Have You Sanitized Your Nostrils Today?

If you know me at all you are probably aware that I am absolutely NOT a germaphobe. I would probably be closer to the opposite. (Would that be a germophile?) Maybe some day I'll go into all my thoughts on the matter but let's just say I grew up hearing "a little dirt makes you healthy" and I'm now one of those moms that lets her kids snack on food they find under the table. (Is that too much information? Don't leave me!)

I mean, I'm not a cave woman. I do own a bottle of anti-bacterial gel. We bought it when Bennett was born and it should easily last us another five years.

I'm sure I err on the side of not being too laissez-faire about germs, especially considering I have small children and it is cold and flu season. Even though I'm not careful enough, I don't want my kids to be sick either! (Ok, I admit I joked about hanging out with some swine flu infected friends so we can all get it, get better and be done with the drama. But I've not actually done it!) So, what's a lazy, non-paranoid momma to do?

Enter an interesting email forward. Uncharacteristically, I did not immediately delete it, but actually read it and then (gasp) sent on to some friends. I appreciate that it gave some tips for staying healthy but wasn't alarmist. I thought, "Hey, I could follow the recommendations without having to purchase gallons of Purell, carry paper towels with me for opening doors or keep my kids inside the house until April!"

Here is the email (For blogging purposes I've deleted a few of the extra details and explanations):

Here's a listing of some steps we can do to help keep us healthy during this cold/flu season! :-) This is a combo of things from Dr. Oz and a friend of mine ....

* The only portals of entry are the nostrils and mouth/throat. In a global epidemic of this nature, it's almost impossible to avoid coming into contact with H1N1 in spite of all precautions. Contact with H1N1 is not so much of a problem as proliferation is.

* While you are still healthy and not showing any symptoms of H1N1 infection, in order to prevent proliferation, aggravation of symptoms and development of secondary infections, some very simple steps, not fully highlighted in most official communications, can be practiced (instead of focusing on how to stock N95 or Tamiflu):

1. Frequent hand-washing (well highlighted in all official communications).

2. "Hands-off-the-face" approach. Resist all temptations to touch any part of face (unless you want to eat or bathe.)

3. *Gargle twice a day with warm salt water (use Listerine or Hydrogen Peroxide if you don't trust salt). *H1N1 takes 2-3 days after initial infection in the throat/ nasal cavity to proliferate and show characteristic symptoms. Simple gargling prevents proliferation. Don't underestimate this simple, inexpensive and powerful preventative method.

4. *clean your nostrils at least once every day with warm salt water, or hydrogen peroxide. *blowing the nose softly once a day and swabbing both nostrils with cotton buds dipped in warm salt water is very effective in bringing down viral population.*

5. *Boost your natural immunity with foods that are rich in Vitamin C (Amla and other citrus fruits). *If you have to supplement with Vitamin C tablets, make sure that it also has Zinc to boost absorption.

6. Drink lots and lots of water...not juice but water!

7. *Drink as much of warm liquids (tea, coffee, etc) as you can. *Drinking warm liquids has the same effect as gargling, but in the reverse direction. They wash off proliferating viruses from the throat into the stomach where they cannot survive, proliferate or do any harm.

8. Vitamin C: Boost your natural immunity! Eat oranges and/ or grapefruit (the whole fruit not the juice) for the vitamin C or just take high doses of a good Vitamin C supplement. If you have to supplement with Vitamin C tablets, make sure that it also has Zinc to boost absorption.

9. Vitamin D!!! When people think of a vitamin to increase when they are sick they always think of vitamin C but Vitamin D is just as crutial! So far, Swine flu, H1N1, has killed thirty-six children in U.S. and analysis of CDC data indicates Vitamin D deficient children at higher risk of death. 58 million American children are Vitamin D deficient; 7.6 million are severely deficient. Vitamin D deficiency is found in ALL auto immune patients (MS, Fibro., remetroid arthits) as well as many cancers.

If you were to maintain your vitamin D levels within the optimal range of 50-65 ng/ml, you would likely avoid being affected during the cold and flu season entirely. Ultimately, your best bet – not just for cold and flu prevention, but for the prevention of an astounding number of common and often chronic diseases – is to maintain healthy levels of vitamin D year-round.

