Sunday, August 21, 2011

Our Attempt at Gardening Part 3


Well, we have had a pretty bountiful first garden this year! We didn't really know what we were doing to start with, but we asked some questions, did some research, and then just planted and watered!! You can read about our other gardening adventures here and here.

We started out with planting watermelon, cucumbers (which Tad forgot he planted until we found full-grown ones in the garden!), strawberries, chives (which grew from small chives into big green onions), carrots, parsley, cilantro, basil, tomatoes, and green peppers. We got almost everything we planted. The strawberries, parsley, and basil just never came up at all. We had the cilantro probably the first half of the season and then it was gone. Our first watermelon patch produced a lot of watermelon, and then Maddy's watermelon patch on the other side of the garden started producing the second round and we are still picking. Watermelon must like super hot, sticky, nasty weather because we probably got around 12-15 watermelon!! The hard thing has been knowing when to pick them. We have picked them too early and too late, but this last one was just right! And Judah and Maddy had a blast eating it!

We got a plethora of carrots, but we didn't really know what to do with all of them! One tomato plant got huge and produced no tomatoes, and the other stayed small and produced no tomatoes (sad!) Our small little green pepper plant looked like it wasn't gonna do anything and then it produced 2 small beautiful green peppers and is working on 2 more!
The green onions are plentiful but I have too many to use up! They are still thriving in the garden so if you live in Oklahoma and need green onions, just give me a holler!
Maddy planted one sunflower from seed, well 2 actually but Judah pulled one up from the root early on :( and it got to be a huge tower! It bloomed while we were in Ohio and we still got to see it in all its glory when we got home. We now are just now harvesting the seeds from it!

And since being back from Ohio, and being very sick in pregnancy, the garden is overrun with weeds and looks like a safari jungle. Every time I go out into the heat for any length of time it makes me feel sick, and I couldn't imagine getting out there with the hoe to hack down the mass amount of weeds that have overtaken everything. Who knew I would get pregnant and so sick halfway through garden season? Oh well. At least it has still produced far more than we could have hoped for!!
So, I guess for next year I have a better idea of what we can get the most use out of, what we don't eat much of, and how much work a garden is. I did pretty well keeping up with it until I went out of town and got sick. So I'm sure I will have different plans for next year's garden. But I must say, I think it did pretty good for a first garden planted by amateur gardeners!! So, until next year, happy gardening!!

Friday, August 19, 2011

Fall is Coming!!

I can't believe that summer is already ending and kids are going back to school! I also can't believe that my oldest is turning 5 in a couple days and is starting kindergarten!! I am so proud and overwhelmed with all the work I need to do to get her school year ready!! It is exciting though!! My mother-in-law gave me a bunch of homeschooling materials for kindergarten so I am piecing them together and getting ready for the year!
I do love summer, but I am always ready for the Fall to start with a more scheduled routine, getting back to extra-curricular activities, and planned days. It is nice to lay back and relax in the summer days, but I get to the point where I'm ready to get going again with a busy year! This year, we will be doing some fun things for school (which I'll include in another post), hopefully have Maddy in swim lessons, and do some other fun groups for school/field trips. It should be a fun year of learning!
I have always loved Fall with the turning of colors and especially Fall baking. Since I am starting to feel a lot better, I hope I'm up to the task of all my usual cooking/baking with Fall flavors! My pumpkin extravaganza should be underway in the next couple of months! Not to mention that with this unbearable Oklahoma heat, I am more than anxious for some cooler weather. They said it would be hot, but I never imagined how hot! It was up over 100 degrees for about 50 days or more and then we only got a few days of a break in the 90's. Being from the north I never thought I would live somewhere where I longed for winter!
I am just about into my second trimester and the new "due date" is February 24 according to ultrasound. We had an early ultrasound so we still don't know if it's a boy or a girl! The other day when I went to the doctor Maddy wondered if the baby was going to come out of my tummy! Not for a long, long time, Maddy! But it will be an exciting thing to look forward to in this upcoming year!
So, with all that said, I should probably sign off and tackle some things on my to-do list. Feel free to comment on your favorite things about Fall, some of your best Fall recipes, or what you look forward to as Fall approaches! I always read and appreciate all your comments!!

Monday, August 15, 2011

Fighting Pregnancy Nausea

If any of you haven't read the last post, we are expecting our third baby at the end of February! This pregnancy hasn't been easy, to say the least. The nausea hit pretty hard at about 6 weeks, right in the middle of my trip to Ohio. It has left me laying on the couch for the last 6 weeks pretty much. It has been hard to adjust to not being able to do what I was used to doing around the house and for the kids. I am more used to it now, and am feeling a little bit better, which makes me feel a little bit more human. It's been a little easier to get out of the house, do normal things, and at least do some dishes and laundry. Needless to say, Tad has stepped it up a LOT to help me! And my brother and sister-in-law have come over and helped clean and watch the kids which has been such a blessing!!!!!
So I wanted to post about some things I have found to help the nausea a little bit, for anyone out there who may be struggling with it, or may in the future. I have found that the main problem is anytime I am hungry, I feel sick. That may sound like a simple fix, but I get hungry all the time. I feel like if I don't eat like a hungry man all day long, and keep my stomach super full, then I will feel sick. And if you've ever been pregnant, then you know the aversions to food don't make it easy to eat. I would walk into my kitchen and feel sick just looking at it. So that makes it a bit of a challenge.
I did try to buy a lot of frozen food so I wouldn't have to cook, but that proved a fail as I didn't enjoy most of the frozen food I got. Partly because of taste, and partly because of aversions I'm sure, but it made it harder to stay full. I then bit the bullet and just started cooking when I could so I would enjoy the food more and be able to stay full. That seemed to help a little.
So here are ten ways I have found (or heard of) that help to fight the nausea:
  1. Keep a snack next to your bed. Eat a little something before you get out of bed in the morning.
  2. Don't get up too fast. The motion can make the nausea worse.
  3. Eat small amounts of food all throughout the day. Keep your stomach full if you can!
  4. Gum and hard sour candy (lemon drops for me) have made such a difference!! If I am in the car especially, I have to have one of them. If I start to feel sick and don't feel like eating, if I have something in my mouth like that, it helps me not feel so sick.
  5. Small, hearty, healthy snacks are great like bananas, apples (love them!), grapes, or a smoothie.
  6. Laying down (I have heard laying on your left side is better.) Sometimes motion just makes me sick (the car, walking down aisles at the store) so laying down helps a lot.
  7. Throwing up. This sounds like defeat, but sometimes if you are so sick, sometimes throwing up will relieve the nausea and allow you to feel better.
  8. Prescription. Sometimes your doctor will prescribe either an oral prescription or a cream that you can put on your wrists. I got the cream though I'm not sure how well it actually works.
  9. Motion sickness aids. I have heard that you can get a little bracelet that pushes on the pressure points in your wrists associated with nausea.
  10. Acupuncture. I guess going along with the same idea as the pressure points, you can get acupuncture in your wrists to get rid of severe nausea.
The good thing is that for most women, the "morning sickness" that can last all day usually ends around the time that you enter your second trimester. So it's not forever. I am just about out of the first trimester so I hope it will be gone soon! You do just learn to deal with it, but when you have other kids, it makes it pretty tough to get things done and keep up with normal activities! You just have to keep your kids occupied in the house while you lay down, rest, and get back to normal!
Well, hopefully my next posts will be more positive as I start to feel better! And as I feel better, I will get more posts out! Thanks for being patient!