Category: Josiah

Two Medium Pizza’s, one and a half pieces of Cheesecake and Five Pounds later…..

Apparently, that’s how much dairy is too much.

I feel BRUTAL today.

I’m supposed to be trying to add some dairy into my diet to see how it affects Josiah (and myself). We are both on some naturopathic “stuff” to help us to deal with the different affects that it has on us. And apparently I’ve figured out how much is too much.

‘Siah has a tiny bit of a rash on his cheeks, and while it could be the starting of exczema, it could also be from teething and his fingers and slobber in and out of his mouth ALL FREAKING DAY. But….he has been dealing with what seems to be acid reflux, and has actually been barfing a little bit. All of that would indicate to me that it would be okay for me to injest a little bit of dairy if I came across it at a restaurant or even going to someone’s house for a meal or even if I wanted to cheat a little, but apparently 4 days of cheating with a half a piece of cheesecake, and then splitting a medium pizza with Jon , and then splitting another medium pizza with Jon because the first was just that good, and then my veryown piece of cheesecake…..apparently that it where the line is drawn….somewhere in all the middle of that.

And for me….I feel bloated, and people in the next city can hear my stomach as it grumbles its complaints to me feeding it that horrible, terrible, no good dairy….and I just feel sluggish and have a headache and feel like I’m in a brain fog, and not to mention that I’ve gained 5 pounds. Nice, eh? It was so not worth it.

So, I think that what I’m going to do is to just go back to taking it easy on the dairy in our own house and with the way that we normally eat. I feel SO MUCH BETTER off of it, and apparently, so does ‘Siah.

In Jeremy related news….

He had another good day. He was thrilled to bring home 4 stickers, AGAIN, and even more thrilled to bring home a friend. Yup! He actually brought home a friend from school, and they played so nicely together for about two hours, until the kid’s father came to pick him up. That is the first time that J has brought a kid home from school, and again….it could all be coincidence or not.

Now, after my whole…..no negative side effects blah, blah blah from yesterday….

We found his lunch from yesterday (almost the entire thing) in the front pouch of his backpack….so that’s not good, especially seeing as I found almost his entire lunch in his backpack again today….so appaerently lunch is not going so well.

We’re going to go in and talk to the principal tomorrow and we’ll mention that, and see what he says about it all; and see if he can help us out with it.

Jeremy seems to be eating well at home, and if lunch is the only meal affected, then Oh Well! He’s eaten an apple and a muffin and some popcorn since he came home, and we’re just about to have dinner so we’ll see. I still think he’s eating enough during the day, as a whole, just not “in school”.

Oh well! I’m sure it’ll all work out. Right?

Missing Children

Okay, so this title is a bit more serious than my usualy drivel….but in actuality, it’s not.

I was tidying up today and ‘Siah and I were in his room. He was playing on the floor with his toys and I was folding clothes and putting them away, and clearing out small clothes and other stuff like that.

I ran downstairs, for a second, to flip the laundry over and when I came back upstairs and into Josiah’s room – it was empty!

Empty Room

He’s been motoring along for a while now and getting really fast with his little army crawl, and I wondered if he’d managed to make it down the hallway towards the kids room.

I gave the room one last glance, and nope….he really wasn’t in there.

Still No Baby

I ran out into the rest of the house and, nope….not down the hall way, not in the TV room, not in the kitchen or the front room, and one panicky moment when I prayed that he wasn’t in the bathroom fishing in the toilet….but nope! He wasn’t there, either…

I had no clue as to where he was.

I went back into his room and heard some little noises, but still could not see anything….and then….

One Little Hand

The little stinker had crawled under his crib and because of the long bedskirt, I couldn’t see him. The kids play with him under the crib ALL THE TIME and it drives me nuts, and I’m always nagging at them to GET. OUT. FROM. UNDER. THE. FREAKING. CRIB, and to stop pulling the baby under there with them.

He poked his head out….

Peek

And grinned at me…….

