Against the Grain

Dental work, the recap

NaBloPoMo: 1, Amy 0.  Or maybe that's 0, 0. 

I keep putting off posting because I need to upload before and after shots of Leo into the laptop and wanted to attach them with a post about his surgery, but this weekend Dan buzzed his hair and he looks totally different again, so it seems like older than old news now and whatever, I might as well post photo-less.

The reason his really bad tooth died is due to falling into a bedpost a year ago.  It wiggled a little at first, but seemed okay until spring when it starting changing color.  The dentist showed me how there was an infection in the gum above it at this point.  They lost the tooth after removing it, but I suspect it fell apart and someone tossed it.  I think having the one dead, infected tooth accelerated decay in his other teeth.  Night nursing probably didn't help.  He rarely drinks juice, and other than a lot at Halloween and occasional suckers from the bank (which I'm stopping now), he doesn't have much candy.  He has my big teeth-small jaw problem which makes it tough to clean between his teeth.  I just hope that the tooth removal, mostly weaned-ness, and more careful brushing will be enough to prevent any additional major work.

I love the Children's Hospital system.  They are awesome and I recommend them for every circumstance (except probably birthing a baby).  We were in the St Paul location when the boys were in the NICU, the Minneapolis location when Peter split his head open and went to the ER for stitches, and the West outpatient location for the dental work.  All of them went above and beyond what I expected for making kids feel secure and comfortable.  The best part about our morning -- as the anesthesiologist held the mask over Leo's face (in the dark room with green twinkling lights on the walls and ceiling, the color picked just for him), the nurse blew bubbles for Leo to kick as he fell asleep.  He was reclined in my lap facing away from me and I didn't know he'd fallen asleep until he dropped his toy truck.  It was so calm and quiet -- I'd expected him to fight the mask. 

Waking up wasn't quite as easy -- because he was recovering from a cold, they wanted him to wake up enough to cough up any accumulated mucus while in the first recovery room, so he was fairly awake by the time I could join him.  A nurse was holding a weepy, out-of-it Leo in her lap when I came in.  I held him for half an hour as he woke up, watching a construction video.  He wanted to pull off his IV and got angry about it for a bit, then would calm down and watch the show again.  I tried to give him a popsicle, but I think his mouth was too numb and he drooled out more than he ate.  He was able to drink some juice. 

By the time we got home, he immediately began running around and chasing Peter.  He's been more wound up in the days post-surgery than he had been before.  He was on ibuprofin for most of the first two days and that usually makes him more hyper.  He woke up the next day saying his mouth hurt (he hadn't had medicine for 16 hours), but hasn't otherwise complained.

He was put under for about 90 minutes -- they x-rayed him, cleaned his teeth, and did all the work while I waited in a family room. 

I'm not quite sure what all he had done.  The dentist listed everything verbally, but I'll need to wait for the bill to come before getting it all straight.  They took out the one tooth, put stainless steel (on the back, white on the front) caps on 3 more, put white fillings on at least 2, and put sealants on everything.  He looks really strange to me.  His remaining top front tooth seems so big and looks like it's going to take over the front of his mouth.  Leo keeps chewing on hard pointy things and I'm amazed he hasn't made the hole bleed.  Both boys have been fairly early teethers and I hope he doesn't have to wait too long before the permanent tooth comes in, but it'll probably be 4 years.  Dan's taught him to say that's he's "Banga Nify" -- Malagasy for missing a tooth.  Dan's mom grew up in Madagascar and has memories of everyone calling her that.  Leo is now pointing out that he's Banga Nify but he's still Leo.  Yes, but now I feel like the last bits of babyhood are disappearing and I have two big kids at my house. 

