Tea Roll Recipe

Several people have mentioned how delicious our Christmas morning breakfast of Tea Roll looks.  So, I have decided to post this (super easy) recipe so everyone can try some!

Ingredients:

1 cup brown sugar

1 stick butter (or margarine)

2 Tbs water

2 cans pillsbury biscuit dough (or refrigerated biscuit dough)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Melt butter in a pan over medium heat.  Add in brown sugar and water and stir until mixture is a syrupy consistency.

pour about 1/4 of the mixture into a greased tube pan.

this is a tube pan

Next roll the dough into balls and throw them into the tube pan.  Once all of the dough has been added pour the remaining syrup over the top.

Now pop your creation into the oven and bake for about 10-12 minutes (our oven cooks things fast so you may have to let it bake a little longer.  Also if you use more than 2 rolls of biscuit dough you will need to bake it longer)

Once your tea roll has finished cooking get your plate that you will be serving it on place it on the bottom of the tube pan and flip it upside down.  Be quick it's syrupy and hot!

Now, enjoy!  I've seen variations of this recipe that include first rolling the balls of dough in cinnamon and sugar mixture, or adding nuts, raisins.  This is the basic recipe, tweak it to fit your tastes and imagination how you will!

10 Words For 2010

Adventure

Graduation

Change

Baby

Joy

Laughter

Family

Struggle

Triumph

UNFORGETTABLE

It's The Most Wonderful Time of The Year

Christmas always has and always will be my most favorite holiday.  As a child I was the one on my mother's case, "can we decorate for Christmas now?"  When the answer was yes I would dive into the boxes of trinkets and ornaments cheerfully chirping Christmas songs as I transformed our home into a Christmas wonderland.  My freshman year of college one of my roommates had to BAN me from Christmas music until AT LEAST after Thanksgiving.

Though my vigor for the holiday has never diminished somewhere along the line Christmas joy turned to Christmas hum drum.  The snow falls, trees are lit, carols are sung and the birth of Christ is celebrated the same way year after year.  Yet somewhere in my heart was missing something......the magic.

I began to fear that the loss of youth meant the loss of Christmas joy.  Until I found a very real and unexpected cure for the "bah humbug" creeping up within me..... a baby!  The very second Thanksgiving was over I was on Christmas hyper drive, every lullaby I sang was Christmasy.  I decorated our home and had little talks with Kylea about another special little baby born around this time of year named Jesus.  Kevin had to reign me back on a few things like cookies and milk for Santa and carrots for the reindeer.  "She has no idea that you're even doing that" he kept reasoning.   I found reason has little to do with the unimaginable joy I found in creating holiday magic for our little family this year. Sure, she's too young to appreciate most of what I did, but now the precedent for tradition has been set.  We've established a hybridization of our traditions to create our own holiday tradition that I think will be perfect for us.

We visited Santa on Christmas Eve day.

Kylea LOVED Santa she smiled a laughed all the way home.

such a sweet little face.....how could Santa deny this little angel?

Made a homemade pizza and watched "A Christmas Story" later that night.

Christmas morning started bright and early for us, the only one not bleary eyed was little Kylea.  I suspect it will be this way for many Christmases to come.

At least right at first.  Most of the day she spent recuperating from her early morning.

We all agreed that before presents we would feed our growling stomachs.  So Kevin set to work making tea roll (a delicious Hart family tradition).

Santa brought us LOTS of toys and presents as well as some exotic fruit from his previous destination (a tradition from my family)

a bumbo so Kylea can sit up all by herself!

Santa brings good doggies a treat

Tekoa says I LOVE Christmas!!!!!

The rest of the day was spent relaxing and playing with presents.

GO DUCKS!

Christmas magic has been restored and I can't WAIT for next year!!!

Mommy Glasses

Motherhood, specifically being a mommy to a newborn (since that is what my experience is limited to) means trading in heels for socks, and skirts for sweatpants.  It often means settling for a brush instead of a shower and cold cream of wheat for breakfast.  It means working for a boss who will be the most demanding of your entire life.  He/She will screech at you whenever they experience any discomfort.  You will find yourself relishing bathroom breaks as personal time.  Though don't be surprised if your new taskmaster is lurking somewhere nearby during even this most private of times.  Just yesterday I realized how much my life had changed as a bathroom break involved first dragging the swing into the bathroom and then executing my business with a bright eyed infant and curious dog looking on the whole time.

