I'm home.

I've been thinking about blogging again for a while now. So much has changed in the last few months. I tear up just thinking about it. I'm home now. That's right, I'm home with my crazy, wild, cranky, laughing, jumping, screaming, clinging, howling, sunglasses wearing, nursing, cackling, throwing, biting, ear twisting, drawing, loving, beautiful children. It feels right. It is good. I miss the mountains. I miss my parents. Fire Boy misses the mountains. He misses grandma and grandpa. Wind Girl is talking. She is peeing on the potty in exchange for chocolate chips. Wandering Dad's boss told him that he was "awesome", and I'm finding good people and friends here. We are good. We are better.

Wordless Wednesday: When I get home from work

Valentines for the kids

Just finished these pillows, inspired by Soule Mama's Handmade Home. Got the rocks at Ten Thousand Villages today.

Gift Doll Slings

I have really been enjoying sewing a bit lately. It's just a few minutes here and there, but it uses a completely different part of Me than usually gets worked these days.

My friend woowoo mama made her kids lovely dolls, but they needed carriers! So I volunteered to make doll slings for them, and it turned out to be very satisfying to make something for someone else. They aren't perfect, but considering that my only sewing time is either late at night or with a 4 year old helper I've decided to embrace imperfections.

Mailing is nearly as big a project as making, and I'm so proud that I accomplished it in a timely manner - it's the small things in life that can make me feel okay about myself, right? The last minute before leaving for work picture taking session revolved around Fire Boy trying to guard the slings while Wind Girl was trying to dance on them, but I did get a few pictures to share. I didn't even try for pictures modeling the slings - that would have been asking too much!



Hopefully the recipients will enjoy, too!

Wordless Wednesday: Birdwatching Behind the Curtain

Wordless Wednesday: Smoothie Sharing

signing "more"

Wordless Wednesday: After Dinner Music

Goodby to Pumping

Today my workday is different. I am not pumping. I am not providing milk for my daughter's bottle tomorrow. It feels strange. I Could pump. I could lift the pump off the floor and up onto my desk and take out my tubing and hook it up and get out my pump parts and express milk into a bottle. But, I'm not. I'm not going to do it.

I never really thought about "hanging up the horns" as being a big event, but it is. For the last four years I have either been pumping, pregnant, or both. When I finished graduate school and started my first "real" job I was pregnant with Fire Boy. After a way too short maternity leave I went back to work and entered the world of pumping mothers. I was rather lost. This contraption was so strange. I was nervous. It felt strange. At times I had trouble letting the milk down. I was stressed over getting enough milk. My baby didn't take bottles well. I had all the worries of a new parent and all the anxieties of going back to work exhausted and juggling my roles as mother and wife and worker and also providing milk for my baby. I was glad to do it, but at the same time it wasn't easy. It seemed like my workday was consumed by drinking, pumping, eating, repeat, repeat, repeat. We had thrush. We had unknowledgeable doctors. We had doctors who tried to get us to stop breastfeeding. Fire Boy had a dairy allergy. I had a lipase issue. I had post-partum depression. I traveled for job interviews. I pumped on planes, in hotels, in airports, in cars, in bathrooms, in closets, in offices, and at home. We moved. I started a new job. And still I pumped. I pumped for Fire Boy until he was two years old and I was pregnant with Wind Girl and my milk dried up.

I have pumped for 16 months for Wind Girl, and we (Wandering Dad and I) decided it was a reasonable time for me to stop pumping for her. She is much more interested in food than Fire Boy was at this age, and much less attached to the bottle. So hopefully today she napped easily without a bottle of mama's milk (and if she really wants it there is milk in the freezer that can be thawed for her). In some ways I feel like I am cheating her by not pumping. The milk is here, ready for her, and I'm choosing to let it stay there and not express it for her. But also, I pumped for 16 months! That is a long time. She is a big girl, and doesn't really need the milk during the day now. She can still nurse all she wants when I am at home, and the amount of milk she gets doesn't have to be diminished.

Although there are days when I have Really not wanted to pump, times when I dreaded it, I feel so lucky to have been able to provide for my children in this way. And I think part of me needed to be needed in that way. I needed to provide milk. It was something that only I could do. I couldn't be there with them, but I, and only I, could provide mama's milk for them. It has been good for them, and it has been good for me in a way. I am glad I did it!

During this time as a pumping mother I have learned so much. I have learned about pumps. I have learned about traveling with breastmilk. I have learned to hand express. I about breastmilk storage. About bottles. About nipple confusion. About changing membranes regularly. About hand-free pumping. About pumping while driving. About supply. About oatmeal and Mother's Milk tea. And about the need for support and accurate information! I have also learned about cleaning milk out of computer keyboards, about overflowing bottles, about spilled bottles, and about forgetting to but the bottles on and soaking my pants.

Luckily though this all I have had supportive friends and family and the wonderful community at Kellymom. This support helped get us through our breastfeeding difficulties, and helped me develop into the mother that I am. I needed support in my endeavors, and I needed friends who I was not afraid to talk to about things like nipples, breastpump tubing, and baby poop, and who could help me see that reverse cycling was only a phase. It seems that everything is only a phase. And this phase of my life is over. I am no longer a pumping mama.

