Deep Breath

Deep breath: Don't yell at the children for playing with fighting over the exact.same.toy even though there are 5 hundred thousand other toys in the house.  Relax, separate them nicely.

Deep breath: Don't freak out because you just discovered your income is probably going down next year.  Even though you can't afford to live on what you currently get.  God is in control.  God is in control.  God is in control.

Deep breath: Don't doubt yourself when someone asks you to do something that you think you can do, but aren't 100% sure.  No one expects perfection but you.

Deep breath:  Just go, get out of the house, exercise.  You'll feel better and have more energy even if you're tired now.  Take the boys, go to the park, get outside.  Don't worry about the dirt!!!  That's what the washing machine is for.

Deep breath: Stop, think, pray.  This too shall pass.



This is a post prompt from The Gypsy Mama. Join in?

The Bug Hotel we are NOT

But you'd never guess that from the amount of bugs we seem to be hosting.  I've killed no less than 6 large spiders in my house this week (the teeny ones I don't mind - one lives on my bathroom windowsill) and a black widow outside on the foundation the other night.  As a general rule if they are outside I tend to leave them alone, but I make an exception for poisonous things that could hurt my babies!

Have I mentioned we also still have an ant problem?  I'm fairly used to finding them crawling on me during the day.  They are so ubiquitous it's hard to be jumpy all the time.  It makes me feel like I can't keep my house clean, but when they can find the teeny tiniest drop of sweet and congregate around it... well, I guess their senses are better than mine!

This was after I'd made some tuna fish and apparently spilled a bit on the counter.  I didn't know they liked protein too or perhaps the mayo was sweet to them.

If you look closely you'll see the one under the arrow is standing "guard" up on his back legs.  Cracked me up when I saw the picture!

Outside I try not to mind them, it's their home... but why do they like my home so much?  And why are the mosquitoes so nasty this year?  I thought I had a mosquito bite on my ankle, but considering it's turned a funky shade of dark purple I'm wondering if it was a mutant mosquito or something else... but they are all out to get me in the evenings and I itch.

But the kicker... oh the kicker!  I came in from watering my flowers this evening and felt something on my back... inside my shirt.  I tried to brush it, but thought I'd better check...  Taking off my shirt I found an earwig crawling in it!!!  Still gives me the creepies just thinking about it!  Time to buy some bug bait!!!

What kind of house do you live in and do you have a bug or pest problem?  We didn't have this problem in our apartment... it's taking some getting used to!

Mea Culpa

Originally when I read about the craziness of BPA I sent an email to all my mom friends as well as posting here. Well, it appears I was misled. Since I have already written to them I will simply post that email here.

It appears I owe you all a giant apology. So, I'm sorry for scaring you!!!

I have been doing a lot of reading on the subject of BPA's in plastics in the last 2 days. Here are a couple things I've found out. First of all the highest level of concern that the US Toxicology report lists is a simple "some" concern about BPA exposure for infants and possibly behavioral/neurological affects. (see link: http://zrecs.blogspot.com/2008/04/national-toxicology-program-concurs.html) This report has not even been peer reviewed yet, that's scheduled for June. Which means that it might get thrown out all together.

But the biggest thing I found was this link from a friend of mine.
http://www.stats.org/stories/2008/should_baby_bottles_feb9_08.html
The entire website is about how we interpret data and their goal is to correct misleading or false media reports about science. Statistics can be twisted to say pretty much anything you want them to.
This article in particular talks about how Europe, Japan, and even a separate US study have all found the levels of BPA leaching out of plastic to be so low as to be considered non-existent. And the study that is causing all the uproar here is based on really bad science and one guy's hypothesis that trace amounts of this chemical (which mimics estrogen) can have the same effects as large doses. Plus these studies were done on mice and rats which digest this chemical differently than humans do. In this case that means that the effects on humans wouldn't be the same at all.

Do with this information what you will. The links are still good if you are looking for totally BPA free plastics. However I am relieved to know that this appears to be a major distortion of the truth and my son is not in dire jeopardy because of one chemical - which kind of doesn't make sense anyway considering how many years this has been used and we haven't seen things like what happened to the thalidomide babies.

What I meant by this last line (which I now see could be rather confusing) is that if all the bad things could really happen that they are claiming this chemical does then we would have seen it long before now.

