Cardboard Cookies

25 Oct 2012 8 Comments

by Natalie in Cooking/Attempting to Cook, Failed Housewife, What's a mom to do? Tags: , ,

For years I have spent a lot of time and money on building up my long-term food storage.

No one ever told me I would never want to use it.

I’m not saying I won’t ever need to use it, I’m just saying that after my cookies tasted like cardboard last week, it’s doubtful I’ll ever crack open another can.

I had the thought recently that I needed to start rotating my stored-up food supply. I have cans of flour that I packaged at my church’s food storehouse that date back to 2006. Others I packaged at my home in 2010.

Instead of buying fresh flour from the store, I’ve been opening cans from my basement and using what I’ve stored. I noticed that my baked goods have been coming out flat. I’ve had to add extra flour to each recipe to compensate.

I can deal with collapsed cookies, but I just can’t stomach ones that taste just plain out nasty.

Each Halloween our family makes ghost sugar cookies with M&M eyes. Last week, those poor ghosts tasted ghastly. I knew was something was amuck when the dough tasted a little bitter. But my two oldest boys keep asking for more samples and reassured me it was delicious.

They must have no taste buds.

After rolling out more than 60 ghosts, baking and then frosting them, I let them sit for the night. The next day, before I took the cookies to a Halloween party, I finally tasted one.

YUCK! I told my husband I was going to trash them all and he let me. That’s when I knew they were bad.

Making sugar cookies is hard work. I nearly cried when I had to dump the 5-dozen ghosts into my outside trash bin.

I really think it was the old flour.

My church encourages its members to have a well-established food reserve to draw on in times of natural disaster or personal crisis. I’ve been trying to slowly grow our hoard. I can’t imagine not being able to feed my little family if we fall on hard times.

But I am going to have to do some research and try something else when it comes to flour storage.  I may end up purchasing a wheat grinder and canning wheat from now on. But who know what that type of diet will do to our tummies if we ever have to use it.

And who knows what I am going to do with the dozens of #10 metal cans filled with musty old flour lining the shelves in my basement.

It sickens me to think that I’m not going to want to cook with any of it. Not even in a disaster – or personal crisis.

Then again, maybe it won’t matter if I am starving. Maybe cardboard tastes loads better when your stomach is empty.

What’s in your long-term food supply? Have you had any success cooking from food storage?

Road Trip

18 Oct 2012 6 Comments

by Natalie in Don't ever take your kids..., Parenting Battles, What's a mom to do?

 

On Tuesday night I vowed to never step foot in my 2008 Honda Odyssey again. After riding all day for our family road trip, I didn’t ever want to sit in that minivan again.

And neither did my 3-month old.

We left last week for California, a trip that would take us 750 miles across the country and at least 11 hours each way.

Before we left, I spent $20 in the Target dollar section hoping to give my older boys something to do while riding. We didn’t make it 30 minutes before those cheap activities failed me.

Apparently you have to be able to open them for them to be fun, and my 6-year-old has yet to learn how to tear through plastic packaging. I got to listen to him whine from the back seat as he couldn’t open, only noisily crinkle the crap out of the wrapper.

At our first stop I opened everything I could see that he might have trouble with. Then I gave him a brief overview on how to operate our traveling DVD players.

The ride was much smoother after that.

My husband and I decided to break up the trip by stopping in St. George for the night and driving the rest of the way the next day. With how well the first day’s travels went I was optimistic about our second day. I was naive.

We left St. George bright and early, but didn’t even make it to Mesquite — about 40 miles — before my 3-month old was screaming. I hopped in the back to calm him down, but to no avail. He was MAD.

We pulled off at a barren exit while I fed him. When we all climbed back in the van, my 6-year-old announced that he needed to go to the bathroom. Luckily there was a potty 5 miles away, but then we all had to endure a can’t-you-go-when-it’s-more-convenient speech from my husband.

At that point I was so nervous about having to go before it was “convenient” again, I thought I better try while we were stopped. When I saw the line of four biker chicks waiting outside the Chevron lady’s room, I changed my mind and decided to hold it.

Bad idea. Our next stop was Barstow where we ate a pizza at a park. You can only imagine what the facilities were like there. I ended up squatting over a chrome commode because the nasty metal seat nearly frostbit my backside. It. Was. Gross.

Aside from a couple of smartphone Google-maps mishaps, one of which nearly led us up a rocky cliff in order to find Pizza Hut, we made it to our final destination without any more incident.