The best most natural way to get Vitamin D is through 30 minutes of sun exposure every day , WITHOUT SUNSCREEN!! If this is not possible than take a vitamin D supplement but first see your naturopath or physician and get your vit. D levels tested! Too much vit. D can be toxic to your body , cause osteoporosis and harden your arteries!

10. Garlic! Garlic! Garlic! The absolute best natural immunity booster!! Eat or swallow raw garlic cloves, as much as you can handle. And if you can't stomach any at all then go get a supplement. Kyolic is a good brand.

So, after reading this, thinking "ah, yeah, that's awesome!" and forwarding to friends, I looked at it with a more critical eye. Something about being "a combo of things from Dr. Oz and a friend of mine", probably because the author invoked the name of Dr. Oz, seemed awfully fishy.

I was transported back to textual criticism lessons from my Baylor religion classes. Suddenly it was glaringly obvious that the writing style, language and punctuation was inconsistent and one of the points was repeated twice. Hmmm...this stinks of a copy and paste job. My guess is it started with three or four points and then people added stuff (maybe tips learned from their doctor or great-grandmother) and deleted other things (kind of like I axed fluff I considered extraneous) before sending on to friends.

So I got my Google on and tried to tease out where this advice might have originated and if what validity there may be to the suggestions. This is what I found:

~~ Variations of this "article" is EVERYWHERE on the 'net. I'm confident there is no singular source, much less one reliable (as in a medical professional, organization or journal) source.

~~ This might be nit-picky but the claim that the "only portals of entry are mouth/throat" is not 100% true. Many sources, including the Centers for Disease Control, add the mucus membranes of the eyes as a potential area for a flu virus to enter the body.

~~ Here is some interesting analysis of this popular email forward. It includes opinions from some random physicians regarding the gargling, nasal swabbing, etc. (As far as I'm concerned, they are just that, RANDOM opinions.) According to this source, none of the techniques have been proven ineffective...although some are proven effective, others are disputed.

~~ Apparently, Dr. Oz does include a recommendation to increase vitamin D intake on his Swine Flu Prevention page. So maybe the big doc's name wasn't totally used in vain.

~~ More info about the vitamin D issue (which I found particularly fascinating) comes from Dr. Mercola, a widely read natural health proponent.

And that's about all I got. Turns out I'm not the best researcher. Either that or maybe Google isn't the premier research tool (could it be??). My exhaustive one hour of web searches didn't provide me all the answers I desired.

Even if my method of "research" falls short, it is apparent to me in talking to various medical professionals (my doctor, friends who are nurses and a nurse practitioner) plus reading WHO and CDC recommendations there is just a bunch of stuff we don't know for sure. No one disputes that hand washing, not touching your face, staying away from sick people and eating healthy are all Good Things when it comes to staying healthy. But other stuff...?

In conclusion (I know, you thought I'd lost the ability to come to anything resembling a conclusion) these tips make some sense to the interested, natural-remedy-leaning, non-medically-educated person like me*. It doesn't appear that implementing any of them in moderation could cause major harm**. Unless you consider some seriously stinky garlic breath "major harm".

So, I'm off to swab my nostrils and gargle some salt water. Why not? Adios and stay healthy!

* Reading my self description it occurs to me that doctors and other medical professionals who have spent years upon years in school probably hate people like me who like to think we know what's up.

** Certainly you realize that this is all my uneducated ramblings and I'm only coming to conclusions for myself and my family and not making any kind of medical suggestions for anyone else. Right? Ok, good!

Just Humor Me

I swear my nine month old is waving and saying "hi". Well, maybe it's "ha" or "ah" sometimes...but sure sounds like "hi" to me.





(I should take the time to trim this video but I haven't so feel free to ignore the last minute and a half where I try to cajole Dayton into saying Mama and she fusses for her sippy cup and then ignores me.)

Other adorable tricks from our baby girl lately: saying Dada, Mama, clapping and beginning to cruise. My favorite is the clapping - extremely deliberate yet totally silent and accompanied by a look of utter pride. So stinking cute! Must get that on video before she loses the enthusiasm for her new accomplishment.

Someday I'll Write a Real Post. I Hope.

