Category Archives: Moms & Dads

TGIF-Weekend Reading….

Posted on by
Reply

Weekend Reading:

Weekend Sunrise

Weekend Sunrise

After a gloomy “warmish” in the 30’s week here in Chicago, I am ready for the weekend, along with a Friday night dinner with friends and a wishful but unlikely “rest filled” Saturday and Sunday and perhaps a sunrise like this one!

This essay from the back page of the Sunday Times Magazine is a nice read. I don’t know about you all, but I grew up in a large city that I hated, Yonkers, NY. Long ago, it was known as the “City of Gracious Living,” but to me, that never mattered. Thank goodness, it was right next to New York City, which was in my mind Yonkers’ only redeeming quality.

 

As we drove off, I was grateful for what Tujunga was for me: a hometown I wanted so desperately to leave, but that taught me to work for the ticket that would take me away.

“Free Range” parents, who allow their children freedom to walk to school at a young age are coming under fire not only on social media but also from local law enforcement and children’s protective services in some areas of the country.  Are you a “free range” or a “helicopter” parent?

 

Kids go to the park every day. But it’s not everyday the cops come calling because kids are spotted there, but that’s exactly what happened to the Meitiv family recently.

 

“We’re amazed this has become a national conversation because we’re just doing what our parents did or [what] was considered perfectly normal just one generation ago,” said Danielle Meitiv, who was investigated on two occasions by Child Protective Services (CPS) in Maryland after allowing her children, aged 6 and 10, to walk to and from school and the local playground alone.

 

As a nursing professional, who worked in labor and delivery, I am not a fan of home births. While I understand why moms would opt for this opportunity, I would not for just the reasons that appear in this mom’s story and post from Yummy Mummy Club.

 

Martin’s feelings are absolutely valid and an upsetting birth experience can have lasting effects on a mother and her family. But it’s wrong to scare women from wanting to go this route, because that decision is one which should come from research and discussion, not fear – one way or another. A certified, licensed midwife is a health care professional and they understand birthing risk. We can plan and hope for the best, but also be keenly aware (as I was throughout the labour) that it could easily go the other way, through no fault of our own. –

You probably notice that two topics above are from Yummy Mummy Club, which is one of my personal favorite sites. I follow YMC on Facebook and enjoy many of their posts. Go ahead and check them out!

Have a great weekend everyone! 🙂

Early Pregnancy – 6 Weeks

Posted on by
Reply

Early Pregnancy-6 Weeks

Pregnancy 6 weeks

Your baby is the size of a “lentil”.

 

Major developments during your 6th week of pregnancy:

  • Nose mouth and ears are beginning to take shape
  • There are dark spots where your baby’s eyes will be
  • Baby’s heart is beating 100-160 per minute,
  • Intestines are developing
  • New tissue that will become baby’s lungs is present
  • Baby’s pituitary gland is forming along with the rest of his brain, muscles and bones.
  • Baby is only 1/4 inch long

Quick Clicks:

Infections cannot always be avoided but there are ways to help limit your exposure.

  • Good hand washing
  • Not sharing glasses or utensils
  • Not cleaning cat litter
  • Gloves on when gardening
  • Staying away from anyone with a contagious disease
  • Avoiding food borne infections
  • Washing fruits and vegetable
  • Thoroughly cook meat, fish and eggs
  • Clean kitchen work surfaces

Personally you may feel emotionally labile, one day you are moody and maybe even sad the next day joy filled …this is somewhat normal. The emotional fluctuations are caused by hormones that are changing during pregnancy. You may also be thinking about how your life is changing along with your body and that can cause anyone to be emotional.

Spotting can be relatively common at this stage. Up to 25% of women experience this. It can be normal but it can also be a sign of a miscarriage. If you have any spotting or bleeding call your healthcare practitioner or go to the emergency room immediately.

