I'm Back (More or Less)

Wow, it has been three months. I just decided that I was too busy and preoccupied to blog there for a while, but I find that I’m beginning to feel the longing to think again. Just a little bit, though. My writing for the next few months won’t be profound or anything, but I just need to get back to it, you know?

The last few months have been filled with a whole lot and a whole lot of nothing. We’ve gotten back into a routine of sorts, although Silas still isn’t on any kind of predictable schedule. My days involve a lot of baby bouncing with some dishes and laundry thrown in for variety. I think that if it was just Silas around, I could get him more settled into a routine, but with two older kids, it is hard to follow his rhythms in between the big boys’ commitments. Welcome to life as a third child, kid!

Silas is so big now compared to last time I wrote here. He smiles. He laughs. He coos and babbles. He rolls over. Silas adores his older brothers, and watches the world with wide eyes. He is nearly four months old.

I am much more mellow this third time around, but every now and then, a little bit of the crazy creeps in. With Silas, I have fixated on his skin. He has fairly bad eczema on his face, and I get really freaked out about it sometimes. I am constantly second guessing myself, trying to figure out what I’m eating or doing that is causing the rash. The other day I actually spread peanut butter on his leg to see if he broke out in a rash. Yah, I guess I’m not completely the cool, relaxed third time mom that I would like to be.

I’ve been thinking about food lately. I’ve been hearing a lot about the show Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution, so I watched an episode on Hulu. I liked it, but it made me so upset that I’m not sure if I can watch any more. Some days I think I’m doing really well with feeding my family as healthfully and as ethically as possible on our budget. And other days I think that I let my kids eat way too much processed junk.

Here’s how I’ve taken a small stand lately: Recently, I have decided to never buy a lunchable again. My kids beg for them—I don’t know why—and I used to let them buy one per week. But I’m putting my foot down. Secondly, I will only let Luke buy school lunch once per month. He thinks I’m soooo mean (since there are two school lunches per month that he would like to buy) but until our school district starts providing lunches that don’t include disturbing offerings like the “chicken hipdipper” and a foot-long hotdog, he’s only getting one per month. I know, I know—I need to work on changing our district’s lunches in some way, but I’m giving myself until Silas turns one. These things I’m doing are tiny little steps, but they are my recent attempts at improving our family’s health and our impact on this earth. And we are still doing all the other stuff we’ve always done. Trying to buy mostly whole foods. Trying to buy as locally as possible. Trying to garden (we aren’t great at it, but I figure that we will improve each year, right?) Oh, the garden. I need to work on that. Right now it is a pile of compost. I’m feeling the crazy lurking over my shoulder, the I-have-a-baby-and-won’t-ever-accomplish-anything-again crazy. Like make a new banner for my blog.

Okay, now I’m really rambling. So much for thinking again.