workin on my fitness

just a couple weekends ago we went to a fitness expo (Mr Olympia) with some of our friends. of course, it is my juicehead husband that i went for, but it was still fun. and being there and seeing so many fit/healthy people actually motivated me a little bit to get in shape.

juicehead photo-bomb!

 i mean really, i have to stand next to this? haha. ;) but really, i've always wanted to get toned up, but just havent had the motivation. so for the past 4 days, i've been exercising! whaaaat!? the last time i did any sort of physical activity (minus hiking a few times at work) was zumba a couple months ago. and before zumba, i honestly cannot remember the last time i worked out.

we've also been eating healthier meals and snacks. my only problem is still my candy intake. but i figure if i eat healthier otherwise, add in working out, and some protein shakes and whatnot---its better than before, right? that's the position i'm sticking with. also, i'm super sore so today was a nice little rest day. i just have to keep telling myself that being sore is feeling my muscles grow. which probably isn't scientifically correct, but i'm an environmental scientist, people! ;)

cheers to working out, and hopefully i will be able to stick with the fitness plan! wish me luck (and good luck to those of you out there who are also workin on your fitness!!).

cloth diapers: why i do it

I've pretty much always known that I was going to use cloth diapers whenever I had a baby. And thankfully my sister-in-law has used them for 3 kids, so she knows the ropes and helped me along. We ended up using BumGenius 4.0 w/snaps. Maybe I'll do another blog post sometime just about using the diapers themselves, but for now I want to talk more about why I wanted to go cloth. [Disclaimer: I realize this is a personal choice, and I don't judge other people for using disposables (cross my heart). But I may try and convert you to cloth, because I think it's awesome ;)]

Henry has one in this pattern. So cute!

There are four "C's" of cloth diapering, and each one of them is a major factor in my decision to go cloth:

1. Conservation: Every baby that wears disposable diapers goes through one TON of diapers in their first couple years. That is two thousand pounds! That's like 200 Heidi Klum's. Whoa. Every year about 27 billion diapers are thrown in landfills (just in the US). The sad thing is that I can go on and on with crazy figures and facts and statistics, etc, but I don't want to bore you (if you're interested, do a simple google search, or email me). Basically, the raw materials, energy, and waste from disposable diapers is astronomical compared to cloth diapers. Also, an important concept of conservation is to reduce, reuse, and recycle. Cloth diapers essentially fit into all three of those categories. You can buy 16(+) cloth diapers and be set for the rest of your children for the rest of your life. If you follow the care instructions and purchase durable cloth diapers, you can even resell your diapers once all your kids are potty-trained. Awesome, I know. ALSO, lots of people like to argue that the water you use to wash the diapers cancels out any environmental benefits/advances over disposables...false. Disposable diapers use 8 times the non-renewable resources, and 90 times the renewable resources than cloth do in production. They also get dumped into landfills, where they will take at least 450 years to decompose. Using water to wash the diapers is a renewable resource, in the sense that the water can go back through a filtration cycle and into municipal use. It does take energy to wash them in your washing machine, but if you use an HE washer, the impacts are minimal when compared to the energy (not to mention crude oil) that goes into the production of a disposable diaper. Also, you can line dry all your diapers (it's actually recommended to do so), which takes no energy (except for your arms to hang them up).

2. Cost: Depending on how long your baby is in diapers, your cost for disposable diapers can be anywhere from $1900 to $2400 or more (I'm not pulling these figures out of a hat, I've looked it up, yo!). Those are average prices for the range of 2 to 2.5 years in disposables. On a personal note, we've bought 25 diapers (I think), and each one was about $14.50 (I have bought most of them when BumGenius has their buy 5 get 1 free sale). That's a grand total of $362.50, and I don't ever have to buy another diaper in my life if I don't want to (I cave in though when I see new cute/fun patterns and colors and want to buy more!). You could even be fine with just having 16-18 diapers; it just depends on how often you want to do laundry, and how much you want to invest up front. We initially bought 18, and I've just added a few here and there since then ;). So yes, there is more of an upfront investment compared to disposables... But it will pay itself off in about 5 months or less. As much as I love going green, I equally love saving green.

3. Comfort: Umm guess what...disposable diapers are basically just plastic with some paper in there too. Oh, and chemicals. If plastic/paper underwear were more comfortable, we'd all be wearing them. But we don't. Disposable diapers contain gross stuff like Sodium Polacrylate (not to get graphic but this chemical used to be in tampons, until it was banned in their production in the 80s because it was linked to TSS!), and Dioxin. With cloth diapers, it's nice, soft, breathable cotton touching your baby's butt. Which also happens to decrease diaper rash (score!), and helps in potty-training your kids faster (they can actually feel the wetness because gel isn't soaking it all up).

