94 posts tagged “life”
My Traditional Chinese Medicine doctor and acupuncturist said to me a couple weeks ago, "You have beautiful hair. You know in Chinese medicine it is believed that it takes lots of blood to keep long hair looking nice." I have a bit of a blood deficiency issue something my previous acupuncturist mentioned many times (he had me eating octopus and wanted me to eat more red meat, and no popcorn or other drying things.) I'd been thinking about cutting my hair for a couple of weeks, but getting my period Thursday and it being very manageable blood wise, was the signal to go for it. I emailed Wendy on Friday and got a Saturday appointment. (Any local folks want a referral to Great stylist let me know.)
Saturday while T napped I headed out. I had sort of warned B that I was cutting it short, but hadn't shared with him the photo I'd sent Wendy. It's perhaps a good thing I wore my glasses to the cut so I couldn't really tell all that was going on (remember I can only see the big E on the eye chart w/o my glasses) other than tons of hair hitting the floor...
Sunday, after my shower and the ends getting wet, my hair was less swingy having picked up a bit more moisture. On the way to church T and I got into a 'thing' and he demanded that I make my hair straight again. I shot back he would need to learn how to use a hair dryer and round brush or get used to it. It is funny the things he picks up on to try and get his way when he is feeling out of control.
Anyway, the cut is cute and a big change. It is a little wedged in back so that my hand goes 'shwoop' right off the hair when I pull on it. If you have ever gone from long to short hair you'll understand the feeling of your hands leaving hair where there used to be some. Here's hoping I get more blood out of this, but if not it is still cute. Good reactions from folks so far.
Oh, and not that you can tell much from this photo, but I cut T's hair too. B said his hair was getting too shaggy.
[Edit: B sent me links about hair being dead and not requiring blood etc. I had forgotten that, but think there is something to said for TCM and acupuncture so whether it is blood or something else I am not concerned. Today Dr. Kang said that it takes many nutrients, not blood.]
Halloween used to be a big deal in my company. A young software company we used to have lots of parties, cake and ice cream once a month to celebrate birthdays, ultimate Frisbee Thursdays, etc. A couple things happened. People got older and more have kids = less time for Frisbee. We didn't get the new product out early enough and started bleeding money so we were purchased. Our new company (complete merger and loss of our name sure to come in January) is a little less 'free' with the parties. So along with open email, "no" all office emails, no announcements of when people leave etc, no one is dressed today.
There has been a sign in the break room announcing the countdown to Halloween (written backwards) which lead me to believe it would be a underground thing. I guess it is so underground that you can't tell... Could be that since we have clients in until 1pm the freaks will come out later, but we'll see.
Just in case, I have two ideas I can do pretty quickly; one suggested by my friend Melanie, one I read on a blog (can't remember or I would totally give credit - I think it was actually a comment on a blog.) The blog suggestion: Ceiling fan = word ceiling on chest, wave pom-poms. I have to make the pom-poms, but I have a couple of plastic bags I can cut into strips and tape to a pencil. The other idea is to be Julia Child. I wore a button down and have the sleeves rolled up. I wore more conservative jewelry (couldn't find my button clip on earrings) of gold 'bamboo' hoops and gold chain necklace wrapped three times around my neck.I brought a wine glass, a wooden spoon, one of my aprons, and my Julia's Kitchen Wisdom book. My hair is totally wrong and I'm not sure I can do the voice, but maybe I can just smile and drink 'wine'.
+++ +++ +++
Apparently there are six of us... I'm now wearing my apron and have my 'wine' - Bon Apetit!
+++ +++ +++
Listening to this and this and more on my Pandora Station http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wmYT79tPvLg
I'm going through gum withdrawal. I just ate some microwave popcorn and would love to follow it up with some breath cleaning chewing. I finished my last pack of gum earlier in the week and am going to try and go gum free. Imagine, I could actually use the toothbrush and toothpaste I keep in my desk drawer! Novel idea! Gum is so much easier, but I was eating too much of it, and it is one of several differences in my life now from when I got pregnant with T. Forget working, stress, lack of sleep, a kid... it's the gum that is the problem!