There were some extra things done that weren't on the original dental plan and I don't know if they'll be costing us an extra $100 or $500.  Or more.  I wish they'd send the Explanation of Benefits so I could at least find out the amount.  Until then, I feel like all our finances are up in the air because I don't want to pay extra on other bills if we're going to be sending another thousand to the dentist.  I do know that the boys and I are now flossing daily and brushing teeth twice a day even if it means I have to pin Leo down to do so.  I'm going to a new, close dentist in a week and Peter's scheduled for the pediatric dentist during Christmas break.  Now, if I could just figure out what is involved with switching our primary care doctor to someone in this part of the metro, we'd stop driving to St Paul for all our health care.  It made a lot more sense to go to a dentist in downtown St Paul when I worked on that block.  Now, not so much.  My 6 month check was scheduled at the same time as Leo's surgery so it made it easier to switch now instead of putting it off.

Hospital Tour

At 9am, Leo is scheduled to obtain a new smile, courtesy of the pediatric dentist who will be removing one of his top front teeth and fixing/capping/who-knows-what-else to most of the rest.  Tonight, all four of us went on a tour of the outpatient children's hospital where this will happen.  Overtired Leo kept going into fits when we had to move into new areas and leave the previous toys behind.  He sobbed for 15 minutes in the car that he couldn't stay and play with the trucks.  The rest of us, who were more concerned about the anesthesia than the trucks were really impressed too.  They had the kids (and their siblings) try on the masks and choose what flavor lip balm they'd use.  The room where they're put to sleep has dark walls with stars glittering everywhere.  He'll only briefly be awake and apart from me -- as soon as he begins to wake up, he moves to a stage 2 room where I'll be waiting.  They wheel them to the parking lot in colorful wagons.  There's a wall full of videos to pick from to watch as they wake up.  Every time the kids have to wait somewhere, there's a huge toy area to keep them from realizing they haven't eaten since bedtime.  The parents' waiting area looks accomodating and comfortable.  If someone has to yank my son's teeth out, I can't think of any better way to experience it.

I had both my own wisdom teeth and permanent canines removed under general anesthesia as a teenager and have strong memories of waking up very confused and wanting to go back to sleep, but only waking more and hurting more.  I'm not sure how much Leo will hurt or for how long -- he'll have pain meds, but he's definitely going to wake up feeling out of whack and I feel so bad that I can't explain that very well to a two-year-old.  I'm glad it's not being done at the dentist's office so that he won't associate the office with pain.  I don't know how much his bad tooth bothers him now -- he hates getting his teeth brushed, but I can't tell if brushing it hurts or not.  I hope that once he recovers, tooth brushing can be less of a battle, but I can't see him suddenly being okay with it.  I'm sure he won't want us anywhere near his teeth in the next few days.  I just hope that getting the bad tooth out and fixing the others will discourage the accelerated decay that seems to be happening. 

I'll let you know tomorrow whether the anesthesia is harder on me or on Leo. 

Favorite Christmas Cookie? And mess update.

I don't care that half the people I know are trying to lose weight or avoiding gluten -- I want to make a lot of Christmas cookies this year.  It's a fun activity for both me and the boys and we can eat a few and freeze the rest.  I suspect it won't be hard to find uses for them during the last week in December.  So what's your favorite recipe(s)?   We'll do the ones with a Hershey's kiss in the middle and sugar cookies (with a million sprinkles) and spritz.  But what fabulous cookies am I missing?  I'm going to be hosting Dan's family's Christmas Eve this year (but not Thanksgiving), which is a white Norwegian flour and sugar fest, for one. 

While I'm talking about baking, here are a couple food pictures from the fall (I'm on the laptop where pictures are easily accessible for a change).

The start to three apple pie fillings I froze in October.  Still have to sauce the other 30 lbs of apples...

This was my pickle and applesauce bookshelf before I canned the last bushel of tomatoes.  Now there aren't quite as many pickles or applesauce jars, but the tomatoes overtook their shelf and have 2 rows up here.  The quart jars are 4 deep and pints are 5 deep. 

The aforementioned tomato shelf.  There are also a couple quarts of maple syrup to their right (I get a gallon at a time, but reprocess it into quarts so it doesn't get moldy by the time I finish the gallon). 