Being a new mom means you will perform your duties while overcoming one of the greatest physical feats your body has ever accomplished.  Forget about resting, there is no time for rest! You will find yourself bending, lifting and squatting all day, despite the physical discomfort of doing so.  Speaking of your body, it will become absolutely unrecognizable to you. 

There are several things I've learned about the postpartum body; First, nature makes up for Aunt Flo's nine month absence in a big way.  Second, bellies do not instantly disappear just because the baby has been birthed.  Last and probably worst of all, hormones rage causing strange and inexplicable fits of crying. For instance crying can be induced when husband cracks a sarcastic joke.  Causing him to stare at you with wide eyes while awkwardly trying to comfort you by patting your shoulder and saying something like, "Aww.... it ok!  Don't be cry!" And wait til you see what breastfeeding has in store for your boobs.

Motherhood has to be one of the least glamorous jobs on earth. In the last month, I have spent every day all day being puked on, pooped on, and screamed at, all on little more than 3 hours of sleep at a time. 

The human race perpetuates itself because for as long as mankind has existed men and women have embarked on this crazy ride called parenthood, often more than once!  After reading the job description one could rightly wonder, how can this be so?  

The answer is, mommy glasses. What are mommy glasses?  Mommy glasses are similar to rose colored glasses only instead of tinting EVERYTHING in the world a shade of rosy bliss they exclusively effect all things related to your infant.  All of the aforementioned terrible sounding job duties of motherhood are suddenly exciting and wonderful. 

A side effect of mommy glasses is a new dizzying capacity to love. If I had to try and describe this feeling I would say, that it feels like someone gathered up everything warm, fuzzy and loving in the entire world smashed them all into a ball and then stuffed all of it into my heart.  Then there are moments like this....

After one of these gummy little smiles it feels like all the love that was stuffed inside my heart has exploded into little pieces of confetti which rush around and fill up every empty space in my entire body.  Sometimes the little pieces of love fill me up so much that they come flowing out, most of the time in a giant smile but sometimes the overflow is a little more.......watery. 

(classic "mommy glasses" induced overreaction to a cute baby smile)

Mommy glasses cause everything you do for your baby to be an act of love.   Every middle of the night feeding, every diaper change, every load of laundry you do out of love.  Normal people are disgusted by baby's various bodily functions but mommy glasses cause you to cheer your baby when after hours of grunting she finally manages a toot.

Without mommy glasses the human race would cease to exist.  Without them there would be no payoff for parenthood.  I have found that my own pair of mommy glasses have made every single one of Kylea's accomplishments absolutely the most exciting thing in the world.

Like when Kylea discovered she has hands.  Promptly after this discovery she discovered they make an excellent pacifier.

look I have hands!  And they're delicious!!!  

Or the day she discovered the mobile in her swing and then enjoyed 30 min of playtime in her baby gym.

The list goes on including things like the satisfaction I get when she looks into my face with a look of recognition, snugly nap time, singing her songs to get her sleepy, listening to her happy squeals and little giggles.  To me, she is absolutely the most perfect little baby there has ever been.  And I think that's just the way God intended it to be.

this is Kylea getting burped....no wobbly newborn head here!

p.s.
Daddy's have their own form of mommy glasses too.

Coombs Positive

When the doctor said our baby was Coombs Positive I had no idea what that meant.  She delivered the news with such a solemn expression that my heart leapt into my throat as I imagined all the terrible things this could mean for our family.  

As I held my 12 hr old infant in the hospital bed the pediatrician explained that it is a type of jaundice.  I could feel my anxiety level drop as I thought, "Oh jaundice?!  What's with the solemn expression?  Davey had that, we'll just stick her on a blanket in the sunshine a couple times a day."  As the doctor continued her explanation I began to understand her expression.  Apparently there are several types of jaundice and that Kylea has a somewhat rarer and more serious kind caused by a blood type incompatibility. 

Blood cells have multiple kinds of proteins about them, which make them unique there are two types of proteins which most people are familiar with the RH factor (which makes your blood positive or negative) and the ABO type.  Kevin has positive blood and mine is negative so I was given a Rogam shot during pregnancy and after delivery to protect both Kylea and a future baby from an immune response that attacks foreign bodies (leading to miscarriage) so the RH factor wasn’t the issue.  The problem was that Kylea’s blood is type A and mine is type O and apparently type O blood doesn’t mix well with type A or B. 

