Chaotic Bliss

Homemade Lotion/Moisturizer

2010-07-09T06:37:00.002-04:00

I am a lotion snob. There are so many lotions and moisturizers out there that just don't meet my standards. My hands get really dry and so I like my hand lotion to make them feel...well...NOT DRY! I can't believe how many just leave my hands feeling yucky after all the lotion has soaked in.

And almost every lotion on store shelves contain harmful, unhealthy ingredients. Even natural or organic products can contain less than desirable stuff. If you wouldn't eat it, then you really shouldn't be putting it on your skin.

A couple years ago I found a recipe of sorts somewhere online. I'm not sure where I found it or who came up with it. It's so simple!

4 parts aloe vera gel
1 part vegetable glycerin

That's it!

I get both of these ingredients from Vitacost for about $8 plus shipping. If you're trying to avoid chemicals and other nasty stuff in your skin products then you know how stinking expensive decent lotions can be! In the last couple of years I think I've only had to buy both these ingredients twice. And I use this stuff liberally every day. So, $16 plus shipping for 2 years worth of chemical free hand lotion makes sense to me!

You can also add in essential oils to give it some fragrance.

This post is part of Fight Back Fridays over at Food Renegade.

Hooray for Summer!!

2010-06-28T21:58:00.003-04:00

I'm on a mission this summer to eat as healthfully and as organically as possible for as little money as possible. So, when opportunities like this come around, I go for it! My friend sent me a text one Saturday and said that the strawberries in her garden needed to be picked that day or they would go bad! It made me sad to think of all these sweet berries going to waste, so I loaded up my giant bowl and headed over. I was able to fill this in about a half hour. I was so excited to have some strawberries for free!! I usually pay $2.50 for a 10 oz bag of organic berries. These filled 3 gallon ziplocs.

We use strawberries pretty much every day in our smoothies. I think the kids would agree that the ultimate, best, yummiest smoothie ever has to have bananas and strawberries. Nothing beats that combination. We also add kefir, coconut oil, egg yolks and honey. Viola, breakfast!

Earth Clinic and Apple Cider Vinegar

2010-06-16T11:32:00.003-04:00

If you haven't checked out Earth Clinic yet, you really should! It's a huge database of home remedies. If you have a health issue that you're wanting a home remedy for, just put it in the search box. What you will get are real people's experiences with different remedies for that specific malady.

One home remedy that seems to be in each search I try is Apple Cider Vinegar. It seems to be a cure for whatever ails you. It can be used to remove moles! It's good for headaches, including migraines. It's amazing at calming nausea and an upset stomach. This is my go to recipe when I or one of my family has a tummy ache.

8oz water
1-2 tsps apple cider vinegar (or more if it's a really bad tummy ache)
1-2 tsps raw honey

It usually works within a 1/2 hour or so.

It's also WONDERFUL for heartburn! When you experience heartburn you are actually not producing enough stomach acid. So if you take Tums, it's just exacerbating your problem in the long run. Tums suppresses stomach acid. So instead of reaching for them when you have some heartburn after a heavy meal, reach for the ACV instead! Not only is it more effective and healthy for you, it's cheaper! One large bottle of Bragg's Organic ACV is about $5-6.

This is part of Real Food Wednesday at Kelly the Kitchen Kop. Hop on over to see more blog posts about using real food!

Fabulous book

2010-06-08T12:38:00.002-04:00

I just purchased an e-book called Real Food on a Real Budget and so far it is proving very helpful. I'm only about half way through but it's already given me lots of ideas to work with. It will help with sticking to a grocery budget and with my goal to start feeding Rob real food too.

Here's the link

It's well worth the investment if you're wanting to cut down on a real food grocery budget.

Sometimes you just have to let go

2010-06-02T21:35:00.002-04:00

My 6 year old and I recently took a 600 mile road trip. I packed some healthy snacks such as bananas, cheese and almonds but we had to stop at a rest stop for lunch. The Ohio rest stops are like the Taj Mahal of rest stops. They are big, bright, airy and wonderful for children who need to run off pent up energy. But their food choices leave something to be desired. Our choices on this particular trip were The Great American Potato Company, Burger King, some pizza place and Panera Bread. Looking over the menu at Panera I realized that this restaurant is at least making an effort to have a somewhat healthy selection. They offer organic apple juice and their kids mac n cheese is made with organic processed cheese (what?). So this is where we ate. I had a panini (which was delicious, by the way and came with chips made with sunflower oil and sea salt) and Matthew had a PBJ with a yogurt thing that he squirted out of a tube. I figure that while on vacation, what are you gonna do? It may have been healthier to just go hungry and forgo the sugar in the jelly and the probable trans fat in the peanut butter. Not to mention the soy that was most likely in the bread.

I have a hard time letting go of this sometimes. I've gotten so passionate about real, healthy, nourishing foods, that I have a difficult time eating something that I know is bad for me. It's even harder for me to give it to my children. But I ultimately trust God for their health and safety and once in a while we eat like the masses. I'll admit, it was fun biting into a sandwich. I have missed them, that's for sure.

Now that we're home from our little trip, we're kind of detoxing from all that vacation food. We ate several meals out and not all of them were of Panera quality. This morning Matthew had a stomach ache and I've been really fatigued. Not good, when I have loads of boxes waiting to be unpacked. But we're back home now and I'm trying to only serve healthful foods. We'll get back on track. Although, Nathan's birthday is in a week and Rob wants to have pizza. "Let the kid have a birthday!" He says...

Here we go again!

Real Food Challenge: Feed Hubby Real Food Too!

2010-05-22T07:10:00.002-04:00

For the last 4 (or so) years that I've been transitioning my diet and that of my children to whole foods, my husband has continued to eat how he always has. Junk. Junk. Junk. He works very hard and he works a lot in order to provide for us, so convenience foods were sometimes his only option. He has finally come to the point where he would like to try to eat a healthier diet and I'm thrilled with this of course. But our challenge is in the fact that in order to feed him only whole, real foods and to fill him up, it's going to cost a lot of money, at least at first. You see, as a person switches to a more natural diet and does away with boxed, fake foods, the tastes change and it doesn't take as much food to feel satisfied. Getting Rob to that point will probably take some time and of course some extra money. This is always where we come to a stand still. But things have to change. He had an ordeal that involved his heart and landed him in the ER several years ago, so in order for him to be healthy and, let's face it, alive for years to come, we need to change what he eats.

Game plan

1. Meal Planning

I absolutely MUST start planning our meals again and be consistent. It makes grocery shopping so much easier and it cuts down trips to the store. It also is so nice to just look at the list on the fridge and know what to make for dinner that night!

2. More variety with each meal

The kids and I are used to having maybe a salad with some chicken for dinner. Or just a bowl of soup. That would never fill Rob up. So I'm thinking a main dish with two or three sides of veggies (with lots of filling butter!). This will make the kids happier too, I'm sure.

3. Learn how to make sourdough bread

I would like to learn how to make sourdough and how to soak grains and make bread from those. This would help with Rob's lunches and snacks. For now, I'm kind of at a loss as to what to send with him to work.

3. Discuss joining a CSA and buying meat in bulk once or twice a year

I think we could save quite a bit of money by doing this, it's just really hard for us to come up with a large sum of money at once.

These are the first few things I will work on and I'm hoping to update how it's going. We are moving next week and when I feel a little bit settled I will start right in with the menu planning. If anyone has ideas on whole, real foods that Rob could take with him for lunch and snacks to work, I'd really appreciate a comment!

Real Food

2010-05-21T18:51:00.003-04:00

Check out my new banner! I am honored to have the Real Food Media banner displayed on my humble little blog. The Real Food Media Network is a group of bloggers that are dedicated to spreading the word about the importance of real food. What is real food, some may ask? It is food taken straight from nature. It hasn't been through any heavy processing. It hasn't been stripped of its nutrients and had additives and chemicals added just to increase shelf life. It doesn't come in a brightly colored cardboard or plastic package. It's meat, dairy, fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, etc...from nature. You can find it on local farms and at nearby markets.

I've been on a nearly 4 year journey trying painstakingly to get my family to a point where we don't eat processed foods. I'm happy to say that we've pretty much made it that far at least. Our food doesn't have ingredients lists and labels. We still have a ways to go as far as getting all organic, grass fed and non-gmo food, but I'm happy with where we are right now.

I'm hoping to post more about my journey with real food and sharing my passion for dealing with health issues using food and better nutrition. I hope you'll stay tuned!

Family Update 2/2010

2010-02-26T09:15:00.006-05:00

Oh so much to say....

I haven't blogged in so long. So much has happened since my last family update.

We are still in our little apartment in Pennsylvania. Our house in Indiana still sits cold and empty. We recently had a little activity on it that gave us a tiny ray of hope but unfortunately that situation is not going to pan out. We are going to wait through the spring for it to sell since the spring is the best time of year for house buying. After that we're not sure what we'll do or where we'll end up. It's very frustrating not having any idea where life is going to lead! But we continue to trust God to take care of us and provide for us wherever he may lead us.

Rob is still working hard at his job. He has had a lot of overtime lately which is great for the bank account but sometimes the kids don't see him for 3 days at a time because he leaves before they wake up and he gets home after they go to bed.

I've been keeping busy with our various activities and some great new friends that I've made. It's fun to have a reason to wear my nicer clothes and to actually put on make up!

At the beginning of this year I signed up to be a Premier Designs Jeweler. Now I did this at the request of my husband because it seemed like a great way to help out with monthly bills and such. At the beginning I told him not to expect much because I have tried direct sales companies before and have had no success with them. And I mean NO success whatsoever. It's just not something that I do well. I had my training show in the middle of January and to this date have not had any other shows. But I'm really okay with it. I know somebody, someday, somewhere will have a show for me. The nice thing about Premier is that there are no quotas. I don't have to sell a certain amount to stay active.

Matthew is doing well with homeschooling. He is doing pretty well with reading and even his handwriting is getting better! He seems to do well with math. I'm looking forward to doing some more fun things with him next year. I feel like I have more of a handle on homeschooling and can plan a bit better for next year. I've sort of been looking into private schools to see if we could possibly send him. It's looking like we won't be able to but maybe someday. Private Christian school has always been my first choice but it's just not affordable right now. But at this point it's so hard to plan for anything since we don't even know where we'll be in at the start of school next year.

Matthew has dumped his dinosaurs. I'm not sure how it happened or exactly when but he is now obsessed with Star Wars. Ugh ugh, triple ugh! He has seen all 6 movies and has a game that he plays on his grandma's computer. With dinosaurs I didn't feel the need to limit his exposure to them. Sure a T-rex can be violent but that's just how animals can be. Now I have to monitor what he's doing on the computer and limit his movie watching. He looks up youtube videos that people have made with legos. Some of them are not appropriate for a 6 year old!

