Favorite kitchen activity

It's nearly impossible to stop her from pulling all of the seasoning packets out of 'her drawer' several times per day. 

Recovering from Christmas...

Looking forward to catching up and getting back into a routine.

How we spend our morning

Birthday Cheesecake - Compliments of Aunt Molly & Nana!

The average day...

Daily schedule:

 

• Awake: 6:45-7:15am - if Daddy's home, he goes in to greet her in the morning
• Breakfast: banana/applesauce/cheerios/yogurt/oatmeal
• 1st Nap: 2-4 hours (typically 2.5/3hrs.)
• Lunch: anything - truly
• Playtime for 2-2.5 hrs.
• 2nd Nap: 1.5-3 hrs. (typically 2 hrs.)
• Play until Daddy gets home - including an awkward sprint/fall/sprint/fall/sprint trip to the front door when he arrives.
• Dinner: whatever we're having - plus some extra greens, if we're on top of it.
• Bedtime: 7pm - bottle, books (unless she's falling asleep in her highchair - which happens 2-3 times per week - then we abbreviate the bedtime routine) and she's put into her bed.

Diapers: 2-3 poopy diapers/day (size 4s)

 

Temperment: She's simply a joy. Truly a joy.

He ran off and left me...

Teaser - some people know this story, but it's a wacky new mom one.

I just retold it to my S-in-Law, Molly as to why new moms shouldn't be left alone for a few weeks. And why no one prepares us enough for our brains melt.

...I can't post more than once a day - plus, I have real Ellie updates that need to be shared, and another post sans photos is pretty boring. :)

Preparing for 2

We hit the last trimester today, in doing so, I am reflecting on how unprepared I felt when we brought Elizabeth home. Not physically or with tangible things, but with the "4th trimester".  Sleep deprivation, managing it all, feeding, clothing and cleaning myself, let alone another human being made for some tears, overwhelming and pure exhaustion. 

I thought it would never get easier, but here I am, relaxing over a hot cup of coffee, having given myself a pedi, finished 2 loads, put away groceries, ordered Christmas cards, researched photo stuff that I needed to find an alternate print lab, cleaned out the fridge, put up some Christmas decorations, cut the hair and strings off the underside of the vacuum spinner, eaten & showered (huge bonus!) and enjoyed a quiet moment as E sleeps. It did get easier - much to my own amazement. :)

So...with 2. I'm taking the survival approach. Whatever we need to do to survive. I hope my dear husband can live off crummy food, wrinkled (hopefully clean) clothes and a narcoleptic wife for a few months.  I really can't imagine having 2 kids to do everything twice though. I look around and see other people everywhere doing it (somehow).  I guess the lesson to print out for my wall and paste on every flat surface in my house is: "It does get easier...whether you believe it or not!"

Why I'm a bad blogger...

Around the 5 month mark, Elizabeth was playing while I was typing, likely blogging on the floor of our dining room. I pulled her onto my lap and she hurled onto the keyboard of the laptop.  I quickly threw her off my lap (ok, well not threw, but you can imagine) turned it upside down and blotted like there was no tomorrow. It seemed to salvage all of the keys, but I didn't dare turn it on or use it for fear of squishing regurgitated breastmilk further into some electrical board. 

Later that night, or the next day, I forget, we discovered that the "o" doesn't work.  We tried everything to no avail.  Dave developed his own shortcut by copying and pasting each time you need to type an "o"...I took it to Best Buy's Geek Squad and they offered the sweet estimate of $135 to send it out and then they would call to give me the price to fix it..."if they can". Nice, huh? So, since I make a habit of throwing $100 bills down the drain, we figured we'd save the dough and just keep doing the copy and paste for each "o". 

Thankfully, we have an iMac for photography work, but when I'm on it in the office, I feel like I'm slacking on post processing stuff, so I don't play on that computer, just this beat-up-freakizoid laptop that can't spell "Mom".

