gratitude

Today, I find myself feeling very grateful for the mothers in my life. Especially the ones who raise their children next to mine - those who share with me their reasoning and commiseration and delight. The mamas who surround me in solidarity and support, who challenge me to learn more, strive harder and be better. I will never know the extent to which the sisterhood of mothering has influenced my ability to nurture Thumbelina as she grows up and into the world. But, I am thankful for having found the path I’ve chosen, and know I would not be here without the mamas who were willing to share with me their wisdom - and who continue to inspire by example. Sometimes, the strength to carry on is found in the mere knowledge that countless women across time and space have shared in my struggles and joy. I am thankful.

I came across this quote in a book I’m reading about unconditional parenting:

“Nothing you become will disappoint me; I have no preconception that I’d like to see you be or do. I have no desire to forsee you; only to discover you. You cannot disappoint me.”

It’s taken from a love letter between Mary Haskell and the poet, Khalil Gibran. I hope that one day, when Thumbelina reflects upon her childhood, she feels as embraced and cherished for her authenticity as this quote emboldens. And hopefully - thankfully - the mothers I am blessed to know will encourage me in loving without limitation the gift I’ve been given in my dearest Thumbelina.

(Thanks for making me a mama, little one.)

prepare to be blinded by cuteness!

A very thoughtful friend created a gorgeous canvas of Thumbelina, using the picture I posted recently with her smoothie adventures. We were supposed to get together today so I could see it, but my poor lovebucket is having a hard time getting well again. So, Shawn posted her masterpiece on her own blog and I literally can’t stop gazing at it! It is beyond beautiful!!! Take a look!!! She is a scrappin’ goddess.

veggie tales

I’ve had several people ask me how the vegan thing is going, so I thought I’d update. The most common question I keep getting is, “But what are you actually eating?” Ha.

It’s hard, people, it’s hard! But not as hard as I thought it would be. It’s been a much smoother transition than I anticipated. We aren’t being very creative with dinner ideas right now, but I don’t tend to get very bored with the same meals anyway, so it might be awhile until we branch out further. (Although Dani is about to mail me some of her favorite vegan recipes, so we shall see… I think Topher would like me to kick things up a bit.)

Costco is rocking my world. I’m able to buy veggie patties that are made out of actual vegetables (instead of only soy), dried tart cherries and goji berries without any sulpher additives, huge amounts of organic spinach, carrots, cucumbers, tomatoes, avocadoes, peppers, apples, bananas, wild blueberries, strawberries, kiwi… are you tired of reading my grocery list yet? But it’s nice to buy bulk instead of running to the grocery store 2-3 times a week and stocking up on produce, hoping the price is reasonable. They also have organic nut butters, organic fruit spreads, organic alternative milks, hummus, etc. I’ve been surprised at how easy it is to find things we can actually eat and enjoy.

I make smoothies at least once a day, and tend to put kale and carrots or cucumbers into whatever frozen fruit we have on hand. (Whole Foods has frozen acai on sale this week, blender-ready, both sweetened and unsweetened - healthy!) We usually eat whole-grain oatmeal for breakfast, with applesauce or cut-up fruit and raisins. Lunch is nut butter and jam, or hummus and veggies on a pita, usually with a smoothie. Dinners have been bean and lentil soups, spinach salads, veggie patties, homemade cheese-less pizza with tomato sauce and veggie toppings, bean and veggie burritos… very exciting, yes, I know. Eating out has lost any appeal (outside of not having to make it myself), mostly because menu choices are so limited. Which is probably a healthy thing!

We snack on items like sunflower seeds, dried fruit and baked goods that we’ve homemade, like vegan banana bread or blueberry muffins. Oh, and shhh… chips & salsa, too. (Dr. Fuhrman isn’t a fan of additional salt in the diet, although we get unsalted tortilla chips from WF.) Thumbelina still recognizes the milk in the fridge (which belongs solely to Daddy) and asks me about it every once in awhile. I just tell her we don’t use milk on our cereal anymore, and she accepts that. She hasn’t asked for cereal or yogurt in awhile. Although cheese is still a hopeful request.