4. Convenience: There's a saying that goes "These aren't your parents' cloth diapers anymore!" because really...they aren't. These aren't clunky fabric squares that you [somehow] fold up and pin on your baby. They're extremely easy to use, and very similar in design to disposables. Once you get the hang of it, it's really quite simple. We use the kind with snaps which are super durable, and harder for your babies to pull off once they realize that that's possible. With diaper inserts, you can even add extra inserts for better overnight coverage. I know a common complaint about cloth diapers is poop. Especially the matter of *touching poop*. I have two comments on this: 1) if you are a parent and have never touched poop or somehow gotten it on you, that's a miracle; and 2) you don't necessarily have to directly touch any poop to clean cloth diapers (if you want to though, that's your prerogative). Oh wait, three comments: technically poop is not supposed to be thrown away and end up in landfills. Even on diaper packaging it will say you need to flush solid waste down the toilet [Sadly, most people do not do this, but that's a whole different story]. You can either swish the diapers in the toilet (by holding the clean corners--I'm not talking about dunking your hand in the toilet!) or spray off the poop (you can buy attachments for your toilet around $40-$50). And then when the babies get older and the poop gets more solid--you literally just dump it into the toilet. Bada-bing-bada-boom!

Oh, and there's another unofficial "C" of cloth diapering: CUTE!!

fluffy butt!

banana/zucchini bread muffins

i had two bananas that were about to go bad, and while Henry loves bananas, i can't feed the poor kid two whole bananas tomorrow. he would probably be constipated for days! haha. i looked up some banana bread recipes, and they all required 3-4 bananas. also, we didn't have any eggs left. so i decided to get creative...

side note, one of the guys i work with brought in tons of squash from his garden. since i've been making my own baby food, i jumped on the chance to take some home. i had already turned one of the zucchini's into baby food the other day, and i still had two huge squash left. there was so much that i couldn't even make it all into baby food, so i grated up some of the zucchini to incorporate into my banana bread experiment.

free and organic? sweet!

i'm going to share the recipe, in case you care to recreate it:

[recipe adapted from food.com]

Ingredients:
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup sugar
~1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
2 bananas
~3/4 cup grated zucchini (I think any amount between 1/2 cup to a full cup or so would work)
1/2 cup applesauce (I used a snack cup of applesauce, cuz I'm classy like that...it looked to be equal to about half a cup...)
4 tablespoons softened butter
1/4 teaspoon vanilla

Directions:
1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees
2. Mix all the dry ingredients together in a big bowl
3. Mash the bananas in a separate bowl along with grated zucchini
4. Mix applesauce, butter, and vanilla in with the banana/zucchini
5. Add the wet (banana-y) mixture into the bowl with the dry ingredients. I just stirred it with a spatula (although the original recipe says to do it by hand).
6. I scooped the batter into cupcake liners (I have silicone liners, you can see in the picture), but you can put it in a bread pan too
7. Bake the cupcakes for 25-30 minutes (I did 28 mins and they were perfect).
[The original recipe had it in a bread pan and said to bake for 45 minutes]

and voila, delicious muffins! somehow i accidentally ate 5 right away. Josh even ate one and not only finished it, but said it was good! that's saying a lot, people. also, what other blog would have the word "constipated" and a recipe in the same post? ;) bon appetit!

weekend adventures

the bijou market was awesome. thanks to everyone who stopped by! here are some pictures that darci took of our setup:

adorable blankets. i want them all!

bows and flower clips

our sign. i made it, and jeff made the frame. he also made stands for us that are amazing!!

skirts, pillowcase dresses, onesies

bibs!

the market was really fun and there were a lot of amazing artists there. we felt very privileged to be accepted to participate. we will be updating our shops soon, so stay tuned! (hair accessories shop, baby items shop).

also, yesterday i left work early and went to the hospital. i was in a lot of pain in my kidney area, and i was having difficulty peeing. gross? tmi? oh well... anyways, so i went to the ER and they did a cat scan. turns out i *might* have a kidney stone. when they first found out the results of the scan the doctor came in and told me they didn't see anything wrong w/my kidneys, no infection, etc. he said it could be a back problem, and that i should follow up with a doctor, and then told me to get dressed so i could home. i get all dressed and ready to go, and then the nurse comes in and tells me that the radiologist just called and i might actually have a small kidney stone, but they weren't positive. and then they told me to go home anyway. so i'm on pain meds and drinking like a fish. fun, huh?

