postpartum vaginal steaming

⚠️ for the ladies! ⚠️

I had the intention on posting about my wonderful experience of vaginal steaming. I had done research on it while I was pregnant and wanted to try it after I had the baby because of the many health benefits. Well... I added too much water into my basin and when I sat down, a portion of my butt cheek touched the hot water! I jumped up so fast, I lost my balance and almost fell back into the hot water! This wasn’t the relaxing experience I imagined.

Anyways, vaginal steaming. It’s like a facial for your “lady goods”! The practice of vaginal steaming is a natural remedy for maintaining your female reproductive health and dates back thousands of years in indigenous African, Asian, Mayan and Native American cultures. Although medical doctors don’t recommend vaginal steaming, many women have found it beneficial, especially after childbirth. Depending on the herbs you use, you can stimulate menstruation, ease cramping, fight infections, clear scar tissue, relieves infertility, hormone imbalances, tones and strengthens. 

This herb blend is from Substance and it came with my Healing Mama Co. postpartum kit. In general, postpartum herb steaming blends includes: mugwort, rosemary, wormwood, basil, calendula, lavender, rose chamomile and motherwort. 

I’m not opposed to trying it again but I would probably get some help from an expert or in a setting that specializes in vaginal steaming. 

*** DO NOT use vaginal steaming while pregnant, during your menstrual period, open wounds or if you have genital piercings. Consult with a Yoni specialist or doula if you have health conditions. 

prenatal + Postpartum supplements

After 7 years of learning more about health and motherhood, for this pregnancy I decided to be mindful of the supplements I take. For my first 2 kids, I just took Rainbow Light prenatal vitamins and they are, for the most part, healthy kids. I am not the best at remembering to take my supplements everyday but I also try my best to be aware of the food I eat everyday. 

Prenatal

1st Trimester: I was really nauseous! With my 1st pregnancy, I just felt really tired and don’t remember ever throwing up. With my 2nd pregnancy, I was glued to the toilet and mainly during the evening. For my 3rd pregnancy, I feel like the nausea and throwing up was the worst. I also experienced constant  heartburn, which was something I never experienced before. Taking the three relatively big prenatal vitamins was not something I wanted to take everyday. Instead, I took these small Folate pills. 

Folate is different from folic acid. Folate is a natural form of B9 vitamin and it is essential for DNA synthesis and supports red blood cells. Pregnancy is essentially the division of cells to form a human being and folate plays an important role in that process. Folic acid is a synthetic form and is more stable, which is why most prenatal vitamins (even the “organic” brands) will contain folic acid. The problem with a synthetic form is that it may not be absorbed if it is not converted into folate in your body. Therefore, an excess of folic acid may cause other health problems.

2nd Trimester: It took some time for me to feel that glowing, 2nd trimester, pregnancy stage. I was able to eat better without worrying about throwing up, so I decided to take Thorne prenatal vitamins. I liked that it contained folate instead of folic acid and they use vitamin D3 as their source of vitamin D. When we absorb sunlight, our bodies produces vitamin D3. If you are vegan, vitamin D3 is derived from animal sources like fish oil and egg yolks. Therefore, vitamin D2 would be best for vegans because it’s derived from plant sources like wild mushrooms. 

3rd Trimester: All throughout my pregnancy, I was in search of probiotics that were safe during pregnancy and could be used while breastfeeding. I also wanted to make sure the probiotics had a 100% survivability rate. Many probiotics will say “150 billion cfu” but this doesn’t guarantee that all bacteria will survive the acidity of the stomach and your internal body heat. I didn’t discover Just Thrive probiotics until I was in my 3rd trimester. This spore-based probiotic is one of the only probiotics on the market that survives it’s journey through the gastrointestinal tract. It needs to survive in order for the good bacteria to colonize into the intestine. It is safe during pregnancy, while nursing, for kids over 2.5 years of age and is not temperature dependent (survives up to 450 degrees Fahrenheit). You can open the capsule and add it to smoothies and mix it into your favorite muffins recipe.

Postpartum

Magnesium Citrate: After birthing a baby, your stomach muscles are weakened so pushing out poop is the last thing your body wants to do. To make it easier, magnesium citrate is a natural way to soften your stool. In general, magnesium citrate is good to take when you’re constipated and when you have diarrhea, you should take magnesium glycinate.  

