Happy Halloween from the Angriest Squid

We decided not to go trick or treating this year because most of the candy would not be edible, for us. 

So I didn't put any time or effort or money into a costume of any sort for Squeaky D. At the last moment I had pangs of regret at not taking the opportunity to dress him up for his first Hallowe'en. I quickly filled long dark socks with fabric, pinned them to a soft elastic to go around his waist. I plopped a grey toque with felt eyes on his head. He was a squid.

Happy Halloween from the Angriest Squid

The angriest squid of all time. He was in the "costume" for all of 1.5 minutes. Next year we might have to practice leading up to the big day. But he loved handing out the candy with me!

Link me up to photos of your adorable children, whether they hated on Hallowe'en or loved it! 

The Secret to great Sweet Potato Fries {rookie Recipe}

Remember weeks ago when I tweeted that I had discovered the secret to amazing and crispy home made sweet potato fries?

Yes. Just yes.

 Well. First, sorry that it has taken me so long to make the big reveal. And second, I lied. There isn't one secret, there are two. And one came about because of the other. A tangled web of delicious secret fries!

After chopping my humongous sweet potato into thick baby-hand-sized frenched fries, I debated between using olive oil or coconut oil to coat the fries and settled on what is now the first secret - Coconut Oil - to bake the fries. I set the oven to 350F and began to smear on the coconut oil, but the cool moist fries hardened the oil and it would not spread. This is when I realized I could parboil the fries, the second secret, in the mircowave for two minutes to heat the oil as well as seal in the tastiness! Huzzah! Parboiling the fries is really the difference between soft and crispy sweet potato fries.

As the fries came out of the microwave, I made sure each fry was coated in coconut oil and sprinkled on some cumin, fresh ground pepper, and mrs. dash, my most predictably favourite spice mix. I made sure to spread the fries out evenly, not a single fry was touching another fry, and left them in the oven around 25 minutes, until the ones around the edges were browned. This is where the little known half-secret comes in: don't add salt to your fries until after they come out of the oven.  You'll thank me afterwards.

More for Mama.

Unless you are Squeaky D. Because quite frankly, he hated the sweet potato fries.

#30. This Moment: Please, no pictures.

Please, no pictures.

 {this moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savour, and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same

leave your link in the comments 

then go to Soule Mama and do the same.

My first handmade trade: SUCCESS!

I make no secret of my love over twitter. The biggest reason, of course, is that it has connected me to some pretty spectacular people.

Many of you reading these exact words, probably.

But one person who was brought swiftly to me after joining twitter was @chasingthenuns, or Sarah from Cerlandia.com. I have freaking loved this woman since BEFORE I WAS A MOM! Which seems like a lifetime and a half ago, okay?

She approached me to do a handmade trade and I said YES! And then we had a postal strike. And then I ruined the thing I was making for her. And then I was just the WORST INTERNET FRIEND of all time and just dragged my ass for weeks leaving the project unfinished while I trudged through sleeplessness and grumpy life.

But in the meantime, Sarah was timely and thoughtful and mailed me my half of the handmade trade.

When I opened up the package, the first thing I saw was my first (of hopefully many!) handwritten letter from her.

I pulled out the bag and immediately fell in love with it.

I just have to show you a close up of the adorable appliques she made! Originally I had hinted we might be using this bag for shopping.

So cute, right? Even crumpled up right out of the box, this bag is perfect, with gorgeous vintage fabric lining. Even though we don't use the bag for groceries anymore. It has officially become our library bag! So perfect for books. Plus, if Sarah lived here, we would for sure be library buddies, I just know it.

She even gifted me some of her son's cloth diaper covers for our own cloth diapering adventures.

And she never once complained (out loud) about how late and horrible I was. I can only hope I made up for it by sending her something she will really love... truly the hardest applique I have ever put on one of my stitched hand-bound journals! But she deserves it.

Love you, Sarah! So glad you found a way into my life and my heart.

Snail Mail Friends Forever,
Farren

Ps - Here is a sneak preview of the applique I made for her hand-bound Journal:

Go take a peek HERE to see the journal in its completion!!

Going dairy-free for my nursling was the easiest choice.

I spend a lot of time talking about gluten-free, dairy-free, egg-free, yadda yadda yadda-free eating. And this is why my recipes are gluten free and dairy free. It's not exactly my idea of the perfect diet, says the cheese-loving egg-nog-missing me. But it has been by far the best choice I could ever make for me and my family.

Allow me to explain.

