Out of Avalon

July 12th, 2010 by Ascelyn

I’m new to all this, but I think it must be a telling sign that one is the parent of a child on a restricted diet when making breakfast can make you so misty-eyed that you need to step away from the stove. Some parents would be thrilled to get their almost-toddler to eat foods with frighteningly healthy-sounding ingredients like milled flaxseed and whole grain millet flour. I was just excited to share pancakes with my little guy.

Let’s backtrack a little. I guess I ought to mention that some of the scenes that kept running through my mind during the interminable wait for my little guy were things like giving him his own little garden plot and tiny tools, or teaching him to knead bread like my grandfather taught me, or baking his daddy’s favorite apple pie to surprise the him after a long day at work. As biological organisms, food is what sustains us, and for most of our history as a species and for far too many people around the world today, it is the most pressing, driving need out there.  With this in mind, I don’t think it’s too wrong that food factored so heavily into my dreams for my as-yet unconcieved child, do you?

So when Moose’s allergy signs started appearing at about a month of age, and more recently, when we were given the list of his known food allergies, my picture of motherhood, particularly as a stay-at-home mom, took a bit of a blow.

As I tell my own mom on a regular basis, we can eat perfectly normal foods without too much extra work.  Last night we had southwest-seasoned chicken breasts with peppers and onions and garlic mashed potatoes.  The only changes I made were to use rice milk in the potatoes and potato flour in the bit of a sauce I made from what was left in the pan from the chicken and veggies.  Lunch was panang curry, dinner the day before was marinated chicken and grilled zucchini, eggplant, and green peppers, lunch was chili…you get the picture.  No substitutes needed for any of those!

Breakfast and snacks are the challenge.  My mini-moose and I have been eating a lot of fresh fruit, which is healthy and tasty, but what happens when you’ve eaten all but a single banana and don’t want to drive half an hour to the closest market before eating breakfast?  What happens when you just need a cupcake?  What happens when you’ve finally, after years of trying, managed to learn to make French toast…only to find out that your breastfed son can’t have bread made from wheat flour, egg, or milk?  (I’m still working on a French toast recipe.  There must be a way!)

Which is all just a long, roundabout way to say that Hodgson Mill Apple Cinnamon Muffin Mix just about made me cry.

The box had been sitting in my cupboard for a while due to an apparently unfounded fear that the muffins would taste horrible.  Sure, we’re permitted to eat them, but no one says we’re going to want to after the first bite!  I used the pancake recipe on the back of the box; the actual muffin recipe called for butter, while the pancake recipe used oil.  I also substituted a tablespoon of flaxseed meal mixed with two tablespoons of water for the egg. 

Compared to my previous attempt at allergen-free pancakes, these were just dense enough, chewy, and altogether pretty great.  Could I do better on my own if I could use wheat flour, milk, and eggs?  Sure.  For a “real breakfast” that someone with numerous allergies can eat, though, these hit the spot.  Moose ate up every bite that I gave him, even after devouring a third of a banana while I cooked. 

Huh. I've never had anything like this before....

I do think these would be better with some sort of topping—maybe not syrup, exactly, but homemade apple pie filling or the like—but I ate them plain without causing my sweet tooth any problems.

I’ll admit, quickly, that the baking powder gives me pause.  Most baking sodas contain corn starch.  Corn is the least severe allergy Moose has by far, however, and he’s eaten handfuls of corn kernels in the past without having any noticeable problems, so I figured the tiny amount present probably wouldn’t hurt him.  I will be emailing the company to find out if they use corn-free baking powder, though.  You never know!

Hey Mikey, I think he likes it!

Mix Ingredients:  Whole grain millet flour, dried apples, whole grain sorghum flour, whole grain brown rice flour, milled flaxseed, cinnamon, monocalcium phosphate, baking soda, xanthan gum, salt.

