Day 74 - Scrap That

Are you a scrapbooking person? If so, then no need to read further, go do your thang. I went through a phase of scrapbooking, where I dutifully pasted my photos into lovely albums, glued little stickers and cardboard doohickeys all over them, drenched them in glitter gel, and captioned with an assortment of gel pens. I think I managed to slog through two albums and about $150 before I realized (and accepted) that perhaps scrapbooking is not for me. Now, I know for many of you it's an awesome creative outlet, and I'm surely not trying to change your mind. In fact, I wish it was something I really enjoyed - I've seen some INCREDIBLE albums which will no doubt be handed down for generations to come. BUT, meh. I would let photos lounge in their packets for years months, until I'd forgotten all the really good stuff and had to come up with captions like "What a blast!" and "Too much fun!". Gack.  Recording family memories is important, so find a way of doing it that works for you. It doesn't have to be elaborate or fancy or especially time consuming, but so much is lost if it's never done. So, here's what works for me now, and what I hope to get done over the next year or so:

1. Each Monday, I upload the photos on my camera to http://www.snapfish.com/ (and also to FaceBook, just for fun & so folks can keep up with His Majesty). There are a number of sites that do this, but I can paste them into a virtual album, add captions, even choose a background & photo layout. I love it because it's reasonably quick, there's no clutter or equipment to buy, and the website has great deals throughout the year. When you're finished with that particular album, wait for a sale and PRESTO!!! Lovely, colorful, skinny little album (which also makes a great gift - capitalize on this). Added benefit? If there were ever a flood, fire, Apocalypse, whatever, I could order another copy. You can also order hard prints, 8x10's, etc. if you have some photos that you'd like to pass down.

2. For items like your show program from "The Thunder from Down Under", drawings, cards, or other special memorabilia (your signed bra from The Thunder), they still mostly go into a traditional scrapbook with a date and brief caption.

3. If I'm saving maps, itineraries, etc from a trip, I put them all in a manila envelope and keep it at the back of the Snapfish album.

4. Next, bit by bit, I'll be taking the shoeboxes of photos and pictures crammed into random albums, scanning them, & doing the snapfish thing. It's going to be a looooooooooooooooong process, but I'll get through it photo by photo.

Saving family memories is really important, so it doesn't so much matter HOW you do it, just that you do. Or hire someone to do it for you (and then come take me shopping - you clearly have more money than you know what to do with). It would be SUCH a shame to lose some of those awesome pictures from, say, 1989. How DID you get your hair so high? (half a can of Rave) How long did it take you? (half an hour with a blow dryer and crimper) How awesome were you?! Very. Yeah, we rocked it.

Day 73 - Your Kids Will Be Stupid if You Don't Buy This

We interrupt this irregularly scheduled blog to bring you a Rant (lucky you). I'm still slogging through boxes of photos and such, so I thought I'd sound off about something else instead.

When I was pregnant with Sebastian, I armed myself with every pregnancy, birth, and parenting book on the planet. I was a force to be reckoned with, and I was gonna Do This Right (whatever that is). After the blessed event, when all the dust had settled and we were sleeping more than 20 minutes at a stretch, I had a horrible realization. According to several books, I was MISSING CRUCIAL DEVELOPMENTAL WINDOWS UPON WHICH I SHOULD BE CAPITALIZING!!!!! Was I rotating colored blocks in front of his face so he could hone his spacial awareness and develop his vision? Um.. no. Was I shaking rattles around his head to stimulate his auditory perception? Tying yarn to his fingers to encourage fine motor skills? Talking to him at least 30 minutes out of every hour?..... no...... OH MY GOSH - MY CHILD IS GOING TO HAVE AN IQ COMPARABLE TO HIS SHOE SIZE! And it will all be MY FAULT!

Take one well-educated woman who has whooped some butt in the career world, add a dash of thirty-something child bearing, and you have a mama who is going to take all the energy she put into conquering the world into raising her child. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you: The Uber Mama. And folks, the Uber Mama (also known as the Park Slope Mommy for those of you in NYC) is big business. It didn't take long for toy manufacturers to try to capitalize on UM's ambitions for her progeny, so they began tagging toys with a litany of Educational Properties. There's a fabulous article about this here.  All of a sudden, there's no such thing as a simple toy anymore, it's all Edutainment. It develops hand eye coordination!!! stimulates tactile development!!! or has your little Brainiac spouting his ABC's by 6 months!!! It's enough to make you crazy (or at the very least, suck all the joy out of parenting). And the thing is? It doesn't even work that well. I'll explain.

