Aaaand We're Back!

Back to blogging, and back to Blogger!

Who knew the month of December would leave me with not a moment to blog!? I envisioned regular updates on all of our Advent activities. Instead I got busy doing the activities {as it should be, after all} and found no time to sit down and write. I did take photos though, and I do intend to share, probably in one longer recap post. Also, I got involved in making a particular Christmas gift and that endeavor took longer than anticipated- as always! The project was well worth the extra time in the end. I couldn't be happier with how it turned out.

You'll also notice that we're back on Blogger instead of WordPress. I just couldn't get settled and comfortable at WordPress. It felt like living in a hotel- none of your stuff is where you like to keep it, and you can't find what you're looking for. Coming back to Blogger felt like getting back home and putting all my stuff away where it belongs (does that analogy translate for non-type-As?). Maybe it's because I was so used to Blogger, where I originally began blogging. Maybe it's because WP is really not as well designed. I personally find Blogger much easier to use and much more customizable. WordPress had options, but they were all part of the "upgrade," of course meaning that you had to pay to use them. I also like the Blogger mobile app much better. Again, easier to use. And if I'm being totally honest, easier to use = more blogging. It's that simple.

I couldn't help but notice that 2013 has been my least blogged year on record {except for 2007, my first year of blogging}. While that's a little disappointing, I know it's mostly due to a new {and very cute} little somebody who I'm spending my former blogging time with these days, and I'm just fine with that. I'm looking forward to starting 2014 with a few posts including Advent, Christmas, and 2013 recaps :)

Until then, Happy New Year to everyone! We'll be partying family-style... a special dinner {at home}, followed by naps when then kids go to bed so we can stay awake until midnight. Yep. That is our actual plan. Cheers to being old! :D

Advent 2013

For me, there is no more exciting time of year than the Christmas season. I've always loved Christmas and do even more now that I'm a mom. Watching your babies experience the magic of Christmas - from Santa, to snow, to the miraculous birth of Baby Jesus - is like nothing else in the world. It gives me some serious warm fuzzies! So you can imagine my excitement each year when it's time to start the countdown. We celebrated Advent for the first time last year when I felt like Carsen was big enough to start understanding that Christmas is a celebration of the birth of Jesus. Of course, even this year she is a little young to grasp the notion of a savior, but I'm happy to start with the idea that we're celebrating his birth.

Last year, I made an advent calendar using some pretty winter cardstock I had on hand, and some leftover Christmas ribbon. You can read the how-to along with our list of Advent activities here. It was really cute, but it got on my nerves a little with the way it was assembled. So this year, I decided to simplify the calendar itself. I still wanted it to be reusable for future years, though, so I used a piece of foam-core posterboard and a pad of sticky notes. I started by making a calendar grid on the posterboard {it was 20" x 30" so I made 4x4 squares and left a 1" margin on each side of the 30" length}. Then I wrote each of the activities on the back of a sticky note - 23 total this year. Since certain activities are better for weekends or some are better for earlier/later in the month, I used our Google calendar to plan out what activities to do on which days and stuck them on the Advent calendar accordingly.

Once all the sticky notes were in place, I just used silver and black Sharpies to write the countdown numbers on them. I personally like to do the numbers as a countdown, although I know a lot of calendars count up to Christmas. To hang it, I placed a command hook upside down on the back of our basement door. Then I hot glued some ribbon to the back of the calendar and looped the ribbon over the command hook. Voila!

 Originally, I had my heart SET on red sticky notes. In my mind, they were everywhere for the holidays. I mean, they're sticky notes... how else would they capitalize on the holiday season?? In reality, I could find them nowhere. It got to be a few days in when I finally decided to just use blue and go with a "winter" color scheme. They're a little too electric blue for my taste, but I feel that I did the best I could with the resources that were available. I did find a pack of Post-Its that were more of a dark blue and they would have looked better, but I couldn't bring myself to spend $8 on a 6-pad pack when I only needed 23 stickies. UGH. I'll begin my hunt for red {or even a nice true green that's not neon!} for next year's calendar promptly on January 1st.

