On letting babies cry it out

Babies cry. Thats how they communicate. It sucks as a mother to hear your baby cry. Especially when you are over tired, frustrated, overwhelmed, and just want to sleep. I know how tempting it is to put your baby into their bed and "teach" them how to sleep, by letting them cry and cry and cry until they finally go to sleep, and repeat until they have been taught to sleep.

But it is cruel. You might not want to think that or admit it, but it is. You are taking a tiny little baby, who trusts you. Who looks to you for everything they need, and teaching them that you cannot be trusted. That you won't be there when they need you. That they are alone and have to fend for themselves. You aren't teaching them how to sleep, you are teaching them how not to trust other people.

I've heard from several people lately that your baby will try and manipulate you. Babies honestly think that when you leave the room you are gone. They don't know that two halves make a whole. They don't know how to say their names. How can they have the cognitive ability to manipulate. It just isn't possible. Testing boundaries is NOT manipulating. To assign such an intent to an infant, shows a major misunderstanding of babies.

But think about it from your perspective as an adult. If you were alone, and tired and scared would you like to be left alone to scream yourself to sleep night after night?

my fuzzi bunz are for sale!

Well we have a new front loading washer and dryer and they just won't wash my diapers well enough for my liking. So sadly we aren't going to be cloth diapering anymore :(

I'm selling 13 fuzzi bunz in gender neutral colors (though there are some dark blues and one pinkish) All are in great condition, and I have the inserts for all. I also have 5 hemp inserts that we used at night!

I'm asking $140 for all of them. Please respond with your email if you are interested.

sauteed garbanzo beans

There is this amazing restaurant in Berkeley and Oakland California called Cesar. It is a tapas bar and an Alice Waters restaurant. If you are any sort of foodie you know who Alice Waters is.

Every spring for a few weeks they have fresh garbanzo beans still in their shells fried with cumin and spices. They are amazingly fresh, and spicy, and yummy. When the bee was ten months old we ate there five days in a row, eating those wonderful beans and my ten month old could get those shells open herself to eat the inside of the bean. She loved them!

She still does. Garbanzo beans are wonderful for so much more than just hummus. They are great in minestrone soup, and other multi bean soups. I even like to use them in chili sometimes because of their meaty texture. They don't ever fall apart when they are cooked.

But one of our favorite quick and easy breakfasts is sauteed garbanzo beans. Sure it isn't a traditional breakfast item, but combined with a piece of whole wheat bread it makes a complete protein that keeps you from getting hungry in twenty minutes.

2 cans garbanzo beans drained.
1 shallot
2 Tbsp cumin (or less to taste)
1 tsp chili powder
1 clove garlic
salt and pepper to taste
olive oil

Mix all but the butter in a food processor until garbanzos and garlic are chopped fine. I sometimes add a tiny bit of olive oil to get the beans to hold together well and make patties. Form patties and fry in olive oil. They will fall apart a bit, and won't ever be firm patties, but it is still yummy. If you add eggs you could make a more firm patty.

I like a LOT of cumin because it is just yummy and I want a big strong slightly spicy cuminey flavor.

Balancing two futures

I think our country is on its last legs. Honestly I do. I think our Dollar is in very big trouble, and will likely collapse within a few years, and that our country might not survive in the way we know it. More it will go from super power, to something more like Russia is today. So I prepare for that future.

We store food, stock up on clothes for the kids several sizes in advance, and plan on chickens as soon as spring comes. We prepare for a future that I believe will very quickly in the future be very bleak.

But I could be wrong. Perhaps our nation is on the road to recovery or at least maintaining the status quo. Perhaps things will continue to limp along in a nature very similar to where we are now. I can't dismiss that that is a valid option. So I go back to school, prepare my family and my kids for them to go to school and grow up and be responsible citizens of our nation.

Flu season

Well fall is in full swing here, and I'm starting to be able to breathe again. Though I know it is short lived as the Holidays are right around the corner.

But fall also brings flu season and that is the topic of much news lately.

We of course don't vaccinate against the flu. I understand that the flu can be deadly and that it is a serious illness, but I think the vaccine is more dangerous for my family than the actual flu. If we had someone in our home who was immunocompromised, we would absolutely vaccinate. But we are all healthy in our home and I don't see a reason to compromise our immune systems with a vaccine.

But we aren't arrogant about the flu either, we do stay on top of things and do our best to remain healthy during the flu season, just as any other time of year. We have never suffered the same sicknesses that our friends do and I believe firmly it has to do with our diet and prevention.

First and foremost I wash hands a lot. The bee also washes her hands regularly. But we do NOT use anti bacterial soaps. Those soaps breed super germs like MRSA and there is no need to use them. I do keep products like purell in my purse when we are out. I'm not thrilled with them, but I do think that sometimes it works well when we don't have good hand washing options.

Secondly we eat healthy real living foods. We have green smoothies several days a week to make sure that we are getting a good amount of raw foods as well as lots of vitamin C and Iron. I often add cod liver oil to the smoothie, but honestly it does not taste that good. The Lemon flavor does the best and is the only one that my daughter will drink anymore. We also don't eat much sugar. That is a big one actually sugar is a immune depressant.

My kids don't eat processed foods. I'm probably the only parent who doesn't send store bread and lunchables to the bees school. That isn't to say they have never had processed foods, they have. But it isn't very often.

But there are a few other things that we do. Both kids take a multi vitamin and a vitamin D supplement every day. Vitamin D is huge in fighting the flu, especially the H1N1. We also take elderberry syrup every day. Elderberry syrup is great for building up an immune system, and some say more effective against the flu than tamiflu is. Vitamin C is best gotten from citrus fruits and veggies, but supplements are easy to find and usually easily eaten by kids.

E-Mealz

**This is NOT a paid endorsement, it is just something I've found that works wonderfully for us**

If you aren't familiar with e-mealz you should be. I love it. It is a menu planning system, and they are just great! Our food budget has dropped dramatically since we started using it, and it is so much easier.

What it is, is meal plans. It is also store specific and goes with the specials at a store during the week. It does use some processed foods, but I either substitute with homemade, or sometimes use the processed. It is healthy and kid friendly.

But more than that it is cheap! It is only 1.95 a week. They offer vegetarian, low carb, weight watchers points, and other options. You can choose for a family of two or a family of four to six. Also you can choose the plan for Wal-mart, Ralphs, Publix, Aldi, or "any store"

I really love it, and it has made our lives a bit easier right now. We are super busy right now and will be getting busier in January. This has worked really well for my family.