Note that I said without any more incident. That doesn’t mean we were free from any more outbursts from the youngest member of our party.

Poor little baby. I think a combination of things drove him to tears — strapped facing backwards, stranded by himself in the middle of the van, restricted to sitting in a tiny chair with a poopy backside, to mention a few.

But the trip back to Utah would be worse.

On the way home, we didn’t stop in St. George. We drove straight through each inch of those 750 miles. It was the longest drive of my life.

Before we even left California my husband made a dangerous suggestion.

“We could slide the middle seats in the van together,” he said. “That way when our baby gets hungry we wouldn’t even have to stop. You could just kind of lean over his car seat to feed him.”

Say what? I didn’t know if I should yell at him for thinking that was a good idea, or laugh at the absurdity of his proposition.

Luckily — for him — I laughed. Then he backed off of the idea like it was a joke. Sadly, I swear he was serious. To his utter disappointment, I sat up front with him and didn’t hunch over the car seat every three hours to nurse.

The drive from California to Las Vegas was actually pretty good. The baby fell asleep and we drove in peace. I finally got to dive into the new novel I bought for the trip.

But after Vegas I think we all had had enough. The two oldest kept punching and pinching in the back while yelling loud enough to keep their brother awake.

Once again I tried to calm the little one down by climbing into the middle and acting like a fool to entertain him, but it was all in vain. I finally climbed back to the front and tried not to let my heart break as he continued to cry. It was horrible staring at his screaming pinkish purple face knowing there literally was nothing I could do for him.

Despite his cries, we drove on.

To top the trip all off, as we were buckling up at our last pit stop, my husband spotted two baby mice frolicking by the entrance to the fast-food joint where we had just eaten. They were inches away from the door to the place where my meal was prepared – Where all of our meals were prepared. Yuck!

Our baby fell asleep while nursing during dinner, giving me a sense of hope. But I guess he has gotten really good at sensing his car-seat confinement. He was screaming mere minutes from our final take off.

Having already hopped in the back seat twice on the trip I figured it would do me no good. I waited an hour or so before I could take it no longer.

By the time we rounded the point of the mountain, I was dreaming of having a taxi-like partition between the front and rear seats of the van. I thought I was going to go crazy with the screaming.

I jumped into the middle of the van hoping that the third time would be the charm and that I could somehow make him stop. We rode the rest of the way with the interior light on as I jingled rattles and babbled like a bubbling idiot trying to entertain him on the last leg of our journey.

Miraculously it worked.

We were able to drive the last hour and a half of our trip in peace listening to the presidential debate while our two oldest boys watched probably their twelfth movie of the trip.

But an hour and a half of peace isn’t enough to forget the other hours of close-spaced stress.

We rolled into our driveway at 9 p.m. At least 12 hours from when we left. And that’s when I promised myself I would never get back into our silver van.

Unfortunately, that promise was short-lived. I had to climb into the driver’s seat less than 12 hours later to take my oldest to school.

So I may not be able to avoid driving around town, but you can be sure it will be a long time before I am ready for another all-day mini-van confinement.

There Is Hope

11 Oct 2012 1 Comment

by Natalie in Dealing with Death, My Angel Baby Tags: , , , , , ,

Author’s note: I try not to write too frequently about my angel baby boy. Thoughts of him are constantly in the back of my mind exhausting my emotions. I don’t want to exhaust others with reading about him. But this week I found hope again in dealing with his loss. I know I wrote about him last week, but I had to share that hope without letting another week go by.

OK. Ill admit it. There have been times since the loss of my son that I have become frustrated with my religion. I have felt discouraged and disheartened as prayers and pleadings have failed to cure my broken heart.

This past weekend my faith in healing was renewed as I listened to a church leader, Elder Shayne M. Bowen, speak on the loss of his 8-month-old baby boy.

He spoke on Saturday, October 5, 2012, during The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, semi-annual conference. It was hands down the best talk I have ever heard on losing a child.

Unlike most leaders in the church, Bowen validated my loneliest thoughts as he spoke of his lost son, Tyson, who choked on a piece of chalk 22 years ago. He addressed his message to those parents who have lost a child and have found themselves asking, “Why me?”

For so long I have felt guilty for asking that question. I have felt guilty for questioning my beliefs.

Bowen’s words proved to me that I am not alone. He spoke of having similar feelings and thoughts. But not only did he speak about his grief and doubts, he shared ways that he worked through his grief and doubt.

