I am a hippy

So...I was going to post this on facebook, but I decided my blog was a better place for it.

So I am kind of a hippy! Why? Let me tell you:

1. I plan to homeschool my kids. Yup, I plan to do that and if ANYONE tells me that my kids will not be educated as well as a public school child, then they are ignorant and stupid themselves. (There may be some heat behind my comment but I am so IRRITATED by someone who recently attacked me for no good reason because I'm choosing to homeschool.

2. Now that I have experienced midwives and homebirths, all of my children (whether that be 1 or 2 more) will be birthed at home (should things allow for it of course)

3. I am into natural healing and bowen and blood reading. Yup, I like holistic health. I am almost a holistic nutritionist (hopefully diploma in hand by end of February!). For the record, I am EDUCATED in the field, so do not try and act as though you are smarter than me and know more about me. I am in it for learning, and if you are able to teach me something, great! If you are just trying to be smarter than me because you think you are 'above me' then bugger off :) (again, there's some heat there, a completely unrelated situation - it's just been a luck week for me haha)

4. I am a vegetarian. I love everything about it! I love the challenge it gives me trying to 'master' it. I am learning SO much with this experiment and I wouldn't change that for anything. Recently we have started going more whole foods in our home. I rarely buy in the middle section of the grocery store. I don't buy my kids fruit snacks. The most processed food they get are yogurt tubes (cuz I freeze them and they're frozen yogurts lol). I don't even buy canned beans anymore, I soak them. Things like that and I feel great! I am overweight still, but that's just part of my challenge I am working through.

5. I am anti-technology. We don't play video games or watch more than 90 minutes of TV a day and we don't own a tablet or ipad, etc. And when we do - it will be strictly for work/school. I will eventually let my kids experience those things because it's part of the world (i'm not stupid), but children do not need to know how to operate some of these things before their 5th birthdays. It's the 'hippy' in me. I don't stop my kids from sitting on grandpa's lap and playing a game with him, minimal exposure isn't what i'm talking about here. I see and have seen too many people consumed with technology, my kids (and me and michael) will know how to play and use our imaginations.

I say all of this because it's what I believe. I am not saying it's the perfect way or the right way, but it it what works in our family and what we will do. Do what you believe is best. I will do my best not to judge you, if you promise to do me the same courtesy.

Halloween 2013

This Halloween I had Carter a Fred Flintstone costume made and I made (with my neighbor) a Wilma costume for me...and Carter wouldn't even put it in AT ALL! I was so sad (and not confident enough in myself to wear my costume just on my own)...there's always next year right? ;_;

Anyways, the -only- thing Carter would wear was a fireman costume that we had (in fact Logan has worn it the last 2 years for Halloween). Carter hates dressing up. The firefighter was okay becuase it's frankly just a jacket, and for some reason he likes the hat. lol. Logan was a ninja turtle. (we are going through a bit of an obsessive Ninja Turtle phase).

Bonus, after halloween I scored on some serious clearance costumes! I bought SEVEN costumes for 5 bucks a piece (all superheros). My Logan just looooves dressing up, so he's often running around as some hero of some sort. :)

I refused to pay 60 bucks for a turtle costume, so we made the mask and belt, and bought the shell for 20 :)...accidently caught this picture!

 

and here's my fireman :)

(LEFT: CARTER, RIGHT: LOGAN AGE 2 1/2)

Vegetarian

I have been a vegetarian for three weeks now. It has been surprisingly easy! I have not missed meat in the slightest. The hardest part has mostly just been eating at other people's houses - eating at home and eating out at restaurants is easy :) ...it just requires a bit of preplanning is all (which being mostly gluten free, it's already a habit of mine to preplan when going places)

Anyways, why vegetarian? A few reasons:

