Remember|Sister Love

5

"A first child is your own best foot forward, and how you do cheer those little feet as they strike out. 

You examine every turn of flesh for precocity, and crow it to the world. 

But the last one: the baby who trails his scent like a flag of surrender through your life when there will be no more coming after--oh, that's love by a different name. 

He is the babe you hold in your arms for an hour after he's gone to sleep. If you put him down in the crib, he might wake up changed and fly away. 
So instead you rock by the window, drinking the light from his skin, breathing his exhaled dreams. 

You heart bays to the double crescent moons of closed lashes on his cheeks. He's the one you can't put down."

.Barbara Kingsolver.

 

 He turned FIVE last week.  Five is such a big age.  Five is no longer a baby.  Five is independent.  Five goes to school.  Five.  How is my baby already five?

Conversations With Cowboy

Cowboy lost a tooth last week.  And we have a lousy tooth fairy.  She rarely comes the night that the tooth was lost.  She doesn't visit in the rain.  Or if its windy.  If its too hot.  Or too cold.  Or for whatever excuse I can make for her at the time.  She was four or five days late and left Cowboy two dollars.  Which he promptly put in his empty wallet.  He just walked in the living room and said, "Mom, can I watch T.V.?"  Then he paused for a second and said, "Or... should I count my money?" 

An Experiment

Matt's sister came to visit during Christmas break. We don't get to see them very often but we always enjoy our time with them. She has been eating a vegan diet for a while now and I was curious about her reasons for doing it and how it was working for her.  She told me it all started when she watched a little documentary.  I watched that documentary last summer along with a few others.  I've been wanting to change the way we eat for a while and while I have made some changes for the better I have a long way to go.  In talking with Tami I told her some of the natural cleaning and beauty products I use.  (I should do a post about that sometime)  She was shocked at how often (or not) I wash my hair that I wash my face with oil and that I make almost all of my household cleaners.  So we decided to try each others crazy for a couple of weeks. 

January 1 I started a vegan diet.  And just because I was curious, I kept track of what I was eating in MyFitnessPal.  The first week I ate really well.  I was never hungry and I never felt deprived in any way. (Oh, and I should mention, I decided to stick with brown carbs as much as possible.  Matt and I had some bloodwork done for insurance at the end of the year.  My cholesterol was on the high side so I need to make some changes anyway.)  I ended up averaging about 1200 calories a day.  On the days I worked out my net calorie intake was between 900-1000.  I know that sounds really low but like I said, I wasn't hungry.  Salads and beans just don't have a lot of calories.   So the first week was really good.  The second week I didn't plan my meals as well.  And when you completely change the way you eat you need a plan.  So it was starting to feel like work when it was time to eat.  I'm sure if I did this for several weeks I would get into a routine, I wouldn't have to check every label, it wouldn't take as much time.  But I only committed to two weeks. On day 11 we went out of town for the day.  It is really difficult to eat out on a vegan diet.  There are animal products in everything.  It was really eye opening.  Everything on the McDonalds menu has some sort of animal product even the apple pie.  We tried to go for Thai food and they have fish sauce in almost everything on the menu.  French fries at most places are vegan but how healthy is that?  I guess technically Oreos are vegan too.  And I found that even at the grocery store there are vegan products but when I would read the ingredients I couldn't pronounce half of them.  So is it good to eat vegan if its made in a lab? 

So here's what I've decided. Whole foods, moderation.  That's what will work best for me.  I didn't miss meat at all.  I did miss eggs.  And I think eggs are good for you.  I am not going to buy as much milk.  And when I do it's not going to be full of hormones.  We all decided we like almond milk.  It's really good on cereal and has way less calories than cows milk.  I'm not going to cook nearly as much meat.  And just like milk, no hormones, no antibiotics.  Real food.  I learned that I love brown rice, and quinoa.  I will bake cookies with good, real ingredients.  I've learned that real food is delicious.  And it really doesn't take much more time to prepare than something from a box in the freezer isle. 

Christmas in Memphis

We went to Memphis the Friday after Christmas.  We were excited for a busy weekend.  First thing on the agenda, my niece Amzie was getting baptized.

