Life Update

Family room, eating area and kitchen
"My house isn't messy, it's custom-designed by toddlers."

Moving:
We have moved to our new house in Burnsville!  When we were shopping, this house was the only one we really loved; we are so thankful that we were able to buy it.  The kids each have a bedroom (Linus had been sleeping in our dining room since he sleeps too lightly to be in with Felicity), I have lots of counter space, and everything is so nice and open.  We are pretty much moved in on the main level and upstairs.  The basement needs a lot of work, and the garage is very full and unorganized.  The neighborhood is nice, but very quiet.  We've met only a few people - the only one who came over to meet us was Bob next door.  He has 2 big dogs that the kids just love.  When the dogs get let out, the kids run to the deck door so I can let them out to watch.  All they do is run around, but to my kiddos, it's a full-blown dog show!

GAPS:
Now that we are on the full GAPS diet, planning food is a little easier.  We are just about out of freezer meat, and I'm really looking forward to getting more meat this month.  We have 1/2 of a hog and 1/4 of a cow coming from our wonderful farm where we have been getting milk, cheese, yogurt and meat for about 4 years now.  Felicity frequently says, "Can we have that (something sugary usually) when we are all done on our GAPS diet?"  But she's holding up really well, even when people (daddy!) are eating things she can't have.  I have seen her eczema die back down again, so hopefully we're doing something right.

Summer:
We have welcomed a new nephew born in OK to my brother and his wife.  He was born 4 weeks early and had a rough start, but he's home and doing well.  She was planning to have a homebirth, but that couldn't happen since he was too early.  But she did her Hypnobabies and had a natural childbirth at the hospital - awesome job, Jess!  Can't wait to meet him in person - maybe we'll have to make that long drive...

Also, I'm super excited because my dear friend who lives in Africa and who I miss terribly is coming to my house on Friday!  She'll be staying about a week and I am so excited to spend lots of time talking and laughing with her.  I last saw her when Linus was a newborn.  I love that she wants to spend her life serving God overseas, but I also hate that she lives so far away.  I thank God for Skype, email, and airplanes.

Linus:
He's finally preferring walking over crawling, though he still crawls a lot.  He is loving the new playroom and all the toys that are finally unpacked.  He says "doggie," "car," "kitty," "daddy," "baby" and a couple other words.  He understands so much too.  As soon as he sees me scooping food onto plates he rushes to his booster seat and whines to be put in.  If he sees me getting my purse or keys, he goes to find his shoes.  He loves to be tickled and wrestled, and loves meeting new people and animals.

Felicity:
Well, for a long time I have been listening to the advice "Your kid will potty-train when they are ready - just give them opportunity" and I'm throwing it in the toilet.  I know that works for some kids, but not this one.  We have been giving her potty opportunities and incentives for well over a year and made zero progress.  So this week, I'm buckling down and making her do it.  That sounds harsh, it's really not.  She is not against doing it, she just has absolutely no self-motivation in this area.  So we're doing lots of no-diaper time, lots of "you have to sit on the potty and try" time, and lots of stickers, undies, cute pull-ups - whatever she is in the mood for.  For 2 days she has spent lots of time sitting there, peed a tiny bit, and then wet the pull-up or diaper I gave her when I could no longer force her to stay in the kitchen (hard floor).  But yesterday we had a little break through.  She peed a little in the evening, so I let her wear a Dora pull-up with a big talk about how Dora doesn't want you to pee on her, blah blah.  She went downstairs to be with Jeff, and a half hour later told him her potty was coming!  He sent her up, she ran to the potty and yelled for help (it's hard to pull down those pull-ups when you're so excited), and sat down and peed!  That's the first time she has ever known it was coming and gotten herself to the potty.  We made a huge deal out of that, and I hope it happens again today!  I put her on once already and she went, so maybe we have really turned a corner.

GAPS Intro - The Continuing Story

Well, we have made it most of the way through the GAPS intro.  I will admit I have not done everything by the book.  On stage 1, I felt like I was just working through a simple checklist.  Make this, eat this, drink this, check!  But as I progressed through stages and added more things, I just couldn't do everything.  There are just too many things to think about and have ready and eat and drink, etc...  I have been faithful to the diet - the only cheating I did was drinking the juice for communion this Sunday (a friend on GAPS makes bread for us "special" people).  But I certainly haven't had my broth with egg yolk and a fermented veggie with every single meal.  Or garlic, avocado and kraut juice in every bowl of soup.  You do what you can, right?  I started stage 5 today which is where raw veggies are added.  I made dressing with olive oil, basil and garlic and had that over butter lettuce with cucumbers.  Yum!

I still don't feel very different; my abdominal pain is still there.  But I'm going to keep at it because I know my gut needs the healing.  I also have a metallic taste in my mouth which can be a sign that the body is not getting enough carbs, that it is processing and getting rid of metals stored in it, or several other things.  I have started cooked fruit for more carbs, and if my body does have metal stored, I am thrilled to be getting rid of it!

I have also experienced what I would call "GAPS fatigue" a few times.  Making all this food is a lot of work, and on days when I don't have leftovers or a plan I feel very tired.  I just want to grab something out of my fridge and eat, but it's not there!  I like cooking, but this is just so much cooking.  On Sunday I did make a meal plan for the week with a grocery list (shopped on Sunday too), and it has helped a lot.

Felicity is doing well with the eating, but not so well with the eczema.  I have been letting her have new things sooner than I have had them just to keep her happy.  I gave her ghee for stage 2 and soon after squash pancakes for stage 3 which have whole eggs in them both in the same day or so.  A few days later, all her spots of eczema had come back.  I immediately suspected the dairy since a relative has dairy allergies also.  But after cutting dairy back out for almost a week now, the eczema is the same.  So starting today she is off eggs too, and we'll see if that helps.  If I can't figure out the cause, I think I will do as a friend suggested and take her for a specific allergy test.  Now that I have seen the eczema go almost away and come back, I am concerned that she has been eating and reacting to something.