Thought dump

It’s been pretty crazy in these parts.

The little hat Ezra is wearing in the picture above has been keeping me very busy – I’ve made 27 of them! I actually have one more to finish, then I will be totally done with all my orders. I’m pretty proud of myself. I managed to knock out 30 hats total, in 3 weeks (the rest were a couple Santa hats and a snowman one). It helped that my mom took Ezra for an extra day two of those three weeks. I became “that girl” at Starbucks, with the Macbook, ear buds and a ton of yarn + needles.

I sure have missed blogging.

Since my brain is still kind of mush from the past three weeks, I thought I would just do a thought dump of a few things going through my mind.

Firstly –  I have become obsessed with podcasts. This all started because I needed something engaging to listen to while knitting at Starbucks for hours on end. I have become pretty adept at not looking while knitting so I had been reading some stuff in Adobe Digital Editions but I got tired of that and wanted to give my eyes a break so I started searching for podcasts in the iTunes store. I first found Dave Ramsey’s, because I have been reading Total Money Makeover (which, speaking of books, there is no way I am going to reach my goal of 52 Books in 2012. But thank God for 2013, amiright??) and I thought I had heard he had a radio show. I’m so glad they podcast his daily radio show because I love listening to it. He cracks me up with his blunt honesty! And whether you agree with his personal opinions or not, you can’t argue that his plan just makes sense. I’m kind of a convert to this cash is king mentality, but that’s another post for another day.

I also stumbled upon this podcast called Stuff Jews Should Know. It’s a husband and wife team – Mottle and Batya – out of Israel and they talk about, as you might guess, things Jews know they should know about, but maybe don’t know so much about. There are only 2 episodes so far, but I love it! I really hope they keep podcasting because they are really informative and fun to listen to. Plus, their episodes are short so it’s perfect for a lunch break or something similar.

But it doesn’t stop there! I subscribed to This American Life because I love their stories, and Freakonomics Radio because I love freakonomics. There are five other subscriptions I’ve got but I haven’t listened to anything on the channel yet so I’m withholding my recommendation until then 😉

Secondly – I can’t get enough of Frasier. Yes, I’m talking about the mid 1990s-early 2000s sitcom starring Kelsey Grammer. It used to be on Hallmark every weeknight from 10pm-12am but when they started showing their Christmas movies they stopped showing Frasier episodes. Cue the sad trombone.

But, by some Christmas miracle, Lifetime started airing Frasier at 10am and again at 2:30pm. Yes, I know the exact times because those times just so happen to coincide with Ezra napping so I can still get my Frasier fix in.

Also, I should add I may or may not have asked for this for Christmas. It’s a problem, people.

Source

Thirdly – we are making a change. A huge change.

We are switching to cloth diapers. I know, I know. I just talked about this not long ago in a Money Monday post… and after saying I didn’t know if cloth saved a ton of money, I got quite a few emails and a comment or two about it. So, I thought, why not give it a shot! One of my good friends cloth diapers her babies and she gave me a few diapers to try out. Suffice it to say, I was hooked.

Our water bill actually did not increase a single cent. Any electric/gas cost is negligible because we are on a fixed cost month-to-month (which, if your energy company will do that, definitely sign up. We pay the same amount for 3 months, then they reassess based on usage, and the bill may go up by a dollar or two or down, depending on any credit built up from the previous months. You can also do one amount for 11 months and in the 12th month they look at usage and apply any credit AND if your credit is out of control huge, they cut you a check. Which is pretty sweet). Not to mention how great I feel knowing I’m putting something good for baby on his bottom. And also how great it is to have diapers for any future babies.

I’ve found Katie Kimball’s (of Kitchen Stewardship) videos immensely helpful in choosing other brands to try out. She did a huge experiment where she tried 20 brands of diapers (23 different diapers from those brands) and blogged her findings. You can watch the videos here.

From my own experimentation, I’ve learned I don’t like pockets at all. I get they are convenient and all that but I hate stuffing them. I much prefer all-in-ones (AIO) or all-in-twos (AI2). I’ve tried out – bumGenius 4.0, bumGenius Freetime (loved them), bumGenius Flip (also a fan), Fuzzibunz (not a fan..it’s a pocket), bumGenius elemental (loved it), Grovia AIO (fan, but it stains even when just wet so that’s a bummer), Kissaluvs fitted (liked it but not totally sold on the fitted train) and G2 with disposable inserts (we had a lot of leakage issues with these).

I really, really liked the Grovia because it was so slim fitting. One complaint I have with cloth is the bulkiness. But, when researching Grovia more I found out they are partially manufactured in China so now I’m not 100% behind them anymore. I’ll keep the ones I have but probably won’t buy more. Not to mention they do stain pretty badly, even with just urine on them, which is weird and annoying.

I’ll have to write another post on my cloth diaper thoughts but, in the meantime, I’ll just say that I really do like it and, in the new year, am looking forward to switching totally over to cloth.

Lastly – I cannot wait for this year to be over.

It’s been a crazy year. I started it pregnant and will end it with an eight month old baby. I’ve made a lot of good choices and a lot of mistakes this year. I’m ready for a fresh start. January always holds such promise. It’s arguably my favorite month of the entire year.

Even though it’s Ezra’s first holiday season, I just can’t get into it as much as I probably should. The holidays are stressing me out and I kind of just want them to end. I’m excited for him to experience Christmas, but I’m more excited to settle back into a routine. Maybe that’s what is stressing me out? We have traveled so much already and, while it’s enjoyable, it definitely takes its toll.

I’m doing all the “right” things – we put up our tree the day after Thanksgiving and I’ve gotten some great pics with Ezra in front of it. We did the menorah and our prayers. We’ve watched the Christmas movies and I’ve even read him How the Grinch Stole Christmas several times but…. there’s just something keeping from totally digging in as much as some of my other mommy friends seem to be doing with their little ones.

I think next year will be different, though. He’ll be on his way to turning 2 – AHH!! – and will be able to interact more with what’s going on. In the meantime, I do love seeing his curiosity over this huge, white, light-covered bush we keep in our living room all of the sudden.

And that’s probably enough thought dumping for now. What’s been on your mind lately, dear reader?