I was just reading over my posts from the last year and am astounded at how different Nathan is from when I first started blogging. When he was evaluated by First Steps in Indiana they said he had delays in almost every category. (cognitive, social, motor skills, speech, etc) A couple of weeks ago he was re-evaluated by the people here in PA. He has a delay in speech of course but his only other delay is in motor skills and they said it's quite a mild delay. They didn't say anything about apraxia. Nathan doesn't have apraxia! It's gone! I'm trying to dig up some videos that show how his speech (or lack thereof) was before we started Gaps. Then I want to post one of him talking now. It's truly amazing. Anyway, he continues to talk non-stop. His behavior has ups and downs but usually he's pretty happy. All in all I'd say I have a perfectly normal 3 year old. Yippee!

And then there's my sweet Gigi. She is growing and developing just as she should. She actually is nearly as tall as Nathan is. She's finally putting on some weight. I think she's around 25 pounds now after having been 20 pounds for over a year.

When Gigi was 4 or 5 months old she broke out in a rash that looked like tiny bug bites. Each spot would be red for about a day and then turn light brown. She probably had about a hundred spots show up within a week or two. She is now 2 1/2 and still has these brown spots all over her body. I feel like I scoured the internet several times looking for something even remotely close to what she has. Apparently I didn't google the right group of words because several weeks ago I finally stumbled on what it is. She has Mastocytosis. It's a skin disease that involves the body's mast cells. Mast cells release histamine when a person has an allergic reaction. In mastocytosis the mast cells group together near the surface of the skin and cause spots. In my research I've discovered that most children with masto have other allergies and allergic responses to things. A lot of children have severe itching and inflammation of their spots and possible anaphylactic reactions. Common triggers of these reactions are chemicals, additives and preservatives in processed foods. By the time Gigi was ready to start solids I was pretty much done buying processed foods. Even as a baby she drank a homemade formula made with whole natural ingredients. So I'm wondering if by having a fairly clean diet is what has kept her mastocytosis at bay. Her spots never flare up. There have been times that I've thought they looked more red than usual but other than that they never bother her a bit. She also doesn't seem to react to other things. She was stung by a bee this summer near her eye. Her eye swelled up a bit but that was all.

These spots usually go away by puberty so I'm hopeful that this condition that she has won't cause horrible lifelong problems. I'm hoping to get her to a dermatologist to confirm the diagnosis and then I'll go on with my own research and not listen to anything they say to do! :) Actually the only way they treat masto is to treat the allergic reactions. A lot of children are prescribed zyrtec and benadryl to control the itching. So far there isn't any medicine to treat the cause because they don't know what the cause is. The only thing I've dug up so far is that histamine levels are directly tied to bacteria in the gut. I was relieved to hear that because I'm familiar with gut bacteria and what to do about it.

So that's us in a very large nutshell. Til next time!

Depression and Anxiety

2009-10-28T12:46:00.003-04:00

Over the last several weeks I've heard several friends of mine say they were struggling with depression, moodiness, anxiety and just plain feeling overwhelmed and tired. It's inspired me to write this post just to share my own journey with depression and anxiety and what has helped me in the hopes that perhaps someone else can get something useful out of it.

I've dealt with depression and anxiety since I was 19. I first went on the anti-depressant drug zoloft after some stressful circumstances (moving, graduation, boyfriend breakup). I was on it for about a year and then weaned myself off. Shortly after getting married I went on it again and stayed on until I became pregnant with my first baby. I weaned off again only to find myself desperately needing it after Matthew was born. I took zoloft until he was almost 1 and then decided to wean off of it again. Everything was fine until about 5 weeks after Nathan was born. I started taking it again but decided that I only wanted to be on it as long as necessary. So when he was about 6 months old, I tried going off of it and I was fine without it. I also needed it after Gigi was born and again, was able to go off of it when she was about 6 months old. As you can see, for whatever reason, major life events caused things to go awry and I needed zoloft.

When Nathan was a baby I started to change the way I eat. I cut way back on processed foods and tried to eat a lot less sugar. We started drinking raw milk and eating more healthy fats including butter and coconut oil. My goal was to eventually eat only whole foods. Foods that are from nature, that have not been through a processing plant and have not had synthetic ingredients added to it. As of now, I've pretty much achieved that goal. We (husband not included) don't eat anything out of a box anymore. I don't even have to read labels like I used to. Our food doesn't have labels.

2 months ago we moved from Indiana, where I grew up and where I loved living, to Pennsylvania. I left my parents, a very close grandmother and some of my best friends. It wasn't an easy thing to do. Given my history with depression this event should have sent me running to a doctor for a prescription for zoloft. But, even though I have been sad about leaving home, I haven't need it. There's no doubt in my mind that a healthier diet is the reason I haven't been depressed.

Processed foods have so many extra additives, preservatives, colorings, flavorings and fake stuff in them that it depletes the body of real nutrients that we need to be healthy and to feel good. And they are all packed with sugar which wreaks havoc on the immune system! When I eat sugar now I get all grouchy and angry and yell at my kids for the whole day after. It's not worth it.

It's easy to just take a pill to feel better. But there is an underlying reason for depression and anxiety. There's a reason for feeling grouchy all the time. If you never deal with the root cause of it, then the problem isn't going to go away on its own. And it's not going to get any better. I know it's hard to imagine that what you eat can have such a profound effect on how you feel emotionally and mentally but it does! There's a strong gut/brain connection. Take drunk people for example! Alcohol goes in and stupid comes out! For me, it's sugar goes in and angry comes out.

So take a good look at what's in the fridge and cupboards. Check out the labels. If nothing else, throw out anything that contains high fructose corn syrup or hydrogenated oils. Those two are some of the nastiest, most harmful ingredients that a person can consume.

Most of all, just please try something. Try to not eat any sugar for a week and see if you feel any better. Or better yet, challenge yourself to only eat whole foods for a couple weeks and see how that goes. It's certainly not going to hurt anything and you may just feel better and that will be motivation enough to keep it up.

Here's to happier days!

Waves of Die Off and a Family Update

2009-10-17T15:17:00.003-04:00

We all have bacteria and yeast in our digestive tracts. We need both the "good guys" (beneficial flora) and the "bad guys"(pathogenic bacteria and yeast) in our system for proper digestion. BUT in most of us the good guys have been weakened or damaged and the bad guys have gotten out of control. Various things can damage or weaken the good guys. Not being breastfed, being born by C-section, poor nutrition, low fat/high carb diets and vaccinations are just a few off the top of my head. Having an imbalance of gut flora can cause any number of diseases and health issues such as asthma, food and environmental allergies, autoimmune diseases, autism, adhd, heart problems, celiac disease, and the list goes on and on....

When a person with an imbalanced flora decides to fight back and stops eating processed foods, stops eating foods they are sensitive to and starts eating healing nourishing foods and introduces more beneficial bacteria through probiotics and fermented foods, then these pathogenic beasts begin to die. Unfortunately they don't go down without a fight. As they die they release toxins which can make a person feel even worse than before they began the diet change! They can cause a flare of the very symptoms that prompted the person to begin the diet.

My two youngest children have been on the Gaps Diet for almost 7 months. The first round of die off when we first started was fairly severe. They were lethargic, vomiting, lost some weight, etc. Since then I've seen milder symptoms of die off. I think it has mostly been displayed in their mood. They are grumpy a lot. Nathan also throws tantrums. Right before we moved to PA we had several weeks of a happy, calm and tantrum free Nathan. In the last couple of weeks he has started throwing them again. Every time this happens I kind of panic and worry that he's going back to this behavior and this is how he's going to be for the rest of his life. Over the last couple of days he has gotten a little calmer. I hope and pray that we're on the other side of this wave of die off.

I decided a few days ago to ramp up the amount of probiotic foods and supplements to produce some die off on purpose. I want to kill those yeast beasties and get it over with! Since then Nathan has been peeing like a horse. He has to pee every couple hours whereas before he would only go a couple times a day and NEVER wake up wet. He's been wetting the bed quite frequently lately. This actually makes me happy. It means that the bad guys are moving out. I haven't noticed anything specific like this with Gigi. But I don't think she has as much yeast overgrowth as Nathan does.

As far as non-diet related news goes--I did decide to homeschool Matthew this year! So far it has been great. I am beyond happy that we made this decision. Judging from how he has trouble staying on task with me at our kitchen table, I think he would have been utterly exhausted after a half day of school. He's such an obedient kid so I know he would have listened and done his best to focus if he had gone to public school. That would have worn him out every day. This way he does a little school with me and has a relaxing rest of the day playing with his brother and sister, friends or visiting Grandma.

We are using Sonlight curriculum that we are borrowing (thank you Cara and Kendra!!!!!). I love the curriculum and I've adapted it for Matthew as best as I can. Some of the reading is over his head so we may skip some of the books. The beginning of the math workbook is too easy, so we're flying through that. I focus mostly on practicing reading and handwriting. I also read him all the poetry, and the Bible stories. We also do a lot with dinosaurs. It's his passion right now. My mom sent us a book called Dinosaurs by Design that gives a creationist view of dinosaurs. We've just started reading that together. I'm really interested in learning about them too.

Nathan is loving preschool and I've gotten nothing but good reports so far. He now sits forward on the potty. Sometimes at home he insists on having his pants all the way off but as far as I know that's not a problem anywhere else.

Gianna is a little stinker. She is a big drama queen and knows that she is adorable. It's so hard not to laugh when she's being naughty and cute at the same time.

Rob now has a new position where he works. It's not as physically demanding and he enjoys it a lot more that what he was doing before.

And then there' s me. I'm doing okay. Days are tough sometimes as all I do is break up fights and do a little fighting myself to get everyone dressed and out the door on time for our various activities.

We're still waiting on our house in Indiana to sell. Until it does we'll make do in our little apartment. One upside to having a really small place is that it doesn't take much time to clean!

And that's all I have to say today. I'll try my hardest to keep this updated more often. I'm thinking of starting a different blog that will focus more on health and nutrition but so far that's just an idea. Till next time!

The Big Move

2009-08-18T20:06:00.003-04:00

So, a lot has happened since the last post. I'll update as best I can. We decided to let our house sit empty and move me and the kids to Pennsylvania. We are staying in a tiny apartment but at least we're all together. The kids have a blast playing with their dad. They don't have near that much fun with me! :) The move went well. We've got most of what we use unpacked. A lot of our stuff is in boxes waiting for another move. We keep praying for the right buyer to come and see our house.

The kids are adjusting very well to the move. We've been here a week and so far it's been just like we're on a vacation. They've been swimming almost every day and playing outside a lot. And Grandma Diane has been here a lot as well. One of these days real, boring life with set in.