In the mean time, here's our list of activities for this year:

• Decorate the tree and our house together


• Read "The Story of Christmas"


• Make cards for soldiers


• Write a letter to Santa {Carsen dictates, mommy writes. Save it in her baby book!}


• Visit Santa {at the mall}


• New Christmas jammies


• Christmas movie night #1 - Carsen's pick


• Make ice cream cone Christmas trees with cousins


• Learn about the symbols of Christmas


• Make paper cone Christmas trees for decorations


• Visit Valley View Farms {Carsen LOVES looking at Christmas trees in the stores, so this is a huge treat for her}


• Make brown paper garland {like this} for decorations


• Christmas movie night #2 - mommy's pick


• Make gifts for grandparents


• Make & decorate cardboard "Gingerbread" houses


• Go see Christmas lights in the neighborhood


• Read "The Night Before Christmas"


• Make ice bubbles


• Christmas movie night #3 - daddy's pick


• Hot cocoa bar {like the one in this post}


• Make a birthday card for Jesus


• Bake cookies


• Make {prep} a special breakfast for Christmas morning

Some of these are repeats from last year and some are new. As Carsen {and eventually Reagan and any future siblings} gets older there's more she can understand and participate in, so I'll change and adapt what we do each year accordingly.  Some things will probably always be on there like decorating the tree and house together as a family, Christmas movies, baking cookies, and making gifts for grandparents. In the future I'd like to add more service-related activities like volunteering and gathering food, toys, clothing or household items for donations {right now we usually do that around Thanksgiving}.

So far, we have... decorated, read "The Story of Christmas," made cards for soldiers, written a letter to Santa, visited Santa, and gotten new Christmas jammies.

 

 

 

Season of Thanks

Every year at this time people start posting all of the things they're thankful for in their lives on Facebook. I've never participated in that. It just doesn't feel like me. But I do like to put my gratitude out there, so I usually write a blog post. It doesn't change much year to year I guess because I'm a simple girl with a pretty simple life. There's of course much more I'm thankful for that isn't mentioned here, but that would be a much longer post than anyone would care to read. Here we go...

I am so incredibly thankful for every piece of my life. I'm a big believer that all the parts add up perfectly to the whole. I wouldn't change a moment, even the icky ones, because I want to be right where I am. I'm thankful every single day for the people in my life- from my precious little family, to my great big family, to our amazing friends, to those people who pluck my last nerve. They're all part of my life and who I am, and I'm thankful for them. I'm thankful for our health. We don't have to look far to find someone struggling with a chronic illness, who can't seem to catch a break, or who's fighting for his or her life. There's not a day that passes when I don't consciously acknowledge how incredibly blessed we are to be healthy. I'm thankful for our home. I don't love it, but it's ours. It keeps us warm and sheltered. It welcomed our girls home from the hospital and has been the only home they've ever known. It has taught us many lessons that will weigh heavy when we buy our next house, that's for sure. It has been  a place of fun and laughter and family for us- squeaks, creaks, leaks and all. I'm so thankful for our income. In a time when many seek work and can't find it or work half a dozen small jobs to feed their families, we have steady income. And it's enough to afford me the luxury of staying at home with our girls, snuggling, playing, adventuring, teaching, and making memories - where I know I belong. That is something I will never take for granted and never stop thanking God for. I am beyond grateful for the sacrifice of every member of the United States Military and their families. Our lives are what they are because they do what they do. Above all, I'm thankful for God's love and mercy. To live life knowing God's love is a gift I can't describe. Words will never be able to express how thankful I am for a loving, forgiving God.

While a blog post about what I'm thankful for is nice, just like all the posts on Facebook every day, what better way to show gratitude than to give back and pass the blessings on? Each year we kick off the holiday season around the beginning of November by collecting things we no longer need or use and make a huge donation. We take some things to Goodwill, some to a local transitional housing shelter, and some to the food bank. Not only does it feel great to clear some things out of the house that we no longer need or use, but I can't put in words how great it is to know that someone else will be warm, or fed, or clean because we made that donation. We are very fortunate to have parents who love to spoil us and our girls at Christmas. As a result, we always have older, lesser used items we can pass along to those in need. This year, Carsen is 3 1/2. While she doesn't have a concept of what it means to be needy, we did encourage her to help us pick out some of her toys and books she doesn't play with as much, and told her we were going to give them to children who had no toys. She was totally on board and didn't make a peep about the toys getting boxed up.

Donating to local charities and helping the less fortunate in our community will continue to be a part of our holiday season as the girls grow up. In today's world of 7-year olds with cell phones, I refuse to let my children be consumed by a materialistic culture and lose sight of what the holiday season is truly about. Of course, as they get older they'll be able to participate more and will certainly understand more what it means to reach out to others. Hopefully it will help to instill in them a sense of gratitude for what they have and compassion for those who go without.

