Spontaneous?

Spontaneous? Umm, let's see where can I schedule that? I'm such a planner. At one point when I was attending seminary and working night shift my sleep was even scheduled. I had a breakdown when one of my prof's gave homework that was due the next day because I had to sleep and work all night. It was not in the plan for that week to have spontaneous homework. My children were VERY planned. I wanted my first child to be born during our 3 week Christmas break...she was born the day we were due back at school..pretty close timing I think. When I was in NP school and working full time I had a schedule of when to study for what class and when to do what homework. I had a color coded calendar. I love looking at organizing websites and organized rooms in my BHG magazine. You can't tell it from looking at my house but I love things that are neat, orderly and in their place. I have a routine at home too and I hate getting out of my routine. It stresses me out totally. But I have 2 kids and my husband is a full time minister...do you know how many times my schedule gets thrown out the window? My husband did not want to know the gender of either of our children. I wanted to plan a nursery...which I did...it just took a little more work.

So, all that to say this..if you see me looking frazzled or if you ask me to do something spur of the moment remember I don't do spontaneous very well.

Running.

I want to be a runner. I like the whole idea of running. Anytime I'm watching a movie and one of the main characters is running with energetic music in the background it makes me want to don my tenny's and hit the road. The thought of running with the wind in my face, music in my ears, alone with my thoughts makes me smile. Running is good for you. Gets the heart to pumping and the blood flowing. All the runners they show on tv are slim and fit and tan...not sure how running makes you tan but they are. My question is..how do they find time to run? I already get up at 5AM and by the time I get home from work it's after 6 PM and I have 2 little ones to feed, bathe, play with and put to bed by that time it's either too dark or I'm too tired to run. Maybe all those tv runners are thin and slim b/c they don't have kids to chase or jobs they are tied to. Maybe one day I'll find time to run or motivation to run. Until then, I'll just live in my little dream running world.

Raising Healthy Kids

Everyday I hear more and more about the rising rates of obesity in our nation and the rising rates of obesity in children and teenagers. More and more teenagers are being diagnosed with high blood pressure and type 2 Diabetes...things that we used to associate with older adulthood. A year ago we made big changes in our eating habits. We cut down our eating out to 2x or less a week and cut down on the number of carbs in our diet. Did you know that 1 serving of pasta has almost the number of carbs you should eat in an entire meal? And how many times do we eat 1 serving? I know people get frustrated with school systems cutting out french fries and fast food places automatically serving apples instead of fries but we have to teach our children to make good choices. My son has had very few servings of mac and cheese but he has had many dinners with broccoli...if given the choice will he choose the mac and cheese...sure but he's barely over a year old. If there's no mac and cheese but there is broccoli he'll eat his weight in broccoli..I've seen it! I hear so many people say their kids won't eat veggies. My response is to keep offering and start early. If they grow up eating fresh food they will think that's "normal". Yes we eat junk food sometimes but I don't buy it often. If given the choice they will choose junk. Don't buy it. Buy fruit instead.

Next post: exercise ;)

Question for you: which do you find harder exercise or eating healthy?

And the Winner Is....

The Dr squinted his eyes as he looked at the tiny red marks on my son's back. "He's allergic to this food right here" he said, then he looked down at his paper to see which food corresponded to the whelp forming around a small punture mark. That moment I scooted a little out to the edge of my seat and held my breath. It was kind of like that moment at the grammy's or the Emmy's or any other award's show when the presenter says "And the award for the most harmful food goes to.." and looks down to open the envelope and give the answer. That was the moment...but after many months of guessing I was about to have an answer to a question that had plagued me and made me doubt my abilities as a mother. A little over a year ago God answered our prayers and gave us a baby to add to our family...a boy. He cried more than our daughter ever did. We tried almost everything. Nursing or sitting outside were the only things that soothed him. We tried reflux medicine starting at 6 weeks. At 4 months he cried so much on a 3 hour road trip he had a rash from broken blood vessels on his back. Labor Day Weekend a play date for our daughter was cut short because he could not be consoled. We thought it was colic..maybe. I heard a friend talk about a gluten free diet while breastfeeding and though it seemed drastic I was desparate. Within a week of my diet change my son was more alert..happier. At his 6 month check up we discovered my milk supply was not enough and he was not growing like he should so we had to add formula. At 7 months he had his first round with bronchitis and breathing treatments. He was off the breathing treatments for a week before the cough came back. 3 weeks later he started vomiting...the vomiting last a week..I was exhausted and worried. Finally it stopped and after a week his appetite came back but so did the vomiting. I got a referral to a GI specialist who thought it was more what I was feeding him not the consistency of it. He said it sounded like an allergy problem...not celiac disease. So after another 3 days of vomiting we cleared the diet and started over. No wheat, no gluten, none. That was the diet. We had to be careful when we ate out. No fast food for him. Our diet improved as a result. Only fresh, no preservatives. We have had a few episodes of vomiting since our GI visit in January and other than one round of pneumonia he has done well. But the cough and the breathing treatments continue.