July 10th, 2010 by Ascelyn

I haven’t updated here in months.  That’s because of a twisted combination of caring for an infant (e.g., my adorable, squishy little time suck) and being laid off from my job.  Unfortunately, the Rocket Factory didn’t see fit to provide me with continuing computer and internet access after my job got cut.  It’s hard to write with neither an extra set of hands to make sure the Moose doesn’t fall off the piano bench nor a web connection through which to send my binary bits of bloggy goodness

In summary:  Mini-moose is now nearly 9 months old, is sitting up like a champ but not yet crawling, loves hanging out with friends and visiting his fan club at the farmer’s market, has two bottom teeth, loves food, and has severe allergies.

Oh yes, the allergies.  We figured out two on our own:  cats and eggs.  Much of the eczema, spitting up, and constant stuffiness had been banished simply by avoiding cats, and a blood test confirmed our suspicions.  Eating the tiniest possible bit of scrambled egg resulted in three hours of inconsolable screaming, followed by hives, a hugely swollen left ear, depressed respirations, and his lips and fingers turning blue.  Not something I’d ever like to repeat, thank you very much.

To this list, please add dairy products, wheat, rye, barley, oat, peanuts, soy, and corn.  The good news is that all the fruits for which he’s been tested, as well as all non-corn veggies and all meats, are safe.  He might grow out of some of his allergies as he gets older, but in the meantime, the two allergy attacks in the last week mean that he probably has other which we’ve not yet uncovered.  I have to admit that it’s frightening, and I’m constantly worrying that someone will decide to “spoil him a little” and slip him something that could—fine, I’ll say it—kill my beautiful, bright-eyed son.

Eating the way I’ve always eaten, and eating out pretty much at all, is no longer possible.  On the bright side, this has finally propelled me into eating healthier and introducing a greater variety of foods into our diet as a family.  Whether I want to or not, very nearly everything we eat now has its beginnings in my kitchen as the most basic single ingredients.  Moose is eating better from his very first foods than I had in the first twenty-four years of my life.

Stay tuned.  As I delve deeper into this crazy new world of food allergies, I’ll be updating this space with what’s working and not working.  Recipes!  Reviews!  Reactions of a hungry little man and his finicky father!  Baking is looking to be a particular challenge, but I doubt it’s insurmountable.

If nothing else, I’ve lost ten pounds just by eating my veggies at long last and not gorging myself on tasty, tasty chocolate treats at work.  Care to join?

April 26th, 2010 by Ascelyn

Here’s to being preemptive and melodramatic.

Two weeks or so ago, I typed up, triple-edited, and finally sent off an email to the La Belle list.  In short, I basically said I was leaving the group due to time constraints.  Budget was also a major factor, though I didn’t want to go into it there.  Sure, I’ve got much of what I’d need to participate, though mostly in the form of raw materials, but going to actual events and even meetings gets expensive.  If I’m hoping to get to stay at home full time soon, I’d gain some time but lose any extra money I have coming in at the moment.  It was something I’d been thinking about for a month or so, and I thought it was time.

That’s what I get for thinking.

Several replies were waiting for me in my inbox by the end of the day, and I spoke to others on the phone later and at MTT that weekend.  It would seem I’ve been rather clueless.  (Surprise!)  Here’s what I’d seen:  Hardcore members/recruits (and I’m using the term “member” to refer to both for the purposes of this entry) who seemed to eat, breathe, and live living history.  The few newish recruits I’ve seen were  fully kitted out, at great expense, and participating actively in events in what seems an insanely short time to me, or were already well on their way to being fully prepared before they joined.  The only members I’ve seen who have kids (a) either have an au pair who comes along to events or have one parent who essentially does LH as a full-time job, and (b) have both parents active in the group to tag team each other.  Everyone was so smart.  Yes, this is one of the things I’d loved from the beginning, but I’m a science sort of girl.  Social studies was never my thing.  Now that I can treat history as a story and try to envelope myself in the culture of a certain place and time, I love it, but that doesn’t by any stretch mean I’m good at it.

