Weekly Chat January 10-16 - Page 5

[JMarie930]

Tara, give this to your DH:

Cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow
For babies grow up, we've learned to our sorrow
So quiet down, cobwebs
Dust, go to sleep
I'm rocking my baby, and babies don't keep.

My MIL made TONS of comments about how I'm not the best housekeeper (this was when I was working 70+ hours a week while DH was out of work AND not looking AND not cleaning the house...), and after we had DS, my mom sent that little poem to me. Some days, I seriously let my house go to he!! in a handbasket. Mady won't be this tiny and needy forever, so I'm just going to enjoy it.

[TaraRae82]

nak

rae, ita! with everything! the funny thing is, our house is no messier and laundry isn't neglected anymore than it was pre-ally rae! i'm totally one of those people that would rather ignore some housework and enjoy every min of my baby's life and give her all the attention i possibly can. my mom gave me one piece of advice before ally was born and that was exactly what you said about "my house is clean enough to be healthy and dirty enough to be happy." she said her mom spent every min of every day cleaning and doing housewife stuff and she swore she'd never be like that because you miss so much! it's just not that important. ryan has always had an issue with my housekeeping habits so this isn't new to him. i'm not sure why now is when he chose to start bugging me about it. sheesh. he said we'd talk about cd'ing and the laundry tonight but i'm not sure i want to because i'm tired of the men in my life "telling" me i'm not good enough (both of my dad's are very conditional and judgemental...nothing is good enough). i know my faults...i don't need to be reminded. i just want to do what i know is best and it'd actually be a great motivator to get the laundry done.

i think the big issue here is ryan and i don't agree on the value and benefits behind "natural" parenting. he's all for the natural stuff that doesn't disrupt his normal life or he has hard facts about. it's hard for me because i don't really even question the crunchy side of life....i just "know" it's right....it makes sense w/o explanation.

rae! i didn't know that was the first nursing in the carrier! congrats! i would've been screaming it from the rafters! i just can't get ally and myself comfy in the wrap to nurse...i carry her too high and tight.

i did have a great time at the LLL meeting today. i really liked having it in a home. much less chaotic i thought. it's always nice to get out of the house and be around like-minded people. it's refreshing when so many people question your parenting choices.

[TaraRae82]

Originally Posted by janasmama

Yeah Fitness Mama (aka Tara)

I wanted to ask you something. I started a CrossFit program...are you familiar with that? Well, I love it! I don't have a scale though and I've been doing this for 3 weeks now and I really don't see any results. I'd like to see if there are any results from the scale...even something small.

Anyway, what do you eat? I want to make sure I'm getting enough calories so that my milk is fatty enough but I don't count calories and I won't. But, when I get back from working out I'm ravenously hungry. I have been even more hungry even on the days I don't work out...I think it's a growth spurt from Annie.

P.S. I hate squats!

i'm not familiar with that. usually you'll see a change in something by 5-6 wks. that change could be the number on the scale, the number on your jeans tag, how your jeans fit, or how easily you can do the same workout. all are great changes.

my food choices are pretty limited because ally can't handle dairy, eggs, or peanuts and i'm a super picky eater. i eat a lot of healthy choice steamer meals (chicken margherita). i do kashi cereal with soy milk or kashi blueberry waffles for breakfast and/or snack. i have natural juices when i take my supplements. i do a lot of fruit. ryan does all our dinners. usually fish, chicken, or steak with potatos. we do turkey chili or spaghetti too. i do a lot of "grazing". i don't really care for full meals. i get full too quickly. i drink a ton of water too. i usually have sweets of some kind in the evening. golden oreos right now. haha!

eat carbs before your workout and protein after. this will fuel your body during and help the muscles recoop after.

Originally Posted by JMarie930

Tara, give this to your DH:

Cleaning and scrubbing can wait till tomorrow
For babies grow up, we've learned to our sorrow
So quiet down, cobwebs
Dust, go to sleep
I'm rocking my baby, and babies don't keep.

My MIL made TONS of comments about how I'm not the best housekeeper (this was when I was working 70+ hours a week while DH was out of work AND not looking AND not cleaning the house...), and after we had DS, my mom sent that little poem to me. Some days, I seriously let my house go to he!! in a handbasket. Mady won't be this tiny and needy forever, so I'm just going to enjoy it.

beautiful....it's got me in tears. i should cross stitch that and hang it.