By now, you are probably taking prenatal vitamins. Sometimes, they can be the cause of stomach upset. Many pregnant moms have this problem with their vitamins, including this writer, If this happens, check with your doctor or midwife. There are chewable vitamins that might work better for you during pregnancy.

Video-Fetal development weeks 1-9 

  BabyCenter.

Early Pregnancy – 5 Weeks

Posted on by
Reply

Early Pregnancy- 5 Weeks

Pregnancy Week5Sesame_424x302

Your baby embryo is about the size of a sesame seed at 5 weeks and looks more like a tadpole.

But despite how tiny your baby is, there is rapid growth continuing to happen. The heart is taking shape and beginning to beat. Wow!

Fetal development video weeks 1 through 9 

Some  pregnancy related discomforts:

  • sore breasts (wear a sports bra for comfort even when sleeping)
  • fatigue
  • frequent urination
  • nausea

Things to do for healthy pregnancy:

  • do not drink alcohol
  • continue exercising or begin to exercise with your health practitioner’s approval
  • see how your partner can participate in the months ahead
  • talk to your family about health history that might affect your baby or your pregnancy.
  • make sure your home and job are environmentally safe places (cleaning products, lead, fumes)
  • quit smoking
  • make a prenatal appointment
  • start taking prenatal vitamins

 

 

TGIF-Weekend Reading….

Posted on by
Reply

Weekend Reading!

bicycle in snow...maybe not this weekend

My picks for weekend reading after another cold week here in Chicago. The weekend looks like we will get a January thaw, you just might want to get outside or read these posts?

Daphne Brogdon is a blogger, blogger who also does stand-up comedy. She now has a gig on the Food Network, Daphne Dishes. Here is post about some of my conversation with her this week.

 

Today, I had the pleasure of enjoying a conference call with her. She answered questions about how she combines both worlds of blogging and cooking and how she came to the place where she is now with her own show Daphne Dishes on the Food Network.

Friends are precious and good friends are few, at least that has been my experience. What happens when a friend’s spouse dies or their child dies? How does your friendship change?

 

Friends are mostly a source of joy for me but as I get older I am finding that the more joy a friend brings me the more difficult it is when a friendship changes or ends.

Ringing in a New Year after the death of a spouse…how does one move on when the beloved is still inside you? One woman’s perspective:

 

So many of the men I meet on Match — the ones who are widowers, not those who are divorced — are still mourning the love of their life. She, their late wife, the mother of their children and grandmother of their children’s children, laughed at his jokes, travelled the world with him, comforted and warmed his bed at night. Now she is gone, never to return. After a while he feels the pull of the body’s biology and the heart’s longing, as do we all. “She” is not coming back, one must move on, so who else might there be, out there, he wonders, in the world-at-large?

So how does one move on, when the love of your life is gone, be it your husband or wife or another soul mate with whom you shared a life for many years or for several decades? In truth, you don’t move on; the beloved is still inside you. You just make room in your life for a new relationship, internally and externally, grateful to have had what you had, and grateful as well for the opportunity to care romantically for another human being before you “shuffle off this mortal coil.”

 

Here’s to a wonderful, warm weekend! Warm is relative!

Signs of Pregnancy

Posted on by
Reply

Early signs of Pregnancy

pregnancy

You may have signs of being pregnant before you have even missed your period. Many women mistake these early signs for premenstrual since they are very similar.

  • At 5 weeks pregnant 50% of women had some symptoms of pregnancy.
  • At 6 weeks pregnant 70% of women had some by 6 weeks.
  • At 8 weeks pregnant 90% of women had some by 8 weeks.

The first sign of pregnancy is usually a missed period. The most common symptoms to follow are:

  • nausea,
  • vomiting,
  • fatigue,
  • frequent urination, and
  • breast tenderness and swelling.

These symptoms can be mild or severe.