Vitamin D3: Many people are unknowingly deficient in vitamin D, which is important for your immune system and bone health. It can also help in boosting your mood. Postpartum depression is very common and something all mothers and fathers need to be aware of. It’s okay to not feel 100% yourself after giving birth, your body and hormones have been on a crazy rollercoaster ride. 

Probiotics: This is something everyone should be taking. Even if you eat healthy, in the US, antibiotics are in most of our food. The only way to avoid consuming food without antibiotics, is by avoiding all processed foods and eating food from your own farm. 

*Magnesium citrate, vitamin D3 and Genestra HMF maternity probiotics = these were in my postpartum kit from Healing Mama Co. 

*Genestra is a brand that many naturopathic doctors recommend. 

Turmeric: Known for its anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties, I am also using this Pure Synergy turmeric supplement as a pain reliever. Thank you Dr. Danielle Diva for pointing out that my Costco bulk turmeric powder will not have any beneficial healing properties.

motherhood

    What does motherhood look like for you? I wish it consisted of aesthetically, beautiful photos, with your hair and makeup to perfection, cute sustainable outfits and vacations on a tropical island with your two-piece bikini. Instagram gives you a false narrative of what motherhood should look like.  Unless you are rich, the majority of us who are experiencing motherhood know it is not glamorous. 

    It is messy and it takes a lot of patience to get through the day, especially those who have more than one child. Some days you fee like you have motherhood figured out and other days you're wondering how you can get them to stop fighting with each other. Some days you look at your single friends with envy and other days, you look at your kids and feel grateful that you ave the best kids ever. Some days you feed your kids peanut butter and jelly sandwiches with candy and other days they get their fruits and vegetables. It's a constant learning process. Once you figure out breastfeeding, then you learn how to deal with tantrums, potty training, then it's dealing with homework and attitudes. What works for one child, doesn't mean it will work for the second or third. Every child has their own personality, their own set of genes that are uniquely one-of-a-kind. As parents, our job is to embrace their uniqueness and help them navigate through the trials and tribulations of life. Teach them self awareness and emotional intelligence that will hopefully help them deal with whatever life might give them but still giving them the freedom to express who they truly are. Then there's our own self. We give so much of ourselves to our kids, we often forget to take care of our own self needs and wants. The constant balancing act we are trying to manage. 

    So, if you haven't showered and you're still wearing the same pajamas you were wearing yesterday, know that you are never alone in your journey, No one has it all figured out, even though it may seem like they have "the perfect life" from their captions and photos. You are doing your best and if you can wake up most days with gratitude then regardless of what your hair or outfit looks like, you're already winning.

play dough

If there is one recipe I master during this quarantine, it is not banana bread or sourdough bread, it is play dough. After years of trying play dough recipes, I think I stumbled across the best one! It involves glycerin, cooking it on the stove and unfortunately, more dishes to wash. I am pretty sure everyone who is sticking to the safer at home rules are tired of washing dishes during this time but if it gives me an extra hour of kids playing peacefully, then I think it's worth it.

This is an activity I included as part of our ocean unit.

I didn't write down the source of this recipe but if you Google "play dough glycerin," you should be able to find it. Here is the informal recipe I jotted down:

2 cups of all-purpose flour
3/4 cup of salt
4 teaspoons of cream of tartar
2 tablespoons of oil (I used grape seed oil)
1/2 teaspoon of glycerin
2 cups of hot water
gel food color

- Heat water
- Add food coloring, mix
- Add glycerin and oil
- Add flour, salt and cream of tartar
- Cook over medium heat, do not overcook - it will get too dry
- Let it cool down
- Place in an air tight container

LA skid row hand washing stations

I would like to say a special thank you to our dear friends, Tricia and Shelly, for including us in their partnership with the LA Network Community Action Networks' skid row efforts to help build and create hand washing stations for the homeless. We decorated a washing station so they can wash their hands with soap and water during this Coronavirus pandemic. 

For more information about the washing stations and to check out the awesome designs people made, visit their Instagram page @skidrowpower and www.skidrowpower.com.

homeschool resource | education.com

Education.com has been one of my go to resources for homeschool worksheets. I have the basic membership, which is free, and I am able to download a certain amount of material. Since schools are currently closed all over the country, they are also providing weekly boosts and independent study packets for each grade level (preschool to 5th grade).

