Where has the summer gone?

Well, if you didn't know already, it's almost September. And you're probably wondering where I've been since April. For our summer, I was hoping that we would be able to go back East and visit family or find work out there... You know, find some way to go back near family. I got my wish! Nate got himself TWO jobs for the summer. And as soon as he finished classes in May we drove 21-and-a-half hours straight back to Virginia so he could start his job at a summer camp. He worked long and hard, and I believe he had a little bit of fun as well. And on the weekends, he prepared and then preached at a little church in Page County on Sundays. For the amount of time Nate had to work on his sermons (which wasn't a lot- his summer camp job demanded lots of hours), the Lord really gave him some great thoughts and insights. Nate was greatly appreciated at the camp and at the church.
And what did I do all summer? I titled myself the Camp Mom and took pictures of campers, did town runs for camp, volunteered where help was needed, and, of course, played with a baby. I was glad to be at camp. I have a soft spot in my heart for that particular summer camp, because I believe it is such a great place, a safe place, for kids. I think Madelyn was a valuable ministry at camp as well. She smiled at pretty much everybody and would let anyone hold her or feed her. 70% of the time somebody was holding her! It was great for me that I could get a break from having to hold her. The only rough part was that we shared housing with the camp nurse so we never felt like we could let Madelyn cry it out, so all that sleep training we did before we left Texas flew out the window for the rest of the summer. If I heard her cry at night, I would nurse her back to sleep, sometimes four times a night. Needless to say, I was tired! And so was Nate!
But we were happy and felt like camp was the place where we needed to be.
Then something happened unexpectedly. Nate was contacted by one of his tutors from Oxford with an odd request. They asked them to work for RZIM! If you don't know what RZIM is, the website can be found here. It was through RZIM that Nate went to Oxford to study apologetics two years ago. They wanted us to move to Boston, Massachusetts to help the ministries that already existed there. We were knocked for a loop! We were astounded! Us? Why us? Why now? We both were immediately thinking that this is not what wanted. Nate had seminary, and I was just getting settled in Dallas. What about staying in one place for more than a year!? I was perfectly happy to turn them down. They asked us to pray and pray and pray about it. So we did. I was so reluctant at first that I knew if God wanted us to work for them then He would have to soften my heart towards the idea. And ever so slowly, I started to think that Boston wasn't that bad an idea... Even a good opportunity to make some money... What? An adventure, you might say? So, we finally decided it might be an opportunity we didn't want to miss out on.
But how were we going to get our stuff from Texas to Boston? Nate wouldn't have time because as soon as we finished our vacation he would preach one last time at the little church in Page County and then drive non-stop to show up to work the next day in Boston. So I convinced my mom to fly with me to Texas and pack our stuff up. After we decided to go with that plan, Nate signed us out of our lease in Dallas, and within an hour someone was asking to move into our apartment! And what was even crazier was they offered to pack up our stuff and put it in a truck so we wouldn't have to fly down there and back! It was unbelievable! We were so thankful that we could be helpful to that couple and they could be helpful to us! It saved us so much money that would have gone into plane tickets and hotel rooms and rental cars. It also saved us a lot of labor. We are forever grateful to a couple we've never even met! With that load off our mind, Nate and I were happy to travel together to Boston with Madelyn in tow.
WORD OF ADVICE- DO NOT drive to Boston by way of Interstate 95. Traffic on a Sunday was still horrendous. We also paid $50 in tolls. FIFTY DOLLARS. I am now considering having my own toll booth on interstate 95, because it seems like there is not enough toll booths on the stinkin' roads!!!! We left Page County a little after one in the afternoon and did not get to our apartment in Boston until THREE IN THE MORNING. This does probably not needed to be stated but I am VERY reluctant to try that road trip again. At least the trip from Dallas to Virginia was a moving twenty-one hours! Okay, there is my rant! Breathe deeply... And now moving on...
We arrive in Boston and meet our housemate, Alycia, who is going to be working alongside Nate. I'm glad for a female presence in the house if we are going to have a housemate. We get along well! We all survived the week of waiting for our furniture to make the trip to Boston and she even helped us move our things into the house. The place is newly renovated, with hardwood floors, new kitchen countertops and redone bathroom. It's very spacious, we don't have enough furniture for all the space we have! How crazy!
The place is starting to feel like a home with our belongings around us and Madelyn's giggles and squeals reverberating through the rooms. It's hard to believe she will learn to walk in Boston! She may even pick up a Boston accent (which is VERY real and thriving) when she starts speaking. It is exciting that she will probably get to play in snow. It's hard to not be in Dallas with our church and DTS friends. It's hard to be away from family in a completely different direction! But the hope is that we will all get to see each other again some day. And Facebook has been a great way to stay connected with people. Yay Facebook!
So that has been the story up to this point. Summer brought some major changes that we didn't see coming. But Nate and I hoping that if this is the Lord's will then he will bless our time here and show us where to go from here. Stay tuned for pictures of my darling ten-month-old and other Rittenhouse shenanigans!
E
- Posted with the help of my iPad

