Lately the Tiny Goddess has been nursing a lot. No, really, A Lot. She'd nurse as much as Miss Mousie if I let her. Many times I have to choose which one to let scream (nursing both at the same times doesn't always work for me, though I do sometimes).
I am trying to shed at least 60 lbs (which would still have me in the "overweight" category according to some). Of course exercise is how I'm going to do it because I can't just stop eating. I am hungry almost all the time. Now, that would be fine except it is hard to watch one's weight when every meal is eating out. (Because of the move and all.)
So I try to pack in the protein for as little calories as possible. Higher protein breakfasts, avoiding lots of white flour and junk, ect.
Here is the kicker, though. I read about what other people eat and am amazed at how they survive on so little. Were I to have a meal like some of these I read about, I'd be faint with hunger half an hour later.
So for now I guess I just need to focus on nutrition and getting enough to eat. Later when I'm in my own kitchen I can figure out how to shed the weight. I think my goal for the next however many days left is to not gain any weight.
And with that, I'm hungry again! I think I'll eat a protein bar (thank goodness for them, I know they aren't a whole food, but they really do help me out) and glug a half gallon of water. (Yes, that's right. I can drink that much water at one sitting.)
It's not so much that I have an eating disorder as much as disordered eating. I'm finding ways to avoid comfort eating (not having snacks around helps, but then I get hungry so I need to have snacks around... you see my issue. Fruit doesn't really help when I crave protein, yet I sometimes overdo it on the nuts.)
The tiny Goddess has lost her shoe and is screaming "Uuuuh-Oh!" at me. Plus she stinks. Protein bar will have to wait.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Monday, November 10, 2008
our new European lifestyle...
My plan for our new life in Europe involves lots of walking and biking. We will be 3 to 4 miles out of town, but very close to things like the beach (surfing!) a castle, and an art center/theatre type place. We also will have a nice long paved driveway.
Long paved driveway are really good things to have if you have children and bikes. Since we were under our 1500 lb weight limit, we wound up being able to take all of our bikes and our bike trailer. A few folks need new helmets, and the baby is months away from being old enough to ride in the trailer, but we have a long paved driveway. The baby can sit and watch us ride and ride. When I was the Artist's age, I was really into this book series about a girl named Trixie Belden (come on Trixie fans, give a shout out!). She lived in upstate New York and her and her friends rode horses and solved mysteries. Perfect! I, being a tomboy towhead like dear Trixie, was Trixie, our friend was Honey, and my sister was Di. (Interestingly enough we had prescribed roles for Star Wars play when we played with our friend, Mike. I've gone over that time and time again with the Explorer.) Our bikes were our horses. We would ride up and down our long paved driveway and pretend to solve mysteries. We even had our own club, "The Originals", which had a songbook (typed painfully on a typewriter and kindly copied by my Dad at his work) and meetings (a few). We tried to solve a mystery even (like the mystery of who was breaking into the Lucy Elementary bookstore). Our mascot was of course the Bobwhite. I wonder if I'm assuming too much from my readers. Have y'all heard of this series? It's so good. Nancy Drew was too much into boys and lipstick for my tastes, but Trixie felt just right. (Once she saved her brother's life after he was bitten by a copperhead by sucking the venom out of the wound!) Ah, Trixie, I love you.
By the way, in Star Wars play, Mike was Luke Skywalker, my sister was Princess Leia, and I was Hans Solo.
Oh, now about our lifestyle. Today we walked to lunch. I thought it would be hardest on one of the kids. Not so. It was hardest on me! My hips are just aching. When the boys were little, I rode my bike around for miles almost every day with them in the bike trailer. I would walk at least a mile a day with the big one in the stroller and the little one in a (very uncomfortable) backpack (and he was my fattest baby believe it or not!). Now, a mere few blocks of baby carrying in a nice comfy wrap has me aching and complaining.
I have to get in shape! (Another flashback, anyone remember get in shape girl?)
