Friday Photo: Just a Photobooth Pic Today

It's crunch time, people. The girls and I leave for CA tomorrow and have an overwhelming amount left on my to-do list. I really wish I could just fast-forward through tomorrow. From beginning to end, I will be logging a horrendous 16 hours of single-parent traveling. For reals.

Deep Thoughts by Ann Reynolds

The other day, I overheard a conversation between two women, one of them exclaiming how exhausted she was and due to of various circumstances, their family had been in "survival mode" for the past couple of days. Usually, I wiggle myself into conversations with the greatest of ease but this time I just sat back and listened. She described the elements of her "survival mode"-- not getting enough sleep, letting dishes sit in the sink overnight, her kids fingernails getting longer before they should, running from place to place constantly late, having an overworked husband who hadn't been home and having to do everything herself, feeling like she couldn't catch a break, money was tight, constantly playing catch-up, two steps forward, one step back, etc. I thought about how familiar it all sounded, but realized that has been life...everyday...for the past four years. It made me sad to think that this life of mine that I love, though hard at times, was a "survival mode." I thought of friends of mine, with their husband's cushy 9-5 jobs, their healthy children, their lack of school loans, their beautiful, clean homes in their picket fence-lined neighborhoods, their weekly trips to the mall, their babysitters, their book clubs, their children's preschool enrollment, their pedicured toes, their cleaning ladies, their impeccable upkeep on their highlights, their family right around the corner, etc and felt a pang of envy. But immediately, I reminded myself of my friends with their barely-there husbands, their children with special needs, their children with severe illnesses, their income below the poverty line, their months of unemployment, their lack of transportation, their single-parenthood, their bad relationship with their in-laws, their never having been to the ocean, their infertility, their failing marriages, their lack of a dishwasher and other appliances, deaths in their families, their addictions, their bad neighborhoods, their having to deal with depression, their backwards housing market, their failing businesses, etc. and despite their problems--they are happy. Those women probably felt like they had been in survival mode for years, too and probably thought of my life as a freaking cake walk. But then I thought back to my friends with seemingly perfect lives. They undoubtedly have complaints as well, ones that do not show on the surface. So instead of dismissing their struggles and feeling like these women could use a whopping dose of reality, they're dealing with their own issues. Everyone is. I'm not one to get caught up in quotes really, but the statement "Be kinder than necessary, for every one you meet is fighting some sort of battle" really rings true. Maybe that's what life really is--figuring out how to be happy during one big, long survival mode.

Nature and Stuff

We've been here in Pennsylvania now as long as we were in high school, or college or med school. Some days it doesn't seem like that long and others, it seems like much longer. In any case, I am already feeling our time here wind down just a tad and because of this, I have started looking around and thinking that we should be taking better advantage of the things Pennsylvania has to offer.

So we went to a free seminar yesterday given by the Amish all about beard trimming.

Pysch! I wish.

We played in a creek near some woods.

The End of My 12 Weeks

I can't believe I'm doing this. I can't believe I'm doing this. I can't believe I'm doing this. But I said I would and I'm no liar.

Here is my Before Kristi Approved picture and my After Kristi Approved picture.

Just kidding.

*My Mom and husband have given me a hard time for not taking my "after" picture in the same swim suit I wore in my "before" picture. Wearing a swim suit this morning probably would have shown my results better and more positively but I was going running and I just wanted to do it while I had Go there.

Gah. I look at my before picture and cringe. Seriously cringe. I am not seeing a person completely comfortable with her body. I'm seeing someone who is in denial. And someone who is tired. And someone who is getting frustrated with the past 30 minutes she has been trying to help her daughter take an un-blurry picture, but can't seem to to save her life.

