The Great Carrot Catastrophe

A few nights ago I was feeding Kairi a jar of carrot baby food. Typically I will follow the spoon with a wipey or a wet wash cloth and clean her up every couple of bites, but this really upsets her. This night I knew that I was going to give her a bath immediately after feeding her, so I just let her get as messy as she wanted. It was kind of fun, really.











Her bathwater turned bright orange and had to be drained and refilled before she came completely clean. And Gracie thought it was hysterical as well. I'm disappointed that I didn't get any pictures of her reaction.

No Boobs in the Cry Room

A few weeks ago I posted something on my Facebook status regarding breastfeeding support. Most of my friends know that I breastfeed my daughter, and while I am not of the Breastfeed-or-Die clan I am pretty well versed in the pros and cons of both breastfeeding and formula feeding and have opinions on both.

Well, as you can imagine, my status sparked a conversation with a younger girl with whom I used to work. In so many words, she stated that she too supports breastfeeding but she doesn't want to "look over and see boobs in the middle of Sunday morning mass. That's what cry rooms are for," she claimed.

Well now. As you can imagine, this struck a chord with me. As a breastfeeding mother and an equal rights activist for ALL I was slightly offended. "I'm sorry if I'm mistaken here, but I was under the impression that cry rooms were meant to be a place where you take your crying baby, as not to disturb the rest of the congregation. You'll have to excuse that assumption as I'm not exactly a member of the church but that is what the name implies. Now, I can't speak for other mothers, but I can read my baby's hunger cues and get her fed well before she starts crying, so there's no real need for me to take her to the cry room, is there?"

I got an immediate response. "Sure there is. Don't you think that waving your bare breast around in the House of the Lord, or in any public area for that matter, is inappropriate?"

Hah! Inappropriate! Boy oh boy.

"Let me tell you what I find to be inappropriate: First of all, the fact that a mother who feeds her child formula from a bottle wouldn't have to leave the room yet I am basically punished for feeding my child the best possible food for her and blacklisted from any public area while doing so. Yes, let's reward the mom who feeds her baby what scientists call "artificial milk." That's right - it's artificial. It's a half-assed chemical reproduction of the better choice.

"Second of all, I find it completely inappropriate that society has marked breasts as first being sexual devices and only second as what they were naturally intended to be. If GOD has a problem with me using my breasts the way he intended them to be used in his house then I shall choose not to visit Him. Although I doubt that is the case.

"Last but not least, I find it HIGHLY inappropriate that you claim to support breastfeeding. As a breastfeeding mother, when people tell me something like what you've just said I hear 'Oh, it's okay to breastfeed, so long as it's convenient for me and doesn't offend me. Because that's who it's about anyway, right? Me.'

"I am all for modesty. While I disagree with the way society has forced our view on breasts as sexual objects I understand that that is the world we live in and if I feed my daughter in public I will do so as discreetly as possible. But I refuse to shy away from giving my daughter what is best and I refuse to be inconvenienced by people who go out of their way to be offended by it. I'm sorry if this seems harsh but I am tired of being looked down upon for making what I believe to be the healthiest, most responsible choices for my child. I appreciate your opinion but that's not the kind of 'support' I need."

My Little Sweetie

I had a cute little picture made of Kairi at http://www.sugarnsweets.com/ for her 5th month b-day. It's really cute. My only problem is that the girl who made it did some weird stuff to her eyes, and while the effect is really neat looking, I also happen to REALLY like my baby's eyes.

Anyway, it was free, so I can't complain. Here it is:

Casting Stones

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Proud Mommy Moments

**EDIT**
I can't figure out why, but my pictures aren't scaling to the right size. Once I get this figured out I will fix it, but in the meantime I'm leaving it as is.

Gracie has begun school. I can't believe it. My kid - my freaking kid - is in school now. Whoa.



This little chunker is in school now. I can't get over it.



It seems like just yesterday that we were bringing her home from the hospital. This area got the closest thing to a blizzard that I've seen in quite some time the day she was born. We had to drive home, a 30 minute highway drive, going about 40 mph. It took so long. But that ride in the backseat with her was so great. We just looked at each other while she held fast to my index finger. *sigh*

But now she's growing up. A couple Wednesdays ago I walked her to her first day of school.


She was so excited.



I don't know how I made it through the day without crying. But I did.

She's really enjoying school so far. She's just like me and doesn't like to get up early. It's hard forcing her to get up when I know that I'm just going to go back to bed when I get home. But I don't tell her that. :)


In other news, Kairi is 5 months old now! She's getting so big! On her 5 month birthday she started doing a few new things. Well, she started doing 2 new things and began doing 1 old thing but really loudly and frequently - when she laughs or gets really excited she will squeal as she inhales. It's so freaking cute. It used to be a very few and far between kind of thing but now I hear it often daily. She's also started doing this funny lip smacking/popping thing. It's really loud and really cute. And she likes raspberries with her cereal too. ...No, I'm not talking about the fruit. She blows raspberries while eating, flinging and spraying cereal everywhere. It's fun though.