 

How are you showing your gratitude this holiday season?

Sleep Happens

I'm keeping it real for you today and talking about our sleep situation around here. Getting babies to sleep is one of the great mysteries of humanity. There are countless methods, doctors, experts, books, old wives tales, and advice {both solicited and unsolicited} all focused on how to get a baby to sleep. Yet, the answers seem to change every few years on what works best.

In my experience, having gone through it once with our now 3-year old and going through it currently with our 7-month old, there is no one answer. What works for one kid may not work at all for another. Every baby is different, which makes it extremely difficult to apply any blanket solution or method to all of them. For example, Carsen started on a nap schedule by the time she was 4-5 months old. She established it herself and took two almost 2-hour naps every day without a peep until she was about 1 year old when she switched to one long nap. To this day she naps every single day from 1:30-4:30, and would sleep longer if I didn't go wake her. From about 6 months old she woke up once every night around 4/4:30 to nurse and would go back to sleep until 8/8:30. Once she moved into her own room around 1 year, she slept 12 hours every night and still does. Easy!

Reagan is totally different. I have been trying to figure out her nap schedule for months. She rarely sleeps more than 30 minutes at a time during the day. You could set your watch by it. I've tried laying her down earlier, later, swaddled, un-swaddled, her room, our room {where she sleeps at night}, and I've just never found anything that seems to make any difference. Usually when she wakes up at the 30 minute mark I can give her the paci and she'll go back to sleep. Sometimes for 10 minutes, sometimes for an hour, sometimes not at all. Again, I can't seem to find any pattern or indicator as to what makes for a longer nap vs. shorter nap. Night time is another challenge of its own. For a long time she slept 8 pm - 3:30 am, and then woke up for the day around 6:30-7. Then for about a month she started waking up around 11 pm and every. two. hours. after that for the rest of the night. Brutal! Just recently, thank the Lord, she has gone back to sleeping until a wee morning hour (3-4) and then waking around 6:30 am when I pull her in bed with me to nurse {she sleeps in an Arm's Reach Co-sleeper which we LOVE} and she snoozes for another hour or so.

Like many sleep-deprived parents, I've turned to the Interwebz more than once in a moment of bleary-eyed exhaustion when I thought I just couldn't take it any more. Of course, what I found indicates that I'm doing everything wrong. Here's the list of infractions...

• Nursing her to sleep


• Using a pacifier


• Using a swaddle blanket


• Staying with her until she falls asleep


• Picking her up when she cries {though only when other attempts fail}


• Nursing her in the middle of the night


• Sleeping inches away from her {in separate beds though}

Most of the advice I find suggests that nursing her to sleep will make her dependent on the boob to fall asleep, as will the pacifier and swaddle blanket, and staying with her until she falls asleep. All I'm doing with all of those things is teaching her that she can't possibly  fall asleep without them. Here's my question about that... if I did all the same detrimental things with Carsen, how did she end up being such a champion sleeper?? My answer to that is simple- all those things aren't the problem.

I mean, is there even a problem? Some argue that babies shouldn't be waking all night long. Well, she doesn't. But when she does wake up, I do something about it and we're all back to sleep in less than 10 minutes. Sure, I'd love to know what it feels like to fall asleep at 10 pm and not wake up until 6 or 7 {or 8}. I'm just not willing to put my baby through a traumatic training experience for my own luxury. She falls asleep nursing, so no, I'm not waking her up just to teach her to fall asleep in her bed instead of happily snuggled against her mama. I have zero trouble transferring her into her bed once she's asleep. Per all the "rules," I've tried not swaddling her. Instead of waking up after 30 minutes, she woke up every 6 minutes. I haven't even attempted taking the pacifier away. While she only uses it for bed/nap times, it is very clear to me that its disappearance would not go over well. The pacifier and swaddling both provide comfort and are part of the reason I can easily get her into her bed. We've also tried putting her in her crib in her own room. It was a disaster. She woke up constantly, sometimes the second I'd step my foot back in our room. If you think waking up twice a night is torture, imagine waking up twice every hour and standing bent at 90 degrees over a crib for 20 minutes soothing a crying baby only for her to start all over again less than 30 seconds after you leave the room.