1. My course has changed me. I have read so many books and philosophies, and proven studies that plant based diets are your most healthiest option possible. (Read "Healthy at 100"). I wanted to see if I felt any different after going plant based.
2. Doing this nutritionist course, I wanted to try vegetarianism so that when people who are vegetarian or want to be vegetarian come to me, I can direct them accordinly - because I have tried it myself.
3. I heard some theories that there's a ying and yang to everything, and meat and sugars are (in many books) a ying and yang to each other. So if you take out meat, technically your sugar cravings should diminish. I wanted to try this. So far this has proven to be incorrect for me. (however, halloween is a terrible time to try the theory lol). I noticed a distinct decrease in cravings the first week, but then my usual cravings came back the 2nd and 3rd week (and last week was halloween). Will see! Still making notes. :)

So teh course (Holistic Nutritionist) is coming close to an end for me. I have finished all the bookwork, and I am currently working on my case studies. I am almost done 4 (of 11), goal is to be done by Christmas. The case studies take longer because I can't do them when my kids are around - I need to be able to sit down and -focus- on them uninteruppted.

I am LOVING this course tho! I look so forward to the years of actually learning and remembering the course material i've gone over. As I said before, it has changed me. I look at labels and I am disgusted. I read a whole line of bread's labels and the THIRD ingredient was benzyl peroxide (might be spelling that right). that was the bread's shelf preservative. Isn't that gross? You bread eaters are potentially consuming peroxide! (not all bread uses that particular preservative), it was just one of those 'ah ha' moments about labels.

The things that have changed already:
1. I'm reading labels more
2. I buy very little canned goods - only tomato sauce/stewed tomatoes - no more soups, no more canned beans - I soak my own beans, I make everything from scratch.
3. I don't buy prepackaged kids snacks. The only bagged things I buy is nacho chips and rice cakes and nuts (pistachios, etc)
4. Going vegetarian and whole, clean foods, my grocery bill has cut IN HALF. Literally. I used to spend 150-200 per week on food. Now I spend 50-100 per week.
5. I do not buy organic vegetables/fruits (except for carrots - I think they truly do taste better organic), but I DO buy organic meat. (did you know that ham has wheat in it? I started to buy michael gf ham - who knew!) Meat is surprisingly filled with stuff.
6. I have started phasing out plastic tupperware and we are going more glass.

I think that's all :) It's been a fabulous journey! I don't feel -different- going off meat yet, but that just makes me that much more confident that it's not a necessity to life. (And I do NOT do tofu, for the record).

Oh, and I do still cook meat for my family, but they are also getting more vegetarian meals as well. Logan is already a self proclaimed vegetarian and has been for a year or two (he eats meatballs and -sometimes- a hamburger)...and not by request, only if I serve it to him.

My goal was to go 1 month. I think I will continue it longer though :)

Baby #3

This is not an announcement. :) This is more of a "here's what's happening". I figured I'd be pregnant by now to be honest, but this time around isn't happening -as quickly- as every other pregnancy I've experienced. Whether a viable pregnancy or a miscarriage, I have -always- been pregnant in 1-2 months upon trying (6 times). This is coming on month 5 of trying and my last period I actually felt sad when it came.

So I've decided to focus more on the 10lbs I gained this summer (ridding of it), and starting tomorrow we will be renewing our Spray Lakes membership so I can start boxing/zumba/belly dancing/etc and maybe get into some better shape :)

I'm not freaking out about not being pregnant (just to clarify), but just so you know it's not something thats happened yet for us.

Big boy bed part 2

As you may (or may not have read), Carter was tranferred faily successfully to his toddler bed. That lasted 3 nights LOL. The next 3-5 nights were a huge struggle. We ended up having to put him to sleep on our bed and then transfer him. This was -not- something I wanted to continue...I didn't want another boy in our bed! He just didn't want to be in his room for whatever the reason.

So what do we do??

I decided that we should just put him into the bottom bunk (a double bed) in Logan's room. This was to be the plan eventually because we only have three rooms upstairs, and Carters room is also the 'baby room' - where baby #3 will eventually go when he/she joins our family.

It has been a HUUUGE success in more ways then one! He is going to sleep easily, without upset, and so is Logan. AND - they're BOTH sleeping all night long in their room! Logan hasn't crawled into bed with us for 4 nights now - that is truly a first for him! I almost miss him...well, I miss him -needing- us to sleep with him. That may sound weird, but he has been in our bed with us, or one of us with him in his bed his ENTIRE life (and he's almost 4 1/2) so I think it's a normal feeling right?  Not enough to ask him to come back of course lol.

