I have been off sugar for a week now.  I am still doing this seem­ingly crazy thing.  I’m a lit­tle proud of myself for stick­ing with it.  I’m not always a stick with it kind of per­son.  Some­times, I like to get my toes wet and be done with it.

These past cou­ple days have actu­ally been a bit harder than the first few.  I’m not sure if I had my start up momen­tum that got me going or what.  Lately I’ve been feel­ing like I’ve done enough now and it’s time for a brownie.  I have resisted, but it’s a lot less fun and excit­ing on day 7 than it was on day 1.  I am notic­ing a bit more energy, although it hasn’t been a dras­tic change so obvi­ous I can­not deny it.  I’m impa­tient.  I know. 

One thing I am miss­ing is good fruit right now.  I live in North Dakota, and sadly, this time of year is not exactly the best for fruit.  At a time when I’m also miss­ing sweets in gen­eral, I am wish­ing for bet­ter qual­ity and bet­ter selec­tion when it comes to the fruit I’m choosing.

All in all, it seems to be going well, and I think I am accom­plish­ing my some­what unex­cit­ing goal.  Onward and upward, I am keep­ing on for at least another week (to Thanksgiving).

Well, maybe not per­fect but it was very cute.

Today, my kids went to my sister-in-law’s pho­tog­ra­phy stu­dio to have their 2 year (sec­ond try for these), 4 year, and Christ­mas pic­tures.  I wasn’t com­pletely sure how things were going to go.  I had an idea though.  I thought that K would prob­a­bly be mostly coop­er­a­tive for a while.  I fig­ured that A would be reluc­tant, and we would be lucky to get any 2 year or Christ­mas pictures.

We took A to have his 2 year pic­tures taken in July, but it was too much for him and too dif­fer­ent.  He wasn’t at all inter­ested in stand­ing in front of her back­drop.  He didn’t like her stuffed bird that helps her.  He didn’t want to sit on her chair or stand on her step stool.  We didn’t push it.  A has always been slow to warm up, so I knew push­ing him wasn’t going to be the answer.

This time, I decided to prac­tice ahead of time.  Sev­eral months ago, I read a blog post I, of course, can­not find or remem­ber where it came from.  It sug­gested that when encoun­ter­ing new sit­u­a­tions, par­ents should prac­tice ahead of time with their kids.  The mom who wrote the blog post talked about going to the den­tist and how she and her daugh­ter role played what might hap­pen.  If any­one knows where this post came from, please let me know.  I’d love to link to it.

So, last night, we got the vests out that the boys were plan­ning to wear in their pic­tures.  We put a blan­ket over the back of the couch.  I got a puppy to be my helper, and we took some pic­tures.  I told the boys where to sit.  I had Jason sit with them, too.  I also had them prac­tice stand­ing together and hav­ing K put his arm around A.  Then, we reversed roles.  K took our pic­tures.  He posed me and Jason.  He got to have the puppy as his helper.  It was a quick activ­ity.  I wasn’t sure it had made any dif­fer­ence at all.  Today was going to be the test.

When we went to have their pic­tures taken, I was wait­ing to see how A reacted.  Their Aun­tie Tera was great with them.  She had K take his pic­tures first.  He def­i­nitely worked the cam­era.  Next, came the pic­tures of the boys together.  I held my breath and waited to see what hap­pened.  Then, I saw a smile.  And another!  I was so excited!  I was prac­ti­cally beam­ing by the time A had his pic­tures.  I can say with cer­tainty that we are going to have some pretty cute hand­some pic­tures and Christ­mas cards!  I can’t wait to see them.  Thanks again, Tera!

Here are a cou­ple of the pic­tures from our prac­tice ses­sion.  They aren’t quite the same as the ones we’ll be send­ing out in a cou­ple weeks.

The food prop

With Dad

Not look­ing at cam­era

I’ve been on Twit­ter for quite a while now.  For a while, I felt sat­is­fied (for lack of a bet­ter word) with my par­tic­i­pa­tion if I updated my sta­tus once a day.  I won­dered what the appeal of it was.  I had actu­ally known some peo­ple who said they had fallen in love with it.  They said they were addicted.  I won­dered what I was missing.

