Preston's Little Miracle

I've been wanting to write about this all week, and am just now getting the chance.

The day that Will left on his mancation, on the way home from the airport Preston was telling me that his ear hurt.  

Kids often say somethings hurts in an attempt to get a bandaid :) Or a kiss or sympathy from Mom.

I didn't think too much of it.

When we got home from taking Will to the airport, I put the boys to bed and then I did some busy things. Two hours later I JUST got settled into bed when I hear Preston whimpering.  I thought at first he must be having a bad dream.

So I go into his room and he is crying, and I ask him if he wants to come crawl into bed with me. He does, so he comes into my room.  

He keeps wiggling and can't get comfortable and then just sobs.  I mean we're talking an all-out cry. 

I could tell something wasn't right and I kept asking him to tell me about his bad dream, and I assured him that dreams are not real and everything was going to be okay, that mommy was right here, etc.

He wouldn't tell me about it, and then finally after like 15 minutes he blubbers out "My ear hurts!"

I felt so bad.  His ear really DID hurt.

So at this point, the boy is like screaming and I can tell it hurts him pretty bad.  

Neither of my boys have ever suffered from ear infections before and so this was a first for me.  I'm sitting there trying to think of what to do. The first thing I do of course is get on my computer and Google ear infections in children and "home remedies".  I read all sorts of things and finally find a remedy that called for ingredients that I had in my cupboard:  salt, warm water, wash cloth, garlic.

I pour a teaspoon of salt into a washcloth and then tie it off with a rubberband. Then soak it in warm water and hold it to his ear.  

He didn't exactly find that very comforting.

I also gave him some ibuprofin.

He was still in a lot of pain and screaming and crying, and I'm just going "Great, this would totally happen the night that I'm a single parent."  So I go back to my computer to find more remedies, also posted something on facebook to see if friends had ideas. I also put some garlic oil in his ear (supposed to get rid of infection).

It's about 10:30pm and I call my parents because I don't know what to do.

My dad tells me "Remember when you had an ear infection when you were younger, and you got a blessing and it was instantly gone? You need to find someone to give him a blessing."

He was right. 

When I was about 14 years old I had my first and only ear infection and it was BAD.  I remember it felt like someone was pounding my ear with a rock, and I cried for HOURS. My mom put garlic in my ear and the whole 9 yards and nothing was working.

Then my Dad gave me a Priesthood blessing and the second he ended the blessing with Amen, the pain was gone and I was asleep within 10 minutes.  I remember having SUCH faith in blessings, and I KNEW without a doubt that once I got a blessing my ear ache would be gone. And it was.  It was my first experience in gaining a testimony of blessings and the Priesthood power.

So back to Preston...

Our next door neighbors go to our church, and I felt terrible calling them so late but I tried. Nobody answered. Well of course not because they are probably sleeping.

I thought well I will try our hometeacher, Br. Apken, though I felt bad because they didn't live super close to us and I didn't want to take him away from his family so late at night. But he was happy to come over.

So about 20 min later, he showed up. Beforehand, I sat down with Preston and told him about the time when I was little and had an ear infection just like he did, and how Grandpa gave me a blessing and it was all better.  I told him about faith, and if he would believe in Jesus Christ that he could heal him, that his pain would be all gone.

Now to a 4 year old, I'm sure not all of this made perfect sense. And the only way I could figure out how to explain to him what Priesthood blessings were was to compare it to "magic", but of course that is NOT anything what it is. But to a 4 year old, it made sense.

So Br. Apken put his hands on Preston's head and gave him a blessings, and blessed him that his ear infection would be gone and that he would be able to get to sleep and feel better.

After Br. Apken left, Preston cried for about 10 more min. All the while I turned on Sesame Street to take his mind off of it. All of sudden, he started giggling.  Wow, did he just giggle? The boy who had just been screaming and crying out of pain for the last couple of hours just giggled?

I sat there and watched him as he was laying next to me completely change from screaming/crying to giggling at Sesame Street within 10 minutes after he got the blessing.  I seriously had a HUGE warm feeling come over my entire body and a tear trickle down my face.  Just another confirmation in my life that God is real and he loves me, and he loves my children and answers prayers.

Preston watched Sesame Street for about an hour!  Haha!  And then he finally fell asleep. He only woke up once around 4am whimpering a bit and then fell back to sleep. But then Taylor woke up screaming at 4:30 and I had to go in with him.  

To say the least, I did not get any sleep that entire night, but I'm so grateful that Preston had a small miracle that night and was healed. I'm also grateful for the Apkens. :)

Mormon Lactavists

The topic of breastfeeding in church has come up a LOT in the past couple of weeks, and I've been seeing blogs and articles all over Facebook about it.

