To Start the Day

~Today starts with no coffee I drank it wall yesterday. Even though I knew there was none left and I knew that I'd be a full dollar short after paying for shipping confirmation on the 2 pretties I just sent out in the mail. A skien of handspun for one of my favorite online peeps and ... erm- cough... a surprise for one of my favorite in real life people. 

~Today will see us at the "big playground" as soon as KaBean wakes up, gets dressed, and eats something. I think we found desert sage growing near our favorite playground, but I'm pretty sure it's part of the landscaping and may therefore be coated with pesticides. If it is not wild or if it looks like it is probably maintained with some sort of chemical cocktail I will leave it there and move on... If not, I will be gratefully clipping a branch and thanking the plant and earth and neighborhood for such a special gift. The bundle that Huz brought out with us on our move is almost gone. We burn it like crazy here, love sage. So it's time to get some more... speaking of which, i need to find my red string!

~Today finds Huz and the ManChild awake before 7am. I know I know... someone out there is probably like "that's nothing my fill-in-the-blank gets up at insane-ungodly-hour!!!" But still, this is my story and 7 am hurts my brain sometimes. Instead of chilling in bed nursing, the ManChild is currently racing his matchbox cars across the steamer trunk that came over the ocean with my great great grandmother's people from some no longer in existence European country. A very loud game for a momma who woke up before 7am to no coffee. 

playground here we come.

My Family Bed

This morning I half woke up to the little, sleepy request for boobies. The ManChild was gently tugging on me, getting me ready for our day. He nursed, I fell back asleep. When I woke up... um, later?... my big family bed felt empty and I was lonely. I know I had just been squished between my beloved Huz and the rascally ManChild. But now they were gone. I looked over my shoulder and could see KaBean's feet pointed at me from the other end of our bed, but no Huz, no ManChild. "oh sheep shit, he's in the wool room touching things." thought my sleepy brain, so I leapt out of bed and rushed to my wool room to find it empty. Then I went to Huz's office, where I found him getting in some early morning work. "He's gone." I told my man. We both started the search upstairs and upon determining that he wasn't in the top half of the house we went downstairs. There we found him, curled up and asleep in the brown chair. Out like a little light. Looking so peaceful there in his little pile of self... Huz carried him back upstairs and placed him by his sleeping sister and they both sort of reached for each other and kept sleeping.

I love sleeping with my family. I love being able to rub KaBean's back when she has a nightmare or a cough. I love being able to nurse the ManChild without leaving my bed or even fully waking up. The kids love that Poppa is right there to snuggle with and that I am right here to hold hands with while we sing bedtime songs. Someday Huz and I will have our bed back and we can stretch out and... um... you know, take naps and shit, but that wont be for a while yet, and I'm reveling in the closeness of our family while we have it so available.

Happy Birthday, ManChild

My son just turned 2. He officially ended his second trip around this sun. He came out of me and is still nourished at my breast. His expressiveness and happiness impress me every day. He loves his big sister and wants to be everywhere she is and she does amazing with him for the most part. This little boy, my ManChild, is one of the best things about waking up every morning. Actually, I think the silence before he wakes up is the best, sshhhhhh.... I want to right about the things that have been important to me in the past, I even just listed them out, but even that felt like too much. But I feel this year, I am just so happy he is mine, well ours. I love him. I love him and his father and his sister and our unit. We are so blessed.

I love you, my little ManChild. Happy Birthday.

He's absorbing the knowledge. Education thru osmosis. Resting under to books works the same way the Fibonacci Baby Blanket will make that baby good at math. 

I know he looks asleep, but he actually told me that Lighting McQueen needs boobies. And also that McQueen likes boobies.  

And apparently, Tow Mater really likes boobies too. 

Best conversation all week when Huz came home from a shoot,

ManChild, "Hi Daddy!!!! Hiii!!!!!"

Huz, "Hey kiddo, I missed you, what did you today?"

MC, in the most excited 2 year old voice you ever heard, "Got BOOBIES!!! Daddy, GOT BOOBIES and switched SIDES!!!!!!!"

Huz, not as excited but still a lot excited but not enough, "You got Boobies?" 

MC, kind of disappointed in Daddy for not being properly stoked but still personally thrilled, "Yeah, Daddy, Boobies, switch sides. and Mater and Queen boobies, too."

My boobies are great fuel it seems. 2 years, going strong.

