Crib time!

Tonight sucks. Tonight is the first night of what will likely be a long week. Tonight is the night we start teaching Audrey to sleep in the crib (ugh). She's been in our bed too long - I know, I know, terrible parents - and I need my space. And she needs hers. She's seven and a half months old, and this has been delayed too many times, mostly because I cave. Her crying breaks my freaking heart and I just want so bad to give her what she wants. What she wants is to cram into the big bed with Mommy and Daddy like she has since she was about three weeks old. But what she needs is her own bed in her own room before we delay it too long and find ourselves smooshing into bed with a five-year-old Audrey plus whatever siblings may follow.

Not happening.

So here we are, listening to her cry for fifteen minutes at a time and trying not to cry ourselves.

I wish I had done this before she learned to stand at least, because now when I walk in there she is standing at the edge of her crib staring forlornly at the door, and she starts screaming in earnest when she sees me walk in.

If ever there was a legitimate argument against co-sleeping, this is it.

Goals

Back on October 15th, I started using the Lose It! app and website to track my calorie intake. I've always been tired of being overweight, but I had a hard time finding the motivation to do anything about it. When on occasion I did actually become proactive, I never had the willpower to stick to it for long. But recently something changed, and suddenly I just couldn't put up with it anymore. So I set a goal to lose 61 pounds at a rate of two pounds per week. Originally, the app said I would reach my goal by May 17th of next year. After tracking my food for one day I realized I was seriously eating too much and making poor choices with what I ate. It didn't take long to get my intake under control.

Now, I'm paying attention to that little thing called a "serving size" that I've always ignored. The weird part? I don't even mind limiting myself. Before, we would dole out the ice cream and just keep eating until it was gone. I thought for sure this would be my biggest weakness, but it turns out that I am actually satisfied with just a half cup of ice cream. And now it lasts longer. Candies and cakes and cookies aren't nearly as enticing as they were, and I think it's because I'm not cutting them out entirely. That has never worked, anyway. I just make room for them in my calorie budget. If I don't have enough calories left, I do a little extra exercise. The last few weeks I've actually been under budget by a couple hundred calories.

What's more: I don't sit and think about food all day. I wouldn't say I was obsessed before, but I was always thinking about what I could snack on next. I thought I would actually be wrapped up in counting calories, but really it just takes a second and I move on to something else. I don't dwell on food all the time, and I feel safe saying I've finally broken my addiction. It's a weird feeling. I love not worrying about food. I love seeing the numbers on the scale getting lower and lower. I love being able to enjoy snacks and candy without feeling guilty.

Yesterday I got to take down the first butterfly from my goal wall. I have lost ten pounds, and it hasn't even been a month yet. Now, the app says I'll reach my goal by May 8th.

I do have the advantage of breastfeeding right now, but I do intend to start introducing more exercise too. I've been shoveling snow and doing more housework, and as much as I hate exercise I've actually enjoyed it because I know it means I can have an extra cookie later, or that I'll lose another half a pound. I've been keeping the house cleaner, which is another mood booster for me. I do love coming home and relaxing in a clean house.

I've also ordered a Jawbone UP wristband, and though it's backordered right now, when I get it I'm sure it'll help with my weight loss. It tracks your activity during the day and can be set to give you a gentle reminder to get up and do something when you've been stationary for too long. I'm really excited and proud of this lifestyle change, and I can't wait to finally be happy with my body again.

It is time.

Today a dear friend shared with me a blog post that gave me a new perspective with which to view my daily struggles as a mother. For the past week I have been exhausted, frustrated, and lost. While fighting off first strep throat and then a head and chest cold, I also had to contend with Audrey's teething, which is keeping us both awake all night. For the first time in my life, I'm not able to take personal time to relax and recover because I have a miserable baby who needs me more than I need me. I have chores that can't be set aside until I'm feeling better (How quickly we run out of clean burp rags and baby clothes!) and errands that are more important than my self-pity. It's hard to admit to myself that, while I was in fact ready emotionally to have and raise a child, I may not have been prepared to grow up and stop being selfish.