Excuses excuses. My New Years Resolution is to be better at marking the milestones and the daily life of my expanding family.

Lesson here: don't let your kid near your computer. Duh, Mom.

Baby Girl Update

Well, one of our biggest struggles recently was a nasty cold...she was pretty cheery through it all.  I finally caved after she wasn't able to breathe through either her nose and mouth enough to eat or drink.  I wasn't able to get any liquids into her, so I knew it was time.  Poor sweet child, she suffered really badly through this cold.  And it went on for 2 WEEKS!  She cleared up her nose on the 13th day, and we finished off the antibiotic for her bad ear infection that was starting to blister.  BAD MoM! I kept thinking she was teething or something!

I guess it pays to keep your Mommy intuition in check. :)

Mommy tip: don't stress about your kid feeling dependent on a pacifier - anytime they have a bad cold, you can help them kick the habit.  Logic here: they can't breathe through their nose, so they need to sleep using their mouths to breathe - thus, they can't breathe and suck on the pacifier.  They choose breathing. :)

Missing Food Club

I haven't been ofor girl's night dinner/food club since September...BUT...the holidays are coming and they grant loads of recipe daydreams...that keep me nicely preoccupied on early chilly mornings. 

And, since Elizabeth easily consumes half of my plate each night, leaving Dave to sympathetically offer me some of his dinner, I'm growing excited by the notion that I can teach/expose her to some awesome flavors at such a young age. For example, the other night she gnawed on roasted asparagus spears, popping equally roasted cherry tomatoes, packing gobs of pinenut couscous into her palms while trading off on pieces of lemon pepper pan-seared bassa, scallops and shrimp. Food snob already! 

I secretly realize that she will likely turn a page and stop wanting anything aside from bread, cheese, cookies and ice cream in another 6 months or so, but I'm holding out hope that she'll skip that phase!

Back to Rachel Ray and Bon Appetit!

Happy Halloween!



How cute that they match?!



My sweet chub-a-lub

Breakfast Shot - Happy Baby

For the girl who was down to 3% weight for her age group, she's sure made up time & eating!  This is one of those photos that definitely captures her when she pulled her head back, offering the perfect view of a double chin, but I had to share...however unflattering it might be on us as we get older. :)

Walking, Talking & Teeth!!!

I've been getting really bad about updating recently.  Partly because we're almost ready to launch Dave's photo blog, Facebook page and a host of other things keeping us swamped...which is really exciting! 

We also were blessed with an insurgency of Slaugenhoups! From all points, Alaska, Maryland, and Clarion County. Very fun.

And...the purpose of this blog...to track our sweet baby girl's first year...has lots of updating to do!  We are finally walking (Well, Ellie took her first steps at Erin Vanderbeck's parents' house on September 25th.  She took a few steps toward Erin's cracker).  Shocking, right?

At breakfast last week, Ellie was eyeing up Killian (the dog) in the dining room while she sat perched in her high chair.  She blurted out as clearly as an adult would say it, "Doggie". Dave and I looked at each other and tried to replicate it, but she was entirely consumed by her breakfast at that point. The "Hi" and "Hey"s are back regularly too.

Finally!!!!!!! a tooth! After a very restless night in the pack 'n' play in Aunt Molly and Uncle Michael's house, I felt a pointy part on her lower left gum.  After months of applying the 'she must be teething' label to a bad night's sleep, we finally made it!  We can stop saving for dentures. Dave can stop losing bets to me about when a tooth will pop. And yes, she walked before she had teeth.

Clearly, I owe better posts on all of these things, since they're all such a big deal in kid terms, but I need to grab some photos too.

Hope everyone's doing well and enjoying fall! 

Just a quick moment to say thank you. To God, my husband, my family and friends

This week I've been reminded of how short and fast life is. We all need this little reminder. Even if it only has me telling people that I love them more often.  I need that.