During delivery there was some cross over between baby's and my blood.  Since our blood types are incompatible all of my blood cells died in her body and became waste that her tiny body is now responsible to get rid of. As an added bonus the fact that our blood cells are incompatible causes some of Kylea’s own blood cells to also die and add to the waste that she must get rid of.  This waste backs up in the liver and when the liver is backed up bilirubin levels rise.  This rise can happen very quickly in Coombs positive babies and so immediate action is taken.

So my brand new chubby little angel was taken away to spend the majority of her day under lights specially designed to break down bilirubin. 

There is no doubt that I was much more emotional after delivering Kylea (a fact which my midwife had warned me of) so being separated from my first born and seeing her with her eyes covered all alone in the nursery whimpering was more than I could handle.  I broke down into teary sobs right in the middle of the nursery.  The nurses looked at me like I was high on drugs (rightly so) and said, "you know this isn't life threatening."  Of course I knew that, but everything is much more tragic when you're hopped up on post pregnancy hormones.

After a lot of coaxing the pediatrician prescribed us some billi lights so we could take our little bug home and continue treatment on our own.  We were ecstatic! To make sure that Kylea was getting the best home treatment possible we were sent home with the "billi suitcase" which looks like this

And the wallaby, which fit into the bottom of the suit case so that she could get lights on her back as well.  The wallaby looks like this.

All put together the set up looks like this.  

I don't know about you but watching your tiny baby from across the room for the first 2.5 weeks of her life is not exactly the way I envisioned bringing home my first baby.  Probably the most difficult part of the whole deal was that we were instructed to leave her in there all day except for when she was eating and to NEVER go to sleep or leave her unattended (in case the eye wear came of....which it did more than once) this meant sleeping in shifts and since I am breastfeeding it more fittingly meant no sleep.... ever.

We did get to take her out of the lights for a once daily excursion to the hospital for a heel poke so they could check her bilirubin levels.

putting on heel warmer so she bleeds well when they poke her

Daddy is just as sad about the heel poke as baby is.

The heel pokes got harder and harder for us to do to her as her tiny feet were filled with the scabs and scars of previous pokes.  

So, after a couple weeks of lights (initially they had said one week max), 48 hours on formula (which was enough of an adventure to deserve it's own blog post) and a heel poke a day for the first month of her life we are now FINALLY on the road to recovery.  We are back to breast feeding, off the lights and don't have to get another heel poke until next friday (jumps for joy!)  if the levels are continuing downward at that check then we are officially done with heel pokes!

It's really ironic that I had just been talking about how things don't ever go the way that we plan them but they're good anyway.  The first few weeks have been hard but I think that it's made me all the more grateful for the chance I get to snuggle and hold my little baby now.  It's also given me a greater compassion for people who giv birth to babies who are life threateningly ill, that must be SO hard.  So I'm full of gratitude and love.....that is until I opened the first medical bill, YIKES.

                                           

The Miracle of Life

“Just a few more pushes and you’ll be parents” I felt the sting of tears as the immensity of the moment hit me, I looked up into Kevin’s face, my rock of support during the 15.5 hour long labor and repeated the words with wonder, “we’re going to be parents!”  I will never forget the tears in his eyes as he smiled back and squeezed my hand. 

“Ok, daddy are you ready to receive your daughter?” asked the doctor.  Kevin’s face changed to all business as he gloved up and with one last immense effort from me our daughter was born into her daddy’s arms and placed up on my tummy under a warm receiving blanket. 

Nothing I can think of will ever compare to this moment.

Or this one.

Or this one.

Though the birth didn’t go as I had planned (after 10.5 hours of active labor I asked for an epidural) it was still one of the single greatest experiences of my life.  I will say that the next baby we have will most likely not be born in a hospital environment as it’s not suitable for medicine free birth.  I was managing labor extraordinarily well until I was forced to follow hospital protocols and procedures which meant no food, no mobility and constant paperwork and distractions.  Keeping myself in a deep state of relaxation proved impossible. I kept being forgotten about since the nurses were short staffed that evening and were dealing with several emergencies that night. They would say things like, we need you to hold still for 20 min. while we get this reading and then they wouldn't return to check on me for 3 more hours.  I knew similar situations would continue occurring and on no sleep (my water broke at 12 am) and no food (hospitals only allow ice chips) I didn’t feel in the right state of mind to calmly handle them unmedicated. 

