Max and Wheat: A story about true love

I never updated on the situation in Max's belly. And I know, inquiring minds want to know.

Max was taken off wheat In June. Max has had reflux his whole life.  It might or might not be the reason he has recurrent ear infections (refluxing so high it gets in his ear canals). So, after an all clear EGD, an all clear Upper GI (swallowing barium and looking at his innards while he was sadly strapped to a table, we both needed valium after THAT), and an all clear on testing for Celiac Disease, the doc wanted to try certain foods out of his diet that can cause reflux.

The first two are dairy and wheat. He'd been off dairy for a year. So, next was wheat. Life off of dairy and wheat is tough. Planning is tough. Eating out is tough. Snacking is tough. Grocery bills are high. Taste is low.

Well, 3.5 weeks off of wheat, Max audibly refluxed ALL. DAY. LONG. Either you could hear him swallowing fluid nowhere near a drink or food, or he had painful sounding hiccups. All. Day. We woke up Monday morning, fully intending to finish our 4 week plan and Rob and I both agreed that he was so much worse. PLUS, the poor baby (WARNING: I'm about to talk poo) was stopped up like never before!

We told gluten free food to SUCK IT!!!!! We gave him an Eggo waffle and a dose of Miralax and didn't hear a hiccup or reflux all day.  He then went to his Grammy and Papa's house, went straight to their Golden Grahams that he loves to eat at their house and ate maybe 7 bowls. Noodles at Chinese restaurants are back! Nutra Grain bars are back! Pancakes are back! Soy sauce is back! Max is happy!

 I feel like, after we saw the GI doc and he put M-train on twice a day reflux meds at a higher dose that he was probably the best he'd been in a year, reflux wise. He had gained weight and grown 3 inches. But when he got another ear infection, we decided that it was best for Max to rule out the option that it was wheat related.  I talked to the doc, since I just so happen to work in the GI department, when I choose to be a nurse that makes money, not a poor stay at home mom, and he agreed that we would know by now if wheat was the culprit. Basically, he said I was a genius. That's what I heard, anyway.

Because his reflux got worse, we've tried to decide what he could have possibly had MORE of during his time off wheat that would have triggered it. All I could think of was nuts. It was an easy snack to give him a baggie of almonds or peanuts, or a rice cake with peanut butter, or granola bars with nuts in them. Our next venture is giving Max a ton of nuts over a few days and seeing if it causes reflux. He'll be in heaven. Unless it turns out that this gives him reflux, then he'll hiccup for a day and never eat a nut again. I hate reflux.

 We love that little dairy free/wheat included kid so much and want the very very very best for him.


***I have a list of restaurants and what to order that I made from our dairy free/gluten free time if anyone wants it, let me know and I'll email it to you.

My kids rock my face off

Wow. We have had a rockstar week. Last week, we didn't leave the house all three days I was off and we had a pretty low key weekend as well.

We made up for it.

Like, a lot......

Sunday, I wanted to look at fabric at Jo-Anns because I'm trying to give our ugly table a face lift and the chair cushions are the worst offenders. Max and I had a Mommy and me outing. He came with me and acted like an angel while I fretted over fabric and eventually left empty handed. I swear, naming my kids was easier than picking out cushion fabric.He was so good, he deserved a trip to the train table at Barnes and Noble. I would say free fun, howeva, mama got a hankering for a coffee and my pick was almost $5. 

Nicely done, Sara.

Monday, we hosted Zac, a friend from MOPS. Zac is in the top 5 funniest people I've ever met. He loves doing pretty much any activity, any action figure, and Disney princesses. The kids were playing in water. Mud got involved after this shot. The water hose took care of the ick soon after.

 They played for a solid 5 hours.

Wish I had pics of Tuesday. We went to story time with my friend Jacki and her kids. After story time, we went to Chick fil A and let the kids play while we chatted. Our kids acted like prize children and had so much fun together. They just moved back from Virginia and we are so glad they are here. 

Because story time and CFA wasn't enough, I decided to chance all chances and run errands with my kids at naptime. Shoe Carnival, Jo-Anns (its really becoming a sickness at this point), and Hobby Lobby (yep, just in case they had magical fabric that called my name). They. Were. So. Good.

 I did buy them facepaint AND Skittles. It might have helped.

