Home Again

Thank you all for your comments and prayers during Nathan's hospital stay. We are HOME! And he is doing very well. We are still adjusting into a new routine of weighing him daily, checking his blood pressure, and giving him (only one!) medication twice a day, as well as needing to go to regular pediatrician and monthly kidney specialist visits. His wonderful pediatric kidney specialist has repeatedly assured us that he is extremely happy with Nathan's progress, that he thinks that he will have no lasting damage, and that he is recovering quickly.  We are going to have to have his peritoneal dialysis tube removal surgery in a few weeks, and then I know that I will feel like we're getting back to normal.


 Nathan is understandably a bit emotional, and swings quickly from extremely happy and giggly to tears.  This is not normal for our even keeled, cheerful boy, but obviously a small child who has been very sick, stuck with countless needles, catheterized (with two failed attempts by the PICU nurses before they called the stat nurse), gone through minor surgery, and gone through temporary cold turkey weaning is going to be scared and confused and feel less secure for a while.


But he is still generally a happy little guy, and is getting his energy and strength back very quickly.  He is blossoming verbally in the last few weeks, labeling everything by color (usually correctly!), spontaneously reciting animal noises-

"Cow say MOOOO. Pig say *snort snort*.  Chicken say BUK BUK BUK."

- and greeting us all by name in the middle of dinner ("Hi, Miriam.  Hi, Mama.  Hi, Daddy.").  He is also enjoying some new books he was given, including a new favorite, Fifteen Animals!, and an old favorite that I remembered reading to my brothers but that we didn't have, Guess How Much I Love You.



Also home is Monkey, who was given to Nathan by some kind friends who visited us in the hospital.  Monkey was 'listened to' by countless nurses, bravely took tylenol first to show Nathan it tasted good, donned a face mask along with Nathan whenever the dialysis nurses needed to change his dressing or hook or unhook his tube from the machine, and even wore a blue cap and accompanied him into surgery.  Monkey's given name on his tag was Bongo, but Nathan told every nurse who asked that his name was Monkey, so we're going with that.  ;)

We are all soaking in the summer with renewed enthusiasm... eating popsicles with all four of us piled in the hammock we bought on our honeymoon (and hung this week... why did we wait so long?!), wearing our "flips flops", as Nathan says, drinking pink lemon aid, and generally reveling in being home and being together.  God is good and has been gracious, and we are full of joy.

Earth Mama Angel Baby Milkmaid Tea Review

I recently received some Earth Mama Angel Baby Milkmaid Tea for review.* 

Milkmaid Tea contains herbal galactagogues like fennel, fenugreek, anis seed, and caraway seed.


I haven't had trouble with milk supply (except during pregnancy, and Milkmaid Tea is not intended for use during pregnancy), but tandem nursing means I am producing a lot of milk (moo!) and so sometimes it is nice to give my milk production a little herbal support.  If you're struggling with milk production, start with this page from Kellymom on how milk production works, and then check out this page with things you can do for your supply.

 The day that my tea arrived, it was pretty warm, and the idea of a hot cup of tea was just not my cup of tea.  ;)  But on the back of the box it suggested that it was good iced or hot, so I made some iced tea with it.  It was great!  It has a nice, mild herbal flavor.  Compared to the Traditional Medicinals Organic Mother's Milk Herbal Tea  I felt that the Milkmaid Tea had a milder flavor.  I think Mother's Milk tea has a  stronger, more licorice like flavor.  I like licorice, so I don't mind it, but I know some people don't like licorice...

The next morning it was cooler and I had a hot cup of Milkmaid Tea instead.  It was tasty, but I felt that it was a bit weak tasting, which surprised me since I had used one tea bag in a standard sized mug and made sure to steep it for 10 minutes (the box suggests 5-10).  However, I didn't squeeze the tea bag at all, like I always do with the Mother's Milk Tea (it says to in the instructions for MMT), so perhaps that was part of it.  The next time I made a hot cup I made sure to squeeze the tea bag instead and I think it seemed stronger.

And because this is a truthful review  - Micah didn't realize what kind of iced tea I was drinking and took a drink.  He did NOT like it, and refused to believe that it didn't contain his childhood nemesis, Slippery Elm Bark, until I read him the ingredients list out loud, at which point he began talking about the need for an ingredient audit!  So, *I* think it tastes fine, but just for full disclosure, that is obviously not a universal belief!

Thanks, Earth Mama Angel Baby!


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*I was sent a box of Milkmaid tea to review.  I was not compensated in any way for this post.  All opinions expressed are my own.  All links are Amazon affiliate links, so if you buy through them I have a few more pennies of play money.

Wednesday reading...

I haven't really written at all about tandem nursing, but it has been a huge part of my experience mothering two, so I'm glad to be working on getting some of that down on paper this week.

So today, giant mug of tea and peanut butter toast by my side, I'm reading, skimming through looking for good quotes, and trying to pull all my thoughts and experiences together into one coherent stream. Kind of like trying to braid tangled hair at this point, but I'm slowly detangling one thought at a time.  I think it has been too long since I could whip out a good paper in an afternoon and late night back in high school...plus of course at that point I could go into a room and lock the door and have no distractions.  I have two cute ones now!  Yesterday I was curled up with the above books and Nathan brought me a book of nursery rhymes.  :)  After we read that we read Bears on Wheels, and then he was satisfied and ran off to play, and I got back to it... and I should get back to it now, since they're both playing happily at the moment!