So, back to the allergist staring at his paper, waiting to know if I had been right, did I do the right thing..and he said "egg" Not wheat, egg. But the more I thought the more I realized that many foods with wheat have egg and unless I added egg to something he had not had much of it so maybe that's why the symptoms got better. I sat there dumbfounded as the Dr marked other allergies but none of them food. So he made a suggestion and asked what I wanted to do. I just stared at him. I wanted to scream "I've been making these decisions, guessing on the best thing for 9 months now! I want someone else to tell me what to do!" But I didn't I just smiled, nodded and said "sounds like a good plan" all the while thinking "egg?" So the plan is to get rid of egg for 3 weeks then reintroduce it...umm yeah that'll be fun week *eyeroll* And get rid of the cat for a months and see how the asthma does...so um anybody want a cat?

Diet

In the past 8 months we have made a lot of changes to our diet. In an effort to decrease risk of diabetes in our family we cut back on carbs drastically. Then, due to Joel colic, I went on a gluten free diet for almost 4 months while breastfeeding. This made easier because we had already cut most of our breads and carbs. As Joel had grown, so has his appetite. But because of his stomach issues he eats fresh stuff and nothing processed unless it specifically says "gluten free". The boy can eat more broccoli than the rest of us put together..probably because he eats our portion! I was waiting for him to turn a year old so we could do allergy testing. We tried to draw blood and it was very traumatic for everyone involved and not very successful. We did get enough blood to test for wheat which came back negative. The thought of feeding my sweet boy, who loves meat and veggies and does not care for carbs, processed mac and cheese makes me cringe. It's been a battle to get the 4 year old to give up her processed sugar. Most of our shopping comes from the dairy, meat and produce sections now and she complains. I want to shout that she should enjoy the fresh food instead of griping but instead I battle to get her eat...and most of the time it is tasty not bland and "yucky". I think we have all felt better and had more energy since the diet change. The hubs and I have both noticed that we feel more draggy if go off the diet for more than a meal. I would love for my boy to continue to love his fresh foods. We go to see the allergist next week for more extensive testing. I'm hoping we can find a balance.

Selfishness

In the 7 years that I have been married I have had few hobbies. I did some scrapbooking when we were dating and that lasted a little while into our married life but between work and ministry and then kids it got pushed to the side. About 3 months ago I decided I wanted to garden. I found a great little vegetable garden plan online and set about making it happen. My veggie garden is now in full bloom, along with about 30 plants in my front flower beds that have been bare for 3 years and 2 beautiful pots on my back porch. But all this green beauty comes at a cost...time. Two nights ago I wanted to finish planting some flowers and then water all my plants. I tried to talk my 4 year old into helping. She watered a few plants then dug one hole and she was done. It was too hot and she did not like it so she went inside. I finished the project outside then went inside to start bath and bed time routines. Both the kids were excited to see me but both wanted to play. Because I spent my time doing what I wanted I missed out on time with my kiddos and felt it in their attitudes. It was a battle to the end.

I know we all battle wanting what we want when we want it. It starts as an infant when all your needs at met and all you have to do is whimper. As we grow we learn about delayed gratification and sometimes what I want will hurt others so maybe it's not such a good thing. Finding a balance between spending time with my children and time on my hobby is difficult sometimes. Last night I decided to do it the opposite way and played with the kids till almost bath time then went out to water. They responded much better to the bath and bed routine b/c they had gotten "mama time". I know a lot of us struggle with spending so much time taking care of other people that we don't take care of ourselves. In my work I see a lot of people who are worn out and worn down because they have never taken care of themselves. Finding something you enjoy and spending time doing it sometimes makes it easier to take care of others.

A place to start

Most of my adult life one of the hopes and dreams of my heart was to be a wife and a mother. Seven years ago this Sunday God granted one of those dreams when I married my dear hubby. 2 1/2 years later we added a daughter to our family and another dream was realized. Our 2nd baby was a little harder to come by but God was gracious and gave us a son almost 6 years into our marriage. This blog is a narration of our lives and how God is continuing to grow our faith and our hope in Him. This is the life I always wanted...sometime I wonder, though, why nobody told me it would be so hard!