sleep, eat, and go potty

I really need friends. I went to the Relief Society broadcast on Saturday and found myself watching other women my age and thinking how fun it would be to have them as my friends. Obviously need to work on that aspect of my life and get out more. So for now, you wonderful friends that leave lovely comments on my blog, you're my sounding board.

And that's why I'm on my third post tonight. Yep, the third. Haven't chatted with anyone in a while so I simply have a lot to say. So here's the last of my thoughts tonight, promise.

I love books period, but lately I especially seek those helpful ones that address the three big battles in parenting: sleeping, eating, and the potty. Here are some good reads that were recommended to me by great moms and I want to pass them on to you.

Jane Nelson has written a number of books in this Positive Discipline series. She talks about maintaining a balance between firmness and kindness and how you don't have to make your child feel worse in order to help them do better. I want to read them all.

This book was recommended to me by a local lactation specialist in my ward. I've only read a few parts of it, but it helps answer a LOT of questions about breast feeding and producing enough for your child's needs. I've just ordered it and I'm excited to read the entire thing.

This should be the first on my list. Hands down, this has been the greatest help to me. My sister-in-law recommended this book to me and it has helped get my kids on a great sleeping schedule, which has made all the difference.

I haven't tried this one yet, but I've read a lot of great reviews about it. I'll let you know soon what I think.

Great cookbook full of creative and yummy meals. Gave me the idea to tell Hazel that mermaids love fish or Cinderella's favorite meal is ravioli. She buys it every time and will at least give it a try. Also, the "minty pea pops" are a new staple in our house. Yeah, popsicles (I just tried to spell that word three times) made with frozen peas that taste like mint chocolate chip ice cream. delicious.

This is the only book I've flipped through for help with potty training. I have to admit that we didn't do the party thing, but I did gain a lot of good tips from this book.


Any books you recommend? Please, do share.

fabric flowers

This past Mother's Day, I was looking for a fun gift idea and stumbled upon these fabric flowers. I loved the idea and made a bunch to sell in July at the Liberty Days festivities in Ogden Valley. I now use them all the time for my little girls and as cute baby girl gifts.

I've been thinking about embellishing them a bit and selling them with matching skirts at a local baby boutique here in Ogden, and I just found these on Heather Bailey's blog.
Aren't they beautiful?

I have to add that in that post, Heather Bailey mentions her vintage buttons and this summer I happened upon my greatest find of the year so far: a bag of my very own vintage buttons. I fell in love. Every woman needs her own button collection in my opinion and I officially started mine last year when my grandmother gave me her buttons. Now I have an entire jar full of them and I can't wait to dig through and find some good ones for these bows.

So pull out your scraps of fabric and make these fabric flower hair clips. You'll love them.

I first used this pattern for Mother's Day corsages. (those are my grandmother's buttons.)

And then hair clips.



Fourth of July bows.

Mine are much simpler than Heather's, but she has some great ideas to dress them up. I also appreciate her new felt line because it is so true: most fabric stores have a very limited color selection in felt. And there's so many possibilities with felt!

picture this

So I still cannot find our camera battery charger. I haven't used our camera in MONTHS! We've been using David's iphone, but as you can tell from the pictures at the petting zoo, the quality isn't all that great. So instead of posting pics of our girls, I'm going to describe their latest happenings....

Sundays are the hardest day of the week, hands down. This past fast Sunday, we were running a bit late. The girls were ready and I was trying to hurry and make myself look presentable (pretty sure I've had a ponytail at church for the past month. bah.) I was standing at the bathroom sink and Hazel was sitting down on the edge of the bathtub that was still full of water from their baths that morning. And yes, you guessed, she fell in. She got soaked, head to toe, and scared herself to death in the process. Definitely didn't make it for sacrament that day.

Lately Hazel is coming to the realization that Charlotte is competition when it comes to the toys. Charlotte usually goes for whatever Hazel is playing with, unless there's pieces of napkin or other paper products on the floor to distract her (once I found a sunkist sticker on the roof of her mouth). The other day both girls were in their room, playing on the floor next to one another and I had a proud mother moment. I said something like, "oh you guys are so cute" or "good job sharing Hazel." I left the room for 10 seconds and then heard a loud thump and Charlotte wailing. When I came back into the room, Charlotte was slumped against the dresser (that was behind her) and Hazel looked extremely guilty. Pretty sure Hazel decided she didn't want to be cute or share with her sister and gave her a solid shove.