The other stabbing reminder from this week is how lonely the world can be.  I memorize very few quotes, but one from Mother Teresa sticks out.  "The United States is the poorest country in the world, because it's the loneliest."  She went on to talk about how the old, the homeless and the diseased live alone. They tend not to commune and families don't pay enough attention.  Don't get me wrong, life is busy and hard just as of is.  I just feel grateful and appreciate the inner push to reach out and give "warm puzzles" to more people, more often.

*ask my Dad about the "warm fuzzy" reference. It's a good one.

Daddy day

Chips, pizza and beer. Oh and football.

Sweet girl

Getting older is such fun!  We ran tons of errands and drove almost an hour to drop something off and she was perfect.

My sweet baby girl...so much fun to take her out!

9-month Doc Appt.

Height: 27.5 inches (50th %)
Weight: 17 lbs. (25th %)
Head Circumference: 45 cm (55th %)

And here's the sleeping viewpoint.

Oh, the joyful faces we get when we look into the backseat.

Food Club - without the Original

So Heather started this food club - Here's the post: Food Club from Poblete Post

And she gave me the nod that I would get an invite to the next club meeting...so when she mentioned it was Philly Restaurant Week and she had already made reservations, I was over the moon excited! Well, she had to cancel (for very good reason) and Laura (another original) had already bowed out, so it wound up being Meghan and my dearest friend, Ally (a fellow city foodie).  We showed up at Zahav in Old City for our 7:30 reservation.

I was so giddy for this treat out for girl's night that I could hardly contain myself!  Restaurant week has the set menu (for any out of towners) $35 for 5 courses here. Wahoo! Love it. OK, clearly I miss city dining! haha.

Here's the link to their Restaurant Week Menu: http://www.zahavrestaurant.com/

We dined on the following: An amazing spread of the 'house salads' I wish that I knew what came with these, I should have taken my restaurant critic flip notepad to jot them all down, but a 2 tiered stand of 3-4 dishes contained on each layer made up this course (also accompanied by an ever delicious large bowl of hummus and fresh made pita.)  Highlights from the cold salad course were: the seemingly roasted eggplant, (I personally liked the okra, although I think I sat alone on this fav.), beet and walnut, a julienned carrot with just the right sweet and tang, tabouleh with the whole parsley leaf.

The Salatim - Salad Course

For our next course, we enjoyed: the crispy haloumi (Israeli cheese) yum with a date glaze; the chilled corn soup, which was good, but must have hit us with a dose of cardamom, so not the most natural of flavors for the night; the fried cauliflower (wow!); fried lamb (kibbe) also yum; and my personal (isolated) favorite of crispy sweetbreads...ooh so good. Meghan was brave and tried them? I think? Ally admitted they weren't so bad. :)

The main dinner course (which came out as more of a small plate, much to our delight, because we were beginning to slow down!) was compiled of the hanger steak (too rare for Meghan - and I'll admit, it was far more rare than I prefer my cow.) The branzino, which was pretty tasty; and an Israeli traditional dish, the Merguez, a lamb sausage. This course was good, but nothing spectacular. 

Finally, dessert (we were nearly stuffed!) We chose one of each. So the waiter adorned our table with: cashew baklava - incredible!;  almond semifreddo (rivaled the baklava - imho); and hte halvah mousse with chickpea praline and berries - now that I think of it - I could down a bowl of the mousse right now! Delish.

We opted out of coffee and tea, but we did try the muddled mint lemonade.

Overall, a nice little Israeli feast - we sent Ally home with leftovers.  Ahhh...how beautiful it was to get dressed up and enjoy a night out with the girls.  We missed you, Heather!

*A special thanks to my amazing husband who, along with my mother-in-law, made it all possible.* xoxo!

Overdue

Wow - sorry for the overdue posting here - I'm going to have to make it short, since Ellie's on her way up from a nap. 