Relief

Well, I am somewhat relieved to discover that my son's favorite sippy cup is actually NOT on the list of cups containing BPA like I feared last night. There was a little factory code on the bottom that said E3 and I thought that meant it was a #3 plastic. So don't be fooled! It must be in the recycling rectangle or else it's just some random number they have printed on there. Whew!
Here's the site specific to Nuby that has pictures of all the safe vs. unsafe cups and bottles. I also found a place to buy replacement nozzles (Good For the Kids) so I'm happy about that since Cory stuck his finger through the top and now it leaks everywhere.
To find out if other brands of cups/bottles and dishware is safe see The Safer Landing or Z Recommends. See if you can find a picture of your specific item because many of them are named similarly with one being safe and another not. That's what caused my confusion over Cory's cup.
This page at Z Recommends also has a great graphic to help you figure out which brands are good and which are not.

Speaking of Cory... he's still not feeling well. Today he spiked a pretty high fever, but thankfully one of my best friends is a nurse and one of Brian's good friends is a doctor so I have resources! He's been keeping down fluids and a little cracker and toast so I think we'll be okay. He's just so sad when he lays around and whimpers. :(

The Nightmare Day

Literally and figuratively, unfortunately.

It started even before I woke up with this crazy dream...

Where first I was in a tent with some caged animals and I was running from some bad people. And then one of the bad guys caught me and poured acid on the back of my neck and my wrists. Somehow I managed to get away and was hosing myself off outside this lady's house when some boys started shooting at me with blow guns and darts dipped in acid. I go in the lady's house to try to hide and she refuses to call the police. Also it seems that there is nowhere in her house that is not visible from the windows. Eventually the boys get inside and when I ask how she says, through Macy's. 'Cuz you know her house was connected to the mall and the doors were open. Weirdness! And actually one of the freakier dreams I've had in awhile.

And then when I woke up and Brian brought Cory in to nurse, he promptly threw up in our bed. Poor little guy.
After stripping the bed and wiping the baby down we weren't going back to bed. I eventually tried to nurse him and put him back to bed. I went to sleep on the couch while Brian got ready for school. About 20 minutes after he left I hear Cory kind of doing his moan thing (it's normal) so I go in to get him and find that he had thrown up all over his bed. So it begins: bath, laundry, nap, rinse, repeat.
He didn't throw up too much more and I had hopes he was getting better, but he wouldn't eat anything all day. And then it started coming out the other end. Good thing he likes baths because he got three today. He also had a fever, but it seems to be responding to Tylenol. It's just so sad to see him not want to crawl around and play with his toys, but just roll a little bit to reach one or two.

So, you can see how I spent my day. Reading books and snuggling as well as doing lots of laundry. I did manage to switch out some of the photos in my header while Cory was sleeping though!

Then to top off my day I discovered this website: Z Recommends. Where they talk about all the baby products that are or aren't safe due to the bisphenol-A chemicals in plastics. The main thing you need to know is that any plastic container with the number 3, 6, or 7 inside that little recycling triangle means BAD NEWS! I found both my baby bottles, Cory's favorite sippy cup :( the sippy at my parents house, and one of Cory's favorite teething rings all had those. The saddest part though? My beloved Nalgenes are a number 7! How many years have I been drinking out of them?!!!
At this point the research shows more harm to young children due to the lack of an enzyme which removes the chemical from your body. Older people have more of this enzyme so it's not as big of an issue. However in small children it can possibly cause behavioral issues as well as early onset of puberty.
Good news is that Canada is probably going to ban this and hopefully the US will come down hard as well as companies bend to consumer pressure. Nalgene finally admitted (after many years of reassurances that it was safe) they are making a new line of bottles, due out this summer, that don't have this chemical in them. In the mean time, I discovered that the Gatorade bottles Brian brought home for Cory tonight are an okay type of plastic. I guess that's my new water bottle.

