Advent: Preparing for the Big Arrival

Almost a month...that's how long regular bloggers wait to post..........right???

My excuses in a nutshell: clearing out the old apartment, moving into the new house, cleaning the old apartment, cleaning the new house, pregnancy fatigue, anemia fatigue, vicious cold, no internet, unpacking, unpacking and unpacking while being hugely pregnant.

Now I can move onto more important things. Like Advent.

Chris and I are determined to make Advent mean something for us this year. Or maybe I should say finally participating in it's meaning. It clearly already has meaning, I don't need to create one.

Advent is a time of preparation. What better year for our family to decide to take Advent seriously than the year I am in my third trimester for our first baby? Our whole life right now is preparation!

 We're a week behind on getting an Advent wreath (although I'm stealing this great, super frugal idea from my friend Erin's blog) but we've managed to do a daily reading and meditation.

Although I've been adamant about preparing for the baby ever since I found out about her in June, (she has a super safe car seat, some seriously cute diapers and more money in her bank account than I do) I haven't gone manic *yet* (her room is undecorated and completely filled to the max with boxes...it's kind of ridiculous. I should get on that.) 

Ok, so I'm not that ready for the baby. I still have 9 weeks. I hope. (If not, she will be very naked and sleeping in a dresser drawer for awhile). However, I wouldn't dream of being grossly unprepared financially or failing to buy a safe car seat. These things are super important.

Where is this urgency when preparing my heart for the Advent of Christmas/Advent of the arrival of Baby Reed?

This Advent, I want to prepare my heart for her. What steps am I making to prepare my heart for this beautiful little person who is going to 100% rely on me? How much am I praying for a change within myself so that she can grow up with the Mama she deserves? I'm thinking of starting everyday with this prayer: Lord, please help me today to be more motivated and less neurotic.

Ultimately this Advent, I prepare my heart for Him. I can be neither the wife or the mother I want to be if I don't start here. Line of thought/prayer at Mass this weekend:
-Advent is about preparing the way for Him.
-What are the obstacles in my life that keep me from engrossing myself in my spiritual life?
-Over and over, I couldn't think of anything tangible. Then, the answer seemingly floated down from the rafters in the church and landed squarely in front of me: Myself. I am the obstacle. Here is my first prayer for Advent:

O Jesus! meek and humble of heart, Hear me.
From the desire of being esteemed,
Deliver me, Jesus.

From the desire of being loved...
From the desire of being extolled ...
From the desire of being honored ...
From the desire of being praised ...
From the desire of being preferred to others...
From the desire of being consulted ...
From the desire of being approved ...
From the fear of being humiliated ...
From the fear of being despised...
From the fear of suffering rebukes ...
From the fear of being calumniated ...
From the fear of being forgotten ...
From the fear of being ridiculed ...
From the fear of being wronged ...
From the fear of being suspected ...

That others may be loved more than I,
Jesus, grant me the grace to desire it.

That others may be esteemed more than I ...
That, in the opinion of the world,
others may increase and I may decrease ...
That others may be chosen and I set aside ...
That others may be praised and I unnoticed ...
That others may be preferred to me in everything...
That others may become holier than I, provided that I may become as holy as I should…

     -Litany of Humility

Easy, huh?


And maybe one day after daily Mass, I'll go buy my little girl some warm baby clothes. She's going to be pretty cold in that dresser drawer.

a chemical-free household, Part 2: 8 Simple Rules

Here' s Part 1.


8 Simple Rules for Chemical-free, Frugal, Green Living:

1. Simple. A lot of chemical-free living is about going back to basics. This isn't to mean we should turn back the clock on progress and do everything like the pioneers did, or using methods that our grandparents used that stemmed from old wives tales more so than science. It means going back to the last thing that really worked. For example, how did women moisturize their skin before lotion was put in a bottle with tons of petroleum-based products? With pure oils like olive, jojoba, coconut, etc (NOT mineral oils - Oil-free makeup propagates the myth that oil clogs pores because bad oils clog pores).

