Sickies and the Salt Sock

For at least two weeks, my little guy has been sick. Low grade fever, snurgles in his head and a cough (barely noticeable during the day unless he runs around, but terrible at night to the point of sore chest and tears from exhaustion and frustration) During the day, I dosed him with Cold Calm and some Oscillo and at night he took Chestal. Around day 10, I gave him Children's Nyquil (ugh. red40) but between the antihistamine and cough suppressant, he slept.  Two nights of that got him past the worst and he's been cough free for almost a week now.

Then... last night, he mentioned that his ear had a slight ache but more frustrating was the fact that he couldn't hear out of it...

Knowing that his head had been full of nasties (had hadn't had a runny nose, only post nasal drip which in an 8 year old means that thick junk is close to the fluid of the ears), I felt it was "Salt Sock" time.  I tweeted about the salt sock and got a lot of questions about it, so here's how we do it for a kiddo (for adults, we use more salt):

What you'll need:

• Salt
• old clean sock - thick cotton is best but an old baby sock can work!

1. Take about 1/2 c of course salt (totally wing it - there is no need for precision on this!) and pour into a pan on the stove. [I use a cast iron skillet though some people heat it in the microwave]
2. Stir or shake the salt until its very warm/hot.
3. Pour salt into the sock (I use my canning funnel!) and tie the top to keep salt from spilling. [I've also heard people use a rubber band]
4. Place the salt sock on the kiddo's pillow and lie with the ear on the sock.  If you use a thinner sock, you can place a towel between the sock and the ear - but its not as effective.

That's it! Simple and effective The warm salt is comforting and the salt helps to draw out fluid which can be harboring bacteria and causing pain.

Repeat as needed during the day (and night if you're awake!)
For other recipes for salt socks, you can google it

HMN's Natural Living Conference: BE THERE!

I am *so* excited for the lineup at the 2011 Natural Living Conference which will be held in Irvine, CA this year on October 1.

I've heard Robyn O'Brien's TED talks and I've seen her speak in person last spring. She is passionate about bring attention to the foods we eat and the foods we feed our children and the effects our choices have on ourselves and our children. I'm excited to hear her talk about The Unhealthy Truth About Our Food.

I'm also looking forward to hanging out with Mayim Bialik, who will be speaking on Parenting by Intuition: From Hollywood to Holistic Mom. Not just that she's amazing as Amy Farah Fowler on The Big Bang Theory (honestly, a favorite show of mine!) but that she is a *real* person who has *real* mommy issues and *real* dilemmas - like finding a holistic/green way to clean the toilet (as per her speech at the Down2Earth Festival in Boston where I was able to meet her in person.)

I am thrilled that I don't have to choose between Robyn and Mayim as speakers; both are keynote speakers at the conference in the main hall!

I do struggle though in trying to choose between the four workshops offered:

• Dr. Lauren Feder - Making an Informed Vaccination Choice
• Trudy Scott - Food & Mood: 9 Steps to Calm Your Anxious Mind
• Jennifer Taggart - The Smart Mama's Guide to Non Toxic Living
• Jennifer Waldburger - Happiness Is An Inside Job  

I am also looking forward to spending the day with like-minded moms and dads, having an awesome lunch and spending time chatting and getting to know friends I only know online and... much to DH's chagrin, I'm *really* looking forward to shopping at the exhibit hall! 

Learn more about the Natural Living Conference here and if you'll be in southern CA in October, do not miss this awesome event!

#HomeHer11

I'm gonna be honest. I don't have time to blog right now... so I'm blogging because I'm procrastinating the other 9000 things I really *do* have to do right now.

In the interest of truth (which is the topic of choice with my Dear Son lately) I will tell you that I cannot believe I haven't posted anything since May - its odd that its been that long because I know I've composed MANY posts in the interim... I guess I need to type them, too.

I will leave you with this thought: When will she post again? What will it be about? Who else at #HomeHer11 needs a cuppa coffee at 4:15pm...?

