Close to Home

Now that I've showed off my residence, I thought I'd show off some of the scenery from the neighborhood... I think I mentioned before that the fireweed were in full bloom as we drove into town that first day, and while they have since wilted in the frost (it is practically winter now) they remain in my mind as part of my first sight of this area.



Yes, the hills really were covered with pink like this the whole way in. ☺

And, of course, my new banner...the view on the way into town (in the early morning light):

Consistent vs Reliable

Ahh consistency, the mark of a great parent, right? They are never pushovers, they do not give in to whining or wheedling. They set their rules and they stand by them. Once a consequence has been put in place, it will be enforced without exception. After all, children need consistency, they depend on it. They will push at the boundaries and if you, as the parent, give even a little then they will push harder and harder and get out of control.
We've all read this before, I'm sure.
All the parenting experts say it, and if the experts agree, then we should agree too, shouldn't we?

Well, I have realized that I disagree. (Yep, there's me, questioning the status quo again!)

I don't want to be a perfectly consistent parent. I want to be a reliable parent.

What is the difference? Well, a consistent parent is rigid, and unchanging. Once a rule is set then it is there and ne'er shall it budge. If we have a rule that you must eat your veggies before having any dessert then thus shall it be forever more! (so let it be written, so let it be done!!) Well, yes, good foods before treats is a general policy in our house...but every once in a great while isn't it fun to break that sort of rule? One night we took an idea from the disney channel and decided to have a "totally chocolate dinner." You should have seen the look on Wolf's eyes when we told him. It was a day that he reminded us of for months.

As a reliable parent my kids learn that it is ok to request making changes--this summer Wolf questioned his bedtime asked if we could move it a little later. We discussed that we had established it because he was in school and had to get up early, but concluded that since it was now summer we were willing to try out a later bedtime and see how it went. (Incidentally, we had tried that later bedtime a couple of times before, and it had not worked out, but just because something didn't work before doesn't mean it's not worth trying again.)

With a reliable parent my kids know that it's ok to ask questions about the status quo (hey, does that sound familiar?!) They know that I can be relied upon to make sure that there are always boundaries, but that sometimes the details are subject to change, and that is good. After all, each person is different, each age is different, and one of the most consistent things about parenting is change!

A general rule for living and working with children

"If I had to make a general rule for living and working with children, it might be this: be wary of saying or doing anything to a child that you would not do to another adult, whose good opinion and affection you valued."

--John Holt

Babywearing in a pinch

Since it's International Babywearing Week, I figured it was a good time to post this. ☺


Ingredients:
1 kiddo who is big enough to sit up but not quite big enough (or awake enough) to walk the distance
1 big towel
1 mama who is 20 weeks pregnant (pregnancy is optional)

Directions:
Put kiddo on your back piggy-back style. (If he's used to being worn he will hang on like a monkey, facilitating the subsequent steps!)
Take one long edge of the towel and center it on the kiddo's upper back--either under or over his shoulders, as desired. Tie the upper corners snugly over mama's bust. If possible, have a helper snug them up with an overhand knot(you won't need a double knot, but especially if the towel is at all damp you will need that helper!)
Take the lower edge of the towel and snug it up under the kiddo's bootie, and tie it around mama's waist (above the belly if she's got another little kiddo in there!) Again, have a helper help you get it snug in front.
Hike securely in peace and comfort, enjoy kiddo falling asleep rather than whining, have fun!
Bear is around 30 lbs, and with my growing belly (the extra weight plus, you know, the bulge) I haven't really been wearing him since last winter.
However, there was one day this summer when we were camping that we decided to go to a little swimming hole. We were told it was "right next to the parking lot" but when we got there we discovered that it was actually about 1/2mile walk in to the falls and pool. That's not that far, but it is a pretty good distance for a 2 year old. So I grabbed a nice big towel and improvised. (The photo is on the way back out, he was on the verge of sleep, thus the groggy expression...)

