Saving Our Pennies

My husband and I went over our budget tonight and we have decided to start saving toward a down payment for a house. It will probably be several years before we have any significant amount put away, but you have to start somewhere. The first step we are taking is to cut our grocery budget. I am going to try to get all our groceries for $50 a week. The cost of living in our area is pretty high, and food isn't cheap, so I am going to have to get creative. I am still trying to follow the principles of the South Beach Diet, so that that makes things even more challenging, as I'm trying to stay away from starches, which are the cheapest foods! What I have been trying to do is only have one grain a day, so maybe I will save it for dinner so I can eat "normal" dinners, such as chicken-and-rice casserole, tuna-noodle casserole, etc. However, I did just get The South Beach Diet Taste of Summer cookbook from the library, and haven't had a chance to peruse it yet. Maybe I'll get some good ideas there. My one splurge will be raw milk for Baby Boy, as I really feel the nutritional benefits are worth the cost. It is--YIKES!--$7 a gallon. So my total grocery budget will actually be $57 a week, as soon as I start Baby Boy on raw milk. I still want to continue nursing him for a while, but I want to wean him very gradually, so I may start substituting cow's milk for one nursing session a day pretty soon.

Haircut

I got my hair cut this weekend. I had had long hair for several years, and I was ready for a change, partly because of the heat lately, partly because Baby Boy likes to pull hair, and partly just for fun. Here's a pic:

 

I got to watch Baby Boy stand up all by himself in his crib today. I heard him babbling to himself after waking up from his nap, so I quietly opened his bedroom door. He didn't see me poke my head in. He was sitting up, and then he grabbed hold of the crib bar and pulled himself up and started chewing on the bar! It was so cute! Eventually, he noticed I was standing there, and he smiled, like, oh, you caught me, Mama. :-)

Not too bad for $19.30

 

I had a fairly successful couponing trip to Walgreens today. I got these products for a total of $19.30:

3 25.4-oz. Pantene shampoo+conditioners
3 25.4-oz. Pantene conditioners
3 12-oz. Herbal Essence products
1 13.5-oz. Aussie conditioner
1 6-oz. Aussie mousse
3 16-oz. Infusium23 products
1 Venus Divine razor system
2 15-pack Gillette disposable razors
1 2.6-oz. Secret deodorant
1 Oral-B Indicator toothbrush

The total retail value of these products is $96.37, so I had a savings of $77.07. I know that is a good deal, but I had been hoping for an even better one. I had talked to the manager earlier in the day, and he told me that the Walgreens registers were printing out $16 worth (a $10, $4, and $2) of Register Rewards (which can be used like cash) for every $20 transaction on select items, as listed in the Walgreens advertisement. So I thought I would get everything for around $1. But when I went to Walgreens this evening, the registers were only printing a $10 coupon for every $20 transaction. I bought everything anyway, because I had a tired Baby Boy with me and needed to get home. To get this price, I used a combination of manufacturer's coupons (I had several buy one, get one free) and Register Rewards.

A Day at the Park

 
 

Crawling

Baby Boy has finally (at 10 1/2 months) started to crawl. He is quite pleased with himself and spent quite a bit of time today chasing after some balls with bells and rattles inside. Before now, he would roll to get where he wanted to go, or scoot on his back. But I think he likes going forward. It's more efficient. ;-)

Crocheter's Lament

I have been wanting to learn how to knit solely so I can make a few of these adorable wool soakers for Baby Boy. So I bravely took knitting needles and yarn in hand, and...found out that knitting is (to me) way more complicated than crochet. Not only is it way slower, but it's hard to insert the needles exactly where I want them and the yarn keeps sliding off the hook-less needle ends and I keep dropping stitches or adding stitches or twisting stitches...you get the idea. With crochet, when you mess a stitch up, you just slip it off the hook, give the yarn a tug, and you're good to start over again. With knitting, it's not the simple. I E-mailed the designer of the soaker patterns I linked to above and asked if she would be coming out with a crochet version any time soon; her response was a definite no. I know there are crocheted soaker patterns out there, but none of them are as cute as the Little Turtle Knits patterns. I'm fairly crafty and it's usually not too hard for me to get the hang of a new skill, but I've given knitting more than a fair shot and I'm thisclose to giving up on it.