Last week I heard Charlotte crying downstairs--that cry that says, "really, mom, come quick!" I found Charlotte sitting on the floor with her mouth pried open by Hazel's hands, who was apparently searching for something. Once I pulled her hands out of Lottie's mouth, I realized that she was mimicking what I do when Charlotte gets her hands on something she shouldn't have in her mouth. Poor Charlotte.

Hazel is about 89% percent potty trained...when she does remember to "go" on her own, she usually shuts the door behind her and does her business in private. The other day I asked if she needed help and she said, "No. I do it by myself. Bye-bye mom," and shut the door.

Hazel always rinses Charlotte's hair during bath time. It's an unspoken rule. I wash, she rinses. After getting in trouble 352 times for pouring the water in Charlotte's eyes, she is now very careful and does a decent job.

I'm not a spanker. But sometimes I get desperate. Today I had Hazel in time-out for hitting me and she would not stay there. Finally, I looked at her and said, "if you don't stay, I will spank you!" Then she tried to move again, so I gave her a sad excuse of a smack on the bottom. We both stopped, looked at each other, and started giggling. I gave up on time-out after that.

A few days ago I was upstairs and I heard David yell up to me, "Did you paint Hazel's nails?" Um...nope. Ends up, she found nail polish in one of the drawers of our entertainment center (which must have been open) and sat down to paint her fingernails and toenails, by herself. She got one little smudge on her pants, two more smudges on our rug, finished the job, screwed the top back on, and put it back in the drawer. Job well done.

Charlotte tries to scare me all the time. It's the same kind of thing we do to make her laugh, like a quick "boo!" She smiles up at me and then grabs at me, grunting loudly to surprise me. She gets this look that says, "did I get ya?"

Hazel pushed Charlotte on the swing we have in our backyard the other day. They entertained one another for a good fifteen minutes. That's when I love having two.

Hopefully the more I write down, the less I'll forget when they're all grown up.

The Petting Zoo

On Labor Day (a few weeks ago), we decided last minute to stay the night at David's parents on Sunday night after dinner and take Hazel to this petting zoo on Monday morning. We really had such a great time.

These baby goats were my favorite. They licked us to death and had bottomless bellies.

Riding this horse was a little dream come true for Hazel.

Dave in his church clothes. His pj's weren't appropriate to wear in public.

I loved this baby horse with its mother. They let me pet them as long as I wanted. Charlotte wasn't too sure.

She didn't really care for the goats either.

This entire farm is run by one woman who does it all on her own. We were the only family there for most of the time so she followed us around and brought the animals up to the gate for us to look at and touch. So cool. I'd totally put the name of the place right here to promote her business, but I can't remember it and can't find it online. So yeah, it's a petting zoo in Liberty, UT. You should go.

Revenge of the Ritz

We had a little scare on Tuesday. {short version: Charlotte inhaled something that affected her breathing and we had to stay the night at Primary Children's. Now she's just fine.}

{If you're up for it, here's the whole story.}
Charlotte loves Ritz crackers and she does really well with them since they dissolve pretty quickly. Tuesday afternoon I was finishing up some work in the office with Charlotte sitting on the bed with her Ritz. She eventually got fussy so I took her downstairs for lunch. On the way down, I noticed she was breathing differently, almost grunting every time she exhaled. I made her lunch and kept listening to her breathe like this and then it became more of a hiccup in between breaths. Eventually she started crying and I could tell she was in pain, so I tried to call David but he was in the middle of practicing for a debate, thus unavailable. I called 911 and asked them what to do (I don't have a car, so an ambulance was looking like the only option to get her to the hospital at this point). I was hesitant to have them come pick us up right away in case I could get a neighbor, but she recommended I get her in. I texted David and told him it was an emergency, hoping he would get it and come home. Then Charlotte started to go a little pale and wasn't responding to me as well, so I called 911 for an ambulance. Just then, David pulled into the driveway. Since Charlotte was still crying, I knew she was breathing, so we jumped into the car and the 911 operator said she'd tell the ER we were coming.

When we got her there, they put her on oxygen because her levels were low and then they just waited and watched her, letting her calm down before they did anything else. Her levels rose just a little bit (from 84 to 89) and then they did an x-ray to see if she aspirated something into her lungs. The x-ray upset her so much that she finally threw up, and immediately after that her oxygen levels went right back up to 98.

