Home Tour: Master Bedroom

I can now add the master bedroom to the list of rooms that are done! The layout of this room caused a lot of problems for me, but I think I've found a work to work around it. All 4 walls have either a window or a door so furniture placement was a little tricky. I'm pretty happy with the style of the room and I'm slowly working toward the same style in the rest of the house. I really love the farmhouse style, mainly for its simplicity, so I'm wanting to add touches of farmhouse throughout the house without going full-out farmhouse.

View as you walk into the room

I found this chair at an antique store and I love the gorgeous wood. Eventually I'd like to get an oversized chair for reading but for now this works.

My desk is my new favorite area. I love the picture hanger that I made from an old barn wood frame and the blue mason jar with flowers is just the cutest. 

PKU Cooking Class

When I got the invitation to the PKU cooking class in Huntsville I was so excited that there was going to be an event so close to home. The event was sponsored by BioMarin and it was free for PKU families! We figured there would be 4 or 5 families there, but we were shocked at how many people were there. The youngest PKU patient there was a 3.5 month old precious baby girl. The oldest was a woman who was probably in her thirties who successfully dealt with maternal PKU and had a perfectly healthy child. I had a great conversation with a 16-year-old young man who has PKU and I was very impressed with his maturity and his understanding of how essential staying on diet is to his overall health and mental clarity. 

The event began with a meet-and-greet where we got to talk with the speakers for the day and some of the other families. Then we had a cooking demonstration by a professionally trained chef. I can't say enough about this guy! He teaches at a college level in Wisconsin and traveled all the way to Alabama just to teach this class. He has 3 children, 2 of which have PKU, so he cooks low-pro things every single day. Also, he used to work in D.C. where he was the chef for President and Mrs. Clinton! How awesome is that?!

Chef Kevin Brown. I didn't get a picture of him at the class, but this is him at another PKU seminar. (http://www.mnpku.org/seminar)

We split into groups and made 4 different low-protein recipes. My group made a delicious apple desert. Think apple cider doughnuts, apples sautéed in maple syrup, topped with Rice Dream ice cream. It was amazing! My job was to chop and sauté the apples. Probably the easiest job of the day--which is a good thing. I would have had 40 people very upset with me if I had messed it up. :)

Blurry picture of my sautéed apples. It's not easy to cook and take pictures at the same time.

The other 3 recipes were vegetable noodle soup, vegetable ragout, and breakfast sandwiches. The chef is a genius! He taught us to make bacon out of sweet potatoes! BACON! Out of sweet potatoes! It was delicious. 

Three of the dishes we learned to make. I didn't take time to get a picture of the dessert--I was too concerned about devouring it!

The food was all amazing. All of the recipes are ones that can be served to PKU as well as non-PKU eaters. For example, you can add shredded chicken to the soup for the non-PKU folks. 

While we ate, a social worker spoke to us about executive functioning difficulties in people with PKU. Executive functioning includes things like attention, memory, problem solving--things we need to make it through every day life. Then another speaker gave us some information on Kuvan, a medication used to treat PKU. Maybe I'll do a more detailed post about Kuvan someday.

Overall, I was extremely impressed with the event. I learned so much and it was wonderful to connect with other PKU families. I look forward to the next one!

Calculating Phe From Protein

Over the past week, I have hit the PKU-friendly-food jackpot. I have found so many things that Hadley can eat that are either low in phe or phe-free. The best part is that they have all been in local stores. Hooray for no outrageous shipping costs! 

However, not all low-protein foods are created equal. Just because the package says 0g protein does not mean that it is phe-free. Manufacturers are only required to put the estimated amount of protein on a package. Therefore, a product that claims to be 0g protein may actually contain up to 0.4g of protein (they were allowed to round down to 0). The same is true for a product claiming to have 1g protein. It may contain anywhere from 0.5g to 1.4g. This could mean a big difference in the amount of phe. 

Most, if not all, PKU families rely heavily on the book Low Protein Food List for PKU by Virginia Schuett. This book contains the phe content for a LOT of different foods, but not all. There have been times when I have found a potential food for Hadley in a store but it was not listed in the book. 

So how do we go about determining the phe in these new products? The first step is to call the company and request the exact protein found in the product. Most companies unfortunately do not have the phe amounts in their products, so the exact protein is the next best thing. 

Here is an example:

The package states that there is less than 1g of protein per serving. I called the Glutino company and they told me that the exact amount of protein is 0.9g per serving. Since 1g protein=50mg phe, I multiplied 0.9 by 50 to determine that there are 45mg of phe per 52g serving (or 0.87mg phe per gram of product). 

I contacted Virginia Schuett to make sure I was doing my calculations correctly. She said the multiplier may not always be 50, depending on the main ingredients found in the product. For the toaster pastries, the main source of phe is eggs. However, eggs are listed 8th out of 17 ingredients (ingredients are listed in order from highest to lowest prevalence), so there probably isn't very much in there; therefore, 50 would have been an appropriate multiplier for this product. 

Even with the added task of determining the amount of phe in Hadley's new foods, I am so thankful that she has more variety in her diet now. So far she enjoys all the new things she has been able to try!

Funny side note about these toaster pastries: I told Hadley it was a pop-tart but she thought I said "hop-tart" because she made it go "hop hop hop" across the table. She cracks me up. :)

Home Tour: Hadley's Room

Well, it has taken almost 2 years, but I am finally putting up some pictures of Hadley's room! 

Her room is probably my favorite room in the house (for now). Since we got all new furniture while I was pregnant, I feel like I really got to start from scratch with the decorating. My main objective was not to get too "babyish" with the room because I wanted it to be something she could grow into. I knew I wanted a brown and pink color scheme and I happened to find some adorable cherry blossom bedding that was the launching point for the rest of the decor. I also knew that I wasn't about to repaint that room while pregnant, and I wanted to leave it the neutral beige anyway. I'm sure I will paint her "big girl room" when that time comes, but for now this works.

Here is the crib and glider/ottoman. We found the adorable cherry blossom rug at Lowe's! The dress that she wore home from the hospital is framed and it is such a special piece to me.

Here is the dresser that serves as a changing table on the opposite side of the room. I knew I didn't want a traditional changing table because open shelves just spell trouble for a curious toddler (plus 5 cats) and the dresser will be functional for a long time. The painting was done by a very talented girl from our church and she painted it to match our bedding. It says "We loved you before we knew you. Even when there was just the hope of you, we loved you." The first time I read that quote it really spoke to my heart. During 2 years of infertility, all we had was the hope of a child, but we loved him or her already.

Here is her bookshelf. We wanted to encourage a love of reading, so we knew that she would have a ton of books and that we would need the storage space for them. I also wanted to be able to store toys in the canvas bins. On the top shelf are some more sentimental things like stuffed animals I had when I was baby. On the very top is a jewelry box that belonged to my grandmother. 

Here is the corner of her room that is between the bathroom door and her closet door. I made the hair bow holder and the bulletin board for her artwork. The rocking horse was made by my uncle when I was young.

Last but not least is her closet. The child has way too many clothes! There are just too many cute girly clothes out there that I have not mastered the art of resisting. Still, there is room to store more toys that I'm sure we will be overrun blessed with after her birthday. :)

I try very hard to keep the chaos of toys and books from taking over her room (and our entire house for that matter). I feel very strongly about keeping a child's room organized and peaceful so that it promotes better sleep. Plus, I am just a neat freak anyway. 

It's hard to believe that I spent many hours in that room praying for a child to come into our lives. Now Hadley is almost 2 years old and I still am so thankful that we get to be her parents. :)