This sum­mer, I attended BlogHer’09, and at BlogHer, I met so many won­der­ful and inter­est­ing peo­ple.  At that time, I was hav­ing a really hard time keep­ing up with read­ing all the blogs I had in my reader, so I wasn’t sure how I was going to keep track of all the peo­ple I had met and seen at BlogHer.  Then, I real­ized Twit­ter was my answer.  Instead of inform­ing peo­ple about what I was doing, I could par­tic­i­pate in a con­ver­sa­tion.  A cou­ple months ago, I was talk­ing with friends and they were won­der­ing what the pur­pose of Twit­ter was.  They were happy with Face­book, and they weren’t sure why they would want to join one more social net­work to talk with their same friends.  At that point, I had a hard time explain­ing what I found to be the difference.

Now that I’ve thought about it a bit, I think I can explain the dif­fer­ence (for me).  Most of my Face­book friends are friends from high school, col­lege, or activ­i­ties I’ve been a part of.  They are peo­ple who I have had a per­sonal rela­tion­ship with for a sig­nif­i­cant amount of time.  I can see pic­tures of them and their fam­i­lies.  I can read about their day to day activ­i­ties.  I can send an invi­ta­tion to a get together, say hi, or catch up with some­one quickly and eas­ily.  Twit­ter is a bit dif­fer­ent for me.  Most of the peo­ple I fol­low and those who fol­low me are not peo­ple I know per­son­ally.  Many are experts in their area or blog­gers I enjoy and respect.  Some are com­pa­nies whose prod­ucts I use and enjoy.  Some are friends and fam­ily mem­bers, too.  I also real­ized that for me, my Face­book page is more about me.  It is what I am doing right now, my fam­ily, pic­tures of us, and links I like.  Twit­ter (again, for me) has become more about being a part of a con­ver­sa­tion.  I still make my posts about what I am doing or some­thing cute my kids have said.  How­ever, more and more, I am read­ing posts about top­ics I might not oth­er­wise encounter.  I can ask ques­tions of peo­ple with dif­fer­ent expe­ri­ences and resources.  I can still share inter­est­ing arti­cles and blog posts.

Over the past 6 months, I have come to really enjoy Twit­ter, and I’m always look­ing for new peo­ple to fol­low.  I am CBerbs.  Who are you and who do you fol­low that you enjoy?

So, a cou­ple days ago, I wrote about being 30 and NOT hav­ing a cri­sis about it.  In one of the com­ments, Rachel said she’d like to see 29 accom­plish­ments that I have had in my first 29 years.  Ask and you shall receive.  Although I write my blog for me, I’m always open to ideas for posts, espe­cially dur­ing NaBloPoMo.

1. I stayed with a host fam­ily in Japan for 6 weeks when I was 17.
2. I climbed part of Mt. Fuji.  I rode the sub­way and train by myself in Tokyo.
3. I ate things I didn’t even know were meant to be eaten!
4. I com­pleted a dou­ble major (ele­men­tary and mid­dle level edu­ca­tion) with 2 areas of con­cen­tra­tion (math and social sci­ences) in 4.5 years.
5. I earned a 4.0 in grad school.
6. I fin­ished grad school in 14 months while teach­ing full time.
7. I mar­ried a fine man at the age of 22.
8. I have two beau­ti­ful children.
9. I (at one point) spoke Span­ish well enough to earn 8 col­lege cred­its on the place­ment test.
10. I have had two nat­ural (drug-free) labors.
11. I have been breast­feed­ing for 4 years, 1 week, and 3 days.
12. I have vis­ited 26 states.
13. I only let in one goal in my one (and only)appearance as start­ing goalie for a col­lege broom ball team.
14. I took piano lessons and played reg­u­larly for 9 years.
15. I played the flute for 7 years.
16. I read To Kill a Mock­ing­bird in high school and thought it was bor­ing.  I reread it when I was 24 and really enjoyed it.
17. I joined a book club.
18. I became a La Leche League Leader (although none of my posts on this site should be con­strued as advice or asso­ci­ated with La Leche League’s stance on an issue unless I state otherwise).
19. I attended BlogHer ’09 and trav­eled by myself for the very first time at the age of 29.
20. I ran (and walked) my first 5K in 2009.
21. I gave up meat and most meat based prod­ucts. (in process)
22. I worked at a camp in the Bound­ary Waters Canoe Area in north­ern Min­nesota for two sum­mers where I learned to hike and canoe.  For other rea­sons, those were two of the hard­est times of my life.
23. I learned to drive a man­ual trans­mis­sion car and pre­fer it over auto­matic in most situations.
24. I went from cook­ing only spaghetti with meat sauce (from a jar) and tacos to cook­ing a dif­fer­ent (and usu­ally yummy) meal every night of the week.
25. I took over the shov­el­ing duties in our fam­ily and shov­eled 95% of the time last win­ter (the snowiest Decem­ber EVER).
26. In one year, I attended the fol­low­ing con­certs:  Trans-Siberian Orches­tra, Green Day, Brit­tney Spears.  I hope to attend Toby­Mac before that year is up.
27. I spon­sor a child through Com­pas­sion Inter­na­tional.
28. I started a blog (this one) for fam­ily and friends and real­ized most of the peo­ple who read it don’t know me or my family.
29. I came up with a great idea for the Inno­va­teND com­pe­ti­tion.  We’ll see where it goes in the next cou­ple years.

