our turkey day

was fabulous! I hope to post pictures another time.

We spent the day with my inlaws. However MIL and FIL could not make it, it was at Chris's big sisters house. I have some great photo's of the 3 siblings getting dinner on the table, that I cant wait to share!

AND! Dinner was served 3 minutes early!!!!!! Nothing was forgotten, nothing was messed up, it was all perfect. Lots of smiles, just a few tears from the youngin's. Well, there was one disaster, Chris shot hot turkey drippings from the baster all over the counter. He claims the baster was broken.

Everyone should Breastfeed

I heard a report on NPR this morning that trace amounts of melamine has been found in US formula. The FDA is saying that levels are extremely low, and it doesnt cause any concern.

I like to be open minded, I aim to be open minded. But lately I find that I judge people who say No to breastfeeding. I am not talking about years ago. I am talking about today, with what we hear about plastics, and formula, and dishsoap. The information is readily available to us to research and learn why breastmilk is the obvious choice.

It would be so great to change everyone's viewpoint on breastfeeding. Let's have that be the norm, and the use of formula should be rare. It is such the perfect food for infants, and there is no worry about the plastics or the dishsoaps used either. Nursing in public needs to be better accepted too. Come on! We have the most perfect food available to us right now for free, we shouldnt be embarassed about needing to nurse in public.

Seems like I am becoming kind of crunchy lately. I'm loving the cloth diapers, and last night I picked up some new laundry detergent that is much easier on our world (7th generation is the brand). When I think about some of this stuff, the answer seems to be so obvious that it leaves me wondering why I never did it that way before. BTW, I am looking for a new deoderant, anyone with a suggestion? I have been getting rashes from my Secret antiperspirant and want to go with something more natural.

7 UP!

7 up!
7 things I can do...
1. Bake and cook
2. Take a very very fast shower when I have to
3. Obsess about things
4. Sew
5. Clean like a mad woman
6. Grow plants
7. Budget and save $

7 things I can't do...
1. Fix other peoples hair
2. Function with a headache, even a small one
3. Walk by a plant without identifing it
4. Deal with the sight of blood
5. Watch me or someone get a shot
6. Fold underwear (more so WONT do)
7. Have any noise while I sleep

7 things I always say...
1. "Has anybody seen my baby brayden", followed up with a Peek a Boo.
2. Roaring, to hear my brady roar back.
3. "Not for Brady's!", as I head off brady sprinting to the dog food bowls.
4. "Not for Oli's!" as I take a stuffed animal from the dogs mouth.
5. "Don't move! I need a picture of this!"
6. "I'm gonna blog about this!" followed by an evil snicker.
7. Silly songs. I LOVE making up silly songs about everything under the sun and singing them to Brady, Chris, and the dog. Actually... even my co-workers. hahaha

7 things I always eat...
1. Peanut butter (REAL brand of course!) and jam (my homemade of course) sandwiches for my on the go breakfast, always on 12 grain wheat.
2. Coffee. must have coffee
3. Lasagna, chris and I constantly competing for the best pan of lasanga. Mine has 9 noodles, and his is "noodlier" with 12 noodles.
4. Kashi stuff. Love the granola, or Go lean ceral. Ceral bars. They have a mean cookie, Dark chocolate oatmeal. One is a great snack!
5. Trail mix. I love to make my own, because the ones you buy dont have nearly enough chocolate. I can use salt free nuts too in mine, and dried cranberries, and choco covered raisins. My trail mix ROCKS!
6. Banana a day!
6. Apple a day!
7. Steel Cut Oats. On my days off, Brady and I love to have this for breakfast!

7 People I tag...--Anyone who is reading this and/or who has a blog!--

setting ourselve up

We just cant win in the sleep department. Ear infections or teething gets in the way, as soon as we get a new pattern started, it all changes from ears or teeth or weekends away.

Seems like the key is consistancy.... sometimes you just get desparate for sleep, and you will do anything for sleep.

We're trying, really. Sleep has been our biggest challange.

Ladies and Brady's day of shopping

That's what my sister's kids called today. Me and Brady, my mom, my sister and her 2 girls went shopping in Eau Claire today. It was a productive shopping day for me! I had a few missions to accomplish.

#1. A pair of shoes that fit my fat footed cutie pie. The best fitting pair came from Sears, and they are size 5 EXTRA WIDE! lol. Size 5 wide were just not quite right, these fit so nice! There is a little room to grow into too. I hope his fat feet slim down, because shoe shopping for him wasnt fun! Nor cheap!

#2. Snowpants or a snow suit. At Kohls we found a snowsuit! Has attached/not attached mittens, matching hat, and even booties that can be taken off too. It looks so cozy, we are ready to play in the snow now!