Anyways, we are beyond estatic for the progress they've both made. And look forward to getting some sleep filled nights the next little while! :)

Carter in a toddler bed

Three weeks (well 4 now I suppose) Carter started acting scared of his crib. He's always been an amazing sleeper, so when this started to happen I was a bit concerned. About a week after, one night he woke up TERRIFIED. Like I went in and he was so scared he gripped me so tightly I wasn't sure what to think. After process of elination: "was it a doggie" no. "was it a kitty cat" no. "was it a ghost" no. "was it a bug" yes! ...at least that's what he told me. So I pulled his bed apart (secretly hoping I would NOT find anything) and I didn't. I had no choice but to put him back to bed. He cried and cried but his room was safe and I didn't know what to do! Anyways..15 mins later he was asleep.

Fast forward 2 weeks: Similar episode. Except I rocked him back to sleep (which I haven't done with him since he was like 6 months old). Next morning: GOLF BALL sized spider bite on his wrist! Oh my gosh!! At first glance I thought his wrist was broken! After a day of bendryl (benelyn?) whichever one, it went down in size to a "normal sized" bad spider bite. I have to tell you I felt like the worlds worst mommy but who could have known!

Needless to say he wouldn't even consider going back in his crib (and needless to say I sprayed the crap out of his bedroom LOL). So...now what right? Carter can't sleep with me, because Logan is already in my bed the last half of every night! Not enough room lol.

Then I got to thinking: 10 days prior I had purchased an amazing bedroom set for 'the baby room'...lol (I call it that because whenever #3 joins our family, that room is always to be the baby room)...it was a beautiful warddrobe with shelving up the one side and a gorgeous change table with shelving and drawers (more like a dresser). It also came with a toddler bed/crib, which I had in the garage waiting to hopefully sell. <Side story: It technically matches the bedroom set, but the crib we bought is OUR crib. Sentimental value sort of a deal lol, so I was planning to sell the matching one and keeping ours>. Anyways, I thought "gee, why don't we throw the toddler bed up here and see if he'll consider sleeping in that" what other choice did I have right?

We hauled it up and tucked it in the bedroom. First night I had to sit in the rocking chair while he fell asleep, but he has slept and napped every night/day in it since! (5 days now). I am in shock! I still have the crib set up for 'leverage' LOL "Carter...do you need to sleep in the crib??" if he's being naughty :D It's worked amazingly.

I have said before that I have been terrified about how to switch Carter from crib to bed because i've never done it before. Logan was/is a co-sleeper, so this was a first for me!

Kind of fun to have a "first" with my second :) (tho, who am I kidding, Carter is all sorts of firsts with the personality he has!)

bootcamp and whatnot

So this week I started bootcamp and I love her style and how hard she pushes, but she pushed -too- hard for a first time! It's been 4 days and I can almost walk down the stairs and up with no pain. It's a M/F bootcamp and I can take my kids, which is why I chose to sign up :) I'm excited to maybe get into some shape again. Still struggling (from past posts) so wish me luck!

Other news: not a whole lot. Been babysitting alot, and been trying to brainstorm some ways to increase my cliental regarding Bowen.

School: I have been getting marks in the 90s on all my exams (3 submitted/returned), and I just submitted my first case study which we had to do on ourselves. This case study isn't for marks, essentially I think it's something for them to brutalize for us so we know what we're doing on future ones (for marks). I look forward to the positve AND negative feedback. It was a hard one to write (yet I really enjoyed it at the same time), because we only have the first 1/4 of our class material/information, so it wasn't very well rounded per say. I'm at a bit of a standstill...we are only operating with one credit card right now and it somehow went MIA so we had to order a new one so my next round of books are on hold until we get the card number (the mia card expired since we used it last lol what are the odds)...anyways, I need to get the material ordered really soon because the school is closed for the summer.

Otherwise, not a whole lot to report. Been gardening/yard working a lot. Enjoying it too (never thought i'd see the day). I planted peas, potatoes, onion, carrots, green beans....and something else, but I can't remember what it is LOL but it's coming up!