THE SLEEP DEPRIVED GET LUCKY

I have to say I feel REALLY lucky.

I am not a person that does well on low sleep. I mean, I REALLY do not do well. Anyone that sat next to me in a college class (even during 1 or 2 discussions…sadly and to the enragement of my companions…on my mission) can attest that I fall asleep WAY too easily WHEN I AM NOT SUPPOSED to. I am usually NOT blessed to fall asleep as quickly at night.

When Brooke was a newborn, Brian and I were BOTH sleep deprived. Everything was new – we switched off very evenly so we were both pooped at all times.

We were also delusional. Once I woke up at 2 AM and found Brian looking frantically between the wall and our bed where we stashed pillows at night. He was crazily tossing them and looking underneath them like a madman.

I said, “WHAT’S WRONG?”

“I just dropped Brooke down here!!” he said in a panicked voice. He kept frantically searching while he talked.

“You did WHAT?!!?” I asked now panicked myself.

Brian said shakily as he kept searching, “I was holding her and I dropped her!”

I rapidly joined him on the side of the bed and began frantically searching myself, the panic and alarm rising with my now rapid heartbeat.

What a site to see – two very tired 24-year-olds at one side of the bed, lifting up pillows in a FRENETIC fashion and trying to find a 7 lb little baby in a 1 foot gap between the bed and wall.

After about 5 minutes of feelings of SHEER TERROR and PANIC in the Wayne household, we hear a little TINY BABY NOISE coming from the cradle. We both turned around and see Brooke quietly sleeping in her cradle.

We looked at each other blankly.

Then, as the situation VERY SLOWLY registered in our brains, we turned the lights off breathing a sigh of relief and zapped into a deep sleep.

With Brooke, these delusional happenings were, embarassingly, normal. We can laugh about them now, but it got a little much! She started sleeping through the night at 9 weeks, and these episodes disappeared.

With Tyler, I was a very merciful wife, and NEVER woke Brian up. I had come to realize that waking up Brian was actually MUCH harder that just picking up the Tyler and feeding him. I would be trying for about 2 minutes – once in a while – to wake up Brian.

For those who don’t know, he is the world FASTEST and DEEPEST sleeper. Stories about him growing up are LEGENDARY. So I digressed and kept the sleep deprivation to myself.

Tyler started sleeping through the night at 10 weeks and my sanity returned.

With Kylianne, I don’t bother to wake up Brian either. Again, - the effort is PARMOUNT to even TRY to wake up Brian. Who can really exert that much effort at 3 AM successfully????? (although sometimes I make him sweat a little by telling him, he gets to do all the middle of the night feeding the next week, now that he is in Summer Vacation).

Well, cute Kylianne was my record breaker – started sleeping through the night at 4 ½ weeks!!!! PRAISES TO HEAVEN!!! She sleeps about 6/12 to 7 hours starting at 11 PM – and she does it 4 out of 5 nights now. And I must say, it SURE makes me a better mom to have a little more sleep!!!!

Now if I could just get Brooke not to confuse our bedroom with the bathroom at 2:00 AM when she gets up to use the bathroom....

HELP!!! NEED TOOTH FAIRY IDEAS???????

Brooke just lost her first tooth -yeah!
BUT HELP - what to do for the tooth fairy???

Brian and I growing up got like 35 to 50 cents per tooth...and we were happy with that....

But I am wondering should we implement at this time a cool tradition? One of the moms in our ward gives her kids a special silver dollar as part of a collection. Then they have a nice collection of these coins when they are done losing their teeth.

That might be pretty cool.... She can't really tell a penny from a quarter yet as far as receiving money.

PLEASE ADVISE: What other ideas are there? What did you get from the tooth fairy. What you did get - did you like it? Was it a special memory???????? What do you do for your kids?

As the month goes by....

tHE HORRIFIC INCIDENT

In the past 20 years, the men that RIDE THE RAPIDS for a living have not seen anything like it – and it happened to Brian’s Dad.

In a high adventure trip with some scouts the boys had been riding with the scouts for about an hour on the rapids labeled a 6 – VERY DIFFICULT.

There was not time to relax - it was all intense. At one point, the guides told them to lean back , but they leaned back too far and the boat turned over. Brian’s dad and a small 12 year old boy were the only ones of the 7 not to be able to catch the safety rope and a very treacherous part of the rapids.

They both went over a 5 foot waterfall – seen in the picture – and got caught in a whirlpool called, “The Washing Machine.” This got their bodies caught and SWISHED and RIPPED around causing BRUISING and BONE BREAKAGE.

Brian’s Dad got uncaught (he had been underwater for awhile and was STILL underwater) as he went over the 12 FOOT WATERFALL called "THE BIG SPLAT" (pictured as the big falls here, with the 5 foot falls being behind it).

The current carried him further down stream. He was still TOTALLY disoriented and was still TOTALLY underwater not able to take a breath.

He kept telling himself – this is REALLY HARD but don’t try to take a breath while your under the water.

The lead kayaker’s plunged down the 12 FOOT FALLS to rescue him and another guide on the side came in a brought him to safety.

He was FINALLY able to take that BREATH.

I get short of breath just thinking about it.

They tried to find the 12 year old boy Timothy, but with NO LUCK. They waited for him downstream where they picked up Brian’s dad. However, they did find him on the side – he had been able to find a rock and he crawled on top of it….and waited.