One in particular, from the SLC Tribune:
http://m.sltrib.com/sltrib/mobile3/55921668-219/breast-church-feeding-lds.html.csp

I don't really want to start a convo on FB about it, but I thought I would blog my thoughts about it here.

Have I ever personally BF during church?  

Yes.  In the ward where Preston was born, I would sit in the back of Relief Society and BF  him under a nursing cover.  There were 2 other nursing moms in there as well, and we all felt comfortable nursing in the back.  Usually the back of the room was quite open.

However, the ward where Taylor was a baby I tried BFing once in RS and it was a bit awkward. It was a very small room and every chair was occupied.  It's not that anyone gave me a hard time -in fact nobody batted an eye. It was just awkward because I didn't have any room and I was bumping elbows.

Did I ever nurse in sacrament meeting or Sunday school? 

No.  I personally never felt comfortable nursing with other people (men) around.  Mostly because I was never savvy at undoing my nursing bra, shirt, and everything else without a boob flying out accidentally.  With Preston I only ever had a blanket to nurse with and it's really impossible sometimes to keep a blanket up on your shoulder with a baby under it (who likes to pull it down) while trying to under your bra under your shirt.

But the second time around, I got smart and bought a nursing cover. These tie around your neck so the baby can't pull them off. GENIUS I tell you.

But so anyway, I always went to the mothers lounge during Sacrament meeting or Sunday school, and sometimes it would be freezing cold in there so I always brought extra blankets with me.  Honestly, I enjoyed sitting in a rocking chair hearing the talks over the speaker system - haha. I don't know why women complain about that - hahaha.

No, but in all seriousness, to hear women getting released from callings or not allowed to attend YW or Primary activities because they are BFing is crap!

Have I ever BF in public?

Yes.  I sat in the corridor of the UofW Stadium breastfeeding Preston during a Huskies football game.  Did people look at me weird?  No, but they definitely avoided me. Haha.  I tried to find a space in the public bathroom to nurse but there was no where sit down. It was either sit on the dirty gross bathroom floor or on a toilet to nurse (which I have actually done before).  I didn't want to BF in the stands of the stadium so my only choice was to find a bench in the corridors and do it.

In the article above, it says women were thrown out of Target and malls for breastfeeding.  I find that offensive.  Feeding your child is not some sick thing that you should be forced to do on a toilet seat in a bathroom stall or on a dirty bathroom floor.  The article didn't say whether or not these women were covering up or just BF without a cover, but either way - if someone had walked up to me at the UofW stadium and asked me to leave because I was BF my child, I would have been mortified and deeply hurt.  There really was no where to feed my baby, unless I walked the 2 miles back to my car from the stadium to nurse him, and that would have been just insane.

I have also nursed in public parks (covered up). I've nursed in a movie theater.  Yeah I've pretty much nursed everywhere out in public BUT I always found more secluded areas and not like I was trying to put on a display or something.  Sometimes, I think people don't understand that there is no where else to feed the baby and the baby needs to eat.

I personally LOVE this advertisement from LUVS.  Way to make BF look completely normal.



My personal opinion about breastfeeding is that as long as the mother is covering up then there should be no problem.  I have been to a storytime at the local library where there was a mother feeding her baby with her breasts COMPLETELY out there and yes it was distracting.  It wasn't offensive, mind you, but it was distracting.  I had a hard time not looking at her chest.

People who compare breastfeeding to porn or bikini clad models is rediculous.  There is absolutely nothing sexy about breastfeeding, and to compare the two is rediclous. BIG difference.

BUT with that said, in our American society and the way that women are objectified, it will still take a lot more time before we are all mature enough to accept BF'ing as normal and acceptable.  But until we stop seeing women's bodies as sexual objects (as the US media is so good at doing), that won't happen. And so until then, it's hard for a women to expect people out in public to be perfectly okay with BFing.

But the more awareness going on, commercials like the one above, and more....is all helpful in the movement to make it more accepted.

As for CHURCH though, I'm honestly surprised to hear about some of the negative experiences that some women have had. It's very disappointing. I hope that eventually there are some guidelines so there is more consistency among the wards here in the U.S.

Mancation

So I was going to name this blog "Week in Review", but that's boring.

What this last week REALLY was about was Will being gone for 6 days on Mancation with his brothers in Steamboat, Colorado.  They skied. They grew beards. They ate lots of junk food. And they had fun.

I asked Will what he was enjoying the most about his mancation and his answer was "Just that I get to do what I want, whenever I want. I don't have to change diapers or put kids to bed or take care of anyone's needs."

Eh HEM. And of course I'm listening to that on the other end of the phone changing diapers and putting kids to bed and totally plotting my own womancation in the near future.