Incidentally, since Bear has always been worn, he just curls his body right onto mine and hangs on like a little monkey. He's much easier to carry--even in a makeshift form--than a child who is not used to being carried. ☺

Happy Birthday

September 22 is Bilbo and Frodo Baggins' birthday (yes, they share a birthday--Frodo turned 33 and entered adulthood on the same day that Bilbo turned 111 and had his massive birthday bash, as found in the first chapter of "The Fellowship of the Ring." Everybody knows that, right?)
Anyway, Hubby put the birthday on our calendar several weeks ago, but since he is heading out of town tonight we celebrated last night with a hobbity dinner of vegetables and mushrooms and (of course) two kinds of birthday pie. ☺ (yes, I'm still trying out all your pie recipes...we've got a couple to go still so it'll be another week or two before I'm ready to announce a contest winner.)
In any case, I didn't have anything particular to say today, except Happy Birthday to the Hobbits, and yeah, I'm a little bit of a geek. ☺

Pictures of the New Place

Alrighty, I know I keep promising I'll get these posted...I had a few from our landlords that showed the empty apartment, but I was waiting until we had some furniture and had unpacked a little better so that I could show what it actually looks like with us in it (also it's so hard to get a sense of scale if you see a picture of an empty room...it's a lot easier to tell how roomy this place is when you can see things in the space!)

Without further ado...

From the front door you can see straight down the hall Turning around...
The kitchen is remarkably tall--I haven't had to utilize a step stool as part of my regular cooking regimen in a looong time. ☺ But since what you see here is all the cupboard space there is, I try to use it all, including on top of the shelves.And our table/chairs (one is often at the desk during the days) and my sweet little makeshift shelving.

The living room (yes, they did make good on the couch issue...good thing!)
Yes, that is a van seat in our living room...we don't have a garage to put it in, and it's been functioning as extra seating as well. The one downside of this apartment is that there's not a lot of storage... There's a big box behind the van chair there that is holding some of our bulkier camping stuff that I haven't found a home for yet... (as well as three boxes that I still need to unpack).
See how I took another box and made it into a little shelf for all our DVDs? ☺ And the TV is sitting on another little box...it would be nice to get a better stand/shelf to put the TV on and that we could store our movies in, but for the moment this is functional.
Also we have a great view, which this picture doesn't show terribly well...

Here you go, this is a better look at the view out our living room window.

Are you jealous of my Home yet?!

(Those mountains are a National Park, and the larger snow field on the right there is a glacier. We can't see the bay because of the trees, but there is bright blue water between us and those mountains...)


Alrighty then, on down the hall...

Here is the playroom, because every kid should have a place where he can let it all hang out a bit (and doesn't have to keep it clean every day...the intent is that toys stay in here and it's allowed to be messy except once a week for me to vacuum...other rooms are relatively toy-free and thus stay pretty clean)
Another of those 'make it do' solutions is that the kids' toys are sorted into boxes rather than having some kind of chest or bin system...the OCD organizer in me wants matching labeled bins, but the kids don't seem to care much (and aren't fond of putting things IN the containers no matter what they are anyway) so hey, boxes work for now.
The playroom closet currently houses all my sewing stuff...

Right now when I want to sew I have to haul the machine and whatever else I need out to the desk and work there (the kitchen table wiggles too much from the power of the machine so I can't use it). I'd like to get set up with a proper sewing desk etc (although I'd love to have it still in the closet where I can shut the door in front of it) but for now it's stacked in boxes...yes *sigh* that is pretty much all fabric/yarn/notions. Well, no, one of the boxes has my serger, one is scrapbook stuff, and one is full of items I've already made that are "in stock" in my etsy shops.

OK then, moving on...

The boys bedroom
Cute matching beds with drawers underneath...so long as they keep the comforters on the beds I've given up asking them to make their beds (they both thrash around in their sleep so much that nothing can stay tucked in anyhow).
They need a bookshelf too...right now all the kids' books are either on their headboards or in that box between the beds there.
Of course I made use of the closet for storage too. They have short clothes, so I figured it was ok to put some things along the floor... The stand-alone dresser is for the baby...1 drawer for those cute cloth diapers, 1 drawer for all the slings/wraps/pouches, 1 drawer for blankets...so it's a good thing his clothes are small cuz there's only one drawer left for them!

And the master bedroom
Yes, those are boxes functioning as a nightstand. They work pretty well. On the other side are the crib parts--I'll be putting up the crib with one side off as a sidecar/co-sleeper bed there before the baby arrives.


Whew, there you have it. I think I got everything.
OK, so I didn't show you the bathrooms...we have two full bathrooms. They look like normal bathrooms. They are neither cute nor gross...thus my not bothering to post pictures of them. Now are you satisfied?!

