Cage Free Family

“Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to stay in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that!” ~Lewis Carol
It's been an interesting two weeks for us.
Simone's colic and reflux seem to be gone, and in the end it appears to have been food allergy/digestion related. We eliminated everything from my diet except beef, turkey, chicken, coconut oil, rice, potatoes and snow peas for several weeks, and this week we are beginning to add things back in. In addition to the elimination diet we added infant probiotics. Together we seem to have taken care of the source of her woes...

Just in time for her to begin teething. Yup, at the ripe old age of 9 weeks. But don't try telling her that she is only 9 weeks old because she seems to have a different idea. In addition to cutting teeth many months early she has decided that it is also time for her to begin sitting up. I'll be hiding the car keys later this week... just in case ;-) Better safe than sorry, eh?

Also this week, we were buried under two feet of snow... twice... and because our driveway is looooong and steep we were snowed in for 4 days. Four wheel drive or no you can't drive through 2 feet of snow up a hill... even with a running start.
I know... I tried ;-p
Teething babies make you do crazy things.
Our driveway was not the only thing buried though. We lost two of our wood piles under the arctic dump as well. We woke up this morning to a chilly -3 degrees (outside of course).
We eventually got out and made it to town to load up on teething remedies for our sweet girl. Seems she just needs to be like her bigger siblings, who coincidentally are also cutting teeth. Quinn and Nichola are both getting molars. Teething generally comes at the time of major emotional or cognitive growth spurts, so you can imagine the comfort level around our house this week!

In other utterly fantastic news, Jeff's employer lost a great deal of money when they sold the profitable part of their company and have decided to manage this by firing employees and abusing or cutting hours on the rest. We fall into the hour cutting category. Better than unemployed, sure, but having your income slashed by 3/4 without notice isn't what I would call a joyful experience.
"Effective immediately" is so rarely combined with something that you want to hear. Bah.

Sooo, it seems that many projects that were perking on the back burners (or still sitting on the counter as it were) are now forced directly into the fire. Fun! Nothing like a good fire under your ass to make things interesting!

One of the things that I have been working on is an e-course. Come April I'll be opening the Cage Free: Simplifying, Decluttering and Mindfully Managing Your Life e-course. It looks to be shaping up as a 3 part series, with each part being around 12 weeks. I think it's going to turn out to be a great thing and I'm having a good time putting it together. Thus far there are weekly assignments, discussions, How-to videos, projects and journaling. In addition I'll be setting up a weekly support chatting session and class forums for discussion and peer support.
Should be fun! I expect to open registration in March and am working to figure out how many I can support per class, assuming that as it moves on I will begin to have parts I, II and III overlapping with new classes starting.

I'm also, for the first time, prioritizing time to work on this memoir that has taken so long that I wouldn't be surprised if my agent has given up one me. Just kidding, Brandi!

Aaaand, if that weren't enough, I'm working with another on the designing and launching of a site dedicated to healing Fibromyalgia (and other spectrum disorders), and of course the book that goes along with that!

There's more, but I'll leave that for another post.

Tonight I am going to remember that I had a baby only 2 months ago, realize that exhaustion and feeling overwhelmed is still normal, and allow myself to go to bed before midnight.

So much to do... so little time...

There comes a pause, for human strength will not endure to dance without cessation; and everyone must reach the point at length of absolute prostration.~ Lewis Carol