[sonshine_rae]

That's funny Jmarie... I just posted that poem on my 'wall' (FB) yesterday .. it hangs in our nursery !!!!

Tara I haven't been able to nurse in a wrap properly yet either.. sigh I love love love them to carry baby and for baby to sleep.. but can't figure out how to loosen/tie it for baby to nurse in them yet. Maybe one of these days I'll get it lol. Part of the problem is that Samuel 'must' (according to him) have his head free without something pushing/holding it down.. and most 'nursing holds' I've seen have the babies head covered/tightly pulled in to mama. I often do what you did today and just take baby out while leaving the wrap on and nurse baby.. lol

i think the big issue here is ryan and i don't agree on the value and benefits behind "natural" parenting.

I have to agree Tara.... that does rather sound like the 'real issue' ..... sigh sorry he hasn't really 'got it' yet.

Also if you'd like to look at 'one more' diapering cost/comparision chart check this one out: http://diapering.wallypop.net/infocostcomparison.html

AAM OH wow.... there is a 4 yr old asleep on my couch !!!

[OrchideZ]

How disappointing Tara! I am sorry you are having to "sell him" on CD-ing. That doesn't seem quite right to me. Maybe you can make the case that since you are the one who is doing the bulk of the work related to Ally and the house itself, he should trust your judgment and what you have researched.
If he is so worried about laundry, do wool covers (they aren't machine washable, the lanolin is self-cleaning and antimicrobial with any pee...just needs to air dry for a few hours before wearing again and only need to be handwashed when there is a poop that gets through) and prefolds (minimal fuss/space in a washing machine load and don't need much when folding/putting away).
You are right...it DOES make sense. It is better for her health, will save y'all money in the long run and she will potty train sooner and yes, it is better for the planet. I would be frustrated if I had to get permission to cloth diaper. Sending you some good mojo so that it will work out...:
The MIL perfection thing would drive me batty. ((hugs))

Peacemamma: You are in LA I see. You should use Dy-Dee Diaper Service like me. They have been around since the 30's and are wonderful.
We also live in an old building with only one washer and knew that we wanted to CD so we sought out a service. We use wool covers and those are hand wash only every couple of weeks. All very easy peasy.
Which part of town are you in?

[TaraRae82]

I looked at that link Rae, and it's great! I'll def pass it on to DH if he's open to hearing my reasons for CD'ing.

Thanks for the well-wishes OrchideZ! I'll carry them with me...hopefully they'd radiate out of me when I try to educate DH and he'll just suddenly "get it"!

[peacemamma]

Hey OrchideZ! Glad to see another LA mama! I'm in Culver City. Where are you? I'll definitely look into Dy-Dee Diaper Service.

[mkmb129]

I'd be very upset if my dh said something like that to me, Tara Or if I had to ask his permission for something I'd be taking care of anyway. You do plenty, from the sounds of it, maybe he could pick up and help with the laundry if it's that big of a deal to him. I'm lucky in that my dh will help around the house, everything from laundry to dishes. He doesn't do a ton, but he helps, especially when I need a hand. My laundry gets fold, but RARELY put away. We pick out of baskets (which ends up unfolding somethings ), I don't have time for all of that putting it away. If I have some extra time, am mad (I clean like crazy when mad, too!), or feel like putting things in order then I'll put it all away, by then it's usually like 3-4 baskets worth, haha.

My dh wasn't too keen on the idea of cd'ing.. so while he was out to sea when ds was a baby, I bought them and started, so he had no say, haha. He came home, and never made a peep about it, I think he knew he didn't have a say so why bother complaining

I'm a prefolds and cover kind of girl for less-mobile babies, and pockets stuffed with a trifolded prefold for mobile ones. I have some fitteds & AIOs, but prefer prefolds & covers and pockets. I have a few FBs, some home-made fattycakes & some other free pocket patterns floating around the net, the fattycakes are my favorite though. I have some DDU pockets for Ainsley that I like so far as well. I love my BSWW for ds as far as covers go, and the rest are mama-made: fattycakes, DDU, & my own pattern.

[TaraRae82]

DH does help around the house some. He takes care of everything having to do with the kitchen for the most part. He does all the cooking and cleans the kitchen if he gets home before 8pm. I don't generally put much effort into the kitchen because I know he does it. He promised me when we got married that he'd do the kitchen if he never had to do laundry again (he HATES doing laundry and use to do it once a month as a bachelor). Fine by me! BUT....you don't get to complain if I don't do laundry like you want! I don't complain about how you put the tupperware away (which is all wrong...) or that you don't clean up the kitchen the same night as the meal that made a mess was cooked!