In all fairness though, I WANTED Will to go on this vacation because the poor guy has been so incredibly busy with his job, feeling a bit stressed and like he never gets a real chance to just have fun.  

I mean I get it.  

Sometimes it's hard to see things from other peoples perspective, especially as parents you can really get caught up in the whole "Who's doing more responsibility" thing.  I know when I'm at home everyday with the kids ALL day long, taking care of them while also trying to clean the house, do laundry, feed everyone, clean up messes, go to the gym, and get a little bit of my work done (music work) during Taylor's naptimes....I know I can really feel like it's unfair that Will gets to sit at a desk everyday and never change diapers and have adult conversations all day long.

We often joke that we would love to trade jobs with each other.  I've never been one of those girls who was super anxious to become a mother. While many of my friends were married in their early 20's and having babies, I was soooo not even ready to be at that stage yet.  And then, when I eventually did marry Will we didn't have our first baby until a few weeks before I turned 31.  Don't get me wrong I LOVE my children so, so much and I really miss them when I go long spurts of time with not seeing them.  But I do really need and crave time to myself after several days in a row of mothering, and if I don't get it - I notice I start to get moody with the kids and my patience wears very thin.  I'm actually pretty sure that is normal for MOST moms out there so I don't think I am any different.

We've talked about how we could make it work so we each worked 20 hours a week and parented 20 hours a week. :) Haha!  But apparently full time jobs like Will's wouldn't really fly with that idea!  Go figure ;)

My point though, is even though I often feel like I do so much of the parenting between us and I often get jealous that he does an office job where he stays clean and talks to adults and all of that - I KNOW that he is often envious of me getting to stay home with our boys all the time and he wishes he could spend more time with them.  I also know that his job is very stressful at times and he even has to work late at night to get the work done, or on weekends - when he would really prefer to spend that time with us.  And then when he does get some free time, of course the boys and I are ALL over him with "Do this!' or "Do that!" and I know he never quite feels like he gets any "me time".

So I was happy to encourage him to go on his mancation to get a break and to have some me-time for himself.  

Will took loads of photos and videos from his trip and I've just included a select few here. Possibly sometime he can blog about it (like never haha), but in the meantime here are a few pics....And then at the end of the post I'll fill ya in on what the boys and I did while Will was gone...

Unfortunately, Daniel (Will's younger brother) landed a very big ski jump wrong (that included a backflip) and totally crushed his knee - broke his leg. He had to go in for surgery. It was baaad. I hear they had to put him under just to get his ski boot off. :( Poor guy. OUCH.

I also heard when they called his wife the first thing she said was "Is Daniel in the hospital?" Haha.  The woman knows her husband well.

All right - where here are the pics from the boys and I....

No this pic is not from last week (it's from a concert a few years ago), but it was my Dad's birthday and I love this photo and him and I.

 I got to spend last Monday with my friend Viktoria - as she was here in Seattle visiting from Sweden.  We filmed some stuff for her reality documentary for Swedish television and also went to Snoqualmie Falls.

Here is me waiting for her in her hotel lobby in downtown Seattle - I must say it had a front stellar seat to the ocean view...

My re-release of The Lullaby Album arrived, tons of copies.  If anyone is looking for a great Mothers Day or baby shower gift, I have one for you :)...

Also my reprint of Illumination came as well, as I was literally down to the last 5 copies of that.  Great timing.

And then over the weekend, we went to my parents house on the island.  We were there for a few days and the boys had a blast playing with G&G's collector edition Buzz and Woody (from Toy Story)...

My old running shoes finally died on me and I was starting to feel the rain in my socks, so I got new ones.  Old ones are now resting in the garbage.

I'm still on my quest to drop some more pounds, have hired a trainer and here is one of my healthy dinners from last week.  My trainer has encouraged me to not only eat grilled veggies for dinner but also always include a fresh veggie as well.  So in addition to this I also made a cucumber salad.

I went through old photos last week and found this one, and remembered how grateful I was for my mother-in-law and her amazing sewing talent for making this dress for me... 

My mom and I being total goofballs... 

Last night we all went to dinner as a family - as it's been super nice having Will back home again. We went to the Rainforest Cafe....the boys were a little freaked out by the animatronics snakes and elephants, but we still had fun.

In other news - Preston has REALLY been into coloring and drawing pictures lately.  He drew me a family photo (his first one) a few days ago but there were just three people in it. I asked him about it and he said "It's Preston, Papa, and then Taylor in your tummy".  Uhhhh, not sure why he drew Taylor in my tummy but I am at least impressed that he realizes where babies come from. No I am not pregnant.

Well that's it for now! Ciao!