Money Makin' Mama

Everyone knows times are tough these days. Especially stay at home moms. I have seen a lot of blog posts about supplemental income for moms. Everyone seems to have ideas on how to bring in extra money while staying home with their kids. I have heard everything from selling goods on etsy to direct selling companies such as Avon to doing childcare. I have been a consultant for Arbonne which I really loved. I have been incredibly fortunate to be able to stay home with all of my children since they were born. At first it was easy because my husband had a great job with a steady income. Just as the economy was taking a downturn, he lost that job. Thankfully he found a new job very quickly but it came with a paycut. A few months before this I had begun caring for two other children in addition to my two. I have done childcare as long as I could remember so this was perfect for me. I cared for those two beautiful children for almost three years up until 3 months ago just before my son was born. Our plan was to move into an apartment for 6 months so that I could take a break from working and we could save up to buy a house. Well, one thing after another came up and quickly ate into our house fund. Including replacing the transmission in my car. Then about two months ago our former landlord called us up and asked if we would like to move back into a house we previously lived in for several years. My husband and I have moved nine times in the eight years we have been together. In all of those moves, this house is the only place we have stayed longer than a year. It is home. So we are jumping at the chance, and signing a 2 year lease! The only catch is that I will need to be bringing in some income in order for us to be comfortable there. I graduated with my BA in Child Development a year ago and my goal is to eventually work with pregnant and parenting teens. For now though I would prefer to do something part time. I need to be the one taking my kids to school and picking them up but I am not opposed to working outside of my home. I am willing to sacrifice a lot financially in order to be the primary caregiver for my babies but I need to contribute to my family too. Not to mention, it is SO satisfying for me to be making money as well! Does anyone have any clever money making ideas?

Oh, Monday.

This past weekend I braved 3 birthday parties. One for my own child, and two on my own with all three kids. Yesterday my husband had a guys day, which he rarely gets to do, so I was on my own all day. Today we had a two month checkup for the baby and a homeschool meeting for my 6 year old to get to. My goal was to leave the house by 9:30 am. My morning and afternoon went something like this: 3 year old wakes me up at 7 am wanting breakfast, I crawl over the baby like a ninja so he doesn't wake up, feed 3 year old, put in workout dvd while praying that baby sleeps for another 30 minutes, baby wakes up 5 minutes into the dvd, 6 year old wakes up asking for cartoons and breakfast, I feed her then feed the baby. I sit down with 6 year old to catch up on the three days of homeschool we didn't have time for last week. I pick out four outfits, shoes and hair accessories, put the baby in the bouncy seat, stick him in the bathroom so I can take a shower. Get out of the shower, check the time. 9:26 am. How the hell did that happen?? Dry off, throw on too big maternity jeans and shirt, do my mom hair. (You know what I'm talking about, some variation of a ponytail, bobby pins or God forbid, a butterfly clip. Oh well, at least its not a scrunchy). I manage to get the kids into the car by 9:46 and to the Dr.'s only 15 minutes late. The Dr comes in, we talk, she checks baby, I sign the form saying I am refusing vaccinations at this time and get a short lecture. We leave, go to starbucks where I ask for the food item with the least amount of calories since I never did get that workout in but I am STARVING. In case you are curious, it's the spinach and feta wrap. Yep, tastes like feet. After that, I drive through Mcd's for the kids (save the lectures please). Hop on the freeway and realize the gas gauge is on E. Praying again that I don't run out of gas on the freeway because it is now in the 80's outside and I just might die if I have to walk somewhere. I make it to the next exit, find a gas station which of course does not accept debit cards outside and I am not getting all three kids out and going inside so I put the $10 in cash I have in my wallet. Get back in, start the car, and the needle doesn't move off E. Whatever. Get to the homeschool meeting and the 3 year old has to pee and baby has to eat. Beg the teacher to give us a light load for the next two weeks and ask her three times when the last day of school is all while nursing the baby. 3 year old has to pee again so I take her. Thankful that baby loves his Moby wrap because that is his home today. Get back to the meeting, finish it up. Now 3 year old has to pee AND poo. Again. I cannot make this up. Drive home, check email, see that the mom's group has a meetup tonight. Hooray, sign me up! Hubby calls and says Sorry, I am in Stockton and won't be home until at least 7. Sigh.

This is what makes it worthwhile.

Sleep much?

Any parent who has had a newborn knows sleep becomes a thing of the past for a little while. My first two kids did not sleep. Ever. At least if felt like that at the time. Neither one of them slept through the night until they were over a year old. My newest little guy has been a little different. Instead of waking up 5 or more times a night, he usually sleeps for a long stretch at the beginning of the night, then wakes up one or two more times after that. My problem is his daytime sleep. He is just not a napper! He loves to be close to me to sleep. A friend gave me a moby wrap and it has become my savior! In fact, he is sleeping in it as I write this.
When my oldest daughter was about 6 months old, I read a lot of books on sleep. I tried letting her cry it out when I was so exhausted I didn't think I could last another night. It was too hard on me and her so I gave up quickly. In the end, I survived their first years of life with little sleep. With that experience behind me, I have learned not to stress about whether or not my son will sleep through the night anytime soon. There is nothing more special than your little one (or two or three little ones) snuggled up in your bed, even if it means the couch for your husband! Time passes so quickly and even when you think you can't survive one more day with no sleep, you do!
As for me, I would rather be sleeping than doing pretty much anything else. I hate being tired!

Hot mama?

