Whole 30, Day 2

Yesterday ending up being ground beef with green beans and spinach and dehydrated onions cooked in ghee for dinner. I DID need all of the snack I took to class, hopefully as I get farther in my blood sugar will stabilize a bit and the crashes won't happen. I was very very tired this morning when I woke up, but I also slept really well last night. And my hands weren't swollen when I woke up like they have been, which is great.

I felt a little spacey yesterday, just kind of generally out of it. Thought I was getting a detox migraine and then I drank more water and it went away. Phew.

Day 2 (so far):

Breakfast:

Same as yesterday. Yum.

Coffee with coconut milk and some cinnamon around 10 AM. Surprisingly tasted really good!

Lunch: 

Leftover dinner, same as last night. This would be even better with some tomatoes thrown in.

Dinner:

Either more leftovers or some chili. Mmmm chili.

Learned:

I LIKE spinach cooked in stuff! Who knew??

My First Whole 30 - Day 1

I've been gone from blogging for a while. Sorry about that. I do that a lot. But now, tired of feeling like crap all the time and tired of feeling like a slave to food (especially sugar), I'm doing my first Whole 30. I think blogging it will help me get through it, so here it is!

Today, 3/18, is the first day of my first Whole 30. So far, I'm still enthusiastic, although apparently my body is a BIG fan of sugar and is already noticing the lack only 8 hours in. Ow my head.

Breakfast:

3 eggs, fried in ghee, over a small sweet potato (chopped) and some roasted red peppers cooked in the leftover ghee. OMG. Delicious. Ghee-licious? Hahaha.

Side note - very friendly Indian cashier at Meijer saw that I saw buying ghee and told me how to make it myself. That was awesome.

Lunch:

Tuna packed in olive oil over salad - half spinach, half romaine. Side of baby carrots. Banana. Couldn't finish the salad or carrots, but I ate as much of it as I could. Not delicious.

Dinner (will be):

Hamburger patty with green beans and...one other vegetable that I haven't figured out yet...cooked in more ghee. At the moment I can't imagine putting more vegetables in my stomach.

I'm a little nervous because tonight is my long class night (there until 10) and I always have a nasty blood sugar crash right around 7 when I'm there late. My plan of attack on this is to eat dinner before I go and then be hyper-prepared for a snack if I need it - I'll bring along two hard-boiled eggs and some almonds, along with a Larabar in case of EXTREME emergency. 

What I've learned so far:

I did not buy NEARLY enough produce.

Showers: Not just for dads! Sometimes.

Last week, we had our water heater replaced. It's been working-ish for upwards of a year, sputtering out lukewarm water in the shower upstairs only if someone had already had a shower, and then for about 5 minutes before lukewarm became cold.

Hubs didn't believe me for a while when I said it was the water heater, then we didn't quite get around to it for a while since it wasn't actually, completely broken.

I also started my Crossfit Foundations/on-ramp program last week and was, as a result, very sweaty. And very, very sore. I dropped off some onesies to my friend for her daughter and through the window, the wee ones caught a glimpse of Mickey Mouse Clubhouse on their TV. H asked to watch MMC when we got home, and I decided that was a SWEET idea since I was smelly and wanted to test out the shiny new water heater.

H can work the TV and Roku, and I told him to pick whatever MMC he wanted. I raced to the shower with the glee of a tiny person on Christmas morning and jumped in.

As I was making vaguely obscene noises during my first truly HOT shower in way too long, I hear H yelling. Not very loud yelling. Just quiet yelling. Probably-nothing-broken-yelling. I decide it's probably fine.

I hear more yelling. La la la, soaping my hair and letting hot water pour on my Crossfit-sore muscles.

Louder yelling.

Me, sticking my head out of the shower curtain: What's up, buddy?
H: (unintelligible yelling)
Me: I can't hear you, can you come up here and tell me?
H: (more unintelligible yelling)

Sigh.

I end my HOT shower and go downstairs.

Me: What's up?
H: This is the Goofy Babysitter one!
Me: ...
H: (expectant smile, since this is the coolest information on the planet)
Me: Oh! Cool! Is that what you were telling me when I was in the shower?
H: Yup!

I got chills, they're multiplyin'...

When I was small, my two favorite movies in the WORLD were Dirty Dancing and Grease. Recently Netflix released Dirty Dancing for streaming and I VERY happily sat down to watch it - since my VHS has long since bit the dust.

The first few minutes of the movie have the requisite exposition. During that part, Baby says that she's 17. SEVENTEEN. When I was 5, that seemed old. ANCIENT. Certainly knowledgeable in all ways of the world and totally qualified to hook up with Patrick Swayze. Now I'm much older than 5 and have a 2-year-old daughter and the thought of her ever being 17 or within 100 feet of someone like Patrick Swayze makes me hyperventilate.

