Orlando Day Two

Last night I was asleep by 8pm and slept til 9am, only waking up for an hour from 2-3am to take care of the baby.  My mom had to chide me for waking up late, despite the fact that I had driven 19 hours from Ohio to Florida and only took an hour nap in the middle. I tried to brush it off. I fed 4L, put my suit on, ate breakfast and got him ready for the pool.  The whole time she's just criticizing everything I'm doing, have done, etc. Finally I'm like "can you stop?" and she says she's just teasing. Grrr. If someone said all that shit to her she'd throw a fit. So whatever, I'm used to it, we went to the pool.
4L LOVES THE WATER! Last night was his first time in a pool, and though he was leery, he was "jumping" forward in the kiddie pool and going under ON PURPOSE. Today we floated him around in this baby raft I got (at a garage sale for $1!).
After the pool he had to nap so mom stayed down there and we came back to the room. I tried to get 4L to nap in a lounge chair but he was too interested in everything else! After the nap we went to Downtown Disney and had lunch at the Rainforest Cafe. 4L was a little scared of it at first, cuz the almost life-size elephants move and make noise, plus the whole place goes dark and stormy like a rainforest lightning storm. Once we were done with lunch we walked around and looked in the shops, my mom watched a high school chorus sing for awhile, and at the end we shared an ice cream sundae from Ghirardelli- even my baby had some!
We all tried to nap when we got home but 4L wasn't interested in that so we fed him and then went back to the pool. My dad met us down there but didn't get in; he took pictures. We got dinner from the food court& headed back to the room. 4L ate a few fries, got in his jammies and fell right to sleep. Thursday we're going to the beach with my friend Trick while my mom stays here. Today wasn't bad, it just started rough and ended rough.

Orlando Day One

So we get to the resort and it's a total clusterfuck. There is no lane for drop off only lanes for valet and taxis. They forced me to park in a valet lane & i wait for my mom to check in. It feels like we're driving all the way back to south carolina just to find our room at the back of the hotel. The room costs 200 dollars per night but it's no bigger than any regular hotel room. The website said there were 6 pools but there are actually only 4. It's supposed to be family friendly, but when 4L is having a meltdown in the restaurant, nobody is friendly and I have to leave to take him to the room. My mom brings my food up to me and it is ice cold and not everything I ordered. So far I'm very unimpressed and quite irritated... 4L did have fun his first time ever in a swimming pool!

First Attempt at Cute Pinterest-Worthy Shit

I love to cook and bake and all that other stuff, hence becoming a chef.  I like to make things beautiful and appetizing, but it's kinda hard to make it really really really cute.  But I tried.

I made some cake pops in my Babycakes Cake Pop Maker (yay Santa), which was easy, because I just used some store mix with a little bit of red food color to make it pink.

Instead of using candy melts, which are both impossible and expensive, I made a simple Royal Icing (water + powder sugar + food color).  The blue came out perfect, the yellow was a bit too runny, and the orange was just a little bit more too runny.  I could have let them dry and double or triple dipped, but it was already like 11:30 pm and I just didn't want to be bothered.  I still think they look good!  I filled the cups with green coconut (dyed by moi); I put little marshmallows on for bunny ears, and it only occurred to me afterwards that I should have snipped them in half to look pointy like a real bunny.  Oh well!  This was my first attempt at cute pinterest-worthy shit, so I am pleased with how they turned out.  It's not like they're gonna last more than a second once they're in your mouth anyway! Hahaha =)

So, Lessons Learned:

1. Thicken up the royal icing - thick enough to swirl around but not thin enough to drip off your spoon.
2. Snip the marshmallows in half.
3. Have camera empty and charged before starting a project, otherwise you'll have to use your phone set on retro cam and some pics won't develop all the way and some will just disappear.

Got these for $1 at Target!

Naked Balls

Balls in Icing

Coconut Grass

Yellow and Orange

Close-Up of Happy Bunny!

Blue Bunny, pink nose, purple sugar on yellow ball

Close up of three colors

Balls on skewers, drizzled w/icing, for babies only!

Pin that Shit!

My Attempt at Indoor Gardening

I planted peppers, cat grass, basil and cilantro indoors this year.  I'm hoping that my little sproutlets will poke their little heads out while they're living inside, which will help them be stronger if we have a super rainy spring & molten-lava summer like we did last year.  The cat grass is already growing, but nothing else has sprouted yet - although the envelopes did say 10-14 days.  So, we'll see.  Here are the pics!