Trixie has a website! http://www.trixie-belden.com/
Long paved driveway are really good things to have if you have children and bikes. Since we were under our 1500 lb weight limit, we wound up being able to take all of our bikes and our bike trailer. A few folks need new helmets, and the baby is months away from being old enough to ride in the trailer, but we have a long paved driveway. The baby can sit and watch us ride and ride. When I was the Artist's age, I was really into this book series about a girl named Trixie Belden (come on Trixie fans, give a shout out!). She lived in upstate New York and her and her friends rode horses and solved mysteries. Perfect! I, being a tomboy towhead like dear Trixie, was Trixie, our friend was Honey, and my sister was Di. (Interestingly enough we had prescribed roles for Star Wars play when we played with our friend, Mike. I've gone over that time and time again with the Explorer.) Our bikes were our horses. We would ride up and down our long paved driveway and pretend to solve mysteries. We even had our own club, "The Originals", which had a songbook (typed painfully on a typewriter and kindly copied by my Dad at his work) and meetings (a few). We tried to solve a mystery even (like the mystery of who was breaking into the Lucy Elementary bookstore). Our mascot was of course the Bobwhite. I wonder if I'm assuming too much from my readers. Have y'all heard of this series? It's so good. Nancy Drew was too much into boys and lipstick for my tastes, but Trixie felt just right. (Once she saved her brother's life after he was bitten by a copperhead by sucking the venom out of the wound!) Ah, Trixie, I love you.
By the way, in Star Wars play, Mike was Luke Skywalker, my sister was Princess Leia, and I was Hans Solo.
Oh, now about our lifestyle. Today we walked to lunch. I thought it would be hardest on one of the kids. Not so. It was hardest on me! My hips are just aching. When the boys were little, I rode my bike around for miles almost every day with them in the bike trailer. I would walk at least a mile a day with the big one in the stroller and the little one in a (very uncomfortable) backpack (and he was my fattest baby believe it or not!). Now, a mere few blocks of baby carrying in a nice comfy wrap has me aching and complaining.
I have to get in shape! (Another flashback, anyone remember get in shape girl?)
Trixie has a website! http://www.trixie-belden.com/
Sunday, November 9, 2008
and so we begin
I'm trying to decide whether or not to blog from here or from Facebook. I am not sure how private this blog is and honestly not sure who I want to be able to read what I put here.
Right now we are in a hotel "in town" for about two weeks while we wait for our flight. While it is nice to be done with all the packing and such, I still can't believe we are moving. I have always wanted to live out of the country, but never thought I would. Now that I am, well, I'm just amazed by it all.
The title of this blog is the Welsh word for friend. I know, it makes for a hard to remember title, but I like the idea of that.
I think now that I have space for anything not move related I can begin again to think about homeschooling. So that is what this post will be about.
I have, in the past, tried to cram too many things into our school day. I'm going to change that this time around. Since we will be just settling into our new home, I'm going to keep it light and fun for December and honestly I'm going to work to make things more fun in general.
I bought this book of monthly ideas for December from this educational supply store. It is full of little coloring sheet activity things involving the December holidays. I'm thinking for each week of December (yes even Christmas week), I will have a different holiday to focus on. Now, please realize I don't have the book in front of me, so there is a good chance I will change all of this. For the first week of December, we will do St. Nicholas day. We'll learn a little bit about the history of St. Nicholas and a little about Holland. For the second week, Santa Lucia day with a little bit about Sweden. I forgot what the rest of the weeks were, (don't have the book in front of me), but I do think I will cover Hannukah, Kwanza, Winter Solstice, and Las Posadas. Italy and the story of Befana (I'm unsure if I'm spelling this all correctly) will be touched on the first week of January.
I would like the kids to learn a few carols, too. I'll probably start this with them this week. Basically I will just start singing them a lot. I think we'll do The Holly and the Ivy (we kind of know this one already) and then I don't know what else. Wonder if there is a Welsh carol we can learn?
What we will be doing each week is just a simple little bit of reading about the holiday, find the country on the map, and maybe make some kind of goodie. We'll also do math and reading and writing. I found this and I'm going to use some ideas from there for writing prompts for the Artist. I'm not going to buy the book, I'm going to just use the ideas and have him write it in his journal. I also found some ideas here and here. I'm going to use the time between us getting settled in and when our homeschool books come in to work really hard with the Artist on basic multiplication facts.
The Explorer will continue with his therapy work and with Max and Lewis alphabet stories. Max and Lewis are these two brothers. Max is the same age as the Artist, Lewis the same age as the Explorer. Max and Lewis have two younger sisters named Lily and Poppy (and they are the same age as the Tiny Goddess and the baby aka Miss Mousie). Lewis is of course the main character of these stories when I tell them to the Explorer. Turns out, their family is also planning a big move except instead of moving to a new country they are moving to a new planet! Lewis learned A while watching his dad fly off in a rocket to visit the new planet (his dad was a little bit scared and so he screamed out, "Aaaaaaaaa!" Also the rocket was shaped like an A.) Lewis learned about Bb when Lily got ahold of Poppy's bear and smushed him into a ball and hit him with a stick. (Poor little Poppy!) Lily has more mischief in store when she takes a big bite out of Lewis's cookie to make it into a C shape. (I was going to have a story about cats, but since we just gave away our cats, it is too fresh to make them into our story.) I'm just going to have fun with the stories and take as long as it takes to get through the alphabet.