So Proud of Himself

He looked so proud of himself…it was so cute, and after he crawled out and towards me, I wished I’d had my camera on me, and the little bugger was so considerate and turned around and headed right back under the bed and so I ran to grab my camera and that’s how I was able to get all these pictures….just in case you were wondering if I’ve had my camera surgically attached to my arm or if I’m dorky enough to just carry the sucker around my neck 24/7….the answer is no. ‘Siah just went to play hide ‘n seek again, and I was ble to catch it second time around…helpful little bugger.

Lovin’ Us Some Country Music

We had a HUGE discussion with some friends of ours….one of whom believes that country music is absolutey wrong…..which of course sparked a HUGE backlash from those of us who believe that country music is as vital to living as breathing is.

In an effort to teach my children to grow up to be proper, well behaved members of society, we indoctrinate them with country music ALL. DAY. LONG……in fact my baby has the radio in his bedroom tuned to the local country music radio station – you know….like white noise…..only better.

We gotta raise these little rednecks properly, and to show you how good of a job we’re doing….

Here’s ‘Siah groovin’ to a little Rascal Flatts.

A Bit Better of A Day

That’s what y’all want to hear, isn’t it?

Well, it’s true…it was a bit better of a day, and for no particular reason either.

I played with ‘Siah quite a bit today….met for coffee with a friend of mine first thing and then basically just bummed around the rest of the day, and it’s not because I am SOOOO organized that I have nothing left to do, – no, it’s just because it’s really tough to get stuff done with a 20+ pound weight attached to your side.

So, I’m going with the flow.  Which I have to say is a bit strange for me…I’m not your typical easy going, take life as it comes type of person, but I must be becoming that person as I’m doing more and more of that kind of “stuff”.

I’m finding this whole having a baby more than 10 years after having my first, to be a TOTALLY different experience. I’m WAY more relaxed and I’m really “enjoying” things this time around.  It feels like I was in survival mode with the first 3, and there were all sorts of little things that I totally took for granted.  It was so easy to get busy and to try to make them fit into my life and I just let so much precious time slip by. 

There were the things that I rushed them through to do, like standing and walking and talking and drinking out of a cup..not that any of these things are bad, but I really pushed them on my kids ’cause it was so cute and it helped them to grow up and I was tired and so it was easier for me, and I  wanted them to hurry up and grow up so that they would move onto the “next stage”, the “easier stage”……so many moments rushed and wasted.  Moments that I can never get back.

I’m so thankful to be able to experience this whole baby thing this time around…I wouldn’t wish to go through the past 3 years ever again, but were it not for all of that…..I wouldn’t have had Josiah and he is so precious, and I’m so thankful to have him….even at 4am when he won’t settle down until after 5am….that is fun, and I AM SO THANKFUL for that…..;P

So, today was a much better day, and I just want to say thanks for letting me know that you were listening and that you care.

UGH!!!!!!

We had a poker night last night.  This is our 4th month that we’ve had a poker night….First Friday or Satrday of the month..two games…$5 per game…runner up gets their money back, and the winner gets the rest….It’s a BLAST!

So, everyone showed up arund 7ish and we hung out and finally got the first game going around 8pm….we wrapped up the 2nd game and chatted a bit more and just as everyone was getting ready to leave around midnight….SIAH WAKES UP.

….and starts to scream…..and scream…..and scream……and scream….

Long story short…he screamed for over an hour and then we finally gave up and I nursed him and he fell asleep. 

BUT….that meant that we didn’t get to sleep until after 1am…..and then the little stinker was awake and HAPPY!?!!?!??! at 6am….UNREAL!

Now, I must say that I think the green smoothies must be doing something, because I don’t ever remember crawing outta bed at 6:30am on a Saturday morning…or heck, ANY morning EVER at 6:30am and being fairly awake and fairly cheerful and not feeling like death has enveloped me and is trying to drag me back into the pit of hell.

But, the afternoon sleepies have hit, and I’d love nothing more than to just crawl back into my nice feather bed and go to sleep…..

I might need to go and make another “Shrek Shake” or “Swamp Shake” as J is now calling them.

