I love babywearing!!!

I have always been an active person.  I like hiking, biking, swimming, riding horses and just in general being outside. I married an active guy too, we love hiking together. I knew having kids would change that a little.  We had our first little girl and we still had an active lifestyle.  We went camping and hiking.  We would pack her around.  I started out with just a baby bjorn and it worked well from what I knew.  We also had a structured hiking pack.  

Then when I had my son 19 months later I seemed to wear him a little bit more than I wore her.   I upgraded to a imitation Ergo.  It worked great and I felt like it was more comfortable for both of us.  It wasn't as bulky as the hiking pack.  I liked it.  

When I had my third baby another boy  I need to wear him a lot more.  It was just harder to get things done with three kids.  He also is much more of a mommas boy than my other kids.  He loves being held.

  I also had a baby ktan I don't have a picture of that one.  I used the ktan a lot when he was a newborn.  It kept him super close and it supported his little body.  Once he was about 12 lbs it started to hurt my back to wear him in it anymore. So I got the ring sling and I just never liked it much and couldn't get the hang of it.  I preferred my fake ergo, until.....

My sister in law introduced me to the Kinderpack.  We had been talking packs and about the Tula and Kinderpack.  I had gotten a tula off a swap page and it was nice but I didn't like the hood on it, and I felt like it was stiff.  So then I made the leap to Kinderpack...... I say leap because they were quite a bit of money and harder to come by.  

I have LOVED the kinderpack.  It has koolknit as part of the fabric so its breathable in hot weather. You can see in this picture there are three panels and one is the breathable stuff.  It makes it a little bit cooler to wear your kiddos in the summer heat.  I really like the design of these packs.  They have 4 different sizes.  Infant, standard, toddler and preschool.  They also have super cute designs and fun patterned prints,  that just adds to the fun of these packs.  

  

My son loves being in this he will fall asleep so fast.  He has never been much of a cuddler so I can't rock him to sleep.  I can wear him to sleep though.  This makes my life so much easier with three small children.  I don't go anywhere without my kinderpacks.  I also will wear my almost three year old son in the standard size pack when we go grocery shopping so I can keep a handle on him.  He is at that independent stage where he wants to walk by himself.  So its nice to be able to wear him and then have my baby sit in the cart.  It makes for some fast shopping trips.  

I love wearing my babies and wish I would have known about kinderpacks back when I first had kids.  I feel like its even more helpful now with three kids and I will continue to use it a lot as we continue to add to our family.  I love keeping them close and still being able to do my daily mom stuff.  

We recently went to Disneyland and being able to wear my 9 month old was a life saver.  He is used to being down and crawling around all day long.   Having to hold him all day long at Disneyland was easier when I could wear him and he still felt close.  

I have tried a lot of different carriers and I love what I have tried and learned from them all.  I would never wear a bjorn again knowing what I know now.  I think the nicer packs are well worth the extra  money to be able to get my stuff done and yet tend to my kids needs as well.  They are a lifesaver for moms.  

Recycle your halloween pumpkins

Growing up we never did anything with our pumpkins after halloween.  I take that back we did........... we fed them to the pigs.   This year I decided to recycle my pumpkins and use them again.   This is the process of how I did it.  

I washed them and made sure all the dirt was off.  

Then I cut it open and gutted it.  I found that it was easier to take the seeds out before you gut it and then use a spoon or ice cream scoop to get the slimy stuff out.   

Then I put it in the oven at 350 degrees I think that putting them flat on the cookie sheet they cooked more evenly and faster.   This one took probably 2 hours to cook to where the skin just peeled off nicely.   This was a larger pumpkin.

You can see how the skin bubbled up and pulled away from the meat of the pumpkin.  

Then the skin just peels off and you put all of the meat into the blender.  I have a blendtec and it worked wonderfully. 

Then I poured the pureed pumpkin into my freezer cartons.  I let them cool for a while then put them in the freezer.  I measured them out to freeze in the amount I need to make my pumpkin muffins.  So all I need to do is let it thaw and then its ready to add.  I don't have to measure or anything. 

Then I took the seeds and washed them off, patted them dry.  I put them in a bowl and put a tsp of olive oil and then added some garlic salt in one batch and I did some ranch packet mix on another batch.   There are so many options of what you can season them with.   It does make a difference to add the olive oil so that it doesn't stick to the wax paper if you coat them in olive oil.  On one of my batches I just added the seasoning and they stuck to the paper more.  

I spread them out on a cookie sheet with wax paper down to make for easier clean up.  I put them in the oven at 300 degrees for maybe 15 min and stirred them around a bit.   When they start to get browned I took them out.  They taste so good.  They are pretty healthy depending on what you season them with.  