Wednesday we were feeling really magical, so we went to the park with our MOPS group. The heat index was 103 by 11am, so it was really cozy PLUS I didn't pack us anything to take to said PICNIC. So, we came, sweated, and left and went to McDonalds. CFA and McDonalds? 

We are obviously not cleansing this week! 

When we got home, GRAMMY AND PAPA CAME!!!!

And we took them to the Museum of Discovery. We had the best time. The last time I bought a membership, Max was 1 and Rylan was 3. They liked it, so did I, but it was always a little crazy. Now at almost 3 and 5 (I just threw up a little) they are so much more in to the exhibits. 

It helped that there was not many people there.

Obviously their life sucks sooooooo bad. 

Being a stay at home is hard. Its awesome but its hard. There are days when either me or Rob ask "why don't you just go back to work?" This blog post. This is why. Because I have two kids that will be young ONE time in their lives. And they are good kids. And we have worked like demons to be able to afford life on one income and getting a week where all we do is party like rockstars and go to parks and museums and have friends over and host family mid-week is our reward. Well, my reward. Sucks being Rob. So why not stay home if I can? Cause for every "your a bad mommy" I get a "mommy will you snuggle me?" 10 times over. 

No I need to clean the house and do the laundry I neglected and catch up with Rylan's therapy and get back to regular stay at home mom crap. Oh, and work tomorrow to pay for all the Chick Fil A and McDonalds and Museum memberships and such.

Advocare 10 Day Cleanse Yay! Or Nay!

The cleanse is over, was actually over on Thursday morning. Want some results? Wanna know how I feel about it? Couldn't care less? Nobody's actually reading my blog anymore because I keep putting off blogging like the true procrastinator that I am?

Rob lost 7 pounds in 10 days.
I lost 3. Whomp whomp whomp.......

I wasn't doing the cleanse to lose weight, so I'm not upset, any loss is a loss and I'm happy with the scale going in the right direction. I just would have liked to have been a little closer to the guy that had Happy Hour and an appetizer platter on Day 5. And liquor. He had liquor too. I'm not naming names. It rhymes with Cob.

Overall, I'd say the cleanse was a success. My biggest wish was to get rid of Fat Brain. Fat Brain needed to go out with the trash. And I think it did. I really do. I don't think about food 24/7. I don't feel like I need "treats" all the time. I have made healthy choices at restaurants and not been sad about missing out.

A big part of eating healthy is cost. It does cost more. At least at first. That first trip to the store to stock up. Its frightening, really. Especially for the girl that was buying a million items for $100 with all the coupons. Very few coupons are for healthy stuff and I've had to become okay with that and know that the extra money is going to the right place. I still use coupons when I can. If you use a store, like Kroger, that has a store loyalty card, your card shows what you buy the most of. So, at the cash register, after you pay, it often prints out coupons for you, and they are magically for things you buy often. For me this is stuff like Almond Milk, eggs, and yogurt. They also send me coups in the mail and they seem to have trended towards stuff that I have started buying, like protein powder. Basically Big Brother is watching. If Big Brother wants to send me coupons, let him.

When I packed Rob's lunches for the next day (yes, that little bumkin is spoiled. It happened well before I was a stay at home wife/mom, sue me) I've started putting my own together. Even if it isn't a day I'll be working. Its nice when lunch rolls around and I have a salad or something all put together. Nothing makes you decide against a salad or healthy fare like having two little tykes yelling at you for a hot dog and being too overwhelmed to chop up fresh veggies. When these two boys get haingry, they get HAINGRY!!!!!

Lean sirloin, mashed cauliflower, peas

I really need to work on food pics. They don't do the food justice

Protein Pancakes

Sausage Corn Italiano
The cleanse says corn is a no no. Rob and I concurred that we didn't get larger than we'd like eating corn. Seriously. Its a terrible pic, but so delish, recipe down below.

Grilled chicken with tons of Cavenders, peas and corn on the cob for the chillens.
We had Roasted Brussel Sprouts. The kids ix-nayed the Brussel Sprouts.
Well, Max ix-nayed being awake for this meal.

Sweatfest at 5am, party of 1? I love days when I get myself out of bed and do this. Its hard. I'm not gonna lie. I suck at the actual, out of bed thing. This is a kettlebell workout. I bought this kettlebell and it came with a free dvd. The dvd seems so freakin easy until your legs nearly buckle and beg for mercy.
 So, obviously its working something.