Below the tomatoes and dishes are the jam half-pints and empty jars.  I've got 17 half-pints there at the moment with frozen rhubarb and raspberries in the freezer to make more if necessary later this winter.

A toy update -- I got all the Legos picked up and sorted by whether Peter received them for his birthday (a 674 piece set) or if they're  Dan's.  An hour later, Leo made a big mess of them and I fixed it and promptly put the big bin much farther away.  At the moment Peter's playing with the small bin, pieces all on the table, and no one's whined much or made an enormous mess of them.  Leo wanted to play with the Duplos (which were also all picked up) and dumped them all on the floor, but when he stopped paying attention to them 20 minutes later, we both put them away.  So far so good.  Some other toys are being picked up and put into the give-away bin because their mess:fun ratio is too high.  Others are being put onto the high shelf in their closet so they can be saved for more supervised times.  We could still get rid of half their toys and not miss them, but it's a start. 

Rethinking the grass

Our suburban lot is about 60 feet by 120 feet.  The house has a 1000 sq ft footprint and the garage/driveway/garden take up the back twenty feet.  That leaves a lot (5000 sq ft) of grass.  Our backyard has a lot of trees, which conveniently keep our house from overheating and the backyard grass from getting crispy in the summer.  I think we mowed the backyard twice this summer and it didn't really need more than that.  But our expanse of front yard grass has been irking me.  It needs to be watered, but then it has to be mowed.  It sits there looking not-that-pretty (because we don't really keep up with the mowing and watering).  Our street doesn't have too many lawn-obsessive people, but no one has given up on the grass and done something else with it either.  I want to grow non-grass in our front yard.

This afternoon we had a sustainable landscaping couple come to our house for a free consultation.  (I met them when we checked out their baby chicks on Halloween).  We talked about our plan to get chicks in the spring, to grow more berries and grapes and vegetables, to get an apple tree or two, to install a bigger, better, permanent sandbox, to get rid of the ugly white rocks that surround our foundation.  We told them we didn't want all the front yard grass, but we didn't want to be the crazy people with the eyesore for a front yard.  They didn't tell us it was impossible or that we were nutcases.  Just bouncing ideas off of them helped us solidify some ideas.  Our hope is to begin making changes next year and continue little by little, doing things ourselves, to keep down the expenses.  If we start doing things and get overwhelmed, they're willing to help as much or as little as we need -- for a few hundred dollars they could put together a detailed plan on graph paper. 

At the moment the plan for the next year is the following:

Over the winter, build a chicken coop and obtain materials for a run.

Get chicks around March, probably keeping them inside for a few weeks.  Get the city's approval.

In the spring, start working on removing all the white rocks.  Do soil amendments.  Talk to people and come up with ideas for around the foundation.  Plan to buy perennials and bushes in the fall when they're cheapest.

Plant ground cover on our side hills and probably bushes at the top and bottom so the boys don't dig there.

Plant square foot raised beds on the south side of our front sidewalk.  It's the sunniest spot in the front yard and it's next to the laidback neighbors. 

Plant berries along the fence in the backyard.  Maybe replace the fence if the next door neighbor does his section. 

Increase current garden 8 feet towards the house.  A lot of stuff I planted just outside this year's garden would then be inside it.

Plan an apple tree or two along the north side of the front yard where they won't block any future garden space.

That would leave the bulk of the front yard alone, but start chipping away at other spaces.  It wouldn't look goofy, but would pave the way towards putting in more beds on that side in the future.  We'd be getting rid of the current landscaping that bugs us and fixing our immediate problem (dirt washing away on the side hills).  I think we'd leave most of our backyard grass alone long-term because it's nice running around, shaded space and doesn't require much maintenance. 