Location:Massachusetts

Am I a terrible Mother?

We made a big change here in the Rittenhouse home. It has not been an easy transition for us (harder for some more than others), but we seem to be surviving.

Two Sundays ago was the farewell to the pacifier.

I also let her "cry it out" at nights.




Does Madelyn look the worse for it?

We have been pacifier-free for two weeks now and I think we have come out a happier trio overall. I made this decision somewhat haphazardly when I realized I was using it indiscriminately on Madelyn. It was the easiest thing to do. Oh, you're making noises- pacifier goes in!- you look sad, angry, frustrated- pacifier goes in! You need to be quiet now- pacifier goes in! Go back to sleep- pacifier goes in! I thought that we would just use it for naps and sleeping, but then I would find myself plugging her in all the time, just to keep her- you guessed it- pacified. While it was much easier to plug her in than to hear her cry, I realized that we were both suffering because of it. She was unable to soothe herself without it, and I was not getting sleep at night because I would plug her back in the instant I heard her make noises. I wanted Madelyn to be able to fall asleep without it, and I wanted Madelyn to be able to put herself back to sleep when she woke up in the middle of the night. Sadly, she was not able to accomplish these things because her mother was an enabler.

Two friends of mine lent me some books on baby sleep: Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child and Good Night Sleep Tight: The Sleep Lady's Gentle Guide to Helping Your Child Go to Sleep, Stay Asleep, and Wake Up Happy. Both are great books on how to understand baby sleep patterns and sleep needs. I learned that timing is key to get baby to sleep well and to nap well during the day. I also learned that tears are unavoidable if you want your baby to sleep well. Try as you might to help your baby, there are things (like sleeping) that he/she needs to learn on his/her own and until he/she gets the hang of it, he/she is going to cry out his/her frustration since that is his/her way of communicating. Finding ways to help your baby get into a sleepy mind-set will ease the transition for the baby and the parent.

Pacifiers, unfortunately for us, were not helping Madelyn soothe herself, because it would fall out as soon as she was completely asleep and when she'd wake up she wouldn't know how to fall back asleep without it. During the day, it was easy enough to plug her back in, but at night, I would just get up and nurse her, plug her back in, and wait for her to do it again in another couple of hours. And this was wearing me OUT. I was reading Good Night Sleep Tight and it was stressing the importance of self-soothing and how as parents, we are more like coaches-helping the baby fall asleep and not doing it for them- and by plugging Madelyn in all the time, she was never learning the skill of soothing herself!

So, two Sundays ago, I plugged her in to fall asleep around 8pm. Around 11pm she woke up, so I nursed her, but this time (on a whim) instead of plugging her in, I threw a blanket on her and walked out. I waited to hear her angry cries and demands for the pacifier. Amazingly, all I heard was groggy fussing and then silence. We did this dance a few more times that night, but I figured we could do it. It was nap times and the initial putting to sleep that I knew would be the battles, so I had to be more intentional about helping her transition to sleepy-mode (no more swinging to sleep for us!). I could see Madelyn was so confused because she was wanting something to suck on, and I wasn't plugging her in. She was having such a hard time with it too, fists and blankets just aren't the same as silicone! It was hard for me to watch her "suffer" when I knew how to fix the situation. Nathan had to keep reminding me that, she wasn't hurt, that she was trying to go to sleep. We're still working on getting the timing right, but when you catch her getting sleepy and you put her down at the right time, she goes to sleep so quickly!