The current had totally swished off their lower clothing – pants, underwear – everything. Going O NATURAL is not a fun way to be swirled about in dangerous rapids!

Timothy had to be AIR-LIFTED out -he had a BROKEN FEMUR along with numerous bumps and bruises.

Brian’s dad got 3 BROKEN RIBS, an incredibly swollen KNEE some goose egg BUMPS on the top of his head, and lots of bruises everywear.

On top of all that, he had to walk 3 miles ALONE along a grown-over-with-deadfall-and-lots-water-trenches-trail to get to where he needed to be reached by the ambulance. The other were with Tim and the other scouts. He HOBBLED along the trail as his RIBS SPASMED. It took him 1 ½ hours to scale the 1 ½ miles. It seemed like forever. Once in the ambulance – they basically 4 wheeled the trail rocking him painfully.

They both got to the hospital eventually. Brian’s Dad stayed overnight with lots of tests and a blessing, and Timothy stayed 2 Days. His parents drove overnight to the location in West Virginia.

Kevin, my brother in law is the scout master. He was great at maintaining control over the situation and keeping everything together as he watched the whole thing transpire in horror. He notified everyone, gave blessings, kept the other boys together, stayed up ALL NIGHT with Timothy and then drove 12 hours with no sleep to his brother’s house in Ohio where the boys all stayed the night.

It was quite an ordeal and we are SO glad it didn’t turn out any worse than it had to. A situation like that, DROWNING would have been an easy alternative to what happened. I think its safe to say that I don’t think Brian’s Dad will be riding the rapids any time soon!

THE FUN PART

Now comes the fun part about having a baby – losing the weight...and the mummy tummy (diastisis)!

I gave myself 1 week ½ to eat what I want after the baby was born, and then I made up my mind to be SMART about what I eat.

I continue to do a Soy Shake (Herbalife in my case) for breakfast and as a snack later on in the day.

I do a “SMART” lunch and dinner - lots of veggies, a good protein source.

I omit all sugars – pretty much. That means:

The WICKED five whites:

White flour

White sugar

White rice

White pasta

White bread

I will do small amounts of the “whole grain” version. But I have found that since my mission in CARB WORLD of CHILE I am insulin resistant – which many people by the way are. I survived 1 year ½ on almost pure carbs and definitely LOOKED like it while I was there. I have definitely had to watch what I eat since then, and have found my body does not allow much of the five whites before it starts creeping up on me.

My cheat - I have found I can still lose and eat a nice 70% cocoa small chocolate bar a day. Not bad - and I DO look forward to it!

So – the past 10 days or so – I have lost 6 inches and 3 ½ lbs. That my not sound like much – but I love that the inches are starting to go down.

My waist obviously is the part I need to lose the most – since that’s where the baby was. The Tupler technique helps me a lot with that too. After Tyler I went from a 32 inch waist to a 25 inch waist in 5 months– part of that was good nutrition and part was the Seated Tupler Exercises!

So I just have to maintain the mindset ( 10 sets of 100 Seated Tupler Exercises per day and eating SMART) until I can fit in all my clothes again!

HOW EMBARASSING!!

Tonite we were taking a walk as a family around the neighborhood. We passed a cute old small lanky man with long white shoulder length hair. He was clearly doing yard work and was standing by his house as we passed him.

Brooke says to us in a booming little voice, “I’VE NEVER SEEN A MAN LIKE THAT BEFORE!!!!”

Brian and I started laughing to ourselves as we continued to walk sheepishly down the sidewalk.

Then she repeated herself since we didn’t DARE reply, andstill DEFINITELY within earshot, “ I’VE NEVER SEEN A MAN LIKE THAT BEFORE!”

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Brooke’s Grandpa Barrowes, who happens to be an endodontist, drove 4 hours to visit us here in Chicago. As she sat on his lap they were laughing about something. Then she suddenly looks at Grandpa more closely and says in a scolding yet humored voice,

“GRANDPA, teeth are not supposed to be YELLOW!! Teeth are supposed to be WHITE!!”

Embarrassed Grandpa was at a loss for words, as we all chuckled and the childlike frankness of our darling daughter!

SURPRISING MOMENTS!

Surprising moments:

On Sunday Brian and I explained to Brooke that we need to teach her how to tie her shoe before she goes to Kindergarten. We had told her about the screening coming up next week and it would be important for her to know how before she goes. As I saw her eyes get really big and thoughtful I knew this new information was percolating in her brain.

The next morning as I was nursing Kylianne, Brooke announced she was going to tie her shoe.

I thought to myself – I don’t know HOW I am going to teach her while I am nursing. She generally wears Velcro and has no experience with us even discussing shoe tying.

As I was lost in my thoughts, Brooke announced, “MOMMY LOOK, I TIED MY SHOE!”

I looked up and sure enough, the shoe was on her foot and it was tied. I was flabbergasted.

“Where did you learn to tie your shoe?!?!?” I asked incredulously.

“Princess Bella (or some name I wasn’t familiar with.) I just learned it on the show!!! I just put one bunny ear around the other bunny ear and went AROUND! Want me to do the other foot?!” She asked happily.

“Sure!” I said – still in disbelief. Maybe it was a fluke – I thought.

She did her other foot as well. And she double knotted it! Now, I have to admit I don’t know if something like this is normal, but I must say I am pretty impressed that Brooke is a SELF TAUGHT ( or Princess-whatever-from-some-show-TAUGHT) shoe tie-er!!!