well, that pretty much sums up my weekend. has yours been fun? oh and yay for thanksgiving being this week! i can't wait! anyone else as excited as i am? ♥

barf

literally. yesterday morning at work i basically ran to the bathroom, and threw up. it was awesome...not. that was around 8:15am. i went home and got right in bed, and didn't get up until 4:30ish pm until josh came home. i didnt even eat anything til later that night when i had some toast. then my sweet friends jeff and darci gave us some chicken noodle soup and i had some of that before i went to bed. today i woke up and still felt awful, so i stayed home from work again.


tonight josh came home and brought me gatorade and some pretty flowers! he's such a sweetheart. i put them in my new pitcher that i just got from ikea the other day. then i was looking at blogs and whatnot on the couch, and was lusting over these boots that i saw on my friend kelli's blog. this conversation ensued:

me: want to buy me these boots for christmas?
josh: how much?
me: umm...475 dollars...
josh: ugh. even in your sickness you still know how to online shop!!

i blame kelli... anyways, i'm going to go eat some toast and drink some more gatorade. hopefully this bug will leave me asap so i can get back to having fun and making money!

sicko

ok, so i looked up what a kidney stone looked like today on google. people have asked me and i'm like i have no idea because mine got blasted and then i basically peed out sand-like pieces of it for about a week. awesome, huh? anyways, i have started to get some bills from that whole kidney stone incident, and the hospital bill alone was over ten thousand dollars. the lithotripsy is going to add at least another six thousand to that. we just got health insurance [it literally kicked in the day i went to the hospital], so thankfully we won't be paying that total amount. however, our deductible is $5000. i was talking to my friend jen about all this today and she said, "yeah, you should never go higher than a 1 thousand deductible for health stuff." hmm...i wish someone had told me that before this happened.

apparently this is the lithotripsy machine. i was in something like this. but unconscious, and not wearing a bathing suit...

eww...do you think they left the hospital gown on me while they did it? i just realized that maybe they didn't... :/

[photo source]

anyways, i went to the doctor a week or so ago, and he told me i was good to go. he said i need to drink at least 3 quarts of water a day. also, did you know cranberry juice is bad for kidney stones?? it makes the particles stick together better. which is funny since it's good for kidney infections, so i had even bought some when this whole mess started. luckily i hate cranberry juice so i avoided drinking it, and now i have a valid excuse to never drink it again! yippeee!

[photo source]

i just wanted to say thanks to everyone who was so nice to us when this whole mess happened. mok and pok (the lovely grandparents) sent me a sweet get well card, which i didn't even remember getting in the mail until josh reminded me [i was a little medicated for awhile there...]. josh's parents visited us in the hospital and gave me a tshirt from their recent alaska trip. pretty sure i wore that shirt for the rest of the week...like...straight.. [who needs to shower these days?]. friends went and picked up medicine for me (you drug dealers!), offered to bring us food and liquids, and were all around nice and helpful. and of course: josh. he missed work for me, put up with me, took care of me, and was super sweet. praise the lord it's over with, and if anyone wants to donate to the *pay-jess's-medical-bills fund* feel free hahaha. or maybe we'll get lucky and win it big in vegas...

health update:

yesterday i went in to get my lithotripsy. that is the procedure when they send shock waves through your body to break up the stone. i was under anesthesia at the time of course, so they removed the stent and then broke up the stone. when i came to i felt horrible. the pain was awful, i was nauseous, and just wanted to sleep. they kept trying to give me medicine via the IV or by mouth, and i just kept throwing up. because of all this mess, i didn't end up going home until around 3 (i went in the office at 11:15).

once we finally got home i just kept throwing up again, and i was just a wreck. the pain was so unbearable i couldn't even concentrate on trying to take my medicine. finally we got everything under control and i basically just passed out around 5:30. josh woke me up at 11:30 to take some more medicine and then i conked back out. now that i am back on my medicine schedule (aka not throwingit up), the current situation is much improved.

now the main stress is the money. i'm too tired and my brain is too fuzzy to get into it right now, but we need healthcare reform. if you don't agree with me, you can just come on over and pay all my medical bills. k thanks haha.

i'm gonna go drink more fluids now and get these stone particles outta me! sorry if it's TMI, but thats what i'm going through right now. xoxo.