#3. More long sleeve onsies. They are working so well for this active 11 month old. It is dang hard to find then in size 18-24 months, but we did at Old Navy, and they were a steal!

#4. Christmas gifts for Brady. Got one! (well, 3 because osme of those onsies will be x-mas gifts) It is a set of music making stuff! Designed for toddlers of course. A drum, rattles, xylophne too! more goodies in there. Double score that it all neatly contains itself in the drum when it is time to put it away. Now my little music lover can be the rock star that he is..... or country music star.... whatever, we flexible.

Dada is due home any minute now. He went hunting. Opening rifle weekend here in WI. He got a doe yesterday (earn a buck territory).

Sounds like someone is rummaging thru my "to be filed box", it is no longer a pile, but now a box. Anyone else have one of those that only gets emptied 2 times a year?

TMI

For those that dont know what TMI is, it's too much information.

11 months after baby, still no period!!!! It's kind of nice really.....

why is christmas like this?

I am getting un-nerved about christmas. This happens every year. The true meaning of Christmas gets lost behind all the presents. So many people go overboard on gifts too. Christmas seems to be focused on how much you spend on each person for gifts.

For me, ideally christmas would be plenty of time spent with family, a handful of gifts for the children, games and fun, plenty of good food, thoughtful gift-giving, a church service, waking up in your own bed, and lots of smiles. We all live an intense busy life it seems, christmas shouldnt be a chore, we should be kicking back and looking forward to that day.

Knowing what christmas is to me, doesnt make it any easier to change it.

My co-worker Dana is the most thoughtful gift-giver. She is a natural. for my 30th b-day she gave me a simple little gift of scrapbooking stickers. She knows scrapbooking is my relief, and probably spent $5-$10 and made a huge impact on me because she ~knows~ me. All the gifts that she talks about giving to her family and friends make me think "wow, she is so thoughtful".

ears again

Yesterday, later in the day brady developed a high temp. (over 104) Chris said he wasnt lifting his head, and completely not himself. So he took him to urgent care and I met them there. When they got there his temp was about 102. Brady's eyes were gross. They were dripping snot. Dr said he probably has a sinus infection, there is no where else for the snot to go, but out the eyes. lovely. And of course an ear infection. We opted to get an injected antibiotic over an oral one. While we were sitting there waiting, I thought he felt really really warm. They took his temp again, and sure enough, it was high 104's. They gave him motrin, and we stayed until his temp came down. It did. :-)

More later!!!!!!! crabby boy.

OK, dad's home so I can post some more. Brady did ok over night, his fever kept jumping as the pain reliver wore off. We saw Dr. L, and got another antibiotic injection.

He is WALKING!

Brady is about 10.5 months and is walking! More then a couple random steps, but he is walking clear across the room! It even appears that he is prefering to walk over crawling. Except this morning, when he crawled at lightning speed to the dog bowls.

Daddy calls us every evening to check up on us and see what is happening. I think he misses Little B. He always asks what he is doing, such as giving 5's, so bigs, and all that good stuff. Daddy will be surprised to see him so skilled at walking when he returns.

Have I blogged that as of last week my hours have been cut back? Not sure.... Anyway, I feel so much more human and happy. I'm working M-Th 8-5. (a perk of working seasonally I guess) My whole outlook on things is much better and less stressed. Life isnt feeling so chaotic these days. With Dada gone, I leave at 6:45 (like usual) to drop off brady. But now I have to pick him up to, that is at 6. I really dont have much quality time with Little B on working days, but we have been making up for it on my days off.

Success in over night diapering!

We are having success! Basiclly, we are using Brady's cloth diapers.... either a happy hempy with a hemp insert. This requires a cover, and the waterpruf cover was leaking at the top. No matter how much I stuffed it! So I took the leap and tried a wool cover. Yes, I was a total skeptic. It made no sence how wool would absorb, but not wick. And.... that I leave it out to dry during the day and it would be ~clean~ after it dried. (something w/ the lanolin and wool naturally does this) I dont completely understand why, but I am impressed happy. Brady is too. Click here to see our babyology wool diaper soaker. If our single happy hempy is dirty, we have had success using a Bum Genius loaded with hemp inserts.

We also got another Bum Genius cloth diaper. I had wanted one in Clemintine orange, but that orange is rather dull and girlie. So we got the new blue, Moonbeam. Check out the Bum Genius here.

his kisses ROCK!

Brady gives me the greatest kisses. Once in a blue moon they are tender and soft. However, most of the time he grabs me by the back of my head and pulls me to his face, to give me a big sloppy open mouth kiss which always includes teeth and tongue. LOL. Then he hops down and crawls away to play. Very cute! 100% boy.

We finally found a toy that has met its match! Its made by v-tech, the crawl and move ball and it rocks too! Brady will chase this ball around and giggle, clap, and have so much fun. Most toys hold his attention for about 5 minutes, this one will for over 30 minutes!