Matthew will start Kindergarten in two weeks. I would love to homeschool him this year, but I don't feel ready and he really wants to go to school. I will use this year to prepare for homeschooling next year.

Nathan will start preschool on September 10th. I think he'll really like it. I'm unsure of how things will go with his potty habits. As of now he still goes #2 in his pants a lot. And he prefers to sit backwards on the toilet. I'm not sure how his teachers will feel about taking off his pants so he can crawl up on it. Hmmmm. He will for sure be in a pull up everyday. Otherwise he is doing great at potty training. He rarely wets his pants anymore. 2 down, 1 to go!!

I've continued to keep N and G on the Gaps Diet during our move and transition. I kind of got away from making a lot of meat and veggie dishes so now that I've started making them more they've been rejecting them. But they'll get back to where they wolf them down. This evening they both devoured roasted onions and zucchini. And for lunch they both ate ground beef and broccoli. I think things are getting back on track.

I think Nathan has a yeast overgrowth. I discovered that too much fruit seemed to correlate with terrible tantrums. For a while he was having these awful fits. It was like he wasn't even there, he was just screaming and not hearing me. Usually a timeout in his room and maybe a swat on the butt would take care of it, but these tantrums were out of control. I removed fruit completely from his diet (except for a small amount of lime juice in smoothies) and the tantrums got milder. And everytime he would get a hold of some fruit, the next day would be horrible. So I kept fruit out as best I could. The last few weeks Nathan has been a different kid. He has been happy, content and cooperative (mostly). Every time I think he's going to go off the deep end he seems to listen to reason and calm down. This morning I put 1/2 a banana in his smoothie. He threw a fit when we went to the grocery store a couple hours later. Of course, I can't be positive that the banana caused it but I have strong suspicions. So, no more bananas for now. He seems to be okay with small amounts of strawberries and blueberries. And he had a little watermelon a couple weeks ago and did okay. It's like a game figuring this stuff out.

Nathan is still learning and saying new words. He says sentences and surprises us at least once a day by saying something new. It's hard to believe that only 6 months ago he didn't say a word!

I'm doing okay too. The first few days were pretty hard. I miss home. But I feel better and I'm excited to hang out with some new friends and lots of Rob's family!

It's been too long!

2009-06-19T15:58:00.002-04:00

It is way past time for another update on the Kulp family!

We're all doing quite well. We are almost 9 weeks into our Gaps diet adventure. When we went gluten/dairy free in the middle of February Nathan gradually started saying words. It was very gradual. One day I thought "did he just say shoe?" And as the days went on he did indeed say shoe and countless other words. Then at the end of March we started the intro diet of Gaps and Nathan is now saying sentences!!!!!! Just the other day I held a conversation with him about where Matthew was. He still has a long way to go with articulation because he's not very clear, but hey, he went from saying absolutely nothing to speaking sentences in 4 months! He also used to be very cranky. Even as a baby he was, as I used to call it, cantankerous. He is now a pretty happy kid. He does have a rather volatile temper and has trouble with tantrums when things don't go his way, but in general every day life he seems more content.

Just today Gigi spent the morning crying. She was just extremely unhappy about anything and everything and I realized that she used to do that ALL THE TIME! She used to cry for no apparent reason almost every day. She is a happy girl now! She, of course, has moments (such as this morning) and tends to be a little on the cranky side, but not near as much as she used to be.

We took a trip to Pennsylvania and successfully stayed on this diet. They had way more fruit than they do at home, but all in all, it went very well. Next week we are going to the zoo and the week after that we are spending 3 days in Columbus, OH. I've been planning our menus for these two excursions over the last few days. I think we'll all have a good time.

Family Update

2009-05-20T22:37:00.002-04:00

It's been way too long since my last post! I was going to try to keep up better. Nathan and Gigi have been on Gaps for just over 4 weeks. They're both doing quite well. Nathan has put on a couple pounds and he says new words every day. I have the greatest video of him reading a book that I'm trying to upload to Facebook and Youtube. It takes so long!
Both of them have also had a few really good, happy days! A lot of our days are full of crying and general unhappiness for no apparent reason. This last week we have had 2 full days of really happy kids. Sunday was amazing. They were in such wonderful moods. I didn't hear anybody screaming or carrying on in the nursery while I was sitting in church. They ate lunch and played at Grandma's house with nary a tear. Of course when we were leaving there were some issues, but by then they were tired. I am confident that we will have more and more days like these.

They haven't had a lot of reactions to foods. We've intro'd almond butter, coconut oil, blended raw apples (in smoothies) and yesterday Nathan had a small chunk of raw carrot. Today they both had some raw red pepper and I put frozen strawberries in their smoothies. I also added more coconut oil than I usually do into their smoothies. I'm not sure what caused it but they had some weird concoctions in their diapers and they both threw up within minutes of each other! So I will not give pepper or strawberries for a while and I will definitely back off on the coconut oil. Nathan cheeks were also red this evening. I'm really suspecting the peppers.

So, nothing earth shattering to report. Just more words and happier days, but that's an amazing accomplishement in just 4 weeks! I'll try to update more soon!

Gaps Revisited: Day 10 Update

2009-04-29T22:23:00.003-04:00

Nathan and Gianna have begun their Gaps adventure. Last Sunday I started serving boiled meats and veggies as per the intro diet. The intro diet consists of slowly adding foods into the diet so you can tell which ones you react to.

In the first couple of days both of them were lethargic and feeling pretty lousy. This is very normal. When the unhealthy bacteria and yeast aren't being fed anymore with anything that doesn't get digested properly then they start to die. As they die off, they release toxins and can make us feel sick.
On days 3 and 4 Gigi ate absolutely nothing. I think she just felt too miserable to eat. I was even serving things that they normally like and eat happily. By day 4 I was getting nervous because I could tell she was losing weight. So I started making smoothies using avocado, coconut milk, freshly pressed apple juice and honey just to get something in her. I didn't veer very far off the intro path, so I was okay with this adjustment. I also made butternut squash pudding before I had planned to. But she started eating a little bit on day 5 and on day 6 she ate a little more. By day 7 she had gained almost all the weight back that she had lost. It was incredible because she really wasn't eating that much!

So by Saturday they were both feeling much better and pretty much normal. That's when I noticed an odd looking blister on Nathan's neck. My first thought was die off. But as the day progressed he had a few more spots. Then Sunday morning he had more. And I noticed some on Gigi as well. We went to church and I figured it was just a die off thing. Finally as I was sitting in the nursery holding Nathan and watching Gigi play among some babies, the thought came to me that they might have the Chicken Pox! Of course I felt terrible that we were probably infecting the nursery not to mention the day care that also uses that room! Ugh! We slinked out of church as soon as we could and I went straight home to Google images of chicken pox. Yup, sure enough, that's what they have. They felt pretty bad Monday and Tuesday but Wednesday they seemed okay and I didn't notice any new spots cropping up.

Part of the Gaps diet protocol is to take a strong probiotic. The kind we take is called Biokult. It has 14 strains of healthy bacteria and millions of cells per.....blah blah blah. Needless to say it's strong stuff.
On Wednesday morning I bumped up their probiotic dosage. I'm not sure how much I give exactly I just pour some powder from the capsule onto a spoon. I just gave them a tiny bit more than I had been. Holy die off! They were so crabby today! They both went to bed at 6 after taking naps! Whew! I've decided to only give them one dose of probiotic per day instead of the recommended two. We will go very slowly with this stuff.

In the last 10 days Nathan and Gigi have both had normal looking bowel movements!! They usually have a mass of murk and mire lurking in their diapers. This is very exciting for me.
Nathan has also been saying more words. He says new words every day. Today he said "play" and he started calling me "Mommy" instead of "Mama".

This attempt at Gaps is so different than the last time. They didn't get quite as sick and it didn't last as long. I'm actually seeing results here within the first week. Last time I didn't see much improvement. There was subtle improvement in Nathan. That's when he first started making animal sounds which is what his speech started as. But there weren't any earth shattering changes. I think they were dealing with so much die off and even though we did it for 5 weeks, the die off just was so strong. I gave them way too much probiotic in the beginning. And they weren't off dairy for long enough. And I gave them too many things made with honey and butternut squash. And they went from eating a PBJ once a day and having milk and cheese all the time to nothing but meat and veggies. It was too much of a change all at once.

This time we had been gluten and dairy free for a couple months before starting this. They were used to seeing veggies on their plates for 2 meals out of the day. It wasn't as much of a shock. Plus, I'm not going through my own terrible die off. I already dealt with that back in January when I started the Gaps diet. I still have a lot more healing to do, but I've come to terms with the fact that I cannot do the intro diet with the kids. I am way too focused on what they're eating(or not eating) to think about what I'm eating. And I end up hardly eating anything. That's really not conducive to healing. So for now I'm just going along with the list of recommended foods and not worrying about the intro progression.

Today for lunch I made chicken/broccoli/ginger stir fry. It also had onions and garlic. Nathan ate the broccoli (with onions mixed in) and Gigi happily ate all her chicken and some of mine. Then for dinner I made roast beef with roasted red pepper, onions and zucchini. They ate all the zucchini, most of the peppers and half the onions. Gigi also ate some of the beef. WOW! They never eat like this! I am so excited to see them eat REAL food and not exist on coconut flour muffins and fruit!

I will try to update this every week, but I'm pretty terrible at updating. If you're wondering how we're doing, feel free to ask!

My Mission Field

2009-04-02T10:50:00.003-04:00

One Sunday at church the sermon was about compassion and in this world of hurt and suffering doing nothing is not an option. It was a call to help those in need and have compassion on those that need the healing love of Jesus. During the sermon I thought about how nice it would be to start volunteering somewhere like a homeless shelter or something. But I'd need a sitter. It would be good if I could start visiting nursing homes and reading to patients. But I'd need a sitter. It would be a wonderful thing to go to Kenya and help out with the babies at the Baby Center. I'd really need a sitter. I'D NEED A SITTER! Now wait a minute, who do I need a sitter for? My children. Those blessed little people that I brought into this world. I came to the realization that I am raising soldiers of the cross. My home right now with my children is my mission field. This is the place I should be right now doing the best I know how to do with them. When they are grown up and moved onto their own lives, then I can look into shelters and baby centers. I'm not saying I won't volunteer as needs arise and circumstances allow but it gave me a certain peace about my purpose in life right now.

For a while now I've struggled with the thought that since I put so much thought and effort into what my kids eat that somehow I wasn't just trusting God with their health. That I was somehow taking things into my own hands too much. But if I was working at an orphanage and the children had leaky gut or autism or apraxia and I knew a diet change would help them, then I would help them! If finances and circumstances allowed, then I would help them feel better with healthy food! Why should it be any different with my own children? I think we do need to trust God fully with our entire lives including our health but we also have a responsibility to do what we know to be best. Doing nothing is not an option.