2. It shouldn't break the bank. If it's not cheaper for me in the long run, I won't do it. It took me awhile to switch certain things, like shampoo, because I couldn't find a truly organic way of cleaning my hair that was cheaper and just as (if not more) effective than my mainstream shampoo.

3. Think long term. I emphasized the long run in the point before on purpose. Sometimes start up costs are expensive. Cloth diapers, for example, can cost anywhere from $300-$800 dollars to start up. However, you'll probably get this money back in a matter of months. In the end, you can save thousands of dollars per kid, not to mention the long term health and environmental benefits. Also, the slightly higher cost of taking care of your body now is way cheaper than paying exorbitant doctor's bills later. Several decades ago, American's spent 17.5% of their money on food and 5.2% on healthcare. Today, only 9.9% is spent on food and whopping 16% is spent on healthcare. (this is according to Michael Pollan's book, In Defense of Food.)

4. Give yourself time to implement these changes. My house isn't 100% chemical-free, but it's come a very, very long way.  There are also a few products in our house that we haven't found adequate replacements (like toothpaste and deodorant -although we no long buy anything with aluminum.) Making changes can be overwhelming. Sometimes you might find a product that is better than what you were using, but still has an icky ingredient or two in it. I think that's a huge step. The less toxins we're putting in our bodies, the better off we are. Keep seeking out that truly chemical-free product and I'm sure you'll eventually find it (and probably love it more than what you used before!) If it's stressing you out, take a break and start searching again later. 

Which leads me to my next point...

5. You're more likely to stick with changes if you implement them slowly and easily. 

I have been trying for awhile to go completely paperless in the kitchen, but we're in the middle of a (very slow) move to a bigger house that needed lots of cleaning. Cleaning both the new and the old place and trying to move has been stressful and put a hold on going paperless. I'm not dropping it all together, but just waiting a few weeks until we're settled in the new place. This way, the new habits will stick and not be associated with stress, because it really isn't stressful to give up paper towels.

6. Redefine old definitions, particularly of cleanliness and beauty. Does something need to smell like chemicals and artificial fragrance to be clean? Instead of buying Febreze or Glade plug ins, try sprinkling baking soda on your rugs, boiling some cinnamon sticks on the stove, or just airing out your house by opening all the windows for a few hours. Insanely cheaper, non toxic, and will release all those germs you've been imprisoning in your home.

     Beauty. I'm not going to say go completely without makeup or hair products. It's okay to like to be all gussied up. I do think there is a huge problem with women not feeling beautiful because they don't have their hair perfect and their "face" on. I know I want to teach my daughter to be comfortable in just her own skin so she doesn't feel the pressure to look a certain way to be beautiful. I also know that this mostly dependent on how I talk and act about beauty in regards to myself and others. If she decides that she likes to have her hair fixed up and wear makeup, I hope that I can point her towards products that won't put her health in danger for the sake of beauty.

7. Read labels & educate yourself. I can't emphasize this one enough. The words "natural" and "organic" are completely unregulated in non-food products. Many products mix in essential oils and organic ingredients with the same old yucky ingredients. 

     It does no good to read labels if you don't know what you're reading. Here's a good basic guide on what to look for and avoid on labels. It's important to know not only which ingredients to avoid, but why you are avoiding them. You may end up making a scale for yourself of what products you want to avoid at all costs and which products you are willing to use on occasion. If you can't find a completely chemical-free product, you might be able to find something in the meantime that has a lower risk. 