In other news, it's been HOT here--around 100 degrees. We don't have air conditioning...well, we do have a small unit, but we can't use it...mainly because in the complex we live in, you're not allowed to install air conditioners in any windows visible from the street. Our air conditioner is only strong enough to cool a small room, like a bedroom, and since our bedroom windows face the street, we're out of luck. Annoying regulations. :-P We've been opening up all the windows until around 10 A.M., then shutting up the house and even closing the blinds to keep the heat and sun out until late evening. It's been working all right, but things are still pretty sticky around here. Baby Boy is sleeping in just a diaper.

We're having transmission problems with our car again, so Hubby has been taking public transportation to work, and I've been walking everywhere I need to go (which isn't really much of a change for me, since I don't have the car during the day anyway). Early this morning, before it got too hot, Baby Boy and I walked about a mile to the nearest grocery store and came home with six bags of groceries hanging from the stroller handles! Baby Boy sometimes gets bored when we're shopping, especially because I like to compare prices and use coupons, so I'm not a very fast shopper. I got a store advertisement and kept giving pages of it to Baby Boy, who had a blast tearing them in pieces the whole time we were in the store (I picked up all the pieces, of course!). I do hope we get our car fixed soon, though. The transmission is still under warranty from when we had to have it fixed last Christmas, but the problem is that the shop is a 90-minute drive from where we live (we broke down halfway to my parents' house last Christmas Eve). So now we have to figure out if it's cheaper to have it towed all that way and get it repaired for free, or just pay someone in town to do it.

I want to go to a fabric store to pick out some fabric for some nursing dresses, but it's too far away to walk, and it would take too long to get to via public transportation, so I'll have to wait until the car is fixed. I don't really know how to sew (I made a few articles of clothing in high school with help from my mom), but I'm planning to learn. Hopefully, that will be more successful than my experience with knitting. I ordered this nursing dress pattern from Elizabeth Lee.

Busy Weekend

Wow, this weekend was very busy and stressful at times. I was a bridesmaid in a friend's wedding, and I had to try to balance being "there for" and helpful to her with still caring for my family, especially my still-nursing baby who will only nurse lying down. Hubby and I planned out a schedule of who was to be at the church when (he was helping with some wedding preparations as well), when Baby Boy would take his naps, when I would be home to nurse him, etc., but things didn't go as we expected. For example, we had planned that I would get to the church and dress in time for pictures, do the pictures, drive the 20 minutes back to my parents' house where Baby Boy was napping, nurse him, and then we would all come back to the church in time for the wedding. Well, as it turned out, the pictures were two hours late in starting, and I had the car with the carseat with me at church, so one of the kitchen helpers had to drive all the way out to my parents' in our car (with the carseat) while we were doing pictures, get Baby Boy for me, and bring him back the church. Then I tried to nurse him in a rocking chair in the nursery, but as I said, he only wants to nurse lying down. And then, because Baby Boy didn't nurse, I leaked breastmilk on my outfit during the reception. Grrr. I am happy my friend is happily married, but I am really glad to be home. Traveling with a baby is hard work!

This Weekend

This weekend I helped a friend who is getting married next week (7-7-07, which I've heard is one of the most popular wedding dates ever) make dozens and dozens of cookies for her reception. I am to be a bridesmaid in her wedding. It was fun to see my old friends from back home.

This morning, I met with some friends for prayer and Bible study. We just started going through a book on the names of God. It has been good for me to get back into the habit of spending time alone with the Lord every day. Hubby and I read together out of a one-year Bible every morning, but I am better at really listening to the Lord and meditating on His Word when I take some time on my own, as well.

I am thinking of doing a "day in the life of me" post sometime soon....I haven't known where our digital camera was since we moved, but Hubby informed me recently that he's known where it was all along! :-) I'm also considering doing pictures of a week in skirts, like I know some ladies have done on their blogs before. I do wear pants sometimes, but I really prefer to wear skirts, as I feel much prettier and more feminine, and it seems like I get more done (same goes for wearing an apron...).

I have lost around 8 pounds so far on the South Beach Diet in the week-and-a-half that I've been on it. I'm feeling really good.