I spoke with the naturopath and he clarified that his test will screen 96 different food allergies, so I think we’ll go ahead and move forward with it. Her sensitivities are still a mystery to me and I notice that they continue to flare - so I’m wondering if wheat is a culprit. I hope not! However, I’ve read that it takes up to three weeks to see if eliminating dairy is truly significant, and we’ve only been attempting for a couple weeks. She has not had any dairy whatsoever, except that she ate a Luna bar with me - which I’d read on a dairy-free site was supposed to be dairy-free, but later realized this to not be true. Getting rid of cross-contamination is now our biggest challenge, because everything seems to be put through facilities that also handle dairy. So, I’m a little frustrated we now need to wait another three weeks to see if this is really making an impact or not, due to our Luna bar snack on the go. However, I really think that even if her allergen test shows that she isn’t allergic to dairy, we’ll probably stay off of it for the time being. I feel better not consuming it, even being sick! And I think she does, too.

So, in case anyone is wondering - no, we’re not starving as vegans (yet, anyway). I feel blessed that we’ve reached a comfortable framework for our nutritional desires and that we have the means in which to buy the food we selectively choose. It’s an easy gift to take for granted. I think back to my childhood of steak & potatoes and mac & cheese, realizing that my parents believed every meal should be hardy - and hope that Thumbelina will know that we did our best in trying to feed her as wholesomely as possible. She may roll her eyes at some of our granola habits, but hopefully she’ll recognize the love behind our veggie meals!

colorful concoctions

The other night, I made Thumbelina and myself a blended smoothie in hopes of kicking this cold that we (STILL!) have at the moment. I needed to carry another load of laundry down to the basement, so after reminding her I would be right back (she repeated “riiiiiiiiiiiight back!” to me), I zipped downstairs.

Only to return and see this guilty face waiting for me:

Yes, those are blueberries around her sweet little rosebud mouth. Here is her…creation:

Hmm.

I’m in the midst of reading Raising Our Children, Raising Ourselves by Naomi Aldort. I took a deep breath and first… tried not to laugh. (Lately I find myself giggling helplessly at most of her antics, and she now thinks everything is a joke - like it’s really funny to scale the outer stair railing and precariously circle the living room while balancing her tippy-toes on two inches of trim, five feet from the ground.) I squashed my desire to inquire “why” she felt inclined to put the crayons in her freshly-made drink. Instead, I just commented.

“You put crayons in your smoothie!”

Her eyes lit up and she clapped. I finally just laughed.

destruction

The streets around us.

an unwelcome overnight guest

Gosh, what a crazy week. We saw many of our favorite little friends, which (understandably) means we now have a germy, coughy-cold underway. However, a small illness quickly became the least of our concerns…

A tornado warning was in effect for most of yesterday evening, but didn’t turn into a watch for quite some time. The sirens began going off while I was doing the grocery shopping. A store manager came onto the PA system and advised everyone to make their way to the back of the store and take cover in the coolers (haha). Yeah, no thanks. I paid for my items and then ran out in the torrential rain, looking every which way (as if I could spot a funnel cloud in the distance and avoid it successfully). The sirens continued during my drive home and eventually stopped once I got inside and turned on the news. It seemed that the bulk of concern was significantly south of us, so I didn’t worry too much about the rest of our night. We ate a peaceful dinner together.

I went to bed fairly late, around 1am, and climbed under the covers to cuddle Thumbelina. About an hour later, I awoke to both of us being tossed into the air and landing haphazardly on the bed. The entire house shook desperately, and I cried out for Topher - who was standing beside the window, trying to watch the storm and see if a tornado was in fact heading our way. I remember running downstairs to the basement, with Thumbelina in my arms, and feeling like the storm was furiously chasing us.  I set Thumbelina down on the floor and then dashed back upstairs with Topher to grab important items. (Medicine, wallets, keys, cell phones and a file box of important documents.) We could hear parts of our roof audibly ripping - I worried the top of our home would snap off and spin away into the night.

So, we prayed. Topher rummaged around and found a lantern of sorts to help us see. We used our cell phones as flashlights to find our way in the dark, since we felt totally unprepared for the situation and the power was out. Oddly, Thumbelina slept through the entire drama and only seemed upset that we couldn’t nurse to her little heart’s content (until I settled us into a corner of the basement). Brr. It was cold! And really confusing, because we couldn’t decide what might happen next and if we should stay awake or not. We eventually tried to sleep when the sounds died down, but the stillness was also eerily frightening. I didn’t want to tell Topher that sometimes funnel clouds come in groups - he grew up in Philly and doesn’t know these things! I did not enjoy wondering what was happening outside without any interpretation from a weatherman or two.