My family will probably be so frustrated with me but I'm leaning towards putting two of my kids on the gaps diet. Again. We did this last summer and it was so hard and it was too much of a diet change all at once. But I've learned so much over the last 6 months. We've also changed our diet so much that my kids are used to seeing meat and veggies on their plates for at least one meal every day. Usually two. They don't eat sandwiches every day. They don't have dairy anymore. I don't think the transition would be that bad this time. My reason? My almost 3 year old son cannot speak. He has apraxia. It is a brain disorder and I believe very strongly in the gut-brain connection. Heal the gut, heal the brain. Many disorders and ailments have been alleviated and even eliminated on this diet. It's a major committment. For a sick adult it could be 2 years or longer. But I think for a child who is otherwise fairly healthy it won't take that long.

I don't think Nathan is digesting food properly at all. His diapers can stand up and testify. And they do almost every day. At least he's regular! But he poops toxic waste. I'm concerned that without intervention he will always struggle. Many Apraxic children also have learning difficulties like Dyslexia. Also, there is a serious shortage of speech language pathologists in this area! He is approved for speech therapy once a week but the SLP is only available twice a month. I feel like we're really losing time because of this and I want to do all I can to help Nathan to heal. It's my ministry.

Gianna will also be on the diet just because she's a baby and it should be easy on her. And why not heal her gut now and avoid problems later on? Matthew is my social bug and always has things to go to and do that it would be very hard on him to miss out on the social event we call eating. He can speak and his brain seems just fine. I still want him to remain dairy and gluten free for several months but I won't be putting him on the gaps diet. Later on if there is a need for it, we can always come back to it.

Well, I've rambled quite enough. Just wanted to spell out what I've been thinking lately.

A couple recipes and an update

2009-03-22T16:50:00.002-04:00

We have been gluten and dairy free for almost 5 weeks and I've been giving Nathan fish oil supplements for about 3 weeks. He has had two hour long speech therapy session which have gone fabulously. The first session she got him to say a "b" sound for bubble. Since then I got him to actually say bubble. He now will imitate consonant sounds when asked. With prompting he will also say "more". (It sounds like "mo".) I feel like the diet combined with the supplements and the therapy is really opening things up in his head. He is trying to say so many things now. He used to not even appear to be trying or to even care. Now he will try, even when I'm not prompting him. He is doing more consonant sounds while babbling as well.

I even think his behavior is improving. Today was the first time I've had to put him in a time out for a long time. Today at church he got a tiny bit of the snack that the other children were eating before the teacher remembered the raisins I had brought for him. This afternoon he has been extremely loud and oppositional. Hmmmmm.

Since starting the diet Matthew's skin has been less bumpy. He still gets bumpy spots sometimes but it seems to be less. He also seems to be happier and less moody. And I weighed Gianna the other day and she weighed 23 pounds! She's been 20 pounds since summer. Hooray! My theory is, at least for these two, that dairy is such a hard thing to digest that it was taxing their systems and they weren't assimilating as many nutrients. And they drank and ate a lot of dairy. We have always had a fairly gluten free house, so I don't think wheat was affecting them that much. My plan is to stay GF/CF for 6 months and then slowly start to reintroduce dairy into their diets. I'll start with kefir and yogurt and work up to butter and cheese.

I just have to share a couple recipes that I've made recently. They make a really good breakfast and of course they are sans gluten and dairy....and sugar!

Pumpkin Pie

1 cup pureed pumpkin
1/2 cup oil (I used virgin coconut)
1/2 cup coconut flour
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup honey
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp baking soda

It's pretty thick when all mixed together so mash it into a pie plate. Bake at 400 for 20 minutes. It doesn't hold together real well but it tastes great. Drizzle some honey on top or add some chopped nuts. Cashew cream or something similar would probably be delicious on top.

Fruit Yogurt

4 very ripe bananas
1/2 cup frozen strawberries
1/2 cup frozen mango (any frozen fruit will do)
1 /2 - 1 cup almond milk (or coconut milk or even water will work)

Blend. Enjoy.

You could also mix in an avocado to make it creamier. Add some coconut oil to the avocado before mixing the other things and you'll have a tasty wonderfully healthy breakfast!

Hungarian? Goulash and a smoothie

2009-03-16T17:26:00.002-04:00

I tried a new recipe tonight for dinner and it was amazingly delicious!! I adapted it from a recipe that was adapted from an Hungarian Goulash recipe so I wasn't sure what to call it.

1-2 lbs chicken cut into pieces (I used thighs)
1 small summer squash, chopped
1 large onion, chopped
A few stalks of celery, chopped
1/4 c ketchup
1/2 c chicken broth
1 tsp garlic powder or a couple chopped garlic cloves
2 Tbsp honey
2-3 tsp paprika
1 Tbsp dijon mustard
1 Tbsp Fish Sauce (original called for Worcestershire sauce)
Mushrooms (I didn't have any so I left this out, but it would be fantastic with mushrooms!)

Cook the chicken and onion in oil until the chicken starts to brown
Add other veggies and all other ingredients. Mix well, cover and let simmer for 20 minutes.

Very filling by itself but for those addicted to carbs it could be served over rice or noodles.

I decided to make a smoothie after dinner and this is how it went down:

1 cup almond milk (I made my own and it turned out great!)
1 very ripe banana
1 Tbsp coconut oil
1/2 avocado
dash of cinnamon
1 Tbsp honey

I blended the melted coconut oil into the banana first. This emulsifies the oil and keeps it from turning into little oil chunks in the smoothie.
Then I blended everything else.
It was YUMMY!! Everyone loved it and was disappointed there wasn't more.

Menu Plan Monday: GFCF Style

2009-03-02T11:48:00.003-05:00

It's Monday!

My kids and I are gluten and dairy free right now so this menu will reflect that. Anytime you see muffins or bread it's made with coconut flour.

Tuesday:
Breakfast: Eggs and apples
Lunch: Chicken Stir Fry
Dinner: Shepherd's Pie

Wednesday:
Breakfast: Banana Bread
Lunch: Burgers and French Fries
Dinner: Pepper Chicken Skillet

Thursday:
Breakfast: Muffins
Lunch: Leftovers and Fridge Cleanout
Dinner: Chicken in Crockpot w/ Roasted Veggies

Friday:
Breakfast: Bacon and Potatoes
Lunch: PBJ's on Coconut flour bread
Dinner: Meatloaf and Carrot Fries

Saturday:
Breakfast: Eggs and fruit
Lunch: Hamburger Stir Fry
Dinner: Chicken Cacciatore

Sunday:
Breakfast: Cinnamon Apple Latkes (thanks Carrie from Thrifty Oreganic)
Lunch: Leftovers and fridge cleanout
Dinner: Chicken/Veggie Soup w/ Salad

Monday:
Breakfast: Muffins
Lunch: PBJ's
Dinner: Fajita Fixins w Cauliflower "rice"

For more menu plans (over 300!!) head over to I'm an Organizing Junkie!

Real Food Wednesday: REAL FOOD Testimonials

2009-02-25T14:17:00.004-05:00

A lot of my real food conversion story can be found here in another blog post.

I just wanted to add now that we know Nathan has Apraxia, I plan to use real food to heal his gut and send Apraxia packing. I love the testimonies of healing and the sharing of the journey on my GapsHelp Yahoo group. It gives me a lot of hope for Nathan's future. I've seen what real food can do and I love it!!!!

For more Real Food stories go to Cheeseslave for Real Food Wednesday!

Menu Plan Monday -- Feb 23

2009-02-23T12:17:00.002-05:00

Here's my menu plan for this week. I make my new menu on Mondays, so mine always start on Tuesday.

The kids have just started a gluten/casein free diet so this menu plan reflects that. I make a lot of meals that I call stir fry. It's basically just a bunch of cooked veggies and some meat thrown together. It's very good, very nutritious and I'm starting to make it more so that my kids will start to eat it. So far, they're not big fans, but we're working on it! :)

Tuesday:
B: Muffins (using coconut flour)
L: Beef & Mac (using Tinkyada rice pasta)
D: Maple Dijon Chicken in the crockpot

Wednesday:
B: Pumpkin pudding
L: Coconut flour PBJ's
D: Meatloaf and cooked carrots

Thursday:
B: Fried potatoes and bacon
L: Hamburger stir fry
D: Pot Roast

Friday:
B: Eggs and coconut flour toast
L: Chicken stir fry
D: Hamburgers and french fries

Saturday:
B: Muffins
L: Leftovers and fridge clean-out
D: Beef and cabbage filling in rice wraps

Sunday:
B: Eggs and Toast
L: Leftovers and fridge clean-out (or chicken stir fry)
D: Shepherd's Pie

Monday:
B: Banana Bread (coconut flour)
L: Hamburger stir fry
D: Salmon Cakes and steamed broccoli

For more menu planning inspiration visit I'm and Organizing Junkie!

Apple Chicken Burgers!!

2009-02-22T18:01:00.002-05:00

My kids ate something that I made! Hallelluia!!

Apple chicken burgers

1lb ground chicken (turkey would work too)
1 egg
1/4 cup (or more) chopped apple
1/4 cup (or more) chopped celery
1/4 cup applesauce
2-4 Tbsp Coconut flour (put in just enough to thicken the mixture so you can form patties)
Salt and pepper
Pinch of thyme
Pinch of garlic powder (or chopped garlic)
Mix together and form into patties
Fry in a healthy oil (coconut, palm, lard, butter, etc)

They were really good! Rob had his on a bun with onion. Delish!

Family Update

2009-02-19T14:29:00.002-05:00

Economic times have hit northern Indiana really hard. It's amazing that Rob still has his job as thousands have been laid off from the RV industry. Unfortunately his job is not providing an income that a family of five can live on. So he is looking other places for employment. He is pretty sure that his old job C&S Warehouse will rehire him. C&S is in Harrisburg, PA.

We just bought a house this past summer. We're going to put our house (in Indiana) on the market and the kids and I will stay here until it sells. Rob is going to go to Pennsylvania so he can work and earn a living to support us. The scary part of this is that one of the most affected markets in this crisis is the housing market. Nobody is buying houses! It could be months or a year (or more) before anyone buys our house. This is not anyone's favorite option, but we just don't know what else to do. Rob needs to earn money to support our family but we need to sell our house. If just he goes to PA he can live for free while he works. If we all went, we would need to buy a house or rent and that would mean two housing payments. Not an option for us.

God is good though! Our house could sell within a week. Or it could take several months. Either way we will be taken care of.

While Rob is working at C&S he will be looking for a job in an IT Department. He recently finished classes and he is now A+ certified and hopefully next week will be Net+ certified. I think he will be looking for jobs anywhere and everywhere, so if anyone knows of any entry level positions open, please let me know!!

