprisingly difficult for me to accept the fact that we won't be able to have a nice home in the country. It's taken a lot of praying and a few tears to accept it! How pathetic is that, huh? I have everything I could ask for - we're moving close to my family and we're going to be able to buy a nice home - and I'm pitching a fit because we won't have a couple of acres to go along with it. Ridiculous.

Let's talk about some much-acclaimed home features. First of all, am I alone in not thinking hardwood floors are the end-all be-all? I mean, I like them, but not in every room of the house. I want carpet under my feet when I get out of bed and I'm lounging around the family room. But maybe that's just me. In all honesty, one of the reasons I like carpet is because I feel like you can get away with cleaning it less often. It seems like I sweep all the time, but I rarely vacuum!

Next, what is the deal with hot tubs? Several of the houses we've seen have them and we can't figure it out. To the best of our knowledge, they only get used when teenage kids want to have a scandalous co-ed party. Do you know anyone who has a hot tub and actually uses it?

There are a few other things I'm not too impressed by (plant ledges, pools, granite, stainless steel), but I'm starting to realize it all boils down to me not wanting to put forth any extra effort in cleaning. This is true laziness shining through I suppose!

I think being able to map a location online is the coolest thing ever. I love being able to look up the houses that I see listed and get a peek at the backyard and the neighborhood. Sometimes you can even get the street view and see how good of shape the road is in! We've actually been able to really narrow down our list of homes just by checking Google maps (lots of street views) and Bing maps (aerial views from different angles and seasons). Awesome. I can't imagine house-hunting before the internet, especially from 1000 miles away!

If we don't find a house we'd like to buy, I think we're going to try to rent in a pocket neighborhood! H/T to Molly for introducing me to the concept. I love the sense of community that it's supposed to foster. I don't know that I could live in one long-term (that's the hankering in me for land and lots of it) but I think it would be a really neat thing to experience for a year or two.

So not only are we looking to buy a house... but we're hoping to find and buy a house in less than a week. Why yes, we might be crazy. It will be a whirlwind several days! Do you have any advice for us? On anything from house buying to mortgages to keeping a 6 month old happy as you drag her to a dozen or more houses within a 36 hour window? We'll take all the help we can get!

The Big News (in case you missed it...)

2011-06-11T10:32:00.000-04:00

By My Husband

Two weeks ago, we announced some BIG NEWS, but I took is down before everyone could see it.

Well, I am here to re-announce our news: ThatMarriedCouple+1 is moving to Missouri! We're not going to discuss all of the details (yet), but come July, expect ThatMarriedCouple+1 to be blogging from Missouri.

Houston means that I'm one day closer to you

2011-06-08T08:23:00.002-04:00

The first part of my faith story is here.
The second part is here.

I had done all the reading I could on the differences between Catholicism and Protestantism. It was time to actually talk to some Catholics and get answers to my questions. Because while I felt like I was getting a good grasp on some of these concepts, I didn’t think the average Catholic in the pew did. While there were a couple exceptions, many of the ones I had met were “cafeteria Catholics” who openly dissented from Church teachings.

While I wasn’t outright hostile in the RCIA class, I was quite skeptical. Clearly I was doing everyone in the class a favor by asking so many questions. Surely they just didn’t have a clear enough grasp of Christianity to see the problems with Catholicism. And certainly I in all my 26 years of experience was wiser than the Church of over 2000 years.

I would quiz Gregory after we got home from the class. “Did you know this?” “What did they mean by that?” “You can’t actually believe that wafer is actually Jesus.”

But the last straw was when the RCIA leader informed me that I would have to be “provisionally baptized” if I did decide to become Catholic. It was a new archdiocese policy, because they had found out some people had been baptized without the words “In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit,” so it didn’t count.

I erupted. I had been baptized once and I was not about to be re-baptized. How hypocritical of them to recite each week that they “acknowledged one baptism for the forgiveness of sins” and then require any Christian wanting to join to be re-baptized just in case! I would absolutely not stand for this.

I simply would never become Catholic if they wouldn’t accept my first baptism.

My outlet for many of these complaints was my parents. I would tell them how ridiculous all these things were and how I could never become Catholic. Looking back, that wasn’t the best thing to do. But I’ve always been close to them and have never really been able to keep my mouth closed, especially on a topic that was so important to me.

Of course my new husband had to listen to my grievances, too. Other than that, though, our marriage was fantastic. We were so happy together. There was just one glitch in the first couple months. That whole “together” part was going to have to be paused – we realized we were going to have to do a long-distance marriage soon. I was going to have to return to grad school (remember how my dissertation plans had fallen through the week of our wedding?) for a semester in Texas, while my husband stayed in Pennsylvania and worked.

When I went back to Houston, I discovered a girl in my department was in RCIA and would be glad to drive me to mass on Sundays. Another friend from my Bible study was really interested in becoming Catholic and would love to drive me to the RCIA class on Wednesday nights. So I continued going, giving God only a cursory nod at the “coincidence” of these girls getting me to church.

I was still praying hard, though. It was already January and at this point I just couldn’t see myself joining the Church in April. While I could probably do it if it was only based on knowledge and facts, a decision like this was based on my heart and my gut. And the thought of belonging to a church that wouldn’t receive my family at communion just made me sick. I could not leave the faith of my family.

The thing is, once you learn the why behind the Church’s teachings, you don’t realize it but you’re a goner. No matter how bad the music and community and whatever else. If you set about educating yourself and come to it with an open mind and an open heart, you don’t have a chance. You will get a taste of truth and not be able to turn back.

But that doesn’t mean it’s easy. I was realizing more and more how much of a divide there would be between my parents and myself. More than anything else, this is what kept me tossing and turning at night. I felt like I would be rejecting my family. I just couldn’t bear the thought of such division. But at the same time, I couldn’t handle the division between my husband and me. I craved unity.

I played the song “Whatever You’re Doing” dozens of times on repeat. I prayed with it. I cried with it.

Finally I decided it was time for me to stop focusing on myself so much. All I was doing was asking things of God instead of doing things for Him. So I decided to volunteer to help serve breakfast to the homeless once a week.

I showed up the first morning at 5:45 a.m. Another bearded man was also there for the first time. His name was Tim. It turned out Tim was training to be a priest. I finally laughed and relented, “Okay, God, I can take a hint.” On Wednesday nights I would go to RCIA and on Thursday mornings I would question Tim. “It’s time for Stump the Seminarian,” he joked as I would bring up the latest teachings I was struggling with.

I knew that if I was ever to become Catholic, I would have to follow all of the teachings. It had to be all or nothing – because if we didn’t believe in all of it, then what was the point? Why not just find some other denomination that didn’t have the rules we didn’t care for?

Of course this meant we had to deal with the biggie. We needed to address the issue of birth control.

The fourth and final part is here.

Also, I really can’t do justice to how painful it is to be separated from your family even though you all believe in Christ. Calah has a vivid post on it here.

Because I love my husband

2011-06-06T12:50:00.003-04:00

We both woke up in rotten moods this morning. We've been having some sleep issues (and by "we" I mean our darling daughter) and it's caused some consternation and crabbiness.

But I hate being in a bad mood and I really hate sending my husband off to start his work week like that! So because I love my husband...

We're having buffalo wings for supper.
I renewed my resolve to follow my husband's plan for improving Miriam's sleep.
I prayed for him. More than once.
When I realized the dog had puked in our bedroom and I stepped in it, I did not yell and swear that I was going to kill that dog.
I was in a good mood for our lunchtime phone call (and I didn't mention the dog mess).
I will actually clean up the dog vomit instead of waiting for my husband to come home so I can point it out and tell him yet again how we are never ever having another indoor dog.
I will shower. And even shave my legs.
The house will be picked up when he gets home and there won't be a pile of laundry waiting for him to fold.

What are the little things you do for your husband?

Going to the chapel

2011-06-02T07:45:00.001-04:00

Part 1 is here.

At some point that summer I decided to do some reading about Catholicism. Gregory hadn’t shown any signs of wavering on religion so far. Before him, I had just expected whatever man I’d marry would change for me - obviously I’d be the more religious in our relationship and it would be more important to me. Yet now I was browsing through books online, trying to find one that presented the beliefs of Catholicism and Protestantism impartially, without trying to convince you that one was right or wrong. I could make my own decision about that, thank you very much.

I flew through the books, beginning to make some sense of Catholic teachings. I loved the history and tradition of the Church, so that was good. They didn’t actually pray to saints, they just asked them to pray for them, just like I did with the women in my Bible study group, so I was okay with that. There were still many things that were completely unpalatable, though. I told Greg that I might be able to become Catholic. Sometimes I said that. Sometimes I said there was no way I could ever do something so ridiculous. I prayed about this situation constantly. I had never prayed so hard in my life. If only God would give me some guidance on this one way or the other! But He remained silent.

One of the motivations behind my intensity was that I was so ready to marry Gregory. I didn’t really acknowledge this, though I think my mother knew it. I figured I had to become Catholic before we could get married or the marriage wouldn’t count.

Luckily, I was wrong. We got engaged the following May and married that August. Of course the priests in Philadelphia wouldn’t hear of an engagement lasting less than six months, but things are more flexible in the rural Midwest. In my hometown, my family’s church is right next door to the Catholic church, and the preacher and priest are actually good friends. Both pastors were happy to co-officiate our wedding.

The marriage preparation in both churches consisted of filling out a survey and going in to talk to the pastor. We were relieved that was all there was to it. After starting the pill two months before, I nervously waited for the priest to bring up contraception. But he only asked a vague question about whether we’d discussed how we would plan our family, and so we glided right past the issue.