So why bother with all the rules? Like myself, here's another mom who suggests trusting your instincts and listening to your baby instead. My approach to parenting, and the advice I always give new parents, is don't over-think it. I use my own common sense and Reagan's cues to determine when she needs to sleep {and all of her other needs for that matter}. If it's not in a perfect pattern, then her needs must be fluctuating at the time. As I type this, she has taken a fantastic 2.5-hour morning nap and went right out for her afternoon nap. It's been a good day, but I've done nothing any different than any other day. The inconsistency can be kind of annoying, yes, but I have to accept that that's just her. I'm sure that when her system settles into a pattern it will emerge on it's own.

In counseling, we always approach things from a standpoint of impact on daily function. Do you need an intervention if everyone is healthy and functioning even if not "by the book?" If it ain't broke.... I'm just saying. If you can't function on the amount of sleep you get and your baby seems miserable, try something different to get more sleep. But you don't need to force a baby into an expert's mold. Your sleep habits are different from other adults, so why expect that all babies will sleep the same way and for the same amount of time? Do what works best for your baby instead of fighting them for sleep, and sleep will happen.

I'll keep you posted on Reagan's sleep as it develops. In the mean time, what worked for you? Does your baby sleep all night or wake up a few times? Is your baby a napper, or not?

Weekend Humor

Do you ever mess with your kids or spouse to amuse yourself {and others}?? I grew up with a prankster brother and sister, so in our family BatDad is classic humor. My sister first discovered him and shared his antics with us one weekend when we were at my mom's for dinner. As a result, we've all been walking around doing our BatDad impressions to each other {and our kids} ever since.

This is just one of many of his videos. I highly recommend checking the others out, too :)

Chicken & Butternut Squash Stew

As usual, I was surfing Pinterest for some new dinner recipes the other day. I'm big on seasonal food, so I love making soup in the fall and winter. I had a recipe for chicken & butternut squash stew pinned to my dinner board and had been anxious to try it. As it was written, though, it required a lot of standing at the stove. With two littles in the house, dinner making is enough of a challenge. I really have to simplify as much as possible and minimize the amount of time spent actually prepping and cooking. So I did the natural thing - made it in the crock pot! I have to say, it couldn't have been easier!

Here's what I used:

• 1/2 butternut squash, peeled and diced {you could also just get a smaller one, but I just freeze the rest to use later in other recipes or baby food}


• 2 chicken breasts


• 28 oz can of diced tomatoes


• 14.5 oz can of black beans {rinsed and drained}


• 3 cups of chicken broth {1 full box, -1 cup}


• 2-3 cloves of garlic, finely chopped


• 1-2 teaspoons of brown sugar to take the edge of the tomatoes, maple syrup would work as well if you don't like adding sugar ;)


• 1/2 cup of uncooked quinoa

Here's what I did:
Toss everything into the crock pot except for the quinoa and 1 cup of chicken broth. Cook on low for 4-6 hours. Scoop out the chicken breasts and shred them up. Then add them back to the pot. You could also cut them up into chunks from the get-go and skip this step if you prefer chunks over shreds. Then cook 1/2 cup of quinoa in the remaining 1 cup of chicken broth. Once that is cooked, add it to the soup. You're done!

This was a huge hit here in The Luckiest Household. Even my husband, who is not a big veggie guy, loved it and promptly packed up the rest in individual servings to take for his lunch. We'll definitely be making this again!

Whenever I make a new recipe I usually come up with improvements to the process or the ingredients either while I'm cooking or after tasting it. For this one, I already mentioned adapting for the crock pot instead of standing at the stove. I also eliminated a bunch of prep steps with the squash by simply dicing it and tossing it in the pot. While I loved the taste of this soup just as I made it, I also think it would be really good with some heavy cream and fresh grated parmesan cheese. Or you could spice it up with your favorite hot sauce, some red pepper flakes, or even chopped peppers right in the soup. It would be interesting to change up the meat too- pork or beef both seem like good options.

If anyone makes it, let me know how it turns out in a comment and share what (if any) variations you used! Enjoy!

Food is Medicine {for the common cold}

All of "Daddy's girls," as Carsen calls us, are on day 4 of a head cold. Maybe it's day 5. I can't keep track. The only thing worse than having a head cold is when your littles have one too. Most people with a cold just pop some pseudophedrine and get on with life. I, for one, am not a big fan of taking medicine (or giving it to my kids) unless I absolutely can't deal without it. Plus, when you're a nursing mama you have to be extra cautious about taking any medication since it could be passed on to your nursling. You also don't want to take anything that will dry up your sinuses because it will also dry up your milk supply. And of course little ones can't take cold meds at all. Instead, we rely on humidifiers, extra pillows, saline, NoseFrida, rest and fluids to battle it out.

