kids say the darndest things...

I love to eaves drop on my kids conversations. Lately, they have been priceless.

SAM: Ok Madam...
JULIET: Madam?
SAM: Yes, I said madam because you're beautiful.

and just now...

SAM: Juliet, that's not what you're supposed to wear to ballet
JULIET: well mommy said I can wear whatever I want
SAM: Ya but I don't feel like you look beautiful in that 
JULIET: Well... I am.

Where do they come up with this stuff??

Placentophagy - (from 'placenta' + Greek φαγειν, to eat) is the act of mammals eating the placenta of their young after childbirth

So it has come to my attention that many people think I am crazy because I want to encapsulate my placenta. I wonder why? Lol. Perhaps the terminology "eat my placenta" is what turns people off. I imagine that your first impression is to picture me chewing on mouthfuls of raw placenta.  Ya... that's pretty gross. But that is not that case. I am not going to cook it like a steak, or grind it up into a meatloaf, or make stew. I am vegetarian after all. But I am going to dehydrate it, grind it into a powder and put the powder into gelatin capsules so that I can take them orally as I would a vitamin. Is that so gross? The process, maybe. But the final product is nothing more than a vitamin. And a powerful one at that. So with that being said, I've decided to devote this post to the topic in hopes that I can shed some light onto the idea behind my choosing to do so. 

When I first heard the idea of ingesting the placenta I was intrigued. Although weird, I wasn't going to bash the idea without first looking into it. There is a growing trend of ingesting the placenta to help with the mother's postpartum recovery and beyond. Besides being nutritious, the placenta contains many vitamins, minerals & hormones that help a mother's body to adequately recover from pregnancy and childbirth. In addition to that recovery, ingesting the placenta also (but is not limited to):

- reducing the chances/symptoms of postpartum depression 
- reducing postpartum bleeding & aids the uterus in returning to it's original state
- reducing insomnia/sleep disorders
- increasing milk production
- increasing energy

Encapsulation is especially beneficial. Not only is it probably the method most easy to stomach, the dehydration process actually preserves the placenta so that you can benefit from it for weeks, months, or years by keeping the capsules refrigerated or frozen. Any time you feel run down, tired or emotionally fragile you can use the capsules as a 'pick me up'. Believe it or not, they can even go as far as menopause when the time comes and aide in the balance of hormones. Given that the placenta's hormonal make-up is unique to the mother, what better hormones to use during menopause than your very own?

The placenta is not something that is usually addressed during pregnancy unless there is a problem with it, so it makes sense that your initial reaction would be one of sheer disgust. With my first pregnancy the hospital actually asked me what I wanted to do with my placenta, which is rare. Often the placenta is just taken away and treated as medical waste and you never even hear or think about it. But what if, for instance, you eliminate the process of encapsulating it yourself (although this is not the case for me) and it was returned to you when you left the hospital already in a pill format that the doctor prescribed as part of your postpartum recovery? Would you think that was gross? What if it was routinely discussed during pregnancy and it's benefits truly, fully understood?  Would that make it normal? If the placenta was your responsibility and you needed to make a decision based on informed knowledge, what was to be done with it, it might not be so strange. Unfortunately, I'm sure that a very large percentage of women who give birth in a hospital don't even know what the placenta looks like. But if you were offered the information on it's role both in utero & postpartum, perhaps your opinion would be different. After all, it is a vital organ in the generation of new life. It's what nourishes your baby throughout your pregnancy, passing oxygen and nutrients to your baby, as well as secreting important hormones. And it's benefits don't end with childbirth. Those benefits can be preserved and used for years to come. Many cultures honor the placenta. It is becoming increasingly popular to plant the placenta in the ground with a tree growing over top. So why not go the next level and explore the idea of placenta ingestion? It has been a part of Chinese medicine for centuries. In our "western" culture/society it's just new. Unexplored. Different. And the idea of doing it yourself may turn you off. But the number of encapsulating specialists is growing rapidly, eliminating the "nasty" process of doing it yourself. Go ahead and Google it. You'd be surprised at how much information there is and just how many people are in fact, eating their placenta.