Budgeting -- 6 month review

Back in May, we decided to stop using credit cards and manage our money a la Dave Ramsey.  I now have a ridiculously detailed Excel spreadsheet that we follow exactly and a pile of envelopes into which I dole out our spending money each month.  There are another dozen categories that don't have envelopes because they only exist in our ING account, but I still track exactly how much they contain and move money into/out of them monthly.  There are probably simpler ways to handle this, but I'd rather have five food categories and every possible expense labeled so I'm not confused about how to feed the cat or pay for haircuts. 

We were able to put almost all our utilities on budget-planned auto-pay except our mortgage (our loan is through a small local bank and requires us to have a checking account with them in order to pay electronically).  I'm amazed how few checks we now write.  Our natural gas supplier just informed us that our monthly payment will be dropping $30 in December because so much got saved up this summer -- I think we signed up for the plan just as gas prices rose and they were expected to stay high.  We've survived just fine without a cell phone, although we're thinking about getting one that would be for emergencies only to have in the winter. 

Sticking to our budgeted spending amounts has been surprisingly easy.  I think through purchases a lot more carefully than I used to.  I'm able to transfer money earned from knitting into our savings because I'm not buying WAHM-made stuff impulsively (money in Paypal used to feel more like free-to-spend money).  We roll money over from month-to-month in most categories, which makes it easier to buy things now than it was in June.  We might go three months without buying any clothes, then need $50 in shoes for the boys, and it's okay. 

The tough part are the big things.  We didn't earn as much as we expected in August and then were hit with a rising health insurance premium.  Between the two, we weren't able to put much into our emergency fund that month and it was disappointing.  We had unexpected windfall gifts in September and made a point of putting them immediately into savings so they didn't just dwindle away.  Then we found out that it might cost twice as much as we'd planned to reroof the house and I got really discouraged.  We ended up finding someone with a great reputation who'll do the work this winter for $4600 -- other estimates had been as high at $7000, although we'd hoped to pay no more than $4000.  Leo's dental work is the next big hit -- that'll suck up the rest of the gift money and possibly some of the emergency fund if they find more problems.  My car needed a new muffler and we had exactly the right amount of money saved for it.  We're now saving more for doctor, dental, and car repairs than I'd planned in June, but we're also putting more into savings as other categories have shrunk and our income went up.  Periodically, I recheck our expected taxes for the year because my job doesn't take tax withholding (independent contractor) and we're aiming to break even at tax time.  We're following Dave's Baby Steps with the exception of keeping a $2000 Baby Emergency Fund because our cars are old and I fear we're due for massive repairs or replacement sooner vs. later.  I'm bummed it's taking us this long to really start chipping away at our student loan, but there's a good chance it''ll be paid off by the end of next year (which is at least 5 years earlier than I used to think that would happen).  

After six months of being as frugal as possible, there are things we'd like to spend money on that aren't in the budget.  I put all my birthday money into a new bike fund, but longtail bikes with great carrying capacities look so cool but cost an extra $500.  Dan would like to go to a music conference in the summer.  I think Leo would love gymnastics classes.  So far, we're holding back.  I think if we start seeing the loan balance dropping, it'll be better incentive to pay it off as fast as we can to free up money for other things.  In the meantime, our ING account is growing even if our emergency fund isn't as the sinking funds (things like Peter's tuition that's due in July) grow. 

Tracking our tax burden has made it obvious that a dollar saved goes farther than an extra dollar earned.  Twice this fall I've come close to agreeing to nanny other people's kids parttime and so far, the jobs have fallen through.  It's depressing realizing how little it would add to the budget after taxes.  At the moment, it doesn't seem like working for my old bosses will happen in the immediate future, but I've tried to figure out how big a time- and money-suck it would be to commute there now that we've moved farther away.  I'd definitely consider biking downtown and taking an express bus the other 20 minutes, which would probably be under an hour total.  Just busing involves 1 or 2 transfers and a 5 block walk and extra time.  Driving would be 35 miles/day.  With the economy as it is, I'll take whatever odd jobs come up for now and hope for something like my former consulting gigs next summer.  I'm working 15 hours a week from home now and it's tough having it suck most of my evening away.  At least now I'm settled with my project and don't stress about my lack of understanding and slow progress.  Dan's crazy quarter is done (extra class and soccer coaching), so he's coming out of that fog and will be working a few hours a month with the company too (it's the people we worked for this summer).  It's just strange feeling like we were earning the same money two years ago and it stretched a lot farther without so much effort. 