So we got married and lived happily ever after. Except we still hadn’t resolved the question of where we would go to church. So I guess it was “happily ever after except on Sunday mornings, an hour of which one of us was quite unhappy.”

We were determined to be united in our faith, for the sake of our future children. I had spoken to several people about the issue, and was quite disappointed in the responses. Even the three different preachers I talked to all seemed to think it was just fine for parents to go to two different churches. This was not acceptable to us.

I kept praying. Still no response.

We church-shopped. We went to four different Catholic churches and three different Protestant churches. Nothing clicked. I began dreading stepping foot inside the Catholic churches - all I could see were these glaring differences. "Why don't people talk to each other beforehand? They must not be a caring community." "How can they sing One Bread, One Body when they don't let everyone take communion? That's so hypocritical!" "I might be okay with choosing to go somewhere where I'm not allowed to take communion, but I can't stand the thought of anyone denying it to my mother!"

It was draining. Finally I declared that I was going to take one of those classes on becoming Catholic, at the parish that we should belong to based on where we lived.

Gregory didn’t want me to. He knew that I didn’t actually want to become Catholic and I was saying this out of exhaustion and frustration. He discouraged me and offered to check out still more churches. But I was tired of hopping from church to church. And they only offered the classes starting in the fall each year – I couldn’t imagine going for another full year without having come to any sort of conclusions. So I decided to take the RCIA class, with Greg accompanying me each week as my sponsor. If I didn’t want to become Catholic by the time Easter rolled around, that was fine – I just wouldn’t. At least we’d know.

Part 3 is here.

My "conversion" story

2011-05-31T16:30:00.001-04:00

I really can't figure out what to title this. "Conversion” just isn't the proper term, because it's not like I converted to a whole new religion - I simply came into the fullness of faith. “My Faith Journey” sounds a bit corny, though that’s what this is. “How I Became Catholic” is also accurate but boring. Anyway, here's Part 1 of my story of getting married, starting NFP, and ultimately becoming Catholic.

I was always a good church-going girl, raised in the Disciples of Christ denomination, attended United Methodist campus ministry in college, and then back to a Disciples of Christ church and interdenominational campus ministry for grad school. I loved my faith. I'm very blessed that I never had any doubts about my faith or anything like that. I felt that questioning was good, but I never questioned the big things.

When I met Gregory in grad school, the fact that he was Catholic was really a non-issue to me. He didn't attend church regularly, so I figured when we married he would become Protestant and I would "win" and it wouldn't be a big deal. Six months in, though, I was confronted with the horrifying revelation that my husband didn't want to be anything but Catholic. And on top of that, he wanted his future children to have a stay-at-home mother! Noo! How could this man who I already knew I loved want his future wife (me) to be a Catholic housewife?! I was appalled.

After about a year of dating, Greg began going to church on Sundays, which I knew was a sign that he was closer to settling down. After awhile he invited me to join him, and we took some turns going to each other’s churches. We both loathed the other’s church. He thought my preacher was too much of a slick-talking Southern evangelical and wasn’t really trustful of the church. I had no idea what was going on during Catholic mass and hated it every time Greg would go up for communion and I had to stay seated in the pew. I would often become so upset that I would start tearing up and it would be all I could do to keep from sobbing in the middle of the service.

While we got used to each other’s churches, we never really felt comfortable in them. “Relationships are all about compromise,” my dad would remind me. When I mentioned to Greg the idea of finding a church in between the two of ours, he countered: “There’s no reason for us both to be miserable in church.”

This was our main disagreement, though we never really fought about it. On almost everything else we were in complete agreement, and we were falling more and more in love.

Part 2 is here.

Auction call

2011-05-25T10:46:00.000-04:00

My husband asked me to take a week or two off blogging. But when we saw Sarah's pictures of the devastation of her hometown, we both agreed that we should do anything we could to help. And one simple way to help is to direct you to Bigger Picture Blog's Help for Joplin.

So this is me asking you to please take some time from now through Friday to join in the charity auction that's being held. There's a new item up for bid every hour today and tomorrow! The schedule of items is up here. Go here to take part.

And most importantly, please continue to hold the people and community of Joplin up in prayer.

7 Quick Takes (70)

2011-05-20T09:02:00.000-04:00

Did anyone else watch The Mentalist season finale? I got to watch the first hour before a certain someone demanded my attention. Apparently after I went to bed it got really good! The first thing this morning my husband told me all about it. It sounded like an awesome ending!

For you tech-savvy TV watchers, is there some place online that I can watch this for free? Even though I know how it ends, I kind of want to see it myself!

We don't actually watch much TV around here. The Big Bang Theory, NCIS, and The Mentalist are the only shows we turn on the TV for.

Partly because we just have bunny ears instead of cable. Sometimes it's all fuzzy and my husband has to get up and adjust them. We're old school around here.

Not that I'm complaining. If we had cable I would just be watching HGTV and The Food Network all day. And I'd probably want to spend more money.

Thanks to Joy for reminding me after my last post that we aren't going to completely ignore all the recommendations for starting solids. We won't give Miriam nuts (mostly because they're a big choking hazard) or honey (even though I don't actually know what botulism is - it just sounds bad). And a spoon might indeed come in handy for foods like yogurt!

I just looked up botulism. Apparently it's "a rare but serious paralytic illness" - thank you Wikipedia. Less than 100 babies a year get it now, and it's basically not fatal if they're treated. Back in 1979 a study found that honey was indicated in roughly a third of the cases of infant botulism. 90% of cases happen before the infant is 6 months old, but to be on the safe side they say not to feed your child honey before they're one.

And now we know.

Miriam can now go a good 4 hours between nursing - but I can't. Not even the physical part, but emotionally I have been surprised that I am not ready to let her go that long between nursing! Isn't it crazy? I went from wanting to cry at the thought of nursing in the beginning to now wanting to cry at the thought of not nursing every 3 hours! I haven't been upset at any other milestones, but for some reason this development has gotten to me!

You know how I wrote about the connection between breast cancer and the pill before? Now you don't have to take my word for it - you can read the book on it! One More Soul is offering Breast Cancer: Its Link to Abortion and the Birth Control Pill by Dr. Chris Kahlenborn for free! Go here to get it. I can't wait to finally read through the whole thing myself!

I had a few other things I could include today, but none of them seem worthy of even their own take now. Mostly because all I can think about is something we're not announcing until Monday! So that's all, folks! Have a great weekend!

Check out more Quick Takes at Conversion Diary!

Our plan for starting solids

2011-05-17T14:28:00.001-04:00

Back when I was pregnant, I didn’t really think too much about feeding our baby actual food. And even in the first few months, my focus was so completely on breastfeeding that any thoughts of solids were pushed to the realm of “I have plenty of time to figure that out.” I wanted to investigate the real food movement and shape up our own diet before worrying about Miriam’s. And then at our four month appointment, the pediatrician brought up starting solids. Suddenly I went from prancing along without a care in the world, thinking I really had this new mom thing down pat, to frantically checking out library books and scouring the internet to figure out how the heck I was going to feed my child!

Luckily, I quickly realized there was no need to panic. At the beginning at least, starting solids is more about learning to eat than actually getting nourishment – she would still be growing primarily on breastmilk. With a sigh of relief, I unwound and set about perusing some literature (thanks for your recommendations!) to figure out some general guidelines for our baby’s first foods. I was already planning to wait to start until 6 months and to make our own baby food once we did. I couldn’t see any health value in commercial baby cereals (although I could certainly see the convenience value!), so I wanted to find a resource that told me what healthy foods to feed when.

I started with Super Baby Food and Real Food for Mother and Baby. These two books were very different from each other in many ways! Where Super Baby Food gave detailed instructions for pureeing and spoonfeeding, Real Food gave loose guidelines to let your baby just feed herself. Where Super Baby Food strongly encouraged a vegetarian diet based on whole grains, Real Food extolled pork chops bones and scorned early grains. Where Super Baby Food was far too concerned about germs and safety, Real Food was a bit cavalier about it.

Nonetheless, I was starting to come up with some vague ideas for how we would go about this. And then I got my hands on Baby-Led Weaning. And I was hooked.

The idea behind baby-led weaning (BLW) is that children are primed to feed themselves starting at about 6 months of age. (“Weaning” in this instance is the more British understanding of the term, referring more to the starting of solids than to the cessation of nursing, although it’s all really one long continuum.) Once babies can sit up and don’t immediately spit things out of their mouths, they can and should start exploring the world of food. They will more play with the food than eat it to start, but they will begin to eat with more purpose when they need to. They join the family at mealtime and learn a great deal by imitation.

There is no specific order of foods. There are no rules regarding the amount of time between introducing new foods. There is no pureeing or spoon-feeding. The baby is simply offered a variety of healthy foods (not too much, not too little, often what the rest of the family is eating) and they determine what and how much they will eat.

This just sounds like an easier way to go about feeding our baby – although maybe I really am just lazy! Of the benefits that the authors list, the ones that really stand out to me are that BLW is such a good learning experience, that the baby is involved in the family meal, and that the baby can learn appetite control and a positive attitude towards food (ie, less likelihood of obesity or eating disorders). Supposedly this also leads to fewer mealtime battles and less pickiness as a toddler, which I would welcome – I’ve been dreading the pickiness, as I was quite picky for quite a long time myself!

The authors do acknowledge two downsides to BLW – it’s messy and people worry.

Isn't this dangerous?
Choking and allergies and malnourishment, oh my!