This is the first toy I have purchased for Brady! Score!

brady's first shiner

Here it is, Brady's first black eye. It just happened last night, so I exptect it to get worse yet.

just you and me; and me and you

Dada left last night to go bow hunting. He has vacation time all next week, and will be gone next weekend too. So it's just Little B and I for the next 9 days. Dada is staying at his parents, which is about 1.5 hours away.

Now. If a mommy wanted to leave for 9 days...... would that ever fly? Probably not, because a mommy more then likely cant be away from her little one for that long. I am surely not ready to be away from Little B for 9 days!

In the meantime... either my computer or my virus program is pissing me off. We have dial up.... so downloading things to try and fix it takes forever and ties up the phone lines.

Brady is taking steps! He started this about a week ago, just a few wobbly steps. Yesterday he was taking a few steps many times during the day. Which leads into the next paragraph......

.............. Brady has his first black eye. Stay tuned for pictures (I am downloading something for a virus scan, and dont want to upload a pict while I am doing that). We were visiting with neighbors/friends last night. Andrea is due iu Dec with a boy, and has been on bed rest for 3 weeks. They live across the cul du sac. So Rachel, our ~ex-neighbor~, and I took Andrea and Tony dinner and visited with them a bit too.

he is so cute when,

Brady is cute often. :-) But the thing that gets me lately is this:

If brady wakes an hour before I need to get up or less, I put him in bed with me. We normally are not co-sleepers, but I want that extra sleep in the morning. ;-) Almost every time my alarm clock goes off (music), Brady goes from dead asleep to up on his knees ~dancing~. It is so freaking cute! You cant help but wake up happy to this smiling, dancing baby next to you.

Chris and I noticed that Brady has gotten very busy in the last 2 weeks. We can hardly keep up to him, he is into everything and never sitting still.

Things I Don't Quite Get

Employers providing health insurance. I dont understand why THEY are expected to provide health insurance. Think about the small businesses out there...... they cant afford to be competitive with the larger companies. If I wasnt married to Chris, I could never afford to have my job. However this business employs about 30 people, our town needs businesses like this one.

Greeting Cards. Why are they so popular? And why are we mailing a mass produced piece of paper that we simply sign and mail?

Salary Employment. I think people mostly get screwed in this situation. Bosses see it as paying someone to get the work done. Most of the time that is an unrealistic expectation to achieve without putting in extra hours.

Very High Heels. Women, why are we doing this to our feet? Our precious feet!?!

Organics in the US. I could create an entire blog based on this. The US does a horrible job with what thier organic guidelines are. With my Agriculture background I am quite opinionated on this. I think the USDA needs to re-evaluate what deems a product as organic, and in the meantime consumers should look into just how organic the product they are paying so much more for really is. (other countries can do it, why cant we?)

Pesticides labeled as natural. A complete false sence of security (just like organics). There are some natural ingredients that are far more dangerous then something that is not labeled as Natural.

halloween pictures

here are some of our weekend pictures! brady was a girafe at daycare, I hope to add some of those cute pictures that tracy took.

speaking of daycare.... this is what happens to one of the projects they made, after you try eating it. It is this paper, that has a black coating, and you scratch in your picture to expose the colorful paper below. Dont know how to describe it, but I recommend not licking it. This photo was AFTER we washed out his mouth.

Our little halloween bat! The costume fit perfectly and brady was so cute in it! Thanks Aunt Sheri!

Brady's favorite drawer in mommy's bathroom.

Daddy with his hot little stud muffin.

the bat was flying! brady loves to fly!

it was cold.

This morning Brady was crying at about 4:45, I usually wake at 5:30. So, I was gonna put him in bed with Chris and I and let him sleep with his daddy after I woke up. (I didnt really want to sit in a rocking chair nursing him for 30 minutes and loose that sleep. As I was walking to our bed I stepped in something! I yelled, AHHH, I JUST STEPPED IN DOG SHIT! Chris flew out of bed (he was sound asleep snoring prior to this), and asked if it was warm or cold. ????????????? I am standing in the dark, with something squished between my toes, and you want to know if it is warm or cold????? I yelled, please take your baby from my arms!

Lights go on, and I learn it is just dog vomit, not shit. Made me feel a little better anyway. Daddy took baby, laughed at me, soon brady was laughing too. I gave dad the choice- stay up for the day and help with baby, or clean up the vomit and go back to sleep. He choose baby. They snuggled in bed and watched me clean it up! Laughing together, giving each other 5's.

There is some movie that chris always quotes "he called the shit poop". I am thinking adam sandler, but not sure. Chris would know. So chris was laughing and saying "she called the puke shit". what a morning. We were all wide awake after this!