Preparing for Guests Tonight

I hate to admit it (because I miss all the foods I used to eat), but I have been feeling really good on this diet. I've been on it for a week with no cheating (even though I've made several batches of cookies for different events!), and I've lost 4 pounds. Hubby and I are looking into getting some home exercise equipment.

Breastfeeding is still going fine; eliminating grains and starches and fruits has not affected my milk supply. I only have one more week to go, and then I can start slowly adding those things back in.

I have been busy today getting things ready for friends to come over tonight. The house was already pretty clean, since we had prayer meeting here last night, but there are always things to do in the kitchen, of course. Our menu tonight is roast beef, fresh bread, green salad, and oatmeal-raisin cookies for dessert. I won't be eating the bread or cookies.

South Beach Diet

So I decided to try the South Beach diet, since it embodies most of the principles I was thinking about trying anyway...now I just have a title for what I'm doing. :-) I had heard mostly good things about the South Beach Diet for a couple of years but never looked into it until this point because I figured, with a trendy name like "South Beach Diet," it must be some unhealthy fad diet. But I read the book, and it seems to make sense.

There are three phases of the South Beach Diet...I am starting with phase one, which eliminates grains/starches, fruits, and pretty much all sugars (lactose in dairy products is considered okay) for two weeks. I have read in several places that a nursing mom really shouldn't do phase one, and instead go directly to stage two, but I think that is probably for lactating mothers of young infants. Baby Boy is almost ten months old and is getting a lot of his nutrition from solid foods at this point. Plus, I am eating lots of protein and plenty of calories, so I don't think my milk will dry up.

I don't miss bread at all. I do miss my morning bowl of oatmeal, and I miss fruit. But I know the deprivation is only for two weeks, and then I can start adding things back in. I have been following the diet for a couple of days, and I feel really good. I am realizing that grains might have a tendency to produce bloating and gas in me (I know it would probably help if I diligently soaked my grains as a good Nourishing Traditions devotee should), because I have had a marked decrease in these annoyances since I stopped eating grains. I am feeling less sluggish, and I have had a lot of energy. I think my stomach has gotten a little flatter.

Updated to add: Oh, yeah, another thing that has motivated me to change my eating habits is an episode I had about two weeks ago. I woke up in the middle of the night with terrible, horrible stomach cramps. I mean, they were so bad, they woke me up out of a deep sleep. It felt like I was in labor, except the pain was steady instead of coming in waves, like contractions. I honestly thought I must be pregnant without knowing it and was having a miscarriage. But after about fifteen minutes of me moaning and crying and writhing, the pain subsided, and I was able to drift back to sleep. In the morning, I was absolutely fine. I figured out that I wasn't pregnant, so to this day, I don't know if it was just bad menstrual cramps or related to something I ate, but man, I don't want to experience that again.

Habits

Today I did a lot of tidying-up around the house, which is fortunate because I found out in the late afternoon that some relatives are coming to visit tomorrow morning!

I took Stephanie's advice in the comments of my last post and the only carb I had today, other than lots of veggies and some raisins for a snack, was brown rice for dinner. I am also avoiding junk food and trying to eat smaller portions.

For the past month or so, I have been taking a nap every afternoon while Baby Boy takes his second nap, but all the housework wasn't getting done. Today I stayed up and worked, and lo and behold, the house is clean tonight. The reason I've been needing to take naps is that I haven't been getting enough sleep at night, so I'm going to try not taking naps and just going to bed earlier. I love getting enough sleep, but it's always so tempting to stay up and read or dink around on the internet. But I am seeing that I need to be more disciplined in a lot of areas of my life, and sleep is one of them.

The house is clean, but bare. We have more wall space in this apartment than in our last one, so now I need to come up with some pretty yet inexpensive ways to decorate. We still (after 2 1/2 years!) haven't gotten enlargements made of any of our wedding photos, but once we do, I'd love to have some of them on the walls. I grew up in a house with pictures all down the hallway, so now that I live in a place with a hallway, I see it as just begging for pictures.

Well, I have a little free time tonight, so I'm going to do some reading and then go to bed early.

Long, rambling post about weight

I cannot believe how much my child eats....and no matter how much I give him, he almost always wants more. He has six teeth and is able to feed himself finger foods pretty well. His favorites are sticks of bananas and cooked yams and thin slices of cheddar cheese. Today I gave him little blobs of homemade hummus on his tray. I also give him strips of homemade waffles and homemade graham crackers (softer and thicker than store-bought graham crackers). I am glad he is enjoying food and gaining weight.