I realized it's been almost a month since I last posted!  Crazy. Quick synopsis of the big things that have come and gone:

• Trip to Germany and Austria (basically the reason I went missing on the blog for a month). Lots of funny stories from this trip that deserve their own post.
• Baby play dates that get so much better each week!  Because the 'play' date actually involves 'playing.'
• Dave has been shooting a LOT. So there's lots of post production that I need to get on - thus, my time normally spent blogging went toward my 'other job'. Which I enjoy just as much, albeit keeping me away from my fun social avenues. :(
• Switching rooms around in the house so that Ellie now has almost an entire room to be safe and play in.  I'm sure the commitment to the kid is much to Annie's chagrin, but it's nice that I can be in the kitchen and keep an eye on her destruction.
• David has been super Dad.  He took on watching Ellie all day yesterday from awakening to nearly  sleeping - he was exhausted when I got home and said, "I don't know how you do it every day." (HUGE GRIN HERE)
• She's started sleeping through the night!
• Nana visited and saved Mama on a few occasions.
• Oh yea, and we're pregnant!

All of these items deserve their own post, so I'll have to get on that!

Glad to be back!

xoxo

Counterproductive to sleep

The following things have been proven sleep enemies(some may appear obvious, but you likely don't plan to prevent them until you're sprinting to the door, chasing the dog or flailing to find that ringing noise:

-hunger
-barking dogs
-sirens
-smoke alarms
-mailmen
-FedEx and UPS
-Hispanic Jehovah's Witnesses (no offense to anyone)
-census workers
-cell phones
-toys that take on a mind of their own
-garbage trucks

I'm sure I'll add more. :)
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Sleep Regressions and Transgressions

I was talking to a friend of mine who's 10th child is 14-months-old now.  She described herself as a perpetual optimist with her example being, "What, teething keeps them up at night? I don't remember." She's so lovely that we laughed it up.  I declared my sister, Annie, to be in the same memory loss camp. 

About 2-3 weeks ago, Elizabeth had roseola.  I didn't know it at the time.  I excused the initial high fever as teething.  Finally Heather diagnosed her and we confirmed it with the pediatrician later that day.  Incredibly high fever (average of 104.9 degrees); fever breaks and a rash appears to spread all over her tiny body.  My niece had the same thing, around 8 months, and Annie said, "Oh yea, I should've realized that it was roseola." Humph.

With the high fever, I was terrified that I was going to not watch her carefully enough, so I rationalized pulling her into bed with us.  Bad move in hindsight.  I should have just stayed in her bedroom and slept on the floor.  But when they're sick, you put everything on hold and it doesn't matter. You do whatever you need to do to survive.   Well, she got better health-wise, but lost her better sleep habits winding up with me doing whatever we all could to get some sleep and respite. 

You have to undo what you do to get through it all.  And so there were some tough nights there - we called in back up, Nana Slaugenhoup, to the rescue.  And she gave me some much needed rest.  She was wonderful - nearly throwing me out of the house.  I got a haircut and joined a gym.  I felt bright eyed once she was ready to leave.  Sad to see her go, and Ellie misses her for sure! 

Lesson of the Day

Try not to feed your child once he or she is tired. (yes, I know they have to be fed before bed) Put off other things to let them eat earlier than later. Otherwise, you will have eyelashes, brows and lids caked with the dinner special.

Rubbing eyes with food on hands=not a fun clean up for either party. :)
Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Today. I found out how strong I am.

Disclaimer: this post is not for the weak of stomach and should not be read within an hour of eating.
We were supposed to go to Connecticut to visit Annie's house. My Mom, Dad, Ellie and I were scheduled to make the trip today; but after a miserable weekend of teething and sleep deprivation, I had to make the decision to stay home.