All in all, I'm glad we did the cleanse. I'm not sure I would do it again, though. I'd do the cleanse in theory, just maybe not pay for the Advocare one. Its a tiny bit pricey (for 2 cheapskates) for a fiber drink and senna laxative pills. And, not to get too personal, but those little pills kind of worked opposite for me. Like, I didn't "cleanse" persay. I kinda had the opposite happen. I just went 10 days without a lot of my vices (no sugar, dairy, alcohol, coffee) and shook off some sweet tooth, craving type problems. So, next time I'd probably do the 10 days without those foods/drinks and maybe just drink some Miralax twice a day and save some $$$$. 

Now for a recipe. We got this recipe from Rob's sister, Staci. He actually made it before there was a Sara in the Rob and Sara scheme of things.

Sausage Corn Italiano

2 cans corn (drained and rinsed)

1-2 green bell peppers chopped

1 onion, chopped

1 package Turkey Sausage link, diced

3 tbsp Italian Seasoning

3 tbsp Parmesan cheese (we omitted this for the cleanse)

Heat up a large skillet. This is the one time I actually use my gigantic cast iron skillet. While it heats, chop up your bell peppers and onions. Cook them till soft. I do Pam (or the cheap version) spray to cook them. I spray the pan and put the veggies in, then do a spray on top of the veggies for when I flip them. When the peppers and onions are cooked, add the sausage. This is cooked before its packaged, so it only needs to be browned/warmed. When the sausage is cooked, add the corn and Italian seasoning and stir it through and allow it to warm. If your kids are not dairy free, like ours, this is the part where you quit stirring and add Parmesan cheese all over the top. About 3 tbsp. Rob and I just sprinkle it on our own plates after serving. 

Make this, make it soon. Your house will smell like Silver Dollar City and your kids will eat it because it has "hot dogs" in it! 

The Couple that Cleanses Together Stays Together

I talked Rob into doing the Advocare 10 Day Cleanse with me. Its a fiber drink and probiotic pills and such for 10 days. ***

The rules are: no dairy, coffee, or wheat for 10 days. Drink at least 8 cups of water, but try for at least 100 ounces. Its a "gentle cleanse" read: you won't be running to the toilet. We've done day one and its true so far.

Why are we doing a cleanse? Well, I know why I am. My weight isn't moving. I had my thyroid checked and its fine. I have gone up and down with the same 1.5 pounds since March. I have over 40 to lose and I keep getting defeated and being all "addict like" and shoving copious amounts of cereal in my pie hole. For the most part, I keep a food diary and work out, but, obviously things could change. So, I'm cleansing, cleaning out the old, detoxifying and starting fresh. If I lose weight, that would be awesome. My biggest hope is for this cleanse to give my body a boost towards burning fat and calories and help me with my cravings.

I don't exactly have cravings, I have what I call, a FAT BRAIN. Meaning, part of my brain is on track with diet and exercise and the other side, the fat side, sees every restaurant and has a moment where it says "we should totally stop there". Even if I have dinner planned. Sometimes when I'm not even hungry.  Fat Brain craves bad food. Fat Brain feeds emotional eating habits. Fat Brain doesn't know when I'm full and wants to eat too much. Fat Brain starts craving dessert before I've finished my meal. Fat Brain sees a serving of cereal and says "that's just enough to piss me off, I need MORE!"  Fat Brain needs to die. I hope the cleanse helps me tear down Fat Brain.

I think Rob is doing it cause he rocks and he's supportive and if he feels better in the process? BONUS!

Day One was easy. Hope it stays this positive! Here's a list of our food

Breakfast-Oatmeal with a banana and tsp of honey

Snack-cashews and Pluots

Lunch-Salad with grilled chicken, watermelon

Snack-Sweet potato chips and hummus

Dinner-Sweet Potato Chili and cantaloupe (I left the zucchini out of the chili and threw in 4 shredded veggie burgers)

For being on a "diet" we ate a ton of food!!!! 

This is Rob's lunch and snacks for Day 2. This cleanse requires a lot of packing and planning.