We actually met up with my parents for breakfast this morning.  It’s been a while since we’ve seen them, and well, I don’t think that a “Ricky’s” breakfast really counts as “quality time”, but it’s better than nothing.   After breakfast, we had to do a bit of running around and we dragged Chris along with us (but not the same way that my mom dragged the lawnmower around with her back in the day – anyone remeber that story?)…..and it was good.  We hung out…..checked out some music videos and blathered on about unimportant stuff…all in all a good day.

Man, gotta go and get me a “pick me up”…..I’m fading here.

Peace Out!

And I’ve Finally Arrived……

Wow, that was the longest plane ride to Prince George EVER!  A whole week…..MAN!  I’m really looking forward to posting every day about all the fun times that we will have and I’ll be sure to just LOAD each and every post with TONS of pictures…….

Actually, I’m home!

Turns out, Girlfriend……doesn’t have Wireless access and so I connected a grand total of 3 times and pretty much only to check my e-mail.

We had SO MUCH FUN.  We talked and laughed and cried and talked some more and laughed some more and did laundry and cleaing and ate and herded kids and laughed more, and it was a most wonderful, wonderful week.

I still have to download and go through my camera and think about what else I can say about this past week……

But, for right now, the kids and Jon and I are having some family time as a WHOLE!  Nothings more important than that, and so I’ll talk to you maybe tomorrow if I’m able to wake up……

I’m a teeny, tiny bit tired.  ‘Siah was a complete and utter mess during the night…..nothing was wrong, but he was just extremely restless and wouldn’t actually fall “hard” asleep, and it all culminated in last nights most amazing…..wake up but not really awake-ness from 12:30am until 2:30am and then finally falling asleep but waking again at 4:30am, and being half awake until 5:30am, and then I got up at 6am to get packed and ready for the day……..so, I think I’ll be going to sleep when the kids do tonight, and Jon gets to deal with ‘Siah tonight. YAH!!!!!

What goes In, Must come Out

Alright, see that face….it’s cute, isn’t it?

Now imagine it choking on something that he scooped up off my floor.

Now imagine that he’s clenching his gums together because he really doens’t want me to remove whatever it is that he’s choking on….

How Cute is that?  (Rolls eyes)

We are officially in the “crawling around my floor and finding any stray piece of ANYTHING that escaped the twice or more daily vaccuming and sticking it in our mouth” stage. 

So far, we’ve had paper, paper, more paper, and the odd unidentified food particle….not good.

And do you have any idea how upset he gets when I “try to help him out” 

OH MY GOODNESS!  It’s insane.  Absolutely ridiculous.

Especially with 497,645,237, 892 pieces of Lego that Jeremy owns, this whle stage can be a bit worrisome, but so far the most creative or colorful or stupid thing that my kids have eaten (that I knew about) was when Jeremy ate 2 pieces of Lightbrite…..how did I know about this?

Well, I didn’t, but when I found the present that he left on the flip side of things…..lets just say that that was the most colorful diaper that he left for me…..even if it seemed like it hurt coming out.  How would you feel if a Lightbrite piece came out pointy end first?

Alright, enough about poo…I hope you are having a great April Fools Day….this was not an April Fools joke, just in case you’re wondering?

We’re still Springing along.

Ha Ha Ha Ha – Springing along…I’m such a “gork” (Kennedy word for Geek and Dork all mixed together) sometimes.  Forgive me….just blame it on sleep depravation….I’m gonna go on and on and on about the sleep depravation again so I know you’ll want to keep reading won’t you..

NOT!  Just joking!  Hey, did I lose some of you?  Did you think I was serious?  I guess I’ve complained about it so much and it’s kind of too fresh to be joked about, hey????….sorry about that.

Nope, not gonna talk about it at all.

Instead……don’t you wish you had a little boy that was a cute as this little guy is……..couldn’t you just “eat him up”? 