Yes, that’s me.  The slow one.  I tend to like that, because I need to be surrounded by people who are smarter than me to be happy.  It’s one of the many reasons why I loved CMU so much.  I’ve spent most of my life playing the role of the brilliant, somewhat dweeby doormat, and while I know much of that is due to the backwater area in which I live, I generally prefer to be around people who make me look stupid in comparison.  The downfall to this is that I look stupid in comparison.  When everyone else is passing me by so quickly and I feel like I’ll never be able to catch up, I become nervous and feel like I’m letting everyone down.  The “doormat” part of me really, really hates letting anyone down.  Add to this that the local library systems suck and that my own fledgling book collection has to be supplemented greatly by what I can find online—which isn’t much if you’re going for accuracy and authenticity—and I don’t know how I can ever catch up.  Some members have been, in my opinion, very harsh on others who won’t (in those people’s minds) or possibly can’t (in my mind) “do their own research.”  I can see how that mindset would develop, but it does make you hesitant to ask too many questions, even when you don’t even know where to start on the research.  What books are worth the money?  Magazines?  Web pages?  Are there museums within driving distance worth stopping by, and would I be able to interpret them for myself?

That’s what I saw.  Here’s the truth:  There are LBC members as far away as Texas.  Some members have been going to meetings for years but have just now made it to a few events.  Others have never made it to an event and rarely make it to meetings.  People who come to their first meeting and attend their first event kitted out within a short time period are the exception, not the norm.  I probably wouldn’t be laughed off the face of the planet if I asked questions sporadically instead of trying to figure it all out myself and then finally exploding into a page-long list of things that I desperately want to know.

I’ll be remaining a recruit, if the group will have me, and biding my time with research and work until I can become active at some point in the future.  I’ll also attempt to attend meetings from time to time, though I won’t push myself to make it to every single one like I did when I first started.  Yes, this will put me even farther behind than I already am, but apparently that’s okay.  It’s all going to be okay.

And now I can stop hyperventilating that I’ve just dropped out of the most awesome group in which I’ve ever become involved and lost all sorts of irreplaceable friends.

April 5th, 2010 by Ascelyn

And the Moose.  That’s kind of a given.

We’ve settled into a more acceptable pattern by now.  Mikey sleeps better than he did, and if you ignore a few additional weeks of sleep deprivation thanks to a fever and the havoc it wreaked long-term on his sleeping patterns, he rarely wakes more than once during the night.  In the morning, I get myself ready, wake him and feed him, then change his diaper.  By then, J is, at least in theory, ready to put him into his clothes for the day and insert him into the baby carrier while I finish packing his bottles into the lunchbox and, if necessary, his diapers and changes of clothes.  J takes him to daycare, I head off to work, and in the evening I pick him up and take him home.  J may or may not make it home at a semi-reasonable hour.  I wash clothes, cook dinner, pick up the house, or do other necessary chores while baby-wrangling, and J is supposed to wash and fill bottles and pump parts for the next day.  That doesn’t necessarily always work, and three bottles of sour milk have been cried over on Monday mornings when the lunch box has been forgotten and left unpacked over the weekend.  That’s something like two or three hours of work right there, people.  Empathize with me a little.

Moose remains the singular happiest baby I have ever met.  He has eczema we’d hoped could be attributed to a milk protein allergy, but cutting all dairy out of my diet hasn’t had any effect on that or several of his other symptoms.  It has, on the other hand, filled me with angst and misery by taking yogurt, pizza, grilled cheese, most subs, mashed potatoes made anywhere other than my house, mac & cheese, ice cream (ICE CREAM, people), and everything else that is good in the world and not made of meat off my plate.  Or bowl, as the case may be.  Did you see the part where I can’t have ice cream?

This insanity will end in ten days when the good and wise doctor who values his life informs me that I can return to my previous yogurt and cheese (and ice cream!) habits.

Michael, on the other hand, had his first solid food at his Grandma and Granddad’s house yesterday during Easter lunch.  Apparently he is fond of bananas.  After all, they go in his mouth, and he is quite enthralled with anything that can potentially be put in his mouth.  He’s been trying to grab our food and dining gear for a while now, and while I’d intended to wait until 6 months, he was only a week shy of that supposedly miraculous date.  I’m a little concerned because he seems to have inherited my allergies, but we’ll wait and see.  Not that I’m sure what would differentiate a food allergy from his typical rashy, congested self, but I guess I’m supposed to have some magical mom sense.