18 Year Old Love

I recently went and saw the new Twilight Movie 4A with my dear friend, Pippi. It was fine, I guess. I'm honestly not a big fan of the movies, up until I saw the new one I think I had only ever seen the very first one. I will admit to reading the books. I'm not really a fan of those either, but at least they were books so I got to make up my own images in my head. I could go on and on about the lameness of the movie but the point is this: I am so glad I did not marry the man I was in love with at 18. Not because I didn't love him, or because we would have turned out horribly and destined to fail and all that but because I never would have found this One. This man. This silly, frustrating, sleeping-while-the-kids-do-god-knows-what man.
It is hard knowing that I love him no matter what. It is hard knowing that this man actually means so much to me that I refuse to put financial comforts before Us. Much to the frustration of my mother. It means that there are no ultimatums. No "If you don't make tons and tons of money I'll take the kids and move in with my parents!" Because a) if the 3 of us plus Isis tried to live there again it would suck like nothing else and b) I don't want to separate from him over money. I can't say "Since your'e not making the money I'll go get a job and put the kids in day care." Any job I would get (without a great deal of luck) would not pay me as much as hourly daycare for 2 kids. So, I'd have to go back on food stamps. Where now we are barley scraping by and we take no assistance from the government, if I were to go back to work, we would have to go back on government assistance. And also, my baby boy is still nursing!

That's right, the Little Baby Man Child has been nursing for 16 months! That is 2 months longer that with Little A... Oh! it's almost her birthday! Little A's Fourth Birthday. I think we will be having another Butterfly Party. Last year's was a Pink and Golden Tea Party and I guess this year's is going to be a Butterfly Princess Party. I'm really excited and will soon be trolling the internet and Pintrest for good Little Girl Birthday Ideas.

That's all the word vomit for now. I missed you. I feel like it has been forever. I still believe in the revolution. I love the world.


also, i miss melinda. but she'll be home soon!

Sooo Facebook Still Hates Nursing

Yup, the war on breastfeeding is still on in a major way. A great support page The Leaky B@@b, has been deleted, leaving thousands (yes really, this page had over 2,000 "likes") of nursing moms without the online support many of them had come to rely on. I know there are so many women in this world who need all the help they can get from on-line communities because they don't get it at home our from family or friends. Luckily, for the most part, have not been one of those people. My people all consider the boobs the only way to feed children. My mom nursed all 3 of her kids AND went back to work and that was in the '80s. My man was never really exposed to it, but when I told him I was going to BF our first child for at least 1 year, hopefully 2, he had no problems and supported me every step of the way.
But not all women are so fortunate. This young woman didn't even know babies were fed from the breast but when she found out about it, that is what she did. Or all the moms with mastitis who want natural remedies before they pump themselves full of antibiotics. Or the women who get weird or mean looks when they feed their babies in public. The Leaky Boob was a place they could go for the encouragement they needed to keep on keepin' on. And now, thanks to facebook, these moms, and many others, are now internet homeless. Where are they supposed to go when their mother in law asks them to go to another room or the restaurant manager tells them to nurse in the bathroom. Ummmm people poo in the bathroom, why would I want to give my child food in the some place people poo? For now they go to the Bring Back the Leaky Boob page, which is really more for people trying to petition Facebook to reinstate the page. Or they go to the TLB Support page. But it just isn't the same.
And, no, The Leaky isn't the only place online for nursing mothers. But the problem is that FB keeps deleting pages that promote breastfeeding. They keep deleting pictures of nurslings. Yet they allow neo-nazi groups and naked body paint groups and dead baby joke groups (which I will not link. They don't deserve our traffic).
So what is really offensive, Facebook?
This-

The first time I ever nursed. K Bean's first time too. 3 years ago

My Man Child Nursing at 4 months. 

Or this (yes, I found these on facebook)

no, it is not a real penis, but damn! sure is graphic.
this was someones profile pic.

So to combat Facebook's blatant discrimination against nursing mothers there will be an on-site nurse in at the gates of the corporate headquarters in Palo Alto Ca. This friday at 12:30.

Nursing on Facebook is Hateful... Oh I'm Glad Someone Told Me!

There just doesn't seam to be enough outrage at the fact that Facebook removes the pics women post of themselves nursing their babies. I understand that some people might not like the practice. OK, I guess, that seams kinda ignorant and stupid. But they don't have to look at the pics, they can just keep going. The Facebook "Nurse-In" was supposed to show FB how many people on that social networking site think that nursing is NOT offensive. At last count I think there were about 6,000 people "attending". Enough people to make the FB bots flag the event as "hateful, threatening or offensive" but not enough to really get support for the movement.
There are sooo many worse pics on FB than a woman nursing her baby. In fact, someone who has photos on his page that I would NEVER want my kids looking at (it shows a very scantily clad woman crouched at crotch level to a man holding 2 guns, so not only does it objectify women but it also glorifies violence) is someone I feel very close to. Over my time living in the American South, he and his girl (who is currently expecting a boy) became very close to me and my man. And no matter how I feel about his pics, I would never EVER flag his pics because they are publicity for his movie and that (acting and rapping) is how he feeds his family. I know him to be one of the nicest guys I have ever met!

SOOOO, this is offensive, shows too much skin for you Facebook Bots?

But this is OK?

