Tuesday, May 26, 2009

Moving Day!

For the last week Kira has asked are we moving yet? Last night as I was putting them down to sleep, I told them "Guess what? We are moving tomorrow" and Kira simply replied "Thanks Mom, you are a nenius (genius)!"

Well it is about time for the actual move, we have packed and packed some more and we are finally out of the house today! The largest Uhaul available, two car trailers and a small trailer later and all of our "stuff" is going to be up there. How did we accumulate so much? I mean when we moved out of our apartment last year we had three weekends in a row of moving sales and sold a boat load of stuff. I could not imagine what we would have if we did not sell all of that stuff too.

Anyways I am looking forward to purging even more when we get our own place. For now we are going to stay with Eric's parents for about a month. Get jobs and such and find an apartment/house without rushing into anything.

Anyways I will write after the oh so fun drive. Thank goodness for the portable DVD players!

Sunday, May 24, 2009

Food Update and My Last Night of Work

So we have been Casein, Egg and Corn Free since Tuesday at lunch. Five days basically. It has been hard. I am so surprised how many things have corn in them. Well not just plain corn but corn syrup. Ketchup! Heinz Ketchup and Hunt's both have Corn Syrup in them. Trader Joe's has a ketchup with cane sugar instead but it definitely does not taste that same as my faithful old friend Heinz...oh well. Not that I drink a lot of soda but 90% of sodas are made with High Fructose Corn Syrup. Hansen's soda are made with cane sugar and I do love those. Then I came to the realization that most chocolate, hence the name milk chocolate has milk or if it is not milk chocolate it has you guessed it High Fructose Corn Syrup.


Needless to say, I am giving up a lot right now and I think I am having a few withdrawls. Because I am cranky, or it could be that there are a few things going on in my life and I am starting to feel even more overwhelmed, hum, maybe both:)


Last night was my "official" last night at the restaurant, whatever that means. I am still available if people need shifts covered in the future. It is such a small restaurant and there are no extra people around to fill in if anyone wants the night off.


It was a pretty uneventful night except for training the new girl and watching the Lakers kick some butt in the last two minutes as usual. The owners opened a bottle of Schramsberg Blanc de Blanc Sparkling Wine and we all toasted to my move. Yummy. I am sad because they are family but I know they are always there for me no matter what. Five years I worked there on and off between two pregnancies and such. They are amazing and I am going to miss them dearly.


The restaurant was sort of my escape from the kids in a way eventhough I often found myself talking about them the entire time I would be working. I think it is good for mom's to have a little job that a couple hours a week they can get away and sort of recharge and appreciate their family more and vice versa. Do not get me wrong I love my kids but there is not a mom out there that doesn't like even the alone time of grocery shopping by themselves I am sure. It is good to have a little time away.


Anyways I was so excited to wake up early and make it to first service this morning at 8:45. I dropped Kira off at the preschool class and them tried, key word "tried" to drop Enzo off at the toddlers room. He would not do it, he has not wanted me out of his sight for the last month because of all the changes. I tried sitting in the back with him but he was smacking on his veggie chips so loud I know it was distracting. Then we went back to the classroom and I tried to leave him, that lasted about eight minutes. I heard him crying all the way from the room to the sanctuary and then when I got paged I heard him all the way there. I know it is a season and I remember Kira going through the same thing but I really need to go to Church and hear a service people! I have not sat through a full sermon for two months. Mommy needs it!


So hopefully after the move I will sit in the new classroom two Sundays, maybe three and he will let me go into church.


I can not wait for our move and neither can Kira. She keeps asking are we moving today? Are we moving yet? Can we move already? I keep on answering, "Soon sweetie."

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Casein

I guess it would not be life if it was not crazy. So the last few days besides packing and dealing with the idea that we are moving this weekend!!! I have been dealing with Enzo and his poops again...wah wah WAH! I know he has not had any gluten and yet he has been pooping right after every meal and not normal poops. This is not good. So I begin thinking what if it is dairy, we do not eat that much but we have been eating more lately. I decided to search Casein in google. Casein is a milk protein and after a few google searches I found on a Celiac website a forum of GF people complaining of similar symptoms but with Casein. Oh wait it gets better. As I read on I found out that most likely he has a casein, egg and/or corn allergy too. We basically have corn tortillas everyday!

Well, it makes perfect sense after reading these comments. Basically when you are consuming gluten your body does not absorb nutrients properly. So his body has recovered and now after about a year he is actually absorbing these other possible allergens and I am seeing reactions with him and Kira.

Now what!!! I am going to take all three of us off dairy, corn and eggs for three weeks and then slowly reintroduce each seperately to see if there are reactions. Cooking is going to be so much fun(Not!). This is going to push me to find even better recipes now more than ever.

For instance, today for lunch we had rice bread avocado sandwiches, apples and grape tomato halves and yes, Kira actually ate a tomato and liked it. For dinner, I made rice noodles with a tomato basil sauce. Now, normally I would add parmesan cheese and a little dollup of butter to my sauce at the end to make it creamy. Instead I added a 1/4 cup of raw cashews to my sauce in the vita-mix and blended it until it was creamy. It was soooo good. I also had to make garlic bread without butter. I broiled the bread until it was a little toasted and then sprinkled garlic and sprayed canola oil on top for a little buttery-ness. It was pretty tasty considerering the alternate of just not having it.

I am going to have to perfect my pancake recipe without eggs and butter now :(

I think it is a good thing though. I know we do not eat that much processed foods but we eat our fair share. I want to eat more whole foods and I think this is the pushing limit to make me come up with better even more healthier recipes. I will definitely post them as they flop or taste good.

Sunday, May 3, 2009

We Are Moving!

Okay, it has been officially decided that we are moving in two weeks!
I gave my notice at the restaurant and we told my parents we were packing it up. I am happy. I am sad. I am excited. I am nervous.
I am uncertain about alot of the details.

I did send out my resume to quite a few restaurants in the area yesterday. One emailed me back wanting an interview which is exciting. It is very similar to my restaurant now. Thankfully most of our stuff is already packed and in storage and all I have to do is pack up our room and the living room with my sewing stuff and the kid's toys.

Kira asked me if we were taking her Jesse and Enzo's Woody dolls with us with a very serious look. I told her yes and that we were taking all of her toys and things. She was relieved and all of a sudden excited about moving.

Enzo does not even get it I think, I know he will hate the ride up in the car. The last trip up and back he pretty much cried the last 20 minutes each way.

So on another note, I took the kids to the nurse practioner on Thursday. I have done all of the homeopathic stuff I could think to do and the cough was not going away. So we went and it turns out Kira had double ear infection and Enzo had a sinus infection and it was turning into an ear infection. No it was not Swine Flu..haha. The kids are now on antibiotics. I hate giving them antibiotics but I realized I don't give it to them all the time like most parents. Enzo has only had antibiotics once because of pneumonia after his M.R.I. . Kira has taken them two other times, basically once a year for them. I really try to do everything but that, but what are you going to to?

On another side note, not sure if it is the sick thing or the fact that Enzo is two now but he has a new habit. He likes to tell me no repeatedly (that doesn't bother me so much) while hitting me or attempting to hit me (that bothers me). He will cry or scream "No, no, no, mama" and throw his fist at me for ten minutes at a time. How do you discipline this? Anyone?????

Depending upon the situation, I mainly tell heim he can not talk to me that way and I put him in a time out until he calms down or I just ignore him if it has only been a few minutes hoping it will stop without attention.

Can anyone help me please? I hope it is the fact that he does not feel very good and that is it. In the mean time enjoy a picture of him in his new tantrum pose!