How Bunnies and Toddlers are Alike

Watching the world

Someone once told me that after a few months of not having a job and doing nothing that I'd want to desperately go back into the workforce. Well it didn't happen that way for me. I fell in love staying home (I just wish the eternal guilt and pressure of the world would go away!) I have gotten to do a lot of things that I didn't get to do while working, like doing more personal art, learning new artistic skills like crocheting, selling my creations, serving heavily in my church callings, visiting my relatives that live far away, adopting a bunny (now 2 bunnies), exercise more frequently (although, during the winter it's still a big fat zero), and yes, watch lots of tv.

I admit I watch a lot of Netflix. I kind of feel like I'm making up for all the time I missed watching while growing up, or maybe I'm just trying to pack it all in before we have kids and I regret ever owning a tv. Either way, I'm aware it's a lot and is my worst bad habit (with the exception of gluttony whenever chocolate is in within reach :P), but I do attempt to either watch educational shows or create art while watching tv shows for background noise as I lose myself in my paintings. 

Netflix has a never ending supply of documentaries. I love nature documentaries. I've loved them since I first watched one in elementary school. I still love the super old ones, which is kind of weird because most of the time I hate watching old shows or movies that scream 'OUT DATED'. I honestly don't know why my zombie teenage self never thought of going into science. I loved science in school and as a kid animals were my passion. So I could watch nature documentaries every day if I wanted to.

Unfortunately, Netflix may have a never ending supply of documentaries, but only a limited number of those are nature/animal ones. So when I ran out of those, I started on physics, astronomy, history, archeology, and paleontology documentaries (all other passions of mine growing up).

Now all that's mostly left in my queue are social political documentaries. (And this it where it gets sad.) Before I married my hubs, I did not understand what was socially happening in the world. I didn't even understand the true definition of 'social'. Not until I was well into my marriage did I realize I did have some opinions surrounding social political topics (I was very apathetic when I was younger, and still am a tiny bit.) I also found myself meeting new people outside of my little social bubble with different ideas that rubbed and wedged themselves between my ideas forming my own social/political opinions. Then I started watching social/political documentaries. Had I known that watching these documentaries would open a Pandora's box in my mind, I would have stopped after the first one.

Social/political docs are my least favorite genre of documentaries. 99.9% of these are super biased leaning towards the left, (which is the way I tend to lean) most are produced by ancient hippies, or social justice gurus, not that I have a problem with my own people, but, when you watch docs that are negative towards everything from food to health care and gendercide to conspiracy theories, you tend to feel like the world is a horrible place and every one is bad and your trapped in your own home with no real freedom because some big corporation has the hands in every human being's pockets and have you tied down while they beat your cat, steal your children, and then fine you thousands of dollars for looking at them funny, all in the name of capitalism/making money/politics/religion/etc.-take your pick. Yeah, that's basically how I felt after watching enough variety of social/political docs. 

As true or untrue the facts are in these documentaries, they gave me disparaging feelings for the world around me and I've been stewing on it a lot lately. A plethora of 'how could they do this??' 'How could they do that??' And 'He said, she said' battles going on in my head. It's bad enough with depression that makes me feel guilty for not being a "productive member of society", that now I have this gray cloud of "OH MY GOSH YOU'RE SCREWING UP THE WORLD FOR ALL OF US!" over my head. 

All I could think about during my stupor was, 'what's God think of all this?' When everything in this life has come into play, up to the present, where the entire world is squabbling with hatred over every single, dinky matter in the world that maybe, just maybe, might influence a person's body and soul in the wrong way- what's God thinking? When part of the world says 'this is right!' and the other says 'no, this is right!'? 

In all my life I have never felt so betrayed by humanity, where everything everyone says is a lie. Even the very existence of God, where most people put their trust when needed, only to have it taken away by the uncertainty of if he exists or not. What do people do when that happens to them? I'm lucky enough to believe that I don't care if you're right or wrong about God existing or not, I'm staying on this path to God no matter what. 