They assumed that is was just a piece of cracker that hadn't dissolved and it came up when she vomited, but there was still a fuzzy area in the x-ray that was worrying them. There was a possibility it was something else that she swallowed that was lodged further down. By this point, Charlotte was asleep and her oxygen was still fine. They decided to stop assuming and send us down to Primary Children's just to be sure since they have all the equipment for her little size. She looked fine to us, but I guess you can't really argue when the ER doctors want to send her via ambulance to another hospital (agh!).

So I got my first ride in an ambulance (hopefully the last). Charlotte perked up and seemed to be feeling well (she was strapped in her cars eat, secured to a gurney) until the paramedic pulled off the stickies that held the wires they used to watch her stats (i don't know the terminology). Then she started crying again and he eventually let me pull her out and they strapped me to the gurney with her. When she calmed down, she started breathing the same way she was before with the grunting! I was glad we were looking into this further.

Anyway, HOURS later in the ER at Primary Children's, after five different doctors had come in to look at her (of course it was every time she fell asleep), they decided that she didn't have enough of the major signs of having something lodged down in her lungs to do the scope (pretty hefty procedure, but lets them see exactly what's down there). She was still breathing differently which worried us so they told us they wanted to monitor her overnight. Then another hour or two after that, we got our room and settled in for a long night. She could only have juice, so she woke up about every hour or two, starving. Poor baby.

The weird breathing subsided that evening and all night she was fine, although her oxygen got a little low again at one point. In the morning, a specialist came in and told us to keep an eye on her, but that whatever had caused the complication was apparently gone, unless she showed any more signs. They did a panel to test her for a virus, just so we could know b/c we've all had a bug, and then we went home.

whew. and now she is safe in her bed, breathing fine, and I can't help but hold her every time she even hints at being upset. Thank goodness for kind doctors who know their stuff, for modern technology and kind nurses who bring you snacks and warm wash clothes and whatever else you need, for the priesthood and the calm it brings into the room, for Kevin & Vicki who spoiled Hazel for a night, and for our sweet little baby who is safe and healthy.

Ritz, we do love you. but we're going to have to ignore you for a while. just in case.

that's the update with us! needless to say, we're all exhausted, there's a slight stench in the kitchen from dirty dishes and none of us have underwear because i've neglected the laundry for too long. but other than that, we're doing fine.

i picked a winner

So there's this little bit of news that I've been meaning to write about for a while now...David decided a few months ago to run for a seat in the Ogden city council. It was shortly after this decision that he also re-applied for school to finish his degree at BYU in business. He's worked harder than I have ever seen him work, trying to balance all of these responsibilities (and a family). Yesterday was the primary election, where two candidates were chosen out of seven to go on to the general election and...


HE WON! Check this out:

It's pretty small, but his biggest competitor, Bart Blair, is only 15 votes behind him. We figured that if we won, he'd be our competitor and obviously we have a lot of work ahead of us to make sure we pull ahead enough for a win in the general election. That will take place on November 3rd.

A BIG thank you to our campaign committee, friends, family, and neighbors who have supported David and helped us achieve this. Congrats to my amazing husband. I'm SO proud of him.

On to the general election!

Wahhhter

Backing up a bit...

Week 3 of my marathon training program went well. I upped my miles a bit more than my schedule called for and was feeling pretty good. My big run at the end of that week was seven miles, the most I've ever run, and I was anxious to see if I felt more comfortable with it this time around. Nope. It was a long and arduous run for me, but I learned a lot. At one point my left knee started aching and I got scared, thinking I might get an injury, so I stopped. Then I realized that ALL my joints ached just as much, so I started running again and finished the seven miles. It was a slow run, but one of the things I've learned is that those longer runs are supposed to be slower so you can get into a good pace and not injure yourself. It's on the shorter runs that you want to push your pace and pick up the speed.

Week 4 was even better. I was improving my time, even reaching my goal of 8.5 minute miles on a 5 mile run. Saturday was nine miles. David took the girls and I took off on my trek around Weber State at the foot of the mountains. It was beautiful! This time I found my pace more quickly and while it was still slower than my shorter runs (which is the way it should be, but I still feel guilty, like I'm being lazy), I felt much more comfortable. The aches came and then they went. By mile 7ish, I felt like I was in my element--my breathing was calm, my body was in a great rhythm, my mind was clear. It was my best run yet. My only regret was that I didn't bring water (more about that later).

NOT my favorite:
-Dogs (the little yippy ones). I had one literally stop me in my tracks up at David's parents house, threatening to tear apart my ankles if I moved while I waited for his breathless owner to catch up and hold him back. It's always the little rats that think they're boss.
-Smokers. Dirty air, choking stench. blah.
-Cars. And this I know is part of running on the streets, but they really just get in the way.
-the BEGINNING of the run. It's like winding up a rusty old clock that was happy with where it's gears were parked (I sound like an old lady, but sometimes it takes my body a while to warm up).
-Digestive malfunctions...nothing too serious here, so far. but DO NOT eat two einstein bagels on a long run day. whew.