In the mean time please keep us in your prayers! Pray that Rob will find suitable employment somewhere not too far from family. Pray for me and the kids while we brave it alone for a while.

Thanks!

Real Food Wednesdays -- Bone Broth Recipes

2009-02-11T11:32:00.003-05:00

This is my favorite thing to do with my bone broth:

Cut up lots of veggies, all different kinds. (I often use zucchini, carrot, celery, spinach, mushrooms, onion, summer squash)

Put 1/2 to 1 cup of bone broth in a skillet or sauce pan.

Let all the veggies simmer until the bone broth boils down to be more of a sauce.

Add chicken or ground beef. (If meat is not cooked, then I throw it in at the beginning)

Let simmer to get it all warmed up.

Add a couple of eggs and scramble them in.

Add salt and pepper to taste.

I think I've posted about this before, but it's so delicious it's worth mentioning twice!
My absolute favorite combination of veggies is spinach, onion and mushroom!

Head on over to Cheeseslave for more Real Food Wednesday Bone Broth Tips!!

Apraxia of Speech

2009-02-06T11:35:00.003-05:00

A speech pathologist came to our house a couple days ago to evaluate Nathan. She told me that she believes Nathan is showing signs of Childhood Apraxia of Speech.

Children with Apraxia "have great difficulty planning and producing the precise, highly refined and specific series of movements of the tongue, lips, jaw and palate that are necessary for intelligible speech."

This is exactly what I thought was going on this summer when I started thinking about having him evaluated. It's kind of nice having some sort of something to call it.

He is going to have his regular developmental therapy each week and he will also have a speech therapist visit for an hour each week. This summer he will attend a special preschool that focuses on speech and language. He will also attend in the fall. It turns out that the preschool is pretty near our home. This is very good news.

Now that we have a diagnosis, I am rethinking the Gaps diet. Apraxia (or Dyspraxia) is one of the conditions that Gut and Psychology Syndrome was written for. I really think a change in diet and some healing to his tiny little gut would help his speech tremendously.

We did embark on this diet back in September. During our 5 weeks on the diet Nathan started making and imitating animal sounds. He also started interacting and playing with me more than he had before. He seemed calmer and happier during those weeks. I know that the diet was helping him it was just very slow. And since nobody else noticed these subtle changes I didn't have any kind of encouragement. It's extremely hard to keep going with something so difficult when everyone around you thinks you're crazy for doing it.
Also, I started probiotics too much too soon. It made the kids sick and miserable. I can learn from that mistake. Another thing that I would do differently is to not have myself doing the same part of the diet as they are. I need to be healthy and happy and upbeat if I'm going to ask them to do something this hard. The last time I was dealing with feelings of depression and anxiety and generally not feeling well due to die off.

So, I'm considering starting again in the summer. If not gaps, then some sort of diet change. All three of the kids can use a diet change. Gianna has been stuck at 20 pounds since the fall. Matthew still has goosebumpy skin and seems to struggle with depression sometimes. He's also extremely skinny. And my dear Nathan needs to be able to speak.

One thing that could really get in the way is finances. We are in a really bad place right now to be changing things and making life more expensive. I will be praying that by summer we will be able to afford lots of organic, local veggies and some grass fed beef and chicken. I know where to get it all, now I just need the money to do it. And after the first several weeks when they're crazy hungry and eating a lot, it really shouldn't be that expensive.

And as for people thinking I'm crazy? I don't care! I want my baby to talk! And it would be impossible to put just him on the diet. Besides, by healing their digestive tracts it will pave the way for a healthy, disease free adult life.

Real Food Wednesday Rookie Tips

2009-02-04T09:35:00.004-05:00

It's Real Food Wednesday! This week it's hosted by Kelly the Kitchen Kop. The topic is Rookie Tips for Real Food beginners.

The #1 big tip when you start learning about foods and deciding you want to change things is to take a deep breath and don't panic.

When I first read Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon I panicked. I felt like if we continued to eat how we were eating that we would surely die. I couldn't believe how bad everything was for our bodies and how much damage that we had probably already done to ourselves with our eating habits. Well, as the saying goes, Rome wasn't built in a day. You can't change everything at once. And you've gone this long with these eating habits, what's another few months to a year in the long run.

Tip #2 -- Start small

The first thing I did was find a source for grass-fed raw milk. I started buying goat for the baby and cow for me and my son. I started making the Weston Price raw milk formula for my little one. You can read more of the baby steps I took in another post.

Tip #3 -- Try one ferment at a time -- get into a routine of making it before trying a new one.

The ferments really overwhelmed me and it took a long time for me to try anything. I was so intimidated! But I finally got my hands on some kefir grains from someone in a nearby city. They mailed them to me for free! Once I started making kefir I couldn't understand what took me so long to try it. It's the easiest thing in the world! Sauerkraut is also quite simple as are other fermented vegetables. Kombucha is also not hard to do. The internet has many many websites with information on fermenting.

Tip #4 -- Try to stay away from the doctor!

Unless of course you have a chronic illness that requires a doctor's care. I stopped taking my kids in for well-child checkups. I decided not to vaccinate and really didn't feel that the doctor visits were necessary. I can tell if they are growing properly. When they do get sick, I research natural methods of taking care of their symptoms. We use the humidifer a lot. We also use saline drops and a bulb syringe for when their noses are so stuffy they can't sleep. I rarely treat a fever. If the fever gets so high and uncomfortable that they can't sleep, then I consider treating it. A fever is the body's response to an infection. It has a job to do. Let it do it's job and kill the virus/bacteria.

Here's a great way to help a fever work more efficiently:

Detox Baths

*Make sure to read the comment below the blog post. I haven't tried that yet, but I plan to if one of my kids has a high fever.

Antibiotics kill ALL the bacteria, good and bad, in your digestive tract. Bacteria and yeast belong inside our bodies. We need them to have a healthy balance in our gut. When you kill the good bacteria along with the bad, it sets us up to have a major imbalance of healthy bacteria and pathogenic bacteria. This in turn can cause serious health challenges. I think, except in certain situations, that it is always best to stay away from antibiotics. I would probably take antibiotics for something serious like pneumonia or diptheria, but for an ear infection? No. Most ear infections will go away on their own if your body is given a chance to heal itself. There are so many natural remedies for the aillments that we come up against. I think it's worth giving them a try before going to the doctor.

I love the Earth Clinic site. It has tried and true remedies from real people. Then others can try them and give a yea or nay as to whether they work or not. It's been helpful to me on several occasions when I wanted to treat something naturally.

That's all I've got for now, but check out Kelly the Kitchen Kop for more great newbie tips!

Allergy testing and random thoughts

2009-01-24T12:23:00.003-05:00

I took Nathan to the chiropractor the other day because my chiro does allergy testing using Kinesiology. Muscles will react to substances that cause problems in the body. Google it if you're interested. I'm not good at explaining how it works. And, yes, it will probably seem hokey and weird to some, but I believe it is an accurate way to tell if a food is causing a problem. And no needles!!

The food that Nathan is sensitive to is dairy. I've suspected this for a while but never eliminated it to see if it made a difference. He's been dairy free to 3 whole days! And I've not noticed any changes yet. But it's really too soon. I did notice that the patches of dry skin behind his knees are gone, but that could be a fluke. What I'm looking for is his bowel movements to be less mushy and more normal. What is normal? See here.

Gianna was at the chiro with us and so the doc just tested her while she was there. She showed a reaction to peanut butter!! She doesn't eat a lot of peanut butter, so this isn't too hard to eliminate. I thought maybe dairy would be an issue for her as well, but that seems to be fine. Her BM's are more normal than Nathan's.

Next week I plan on taking Matthew in to see what he could be reacting to. His skin is bumpy. It's like he always has goosebumps. This comes and goes and he's had it since he was a baby. I've always suspected a food reaction but could never pin point anything. He's also complained a few times over the last couple weeks of his legs hurting. Not sure what that's about so I'm anxious to see if he reacts to anything that he eats regularly.

About a year ago I had a stool analysis done to see if Matthew was intolerant to gluten. This came back negative, so I don't really expect wheat to be an issue.

While my kids were in the bath I was comparing their rib cages. Matthew's ribs stick right out, you can see every one. Nathans are less visible but he's still pretty thin. I can't see any of Gigi's ribs. The interesting thing is Gianna hardly eats anything. She picks at her food and I wonder sometimes how she sustains herself. And bottles are a thing of the past, so I know she's not filling up on milk anymore. Yet she has more meat on her bones than Matthew does. My theory is this:

A healthy gut will absorb nutrients and minerals properly so that the body can use them properly. A leaky or unhealthy gut will not absorb nutrients and minerals properly and the body suffers. I think that Gigi's gut is in a much healthier state than Matthew's. Her body is absorbing and using the nutrients that she gets from the tiny bit of food that she eats. Matthew doesn't gain a lot of weight because his body just isn't receiving those needed nutrients even though he eats more.

When we were on the gaps diet Matthew gained about 8 pounds in 4 weeks. It was so nice to see his ribs not poking through his skin. Both he and Nathan had fuller cheeks and just looked more robust. Matthew has since lost a few of those pounds since we had to stop the protocol. I think Nathan has too, it's just harder to get him on the scale.

Someday I want to feed my kids nourishing foods. I don't know if I'll ever do the actual gaps intro and diet protocol again with them, but I plan to continue to do what I can to heal their leaky guts. I know they seem normal but from what I've read I can just see the leaky gut issues in them. It hurts to know the solution but not be able to implement it. All I want is for them to avoid the health issues that plague our extended family. My family has a huge history of digestive disorders, depression and anxiety. Robs family is riddled with heart problems.

So, what's a mommy to do? She will pray. She will pray for guidance and wisdom. She will pray for peace in her heart and soul. She will also pray for cooperation from the kids to eat better food. And for support from family even though what she's doing seems off the wall. And of course she will thank her Heavenly Father for these amazing blessings called Matthew, Nathan and Gianna.

Nourishing New Years Resolutions

2009-01-09T22:11:00.001-05:00

I've decided to take some more baby steps this year in making my kitchen and my family's diet more nourishing. This is part of the Nourishing New Years Resolutions Carnival started by The Nourishing Gourmet!!

#1 Make Sauerkraut on a regular basis.

The jury is out on whether lots of raw cabbage is healthy but I really just want this stuff for the juice. It is stuffed with enzymes and probiotics and it's delicious! This stuff is really alive. When I open the jar after it's been fermenting for a while it hisses at me. I love it when my food talks to me!

#2 Stop having bread be a daily item in my kid's diet.

My kids are carb addicts. I'd like to virtually eliminate bread from their HOME diet. When they're at Grandma's and she wants to feed them sandwiches, fine. But at home, I'd like them to start eating whole foods.

#3 Start soaking and dehydrating nuts for making flour and nut butter.