Other signs of pregnancy that women reported by 8 weeks of pregnancy include:

  • Mild uterine cramping or discomfort (without bleeding)
  • Abdominal bloating
  • Constipation
  • Heartburn
  • Nasal congestion
  • Shortness of breath
  • Food cravings or aversions
  • Mood changes
  • Lightheadedness
  • Spider veins
  • Itchy palms
  • Increased skin pigmentation (on the face, linea alba, or breast areolas)
  • via Early pregnancy symptoms: What will I feel and when? | BabyCenter.

 

TGIF-Weekend Reading….

Posted on by
Reply

Weekend Reading!

My picks for weekend reading

After an arctic cold week here in Chicago, I am really glad to see Friday and the weekend roll around, with the sun shining outside my window as I write this post. I am not letting the sun fool me – it is only 7 degrees outside with a below zero windchill of minus 11 degrees! Yikes!

I am going to post a picture that you can use for some meditation or as just a reminder of a more comfortable summer day on the water-my personal happy place!

Weekend

A Day at the Beach…Martha’s Vineyard

 

Seeking women over 50! Do you want to make a big change in 2015? Read this, it might help you with your resolution.

 

Dear Readers,

We’re seeking 15 women age 50 and older who plan to make a radical change in their lives in 2015. Whether your New Year’s resolution is to strike out on your own, reinvigorate your marriage, get healthy — through diet, exercise or something else — start a business, adopt a child, overcome a fear or learn a new skill in 2015, we want to hear from you. The aim is to create an inspiring initiative that reminds us it’s never too late to change your life, pursue your passion, or prioritize personal happiness and wellbeing over traditional definitions

 

How do kids organize and control their world. There is no gray for them, knowing this just might help you understand their behavior.

 

In fact, black-or-white thinking helps kids organize and control their world. As they put things into one of two categories – like or dislike, fun or boring – they make predictions about behaviors and situations. Being able to do this shows they can understand two very different ideas at the same time.

 

How are you going to find social connections as you get older? Do you respect the Virtual Village concept?

 

Then he ran across the idea of virtual retirement villages, whose members pay a yearly fee to gain access to resources and social connections that help them age in place. Sold on the concept, Mr. Cloud joined with some friends to start Capital City Village four years ago.

I hope you all have a warm and wonderful weekend!

Twenty Innocent Children…Don’t Forget Them

Posted on by
Reply

Have You Hugged Your Children Today?

children

Tonight, I am reminded by my friend and fellow ChicagoNow blogger, Sheila Quirke, aka. Mary Tyler Mom that tomorrow marks two years since the horrific and violent tragedy at Sandy Hook. Twenty innocent children lost their young lives along with their teachers and others at school that day.

I am thinking of their families, their parents, siblings, grandparents and all those who knew and loved these little ones.

It makes me cry.

I can’t even imagine the utter pain that these families have suffered over the past two years and how they will continue to suffer from such a tragic loss.

Nothing is more devastating than the death of a child.

What continues to scare me to the core is the everyday violence that we have almost come to expect when turning on the news. It seems that each day since that violent shooting, there have been more and more gun related deaths.

It breaks my heart when I hear about another child that is an innocent victim of a shooting. Children should be safe in school and in their homes…they should be safe walking to and from their neighborhood school…they should be safe in playgrounds.

But sadly, they are not.

I have been following and supporting the work and progress of Sandy Hook Promise along with reading the shared stories by Daniel Barden’s dad.  Mark Barden writes so beautifully about his son, Daniel, who lost his life that day as a first grader in Newtown.

Mark Barden lovingly writes how Daniel was such a sensitive child especially when it came to the needs of others, I feel like I knew his gorgeous little boy with the beautiful smile.

I keep reading Mark’s emails and his stories, hoping against hope that somehow, some way this nightmare will go away.

It will not.

This is a “living nightmare” for Daniel’s family. However, through his sorrow, Mark and the other members of Sandy Hook Promise are trying to make a difference with their work surrounding gun control.

I support Sandy Hook Promise and I pray that others will support their work too. It will not bring back their little ones but it hopefully will prevent some other families from suffering a similar tragedy caused by someone with a gun.