No-S, 3+ months later

I started the No-S diet in late July and have mostly been following it ever since.  I'm not as stringent as I was at first, but I haven't let it go completely.  Today my SIL brought over pineapple upside-down cake and a had a small piece -- before I would have had a second piece.  My ice cream consumption has dropped way down.  I began making my own ice cream maybe once a month (1.25 qts) instead of buying 2-for-1 1.75 qt containers at least twice a month.  I might eat a little dried fruit or pickle slices during the day while getting snacks for the kids rather than eating a dozen cookies after baking them.  I did eat six or seven fun-size candy bars the other night, but I can't think of any other non-special weekdays when I clearly ate way too much.  The hardest time to keep eating under control is at get-togethers where food is sitting out buffet-style for hours.  If food is there, I feel the need to keep eating it.  Being conscious of that and recognizing that I really don't need more food helps.  I've had issues with upset stomach over the past fifteen years -- late in my teens I remember having an ultrasound of my intestines and stomach to check for ulcers or other problems, but nothing was found.  I've realized in the past few months that simply eating less goes a long way toward having a settled stomach. 

At the same time, I stepped up my biking considerably, peaking at about 60 miles a week throughout September.  I'm intending to start doing T-Tapp one of these days.

The physical results have been a loss of about ten pounds and four inches off my waist.  Size tens are falling off and eights aren't tight anymore.  My BMI dropped from 23.2 to 21.6.  I'm almost exactly my Leo-pre-pregnancy weight and five pounds under my first pre-pregnancy weight.  I found a chart of my measurements from June 2003 and was surprised to see that my waist is nearly the same -- it doesn't look the same! 

From June to early October, I was seeing a physical therapist to shrink my diastasis recti caused by two late, nine+ pound babies in fairly quick succession.  I've totally slacked off on the exercises in the meantime, but now I know how to work on it and what I need to do to be strong enough to carry another baby without hurting myself more. 

The biggest change I'm trying to make is the attitute that eating constantly is normal.  I know some people need to snack, but for me snacking just leads to more snacking and it's much easier to stop before I start.  I feel hungry sometimes, and that's a good thing.  It's going to be tougher to keep losing or even maintain this weight when we're stuck indoors for months and food is the center of the next two holidays, but I feel like I now know it's possible.  Being aware of my consumption has been a big change.  I want to appreciate treats instead of plowing through them all the time.  I think that once I reach the weight I'd like to maintain (low to mid 130's, down from the 138 I'm averaging now), I'll focus more on portion size instead of cutting out all snacks.  For awhile, I was eating bigger first portions because I knew I couldn't get seconds and was afraid of being hungry.  It's easier to now to know what  a reasonable portion is and that I'll survive even if I'm hungry before bed. 

Many thanks to Erin for her constant inspiration.

Fall Pictures

  My next-door neighbor chased my boys around our yards for an hour before the snow started falling a couple weeks ago and took these pictures.  Our plan is to use these instead of going to a studio for Christmas cards and gifts for family.  She's a photography student with lots of nieces and nephews who likes excuses to take pictures.  I'm knitting her a hat as thanks/bartering. 

 

 

 

 

Can I order another 6 hours before morning, please?

Apparently, it was asking too much to expect to be able to go to a MOMS Club board meeting, work for two hours, do my Bible study lesson for tomorrow, divvy up the month's envelope cash, write a half-decent blog entry,and prep for tomorrow's dinner after the boys went to bed at 8pm.  Big shock there.  Alternative plan -- apologize for lack of Bible study preparedness, go to bed later, write this pathetic excuse of an entry, and thaw frozen homemade tomato soup and make grilled cheese tomorrow.