I read a little further in the book, that she should be sleeping ten to eleven hours at night without a feeding for her age, and I was blown away! There were a few nights where she would sleep nine hours at a stretch (and I would get six), but those didn't happen consistently, so I figured it was because of growth spurts or catching up on calories that she would cry out at night. But the one night she cried every three hours (which she hadn't done since she was two or three months old!), I knew I was causing her more problems by going to her every time she cried. I realized at night she would wake up and she was probably thinking," I'm up. What do I normally do when I am awake? I eat. I must be awake because I need to eat." So if I went to her at night, I'd end up nursing her to sleep, because nothing else I did helped. I had to make another decision that if she cried before 3am, I would not go to her. I made this decision for the both of us. For our health and for our sanity. It took her a week, but for the last two nights she has slept twelve hours in a row, and I've gotten eight in a row! I don't think I've slept eight hours in a row since Madelyn's been born. We should've been doing this AGES ago! If I thought six hours of sleep was great, eight hours is AMAZING. Can I ever sleep ten hours again? Probably not, but I'll take eight for as long as I can.



Reward for successful sleep! Single serving cookie!

Taking the pacifier away has not been easy, but I think it's been the best thing for us. And listening to a baby's cry does not settle well on a mother's ear. Putting Madelyn to bed definitely requires more work on my part, but I think it is worth it if I can grow a happy human being. Maybe we shouldn't have given it to her in the beginning, but looking back, it was the best thing for us at the time. Now that it's gone, Madelyn is still trying to find something else to suck on, and she's not always pleased with my soothing efforts, but I think she is a happier baby overall. Of course not every baby is the same, and everyone needs to be sensitive to baby's needs. I can't say we're a success story yet. But I definitely can tell how far we've come in the short time we've implemented the new sleep regime and schedule. We're on a much better schedule that we should be able to keep. It's also better for her to get this all down now BEFORE our big trip back to the East Coast.

What do you think? Pacifiers-Nay or Yay? When do you say good-bye to them? What about night-waking?

And look! The little rascal is sitting up on her own! Now if only she'd learn to roll over...

- Posted with the help of my iPad!

Yogurt Making!!!

(Nathan questions the need for three exclamation marks in the title, but he just doesn't realize how exciting yogurt making really is!)
Yogurt making is actually really easy, especially if you have a yogurt maker. The maker maintains the perfect temperature for yogurt cultures to grow (you can make yogurt without a maker, and there are plenty of websites that will tell you how, the yogurt maker just maintains a temperature of ~111F, so if you don't have the maker, you have to find another way to maintain the temperature for a loooong time. If it's too hot, you'll kill the cultures, if it's too cold the cultures won't grow fast enough) and all you have to do is be patient and wait 8 to 12 hours for it to be made! We make whole milk yogurt, because we aren't afraid of milk fat, but you can use skim milk. We also add powdered milk because I like thick yogurt, and powdered milk adds more milk without the extra moisture. Just a few things to make you aware of before we begin! So let's begin!
Utensils you need: a high sided saucepan, a pitcher, and a whisk. (I also use an immersion blender sometimes- I'll get to that!)
Ingredients for yogurt flavored with jam or jelly:
- 4 to 5 tablespoons of jam or jelly (taste preference)
- 6 ounces of unflavored yogurt or 1 tablespoon of culture (it's cheaper to buy a quart of plain yogurt and keep using it than buying yogurt starter)
- 5 to 7 tablespoons of powdered milk
- about 42 ounces of milk (or seven jars not all-the-way full) of milk
Our yogurt maker has seven six-ounce small jars:




So we use seven jars of milk (about 42 ounces of milk). You pour your milk into the sauce pan and slowly heat the milk, stirring constantly to keep the milk from burning to the bottom of the pan. Heating ensures a firmer yogurt.




The milk will start to climb the side of the saucepan, and have a frothy surface. Once you reach a temperature of 180F, remove the saucepan from heat and allow milk to cool to lukewarm (95F). Keep stirring! To accelerate the cooling, move the pan into an ice bath. You can see in the picture below the line the milk climbed up the pan.




While the milk is cooling off you are going to make your culture. I start with a 6-oz jar of plain yogurt, the powdered milk, and the jam. You can change the amounts of jam and powdered milk to suit your tastes. Stir these together as best as you can.