Now what made this a particularly hard decision to make was that I've been struggling with feeling like a shut in recently. Elizabeth, as we just had diagnosed (thanks Heather!), had roseola. The fever was insane, but she's on the mend with the fever gone. Just the rash, which isn't contagious. Oh, and a fantastic bout of teething. All of this has turned our usually amulet sweet angel into a terribly cranky, achy, child at times wailing in searing pain. Yup, it's been a fun weekend. :) poor girl. So with having cancelled so many of our outings last week and putting just about everything on hold to comfort our baby, yes, I began to feel depressed. Because frankly, it was depressing! Who wants to feel sick! Shout out to Heather who felt the same way with Pippa's cold last week.

Alright, so back to the strength finding.

No Connecticut, but yes to a Wegman's trip in Mount Laurel. Also, we have had pictures at the adjacent Costco for almost 4 months. (I figured I should pick them up.) with an itemized shopping list, good spirits and sleepy baby, we headed out after our first nap.

About midway down 295, Ellie started smiling at me and being playful. I told her how much I love having my happy daughter back and singing to her in the rear view mirror.

I got a faint whiff of a number 2, so was thankful I'd added baby wipes to our shopping list. After pulling into a clutch parking spot, I was greeted with a huge grin and laughs as I opened the rear door. Ellie was returning to her giddy self, finally! Her face was covered in chunky orange goo. I thought, oh, poor baby! She threw up! And I quickly recounted what I'd fed her for breakfast. Oatmeal and applesauce. Hmmm... Not orange colored. Dreadfully, I looked down her body and discovered, to my horror, some of that same chunky orange goo peering out of her pink cloth diaper.

Oh. No.

It's poop. There's poop on her legs. There's poop on her arms, hands, feet, neck, mouth, eyebrows, eyelashes, up her nostrils, inside the ears, hair, sippy cup, pacifier. The carseat.

So rallying my senses and reminding myself to avoid breathing deeply, I grabbed the carseat, the diaper bag and my purse. The brisk walk to grab a shopping cart offered a lovely dripping from the carseat onto my right foot. Awesome.

A beeline down the baby aisle and snagging a box of diaper wipes, we were off to the restroom. We'd pay for them after. As we opened the bathroom door, I caught a glimpse of a woman in her Mid-eighties teetering toward the only handicapped stall, of course housing the changing table we were after. Most older women are so cheerful; sadly, this woman was as unhappy as she could be. She turned around to ask why I was allowed to bring my cart into the bathroom. She said her husband was waiting outside and they got into a fight because he wouldn't come into the restroom too. Then she asked me how old my baby boy was. (I mentioned she was in a pink diaper, right?) Ellie must've thought it was a ridiculous question because she showed her displeasure by (truly) vomiting on me. The older woman said, "oh, she just threw up on you." Ellie thought that assessment was equally dumb and vomited again. Now, with vomit running down the inside of my shirt, my arm, hands, and a baby smeared with poop, we watch the woman continue the inch by inch, foot, then cane, then other foot, then cane again move into the stall. I gave up, (judge all you want) and decided the sink was going to have to do.

Tearing open the box of wipes, I started with her face and hands, then tackled her body, then opened the diaper. The irony, the diaper didn't capture much of the poop, it was almost empty. Ha!

Finally cleaned up, the woman finally comes out of the bathroom stall, just as I'm dousing Ellie from head to toe in antibacterial lotion. (side note: it made me laugh when the same older woman walked out without washing her hands, but there couldn't have been anything dirtier than what we put into the trash can. Ha!). I scrubbed the carseat, bagging the clothes, diaper, pacifier and sippy cup. I wedged the carseat on the bottom compartment to air out while we shopped.

Ah, what do they say? Cleanliness is next to Godliness? At that moment it felt it! I marched over to the coffee bar and treated myself to a large latte. Yum!

For some reason, I felt surprisingly happy. I felt like if I could avoid vomiting, find remarkable patience and actually rouse some humor out of this, then I really can take on this motherhood thing.

Who knew I would discover my inner Mama strength in a ration of diarrhea? (dealing with the notion that my daughter may have attempted to consume her own feces? Well, I'll save that for another day.)