Mix with Water and You're Good to Go!

Looks more like mulch than soil

Filling up the egg carton

My good seeds!

Peppers

Basil

Cilantro

Peppers

In the windowsill

Side by side

Now that I have it open, they are actually in the window!

After everything was in their respective planters

Cat Grass

On the side table

In the sun

Starting to sprout

Fox is checking it out

After only 6 days!

Homemade Teething Biscuits

These aren't too bad, they taste a little bland so if you want to add vanilla, I would suggest doing so!  I added cinnamon but it wasn't enough flavor.

Recipe:

1 cup baby cereal (I used whole wheat)

1 cup flour

1 cup juice or water (I used half apple juice, half water)

Spray your baking sheet before you start!  Then, spray your hands.  It's easier than using a spoon.

Combine ingredients; Mix will be sticky. Roll into balls and flatten into cookie-type shapes.  Bake at 425 for one hour or until the outside is "hard".  

These biscuits are kinda weird in that they are tough on the outside but almost hollow on the inside.  This means that Little Miss or Mister can chomp away and they won't break apart or mush up (until after a really long while) and it prevents Baby from choking.

Ready to Bake

About halfway done

Finished Product

They'll stay fresh for seven days - after that, toss 'em to the birds!

Note the semi-hollow inside

What is this?!

Yeah, OK, it's pretty good.

Nom-nom-nom

It's a Small World After All

...but it's also an expensive and scary world, after all!

So, with Poke's large tax refund, we are going to take a vacation.  In the 6.5 yrs he & I have been together, we have not taken any vacations other than two days at Cedar Point in 2008.  This year we have the time, the money, and the togetherness to do it!  Finally!

I was looking at Disney vacations and extended an invitation to the grandparents to join us.  My friends, however, made a good point - 4L might get scared of the characters!  I can definitely see that happening, because he is often terrified of his own shadow - okay, maybe he's not that much of a scaredy cat, but he does get very very nervous (to the point where he starts yelling) around large groups of people.  Perhaps I should plan a Disney vacation for year 5 and not year 1.

That all being said, I think we are still going to head to Disney.  They have some really awesome resorts there, and we don't have to buy any tickets to the park, or we can buy one ticket for one day.  It might be nice to leave 4L in the baby room and go play with Poke at Disney World!  Of course I can just imagine feeling horribly guilty leaving him... but then again, maybe not.  Who knows?!  Definitely have to think about this.  Luckily the Disney vacations website has a sweet planning tool, where you can choose your style (basic - luxurious, dining plans, etc) and budget and they will give you all the options that fit.  Then, once you have those options, you can tweak it to match your exact needs.

If you have any suggestions on baby-friendly resorts, I would love to hear them!

Wii Fit Plus!

So, for Christmas, my FMIL (future mother in law) gave me a $50 gift card to Best Buy.  I was like "huh, what can I do with this?" because I don't generally buy anything there, and we already have all the electronics we could need.  Then, shortly after my 30th birthday, something (the fat pouch) inspired me to start losing weight - finally - and I began to come up with a plan.  I thought about going back to Weight Watchers, but they've changed their program so much and it's very, very expensive these days.  I checked it out and even though it would have been pretty easy to re-learn the new system, I wasn't interested in paying for it, so I ended up going back to SparkPeople.

SparkPeople is a website that offers nutrition, fitness, and other trackers.  They now have an app for your smartphone, too!  All I have to do is put in the foods I eat, and it will calculate it for me.  Almost every single food you can think of is in their database, or you can enter it manually.  To begin, you put in your weight, height, age, activity level, etc. and it tells you how many calories you can have per day, without exercising, to lose weight.  Then it says you should exercise, and encourages 30 min/day, 3x/week.  My numbers are pretty easy to follow: 1330-1660 calories/day, exercise 7 days/week to burn 299 calories every day, and drink 8+ glasses of water per day.

It's been a bit rough getting my calories in order, because I went from eating less than 1,000 calories a day to eating over 2,000 - thanks to working out and actually feeling hunger!  Silly brain, always going to one extreme or the other!  Anyway, it took about 10 days but I am mostly able to keep my calories close to 1660. I'm hovering around 1800, but I also burn anywhere from 310-490 calories per day.