Birthday Cake

A few days ago my little boy turned 4. Four! IV. Four years old! Goodness..... He helped to make his birthday cake. We could only find one beater for the mixer - someone ran off with the other evidently. And this is my mom's mixer. We can't find either beater for my mixer. Somewhere there must be a stash of beaters?

And.....I mad a birthday crown for him!!! I did it. I did it. I've been trying to do a bit of crafting in the evenings after the kids are asleep, and it feels good. I got my sewing machine from my mom. It's a lovely machine that she gave to me as a graduation present when I finished graduate school. But I was pregrant with this will man at the time and it took four years before I carved out time to sew. I let Fire Boy pick out the colors for the crown and he surprised me with his picks. I thought about making a fancier crown, but decided to keep it simple, and he was quite satisfied with the result.

green playsilk

Today our green playsilk was a backpack, a coat, a parachute for Fire Boy, a parachute for a ball (man), a doll, a grassy field, a cloud covering the sun (yellow playsilk), and it also had several less defined roles. I can safely say that Fire Boy's imagination is functioning adequately.

(and clothes are too bothersome for Fire Boy - pants either have baggy knees, touch his feet, are too short, are too loose, or too tight. I just ordered him some tights...)

Wordless Wednesday: Four Generations of Women's Hands

thinking back to warm summer evenings

I have been working on a more serious post about events of the last few weeks, but in the mean time I'll put up something lighter..... It's a cold wet day, and as I was looking back through pictures these caught my eye. I took these on one of our evening walks back in August. The picture quality is poor, but I had a baby on my back and a toddler in the stroller!

I could use a nice warm evening walk about now!

**For some reason my pictures didn't show up the first time, but I think I've fixed the problem now...

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We headed out each evening with snacks. Carrots, apples, bananas (no bananas for the babe since I don't fancy banana in my hair).


That's our route.

She doesn't allow hair ties to stay in for long...

View from the top of the hill. It's worth the huffing and puffing to get to the top.

Coming back down after mooing at the cattle.

Passing the silage pile. Smells so good.

The stroller sprouts arms.

And Fire Boy spots the hair tie that Wind Girl pulled out on the way up the hill.

I love to look down and see little toes at my sides.

Maybe we should bundle up and try a winter walk if it's not too windy.

thoughtful little boy (sometimes)

Last evening Fire Boy broke a toy. He broke the top off of his wooden toy gas station while I was putting Wind Girl to bed, and then he told me why he broke it off (he didn't like the sign on top). I explained to him that we do not break toys on purpose and that the whole toy garage might need to be put away for a while until he could learn to take better care of it (this is not the first time he has made modifications to the design). His first reaction when we tell him that things need to be put away is to check the severity. Our conversation went something like this...

FB: "Far far away?"
Me: "No, just in the back room for a while until you can play more carefully with it." "
FB: "Oh. Not far far away?"
Me: "No, not really."
FB: "No, I think we should give the garage to a little boy who needs toys."
Me: "You don't want to keep it?"
FB: "No, I think we should take it to a little boy who doesn't have many toys. And my toolbench, too"
Me: "That's very nice, but I think we'll just put the garage away for a few days."
FB: "No, no, I think we should give it away to someone else."
Me: "That's really sweet, dear. That's just like Snip Snap and Snur gave away their brand new yellow sled to the little boy who wanted one and didn't have any money. That's very nice of you, but I think we'll keep the garage and toolbench."
FB: "Okay. Let's draw a picture before we read books."

I guess this comes from the fact that we take outgrown toys to thrift shops and talk to Fire Boy about how we are donating them to children who don't have many toys. Yesterday I was sorting toys and asked if we could pass on one of the things he never uses, and he said "no", but gave me an item that is one of his favorites instead (I did not donate that item...).

Last winter I got warm fuzzies listening to Wandering Dad explain to Fire Boy about the Salvation Army bell ringers. My the end of the season Fire Boy wanted to put change in every bell ringer's bucket. Maybe this year he is ready for a more active roll in giving?

So for now I will focus on Fire Boy's thoughtfulness and generosity instead of the fact that he modified a toy because he didn't like the sign on top.

camera eye of a 3 year old

Last year we bought our son a kids camera, but the picture quality was poor and the flash was worse. So a few weeks ago Wandering Dad hunted out our old digital camera, charged it up, and gave it to Fire Boy. It has been very interesting to see what catches his eye, and below are a few pictures from the first time we downloaded it.

exploring textures

self and family

lots of feet and shoe shots

lots of pictures of random objects

Other interesting pictures included a monarch butterfly chrysalis waiting to hatch in our garage, a measuring spoon, cloth diapers, play room mess (lots of these), daddy changing diapers, and grass.

Next time we find the camera I'll download it again...

fishing in the sky

A few weeks ago Wandering Dad took our son to the open house at the local fire hall, and they came home with a yellow balloon. Our little Fire Boy was having trouble understanding the ins and outs of helium balloons, so Wandering Dad though of a great activity.....fishing in the sky. He attached the balloon to the end of a fishing line, and let Fire Boy fish for it. They let the line go out and out and out and the balloon go up and up and up, and then Fire Boy reeled it in, time after time. This is a great way to keep a toddler busy for half an hour or more. Thank you creative dad!!





And it's also a great time to practice walking skills.