My poor little blog has been terribly neglected and I can't seem to get my groove back. I have lots and lots of things I want to write about but I haven't made it a priority to sit down and do it. Part of my problem is I find it impossible to spit out an informative and/or interesting post in less than about 45 minutes. I am apparently incapable of finding middle ground between a quick twitter-worthy picture/blurb combo and a 2000 word essay which takes me an hour or more (usually skewing towards much more) to craft. Although I certainly don't claim to have any sort of enviable writing skill, I do really enjoy my attempts at story telling and my "process" (such as it is) requires time.

(Full disclosure: that super-lame paragraph required more than 20 minutes of effort. I'll admit it. I have issues.)

And, if you haven't noticed, I tend to be a bit on the wordy side. I can't help it.

All this to say, there are a few things I have been thinking about lately that I want to find time to write about sometime soon. Say, before the onset of menopause. (I don't want to stress myself out with deadlines or anything.) Here are some percolating topics:

* Our all-cash budget - update: we have closed ALL our credit card accounts

* I think I'm becoming a toy snob.

* We went to Alabama. We built an apartment.

* I love, love, love the show So You Think You Can Dance. And I'd love to tell you why.

* Reducing our use of plastics (it's a desire more than action at this point, but something I've been thinking about a lot)

* Cloth diapering update

* Not unrelated to above, the time for potty training has arrived. I just have to get off my lazy duff and do something about it

* Discipline - it's hard!

* I recently told Jeff, "I think I'm on the verge of becoming really weird about food." (Blame the books I've been reading about American food culture.) Again, lots of thinking, not much acting so far.

* This two kid thing has been kicking my tail in totally unexpected ways. But I'm learning to give myself grace. Sometimes.

* I used to think organized sports for toddlers was absolutely ridiculous. Now I'm considering giving my two and a half year old baseball lessons for Christmas.

* And of course, my children are cute, funny and smart. I have proof.

On the way home from Alabama I was asking my dad, who's writing I enjoy immensely, why he hasn't been writing lately. His response was that since all his kids left home he's short on material. He bugged me to write more consistently, since I have so much to say these days. Problem is, I'm short on time. And there's the rub.

So, what do you, my dear, loyal readers (bwhaha, that's funny! I mean, Mom, Lisa, Tricia?) care to read about? Which of those topics should I tackle first? Anything I'm leaving out?

Apparently You Don't Have To Teach Boys This Stuff

So I'm in the laundry room folding clothes and Bennett rides up to the door on his trusty "big tye-cycle" and requests my attention.


"Wook, Mommy! No two hands!"

Here's to a future full of risk taking!

Hey Look What I Found!

Previously written but never published blog posts! So just in case you are wondering what we were up to six months ago...

* My Little Man

* Laura's Gonna' Be A Mommy! (note: sweet baby Jack was born June 16th and we love him!)

* Easter Fun (Including, "You've Been Peeped!")

* Easter Sunday

(another note: For my own peace of mind and so when I look back at these in years to come I can pretend I had it all together, I've organized the posts according to the approximate date they actually occurred, not when I finally got around to publishing them here.)

Family Fridays

It seems my definition of a fun Friday night has changed quite a bit in the past few years. This weekend I enjoyed a perfect start to the weekend by just hanging out at home with my favorite folks. My people. My little family of four. And it was great!

The weather was pleasant so after dinner we moved our party to the back yard for Bennett to work on perfecting his newest skill.


Oh yes, my not-quite-two and a half year old has declared himself too big to use a baseball tee. So he's moved on to coach pitch.

What a stance.


I love his look of concentration. Apparently sticking the tongue out helps?


Keeping his eye on the ball...it's a hit!


Meanwhile, Dayton finished off some peas and carrots.


Have I mentioned that she prefers to feed herself?




She manages to commandeer almost every feeding operation.


And it makes quite a mess.


Somehow I find her to be irresistibly cute, even covered in icky, sticky baby food.



Hopefully next time it won't be a month between blog posts! I'll try to do better. (But I make no promises...) Until next time!

Things I Must Remember

Be forewarned: this post is not remarkable in any way except in the way that I find my son's achievements, idiosyncrasies and view on life to be fascinating and remarkable. So this little list is for me and for my family...a feeble attempt to cut a swatch from the fabric of time and tuck it in my pocket.

* Bennett is talking up a storm the past few months. He's been using longer and more complex sentences. A month or so ago he scolded me for standing on a chair: "Get down mommy! That not a wadder!"