My first twelve weeks of the program have ended and I am 13 pounds lighter, 6 inches smaller around my waist and 4 inches smaller on my hips, though I have to say, where the book says to take your measurement each week isn't the place on my hips where I saw the most improvement (a couple of inches below that, I'd say (yes, those would be saddlebags) but I never did my measurements there) but that's ok. It's not the numbers that I was really aiming for anyway. What I do know is that I have my waist back, I'm less thick in weird places like my neck, back, armpits (ew!), and my pants are definitely looser. In fact, jeans that once were hard to button, I can actually just pull straight off my body without buttoning, which is a pretty good feeling. I'm more toned. I'm stronger. I feel better. To be honest, though, I'm a little disappointed in myself because I didn't do the entire 12 weeks perfectly. It was more like I did the first 8 weeks perfectly 100% and then did the last 4 weeks at 50%...or less at times. When I found out about Ruby's Celiac Disease, I suddenly had to focus on what she needed and how to cook for her and this new lifestyle for our family, so preparing my Kristi Approved meals went out the window. I tried to make good choices but I feel like if I would have done the next 4 weeks perfectly, I would have lost more but that's ok. You can only do so much, you know? I have the option of continuing, but I'm not going to. I feel like because of countless hours of nutrition classes for Ruby's Diabetes and now Celiac, I can do this on my own. It won't be as easy or straight forward on my own and my continued weight loss won't be as speedy but I'm trying not to get overwhelmed right now and so I'm just going to do the best I can with less structure and try my best to stay in control. I think what I loved must was that the program has changed my relationship with food, which needed to happen. If I can maintain this frame of mind where I'm not obsessing over food, anticipating when the next time I'm going to eat and what that will be and how that will impact my emotions, not to mention the constant overindulging, I'll be in good shape. Right now, I'm just focusing on cooking healthy food for my family. I'm feeding a Diabetic with Celiac Disease now and my #1 priority in the kitchen is to make her as healthy as possible.

Winning this Kristi Approved 12 week program was such a good thing, it kind of makes me teary eyed to think about it. I feel so much better compared to how I felt 12 weeks ago and more empowered. I couldn't have done it by myself. If you need a jumpstart, structure and an easy "THIS IS WHAT YOU NEED TO DO AND HOW YOU DO IT" step-by-steps, you should consider this program. I was never hungry. I LOVE the exercises. I loved how simple the meals are and thought most of them were tasty-tasty. During the 12 weeks, I missed cooking but like I said, I needed to change my relationship with food, and this did it. Now I can go and cook with a different perspective--what ingredients will be the best for my body but also taste the best rather than what am I craving right this second and if I ate that thing, it would make my mood so much better, wouldn't it and let's eat all of it right now like it's going out of style. I also loved lifting weights, which I had never really done before. I was a total cardio junkie but now I feel a little more well-rounded physically, so to speak. It was just the change I needed to make.

Anyway, Kristi Approved rocked. I highly recommend it.

Friday Photos: Playing Around in the Backyard

Warning to my mother, who hates pictures of crying children: There are two pictures of crying children in this post, (both episodes were short-lived if that makes you feel better, Mom) but posted for the purpose of capturing the sweetness of the accompanying sister, who is shown comforting the crying sister. So...just focus on that, Mom.

Ruby helping Olive up the hill.

Someday, she won't find me funny anymore.

That will be a sad, sad day.

You can't tell, but Olive is patting May on the back

and I wanted to document it.

She's a very nurturing little person.

You will notice May really isn't showcased in these pictures.

She wasn't in the mood.

See below.

Today's Hospital Adventure

Ruby had her endoscopy and biopsy today. As we suspected, the scope found inflammation, definite indication of what her blood work has already told us: definite Celiac Disease. We are going gluten-free full boar. Well, not we, per say. She. Our gluten intake will be significantly less--no harm in that. I'm sort of excited. I love cooking and am trying to look at cooking gluten-free as a fun challenge.

Though too much of our day was spent at the hospital, sitting in a waiting room and in a tiny pre-op/post-up partition (Why do hospitals insist on painting their walls weird colors? And having bizarre patterns in their linoleum? And smelling so funkdified? I freaking hate hospitals. I've spent way too much time in them), there was a fun highlight:

During Ruby's procedure, I went down to the gift shop to get her a gift from my Mom and was walking inside the "skybridge" over a massive construction site on one end of the hospital. The "skybridge" is a glass enclosure that connects one building to another up on the second floor. There were about a half-dozen rowdy nurses on their lunch break standing at the glass panes and checking out the construction workers down below, pointing, whistling and cat calling. The tables had turned. The universe suddenly went belly up. I wanted to give them all high fives.

