Working Mom or SAHM: Does It Really Matter for Baby's Development?

"According to this study, would the ideal then, be to stay at home the first year and then to work?"

For babies whose mothers work outside the home, the positives may outweigh the negatives when it comes to baby development.

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crunchy mama?

Reading all about babies and baby health and baby gear and baby development has been a huge distraction from pharmacology and pathology. After all - when given a choice between picking out a stroller (do I want it in Spice or Sage?) and memorizing the names of anti-Tumor Necrosis Factor drugs and their toxicities - the former is so much more fun!

One of the divides I've been straddling is whether to go the green route or not. There's the smaller things: I think I'd like to make our own baby food (pureed carrots, bananas, and sweet potatoes are no match for our super-duper-Waring Pro blender!) And the bigger ones (I think I'd like to try for non-medicated labor & delivery).

But one of the decisions I waffle back and forth on is the cloth diaper issue. I like the idea of saving money, of not filling landfills with plastic pouches of poop, of reducing diaper rashes, and they are gosh darn cute! I've even done a lot of research and picked the brand I would like: FuzziBunz One Size! But the head and tail of it is - I'm going to be pretty darn busy with medical school, and the fewer laundry loads per week the better. And here's what I've started to wonder - is it hypocritical to push for cloth diapers, but not do cloth menstrual pads? Because I can't fathom doing cloth menstrual pads - the washing just sounds disgusting. And unsanitary. And I don't feel any qualms about buying disposables in bulk at Costco. For some reason, people don't seem to often extend the logic of cloth diapers to their own sanitary pads.

Medicine presents an interesting dilemma for those with crunchy/hippie/green tendencies. Since the germ theory caught on, there's a huge amount of waste that goes on in the name of sanitation and efficiency. Is there any good way around it?

Pregnancy!

Pregnancy is such a weird thing - it really forces you to realize that our bodies

are made to be functional, not to just sit around and look pretty. Because my body's been doing some crazy things - it's like going through a second puberty! Hormonal things doing weird things to your skin and appetite, your body growing and expanding, getting really tired. I've had to really let go of any self image issues and realize that - you know, I'm incubating a little person! It's okay to scare myself every time I step onto a scale!

And that's the really crazy part - it becomes clearer with each day that there's a little person inside. And he has a mind of his own (we're expecting a little boy!). We call him our little ninja - because he moves around like crazy! Adam could start feeling him doing roundhouse punches in my belly all the way somewhere between the 16th and 18th week. Now that he's bigger, it's a little more like tai chi - but they are huge movements that almost make me feel sick! I suspect we're going to have an active little one on

our hands. :)

The picture is from Colorado at at 7 months now - in the 3rd trimester! I find it hard to be patient for when we finally get to meet our little guy in October! :)
)

Thanksgiving Hymn

A beautiful hymn I pulled off the CCEF blog:

Come, ye thankful people, come

Come, ye thankful people, come, raise the song of harvest home;
All is safely gathered in, ere the winter storms begin.
God our Maker doth provide for our wants to be supplied;
Come to God’s own temple, come, raise the song of harvest home.

All the world is God’s own field, fruit unto his praise to yield;
Wheat and tares together sown unto joy or sorrow grown.
First the blade and then the ear, then the full corn shall appear;
Lord of harvest, grant that we wholesome grain and pure may be.

For the Lord our God shall come, and shall take his harvest home;
From his field shall in that day all offenses purge away,
Giving angels charge at last in the fire the tares to cast;
But the fruitful ears to store in his garner evermore.

Even so, Lord, quickly come, bring thy final harvest home;
Gather thou thy people in, free from sorrow, free from sin,
There, forever purified, in thy garner to abide;
Come, with all Thine angels come, raise the glorious harvest home.
—Henry Alford, 1844

One of the really good things about living in Dallas

Better than Dreyer's/Edy's, better than Haagen-Daz, and better than Tom & Jerry's, is Blue Bell ice cream! Adam and I have 3 tubs in our fridge. We like ice cream. And my definite favorite is the seasonal peppermint ice cream - if you come visit us around the holidays, we'll treat you.

Adam and I are starting to feel more like ourselves again, as if a heaviness has been lifted off our souls. Here's an analogy: if you take one of those stress reliever squishies that you get from career fairs and put a filing cabinet on top for a year, and then take the filing cabinet off, the squishy looks at first like it's permanently squished. But then it ever-so SLOOWLY starts to expand again. That's where we are. We'll try to revive our posting again. Meanwhile, check out our more 'academic,' less personal blogs at:

adamisblogging.blogspot.com
scribeintheward.blogspot.com

Cake the Magnifcent

This is before:
And this is after: I'm quite proud of this cake. :) This is the the class final cake - a buttermilk chocolate cake filled with hazelnut chocolate cream, topped with royal icing roses, rosebuds, violets and daisies, with buttercream basketweave and rope borders. And the cake was very good! The recipe is on my food blog http://inediblegrapes.blogspot.com . I've discovered that there are two essential tricks to cake decorating: 1) get the icing consistency right 2) colors matter a lot!

Doesn't this look tasty? Yes it does... Mmm.... and you're not getting a single piece!

Cake the first (with rainbow) and cake the second (with animals)

All hail the power of Wilton Method Cake Decorating Course I.

I'll confess this one took me five hours to decorate. But I'm quite proud of the animals I invented!

Melissa graduates!

Melissa graduated from Berkeley! I'm very proud of her for persevering through a very tough year.