Every night I get overwhelmed because I am tired, sick, and mentally drained. Audrey is tired too, but her pain is keeping her awake and she doesn't understand why I can't make it go away. I don't either. Until now I've been able to satisfy her every need, be it food, sleep, a diaper change, or entertainment. This feeling of uselessness is new to me. Every new situation we've faced I've come out on top; I've figured out what to do to make it better. But now I have no answer, no solution, and no peace.


Just like the first weeks after she was born, I find myself becoming forgetful and mentally disorganized. I can't focus. I have no energy. I feel like I need to sleep for three days straight. I want to get away by myself, but I can't even do that because for some reason I can't pump milk anymore. Every time I try I get maybe 10mL, which isn't even enough to bother freezing. When Audrey nurses she gets plenty, but I've gone so long feeding her straight from the breast I wonder if it has impaired my ability to pump. I've got plenty of milk stockpiled in the freezer, but if I leave Audrey with someone and am unable to pump, my supply may be affected.


It's so easy to fall into the well of self-pity and wallow there waiting for someone to drop down the metaphorical rope that is the solution to all my problems. It is so very easy to forget what this is all supposed to be about: the joy of raising my daughter.


And then, after a truly hard night of little sleep and lots of crying, I wake up to the toothless (for now) smile of my beautiful baby girl, and I have to pause and understand that it is time to grow up. It is time to be more than myself. It is time to give my everything. It is time to be strong, supportive, patient, gentle, soothing, selfless, and forgiving. It is time to be Mother.

A love too big to measure

Before I was pregnant I had no idea what having kids would be like. I was so completely unprepared. For example, I thought we would have no use for bibs until our baby started eating solid foods. I didn't account for the steady stream of drool and the almost-as-steady stream of spit up. I also had no idea how many burp rags, diapers, wipes, and outfits (both mine and hers) I could go through in one day. There are so many things I just didn't know to expect, but one thing above all others continues to surprise me.

I never expected to be so in love.

Sure, I knew I would love my baby, before I even knew I was actually going to have a baby. And when I found out I was pregnant I felt a hesitant sort of excitement, but I did everything I could not to become too attached too soon, as I'd miscarried before. Then, when we saw the heartbeat and her tiny arms wiggling (though we didn't know she was a she yet), I felt an overwhelming stream of love for the tiny being inside me I couldn't even feel moving yet. But even then I was unprepared and unwitting. I had no idea what was to come.

Throughout my pregnancy I grew more and more attached to the little person I was growing, without actually having any real sense of her as a person. I feel stupid trying to describe the feeling, but there it is.

After she was born I had a couple of weeks of panic, self-pity, and uncontrollable weeping. I would hold her and rock her, sing to her, kiss her, smell her and try my darnedest to feed her. It was a rough time, filled with long nights and a lot of daytime naps. I know I loved her; I am sure of it. Looking back now I regret that I didn't take a break from the woe-is-me attitude and spend more time just loving her and realizing what an incredible blessing she is. 

Somehow we made it through those first weeks and breastfeeding became miraculously easy (like everyone said it would). Over the course of the next few months, I was able to enjoy her developing personality and to adore her smile and to stop crying every time she cried. I learned that I love her, more than I love anyone, anything. I love her more than myself, more than I can even fully grasp. I never, ever, ever (I really mean it) EVER could have understood this kind of love before she was born.


I love her cooing and gurgling. I love the faces she makes and her attempts at laughing. I love when she screams just for the pleasure of screaming. I love waking up way before I'm ready and being unable to be grumpy because she's grinning that beautiful toothless grin at me. Her cheerfulness is infectious, and I can't believe I ever made it through the day without it.

It may sound terrible, and it is very hard to admit - even to myself - that I didn't feel this kind of love the instant I met her, but I think it's important to put it into words and, more importantly, to forgive myself for it. Everyone copes differently, and what matters is that I didn't let it get the better of me.