8. Be reasonable. When I started doing this research, I didn't run out and throw away every product I own (I'm way too cheap to do that). When my old soap ran out, I just replaced it with the new product. I didn't need to replace every product either. I think with going chemical free comes a simplicity - so many things I use have multiple uses.
Another note on being reasonable...if I'm at someone's house and they have hand soap or lotion that isn't chemical free, I don't snub my nose up at it and follow with a huge lecture on the danger of chemicals. I use the product. Our bodies have an amazing ability to get rid of toxins.  The only exception I make to this is when it comes to little children. After my own research, I've determined that it is crucial for my kids to be as completely chemical-free as possible. Little bodies are still doing so much crucial development that they can't process toxins like older children and adults. (The amount of harmful ingredients in basic baby brands like Johnson & Johnson, Baby Magic and even Aveeno is appalling to me.)  Again, this is my own conclusion from the research I've done. It's a choice I'm making for my family.


My philosophy on both food and topical products is to eat/live as healthy as possible about 85-90% of the time. (I love to occasionally wear perfume & eat pizza rolls.) You are welcome to not agree with this. Like I've said in my introductory post, there's no set way to live, eat, etc. The only position I think that is hard to respect is the unconscious consumer. If you've done your research and decided that ______is safe for your family, that's ultimately your decision.

I'd love to know your thoughts on this, even if you disagree with me. :) Part 3 coming soon!

a chemical-free household, Part 1: Introduction

I've have started several different posts about going chemical-free in our household, but I could never quite concisely introduce the topic. To make this less overwhelming for you (by you, I mean me) I'm going to do this in multiple posts.

A little back story - how did I get even interested in going chemical-free?

Whoever said "Necessity is the mother of invention" had it right on our case. A lot of our simpler, greener lifestyle initially happened by chance. Overweight and feeling gross? Let's look into what the heck we're eating. Is the monthly budget tight? Let's see how can we streamline our household products/toiletries more cheaply. I was having horrible skin problems, so we looked at what chemicals we were using in our soaps, which made us investigate other toiletries, detergents and cleaning products. My dad has has had a long, painful battle with cancer. Something that shakes up your life that much makes you think - how did this happen? Not that his cancer was caused by these products, but who knows? If you've had cancer or know someone who has battled it and seen how ugly it can be, you want to run away screaming from any products that have been linked to the disease. He started doing research of his own and sharing alternative products with me. (By the way, they work better and are cheaper than anything I was using before. More on that later).

Recently, I was passing along my basic knowledge of cloth diapering to an inquiring friend. This spawned an out of control conversation about living economically and chemical-free. She asked questions way faster than I could answer them. Each time I began an answer, it opened the door for another question. How do you answer a question like, "If it's not safe for us, why do they sell it?" to an extremely overwhelmed person who wants your years of research on living chemical-free in 20 minutes? After the conversation she told me that she wasn't going to remember everything I said and I needed to send her a long email and take her shopping to point out which products were good and which ones were not. 

It was my turn to feel completely overwhelmed. It has taken me YEARS to become a conscious consumer (and I'm still learning so much). Even if it was possible to take on the daunting task of giving her a complete education in one sitting, I wouldn't. I know the only way these changes have worked for me is that I have done them gradually. They started with something or someone inspiring me to _______ (cloth diaper, eat better, etc.) which led me to tons of research and subsequent trial and error when implementing it into our lives. I've taken research and advice and combined it with my own conscience to decide what's best and safest for our family. 

There are a ridiculous amount of ingredients that are not banned in the U.S. that are linked to cancer. These ingredients aren't in just "occasional" products, like oven cleaner. Substances known to cause cancer (as well as reproductive problems and hormonal imbalances) are in our makeup, soaps, diapers and baby shampoos.

Before I get ahead of myself, here's a video called The Story of Cosmetics  from the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics (not just makeup, but shampoo, lotions, shaving cream, baby wash, etc.) I think it's a good introduction to being a conscious consumer in general.




I'd really love to know your thoughts so far. Another post is coming soon!

a solicitation for advice

As excited as I am about the baby coming, as intensely as I have researched labor & delivery, parenting and discipline methods, breastfeeding, etc. I am still truly terrified of one thing - the baby registry. I immediately recoiled in horror at the enormous list of "must have" items that Babies r Us provides. Freaking ridiculous.