Around August of 2009, I started to put two and two together (OMG, FOUR!) and realised that I was not healthy and in denial. For a large part of my adult life I had been sick and still did nothing about it. So I started reading. I talked to a doctor, I talked to many friends with similar afflictions, and I decided to reduce gluten in my diet.

I started feeling a lot better. I reduced it even further. I immediately noticed that my skin was better, my stomach felt better, I was less bloated, I didn't spend hours in the bathroom every morning. Within a month my depression had lifted. Within two months, my lady-cycle was regular.

After I became pregnant, I noticed anything gluten made me much sicker than before and completely stopped eating anything with gluten. Now even a slight slip up and I am violently ill.

Easy peasy, right?

I wish that were all. After the birth of my son (almost a full year ago? holy balls.) there was a steep learning curve. He threw us for a loop. Why was he always coughing, sputtering, and screaming? Why did his breath smell like acid, why does he hiccup all day and arch his back away from me when I try to nurse him? Don't babies like to nurse? The doctor diagnosed him with reflux, gave us a prescirption and sent us on our way. We used it, and it helped with the reflux, but not with the tummy pains. And definitely not with the mucousy, frothy green poops. Yeah, that's right, poop talk. I'll try to keep it limited.

All of this, of course, was accompanied with one very unhappy baby. So we searched for answers. Several mothers recommended eliminating certain things from my diet, especially dairy, so I played around with it and saw results. Three weeks off dairy completely and we were able to ditch the reflux medicine. This led me to try a full elimination diet, eating only rice, chicken, some vegetables and few fruits for two weeks, and then slowly re-introducing foods.

At first it was very apparent that Squeaky D reacted to dairy, egg, soy, and peanut, and at the time I also suspected beef, beans, citrus, and tomato, though I can thankfully eat those now!  Lately I have also stopped eating cashews and shellfish because of recent reactions. Some of these we have actually let him try, like egg, and he has had rashes across his face and chest almost immediately afterward. Scary.

Eczema Baby D - Still getting rid of dairy

For a long time I had nothing but the anecdotal experience of very wise Mamas to back me up, and a lot of defending to do about my diet and our restrictions to family and friends. I've been told to give it up and "just wean to goat's milk" because this all must be "fake" or "too hard." But then I read Dr Jay Gordon's article analyzing dairy protein allergy in children and nurslings and I felt vindicated. More and more literature supports nursing moms who decide to eliminate dairy and other foods from their diet.

And honestly. It hasn't been that difficult. There have been times when I have forgotten to read ingredients and had a slip up, and ohh boy. There is nothing inside me that wishes that kind of pain on my little boy, no amount of delicious applewood smoked gouda could convince me to go through the terror that the following two days (and three nights) would bring. No matter how drool-worthy.

So that is why all my recipes are weirdly dairy free. And egg free. And gluten free. And all that other stuff free. I have enjoyed the challenge of teaching myself to cook, especially within these interesting restrictions. And I love me a happy, healthy baby.

#29. This Moment: Follow the Yellow Leaf Path...

Lovely Autumn Path

 {this moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savour, and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same

leave your link in the comments 

then go to Soule Mama and do the same.

#28. This Moment: My Autumn Baby

Autumn Baby

 

 {this moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savour, and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same

leave your link in the comments 

then go to Soule Mama and do the same.

#27. This Moment:Teeths

SnuggleBug. Featuring: Teeths.

 {this moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savour, and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same

leave your link in the comments 

then go to Soule Mama and do the same.

From a Breastfeeding Mom to All Moms, Everywhere.

From a Breastfeeding Mom to All Moms, Everywhere.

I'm a breastfeeding feminist. I believe that breastmilk, evolutionarily, was made for human consumption. It is complex and, scientifically speaking, ideal for babies.

That said, there are times when mothers choose to quit breastfeeding. There are times when mothers choose to quit pumping breastmilk and bottlefeeding. There are times when mothers do not breastfeed at all.

And you know what bugs me the most out of all of this? That those mothers consistently feel the need to explain to us, the breastfeeders, the world, why they formula feed. Formula feeding moms feel the need to justify to the world - "This is why I'm not breastfeeding!" - they have to explain to us the reason why they made that parenting decision.

And yeah, that makes me pretty sad. Do you know why? Because I trust those moms to make that parenting decision. I am not those women. I do not live their lives, I do not know what they have gone through, I do not know the challenges they have faced. By that fact alone, I have no right to judge the choices they make regarding how they feed their babies. Even Jessica Valenti said that formula feeding was 100% right for her. Why should we ask her to justify that decision? We don't know her and we don't live her life.