Breakfast-Scrambled eggs and turkey bacon

Snack-Peanuts and grapes

Lunch-Leftover Sweet Potato Chili, cantelope

Snack-Wholly Guacamole and carrot chips

Dinner-Grilled Steaks, cauliflower mash, peas

Snack-strawberry popsicles 

(strawberries,water, truvia sweetener in the blender and freeze: BOOM)

***Not a fan of cleansing and think it is BS? Good for you! Please don't leave me a comment about your negative feelings on the matter. Love Peace and Chicken Grease, Quallsy****

****I probably shouldn't have chicken grease on the cleanse.

I forgot I had a blog

I have no excuses. I just took a few days off, got out of the habit, and then, holy cracker jackles, it's been a month!!!!

So, to refresh....

We've had a lot of pool time. Max is working on his tan and his modeling poses. Both are going swimmingly. Lololol forever. 

Rybearski has had some...um....behavior "mishaps" and now has a sticker chart. There is a bucket of toys on top of the fridge with army guys, swim gear, coloring books and action figures galore waiting on a full chart.

July 4 came. This is how Max Attack watched the boomers.

I don't talk much about church (or maybe at all?) but we have joined a new church and its been one of the best things for our family ever. I've missed being part of a church family. Anyhow, we made it into the church newsletter. That's us on the left, with our ever classy son with no shirt on and the other one MIA. 

Rob and I painted our living room/kitchen area. It went from red to Sensational Sand. Much more bright in the house now. Red is awesome, but 4 years of staying home with red walls was plenty.

My friend Laura and I ran the Color Me Rad run. It didn't start till 930 on the most humid day of the year this far and I was healing from the stomach flu but we did pretty stinking good.

The boys and I did some berry pickin.

Mac has started sleeping on his floor. It's odd but whatever. Sleep in the cabinet for all I care, JUST SLEEP!!!!!

Rob

One person that doesn't get a lot of mention on here is my hubbers. I think he kind of prefers that. He's thought about adding to the blog before, but really only feels like he has something to blog about when he needs to rant on something and then he doesn't want to be a ranter. Is that a word? His biggest rant, worthy of bloggerland discussion, was the Easter jelly bean problem in the past few years. Jelly Belly is out, store brand and Starburst had taken over and he was TICKED! It really is the important things.

I'd like to talk about him for a sec. Because its Father's Day and he needs a spotlight. Rob was a dad when I met him. He had a Pomeranian mix that thought he was human and Rob was the best dog dad I've ever known. He and Curt were an awesome team. When Rob came over to my house for dinner, so did Curt. When we went on a trip, so did Curt. That dog, to this day, took up a major part of Rob's heart. When we lost Curt, it hurt worse than I ever expected it to. I know it hit Rob far worse. Curt will always always always be in his heart.

Rob had daddy duties far before most dads. At 7 months pregnant, I started having contractions and was put on bedrest for two months. Coming home to a wife that has, literally, been laying on the couch ALL DAY and has not talked to anyone and is depressed, isn't fun. I know it isn't. He did it for 2 months straight.

One day I asked him to bring me some M&Ms, meaning a small package of them. He returned with a 5lb bag. He dealt with 5 trips to the hospital, some of which kept us there all night on the monitors and sent us home at 7am, just in time for Rob to take a shower and go back to work. He brought me magazines, books, family, and food. He cleaned the house, played board games with me, brought me a lap top, rented movies, rubbed my feet, provided a stop watch for contractions, did whatever I needed.

One of the hardest experiences of our lives was the day Rylan was rushed in an ambulance to the hospital when he was 8 months old. It was hard. I was blessed to have this man by my side. I was still hormonal, and blaming myself for letting Ry get that sick. He was my shoulder and more during that time. When I started getting sick, and they moved in a sketchy family with us to share the room, he gladly offered to stay nights with Rylan and asked my parents to take me home so I would sleep. 

Life got better with our sweet baby. 

Ry was seriously a happy kid and Rob's total twin. Just when life had settled down we decided to spice it up a bit............

22 months into parenthood, we had Max, another happy baby prone to respiratory funkiness. He came with lots of goos and smiles and reflux.

He just happens to share a love for the same team as his daddy
We Wuv our Wob(Daddy) so much. The kids literally shriek with joy when he pulls in the driveway in the evening. I'm glad he's been my parenting pal these 8 years.

Memory lane....Quallsy style

Poor Curt. You can see how ticked he is

Clones

It has sometimes been hard. It has been joyful many more times. I have had a best friend through all of it.