* Since having his hair washed in the bathtub elicits more drama than we are willing to endure on a nightly basis we often toss Bennett in the shower to achieve a tear-free cleaning. Sometimes he isn't keen on taking a shower until we ask if he'd like to "wash his cars". Bennett LOVES to wash his cars in the shower. And fill cups and containers with water, shoot his cars in them like mini basketballs and then dump the water out. Fun times.

* As is typical of two year old development Bennett is insistent on doing everything (every.thing.) by himself these days. From opening the car door to pouring milk to turning off the tv, he can do it! And he lets us know we need to back off and give him a chance by insisting "dat MY job!"

* Reading is a favorite activity lately. We try to go to the library weekly and he loves finding new books. He likes to us to read to him but also enjoys reading by himself. Sometimes he will bring two books over, hand one to me and say "You read dat book. Dis my book." For a the past couple of days I've taken advantage of the opportunity to do some of my own reading (I'm jumping on the Harry Potter band wagon about a decade late) and we've settled on the couch each morning for a little side by side reading time. I love it!

* Our dear son is a bit OCD. Especially when it comes to bedtime. Recently he needs his blanket, his Bible and his water bottle...with ice pwease. Fan on. Night light on. And sheet on, but not "too tight" (we're not sure what this means exactly). A new development is the requirement that Bible and waterbottle be tucked into his sheet as well. There will be shrill calls for mom or dad to come rectify the situation if one or the other is out.

* Speaking of the Bible, his children's story Bible is his FAVORITE book by far. He usually calls it "God". As in, "I wan read God" or "where my God?" or "I wan take God bye bye". And then there was the time I had to follow through on my threat to not read any bedtime stories if he didn't obey and I left him in bed crying and shrieking "Mommy! I WAN GOD! I WAN READ GOD!" But I stood firm and refused to read the Bible to my weeping child. You can send my Christian Mommy of the Year awards to Stacey "No Bible Tonight" Parker.

* B learned to ride his tricycle last week. He was frustrated for a day or two as he tried to figure out the peddling but stuck with it and I was proud of him for persevering. Now he speeds in all over the house begging for me to "watch dis, Mommy!" When I call him to come to the table for dinner or to the bedroom to get dressed he often insists on "driving" to his destination.

* This child can turn almost anything into a sports type game. He helps switch out laundry by wadding wet clothes into balls and tossing them in the dryer, cheering himself ("yes!") with each successful throw. He likes to see how far back he can stand from the toy bucket or block box and still get items in when it's time to clean up. Once he kicked a toy and yelled "score!" when it rolled under the entertainment armoire.

* We've recently started to hear "I wuff you" unprompted. It is the best.

Finally They Feed Me!

I swear that was what Dayton was thinking when we made the first attempt at "solid" food on her six month birthday. I wonder if we might have been more successful in getting cereal into her mouth had we begun when she was a bit younger. Little girl is in quite a grabby stage right now and was not interested in letting us feed her in the traditional manner.

I wanted to edit these a bit but I'm only proving my ineptitude at such pursuits. My vision of a cute little video that included short excerpts of the action and a sweet, peppy song is proving to be slightly more challenging than I anticipated. After an embarrassing amount of time I've managed to crop out some of the more redundant bits. The song...well, it ain't happening. Not tonight anyway.

But, in my humble and slightly biased opinion, Dayton Joy is pretty cute...peppy song or no.

Make an on-line slideshow at www.OneTrueMedia.com

Green Day!

After way too much playing inside due to brutally hot weather I decided we needed to spice up a boring weekday by bringing back color days. Without any planning or preparation I declared at breakfast on Tuesday that it was to be Green Day. Bennett was pumped.

So I put him in a green t-shirt and made it up as we went. Here are the little ways we celebrated Green Day at our house.

Green Hunt:
A walk/ride first thing in the morning (while it was still under 100 outside) to look for green things in our neighborhood.



Green Craft:


I secretly collected the grass and leaves for the project so as to avoid teaching the two year olds to destroy plants for fun. I was pretty sure they wouldn't understand why it was okay to pull a couple of leaves off my rose bush today but wouldn't be okay tomorrow.


Green Gift:
My mom got sent some appropriately themed gifts to Bennett for future color days. Thanks for the puzzle, Gran!