We woke up to roof damage and swingsets piled in our backyard. Our next door neighbor’s chimney is dangling, and several people on our street have their air conditioning units twisted upside down. We feel very blessed that the damage was so minimal in comparison to what could have happened, because merely three blocks over is where the worst damage occurred - homes are literally leveled. Piles of wood.

Topher’s friend came over to help him check out the roof damage, since our insurance company is swamped and not very helpful (as of yet) in offering guidance about what we should do. However, I was under the impression that Topher’s friend - the former professional roofer - would be climbing up on top of the house, NOT Topher. So I flipped out slightly upon realizing that my dear husband planned on climbing a ladder and walking around our potentially unstable roof in the midst of gusty winds. Thankfully, he is fine. I was not happy about his decision to go up there, roof damage or not.

Tomorrow I am putting together an emergency kit. I don’t want to ever feel panicked again about realizing the few simple items we need to be comfortable and safe are scattered around the house. Not fun!

discovering dandelions

Sometimes, when life seems too complicated - a little time spent with Thumbelina unravels the simplicity.

Dandelions need to be discovered.

And after we’ve picked fistfuls of weeds and marveled at their beauty, the best thing to do is run. Just because we can.

I should follow her lead more often.

ch-ch-ch-changes

Gosh, when I get out of a habit I really… get out of a habit. Like, updating this blog.

Speaking of habits, we are in the midst of a major change around here. Thumbelina and I saw a naturopath last week. It appears that Thumbelina has some major food sensitivities, and he suspects I do as well - so, we’re cutting out meat and dairy (”for the time being,” I keep adding - mostly to just make myself feel better) and going vegan. Eventually we’ll have a blood test done to see exactly what we need to avoid, but the dairy itself I think is a huge component. And… not so fun to give up.

We joined Costco in our quest for bulk (mostly organic) produce, and walking past the gigantic chocolate layer cakes was slightly akin to torture - but, I persevered and we came home with a healthy trunk of fiber. Woo. So far, it’s going well but it’s definitely not easy. We cleaned out our entire pantry and freezer, giving away anything that had dairy within it, since I was worried I might give in if Thumbelina saw something she wanted but couldn’t have. Topher is probably struggling the most, since he’s halfheartedly trying to support my vegan efforts, but… he misses milk and cheese.

Beans are a new world to me. We’ve dumped canned beans on salads in the past, and included them in Mexican food, but… I’ve never actually soaked beans. And now I’m attempting to sprout some and use them generously in our meal times (to varying degrees of success). I realize it’s a process, but I wish we were already comfortable and happy to be eating this way. However, it’s really opened the door to lots of reflection about how food is so easy to misuse - it becomes far too important, much too easily (for me, at least). Food is merely fuel and it only makes sense that we should eat the most nutrient-dense food available to us. (Yes, I’m paraphrasing the Eat to Live book.) I think it will feel more comfortable once the dairy withdrawals have passed. Thumbelina asked for cheese and yogurt and milk and toast (with butter) all.day.long. Poor thing. But I’m already noticing an improvement with her skin sensitivities, so that is helping inspire me to keep going.

In the midst of drinking oat milk and eating trees (as Thumbelina calls her fresh spinach), we’ve gotten out and about quite a bit lately, since Spring has seemingly arrived for good. It’s been alternately sunny and cloudy, with lots of rain on the forecast.

Here’s a snap from yesterday, at the park, on a very windy day:

As for Thumbelina, her cuteness continues to grow exponentially by the day. Normally, Topher is responsible for bedtime after I nurse and hand her off - so I’m not usually around for her bedtime prayers. But, this evening was a little different and I got to hear their typical conversation with God. Topher explained later that they thank God for things that are important to her - and on the list are things like milkshakes and her jungle gym. Barney, Baby Bop, BJ and Riff. Music. Crayons (cullies). Outside. The park. Tickles. Apples. MeeMee & Daddy. He prays in simple phrases, followed by an amen, so it’s very easy for her to participate. She loves it! And she melts me.

