A Diabetes Milestone!

Tonight I covered up the Hypoglycemia chart with my baby to-do list!  That means I'm confortable enough recognizing the signs that I don't need a picture chart.  Yay for progress! 

When I taped up these charts I was pretty sure I'd never cover them.

Gratituesday- Landscapers for the Condo Association

We live in a first floor condo.  We have a 6 foot by 6 foot porch as our "front yard" and about 15 feet of sidewalk to the road.  Along this sidewalk has been English Ivy.  I have a strong dislike of this ivy that has grown over the past 3 years.  One because its poisonous if ingested by wee ones...something my wee ones have tried numerous times.  Two it provides a beautiful, moist, shaded, warm breeding ground these nasty little biting bugs called mosquitoes.  They actual swarm on our front porch in the summer.  It's pleasant.  This beautiful winter (another reason to be grateful!) has shown that I can allow our girls to play with chalk on our front porch.  It's a beautiful thing to cook dinner while the girls play a bit outside.  They are happy during what my mom calls the piranha hour (4-5pm) and I am able to cook dinner quickly.  I love having the girls cook with me, but I find dinner is not the meal to have this happen on a daily basis. 

Okay back to my lovely ivy.  I decided that before baby #3 arrives I wanted to pull it out so that hopefully it would help with the swarming mosquitoes and allow the girls to play outside while I nurse or just so all of us can be outside during the summer without getting eaten alive.  On another nice winter day I asked one of the men from our condo's landscaping company about pulling out the ivy.  "Instead of saying sure go for it lady."  Instead he called his boss and pulled it all out that evening!  What a blessing to be able to cross that off my to-do list without having to actually do anything!  Now I have this wonderful space that the girls are LOVING and hopefully come spring we can plant some herbs and flowers that will be pleasant to look at, not kill my children when ingested, and provide a bit of food.  An actual garden isn't allowed by the condo association nor do we get enough light to grow most veggies or fruits so that goal has to wait until we have a yard.  I'm also going to be in my third trimester of pregnancy by then realistically I will not keep up with a full sized garden no matter how ambitious I am. :)

I'm grateful for God providing help to do a job that was a bit more than I was probably going to get to.

Fun Ice Cream Cupcakes

My daughter Sofia turned 2 in early Feb.  We celebrated with cupcakes and ice cream on her birthday, however, she really just wanted to the ice cream.  A girl after my own heart!  I'm a bit of a fan of ice cream.  Since we were having a family party this weekend I figured I'd try some ice cream cupcakes instead of my normal ice cream cake.  I liked how they turned out! 

They took less than 20 minutes to make and Sofia loved it!  As a bonus the carbohydrate measuring was easier and a MUCH lower total than lovely traditional cake and icing cupcakes. 

The birthday girl enjoying her ice cream cupcake.

What I did:

1.  Crushed cookies in the bottom of silicone baking cups (using sturdy cardboard would work too, just not the thin paper cups).  Another even healthier option would be fruit in the bottom.

2.  1/4 cup of softened ice cream in each cup then smoothed with a spoon.

3.  A bit of chocolate gauche (just because I love chocolate)-optional

4.  Freeze until ready to use.

5.  A dollop of whipped cream with a few sprinkles for color.

Carbohydrate count is based on the bottom you use and 1/4 cup ice cream.  With the ingredients I used ours were 15-17 carbs. 

Enjoy!  Let me know what combinations you try!

Gratituesday- Grateful for Well Timed Sickness

I know it sounds odd, but I'm grateful for our entire family getting sick this week instead of last week.  We all came down with colds Sunday morning that we just haven't shaken, its been 4 days, but that is super rare for us to be sick more than a day or two.  I'm grateful it didn't happen last week when we had a Valentine's Day party and Sofia's second birthday party along with all the planning that goes with it.  We were able to celebrate with our family and then get sick:)  We then spent Sunday through today (Wednesday) spending quality time as a family.  At least we didn't have to worry about making someone else sick.  President's Day Mark had off work so we taught the girls to play bingo, did lots of puzzles, and watched a movie.  Normally we'd be doing house projects or running around, Mark did finish painting our new headboard...it's awesome.  It has been nice to just stop and spend large amount of quality time together without feeling like the house needs to be cleaned or needing to go to a meeting or run errands. 

On that note, I am hoping we all shake this cold soon:)

It's a....

Mark and I can't ever wait to tell anyone that we're pregnant.  It's almost amusing.  With all our kids we've told everyone we know within a week or two (sometimes days of finding out).  Our current pregnancy took us a bit longer to announce than the others because we found out the evening after we arrived home from the hospital with Marian's diabetes diagonsis. 

As a side note, this wasn't exactly a "surprise" baby but it wasn't expected.  In the hospital I was about 95% sure I was pregnant but I thought telling Mark while we were also soaking in all the information they throw at you in a 48 hour time block of diabetic care training might be a bit much so I waited a whole day.  This baby caused a lot of laugther between the two of us out of both joy and total disbelief that God saw fit to give us a diabetic 3 year old and a pregnancy at the same time.  It's odd joy amid sorrow.  We had wanted to get pregnant in November or December, but I can promise you that we would NOT have tried to get pregnant that soon after Marian's diagonsis.  God seems to have different plans.  Which I'm grateful for!  It's been a blessing to get to think about another baby.

Our last two pregancies we've let them be surprises until they were born.  I LOVE doing!  It's so fun to give birth and all of sudden find out.  But we decided for various reasons to find out, if possible, during our ultrasound for this pregnancy.  The baby was more than cooperative.