Make It Do...

Use it Up
Wear it Out
Make it Do
or
Do Without

It's a good mantra, particularly for a family who has made a conscious decision to live modestly and frugally and put every cent we can toward getting out of debt. When we moved to Alaska we got rid of all our furniture because it costs so much to move it...in Pelican our apartment was furnished so we didn't have to worry about not owning much, but since moving into our new (not furnished) apartment we've had to buy a few things. Some things were needs and could not wait (beds and a kitchen table) and since time was of the essence some of it had to go on the credit card. We chose modest models of all of the above and went ahead and got them. There are other things however that fell into the category of 'want' (even if it was 'really really want') and so we have chosen to forgo them for the time being in the interest of avoiding debt and waiting until we have cash...and thus it is that I show off my new kitchen shelving:
A classic example of "make it do"
Take a bunch of same-sized moving boxes, cut off one long flap and one short flap and then fold the other flaps into the adjoining boxes as you stack them...Voila, additional kitchen storage for free.

I did use some plywood and packing honeycomb cardboard to build a little bookshelf, and it is not holding up nearly as well...

(aren't you proud of us for our book minimalism?
We got rid of at least 3/4 of our books when we moved...support your local library!)

...yeah, it sags a bit...so a proper wooden bookshelf is about the top of my 'wants' list (right there with a bedroom dresser...yes, aside from a few items on hangers, I am literally living out of a suitcase...). Hopefully we'll be able to find one on craigslist or freecycle soon. ☺



And yes, I have taken photos of the rest of the house. The virtual tour will be posted on Monday. ☺

32 Weeks--Nesting and the New Midwife

Ahh, over 4lbs and about a foot and a half long (you got that, he's close to birth length, even though he's got at least a couple of pounds to grow) no wonder I can feel him pushing and wiggling all over in there. He likes to stretch out and push against my pelvis and my ribs at the same time...laying down in bed at night feels great because it lets me (and him) stretch out. I'm blessed with a long torso, so I guess I have more room in there than a lot of women do, but even I start getting squished at this point. ☺

Your not-so-little-one is just a bit closer to their birth weight and height at around 4 pounds and 17 inches. With each added layer of baby fat, your baby's skin starts to look more and more like it will when they finally get to see the light of day. The heavy news: you can expect your miracle-gro muffin to gain about a half a pound of weight per week from now until about two weeks before birth.

Your baby's still-developing immune system has gained substantial strength over the past few weeks getting them in full gear to face our disease-ridden world o’ wonders. Obviously, a large majority of your child’s immune strength will be derived from exposure to breast milk as well as the outside elements. Their cute little noggin’ (which could already be covered with luscious locks or just purty peach fuzz), is still soft because the skull bones have not yet fused together. As much as that sounds a little too vulnerable, their “skull softness” allows for a much smoother passage through the birth canal during labor—something both you and your little swimmer will appreciate when it’s finally time to “go!” Also, some babies will have that “soft spot” on their head for up to one year after birth.