Even with my faith secured with God, I was still in a funk over how horrible we treat human life. Life period. How we lie to get gain or to hurt others. How some are so stubborn that they won't change to better the world around us. I was feeling dark until I watched this video:

http://www.iamnotthebabysitter.com/nicu-first-year-life/

I watched the video and I sat there thinking, I would be so very lucky to get that far along in a pregnancy! (I did have to wipe a tear away.) Then I watched as the nurses rested the baby on his mom's chest with a dozen of tubes sticking out of him every which way. And instead of thinking how horrible it was that they had turned her baby into a cyborg or some other obscure negative thought from my funk, all I thought was how wonderful it is that science has advanced so far that this tiny little life has a chance to survive. How wonderful those nurses must be to dedicate themselves to being this little angel's guardian. How wonderful it would be if science could do that for me!

Somewhere in the back of my head I was thinking, "screw those money bags! This here is a perfect life, pure and not corrupt." I decided then, that even if there were money bag hogs pulling the strings behind the hospital or the company who made the equipment used at the hospital to help keep him alive, I couldn't let their failings to the world bother me, because someone, at some point, got it right when they brought that machine into the world. It's only when the bottom line and protecting that bottom line matters more than changing the world or protecting the lives in it, that everything goes corrupt.

As much as I wish I could put the genie back in the bottle, I can't. So here's to trusting God in hopes that they don't screw us up more than they have already, and here's to the generation being born now in hopes that they can correct our mistakes.

How I learned a faster way to shave

Today I discovered something that took me more than 14 years to learn. Yes, I learned a better way to shave. If you just want to know what I did then skip to "The Trick" section. If you want to read the long story, then read on.

 I started shaving my legs when I was 12. Never should have ever started shaving, then I'd still have soft (short) blond leg hair, but such is life. I first started with a disposable razor that I pulled out from under the sink, I think they were my mom's. I sat in the bathtub full of hot soapy water and started to nervously and slowly pull the razor from ankle to knee. After a few slides I realized how easy it was to shave! So, I went faster and faster over the meat of my leg. Then I swiped over the bone- slice. A good 4 to 5 inch long ribbon of thick skin fell off my leg, then ribbons of blood. Gross. I still shudder thinking about it. I was kind of in shock, then ashamed because honestly I didn't know if it was ok for me to be shaving. So I hid my wound from my parents and wrapped it in a rag (like my parents wouldn't have noticed a huge rag tied to my shin!) Needless to say, I did not finish shaving that leg or start the other one. I was pretty much scared off from shaving, and I did go to school for the next week or so with half a shave leg and a five inch scab (beautiful, I know!). I can't remember when I started shaving again, but I was VERY careful and gentle when shaving over the bone from then on.

A couple years later I discovered Venus razors. I first tried one when I was at girls camp and a friend shared her razor with me (who shares a used razor?? What was wrong with me?). I discovered how much different it was than my mom's cheap, disposable BIC razors. So I started buying Venus. I also learned that my friend didn't shave the backs of her knees because they were sensitive, that was weird to me. I didn't have sensitive skin back then (I'll tell you again, it was a mistake to ever start shaving!). Then a couple more years later, I got hit with very sensitive, dry skin after shaving. It was worse in the winter, so thus started the tradition of not shaving in the winter. I tried everything from lotions to shaving cream, shower gel to conditioner to help with the sensitivity while shaving. I tried shaving under water and dry shaving. I tried razors with one blade, two blades, all the way up to six blades. I even tried Nair, hate that stuff. Do not use it on your pits! Speaking from experience here. Then a friend from High School suggested I try an Intuition razor, which I have to admit, was pretty good, but bulky. I still suffered from irritated skin after shaving.

So I have been left with very few options. My shaving regime consists of never shaving during the winter, then when spring rolls around and it warms up, I take hot, hot showers and would have to shave first (because if I didn't then I would be shaving when all the hot water was gone). I ended up using a man's five blade razor and swapped back and forth using shaving cream, shower gel, conditioner, and sometimes plain old body wash sudsed up on my louffe. Then afterwards I put on lotion. At this point it didn't matter what brand of lotion I use because they all sting when you rub them in.