Sheila has written a post at ChicagoNow that I recommend reading. It is not easy to ponder the events of this horrible day but if we do not remember our past we will be forced to repeat it.

Thank you Sheila for your thoughtful words.

Two years ago tonight, twenty families in Newtown, Connecticut tucked their first graders into bed for the very last time.  These children got on their pajamas, some of them might have bathed, they brushed their teeth, complaining about it, I imagine.  Their moms and dads might have read them books and sung them songs.  And then, for the very last time, they turned out the light and said. “Good night.”

via Read This Before You Tuck Your Children Into Bed Tonight | Mary Tyler Mom.

Holidays and Indulgent Grandparents…

Posted on by
Reply

Grandparents and Gifts

grandparents

The holidays are almost here and gifts will be pouring in from relatives to your children especially well meaning grandparents. It can quickly get overwhelming for you as parents and your kids. This is not a good feeling.

What if anything do you do to control the amount and type of gifts your kids receive at Christmas and Hanukah?

Let’s assume that most grandparents are well meaning even though you may think that sometimes they have lost their minds when it comes to gift giving.

grandparents

If it is not too late, try to have a conversation with them about what your children would like for gifts and what actually might be some really great gifts. This is not always a comfortable conversation to have but if you sandwich your points between two positive comments, it can soften the discussion. You might begin a conversation by telling them how helpful they have been recently, being specific and then swing into the gift topic.

Always end discussions like this with another positive thought as it leaves the conversation with an upbeat feeling instead of a decree about how you are raising your children and what grandparents can and cannot give them as gifts. To me, it is a blessing to have a grandchild.

My motto here, is to be kind as you never know what kind of day your family members are dealing with…we all have our difficulties to negotiate each day.

 

TGIF-Some Weekend Reading

Posted on by
Reply

TGIF

TGIF

I love reading about the brain and all of the discoveries that have been made since I first began studying to be a nurse at NYU in 1970. At that time, we knew relatively little about the brain compared to the present. With the advent of MRI and the PET scan, we now know much more about the brain’s plasticity, how the brain works and changes as we develop and age.

Read about how “curiosity” affects how we learn…

 

“Curiosity may put the brain in a state that allows it to learn and retain any kind of information, like a vortex that sucks in what you are motivated to learn, and also everything around it“. This means that once the brain is stimulated via curiosity, it is much more effective at learning and memory functions.

 

TGIF

Vaccines are important, as is herd immunity, which has become a news item very recently since the outbreaks of pertussis in some areas of the country.

I believe it is important to understand all the facts about vaccination and community living before you choose to leave your child unprotected and susceptible to a deadly disease which has been under control for so many years.

We now have Ebola on our shores…I am wondering how many people would opt for a vaccination against Ebola if it were available?

And that’s where I feel like it’s legitimate for us to examine what they’re doing around vaccination. Because it is a question of citizenship. That can get forgotten as we get more and more isolationist in the way we approach parenting and families. There’s so much emphasis on making it a perfect world within the home, on making it non-toxic and sealed off from the world and safe in every way. It becomes this bubble we bring up the child within. And the more we bubble ourselves, we let ourselves pretend that we can create an alternate little world in the home. It lets us forget the ways in which we are essentially dependent on the community at large and what we owe the community at large.

 

TGIF

Is parenthood a type of religion? Are you afraid to criticize your own child even if it is “constructive” criticism? How does your own marriage fare compared to your relationship with your children?

All interesting thoughts to consider as we raise our children and grandchildren. How is our culture determining the future of our kids and our marriages. Remember, Amy Chua and her book about being a Tiger Mom? The reaction was fierce…it was a cultural difference.

Have a look at our own culture!

Another sign of the parenthood religion is that it has become totally unacceptable in our culture to say anything bad about our children, let alone admit that we don’t like them all of the time. We are allowed to say bad things about our spouses, our parents, our aunts and uncles, but try saying, “My kid doesn’t have a lot of friends because she’s not a super likable person,” and see how fast you get dropped from the PTA.