All that "stuff" just overwhelms me. I have a strong dislike for stuff. I like items in my home that are useful and beautiful. I hate junk. I get stressed enough making the obligatory Christmas list (more on that in a later post). I feel that creating the baby registry is like someone saying "Hey Nicole, can you make a list of all of the absolute essentials that you need for your child to be a well-rounded person. Be sure to make good choices even though this is your first kid and you really don't know how you are going to parent your child specifically." I've added pressure to myself by wanting to have safe, useful, practical things that can last through multiple children, fit a "green and frugal" lifestyle and also not take up too much room in a small house.

The more I research, the more I remove items from my registry. And re-add them. And remove them again. So I'm turning to my readers for help. Even though most don't publicly follow my blog, I know you're out there. When I run into you somewhere and you know what I think about certain things and what is going on in my life, I know you are reading this ;) Seriously though, it thrills me! But it's time to come out of hiding and help an ignorant mother-to-be out. My burgeoning belly is apparently a signal for everyone in the world to give me unsolicited and (sometimes harsh) judgments on my parenting decisions. Here is your chance - I'm asking for advice.

To give you guidance, this is my (current) parenting philosophy after nannying countless kids and considering our current lifestyle. (I'm allowed to change this after my baby is born...a mama's got to be able to learn and grow too!) I'm going to start out with the intention of baby wearing, cloth diapering, breastfeeding and room sharing (a form of co-sleeping).  I'm not opposed to things such as playmats and bouncers, but I do want minimal junk in my house. I prefer to have a small amount of toys that are safe, simple and encourage creativity.

Please. Educate me. Wear the comment button out!

Curses and Blessings

Yesterday was a curse and a blessing.

There were several accidents on the way to work yesterday, making me late. Curse.
I got to listen to Danielle Rose a little longer in the car - her music always makes Baby Reed dance and she's even starting to obviously have favorite songs. It's such a joy getting to know her personality already! Blessing.

While nannying, I fell down the stairs - 6 and 1/2 months pregnant and holding a five month old baby in my arms. Curse (and painful).
While I lay at the bottom of the stairs crying, I realized that I had managed to protect both my huge belly and the baby in my arms who, coincidentally, was cracking up laughing - his new favorite activity. Baby Reed almost instantly started bouncing away, assuring me of her safety. Huge Blessing.

Our apartment is a disaster. We're living in the old apartment while all of our stuff is in the new house. (Read: We have all of our furniture and neatly packed boxes at the new house, while the floor of our old apartment looks like the carpet violently threw up all of our possessions.) Curse.
Deciding to make lemonade out of lemons, we turned our bare living room floor into a picnic ground completely with sleeping bags, fluffy pillows, cannelloni, apple crisp and a viewing of our favorite movie. Blessing.

This morning I woke up in so much pain from my tumble down the stairs that I could barely get out of bed. Curse.
My little girl continues to dance away in my belly, oblivious that her mother is a klutz with a messy house who inevitably falls asleep by 9pm - the only blessing I need.

Why I washed my face with oil

I think I have officially crossed into a full-fledged "crunchy" person. And I am loving it.

I'm always looking for more frugal, chemical free ways to live. I'm not an alarmist who immediately threw out all of my old beauty products when I found out about the chemicals in them. I've been gradually switching out my products over the course of several months. I've switched my soap & shampoo and numerous other toiletries. I'll get into what specific products I've been using in another post, but my main product right now is Kirk's Castile Soap, a super cheap soap with no yucky ingredients. I use it for washing my hands, body, face and even for shaving. One time I was desperate and used it as a shampoo, which worked pretty well also. 

Although my skin has cleared up SO much, I feel like pregnancy has made it dull and dry. I haven't been able to find a reasonably priced, chemical-free facial moisturizer either.