And beyond that, I’m not really certain what else to say.  My little guy, like most others, I suppose, isn’t a person easily summed up in words.  He’s bigger than that.  You have to experience him.  I think this is best accomplished via a good diaper changing, so make sure you schedule your moose-y experience in the near future.

February 8th, 2010 by Ascelyn

I am not going to complain.

I am not going to recount the last month or so, however long it’s been, of the baby’s life.

I am not going to spend the evening with my husband and child.

I am not going to do many things.  Including sleep.  I’m too tired.  Well, not too tired to sleep, but instead I have to stay at work late, then go home and wash diapers, prep bottles for tomorrow at daycare, wash clothes for tomorrow at work, and doubtless many other things I just can’t think of right now.  I might finally get to bed by midnight, but I’ll have to wake up at least once, maybe twice, hopefully not every hour like last night, before getting up for good by six at the latest.  I’ll definitely get to listen to my husband complain about how tired he is.  You know, that guy who stays super late every night, goes to bed before me, wakes up after my day has gotten well underway, and doesn’t even notice when I get up to feed and change the baby.

So tired.

The house is a disaster zone.  I still have one very important thank you note to write, but because I want to do it right, it hasn’t been done at all.  The grandparents are whining because they don’t get to see the Moose enough.  I don’t get to see him enough.  Everyone says babies change and grow so fast.  I guess that’s true, but I haven’t been there to see it.

I hate being here, at work, and I hate the constant questions from my coworkers, acquaintances, and random strangers of why I’m not at home.  It’s the judgment in their eyes that gets me.  Looks from the females that say, I would do/am doing it differently.  From the males that remind me, My wife stays at home, because she considers our children to be more important than a career.  Because I know why I’m not at home, but it’s not a reason I ought to go into here.  I also know that it’s not going to change, and that makes me mad.  I wish I had the energy to be mad.  I wish I had help so I would have energy.  If I can’t have those things, I wish I at least had a job I would consider a career.  This is just a job.  It’s interesting work, but I’m not particularly good at it, and I have no real desire to move up and no real place to move up into.  Meanwhile, my son grows up, apart from me.  It makes me sad to keep telling myself that I can do Thing X in mid-February and Thing Y in April, when by then I will have missed months more that I’ll never get back.  Months where he’s growing so fast and changing literally every day.

Now I have SCA people poking at me and wanting to know why I haven’t signed up to help with various up-and-coming events.  I’ll do it sometime after I sleep.  And maybe eat.  I would like to eat again someday.  I would like to have clean pants to wear.  I would like to spend time with my beautiful baby boy.  But I’m essentially called a freeloader and told I must not value the barony because I don’t have time to come to meetings that are hours away on weeknights and because I don’t sign up to work all day in positions where I wouldn’t have a chance to leave and feed, change, interact with my Mini-moose.  Because my priorities apparently aren’t straight.

I said I wasn’t going to complain.  Trust me, this isn’t even the shade of a complaint compared to what I have stored up.

Perhaps later I will post happy things.  If I’m not too tired.

December 23rd, 2009 by Ascelyn

We’ve been using cloth diapers exclusively for nearly a month now, and while the excitement and newness may have died down a bit, the happiness hasn’t.  I love my BG 3.0s, and hopefully I’ll have found a new home for the other four diapers we tried shortly.  While I was worried for a while that I’d just have to buy all new diapers for any future children if we wore out the one-size diapers on Michael, we’ll still come out ahead unless we have more children than there are diaper sizes.  Besides, it looks like replacing the Aplix and elastic should be easy, and that’s what supposedly wears out.

Suffice it to say that we had several leaky diapers with disposables, even in the brand that fit him best, and that we never have with cloth.  Ever.  Even after going eight or nine hours at night.  And there have been some seriously nasty poosplosions with which these things have had to contend.

After an incident at my parents’ house, he did have a bit of diaper rash.  I used prefolds on him for part of the day after it appeared, since Grandma El’s can be used on those but apparently not on my bumGenius pockets, according to the lady I called at Cotton Babies.  Once J got home and I had some time, I cut up some scrap fleece I had laying around into liners, just strips I can lay inside the diapers so that the rash ointment doesn’t touch the suedecloth.  Works like a charm and costs next to nothing.  It sounds silly, but the same ointment does wonders for his cradle cap, though it’s kind of sticky and I don’t use it when he’s going to have to go out and wear a hat.