After overcoming my initial grief at not following through with my plans I look back on the birth of my first with nothing but fondness.  Though I was medicated for the last 5 hours, the birth environment was still exactly what I had dreamed, unhurried with only the midwife, one nurse and Kevin present. Following her birth we were allowed to soak in every beautiful moment with our precious little baby.  It was nothing short of one of the most spiritual experiences of my life.  I felt an instant bond with the baby and a new reckless abandon kind of love for my husband.  We’re a family now!

Maureen Hawkins sums my emotions exactly when she says,

“Before you were conceived, I wanted you.

Before you were born, I loved you.

Before you were here an hour, I would die for you.

This is the miracle of love.”

We're blissfully sleep deprived and loving every minute of our new role as parents.  Babies allow us to view the world with a whole new kind of wonder.  The miracle of life, what an honor to be a part of it!  

Making Plans and Learning Patience

(image borrowed from Google)

“Give your stress wings and let it fly away. 

~Terri Guillemets”

Previously I blogged about the focus and tunnel vision I was experiencing while waiting for the birth of our baby.  I think in my mind that the baby was for sure going to be born early.  The second she became full-term I expected her to bounce right into the world.  Though it's ridiculous to say I planned it that way, that is indeed the case.  When my plans to control nature with my mind fell through I was baffled.  Alas, I’m learning something I think I need to apply to multiple facets of my life, patience. 

We don’t always get the promotion we want when we want it, or meet that special someone when we think we should, or be able to have a baby right when we plan it.  Part of the beauty of life is the variability of it. It’s unpredictable, messy and lovely all in the same breath. 

Let me share a little physiology with you.  During pregnancy circulating levels of estrogen and progesterone increase.  These increases are paramount to the healthy development of baby during pregnancy.  During the final stages of pregnancy these hormones spike to an all time high, this helps to preparing the body for birth.  An unfortunate side effect of this spike is extra, super duper moodiness. 

Overall, if I had to describe myself I would say I am very even tempered.  Kevin’s boss was asking how I was doing and wanted to know if I was in the “cranky stage” yet.  She said during the final weeks of her pregnancy her poor husband couldn’t do anything right, she would yell at him just because she could.  Kevin laughed and said he knew I was pretty tired of being pregnant but he didn’t think I was cranky yet.  Let me be frank, internally I am a messy blob of over emotion.  I am trying my best to temper it (though irrational outbursts have occurred recently) but it’s not easy when everything is so darn annoying lately!

Normal everyday interactions somehow strike me as annoying as EVERYTHING seems to remind me that I am STILL pregnant. 

Here are some recent interactions that demonstrate what I’m trying to describe:

Well intentioned person: “well” they say, “you are almost there, just a few more days!”

Me: politely smiles and says “that’s true”….but inside I’m thinking.  “Days!!!!! Do you realize what you are saying?  Every single day feels like a year!  And you think the fact that I have a few more of them to endure will help me feel better?  I DON’T THINK SO!  I then walk away feeling ruffled and indignant.

Curious Friend:  Where’s that baby?

Me:  Again with the polite smile, and I say, “She’s still not here yet, I’m sure she’ll come when she’s ready.” But internally I’m thinking, “What do you think this belly is???? It’s not like I went on a ding-dong eating binge!  Also, do people typically leave their houses without their newborn infants?  What does she expect me to say?  Yup I had the baby!  She’s resting in her crate inside with the dog.  Don’t worry we tied a bottle to the side of the crate she can drink from if she gets hungry while we’re out.  We're choosing the natural selection parenting technique, we want to make sure our baby is at least as intelligent as a hamster before we make a commitment on keeping her.”

Neighbor who thinks he is hilarious- Are you still A ROUND…..pa ha ha ha

Me: politely laughs in return and says “well it certainly seems so!”   I’m not sure I should even write what I’m really thinking…..suffice it to say, pregnancy is not a free ticket to call a woman fat, EVER.  I am baffled by how many people don’t get that.

Neighbor’s dog:  Bark, bark, bark……..bark………bark, bark…………………. BARK!

Me:  With each bark my blood pressure rises and rises. Until finally I leap up and begin rummaging through papers for the number to security.

