I'm back!

It's been a while... but I still love you, blog. It's time to get back into the groove of things!

Lots of news here- first of all, we're staying in Virginia! Starting the first of October Daniel will be running a rental farm for Polyface. We're extremely excited about it! The farm, called Briarmoore, has an old log-cabin house in which we'll be living. We will be moving over there in two or three weeks, once the current tenant moves out. I'm a little concerned about moving in, as when I saw the house this past week it was extremely dirty. Structurally it's fine, and everything works in the house, it just needs a seriously good, deep scrubbing. But we'll get that done, and once that's done everything will be fine. I'll post pictures once we're settled in! Daniel will be taking care of egg laying chickens, pigs, and cows starting in October, and he'll be adding rabbits shortly after that. Next spring we'll have all of the above and add broilers (meat chickens) to the mix. We're very thankful that God sent us to Virginia! We don't have any plans to go back to Kentucky.

So what's been going on the past two months? Well, Zeke turned 2 in August! That was lovely. Then I started babysitting a 4-month old little boy at our church, about 25 hours a week. He and Zeke are both napping right now. Zeke adores Malachi, and Malachi loves watching Zeke play. I'm glad Zeke doesn't seem to be jealous. I've also been doing laundry for the other interns at the farm, so I'm currently making more money than Daniel! I doubt that will ever happen again!

About three weeks ago I had an appointment with a naturopathic doctor/nutritionist named Jane. I was very eager to see her, as I've had on-going health problems for years now, and I was never able to get a conventional doctor (at least in the military system) to take me seriously. I've been absolutely unable to loose weight, constantly tired and moody, and unable to carry pregnancies to full term (Zeke was born at 27 weeks gestation, and I've had multiple miscarriages), horrible joint pain, and other various problems. She was an absolutely amazing doctor! She had a machine which, to the best of my understanding, works like this: you hold two pieces of metal which are attached to a machine by wires- it sends a weak electrical current through your body. Every cell in existence has it's own unique electromagnetic frequency, and this machine records all the frequencies of all the different types of cells in your body and sends them into a software program on a computer. This software then shows the doctor the exact levels of every substance in your body, what you're allergic to, etc, and she is able to analyze the data with the medical and nutritional training she has. She was able to figure out that I have Hypothyroidism (I already knew that, but regular blood tests always showed up negative and so no one would ever give me medicine for it!), Polycystic Ovarian Synrdrom (I suspected this some, and Paige, she said to tell you that you were right!), and Lymes Disease. No wonder I'm ALWAYS tired!! She said that the first two problems are inter-related and mainly caused by an extremely severe iodine deficiency (again, the machine was able to show her how much iodine is in my body). She gave me a list of supplements to order, and drastically restricted my diet: no wheat, oats, red meat, pork, dairy, tomatoes, walnuts, fish. 75% of my daily diet is vegetables and the other 25% is chicken or eggs, rice bread, fruit. I'm still waiting for some of the supplements to come in the mail, but even just with the dietary changes in the last few weeks I feel much better. The only discouraging thing is that I haven't lost any weight yet. I think that will change once my iodine supplement gets here and my thyroid gland is able to function correctly. I've talked to three other people who saw her last week, and in just a week and a half they had lost 5,8, and 10lbs just from the dietary changes. We've already been eating healthy for years and so I guess it will just take my thyroid kicking in for me to start loosing weight. Anyhow, the machine is called Asyra (I'm sure you'll be googling it, Paige!). I was skeptical at first, but the appointment was amazing, and it was such a relief to have someone affirm the fact that I'm not well. I hope to be feeling so much better over the next few months! I have another appointment with Jane in October so I will be re-evaluated then. I'll keep you all updated incase you're curious.

Alright Malachi woke up from his nap and he's crying! I'd better get going! Sorry no pictures :(