I was browsing the archives of Simple Mom, one of the many blogs I frequent when I came across a post for the oil cleansing method. That's right. Cleaning your skin with oil. Before you swear off my blog, please read this post and my comments below on how it worked for me.

Instructions on how to do this are on the link I posted above. It's basically a combination of castor oil and olive oil. My skin has been so unbelievably dry (and I didn't have any castor oil at home) that I actually used pure olive oil. I'm such a believer in the oil cleansing method that I'm going to buy some castor oil as soon as I have a chance for a deeper clean (castor oil is supposed to draw out dirt and unclog pores).

I thought it would feel weird and greasy, but the more I rubbed it in, the more luxurious it felt. My skin was just drinking it up saying, "Please never dehydrate me again!" After a quick steam with a washcloth, I just used the same washcloth to wipe the oil off of my face. I did have to rinse off the washcloth a few times and gently re-wipe portions of my face, but in the end I didn't feel greasy AT ALL.

Pluses:
a chemical-free facial
softer, smoother, flake-free skin
inexpensive (I dipped two fingertips in olive oil, and that covered my entire face)
smelling like an Italian restaurant for a couple of minutes (this may be a minus for you, but it                      
made me really happy...and started a craving for Italian bread with herbs)

Minuses: none

I seriously cannot stop touching my face.

Being a Good Steward, Part 1: Money

Stewardship: 1. responsibly managing the resources within one's control: can refer to environment, money, time, etc.; 2. a virtue intended to make one feel guilty for buying a $4.00 cup of coffee that comes in a non recyclable cup in the drive-thru while having the car running and the A/C on high.


I used to focus so much on what I lacked in: money, talent, etc. Recently I feel like a veil has been lifted and I can see how abundantly blessed I am instead of what I am lacking. This realization has come with the responsibility I know have of being a good steward of all I have been given, no matter how big or small the amount.

Not to brag, but I am very bad at many, many things. Dancing, reaching things on the top shelf, initiating small talk, leaving voice mails, playing tennis and (according to my husband) loading the dishwasher - just to name a few. I can live with these failures.

Making a budget and sticking with it should not be something I fail at doing. The way I deal with money impacts my family immensely in the long and short term, not to mention being irresponsible with it is a slap in the face to my husband who works so incredibly hard. We have lived by certain money rules for awhile that have kept us from getting in trouble, the main one being to use credit cards like they are debit cards and to pay all of our bills on time. We're good at this rule. Our credit score is awesome. Too bad this is only step one of being good stewards of our money.

Every time we tried to establish a budget we either disagreed about nearly everything, failed to make the budget realistic, or just didn't stick with it. I think a lot of this was my attitude towards the Big Scary Budget. I would try and approach it with my head held high, but would quickly run away with my tail between my legs, crying in a corner while emotionally eating a Chicken Biscuit from McDonald's (which was not in the budget). The budget would blow up in a scene similar to this:

Chris and I recently attempted to tackle the BSB again, this time with much success. We agreed on almost everything. After clearing that hurdle, the next one was fast approaching - sticking with the given budget. As the end of the month comes near, I see that I did an OK job. I have a lot of fine tuning to do over the next few months, including finding a way to organize and keep track of everything more efficiently (If you have a system for budgeting that you use, please share in the comments below!)


In the past, every time I couldn't do the budget perfectly, I would quit. Right now my methods are probably laughable, but they are working. We're well on the way towards our main goals of saving like crazy, living below our means and giving to charity/tithing every single month.


It has been difficult to change. The tough thing about realizations is that they call one to action, to make tough changes. However, I shudder at the thought of being one of those people who remains stagnant, never growing or learning, always struggling with the same thing. I think I'd choose painful inner growth spurts over being stagnant any day.

Now I'm going to go turn off the lights in the other room and maybe crank the AC from 72 to 75. Hey, I'm a work in progress.