SOURCES:

http://placentabenefits.info/

http://www.cafemom.com/journals/read/1577334/Placenta_Encapsulation_Instructions_w_Pictures

Ode to 37 Weeks

I couldn't sleep last night so between the hours of about 2 & 4:30 for some reason I was compelled to write this poem. I have no idea where it came from... but it kept me up.


My back is sore
My belly aches
My muscles stretched & beat
My cervix stings, the pressure's on
I cannot see my feet

My arms are fat
My legs are huge
My arm pits aren't the same
The speed at which I move around is really quite a shame

It feels like something's in my pelvis stretching me apart
Like walking with a ball stuck in between my private parts

Ive got swollen hands & swollen feet
That jiggle when I walk
My boobs have grown four times their size
My nipples too, a lot

I get up ever hour cuz I always have to pee
I snore so loud my husband he won't even sleep with me

Carpal tunnel plagues my wrists
And is even in my hands
Every time I sneeze or cough I risk peeing my pants

My stretchy clothes just barely fit
My underwear are tight
Sitting up ain't comfortable nor lying down at night

My Braxton hicks contractions getting stronger by the minute
Acid reflux is a battle even Maalox cannot win it

The water retention in my legs makes them hard to bend
I have rolls all down my back & sides
I want this all to end

Hormones hormones hormones that are rushing through my system
The emotion & the crying & the meltdowns that go with them

My skin is stretched & itches & my belly button's awful
My body is so big now I don't even walk, I waddle

Im lazy and im tired and I sleep an awful lot
Who ever made this 40 weeks should definitely be shot

In Utero

Seriously?

Wednesday can be a busy evening of activities. We have swimming lessons at 6 and every so often Sam has hockey from 4-5. Yesterday was one of those every so oftens. It's a difficult night for 37 weeks of pregnancy. Thankfully I was only along for the ride. My husband was home to do all the dressing & undressing.

It just so happens that the way my husband's schedule of shift work has fallen that I've pretty much undertaken the role of hockey mom & am the one who most often brings Sam to his practices. Leave it to Sam to point out Papa's 'mistakes'. Doesn't every father want to hear "that's not how mommy does it"? Last night Sam said that Maman doesn't tie his skates that way... she doesn't put the skates near her "parties privées"... where does he come up with this stuff? I thought it was cute enough to share.

So back to the real reason I'm posting. Just when you think your evening is going smoothly...

Swimming finishes at 6:30 and we usually let the kids play in the wading pool while the change room rush clears out. Then the kids get into their jammies & off we go home for bedtime. Last night we needed to put gas in the car so we headed to the gas bar first. It could have been the huge bump my husband hit pulling in that knocked out the radio... it could have been something else... but after filling up, the car WOULD NOT start. Dead. Awesome.

We sat in the car for at least half an hour while my husband played with the battery & fuses trying to figure out what went wrong. The kids started to panic like we were trapped in the middle of nowhere... when we were actually walking distance from EVERYTHING. The Super Store... Mega Walmart... Boston Pizza... Starbucks. All they could think about was their bedtime snacks & how lonely monkey  mama were at home. End of the world. After we contacted, or tried to, everyone we know I finally called CAA. It was 7:50 and they told me they'd have a truck there by 8:45. Lovely. The windows were so fogged up and we just sat there. Bad on us to not have any booster cables in the car... but bad on EVERYONE else who came through the gas bar for not having any either. Talk about well prepared Canadians. We weren't even sure that it was the battery... because not all the power in the car died at once. It was a bit weird. At 8 o'clock I figured there was no point in all of us waiting in the car so I took the kids in their jammies & headed to Starbucks, where we had hot chocolate and a clear view of the dead car & my lonely husband waiting in the cold for the truck.

The truck arrived earlier than predicted. Thank god. We'd already been stranded for an hour +. The kids were excited to be out of the car, drinking hot chocolate & watching the events unfold. The truck pulled up to our car to give it a boost and of course, because the evening wouldn't be complete without a total gong show, the truck battery dies within 10 seconds of trying to boost our car. Really? That's like an ambulance crashing on its way to the scene of an accident.