Monument Ave. 10K

Adam and I ran our first 10K rce on April 5th. This 10K is a bit of a tradition here in Richmond. It's put on by Ukrop's, the local grocery behemoth. The run is along Monument Avenue, flanked on both sides by beautiful old colonial mansions and dotted in the middle by huge monuments to Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and all the heroes of the South.

My (Jenn's) parents were visiting and the Purdys were there, so we had fans to cheer us on! Even the rain didn't dampen our spirits (it actually made for lovely running weather), and we both made our goal times. The 6+ miles went by quickly, with all the people on the sidelines, water breaks, and the music. We had a blast and the race motivated us to get in shape, and we'd heartily recommend this to anyone. I'm afraid we're still not runners though: toss us a soccer ball or a frisbee anyday! Can you spot us at the finish line?

the hungry hungry catepillar

like my new sleeping bag?

squirrel love

Squirrels are annoying. They have wreaked destruction upon our ceiling, chewing holes in the ceiling above our family room, one in our closet, and 3 in our kitchen. I have to brush off bits of ceiling off our refrigerator when I'm reaching for the oatmeal. But for all that, they can have their cute moments too.

Things I'm thankful for about Richmond

- West End Presbyterian Church and the friends we've made there
- our small group Bible study
- Massey Cancer Center and the people I work with
- Lots of green trees!
- the Byrd Theater and $2 second-run movies
- Five Guys Burgers - juicy burgers with good meat, topped with sauteed mushrooms and onions. They knock the socks off of In-N-Out! (and they're Zagat rated too!)

Camping at Lake Sherando

Camping! So much fun. Jenn and I finally got a chance to go with our church and I may have a caught a bug. We had a great time. We were one of three couples there without children, and there were a total of 78 people. I am pretty sure children outnumbered adults on this trip.

The first night it was pouring down rain and howling wind, so we didn't bother setting up a tent. We slept in the back of the Subaru. The next day dawned beautifully, and we had a great day to go hiking in the lush forests.


Picture of our campground, with a nice foreground!



We went on a hike around the small lake and found...


NEWTS!!! They are hilarious creatures. Incredibly slow and awkward, these cute little guys would stand in the middle of the path in a "YOU SHALL NOT PASS" posture. I'm not really sure what they were trying to do, but they sure were silly looking.




Then we caught a frog, who despite an initial struggle...



Decided he liked us and sat in my hand for this great picture. And because we don't like frog legs...


We let him go. And continued our hike through the forest.



Which was absolutely beautiful.



And just full of life.

It was great hike and we came back quite tired that evening to a great dinner of fried chicken and some time of just sitting around a campfire roasting marshmallows.

In the night it was really cold around the mid 30's or so and really damp to boost, but it did provide some nice scenery on our way out.




It was a great trip and nice weekend to get out before it starts to get too cold.

Also Jennifer and I were encouraged and challenged by our pastor's sermon today. He dealt with a very difficult passage that has often discouraged me, but he did so without removing the passage's teeth. I hope you too may likewise be encouraged. Steve Shelby Heb. 6:4-9.

Adam and Jennifer go boating with the Pritchards!

The Pritchard sisters, Kerri and Robin, invited us to go boating with their family last weekend! We had a fantastic time. We met Kerri (first on the left) and Robin (third from left) through our church's a capella group, and they both have fantastic voices. One of the great things about Richmond is that the James River which bisects the city, and is lined on either side with big leafy green trees. And the water is warm too! So Robin and Kerri make waterskiing look as easy as pie:


and here's me. Clearly, the look of agonized concentration that one sees with constipation.That's about as much vertical lift as I got; I did manage some horizontal width however. You'll have to imagine the picture that comes next: me doing the splits. Boy, was I sore the next day.Water tension and I are not on good terms.

Ridin' through the streets of DC

Ever since I watched Weird Al's very funny "White and Nerdy" music video , I've wanted to ride on a Segway. And when Adam's family came to visit, Adam's parents took us on a Segway tour of DC! It was fantastic! I'd imagined that riding a Segway would be akin to riding a unicycle, but in fact it was very intuitive to ride. We felt like celebrities, with heads turning, people smiling, and tourists snapping pictures of us. The engineering design behind the segway is the best part about it. 5 gyroscopic sensors and 2 accelerometers measure the plane of motion, and when it senses a change in the balance, the platform moves to alleviate it. Very cool! I can't say our tour guide was very good at all in guiding us through our nation's capital, but I had a capital time on the Segway! I really thank God for giving me such wonderful in-laws too. Even an upset-stomach didn't keep Adam's mom from gallivanting around the capital!

We also were there in time for the cherry blossoms, and ate at some fantastic restaurants, and visited the Smithsonian museums! I was rather disappointed that the Smithsonian Museum of Natural History was mostly a stuffed-animal collection, rather than like the Exploratorium in San Francisco, but it did have a gorgeous rock collection. Funny, everyone else rushed past the minerals to get to the Hope Diamond and other jewelry. Give me this instead of the Hope Diamond any day!

Adam and I do make quite a colorful couple!

Eric & Melissa's Visit!

Melissa and Eric both came to visit on their spring breaks! It was a lot of fun, and they came just in time for the cherry blossoms here. We visited Maymont, which is what I consider one of Richmond's treasures, in addition to the Byrd Theater. Maymont is a large estate, with gardens, animal exhibits, and even a small aquarium with some amusing otters.

if the sheep just were wearing something orange, he'd be the spitting image of someone we know...

And for some reason, Adam and his friends always have a thing for trees