The poofiness has subsided a bit:)

I thought I would add some pictures of what my hair looked like a week after I TnRed all of it. I took two or three showers that week and it settled things down a lot. I'm really happy with it:).

They're staying together for the most part:)

Also, I'm taking up a new hobby! The fires have been ridiculous lately and I haven't gotten a chance to run, so that's being tabled for the time being. Anyways... I was watching someone's dread progress vlog, she was 6 months into letting her hair naturally dread, and had the most amazing young natural dreads I've ever seen! That's beside the point though:), at the end of the video she showed the new LED hoop she had gotten. It was a very large hula hoop. I was slightly confused, so off to Google I went, and I found the most amazing videos of people "hooping!" I got really excited about it, it just seems so fun and really appealed to me. I got on etsy and ordered a hoop from Stephanie, who I found through dreadlocksite.com. She has an etsy shop, Spread It Round Hoops and I ordered a custom hoop from her! I got to pick out the size and colors and she has been wonderful to work with! She's making it this weekend and it should be ready to ship on Monday. By the end of the week I should be ready to start hooping! I am very excited! And to give you an idea of how awesome hooping can be, I will leave you with a video:).

Dreadlocks, C25K, and more reasons to hate Georgia

I was looking through pictures on dreadlockssite.com the other day. Each time I would see a picture of a set of dreads that I really liked, I would go through and see what method they used. Every single set I liked was started by using the twist and rip method, so I decided to take the plunge! Over the last six months my hair has completely sectioned itself naturally, but really only the top layer of my hair was really starting to knot up. Since the look I wanted is normally gotten through twist and rip, I decided I should probably use that method too. I need to take pictures today because after a shower they are not as puffy, lol, but they definitely need some length and weight to them before they'll look really good. Hopefully that will happen over the next 6 months:). Here are pictures from right after I did them all. (The first pic is just after doing most of the front.)

I have no cool way of moving on from the dreadlocks, so here is my awkward transition. Today I did the second day of Couch to 5k (C25k.) I'm excited to get into running, but it would be so much easier if I didn't live in Georgia! In Iowa almost all morning are nice, even on the hottest days, it is still nice in the morning. Here in Georgia you have to get up before the sun if you want to run in nice weather! And that just ain't happenin'. Not to mention it is smoky half the time, because there are constantly controlled burnings. I'm probably going to kill myself trying to run in these crazy circumstances, where it's hot and smoky. Today the smoke didn't seem so bad, so I went running anyways. I have to take the girls in the double jogging stroller, so I'm not so sure I should've gone :/. It's the only workout I can do completely in peace, since the girls are content in the stroller and can't really interrupt me. Plus, if I wait until the smoke rises then it's already too late in the day and it's just torture to be outside at all.

Right now these first workouts are pretty easy, walk for five minutes as a warm up, then alternate running one minute and walking a minute and a half for like 20 minutes, then another five minutes of walking to cool down. I'm not sure how many times I do the alternations because I have a nifty C25K Android app that does it all for me, making a little chime when it's time to switch from running to walking. I have to do this first workout one more time and then I switch to the week 2 workout. I'm really hoping I can stick to it!

And as a little update, I have not had a drop of alcohol since before my post about two weeks ago. I'm really trying to keep it up! Although I've been having a Netflix Grey's Anatomy marathon over the last couple of days and they drink all. the. time. Sort of makes me "thirsty," haha, but I'm staying strong!

I just feel like rambling!

I've wanted to blog for the last week or so, but just don't know what to write about, so I thought I would just ramble and talk about whatever!

My hair has been doing awesome things since the last time I took pictures! I can't believe how much more knotting I've had. I would post pictures, but I promised myself I wouldn't take pictures too frequently, because I figured the more spaced out I take them, the better I'll be able to see progress. I might take some pictures at the 7 month mark, although originally my plan was to wait until 9 months, keeping up with the every 3 months thing. I've also been thinking about making a video, since it's so hard to see my awesome baby dreads with my crappy camera (aka my phone, haha.) It's such a fun experience because you get to see the dreads being born and growing, they have such a mind of their own:). As my hair gets longer, I love it even more, I'm so excited for the months (and years) to come!