And what's more, I love her more now than I did when I made this realization. I love her more today than I did yesterday. I will love her more tomorrow. As incredible as it seems to me that I could possibly love her any more than I do at this moment, this instant, right now as she sleeps so peacefully in my arms, I will. And I'll continue to do so for the rest of my life.

Glitter Flats (or How I Glued the Carpet)

Today I noticed I had two things lying around taking up space that I was hesitant to get rid of: a pair of old, comfy, well-worn (read: dirty) canvas flats, and a big container of multi-colored foil glitter. Remembering this tutorial, I knew I had a potentially adorable pair of shoes just waiting for me to bring it to life. Now, I did follow most of the main points in this tutorial, but there were a few things I had to do to prepare the shoes, as they'd gathered a lot of cat hair and dust from sitting in storage. Besides that, I had worn them for two straight summers, so they weren't clean by any stretch of the imagination. Just for practice, I'll do a step-by-step write-up to show what I did. In addition, all I have is Mod Podge for paper, but I decided to use it anyway.

**Before I start, I need to warn you. This has the potential to be a very messy project. If you are at all clumsy, like me, or absent-minded, also like me, put down a LOT of newspaper/craft paper/drop cloth. Unless you like gluey, glittery mess everywhere. In that case, forget I said anything. Moving on.

Here's my set-up:

And my assistant:

Yes, she's missing a sock. I don't know how she always manages to lose only one sock. As you can see below, the shoes were covered in cat hair, and the rubber toes were super scuffed.

The shoes were adorned by these tattered bows. I didn't like the bows, and I didn't fancy trying to glue glitter to them.

First thing's first: get rid of the cat hair. As an owner of four cats and a dog, I am always stocked-up on lint rollers.

Then, I needed to clean the rubber toes. A little water and some minty-fresh toothpaste (with Scope Outlast!) took the dirt right off. Any toothpaste will do. You don't need anything fancy; it's just all I had. I would avoid using a purely gel toothpaste, but if it's got some gel in it, it should still work.

A little bowl of water.

I covered the canvas portion of the shoe with paper towel to keep it dry.

Here you can see it made quite a difference:

All clean!

Next, to take off those bows! I used a seam ripper and they came off with no trouble.

Much better.

I decided to put tape over the rubber so I wouldn't get glitter on it.

It didn't really work.

Maybe Vaseline would have been better.

This is after two coats:

I definitely got glitter on the inside.

A bit messy.

I tried drying them a bit with a hair dryer...

...but my assistant decided she'd been patient long enough and started screaming. Like that kind of screaming that means she's pretty sure she is actually dying. In my haste to comfort her, I knocked over my open bottle of Mod Podge, and of course it spilled a bunch on the carpet. Why was it still open? I really need to learn to pay attention. I didn't get any pics of the carnage, but thankfully Mod Podge is fairly easy to clean with just soap and water.

I let the shoes dry for about two hours and checked to see if I needed to add another coat. There were a few spots where the canvas was showing through, so I could have just filled in the holes, but I opted for another thick coat. I let them dry for about another hour, just to the point that the glue was still tacky but had turned clear. At this point, I needed to get the excess glitter off of the rubber pieces. It peels off easily enough, but I didn't want to risk pulling on some of the glitter on the toe and having it peel off any of the glitter on the canvas. I used a utility knife to cut along the edges of the toes and the soles (being careful not to cut too deep), then peeled away. For the really sticky bits, I used a q-tip dipped in nail polish remover. While doing this, I rested the shoes on my leg. I definitely scraped up the spot that I rested the shoes on, because (surprise!) foil glitter has sharp edges. Don't do that.

Here they are after I got the extra glitter off:

I took them in the garage and sanded along the inside of the foot hole so my feet wouldn't get scraped up by the glitter while wearing the shoes. I then sprayed them with two coats of clear glaze, as recommended in the tutorial I was following. To protect the inside, I stuffed them with newspaper. 

Before glaze.

After glaze.