Luckily at this point my husband's friend arrived to drive the kids & I home so I could at least get them to bed only a couple hours past bedtime. Soon after a new truck came & boosted some life back into the car. I guess it was the battery after all. Or so I hope. Although it started without issue this morning who knows what tricks are up its sleeve? Hood? Perhaps we should invest in some cables. Or a new car. Volvo for sale. Anyone?

Boy, n
1. noise with dirt on it

Girl, n
1. sweetness wrapped with just a sprinkle of attitude

TOTALLY RANDOM POST: cows don't get enough credit for being cute...

36 Weeks & Counting...

So here we are. 36 weeks. Today I stood on the scale at the YMCA and was pleasantly surprised that it considers me lighter than my scale at home. Yay YMCA scale. 182lbs suits me fine. So... with that being said, CAN WE BE DONE YET PLEASE??!! Forget the aching muscles & weight & breathlessness & fatigue... the heartburn & acid reflux alone is enough to have my uterus removed to prevent further childbearing. I've also been accused of LOUD sleeping... similar to a highway semi so I'm told. So I've voluntarily banished myself to the basement. I'm ready for this all to be done. I have one more week to go to be allowed to continue with the home birth, and I pick up my birthing pool tomorrow. I am also looking into getting a belly cast done, if someone would just respond to my emails. Geez. Is it wrong of me to expect a response within 24 hours?? Isn't that just good customer service?? Hopefully it'll all come together in time. In the meantime.. here's my belly.

Winter Collage

It's been quite a mess of weather here lately. Rain, freezing rain, snow, rain. I've been posting some photos and I made another collage today to share. Some of the photos I've already posted but some are new. I just love these winter photos.

Cirque

We went to see Cirque du Soleil's DRALION on the weekend. Fabulous as always. Today I had the kids draw a picture of their favourite part...

Surprise surprise. Juliet liked the "princesses" and Sam the clowns. In his picture the left most red person is the clown who's belly kept punching him in the face (also the left most photo). The lines symbolize the belly hitting him in the face. The top yellow clowns are from when the clown with the crazy hair (middle photo) was trying to staple hair to the bald clown's head (right photo)... see the crazy hair & the stapler in his hand? The blue people are from when one of the clowns was trying to scare away 3 other characters with the stinky insole of some guy's shoe... but I couldn't find an actual photo of that. You can clearly see him holding up the insole... and the blue lines represent the characters running away. Awesome.

Adventures in Diapering

My husband & I thought about cloth diapering when I was pregnant with Juliet. We visited a store in Ottawa and were there for over an hour thinking about it. I think what deterred us was the off the bat $400-ish commitment and the over-whelming ease of disposable diapers. I don't know what is different this time, for some reason the whole idea of cloth diapering seems really easy & appealing to me now.

I'm sure my husband was diapered in cloth... geez he was raised in the woods with no electricity & boiled hot water on the gas stove to bathe in. Read by candle-light & used the stove elements as a toaster.... peed in a pot by night & in an outhouse by day. Cloth diapers couldn't have been a far cry from that lifestyle. My mom used cloth diapers for me... mostly because were in in Mexico for most of my diapering years and the diapers there my mom described as a 1 ply tissue in a plastic bag. I also spent a lot of time running naked on the beach. Also, if I remember correctly, my Granny (dad's mom) gave my mom the gift of diaper service for when we were back in Canada, which is an awesome gift and a service that should really be more alive today than it is. Or at least more wide spread. Unfortunately we don't have the benefit of a diaper service, but we do have a local company that sells everything we need. SO.... after a quick $300 investment...

We picked up our infant starter kit today. This initial investment should last us the first 6 months... if we don't give up and throw the whole idea (shitty diapers included) out the window. It seems pretty easy though... and there are a lot of accessories today that make it even easier.

In addition to the kit I picked up a dozen preemie sized cloth diapers that are supposed to fit babies from 4-9 lbs. Given that my first 2 were born under 7 lbs... I wasn't going to take any chances.

They're so small!!!!!

Here's the rest of the kit...

