No More Nursing

The title here is misleading. Of course I am still nursing my one-year old. It's the four-and-a-half year old who recently stopped. I was blessed to tandem nurse both my babies for almost a year. And then I realized I was ready to be done with nursing my son. In my heart I wanted it to be his decision, or at least a mutual understanding. We talked and talked about this. We started talking in November, and in January we were still talking.

I finally made the call. January 31st was his last day to nurse. He sailed through it with assorted feelings, had an ice cream sundae, and I was down to one nursling. In the wake, I mentioned to Papa-Bug that he needed to eat right away when he woke up because he was waking up hungry expecting that good Mama Milk.

The child overheard me and a frequent refrain from him has been; "I just don't think I get enough dairy in the mornings, Mama." I've offered cow milk and milk alternatives. No dice.

Brainwave yesterday. I have some bags of Sister-Bug's milk in the fridge that I pumped when overflowing last spring. So I warmed on up and put it in a cup.

And he didn't really like it.

I told him that it didn't taste as good as it did because his body doesn't need it anymore.

He looked proud of being so grown up.

Basic Nutrition - The 3 Gs

Who can hold the nutrition chart in their head and then carefully and dutifully count the number of servings of this and that each day? I certainly can’t and I study this stuff! Nor can I count for my kid (and how is a serving of grains for a child different than for an adult?) because there is almost always lots going on here and likely I am busy answering a question about the functionality of hydraulic pistons for the four-year old, balancing the one-year old on my hip, and trying to answer the phone, while pulling together a lunch that will suit us. Things get busy and complicated and most of us just don’t have good time or knowledge to go that in-depth with our daily food consumption. Now, if Nutrition and A Balanced Diet is complicated for me - educated in nutrition and herbalism - to follow and understand, how the heck do I explain it to my four-year old? I have talked with plenty of adults, parents and not-parents, who quail at the mention of Nutrition and A Balanced Diet. This stuff can be crazy technical. Or is it??

Enter the “3 Gs”. I must admit, this is not my own idea. Once upon a time I overheard some parents use this concept to explain to their preschooler why it’s important to eat the salad. I was struck by the simplicity and elegance of this idea. But what are The 3 Gs?

The basic idea is that your body needs
Proteins for Growing,
Carbohydrates for Going,
and
Vegetables/Fruits for Glowing.

That’s it. In a nutshell. You can explain that to anyone from about 18-months up. I’ve explained this to adults and often see the relief at the simplicity of feeding themselves a well balanced meal. The important thing is to simply make sure that the plate you serve yourself has a component of each G on it, or that you get some of each G throughout the day. You can tinker with how much your body/your kid’s body needs and to with what you learn from your own response. For example, kids need a heck of a lot of protein and fat to grow their busy brains and bodies, so you can adjust accordingly.

Of course, there is a caveat. A Big Mac does, technically, have all 3 Gs on it – meat for a protein, bun for carbs, and iceberg lettuce and tomato for fruit/veggie. But that doesn’t count. Most school lunches do, technically, have all 3 Gs included, but that doesn’t speak to either the quality or what the kids choose to eat. Using this method assumes we also use intelligence about the quality of foods we put in our bodies. The same rules of food consumption apply – eat whole foods, eat fresh foods when possible, eat a diversity of foods, and enjoy your food.

But now you can toss that nutrition chart. It’s a pile of lobbied in c**p mostly, anyway. But that’s a rant for a different time.

Like A Migratory Bird

Once upon a time I had other blogs. But those were too much for me and I needed to downsize. The pressure of keeping up with a work blog (when not Momming-Around I am an herbalist) AND a personal blog. All on my own site, needing to do upgrades and whatnot.

The truth is, I love blogging. I love sharing and I love writing. I don't love dealing with computer stuff. And I realized that there is this whole 'instant blog' situation where someone else deals with the computer stuff for me and I can just write. Brilliant. So a migration.

Brother-Bug is waking up. My time to write has evaporated once again. So in the future, many post will be re-posts. Migrations. Old posts from old blogs that I just want to keep around.

What's Next?

We just moved in. The house is ours (more accurately it belongs to a bank, but let's not get too picky) and we already love it. But there is a pile of boxes in every room. There are projects upon projects.

And I don't know where to start. So I started here. With a blog. Because if I don't do something that isn't moving related, I think my brain might melt out my ears. That would leave an unpleasant and sticky puddle on my new floor. Which would be another project for me do contemplate.

Brother-Bug is doing a puzzle and singing to himself and Sister-Bug is sleeping. She's been sleeping most of the day and I hope she's not sick. I could go sleep with her, maybe. But then I would wake up and there would still be boxes. And more boxes. And baby locks to put in the kitchen.

So here we go. Breaks over. Make some tea, woman!

What's next??