Finally I have a strong example from a stalwart church leader to guide me on my path to healing my broken heart.

A lot of times members of my church attest to being thankful for their trials and the lessons those trials have taught them. I have felt alienated from my peers because I have never felt thankful for losing my son.

In his talk Bowen said he felt guilt, anger and self-pity after the death of his baby boy. He told about the doctor telling he and his wife that there was nothing they could do and then he wondered how he was going to tell his other children that their brother wasn’t coming home.

I have wondered the exact same thing.

He said others told him that they knew how he felt – but they knew nothing of how he felt.

I have heard similar comments.

After his son died he had many sleepless nights, some of them he spent wandering his house checking on his other children.

I have wandered a similar route.

It comforted me to hear that a spiritual giant from my same religious background experienced some of the same things as me – and that he too struggled with his testimony after losing his baby.

It made me feel “normal” for the first time in a long time.

My favorite part of his talk was near the end when he described how far he has come.

“Sometimes people will ask, ‘How long did it take you to get over it?’ The truth, is you will never completely get over it until you are together once again with your departed loved ones. I will never have a fullness of joy until we are reunited in the morning of the first resurrection.”

I couldn’t have said it better. I, like elder Bowen, may be able to be happy at times, but I will never find true, complete joy until I can hug my baby boy once again.

Bowen said that Tyson remains an important part of his family, and Luca is an important part of mine.

After feeling anger, self-pity and guilt, Bowen prayed that his heart would change.
He said that through very personal, spiritual experiences he was given a new heart and even though it was still lonely and painful, his whole outlook changed.

I feel like Elder Bowen is at the peak of his mountain of grief while I am still at the summit. I still have a long way to go to work through my sorrow. But knowing that others have crested over rough boulders and sharp slopes on their way to finding peace gives me hope, hope I haven’t had in a long, long time.

I am still waiting for my new heart, but now I believe it will actually come.

If you too are struggling while dealing with the loss of a child, listen to Bowen’s talk. Hopefully it can bring you peace and hope like it did me. If nothing else, it will show you that other people have been there and you are not alone.

My Bassinet to Crib Panic Attack

04 Oct 2012 1 Comment

by Natalie in Dealing with Death, Parenting Battles, What's a mom to do?

I buried part of my innocence when I buried my baby boy.

I wish that I hadn’t.

Before Luca died two years ago, I was naively optimistic about the world. I was certain that nothing bad or difficult would come my way.

Boy, were my eyes opened the night I found out I would have to deliver him after he had already died. Bad things happen to good people, and I will never see the world the same again.

But I thought things were going better for me recently. That having a rainbow baby had once again instilled hope into my life.

I didn’t realize how scared I still was that something might go wrong again for me — until we tried having our new baby sleep in his crib, in a room down the hall.

I thought I was ready to move him, my two-and-a-half-month-old good night sleeper, into a bedroom with his two oldest brothers. But after a 2 a.m. panic attack the second night of having him out of my room, I knew it was too soon.

I pushed my husband out of bed, made him go grab our baby and bring him back to me. I was scared to death that something had happened to him.

Seriously? It’s crazy how much I still worry that something is going to happen to my living children. I have some major posttraumatic stress when it comes to my kids.

Having a new baby has given me hope, but that hope hasn’t quite extinguished all of my fear.

I guess I didn’t realize how many times a night I reach over his bassinet wall to feel the rise and fall of his chest, or lean over to brush my ear near his nose to hear the in and out of his breath. Having him near — close enough to physically feel that he is still alive — has comforted me more times than I realized.

So after one and a half nights in his crib, he is now back in the bassinet by the side of my bed. I know that eventually I am going to have to move him to the other room permanently — heaven knows he’s getting nearly too big for his little bed. But I don’t know how I am going to do it.

How am I going to put my mind at ease? How will I keep from waking and worrying a dozen times a night when he’s not next to me?

Gosh I hate that I have these feelings. I hate that anyone has to go through hard times.  I wish I could go back to the days when I was positive that everything would work out the way I wanted it to.

But I don’t think I will ever be able to go back to those days. And I wouldn’t trade having Luca for anything. He may have died, but he is still, and will always be, my baby.

I just wish he were still here with me, and ultimately that his death hadn’t shattered my rose colored glasses and left me worrying about what big trial I am going to have to face next.

I wish I could have held onto my everything-in-the-world-is-amazing positive attitude a little bit longer. Then maybe I could sleep easier at night.