Elle raises her arms for Breast-feeding!

Anyone who knows me knows that I am passionate about babies and the feeding of babies. Both Meg and Elle were breastfeed into toddlerhood and it was one of the most rewarding experiences of my life. It is so empowering to grow a baby!  Professionally, I have chosen to pursue my certification in Lactation to help other moms and babies during this time of their lives.

I have recently learned of a piece of legislation in congress that has been written to help protect breast-feeding moms and babies when moms return to the work force.  I encourage all of you to read up on it and write your congressional leaders to support this bill.

The American Academy of Pediatrics wants babies to have breast-milk exclusively for six months and with complementary foods until twelve months of age a AT THE VERY LEAST!  This is not happening and one of the major reasons why is that the workforce is not supportive of nursing moms in general.  Companies are always looking for ways to cut  costs, if they supported breast-feeding moms, their medical costs would be lower, workers would take less sick days and everyone wins!

One of these days people in power will realize that prevention is cheaper than treatment.   Breast-feeding prevents many illnesses and promotes good health both physically and mentally.

Here is the link for more information:

Here are some great pictures from the Father-Daughter Dance the girls went to a couple of weeks ago with Hubby.

They look wonderful don’t they!?

We went to  King’s Island this past weekend.  We got great ticket prices thanks to Genesis having an employee day(s).  We hit the park at five o’clock Friday evening to get in some rides.  This was the best time for the kiddie rides and some big rides too!  We could just walk on or wait a few minutes for Scooby Doo’s ride, Little Bills Giggle Coaster, Blue’s Skidoo and all the favorites.  Meg and Hubby only had to wait 20 minutes for Diamond Back.  Diamond Back is the newest and fastest coaster at King’s Island.  It goes over 80 mph!  Meg adored it, hubby lived through it and Mita is mad because she isn’t tall enough to ride it yet!

Saturday morning Genesis employee’s got in at 8:30 to ride the Diamond Back early with little wait-time.  I am a roller coaster buff.  A few years ago I realized that  I could no longer ride the old wooden roller coasters because they throw you around to much, but the newer ones I still adored.  I’m sad to report that I can no longer call myself a roller coaster buff.  I closed my eyes the entire time and the picture they took of me and Meg says it all.  Because of the cost of said photo ($10!)  I did not buy it and will have to tell you about it.  I had my eyes so tightly shut I looked like a cartoon and Meg has her hands high up in the air with a huge grin and open mouth.  I’m glad some of the “young” me lives on in Meg.

Meg and Mita hit some unbelievable rides while Elle and Enu rode Little Bills Giggle Coaster FIVE times!  By the end of the day Enu had abandoned Elle and I and she also went on as many coaster as she could.  Good times:)  We even caught an Ice Skating show.  They skaters were fun to watch and had some good jumps.  The best part of the show according to Mita was the balloons dropping at the end! 

As I type now, Hubby has the three older girls back at King’s Island  enjoying the park at night. Elle declared it was very unfair (through her yawning) that big kids got to do more.  So, being a fun mom, I let her jump on the beds and jump from one bed to the other until she finally got tired.  Please don’t comment on how many concussions kids get annually from jumping on hotel beds, I cannot take any more guilt!

Sunday we bombarded Daddy with gifts and many, many handmade cards then visited friends for the afternoon.  A great weekend for all of us.  I’ve posted a few pictures so you all can see how we enjoyed Father’s Day Weekend.  I hope everyone had a great time with their family this past Daddy’s Day!

I often joke that I have been taken off the mother of the year award list.  My hubby however is very much in the running for father of the year.  Not because he is perfect (he isn’t, but close!) but because he is just an all around great dad.  I am very much appreciative of all he does for our family; camping with the kids, reading books aloud (his second time for Harry Potter) and keeping me sane and much more.

As you know our lives has been touched by older child adoption. There are many older kids needed homes all around the world.  The Dave Thomas Foundation for Adoption is a wonderful organization that promotes older child adoption and adoption from foster care.  Although our family did not adopt from the U.S. we have gotten great information and resources from this Foundation.  I  used materials from them to ask Genesis to provide adoption benefits for their employees and Genesis is now offering $4,000 towards adoption costs!