update:

a bit after i wrote that post sunday night, i had to go back to the ER. i couldn't hold any liquids [i threw up like 10 times in a span of a few hours, and one of those times included when waiting for meds at walgreens. lovely, huh?] and couldn't use the restroom [at all]. so josh drove me back and i had to wait in the lobby for over an hour to get admitted. ER waiting rooms are SO annoying. they say people are admitted based on "the severity of their ailment". that's a lie. a girl who came in after i did with a swollen foot, and a boy who came in well after i did with a cut finger BOTH went in before me. i'm like *hellooo...there is a KIDNEY STONE stuck inside of me, i can't stop throwing up, and I CAN'T PEE!!!* it was slightly frustrating to say the least.

when i finally got admitted i got my own little room in the ER and the doctor came and checked me out. now, because i was on pain meds and zofran the whole time, the order in which things happened is a little unclear to me. i think sunday morning i had gotten a catscan, which is when they determined the stone was 4.5 mm. apparently that is on the border of a stone being passable (up to 4 mm) by yourself, or too big that you need help (4+ mm). so when i was having all that trouble sunday night, they decided to admit me to the hospital (not just the ER). it took forever [of course] for this to happen, but around 1am i finally got set up in my own room upstairs. i made josh go home around 12:40, since he was silly enough not to eat anything all day, and had to work the next morning. oh, i also got a catheter sunday night, which sucked.

monday morning i was woken up by a guy who told me i needed an xray done. i'm pretty sure i rolled over and ignored him several times before it became clear to me that it was real life and i needed to wake up. i'm sure i looked worse than a hot mess (although i didnt have my contacts in so i wouldnt reallly know) as i got wheeled down to get an xray done. they were checking the location of the stone to see exactly what needed to be done. well, the stone was right under my kidney so they couldn't just take it out. so i got put under and they put a stint up there to help until i could get another surgery to blast the stone up into a ton of pieces. josh skipped work to come be with me, which was really sweet, and his parents came and visited too. after the stint was in place i was wheeled back up to my room apparently (i was knocked out). when i woke up i almost immediately pushed the button for pain meds. it started beeping and then going crazy and i was all worried. the nurse came in and was like "did this go off all by itself?!" and i guiltily admitted, "umm...i pushed it..." busted! haha.

a bit later i had to get another x-ray to make sure where everything was located again, and afterwards the x-ray tech was like "is there a wire on you?" i had no idea what she was talking about, and she even looked at my stomach, before she finally asked, "did they put some kind of tube in you?" and i was like "ohhhhh...they put a stint in there." it was pretty funny. around 7pm i was finally allowed to go home. we went back to walgreens and got more drugs, but i didnt throw up this time. the guy working remembered us and said that was the first time someone ever barfed at the pharmacy when he was working haha. i was embarassed, but then he shared a story that made me feel better about myself (think of a husband taking birth control for his wife because it made her sick, them getting pregnant, and having no idea how it happened hahaha). thankfully monday night i could start eating real food, and our friends brought us panda express over.

so tomorrow (wednesday) i am getting the stone blasted up. today i am at home all hopped up on drugs and drinking tons of fluids. this has been quite an interesting experience, and one i hope to never go through again. unfortunately they say if you ever get one, theyre easier to get again. phooey! anyways, thanks to everyone who has been so nice and brought us food, visited, etc. i heart you all.

addicted

first week of my summer job is OVER! too bad it doesn't feel like summer. today it snowed and hailed on us. yes. enormous amounts of big, fatty, fluffy snow coming down like a winter wonderland. then mini pebble hail. then snow. then drizzle. then snow. all while we hiked and did work and tried to write stuff down. thanks utah for being so awesome [well, awful, but sometimes awesome].

and while i sit here with sore legs and an exhausted body (5+ hours of hiking in one day will do that to you when you're out of shape), i'm almost falling asleep. speaking of out of shape, i need help. for anyone who doesn't know, I AM ADDICTED TO SUGAR. literally, addicted. like a smoker, except with candy. i've pretty much always been this way, even though i have short spurts where i try to quit.

i want to cut back on my sugar intake, but i need to do it in steps or something. i also want to increase my fruit and veggie intake, as well as get more exercise. i don't know how to manage all of this. i want to be healthier but i dont want to cut out all the stuff i love. like candy and pizza and carbs. anyone have advice, experience, websites, etc that could help me at all?? i've been doing better with fruits and veggies: i went from about 0-1 servings a day to about 3. yes, that's combined. TRUTH COMES OUT,PEOPLE: i am super unhealthy.

the summer job will help my exercise too, so that i'll be hiking at least 2-4 days a week. i think i need a personal trainer. or life coach. and someone besides josh, because when he tells me to do things i think he's saying i'm fat. it's a twisted mind game i do to myself, but i can't help it. jillian michaels, where are you!? or maybe oprah...?

[all pics from weheartit]