Eadric’s mom serged some cloth wipes for me (thankyouthankyouthankyou!), and while I still intend to sew some more after Christmas, they’re doing the job well.  I’m using a spray solution of 1 cup water : 1 tsp. baby wash : 1 tsp. apricot oil, and it seems fine.  The baby wash was the non-Johnson’s only unscented one at the market and is the cream kind, so it takes a while to dissolve.  I’m kind of ticked that my Burt’s Bees apricot baby oil smells so great from fragrance instead of the oil, though.  Our spray doesn’t really smell like anything.  Of course, I guess that’s better than smelling bad, right?

Regarding prefolds:  the reviews are right.  Unbleached Indian prefolds are both softer and less sturdy than bleached Chinese ones.  I think I’ll just run another line of stitching along the serged edges, which are already kind of getting shabby.  We use them mostly as burp rags and occasionally as back-up diapers, though, so it’s no big deal.  I might have went ahead with all prefolds and covers if there was no daycare in our future, J was more willing to learn, and we didn’t have the money for pockets, but they’re just too fussy for me when dealing with a squirmy baby.  I’m thinking of trying to dye some of the ones we did get, just for kicks.  You know, in all my spare time.  I can’t figure out how I can dye the two outer (thinner) parts one color and the thick middle strip another color, though.  That’s my real goal.

Nobody seems to be having any reactions to the Charlie’s Soap we’re using, which is a relief.  I only read that some people had bad reactions to it after we started using it, so I was a bit worried.  The Bac-Out spray really seems to help keep the stains from setting, too, though I’ve never really gone without it, so I don’t know if maybe we’d be stain-free anyway.  It smells awesome, though.  Unfortunately, we’re almost out, and shipping to get a jug of concentrate is going to be a killer.  No one around here carries it that I know of.

Washing remains a piece of cake.  It takes no extra work at all to wash, and maybe ten minutes max to restuff them with the inserts.  Less time than it would take going through the check-out line to buy disposables, and far less than a trip to the landfill (or to my parents’, who keep saying I could just drop off trash there, but who would waylay me and force me into an hour-long conversation while I’m trying to get somewhere).

I think that’s it.  I’ll save my Grand Plan! for later sometime.  Thank goodness I didn’t let people talk me out of using cloth.  Most of them either had done it back in the day by necessity and hadn’t seen the new diapers or were using disposables now without trying cloth, probably because they’ve never seen the new diapers.  A few people around town have already decided after seeing me change Michael that it seems like a good idea for any future children of their own, so I’m laughing inside.  Quietly.

December 23rd, 2009 by Ascelyn

J has decided that Michael Needs. A. Stocking.  Right now.  This after he had originally agreed that we might as well wait until next year when (a) the kid would actually care and (b) I would have a functional sewing machine on which to make a rockin’ stocking.  Instead, we have to run around town two days before Christmas to find a stocking.  A stocking into which we have no stocking-y gifts to place.

The tree, on the other hand–the first tree we’ve had since we’ve been together–is decorated, and gifts have been placed under the care of its verdant limbs.  Unwrapped gifts, for the most part, since J’s gift is part his new grill and part a framed picture for his desk at work that may or may not be ready in time.  Mikey’s gifts are unwrapped and apparently “boring,” mostly consisting of books, useful items we’d need soon anyway, and three outfits.  We did get him two or three small toys, like a trio of soft stacking blocks, but nothing flashy.  Oh, and the baby signing kit I wanted!  That’s for both of us, I suppose, but I had to keep myself from opening it when it first arrived.

I guess I should eventually get around to putting away the boxes the ornaments were packed in.  The sheet the tree sat on needs washed, and the plastic netting trashed, and needles vacuumed.  Oh, and I need to get a picture of our baby into his first Christmas ornament instead of the default child that comes with it.  Ours is cuter.  Hmmph.

