Kristen Anne Glover

Birth Order Explained: It’s Your Mother’s Fault

Many smart people have spent many long years researching a strange phenomenon related to birth order. The theory goes something like this: your personality is directly impacted by your birth order. If you’re the firstborn, you tend to be a certain way. If you’re the youngest, you tend to be another way. I’m no psychologist, but I can assure you, it’s all true, and it all goes back to your mother. May the good Lord help you if you were born after number five.

The Metamorphosis of Motherhood

After your first child	After your third child	Sometime after your fifth child
Maternity clothes are so cute!	I can’t wait to get back into my normal clothes.	These are my normal clothes.
Jake, come here!	Jake, I mean Susie, come here!	You—come here! No, not you. You! Yes, you! If I say “you,” I mean you!
Look at the homemade costume I made for you!	Let’s see what’s left at the costume store.	Here’s some aluminum foil and a Sharpie.
What would you like for dinner?	This is what we’re having for dinner.	If you don’t eat the casserole, it’s going in the soup for tomorrow.
Don’t eat that off the floor!	The floor isn’t that dirty.	Get it before your brother does.
Your birthday is only a month away! We’d better start planning.	I forgot candles. I’ll hold up five fingers and you can blow them out.	No, I didn’t forget your birthday. It’s called a “surprise party.”
Would you like to learn soccer, karate, piano, origami, French pastry making, Spanish, or water polo?	You’re taking ballet because your sister takes ballet.	There are lots of great cartoons on in the afternoons for kids your age.
Let’s pick up before Daddy gets home.	Let’s pick up before Grandma comes.	Let’s just move.
Let me help you!	Let me know if you need my help.	You don’t need my help.
I’ve created a wish list of educational toys for Timmy’s first Christmas. It includes all the Newberry award-winning books, a baby biology set, Latin fridge magnets, and a planetary motion crib mobile.	Don’t buy him anything that makes noise, needs batteries, might choke the baby, or requires parental supervision.	Just give us the money.
My husband wrote me a love note and rubbed my feet!	He watched the kids so I could go to the grocery store by myself!	He vacuumed!!!
We need to childproof the house.	How come the baby is the only one who can open the baby gate?	He’ll only do it once.
Please put on your new shirt.	Please put on a clean shirt.	At least you’re dressed.
I will never be one of those mothers.	I feel sorry for those mothers.	I am one of those mothers!
I didn’t know I could love anyone like this.	I didn’t know my love could multiply like this.	There’s always room to love one more.

Giveaway!

A Baltic amber giveaway (baby not included)!

Update: This giveaway is now closed! Congratulations to reader Sarah who chose the Lemondrop necklace as her prize!

Thanks to all of you loyal readers, this website keeps growing and growing, which means it’s time for another giveaway! I’m proud to offer one of my favorite products as our latest giveaway, a Baltic amber necklace from Hazelaid!

What’s so great about an amber necklace, you ask? Well, let me tell you.

A Testimonial

A year ago, I was introduced to the Hazelaid company. A friend of mine recommended their Baltic amber and hazelwood products, which she said had incredible healing properties. I read everything on their site, including the following description of Baltic amber:

“Amber is not a “stone” but a natural resin. So as it warms with the body’s natural temperature, amber releases its healing oils (these oils contain succinic acid) which are readily absorbed into the skin and then into the bloodstream. Baltic Amber has some of the highest concentrations of succinic acid found in nature, and this is what makes it so special. Succinic acid is a natural component of plant and animal tissues, and its presence in the human body is beneficial in many ways.

Commonly known as “teething jewelry” in Europe, Baltic amber has been a natural remedy for pain relief for hundreds of years. Baltic amber is a natural analgesic that will help relieve headaches, reduce inflammation of the throat, ear and stomach and fight irritations, infections and respiratory diseases as it dramatically improves the body’s immunity. Many adults report improvement of arthritis discomfort and carpal tunnel pain in their hands when wearing amber on the wrists.”

I then bought two items, hoping they would help with some of my life-long health issues including inflammation, joint pain, and a chronically weak immune system.