I am getting Braxton-Hicks contractions fairly regularly now. I don't generally find them painful, although I definitely do notice them...it's just a big squeeze in my middle. BHs are sometimes referred to as "false labor" but that's something of a misnomer...they are real and they are doing something, it's just not full on labor. It's more like "practice labor," and thank heaven for it because every little bit that can get done now is a bit that I won't have to worry about on delivery day!
I've gained about 15lbs at this point, which I think is slightly 'behind' on the average curve, but it seems pretty normal for me. I had gained 10 or 11lbs at this stage last time. I seem to just wait till the second half of my pregnancy to put on any weight, but then I gain it steadily enough and Bear was a healthy size so I'm not the least bit worried about Eagle. I have a gut feeling that Eagle is (or will be) a little bigger than Bear was, but I'm really not worried. Bear wasn't that big (I was actually surprised at how little he was--just over 7lbs) so we've easily got a couple of pounds leeway.
32 weeks, as you may recall, was the time when I got my first stretch marks with Bear. Well, I haven't noticed any new ones this time around, and since I have plenty and to spare leftover from that pregnancy I am hoping that they will last me through this one too and I won't need any new stripes this time. I guess only time will tell!
I had my first prenatal appointment with my new midwife last week and I'm so happy with her. Even when I was seeing the midwives in Utah I felt like I was on a bit of an assembly line, or a to-do list...it was just such a busy clinic that I'd have to wait for my appointment, then they'd take me back and I'd wait some more in the room, then the midwife would come in and spend 5 minutes with me and be on her way. 45minutes in the office and only 5 of it with the midwife, you know? Sure, they were nice, but they were just in a hurry. My midwife here, A, practices on her own, so it's a small office and she doesn't take too many mothers at once. I hardly had to wait at all and she spent over an hour with me. One thing I really liked was that she felt my belly to determine the baby's position (my OB did that one time with Bear--toward the end, to make sure he'd turned head-down, but A does it at every visit). Since she knew precisely how the little Eagle was laying, she was able to put the doppler in precisely the right spot to hear his heart (rather than moving it around and spreading goo all over my belly as she hunted, which is what the other midwives always did). Another thing I loved about A was that she made Bear part of the appointment--she let him climb up on the table next to me and then let him put the doppler on my belly in the place she indicated--he was so pleased with himself when that thumpa-thumpa came over the speaker.
Aaaaand, yes, I'm nesting. As we've gotten things unpacked and settled in here in our new home, I've found myself feeling the need to get out baby things too. So I've gotten out (and washed) all the baby blankets. I've gotten out the small size of cloth diapers. I've got all my babywearing things unpacked again...it's terribly fun looking at the tiny jammies and remembering how they are way too big for the newborns...but how they get outgrown in a matter of weeks (or days) after birth. I haven't set up the crib yet--but I have to save something for the last month, right?!

Now that I have my midwife here, and I have seen where I'll be giving birth, I'm able to start visualizing D-day (delivery day). I'm getting really excited for this birth...I was always excited for the baby, but I'm starting to get into the headspace of preparing for the actual birth, and that's exciting. Two of my friends have had babies recently and I've been reading their birth stories (one had twins, naturally, at home, and both were breech!). I've been reading [natural] birth stories from books too, and it's so inspiring to read page after page of stories of women bringing their babies into the world. ☺

How We Met--Treehuggers

Another installment in the "how we met" series...(if you don't know what that is, go here to see the first post...trust me this will make a lot more sense if you know the background! You can read the whole series by clicking here.)


Hubby was with a group of treehuggers who had handcuffed themselves to some old growth trees in protest of the loggers who wanted to cut them down.
I was working as a summer intern with the group who was sent out to try to mediate with said treehuggers...

At this point the person to whom he was telling the story--our new neighbors--became extremely interested and started asking details--which agency was I with, what kinds of trees, how big do they get anyway, how long does it take them to get that big...the story kinda fell apart because we couldn't answer all the questions!

The real irony is, if either one of us was going to be a handcuff-myself-to-a-tree sort of activist, it probably would have been me. ☺

In Defense of Food by Michael Pollen

I recently finished a most fabulous book: Michael Pollen's In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto. I heartily recommend it, and I do so with the note that it will probably make you re-evaluate not only what you eat but also how you eat it. Pollen says so much and says it so well that, rather than try to summarize, I will simply quote liberally from the book:

"The trend toward simplification of our food continues up the chain. As we've seen, processing [foods] depletes them of many nutrients, a few of which are then added back...Fortifying processed foods with missing nutrients is surely better than leaving them out, but food science can add back only the small handful of nutrients that food science recognizes as important today. What is it overlooking? [S]cience doesn't know nearly enough to compensate for everything that processing does to whole foods. We know how to break down a kernel of corn or grain of wheat into its chemical parts, but we have no idea how to put it back together again. Destroying complexity is a lot easier than creating it." (115-6)