Choking is the one thing I was worried about. This book does include a whole section on it and on mouth development – how the gag reflex starts out fronter on the tongue and moves back, and how babies learn from that. BLW also encourages serving large pieces that babies can hold and gnaw on, as opposed to tiny pieces that can get stuck. After reading about it, most of my fears were allayed. But just to err on the side of caution, I am planning to take an infant CPR class!

I’m not worried about allergies. As far as I can see, there’s no consensus on whether starting common allergens early or late will lead to a reduction of allergies. Since we don’t have any family history of allergies, I feel fine not waiting a week between new foods and introducing more than one food at once.

I’m not worried about getting the right nutrients. We eat pretty healthy and as I delve into the real food movement more and more, we’re eating healthier and healthier – so Miriam should be fine with the foods on our table.

The one issue I had with this book was that it didn’t really cite any research to back its claims up. BLW goes against a lot of conventional wisdom, so it would be nice to have some studies supporting it (though I’m not sure how truly well-founded most of our conventional “wisdom” actually is at this point!). But apparently BLW such a new concept (at least in the West) that researchers are just now looking into it. A Google Scholar search turned up only a few studies. I was happy to find that the January 2011 issue of Maternal and Child Nutrition was available free online so I could read through the couple articles out there on the topic. But these were basically descriptive studies that confirmed that yes, BLW is possible and it occurs. I also found one other study (here), which found a correlation between BLW and a “lower control maternal feeding style,” which could be positively impact child weight and eating style. Because I personally think that the arguments for BLW make sense, I look forward to better scientific validation of them in the future.

So what’s the actual plan?
A few weeks ago I thought I would be writing out a detailed list of what foods we were going to eat when. But nope. We’re going to wait ‘til she’s 6 months – but probably not a day longer! I probably will still start by giving her foods like avocado, banana, and sweet potatoes, but in chunks and sticks instead of pureeed. Then we’ll start just taking (healthy) foods off our plates and putting them on her tray and letting her go to town! We won’t worry about how much she’s actually ingesting until she’s more like 8-9 months at the earliest. And eventually she will transition from mostly breastmilk to mostly solids. And then all solids, at which point I will likely be a blubbering mess unless there’s another on the way.

Have any of you done baby-led weaning? How'd it go? And I would love to hear any anecdotes about starting finger foods, whether you started with those or purees!

7 Quick Takes (69)

2011-05-13T14:47:00.000-04:00

Anyone else having issues with Blogger the past day or two? It was "unavailable" all morning for me.

The bad news is my sewing machine broke. It was going to cost $110 to fix it. We won't be paying that. I'm pretty sure that's more than my parents paid for it eight years ago. Heck, I can get a better one on sale for only like $20 more than that.

So the good news is, I'm getting a new sewing machine! Any features in particular you would recommend?

A few people have asked about the feasibility of EC with subsequent babies. Now obviously that's something I have no firsthand experience with, but I agree that it sounds fairly difficult. However, I have read other people say that it's not as big of a deal as you would think! (And since I have found that, now that we're used to it, EC itself is not as big of a deal as I thought it would be, I tend to think they might be right.) You would think it'd be harder because you can't devote as much attention to the baby, but experienced ECers say that sometimes having older kids helps, because the siblings are able to pick up on the baby's signals and will warn you "Mommy, baby has to pee!" Interesting, huh?

If you're new here, I promise I don't talk about pee in every post.

(Just in the past 6 of 9 posts. Really? Oh dear. Time to move on to some more exciting topics. Although I clearly think the topic is fascinating!)

Miriam's first tooth has broken through! And boy is it sharp. I guess we won't be letting her chew on our fingers all the time anymore. Hopefully that's not too hard of a habit to break!

Any thoughts on high chairs? We had this one on our registry, but left it at my parents' house. However, Miriam would really like to sit up high with us and I'm too lazy to clear the whole table so there's room for her to sit in the Bumbo, so obviously we need to get one for ourselves. The one that goes on a chair seemed to work well, so we'll probably just get it, but I thought I'd see if anyone had any suggestions. I did search Etsy to see if there were any nice old-fashioned all-wood ones, but no dice.

I had no idea there were so many things to think about when it comes to baby drinking cups. There are sippy cups, tippy cups (?), and miniature regular cups. I'm thinking that when the time comes, if possible I'd like to transition her straight to cups and not have to deal with bottles. What do I need to know about these different types of cups?

That's all I've got, folks. Visit Conversion Diary for more Quick Takes!

Have a great weekend!

Accidents happen

2011-05-11T08:30:00.000-04:00

I was all over the place yesterday. I started listing all the things I was freaking out about. Then I thought to myself, "Well at least we haven't had any problems with cloth diapering and elimination communication. That's going really well!"

You know where this is headed, right?

Last night after nursing, my husband took Miriam off my hands so I could shower. She started fussing while he was changing her diaper, so he picked up his naked daughter. Who promptly peed all over him.

I had to laugh. We've gotten used to carrying around a stark naked baby, but I always make sure she's just peed before we do! I was just a little bit proud of myself that Miriam's never peed on me like that - she's done it while I was holding a prefold under her, but never just all over my clothes.

Fast-forward to this morning. I've put on a skirt for the day, reveling in the gorgeous weather. Miriam has already peed in the toilet twice, so I'm carrying her around naked until the next time she needs to go. I'm still feeling sorry for my husband, so I'm glad to help him with the dog this morning. I glance at the clock as I go to fill the water bowl, relieved to see I still have five more minutes before Miriam has to go pee again.

But it turns out babies are just like the rest of us - when they hear running water, they feel the urge. And that, my friends, is how my perfect baby peed all over me this morning.

This is after she leaked through two different diapers in bed last night.

I just wanted to make sure and keep things real on here.

Despite all the urine we've dealt with in the past 12 hours, I'm in a remarkably good mood! Sure, she peed on us - but that happens. I probably needed to be knocked down a peg anyway! Sure, she peed in bed right next to where I was lying - but that happens, too. I've gotten good at keeping enough spare diapers and blankets next to us that I've become adept at just changing her, covering the spot, and going back to sleep - no getting out of bed required!

And on an even more positive note, twice during the night when she was fussing, I held her to pee in a bowl and she did! I'd been suspicious that some of her night wakings were because she had to go to the bathroom, and this has really confirmed it.

So there you have it. Some of the ups and downs of EC - which on inspection are really just some of the ups and downs of parenting. Pee happens. Whether your baby is in a cloth diaper, a disposable diaper, or no diaper at all.

Right? Tell me you've been peed on or slept in a peed-in bed, too...

Lazy Parenting

2011-05-09T09:46:00.000-04:00

I find it very interesting when people say they've made certain parenting choices because they're lazy.*

I mostly hear it in reference to co-sleeping, along the lines of "We co-sleep because I'm too lazy to get out of bed at night."

Perhaps there are some instances where this is the case, but I actually kind of doubt it. For example, if you thought co-sleeping was completely unsafe, you wouldn't potentially put your child's life at risk just because you were lazy. (For the record, it can be perfectly safe, but that's not the point here.) If you co-sleep, you've probably decided to do it because that's the best way for everyone in your family to get the most sleep. Yes, much of that decision probably hinges on not having to get up in order to feed the baby, but I would consider that more a matter of making your life easier rather than succumbing to laziness.

The other thing about claiming laziness as motivation is that it can often be used to justify the opposite as well. Take breastfeeding, for example. A mother could make the case that she nurses exclusively because she's too lazy to deal with formula, making and cleaning bottles, etc. But at the same time another mother could make the case that she only uses bottles because she's too lazy to be the one to always feed the baby - this way her husband/mother/babysitter/whoever can do more of the work. The rationale of laziness can be used in multiple ways.

Laziness could be justification of starting solids with your baby as finger foods (no separate meals) or with buying jars (no cleaning up after making homemade purees). Laziness could be claimed in using elimination communication (fewer diaper changes and earlier potty training) or in using diapers past toddlerhood (no diaper wars and no accidents on floors).

The funny thing is, I only hear about laziness in reference to the "crunchier" choices. Perhaps that's because these mothers** know their choices aren't necessarily mainstream and they want to justify it without getting into a debate and sounding like they're looking down on other mother's choices? Perhaps it's because the mothers who are making the choices to do otherwise already have enough people making them feel guilty and they aren't about to denigrate what they're doing?

I don't really know. What I do know is that in most cases, there's a lot more going into these choices than just a mother's sloth. (I don't even really need to list the factors - expenses, father's role, daily care situation, etc.) These choices are made based on what's best for that particular family at that particular time - and I think the family will naturally tend to view them as the easiest solutions.

For the record, I don't think any of these things are being lazy, because so far I've found that laziness is fairly incompatible with parenthood. Even if you wanted to be lazy, you're still doing a heck of a lot of work!

So is it a disservice to label something as the "lazy choice"? Is it even accurate? Would it be better to call it the easier choice for that family, or am I just overanalyzing? Have you joked about making parenting choices based on laziness?

* I'm not meaning this to be a critique, more just an observation - so if you've said this before please don't think I'm criticizing you personally!
** Let's be honest, it's not the dads saying this - heaven help the father who talks about being lazy in reference to caring for his child!

7 Quick Takes (68)

2011-05-06T09:36:00.001-04:00

Bad news. I read through an entire book about raising a family cow and have decided that we won't be doing it. At least not until I'm past childbearing years and can really do it right. (Because let's be honest, who would want to get up and milk a cow at the end of the third trimester or after nursing all night long?) I can't tell you how disappointed I am.

I can't tell you how relieved my husband is that I got that cow notion out of my head.