...and that's where the Best Buy gift card comes in!  I started SparkPeople and didn't plan on exercising at all, just hoped that eating the right amount of calories would work (yeah, cuz it worked so well in the past...?).  Poke and I had left 4L at his Nana's house, and were running some errands when I remembered the gift card and suggested we go look to see what they had.  Originally I thought maybe I'd get a tablet or a TV, but even the smallest, cheapest tablets/TVs were well over $100 (I was willing to pay half).  We wandered around, checked out the GPS area, car stereos, and ended up by the video game systems.  YAY!  I thought maybe I'd get a few Wii games, and then it caught my eye - the Wii Fit Plus.  It was on sale, and with the gift card I ended up getting it for like $15. YAY!  It took a couple days to charge my batteries and get motivated, but I finally hopped on two days later.

At first, I was like "What. The. Fuck." because it was really weird to be standing on this balance board and moving the character on screen in all these strange games.  The little guy talked me through the process, doing a body test and introducing me to all the features.  I've been doing it for 16 calendar days now, 14 actual days (I take Tuesdays off), and I'm getting pretty good at most of the games.  It even includes Yoga and Strength Training, which at first I could not do and actually sobbed after trying.  These days I can do most of the Yoga and some of the Strength Training, and allegedly it will get easier as I go on.

The problem is, even though I've been working out steadily for two weeks, I haven't lost any weight.  I don't think I've lost any inches either because my jeans actually feel tighter!  I don't understand what is going on.  For the first time in my life I'm drinking plenty of water (36-44oz/day or more) and getting regular exercise, as well as burning way, way more calories than I take in.  My BMR is 2329 + 310 burned cals/average and subtract 1800 cals/eaten from that = 819 cals/differential.  They say to cut out 500/day to lose a pound a week... So why am I not losing any weight?!

I'm hoping that it's just a matter of getting things going, and sometime in the next week or so I'll start to see some results.  It'd be nice if I could just see something - even if my jeans just felt better.

Gluttons for Gluten(-free)

I am SO annoyed with this godforsaken Gluten-free trend that is sweeping America right now.  Everything is being changed to be Gluten-free, or labeled as “GLUTEN-FREE!” when it's always been Gluten-free, or there are new Gluten-free alternatives.  The thing is, a very, very small percentage of the population actually need Gluten-free food... but for some reason everybody and their goddam brother are scrambling for it and grabbing it off the shelves like it's cocaine-laced Slim-Fast.

The only people who truly need Gluten-free diets are those with Celiac or Duhring's diseases, and those with a wheat allergy.  There is zero evidence that it "cures" or "treats" Autism, although if you listen to the whack jobs *koff*Jenny McCarthy*koff*, it most certainly does (even though a professional, scientific study showed that it did absolutely nothing).  Unfortunately, like the Atkins, South Beach, Zone, Cabbage, Vinegar, etc etc etc, it has become the new fad diet.

The problem with going Gluten-free is that it can actually be quite dangerous if it's not necessary (and even when it is necessary, if you don't do it properly).  From the Wikipedia page on Gluten-free diets:

Deficiencies linked to maintaining a gluten-free diet. 

Many gluten-free products are not fortified or enriched and contain lower amounts of nutrients such as folate, iron, and fiber than other foods. Additionally, because gluten-free products are not always available, many Gluten-Sensitive Enteropathy (GSE) patients do not consume the recommended number of grain servings per day. A gluten-free diet may not meet the recommended intake for fiber, thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, folate, iron, or calcium. It is important for those who avoid gluten in their diet to find more nutrient-dense food sources to prevent such deficiencies. People who change their standard gluten-free diet to implement gluten-free oats at breakfast, high fiber brown rice bread at lunch, and quinoa as a side at dinner have been found to have significant increases in protein (20.6 g versus 11 g), iron (18.4 mg versus 1.4 mg), calcium (182 mg versus 0 mg), and fiber (12.7 g versus 5 g). The B vitamin group did not have significant increases, but were still found to have improved values of thiamine, riboflavin, niacin, and folate. These dietary changes can greatly reduce a GSE patient's risk for anemia (especially Iron Deficiency Anemia) and low blood calcium levels or poor bone health. 

