Hippie Mom in a Preppy World

Posts Tagged ‘granola’

I can haz Breeze Carrier?

Dear Santa or Ceiling Cat (whomever reads this first):

I’ve been a very good mom this year.  My baby Fox loves it when I wear him close but I can only do it indoors or when it’s cold.

The Baby K’Tan Breeze Carrier is the same style of sling that my baby already loves and would enable me to wear him anytime, anyplace including outdoors in the heat at fun places like the Farmer’s Market and Drum Circle without him sweating so much that he risks dehydration or worse, heat stroke.

the mesh provides cool breathability

I’ll be a very happy mom if Christmas comes early this year.

kthxbai,

Mommy Fox

Last week I went to Halloween Horror Nights with the hubby, this is the longest time that I’ve been away from Shammy and the longest physical distance between us.  I did fairly well as long as I was distracted but I cried at all of the lines and really cried during the part with the cribs at the Orphanage haunted house, people must have thought that I was very scared.  I was in such a rush to be done and out of there that I even skipped going on my favorite ride.

Since I was away for so long I brought the pump along with me and due to time constraints I brought the battery pack to pump in the car.  I will say that pumping breast milk while in a moving vehicle is quite a sign of my commitment to breastfeeding and quite the labor of love.  Specially when hubby kept forgetting to warn me about bumps.  I got to do this twice that day, it was interesting to say the least and it would have made for a funny picture.

While away I had my first real drink since before I got pregnant, I had been good this whole time and I was away from Shammy long enough for it to be out of my system in time, I have a weakness for the bags of blood/ jello shots.

I’m glad that hubby drove on the way back because I would have had a major lead foot from being so anxious to hold my baby again.

Shammy is growing at an amazing speed, his latest costume size says that it fits up to 9 months and at just under 3 months is has barely outgrown it.

On the EC front, I caught his first diaper free poop and I must say that it shoots out as such a projectile speed that he could get a job doing quality testing on hurricane shutters!  I haven’t really stepped up my EC efforts, I mainly try to see if I get lucky when I give him a few minutes of diaper free time in between changes.

I have been able to manage things so that I only need to use 2-3 disposable diapers per day and the rest of the time he is in cloth.  One pack of disposables now lasts 2 weeks.  I now make sure that I use cloth overnight and in the morning and leave the disposables for the afternoon when his output is more moderate and this method ensures that he can wear the same outfit all day.  Still dreaming of the day that I have enough cloth to not have to buy disposables anymore…

Last week I also applied for my dream job.  As I have previously mentioned, I would love to become a Peer Breastfeeding Counselor for WIC.  At the La Leche League meeting I asked a current counselor if there were any openings and she mentioned that one of them just resigned and there is an unlisted vacancy that they were not planning on posting.  So I got her supervisor’s name and sent her a letter and application directly, I would be beyond thrilled if this pans out.  Wish me luck!

On Saturday we took Shammy to his first Pumpkin Patch, you would think that he would have been all excited since he was dressed up for the occasion including pumpkin socks but instead he chose to sleep through the whole thing and no amount of handling woke him up during our stay, oh well.

Shammy’s blessing ceremony is less than 2 weeks away and it also happens to be Shammy’s 3 month birthday, it will be short and sweet but look forward to being blessed with lovely weather in our backyard.

A $1,100 sling?! WTF!  Given that the standard sling for that brand averages $500 I can assume that it wasn’t a typo.  And here I am complaining when a carrier I like costs more than $100  (on the other hand, the carrier that I want is a measly $65, a bargain by comparison!)

“no baby yet?” that seems to be the question du jour, usually coming from the masters of observation mentioned previously, if I’m still walking around with a basketball under my shirt the answer to that question should be pretty obvious.  It makes me wish that I had ordered a t-shirt that says: “No I haven’t had the baby and I’m not in labor.” or even better, one that says “it isn’t over until the fat lady isn’t fat anymore”

I made the mistake of sharing a link that I found interesting/amusing on Facebook about how people swear that a dish at a certain restaurant is guaranteed to induce labor within 48 hours.  Several different people took it to mean that I wanted to eat the dish to induce myself, quite a jump in logic!  Specially when I’m the one regularly ranting about how one shouldn’t induce labor unless medically necessary.