Items I Previously Thought Were Useless

1. Baby Bathtub - so many people said that I'd never need/use them.  I would end up bathing her in the sink, etc.  I registered for a $15 ultra basic sling for the baby, but then returned it right before she was born after the advice that it'd go to waste.  Lesson:  BUY ONE.  I wound up not bathing her  (very often at all) because it was such a complete ordeal to bathe her for the first month.  First of all, you need four hands when they first come out since they need 2 hands just to support their bodies and head.  Then you need another two hands to soap & wash quickly! And the reality is that they do NOT love being held out under a faucet or anywhere outside the cuddly loving arms being hosed or lovingly poured upon.  No matter how gentle you are, they just don't like it.  My advice: crank up a space heater, have a nice luke warm water awaiting the baby in the tub that has a sling for the infants in it; get everything you need right next to you and settle in for about 20 minutes on your knees.  Now that she can sit up, she doesn't need the tub, but I don't know how she would ever have gotten clean within the tub in the first 6 months.
2. Thermometer - I always figured I'd be able to feel her head and know if she had a fever.  Not true.  When the first cold comes along, you're suddenly at the drug store thinking the $80 instant thermometer seems reasonable.
3. Bibs - I thought it was just for food, so I'd only need one or two.  Reality check.  They drool. A lot. And they do it early and often.  I wasn't prepared to 'bib' her just to keep her clothes from being soaked (especially in the winter).  Buy extras from the dollar store. Granted you take them off when you're trying to impress someone with how put-together you kid seems, but you keep it on right up until you make your debut.
4. More than an average of 3 onesies/day for each week - I remember thinking, how many outfits can one child wear!?! And then she came along...(with ownership that I just don't love laundry...so that might factor in...somehow) and somedays she'd go through 7-8 onesies in one day. Spit up, poop, pee, more spit-up, drool, a bath, hopefully no more poop and you're averaging 5 outfit changes.  Now I had a spitter, so that could be it too.  I remember being grateful for the dozens of clothes she had early on.
5. Swim Diapers - Always figured the regular disposables would be just fine.  What I didn't account for was the triple sized blow-up the diaper experiences once you're in the water for more than 3 minutes.  Heather and Meghan (mama friends) couldn't stop laughing that Elizabeth instantly quadrupled her body weight with the swollen diaper - making it nearly impossible for her to even move her legs. There should've been a picture.

Boppy's main resident these days...

Hilarious Mommy Article - Must Read

An Aerial Disaster

The Best of Friends (and Cousins)

Berry Tart with Mascarpone Cream

Can use all strawberries or the mixture of any berries. Wonderful use of large quantities of berries.

Sweet Pastry Dough
Pie weights or raw rice for weighting shell
1 cup mascarpone cheese (about 8 ounces)
1/3 cup well-chilled heavy cream
1/4 cup sugar
1 ½ t Vanilla
Zest of ½ lemon
1 1/2 cups small strawberries
1 cup raspberries
1 cup blueberries
1 cup blackberries

Preheat oven to 375°F.

On a floured surface with a floured rolling pin roll out dough into an 11-inch round (about 1/8 inch thick) and fit into a 9-inch tart pan with a removable fluted rim. Roll rolling pin over top of shell to trim dough flush with rim and with a fork prick bottom of shell all over. Chill shell 30 minutes, or until firm.

Line shell with foil and fill with pie weights or raw rice. Bake shell in middle of oven 20 minutes and carefully remove foil and weights or rice. Bake shell until golden, about 10 minutes more, and cool completely in pan on a rack. Shell may be made 1 day ahead and kept in pan, loosely covered, at room temperature.
In a bowl with a whisk or an electric mixer beat together mascarpone, cream, and sugar until mixture holds stiff peaks. Do NOT overbeat. Add vanilla and lemon zest, blend for a few strokes. Add mixture into shell, spreading evenly.
Quarter strawberries and in a large bowl combine with remaining berries. Mound berries decoratively on mascarpone cream. Tart may be assembled 2 hours ahead and chilled. Bring tart to room temperature and remove side of pan before serving. It can also be served frozen (as I learned at Heather's)

Serves 6 to 8.
Don’t assemble until before serving. Keep refrigerated.