You will stir some of the milk into the yogurt mix until the yogurt is dissolved and you have a smooth mixture.




Pour this mixture into your pitcher. Add the milk.




Now if you like chunks of fruit in your yogurt, move right along to the next step. But if you are like us and don't want the chunks, you will take your immersion blender and blend the yogurt mix until everything is smooth.
Get everything combined and smoothed. Then arrange your containers. Make sure they are clean!




Pour your yogurt into jars.




Arrange the jars onto the yogurt maker and turn on the machine.




Leave the white lids off of the jars. Cover the maker with the plastic cover.




Then wait FOREVER (or eight hours if you used whole milk, ten if you used 2%, twelve if you used skim). As you can see on our yogurt maker, there are little gray numbers on the side of it to indicate hours, and the plastic cover has a little notch you can move to hover over the number of hours you need to wait until the yogurt is ready. What I do is move the notch to the time when my yogurt will be ready. So if my yogurt will be done at 8 o'clock, I move the notch over the top of the 8. In the mean time, clean up your mess! You will surprised at how few dishes you used!




Only a pot, a bowl, a pitcher, and a spoon or two! So easy! When the yogurt is done (all firmed up), turn off the maker. Water might condense on the clear lid of the maker, so when you remove the lid, be sure none of the condensation drips back into the jars. Cover the jars with the white lids and chill them in the refrigerator for a minimum of three hours before eating.
So there are pros and cons to yogurt-making. You are taking time out of your busy schedule to make what you can just pick up in a grocery store. You do have to wait a long time before you can eat it, and you can only have as much as your little jars will hold. Don't forget about the up-front cost of the maker to begin with.
BUT on the other hand, you know what is going into your yogurt, you can add or take away the ingredients, so add honey, sugar, more jam, less jam, etc. If you use the maker a lot, it is worth the cost and makes your life easier than without. You can make lots of yogurt from one quart of plain yogurt. All-in-all, your 6-oz jar of yogurt is just nickels and dimes to what you buy in the grocery store. I also use yogurt-making as a time for bonding with Nate. We enjoy making it together just as much as we enjoy soap-making together, and you can eat the results.
So there you are, folks, get yogurt-making! What are you waiting for? Oh, you might have questions? Well, don't be afraid to ask!
(Most of the directions, I got from the instruction manual for our yogurt maker- Euro Cuisine Yogurt Maker. I did improvise on some of the parts, which means YOU CAN TOO!!!)
Oh, and of course I can't have a post without a picture of my little one!




Relaxing with Papa!




Tummy time!




Hanging out with Mama!
- Posted with the help of my iPad!

Where the wind comes sweeping down the plains...

Well, Nate's spring break is here- FINALLY- so we decided we needed to get out of the city and go climb a mountain of some sort.  We looked at maps and discovered that one of the closest parks in Texas (with a mountain) was six hours away. Boo.  So we decided to head north to OKLAHOMA!!  I don't think either of us have ever been there, so it was a great opportunity to go and cross it off our list.  We left Friday morning...

Here we are all excited!  Madelyn is already sleeping in the back.  It's for the best, we still got stuck in traffic! Boo!

We drove through Wichita Falls on the way up to Oklahoma.  I actually lived here for a small part of my life, and so it was fun to visit this place again.  Of course I didn't remember anything because I was 5 or 6 when we lived here... Anyways!...

Taking a break before we leave the state of Texas.  We found bibs to be quite handy as Madelyn is a saliva-spitting machine.  She is staring quite intently at the dashboard.  If she's anything like me, she's going to be a button-pusher someday...

We finally made it to WICHITA MOUNTAINS NATIONAL WILDLIFE REFUGE! Hooray!  We are immediately greeted with this sign.  I was quite willing to heed the warning, but still very eager to encounter both the longhorn and the buffalo!

We stopped at the visitor center and discovered lots of fun facts.  But most importantly, that at this stage in her life, Madelyn could ride on a Bald Eagle or a California Condor, if she got the chance (Or she could still be attacked and eaten by either- not comforting!).  Good stuff to know.

After four hours of being in the car, Madelyn earned some Tummy time!  I supervised Madelyn while Nate did everything else...