After describing the findings of several people who studied indigenous peoples from all over the world (and found that all the people were healthy on these natural diets, even though the diets themselves varied greatly) Pollen comments that “The human animal is adapted to, and apparently can thrive on, an extraordinary range of different diets, but the Western Diet, however you define it, does not seem to be one of them.” (100)
He discusses the history of nutrition in the western world--seeking for foods that would be cheap, give lots of energy, and be quick and easy to prepare and eat. I appreciated that Pollen doesn't criticize the motives or the people involved so much as explaining why the results have been (and are) problematic. He goes into the nutritive and metabolic differences between white and whole wheat flour, and spends most of a chapter on what we have recently learned--but long ignorantly overlooked--about the differences between Omega 3s and Omega 6s. He takes on the matter of organic vs conventionally grown crops, and concludes that "very simply, we have been breeding crops for yield, not nutritional quality, and when you breed for one thing, you invariably sacrifice another." (121) (If you have ever smelled one of those huge fancy hybrid tea roses you probably know that they smell like nothing. On the other hand the wilder roses with the little blossoms are euphoric!) Pollen continues "Halweil cites several studies demonstrating that when older crop varieties are grown side by side with modern cultivars, the older ones typically have lower yields but substantially higher nutrient levels. USDA researchers recently found that breeding to 'improve' wheat varieties over the past 130 years (a period during which yields of grain per acre tripled) had reduced levels of iron by 28 percent and zinc and selenium by roughly a third." (121)

Finally, Pollen concludes the book with a list of guidelines, or as he describes them "eating algorithms, mental devices for thinking through our food choices." They are summarized right on the cover of the book: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. Within the book of course he expounds upon each point. I have not copied all of his guidelines here, but this list is representative, and makes a good jumping off point for improving your diet--and your health. ☺

"The more eaters who vote with their forks for a different kind of food, the more commonplace and accessible such food will become." (14)

EAT FOOD (FOOD DEFINED)

• Don't eat anything that your great grandmother wouldn't recognize as food.
• Don't eat anything incapable of rotting.
• Avoid food products containing ingredients that are A) unfamiliar B) unpronounceable C) more than five in number or D) that include high fructose corn syrup. (He adds that none of these things alone is evil per se, but that they are all indications of a highly processed food, and therefore an undesirable one.)
• Avoid food products that make health claims. ("For a food product to make health claims on it's package it must first have a package, so right off the bat it's more likely to be a processed than a whole food." Futhermore going to the trouble to secure those official health claims from the FDA involves time and money, and typically only the big food companies have that.)
• Get out of the supermarket whenever possible (try farmer's markets or, what a notion, growing your own garden!)
• Shake the hand that feeds you (I love that one!)
  

MOSTLY PLANTS (WHAT TO EAT)

• Eat mostly plants, especially leaves (because different parts of plants have different nutrients, and as the western diet has become more and more seed-based we have become less and less healthy).
• You are what you eat eats too (in other words, "the diet of the animals we eat has a bearing on the nutritional quality, and healthfulness, of the food itself.")
• Eat like an omnivore (eat a variety of foods!)
• Eat well-grown food from healthy soils (this more or less means organic, but certification is expensive and many smaller farms have the good foods in spite of not having the sticker).
• Eat wild foods when you can.
• Seek a more traditional diet, and regard nontraditional foods with skepticism. ("I'm inclined to think any traditional diet will do; if it wasn't a healthy regimen, the diet and the people who followed it wouldn't still be around.")
• Don't look for the magic bullet in the traditional diet (health comes from an overall pattern of good eating, not from ingesting large doses of one specific nutrient).

"A diet based on quantity rather than quality has ushered a new creature onto the world stage: the human being who manages to be both overfed and undernourished, two characteristics seldom found in the same body in the long natural history of our species." (122)

NOT TOO MUCH (HOW TO EAT)

• Pay more, eat less (Spend more money for the higher-quality foods, spend more time in preparing them, don't overeat)
• Eat meals (not just snacks. Interact with your family/fellow eaters as you sit together.)
• Do all your eating at a table (Don't eat in the car or in front of the television.)
• Don't get your fuel from the same place your car does ☺
• Try not to eat alone
  
• Eat slowly (eat deliberately and mindfully. Also, it takes around 20 minutes for your brain to get the message that the stomach is full, so if you finish a meal in less than that time you're obviously not listening to your gut.)
• Cook and, if you can, plant a garden ("To take part in the intricate and endlessly interesting processes of providing for our sustenance is the surest way to escape the culture of fast food and the values implicit in it: that food should be fast, cheap, and easy; that food is a product of industry not nature; that food is fuel, and not a form of communion...")

"I no longer think it's possible to separate our bodily health from the health of the environment from which we eat or the environment in which we eat or, for that matter, from the the health of our general outlook about food (and health). If my exploration of the food chain have taught me anything, it's that all the links in it are in fact linked: the health of the soil to the health of the plants and animals we eat to the health of the food culture in which we eat them to the health of the eater, in body as well as mind." (144)