Green Kitchen Helper Preparing a Green Dinner:







Hey, I know there are many (many!) healthier green options than green pancakes and applesauce...but this is what I could come up with at the last minute without requiring a trip to the store.

And although I was fairly certain I did not allow Bennett to touch the food coloring, he managed to turn himself a little green as well.


So obviously it was necessary that we end the day with a...

...Green Bath:


Check out that tan line! (And please forgive the grainy phone photos.)


We had a great time celebrating Green Day. Stay tuned for the next time I need a way to make a boring day at home seem more novel...Blue Day coming soon!

That's My Baby

I absolutely cannot get over how much I love this little girl. Our precious Dayton just personifies happiness and brings so much light to our little family.

And she is already (gasp!) SIX months old! How could that be??


At times I worry that I don't pay enough undivided attention to this sweet thing because she isn't demanding at all. In general, Dayton just wants to be in on the action. If we make sure she is near all of us as we go about our day cleaning, playing, eating, then she's a pretty happy camper.


In fact, she has the remarkable ability to wake up from her evening catnap just as we sit down to dinner every.single.night. It doesn't matter if she's been sleeping for an hour or 10 minutes, she senses we're about to converge around the table and alerts us to the fact that she will not stand to be left out. So she joins us each night...our pretty little centerpiece.


Other people constantly comment about what a happy baby she is. And it is so true! She is full of big gummy, drooly smiles for everyone she meets. We couldn't have picked a better middle name for our sweet Dayton Joy.


Baby girl loves and I mean LOVES her big brother. (Too bad it is proving impossible to capture a halfway decent picture of the two of them together.) He covers her with kisses as soon as they are reunited in the morning and after naps or being separated in their classes at church and she just eats it up. She watches him like a hawk and gets a pretty big kick out of all his toddler antics. For his part Bennett is (usually) a generous brother and often offers to share his cars and balls. At times he gets frustrated when she touches "his" things and recently I've heard such complaints as "No! Baby touching MY cup/toy/book!" That will pass though, right? (kidding!)




Dayton is still sleeping like a champ. I'm afraid I wouldn't know what her schedule is if she has one because poor thing is subject to being hauled around with us whenever we are itching to go. She gave up sleeping in her carrier at about one month old (unless we are in the car moving at freeway speeds) but she's a pretty good sport and grabs naps when and where she can.



She sucks her thumb when sleepy and it is SO STINKING CUTE. Take my word for it. Cuteness supreme. All she needs to sleep is her thumb and something soft, preferably her lovey, to hold against her face. If Lovey is not available she'll reach around until she can find something, anything, to snuggle with...the hem of her dress, a blanket or even a pair of Bennett's shorts I have left laying nearby.



A few weeks ago we finally moved Dayton out of our room and into the nursery upstairs. She been sleeping through the night for ages so I didn't really NEED her right next to me all night. On the same token she wasn't disturbing us either so we were in no rush to change our sleeping arrangements. And upstairs just seems so very far away. But at almost six months she was really way to big for her darling little infant cradle so away to the nursery she went.

At her six month doctor visit Dayton rang in at 17 lbs 10 oz which I believe is 80%. I'm ashamed to say that I've already lost the paper with the rest of her stats so I can't recall the specifics except her length and head circumference (which I know you have all been dying to know about) were also between the 80th and 90th percentiles. She's a good sized girl and we adore her three chins and squeezable rolls.



I've not been good about writing down every smile, toot and kick but she's doing just fine meeting developmental milestones. She is rolling from both her back and her belly, giggling, babbling, reaching and grabbing for EVERYTHING (her wingspan is greater than one would expect, I'm amazed at what she can knock over from that Bumbo of hers), and is so very close to sitting up independently. No teeth yet but she sure does drool like a champ. Bennett calls it "dripping" as in, "uh-oh, baby dripping again!" And she's making her first attempts towards crawling...raising herself up high on her arms and pushing against the floor with her feet. I think (hope!) I still have a few months left to trust her to stay where I leave her.

I believe I'm beginning to ramble and it has required multiple stops at the computer over four days to piece together this overdue half-birthday post so please forgive me for not being terribly cohesive or entertaining. There is just so much I want to remember! I'll wrap it up with a few more recent pictures. Because I just can't get enough of this girl.