Thanks for the support ladies. It does help to at least know that I'm not crazy here in what I'm asking for. I wouldn't ask permission at all if it weren't such an investment all at once. I'd just do it if it cost $15 a pop once a week like sposies. He wouldn't blink an eye. A general rule for us is if it's going to cost $100 or more all at once, we talk first. Especially now that I'm not working (aka, not bringing in any income), I have NO idea where our finances stand and I don't want to hear it from him if I spend too much. He rarely tells me no when it comes to spending money so it's much easier to ask on the front end than to ask forgiveness after he gets upset if I spend too much.

[JMarie930]

Originally Posted by TaraRae82

i should cross stitch that and hang it.

Here you go!

http://www.goldingcraft.com/1073119.htm

[sonshine_rae]

hmm *Rae's wheels are turning* ..... so Tara why not just buy the diapers in smaller amounts? $15 a week turns out to $60 a month.. depending on what kind of diapers you settle on you can get a great start in a couple months or so.
Seriously though if all it were was money decisions (and not his total refusal and laundry bashing), the fitteds I showed you today (along with covers, and a couple pockets etc). I'm actually trying to give those away (your the second friend I've offered them to, no offense but you weren't interested in CD's when I first wanted to give them away). I've got 20 fitteds that have been used/abused and passed around in baby size and 19 in 'toddler' size that we don't use. I got them all at a LLL benefit auction and only donated $25 for them. And/or if you ever changed your mind about prefolds I'd be willing to let you borrow our infant size (Samuel is in Premium), which could work for a while yet, especially if you just laid them in the covers. But I'd want the prefolds back since we hope to have more kids.

However.. I am a bit concerned with your comment today.. about having an aversion to the lil' ones poo/pee .. you'll have to get over that no matter what kind you use Tara. For me when we used disposables all the time I was ALWAYS cleaning poop and sometimes pee out of clothes because it leaked out everywhere. So I had already gotten used to touching/laundering that kind of stuff. Even with AIO's or OS diapers you'll still have to touch it.... truly you do touch it even with disposables the 'germs' are still on those diapers even if they are dry to the touch. Just something to consider though if you don't think you can get past the ick side of things.... then maybe it's not worth your bother?

Also another thought would be you could try the fitteds as a 'free' way to prove that you will wash them to your DH lol.

Whatever the case I hope you are able to come to an agreement and be content about it with each other .

[Faerieshadow]

Tara, random thought on CDing/laundry... the kind of AIOs I like to use are the ones that the insert is not completely sewn in, just at the top... anyway, with AIOs like that, there's nothing to folding them. Heck, you could just toss them all in a basket and pull one out each time you needed. No laundry folding to worry about.

[Baby_Cakes]

I wore dishwashing gloves when I was dunking and laundering CD's!

[sarah1122]

Hey mamas....been lurking for months and just started posting to our DDC.

Why not just buy a few at a time? You can get a dozen prefolds and 3 or 4 covers or a few AIOs for way less than $100, which is plenty to get you started. That way you don't have to involve dh and you can do the cloth during the day to see if it works for you...no sense in trying to convince dh that cloth is best when you're not sure if you'll even like it, ya know?

We're totally committed to cloth for financial and environmental reasons, but we bought some 7th Gen. sposies for our plane trip over Christmas and have some left. Every time I'm in the midst of a poop disaster (which is almost daily) or schleping a bucket full of stinky dipes down to the washer I look wistfully at the pile of sposies in the bathroom....its sooo tempting. My dh would freak though...he thinks sposies should be illegal and I have to admit that I feel like Luca has a paper lunch bag on his bum when he wears one. ;-)

[audsma]

^I love it, Carrie!

Tara, this is about the 5th time that I've thought to myself "her dh sounds exactly like my dh" except that mine doesn't touch the kitchen unless there's a worse chore he's trying to avoid.

Rae- my thoughts exactly on the $15 a week. I had multiquoted to say that. One CDing benefit DH finds is that he's not lugging the trash with the stinky 'sposies out, and he doesn't have to make emergency trips to the store when we run out of them!

aam: I'm avoiding going in to talk to my former/future boss about setting up a schedule for me that's flexible for next year. I don't want the reality of having to work to set in yet. Then again, I don't want to go in too close to the time my coworker adopts her baby, since last time my boss saw me babywearing he said "I don't know why you can't just come back to work wearing him!"