I found this little sight words bingo game for my preschooler and it was a hit! Trying to get 3 in a row was too easy so we changed the rules so that the first person who gets the entire card filled, wins the game. Since my 1st grader knows all the words, I also had her call out the words so I could play the game and even my husband played along too. I printed the game pieces on cardstock paper for a little more longevity and plan on continuing to play this game to help my son learn his sight words.

intro to volcanoes unit

Last week, we finished our introduction to volcanoes unit. Here's a look at some of the work we did:

Layers of Earth pattern and Parts of a Volcano - Stephanie Hathaway Designs (love her designs!)

Volcano Experiment - kit from Lakeshore Learning

Book - The Earth Book: A World of Exploration and Wonder by Jonathan Litton

We also used video resources from:

Mystery Science

Scholastic's Watch & Learn

My kids have been really enjoying Scholastic's Watch & Learn. They're concise videos that provide basic information for my 6 year old and 4 year old. They also provide worksheets you can download and print out for kids to fill out after viewing the video. I also love that they provide Spanish versions, which is great for my 1st grader. 

testing out paint from the real paint co.

Our Sunday started off as a beautiful sunny day but at around 4pm, the clouds came in and now it is raining. So we painted our volcano for tomorrow's mini lesson on volcanos.

I was in search of nontoxic, kid friendly and environmentally safe paint for us to use. I always felt bad washing paint brushes in the sink because I knew the paint would go into our water system. Today, we sampled paint from The Real Milk Co. It's a powder that you mix with water. According to their website, "their formula is made with 100% organic ingredients, nontoxic, food contact safe, VOC free and even biodegradable/compostable." I wish their samples came in little glass jars instead of plastic but I have to pick and choose my battles.

It took some time for me to mix the powder and water together. I didn't want to use the entire sample because I knew we weren't going to need it all so I used a little dropper to add the water as I was mixing. The colors I chose were cocoa, mocha and black iron. After we were done, the volcano ended up looking like one color but we'll see how it turns out tomorrow when it dries. It could be because my kids eventually mixed the colors together as they were painting.

Each sample was $3.50 and if I wanted to get a set of 6 basic colors, it would cost roughly around $21 but they have a flat rate of $10 for shipping. That ends up being a little pricey for 1 oz containers. There's another company I would like to try so I'll post an update on which ones we liked best.

Hopefully everyone else is having a nice and relaxing Sunday!

virtual art class with author Mo Willems

We are huge fans of the Elephant & Piggie series by Mo Willems! The author is doing a Lunch Doodles series in partnership with The Kennedy Center. Every weekday at 1pm ET, he will have a new episode in which he has a new activity for kids and/or a drawing lesson. Parents can download and print out the activity sheet for the day. Since my kids wanted to draw pigeon from the Don't Let the Pigeon Book series, we watched the 1st episode where he taught them how to draw the famous Pigeon. I also read them one of our favorite book, Waiting is Not Easy, a book that seems to be fitting during the world's current pandemic situation.

Afterwards the kids wanted to wear their costumes, saving their Halloween costumes come in handy when you're stuck at home.

linking cubes

These linking cubes have been a hit in our home lately. After their math activity, my kids spent a couple hours building shapes and people out of them. They are definitely worth the purchase. Since my daughter is working on 1st grade estimation, we will use the linking tubes tomorrow for an estimation activity.

For this preschool math activity, I downloaded these free cards from Montessori Print Shop and instead of using the "quantity" cards that were included in the set, I had my son use the linking cubes to represent each number.

homeschool - states of matter

I've been homeschool my preschooler for a few weeks now and will occasionally give my 1st grader homeschool work after school but today was the official day both of my kids were home due to the Coronavirus pandemic.

Today we were suppose to do a volcano experiment but upon opening the box I realized I had to actually make the volcano model and it would take 2 to 3 days to dry. Total fail! So I whipped up a little lesson on the states of matter in addition to their regular math and handwriting school work.

For the properties of matter introduction, I used Scholastic's Watch & Learn Library under the Physical Science & Engineering section. I printed two different "Think Sheets", one in Spanish for my 1st grader and one in English for my preschooler. I then looked online for free worksheets that would help them understand the concept.

This worksheet is from Mrs. Thompson's Treasures website. We also used a Chemistry set from Lakeshore Learning that helped demonstrate the difference between liquid and gas. The rest of time was spent working on workbooks, math and playing with linking cubes. For the most part, we had a pretty productive day, with the kids only watching tv while I was making dinner.