My husband found the video below (here) a few months ago and showed it to me. We debated whether it was a real baby or just a doll. But ultimately I had to turn it off - I was just too horrified at the sight.

(Hopefully I embedded this right. It was all in Russian...)

Now that Miriam is bigger, I'm able to pull her up by her arms, though, and that video came to mind again. So I thought I'd try to rewatch it. Turns out, I'm still aghast. Especially since it turns out it's real.

I was tempted to make all seven of these takes about baby sleep. It's all I've thought about for a few weeks now, since Miriam's decided she'd like to go from waking up 2-3 times a night (which I was fine with) to 4-8 times a night (which I'm less than fine with). But I have been very unimpressed with the several books I have read about the topic so far. So would you mind if I asked you a couple questions?

What is your bedtime routine? Or perhaps more specifically, what was it when your child was a baby (approximately 5 months old)? I hear a lot of suggestions for giving a bath every night, which I do think would be a strong association, but my husband and I would rather not do that - it's too much work, especially since it's not like she's crawling through mud and actually needs to be cleaned every single day. We actually think it'd be better for her skin to not be bathed daily. So are there any alternatives to taking a nightly bath? I can't figure out how reading three little board books and saying prayers will amount to the 30 minutes of pre-bed soothing that I keep seeing suggested. What routine works for you?

What time do your children go to bed? Or again, more specifically, what time did they go down as babies? I'm thinking 7:00 would be good, but that would mean we'd start soothing her down at 6:30, which my husband thinks is way too early. Plus it's still light out! Right now we have a bedtime of roughly 8:00, but I'm pretty sure she's overtired by then, because she'll just cry in our arms until I nurse her to sleep. Also, if it makes any difference, she usually wakes up between 6:00 and 7:00 in the morning.

It's interesting trying to balance EC with sleeping. I had totally planned not to try to do it at night, but sometimes when Miriam halfway wakes up crying, I know it's because she has to pee. I keep a tupperware container right next to the bed now and will sometimes put her over it; she'll then pee and go right back to sleep. Sometimes. Fascinating.

Visit Jen at conversiondiary.com for more Quick Takes!

Have a great weekend and a happy Mother's Day!

Your recommended reading

2011-05-04T08:00:00.000-04:00

It's a cold and rainy morning here, which means it's a perfect time to catch up on my online reading!* I've been essentially offline for like 2+ weeks, so I'm wondering what I've missed. Can you fill me in? Any good blog posts or comment threads? (Feel free to self-plug!) Any good articles out there? Watched any good videos lately? Is there any interesting old stuff that I might have missed? What's your favorite site to visit when you're bored? And any must-read real books that I should check out from the library soon?

*Why yes, I did just write a post about how I don't want too much technology. But I have all kinds of excuses - I finished my library books and am not going for more until tomorrow... my sewing machine is getting fixed and so I can't craft... the weather is gross and so we can't go outside... I've even finished all the laundry and chores!

Better off turned off?

2011-05-02T16:27:00.000-04:00

Does technology actually make life better?

Yeah, that seemed like a no-brainer to me, too. Of course it does! But the opposite was the premise of an interesting book I just read called Better Off: Flipping the Switch on Technology. It was written by an MIT grad student who went with his new wife and lived in a "Minimite" community - a group that uses so little technology that even the Amish consider them backwards.

One of the lessons he learns is that hard physical labor eventually becomes automatic, freeing your mind for deep conversations, which speed the work along. If you're intrigued, you can read an excerpt of the first chapter here and an interview with the author here.

Brende doesn't make the case that all technology is evil, but that it's certainly not neutral and its role is to serve humans - not the other way around. Keeping that in mind, he promotes thoughtful consideration before rushing to get whatever new gizmo has come out, even if it promises to save you all kinds of time and effort.

What was most interesting to me was the difference the lack of technology made to community. You don't get to choose who is in your social circle - it consists of people within walking or buggy distance. Granted, everyone in this community already shared an important commonality in desiring to live this lifestyle, which probably facilitated getting along. But there remained important differences among the people in temperament and religion, among other factors. The thing is, whether you like your neighbor or not, you need his help come harvest time.

As fascinating as it is to read about this, I don't know that turning your back on the modern world and joining a group like this is a realistic solution to whatever problem bothers you most about society today (whether it's technology or morality or whatever). But we can learn from the people that do and try to apply their wisdom to our own situations. I think the most important thing is just to be intentional (something I often have to remind myself to implement).

Intentional in fostering community with our neighbors. And intentional in our use of technology.

One example of technology that is best in moderation is the cell phone. Now I'm not opposed to cell phones. As proof of that, my husband wanted to get rid of his and I wouldn't let him. But when phones come before people you're ostensibly interacting with, there's a problem.

My dad was complaining the other day about how "kids these days" will pull out their phones and be texting while you're trying to have a conversation with them. My 23 year old brother informed my dad that's just how his generation is, so he'd better get used to it. I disagreed. Sure, that might be how his generation is (is there really such a difference in 5 years?), but that doesn't make acting that way any less rude. The person right in front of you has to come before the person on the other end of the line.

Something is wrong when the commercial below is actually depicting the world we live in - but a new phone isn't what's going to save us.

It's not that I consider myself better than the people fiddling with their fancy phones. If anything, I consider myself weaker. I know myself well enough to know that I would be constantly checking it and consequently shortchanging whoever I was with. I can barely handle having the computer in our living room - it is constantly sucking my attention away from my husband and my baby. If I had a phone that dinged every time I got an email, I'd be intolerable.

That's the main reason we don't have internet on our cell phones - because I don't trust myself with it. (Plus we're cheap.) While it may be fun and handy in the rare emergency, it is certainly not a necessity.

The other day we were taking a walk and a man stopped his car to ask us for directions. He had one eye on his phone and one eye on us. We told him to go straight and around a bend and the road he was looking for should be there. He looked back at his phone, thanked us, and made a U-turn. He trusted his phone more than he trusted people.

Obviously there's some irony in a blogger complaining about the pervasiveness of the internet. I do think technology can aid community - like when a new bride moves across the country and stays in her apartment writing her dissertation all day and can't find a way to make friends and so she joins the blogosphere. Ahem. But at the same time, it's awful easy for the same technology to stand in the way of a full face-to-face community, the kind that gives hugs and brings meals and knows your family. When I turn down a playdate to stay home and blog, there's something wrong there.

But enough about my weaknesses and what I think - what do you think? Have you ever considered tempering your use of technology or do you completely embrace it?

7 Quick Takes (67)

2011-04-29T12:26:00.000-04:00

So what did you think of the dress? I thought it was beautiful and elegant, but it was definitely not my style. I loved the skirt and long train, though.

My husband thought she looked too skinny. I love that man.

Anyone doing anything to celebrate John Paul II's beatification this Sunday? Any good ideas to share?

We've decided we'd like to donate our car instead of selling it. Has anyone else done this before? Anything we should know? We're leaning towards donating it to The Society of St. Vincent de Paul, but they're just what I found on a quick online search, so we're open to suggestions for other groups to give it to.

I realized yesterday why I'm destined to not be a novelist - I just don't do details. When I'm reading a story, no matter how good the writing is, I see a few paragraphs describing the scenery and just skim over it. Even when I tell myself to slow down and soak in the details, I end up skimming. Since I don't bother reading them, I've never bothered to try to write them, either. Any other detail skimmers out there?

My husband was telling me about this "liquefaction" happening in Japan. Have you heard about this? Apparently there's a part of Japan that was essentially built on a landfill, and after the quakes and whatnot, the ground is no longer stable. So the ground sways and opens up and water oozes through. Scary! Check out the first 45 seconds of this video, which I found here.

Perhaps I should clarify that Miriam doesn't always poop just once a day (since we're already way past the point of TMI when it comes to my daughter's excrement). We're not that lucky yet! She goes anywhere from 1-3 times a day. She always does it once first thing in the morning, then often a second time later in the morning. If she's going to go any more the rest of the day, it's by suppertime.

How do I know when to catch the later ones? I don't, really. She just only goes when I'm holding her in position. Occasionally she'll let out a toot, and then I do whisk her to the bathroom, because that's the only signal I know! But on the whole it's up to her.

So apparently they only make infant sleep gowns (as opposed to sleep sacks or pajamas) in size 0-6 months. Miriam had outgrown hers by 3.5 months. So I decided to sew one myself. I finally finished it this week - just in time for the weather to be too warm to wear it! Oh well, that's the way it goes!

Visit Jen for more Quick Takes.

Have a great weekend everyone!

Dream Home

2011-04-28T10:32:00.000-04:00

We've been thinking and talking more and more lately about buying a house. Which is of course one of the most exciting things ever! So while I am quite content for the moment, I have started daydreaming big time.

Now I always thought that my husband and I would build our own home. This is probably because my parents and both sets of grandparents did, so I just assumed that's what people did. Plus I had a good friend who would draw home designs for fun in middle school and high school, and I picked up her habit.

My husband, however, shakes his head and reminds me of the glut of houses out there. The thought of building our own place had never crossed his mind.

Regardless of whether we build or buy, the dream is one of the following houses on a couple acres.

Now if we were in the market for a ninety-three hundred square foot mansion, this one would probably be the winner:

And while we're pie in the sky dreaming, let's throw in a tree-lined drive, a creek for the kids to play in, a small orchard of mature fruit trees, and a barn for the cow. And perhaps most importantly, kind Christian neighbors, who have kids for our kids to play with and who raise chickens so we can buy eggs from them. We'll be in the same 4-H club.