I made my first batch of almond flour the other day. It was surprisingly easy it just involved several steps. I'd like to start doing this so I can use a healthful flour in my recipes. I might even try making my own almond butter! Yum...

When changing diet patterns and habits it's important to take small, baby steps. It would be so emotionally and financially challenging to change everything at once.

Here's a list of the baby steps I took (starting about 2 1/2 years ago) to get where I am today (which is still pretty far from where I'd like to be).

*Purchase raw milk
At first it was just for the baby (Nathan) but then I started getting it for me and Matthew.

*Eliminate and stop purchasing food items with hydrogenated oil and high fructose corn syrup.
I found a healthier peanut butter, stopped buying Hamburger Helper and started reading labels like crazy.

*Started making meals from scratch

*Stopped buying processed food

*Stopped eating fast food at least once a week

*Started making chicken stock regularly

*Started making kefir regularly

*Started buying organic items whenever it was financially possible

*Started buying most produce at local farms and farmer's markets (only possible in the warmer months of course)

I'm going to make my first attempt at a garden this spring. Someday I hope to be all organic and have my kitchen be full of only whole foods. This will probably never really happen because hubby isn't on board with most of this. But I can dream right??

The Christmas Hamster

2009-01-09T21:44:00.004-05:00

We took our annual pilgrimage to Pennsylvania for Christmas and it was, as always, a blast. The kids play, play, played with Grandma and enjoyed all the delicious goodies and treats that surrounded us. Christmas morning was a flurry of paper and noisy toys and the rest of our week was filled with visits to family and friends. I love Christmas in Pennsylvania.

Now that we're home, we are trying to get back into our regular routine (if you can call it that). The kids are in sugar detox and Grandma withdrawal. Everyone is a little off, but that's to be expected after Christmas. Doesn't everybody get depressed in January? I need to order some cod liver oil and try to get some more vitamin D into us to fight off the winter blues. Maybe I could get the kids to play in a tanning bed.

While we were in PA we bought Matthew a hamster with money he got from his Great Grandma Hartman. We picked out a small cage with a wheel and bought some bedding and food and a water bottle. Matthew named his new friend Sally. She was just a baby and was very small and fuzzy. She slept all day and ran on her wheel at night like all good hamsters do. She rode at Matthew's feet all the way home to Indiana. After a couple days at home, she started biting. When Matthew and Nathan would put their fingers in the cage (like they had done before), she would nip at them. It didn't really hurt, just startled them. It did seem odd, but I just figured it was because we hadn't been handling her very much and getting her used to our hands. Well, sure enough one morning I noticed that Sally didn't look very alive. And she wasn't. Matthew didn't notice because she usually slept all day anyway. So, I kept his attention away from the hamster cage until he went to school at 12:30 and I headed to the pet store.

You know how before you have kids you have all kinds of things that you say you will never do when you have children. Well, I'm pretty sure that I probably said that I'd never fake my kid out and replace a pet with a similar one. But there I was off to the pet store to find a Sally twin. The creature didn't even last two weeks! I really was okay with my decision. But the store didn't have a Sally twin. Nothing even close. They had about 4 hamsters total in the store and they were all much bigger than Sally. So I picked out a brown one since Matthew had insisted on having a brown hamster and resolved to just break the news to him after he got home from school.

When I told him the news he was a little shocked and then a little while later he cried. And cried. I'm thinking we may never get a dog again or a cat or something really lovable if he doesn't handle losing a hamster that he'd had for 2 weeks very well. He's such a sensitive little guy and has always treasured his possessions. Even as a baby he would attach himself to certain toys and be obsessed with them for a period of time.

By evening of that day he felt much better and was starting to like his new hamster. He heard me call it Hammy once and decided that would be its name. We started out calling it a she, but Rob checked between its legs and we've now determined that it is a he. But all of us interchange quite a bit so Hammy may have a bit of an identity crisis.

We get Hammy out of his cage every evening after dinner. We build a little 'house' for him out of blocks so that he can roam around the floor. Nathan likes to laugh at him and poke and pet him and try to pick him up. Gianna giggles at him and tries to pick him up.

Good times.

Good Times and Eggs

2008-12-18T21:45:00.004-05:00

Our big annual trip to Pennsylvania is coming up in just a few days! This is always a fun time for our family. I look forward to it all year!
In anticipation of all the goodies that will be surrounding me next week, I've started to wean my body back onto sugary sweets and junk. Why just today I painstakingly fed myself several scoops of cookie batter. The night before I had a few spoonfuls of chocolate frosting. It's not easy! (please note sarcasm) I have been trying really hard to behave myself in the sugar department because I know that I will have no control once we step over the state line. So I'd better get my body used to it again. Then when we get home, I will once again put on a resolve of steel. And hopefully quickly lose the ten pounds that I am sure to gain in the next couple weeks.
Speaking of chocolate, remember that chocolate milk every day caused depression? Sure enough today I was CRANKY! I was nothing short of beotchy! I really need to watch my chocolate consumption. And right now I feel kind of sick. Blech.

I'm starting to suspect chicken makes me feel nauseous. I really want to try an organic pastured chicken to see if that makes a difference. For dinner the other night I had a cup full of homemade chicken bone broth. And I felt sick. Now I might have thought that it could be too much fat that made me feel nauseous, but it really didn't have that much fat in it. The chicken I get is raised without anti-biotics but they're not free range and who knows what goes into their feed. I'm wondering if there is some pesticide or something that doesn't jive with me and that's why I didn't see more results when I was on the gaps diet.

When chickens are allowed to roam free eating grass and bugs and bathing in sunlight, then their meat and eggs are much higher in nutrients such as Omega 3, vitamin A and vitamin D. Factory chickens are in cages side by side with not even enough room to turn around. Their beaks are clipped so that they can't eat each other and their grain is brought to them on a conveyor belt and their eggs are taken on a conveyor belt. In this kind of environment there is all kinds of sickness and disease which requires use of heavy antibiotics.

I found a farm near my house that sells eggs and on my second visit to purchase some eggs I was planning on asking them if their chickens were free range, just to make sure. I pulled in the driveway and immediately saw a bunch of chickens pecking around in the yard and garden. I was so happy I think I squealed! One of the reasons I'm so happy is that they only charge $1.50 per dozen! This is the same amount as the grocery store, so Rob doesn't give me a hard time about it. Yes, I believe a squeal was perfectly in order. :)
I'm sure the farmer supplements them with grain in the winter, but this is about as good as it gets on my budget. And the yolks of their eggs are a deep dark orange color. A dark orange color indicates a much more nutritious egg, high in vitamin B12, E, Beta Carotene and CLA.

Here's a picture I took of a couple eggs. One is from the grocery store and one is from my lovely farm. The one on the right (from the store) actually isn't as pale as I've seen them. Many times yolks from the free range eggs will be really big. This one was a little on the small side, but note the orange color! Love it!

Well, that's enough about eggs. Have a Merry Christmas!

2008-12-03T20:51:00.002-05:00

Matthew and I survived our road trip to Ohio to transfer the dog to her new home. We got to spend 2 hours with Aunt Debbie and Kody. We walked around a big hardware store that had lots and lots of trains (including Thomas), John Deer stuff and other die cast things that boys just love. Then we ate lunch at a pretty good restaurant called Steamers. Then Matthew and I turned around and drove the 5 hours home. It was tempting to just keep going and drive to Pennsylvania for a visit. Rob has off the next 6 weeks, why not? He could handle the two little ones for a week or so. :)

On the way home I was listening to Breath of Heaven by Amy Grant. I've never been crazy about that song, but I was really listening to the words and decided that the song is a perfect prayer for a mom of young children. I especially like the part that goes:

Help me be strong...
Help me be...
Help me.....

It reminds me that God doesn't care to hear flowery and eloquent prayers (of which I am not capable). He wants our honest prayers straight from our hearts. And some days my honest prayer from my heart is HELP ME! Help me not yell at my kids, help me not resent my husband, help me not to be lazy and ignore housework!

Breath of Heaven, hold me together
Be forever near me, breath of Heaven
Breath of Heaven, lighten my darkness
Pour over me your holiness, for you are holy
Breath of Heaven

I've been working a lot lately on my prayer life and habits. I tend to have a lot of random thoughts and ideas run through my head that are completely worthless. So I'm trying to turn those thoughts into prayer time. When I find myself rambling inside my head I pray instead. It's been hard to remember, but I think I'm getting better. It's always thoroughly annoyed me that my mind wanders like this. Am I the only one?

Road Trippin'

2008-11-30T20:52:00.003-05:00

Over the last few weeks I've become suspicious that Nathan and maybe Gigi are allergic to the dog. So we've made the tough decision to find a new home for our dog Gidget. Fortunately Rob's aunt has decided to take her in. This will make it so that we can see Gidget sometimes. Matthew was quite heartbroken when we told him that she would have to go. But he feels better knowing that his good friend Kody will be taking care of her.
Gidget's new home will be in Pennsylvania. So, tomorrow morning Matthew, Gidget and I are leaving early and driving to a halfway point in Ohio to hand Gidget over to her new owners. I'm kind of looking forward to a fairly quiet day in the car. Matthew has lots of movies from the library to watch and I got some CD's. Matthew is a great traveler. He took his first road trip from Pennsylvania to Indiana when he was just 7 weeks old! All my kids took their first trip before they were 3 months old. And we go on road trips to see family at least 3 times a year. They've gotten used to being in the car. I prepare with toys, books and snacks. And God bless the genius who came up with portable DVD!!
Rob will be staying home with the little ones all day. This will be a first. He's never spent an entire day alone with any of the kids except Matthew. I will be praying that nobody is exceptionally cranky tomorrow!

Nathan Update

2008-11-24T13:26:00.004-05:00

Nathan had his third First Steps therapy session with Melissa. He was able to blow bubble successfully several times and he blew a party blower several times. This is definite improvement over the last time he tried to blow. I bought him two cups that have straws to drink out of instead of regular sippy cups. The sucking action will help strengthen his mouth and tongue muscles. And these straws are not easy to suck through. They should strengthen him up in a hurry! He also very clearly said Wuh when he was playing with a dog puppet. We need to keep working on sign language. He knows how to do a few signs and used to do them but now it's like he just doesn't want to. But we'll work on them anyway.
Gianna has been sick this week. I don't know if she's got the slowest moving virus ever or if she caught something on the heels of recovering from something else. She had a fever for 3 days and since then has had a bit of a runny nose, runny goopy eyes, and a general feeling of yuckiness. But she has gradually felt better each day, so I've put off running to the doctor.
We are looking forward to Thanksgiving on Thursday! Tony and Tara are coming from Kansas (my brother and sis in law) and we haven't seen them since they moved in August (or was it July?). Matthew's very excited to see them again. We'll be at Grandma Stickels house stuffing our faces all day. Then Friday my friends are coming to our house for brunch. Friday afternoon we are having family pictures taken and then on Saturday we have another family dinner.
I LOVE this time of year.