Gluten-free foods include rice, potatoes, soybeans, maize, millet, buckwheat, amaranth and quinoa. The diet may be low in fiber, iron, folate, calcium, magnesium, zinc, vitamin D, B-complex vitamins (thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, and vitamin B12). Celiacs adhering to a gluten-free diet may be at risk for inadequate calcium, non-starch polysaccharides and Vitamin D. Oats can increase intakes of vitamin B1, magnesium, and zinc in celiac patient in remission.

The other thing is that even if a product is labeled Gluten-free, it might still contain Gluten (more on that later) because many factories use products that contain Gluten to dust their machines or process Gluten-not-free stuff on the same machines as Gluten-free.  Then there's the issue of alcohol.  Of course there is Gluten-free alcohol out there, but if it is made from any kind of grain, it contains Gluten.  So if I see your stupid face with a beer or whisky or whatever, telling me about your Gluten-free Lent, I'm going to kick you.

Also, it is almost impossible to be completely Gluten-free (unless it was supposed to be that way), and that "Gluten-free" really just means a teeny-tiny amount of Gluten (because 0 calories actually means <1 calories, and 0 carbs means <1 carb and so forth).  Did you know that the amount of Gluten at which intolerance presents itself is undetermined?  Yeah, I didn't think you did. Probably because you think Gluten-free is going to help you lose weight or be healthier.  Sorry Charlie, you're just a fucking moron.

I just get so incredibly frustrated!  I'm not going to lie and say I've never tried a fad (diet or otherwise) or prayed/hoped for some miracle cure for my morbid obesity, but sometimes I just cannot comprehend what people are thinking.  Why would you remove something totally innocent from your diet for no reason, especially if removing said thing could actually create a nutritional deficiency?  Ridiculous.  The problem is that people eat too much fake food.  Why did the Atkins diet work for so many people?  Yes, because they cut out carbs, but not because they cut out carbs - Americans eat way too many carbs in the first place!  Atkins doesn't rule anywhere else like it does here because the rest of the world knows how to eat in moderation.  Eat whatever the hell you want - just don't eat ten pounds of it!  Also, eat REAL food - they say five ingredients or less, but I find that to be a bit restrictive.  I have eaten Helper three times in the last three years, and those three times I felt (and did nothing but) shit the next day.  Too many preservatives!  Cheese powder?! YUCK!  Seriously.  When I learned in culinary school that margarine is one molecule away from being plastic, I decided to start making a change in my diet.  I've given up all lite/low fat/etc foods because they aren't real - no canola/vegetable oil either, only olive oil (I do have a bottle of canola that I've been working on for about 2 years now, and I just can't bear to get rid of it and throw away all that money - it's used very sparingly!)  Splenda and Diet pop are the only fake foods that are regularly let into this house.  I'm not trying to be some guru or trendsetter, but come on people - there's a reason why we're all so fat.  You might be saying to yourself, "Who the fuck are you, Kel-Bell?" and I will answer "I'm just a well-educated mother, partner, and chef who wants to make the best life for my family and myself."

Happy Birthday, Abie Baby...

Since it's 1:52am, it's technically Presidents' Day.  Abraham Lincoln's birthday was seven days ago and George Washington's was eight, but whatever.

This, along with the current election shit that's already hitting the fan, makes me wonder what our founding fathers would think of the government these days.  Yes, I know Lincoln was not a founding father.

There have always been "sides", cliques, parties, whatever, since the dawn of time.  Sometimes a girl like me, however, just doesn't know where she belongs!  The liberals piss me off because, as the sayings go, they don't want to get jobs/use facts/allow babies to be born/etc.  The extreme right, on the other hand, pisses me off because they insist on putting God into everything, perpetuating an ancient caste system that should have never occurred in America, and having a tendency to skew things into what they want it to be.  

What I really want to be is a Socialist.  I truly believe that if everyone actually had to work for the irrefragable greater good, they might fucking do it.  There is too much distance between the rich and the poor, and us middle class people are the ones suffering.  How can the middle class be determined by $15k-$250k per year?!  If Poke made $250k per year, I'd be wearing diamonds in my pussy and 4L would have gold-plated diapers.  We live off of $27k, and barely make it.  Thanks to WIC, we don't have to buy food for 4L, but that is only 1/3 of our monthly grocery bill.  What are we supposed to do when he starts eating real food, and more of it?  Currently we get 32 jars of baby food in a month, and he eats 2/day - that's clearly not enough.  I have to supplement with actual food, which is fine because I want him to eat what I cook and get used to it, but there are some things that aren't nutritionally sound for a 7 month old!  We don't qualify for any other kind of aid, and even though I have no job and no income at all, I don't qualify for any kind of Medicare/Medicaid.  It's BULL.  Meanwhile there are people out there buying alcohol, cigarettes, and all kinds of fried fucking chicken with their goddamn EBT cards.  