And this isn't even one of the bad. It doesn't really bother me, but I have a hard time believing people would flag the "Nurse-In" because of sexual, violent or offensive content but then leave stuff like this all over the damn place.
oh well
yay bobbies

A Success Story and a Peaceful Bedtime.

I just got to put both babies to bed in my bed with me in the middle. Can I just say how amazing it feels to nurse one while the other has her arm around my neck whispering, "I love you Mommy. And I love the Man Child, and Daddy, and Isis..." this truly is my reason for living.


It had been hard for me to really mother these 2 little beings for a while. My co-parent, their father, my lover had been gone on business for waaay to long this time and the 3 of us were wearing thin. I was starting to get mad and easily frustrated with Bean having to leave the Man Child to cry while I sorted her out. But yesterday and now today have been true attachment parenting successes! Even with Bean having a bit of a stuffy nose and a low temperature, she has been fun and mostly agreeable. Not perfect... lol... she is 2 after all. Bed times like this reaffirm my belief that I can be a gentle peaceful mom and that my kids will not grow up to be spoiled rotten, they will be confident knowing they are loved and free to express themselves without fear of judgment or ridicule.

Busy, Busy and a Huge Fight

So, the last few days have been intense. We had a few good days, I started running the Nutcracker rehearsals for the Mendocino Ballet. That was fine, I don't know how I feel about working with little kids. I mean, last week was alright but pretty soon I have to tell them that they aren't all good enough to do certain parts. How do you say that to some little kid who wants to be the next great ballerina without taking class. I mean god really, you think you're kid should be in the Nutcracker but you (or they) don't want to go to class every week? Really? really. You think this is gonna work out? Great. And I have to try to make a presentable dance out of girls who don't go to class. Sweet.
Any way, I made some delish vegan/gluten free chocolate cupcakes that were soooo great! The frosting was A-MAZE-ING! And instead of sweetening the cupcakes with sugar the recipe called for using maple syrup! Sooo yummy!
Gave Zen a bath, that is always fun! I love bath days for him, he looks so happy when I put him in the water. He likes when I pour the water over his buda belly. The big goofy grin he gets is sooo cute.

Then tonight, at 1 o'clock in the morning, when I was trying to sneak a diaper on Kaya, she woke up and had a huge melt down. I mean huge! She started freaking out, kicking, screaming, punching, hair pulling. I thought she was going to break her legs in the crib slats. (It is a 3 sided bed now, but still has crib sides) It was so bad. I started crying in frustration, and pain, that girl kicks soooo hard! I was so upset, I just want to be a good mom, but after this... Ahh, I wanted to just spank her and make her put the damn diaper on and stop crying and go to bed dammit! AHHHH!!! I have such a hard time managing my hanger and frustration with her. I know she needs love and attention and not to be pushed aside so I can take care of Zen. But, and I know I've said this before, I'd rather nurse and snuggle than get yelled at and hit. ugh. I'm doing the best I can, trying to feed her more home cooked and less packaging and more fruit and less 'snacks'. Oh well, tomorrow is a new day and I know I love her. I love my girl soo much, I want to get stronger in my peace with her. She is amazing and so intelligent and when I treat her right she can be sooo good. Any way, good night. I'll see you tomorrow.

I Do What Is Best For Zen or The Vaccine Question

Breast feeding on demand for two years is absolutely best for my baby. It has everything his growing body needs, it comforts him, he knows I am here for him 100%.

Cloth diapers are absolutely best for my baby. They are clean, easy to use, soft on his bum, chemical free, and I know every single person who has touched them since the last time I washed them.

Co-Sleeping is absolutely best for my baby. He hears my heart beat and knows I am there for him. If he gets hungry we just get closer and he can root his way right to my breast. Co-sleeping absolutely prevents SIDS. If you are drunk or smoking or super tired you could roll over on your baby, good thing I don't drink or smoke and I take naps.

Baby wearing absolutely best for my baby. He doesn't cry when I wear him, which means I don't have to stay up and walk the floor with a sad baby. I know where he is all the time, either on my front or my back. I'm helping his neck and shoulder muscles develop. In fact, he will probably, sit, stand and walk sooner than his bucket baby peers. He might not, but that's up to him. I can nurse in public without nosey jerks noticing and still play with Kaya while holding him.

Keeping my son intact is absolutely best for my baby. I didn't mutilate his genitalia during his first week of life. Isn't that the best reason not to anything?

There are conclusive studies on how all these things are the best things you can do for any infant but there are studies on both sides of the vaccine debate that are right-ish. The thing is, if I read only anti-vac studies there is enough information there for me to say ABSOLUTELY FRIGGIN NOT! But if I read only pro-vac studies there is enough for me to say HELLS YES!!! This is something I just don't know how to solve. I can shave my head, knit a frog, and nurse my son all in the same day, but I just can't decided if I should vaccinate him or not...