I, on the other hand, need to go the opposite direction on the scale. Recently I found Blest With Sons' ten-month pictorial weight-loss chronicle. She lost 78 pounds! I am so impressed...and inspired. I try to eat pretty healthy, but I know I could do better, and my only official exercise is a daily walk. For the first few months after Baby Boy was born, I steadily dropped some pounds, but I've totally plateaued for the past, oh, five months at a number much higher than I wish it were. Maybe someday I'll get brave enough to post my actual weight here for accountability, when I finally decide to get serious and lose thirty pounds. I still haven't figured out why I gained over sixty pounds when I was pregnant. Waaaaah. My body will never be the same again. Okay, I'm pulling myself together now. :-)

My main reason for delaying getting serious about losing weight is that I am still breastfeeding, and I'm worried that my milk will dry up if I exercise a lot and change my eating habits. But I really want to get down to a reasonable weight before getting pregnant again (and gain not more than thirty pounds during pregnancy next time around). So now I'm torn between wanting to nurse my baby as long as he wants and needs (I've always thought I would breastfeed for at least eighteen months) and losing weight. I am pretty sure (at least I'm hoping) that my body is "holding on" to five or ten pounds while I am lactating. I've talked to lots of women who say that was the case for them. So maybe when I stop breastfeeding, at least a few pounds will come off relatively effortlessly.

My husband is so sweet; I truly believe that he thinks I am beautiful no matter what I look like, but I need to lose weight for me. I want to be healthier and have more energy; I want to feel pretty and not frumpy. I want clothes to fit me again.

But to be completely transparent, I'm afraid to start trying to lose weight in case it doesn't "work," and then I'd be so disappointed.

Warning--Girly Post

In the past year of so, I've become aware of a lot of problems with tampons (dioxin, fibers scratching the vagina, toxic shock syndrome, environmental pollution, etc.), and to a lesser degree, with disposable pads. In my mid-teens, I stopped using disposable pads because they gave me a rash and were very uncomfortable to me, and I switched to tampons. Well, I have been looking for a more natural alternative to tampons. At first, I tried the Diva Cup, but so far I have not been satisfied with it and I am thinking of returning it. I trimmed the stem some, but it still pokes me, and I always feel the cup inside me. I really want it to work, but I am not as motivated to keep trying, now that I have...reusable cloth pads. I ordered some from New Moon Pads. They are very soft--way more comfortable than scratchy disposable pads--and they are not bulky. In fact, when I got them, I was amazed at how thin they are. The pads have a fleece layer to prevent leak-through (it works!). They are super-easy to care for. I don't find it "gross" to wash pads. Menstrual blood is not any more "dirty" than when you cut your finger and it bleeds.
When you use reusable menstrual products, you are keeping chemicals away from your body and you are not filling up landfills. And reusable cloth pads are very economical. For example, I got 3 pantiliners, 2 light pads, 4 regular pads, and an overnight pad for $39. You can wash and re-use them indefinitely (at least 10 years, probably longer). So once you get your initial "stock," you are good to go for a long time. No more laying down $5 for disposable products every 28 days! From New Moon Pads' info page:

"DID YOU KNOW? On average, one New Moon Pad costs approximately the same as one cycles worth of disposable products. Approximately 12-18 cloth pads are needed to get through one cycle (depending on how often you launder). That means New Moon Pads pay for themselves after just
1 to 1.5 years. PAD LIFE EXPECTANCY 10 years SAVINGS (you ready for this?) 8.5 to 9 years of no cost coverage! ...and that's just the financial savings...there's the health/comfort factor and environmental savings to consider as well."

By the way, you can find other frugal tips over at Biblical Womanhood.

Edited to add: Oh, and one more thing--the bigger reusable pads have extra layers and are great for postpartum bleeding. I think they would be so much nicer on tender just-pushed-out-a-baby parts than disposable pads.

Rain

Yesterday I received in the mail a stroller rain cover I purchased on Ebay, and today I got to try it out! It is a Protect-a-Bub cover, and it works great, except for the fact that Baby Boy loves to kick it and chew on the clear vinyl "window." But at least it keeps the rain off.