I’m 30.  Know­ing that I had my big birth­day com­ing up, I spent a bit of time think­ing about it over the sum­mer.  What does 30 mean?  How do I feel about it?  Have I accom­plished what I’d hoped to accom­plish by 30?  Was I going to have a cri­sis about being 30?  How was I going to define my entrance into my 30’s?

When I turned 25, I had just grad­u­ated with my master’s degree in spe­cial edu­ca­tion.  I had a bit of a cri­sis over it.  For the first time in a very long time, I wasn’t going to be a stu­dent.  I didn’t have classes. I wasn’t going to be graded.   I didn’t have teach­ers.  In order to com­bat my feel­ings of angst, I decided to take a lead­er­ship class at my church.  I guess I replaced one type of school with another.  I was also a teacher, I guess I had found my com­fort zone. 

This sum­mer as I approached 30, I thought of clos­ing down this blog and start­ing up a now-that-I’m-30 blog.  I fig­ured I would set some goals for myself, report sev­eral times a week, and dis­tract myself until I was 31.  Then, instead of hav­ing a cri­sis, I would do those things I had long put off or found an excuse not to do.  Instead of doing that, I just didn’t.  I found things to busy myself, and I finally made a tan­gi­ble goal for myself by elim­i­nat­ing sugar from my diet from now until Thanksgiving.

Just when I was feel­ing jus­ti­fied in my com­pla­cency, I got an email.  A fab­u­lous friend of mine had com­mented on my sugar post.  This is a friend who was in my wed­ding (and I was in hers 22 weeks preg­nant with K), a friend who I think about quite often, a friend I admire greatly, and a friend I had not talked to in over a year.   I was so excited to read a com­ment from her.  I was even more excited to see she had a blog.  It struck me as a lit­tle funny that her blog is thirty things she wants to accom­plish before she’s thirty.  Hmmm…  Maybe I’m not feel­ing so great about my com­pla­cency all of a sudden.

So, Friends, I bet you can guess what will be com­ing in the next few days and weeks.  A list.  I am not nearly as ambi­tious as my friend, so I will not be cre­at­ing the blog “30 Things I Did While 30.”  I am think­ing I will be set­ting monthly goals for myself.  So far, I have this:   Octo­ber– Pro­cras­ti­nate (check)  Novem­ber– Elim­i­nate sugar and refined car­bo­hy­drates from diet (in progress).  I will keep you updated as the list con­tin­ues to grow.

But this is AWESOME!

*scroll down for video*

Wanted:  One friend old enough to be my mother or grand­mother.  Must like to talk about her­self and her fam­ily.  Must have opin­ions to share.  Must be will­ing to share ideas and thoughts about both her life and mine.

For a while now I have been think­ing about this topic.  I feel like I am miss­ing the friend­ship and knowl­edge of older women.  Right now, as I’m in the midst of try­ing to make wise choices about finances, grow in my faith, pre­pare healthy and tasty meals for my fam­ily, raise two boys, and con­sis­tently grow and improve my rela­tion­ship with my hus­band, I think I could use a friend like this.

I have many incred­i­ble aunts, a great mom, a great mother-in-law, and friends my age who I can talk to about the things I listed above.  I’m look­ing for some­one in my area who I can invite over for tea or cof­fee.  I’m look­ing for a friend who can pop over while she’s out run­ning errands.