]

What I loved about doing this is that the kids loved to help get the seeds out.  They love getting dirty and playing in slimy guts.   They even liked eating the seeds because they had helped make them.  It was fun.  It was also something we already had and used now we were recycling it.  It was a fun thing to try and they are delicious everyone loved them. 

Colloidal Silver and how I use it

My mom being the smart person she is she gave me some colloidal silver that she had made because my son would get ear infections a lot.  She said this will help kill the bacteria in his ear.  I was skeptical of this Silver..... it looked like water.  I knew my mom wasn't crazy or wouldn't tell me something if it weren't true.   I didn't actually use it on his ear infection because he had already gotten his antibiotics and it was a pretty severe infection.   Not to mention my skepticism about it.   I did use it on my sunburns though and WOW!  talk about amazing.  The morning after being outside too long and getting burned I would put the silver on and when I woke up it was a little pink maybe.  This is no excuse to not put sunscreen on.  I was amazed at its ability to sooth the burn.   I soon after burned my arm on the oven and I immediately grabbed my silver and applied some right on the burn.   It still burned and hurt like burns do for a while. I kept applying it every 10 min or so when it would dry out.  In just a few short hours it didn't hurt at all anymore and the next morning I woke up to an almost normal skin on my arm it was a little hard and scaly but no red or continued burning.  We have also used it as diaper rash cream and it works wonders.  I keep finding new ways to use it and its cleansing abilities.

Another Silver encounter I had:

I normally hate attending those parties people throw for distributors like Mary Kay, Tupperware,  Scentsy, pampered chef or any of those I just don't like them.   I just feel like they are pushy and I hate that feeling.   We have recently moved and so we are new in the area.  Well one of my friends from my church had invited me to a Norwex party and I thought oh boy I really don't want to go but this is a good way to meet some new people.  I knew nothing about Norwex except that its cleaning supply products.  I really hate cleaning..... I love what it looks and feels like after my house is clean but the actual process................ not so fun.

 So I ended up going and I was pleasantly surprised when the lady talked about her cleaning cloths and how they were lined with Silver. That caught my attention......the same silver that is used to make the colloidal Silver I already use in my home. She went on to talk about how silver has self purification properties.  I found that very interesting because of my experience with the colloidal silver.  I have ordered my cleaning cloths and I will let you know what I think.  

This is not a plug for Norwex I am just sharing my new found knowlege of Silver and Norwex happened to be a part of it.  I am anxious to try them out and see how I like them.  Anything to make cleaning with three small children easier is a friend in my book.  Also to have less chemicals in my house is another bonus. 

Where my crunchiness began

The other day my mom was over and she asked me what made me start to be healthier and more natural about the way I do things?   I stopped and thought..... Where did it start?

I had always considered myself pretty healthy and natural in some ways.  I rarely ever take medications and I used the essential oils that my mom had around the house.  I tried to eat somewhat healthy and I exercised.

I thought back and I came to the conclusion that is was a lot of small things that built up.  First I would say it was my Gallbladder acting up and causing issues.  I went to a natural herb person to try to get some herbs to help me.  They didn't seem to relieve my pain.  I eventually got it removed 2 months after I had my second child.  I just began thinking about all of the remedies this lady had given me. I still took some of those herbs she suggested I take to help my overall digestive system.

When my oldest child, my daughter was potty training I bought some "trainers"  they were part of the cloth diaper world.   I liked them ok but I also had a son that was about a year old at that point.  I was going though a lot of diapers before she got potty trained and I hated going through so many diapers.  So I decided to give the cloth diaper route a try.  I remembered my mom doing it and helping her....... those were not very good and positive memories.  My sister in law had said she was going to do cloth diapers with her son who was born about 9 months after my son.   So I thought I will give it a try since its pretty much the same as potty training with cleaning up anyways.    I just ordered a bunch off a website and it was package deal so it came with everything I would need to start.   After months of using them I decided its not bad at all I like it.   After two years of cloth diapering I love it.  I really don't think its bad at all, and I actually kind of liked it.  I feel like I had to touch a lot more poop and wet things with disposable because we would have blow outs or leaks.  That is a whole different post on its own about my cloth diapering journey.

Cloth diapers just got me thinking more about other ways to save and be more environmentally friendly. Be more natural.   Then I was pregnant with my third child and my dr had surprisingly retired in the middle of my pregnancy.  So here I was 20 weeks and I was having to look for a new Dr.  I decided I wanted to go the natural route.   I chose a few midwifes in the area and interviewed them to find out more about them and how they practiced.  I decided to go with one that seemed like a good fit.   I think this is really where I began to be a little more passionate about natural and healthy living.  I began to socialize with more naturally minded people.  I joined groups on Facebook that I could learn more about living and being natural.   I had my third child without medication and I loved it.  It was so different than my previous two.  I had always wanted to deliver my babies natural.   This was another huge step in my crunchy journey.