Tell me about your dream home! And tell me I'm not the only one who browses house plans in their spare time...

EC on the go

2011-04-26T13:22:00.000-04:00

I was a little apprehensive about trying elimination communication outside of our home. But with a long trip to visit my family for Easter, I figured there was nothing to lose in trying it!

The first day we woke up at 3:30 in the morning to get to the airport for our 6:30 am flight. I was a bit concerned because Miriam always poops first thing in the morning when she wakes up, which is between 6:00 and 7:00. What if she pooped during the flight?!

So right before the plane boarded, I carried my four month old daughter into the bathroom. I held her over the toilet, a new position that we'd started practicing just for this trip. And... she peed immediately! I waited a bit in the hopes that #2 would follow, but no such luck. Still, I proudly diapered up my baby again and away we went.

It was an uneventful flight with no diaper explosions, and after arriving and letting her grandparents love on her, it was time for a diaper change before the long drive home. Since we were in the bathroom anyway, I once again took her into a stall and held her over the toilet. Another immediate pee! By now I was elated. My baby not only did great on her first plane ride, but she also peed in two different airport bathrooms!

Back at my parents' house later that afternoon, I decided to try it again. It was time for a diaper change anyway. I held Miriam over the bathroom sink and she gave me a smile of relief.

"Mom, Miriam just pooped in the sink!" I hollered with excitement.

My poor parents, who don't really know what to think about this whole EC venture, weren't sure how to react. Finally my mother just shook her head and informed her crazy daughter that there were disinfectant wipes in the closet to clean the sink with.

And after that, Miriam was able to have her regular morning constitutional each day of our trip. You read that right, my friends - there was not a single poopy diaper! If anyone's counting, this makes 8 weeks (56 days) of elimination communication and only three days of yucky diapers to clean up. Needless to say, I'm pretty stoked. While we're nowhere close to being able to travel or even go about our daily lives without diapers (she just pees too often for that), it is really cool to know that my baby can and will go in the bathroom instead of her diaper if she's only given the opportunity!

7 Quick Takes (66)

2011-04-15T08:01:00.000-04:00

I'm trying to figure out how to balance blogging with real life. So far I've done well at making sure to prioritize Miriam over the computer, but it's the other little things that I want to do that compete. So for example for a few days I didn't comment because I was busy sewing (homemade wipes, nursing cover, etc.), and then I felt guilty, like I was ignoring my friends! But I still haven't finished the sleep gown I wanted to make because the internet sucked me in. How do other moms balance this?

Some people have asked how serious we are about moving to the Midwest. let's put it this way - I just spent too much money to buy a wooden teething ring in the shape of Missouri.

Guess who else decided it looked like something nice to chew on?

It has taken all my willpower not to write an entire post about how much I dislike having a dog now that we have a baby. The only thing stopping me is that I'm afraid you all will hate me. So let me just put it this way: I am not meant to have an indoor dog.

So, car seats. Is it actually illegal for your baby not to be riding in one, or just strongly discouraged? Just checking...

While I'm asking questions, I have an important one. How can we go about condensing naps and settling Miriam into a routine? She takes like 5 short naps a day, and I'm pretty sure she's overtired at night. I have been able to start making her afternoon nap longer, by nursing her back to sleep when she first wakes up. But I don't necessarily want to do that all day long. Any suggestions?

At Miriam's four month appointment this week, the pediatrician mentioned we could start solids. I felt a moment of panic and asked if it was okay to wait until six months. He seemed surprised, but said that was fine, just not to wait any longer than that. Phew! I haven't researched how I want to feed Miriam at all yet, so guess what I'll be reading about over the next month or two? Any suggestions on that topic?

We're flying out next week to visit my family! I'm soo excited! Among other family members, Miriam will get to meet all four of her great-grandparents on my side!

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Have a great week!

Speaking of spending

2011-04-13T09:24:00.000-04:00

Wow, after hearing how little some of you pay for meat, I'm almost ashamed of what I pay! And that's at the least expensive of three local grocery stores!

While we're on the topic of money, my husband came home the other day from hanging out with some guys, one of whom does marriage prep classes. One of the questions they ask in those classes is "How much does something have to cost for you to ask permission from your spouse to buy it?" Apparently the answers vary greatly!

My husband's answer?

"Well, my wife called me at work the other day to ask if she could buy a teething ring for like $8, so I guess not much!"

Actually it was $12 plus almost $6 for shipping. But he's right - in the grand scheme of things $17 isn't that much money. What's interesting to me, though, is that I'll easily spend anywhere from 4-8 times that much at the grocery store and not even feel the need to mention it to him. Why the disparity in reporting?

For me it boils down to needs versus wants. We need food, toiletries, and clothes. (And really not that many clothes.) Those are the main things I buy, and neither my husband nor I feel the need to have me check in with him over that. That he trusts me to make these purchases makes things a lot easier. I would feel pretty silly calling him at work from the checkout line and saying "Groceries are gonna be $108 today. Is that okay?" What's he going to do, say no and have me put back the broccoli and laundry detergent?

On the other hand, I will agonize over buying almost any piece of clothing that costs more than say $10. Do I really need it? Is it on sale? How much did it cost to start? Am I going to get a lot of wear out of it? Is it truly worth it? A majority of the time I won't buy it.

And that brings us to the more discretionary items. This is where the asking permission part comes in for me. When something costs more than I think it should (like a $12+ teething ring when I assume I can get plastic ones for a third that much), I can't justify it myself. I can explain just why it is so much more expensive (handmade, wooden, organic, they plant a tree for every teether sold, yadda yadda), but I can't bring myself to purchase it without a go-ahead. Especially if it's something we don't truly need and could live without.

I used to buy books anytime I felt like reading them, but my husband noticed that it was really adding up. So I headed back to the library (hello old friend! it had been so long since I browsed you for fun!) and I am really glad he pointed out what an expensive habit I had developed. My latest expensive habit is the fabric store, but I'm trying to get that in line before he has to say anything!

This morning as I was starting this post, I realized I didn't know exactly what amount of money my husband would say in response to the question, so I asked him on his way out the door. He looked at me blankly.

"Elizabeth," he said. "I don't buy anything."

I laughed, because he was right. He hates shopping. If I even ask him to swing by the superstore while we're out, I can count on him being in a bad mood the rest of the day. He abhors buying unnecessary little things, knowing that when you spend a lot on little stuff then you don't have anything left for the big stuff that's really important. There's no need for him to have a set amount of money to ask my permission to spend, because he's not going to spend it unless we really need it - and in that case, we'll be together determining what to spend it on.

So I guess our answer to the original question would be "$10 for unnecessary items" for me and "N/A" for my husband!

I know this may differ for people, especially those who are good about following strict budgets, so I'm interested to hear your answers. How much does something have to cost for you to ask permission from your spouse to buy it? Does it vary based on what type of item it is? Has your response changed over the course of your marriage? Do you think it would vary if you worked outside the home versus stayed at home?

What's it gonna cost me?

2011-04-11T16:56:00.001-04:00

So the idea of eating real food is all well and good in theory, and reading more on the topic could probably easily convince me to go in whole-hog, if you will. But the thing is, I’m cheap. Not so cheap as to have actually made and abided by a budget, but cheap enough to always buy the generic brand. If eating real food is going to double our grocery bill, I’m probably not going to do it. We already eat fairly healthy as it is, so I’m not willing to spend double on a gallon of milk for example. Especially when food costs are already increasing.

But since I realized I was making an assumption that eating real foods would be more expensive (and you know what they say about people who assume), I decided I needed to investigate for myself. So during my regular grocery run last week, I took along my notebook to figure out exactly how much more eating a little bit more healthy would cost us. And today's post is me working out the math.

Now of course, the ideal is not to be going into the grocery store at all, but buying from farmer’s markets, local farmers, etc. And that sounds great, and is something I’d really like to do. But we won’t be buying half a cow until we have a deep freeze to store it in (and we likely won’t own a deep freeze until we own a house). And our local “Farmer’s Market” is not the most authentic. It’s Pennsylvania Dutch people selling stuff they bought wholesale - I asked at both the poultry and dairy counters, and they aren’t raising this food themselves. (They also have cell phones and cigarettes and braces, so my husband’s convinced they’re just actors dressing up as Amish folks.)

Just last night we ate with some friends and they mentioned Farm to City. I hadn't ever thought about using a CSA, since we have our own garden in the summer, but apparently you can get much more than vegetables from buying clubs associated with CSAs! Including pastured meat, dairy, and eggs - exciting! We'll definitely be looking into that in the future.

But for now, I'm still sticking with my local grocery store. To my knowledge, nothing there is actually grass-fed or pastured. But even within the supermarket, there are baby steps we can take towards eating “realer” foods.

Poultry
The USDA prohibits adding hormones or steroids to chicken, so there’s no need to get excited when that’s on the label. Really all you can look to see is if the chicken cage-free and/or vegetarian-fed. Here’s what Planck has to say about chickens that are vegetarian:

That may sound good, but it’s actually not ideal. Recall that chickens are not natural vegetarians. Omnivores like us, they need complete protein and thrive on a diet of grain plus plenty of insects, worms, grubs, and other foods like sour milk. “Vegetarian” means the chickens were not fed cheap protein in the form of ground-up pigs, cattle, and poultry; that’s good. But it also means something else. You may be certain that a vegetarian chicken has never been outdoors. If it had, it might have eaten a bug or two. If you can’t find pastured eggs, barn-raised birds (not in cages) fed omega-3 are second-best. (Real Food 214-5)

Good to know.