It was a very special baptism.  Amzie turned eight in October but had to wait for her dad to get home from a deployment to be baptized.  She was really looking forward to it.  All of her cousins and almost all of her aunts and uncles were there.  Nana and Poppy joined us from Canada through Facetime.  Her Grandma and Uncle Chad gave talks, her Grampa, Dad, Aunt Amanda and brother Evan sang.  There was a very special spirit there.  Amzie even bore her testimony that she knows the church is true.  After the baptism we had a family lunch.  It was great day with our family.

Amzie with all of her cousins.

Amzie's baby sister Lucy and our Mamaw.  The youngest and oldest members of our family.  And two of my favorites. 

Sunday night we gathered for our family Christmas party.  Good food and good times.  It was a great night.

The Walking Dead

So maybe it's weird to put this amongst all of the Christmas posts but this is what we did one day on Christmas break.  Matt's sister came to visit from Connecticut and we found out that her boys are pretty big fans of The Walking Dead.  So they were really excited to learn that much of the show is shot in and around our little Georgia town.  So we decided to go for a drive.  I found a map on the interwebs that shows the location and what episode was filmed there. We really had fun.

This is the little town they go to for supplies while living on the farm.  It's about five minutes from our house and around the corner from Caveman's high school.

The "pharmacy" Glen and Maggie go to.

Zombies!

The bar where Glen and Rick find Hershel.

"Woodbury Town Hall"  This is about fifteen minutes from where we live.

The town of Woodbury form season three.  It's actually called Senoia.  The locals call it Suhnoy.

Elders Mill.  This is where they camp in the season 2 finale.

Newnan High.  Where Shane and Otis go for supplies.

Still at the High School.  This is where Shane is running from the zombies after getting what he needed from the school.

The stadium from season 3.  Creepy right?  Have you seen the movie Zombieland?  Some scenes from that movie were hot two blocks from here.

We also saw the church they ran to when they heard church bells in season 2.  But we weren't sure it was the right one.  We looked it up when we got home and it was.  Our last stop was the daycare that Glen and Maggie go to for supplies in season 3.  It was too dark to get a picture but it's right across the street from our local bowling alley.  We found that the prison is actually a studio.  And that the studio pretty much owns the town of Senoia.  Nobody knows where the farm is.  Perhaps on the studio property?  We probably would have made a couple more stops but it was getting too dark.  And we needed to feed our children...Any Zombie fans out there?  Come see us, we'd love to take the drive again.

Christmas Eve

We invited the missionaries to spend Christmas Eve with us.  The kids were so excited to have them over.  It was p-day so when they got here they used the computers to email.  I'm not sure how much they were able to accomplish because the kids were bugging them to play games.

When they were all done with email we played Five Crowns.  Well, most of us.  Elder Holt, the new guy, played with Baby.  At one point he was wearing an Iron Man mask, carrying a Captain America shield, wearing a sheriff Woody badge, carrying a Thor Hammer and a light saber.  I think it's safe to say that Baby and Cowboy had fun with him. 

Elder Gautavai played cards as Boba Fett for a couple of hands. 

We always grill steaks for dinner and this year was no different.  But we had to grill some salmon for our missionary that doesn't eat meat.  We had baked potatoes, a big salad, and some roasted veggies.  Then Matt gave the Elders giant bowls of ice cream and cookies. 

After dinner the kids were ready for presents.  Our home teacher brought us a book called Christmas with the Prophets.  It has a paragraph or two from each prophet about Christmas.  We took turns reading between opening presents.  Baby was the first to open a present and he tore into.  He had been looking at that present under the tree for days and he couldn't wait any longer.

All of the kids got new jammies and the Elders got Georgia sweatshirts.

We loved reading the messages of the prophets.  I think we started a new tradition.  It brought a sweet spirit into our home.  The Elders left us with a sweet message and a prayer and went on their way.  Matt and the kids tracked Santa and laid out some cookies.

 Then they went to bed and took forever to fall asleep.  And Santa came.  And we had a really great Christmas.