I'm a Lovely Blogger!!!

The wonderful ladies over at The Self Love Project have given me my first ever award. I am SO stoked, I can't even begin to tell you!






I am passing it on to:



Angela Renai Her photo blogs always inspire me.


Tracy Greene at GreeneUniverse She's just getting started with her blog but hopefully she can call some attention to some important issues.


Dev who is single handedly attempting to watch and review all of the worst 100 movies as defined by IMDB.


Jeremiah at 365,000 Words who is taking and posting a photo a day.


Diary of a Modern Matriarch's AndreAnna whose funny stories about her two young children often have me nodding my head in relation.


Jocelynn over at Jocelynn's Corner for being just absolutely hysterically insane.


Shawn from Backpacking Dad who has wonderfully witty stories to share not only about being a parent but also adventures in cooking.


Loralee of Loraleeslooneytunes fame for inspiring me to start this blog and give it a real go, as well as being just totally freaking awesome.


Heather from Mama-Is. I started reading her blog just after giving birth to Kairi. Her newest addition was born within a few days of Kairi. She writes a lot about being the kind of parent I want to be.


Erin the Queen of Spain whose blog has helped me discover my views on the way the world works. I also love the posts about her kids - her family is so relatable!


Heather and Whitney at Rookie Moms who have made it their mission to provide one fun activity per day for your growing child for the first year.


The Looney Bin's Erin whose quirky and fun posts always have me either laughing or at least agreeing with what she's got to say.


Rick, the New Moderate, who is working vigilantly to battle extremism in every extreme.


Alisa whose Project Happily Ever After is a wonderfully entertaining question and answer blog full of relationship advice.


Violent Acres V who is always able to put things just the way I would say them if I removed the filter. LOL.



Rules of the Award:


Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award and his or her blog link. Pass the award to 15 other blogs that you have newly discovered. Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.


Thanks again to Shraddha and April at The Self Love Project. I really am honored.

Health Care Reform - Get Your Voice Heard

Hi guys. Sorry I have been MIA for a bit. I am still working on my story and I was planning on posting it as my next post, but I want to get this out first.

A fellow blogger, Loralee Choate of Loralee's Looney Tunes recently attended the BlogHer conference in Chicago. While there, she was invited to attend a small luncheon with White House Senior Adviser Valerie Jarrett to discuss the health care reform.

A very brief rundown of the situation is this: Loralee's husband Jonathan switched jobs/job titles/something along those lines and had to switch insurance because of it. In the middle of switching insurance Loralee became pregnant and somehow, by some stupid loophole in the system basically, they fell through the cracks and she became uninsurable. Everyone she turned to told her that her pregnancy was considered a pre-existing condition. And her pregnancy was extremely high-risk. So she had to deal with this extremely difficult pregnancy and the stress of that while also dealing with the stress of being uninsured. The saga begins here if you want to read more details about it (it's much more accurate as well as better written too, so I do suggest it.)

Okay. So with that said, Loralee was invited to speak with Valerie Jarrett. She told her story and also spoke of her husband who has much more conservative views on the issue of health care. Both of them have written blog posts that are being read by the White House. Loralee's is here. Jonathan's can be found here.

The two of them have also been invited to the White House (yes, actually invited to go to the freaking White House) to express their views and opinions, and they are bringing with them the words of their readers. So please, go read what the two of them have to say and post some comments. Give them your opinions. What do you want changed? What do you want to remain? What policies to you agree with/disagree with?

If you have something to say, now is the time to say it.

Adventures in Photo Editing

I have been doing some tinkering lately with photo editing. Mostly in the past I've just used programs like Google's Picasa, programs that you can have some fun with but are really pretty limited.

A few nights ago, a friend of mine turned me onto a program called GIMP. It's free and you can get it here. So far I've only tried doing some cutout and paste stuff and some color burst, but I can already see that it's going to be a fun ride once I really figure out how to get my hands dirty.

Heavy

I have a story that I want to tell you but I am not ready. It is an extremely personal story. It's emotional and heavy. Carrying this story around for the past four years has been both a blessing and a burden. It has allowed me to reinvent myself but it has also kept me caged in.

I am going to begin working on my story. I don't know how or where to begin, but I will get it out and once it is done I will share it.

Until then, perhaps you too should ponder on your own reinvention. Shraddha over at The Self Love Project has got an interesting perspective on it. Go check her out.

Sing Song

♫Oh, I love my little beanie, I love her oh so much. I love it when she squeezes me, I love it when we touch. Yes I love my little beanie. I love her little kisses. She's all I ever asked for and the answer to my wishes.♫