random stuff

Ila peed in David's shoe a couple weeks back. I know I should be upset or something but it is the best place she could have peed, seriously. Like the proverbial dog:) It was hilarious!

Clyde is 1 now. I sorta skipped posting that. In fact, tomorrow he is 13 months. He has finally started to feed himself a little bit, which is great since it makes things easier for me. He still pick up bites I put on his tray, but if it is something really tempting and I put it into his hand, then he'll eat that. And he can drink from a sippy cup now, and can hold his bottle! He would not have anything to do with either until a couple weeks ago. I finally bought a new sippy for him to try and it helped a lot.

Ila sings or talks all the time. She has long convoluted sentences with multiple clauses and has a large vocabulary. I'm thinking of trying to teach her to read in a home schooling format soon. She already knows all the letters and sounds, so maybe she could do it. David supposedly started reading at age 3, so maybe Ila will too.

6 months later

Today is 6 months exactly since I first started no refined sugar. I have changed the commitment from no refined sugar to be no treats or treatoids.  I haven't lost any weight, but I did discover that I have fructose malabsorption (thus honey is a bad sweetener choice for me) and that I don't think the Costco brand of maple syrup is worth eating (or buying) compared to other brands I've tried. I think my lack of weight loss was because I was just replacing regular treats with honey sweetened ones. Which is really not helpful. So the end of that. I think I will be ok with still eating dark chocolate, so long as it is 85% or more. That stuff is not a big temptation for me. Also, naturally occurring sugars in carob and whole fruit I think are fine. But not fruit juice.

the end.

Things of note

I was running last saturday. Out of nowhere a 60 year old woman comes jogging up to me and starts running with me and talking. "You were my inspiration this morning," she says. She goes on to say how when she saw me running so slowly, she knew she could do that. She gets frustrated with running and getting tired too fast, but at my pace, she could go for a long time.
Well. I am glad to have inspired a 60 year old woman with my slowness. Though I had not thought to inspire anyone by running slower than my husband walks...I am glad I did:)

Clyde is happy again. He was sad for a while. He has 7 teeth now and is 10 months.

My 3rd half marathon is coming up on saturday. This one looks to be the worst time ever, considering I didn't run for 2 months and just started again last week. I don't really care though. I'll just stay ahead of the SAG wagon. (The wagon that picks you up if you are below 16 min/mile pace.) I will try not to SAG. The run last saturday (where I inspired the lady) was only 6 miles. And it is my longest run in 2 years. So we'll just see about 13 miles on saturday.

Also. Four months after moving into our (purchased) house, our rental contract is finally over at our old place. I am SO glad to be done with mean landlords and subletting. Hopefully never again.

There were more things of note but I have forgotten them. Alas.

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Update: I did finish the race ahead of the SAG wagon. 3h 15m total. Not bad for hardly any training and walking half the race! Also. Clyde is 11 months now and has 8 teeth:)

relentless

After a recent discussion with friends, I decided to give up something for lent this year. I'm scrapping added sweeteners, refined or not, from my diet. I'm shooting for 10 grams or less each day of added sugars. (This includes fruit juice. Whole fruit is ok.) After lent I'll allow unrefined natural sweeteners to some degree, but I am going to continue to avoid refined sugar for a year, staying below the 5 or 10 gram/day mark. (I'm still working out what is feasible without making everything from scratch.) I'm hoping that during that time I will totally lose my desire to eat it so that when the year is done, I won't suddenly rush out and buy a bunch of treats, and will instead want to continue avoiding it.

I know this is sort of drastic, but smaller measures don't seem to work on me and I'm tired of the ill effects on my health and well being. It's all or nothing, and I choose nothing.

For the record, lent began on 3/5/2014. Wish me luck.

Birth

I will amaze you all and make a post.

Here it is.

My baby is nearly 5 months old now. Life is busy now with two kids. (Biggest understatement I have ever made, possibly.)

Here is the story of the birth. The day Clyde was born, I did many things. I can't even remember them all. Here is a list of what I do remember:

• shopped at Trader Joes. The cashier asked when I was due. "Monday," I said. Two days away.
• went to the library.
• made three loaves of meatloaf. One of these loaves was dinner for David and Ila that night. They were supposed to go in the freezer that night (for post-baby meals), but stayed in the fridge for 2 more days.
• Emailed a friend. "Baby has not come."
• emailed j the square. "mailed the choker yesterday." For her wedding. 
• went to a church dinner before Relief Society general conference. I ate tomato basil soup but could not eat the bread because it had wheat. Then I had ice cream. I thought my chair was very uncomfortable.
• sat and started watching conference. thought I had gas pain from the ice cream. Pulled out my phone to measure intervals just the same. 
• water broke one hour in. luckily, did not get onto church pew. dash to the ladies room. I guess it was not gas after all. 

After that, two friends got me home. One drove my car, another followed in hers. I was in serious pain when I got back. We called the neighbor to come over, called the doctor, wasted 30 minutes packing stuff. My contractions were around 5 or 6 minutes apart (before water broke). I was expecting a long slow labor. 7 minute drive to the hospital. Lots of screaming in the car, and 2 minutes apart by the time we arrived. Next, the wheelchair in the parking lot of the hospital. We should have gone to emergency, but we did not know valet would not be there on a saturday night. The security guard pushed me into the hospital, passing me off to another guard.

4th floor entry: Can you please spell your name? What is your date of birth? I thought, let me through before I am killed.

More screaming. The nurses can hear me down the hall and prep the room for me. The nurse tells me to breathe.

5 minutes later: baby comes out. His head was perfectly round. No time to be squished. Thank you Kate the doctor. It was 9:08 pm. My "gas" pain had started at 7 pm, and water broke at 8 pm.
Afterward, I was officially admitted to the hospital. 

I was wearing a yellow shirt (this one) and grey skirt during the birth. I wore that same skirt home 2 days later. Still mostly clean, amazingly enough.