Remember how I mentioned I regret ever starting to shave? Well, like weeds jacked up on Miracle Gro, my soft, baby, blond meadow of hairs over the years turned into black, giant, hungry jungle of hair. So every Spring I hack away at the jungle dulling a new blade every time and spending forever trying to get all the obnoxious hair out of the blades underneath the shower head. I'd have to go over the same spot of skin at least a dozen times, cleaning the blades each pass over, before they were smooth, and then I'd get bad, bad, bad, bad, bad razor burn!

Today when I started my annual hacking away at my legs (mind you, with an already dull razor because a certain husband of mine used up all my razor heads on his bald head this summer!), I had the hot water on full blast (btw, this for me keeps the goosebumps down on my legs which lessens the razor burn some.), I was rubbing bar soap straight onto my skin (no sudsing it up first) and was getting really irritated with how long it was taking and how difficult the ginormous amount of hair in the blades was to get out. I could already feel the razor burn forming on that area on my leg. Then suddenly I realized (or remembered, I don't know which) that after pulling my razor back, I could push it forward on my skin and all the hair would come out of the razor! EVERY SINGLE STRAND! I couldn't believe it! Here I was having already spent several minutes hacking away at a section of my leg and then spending several minutes cleaning out the hair under the spout and within a millisecond after my next swipe the razor was clean! Well I didn't waste anymore time, I started chugging away back and forth, back and forth (being careful around the bony areas of course!) only stopping occasionally to rinse the clumps of hair off and then gliding on more soap. I'm proud to say that I got my legs (and pits) completely shave before the hot water ran out!

After getting out of the shower and drying off my legs I noticed I missed a few spots (understandable), so I pulled out my Intuition razor, got it wet and went back and forth on the spots I missed (making sure to keep the razor constantly wet). When I was done, I took a damp washcloth, wiped the hair off, lotioned my legs (with Lubriderm lotion if you're wondering) and magically had no pain from applying the lotion! Voila! I had successfully "dry" shaved and had perfectly smooth, razor burn free, moisturized legs. I don't know what actually helped the razor burn, could've been a combination of all the things I did and used, but I'm just excited that I found a way to shave faster and easier! And I'm also happy that I can now enjoy my hot showers after shaving!


The Trick 
for easy, quick shaving away large amounts of leg hair

If you'd like to use the same method that I used with the same products (or you can experiment with whatever you have, I'd be interested to here from you if different products with this method work to help the sensativity) here are the exact products I used and how I used them:

Dial Soap Power Berry Scent

I used the power berry scent, but I'm sure any scent would work. I rubbed it directly onto my skin (don't suds it up!) I found doing this for me helped the razor glide better.

Gillette Fusion Razor

I think any razor is fine, but I liked this one the best.
Start at the ankle area and pull up to the knee like you would normally, then slide back down toward the ankle about four or five inches or to whenever the clump of hair comes out. You can do this back and forth motion* several times before you have to wash all the loose hair off your leg.

*If you're like me you shave vertically from ankle to knee, but if you stop below the knee, wiping the hair above where you stopped, and shave your leg in two sections (top and bottom) for both your lower and upper leg rinsing the loose hair in between sections you'll get less loose hair stuck in the path of your razor.

Schick Intuition Plus Razor

Intuition razors are nice to use with this method because they have that nice giant lubricating brick attached to it which when you push down you re-lubricate your leg making it possible for you to get away with not using soap to lubricate.
They are especially great for dry shaving or touch ups after your shower. Just make sure you keep the razor wet when dry shaving using the same back and forth movement described above.

Lubriderm Advanced Therapy Extra-Dry Skin

I like Lubriderm because it stings less or not at all and is not too thick or too thin, but if you have a favorite use it!




If this method works for you or doesn't work let me know!

First play date of the season

The weather was so nice today (ok it was still in the 30s, but after so much negative weather, it felt like spring!) that the bunnies and all our neighborhood friends got together to play. 

Myla, my now veteran bunny, had a little trouble getting back into playing with kids. She was quite nervous to play and even more nervous riding in the bunny cart to the playground. She got tangled up so much that once we got to the playground I let her out of her harness and leash, and like a good bunny she stayed in the playground area running around with the kiddies running after her. She even discovered Aubrey's backyard that was full of her favorite treat- crispy dead leaves! We had to drag her out of the yard a couple of times because all the kids kept following her into it and a few slipped on the left over ice and mud. She got quite the workout outside that when we came home she went straight to the litter box with a trail of little poopies following her (she really had to go!).