Playground - at Sea Isle City

Love the Slide!

And the Swing!

Berry Festival - with Molly & Michael

After she's tasted every berry there...

And with her own chair!

Aunt Molly!

First Thing in the Morning

So with all of the new Slaugy babies on the way...Congrats Aunt Molly and Uncle Michael - due in December. Congrats Aunt Mary and Uncle Garret - due in January/February. :)

We were finally able to visit Molly and Michael in Maryland...and prepare them for parenthood! :)

Weaning stinks. Period. Any suggestions are welcome!

Chicken Tortilla Soup

2 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 small onion, diced or sliced
1 green pepper, diced or sliced
2 tablespoons minced garlic
1 jalapeno, finely diced
6 cups low-sodium chicken broth
1 (14.5-ounce) can fire roasted diced tomatoes
1 (14.5-ounce) can black beans, rinsed and drained
3 chicken breasts, boneless and skinless
2 limes, juiced, plus wedges for garnish
1 cup roughly chopped fresh cilantro leaves
1 avocado, pitted, sliced
1 cup shredded Mexican typecheese
Salt and freshly ground black pepper

In a large saucepan heat the vegetable oil. Add the onions and cook for 2 minutes. Once the onions have softened add the garlic and jalepenos and cook for another minute. Pour the chicken broth, tomatoes and beans into the pot and bring to a boil. Once at a boil lower heat to simmer and add your chicken breasts. Cook the chicken for 20 to 25 minutes. Once chicken is cooked remove from pot. When cool enough to handle shred it and set it aside. Add lime juice and fresh cilantro to the pot. In a serving bowl add a mound of shredded chicken. Ladle soup over chicken and top with a lime wedge, grilled tortilla strips, avocado slices and cheese.

Serve with tortilla chips or break up and toss in.

Serves 4.

Playdate pals - Pippa and Connor

Pippa, Connor & Elizabeth

baby yoga

The View

Heather/Pippa and Meghan/Connor and Ellie/I signed up for Mommy and Me yoga.  I was thinking it'll be the refreshing relaxing yoga of days past. 

Um...not exactly.

The kids drowned out the nice soothing meditative sounds on the sound system.  Ellie was crawling all over the place; when I tried to pull her onto my chest to do a move, she pulled my shirt down to nurse; I tried to do a move where I stand on one leg and lift the other horizontally.  Ellie had another idea, she wanted to be lifted off the ground by grabbing onto my ankle and desperately trying to not let go.  Oh and this was accompanied by some real tears.  Yoga must be killing her mom - clearly that could be the only reasonable excuse.

That was last week.This week, it was awesome!!! I was able to plan better - got there early and fed her both real food and nursed.  She was able to nap beforehand, so Elizabeth felt pretty comfortable playing by herself.  The only time I had to really focus on her was when she nearly took out a fellow yoga mom (standing on one leg) by sneaking up from behind. I thwarted her attempts to grab her leg and stand up with inches to spare. 

Regardless, this week was a tremendous improvement. I got a nice bucket of sweat going (which is my goal) and no big incidents. 


Overall, a major success!  Here are some shots from the day. :)

Little victories

Last night, David and I were having dinner. I had steamed some very small pieces of zucchini and didn't mash them. We put them in the middle of her tray in hopes she might become interested in using her hands to start feeding herself. Since she places everything in sight on her 'direct-to-the-mouth-conveyer-belt' I thought for sure she'd pick it right up.

A Blueberry Morning

Instead, we got some fake crying noise, grunting in the spoon's direction (we had a second course of scorn squash) and a complete disinterest in the zucchini. After about 5 minutes we move on. Oh well, we said. Guess she's not ready yet. I had talked to Heather about Pippa doing just this, so I knew it was within her developmental ability.