[caption id="attachment_834" align="aligncenter" width="504"] My poor, sick Reagan baby[/caption]

But sometimes the humidifier and some extra pillows still leave you and your little ones in misery. That's where I am! Sick and tired of being sick and tired... literally. Knowing that many common foods have health-promoting, immune-boosting, anti-illness properties, I set out to find some food-based or otherwise non-medicinal head cold relief for moms and babies. Oh, and I decided to share it with you in case anyone else is looking for the same thing :)

Here are some options I found...


1. Hot "Tea" Concoction
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup unfiltered apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 wedge lemon
Bring water to a boil. Combine hot water and apple cider vinegar in a small glass or mug. Add honey and cayenne pepper. Stir well. Top off with a squeeze of lemon. Take a deep breath of the mixture, and start drinking!

2. Cinnamon + honey
Mix 1 teaspoon of honey with 1/4 teaspoon of cinnamon and take 2-3 times daily. Both are antiviral, antibacterial, and antifungal. Could probably be mixed into a tea as well if you can't handle eating it right off a spoon.

3. Netti Pot
Get yourself a store-bought Netti Pot (or similar device) and follow instructions.
*Side note: I would personally boil, then cool the water before pouring it up into my sinuses just to ensure it is free of its own potentially harmful microorganisms. 

4. Homemade Chicken Broth/soup
Place a whole chicken in the crockpot with 6-8 cups of water depending on the size of your bird and your crockpot. Add vegetables and season to your liking. Cook on low until chicken is done. Remove chicken and save the broth. You can use the chicken meat and make it into soup, or simply sip the warm broth (you may want to skim it for fat/pieces, up to you). This is NOT the same as buying canned or boxed stock at the store ;) Read about the benefits of real broth here.

5. Garlic
Garlic soup (garlic cloves peeled and boiled in water), garlic tea (chopped garlic, lemon juice, honey, boiling water), lots of garlic added to your food, or even just peel and suck on a garlic clove. It's a natural immune-booster and along with your budding romance, it can kill bacteria too!

6. Electrolyte Popsicles
An easy recipe from My Whole Food Life, a blog I follow. Her recipes are vegan and all-natural. This recipe is especially for kids (it can be tough to keep them hydrated when they aren't feeling well), but adults could enjoy them just the same!
*Note: this recipe contains honey and should NOT be used for children younger than 1 year.

7. Herbal Steam
Bring water just to a boil with a few drops of essential oil mixed in. Then breathe the steam. You can place a towel over your head to trap the steam as well. Just be VERY cautious with steam/a pot of hot water to avoid burns.

8. Vapo-Rub Alternative
Skip the petroleum in store-bought Vapo-Rub by mixing a few drops of essential oil like eucalyptus or peppermint with a small amount of vegetable oil and apply to the chest or soles of baby's feet to open up the lungs.

**Disclaimer - I am not a doctor or medical professional, so please use this for information only and always consult your doctor for concerns about your health and treatment! Furthermore, I have not tried all of these methods nor am I endorsing or recommending any of them. Just sharing what I found readily available online!

Overall I found lots of recommendations including honey, lemon, ginger, and garlic used in various ways. I'm sure you could play around and create your own recipe with those ingredients and still get similar benefits. That's just my personal, non-medical opinion though. I think of these I would be most apt to try the cinnamon & honey (probably in tea) or the homemade Vapo-Rub. I'd also give the popsicles a try. I can usually tough out a cold pretty well, but it's really hard to manage two little kids with colds too. The Vapo-Rub would be great for them too. As I think of it, some essential oil in a nice warm bath might be soothing too - similar to the herbal steam, minus the danger of boiling water.

Just for interest's sake, I found some really weird suggestions too! One of them was to blow a blow dryer in your face (without burning yourself) for as long as you can stand it. What?! The hot air supposedly kills the rhinovirus in your nose. Also, cut an onion and leave it beside your bed when you sleep. It's supposed to absorb bacteria/germs.

Has anyone ever tried this stuff?? Do you know of any food-based or non-medicinal remedies for the common cold? Do you have any tried-and-true practices that help when you're sick?