Technology - the Love/Hate Relationship

Since it seems to me I'm kind of in a complaining mood this week I was all set to write about some fun things that Cory is doing and post some pictures that we got of the 2nd time he ate squash... and let's just say he makes the same funny faces for every new food he tries!
But then I discovered this morning that my eBay account had been hacked - the email and name was changed - and they bought 17 items of computer and video game equipment running up into the thousands of dollars. Ugh. So after multiple hours online and 2 different sessions with eBay live help I *think* I finally have it all straightened out.
Which also means that I didn't get to run my errands while Cory was up between naps, but then Brian came home early so I went after school. (They were things that had to be done before tomorrow or I wouldn't have even bothered)
Then I also discovered that gmail doesn't work very well in Firefox, which is my preferred browser. So let's just say I'm ready to throw my computer out the window at the moment!
Not to mention that I'm all freaked out about people using my pictures to make some pervy profiles on orkut - which is some new social networking site run by google. I'm trying to figure out how to watermark my pictures in a very visible way without ruining the picture entirely... wish me luck!

The one (or two!) good things that happened today... I got my Discovery Toys start-up package in the mail!!!!! The toys are so cool and I can't wait to get started! My mom came down and was looking through the catalog and said she actually has some old versions of quite a few of the toys! I only remember the MarbleWorks and this shape matching little kids toy, but this has got to be a good selling point!
So I'm off to read up on how to be a good consultant - and tomorrow I'm taking the day off from technology. I'm going to a baby shower (yay!) and then going to paint Cory's new/hand-me-down crib!

Happy weekend all!

Red

Have I told you yet that Cory's favorite color is red? You wouldn't think it would be possible, but there it is! And we've known it for quite awhile. He gets distracted when nursing in the car because of the red Chinese tassel thing hanging off the rearview mirror. And tonight when I set him up to burp there was a red blanket laying over the arm of the couch. He went for it with intense focus! It was so cute! He also really likes his Elmo book...

Today I've been seeing red... as in freaking out... just a little bit.
I was reading a post on another blog about a mom having to prove that she didn't have to vaccinate her kids for them to be in pre-school. That reminded me that I've been thinking about this off an on. That there are some people who think there's a link between the MMR vaccine and increased rates of autism. There hasn't been any definitive proof that the 2 are linked, but they haven't dis-proved it either. (Just so you know that vaccine isn't recommended until they're 1 year so I've got time to research - and worry)
Most of the reasons they think there's a link is because of a preservative called Thimerosal which has a lot of mercury in it. Now tell me, why on God's green earth are they still using mercury when they know how bad it is? And in little babies shots?!!! However I do know that there are a couple of different versions of this MMR shot and not all of them have the Thimerosal in them. So now I just have to make extra sure that my doctor's office isn't using one...
But I've also been thinking, why in the world do they have to give so many shots when the babies are so young? They wanted to give Cory a Hepatitis B shot in the hospital when he was born! Hello, that's a blood borne disease? Where's he going to get it when he's staying home with me?
Some vaccines I have no problems with, Polio? You bet I'm gonna get him vaccinated for it. But chicken pox? Not so sure. For one thing it's a very new vaccine. For another thing chicken pox and even shingles while painful are not debilitating diseases last time I checked.
Plus I just think that giving a 2 month old baby 5 different vaccines all at once is not quite right. It just makes them horribly miserable and seems a little hard on their tiny bodies. I don't know, please don't quote me as authority, but I think they should space them out a bit. Especially since then there's no way to know if they have a reaction which one it was to.
I'm thinking that I'm going to have them wait to start any more rounds of shots until he's a little older. He has one more set to finish the Hep B, Polio, and DTaP and they are supposed to be given within a certain frame of time. But no new ones until later.

But needless to say I was fretting over this all day and of course when Brian came home we had to have a giant argument about it. I wasn't seeing straight because all I could think of was my precious baby being all cute and interactive one day and then after shots turning anti-social. I'm not sure I could handle it. So yes, I was freaking out.
Which reminds me, who do I think I am in control of everything anyway? Didn't I learn this way back in Costa Rica in 2001? That freaking out about all the what-ifs in the future gets you NO WHERE?!!! Didn't I get a dove tattoo to remind me that Jesus brings PEACE to my heart and my life!
So let me see, 1) I'm not going to stick my head in the sand, I will do research and be cautious, but 2) I am not in control over my life let alone any possible circumstances that could hurt my baby. 3) I will now proceed to try to calm down and be rational. Every time I start to think about it I will pray. For other people like Amy's family who have to deal with real things that could freak you out.