I'm post phoning science, history, and Latin until after the first of the year. I think I will do some light spelling work, but just based on words the Artist misspells. He has been asking about copywork, believe it or not, so we will do some of that, too. After the first of the year, I would like to introduce some dictation but we will see.
I have this grammar lesson series based on A Cricket in Times Square. I started it back in the fall but dropped it. I may or may not do it in December. Probably I won't do it until after the first of the year, though.
So there you have it. I also have decided what to do about this blog. For now, I'm keeping it public. I like having the option of just babbling on about homeschool stuff and on my facebook blog I think it may not interest other folks. Plus I like the idea of being able to revise my ideas out loud so to speak.
Right now we are in a hotel "in town" for about two weeks while we wait for our flight. While it is nice to be done with all the packing and such, I still can't believe we are moving. I have always wanted to live out of the country, but never thought I would. Now that I am, well, I'm just amazed by it all.
The title of this blog is the Welsh word for friend. I know, it makes for a hard to remember title, but I like the idea of that.
I think now that I have space for anything not move related I can begin again to think about homeschooling. So that is what this post will be about.
I have, in the past, tried to cram too many things into our school day. I'm going to change that this time around. Since we will be just settling into our new home, I'm going to keep it light and fun for December and honestly I'm going to work to make things more fun in general.
I bought this book of monthly ideas for December from this educational supply store. It is full of little coloring sheet activity things involving the December holidays. I'm thinking for each week of December (yes even Christmas week), I will have a different holiday to focus on. Now, please realize I don't have the book in front of me, so there is a good chance I will change all of this. For the first week of December, we will do St. Nicholas day. We'll learn a little bit about the history of St. Nicholas and a little about Holland. For the second week, Santa Lucia day with a little bit about Sweden. I forgot what the rest of the weeks were, (don't have the book in front of me), but I do think I will cover Hannukah, Kwanza, Winter Solstice, and Las Posadas. Italy and the story of Befana (I'm unsure if I'm spelling this all correctly) will be touched on the first week of January.
I would like the kids to learn a few carols, too. I'll probably start this with them this week. Basically I will just start singing them a lot. I think we'll do The Holly and the Ivy (we kind of know this one already) and then I don't know what else. Wonder if there is a Welsh carol we can learn?
What we will be doing each week is just a simple little bit of reading about the holiday, find the country on the map, and maybe make some kind of goodie. We'll also do math and reading and writing. I found this and I'm going to use some ideas from there for writing prompts for the Artist. I'm not going to buy the book, I'm going to just use the ideas and have him write it in his journal. I also found some ideas here and here. I'm going to use the time between us getting settled in and when our homeschool books come in to work really hard with the Artist on basic multiplication facts.
The Explorer will continue with his therapy work and with Max and Lewis alphabet stories. Max and Lewis are these two brothers. Max is the same age as the Artist, Lewis the same age as the Explorer. Max and Lewis have two younger sisters named Lily and Poppy (and they are the same age as the Tiny Goddess and the baby aka Miss Mousie). Lewis is of course the main character of these stories when I tell them to the Explorer. Turns out, their family is also planning a big move except instead of moving to a new country they are moving to a new planet! Lewis learned A while watching his dad fly off in a rocket to visit the new planet (his dad was a little bit scared and so he screamed out, "Aaaaaaaaa!" Also the rocket was shaped like an A.) Lewis learned about Bb when Lily got ahold of Poppy's bear and smushed him into a ball and hit him with a stick. (Poor little Poppy!) Lily has more mischief in store when she takes a big bite out of Lewis's cookie to make it into a C shape. (I was going to have a story about cats, but since we just gave away our cats, it is too fresh to make them into our story.) I'm just going to have fun with the stories and take as long as it takes to get through the alphabet.
I'm also going to start up doing "reading lessons" with the Explorer. The lessons are based on ideas from the book Teach a Child to Read with Children's Literature
I'm post phoning science, history, and Latin until after the first of the year. I think I will do some light spelling work, but just based on words the Artist misspells. He has been asking about copywork, believe it or not, so we will do some of that, too. After the first of the year, I would like to introduce some dictation but we will see.
I have this grammar lesson series based on A Cricket in Times Square. I started it back in the fall but dropped it. I may or may not do it in December. Probably I won't do it until after the first of the year, though.
So there you have it. I also have decided what to do about this blog. For now, I'm keeping it public. I like having the option of just babbling on about homeschool stuff and on my facebook blog I think it may not interest other folks. Plus I like the idea of being able to revise my ideas out loud so to speak.
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