Last night T pooped in his sleep again. I went in to check on him before I climbed in bed and his room smelled. B confirmed he thought T had pooped when he went in to check. This was our topic of conversation as the lights went out: T's poop. How romantic! I was wearing big fuzzy socks and a 'sweater' on top of my somewhat sexy nightgown. It made me question any baby success; poop and sweaters before 'cuddling'.
I was thinking too about how the last bunch of times I have ovulated my breasts are very tender - so much so that I have to adjust T on my lap when we sit and read. I have also been feeling quite crampy and somewhat 'fragile' like a I do before a heavy period. Those feelings, and bloating gas, where no more conducive to baby making than the fuzzy socks and poop talk.
None-the-less I'm trying to visualize a happy sperm and a happy egg meeting and 'getting along.' I'm also trying to visualize a nice uterine wall lining so very inviting and lovely looking to a little blastocyst ball. Additionally, I am trying to be very inviting to any baby soals that might be hanging around looking for a home. We have a good one, not perfect, but much better than some alternatives!
'Baby 2010' is in full swing. A July baby seems just fine.
After church T asked, "Why can't we see God and Jesus?" I rambled out an answer having to do with faith and believing, but on Monday posted to my Sunday school class email list.
Yesterday T (age 3) asked me yet another question I wasn't sure how to answer.
I have almost zero knowledge of the Bible and stumble over faith questions all the
time. How would you/have you/and should I answer, 'Why can't we see God and Jesus?'
Thank you,
J
(my stumbling answer had to do with faith and believing)
++++++++++++++++++++++
J,
My first thought is that God wants us to see him through others .He wants people like you and me to be kind to others and set an example of what a Christian should be like. We can act in a manner that makes God smile when we reach out to others in various ways. Every act of kindness makes a difference in the lives of others.
We will see God one day and if we have grown in our faith it will be a very happy day.
Hope this might help a little. It is certainly not an easy thing to understand or accept.
Thanks,
A
++++++++++++++++++++++++
Hi J,
I have a great book "801 questions Kids Ask About God" and I thought of it immediately when I read your e-mail! All of the below is from this book:
*****
Q24: Why can't we see God? Answer: We can't see God because he's invisible. But we can see what he does. Balloons are filled with air that we can't see, but we see the balloon get big as the air is put in. Radio waves are invisible, but they exist. Just because we can't see God doesn't mean he isn't real. Believing that God is there even though we can't see him is faith. Someday, in heaven, we will see God face to face.
Key Verse: Now we see things imperfectly as in a poor mirror, but then we will see everything with perfect clarity. All that I know now is partial and incomplete, but then I will know everything completely, just as God knows me now. (I Corinthians 13:12)
Note To Parents: Young children struggle with this because of their concrete way of thinking. Using illustrations like the ones here are helpful, but still imperfect, we can't see air because its molecules don't form a solid enough image for us to see, not because it has no physical form. In contrast, God is invisible to us because he is a spirit.
*****
Hope this helps!
K
++++++++++++++++++++++
Hard at early age but easier as they get older. We see God and Jesus when we see Love. Keeping God and Jesus as less of person and more of a spirit/feeling has been helpful for our 2 girls. Our girls understand that neither are in the flesh as themselves since both are 'much' older than their grandparents. Jesus and God lived a long, long, time ago. Bridging flesh from spirit is difficult to tackle. We still mourn loss of family cat from 15 months ago and the the girls (4 and 6) understand he's in heaven and that we still remember him, just like Jesus, and look forward to seeing him again. We usually talk about much later so not to scare them with dying.
Br
+++++++++++++++++++++++
Ahh! Great question, T! S isn't asking this question just yet, so I would love to hear from other parents who have fielded this question, but here are my thoughts.
God is not a human person like our friends and family. God doesn't have a body, doesn't have to eat food or breath air or drink water. God is different, so we feel God around us or see things God has made instead of seeing God the way we see other people. We know God is there when we see trees and flowers that started as little seeds or the moon and the stars, the clouds and the sun. We feel God when we are with the people we love and who love us, because God made each of us so that we could love each other. Lots of people have said that God is like the wind--we can't see it, but we feel it and we see its effects.