He is almost ALWAYS this happy.  It’s very rare that he’s not smiling and even rarer that he’s crying.  I just LOVE him so much.Topic Change…… 

I also dyed my hair using a natural hair dye.  It’s called Herbatint and it’s amazing.  It is more expensive than just buying a color from the store.  It was just under $30 for the box, but I was pleasantly amazed at how it didn’t smell like I was frying my hair or burning brain cells from the fumes.  We’ve been trying to rid our house of the Detergant SLS because it’s been linked to eczema and Josiah does typically have a flare up when he comes in contact with it…..and it’s in EVERYTHING, and it a known irritant……if that’s the case, then why put it in all the freakin’ baby soaps……it’s ridiculous.  Anyway, this dye doesn’t have SLS and it works so far.

Anyway – I went Black…it seems that if I go really dark, that by the time the dye lightens and wears off slightly that it’s pretty close to my natural color…..which is a nasty sorta mousy brown color……enough about that…..here’s me.  Excuse the frizzies…I’d do a re-take, but I just don’t care that much – you can see the color and realize that I don’t have perfect hair, and that I really dont’ care……get a little chuckle outta the “halo”….yah, that’s it…..it’s my halo…I’m an angel…ha ha ha!

In other news….my kids are playing SOOOOOO Nicely most of the time and here’s a shot to prove it…..I’m not gonna tell you how we staged this shot just so you’d think that we were such a nice family who calmly and quietly plays games together….’cause we didn’t and even if we did….I wouldn’t tell you about it….I’d just go on about my business and be all cool about it….now that I’ve blathered on and on – you have no idea whether I’m telling the truth or not, so just enjoy this pic of the 3 older darlings playing nicely together….as this is a rare treat.

Nothing like a sweet game of pick-up sticks.

Now, for some really amazing news…..you should see Josiah crawling…okay…it’s a bit weird, and none of my other kids did this…….He Army Crawls.  It’s darling, but strange…just get up on your hands and knees already, son!

Isn’t he just DARLING?  See, flat on his stomach…..weird.And here he is coming to get you….

Regardless of how strange his little crawl is…..HE IS FREAKIN’ FAST.And so now…….

This is the view coming up our stairs.  Yup.  We are now officially gated, and it makes life WAY easier ’cause I can just put him down and let him go….mind you with 3 older kids…there is a whole lotta yelling and screaming gently reminding to “please remember to shut the gate EVERY SINGLE FREAKIN’ time you come in or out” ’cause I’m nice like that. I’m also into the “vaccumming the carpets 40 times a day” stage because apparently my older children are SLOBS and the baby is “exploring” everying by putting every little piece of anything and everything into his mouth.  It’s so much fun.

Today is Day 3 of Spring Break but it’s also Wacky Wednesday.  Named because……beacause……well, because both words start with a W…..We decided that it’s hard for Jon to be working from home and for the kids to not understand how come he’s around but not available….sooooooo…….he’s working Mon and Tues and Thur and Fri from 7am to 5pm and we are tkaing Weds off.  It’s nice that we can do this.  One of the perks of working for your self at home, but it’s also a Loooooooog day when you’re working for 10 hours straight.  So far so good and we’re headed off to see a movie with the kids today. 

I think we’re going to see “Horton hears a Who”.  It should be fun, and then we’re going to have dinner with my parents. So, a nice day that’s not too crazy busy, but fun none the less…..  How’s your Spring Break coming along?  if you have one? 

‘Siah Makes The Rounds

I had to go into Langley last week and pick up some “stuff” from the Naturopath’s pharmacy.  I was a bit early and so I visited my dad at his office first….

Here is Josiah and Papa Mark, just hang out….

And here they are admiring each other”s baseball caps…..it must be in the genes or something like that…..
ps.  click on any of the pics to see the whole set

We LOOOOOOOVE hanging out with Papa.

After we visited Papa for a bit and even bought a few things at the Ladybug Organic Store, we headed over to see Nana Karen…she hadn’t gone into town to see Uncle Chris yet and so we had another little visit.Here is Nana looking so pretty.

Later that day, we got a picture with Geli….the kids ADORE Josiah and he absolutely LOVES them too…..He gets all excited and kicks his legs and waves his arms and screams at them when they get close.Doesn’t she look beautiful?