I have never been a pregnant woman with a cute little bump. When I am with child, I gain weight from my chins to my cankles. That's when your calves blend into your ankles for those of you not in the know! I typically add about 50-60 pounds to my 5'6" frame.  Every pregnancy I think to myself, this time I will work out and eat better, but I love food. I mean, I really LOVE food. I also have a ferocious sweet tooth. If there are sour gummy worms anywhere in sight, they belong to me. Forget about asian food. I'm surprised my kid didn't turn out half Thai. In between pregnancies, I am in decent shape. When I got married a little over a year and a half ago, I worked really hard and was in the best shape I had ever been. Unfortunately now I have that to compare my current body too.
Since having my third child almost 7 weeks ago, I have lost about half of my pregnancy weight. That leaves me with 28 extra pounds of solid jiggle. I have heard the saying that it took nine months to put the weight on and it might take as long to take it off. I don't think so.
You see, it was 90 degrees over the weekend and my kids wanted to go to the pool. My only choice was to buy a *gasp* bigger bathing suit. So off to target I went, with baby and one of my best friends in tow. She suggested a tankini, since my husband was appalled that I might buy a "onesie." Isn't he clever?
I found a tankini top and some shorts to go with it, but for some reason I bought them both in size medium, which is what I would normally wear. Why did I do that? I have no idea. When I got home and met my hubby and kids at the pool, his reaction went something like this: "Richard Simmons wants his shorts back." I told you he was clever. Ok maybe I should have gone up another size instead of squeezing myself into something a tad too small. I thought about posting a picture but I think I will wait until I have actually lost the weight to do a before and after.
Anyway, having weight to lose sucks. I have crazy motivation and serious desire to lose the weight but a very cranky newborn and two older kids who leave me with little time. Is this something other mommy's struggle with? It can't be just me!

My homebirth story

After 42 weeks of pregnancy, lots of walking (ok some walking), drinking various herbs, membrane stripping and listening to advice from just about everyone regarding how to start my labor, I finally gave in and drank a bottle of castor oil on the 294^th day of my pregnancy. 5 hours later, active labor started. I put my two daughters to bed just as labor was starting and hoped that they would fall asleep fast. I had always thought that when it finally started it was going to go fairly quickly and it seemed like it got intense right away. So around 10:30pm I had my husband call my good friend who was going to photograph the labor and birth and our midwives. Everyone showed up around 11:30 pm.

When I was checked, I was 4cm dilated. My first instinct was to get discouraged at that low number but instead I convinced myself that my body was working really hard and it would still move quickly. In the beginning, I moved around the house a lot trying to get comfortable. Eventually though I wanted to stay in our bedroom and labor pretty much on my own. My husband knows how I am in labor so he was there when I needed his presence and backed off when he sensed I didn’t. I kept asking when I could get into the birth tub but I couldn’t until I was at least 6 cms.

Finally around 1am (at least I think that’s what time it was!) I got into the tub. I was already in transition at that point so the water provided little relief. Every symptom of transition that you read about, I felt like I was having. My legs were trembling uncontrollably and it was driving me crazy! I asked one of my midwives to break my amniotic sac so that we could move it along a little. She did and I instantly felt like I needed to push. It is amazing the almost primal urges your body experiences in trying to get the baby out. Nothing else matters at that point. The baby had a little trouble coming out, due to his big size. I had to move into several positions to try and help him and finally he was out! All 9lbs 5ozs, 22ins of sweet baby boy. I am so thankful to have been able to give birth to my son in our home with the support of my husband and our wonderful midwives, and to have an amazing photographer to capture it all.

Another crunchy step

I have never tried cloth diapering. I could list the reasons why not, but I am sure you can imagine. The other day, my midwives put a link on their facebook page from a website called www.theecochic.com. The article they linked to was called "How to cloth diaper your baby for only $50 from birth to potty training." Well I am always looking for ways to save money so I'm really considering it! I have to admit, while I was pregnant, I stocked up on diapers. I mean really stocked up. Anytime they were on sale, or clearance, or I had coupons, I bought diapers. I thought I would be covered for quite awhile. When my son was born, he was over 9 lbs. That meant that he wore newborn sized diapers for 3 days. Literally. In the past 6 weeks, he has blown through all of the size 1 diapers. Today I finally took apart the really cute diaper motorcycle centerpiece my friend made us for our baby shower so I could use those diapers!
Do they have a cloth diapering class for semi-crunchies? I wouldn't even know where to start....

The Greater Good

I recently gave birth to a son, who is 6 weeks old now. When I took him in for his 2 week checkup at his pediatrician's office, I was asked if I wanted to do the Hep B vaccination. Normally, this shot is given in the hospital at birth. However, my son was born at home so he was spared this. I politely declined and my pediatrician (who I love and have been seeing with my older children for over 2 years), didn't push the issue. This got me thinking about the many times in the future I would be asked about shots for my son. With my first daughter 6 years ago, I was a young mom who really didn't question much. When my second daughter was born two years after that, I had learned more about vaccines and I decided I would allow her to get all the recommended shots but we spaced them out. Most people have heard the controversy in the news recently about vaccinations and injuries caused by them. Whether there is a link between autism and vaccines, we may never know. But the fact is that there is a much higher incidence of autism in males than females. That is just not a risk I want to take with my son. I know this is a sensitive subject for a lot of parents and I would never condemn someone for their beliefs. As parents, we choose what is best for our child. A documentary has come out recently called The Greater Good. (www.greatergoodmovie.org) I thought it was a moving and insightful film about vaccinations and the damage they may cause. I mentioned in a previous post that my husband is very much un-crunchy. He thought I was crazy for even questioning getting all the recommended shots for our son. Forty minutes in to the film he said, "I don't need to watch any more. We aren't getting him vaccinated." I couldn't believe my ears. I wasn't even sure how I felt yet! For those of you Californians, a very important issue is at stake. Please read about California Bill AB2109! This bill has passed the first stage of becoming a law. It isn't about whether or not you vaccinate. It is about the freedom of making that choice for your own child.