Here are my grocery store options for boneless, skinless chicken breasts:
Store brand $4.59/lb
Perdue (cage-free, vegetarian) $4.99/lb
Nature’s Promise* (vegetarian, no antibiotics**) $5.49/lb

For an extra 40 cents a pound, I think I’m actually willing to pay for the name brand and not be eating chicken that could have eaten chicken. Plus I can just keep an eye out for when it’s on sale and stock up then. (Today I got Nature's Promise for $3.99/lb!)

Beef
It seems like cattle are the biggest food you have to worry about having extra stuff (hormones, steroids, antibiotics, etc.) in. (The biggest actual food that is – as opposed to processed “food-like products” to go Michael Pollan-style.) So I am surprising myself by again deciding that it’s worth the extra 60 cents to go with the brand name ground beef above the store brand. This is also something I can catch on sale and freeze above my fridge, so overall it shouldn’t actually make a noticeable difference in our budget.

Lean ground beef:
Store brand (90%) $4.09/lb
Laura’s/Nature’s Promise (92%) (no growth stimulants or antibiotics, vegetarian) $4.79/lb

Pork
Oh pork, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways. Pork tenderloin, pork burgers, and pork steaks; breakfast sausage, smoked sausage, and sweet Italian sausage; BBQ pulled pork, and let us not forget bacon! (Oh bacon – I honestly have an entire post on how I love bacon in my drafts folder, so perhaps I should save my ode to bacon for another day.) Unfortunately there were no healthier alternatives for most of the pork products we eat. I could basically only compare prices for pork chops, which we rarely buy.

Pork chops:
Store brand $5.29/lb
Nature’s Promise – vegetarian, no antibiotics $5.49/lb

Only a 20 cent difference? Well then that’s a fairly easy change to make.

I did see that Nature’s Promise now has bacon in our store. It was too expensive the other day, but it’s on sale this week so I’ll pick some up. It would be hard to compare prices on that, because I only buy bacon when it’s on sale anyway. (Noticing a trend here? Buy on sale and freeze. That's how I roll.)

Eggs
The same thoughts apply to eggs as to poultry: basically pastured/local < cage-free/barn-raised/vegetarian < regular. If you want to know more about your egg options, read this article at Kitchen Stewardship - she also provides a bunch of links to other posts on the topic.

A dozen eggs:
Store brand $1.79
Name brand (vegetarian, cage-free, even omega-3 supplemented) $2.99+

I have a hard time justifying spending over a dollar more for a carton of eggs. We don’t eat that many eggs - while I really like them, my husband thinks they’re gross, and he won’t kiss me after I eat them, so I don’t eat them all that often.*** So maybe in some people’s eyes that would make it not so bad to spend more when we do buy them, since it’s not quite as frequent of a purchase. But since it’s my husband’s health I’m more concerned with rather than my own, I’ll be sticking with the generic eggs for now. Maybe when Miriam is old enough to eat them it’ll be a different story; but hopefully by then we’ll be buying them from a local person anyway!

All that said, I have been finding coupons for Land o Lakes eggs lately, so when I have one of those I do go ahead and buy their “all natural” vegetarian eggs, or some version thereof.

Milk
Now of course the all-in real food folks say go raw or go home. But seeing as it’s a major change for us just to go from skim to whole, we won’t be trying raw milk any time soon. (Unless of course you have some you’d like to share with us. I would like to at least see what it tastes like!) Also, Katie at Kitchen Stewardship explains that organic is not necessarily better when it comes to milk (which is good, because I really wasn’t wanting to shell out that much more).

Gallon of whole milk:
Store brand $4.04
Brand name (no rBST) $4.32
Organic $6.47+

Even though the FDA maintains that there’s no difference in the milk with or without hormones (rBST/rBGH), that’s one of those things that I’m just wary enough not to want to risk. So it’s an extra 28 cents for us!

Butter
Since margarine is not an option, the only thing I can see to compare in my local grocery store is the store brand butter vs the name brand butter. And I don’t see any real food-related differences on the label: nothing says grass-fed, hormone-free, etc.

4 sticks of butter:
Store brand $3.89
Name brand $4.79+

I will be keeping that extra 90 cents. (Although butter is yet another thing that I buy on sale, when it’s 2 for $4, and freeze. We might need to get a deep freeze sooner than I thought!)

So what’s it gonna cost me?
I am really surprised to realize how much more I am willing to shell out for and how little it would actually cost us. At the most, we’ll be spending an extra $122/year on the above foods (including the expensive eggs). Click on the table below for details - when you break it down by price per serving it seems like nothing. And that's all before sales!

Do you stick with generic foods or splurge on the best you can afford? Anyone try to buy mostly from farmers (markets) and CSAs, and have any advice or comments to share?

* Nature’s Promise is my grocery store’s brand of “natural” and organic products.
** I’ve still got to look into the whole antibiotic issue. Sure, you probably don’t need to just include it indiscriminately in the feed, but what if you have an animal that’s sick? What do you do with it? How do you prevent the other animals from catching the disease? As long as the antibiotics are out of the animal’s system by butchering time, I don’t really have a problem with them.
*** Isn't that how you make your food choices? I haven't had Doritos in years just because of that!

Quick Takes (65)

2011-04-08T07:59:00.000-04:00

By My Husband

We’re bringing back Sunday’s best. My younger brother and I agreed that it’s time to bring back wearing a suit to Church. My wife and I live in a pretty affluent parish, but the monsignor still has to remind people when summer comes around not to wear flip flops and shorts to church. Starting this week, it’s a shirt, tie, and jacket to Church on Sunday.

I think that we should propose the theme, “NFP in the Digital Age” for next year’s PNFPN conference. It’s a take on Matt Swaim’s “Prayer in the Digital Age.” There could be a presentation about NFP related apps, a talk about online NFP communities, NFP related blogs. Maybe we could even get Matt to come and talk. Would that work?

I’m reading Father Larry Richards’ book “Be a Man.” Nothing gets me fired up more than reading the excerpt from the Book of Kings when David says to Solomon “Take courage and be a man… Act with the wisdom that you posses.” If we ever have one/several son(s), I am going to stencil that verse around the top of his/their bedroom.

On another manly note, I recently realized that the three popes that have been named “Great” all have names that run in our family: Gregory, Nicholas, and Leo. If we ever have a son, I think we have some strong names to choose from.

I am realizing more and more how valuable it is that my wife and I are on the same side of so many debates. It’s nice to know that we won’t ever have to argue about what proper Church attire is, how late the kids will be allowed to stay up, and more.

I love how happy our daughter makes other people. Little girls stare and smile when they see her. I have had an elderly woman come up to me and say “Thank you for sharing your baby” after an event at Church. Even my 93 year old grandmother can’t hold herself back from loving on her.

Our daughter rolled over for the first time on Wednesday night and I was the one to see it! She did it again the next morning and this is the picture that my wife took of her. She’s only 4 months old now, but she looks older to us!

Our first month of Elimination Communication

2011-04-06T13:19:00.000-04:00

I sat down to type this post and was at a loss for where to start. Somehow in the past five weeks, Elimination Communication went from being this exciting and all-consuming adventure to just another part of our routine. I'm pretty sure that's a good sign, though!

Luckily I jotted down a few notes at the beginning, so I can recall in more detail how this has gone. (And actually, the first two days I kept meticulous notes, and if anyone's interested in that I'd be happy to post it.) Consider this fair warning: if you don't want to read the particulars of my baby's bowels, stop now!

Before we started
I had been trying to pay attention for a few weeks before, and made sure to say the cue ("Go pee-pee!") if she peed during a diaper change. By the time we were ready to start actually ECing, we had a pretty consistent diaper change routine: after each nursing, I would undo her dirty diaper but leave her on it and wait up to 10 minutes. Probably ¾ of the time she would pee, and I used our cue phrase. Then I’d wipe her and put a clean diaper on her. I would change her diaper frequently, at each nursing and usually once during the night, so she wasn't used to being too wet. Her poops were so irregular (and huge) that I decided not to worry about them to start.

I decided to begin at around 3 months. At this point we would be past the initial learning curve of breastfeeding and just parenthood in general, but before it was too late (some sources suggest there's a 6 month cut-off, after which EC is more difficult). By three months, Miriam would have better head control but not yet have hit big developmental milestones (which often distract from EC and result in more misses).

We actually ended up beginning EC at 2.5 months (11 weeks), because I was just so excited to get started! By then I had read two books on the topic and the third was on hold at the library. I had waterproof pads to protect the carpet. I had two shirts (as opposed to onsies) so she wouldn't be cold when she was diaperless. I had a Tupperware bowl strategically placed in the living room for when there wouldn't be time to make it to the bathroom. In short, I was raring and ready to go!

My goal was to try it for at least a month. I would do the first two days completely diaper free to learn her timing and patterns. I wouldn't bother doing it when outside of the house or at night. They say the best times to catch pees are immediately after waking up and during or after nursing. They also say babies tend to pee more in the morning than the afternoon. Armed with this knowledge, we began!

Day 1
Went incredibly well! She went without a diaper from 7:00 in the morning to 9:00 at night. During that time she peed 21 times. (I know, that sounds like a ton.) I "caught" it 13 times! We "missed" it but saw her going and so said the cue words twice. And we completely missed it six times. I was so excited about catching so many pees that I sang for joy throughout the day.

Day 2
Caught my first poop! She had just nursed and while I was holding her to pee, out came the poop! Hooray!