And since everything is healthy, the only time I would consider induction is if I’m overdue which I am not (yet).  Yes people, please remember that I still have almost 2 weeks to my official “due” date or as I like to call “guess date”.    And if it comes to that, then I’d rather try the natural tricks before I check myself into the hospital for a pitocin drip at 42 weeks.

As much as we’re excited to meet baby Fox, I am not trying to dictate when he/she should make his/her appearance.  In a sense I would probably miss being pregnant as I’m still enjoying it all when I don’t count the cankles.  I do hope that this isn’t one of those “cool babies” that insists on being fashionably late for it’s debut but baby will get to pick the time it considers best and we’ll adapt to that.

I guess this is another aspect of being a granola mom in a fruit loop world.

Thinking about fruit loops, it saddens me to see so many other new parents putting so much focus on the theme and color scheme of their nursery and not on other more important (in my opinion) decisions.  But I notice that this is because there is hardly any mention of the important  decisions to be made since most people think they have no choice and go with the “standard” procedures.

I am referring to things such as where to give birth, how to give birth, who to give birth with, which classes to take, whether to have a doula, which prenatal tests to take, to eye goop or not,  whether to vitamin K shot or not, whether to delay vaccines or skip them, whether to circumcise and most of this is just the “medical” side of it.  There’s still the decisions on parenting style and everything that comes with actually bringing the baby home.

It shocks me how often I hear somebody saying that they just did things that way because “that’s how everybody does it”, “that’s what my doctor told me to do” or “I didn’t know there was an alternative”, has anybody ever heard of the concept of INFORMED decisions?

In non ranting news, this week we had a belly cast made of the bump, it didn’t come out perfect but being Daddy Fox’s first job as sculptor it’s pretty good, it wasn’t hard to do and aside from having a waterproof belly and boobs from the vaseline lubricant it wasn’t as messy as we feared.

Now it’s a matter of me getting the chance to try to sand it a little and figure out how to decorate it after a trip to the craft store for ideas and supplies.

I had been having trouble sleeping for a very long time and something as simple as flipping sides was being torture, this was in part because we have a tiny bed and Daddy Fox is a giant and I’m not so pixie sized with the bump so there isn’t much room for movement and positioning.  Apparently Daddy Fox got tired of my whimpering and swearing throughout the night and he started to sleep on the futon in the bedroom and suddenly the room to spread and move in bed has allowed me to get the best sleep in months.

It sucks that it’s harder to fall asleep without him as close and  I can no longer sneak in middle of the night cuddles without getting up but at least I’m starting to get some decent rest again.  I appreciate his sacrifice and it’s cool that our room is big enough to fit 2 beds so that he doesn’t have to be all the way out in the couch.

An unexpected side effect to this pregnancy is that I’ve developed a sensitivity to certain food ingredients.  In the past all I had to do was avoid seafood and I could eat anything else without remorse but in recent months I find myself having reactions to MSG and other food additives used in many popular restaurants.  Now I get sick after every time I eat at Golden Corral and the other night I had an allergic reaction to food from Chipotle that was bad enough that required me breaking out the benadryl to avoid skinning myself alive.

Back to ranting… This hasn’t yet made a big stir in the news but it may, there is a peaceful “nurse in” being staged tomorrow at a park in Orlando to protest the discrimination by a lifeguard against several breastfeeding mothers and I’m cheering for them from afar.

A lot of people seem to be getting their panties in a twist over this ranging from “breastfeeding is gross” to “I don’t care what you do but I don’t want to see you do it”.  A lot of this stems from the taboo over breastfeeding and the over- sexualization of breasts.  I roll my eyes at the prudes that don’t want children to see a woman nursing a baby, they will never grow up to learn what breasts are truly for otherwise since media and society emphasizes a completely different purpose for them.

Normalizing breastfeeding means more people, adults and children, must be exposed to it on a regular basis in the course of their everyday lives.  Breastfeeding is not something to be embarrassed about. In cultures where breastfeeding is the norm, children simply don’t ask what mothers are doing with their babies, because they already know what breasts are for. And parents understand the dual purpose they can serve without embarrassment.

I’ve got nursing covers and if I use them it will be for my benefit and not anybody else’s and if baby doesn’t like them or it’s too freaking hot or inconvenient to cover up while nursing people can choose not to look or put the cover on THEIR head.