 I know from whence I speak. I jumped on the UM bandwagon so fast it would scramble your developing brain. I'm about to share an embarrassing secret with you, and I hope you won't tell anyone else: I actually ordered several activity books for infants and designed a curriculum for Sebastian. Shut up, you've done ridiculous things like this too (share! share!). Thing is, I really wanted to Do It Right, but wound up obsessing over every milestone. Turns out, you don't need a lot of bells and whistles to "stimulate development" (in fact, the curious nature of children takes care of a lot of that for you), and not everything has to be a "teachable moment". Believe it or not, Shakespeare didn't have a Speak-n-Spell or flashcards. What does work? The stuff we've been doing since Grandma's day: reading to them, toting them around, talking to them, giving them room to explore the world, playing, and leaving them alone sometimes to play by themselves (notice that "sit them in front of the television with a Baby Genius DVD" wasn't in there? More on this another time.). AND you don't have to do it for 13 hours a day! Live your life, bring them along, and love on them. Some of the best advice I got was "Treat this child as if he were your 8th" (try it, it works). So now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to throw a load in the wash and let Sebastian help - he likes to watch the clothes go round and round. Who knew it was so simple? So let's get back to basics, turn off the mommy guilt, and step awaaaaaaaaaay from the Dr Sears/Spock/Ferber - we know more about our behbehs and how to raise them than we think we do.

Day 72 - Thanks for the Memories!

I’m still actually working hard on the kitchen with meal planning, food prep, yada yada, but I will spare you the gory details today, and instead focus on my next big project: what the heck to do with all the MEMORIES – you know, the ones in the form of pictures, yearbooks, embarrassing love letters and journals from days of yore, etc. When all the dust has settled from a Stuff Purge, we are left with (hopefully) the touchstones from years gone by. What to keep? What to toss? How to store it? OY – this is going to be a doozie. Join me, won’t you?

First, I’m going through everything one more time to make sure it’s something I really want to keep. Those oh-sweet-Jesus-I-hope-my-kids-never-find-these love notes between me and my ex(es)? Gone. I mean, it didn’t end well (obviously), so why keep the cringe-worthy remnants around? Pictures, sure – these were important people in my life, but that’s it. Oh my – so much “treasure”, and I won’t lie – it feels weird getting rid of some of this stuff. Here’s what I wound up tossing:

-          Said steamy ridiculously chaste love notes

-          Return to ex: one class ring (hey – where’s mine?!)

-          All ugly pictures, especially of me. I’m keeping all the ugly pictures of the girls in school who used to torment me. You know who you are. I have pictures. I have Facebook. You have half-closed eyes and a perm. BOOYAH!

-          All duplicate photos (why do I have duplicates anyway?!)

-          Keep the best, toss the rest – I don’t need 85,000 pictures of me on a horse. 45,000 will do just fine.

Here’s what I’m keeping:

-          Pictures that are really worth holding on to. You know, the ones that trigger a story, an “aaaaaaw”, or a deluge of memories

-          Journals

-          Yearbooks

-          Meaningful Mementos – the outfit Sebastian came home in (it still smells just a little bit like him, I will NEVER part with this), my debate pins (nerd alert!), my tiara from the Miss PreTeen NC Pageant (this is a story for another time), and the like.

Next, I’m tackling how to store all these treasures. Right now? Sebastian is learning to use a spoon and my kitchen has a distinctly Jackson Pollack flair from all the SOUP HE’S FLINGING ON THE WALLS. Time to clean up … or let him fling just a few minutes longer while Mama pretends not to see the mess…

Day 71 - What Have We Learned So Far?

Today is my last day focusing on the kitchen because I just can't take it anymore. So, I thought I'd get all Oprah on you and share some of My Favorite Things. I will also share some Things We've Learned So Far, so file this post under "educational". But before we dive in, I'll share a little exchange my husband and I had the other day after I came home from the grocery store bearing Hemp Seeds:

Him: Hemp seeds? Really?

Me: Yes. They're very good for you.

Him: What do you use them for?

Me: Stop interrogating me! I don't know yet, but they're very good for you.

Him: OK. Well, I guess if we're going to try this whole healthy eating thing, we might as well be baked.

Aaaaaaaaanyway, here we go.

My Favorite (Kitchen) Things
- I have already waxed poetic about my Vitamix. Love. They will have to pry it from my cold, rigor mortised hands when I'm dead.
- "Healthy Bread in Five Minutes a Day" (making beet bread this week in honor of Valentine's Day)
- pizza peel & pizza stone - makes the bakin' of said bread easy peezy.
- spiralizer - easy way to turn veggies like sweet potatoes, zucchinis, etc. into noodle or pasta shapes. More veggies = healthier you. Bring it!
- agave nectar - super sweet like sugar, but less of an impact on your blood sugar. Great for weaning yourself off the sugah sugah.
- Oreos
- the usual mix of gadgets: garlic press, wooden spoons, scrapers, measuring cups & spoons, kitchen shears, yada yada. My rule for purging: if I haven't used it in 6 months, buh-bye. I am ruthless, I tell you!
- OXO containers
- glass storage bowls (that plastic stuff is so very iffy, and loaded with mad freaky chemicals. Even if it says BPA free, ask yourself - what are they replacing the BPA with? Go for the glass.) We have these and I love them.