Let me tell you, as a fledgling crafter, I had never used clear glaze (or even heard of it, at that). I went to Michael's on a quest to find some, and couldn't find anything that mentioned flexibility. I ended up getting this one:

Based on the description, it's comparable to what the artist used in the cited tutorial (she used Dresden Clear Glaze. Upon further research, however, I did find a few spray glazes that may work better in the future (not that this didn't work beautifully). Design Master makes two products I hope to try out soon, one called Super Surface Sealer, which mentions flexibility with a satin finish, and another called Master Shine, which boasts a flexible, high gloss finish. Both seem perfectly suited to this project, as well as many other projects.

Here is the finished product:

I love them. I adore them. I was worried the canvas wouldn't work as well as a hard-sided shoe like in the tutorial, but it worked great! I want to wear these everywhere. I may even make a couple more pairs in solid colors.

Anyway, thanks for reading and enjoy making your own glitter flats!

Diaper Box to Toy Box

Recently, my mother-in-law sent us a huge box of toys for Audrey. Most of them are too advanced for her age, but they won't be for long. Until she can play with them, I needed to think of some way to store them. Our house is a little small, and her nursery (which also serves as my crafting/sewing room) is pretty much stuffed full of baby clothes, blankets, diapers, crib sheets, fabric, scrapbook supplies, stuffed animals, etc. It also houses our file cabinet and my sewing cart. Needless to say, I didn't have a lot of options when it came to storing toys with which she can't yet play. Of course, this situation needed to be remedied.

Not safe!

I would have liked to build a toy box, but for now I opted for a cheaper solution. So I wrapped an empty diaper box with some old gift wrap - I'll switch it with some canvas later; for now I just wanted to use what I had on hand. Then I sewed up a basket liner using this tutorial and some fabric I purchased a couple years ago to make a dress (I subsequently lost interest in said dress - typical.).
Here is the finished product, filled with those awesome toys:

I'm satisfied with it for now, but I do look forward to replacing the gift wrap with canvas. Besides, when her toy collection grows, I'll need a bigger box. Or I could do a couple more diaper boxes with the same fabric. We'll see.

Today's post is a twofer, though! My friend's birthday is coming up, and I'm busily making things to give her. Here is a treat box I'm going to fill with goodies:

I followed this great tutorial. I love that she included measurements; this was a very easy project to complete. To add some strength to the lid and outside if the box, I glued the scrapbook paper (which was much lighter than card stock) to some thin cardboard before folding it up. I do have a few more details I plan to add, but they'll have to wait until my Slice die-cutting machine arrives. I'll post more pics when it's finished.

So far, almost all the crafts I've posted have been based on ideas I've seen when Stumbling, or even reproduced following online tutorials. I put my own spin on them, sure, but they're not my original ideas, and - I want to be clear - I don't take credit for them. The reason I mention this is to explain why I haven't done any step-by-step instructions. I link to the tutorials I've used, and I encourage you to visit them and try them out for yourself. I've had a lot of fun creating my own versions of these projects, and I do intend to complete projects of my own. When I do, I will include a how-to. Since I'm just starting out, I'm hoping that doing it this way will spark my own creativity. Of course, even if I do come up with my own craft ideas, that isn't to say they won't have been done before. The beauty of arts and crafts is that many people truly can think of the same idea at the same time, without any outside influences. The reason our creations are unique is because we put our own mark on them.

Anyway, I've gone on long enough. Thanks for reading!

Sweet Potato Baby

As Audrey approaches the stage in which we're supposed to start supplementing her diet with solid foods, I've found myself floundering in the search for foods the whole family can eat. I don't intend to buy prepackaged (read: expensive) baby food, and we have a very nice food processor, so the plan is to buy, cook, mash, and freeze a range of foods for her. Being that I'm a first-time mom, this is new and potentially scary territory. Daily, I spend a few hours on pediatric websites and parenting blogs, and all I end up with is a queasy feeling and more questions than answers. How much solid food should I give her to start with? What types of foods should I avoid? How many different types of food should she eat in a day? Is there some kind of pyramid for this?