Friday Photos: May's Turn

If I'm Going to Make an Apron, Then By Golly, I'm Going to Obsess Over It

Not just any old apron will do. Oh no. The fact that I'm ready to put on an apron again, is a big deal people. A BIG deal. Let me tell you a little bit about the ones I was forced to wear as a child and then you might see why I'm being so picky.

They had sleeves, a square neck, and two ties in the back. They were much like hospital gowns, now that I think about it. You know, the ones that movies have their main characters wear while they break out of hospitals, when they hurriedly rip off their IV's and go flailing barefooted down the hall with their bare buns exposed for all to see. This is where I would like to make an ironic statement and draw parallels between members of my family and mental institution patients both wearing this particular style, but I won't. Moving on, one was coral colored and the other blue. Very thin fabric.

Now let me tell you about the ones I was forced to wear as a teenager and even a college freshman home from BYU during Christmas break (to which I refused and was given "Fine, then you can do your own laundry while you're home then," to which I said "Gladly!" and flung the apron off with the gusto that only years of pent up resentment and defiance over the wearing of said apron could produce.)

Full style, but no sleeves. (Risque!) A d-ring type neck strap thing, much like the Hooter Hiders that everyone is so wild about but I never got the hang of. Thick canvas fabric. Pockets for I don't know what. (A spatula because you're just too lazy to reach into that drawer right there? Some old Werther's Butterscotches? Hundred dollah bills, yo?) A tie in the back. These were mostly of the flowered printed variety.

Since that day when the apron and I parted ways, I've seen a plain royal blue, a cow print and a polka dotted number come down the line and into my Mother's overstuffed apron drawer. Was there a red one at one point? There had to have been. Mama Garlock's all about the red.

So since I have obviously been traumatized, I would like to steer clear of anything that resembles any apron that I've ever worn from the time I was squozed in the world (by a mother who everyone thought was wearing a hospital gown but was really just wearing an apron, SUCKAS!) until the day I dramatically flung off my apron and started doing my own laundry, which was the last time I wore an apron...over a decade ago.

Though there are a lot of aprons out there, I haven't seen any that really tickle my fancy. My lovey-dovey Anthropologie sells aprons (but we love her anyway) but there's nothing there I want to copy. There are a lot of skirt-styles floating around but that style doesn't make sense to me at all. Like why are we only going to be protecting our pants? Why discriminate against the shirt? I need coverage people. I'm a hot mess, which is why I've relented to going back to wearing a freaking apron in the first place. There are a bunch with like 4 different fabrics in them (the main fabric, the right pocket, the left pocket, the straps, the trim, all different but coordinating fabrics...gah!), some with ric-rac or puff-ball trim, some with ruffles or pleats but those are too cutesy-wootsie. I'm not anti-pleats or ruffles or puff-ball trim or ric-rac per say, but just because I'm a girl wearing an apron, doesn't mean I have to look like I've lost my sheep and don't know where to find them.

I think the look I'm going for is something Audrey Hepburnish. (What else is new?) Something almost French looking, like what your typical cigarette smoking, beret wearing, striped bateau-neck shirt and skinny black pants that hit above the ankle wearing, bicycle with a basket in the front carrying a loaf of bread and a bunch of red tulips riding French woman would wear...if she was forced to wear an apron.

Ten Things of Which You Are Sure to Find at Every Community Pool This Summer

1. A discarded band-aid.

2. A girl who developed early, wearing a bikini, surrounded by boys who are her same age but two feet shorter than her.

3. That same girl who developed early, wearing a bikini, aggressively dunking the heads of the boys who are her same age but two feet shorter than her under water.

4. A kid in a speedo.

5. A kid with long hair who inadvertently splashes you with every move he makes.

6. Moms in bikinis with their c-section scars.

7. A teenage girl getting thrown into the pool by a teenage boy. The screams that ring out from her mouth are ones of horror, of terror and "Look at me!"