A Few Things We've Learned Along the Way
- smoothie: avocado + broccoli + onion + spinach = revolting. Don't do that.
- reducing your consumption of animal products will NOT simplify your life at first. Apparently, first you suffer, THEN you reap the rewards. Such is life. It's bound to get easier once we get into a groove (or Marty becomes a chef, whichever comes first).
- Oreos are vegan (wheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!). Oreos are not healthy (booooooooooooo....). No Oreos.
- baking soda and baking powder are not at all the same thing. Someday, I will tell you how I know this. Please do not ask me why I didn't know that in the first place.
- seaweed tastes exactly the way you think it would
- cutting back on caffeine can make you a little cranky. Bitch.

Next week, who knows what I'm tackling. I'm starting to see things magically falling into place, so this whole endeavor seems to be bearing fruit. YAY! Perhaps it's time to set up some (gasp!) routines? Being a freelancer leaves a lot of unstructured time that gets parceled out in odd ways. Can I get a shout out from the SAHM's and other folks who work from home? WAY harder than you'd think. Well, back to my sewing machine - I'm working on a VIBRANT pink peplum jacket to go over some costumes. It hurts my eyes.

Day 70 - Awash in a Sea of Granola

Now, Dear Reader, I could tell you about how I cleaned out all of my kitchen drawers (I did) and only found two measly napkin rings to get rid of (disappointing and not at all satisfying), OR I could tell you about The Very Heavy Food Drama going on in our house. Or at least in my head. What's that? You want to hear about the Drama? It's probably not what you think, but read on. I'll try to add a little "Real Housewives of New Jersey" flair to keep it real salacious interesting.

Sigh... I have been reading. Now, I realize this doesn't sound like a bad thing, but... sigh. You see, I have been reading three books that are making me think (which I try not to do unless it's a special occasion), and now I have all this information that I can A- totally ignore or B- choose to do something with. The problem? I can't do A. What are these Tragic Tomes which are causing so much sturm and drang? Two by Michael Pollan, "The Omnivore's Dilemma" and "In Defense of Food", and "Crazy Sexy Diet" by Kris Carr. All three are infinitely readable, incredibly well researched, and do not smell of Preachy-Judginess, and I can heartily recommend that you read at least one if you haven't already (the Michael Pollan books would be my first stop). So why am I whinging and whining? Because there's a lot that's gotta change in the way our family eats.

Throughout my life, I have been blessed with revoltingly good health - I ate well, got oodles of exercise, and simply got lucky. Then, I got pregnant. Starting at about week 6, I had violent hyperemesis (read: mega-barfing 8-9 times per day, including in the middle of the night). I was so miserable - imagine having the puke flu for weeks months on end - that I found myself having a lot of alarmingly dark thoughts that really made me question whether or not I was fit to be a mother. I was hopeful that it would ease by week 14, but it just got worse, and I set up camp in front of The Great Porcelain Throne (I really did). That messy little time of my life drove home the simple fact that I do not want to be sick. Not now, not later. For the record? Sebastian was worth every heave and wretch (which continued through my 7th month), but most illnesses do not have such a cute outcome. And here's what I'm grappling with: 75% of all chronic diseases can be linked to what we put in our mouths (yes, you read that right). Heart disease, diabetes, even the Big C. Heavy. But I do not WANT heavy right now! I want light and fluffy! Like marshmallow creme! Mmmm.... Fluffer-nutters.... Argh, see???!!!! It's hopeless!

So, I am broadening my Quest for Simplicity a bit to include food. The Old Me would have gone nuts and overhauled our kitchen in a night, only to be secretly stashing Oreos (next to the tampons where the hubby would NEVER look) within a week. The New-ish, More Realistic Me is tackling one small change at a time to ensure stickiness. Over the past few days, I've added collard greens to a smoothie (survived), traded my Parmesan cheese for nutritional yeast (still alive), and made a pact with the hubby that we will only buy organic free range chicken and beef (effectively limiting our meat consumption since said items cost $99 a lb). I'll keep you posted since the potential for hilarity is high. One thought I'll leave you with that has stuck with me is this: there is no such thing as "cheap" food - you'll pay for it one way or another. I'd rather part with some green than part with my spleen! ... OK, whatever, blame it on the cells in my brain SCREAMING for cream cheese.

Day 69 - Mmmmm, SPICY!

I put all my spices in little labeled containers. I am awesome. That is all.