My favorite:
-finding my speed and settling in.
-downhill breezes.
-sprinklers.
-other runners; nice to have some commiserating company.
-the quiet. I always liked having music, but now I love the quiet.
-being by myself for a little while.
-feeling the calories melting away. yes.
-making good time.
-coming home with the sunset.

With that said, I embarked upon my fifth week this past week and was doing well. I'm having a minor issue with my new stroller that needs "tweeking" (name that movie), so I've been doing everything possible to get the girls to bed and run when David's home at night. Wednesday night I went out for a short 3 mile run, which went well. However, I had planned two visiting teaching appointments directly after the run, so I only had time for a quick few sips of water and a sad excuse of stretching. I got home late, did the dishes, showered and hopped into bed. Then the nightmare began.

At first I thought it was a bug. I felt nauseous all night and all day the next day. It just got worse and worse until finally in the early afternoon, David came home from school and took the kids while I passed out on the bathroom floor with signs of dehydration. I knew what it was once my hands and legs locked up and my lips tightened together and I wanted to throw up every time I moved. I've had that feeling once before after a major flu attack when I begged David to take me to the emergency room and he just poured more Gatorade down my throat and said, "We can't afford it!" So I slept and slept and drank sip by sip and then slept some more. Eventually that night I felt human again and passed out until morning. I've never felt so bad in my life. I wanted to die. It took me another day and a half to fully recuperate.

SO. Obviously between nursing and training for this marathon, I'm not getting enough water and calories. I've noticed my milk supply (sorry if TMI) is waning and I've had to really think a lot about whether or not I should continue training or wait until I'm done being prego and nursing. It might just be too much on my body. At the same time, this marathon has done SO MUCH for my mental health. What to do.

I've taken a few days off to heal and get healthy and hydrated and make sure I'm giving my baby the nutrients she needs. I hope I can continue running. I will do my best.

That's all for now. Sorry it's so much information, but writing it all out is so helpful to me.

janelle

Lottie

I love Charlotte. I love her age. She's old enough to laugh at me and be a tease to her sister and grab food off my plate, and yet she's still so little and cuddly and dependent on me. She watches me everywhere I go and as soon as I leave her sight, she starts to cry as if I might not ever return. As soon as I peek my head around the corner, she stops and gives this pouty face that says, "are you coming back now?" When I kiss her face or nuzzle into her neck, she grabs me with both hands and gives me an open-mouth kiss. She always smells good. Her cheeks feel like silk and she has the cutest bum I've ever seen (since Hazel that is). When she reaches her arms up as far as they go, they just barely touch the top of her head. I love how she fits me, calms me, and makes me want to nap all day long with her on my chest. Don't grow up baby girl, not yet.

And why am I still awake at 12:09 am? Charlotte.

A small little miracle

Dear Blog,

You are my magic genie. Last night I told you about BOB and how much I need him. You must have also known that my husband made a (good) last minute decision to go back to school full time, on top of his job, which means he's no longer around to watch the kiddos while I train for my marathon. This morning I woke up and found THIS:


This, as you know, is a BOB Ironman Duallie Double stroller. This BOB is even better-suited for my needs than other Duallies because its lighter, narrower, and equipped with on-road tires for speed and a smooth ride while I run. It has five-point harnesses, reclining padded seats, hand break, foot break and parking break, storage space, etc...

The best part is that I found it on Craig's List for $150.oo instead of $479.99. Two years old with minor wear and tear on the handle. I'll take it. The even better part is that my mom wanted to get me a double stroller for my birthday this fall, so it's covered. So, welcome to the Phipps family, Mr. Ironman BOB. Thank you blog, for listening and thank you MOM for my new running buddy.

Love,
Janelle

BOB

dear BOB,
I want you to be the newest member of my family. According to a LOT of reviews, you are the most reliable, sturdy, smooth, roomy and user-friendly jogging stroller there is. But there's one problem, BOB. You cost more than two months of groceries, half of one month's rent. I could buy two tickets to California, a leather loveseat for my living room, or a used laptop for the price of YOU.

Let's work together here. I've got to find you second-hand and affordable. I would love to have you in Mesa Orange with a weather shield. Call me.

love,
janelle