I love my children. Say it, rinse, and repeat.

Y'all know I love my kids like a fat kid loves cake, right? That I pretty much don't remember what life was like without them. That I pretty much devoted an entire blog to talking about the goings on of our household and 9 times out of 10, the goings on are about my kids? Just felt like I needed to preface this post with how much I love these two children.

ZOMG THEY ARE MAKING ME CUH CUH CUH-RAZY!!!!!

This little munchkin lifted my dress up in the middle of church yesterday, exposing the back half of the church to my dimply, ugly butt and old, ugly gray cotton unders.

-Have I mentioned that we go to casual service and I usually wear khaki pants, capris or sometimes even jeans, but yesterday had gotten up and ran and was feeling slightly sassy and a tiny bit thinner and wanted to put on a nice dress?

-Have I mentioned we are going to a new church and a lot of people are just getting to know us?

-Have I mentioned that we usually sit in the back and this one time we let Ry pick the chair and he sat way, way way further up in church, allowing more people to get the awesome show.

This little munchkin has decided that he doesn't want to go to bed. Bedtime is equivalent to "hey Sara, do you want to be pregnant again?" in my brain. The pure thought of putting him to bed makes me cringe and remember all of the pain of the past.  He doesn't want to sleep in his bed anymore. We've made him a nice pallet on the floor, but he has to get up about eleventy hundred times to ask for water, food, a different place to sleep. He suddenly wants to cuddle. He needs to be read a book. He is really really hungry. (sidenote: we offer him cuddles, food, books ALL.DAY.LONG). We have a safety knob on his door that makes it to where he can't open his door from the inside. If shit really hits the fan, we close his door and let him scream. If its an extra special night, he gets out of his room anyway, and comes and hands us the dismantled safety knob. Kid is MacGyver. 

If, by chance he goes immediately to sleep, like he did last night, because he was soooo tired from no nap and playing in the sprinkler all day, we are treated to a midnight showing, and hours (yes I said and meant hours) of needs. Water. Food. A different place to lay. A cuddle. A book. He is really really really hungry.

I keep reminding myself that when Rylan went through these antics, we had a small baby and I was still nursing and recovering from Death Fever (Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever). We can do this. We can do this. We can do this.

Workout Wednesday (on a Thursday)

Its week 6 of my Couch to 5k. This, my friends, is officially longer than I have ever stuck with the C25K. I swears. I look forward to being the kind of girl that does not give up, cause I've kind of always been a giver upper. At least when it came to diet and exercise.

Todays workout:
5 minute warmup (around 3.7 mph)
5 minute jog
3 minute walk
8 minute jog
3 minute walk
5 minute jog
5 minute cool down (around 3.5 mph)

After doing the fat girl bounce walk/run, I come home and get Lola a do the cool down with her, just to feel like a good Dog Mom for 5 minutes.
When I came home, both kids were still asleep, which is the second miracle, the first being that I got up and worked out at 5:30 on a non-work day. So, I had the most blessed weights session while I watched Extreme Weight Loss on the DVR. Non animated TV? I'll work my A$$ off for that!!!

What's this, you might ask? When I do weights and such, I often get lost in the numbers. I'm often fixing bowls of cereal and sippee cups or talking to Rob before he leaves, in between sets and I forget what I've done and what I have left to do. I know doing SOMETHING is better than doing NOTHING, but I want to hold myself accountable and SEE PROGRESS. So I starting putting a mark for every set I do. 15 bicep curls gets a tick. 15 situps gets a tick. 30 second plank gets a tick. yada yada yada. Somedays I do more arms and less legs. Somedays I forget to work my abs altogether. Some days my legs cry for mercy.  My goal is to have one more mark than the day before. Today I had 23 marks. That means I did 345 of SOMETHING. The number 23 cannot be divided by 3, so obviously I failed to do 3 sets of every exercise, but oh well. I failed to do any sets of any exercises for way too long, I'll take 23. I feel like I did a good mix of squats, lunges, planks, situps, and arm exercices. I badly need to up my weights. If possible, I do both 5lb weights in the same hand, but nobody wants to drop a weight on their head, so sometimes its just safer to stick with one.

So.....anytime my body wants to catch up with my endurance and lessen that waistline and BONUS the number on the scale....I'd appreciate it!!!!