Jesus live on earth and have a human body like us. He ate food and breathed air and drank water. The people who were alive at that time many, many years ago could see Jesus, but after Jesus died and came back to life he went to live with God. Jesus is still around us, just like God the Father is, but we can't see him because he is not on earth in a human body the way we are.
Not being able to see God and Jesus can be frustrating, but it is part of what makes them special. Because they don't have human bodies like us, it means they can be with us all the time. God and Jesus know how we feel and what we think without our having to explain anything. If we close our eyes and be still, we can often feel God and Jesus with us even though we can't see them.
What do you think? Would this answer help T or your child or not? If you gave this answer, what would the next questions be?
Let me know!
thanks,
R
+++++++++++++++++++++++
Hey J,
EM here. I think I would answer that question with "Because God and Jesus live
in heaven." I think you will get many more questions because it sounds like you have
a real thinker. I hope that's not too simplistic.
E
+++ +++ +++
Aren't these great answers?
I overheard some coworkers talking about one of their children. The boy is almost two and is adopted. One coworker is a nurse and she said, I think, that if you take the child's height at age two and triple it (?) that will give you a good estimation of their adult height. So I of course had to go back and find T's stats from age two...
Two year stats
Weight: 31 pounds 12 ounces (with his cast. Down from what we
estimated as 32 pounds at the ER) or 75th+ percentile
Length: 36 1/2" or about 90th percentile
Head circumference: 19 1/2" or 75th percentile
Then I looked to compare the three year stats
Weight: 35.7 lbs - 75% (in shirt and shorts with socks and underwear)
Height: 39 1/4" - 90%
BMI: 16.2 - 54%
BP: 88/56 (sitting in my lap and a little unsure)
So tripling the two year height would put T at 9 feet - obviously not correct - but doubling it says he will be 6 feet. That could be cool - tall but not too tall. So then I found this other site: Kids Growth. They list several methods of estimating, and have calculators for two methods. By the calcs T will be between 5'7" (unlikely in my mind) and 6'. One of them methods they have listed is this:
That puts T at 72.5" or not quite 6' and a 1/2".Another approach is based on the fact that most healthy children will grow to a height that is somewhere between their mother's and father's heights. Using these factors, this method predicts adult height by adding the parents' heights together, dividing by two, then adding three inches for a boy (or subtracting three for a girl). While this method is fairly accurate, the child's ultimate height can vary by as much as five inches above or below this calculation.
Keep Kids Healthy has growth charts, and if you follow out the 90% line (where he has been the last two - three years) for age 20, T will be 6'1" - same as his dad. :-) If you follow out the 75th line for weight, T will be about 175, or a bit heavier than his Dad. That sounds good too, and I think B would agree with that.
I'm sitting in my comfortable home with the radio on. The news is talking about the earth quack in Indonesia and the tsunami in the Samoan islands. I recently finished the powerful book A Fine Balance by Rohiston Mistry which deals with poverty in India, and then there are the issues in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Darfur and other parts of Africa. So much devastation and need.
As I think about what I could do to possibly help (money to Mercy Corps, the International Red Cross, Care, Pennies for Peace...) I think, but there is need of help right here, right in my county. Some people in my county lost their homes to flooding, there is poverty not far from me, a rape crises center, several homeless shelters a very short drive away... What to do?
+++ +++ +++
In a similar vein, thinking about how I would like to have another child I keep thinkging about the children who are already born who need homes and love. There are orphans all over needing someone to care for them. It makes me sick when I think about how I would love to have a baby and then I read of a mother who starved her twins so much their brains shrank, or the child who was burned in the tub, or the infant who was left in a storm drain.. Why?
Yesterday at 7:45pm
had an up and down day with the boy - fun at the planetarium, cuddled napping, and fun in the fort we built, but also suffered accidental (?) head butts, a bite, and hair pulling.