Adelaide is 10.5 months old and taking lots of steps! McKaleigh didn't walk until a few months after she turned a year old, so it's really weird to see Adelaide making these attempts! It seems like every day she can take another step than she could the day before, it's pretty fun. McKaleigh and Adelaide also spend a lot of time playing together, which just makes me so happy:). It's fun watching them become friends.

Michael is coming up on orders for Korea, reporting in January. After the holidays, the girls and I will be moving to Iowa to be closer to family. I'm so excited to live in my hometown again. More and more I'm realizing that I'm really not cut out for the military lifestyle, so this will be a much appreciated break from it. I'm going to miss him so much, but at least it's not a deployment!

Overall things have been great for me! The house is messy, but in a manageable way:). I put everything off til the last minute in my class, but somehow still manage to have an A! Life is chaotic and crazy and I'm happy! I love being happy:).

April was a great month...

...and I'm hoping July can be just as great. Looking back through my posts I saw a little spurt in April where I posted more often than I usually do. Then in May and June I posted ONCE each month. I'll let you in on a secret... when I'm happy- I blog, when I'm not happy- I don't blog:/.

I have natural tendencies toward depression. There's a good chance it is genetic as there is quite a bit of depression in my family, but whatever makes it happen, it's something I battle with on a regular basis. Knowing it may be genetic actually really helps me in being able to accept that this is part of who I am. It gives me courage in figuring out what steps to take to live my life to the fullest, anyways. I know that I can be happy, it's just a matter of keeping myself out of ruts, ruts like the one I experienced over much of May and June.

I have found a main culprit in the depressive ruts I have experienced in the past year. Alcohol. Alcohol drags me down into a depression. I mean it makes sense, it is a depressant afterall, but the effects remain long after the buzz is gone. It seems that after a night of drinking I am down the entire next day, and then for some reason I feel an urge to drink that night, and the next night and the next. It is an awful vicious cycle that I have one hell of a time breaking. Then finally I look around at the house and want to cry because I feel so overwhelmed at all the housework I have gotten behind on, because of feeling depressed and not wanting to do anything. That feeling usually lasts for a few days, until something in me snaps and I say "enough!"

Thankfully, I have had my "enough" moment, once again. Today has been a far more pleasant day than the days we've had recently. I feel proud of what I have accomplished today. I don't feel overwhelmed by what needs to be done. I feel capable and strong and in charge of myself and my feelings. It was hard to write this, because society makes us feel as though having these feelings makes us weak, and I hate appearing weak. There is something freeing about admitting these things, though, and if anything I will have this post to refer back to when I feel myself slipping back into a rut. I will have this post to remind myself of how good things can be and how I am in control of my life, I just have to take control of it.

Dread Progress- 6 months

It's been 6 months already! Things are really starting to get going now, but it's really not that easy to tell in pictures. I'll post them anyhow:).

Why we don't say "Good Job"

That's right. In my house we don't say "good job," well except for maybe sarcastically/jokingly when someone has goofed something up. The only other exception is when interacting with our dogs.

It is often said that as an alternative to punishment, we should instead praise our children when they are doing something good. This isn't the opposite of punishment, praise is a verbal reward and as Alfie Kohn has put it rewards and punishments are simply two sides of the same coin. Both are focused just on getting our kids to do what we want them to do, they are "doing to" approaches, as opposed to the "working with" approach that I prefer. But I will get more into that in another post.