In addition to the dozen preemie diapers & 2 covers the kit comes with 24 infant size diapers & 6 covers. It also comes with 300 flushable liners that make for an even easier clean-up!! There's a HUGE wet bag and I bought a smaller one for traveling. The wet bags are like diaper pails. You just put the dirty diapers in the wet bag, zip it up... and throw it all in the wash every 2-3 days. Just turn the bag inside out et voila!

The kit also came with a sample of some bum blam, because traditional diaper creams are a no-no with cloth diapers.... as are regular detergents, fabric softeners & bleach. Who said this was more economical?

I have to pre-wash the diapers AT LEAST 3 times before I use them. I need a special detergent that has...

-no fabric softener
-no bleach
-no natural oils
-no perfumes
-no dyes
-no UV brighteners
-no stain guard ingredients
-no enzymes

Ummm.... ok. That leaves me with something I hope I can find in the organic section of the grocery store, which shouldn't be a problem but will be expensive. The amount of detergent I use is supposed to be quite minimal... less than recommended, so I guess that works in favour of "economical".

Each time I wash the diapers I need to do a cold pre-wash with NO detergent. Then the diapers get washed in hot water & dried in the dryer (or on the line). More work... more money. I guess the extra money spent on special detergent, special bum balm (if needed) & extra water doesn't end up comparing to the money spent on disposable diapers. AND... the satisfaction of using cloth diapers and not contributing to the deterioration of the environment via disposable diapers is a payoff in itself. 

I'm getting excited. I hope that it all goes as easy as I think it will go & we don't run into any problems. I'm sure this won't be the first time I write about adventures in diapering....

Winter Wonderland

If I had a winter jacket that did up... a pair of winter boots that fit and a pair of snow shoes I'd venture out to the conservation area to take some really nice winter photos. Instead you get my back yard.

TA-DA!

ICE

Lovely January weather. Everything is covered in ice, which means but a few things: No school buses... bad driving... EXCELLENT photo ops.

Baby's Room

Done. FINALLY. I went super traditional and chose pink. When my mom was here before Christmas she & the kids went at 'er and got the room painted. But I wasn't satisfied and we ran out of time. Something was missing. With that in mind... I hit the ground running with the marvelous idea to add some stripes to the walls. Who's dumb idea was that again?? Oh yeah. Mine.

Soon after I began taping out the pattern I seriously began to reconsider. What was I thinking? Two days and numerous contractions later the taping was done... and I was losing interest. I decided to give it a rest for the weekend. Yesterday I was at it again. I mixed the left over pink paint with half a gallon of white paint to create a light pink for the stripes. On it went with a roller. I was so tempted to just leave it at that and pass off the roller marks as texture but I didn't. Today I tackled the actual texture I wanted to add to the stripes to finish the job. I used a brush and roughly painted a second coat on all the small stripes. Then I added some raspberry colorant to the light pink paint and roughly rubbed it over the largest stripe.

There were NUMEROUS times I wanted to give up or to just do a half-ass job... but I didn't. I pulled through and the room looks fabulous. I wish I had different curtains but I really want to keep the room dark for sleeping... so I just added some white sheers over Sam's old brown curtains. I set up my changing alcove in the old closet and added some artwork. All that's missing.... the baby. Oh and maybe some newborn clothes & PJ's... fitted crib sheets.... diapers... wipes....

Merry Chaos & A Happy New Groove

The celebrations are over. The house is quiet. The kids have another 6 days of holidays. It's -16. There's a dusting of snow on the ground. Too cold to go for a walk. Not enough snow for tobogganing. No ice for skating. I don't even have a winter coat that does up. My feet are too swollen for my winter boots, not to mention my kids came home from school before the holidays with 1 glove each. Awesome.

The holidays were great. For Christmas I got a cold sore and a broken hot tub. My husband got a gun. Yes... me, the anti-gun, never going to have one in the house wife bought him a gun. A semi-automatic assault rifle. Sounds worse than it is. I was going for the extreme element of surprise and I definitely got it. It was worth it, but perhaps I'm watching too much red neck TV.

We traveled a bit. We ate a lot. We were at Pepère's for Christmas Eve, home for Christmas & off to my aunts for Boxing day. The kids were tired...