Not.Fair.

But I digress.

I have a friend who is a conspiracy theorist (a real one, not the speculative kind like Poke used to be), and a friend who is a die-hard liberal.  I don't have too many straight-up conservative friends, although one comes pretty close.  I respect all of their opinions, I don't always agree, but sometimes I just can't understand.  It seems like the folks who are set squarely into one of these groups (whatever group they choose) always has to run screaming into the conversation, blasting those who disagree or are different, and stating reasons why their group is the only/best group.  It's fucking ridiculous!

To me, some things just aren't important enough to be a true political affair - women changing their last name, light bulbs, living on the moon.  Then, there are the things that are important - abortion, taxes, health care... that's where I get all stretched out.  I can sum up my feelings in three neat bullets:

• Abortion = Murder
• Taxes should be lower for me (and those who make less than me), and higher for those who make more than me.
• Health care should be publicly funded (See: France)

I guess that's it for today.  Here's a video for you, in honor of Presidents' Day!

*Does not connotate affiliation with the modern Tea Party

Fat vs Thin vs Bottle vs Breast vs ...?...

There's a lot of speculation out there about feeding a baby too soon, with a spoon, and feeding it rice/oatmeal/etc.  They say it causes obesity and diabetes, but where are they getting this information?  IF they are getting it from looking at our generation, and even our parents' generation, it doesn't correlate.  We're obese/diabetic because of our current lifestyles, not because of what we ate 30+ years ago! Genetics does play a role; as I've said before, my brother and I were fed exactly the same way as babies and yet he turned out slim & fit whereas I'm morbidly obese.  His parents were small and thin, my parents were average and stocky. 

I even read an article just now about a "study" they did on 92 spoon-fed babies vs 63 breast-fed babies.  10 of the spoon babies were overweight, and 9 of the breast babies were overweight.  First of all, they clearly stated that all the children were within a "normal healthy" weight range - so these "overweight" children were probably just the top 10 and top 9 of their groups.  Second, 10 out of 92 (10.87%) is significantly less than 9 out of 63 (14.24%), which to ME would indicate that the breast-fed children were actually the ones who had a "problem"!  In fact, I have a friend whose son was born 10 days after 4L, and is considerably larger than him.  

Due to the complications from my C-section, I only nursed 4L for about 10 days, while her son has been nursed the entire time.  Using that as anecdotal evidence, in combination with the aforementioned "study", I'd say breast-fed babies do tend to be larger - and it makes sense!  They get all the nutrients, calories, antibodies, etc etc etc EVERYTHING from the mother, and who knows what she's eating (I don't mean my friend here, cuz she is healthy, but I mean other mothers that I don't know!).  Spoon-fed babies are fed specific amounts at a time, leaving no question as to how many calories they are actually getting and from where those calories are coming.

Obviously, I'm not a doctor or scientist, and I only took one nutrition course in college.  That being said, I do read a lot, on both sides of the argument (whatever the argument may be!), and I have my own experiences to draw from.  Personally, and I know others who agree, I think that nobody really, truly knows wtf is going on with babies, and it's all just speculation.  Thirty years ago my parents were told to put me on my stomach to sleep, along with millions of other babies, and we all lived.  4L HATED sleeping on his back, and now that he's old enough to roll around on his own, he sleeps 99% of the night on his stomach.  Babies who sleep on their backs still die from SIDS, because nobody knows what causes SIDS. I would be willing to make a bet that in less than ten years, we'll be back to formula is the best and sleeping on the stomach is correct.  I can picture it now, doctors telling insanely obese/diabetic mothers that their milk is just too diseased/fatty/diabetic/etc to feed to a newborn, and that formula would be safer. Right now there's a big push for ADHD medications/diagnoses, and I think that in less than ten years the medical field will agree that it's lazy parenting because they'll have moved onto the next thing that Big Pharm wants to hawk.

...And that's my blogpost for the morning.  Now we're off to baby laptime at the library, cuz one thing is for sure- books will never be bad! (Unless you're CS Lewis in Fahrenheit 451... ok, gotta stop there!)