Forgiveness (It's a long one...)

2008-11-19T11:26:00.004-05:00

So, I think Nathan may have said the word 'tickle' yesterday. Or at least tried to say it. He did it again this morning too. He only does it when he's tickling Gigi's feet. Interesting. This is very exciting progress!

Believe it or not, I blame myself for Nathan not being able to talk yet.

All through my whole pregnancy with Nathan I planned to try breastfeeding again. Breastfeeding Matthew was a painful experience that only lasted about 3 weeks. But I was willing to give it another go. Then in the last few weeks of my pregnancy I changed my mind. For absolutely no reason. I may have thought it would be easier or something, but there was really no concrete reason for this decision. So Nathan was not breastfed at all. He didn't do well on regular formula either, just like his brother. He also didn't do that well on the really expensive formula. (His brother did)
I honestly think that if I had nursed Nathan, even for a few weeks, that he would be talking. I may be wrong but who knows?

I've always been an extremely forgiving person. I've even been very forgiving of myself in the past. But I really struggle with this one. God is working on me though. Every day.

However, I firmly believe that all things happen for a reason according to God's plan. This is the story of how my STUPID decision played out (so far):

When Nathan was 2 months old I started looking around for a homemade baby formula recipe. I found one at Westonaprice.org and started researching. At first it seemed complicated, but I gathered my resources (and courage), bought some raw goat milk (eek!), made the formula and fed it to my baby. He was so much happier and calmer on this stuff. His terrible cradle cap (called seborrhea) started to go away. His eczema got better. He started to get fat!! I was so pleased with the formula and thankful that God allowed me to find it and to be able to afford all the ingredients.
Nathan's very first solid food was avocado and egg yolk. No more rice cereal for babies in my care. According the westonaprice.org babies don't produce the enzyme to break down grains until they are a year old.
Up until he was a year he ate a really healthy whole food diet. (Once Gigi was born, I didn't spend as much time on preparing his food and he started eating more convenient things. he slimmed down quite a bit after she was born)

In my research of the formula on the weston price site, I came across TONS of information on diet and nutrition. And I discovered we're all doing it wrong. I'm not naturally a person who believes everything she reads or hears, I promise. The stuff that I read really made sense.

Raw Milk:
Unpasteurized milk has enzymes in it that help us to digest it and other foods. It also has healthy bacteria that will usually kill off any unhealthy bacteria that may be in it. But if you get raw milk from a clean farm where the cows have access to pasture, then the milk will be of good quality and should not make you sick.

Fat:
I'm sure most people agree that natural is better, especially when it comes to food. So why would something like vegetable oil which has been processed and refined be better for our bodies than whole milk, or butter, or cream or cheese. These all come from a cow! How much more natural can it get?

Grains:
Grains are only good for us if they are properly soaked or fermented. If they aren't they are extremely hard for us to digest and simply wear our digestive system down. I know, it's hard to grasp that we can actually live without whole grain.

This of course is only a fraction of what I've learned over the last couple years. For more info go to westonaprice.org or better yet, order the book Nourishing Traditions and read through the front section. It will change the way you look at food.

Anyway...

I slowly started to change the way I feed my family. My first change was the raw milk. I also started buying cow milk and gave it to Matthew and then I started drinking it too. The next order of business was to BANISH all High Fructose Corn Syrup and Hydrogenated Oil from my kitchen. Except for the things Rob has to have, it's gone. I changed to a natural peanut butter, jelly made with just fruit and bread without HFCS. I started making meals from scratch. No more Hamburger Helper.
Very slowly I've changed things here and there. Are we the healthiest family ever? Absolutely not. Due to gut damage, we are definitely not optimally healthy. We get sick probably about as often as anyone else, but there is definitely a difference. Nathan and Gianna (who I believe have the healthiest guts of all of us) get over illnesses quickly and usually pretty easily. When I compare Matthew's first two years and Nathan's first two years, the difference is incredible. Matthew got sick a lot and when he got sick he would have a fever and it would go into his chest and give him a terrible cough. He's been in the ER twice for croup and had it two other times when we were able to control it. He had bronciollitis at four months old. He had one ear infection. He was on antibiotics several times. Nathan has never had an ear infection. He's never even been on antibiotics. He's had two doses of motrin his entire life. Once, when Matthew and Gianna were sick with some stomach bug, he got a cold. No stomach bug for him.
Gianna is very much the same way. No antibiotics and she's never had motrin.

Nathan and Gianna also are not vaccinated and I believe this is also a big part of the difference between them and Matthew, but I'll save that for another post.

So, here we are, eating as naturally as our finances will allow and I of course can't shut up about it. I tell everyone I know about Nourishing Traditions. So Rob's mom reads it who lends it to his aunt who lent it someone else. Nourishing Traditions went through the Kulp grapevine like wildfire. Before I knew it everyone was eating coconut oil! And rethinking what they eat and feed their families. And I think I remember several people saying they started to feel better and see results, but I don't remember the details. Rob's mom lost a lot of weight. My 3rd pregnancy was so much smoother than my other two. My morning sickness was gone by 12 weeks instead of lasting into the 6th month. I only gained 30 pounds as opposed to 60 with the other two

My point is, my stupid decision to not breastfeed Nathan led to a me and several other people changing at least a little bit about their diet and lifestyle. I think we'll ultimately be healthier for it and avoid problems that may crop up later in life.

If I had breastfed Nathan, maybe he would have nursed a long time, or even for only a few weeks. Maybe he would have been fine on Nutramigen like Matthew. If he had, I probably would have had him vaccinated and fed him rice cereal. Who knows what damage his gut may have sustained beyond the breastfeeding because I would have had no reason to look for that homemade formula recipe.

God is good all the time. I know he made good from my bad. And I trust him to keep doing that. Thanks for reading!!

Chocolate Milk

2008-11-13T19:34:00.003-05:00

Almost all my life my breakfast consisted of a tall glass of chocolate milk. Maybe about a year ago I started cutting sugar out of my diet. I can't bring myself to drink plain milk, so this meant that I stopped drinking my beloved chocolate milk. Everything was fine.
Several weeks ago I decided that my tummy was happier when it had raw milk every day. So I went back to having a glass of chocolate milk every day. About a week into my reunion with my lovely breakfast, I got REALLY depressed and sad and overwhelmed. And if you know me, you know that I think that almost any health related issue comes down to your gut health and what you're eating. So I racked my brain as to what had changed in my diet, praying and hoping it wasn't my dear chocolate, but that was the only thing that had changed. Sigh. So I no longer have chocolate milk every morning. I may have a glass here and there and I certainly eat chocolate once in a while but not every day anymore.
I am no longer depressed. In fact today was the best that I've had in a while. My boys and I were all awake at 4 am this morning for whatever reason, so it wasn't because I had a great night's sleep. That rarely happens. I made breakfast at 7, got everyone dressed and started to CLEAN MY HOUSE!! It was so exciting! The kids played really well, the little ones took naps and I just powered away and got everything picked up and put away. I even swept my carpet. I'm praying for the same kind of motivation and energy tomorrow. I still need to sweep and mop my kitchen floor and sweep the hard wood.

Nathan's first session

2008-11-10T14:32:00.002-05:00

Nathan had his first First Steps therapy session today. His therapist's name is Melissa and she is very nice and he warmed up to her right away. I had to occupy Matthew with a computer game because as soon as Melissa walked in he was talking to her about things. She and Nathan played for about 50 minutes and she wrote up a summary of what they did. They blew bubbles while she was here and Nathan actually got a few bubbles to come out of the wand. Matthew can barely get that to happen yet! She is also going to call for a speech therapist consultation. She noticed his tongue got in the way a lot when he was trying to blow the bubbles. She also said to have him drink applesauce or pudding or something thick through a straw. This would help strengthen his mouth muscles.
Nathan also had a hearing test this morning to rule out a hearing problem. He's free and clear. No problem with his ears, just as I suspected. He was an absolute angel at the audiologist. He let her put things in his ears after I said I didn't think he would. The doctor said "he has the cutest little face!" I think so too!

Read this!

2008-11-05T20:23:00.001-05:00

This was posted by Josh Harris. He wrote a book about dating that I read when I was in high school, but I guess now he's a pastor. Reading his thoughts on this election have helped me start to get out of my doomsday funk. Thanks to my mom for pointing it out to me....

Praying for President Obama

On Sunday I told my church that after the election half the country would be elated, confident that all would be right in the world because their candidate won; the other half dejected and sure that the world had ended because their candidate lost. But Christians should realize that both sides are wrong. If you voted for Obama, he isn't worthy of your ultimate hope. And if you didn't vote for him, don't despair as though Jesus isn't reigning over the world.

Those who call Jesus their Lord can be filled with a quiet peace and confidence in all seasons. Our Savior is never in the White House. Our Savior is Jesus. We must turn to him with joy and faith. And as we do let's pray for our new President Elect that God would give him wisdom and grace to lead our nation in the days to come. My friend Justin Taylor shares the following helpful words:

No matter who you voted for--or whether you voted at all--it's important to remember that, as President, Barack Obama will have God-given authority to govern us, and that we should view him as a servant of God (Rom. 13:1, 4) to whom we should be subject (Rom. 13:1, 5; 1 Pet. 2:13-14).
We are to pray for Barack Obama (1 Tim. 2:1-2).
We are to thank God for Barack Obama (1 Tim. 2:1-2).
We are to respect Barack Obama (Rom. 13:7).
We are to honor Barack Obama (Rom. 13:7; 1 Pet. 2:17).
There are many qualifications to add to these exhortations--for example, see this excellent post by John Piper--but it's still important to remember that these are requirements for all Bible-believing Christians.

Though I deeply disagree with Barack Obama on certain policy issues (most notably his support of abortion), I am committed to praying for him and his family in the years to come. And I am grateful to God that in his election our country has taken an important step away from its sad history of racism and prejudice.

Overwhelmed

2008-11-05T08:11:00.000-05:00

Usually when I feel overwhelmed, it's because my kids don't eat anything I make them, or it's because I'm a terrible housekeeper and things are always a mess, or because there's not enough time to get everything done. Sometimes I'm overwhelmed by being a mom of 3 small children. But lately, I'm overwhelmed and just exhausted from being a human being. I've found myself envying the dog!
I think the election has a lot to do with it. As a Christian I feel that there are some freakishly weird things coming up in my lifetime and the thought of it all is just exhausting. I would love to be 75-80 years old right now. They get to see some of it play out with the knowledge that they may go home soon. Their kids are grown and taking care of themselves.
I had someone the other day say they don't envy me in raising children these days. It's a scary world.
I know this funk of mine will pass and life will go on. During my college years I finally got to the point where I wasn't afraid of the future. I welcomed the thought of Jesus returning to take us home. I'm still not afraid and I still look forward to that day, but it's all so overwhelming! Maybe I just need a nap.