Not mentioned, a trip to the very cool Relics ice cream shop. Ice cream and various bits of memorabilia like cars and Simpson characters. B might have also found a new mechanic for the Z and a place to sell it. Also not mentioned, walking through a 'river' to get back in the car during another down pour.
T and I had a nice time at the coffee shop after church. Pumpkin muffins for both of us. Then he came home and had another 1-egg spinach and cheese omelet. He had 1 3/4 1-egg spinach and cheese omelets On Friday. We think he might be about to 'spurt' again.Gorgeous day - too bad I was in church, napping with Tommy, at the Farmers Market, and cooking through most of it.
tonight I made vegetable lentil soup, FM-deli-grab-bag sandwiches, sour lemon biscotti, my breakfast and lunch for tomorrow (included making a batch of salad dressing), and I put together an Italian sausage lasagna. Why does it feel like I'll be doing 'all' of this again in two days?
When I returned from the Farmer's Market I almost immediately had to start cooking dinner. Up from nap, to FM, then to kitchen. Boo Hoo on SUCH a LOVELY day! The lentil soup and sandwiches were dinner. I got a grab bag of deli meat at the FM. They put scraps and ends in bags. If you ask about them you can buy them. Mine was $3 for about a pound I think, could be 2 pounds. Anyway, my sandwich consisted of a mystery bologna type thing, peppered turkey, and some pastrami. I think I managed to only put turkey on B and T's sandwiches. While kind of a good deal, I'm not sure I'll do it again.
T has been doling out his bedtime favors. He takes great delight in telling us what we can do for him. "Mommy you read books, and Daddy you can rock me." He says it with a big smile. We have more and more been calling T his royal highness or similar names. So after I was releived of my duty, I got on the computer a bit, then headed back to the kitchen.
I made my lunch and breakfast for work tomorrow. Mixed cereal with dried fruit and milk, a salad with a cracker, and fresh fruit. This entailed mixing up a batch of salad dressing, and cutting watermelon for the week. Then I made B some biscotti he had been loadly hinting at needing, and finished by preparing lasagna for dinner the next two nights. Course I'll be at book club on Tuesday, but B and T will need dinner...
In a nutsheell that was the weekend. Minus our trip to a consignment sale on Friday - $75 netting 6 books, 1 game, more Dupolos, 1 set of ABC 1930's esq flashcards, 2 pair pants (1 Hanna Anderson), 1 Blabla cotton/wool sweater, 2 fleece footed PJs, and 6 shirts that included some GAP, a Talbots, a Hilfiger, and a Garnet Hill.
Photos to come later...
From the Associated Press:
As much as a foot of rain fell over parts of the Atlanta area Monday. The town of Dallas northwest of Atlanta had 16 inches in a 48-hour period, the Georgia Emergency Management Agency said.
From an email from one of the local commissioners last night:
County Flooding:
Nancy Creek: Flood Stage = 11’, Currently = 13’3”, Forecast = 13’5”
Peachtree Creek: Flood Stage = 17’, Currently = 20’6”, Forecast = 24’2”
Yellow River: Flood Stage = 11’, Currently = 11’9”, Forecast = 20’
Warning #1 - Expecting 4 inches of rain in the local area; however 6 inches or more is expected ....
From B's IM to me about drop off this morning:
Bill said (11:12 AM):
Fun on the way in. No traffic issues. (Lighter than normal.) Once there, I read Jack & the Beanstock at T's request. Other children listened.
Then, he told me I could go, as he played with [friends].
Bill said (11:12 AM):
That was it. Very easy. He seemed happy @ play
http://www.ajc.com/news/flooding-claims-lives-search-142739.html
"...Weather Service radar estimated that as much as 15 inches of rain had fallen since Friday, much of it beginning on Sunday afternoon, when a series of strong storms began training, or following one another, northward through the area.Those storms were still dumping rain across the western suburbs Monday.
"The Weather Service said 3 to 7 inches had fallen just since 9 p.m. Sunday..."
Luckily our basement only has puddles. The rain has been falling since Tuesday - 7 days ago.