We went to the park, and I let Baby Boy go in the swing, even though it was sprinkling. Recently I read a quote I like--I think in a book about Montessori learning. It is: "There's no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothing." I don't know if I'll ever get around to it, but I would love to cross-stitch that saying along with pictures of kids playing in rain or snow.

Well, I may or may not be going to Hubby's company BBQ tonight (it will be canceled if it is raining), but I am supposed to bring a fruit salad and a dessert. For the dessert, I think I'm just going to make oatmeal chocolate chip cookies; if we don't end up going to the BBQ, I can just bring them to church on Sunday.

Baby Boy has become such a good sleeper lately (finally)! He takes two naps every day, usually from around 9:15-10:30/10:45, and from around 1:15-3:30/3:45. He goes to bed between 6:30 and 7:00, and sleeps straight through until around 5:30 A.M. We let him babble and play in his crib until 6:00, and then we get him up. I wonder if he will always be such an early riser. It suits our family, though, since Hubby usually leaves for work around 6:30 A.M. Since Baby Boy gets up early, Hubby is able to spend a few minutes with him before he leaves for work.

Peaceful Day

Since we moved a few weeks ago, I've gotten in the habit of taking Baby Boy to a park every morning that is about a 15-minute walk from our house. He loves to ride in the stroller and often babbles and sings. Sometimes he tries to imitate the sounds of sirens or dogs barking. This morning I pushed him in a swing at the park (he giggles hilariously when I push him from behind for a while and then run around to the front and say, "Peekaboo!"). Then we went down a slide a few times, and we patted some trees and bushes together. (I so want to live in the country, but I do the best I can in the city to introduce my baby to nature).

Then Baby Boy took a two-hour morning nap (which he very rarely does). When he woke up, we played "Come to Mama,"--I sat him down in the middle of the hallway and then I went to the end of the hallway and cajoled him to come to me. It took him about 10 minutes, but he eventually got there by laying on his back and scooting backwards to me. He's nine months now and not crawling, but I'm not too worried--my mom says I went straight from rolling and scooting to walking and never crawled, so maybe Baby Boy is taking after me. Still, babies are just so cute when they crawl that I would like Baby Boy to crawl if only for that reason, but I know he'll develop at his own pace.

Then I put him on my back in the Ergo (yay, I finally figured out how to do it! It's not as easy as the women on the video clips make it seem) and vacuumed the house and did the dishes and prepared some "finger foods" for him. Hubby and I can't eat in front of him any more without giving him some food, too, or else Baby Boy gets very upset. He wants to be in on the action (and do whatever he sees Papa and Mama doing)!

Oops

Kind of funny that this should follow my post on baby food, but...ever forget to feed your kid lunch? I did today. I realized it as I was nursing him after he woke up from his afternoon nap at around 2:45. I finished nursing him and then gave him his solid food lunch. The break from routine didn't seem to bother him, but I'll try not to let it happen again. :-)

Baby Food

On Mother's Day, Hubby took me to lunch at an Italian restaurant close to our new house. He asked me what I wanted for Mother's Day, and I said, "Well, there are a couple of books I've been wanting...". I ordered Breastfeeding and Natural Child Spacing, by Sheila K. Kippley, and The Naturally Healthy Pregnancy, by Shonda Parker.

We are very slowly uncovering the carpet in our house as we put boxes of things away. I have most of my kitchen things put away now. Yesterday and this morning, I made approximately 8 dozen food cubes for Baby Boy, in 5 varieties:

1) chicken, barley, carrots, celery, tomato, green beans, peas, onion
2) chicken, barley, peas
3) chicken, sweet potato, applesauce
4) beef, sweet potato
5) bananas, avocado

I feed Baby Boy meat twice a day because it is the best source of iron (well, along with breastmilk). So far, I don't give him any supplements, so I make sure his food is nutritious. I buy organic foods for him whenever possible. I make him porridges with different grains, such as brown rice, quinoa, millet, barley, and oats. One meal a day, he gets whole plain yogurt mixed with a fruit or fruit and a grain. Baby Boy loves to eat. :-) I breastfeed him 4-5 times a day. My goal is to keep breastfeeding for at least 18 months. I enjoy it, and so does he, and it's good for both of us. However, I do look forward to being able to wear dresses again. I don't have any nursing dresses, because they are very expensive to buy new and I've never seen any at secondhand stores.