Then yesterday, our internet went out for a bit. Since we stream all of our tv, this meant we were without tv for a while. H has been strictly anti-movie for a long time (his choice, definitely not mine - I desperately want an excuse to see all movies labeled "kid"), but since there were no other options, he agreed to watch one. He picked The Little Mermaid, which was another favorite since I was a child in the late 80's/early 90's. Ariel is 16. SIXTEEN.

"Somebody's gotta' nail that girl's fins to the floor."

YES, Sebastian. YES.

On the Fall of an Icon

When I was 8, I got a glimpse of a tabloid in the grocery store. It had a grainy, lurid picture of Donnie Wahlberg (then of New Kids on the Block fame) trashing a hotel room or something equally Rock Star. I was DEVASTATED. Now when I look back on it, my reaction is hilarious, but then I was so sad that someone I idolized (he was my favorite, yo) had done something that, in my tiny type A world, was so obviously a "bad thing." It was my introduction to someone being knocked rather unceremoniously off of their pedestal, if only in my mind.

I thought I was too old to have that kind of reaction to something - I know famous people are a) not the characters they play and b) people and therefore fallible.

Yeah. Not too old.

I recently picked up the first book in the Homecoming Saga by Orson Scott Card. My friend introduced me to Orson Scott Card about 10 years ago with Ender's Game. I fell in love. His writing is so beautiful sometimes that it physically hurts. I've always found his opinions on God to mesh with mine - at least the opinions that come out in his books. Andrew (Ender's real name) was on our list of boy names when I was pregnant. I hadn't gotten around to the Homecoming Saga yet and am desperately lacking in things to read right now, so I was thrilled.

OSC is in the news a lot right now because Ender's Game is being released as a movie. I Googled the series to see if we had all of the books/how many there were - and stumbled on several articles discussing his opinions re: homosexual people.

And I felt like I was 8 all over again.

The Five Stages of Children's Television Acceptance

There's a phenomenon I've observed since I became a SAHM. We don't stay away from kids' shows in my house. Oh no. We embrace them as the 20-minute sanity breaks that they are.

But...they're not exactly great television. Or even really entertaining horrible television. Except for Sesame Street. Cookie Monster just understands me, you know?

I've noticed that there are stages a person goes through when introduced to a new show.

Stage 0: Loathing

This one only applies in some cases. This is reserved for the Caillou's, and the Daniel Tiger's. You hear the theme song (or the teachable moment ditty) and you cringe. You physically cringe. You swore that you'd never let your kid watch this show, but they caught a glimpse of it in the STUPID PBS Kids/Disney Junior app.

Stage 1: Annoyance

When your kid asks to watch The Show, you grimace a little. But The Show and your kid, their relationship is new and shiny and full of wonder, and when it's on, their tiny adorable face lights up like it's really irritating Christmas. You agree, and you tune out while it's tuned in and do other things. Productive things, like cleaning and definitely NOT surfing Facebook or texting your BFF.

Stage 2: Neutrality

The music stops bugging you, and in fact you begin to learn the words to the theme song, thinking, "oh, what a clever play on words!" You can explain the plot of the episode based on the title or episode number because your son always wants to watch "the one with Super George." Every once in a while you glance up from...the cleaning...and watch. You mock it to your friends, which you could really only do if you paid enough attention to know the characters.

Stage 3: Insidious Lyrical Poisoning

The songs are stuck in your head. A LOT. You have two choices: 1) go slowly but thoroughly insane, or b) learn the words and nod your head along as they rattle around in there on a constant loop. When the song that's stuck in your head comes on the show, you're kind of relieved because you can learn the rest of the words without admitting to Googling them.

Stage 4: Appreciation

You get excited when there's a new episode. You tell yourself it's relief because you're sick of the episodes you've already seen, but we all know this is only partially true. You chuckle at the kid-friendly puns, and occasionally suggest it as a show choice.

Stage 5: Assimilation

You admit it. You like the show. You feel genuine affection for the characters, even Katerina (meow meow). You begin to notice nuances, like the fact that Daniel Tiger is the only kids' show you've seen with a single parent family (rock on, Daniel Tiger!), or that we only see one set of grandparents at Caillou's house. You look forward to watching it and wonder if you've completely lost your marbles. This is almost always when you child(ren) stop wanting to watch it and you're all, "Aww. But...but...Sofia!"

Happy Daddo Day!

Happy Father's Day to four very special people:

1) My husband, who is the most amazing dad and child-wrangling partner I could ever have imagined.

2) My dad, who has always loved me unconditionally as his own regardless of a) no shared genetic material and b) not meeting me until I was a (probably psychotic) 12-year-old.

3) My father-in-law, who helped raise the aforementioned husband really really well.

4) My mom, who was mother and father to me for a very long time.

So far, we have finished the following Daddo Day Missions:

Operation Maple Donut Procurement
Operation Handmade Card
Operation Get Groceries Because There are None and Sometimes You Have to be Practical (or Operation Om Nom for short)
Operation Jet's Bread