Like set up the tent... Start the fire... Unload the car...

I made sure Madelyn didn't roll off the picnic table...

And that Madelyn didn't eat the apples (haha! You can see Madelyn's bald spot where she rubs her hair off!  How sad, cute, and funny all at the same time!)...  After all our hard work

We decided to go exploring and after strapping Madelyn on to me (despite her protests), we walked around this lake, called Quanah Parker Lake.  On the other side of the lake is our campsite!

Our first real buffalo sighting!  Right at the lake!  There were kayakers on the other side taking pictures of them as well.

And this is the dam at the lake.  A beautiful day for strolling along the lake.

This is on the trail to the top of a little hill called Little Baldy.  Madelyn fell asleep!

I was trying not to jostle Madelyn around too much while climbing, so I kept going "Nate! Help me up!"  He thought it was funny.

Here's Nate holding a buffalo.  We actually had a close encounter with one buffalo.  He started walking across the road, and Nathan blocked his way from getting to the other side.  I was nervous that the buffalo was going to ram the car, but instead he walked around the car, much to my relief!

And here's a longhorn, up on a hill!

How they survive on dried grass is amazing to me!

Sunset up on Mount Scott.  It was quite crowded up there, so we decided to keep driving around...

...and came across these little guys!  This one ran across the road, and Nate hit the brakes, yelling, "Look out! What is that?!"  I was all excited, shouting, "Prairie dogs! Prairie dogs! Prairie dogs!"  I was trying to get a picture of one standing up, but they're quick little critters!  I was happy just to get a semi-blurry picture of one!

Then there was this place in the park called Holy City.  The longest reenactment of the Easter Story.  More about it here.

At this point, we were looking for Elk, because we had seen buffalo and longhorn, so we were driving down all these roads, and saw this beautiful sunset at a deserted lake.  Looks like this was a picture opportunity just for us!

Here's our fire!

And here, we are trying to get Madelyn to enjoy camping.  She's bundled in two sleepers!  Both  father and daughter seem quite happy to be gazing into the flames...

Here, I'm trying to block the smoke from Madelyn.

Here's part of our dinner- mac and cheese by lantern light! How romantic, haha!

And here's the sunrise to greet us the next morning!  It was nice sleeping outside in the cold. I think even Madelyn enjoyed it... but somehow during the middle of the night...

She found her way into our bed!  How could this have happened? Mysterious things during the night...!

Here's our map of the park.  We were trying to figure out where we should go hike for the day!

More buffalo sighting!  And Nate's beard hair in the corner!

This time, Nate carried Madelyn on the hike!

We were hiking the small trail in the bottom right corner.  It's called the Kite Trail and followed along a creek.

Nate and Madelyn looking down the canyon at the creek!

When we reached the end of the trail. Nate looked at his GPS and said, it's faster to blaze a trail back to our car than just walking along the road.  So that's what we did!  Watch out for snakes!

And Cactus/Cacti!

And so we made it back to the car.  We drove to another hiking spot and were just starting when Madelyn started crying.  We went off the trail a ways, thinking if I fed her, she'd be better, but as soon as Nate would strap her back on, she'd cry again.  After a few more minutes of this, we said, "We're done for the day!" and high-tailed it out of there.  We found a shady spot to stop and let Madelyn kick around.  She seemed much happier after that.  I'm sure she was done being on Nate's back, and being in her car seat.  I didn't blame her!  Unfortunately, she was going to have to go back in her car seat for the long drive home.

One of our stops along the way back home.  She was happy as soon as we got her out of her car seat!  Look how chubby she is!

All in all, I think it was a fun trip.  The weather was perfect, lots to see, and it was fun just to be in the wilderness together.  We would recommend Wichita Mountains Refuge to anybody who wants to see some wildlife and hike some quick, fun trails.  I think next time, we'll try and go when it's not so crowded, and we'll try and find more opportunities for Madelyn to kick around and not be strapped in for so long.  She'll enjoy camping and hiking a lot more as she gets older, too.  

Next post to expect will be about this fun little gadget I got for Christmas: my yogurt maker!  I really enjoy making my own yogurt, and I hope after I show you how easy it is to make it, you'll want to try it too!

-Erin