I get to go walking with other mamas today! And, tomorrow we're going to pick up my new range for my new kitchen. (Here's hoping the kitchen is up and functioning by June.) I'm soooo excited to get it! Perhaps we'll be able to stop and get one of those little IKEA potties too and spend a few of our gift cards from Christmas. Then it's (hopefully) off to my favorite Farmer's Market in Davis on Saturday morning. Yippeee!

[Changed]

Why one earth are you guys dunking diapers? You know you don't have to do that right?

[Baby_Cakes]

^I only dunked when I had to give Nora formula. You would not BELIEVE the stink on the diapers when I left the poo on them. It was like a metal smell. It must have been from the iron in the formula. Once she was back on bm, no way I would dunk. I just threw them in the wash.

I posted on our thread in LWAB about my MIL pouring my BM down the drain, and I just wanted to repeat here that I am SO GLAD I figured it out now that she was doing that instead of later! I was so afraid I was going to have to supplement or pump 4 times a day instead of 3...ugh, that wouldn't have worked out very well. Granted it would have only been for another month or so till I was at home with her, but still.

I talked to DH last night and told him my "plan" for waiting until Nora was 6 months old (at least) before I attempt working part time. He's good with it (and if he weren't, I would have worked on him until he were). I'm going to look for work during that time though and my MIL can babysit when I need to go on interviews. I think I could handle working 2-3 days a week and a weekend, like a Sunday or something. We'll see what's out there.

[PassionateWriter]

Tara,
we use pocket diapers. im a pretty lazy cd'er and it works for me. we have some really cute fitteds but i just tend to stick with one of something for uniformity.

one thing i noticed is that my laundry got done faster when i CD b/c i had to make sure the laundry was done before doing the diapers.

i made it to an LLL meeting yesterday!! yeh!!

[mamanurse]

Originally Posted by Changed

Why one earth are you guys dunking diapers? You know you don't have to do that right?

Originally Posted by Baby_Cakes

I posted on our thread in LWAB about my MIL pouring my BM down the drain, and I just wanted to repeat here that I am SO GLAD I figured it out now that she was doing that instead of later! I was so afraid I was going to have to supplement or pump 4 times a day instead of 3...ugh, that wouldn't have worked out very well. Granted it would have only been for another month or so till I was at home with her, but still.

My mom was kinda haphazard with it on Tuesday and I gave her "the lecture." I also told her that if she runs out, she'll have to bring Hazel to me to feed as I refuse to give her formula. She looked at me and said "Why? That's what it's for. You guys are fine." I said "Fine? I have lupus, sister 1 has RA, and sister 2 has Crohn's." There's no proof that formula caused these disorders, but it certainly didn't help. I also said "I won't give Hazel formula because it's substandard nutrition. It's the equivalent of giving a multivitamin and a twinkie." She didn't even know there was HFCS in it. So I have a feeling she'll be more conservative with it now.

Olivia, Hazel, and I are going to meet another mom or two for lunch at Cafe Sip 'n Play in a suburb nearby. It should be fun

[Orionbelt]

Hi Everyone!

I've been busy the last few days preparing for DH leaving for sea Trying to stock up on things that are hard to pick up with three kids (like dog food, windshield washer fluid, etc). His ship leaves on Monday...yikes! I was so worried about how I was going to nurse Charlotte to sleep and keep an eye on the kids at night time so we decided to put our huge, comfy leather chair in my daughters room (which is kind of like their second play room) so I can nurse her in there and keep an eye on my kids.

I think my oldest two can sense that something is going on because they have been acting out lately and testing the waters with me. It gets so frustrating some days being a Mama and the Mama guilt gets to me sometimes but I realized that I have really happy children so I must be doing something right!

Mamanurse: That cafe looks awesome. We have one here that is similar but not as nice. I didn't know that you lived in Vancouver either. We just moved to Halifax after spending a few years on Vancouver Island and we are planning on moving back at the beginning of next year. It's funny...we lived in Victoria for over two years and I never made it over to Vancouver!

Have to cut this short...my coffee maker just beeped, I have a piece of gumdrop cake thawing on the counter and I hear Charlotte starting to fuss....hmmmmmmm...which one to go to first...just kidding!