Coconut Flour Pancakes

2008-10-28T08:03:00.000-04:00

These are pretty good! And there is nothing refined or processed.

3 eggs
2 Tbsp milk
1 1/2 tsp honey
3 Tbsp melted butter

Stir together and add:

3 Tbsp Coconut flour
1/2 tsp baking soda

They're tricky to flip and they burn kind of easily, but once you get the hang of it they turn out fine!

Top with butter, peanut butter, maple syrup, whatever your favorite toppings. Delicious and extremely healthy!

Update on the family:

We've all been fighting a cold lately. Matthew finally succumbed to the runny nose this morning. I'm not sure he'll go to school today. I was hoping to go visit Grandma Stickel today, but we'll have to see how everyone feels. Once a week while Matthew is in school I've been leaving the younger two with grandma and going shopping for a couple hours. It's been wonderful!! I love shopping by myself!
Rob has actually been enjoying his IT classes. (He has always stated that he dislikes school of any kind) He is overwhelmed with all the reading he has to do but that comes with the territory. He looks forward to being qualified for a better job in a different field.
Hopefully Nathan will start his First Steps therapy next week. I picked out a therapist and now we're just waiting on Nathan's doctor to sign the papers and then we can start! He has been making lots of animal sounds which he hadn't done before. He also has been using more consonants (bababa, dadada) which is new. So I know he's making progress on his own, but I'm excited for the therapy to begin to give him a boost. I think he'll be happier. I know I'll be less frustrated. And hopefully he'll be ready to start school when he's supposed to. If he's not ready when he's five and we keep him out for a year but Gianna IS ready when she's five, they would be in the same class! How weird would that be? Everyone would think they are twins! Oh well, I'm sure we'd all get used to it!

ChaCha

2008-10-24T08:22:00.001-04:00

Have you ever heard of ChaCha? It's a service where you can text any question and a real person will research on the internet and text the answer back to you! I just started as one of their "guides".

They pay you .10 per question at first but if you do more than 200 questions per week and maintain a certain percentage in quality with your answers, then they pay .20 per question. I don't think I can quite get 200 done in a week yet, but as time goes by I think I can work up to it.

It's not a lot of money, but I have decided that any money I can make sitting on my couch is good. And there are people who are doing this as full or part time jobs. There are people making $100 per day! Of course, they're sitting at their computer for 6-8 hours but that's what you would do at an office job and you probably wouldn't make that much at an office!

If you're interested go to ChaCha.com and sign up to become a guide. There should be a place to put who referred you. My ChaCha handle is moonlight if you need that info.

Just a warning: you do sometimes get explicit sexual questions and you have to answer them. So if you're not comfortable with doing that sometimes, then I would advise not becoming a guide. There are a couple other roles that earn .02-.04 per question where you're not actually answering the questions.

Nathan's Update

2008-10-19T07:45:00.000-04:00

Two very nice ladies from First Steps came to our house yesterday to see Nathan. They brought a ton of paper work and a big bag full of toys! They asked me lots of questions and played with Nathan. They determined that Nathan has significant delays in a few areas.

Cognitive (in particular problem solving)
Verbal and Social Communication
Gross Motor Skills

I was so relieved to hear them say that with therapy he will catch up to other kids his age.

I expected them to say he has sensory issues too, but they didn't think he had any significant problems in that area. That's a relief as well!

On Friday they will come back to our house and we will write up a plan for Nathan's therapy.

They also made it pretty clear that I don't have anything to worry about with Gianna! She was very active while they were there and chattering away. Yay! Maybe I'll have one kid that doesn't need therapy!

Smoothie

2008-10-16T10:28:00.000-04:00

Here's my favorite (made up) recipe for a smoothie. My kids and I have this every day.

Free Range raw egg yolks blended together with a couple tablespoons of melted coconut oil. (this emulsifies the oil and keeps it from becoming little chunks in your cold smoothie)

1 avocado (this makes the smoothie so creamy and yummy and is full of healthy omega 3!)

A handful of frozen berries

Then I do about half and half kefir and orange juice.

Blend it all together and enjoy!

I also put my kid's daily dose of cod liver oil in their cups of smoothie. I have learned NOT to mix it in entirely. I just put the 1/4 tsp in the top of their cup and leave it. They drink it down in the first couple swallows and it doesn't make the whole thing taste like fish.

KEFIR

This is a fermented drink made with milk. All you need are kefir grains from someone who makes kefir. The grains multiply as you make kefir, so anyone who makes it should have extra to share. You put about 2 Tbsp of grains in a quart mason jar and fill it with milk. Raw milk is best, but this will also work with pasteurized (not ultra pasteurized). Put a tea towel or paper towel over the top and secure with a rubber band. Let the jar sit out on the counter. I leave mine to ferment for 10 hours. After it's done, you put the grains in another jar and fill with milk and put your kefir in the fridge!

Kefir is full of healthy bacteria and enzymes. And it's quite tasty in a smoothie. I can't get myself to try it plain. But I don't like plain milk to begin with.

2008-10-10T11:37:00.000-04:00

I will probably blog a lot about food and health and nutrition because that is one of my passions.

Right now I'm cooking up some chopped up veggies in homemade chicken broth. When the veggies are cooked, I will add in some chopped up chicken (already cooked). When it all looks mixed together I'm gonna throw in a couple eggs and scramble them up with it. Yummy. The kids will turn up their noses and just pick at it, but I don't care. I only make this once or twice a week. They'll live.

Later, for a snack, I will make them their beloved squash pudding. I chop a butternut squash lengthwise, scoop out the seeds and gunk, put it face down in a pan of water (just a little water) and bake it for 1 hour at 400 degrees. When it's baked I scoop out the flesh and whir it in the food processor with lots of butter, salt, and cinnamon. The kids go crazy over this. It's dessert to them. Sometimes I add honey to mine (don't tell!).

I got the book Deceptively Delicious for Christmas last year and I love it! It's got some great ideas about how to hide pureed veggies in regular food. So far I've hidden veggies in meatloaf, hamburgers, macaroni and cheese and squash pudding. The book has a hideous amount of incorrect advice about low fat this and that and about using tub margarine instead of butter, but it has some great ideas for tricking kids into eating veggies.

Nathan actually yelled when I presented him with his lunch. Matthew has eaten 2 pieces of chicken because he has to chew each piece FOREVER before he can swallow it. He says he will not eat the veggies. Nathan is now standing in a chair beside me eating MY vegetables out of MY bowl. Now, understand, that he has the exact same thing in his bowl at the next seat. And I think he dipped his dirty hand in my glass of water. Ugh.

First Steps

2008-10-05T12:09:00.000-04:00

On Saturday Oct. 18 First Steps is coming to our house to evaluate Nathan. Nathan is two years old and still doesn't say any words. He also has some other quirky behaviors that I think may be related. I've heard some good things about First Steps and how their occupational and developmental therapies can really bring about some changes in a child who is behind.

I'm a firm believer that health begins in the gut. This includes mental health. I think if Nathan had a healthy gut he would have no trouble speaking by now. We actually went on a gut healing diet several weeks ago called the gaps diet. For more info check out www.gapsdiet.com. We were able to go for 5 weeks but due to lack of funds we needed to stop before we saw significant results. If money were no object then I would have been able to go all organic, all free range, all grass fed, etc. I think then we would have seen big results pretty quickly.
Also my kids are very uncooperative when it comes to eating. They both have food issues, which I believe is related to their speech problems. It all goes around and around. So, I'm back to feeding my kids as healthfully as I can.

I've learned that God is bigger than speech problems or sensory issues and he's bigger than the Gaps diet. Through our tiny gaps journey he taught me that I need to trust HIM with my kids. He knows the condition of their tummies and their brains. I will rely on His wisdom and guidance on what to do with these precious gifts he has given me.

So, we're trying out First Steps. From what I've read online, if Nathan has sensory issues, his must be very mild. I've read some stories of children that just break my heart. They are completely unable to live normal lives because they can't process things properly, like sounds, touch, sights, tastes, etc.
But if I can do something now to keep Nathan from struggling in school or in future social situations, then I want to do it.

Organization

2008-09-30T21:01:00.000-04:00

Wow, am I not an organized person. I try really hard. I make lots of lists, but they usually get lost in the crazy mess of papers on my kitchen table or counter. This past weekend I shipped my 3 kids off to Grandma and Grandpa and cleaned and organized my house! It was so much fun for me to do. When the kids are home, I barely have enough time to pee let alone organize or clean anything. This weekend I got on top of the mess. It's now Tuesday and my home is still clean, picked up and fairly organized. The first floor anyway. The upstairs bedroom and office are still pretty messy, but the kids don't go up there and nobody sees it anyway. I'll hopefully get to that someday too.

I'm trying to be more anal about keeping a clean and organized home. How does one go from being a type B to a type A personality on purpose? I don't know if it can be done, but I'm trying to do it when it comes to my house. I get very depressed when my house is messy and the kids are screaming and I need to make lunch. I feel like I will never get anything done. It's extremely overwhelming. That's something that's hard to explain to someone (like my husband) who has never struggled with depression/anxiety issues. There are days where the simplest of tasks seems insurmountable to me. Like the dishes, or making a phone call, or making another lunch that my picky children will refuse to eat. Since this past weekend, I have not felt that way. My house is picked up, or it can be picked up in a matter of minutes. When I see something on the floor, I pick it up right then and there. I do not step over it and plan to pick it up later. Aaaah, this is how it feels to be a type A. Love it! Wonder how long it will last?

I also started making a list of everything that needs done each day. On notebook paper I make 4 categories; House, Business, Errands, Menu. Then on the back I make the shopping list if I need one.

House means whatever housework needs done that day. I always write in dishes and laundry and I write down FOLD AND PUT AWAY. This is my downfall when it comes to laundry. I love to wash and dry it, but it never seems to find its way to our dresser drawers. We just grab clothes out of baskets. NO MORE! The last two days I have put away everything that I have folded. Victory!! I also write down one chore that I want done every week. Like clean the bathroom or the kitchen floor. Today I was supposed to clean the upstairs bathroom. I failed on that one. It's hard for me to be able to spend anytime upstairs where I can't hear the kids. I'll try to do at least some of it tomorrow. I did clean the kitchen floor yesterday just like my list said to do! :)

Business refers to any bills that need to be paid, ebay items that need shipped or phone calls that need made.

Errands means what needs done outside the home.

Menu is what I am planning for meals and snacks for the day.

Maybe tomorrow I'll go out and buy a fancy notebook and some stickers to put on my binder!