8. A heavy kid swimming with a t-shirt on.

9. The heavy kid's older brother who is even heavier, spending his allowance on nachos and coke.

10. The bored life guard who hollers "Walk" with as much enthusiasm as one would have watching grass grow, which is what he is spending most of his time doing, rather than watching for drowning victims.

Olive Also Likes All of Our Ants

Locked Out

I left the keys in the house and locked the door. The car is also
locked. We wait for Dr. Reynolds to break loose from clinic to come to
our rescue. Well, it's a good thing we keep our front porch
littered with bits of chalk, random sticks, broken bird houses, a pile
of rocks and empty bottles of bubbles.

A Long Story and Then Watch How I Get All Deep on Your A's

When we moved to PA just a few weeks after Ruby was diagnosed with Diabetes, our new pediatric endocrinologist here in PA ordered a myriad of blood tests to be done on Ruby to screen for a bunch of random stuff. We got the tests done but didn't hear anything back, which we didn't think anything of. One doesn't expect to have a diagnosis of Diabetes AND something else simultaneously. What we didn't know then was that the tests did indeed indicate that she had another disease that needed diagnosing: Celiac Disease. But it was overlooked. I don't know what happened, but no one said a word about it. Almost four years later to the day, which was a couple of weeks ago, on a whim, I had piggybacked an appointment for Ruby onto Olive's 15 month well-check for her to have her eczema checked out. A resident pediatrician peered at Ruby's rashy knee and said "Hmmm. I'm not sure this is eczema." Ruby has had eczema her whole life and when written a prescription for the proper ointment, it goes away, but we were out of the ointment and it had flared up again. I inwardly groaned and thought "Rookie." She turned to me and asked "Has she ever been checked for Celiac Disease?" "I don't think so. Maybe. I don't know?..." (Ruby gets blood tests for her thyroid and other things every couple of months, so I really had no idea.) The resident "hm'ed" and "ha'ed" and then proceeded to tell me to put over-the-counter steroid cream on it. "What a waste of time," I thought as we walked out prescription-less.

But that appointment ended up being the opposite of a waste of time. A couple of days after the appointment, I got a call from the resident. "Something just kept bugging me about that rash so I looked back through all of Ruby's labs (which are PAGES, bless her) and found that in 2006 she was tested for Celiac Disease." She proceeded to tell me that the test indicated that she had tested positive...in 2006. Four years ago. Grrrr. She wanted to have Ruby tested agin. I went straight to the internet to start my research. Once you have Celiac Disease, you have it for life and the only way to make it better is to eliminate gluten from your diet, which is a protein found in wheat, barley and rye and is found in...most things, unfortunately. It's autoimmune. It's not uncommon for those with Diabetes to also have Celiac Disease. The main symptoms are GI problems, like chronic diarrhea, which Ruby never had, but she had been complaining about stomach aches which I chalked up to hypochondria and wanting to go down to see her *awesome* school nurse during the day when she was bored in class. She also had complained that her throat hurt most nights, which again, I chalked up to hypochondria and not wanting to go to bed. She also made this weird sound with her throat like she had a hard time swallowing but Ruby is so over-aware of herself and what's going on within her body because of her Diabetes (thinking about if her blood sugar is too low or too high), I didn't think anything of it, other than she had recently become aware of the act of swallowing and was exaggerating the process...if that makes sense. What really perked my interest were the less common symptoms such as mood swings and changes in behavior. All of a sudden, a light bulb went on. This is when the sun broke through the clouds, a chorus of choir boys could be heard and dare I say, I saw a rainbow with a fatty pot of gold at the end with little green leprechauns dancing around.

For the past year, I have asked myself on a daily basis "Where has my child gone?" Ruby has been really, really tough to deal with and our relationship has suffered which has been our main struggle. She's been moody, she's been irrational, she's been extremely difficult. "What if this is the answer?" I thought. We jumped on the gluten-free bandwagon right away. The next day, Go took her out on a date and broke the news to her. He took her to the grocery store and showed her the gluten-free aisle, had her pick out a gluten-free treat and took her to a movie. She's used to having to be more restrictive with her diet than other kids and has always handled it with amazing grace and this was no exception. The next morning we went to a better grocery store and went to town and filled the cart with gluten-free goods. She pointed out things at the store that she loved but could no longer eat with a matter-of-fact attitude. Her strength and her goodness never ceases to amaze me. We took her in to get her blood tested again, per the doc's request and waited for the results. For a week, she was gluten-free and: her rash has almost disappeared. No complaints about stomach aches. No complaints about her throat hurting. No weird sound from her throat. What was the best thing, though, was that her demeanor has improved. She has been more cheerful and more rational and I've seen more than just glimpses of my happy, cheerful Ruby.