Unpacking

Wow, what a whirlwind the last few days have been! My back and feet are so sore--partly from lifting and unpacking boxes, partly from holding Baby Boy more than usual--this move has been tough on him. On Sunday, he just cried and cried as people carried everything out of our old apartment to go in the moving truck. We had a lot of people from church helping us; otherwise, there's no way we could have moved all that stuff in one day. All the chaos has been traumatic for Baby Boy...he doesn't want me to put him down or leave him by himself. He is nursing a lot longer than usual, like he doesn't want to let me go. It's kind of nice to be his comforter. I like that he feels secure with me.

We have three bedrooms now. One for Baby Boy, one for Hubby and me, and one for an office/storage room. Hubby found a nice California king bed for us on Craigslist. We just got it set up last night. It's really firm, which we like. It feels like an acre compared to the queen bed we've slept on for the past two years. A California king is four inches longer than a regular king bed, which is so nice for Hubby, who is almost six-and-a-half feet tall.

We also have two bathrooms now, which can be convenient. I have less space in this kitchen than I had in my old one, so I'm working on paring down my kitchen gear.

We have a little balcony. After we finish getting things out of boxes and putting everything away, I want to put some plants out there. It doesn't get a lot of sun, so I'm thinking maybe petunias or some other flowers that do okay in shade.

I love it that there is a public library ten blocks from our new house! It's a small one, without storytimes or many special activities, but at least I can put books on hold online and pick them up at this branch. I love to read, and so does Baby Boy, so it's very exciting to me to live so close to a library.

A friend of mine from church found out that she didn't have to go in to work, so she called and asked if I wanted to go to coffee. Hubby had the car with Baby Boy's carseat in it, so we couldn't drive anywhere, but we decided to walk to a coffee shop we had heard about. Baby Boy came too, of course. He enjoys riding in his stroller. The coffee shop turned out to be a great place for conversation, and they have good food, too. I am sure I will go back again sometime.

The reason we moved, among other things, is that we are part of a home church, and we are trying to all move into the same part of town so we can have fellowship with each other and reach out to the community together. Neither Hubby nor I specifically have the gift of evangelism (if you're wondering, Hubby's main spiritual gifts are discernment, teaching, service/helps, and exhortation; mine are mercy and possibly hospitality), but we still want to share Jesus with people. We just need to start doing it. As soon as I get my kitchen stuff unpacked, I am planning to make cookies for the other people in our building. Then maybe we can invite someone over for dinner and games and start to build relationships.

Well, there's so much I could be working on...I'm going to do a little more and then call it a night.

Roseola

I am posting this here mainly for my own personal record, but anyone else is welcome to know too:

I am pretty sure Baby Boy had roseola but is over it now. He had had a slight fever (only around 99-100 degrees) off and on for a couple days last week. I didn't think much of it, and just breastfed him a lot, and then he was fine. Then on the evening of May 1, I noticed a rash on his chest and tummy. In the morning, it was covering his front and back, on his neck, and very lightly on his face. He had no fever at all at that time and was perfectly happy, so from my research I concluded it was not measles (because he would have been acting a lot sicker and would have a high fever), but roseola. It was mostly gone yesterday (May 3), and seems to be all gone now.

Moving Update

I am feeling a little ::ahem:: a lot behind on packing. We're moving in three days! Yikes! Not only do I still have a lot of packing to do, but I want to be caught up on laundry before we move because we're not positive we'll have a washer and dryer as soon as we move in (a friend from church is generously letting us borrow her practically-new washer and dryer; the place she's in now came with a washer and dryer, so hers have just been sitting in storage for several years).

I usually cook Baby Boy's food ahead of time and freeze servings in ice cube trays, but I'm thinking I might just buy some store-bought baby food for the next few days. It would save a lot of time, as using homemade food involves heating the cubes in a saucepan, grinding up grains in the blender and cooking them, and then doing all the dishes!

Well, I'm off to find something not-too-noisy (no pots and pans!) to pack while Baby Boy takes a nap.