This Father’s Day weekend Wendy’s will donate money to the Dave Thomas Foundation with each Frosty that is bought.  They even have Father’s Day E-Cards that they will send for you and donate 25 cents with each card.

Be sure to have a frosty this weekend and help kids find families to love them.  Wouldn’t it be great if every child had a reason to celebrate Father’s Day?

I was taking a bit of a nap today (I bribed Meg to watch Elle while I layed down) when Elle wandered up to my room (Where was my paid help?) and asked me if I was hungry.  I told her no, I was fine and she said,”If you were hungry I would make you food.”  I of course told her that I was hungry and she could make me food.  She ran off and I went back to resting.

I had assumed that she meant her fake food she often shares with us.  She will walk around with a pad of paper and a pen and make us write down what we want to eat and then give  us a plate full of what ever she finds in her plastic kitchen.

After the  phone brought me out of my not-so-slumber slumber I ran into Elle in the  Kitchen.  She had a cookie sheet with  a napkin on it, a small pile of ketchup, two burnt french fries (left over from lunch), a buttered bagel, pepperoni, applesause, four teddy grahms and a banana (she had a big sissy help her peel it).  This was the sweetest gift from her.  She had worked hard and was so proud of herself!

Elle tries so hard to be big like her sisters and I want her to stay little.  I cannot stop the clock and deep down I don’t want to. Elle shows such a compassion towards people, animals and insects.  Watching her grow and become who she is meant to become will be an amazing thing to experience.  I will miss my little baby though, when she is all grown up and starts rolling her eyes at me!

I was a counselor at Girl Scout Day Camp this week. Don’t ask me how I got roped into this, I don’t have a clear memory of it, just the lure of getting one of my girls getting to go for free. I really don’t mean to be so negative about this. It was a good time. The girls had fun. Meg just adored it. Mita and Enu were exhausted and didn’t go the entire week, but had a lot of fun. Elle went for two days, and then spent the rest of the week being treated like a queen by the Grandma’s.

A few things that I learned. When dealing with 9 year olds, they are torn between wanting to play on the playground and doing “big kid” activities. We balanced out this struggle pretty well I think with fun crafts and activities that were not to “babyish” and just letting them run and play octopus tag and red rover. Some of the things we made: Flower boxes, body glitter, fruit pomanders, wildlife journals, toilet paper tube planters, grilled banana boats. Of course the thing the girls worked on all week and loved were the keychains, necklaces and bracelets made out of that plastic laynard string that is so popular right now. I also had charcoal drawings and stress balls planned, but we didn’t have enough time for it all.

On top of those crafts, we hiked, learned canoe safety, learned archery, fishing, survival skills, local plants and trees, water games, team building exercises and we picked up literally bag upon bag of trash to clean up Dillon State Park. Dillon is a cleaner place this weekend thanks to us Girl Scouts. I hope others will learn to use trash cans and ash trays!

I was so proud watching Meg learn new things and work on her leadership skills. We worked on decision making skills and how to work as a team. These skills are sorely lacking in many adults as you may have noticed and I really want my girls (and their friends) to learn how to work with others and make decisions.

Enu really made herself known this week. She was in the Kindergarten-First Grade group, and they only had four kids most of the week. This group was sooooo loud that no-one could miss them. They had an adorable candence that used their group’s name,”The Chattering Chimpanzees”. They did two skits at the end of the camp program and did great!

Mita’s group was very busy. They earned nine Try-Its and did 54 activities in five days. She missed Thursday and Friday day programs as she was so very tired and overdone! She did do the skit tonight and stood with her group proudly. I think she did extremely well for her first year at day camp.

So what did I learn? I took a fish off a hook for the first time. I also learned how to get in a canoe without tipping it over! Mommy-wise, I learned that next time I cannot be a counselor again, but should volunteer at each of the girls groups instead. It was hard on everyone having me with Meg with whole time, and jealously ensued. I also learned that I cannot keep up with this pace anymore, and will be looking for someone to help take over my troop next fall…. anyone interested?