A friend Sarah and I were out with a group of moms recently, and when I disappeared to talk to someone else, the topic of breastfeeding - and struggling with breastfeeding - came up. Sarah told me later that two other moms out of the large group professed having difficulties before my friend spoke up about her experience with public health nurses telling her she was starving her child and the subsequent the guilt trip she faced on the internet when she blogged about supplementing with formula. And she confessed to me that as soon as she put it out there, as soon as her story hung over the group in silence, she was nervous about what the other moms would say. Thankfully one wise mother piped up and said something I have said before, too: "We as mothers have enough to worry about, we need to be free to make the decisions that are best for our babies without being made to feel guilty."

If you formula feed or if you breastfeed - your baby is fed and loved and cared for. You are an amazing mom.

Squeaky D raises his fist in Solidarity

I do talk about breastfeeding a lot. It's what I do these days. But I've also shared the story of a Formula Feeding mom. I am a close supporter of many moms who formula feed. I want people to know that you can support and encourage breastfeeding without leaving formula feeding moms behind.

In the last week or so, things have become very heated in the feminist twitter community. Yes, there is one, it's weird and awesome all at the same time. Of course I love it.

Firstly, it must be addressed that there are some women who are not kind. Bluntly, that is it. There are women who champion breastfeeding without being considerate, without being kind or compassionate. Some of them even spread a hateful message. I do not stand behind these women, and I encourage everyone I meet to be inclusive and kind. This is very obviously a sensitive topic and I don't think there is anything wrong with treating it as such.

And secondly, breastfeeding in this modern time has become, unfortunately, something that is mysterious. There are a lot of misleading half-truths that are consistently spread by older generations, doctors, nurses, hospital "lactation consultants," and formula companies. We desperately want to spread truth about breastfeeding, and sometimes that means questioning things that women have heard.

For instance, someone shared in the midst of the kurfuffle that her mother could not breastfeed because she was intolerant to breast milk. Babies are not intolerant to breast milk. A baby could have an allergy or a sensitivity to something a mother is eating, but maybe that mother would have made the choice to eliminate peanuts or eggs (or whatever) from her diet and continued breastfeeding. Maybe not. But maybe so! And isn't it her right to know that and make an informed decision? It is hard for us breastfeeding mothers to stay quiet when we hear people repeating misinformation and all at once respect the relationship that mother may have with her choice to formula feed.

We know about the "mommy guilt," all of us. I know of it so deeply that sometimes it is crippling and I can feel weighed down and crushed by it. I can't imagine what it might be like to be bottle feeding publicly have have someone shame me for parenting my child. As a breastfeeder I fight for the right to breastfeed publicly but I have never had someone insinuate that I was a bad mother for breastfeeding. How upsetting, how demoralizing, how infuriating, how utterly cruel. This is not a comfortable position and I myself would probably also take a defensive stance. My worth as a mother is hardly defined by how I feed my baby. 

Please, my formula feeding moms, my fellow moms. Please understand that so many of us, we don't think you are stupid. We don't think you are uneducated. We don't think you didn't try hard enough. We don't think your baby is eating poison and we don't think your kid is going to be stupid.

We just want formula companies to stop their false advertising. We don't want them to lie to mothers anymore. We don't want them to pretend to offer breastfeeding support.

That's it, really. We just want the truth and the experts on breastfeeding to be the ones offering breastfeeding support. We want educated doctors, nurses, and internationally certified lactation consultants handing out unbiased information and support. I don't mind that formula companies exist and I think formula should be available, I just want them to keep a respectful distance from a mother's right to educate herself about feeding her baby.

We want all moms to make the best choice for them and their babies and their families. And you don't have to justify it to us, the breastfeeders, or anyone else.

Can I say it again? Your baby is loved and cared for. You are an amazing mom. We can all support all mothers so that each one knows her rights and has the access to make her best decisions, no matter what they may be.

#26. This Moment: Friday Flashback

Squeaky D Flashback: Three Months Old

 {this moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savour, and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same

leave your link in the comments 

then go to Soule Mama and do the same.

He was refusing to breastfeed. What was I to do?

My baby refused to breastfeed at four months old. Was he trying to wean? 

I love breastfeeding my baby. Now that we have been doing this dance for over ten months, I can look back on our steps and see the areas where we lost our footing. Where we had become off-beat. How I was steadfast and determined, I simply didn't see any other choice and so I dug my heels in, turned up the music, and kept dancing, even if I didn't know what the dance was supposed to look like.