This past summer I was diagnosed with a more aggressive type of basal cell carcinoma.  I had had a bump on the back of my head for years. I just thought it was a weird zit that I never paid much attention to.  Then it began to bother me a little bit more and one day it was numb and the whole part around it was numb as well.  I though I had better go get this checked out since we already met our deductible for our insurance. haha.    So I went into a dermatologist and he excised it and sent it off to the labs.  He said it looked just like a cyst.   A few weeks later I got a letter saying the cultures came back normal and its all ok.    This was a picture after the dermatologist had taken out the small part and cauterized it.

 Then a days later I got a call from the Dr. asking me to call back.  I just forgot and never called him back I was a busy mom with three kids and we were in the middle of buying and selling houses.   Then he called again and this time I answered and he said that the pathology came back positive for cancer.  CANCER?!?!  A million different thoughts run through your mind when a Dr. tells you you have cancer.  So he referred me to a specialist and I went in and they removed my skin cancer.  They got it all in two rounds of MOHS surgery and then they had a plastic surgeon fix up my head.  I will spare you the picture of the actual cut out part.   This is the bandage after the plastic surgeon had fixed me up.

This scary experience made me A LOT more aware of my health and my life.   When they told me I had cancer I automatically thought the worst and I thought my poor family I have three small children and a wonderful husband I will be leaving behind.   Thank goodness it really wasn't  that aggressive of cancer and we got it all taken care of fast.  I decided ok I need to really be healthier and make sure my kids eat and have a healthy lifestyle.

I have tried to be more aware and learn of other ways to be healthier and not just diet but change my lifestyle to be healthier.   I want to have more energy and have a happy healthy life.  I want my kids to know and learn about eating and living right.  I love finding new things to try and ways to be healthier and happier.  I am grateful for those small steps that have brought me to where I am today.

Breastfeeding vs bottle feeding

I thought I would write a post about this because I have experienced both.  Everyone has their own opinion and thoughts about this...... This is mine.
 My first daughter I exclusively breastfed for 11 months and then she self weaned.  I then realized I was pregnant so I don't know if that had anything to do with it.    She was a great nurser and I never had a problem making enough milk for her.  I went back to work at 6 weeks.

I would pump and send the milk with her.  I just have the simple hand pump because I didn't use it a whole lot.   She did fine on bottles, she actually had a hard time at first nursing again after she had a whole day of bottles.  I only worked one day a week so she only had bottles for that one day a week.  She did great otherwise.  I thought to myself why would anyone want to bottle feed if breastfeeding was pretty easy and inexpensive.  Little did I know.......

Then I had my second son and he was a whirlwind of his own since he was born.  His cord broke while he was being born so he lost a lot of blood.  They kept him in the NICU for a few hours to monitor him so I didn't get to breastfeed him as soon as I wanted or even have skin to skin time.  They told me he needed fluids so that I should get some formula in him.   So I did.  I was still nursing him and pumping extra to try to get my milk to come in sooner.  I continued to supplement him as we went home.  Two day after being home he still just wasn't getting a good latch, so I went back to the hospital to get some help with a lactation consultant and they suggest I used a shield.   So I did and he would eat a little better but still not very well.  A lot of the time I would just pump and then feed him a bottle because it was so draining to try to feed him.

I had gallbladder issues start up when I was 27 weeks pregnant and I had tried natural ways to help reduce the pain.  Nothing worked I continued to have the attacks and after he was born I thought it would go away but 2 weeks after he was born they started up again. I literally could not eat anything.  I lived on muffins and apple juice.  I noticed my milk supply was dropping drastically.  I decided after a 48 hour attack it was time to remove my gallbladder.  I couldn't go on living like this.   So I had the surgery and 2 days later my milk was pretty much gone.   I was exhausted from the surgery and trying to keep up with my 19 month old and my newborn it was just too much. I had decided I would just formula feed my baby. Yes I felt like a failure......I couldn't feed my son.... I had done it so easily with my daughter.   So I shopped on ebay and our local classified sites and got the similac sensitive formula for relatively cheap.    He was such a happier baby because he was getting enough food.  He had always been fussy and wanted to eat ALL the time.  Come to realize that was because I wasn't producing enough for him, without being able to eat much myself.   I blame my low milk production on my gallbladder.

There are definitely some benefits to formula feeding your baby.  Dad can now help.   This was great on weekends I would have him help on the nightly feedings.  I didn't have to worry about pumping if I wanted to leave him with someone for more than a few hours.  It was fabulous.   Then we went camping and I thought how am I going to get warm water to make his milk?  That complicated things a little bit.  We are big campers so I had to figure something out or we would have a rough summer.  I bought a thermos and would put boiling hot water in it.  it would last at least 12 hours.  I would add cold water to his bottle and some of the boiling water to make it just right.  This was quite complicated in the middle of the night in a tent.   Overall the year went by and he thrived on formula so we were all happy.  That is what was right for that situation and I was ok with that.