Fagioli was a success and allowed me to bake bread in the afternoon since I didn't have to fix dinner then.

Happy moment of the morning -- bought gas for $1.76/gallon (was labeled $1.92 and I had $1 off total purchase coupon).  I don't think I've ever gone 13 days between fillups and topped off the tank for under $12 before.  Even when the car was new in 1999 and gas was $1.  Wait, I take that back.  According to my obsessive charts, I did go 15 days between fillups in July 1999 and pay $11.39.  Gas was $1.34/gallon then.  Hmm, did it again in September of that year.  Okay, going the other direction -- the last time this was possible (the combination of low mileage and gas prices) was April 2000.  I was a junior in college.

Crockpot Meal Planning

I'm so exhausted that I keep finding myself staring at the screen blindly.  Tonight's the first time in three days that Leo hasn't gotten out of bed over and over and over again.  We finally started putting him in timeout when he got up after 90 minutes yesterday and that seemed to do it.  Geesh.  I'm still recuperating from going to bed at 2:30 Saturday night and the boys getting up at 5:15.  We refused to get out of bed until 6 when Leo came in the room with a mile of library tape torn up. 

I'm following Linda's lead and trying a lot of crockpot recipes this week.   I was still putting the grocery list together on the drive to the store, but I don't think I forgot anything. 

Today I made quiche with endive, onion, shallots, and cheddar (combining recommendations from my BIL, America's Test Kitchen's approach, and whatever ingredients I had on-hand).  I had a lot of leftover egg/milk, so I sauteed more onions and shallots, added chopped kale, then the egg/milk and made a very kale-y frittata.  When the boys were starving waiting for Dan to come home, they actually ate it, picking around some of the kale.  The quiche (frozen store-brand crust) went over very well.  In the crockpot, I made Pecan-topped Sweet Potatoes.  We ended up eating them long after everything else, and no one was really hungry enough anymore.  The boys ate around the potatoes.  They were fine, but the pretzels were definitely extraneous.  I liked the mashed sweet potatoes we had last week with only butter and milk added much better with less fuss.

Rest of the week:

Pasta Fagioli

Barack Obama's Chili

Potato Leek Soup with roasted beets (maybe I should have sandwiches ready...)

16 Bean Soup with  Corndog Muffins

Pepperoni and Mushroom Pizza (have extra crusts from last week) 

Our CSA is now down to every-other-week deliveries and our fruit share stopped (we could have gone through January, but the selections aren't our favorites in the winter) so we have more to buy at the grocery store now.  I was pleased to spend $52 for the week's worth of food.  I'd love it if we could stay around $200/month in grocery store spending (we have another $200 budgeted for food from other places, although most of that will roll over for future months because it's an off-month for bulk orders).

Some knitting

I think the last time I posted photos of recent knitting may have been 18 months ago (although my use of categories is shaky).  Here are some of my projects since then.

This was an infant sweater knit in a trade with a friend.  I got an awesome little bag that holds my knitting as I wander around -- a knitting purse, I suppose.

  Hat for a customer with a child Leo's age -- convenient demo child -- knit from Dashing Dachs' Stallion merino in Horsie.

Not knitting, but here's a jumper I made for our next-door neighbor's third birthday.  First time I sewed in a zipper.  The fabric is from Michael Miller, I believe.  I'm always looking for an excuse to make girly stuff :)

These are possibly the most colorful longies I've ever knit.  That will be one zany newborn!  Dashing Dachs' Masquerade in blue-faced leicester wool.

Largest order ever -- four pair of small longies with Peregrine merino wool from Three Irish Girls.  Her baby was due in October -- I knit a congratulatory hat with some leftover wool and need to send that to her.  Maybe four pair of medium or large longies will be in her future?

Preemie hats for a photographer to use -- here's how they turned out.

 

Ruffly, bright shorts for a customer knit from Dashing Dachs' Silvio.

 

Hooded cable knit scarf  using Lorna's Laces wool.