Tomorrow we got to J’s sister’s house for Year 2 of our Christmas Eve extravaganza.  I voted for moving it to our house this year, since C’s is teeny-tiny (as in, meant to be a two-person hunting lodge; you have to step over people constantly) and V’s is so new and shiny that it doesn’t really have anything in it yet.  We have space and stuff, including a twin bed and a crib for my nephew and niece, a nice TV for the movie-watching, and a decent kitchen for making the meal.  Oh, and a place for me to retreat and nurse the baby instead of having to go out to the car, since not only is there nowhere to sit at C’s and no extra rooms, but several people also get squicked out by the idea of breastfeeding and I can’t sew my nursing cover until I get my new machine.  Which will be a day later.

Still, it was a lot of fun last year, and I’m looking forward to continuing our turkey-eating tradition, a tradition which, unlike Thanksgiving, doesn’t involve any form of parents/grandparents or driving from one house to another and is therefore fun instead of stressful.

Merry Christmas, everyone!

December 18th, 2009 by Ascelyn

My first week at work is almost over.  Granted, it was a strange week–a half day Monday and Thursday off because Certain People who had promised to watch the baby ended up backing out for those times.  Still, while work itself isn’t too bad, I hate leaving in the mornings and am so sorry in the evenings that I missed having the time with Michael.

It made spending all day with him yesterday all the sweeter, though.  At least until this morning, when I fed him just before I left.  He finished and was grinning and babbling at me, but by the time I was on my way out the door, he was wailing.  I felt like I was abandoning him.  At home with J, he’ll have one-on-one attention and be held and cuddled.  At daycare, I’m afraid he’ll just be left in his crib alone all day.  I know for certain that he would at most of the places I checked; they told me that very plainly.  I don’t think he will be at the one where he’ll be going, but the prospect still worries me.

If I were to stop working here, I’d probably start watching another baby at home.  Sure, I wouldn’t make as much money as the people who are at full capacity, but I’d know I was taking good care of him or her, and I hope that would make the other parents feel comfortable.  One person can care for–not just have around, but actually care for–two babies.  I just don’t see how they can really take care of two infants and six preschoolers.  Then when the other baby and my own have both turned two or three and are out of diapers and not requiring super-constant hands-on care, I could start watching another child or two.

J’s been working like crazy, usually long into the night after we’ve gone to bed.  I’m really glad he’s getting to spend the next two weeks with his son.  He’s never been alone with him for more than the amount of time it takes me to get a shower before.  Honestly, though, it still worries me immensely that I have three CVD runs in the next three weeks, and that sort of a schedule is only going to get worse.  Who’s going to watch Michael while we’re away…all day, and possibly all night?  I wish I had a better idea of how things were going to go.  He shouldn’t be working that much anyway, and my schedule should have evened out years ago.

November 29th, 2009 by Ascelyn

We moved the pack & play out into the loft Wednesday so that it would be easier for me to do diaper changes in the middle of the night without turning on the light in our room.The light from the closet was sufficient while I could still use the changing table attachment, but now that he’s too heavy for it, I was having trouble seeing down into the bassinet part thanks to the shadows.

It’s much more convenient set-up.  He’s also started sleeping for five or six hours through the night, only waking once to eat.  At this rate, he’ll be down in his own room in the crib by Christmas.  Yay!

November 27th, 2009 by Ascelyn

Just placed another order with Mom’s Milk Boutique.  I love them.  I LURVE them.  Everyone should buy from them.

On order:

• 24 bumGenius 3.0 OS pocket diapers
• 2 diaper pail liners
• 2 wet bags
• 12 unbleached Indian prefolds
• 2 free pairs of Baby Legs that I’ll be giving to my sister-in-law and neice
• Grandma El’s diaper rash cream, safe to use with cloth diapers

Because such is my luck, I placed my order 9 minutes too soon to be in the running to win a $180 silk ring sling.  Boo.

Now I just need to make my lovely cloth wipes and wipe spray.  Which involves buying a functional sewing machine (another rant entirely) and going to the market.  Which means I can buy sausages.

Mmm.  Sausages.  How did I spend my entire life thinking I didn’t like you?  So tasty….

Hooray for diapers!  (Can you tell I need sleep?  On the bright side, the little moose only woke up once last night!  Go Moose!  Go me!)