There have been moments where I was exhausted, confused, raggedly looking into the eyes of my friends and desperately pleading for a moment of sanity thinking - "Am I doing this right? Is this really how it is supposed to go?" Not knowing that when it comes to breastfeeding - and babies in general - there really isn't a "supposed to" about it.

When Desmond was four months old he woke up. That is, he realized he could see the world and couldn't tear his eyes away from it for one moment, not one. He only wanted to be held high enough to see over our shoulders, or facing away so that he could look look look at everything.

q u i e t n e s s

This made breastfeeding very hard. Friends would come to visit us and he would squawk, hungry like a tiny bird. I would gently bring him to my breast and he would hungrily root and latch. And then immediately become angry and arch his back away. Partly? This was a learned behaviour from the reflux. But mostly he did not want to look away from the world. He did not understand that snuggling into my breast meant he would no longer be hungry.

This was more than just a baby bobbing his head into the breast. More than just a baby pushing and pinching the breast. Those actions are signs of hunger often misinterpreted.

This was a baby, my baby, full on refusing to take the breast and suck or feed. This was a nursing strike. At a very young age.

I didn't know at the time but we were going through was something many women go through. At my LLL meeting, mothers saw him squawk in hunger, mothers saw him angry and refusing to be turned into the breast, angry at the suggestion that... maybe he'd like to eat? They offered their sympathy, they offered to help any way they could. Their eyes told me - "It's going to get better." As I packed up a finally full, finally sleeping baby to drive home in wintery darkness, Leaders would put a hand on my shoulder and thank me for being determined, for coming to the meetings. "Keep coming," they'd say.

Obviously I was petrified to leave my house to go anywhere else. How could I go to the grocery store? How could I go to the bank or the mall? My baby would become hungry, but what it took to feed him was at least a 15 minute ordeal that involved a lot of crying, a lot of that very screamy baby screaming that we call Code Red around here. And I was unable to juggle the two of us in any discreet kind of way. I couldn't very well plop myself down in the pickle aisle with my breast out and struggle with my screaming baby for 15 minutes. I wish that I could have, but people today wouldn't understand. Because What would people say? They would say breastfeeding is only okay if it is discreet. Right? We tell mothers No!

Not if a she needs to sit down on the ground and pull down her v-neck and leave it that way and THEN somehow finagle the L O U D E S T infant into quietness just so that she can get some fucking groceries, god dammit. No, not the mothers who really need it, not the mothers who are struggling. They can't be discreet so they are NOT OKAY IN PUBLIC.

There were only two things that I knew for sure in those days:

1. A four month old baby is not trying to wean. A four month old baby has no concept of those things. 
2.  A baby can't be distracted if it is already sleeping. 

And so we became very good at putting the baby to sleep without the breast at all. We wore Baby D and walked until he slept. We held him in our arms and danced around the livingroom until he slept. We held him to our chests and bounced gently on the exercise ball, humming and shushing, humming and shushing. Until he slept. And he would cry. But then he would sleep.

He sleeps.

Once his lungs were quiet and his eyes were closed, I could bring him to my chest and he would latch and he would suck and he would eat and eat and eat. And he would sleep. And I would visualize and take deep breaths, anything anything to get that letdown to come as fast as I could. Rushing rivers, gates opening, waterfalls of milks. Breathing deeply, my hand on his tiny head, celebrating; my baby is q u i e t.

We had cracked the secret code. And so all day I would feed him after he fell asleep. If he would fuss during a nap, I would lay beside him and let him eat. I would feed him again as he woke up. He started eating more over the course of the night to make up for the days. I didn't mind. Babies need to eat, and I wanted to feed him. I would breastfeed him anyway that we could make it work.

Every day it became easier until at one point - it stopped. He started making the connection and the dance became so much smoother, we were more than comfortable taking time-outs from the world to nurse. And then it was just gone. I can still remember the first day that he was happy and excited to breastfeed every. time. And I'm so grateful that I powered through that rough patch, that nursing strike, to emerge on the other side.

Now? Six months later I am even happier. This dance couldn't be any easier.

#25. This Moment: Garden Harvest

mmm.

 {this moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savour, and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same

leave your link in the comments 

then go to Soule Mama and do the same.

#24. This Moment: It's Autumn, Baby.