I believe in people’s right to be offended but that doesn’t entitle them to interfere.  There are many legal activities I witness in public that personally offend me and when I don’t like it, I stop looking and continue about my day.

Regardless of the many benefits of breastfeeding and its promotion by medical and governmental organizations, Florida law protects a child’s right to nurse but most people don’t know about this. Florida enacted Fla. Stat. § 383.015(1) (1993), which reads:

“A mother may breastfeed her baby in any location, public or private, where the mother is otherwise authorized to be, irrespective of whether the nipple of the mother’s breast is uncovered during or incidental to the breastfeeding.”

Why should we stand up for our breastfeeding rights?  Because the next breastfeeding mother might not know her rights, she might not be confident enough to stand up for herself, she might even be discouraged enough that she stops breastfeeding.

On the getting ready for baby front, the stereotypical nesting instinct of wanting to clean and disinfect everything including the screws in the cabinet hinges has been non existent for me.  The house needs a good spring (or in this case summer) cleaning but the best that I can do is try to keep it from getting worse, oh well…

I have been doing some last minute shopping for miscellaneous items that we still don’t have, most of it would be extras (more towels and washcloths) or luxuries (fox crib mobile and wall decals) but it brings me joy, still dreaming over that fox themed bedding set that is out of my current financial reach….

I have printed a sign to be posted in our front door in case I get loud at odd hours while in labor and somebody calls the cops.

Think it gets the point across?

As I ate some organic plain granola with yogurt (yummy!) I read the bag it came in “no artificial preservatives, flavors or colors”  and chuckled at how some people call me granola as an insult but the more I look at it, the more I take it as a compliment.

I sometimes refer to myself as a ‘hippie mama’, “offbeat mama” or a ‘crunchy granola mom’. The terms are a sort of short-hand way to tell you something about who I am. For example, I plan to cloth diaper, breastfeed and babywear. I consider myself a feminist and a pacifist. I subscribe to Mothering magazine and my baby listens to a lot of drumming music.

However, when compared to other granola moms I’m merely crispy, not crunchy. I took a “how crunchy are you?” online quiz and got the result- “Super Nutty, Ultra-Crunchy, Granola Earth Mama” but beware that at 139 points this is nowhere near the high score of “WOW!~Crunchier than Grape Nuts!”.

However, one mama can only be so crunchy, you know? So, today, I am going to share with you some of the many ways that I am not such a hippie mama after all.

1. I love camping but I must still have access to a shower, even if just a camping shower bag.

2. I do not own a pair of Birkenstocks, and I never have.

3. I do not enjoy Bob Dylan, although I am sure he has a broad influence and revolutionized music as we know it. Or something.

4. I  shop at Walmart. While I would like to avoid big box stores whenever possible, sometimes they really do have the best prices and selection.

5. Even though I’ve been vegan and vegetarian for years in the past.  I eat meat, and I like it. I also eat wheat and dairy and occasionally consume high-fructose corn syrup. Because sometimes? Mama needs a coke slurpee fix.

6- I have a lot of baby gear such as a crib, bounce chair and stroller, and including the playard, otherwise known as a  baby jail.

7. I am pretty law-abiding, although I have no problem writing a strongly worded letter to an elected official.

8. We live in the suburbs, and have no plans to move back to the land.  I don’t care for the sprawl but I live with it.

9- I have plastic food containers, as much as I strive for BPA free, I admit I still have plenty that came from the dollar store.

10- We recycle and try to be environmentally conscious but I admit that my carbon footprint still has room for shrinkage.

11- We have a TV (although 95% or more of its usage is by hubby I still watch some shows)

Sometimes I  feel judged by people and others make comments that  I am engaged in a one woman game of ‘hippier than thou’. I am not. I do the things I do because I enjoy them. If you don’t enjoy them, it’s fine by me.  I will not agree with it, I will not endorse it or promote it but I will respect it, just know that you will get an earful of my opinion if you open that door but I will never go on an unsolicited sermon (unless you start the subject).  It’s also cool if you’re an organic raw vegan who wears Birkenstocks and loves to primitive camp. As long as we can be tolerant and understanding, we can join together as one happy tribe, I say.