So, it took a couple of years, but…

She finally called me Mommy!!!!!

Topher started referring to me as Mommy instead of Mama, because Thumbelina says “maff” for “off,” and “mah” for “mouth,” so we were beginning to wonder if Mama just didn’t make sense to her. But hearing me referred to as Mommy seemed to do the trick right away. It comes out as “MeeMee.” So cute. And she still announces when she’s happy, so I’m glad she hasn’t lost her use of that word. It’s the best thing ever to have her grab my hand and say, “Happy, MeeMee!” And I say, “Are you happy?” And she says, “Fee (what she calls herself) happy!”

This weekend we spent de-cluttering and rearranging. We moved the train table out of the rec room, so now we have more space for Thumbelina’s pretend play stuff and also my treadmill and trampoline. The train table (which we got crazy cheap from Charlene, a parenting group friend, for only $20) is not something I can bear to part with for the time being, but it wasn’t being used in any purposeful way so now it’s going to stay in the garage for a little while. The rec room seems so much bigger without the table taking up so much space. We finished moving Topher’s desk and computer into the living room (since we’re sans furniture, and at this point have a jungle gym hanging out in the middle of it) and turned the third bedroom (formerly the office) into a craft & learning room for Thumbelina. I’m so happy with it! We’ve been dragging this $20 bookshelf from IKEA around the country with us during every move, keeping it in storage and for some reason haven’t ever given it away in all the years we’ve not been using it. But now it’s a great way to keep her activity bins neatly stacked. Lately I’ve been struggling with the poor accessibility to all of the fun stuff we have for Thumbelina to play with, and realizing that some of her things aren’t getting any attention. It seems like such a waste to have toys and activities just sitting around, ignored or lost. She is always moving toys or items from one room to the next, because we haven’t given her a proper sense of where certain things belong. Soooo, now we’ve decided that her kitchen and pretend play items are in the rec room, along with miscellaneous toys. Her bedroom has a bookshelf and baby dolls. The learning room has puzzles, alphabet and numbers activities, art supplies, felt board, small manipulatives for counting & sorting, color & shape activities, matching games, books that are intentionally educational, language activities, instruments and her Calendar & Weather interactive posters. It sounds like a lot, but it really isn’t. (I think I listed all of that out for my own peace of mind.) I can’t stand feeling scattered, and I’ve felt so guilty lately for knowing we have all of these fun things to do together, but half the time I don’t know where anything is - so, hopefully this set up will be great for us. I also bought a clothesline and strung it along the ceiling so we have a specific place to hang up her art projects, most of which have been ending up in the trash lately because she’s always on a creative binge. She fills pages and pages full of scribbles or the most detailed “designs” (when she isn’t asking one of us to draw Barney). I need to start saving a few of the masterpieces and putting them into a scrapbook for safekeeping.

We have more organizing to do tomorrow, but I feel like we’re off to a good start.

Thumbelina has continued her quest for a milkshake, and we’ve spent a lot of time pretending to make one. My smoothies are still a hit, but she doesn’t consider them a shake anymore. She gives me an annoyed look whenever I say, “Let’s go make a shake!” and start getting out frozen fruit. She seems increasingly irritated that we don’t seem to understand what she’s talking about - and I know, you’re probably thinking I’m the meanest mom ever to not go out and buy the poor little sugar addict a real milkshake. The other night, I came home from dinner out with a few mama friends, only to find Thumbelina standing at the top of our stairs and exclaiming, “Shake! Shake! Shake!” over and over again. I asked Topher if he bought her a milkshake while I was gone, and he said “Um…no. Not exactly.” Hmm. Okay. But Thumbelina persisted in talking to me about milkshakes, excitedly mentioning Daddy’s name and pointing to the refrigerator. I eventually opened the door and found a frozen-looking concoction on the top shelf. Topher came in and tried to nonchalantly say, “Oh, yes, we made milkshakes while you were gone. Those are the leftovers.”

