Space Odyssey

Andy came home from the store the other day with a couple of activity books for the kids.  Fairies for Lillian and spaceships for Clayton.  I helped him make a shuttle and then was off to work.  When I returned, I found this on my camera:

7 Fixes from the Green Economy

Bold solutions from the green economy are the antidote to the broken economy—and can repair the damage and create a world that works for all.

Everyone now understands that the economy is broken. What our members and readers have known for years— that the economy is not working for people and the planet—is now playing out on Wall Street and Main Street every day.

Read more here.

The Volcano Effect: Why Skipping a Nap Results in Meltdown

This is very timely for us right now!

**********************************************************

By Elizabeth Pantley, Author of The No-Cry Nap Solution

From the moment your child wakes in the morning he is slowly using up the benefits of the previous night’s sleep. He wakes up totally refreshed, but as the hours pass, little by little, the benefits of his sleep time are used up, and an urge to return to sleep begins to build. When we catch a child at in-between stages and provide naps, we build up his reservoir of sleep-related benefits, allowing him a “fresh start” after each sleep period.

As shown on the sleep chart below, as children age, the length of time that they can stay “happily awake” increases. A newborn can only be awake one or two hours before tiredness sets in, whereas a two year old can last five to seven hours before craving some down time for a nap. When children are pushed beyond their biological awake time span without a break that’s when they become fatigued, fussy and unhappy.

Age	“Happily Awake” span of time between naps
Newborn	1 – 2 hours
6 month old	2 – 3 hours
12 month old	3 – 4 hours
18 month old	4 – 6 hours
2 year old	5 – 7 hours
3 year old	6 – 8 hours
4 year old	6 – 12 hours

As the day progresses, and the sleep pressure builds, a child becomes fussier, whinier, and less flexible. He has more crying spells, more tantrums, and less patience. He loses concentration and the ability to learn and retain new information. The scientific term for this process is “homeostatic sleep pressure” or “homeostatic sleep drive” . . .  I call it The Volcano Effect. We’ve all seen the effects of this on a baby or child, as it is often as clear as watching a volcano erupt; nearly everyone has observed a fussy child and thought or said, “Someone needs a nap!”

As a child progresses through his day, his biology demands a sleep break to regroup, refresh and repair. If a child does not get this break the problem intensifies: the rumblings and tremors become an outright explosion. Without a nap break, the homeostatic pressure continues building until the end of the day, growing in intensity – like a volcano – so that a child becomes overtired, wired and unable to stop the explosion. The result is an intense bedtime battle with a cranky, overtired child, or an infant who won’t fall asleep no matter how tired you know he is.

Even more, a child who misses naps day after day builds a sleep deprivation that launches her into the volcano stage much easier and quicker. If she is missing naps and also lacking the right quality or quantity of nighttime sleep…watch out!

Newborns and young babies have a much shorter span in which their sleep pressure builds. They rapidly reach the peak of their volcano in one to three hours. This is why newborns sleep throughout the day, and why young babies require two or three or four daily naps. Over time, as a baby’s sleep cycle matures he will be able to go longer periods between sleeps. It is not until age 4 or 5 that a child is able to go happily through the entire day without a nap, and sleep research suggests that even through adulthood a mid-day nap or rest break is extremely beneficial in reducing the pressure in all human beings.

The Volcano Effect is not something reserved only for children! This biological process affects adults as well. Understanding this can help you interpret what is really going on in your home at the end of a long day, when children are fussy and parents are grumpy – resulting in a whole mountain range of volcanoes.

Sleep pressure can be exaggerated by environmental issues such as the previous poor night’s sleep, on-going sleep deprivation, or daily stress. What’s more, each person’s moodiness feeds off the others, causing contagious crankiness. And then you’ll find yourself losing patience and saying to your child, “I’m sorry, honey. Mommy’s just tired right now.” (This is a very telling explanation we don’t often stop to analyze.)

This Volcano concept brings to light one more important point: Quality naps can make up for lost night sleep – but extra nighttime sleep does not make up for missed naps, due to the homeostatic sleep pressure concept. Therefore, no matter how your child sleeps at night – great sleeper or poor sleeper — his daily naps are critically important to release the rising sleep pressure.

*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*

This is a copyrighted excerpt from The No-Cry Nap Solution: Guaranteed Gentle Ways to Solve All Your Naptime Problems by Elizabeth Pantley. (McGraw-Hill, December 2008).

You may reproduce this on your website or in your work. Please include my name and book title. More excerpts (available for reprint) are posted on my website. http://www.pantley.com/elizabeth

Vicks for babies? No thanks.

If you have children under age 2, have you seen this news?  I’ve only heard recommendations to put it on kids feet.  But overall, this just solidifies my beliefs that something at the natural foods store is better.  Have you seen all the products at Vitamin Cottage lately?  WOW!  I went to buy a new toothbrush and toothpaste there they other day and there were so many choices I could barely decide which one to get!  To your health…

My New Quest

A couple of weeks ago I attended a talk by a local, Boulder nutritionist, Amy Keller.  I came away with a new mission to eliminate as much MSG and High Fructose Corn Syrup (HFCS) from my family’s lives.