In between these fits of mania I am still my same rational self.  I realize that, “this too shall pass.”  I can still see the beautiful things that I am blessed with; an awesome husband who I grow to love more and more every single day, a healthy baby, an easy pregnancy, a nice place to live, jobs, the gospel etc.  When I refocus I feel the peace that I long for return to my life.  I need to give myself permission to do as the quote says, to “give my stress wings and let it fly away.”  And to realize that when things don’t go according to how I plan them, it’s because God has a better plan in mind.  

Advice for the Undergraduate

A young college undergraduate recently asked me if a college education was really worth it anymore.  After all, my friend reasoned, the market is saturated with college graduates and many of those graduates are working menial jobs.  My friend said there was research to back his arguments and those researchers claimed debt incurred negated success achieved later.  They also claim a college degree is basically null in the current market.  I considered these arguments in depth and decided that they are based on granules of truth but lack an alternate route to success and any real message except "give up".  I find this message damaging and pessimistic, I hope to dig out the real answer to this dilemma.  So I’m about to put on my Dr. Laura hat and offer my opinion (as a recent college grad) of the value of higher education. 

I will concur that there was a time when a college education was a golden ticket to a high paying job.  Graduates could wave their diploma around and step into high paying management type jobs.  It is true that today that much labored for piece of paper doesn’t carry as much weight.  Employers will look at a degree and say that’s nice, we’re looking for a degree plus 5 years experience.  Let’s look at why this is the case. 

According to the Bureau of Labor and Statistics, in the month of July alone there were 143,703 separations.  During the previous year over 500,000 separations were reported.  Simple math dictates that this year’s rate is double the previous year’s with projections of over one million separations predicted by year’s end. 

These separations mean that there are literally hundreds of thousands of workers with education AND experience currently searching for jobs.  Economists say that, “College graduates entering the job market in 2009 and early 2010 will face more competition than we’ve seen since the Great Depression.”

The market IS saturated with college graduates, which is why it is more imperative than EVER to obtain an education.  I believe that many college students are approaching their education with an outdated attitude.  They expect to achieve success in life by obtaining their degree.  They show up to class, get good grades, and work a part-time dead end job just to pay bills.  Still more chose not to work at all and focus on just school alone.

College is 100% what you put into it.  It is not unreasonable to say that you can graduate with a degree AND applicable job experience.  Is the road easy? NO!  Will it be worth it? YES!  If I could offer a few pieces of advice to my young friend it would be this; limit debt incurred from student loans, develop a strong network while in school, and obtain applicable work experience while in school.

While it may take some extra work and ambition it is not impossible to obtain scholarships and work for most of your tuition.  Common advice when I was entering college was, get a student loan to pay for all expenses and focus on good grades.  I did this and ended up incurring a substantial debt because of it.  I will probably spend the rest of my adult life trying to pay it off.  Some debt will be necessary but my advice would be to seek options that will cost you the least while still offering a quality education.  Strategies to limit debt incurred from education are endless.

Next, develop a large and diverse network while in college.  That slippery haired biology professor with the strange research fascination with hermaphroditic amphibians is also a published and respected scientist.  Yes, he’s creepy but a referral from him could greatly improve your chances of getting into med school or open doors to lucrative careers you had never previously considered.   Remember that old saying “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know.”  Don’t be fooled into thinking that good grades are good enough, they’re not.

And lastly start NOW by building your work experience.  This is a transient and opportune time of life.  Seek out opportunities for employment in a field closely related to where you want to eventually go.  Many companies offer tuition reimbursement as part of their benefits package, so you can accrue applicable experience and fund your education with on fell swoop.  Remember that not all resume-building experiences are paid opportunities, search out volunteer opportunities, internships, set up job shadows and find a current professional willing to mentor you.  Get to know professionals working in your career of interest, connections you make now will open doors for career opportunities later. 

The current economic climate has made higher education a necessity instead of a golden ticket.  Consider your education as an important ingredient in the recipe of success.    Unemployment rates are staggering, and are continuing to trend upward. My advice would be to afford yourself every opportunity for success possible by pursuing and achieving a higher education.  

Evolution of the Baby Bump

Trimester Number ONE

8 weeks along.  Feeling a little nauseous but didn't know it was because I was pregnant!

we're having a baby!

10 weeks....still not too obvious yet.

Trimester Number TWO

baby at 19 weeks, my stomach looked very similar to the 10 week pic.

after long hiatus from belly pics. here it is at 24 weeks!

25 weeks 

Trimester Number THREE

28 weeks

32 weeks

37 weeks and 5 days... technically full term!!