 
And then we got a picture with Great Grandma just before she headed off to Fiji…..How many kids get to know their GREAT grandparents….we are so blessed to have Grandma and Grandpa still around and going strong.

Purge

4 garbage bags and 1 box full of garbage and 6 boxes of clothes

That’s what I got rid of this weekend.

I’ve been really wanting to scale down and streamline our way of living.  We have TOO MUCH CRAP and we don’t use half of it and so…….It Must Go!

The kids rooms are the worst….they have so many toys and clothes and they never even end up wearing or playing with it and I think it’s because of the sheer volume of junk that they have to wade through in order to just try and find something.

I mean, come on…seriously, does Xandra really need 20 t-shirts and 10 pairs of pants.  ABSOLUTELY NOT!

And Jeremy has more sets of toys than he can possibly play with EVER!

So, about 3 weeks ago, Jon and I planned out that this past weekend was set aside and nothing short of a family death could blast us away from decluttering and throwing out pretty much everything that we could lay our hands on.

I hadn’t seen the floor of Xandra’s and Jeremy’s room in…in…..I don’t know how long, and so I had them load everything into their blankets and drag it out into the middle of the family room carpet.  Now I’ll admit that watching them bring their crap into my tidy area of the house stressed me out to no end, but I kept focused on the goal…..garbage and clutter OUT!  that made it only slightly more plausable to handle.

We threw out everything that was old or stained or had holes in it and everything that was either not an absolute wear-once-a week or a favorite.  That left us with about 3 pairs of pants and about 8 t-shirts…..maybe still too much in my mind, but then I have one pair of jeans and so I don’t know that I’m a good balance when it comes to that.

We sorted out toys and toy sets and the lego……OH MY GOSH….the lego was in everything.  I thought we only had one box of lego…..turns out that we have 2 boxes of lego – 2 full boxes of lego…who woulda thunk it? 

It took all day, mostly because the kids kept complaining and trying to take off…my threat was that if they stopped that whatever was left…..was GARBAGE and was GONE!  So, they kept at it and come bed time – their rooms were clean and tidy and pretty much empty and they LOVED it.  Jeremy even  woke up the next morning and made his bed and then came out to tell us about it. Sweet, eh?

So, now comes the hard part…..keeping it that way.  But I’m determined that I’m not finished yet.  I really want to get to the place where we have enough of what we need and not a huge amout of surpluss or excess..there really is no need, and with less stuff – comes less mess…..at least that’s what I’m telling myself right now.  It’s true, right?

We have a date for 2 weekends from now where we are going through the garage and we will be ruthless……nothing (or almost nothing) is sacred.  I have to say that I do feel really good and I so wanted to just take the boxes of clothes and deliver them to the thrift store today, but there are so many little girl clothes and I have to give my sister first crack at them, but honestly, a part of me wants to save her from the “excess”, but that’s not my decision to make, is it?  And maybe she has a deficit – who am I to make a call on her behalf, so for now they are sitting in my hallway and hopefully tomorrow they go to her.

This feels good, this purging…..and speaking of purging…

100_8753.JPG

I’ve kept it small so to not offend your delicate sensibilities…if they are in fact delicate,  ’cause after 4 kids – nothing is delicate over here.

Josiah, just short of 7 months, used the toilet for the first time…..Yah him.  We have officially started introducing solids into his diet and well, diaper changing is now officially nasty.  My mom encouraged Angelica to use the toilet from a very early age – I think she was around 5 months old when we first started hanging her over the toilet – and she was in little tiny underwear when she was 9-10 months old.   She was so cute when she’s run to the toilet at a year old…..I hated changing dirty diapers and changing cloth poopy diapers is even less fun.  I haven’t bought a sprayer for my toilet yet and I desperately need one.  Anyway,  it’s not a true toilet training of the child as much as it’s a parent training….being able to read your child’s cues, but heck – anything that makes me have to change less poopy diapers….I’m all for it.  And so it starts…….

Hey, don’t say I ever held anything back from you – I’m all about sharing….maybe too much so, but hey…..what can I say?