.


Jump forward to my third baby.  He nursed within minutes of being born and has nursed like a champ ever since.  He is now 9 months old and he loves nursing.  He nurses way more than he probably should at this point but I figure he likes it and its so easy.   I love nursing and find it so much more convenient than formula feeding, now having experienced that side of things.  Its always there and ready.  Its always the right temperature.  I get quiet bonding time with my baby.   Yes it "ties" you down  a little but I don't mind.  I love my baby and he needs me.  I am so happy that I am able to produce enough milk for him and that he likes to cuddle.

Overall they both have their perks and downsides.  I guess it comes down to what YOU feel is most important for YOU and YOUR BABY.    That is really what this is all about, is if you and your baby are happy with what you are doing.  Some moms are not able to produce enough milk to sustain their baby and I am so grateful that we have formula for those situations.  Also some moms just don't want to breastfeed and that is fine too.  Everyone has their own opinion and their own family.    I am not opposed to formula feeding and in no way do I look down on those moms.  I have been there... I was once one of those moms.    We all have our reasons for doing things and we shouldn't judge other moms for their decisions about feeding their baby.  We are all just trying to do our best and we need support from other moms.

   I love breastfeeding and I really do think its healthier for baby if we are able and willing to provide that for our baby.  Our bodies know just what our babies need and they adjust the milk to the needs of our babies.  I will continue to breastfeed my babies but if something comes up again that makes me not able to for whatever reason and I have tried and tried and it just doesn't work out.   That is ok.   I am ok with formula feeding too.  Its not the end of the world like I once felt and thought it would be. The overall goal is to have a happy and healthy baby.

Green smoothies and Milk Kefir

I have been into green smoothies lately.  I started having them probably a year or so ago, but they were mostly fruits and yummy stuff with a little bit of spinach.   I recently went to a class from The Green Smoothie girl and learned a lot.  I read her book "The Green Smoothie Diet" and I loved it.  There is so much good information in there not just about smoothies but about gardening and composting.   I highly recommend this book.

They also talked about how eating healthy can help cure cancer and prevent it from reoccurring.  This hit home because I was recently diagnosed with the more aggressive type of basal skin carcinoma.  (A whole different blog post)  So I decided it was time to take action and do the challenge of a green smoothie a day.   It has been 4 months since I started and I do feel much better and healthier.  I feel more alert and not so tired all the time.  

I use and eat a lot more veggies than I used to because I feel like I can throw anything in my smoothies.  My staples in the smoothie are spinach, milk kefir, chia seeds, banana, carrots, and then some sort of fruit either peaches or mango.  If I have anything going bad I throw it in like pears, celery, radishes, apples, literally anything.  Here is my smoothie today.

                                               

My sister in law introduced me to Milk Kefir.   I had heard about it before but never really researched it much.  She gave me some grains to start my own and I LOVE it. 

                                                 

 Its a natural probiotic that you can make yourself and it continues to grow. I love that as long as you "feed" the grains you will always have plenty of it around.  I put my grains in a quart jar and then fill it up with milk.  I cover it with a coffee filter because it has to be able to breathe and then 24-48 hours later I have kefir ready to use.  I put that in my smoothies everyday and I feel like I fight off colds better.  I really try to get the kids to drink it as well.  I will do anything to fight off the colds all winter long.   

I used the kefir to make some corn bread last week. I replaced the sour cream with kefir and it tasted the same.  So I am excited to experiment more and substitute it for sour cream. I love this use of it because I rarely have sour cream or cottage cheese around unless I buy it specifically to make something.  I want to make lasagna with it because we are big lasagna fans at our house.  

I love finding new things to try that are healthy and taste good as well.  So if you have any good recipes to make with kefir or just your favorite healthy recipe leave a comment.  

We all have to start somewhere

I have been wanting to start a blog for a while now.  So here I am.   I wanted to write a blog for multiple reasons one of them being to journal my crazy life.    I also think that posting certain things on a blog will help me be held accountable and express myself.

First a little bit about myself.

I am a busy mom of three kids.  I have a 4 year old, 2 year old and 9 month old.  I also work part time so that is enough to keep me extremely busy.   I love my family, my job and my life in general.

I am trying to be healthier and be more natural in a lot of ways.  I love DIY stuff and crafts.  Thanks to Pintrest I have a never ending list of stuff to do.  I also love being outdoors and being in nature.

So here we go on our blogging journey!