Now, the thing about Topher is that he’s only learned how to boil water in the last year. He can therefore make pasta, but he never leaves the stove while it’s cooking, because… well, I’m not sure why. He can brown taco meat and scramble an egg. (We’ve spent nearly five years of marriage practicing these few tricks.) However, none of these facts ran through my mind when he apprehensively mentioned the homemade milkshake in the fridge. I just thought, “I’m glad I bought that ice cream last week. Poor Thumbelina has really been wanting a milkshake.” But, I noticed a horrible grimace when I let her grab the milkshake from me and she took a sip. And then she kind of gagged and half-heartedly said, “Shake.” Hmm. So, I tried it. And nearly threw up!

Topher, watching all of this, completely ignored my reaction and was like, “She LOVED it. We put a few scoops of ice cream, some milk and some syrup together in the blender.”

“Syrup?”

“Yeah, I found a bottle of Aunt Jemima’s syrup in the back of the pantry.”

Gag.

“How come it tastes so salty?”

“Oh, well that’s because I put sea salt in it.”

After talking to him a little bit, I realized the addition of salt came about because he’s watched me make cakes and sweet breads and cookies and they all have salt in it. And those are all really sweet, yummy things. So therefore the salt must somehow interact with the sugar, right? And make it taste good, right…?

happy birthday, again!

So, we went to an indoor inflatable play place yesterday, assuming Thumbelina would love it because jumping is her favorite thing to do as of late. She was quite happy when we arrived, sitting on daddy’s lap in the parking lot to ‘drive.’

But, as soon as we got inside and Topher jumped into the inflatables, she wasn’t quite so enthused.

Yes, those are Topher’s feet. Do you like the “No Diving: Enter Feet First” sign?

After we finally got Topher to, ahem, come back out - we spent most of our time in the small toddler area, which seemed more comfortable for Thumbelina (much to Topher’s disappointment).

Since the play place wasn’t much of a hit, we decided to head out to the toy store and FINALLY pick out her birthday presents. Yay! We got her an indoor/outdoor jungle gym of sorts. She can climb and slide and do all of her monkeying on it, hopefully. We also picked up a wooden letter puzzle, since she’s been interested in the alphabet lately. Not surprisingly, Thumbelina managed to find a Barney and Riff that were on clearance. They aren’t the small, blissfully silent types that she’s been carrying around for months, either. Nope, they sing songs and Riff even has two obnoxious maracas that he shakes around. She also found a Barney coloring book and Mama took pity on her and bought another Barney dvd. Oh joy!

Admittedly, the jungle gym isn’t put together yet, but she’s quite taken with Riff and Bah-ney.

I would post pictures of her Barney cake, but it’s so sad and pathetic that even I, with my no-shame policy regarding craft attempts, can’t bring myself to post pictures. It took me TWO HOURS and Topher continually came in to gently suggest that I just give it up. Maybe because I kept having to scrape the frosting off the cake and re-frost it to have a clean slate. (Thumbelina fell asleep while waiting for her cake, which at first made me feel sorry that I was taking so long and being so frustrated with something so silly - but then I realized she was spared learning a few colorful words I’d prefer she not hear yet. Yay.) And then when I finally managed to trace a great outline of Barney onto the cake, the purple frosting came out as red and his eyes looked deranged. Isn’t that sad? The only triumph during the entire cake debacle was that she at least recognized him as Barney - though with a distinct question in her voice, kind of like when a parent asks their child to “tell me about that drawing, son!” because they don’t want to mistakenly hurt the kid’s feelings. Topher was like, “At least she didn’t think you made her an alien cake, right?” Yes babe, that makes me feel a million times better. Nevermind that Thumbelina thinks she sees Barney on any cereal box.

We did make an emergency run to the grocery store and procured a few pink princess cupcakes. Thumbelina enjoyed the frosting the most, I think.

My one culinary success this birthday happened to be using my trusty blender and re-introducing smoothies. We haven’t had any in awhile, which is a good thing because Thumbelina discovered milkshakes last weekend during the wedding - and has asked for a “shake” every day since. (Poor Topher ran out of ways to amuse her during his many hours of solo parenting between activities.) Fortunately, she was satisfied that a cherry-peach-mango smoothie is a sufficient “shake.”

If there is any mercy in this world, Thumbelina will have a new interest by her next birthday and Barney will be a friend of the past. Then maybe we can actually order a cake, since not one single local bakery still does Barney cakes anymore. (And I can spare my little one the torture of my cake-decorating disability.)