I Hope There Aren't Hormones in Heaven

These postpartum blues stink. And I couldn't help thinking today that I hope there won't be hormones in heaven. Life would be so much easier without them!! 

And I hope we won't need sleep either. 

I think you could probably trace almost every unkind thing I've ever said back to lack of sleep or hormones. And you could definitely trace every tearful breakdown to one of the two. That sounds like I'm not taking responsibility for my actions, but really-- I think in heaven it will be a lot easier to be peaceful and happy because we won't have these mortal ailments to deal with. 

Word of the Year: Gratitude

I decided that instead of making a list of new year's resolutions, I would choose one word to guide the new year. I want to make 2012 the year of gratitude.

I want to feel and express gratitude every day for all the blessings I have: my family, my health, my home, my friends. Gratitude puts life in perspective-- especially when things get hard. I know this year will have challenges, and so I want to be armed with gratitude.

Gratitude is a principal teaching of President Thomas S. Monson. I love what he says on the subject.

Introducing . . . Baby Isaac!

Baby Isaac arrived right on time-- just a few hours after his due date: December 15th at 3:22 am. He was 8 lbs. 6 oz. and 21 1/4 in. long. Here are pictures from his first two weeks. As you can tell, infants change so much from day to day. He looks different in every picture!! We love having Isaac in our family. A few fun details about him: 

• He has been a champion nurser. After spending 4 days in the NICU to receive antibiotics and sun tan under the bilirubin lights, I was worried about how he would transition to full-time nursing since I was not able to nurse him for every feeding in the hospital. The first day and half we supplemented with Similac (which he had been eating in the hospital), but after that we've exclusively nursed and he's done great! He has some mild thrush, but we've been taking medicine for that.
• He hates getting his diaper changed! I'm not sure if he was traumatized at some point or what, but for the first week and a half, he screamed at the top of his lungs through every diaper change as if we were torturing him. And he kick, kick, kicks his legs, making it very difficult to get the job done. Over the past two days it's gotten better though. We hope it's just a phase. 
• His cry is a high-pitched scream that my mom says is exactly what my cry was like. When I was a baby, my family called me a mouse. 
• He is hardly fussy at all-- which is very different from how I was! He cries when getting his diaper changed, when he's hungry, and sometimes when he has indigestion, and that's it. We hope this is NOT a phase. :-) 
• He has long stretches of quiet alert time. A few times we've put him in his crib, thinking he was going to sleep, but he will just lay there--for up to 15 minutes-- just looking around. Right now, Brent is holding him, telling him a story, and he's just looking at Brent and listening quietly. Yesterday, I put him on his stomach for some tummy time and put some toy keys near his head. He tried for about 5 minutes to grab the keys-- trying to lift his head and squirming. The amazing part to me is that he didn't get frustrated. 
• He is a big grunter. He grunts so much in his sleep, we can hardly sleep! 

 

Our Tree

Last year, we didn't worry about buying a big Christmas tree because we spent the holiday season in California with my family. I did find a 2' tree at Good Will that I put on the dining room table, and we inherited a 3' fiber-optic tree (impressive huh?) from our adopted Grandma-- Sister Cronkite. But as much as we love those two trees, we knew we wanted a big Christmas tree this year since we will be celebrating at home with the new baby (if he comes) and my mom. 

We took advantage of a sale at Target and bought a 7.5' unlit tree. Crazy as it sounds, Brent actually wanted to string the lights on the tree! As a kid, my family always got a fresh Christmas tree and putting the lights on it was an undesirable task for my dad. Little did I realize, it's actually more work to fluff a fake Christmas tree than it is to put on the lights. It took over 45 minutes to bend out all the branches to make this tree look full! 

Phase 1 

(Brent threw the lights on at the stage just to be silly. Notice my feet in the bottom left-hand corner. Yes, I did watch him do all the work.)

Phase 2

(Starting the process of fluffing the tree. (Notice our wet bar--straight from the 70s-- behind the tree. ha!))

Phase 3

(Forty-five minutes later. . . and after I actually did join in to help on the fluffing. . . we realize that one of the boxes of lights we bought has a WHITE cord. Dang it. The lights only extend 3/4 of the way up the tree. That's okay because we're too exhausted to decorate anyway. )

The Final Product 

(Hear angels singing in the background. And notice the empty car seat under the tree!)

The icicle ornaments are my favorite part!

Merry Christmas! 

So Excited to Be a Dad

Brent is so excited to be a dad, and he has really enjoyed his first fatherly duties, like putting together the crib: 

Every day he talks to the baby through my belly before he goes to work and when he comes home. Unfortunately this week has been one of the longest, most difficult weeks of his career. Last night he came home at midnight and the night before that it was 11pm. And he worked all last weekend and has to work all this weekend (including Sundays)! Needless to say he's been telling the baby to come any time so that he can have a break! :-) Amazingly, Brent has stayed sweet and positive through the whole thing. If I were working his schedule, I'm embarrassed to say I would probably not be very nice when I got home. But Brent is just tired and happy to be home. He's going to be a great dad! He already is!

Houston Baby Shower

I never posted about this, so I thought I'd do it now. . . My friend Lisa P. threw me an amazing baby shower early in November. She decorated everything so nicely and served the best food ever: Creole Stew and Cheesy Grits. I knew Grandpa O (who grew up in Georgia) would be proud! It was such a unique baby shower menu, I had to take pictures!