Reflections after the first week
It does take a lot of focus, but I think I’m doing good at staying relaxed. If I’m finding myself obsessing too much over it, I put her in a diaper and don’t worry about it for a while (usually until her next nap is over, as that’s a regular and easy catch).

Before we started this, Miriam was going up to 5 days between poops. While the doctor and everyone said that was fine and normal, I just didn’t like it. Now she poops almost every day, sometimes twice a day! Although she never looked unhappy to be sitting in a poopy diaper (on the contrary, she looked happy and quite relieved!), I really think she just didn’t like pooping in her diaper. I realize I’m taking that dangerous step from correlation to causation, but I do think she’s pooping more now because it’s not going into her diaper.

And have I mentioned she hasn’t pooped in a diaper AT ALL since we started this? General health and wellbeing aside, that alone is enough to keep me doing this!

Related to the above: I need to get her to poop in the toilet so I don’t have to clean the sink all the time!

Reflections after the second week
EC continues to go well… a little too well, actually. So well that we’re a bit nervous about things and my husband wants us to scale back. In fact, he asked me to take a day or two off. So I am and hopefully we’ll be able to get more balanced with it in the third week.

What “things” are we nervous about? There’s two. First, she’s pooping several times a day now, but it’s like she’s trying really hard to go even when she doesn’t have to. Like she thinks she really has to squeeze absolutely everything out. And we don’t like that.

The other thing might be unrelated, but we suspect it is related. For several nights now she’s been waking up and fussing multiple times (at say 3:00, 4:00, 5:00, 6:00, and then we get up around 7:00). I know she’s not hungry, and she’s not even waking up completely. I was thinking it was because she needed to go to the bathroom, and contemplated trying EC at night (though I hadn’t wanted to originally because I wanted my sleep!). My husband is also pretty sure it’s because she’s not used to being in a wet diaper anymore and she just wants to be changed. (We used to be much better about making sure to change her at least once at night, but we’ve gotten so good at sleeping and feeding and going back to sleep that I really slacked off on this!) So we’re going to try to change her at least once and maybe twice a night and see if that doesn’t cut out the fussy half-waking.

She’s fine being diapered during the day, though. That could of course be because I change her very frequently, and will try to give her a “pottytunity” at times she usually goes (waking from naps and after nursing).

While I’m not going to continue going all out and really will scale back to just part-time ECing, I think at this point I could probably catch most of her pees during the day if I wanted to. (At least this is her routine right now – I know, babies change their routines as soon as you get used to them!) She goes as soon as she wakes up in the morning, then 15-20 minutes after that, then 15-20 minutes after that. She goes immediately after waking up from a nap. If it’s shortly before a nap, though, don’t bother trying. She almost never goes while nursing, but will go within 5 minutes after finishing. After that she can go every 25-30 minutes. I realize this sounds slightly intense, but it really has been kind of fun to try to figure it all out!

Reflections after 3.5 weeks
We did much less ECing this week, between the day or two off at the beginning and being out of the house for various other things. She pooped in her diaper a few times, and after having to clean that up, my husband said "Time to go back to EC!" I'm glad to have him on board - otherwise I wouldn't be doing this at all!

Reflections now
It still feels like we're on the go more, but I've been able to work in EC around that. I'll usually catch a pee after I take her out of the car seat if she was sleeping in the car. As I said at the beginning, EC is just part of our normal day now. As soon as Miriam wakes up, she poops. We let her go diaperless for a bit or carry her around with a prefold under her for about 15 minutes, when I take her to pee again. Repeat that and after her next pee I put her in a diaper for the day. She's basically in her diaper the rest of the day, but I take it off her to pee after she wakes up from a nap and sometimes after she nurses. At that rate, I'll catch 6-10 pees a day.

If we aren't out and about, I'll give her naked time on a blanket for a while. While we're on the floor like that, I'll grab the baby potty and see if she needs to go in it if it's been 20-30 minutes since she last went. She picked up very quickly (like within days) that when I hold her in this position, that's her cue to try to go to the bathroom, so I think one of the next steps will be branching out and trying to go in different places besides our bathroom sink or plastic bowl in the living room. We've successfully gone in the kitchen sink* and now I think I'd like to try going at other places and, once it's warm enough, outside.

This is not our baby.
But this is the position we hold her in (just with the legs a little lower).

We don't do EC "perfectly" and Miriam is not naked all the time - though she would be very happy if that was the case! I don't know her signs yet, and with us doing it "part-time" like this am not sure when I will pick up on them - I read in Bauer’s book that it will take anywhere from 2 weeks to 3 months to learn your baby’s signals, so I'm not holding my breath on this! Right now we're happy at the rate we're going.

In some ways, EC has reminded me of breastfeeding. It takes so much concentration at the beginning, but after a while it just becomes second nature - though you still need to plan around it somewhat. I do think it's really good for our baby's health - though I'm certainly not saying this is for everyone! It's much easier to do if you're a SAHM, and if you only have one child to focus on. It will be interesting to see how this continues as Miriam becomes mobile - I hear that it can be a bit trickier then!

*If you ever come to my house, please don't be afraid to use our sinks. I promise I will have disinfected them before you arrived! And if I haven't, well, pee is sterile, so it's not that gross...

What’s the Deal with Fat?

2011-04-04T14:29:00.000-04:00

There are a number of little issues that I'm curious about when it comes to real food. Fat wasn't originally one of them. Everyone knows that fat, though tasty, is bad. End of story. Right?

Well, as I was reading through Real Food by Nina Planck, I discovered that the story is much more controversial than that. She goes into all the details about the different types of fats, but to be honest I never really pay attention to the whole saturated vs monounsaturated vs polyunsaturated, let alone trans fats, omega-3s vs omega-6s, types of fatty acids and so on. It's too much for me to bother to remember. So while I paid enough attention to it while reading so I could understand, I was looking for easy rules.

So imagine my delight when it seemed like the easy fix was just to eat as much fat as you wanted in foods like steaks and dairy products! And to cook with lard of all things!!

But there was of course a caveat. You can indeed eat fatty food without concern – but if you’re going to eat “real” fats then they need to come from “real” animals, as opposed to say factory-farmed animals or industrial inventions.

Why the focus on grass-fed?
I always ignored the whole grass-fed, free-range stuff because I figured it was some poorly-disguised PETA ploy. It turns out, though, that it’s about much more than animal’s quality of life. Planck points out that “With animal fats, the breed and especially the animal’s diet affect fatty acid composition and nutritional value. In other words, all beef fat is not identical” (172). And perhaps more importantly, there’s the risk of “the “bioaccumulation” of carcinogens in the fat. As toxins travel up the food chain, they become more concentrated, and they lodge in fat. A feedlot steer contains a great deal of grain, most of it grown with chemicals, which means you ingest more chemicals from a steak than from a slice of bread. Any toxins in the beef fat, in turn, accumulate in your fat, which might explain the rise in fat-related cancers” (116-7).

So unless I’m willing to shell out for the free-range, looks like I should keep cutting off the layer of fat. (Okay, in all honesty, I usually don’t bother trimming the fat from my pork chop. It’s so tasty! But I usually do feel guilty about it, at least.)

What about fat in dairy?
Again it’s healthiest to get dairy products from grass-fed cattle, but from what I’ve read it still seems like you’re better choosing your store-brand whole milk over skim. (Here’s a good post about choosing what kind of milk to buy.) You need fat to absorb the good stuff in dairy products, like calcium and vitamins.

The fats in my kitchen, from best to worst.

Wait, vegetable oil is a fat?
I’m a bit dense, because I totally didn’t realize this. But the difference between whether something is classified as a fat or an oil is simply if it’s solid or liquid at room temperature.

Anyway, refined vegetable oils (industrial fats) are major villains in the real food circles. For one thing they’ve only been around for less than a hundred years. But more importantly, they’re actually not healthy. How serious is this? Planck actually goes so far as to say:

“If you can’t find the perfect version of a food – say, 100 percent grass-fed beef – look for the next best thing. Any version of the traditional fats will be better for you than any version of the industrial fats. Those you must avoid like the proverbial Black Death.” (173)

So here’s the gist on fats, from a real foods perspective: Eating fat doesn’t make you fat. Grass-fed animal fats are perfectly healthy in moderation. Industrial fats (refined vegetable oils) are completely unhealthy.

Importance Level: Fairly high.

Simple Solution: Use real butter instead of margarine and olive oil instead of vegetable oils. Don’t be afraid of full-fat dairy.

Thorough Approach: Eat only grass-fed fats. Ban industrial fats and anything with the word “hydrogenated” from your kitchen.

Range of Options:

That Married Couple’s Conclusion:
We already use real butter, because my husband prefers its taste, and I do most of our cooking in EVOO. I was buying almost exclusively skim milk before, with the occasional half-gallon of whole milk for my husband, but after reading about the virtues of full-fat dairy, we’re going all in with whole milk. I hadn’t drunk it in probably 15 years – it is so thick compared to what I was used to!

I have yet to decide what if any changes we will be making to our meat and egg purchases, so we won’t be eating too much straight animal fat just yet.

And what about the oh-so-evil industrial fats? We don’t actually eat much packaged food, which are laden with them, so we’re good on that front. Realistically, the oil is probably not leaving my kitchen anytime soon, though I am hoping to slowly transition away from it. I threw out my shortening after taking the above picture and also replaced the vegetable oil with canola oil. I know sometimes you can replace oil with applesauce when baking, but none of the real food folks mention this – probably because they wouldn’t approve of what I’m baking in the first place! But the thing is, I really like cake. And I’m not so sure about the coconut oil they keep talking about (and by not sure, I mean not sure that my grocer will carry it or that I’ll be willing to pay for it). So we’ll see how that goes – we are certainly a work in progress!