This was Toothless's first time at the playground. Toothless had surgery a week ago so she wasn't allowed to run around in the grass (and because she's still a bit jittery and would run away), but that didn't stop her from having a good time. She was extremely well behaved while riding in the cart and around the kids. She stayed on her harness (she's not much of a chewer so I don't have to worry about her chewing through her harness and leash) and munched on yummy grass, cleaned herself, and relaxed in the shade. She's not used to walking around her leash and, like Myla used to do, when she'd get tangled in it, she'd freak out. Luckily, she was fine and her surgery incision wasn't damaged. I was surprised how well she behaved even when I lost hold of the leash (during one of the times she got tangled in it) she leaped a few feet, stomped her feet (she's our stomper in the family) and stayed still so I could retrieve the leash.

I have to admit that I was almost overwhelmed at the thought of taking two bunnies out in the open playground, especially when Myla was being all jittery on the way there. But because of how well behaved both bunnies were today (and with the help of having TWO harnesses thank goodness!) I can confidently say that it won't be an overwhelming hassle to bring both of them outside at the same time! I love both my bunnies and even though we've had some troubles with Toothless, I'm so proud that they were so good outside! Now that I think of it, I remember when we first got Myla I felt really overwhelmed with having a bunny, but after a few months she became the love of my life and now I have two bunnies to love!

An auntie again hits close to home

When I married my husband six and a half years ago I married into a very large family. While in my family there were only four children, Alex came for a family with eight children. I'm the second oldest and Alex is third from the bottom and last of the boys. So when I married in I inherited over a dozen nieces and nephews. Since then over half a dozen have been born. I love, love, love all my nieces and nephews on Alex's side of the family, especially all the new babies. 

But when my sister had her first child a year ago it was very different than any of my other nieces and nephews births. I don't know if it's because it's my own blood relative or the fact that I can see many of my family traits, many of my traits, in my niece, but something about it got me more excited than before and felt uniquely different. 

Yesterday my sister announced that they are having another baby. Again, I became extatic and I got that wonderful feeling. But then something else hit. I felt like time was going to fast, my sister already nine weeks into her second pregnancy while I had been spending six years trying to get one. Time seeming to go fast actually isn't any different than when many of my friends and family start having their second, third and even fourth child. Except, like feeling the birth of my biological niece felt different from the ones I had inherited through marriage, this felt different. 

I have always been okay with other people around me announcing their pregnancy. Even when they tip toe around me I always tell them that it's ok to tell me their wonderful news because that means I get to hold more babies. But for some reason my sister's happy news felt different. I don't want my sister or anyone else to think that I'm not happy or excited that my sister is having another baby, because I am. I really really am. I can't wait to start spoiling that baby! 

That feeling though... I don't know if it's because I feel like I'm losing the race, or I feel like I got the biological short end of the stick, but I felt that my sister's news was terrible because I wasn't even close to being capable of getting pregnant. 

This isn't true though. I felt awful after I had that thought. My sister bringing another child into the world isn't terrible  or aomething to feel guilty about, it's a wonderful, happy and sacred event. All these years that I've told people it's ok that they tell us about their exciting news and here I was in my head thinking it wasn't ok that she had another baby. 

However, these thoughts were pretty fleeting. Even as I'm writing this I don't have them anymore. But it was so strange to feel that way. And I don't understand why I felt that way with my sister and not the hundreds (yes I used to keep count) of other friends and family that have been popping out babies like crazy the past six years. And I don't understand why I never felt this way when my sister's first child was born. Maybe it is a combination of hitting too close to home and l a race against biology and time. I don't know. 

I would like my sister to know that even though I had that thought for a split second, that's not how I feel and after experiencing this it's not going to happen  again. Not because I feel bad for having the thought, but because I genuinely do not believe that. I do not believe that one baby's life is worth more another. Having lost four babies I, of all people, should understand the worth of a life, and I do and I hope to never have this thought ever again with anyone whether it be friends or family or complete strangers.