Back to why we don't say "good job." There are many reasons we avoid the phrase, one of them being that I find it to be manipulative. I haven't always been anti-"good job," and I found that I almost always said it in response to McKaleigh doing something that was pleasing to me. I was using my "good jobs" to get her to do what I wanted, which I am not okay with. I want my daughter to do good things because she wants to and because she understands why they are good. I don't want her to do things just to make me happy. Now when I hear people say "good job" it makes me cringe. I can't hear it without thinking of how condescending and manipulative it sounds.

Among the other reasons, which you can find in Alfie Kohn's article "Five Reasons to stop saying 'Good Job!,'" are that it creates praise junkies, steals a child's pleasure, causes children to lose interest in whatever they were praised for, and actually reduces achievement.

When I first heard about praising being bad I thought it was silly. In fact, I thought it was cold and heartless not to offer praise, but really I think that's because I didn't have a good understanding of what praise really was. Praise is a positive evaluation or judgment. Sure it may be positive but the key word here is "judgment." We are constantly placing our judgments onto children. Here is an example of why that can be damaging in an excerpt from Alfie Kohn's book "Unconditional Parenting" (pg 156):

Recently, I found myself at a crafts activity sponsored by a local library in which children were invited to create snowflakes out of pipe cleaners and beads. A boy of about four or five sitting near me showed his mother what he had done, and immediately she gushed about how wonderful it was. Then, since I was the only other adult at the table, he held his snowflake out so I, too, could see it clearly. Instead of offering an evaluation, I asked him whether he liked it. "Not so much," he admitted. I asked why, and he began to explain, his tone suggesting genuine interest in figuring out other possible ways he might have used the materials. This is exactly the sort of elaboration and reflection that are stifled when we slather our kids with praise. They tend to stop thinking and talking about what they've done as soon as we pass judgment on it

.

There's so much more I could say on this topic, but I will let you do your own reading, since I don't feel that I could say it any better than Mr. Kohn:).

I feel great, but there's one thing missing

For the last couple of days I have been doing so great with housework. Throughout the whole week I don't think there was really a time that I would've been embarrassed to have someone come to the house. Of course there's the regular mess of toys and books, but other than just the evidence of children being children, the house has looked pretty nice. I didn't make a plan or strategy, I'm just doing it! It feels great to do some cleaning first thing in the morning. I get all the dishes put away and clean up the clutter on the living room floor, then steam mop the heavy traffic areas of the kitchen and after the girls are up, I vacuum the heavy traffic areas of the living room. It is such an amazing fresh start to the day and just gets me off on the right foot!

I've also done some new things this week. I baked bread for the first time yesterday and am giving it a second go today. It wasn't a complete failure yesterday, but not necessarily a success either. I should have waited to see if it would rise a little more, but I was getting impatient. I have the dough in the pan and am waiting for it to be done rising right now. Although I think even if I did bake it right now, it would be a lot better than yesterday's loaf:).

I did a little search for some simple crafts to do and found things to do with newspaper and magazines. I made a few coasters yesterday using nothing but a pair of scissors and pages of magazines that I folded up and wove together. It was super easy, but fun to do, and I love the way they look:).

Now for the thing that is missing. Exercise! I love working out, really I do! I'm just having trouble finding the time to do it. I normally stick to workout DVDs and hope to start running, just around the neighborhood, but I haven't been getting out to do it lately. Every time the weather gets bad I get out of the habit of running, and Adelaide is at an age where she won't really let me do a workout DVD. At one point I was working out in the morning, but I just love using that time to clean, and don't really want to mess with what I have going with my morning routine. I think I may have to settle for doing basic exercises intermittently throughout my day. I know eventually I want to work out like I used to, but I think right now I'm just going to concentrate on developing these cleaning habits.

Hope everyone else is having a great week! Yay, tomorrow is Friday!

Here are links to the bread recipe I used and a tutorial for the coasters

Bread: http://www.thesimpledollar.com/2007/11/04/homemade-bread-cheap-delicious-healthy-and-easier-than-you-think/

Coasters: http://howaboutorange.blogspot.com/2009/06/recycled-magazine-coasters.html