Our pets have no names

We have pets.  They live in the basement. The kids love to feed them and care for them!

So, why no names? Mostly because they're hard to tell apart and because there are dozens of 'em!

We have pet worms.  OK, maybe they're more like indentured servants.  We do give them a nice home and all the food they can eat :)  The kids did try to name a few, but then they squirmed away and we're not sure if the ones that they saw again were the same or not...

That said we're looking forward to doing a bit more gardening this summer so we can put to use all the good compost they've made for us!

Our worms came from our good friend Mary who breeds them (HA! She simply has multiple worm bins and as a Master Gardener gives seminars around the area) Our bin is filled with shredded paper from the home office, scrap food waste and some coffee grounds and filters.  Definitely not as much coffee grounds and filters as we go through though... that is in another bucket on the back deck waiting to be dumped somewhere else as an outdoor compost area.

Since we're living in a townhouse without any space in which to put an outdoor composter or open pile, I'm still in a battle with myself over the desire to compost the grounds and filters and the reality of having no where to put 'em.

Garden updates to come!

Nursing Our Future... 2011

It has been nearly a year since I created this video for the Holistic Moms Network.

I still get choked up listening to Catherine Marie Charlton's song Gouda and Grapes - because I can see the pictures of the moms in my head.  Pictures that moms from chapters all across the country felt compelled to send in for the video in response to one email asking to help support breastfeeding mothers everywhere.

Moms who know and understand the need for breastfeeding support.  Moms who know and understand that the more breastfeeding is seen for what it is - feeding and nurturing a child at the breast - the more it will become commonplace and unquestioned... at Tavern on the Green, a children's museum, a coffee shop, at the Acropolis, the Eiffel Tower!

In solitude and in solidarity - WE MUST NURSE!

Please watch the video - and share it with everyone you know - and those you don't know - because breastfeeding is the way nature intended our future generations to be nourished and comforted and it needs to be seen (in videos, in private homes, in public places and on Facebook!)

Searching for balance... coughing all the way (hack hack hack)

I've been sick with an upper respiratory thing which moved lower for over 3 weeks now. ENOUGH!

While I'm very holistic in my approach most of the time, I couldn't find the right combination of homeopathic and herbal support and when I KNEW I had a sinus infection and was heading to visit relatives for Thanksgiving, I threw in the holistic towel and took antibiotics. 10 days later I'm still hacking up a lung at times and sound like I took up smoking a few packs rather than the z-pack!

What I find works best for me and my family is the balance between allopathic and homeopathic, between black and white. There *is* a gray zone (or in this case, a medium shade of green zone!) and I truly believe more people live there than is realized.

I'm not done with this... this is gonna be another post I'm sure... but I do have an invitation to a tea party in the tent under the kitchen table and I just cannot be late!

Twitter Tutorial - Lesson 1

OK -- so I'm not a Twitter Professonal, but I tweet. I'm 42 and I've kinda found my way -- so when a friend in my age range asked me to help her figure it out, this is what I came up with as a first draft.

What do you think?
-------------------------

Twitter is a new animal. It is such a different thing than the rest of social networking, you simply have to let it be what it is and discover how you two get along :)

It is actually very simple. You set up an account and you say something (as long as its under 140 characters) and you hit send. Unfortunately no one sees it -- because you have to have followers to have people see what you're saying! So, in order to have people follow you, you need to go make some Twitter friends. You search for people you know, people who have similar interests to you, people who live locally to you, etc. You "follow" them -- and in turn, you hope they'll follow you back.

Now when you say something, someone sees it. Most often (99% of the time) they will not respond. Don't be offended. They may not have seen your one tweet in their long list of tweets that the hundreds of other people they follow sent. So you say more stuff more often.

Then people start to see what you're saying, comment back, have conversations, build relationships.

There are many ways to sort these conversations so you don't miss the good stuff in the midst of the banal... that's for lesson #2.