My Autumn Baby

 {this moment}

A Friday ritual. A single photo - no words - capturing a moment from the week. A simple, special, extraordinary moment. A moment I want to pause, savour, and remember.

If you're inspired to do the same

leave your link in the comments 

then go to Soule Mama and do the same.

Home-made gluten-free Turkey Burgs! {Rookie Recipe}

Can we get it out of the way? Can we just say it?

Hamburgers are awesome. And apparently gluten free hamburgers are impossible to get right. In the last two years I have had very few truly amazing gluten free burgers. The problem is usually the bun.

Gluten free buns are bad, mmkay? They just are. They are hard when they should be soft or gooey when they should be fluffy. And they taste like wrong. Just wrong.

And even if the bun was even just alright, the patty is usually unseasoned. No barbecue sauce. Just a round puck of meat. Gross.

So obviously you could understand why a girl's gotta put her foot down and say Enough! I will make my own gosh darned gluten free burger and it will be INCREDIBLE YOU GUYS.

And? It was.

Most delicious burger of all time. OF ALL TIME!

What I used:

1 lb ground turkey
1 egg
1 package of Glutino Gluten Free crackers, pulverised.
1/2 an onion, finely chopped
4 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 tblspn of chopped dill
1 tsp oregano
1 tsp garlic powder
a dash of montreal steak spice

Romaine lettuce
hamburger fixins

What I did: 

Pulverising these crackers was harder than I thought it was going to be. I'm not a huge fan of Glutino Gluten Free Crackers for eating. They try to be Ritz crackers and fail. They are too crunchy and too sweet - perfect for cooking with. First I beat the crackers (inside their little "freshness" baggie) with my hands. But they would not be crushed. Then I beat them with a soup can. But, nope, they were still not interested in being crushed. So I got out my rolling pin and I let loose on those crackers like they done me wrong. For a good five minutes. And now I want a food processor very badly. But I crushed them real good.

I put two packages of ground turkey in a huge bowl, added the crackers, the egg, the onion, and the seasonings and mixed. Some people use their hands for this. I used a wooden spoon and a rubber spatula and probably looked like a fool but I did not have gooey raw meat on my hands so I feel like a winner and that is what counts. 

Amazing Tupperware Patty Press... things.

Once everything is really well mixed, I brought out my secret weapon: My mother's ancient Tupperware hamburger patty press set... thing. You take a spoonful of the ground meat, put it in the mold, and then use a press to flatten it and shape it into a patty. I'm sure it would be easy to do by hand, but baby - this patty press helps the burgs stick together on the grill so well. I'm glad I would not relent and give it up in the great Tupperware purge of ought-nine.

I stacked four patties on top of each other, separated by a small square of waxed paper. This is a great way to freeze them, in groups of four, so you can quickly defrost and grill some gluten free burgers on a whim - any time you like!

We decided to grill 6 burgers right away, topped them with pickles, red onion, mustard, and ketchup, and wrapped each burger in one or two romaine lettuce leaves. The lettuce wrap is actually AMAZING. Better than any gluten free bun you've ever tried, crisp, fresh, crunchy - and it doesn't fill you up so you can go ahead and have a second burger, guilt-free.

Can't wait to try turning this recipe into a meatloaf! I'll let you know how it goes.

Do you make your own burger patties? What are your favourite spices and ingredients?

Who is Mandude?

Who is Mandude?

Well. He isn't my husband. And I'm not his Wife. I'm simply Ms. Square and he is just Mandude, and together we love each other the best way we know how, constantly striving to know how to love each other better and better.

When we first met neither of us gave the other very much of a second glance.

When we second met we could not stop laughing together.  I loved that his laugh revealed his Russian accent and when gushing about him to friends online (livejournal for life) I referred to him as The Russian. As we got to falling in love, moving in together, starting a family... we realized "boyfriend" and "girlfriend" just didn't cut it anymore. Those terms just didn't match our endearment.

So we tried out partner for a while. We still use it a lot to strangers, but it does seem to make people think we are a homosexual couple for some reason. We also tried out the word spouse, which is my favourite word when I'm dealing with the public.

We is serious about Om Noms

And of course there is the ever-popular "Baby Daddy," which is actually a personal favourite of mine but people don't seem to realize that - yeah, we're still together and in love. So darn.

One evening I was on twitter and everyone around me was tweeting about their spouses. Hubby, Wifey. DH, DP, SigOth... none of it seemed to fit us. I thought, who is he to me?

The dude who mans my heart. My Mandude.

So Mandude he became, and he wears the title well.