This week TGIF is posted late…but I sure hope you read it!

Related posts: https://parentingintheloop.com/2013/01/25/weekend-reading-2/

TGIF…Some Weekend Reading!

Posted on by
1

TGIF

 

TGIF

Fall Weekend

 

For too many reasons to list, I have been absent from ParentingintheLoop for awhile.

I missed writing and hopefully will be getting back into my routine.

This week there were so many things that caught my eye while looking through parenting posts. Back-to-school is always a time of year that has been a struggle for me. Getting settled into a routine and the shortening of daylight leaves me sometimes anxious for what the winter will bring. I am an optimist but Fall has its sentimental moments which are not always my favorites.

Cooking is my time to relax and lately I have been throwing my efforts into more healthy choices for all three meals of the day especially lunches. I have been drawn to some interesting recipes and since we have a nut allergy in our family that is something that keeps me looking for homemade food choices especially when it comes to snacks.

Here goes some of my choices from this week. TGIF!

I love granola and most are exposed to nuts in the processing or contain nuts so they do not have a place on my kitchen shelves. I haven’t tried this recipe yet, but it looks very promising and a great snack or something to throw in my bag to munch on while running the day’s endless errands.

In case you’ve missed the commercials and advertising that we have been inundated with since mid-July, it’s Back-to-School time! Parents everywhere are reluctantly turning their attention to that universally dreaded task—packing the lunchbox. While I am a well-known proponent of unexciting lunches, I do like to dazzle the children with a variety of homemade treats.

 

 

Don’t get me wrong, I do not and simply cannot make everything from scratch… with my schedule this is impossible . As much as I would love to do scratch cooking there are some shortcuts that I do take. As a grandmother, I have learned to accept my limitations albeit sometimes not so gracefully. Limitation is not something  to which I willingly succumb, being limited makes me feel old but on the other hand I have to be realistic and acknowledge that I cannot do everything. It is better to prioritize what is truly important and let the other things take care of themselves. This post from Yummy Mummy Club Canada made me think about some of the convenience foods that although they sound healthy their ingredient list belies their nourishing label.

See what you think. TGIF.

 

But when I do buy packaged foods—after all, they do come in handy now and again when you’re a busy parent—I rarely read the nutrition facts table. Instead, I skip right to the ingredients list, which is the most important bit of information on the package or box. The shorter the list, the better, and ideally you want to see real food ingredients instead of fillers, stabilizers, and additives.

 

One of my favorite cook books Homemade With Love is from Jennifer Perillo. She is an exceptional scratch cook and I love her recipes. A few years ago, I had the pleasure of meeting her and actually enjoying a luncheon she prepared at her hotel her in Chicago. I credit Jennie with bringing me back into the kitchen after being an empty nester for several years. If she could prepare such a lovely lunch in a hotel room kitchen I should be able to return to my kitchen easily with her cookbook in my hands.

Jennifer just announced yesterday that her first issue of Simple Scratch Cooking : A Homecook’s Journal for Making Easy, Everyday Meals will be out in October. I am beyond excited to receive my copy soon…in time for the winter when I find the most comfort in cooking a lovely meal at dinner time. TGIF

 

I’m leaping, and my heart is beating out of my chest as I do so. Finally taking a little control of my professional destiny with this project. So, here it goes…
The first issue of Simple Scratch Cooking: A Homecook’s Journal for Making Easy, Everyday Meals is available for preorder. If you believe in me, and my work, please share with everyone you know. I’m offering a 10% special discount for orders placed by 10/15/14 (use code SSC1015 at checkout). I plan to spend what would’ve been our 10th wedding anniversary on 10/16 packing, and shipping, the inaugural issue.
http://injennieskitchen.storenvy.com/products/9951769-simple-scratch-cooking-a-homecooks-journal-for-making-easy-everyday-meals

 

Here’s to a wonderful weekend. TGIF everyone!