I thought maybe I could attempt to catch up on where I left off of here, but geesh!! it has been over a year!! I was pregnant with Samantha and now she is a whopping 7 1/2 mths old! So there is now way I could recap everything about this past year, and therefore I am just going to start from how things are going now. My kids are beautiful, smart and wonderful! Samantha is crawling and sitting and rolling over and walking along furniture. She has one walking toy that she will walk with if she ever stops dancing long enough to focus, lol. She dances way more than Maisie ever did. Speaking of Maisie, she is doing wonderful as well, although she has been slipping in the potty training area at home. Not sure what is going on, but there have been several times that she just pees where she is standing, no warning, nothing! It makes me so frustrated!! But we move on and hope she gets better, at least it isn't in public, so far she is great when we go out.
Maisie sure does get testy with her sister though, I know she loves her, but she seems to think she can treat her like her baby dolls. They will be playing in Maisie's room and then they will both come out, Maisie of course is in her panties, but then Sammy comes out behind her in just a diaper....and she was fully clothed before she enter the apparently clothing optional room. Of course Maisie insists that she can wear Sammy's clothes and struts around the house in very small apparel. This is all okay though, because they definitely keep each other entertained and therefore, I may have a few moments during the day to myself.
Maisie isn't napping anymore, she gave that up shortly after she turned 2, so I don't have a me time in the afternoon. Though Maisie and I have an agreement that is working out fairly well for the both of us. Sammy will take a nap in the afternoon anywhere from 1130 to 1pm and sleep for usually at least an hour, sometimes closer to two hours. Maisie, for those of you who may not know her, has a really hard time staying quiet so I take her into my bedroom and put something on the tv. Usually it is one of the feature films for families that my mom has sent us, and she will play with the iPod touch and/or watch the TV while I have a chance to workout on the elliptical that was given to me by a friend. I don't EVEN want to go into how out of shape I am, but I will say that I am working on being much more healthy. So Maisie is content during Sammy's nap and I get a semi-quiet time to do my thing. I will take it!
Speaking of being healthy, we have been making MAJOR changes to our eating, health and beauty, and cleaning lifestyle. I am making all of the soaps, cleaning supplies, shampoos, etc that is used for cleaning the house, and ourselves. I can't make my own make up so we are just going as "green" as possible on that front. As far as eating, there are several things that we have added to our 'diet' that we just can't live without anymore. The first was pure, unrefined coconut oil! This is almost a miracle product, not just for eating, but for health and beauty. I don't even buy lotion or chapstick anymore. You do the research, you will see how beneficial the coconut oil is for you inside and out. The second thing we have started is kefir! kefir is actually quite a big thing now depending on where you look. In a nutshell, it is like plain yogurt, but WAY more probiotic and SOOOOO much easier to make. It is also something that grows on its own, so you don't have to buy more once you have the grains. Anyways, do the research, another WONDERFUL healthy addition to our diet that we can't live without. We are starting to get off of the bleached flours and sugars and going all natural and pure. This is a little bit more difficult because apparently once flour is ground it loses all of its nutritional value in three days and since we can't grind our own wheat at the moment, we will have to be satisfied with the natural unbleached flour. As far as the sugar is concerned, we CAN buy, though a little more pricey, Sucanat which is way more nutritious than the extremely refined sugar that you buy in the store. We are trying to get off of the High Fructose Corn Syrup, do the research, it is bad! We are cooking MUCH more at home, trying to do whole foods, started canning, etc. We LOVE it! It is actually quite satisfying doing so much in the kitchen and making EVERYTHING, not to mention everything tastes SO good.
Anyways, this post is getting really long and kids are starting to go nuts, I better tend to them. It is almost time for Sammy's nap anyways. Hopefully I will have a few moments to keep up with what is going on in our house and not let the next post be a year from now! haha, we will see.
The McQuary Family