It is hard!

One of my favorite things that Amy said was, “The FDA does not exist to keep our food safe or healthy.”  Boy, was she right!

I’ve been conscientiously working on my mission and feeling a little bit better about my level of education on these two items…  Then, last night, while watching HGTV, I saw this:

I was appalled! Andy said, “Oh snap! HFCS just did you like that.” My jaw just hung open. Wow. Did you notice that it was “made possible” by the Corn Refiners? I’m sure they don’t have any stake in skewing the truth… NOT!

Like the man in the commercial, I couldn’t exactly explain to Andy what it was that was SO bad about HFCS. I said, “It confuses your body and turns off your ability to say ‘I’m full’ which can lead to obesity.” Andy said, “I thought that was MSG?” I said, “I think both do it, but MSG is also a neuro-toxin.”

Then I got really hot, “And it’s ok in MODERATION??? How can you possibly have HFCS in moderation when it’s one of the FIRST ingredients in almost EVERYTHING!” As I said this, I was sipping a rum and coke. So, I continued, “I feel like in order to have any kind of MODERATION, I have to eliminate absolutely everything else with HFCS from my diet just so I can have a rum and coke once a week.”

What disturbs me most about this whole issue is that rather than provide healthy and nutritious foods for us to eat and feed to our families, these companies would rather serve their bottom line. They’d rather use HFCS because sugar is too expensive. They’d rather produce products that gel together better and are shelf stable for YEARS. And if there is evidence that these ingredients will deteriorate your health, they act so deceptively!

Case in point: did you know that food processors petitioned the FDA to list MSG on food labels as “spices” or “seasonings” or “natural flavorings”???? If that’s not deceptive, I don’t know what is.

In fact, I’ve recently had a revelation. Some of you know I am prone to terrible migraines. Now I’m reading that:
1 – MSG triggers migraines
2 – MSG can cause numbness in the face and neck area (this usually happens when I get a migraine – which really freaks me out)

In fact, Andy and I went out to see a movie on Sunday night. After a couple handfuls of popcorn, my tongue went numb and I was having trouble focusing. This really freaks me out because when it happens I think I have a serious neurological disorder. I usually get this fear that I’m going to have a stroke in the very near future. I’m a little reassured to self-diagnose that it’s an effect of the MSG…  at least that is something I can avoid.  I don’t know how I would avoid using my own brain.

Anyway, back to HFCS, I was encouraged to find this ad on YouTube today:

Ok, enough with the negativity. I don’t want to bring you down, I want to inspire you to make more conscious decisions in your life. So, what’s the easiest way to avoid 99% of this crap? Buy organic and make it from scratch! Added bonus: save the planet!

Curses You Post-Holiday Sales!

I managed to sneek away from home a couple of days ago – with Andy and Gran Debbie still home on extended leaves from work and partially under the weather with a cold.  I think I said we needed milk.  I really did get the milk.  But I also went to Kohl’s.

It is a rare and precious thing for me to get away from the kiddos to shop these days.  While I am thoroughly enjoying NOT working as much as I did last summer, it’s nice to have some alone time now and then.  This particular trip was also spurred on by two things: (1) our New Year’s Eve dinner at 3 Margaritas to which I wore my black dress shoes which are full of holes and (2) a glossy Kohl’s ad featuring womens boots at drastically reduced prices.

Anyway, my trip to Kohl’s was not entirely pleasant.  I never seem to think the clothes in stores have ANY style anymore (I know, I’m getting old) and they never seem to be marked down quite enough.  Not to mention the fact that I don’t like the way things look on my larger-than-life-behind.  Alas, I managed to find a cute, long sweater vest in black and some black high-heeled boots (similar to some that I had years ago but lost due to a missing heel).

I brought my treasures home and paraded them around the living room.  I immediately decided I didn’t like the sweater vest.  I emptied the dishwasher in my new fancy boots.  But something didn’t feel right.  Maybe they should be brown?

I put them in the car yesterday and thought, I’ll go check out the brown ones someday this week.  I didn’t make it to Kohl’s yesterday, but I did make it to Hobby Lobby to check out the holiday clearance stuff there.  I scored!  I bought a bunch of the paintable crafts that the kids love so much at 80% off!  While I was there, I decided that I could use some more of the cute wall hooks that I put in the entry way for the laundry room.  But they weren’t on sale (4.99 – previously 50% off).  I bought four anyway.

So today, in a rage of guilt, I returned the sweater vest and the boots and the hooks, too!

Then Andy went out for wings and beer.  I don’t know what he spent, but I miss my fancy boots.

I promise…

… the holiday pics are coming!

Happy New Year!

MAU Action

From the MAU Handbook, this week’s action is:

Write a letter urging the new U.S. President to create true security by ensuring the health, education and safety of the world’s children:

The White House

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW

Washington, DC 20500

Happy Holidays!

Here are some pictures of the fam on Christmas morning, at our cabin in Estes Park and other fun things!