What kind of fats and oils do you use in your kitchen?

Related:
Since I didn’t actually explain the scientific reasons behind why fat is actually healthy, I encourage you to investigate it for yourself!

Kitchen Stewardship is a wonderful blog and has quickly turned into one of my go-to sources on a natural lifestyle. It’s a bit overwhelming, but she really does her research. And since she provides baby steps, keeps money in mind, and most importantly practices NFP, I trust her. She’s written about the whole gamut of real food topics, among them a whole series on fats. Here’s her baseline chart on the subject.

And from The Weston A. Price Foundation, another real food advocating website: Know Your Fats Introduction, The Skinny on Fats, and The Rise and Fall of Crisco.

There’s also a plethora of resources out there on how awful margarine is (even if the label now boasts "trans-fat free"). I’m trying to figure out how to break that to my parents!

10 facts about That Married Couple

2011-03-31T09:17:00.000-04:00

1. Today marks five years of us being together! My husband the scientist surprised me with red roses to celebrate!

2. We met the first week of grad school in Texas. He was wearing a white polo, blue shorts, and orange flip-flops. I had a crush immediately. But even though we were living in the same apartment building, I only saw him three times over the next seven months. But once we finally did get together (thanks to Beer Bike of all things), we were inseparable!

3. Our first actual date was going out to brunch. I still remember feeling all tingly when he held my hand walking to the car afterwards.

4. Actually, holding his hand just keeps getting better! I loved it when we were dating. I loved it even more when we were engaged. I loved it even more when we were married. I thought I was going to burst when we held hands while I was pregnant. And now, walking down the sidewalk, when he has the baby carrier in one hand and my hand in the other? I'm about to explode with love.

5. I took him home to meet my family that Fourth of July. After that weekend, I knew for sure that I was going to marry him. I'd had an inkling for awhile, but I wanted to make sure and get my family's seal of approval.

6. However, my then-boyfriend thought he needed to focus on schoolwork, so off he went for 6 months to California. That sucked, but it prepared us for other times in our relationship when we would have to do long-distance. Plus when I visited him we had an awesome time at Universal Studios!

7. We've road-tripped across the country with all our moves. California back to Texas. Texas to Missouri and back. Texas to Pennsylvania. I can't wait until we do our final road trip from Pennsylvania back to Missouri, to stay (crossing fingers and praying hard)!

8. We didn't have a song for the longest time. Finally when we were watching Big and Rich at the rodeo, he suggested our song be "Lost in This Moment." And I melted. And then he started crooning "Stuck in this moment with you" and I laughed.

9. My husband's enthusiasm for fatherhood is unmatched.

10. Since you already know my real name and our daughter's real name, I think it's time to reveal my husband the scientist's real name. (You could find it in one click, anyway!) It is...

Gregory! Were you surprised?

Check out 10 interesting things about lots of other couples over at Betty Beguiles!

Water bottle winners

2011-03-30T16:12:00.000-04:00

I know you've just been dying to hear who gets the estrogen-free water bottles. After consulting random.org, the winners are:

Maria and Rosita!

Congrats ladies! (Rosita, since you didn't leave your email address, please email me your mailing address. If I don't hear from you in a few days, I'll draw a different winner.)

Thanks to everyone who entered!

Am I wearing mom jeans?

2011-03-28T08:25:00.000-04:00

I went pants shopping the other day. It took a good ten years, but I am at the point where I don't even glance at the juniors section. I am very careful in the women's section, though. In particular, I avoid the mom jeans.

You know the ones I'm talking about. The shade of wash that's more blue and kind of has a cloudy as opposed to striped look. The tapered leg. The long, flat butt. The zipper that goes up, up, up, above the belly button to the actual natural waist.

I am an expert at avoiding those things. I know exactly what I want in pants. Boot-cut and mid-rise! That could be my mantra. Boot-cut and mid-rise! I cheer it in my head as I browse the clothing racks. Boot-cut because it's more flattering to my figure. Mid-rise because I'm too old to want to worry about showing my buttcrack and too young to wear pants up to my bra. Boot-cut and mid-rise!

This skinny leg trend kills me. My legs are way too big for skinny jeans and I refuse to wear them. The one time I tried them on I almost fell over attempting to shimmy them over my giganticalves.* When I see these teenagers walking around in jeans that look more like leggings, I just laugh and shake my head.

Just like my parents did when the flare leg came back in style for girls and boys were wearing those ridiculous JNCO jeans. Remember that?

When I reminisced about that, though, I started getting nervous. If skinny legs are the style now, are my own mother's tapered legs closer to "fashionable" than my boot-cut? Will Miriam someday look back and laugh at her mom's insistence on boot-cut and mid-rise, and avoid them at all costs? Am I wearing the next generation's version of mom jeans?!

I realize that strange little fake pocket thing at the top makes them momish. I still bought them, thinking they wouldn't show under whatever shirt I was wearing.
That can't be a good sign.

At the store, I didn't have much of a choice. The sale racks in the women's section gave me nothing but mid-rise straight-legs to choose from, and I wasn't about to pay full price or peek at the junior's section. So I relented, happy to at least get the right height and deciding that perhaps the straight lines would be a bit more similar to the skinny leg style (because let's face it, most of the teenagers wearing skinny legs are not curvy yet) and keep me from being too unfashionable too quickly.

When looking at these jeans in the picture, I have to say that it looks like the pair on the right are definitely something my mother would wear. The pair on the left is okay, though, right?

The next day I asked my husband what he thought of my new semi-stylish straight-leg jeans. He looked at them skeptically and informed me they were a bit baggy. And while I'm glad I won't have to worry about modesty in these jeans, I would rather wear clothes that my husband actually likes. So it's back to the boot-cut the next time I buy jeans, fashion be darned!

And when you find yourself actually muttering "Fashion be darned!" out loud, that's when you know you are indeed wearing mom jeans.

What do you think: what are the cut/rise/color of today's mom jeans? Are we all wearing mom jeans and don't even realize it?! Or is it just me?

Related:
Mom Jeans and the Dreaded "Long Butt" (h/t Mrs. 2nd Lt).

* Maggie expressed doubt at my having giganticalves the other day. Oh, but I do. Feel free to ask my friends. I don't really mind it, but it is something I have to work around. For example, I have a hard time getting shin guards and soccer socks to fit.

7 Quick Takes (64)

2011-03-25T08:05:00.000-04:00

The NFP conference was great! In particular Bill Donaghy and Damon Owens, of the Theology of the Body Institute, were excellent. My husband raved about Damon Owens: "That dude's dynamite!"

I think we're going to buy the book God's Plan for a Joy-Filled Marriage. Anyone have experience using that for marriage prep classes? We've talked before about helping with pre-Cana classes (although we didn't actually take one ourselves). We've also talked about becoming an NFP teaching couple. Really we're just kind of waiting for someone (ahem, God) to ask us to do something and we're in!

Well, this weekend we sat next to a couple and she asked us if we'd be interested in being an NFP witness couple. So it looks like that might be the path we take!

Our parish is doing a Theology of the Body study and my husband and I are leading one of the discussion groups. It's been a lot of fun so far! Miriam is learning a lot, too. We like to start them young.

We are looking to sell one of our cars. It's a '98 Chevy Malibu that I have loved, but its time has come. It no longer has air conditioning or even reliable heat. So what's the best way to get rid of it? Craig's List? Just sell it to a dealer? Just sell it for parts?

My husband kindly pointed out that not everyone gets as excited about water bottles as I do. I am constantly drinking water throughout the day and get a little panicky if I'm out somewhere and don't have any water on me. I even have to have one next to me during the night. So maybe I'm a little obsessive? Anyway, even if you're not as weird as me, if you'd like a free water bottle, I'm giving one away!

What do you do about your baby's nails? We will cut them one day and by the next evening my chest still looks like it's been attacked by a rabid cat. Do I need to file them or something? How would I go about biting them? The extent of attention I pay to my own nails is to cut them when they're too long, so I'm completely ignorant about all this.

I am loving motherhood!! It will be interesting to see when my fertility comes back and when the next one comes along!

Visit Jen at conversiondiary.com for more Quick Takes!

Have a great weekend everyone!

A BPA-free giveaway!

2011-03-23T08:25:00.000-04:00

When I read about a company that was making plastic products that were free of "estrogenic activity" chemicals, I was intrigued. When I saw that they were a small business in Texas and that their water bottles were proudly made in the USA, I was tempted. And when I saw that the bottles were dishwasher safe and only $7.99, I was hooked!

I explained to my husband that I needed to get one for the sake of research. You know, so I could let you all know how they were. But then I saw I could get a better deal by buying three instead of one, and since shipping would be the same (fairly expensive) amount, we decided we might as well buy all three and give a couple away!*

These bottles are Miriam-approved.

To enter for a chance at your very own Hydrapak PureBot, just answer one of the following questions in the comments. (And if your email is not enabled or included somewhere on your profile or blog, please include that as well so I can let you know if you win!) Entries close next Wednesday. I will draw two winners at random.

What do you think about the whole BPA issue? (It's fine if your answer is "I could care less!")
What natural living topic interests you most? (For example: real food, natural body products, natural household cleaning products, etc.) Have you been motivated enough to look into it and make changes to your lifestyle based on it? Is there anything in particular that you'd be interested in reading a post about?
What is your favorite resource related to natural living? (Blog, website, book, etc.)

Good luck!

*This company has no idea I'm doing this giveaway.