Blue-eyed Boys

Applegasm

Yes, it's that good! No, the crappy pics don't do it justice. I was in too big a hurry to eat it to stop and take a decent picture. This has been my latest guilty paleo pleasure.

1/2 red delicious apple
1/4c raw almonds
1 tbsp Enjoy Life mini chocolate chips
1 tbsp caramelized coconut chips
Drizzle honey (about a teaspoon)

You can thank me later.

Frosty

Jim and Kellan built a snowman last night. (Never mind Kellan's face, Jim is clearly an excellent photographer.) They came back inside and K was telling me all about it and of course my first thought was, "Oh, how fun!" Then when Jim was putting him to bed he said, "Don't forget to say goodnight to Snowman!" So, Kellan runs over to the window and say, "Goodnight, Snowman, I love you!"

 
This is no good. He's just humanized Snowman, who will inevitably melt within the next day or two. Greeeaaat. All day long K has been looking out the window checking on Snowman. At one point he even told me, "Mommy! Snowman is so cold! He needs a warm ribbon on his neck!"

Well, sometime in between K's nap a few hours ago and when Jim got home, Snowman's head fell off. Jim pointed it out to me when he came in from work. So I made him go fix it. How traumatic would that be??? He said when he was trying to fix it the whole thing broke and so he recreated it but now it's missing its eyes... Ah well...

Love

He has the longest eyelashes ever.

Remedying Reflux with Paleo?

Reflux, reflux, reflux.... The bane of my existence right now. We've been dealing with some pretty intense tummy issues for the little guy ever since he was born. Spitting up (well, more like copious amounts of vom), arching his back until he was practically in a back bend, hiccups, gurgling, not sleeping any longer than 15 minutes at a time, and the crying... Oh dear lord god, the crying. It never ever ends. It's pretty constant, all day, every day, except for the few fleeting moments of smiles and laughs and happy quiet time. But the crying would always start again and it's not like any baby crying I have ever seen. It's shrieking. For hours and hours.

At first the pediatrician tried to tell me he just has colic. I wasn't buying it. First of all, I'm not much of a believer in "colic" even though I've been told my baby has it. I don't believe babies cry for no reason. There is always a reason. And my baby is telling me something is wrong. My gut was telling me this was not okay and it was not normal. Granted, I was spoiled as a first-time mom because my first son was the world's easiest baby who rarely cried. But I knew that even if A was a fussy baby, this was not okay.

No words...

“Making the decision to have a child is momentous. It is to decide forever to have your heart go walking around outside your body.” -Elizabeth Stone

There are no words to describe how much I love these boys.

 

I had no idea. Before I had kids I had no idea how profound my love for them would be. I've heard people talk about it, but I couldn't help feeling like no one told me or warned me. I know now that it is because there are no words to describe it and no measure to compare it to. It's just not something a person is capable of understanding until they are holding their baby and experiencing it.

When Kellan was born, I was completely overwhelmed by how fiercely I loved him. I have never loved anything more in my life so intensely. The enormity of it scared me. It still scares me. I couldn't imagine loving anyone or anything else anywhere near as much as I loved him. His birth was when my eyes were truly opened to what real, raw, unconditional love is and I realized, to my horror, how absolutely devastating it would be if anything happened to him and why my mom was so "ridiculously overprotective" of me. I get the term "mama bear" now, when before I thought it was just cutesy. It's very real and quite descriptive of how fiercely a mama protects her babies.

When I was pregnant with Aven, like most 2nd time mamas, I still worried that I couldn't love another child like I did my first. I couldn't imagine that it was possible. It seems silly now that I worried about that because as soon as he was born, I felt that exact same fierce, intense love for him too. It was no different and no less and just as overwhelming as it was with his brother.

 

Several of my friends, now pregnant with their 2nd child, ask "Will I love this baby as much as my first?" You will. I promise you, you will. Just like you couldn't prepare for how much you loved your first baby, it will blindside you and overwhelm you and sweep you off your feet and bring you to tears because of its enormity. There is nothing sweeter.

Aven Lucas's Birth Story

The birth of my first baby, Kellan, was a pretty typical hospital birth. Although I began labor naturally, once I got to the hospital and accepted the epidural, the famous “cascade of intervention” began. I still ended up with a vaginal delivery (despite a few mentions of a c-section when I stalled out at 7cm for 4 hours.) After the birth, I was happy with how things went, but later, as I became more educated and aware of my birthing options and aware of how things could have been, I decided I wanted to approach the birth of my second child a different way.

About halfway through my second pregnancy, I decided to use the Hypnobabies home study course to prepare myself for a natural, unmedicated childbirth. I wrote up a “rough” birth plan and approached my doctor with it. He agreed with most of it, but there were a few things he did not agree with such as delayed cord clamping (he didn’t agree that he could delay AND place baby on my stomach right away) and refusing the Pitocin shot after birth (I hemorrhaged after delivery with my first baby, so he wanted to administer it just in case.) I decided to continue with him despite disagreeing on those points, but continued to research and hit up my AMAZING doula friends for advice. (A big thank you to my doula friend Nikki (In the Atlanta area? Check out her doula page here!)  for sitting down with me and helping me finalize everything!)

On Thursday, two days before my 11/17/12 EDD, I had my last prenatal appointment and my doctor mentioned wanting to schedule an induction date 10 days after my EDD. This upset me a LOT because, although I’d agreed to cervical checks, I wasn’t letting him tell me how far dilated/effaced I was. I didn’t want to worry about numbers that don’t mean much and was feeling pretty confident that I would give birth in my own time, when my baby was ready. He had asked me several times if I wanted him to try to get things moving (via membrane sweep), but it was important to me to let my body do what it was meant to do as naturally as possible, so I declined every time. When he mentioned induction, it immediately  began to rattle me and shake my confidence in my own body. Looking back, that is so crazy because I’d already done it once, of course my body knew what it was doing! I told him I was not going to discuss the possibility of induction until my EDD had passed. I told him that I trusted my baby to come when he was ready and my body to know what to do when he was time, why didn't he? He said he would call me on the following Monday and give me time to think it over. I was prepared to tell him that I would not consider induction until December 1, when I would be 42 weeks pregnant. (ACOG even says you're not "overdue" until after 42 weeks anyway!)