P.S.  We did not teach Elle how to start a fire, but she did watch well enough to build her own A-frame pile of wood correctly.  This is scary I know!

I am not a flashy person. Seriously, how many of you have ever seen me in sequins? I tend to wear a lot of brown shirts with blue jeans. Except for two years in high school when I wore all black clothes decorated with skulls, my clothes have not brought attention to me.

I recently bought a purse that screams, “Hey, Look at me!” Why did I do this? I liked it. It made me happy. I was looking forward to summer and wanted a summer color. It was 30% off. SOLD!

As I walked in the door Hubby took one look at me and said, “What’s up with the lily-pad purse?” I realized that it does look like a lot a lily pads sewn together. I like lily pads. I like frogs. I love this purse!

I have gotten more complements on this purse in the month I have had it than anything I have ever had in my life. My wedding dress was not as complimented on as much as my lily-pad purse! I even had one person tell me it was so ugly it was cute. I took it as a complement.

The down side to a gorgeous and wild purse is that everyone looks at you. I have actually left it in the car as to not attract attention to myself (a no makeup run to the store). At a conference last week I walked in a room with hundreds of women and got so many smiles and “nice bag” comments I blushed.

This green, lily-pad purse could very well be my fifteen minutes of fame. While Oprah won’t be calling, at least I’m not on the pages of the Inquirer!

Are you a flashy dressy? Any advice for this newbie?

P.S. Check out my friend’s review here and find out how to win a new refrigerator!

Photo Credit MandyW 2009

As many of you know, Hubby took all four girls camping. They left on a Thursday morning and are due back this evening. I got a lot of comments about my free time. I kept going on and on about how much I was getting done.

It is true that I accomplished much. I’ve also gone hours without talking, skipped meals without realizing it and watched movies I had been wanting to see thanks to Movies On-Demand (The Curious Case of Benjamin Button and The Secret Life of Bees are sooooooo worth watching). My laundry is caught up, I am ready for this coming week’s Girl Scout Day camp. Heck, I even put up my tomato stakes for the tomato plants the kids are growing with my mom! A lot got done, including the shelf-paper I have been wanting to line my pantry and bathroom with.

My mind also became numb. I saw how easy it would be to become a hermit. While I went shopping and had dinner with family, my urge to come home and be alone was strange. Almost like someone had clicked a pause button so I could rest.

I didn’t go in the girl’s rooms. I had planned on giving them a good cleaning, but it was to hard to go in there. It would cause me to think about them and worry. I didn’t need to worry. Hubby is perfectly capable of caring for the kids. The girls do a good job at taking care of themselves for the most part. Plus they are such tattle-tails trouble doesn’t stay a secret for long!

It has been a long year for me as a mom. I sometimes craved being alone so much I felt guilty. Happiness is what I am now feeling, because I do miss them so much. I miss the mess, the noise and the laughing.

In a few short hours they will all come bounding into the house, smelly with dirty clothes and talking all at once with stories of the trip! We will have baths and I’m sure I’ll be watching videos and seeing pictures very soon. My pause button will go back to fast-forward and I will cringe at the dirty laundry. My life will be normal again and I am ever so grateful!

Of course Hubby was dearly missed as well. He is the anchor of my ship called chaos.

What is the longest your kids have ever been away from you?

Hubby and I went on a seven day/six night cruise when Meg was only about three. That was really hard. We had a great time and kept busy and she had fun with the Grandmas. Meg has also done a week long sleep-away camp before.

Today, Hubby took all FOUR girls camping. The house is quiet, I have accomplished much. I am very tired right now and don’t want to go to sleep. It was hard to look at their rooms tonight. When I am away from the kids, it seems pretty easy to stay busy. When THEY are away, well that just has not happened before. At least overnight and all of them at the same time.

I’d love to hear how you all make it through times like these!

Photo Credit