And this is why I love her new diagnosis: even though the news of yet another thing being wrong with my child's body was a slam, it was worth it to get her "back."

A couple of days after her tests, we got a call from the ped's resident with the results from the blood test and her antibodies were sky-high, indicating Celiac Disease. So we have an appointment with a peds GI doc this Wednesday, an appointment with anesthesia next Tuesday and she'll get her scope/biopsy the next day, Wednesday. She'll be under anesthesia during the scope, they'll get a biopsy and see what the damage is. For the next week and a half, until her procedure, they want her back on gluten to get definitive results.

I am 100% positive she has Celiac Disease and that gluten is harmful to her body and this is an example of why: Knowing that they want her back on gluten until her tests, today I gave her her first bit of gluten in a week: 1o pretzels. In just 3 hours afterwards, she was itching again, she was irritable, she was complaining that her throat hurt and making that weird sound. This shows me how important it is to stick to her gluten-free diet. It's not going to be easy. It's a HUGE hassle, not to mention a big fat bummer for her. No pizza parties. No Happy Meals. No birthday cake. No pancakes. No refreshments at church functions. No ice cream unless it's gluten-free, which is basically Haagen Daz and Dryers. No normal chocolate chip cookies. No normal bread. No candy bars. No dinner rolls. No pot stickers. No brownies. No sacrament bread. Nothing with flour. Not even a speck. Her own gluten-free bread must be toasted in a separate toaster so that absolutely no speck of normal bread gets on there, because the tiniest bit causes a flare up.

It's so not fun and heaven knows this family doesn't need another health issue thrown into the mix, but that being said, the bigger part of me is SO grateful that the resident went with her gut and looked back in her files and caught this mistake. This could have gone undiagnosed for YEARS, which could have eventually caused cancer and all other sorts of ravaging. But mostly, this is the step we needed to get our Ruby back. All this time, I thought it was me and poor mothering skills. It would keep me up at night, wondering what the problem was, did something happen to her, was there something she's not telling me, what was I doing wrong? etc. I wondered how our relationship could go on like this; if it was like this when she's 6 and 7, how in the world would it be when she's 14 and 15? Now, so many things are making sense. The dots are connecting. So even though the news of Celiac Disease is a hard one to swallow (pun intended), I'm grateful for it, because to me it was a definite answer to my biggest current prayer--what is going on with my child and what do I need to do to improve our relationship? And Celiac Disease was the answer. Once again, I am shown that God is aware of me and my struggles and He's aware of my family. In every hardship our family has had to endure so far, I can honestly say "the silver lining" always ends up being worth it's weight in gold...or, uh silver, rather...

And there you have it.

Happy 30th to Moi

Turning 30 used to freak me out. Up until about a year and a half ago, it really bothered me until I realized, "Hey, I'll be in my thirties when we're out of residency," and then 30 didn't seem so bad. What also helped my attitude was setting the goal to "Weigh 130 at 30," which is five pounds lighter than when I started out my pregnancy with Ruby, something I haven't seen on the scale for almost a decade. Yikes.

As of a couple of days ago, I was 131.5. A lot of my spinning folks are aware of my plight, so when I walked in the spin room this morning, they were like "Did you make it?", "Are you 130 yet?" and I said "Nope!" and they all let out a loud groan because they knew this meant that I was going to kill them. "I have 1 and a half pounds to lose, people! And I'm going to leave it on the floor of the spin room. Starting NOW! GET THOSE LEGS MOVING! COME ON!" The groans turned into roars, whoops, yelps and whistles. What a fantastic way to start a birthday. (Technically, my birthday is Sunday, the 11th, but we celebrated today.) I came home, hopped on the scale and lo and behold...130!