To celebrate with our family we had a cake cutting at Sofia's 2nd birthday party.  It was such a fun way of telling everyone, including our girls.  Here's the cake:

IT'S A BOY!!!

The girls are still saying its a girl.  I think for Marian its denial and for Sofia its doing whatever Marian does because there is nothing cooler than your big sister. 

We are very excited and looking forward to this baby's arrival in early July. 

Blood Sugar Highs are Scary

I've read frequently and experienced the fears of having a 3 year old with low blood sugar but every once and a while I am reminded of the fears (and slightly absurd comedy) of high blood sugars as well. For example tonight's dinner.  We got home from BJs and I finished making the veggies for dinner and we sat down.  I forgot to check her blood sugar initially as this pregnant momma was HUNGRY.  All of a sudden Marian started pouring her water bottle onto the floor, this was no accident.  As began to clean it up (my first mistake, she should have cleaned it up), she grabs at my hair and pulls hard!  So she was disciplined for both.  We went on with dinner.  Less than a minutes later she looks at me after I told her to "Please continue eating" and dumps her entire plate onto the floor.  I then proceeded to check her blood sugar...325.  Okay so she's high this explains some of these behaviors.  I gave her a correction shot amid a fit and sent her to her room to calm down reading quietly for a few minutes.  I've learned fighting a battle with a child with high blood sugar is a losing battle.  She calmly came out a few minutes later and was ready to deal with life again.  We cleaned up the mess and dealt with her plate throwing and how to handle a situation without throwing food items (or any other item for that matter).  At the time I went from thinking "what are you doing I know you've been trained better than this" to "is this some kind of joke."  The irrationalities of a 3 year old combined with high blood sugar is scary and slightly amusing to think about the absurdity of her responses. 

It's always such a humbling experience to realize that one, I probably could have avoided many of these problems tonight by remembering to check her blood sugar before dinner instead of after it had begun.  Two seeing how completely out of control she can become when she has high blood sugar scares me for as she gets older and the choice isn't to throw a plate but drive irresponsibly or something.  A good reminder tonight to persevere in prayer for not just today but the future of my children!

Gratituesday

Laura from the blog Heavenly Homemakers does Gratituesdays with a post about what she's grateful for every Tuesday.  I've always loved it!  What a great way to focus on praise and not complaining!  I'd like to do the same thing.

I know its Valentine's day so maybe its a bit corny but I am so grateful for my husband.  He is a man that loves God more earnestly seeks to love God and live as he's commanded.  He's not afraid of taking the hard road even if it means some sacrifice, which is sometimes a bit scarey as his wife;)  He works full time goes to seminary part time and stays involved at church.  Our pastor has been gracious enough to allow Mark to preach about 6 times a year.  I love when he's preaching!  I learn so much, possibly because I hear the sermon at least 2 times.  He preaches with honesty and humility always taking us back to the cross.  I look forward to the day when I get to hear him preach every Sunday. 

As a father, he seeks to be involved and shepard our children well.  Considering he's from a family of all boys, he has done a wonderful job learning to play dress-up, dolls, and house.  Of course our girls can also build a tower with legos to rival most 3 year old boys and have learned how to throw snowballs at an early age.  I think Sofia was hit with her first snow ball at 3 days old.

I love having a husband that cares for me well and seeks to serve me even when I don't deserve it.  As a bonus he sometimes even cooks.  Like tonight when he made me the crab cakes I've been craving.

Encouragement as We Begin the Journey

We're on a journey with about 15,000 other families this year.  Since getting over the shock of my three year old daughter's type 1 diabetes diagnosis I've asked myself a million times what did I do wrong.  Thankfully, everything I've read has reminded me that its not about my "errors" as a parents that have caused this.  I'm even more grateful that the Bible has reminded me of God's goodness throughout tough times.  While we were in the hospital one of my best friends emailed me John 9: 1-3 "As he passed by, he saw a man blind from birth.  And his disciples asked him, 'Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?'  Jesus answered, "It was not that this man sinned, or his parents, but that the works of God might be displayed in him."(ESV)  It brought tears to my eyes when I read it sitting in the hospital and it still gives me chills and brings tears to my eyes.  What comfort from God in the moments when I'm asking "why, did I cause this suffering for my little girl?"  Also did I mention I'm a perfectionist...so this little sin doesn't help. 

The second verse my friend sent us was for our daughter, Marian.  2 Corinthians 12:8-10 "Three times I pleaded with the Lord about this, that it should leave me.  But he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness."  Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weakness, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.  For the sake of Christ, then, I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and calamities.  For when I am weak, then I am strong." (ESV)  What a wonderful encouragemnt for our daughter as well as for my husband and I!  The apostle Paul knew what is was to suffer yet God used his suffering to glorify himself and for Paul's good.  We heard about an 8 year old boy that told his mom he was glad he knew how to give himself insulin because someday someone might need it and he'd know how to do it.  I pray both Mark and I can help all of our children look at our weaknesses and see ways that God can use them for his glory. 

What am I doing?

I've been contemplating a blog for about 6 months now.  I even have a notebook and file of blog post ideas, however, the name has been the kicker as well as its writing which freaks me out.  I've never been known for my writing skills, but for some reason ideas keep coming to my head.  I thought it would go away once my daughter was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes, but its gotten worse!  Mainly because I've found an absense of positive Biblical perspectives on diabetes.  So here we go.  I hope this is a blessing to someone besides myself:)