Do any of you have friend­ships like this?  Any thoughts?  Have you found this to be ben­e­fi­cial for both you and your friend?  If you don’t have a friend like this have you ever thought about it?  Does any­one else feel like it would be so amaz­ingly great to have some­one to talk to about these sorts of things?

For a while now, Jason and I have been tak­ing steps to cre­ate a health­ier lifestyle for our fam­ily.  This includes reg­u­lar exer­cise, car­ry­ing a water bot­tle (and using it), watch­ing less tv, and now for me elim­i­nat­ing sugar from my diet.  Today was day one, and I’m happy to say it was a success.

For a while now, I have been what I con­sider to be exces­sively tired for an extended period of time (12 years).   There are many pos­si­bil­i­ties that could be caus­ing my lack of energy.  After explor­ing a few of them with lit­tle suc­cess, I have decided to delve into the ones that take a bit more work on my part.  One of those is elim­i­nat­ing sugar and refined car­bo­hy­drates from my diet.  In addi­tion to being sleepy a lot, I also take an asthma med­i­cine that is linked to increased like­li­hood of thrush, and before my asthma was diag­nosed, I took many rounds of antibi­otics in order to treat my appar­ent sinus infec­tions.  Com­bin­ing all those fac­tors, there is a pretty good chance I have a yeast imbal­ance in my body.

A cou­ple of the peo­ple I fol­low on Twit­ter have been talk­ing about sugar and yeast.  After mak­ing the deci­sion to jump in and do it, I chose today as my first day.  I’m not doing a full can­dida diet.  I’m start­ing small.  Well, small­ish.  My plan is to avoid refined car­bo­hy­drates and elim­i­nate sugar for at least the days from now until Thanks­giv­ing.  Ide­ally I would like to keep this up until closer to Christ­mas so I don’t get back into the sugar habit between Thanks­giv­ing and Christ­mas, but for now, I’m stick­ing with a smaller goal.

Unfor­tu­nately for me, I seem to have missed the Sugar Free Chal­lenge that hap­pened dur­ing a week in Octo­ber.  Because I’m doing this on my own, I decided to make a smaller goal than what I orig­i­nally wanted.  If any­one reads this and is inter­ested in par­tic­i­pat­ing, let me know!  Sup­port would be great and the more the mer­rier applies here.

unday:  Clas­sic Risotto (Taken from Good Housekeeping’s Veg­e­tar­ian Meals)

Mon­day:  Red pep­per pasta

Tues­day:  Stir fry

Wednes­day:  Ricotta spinach cal­zone (Taken from Good Housekeeping’s Veg­e­tar­ian Meals)

Thurs­day:  Broc­coli Pesto Spaghetti (Taken from Good Housekeeping’s Veg­e­tar­ian Meals)

Fri­day:  Fet­tuc­cine with Creamy Tomato Sauce and Peas (Taken from Good Housekeeping’s Veg­e­tar­ian Meals)

Sat­ur­day:
Lunch:  Left­overs
Sup­per:  Sweet Potato Chili (Recipe from The Clue­less Vegetarian)

Sun­day:
Lunch:  Flat omelet with broc­coli and cau­li­flower (Taken from Good Housekeeping’s Veg­e­tar­ian Meals)
Sup­per:  Penne with Sweet Onion Sauce

As I’m sup­posed to be writ­ing this post and meal plan­ning, I am instead try­ing to catch up on the unread posts in my Google Reader.  In the past few months, I have var­ied between being caught up on all my feeds and being hun­dreds and hun­dreds of posts behind.

In the past, I have talked about my strug­gle to com­ment more on oth­ers’ posts because of the ease of flip­ping through so many blogs on that Reader.  Tonight, I also real­ized that when peo­ple post only an intro or the first cou­ple lines in Google Reader and invite you/me (the reader) to visit the blog to read the rest, I have a sim­i­lar dilemma.  Should I click?  I prob­a­bly miss a lot by not click­ing and just mov­ing on, but most of the time I don’t go to a blog like that.

I know that peo­ple choose to do that for dif­fer­ent rea­sons, but for me, it’s a lot eas­ier to read all the blogs and posts I want to read if they are acces­si­ble in Google Reader.  With its down­falls and all, I still find hav­ing them all right there is really the eas­i­est thing for me.