updates all around

1. The best lunch ever: iced peppermint herbal tea and a bagel sandwich with avocado, cream cheese, fresh turkey, and at least an inch of clover sprouts. I know this to be true so don't doubt me.

2. I've been upping my protein intake this week a lot and it's really helping my headaches and my exhaustion. With Zeke I had a really hard time getting enough protein as well, honestly I had a hard time getting enough calories at all. Since I've been on about 3,000 calories a day for almost 2 years now I'm really used to the high calorie diet and barely have to think about it. In fact in another 2 or more years when I finally wean Blueberry and have to go back down to a reasonable intake of food we're probably going to have problems. But after my pregnancy with Zeke I allowed my protien intake to dwindle back to basically nothing so Im having a hard time with that again.

The problem is that not only do I really not enjoy eating red meat, but peanut butter and eggs make me nauseous when I'm pregnant. Josh jokes that protien must make me nauseous because it seems like most protien rich foods do. On top of that issue is the fact that I need the full 80-100 grams of protien that is recommended a day to even function as a person, to feel GOOD I need even more. So I've been doing a lot of sneaking. I eat a handful or two of almonds a couple times a day, I put protien rich slim-fast type powders in my milk, I sneak a boiled egg or even two on my salads where I dont really notice them...

Josh has also bought me a few protien bars to try out that he's heard come highly reccomended. I dont like the ones that he eats but they are like the highest protien count that you can buy. They dont taste necessarily BAD but they also dont taste good, and one bite tends to make me over-full.

Anyways, if anyone has any ideas on how to sneak in even more protien I'm open to suggestions.
I do like chicken and fish and have been making it alot for dinner but it seems like a lot of work for lunches and snacks.

3. By my calculations I am 16 weeks today and should start feeling movement any day now. If I don't at least this week Cathy and I will probably re-think my due date since its pretty fuzzy yet.

4. I took Zeke to the public pool on Friday and we had a blast. I think we stayed just under 3 hours, long after all our friends had left. We are definately going to go back soon. I wore my one peice swimsuit because I was feeling rather ashamed of my tummy since it's not pregnant looking so much as just bloated looking. I thought people would assume I was chubby and not just pregnant. It's getting tight enough that it's really uncomfortable though and by the time we left the pool I was really regretting the decision. I hate it when I let myself get ashamed of my body that way. I mean, honestly, who's going to be sitting around the pool judging other women's bodies? And if they are, why do I care what they think of me? I know I'm healthy and beautiful and that should be enough. I honestly have learned to love my size, and my shape. Of course there are things I could change but I am healthy and strong and the way God made me. Anyways, we are going to Kim and Prestons' tomorrow to swim and I am so going to wear my two piece so I can actually breath, tummy flab or no. Even if Kim is teeny tiny ;)

5. Zeke just fell asleep in his highchair. I think its nap time.

6. Ziggy is continuing to assimilate into the family perfectly. He is perfectly litter box trained and we've even been able to move it into the upstairs bathroom where it is more out of the way. Ezekiel and him play constantly. In fact, they want to play so much that both have ended up on occasion being punished for not allowing the other to nap. First thing whenever Zeke comes home or wakes up he yells "kitty" and has to find Ziggy to hug and kiss him. I've never met such a dependant cat before, though, he HATES being left alone in a room and if he falls asleep and you leave he will cry when he wakes up until he finds you. He sleeps all night cuddled right under my neck, lol. When Blueberry is born and he's kicked down by my legs he's probably going to be dissapointed.

7. I am realizing Zeke is truly a toddler and needs to be treated more like one. Always before when we disciplined Zeke we mostly just redirected. Sometimes he would get really defiant and keep going back and back to the naughty behavior and we would have to remove the temptation completely or even spank him if it was dangerous but for the most part his interest could be easily moved. Not so much anymore. He remembers now and he KNOWS what he wants. Redirecting is no longer enough.

Josh and I's new plan, which we've started implementing the last few days or so is really working though. At first offense we get down to his level and tell him gently that he can't do that, WHY he cant do that, and offer a similar activity that is IS allowed to do. Honestly, this is really working and a lot of the time it ends right there. Josh and I both feel like explaining to him why he can't do something, rather then just telling him no and offering him something else to do, is the key. Of course many other times Zeke decides that our reasons are insufficient and he will go ahead and continue whatever he was doing, at that point we physically remove him from the area he is being naughty in and tell him much more firmly that no means no and he will not do that. Sometimes he cries for a while and then moves on, and then other times he squares up his shoulders, gives us a nasty look, and runs as fast as he can back to what he was doing. This time he gets spanked. I hate spanking him but I also dont know what else to do and DO NOT want to encourage that kind of defiance. I feel like he is too little for time outs and that just removing him over and over again just puts me at his level, fighting as an equal.

Luckily it rarely goes that far. And often when it does there are outside factors contributing like over exhaustion, being overwhelmed by the day, teething, ect. If I think that is the case then oftentimes after the firm no step I will just stop what I am doing and have some quiet time with books or something. That way he doesn't do it a 3rd time and I am not forced to spank him when I know he is overwhelmed and unable to control himself completely, After a little break or nap he's often ready for me to go back to what I was doing and it's not really a waste of time because I would have wasted just as much if not more spanking him and dealing with the after-affects. Of course I will admit, he's not always over exhausted, sometimes he's just being stubborn and ornery. And sometimes I cant stop what I'm doing. So the spanking does happen on occasion. Probably every other day.

Josh and I are hoping it gets to be less and less though since our steps are so consistent and with both of us doing them exactly the same. I know having a game plan set of exactly what we will do not only helps Zeke make sense of what to expect but helps us to keep calm and avoid over punishing in the heat of frusteration.

Wish us luck with it.