Needless to say, I feel lost. I have found answers to most of these questions, but because the answers are so wide-ranging, I can't decide which ones are the right ones for my family. The only answer I get from the pediatrician is that breastmilk is enough for now because she's still gaining weight. Awesome. Not that it doesn't make me feel good to know I'm still doing well at feeding my child, I just need some pointers so I can prepare for the future.

I'm also trying to improve the variety and health-factor of my diet and that of the hubs. Peas are a no go, at least for me. I'm not sure I could even stomach the task of mashing them up for Audrey, I hate them so much. I'll try, but I can't guarantee it'll work. We'll see. Beets, carrots, squash, and spinach are apparently unsafe to prepare at home (things I wouldn't know without Google) due to potentially high levels of nitrates. Living in Alaska, produce is not only expensive, but is also not very fresh. For some items, it's not a big deal, but peaches, pears, avocado, and bananas can be pricy. I have been buying bananas anyway, and I don't intend to stop, but peaches, pears and avocado may be another matter.

I was about ready to give up and just buy the darn food in jars, but last night something awesome happened. I was at a friend's house, and she was preparing the week's food for her one-year-old son, Noah. She'd bought two big sweet potatoes, a big yam (which we later discovered was actually just a light-colored sweet potato that had been mislabeled by the grocery store - a common mistake), and a summer squash. She cut all three up into small chunks and roasted them, some plain for Noah, and some with spices for her and her husband. Now, until last night I was under the impression I didn't like sweet potatoes. I hate sweet potato pie and fries, and really had never tried them any other way.

They were amazing. Not too sweet, and not bland, but not overly spiced. What's more, Audrey loved them too. I just smushed some up with my fingers and let her have a taste, and she went nuts! Best of all, they're cheap! Even in Alaska!

I am now a convert. At least for this particular preparation. Here's a simple recipe, and I highly recommend it, even for people who think they don't like sweet potatoes.

Ingredients:
2 lbs sweet potatoes, peeled and chopped
1/2 white onion, chopped
2 tbsp olive oil
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
3/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper

Directions:In large bowl, combine all ingredients. Toss to coat potatoes. Transfer to large rectangle baking dish and bake at 475 degrees for 25 - 30 minutes.

Such a simple recipe, and totally worth a try. If you're also preparing some for a little one, set aside a portion of the sweet potatoes to bake plain. I can't wait to make this at my home.

Cash Envelope Clutch

I've been meaning to start the cash envelope system for a while, but it is hard to change how we've been doing things. Really hard. Saving money is not one of our strong points.

I figured we need to start being more responsible, especially now that it's not just me and the husbo anymore. This is step one.

I followed the tutorial for the clutch by Sunghee at Hybrid Chick. The only thing I did differently (aside from the paper choices) is the fastener. She used a magnetic snap under the flap, but I didn't have any. Instead, I attached a button to the flap with embroidery floss, made a loop out of an old hair tie, and poked it through a hole near the bottom. The first time I closed it, the embroidery floss tore a huge hole in the flap (should have seen that coming). To add some strength, I cut a piece of plastic from a container of screws my husband had brought home from Lowe's and glued it to the back of the flap, then poked holes through it and the paper and tied the button back on.

The envelope template and tutorial is at Kelleigh Ratzlaff Designs.

I love this clutch, and I can't wait to use it. I plan to make another for my friend who is already using the cash envelope system. What a fun and completely customizable project!

Sock Dolls

About two years ago I came across a book about making sock dolls, called Stray Sock Sewing by David. I loved the idea, and ran with it. I made quite a few during the first year, but when I got pregnant I was sick so much and had so little energy I stopped crafting for a while.

Anyway, here are the ones I made already.

This is the first one I made, a vampire zebra for my friend.

The eyes are a bit wonky.

This is a cat/dragon or something.

I added some decoration to the back on this one.

This is my favorite. It's a zombie cat!

I gave this little piggy to my mom.

This is based on a sketch I had lying around.

This green cat was made for a friend's kid.

This squirrel was for her other kid.

I don't know about this one.

I have a few I need to finish up, and some ideas for more after that. I just need to get back in the swing of things.