But I was skeptical. How could tree sap and bark help? I’ve been dealing with these issues for so long, I couldn’t believe anything so simple could help.

I received my order very quickly, put on the products, and waited. I was stunned—simply stunned—at how the products began to work and my life changed. It sounds dramatic, but when you deal with chronic health issues, and they suddenly go away, you can’t help but be amazed! Here are the changes I experienced:

Since I was a child, I have experienced chronic pain in my limbs due to the way I grew. I used to have to take medication every night just to sleep, and often more during the night because the pain would wake me up. Since wearing the necklace, I have been able to completely cut out all pain medication! I have not been able to do this in years.

My immune system has never been stronger. I am the kind of person who used to get sick all the time. Since wearing the Hazelaid products, I have only gotten two colds this year. This is a miracle for me! I didn’t even get the flu that my kids caught. Usually, I’m the one who brings it home in the first place!

My menstrual cramps have virtually disappeared (male readers, you have my apologies!). I did not expect this to happen, as it’s not something Hazelaid talks about on their site. I have always suffered from extremely painful cramps during my period. I live on Advil, and if I don’t take 3 at a time, I can’t function. I sleep with Advil beside the bed because the pain wakes me up. My menstrual cycle has always been a huge source of stress and frustration for me because of this. I feel like once a month, I have to enter a long, dark, painful tunnel. I was astonished when the natural pain relief in the necklace was powerful enough to combat even my menstrual pain. I now take, at most, 2 Advil the entire duration of my cycle. It’s absolutely incredible!

I have become such a believer in the power of Baltic amber that I contacted Hazelaid and asked if I could give away one of their products. They were gracious enough to give me a discount so I could order two necklaces. I chose the strongest, most powerful necklaces they have! The winner gets to choose their prize, either 16” Super Butter Baltic amber necklace or an 18”Lemondrop necklace.

The Super Butter amber necklace has the highest succinic acid content.

The Lemondrop necklace also has a very high succinic acid content, but the more neutral color might work better with your wardrobe!

How do you win one?

The contest is open to all of my readers around the world! Simply leave a comment below and the winner will be chosen at random at 4 pm PST on Sunday, April 29, 2011. Please allow 6-8 weeks for delivery.

A discount for everyone!

I wish I could give everyone a necklace to try, but since I can’t, Hazelaid has graciously offered a 10% discount for all my readers!

Simply shop online and enter code tow10 at checkout. This code has no limitations and no expiration, so feel free to share it!

Thank you all for your continued support!

Kristen

Great Gears!

A wall of gears

For the first time in his life, my oldest son has his own room. At first, he didn’t know if he was going to like sleeping all alone without anyone to talk to as he falls asleep. He’s a very social boy, and we had to convince him that he really didn’t want to sleep with all four of his siblings (which would be the epitome of awesome, in his mind).

I set about to make a room that he would be proud of, something like felt like his. The room is small, but has a lot of empty wall space. When we moved in, I had painted the lower part of the wall to look like washed denim. I love it and didn’t want to change it (it was a lot of work!), but the upper walls were bare and needed a bold, interesting graphic. I thought about it for awhile, rejecting Jonathan’s proposal that I draw an ocean mural, and came up with the perfect solution: an arrangement of various gears scattered across the wall.

Gears! They’re a designer’s dream. Here’s how you can get them on your wall.

1) Find images of gears that you like. You can find a million different gear outlines on the internet from sites like this one. Use the power of Google to find slews of gear graphics.

2) Project the image on the wall. I used my husband’s projector for this, but you could use an overhead projector as well, or print the gear and create stencils (but that sounds like a lot of work).

The workhorse

3) Lightly outline the image with a pencil. I projected one image at a time, starting with a large gear in the center of the wall and adding more on either side as I liked, keeping balance in mind. Just eyeball it!

Outline the gears

4) Paint! I used acrylic paint, but this got kind of tedious because each gear required more than one coat. Ugh. Use higher-quality paints than I did for faster results! I used black, grey, silver, and a burnt sienna to tie in with Jonathan’s dresser, which I painted years ago in the same color.

That’s it! Jonathan loves his room. Here are a few more photos, including the pegboard project wrote about.