The day just got better. I was royally spoiled by my man as usual. I take that back...referring to the "as usual" part of that sentence. When I turned 26 was right after he started his intern year, he was working 110 hours a week and we literally didn't see him for months. My 26th birthday I did NOT get spoiled. But I forgave him because it wasn't his fault...and I digress. So every year before 2006 and after 2006, I did get and have gotten spoiled and this year was no exception. It may or may not have included and was not limited to the following things:

Even still, I can't help but do little things for myself and think "Happy Birthday, self!" during the week leading up to July 11th every year.

Such as the 2 bunches of gorgeous bright pink gladiolus I have sitting in a vase in the middle of my kitchen table. Thirty gladiolus to the thirty year old!

The $4.99 DVD of Raising Arizona I came across in Costco a couple days ago. Don't mind if I do!

A cold bottle of Diet A&W straight out of the grocery store mini-fridge yesterday. How thoughtful of me.

Splurging a little on the best fruit in the world. Why, thank you.








Thirty was good. And I think it's going to continue that way.

Friday Photos: Just Us Today

I have not mastered the self timer. And that's ok.

She's so serious.

Well, not really.

Some Things

1. I am advertising on a new blog: noodlesandmilk.blogspot.com. She will be having tutorials (I'll be doing one soon-I'll let you know), give-aways and free pattern testing for the patterns she puts up in her shop. Check it out.

2. We're going in to get Ruby tested for Celiac Disease again but are not expecting different results. We've dove into the very expensive gluten-free world head first. Thank goodness it's tax-deductible.

3. It was 100 degrees here in PA yesterday. Ick.

4. In less than a month, I will be in Orange County. Dreamy, dreamy.

5. Go has discovered city-data.com, and has spent hours scouring the California coast map for towns that fit our criteria for potential places to plant our roots in two years. Exciting! Yes, yes, desert-loved ones, Vegas is still in the running, but so not as fun to look at on city-data.com...or in general for that matter. Ha!

2005 Called. They Want Their Shorts Back.

I still own an item of clothing I bought back before May was born that looks like this:

Long, brown, corduroy, gaucho-style shorts that go down like an inch or two below my knee caps. Some real lookers, especially with my unusually short legs. Really, there probably wasn't a more UN-flattering piece of clothing I could have worn. A flesh-colored mu-mu would have made me look better than these shorts did. And I think there were a couple of times when I even wore them with suede plum-colored lace up Camper boots. Arr, Matey. Shiver me timbers.

I have a looong list of projects I'd like to dive into but Etsy orders, though I'm grateful for them, have taken over my sewing machine time. But I'd like to try my hand at tailoring--I've never done anything like that before and I'd like to see if I can make these into something wearable rather than throw them away or risk getting snickered at if I donated them to the Salvation Army.

Tailoring these shorts so that they are fitted instead of (gulp) wide legged and taking them up to a normal Bermuda-short length is what I'd like to do with them, besides use them has a handkerchief while I look back at old photos of me actually wearing these beasts.

Friday/Saturday Photo: Olive and the Pop Beads

Today Was Crazy: Friday Photo Postponed Until Tomorrow

That announcement was mainly for my Mom.

*After an extremely busy morning, I was given the news that Ruby has Celiac Disease and spent most of the afternoon researching it on the internet, which yes, isn't always the best idea, but Dr. Go was unavailable for questioning and my inquiring mind wanted to know what we were in for. More on this later. Blah. Thank goodness for awkwardfamilyphotos.com.

Dude! She Knows I'm Alive!

I feel like I'm a freshman in high school and a dreamboat senior water polo player just passed me a note in class.* In this morning's DesignMom post, she listed some of the things she featured on Babble, another blog she writes for and HELLO! She featured my pilot caps! Never mind Cloud 9, I'm on Cloud 10.

*Note: Even though the senior water polo player is indeed a dreamboat, apparently he is not very sharp, as he is a senior and in a class with a freshman. But we don't care. Because he's a dreamboat.

Right Now

I'm not going to lie--this brought tiny happy teardrops to my eye balls.