It was so wonderful to have the support of so many friends. Really, I have the greatest group of friends here in Houston. I am so grateful! 

Thanks to everyone who came and made it a special day for me!

Thanksgiving

 For Thanksgiving this year, we ate Turkey two days in a row (plus left-overs). YUM! The day before Thanksgiving, we hosted a meal at our home. Our good friends, Teresa, Eddie (and his daughter), and Emily (who came down from UT) and Andrew joined us. Then on Thanksgiving day, Andrew's family had us over for a mid-day meal. Can't complain about having two Thanksgiving dinners!

Then the Saturday after Thanksgiving, we drove up to Magnolia, TX-- a small town NW of Houston-- where my mom's cousin Alan Ogles lives. Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures with the family members! But I did take some on the way up. Small town TX is just so different from Houston. We loved the amazing forest-lined country roads. It was so good to meet and visit with family-- OGLES-- in Texas!!! They welcomed us like they had known us forever. We're glad we have that connection now and plan to get together more often.

Also, on Thanksgiving weekend, we had all our baby gear delivered from Amazon. We're ready!!

They Don't Have White Christmases In Houston

I heard this song on the radio today. And I laughed because this is a song that you could only play on the radio in Houston, so I'm sure none of you have heard it.

The truth is the lyrics exaggerate how warm the weather is here right now. Our high today was 50 and the low is in the 30s. Can you believe it? It actually feels like winter! Woohoo!! So, I'm not sure the iced drink or flip flops mentioned in the song are necessarily called for, but it is true that we don't have white Christmases down here!

Your Toothpaste May Be Harming Your Teeth

That is what I learned at the dentist last week! For the past 6 years or so, every time I go to the dentist, I get comments on my gum recession and am told to only use a soft-bristled tooth brush and to brush softly. But I do brush softly, or so I thought. It wasn't until this last trip to the dentist (I've had 6 different dentists in the last 5 years) that I learned what the real probably might be: my toothpaste.

The hygienist menitoned it first. She said that I should only use a small amount of toothpaste. When I asked why, she said it can be abrasive. Then, when the dentist examined me, he commented on my gum recession and said there are even some small pockets that have been worn in my teeth. At first he said I needed to watch my technique, but when I told him I don't brush back and forth vigorously, he asked me how much toothpaste I use. I told him I usually cover my whole toothbrush with paste. And he said that might be a problem. You should only us a pea-sized amount he said. A pea-sized amount! That's what the toothpaste tube suggests for children under 6. Not to mention all the toothpaste commercials that ingrain in our minds the image of a long, full squirt of toothpaste for each brushing. My whole life I've been using too much toothpaste.

My dentist said that there is actually fairly new research coming out about the abrasiveness of toothpaste and that it's actually been a major flaw in dentistry that they've blamed gum recession on hard-bristled toothbrushes. He said that toothpaste can actually be more abrasive than a toothbrush! Who knew?

I did a little online research and found this table on a few different dentist's websites. It rates toothpastes according to how abrasive they are-- and not surprisingly I've been using highly abrasive toothpastes. I always buy whitening toothpastes, and they are among the worst!

I just felt like I needed to pass this information along, because I'm sure there are lots of people out there who also have problems with gum recession-- especially those of us who have had braces. (Gum recession is often initially caused by braces.)

It's hard to change habits, but both Brent and I have cut down our toothpaste usage quite a bit. I just wish those tubes were designed to allow a smaller flow of paste.  It's practically impossible to get just a pea-sized amount out without touching the tube to your toothbrush. (Yuck!) The next step is to start buying less-abrasive toothpaste. Hopefully my teeth won't turn brown from not using whitening toothpaste anymore. :-)

Wafflettes

I meant to post this recipe AGES ago, but then I got sick for 3 months, and then I forgot about it. That is, until today, when I made these again for the first time in. . . . 7 months. 

Wafflettes are my name for this delightful breakfast food: a combination of waffles and omelettes. And they actually taste like quiche. I got the recipe from my roommate/old mission companion/best friend, Annelies. She got it from her mom, Melanie. And I don't know where it came from before that, but it is a favorite in our family. Here is the original recipe, but I usually double it to make it really worth my time. 

Ingredients: 

• 12 eggo waffles (any brand is fine)
• 6 wedges Laughing Cow Swiss Cheese (I like the garlic and onion or sundried tomato flavors.)
• 1 c. chopped ham or bacon
• 4 eggs
• 2/3 c. plain yogurt (non-fat is okay)
• 1/4 c. green onion, chopped
• 1 tsp. garlic powder
• dash of salt and pepper

Directions: 

• Preheat the oven to 375.
• Chop the green onion and ham/bacon. 
• Spread 1/2 a wedge of laughing cow cheese on each frozen waffle (no need to defrost).
• Sprinkle the meat on the waffles. 
• In a bowl, mix together eggs, yogurt, garlic powder, green onion, salt, and pepper. 
• Spoon egg mixture onto each waffle, taking care to not let it spill over the sides of the waffle. 
• Bake for 20-25 minutes. 
• After the wafflettes cool, put them back on the cookie sheet and freeze for a couple hours. Once refrozen, store in freezer bags. 
• To reheat for a quick breakfast: Microwave for about 45 seconds to thaw and then toast in the toaster. 

YUM!! These are so good, you'll want to eat them for breakfast, lunch, and dinner!