Not terribly disappointing, but parents are great at getting excited to try something new only to learn it rarely works on the first try. So I started feeding her the acorn squash. We were all using utensils when all of the sudden we see her slam both hands down on the zucchini and bring them to her open mouth. We look on in amazement! Then she did it again. David puts his hand up to quietly high five and my eyes filled with tears. Yes, tears. And yes, I deserve to be teased for crying because my baby picked up food. So exciting!!!

Little moments that surprise you.

We had halved blueberries for breakfast...on to something new!

Yogurt

-One half-gallon of milk (8 cups). I would suggest at least 2%. When you use whole, it comes out the consistency of low fat.
-1/2 cup PLAIN Yogurt.
-1/2 cup Dry milk. This one is optional. It just thickens it up more.

Turn crock on LOW & pour in milk (dry milk too if you're using it).  Heat on low for 2 hours and 45 minutes. After, turn OFF and unplug. Let cool with lid on for 3 hours. After, remove 1-2 cups of milk & place in a bowl. To the bowl, add 1/2 cup of yogurt & whisk WELL. Return mix to crock & whisk thoroughly. Cover & wrap crock in a big bath towel (to insulate). Let it culture for 8-12 hours. Usually I do 12, it makes it thicker. Scoop into jars/containers (I use Ball canning jars). Refrigerate at least 6-8 hours for best texture.
That's it! I know it takes an entire day, but the amount of actual work you do is about 5 minutes. The rest it does on it's own. I add flavor to it before serving. Usually we use homemade jam but there IS a lot of sugar in jam. You can use fresh fruit, honey, plain 'ol sugar, vanilla extract (tiny bit), or whatever other flavors you like!

I think it would last at least 7-10 days.

Silly Grandpa - he was helping play dress up

Pants on the Head

Mouthful of 4th of July Sand

Food Update

The girl's getting it down. She's a champion spoon eater. It doesn't really matter what's on the spoon, as long as it's reloaded as soon as she wipes it clean. If you're not fast enough, you'll be treated to a pounding of the right hand on the tray table and some bizarre fake crying noises.

It's most astounding how much Elizabeth can eat. One of my greatest fears in this whole food thing, aside from the obvious choking, is that I will somehow teach her to overeat and pressure her into a lifetime of being overweight. They say breastfed babies develop a sensor in their bellies to let them know when they're full, but it still sits high on my list of neurotic mommy fears.

The strange thing that she does when she's eating is she sticks her left hand, well up to the fingers at least, into her mouth after nearly each spoonful. After overcoming questions of infant bulemia, we've learned from Heather that Pippa does it too. Phew!!! My Mom swears that she's exploring the textures in her mouth, but when my helpful husband pitches it, the hand in mouth makes him a little crazy. (it takes twice as long to feed her when she's 'exploring' each bite!)

Going cloth...

We finally ran out of diapers - we've been incredibly blessed with generous family and friends who had outfitted us with diapers since she was born.  I was either going to have to buy new #3 diapers or go cloth.  I'd been avoiding going cloth because it seemed like a huge hassle and too much work.  Well with the addition of solid foods, we had firmer poop coming out, so it seemed like it might not be such a hassle anymore.

I had a playdate with Heather (my green-super-save-the-world-Mama-friend) and Pippa.  I was telling her that I might go cloth; she jumped on it and said she was planning to sell her extra bum genius diapers.  So I bought 7 of them.  Heather had 20 (I think?) and she felt 12 was enough for her.  I nabbed another 2 or 3 (I forget here too) from my sister who tried the same brand in the early days with my niece. (It became too difficult for her in a highrise apartment building with a shared laundry room.)  So there I was with my 10 or so cloth diapers ready to go.  I knew enough from conversations with Annie, Heather & Meghan that bum genius seemed to be the ideal brand since they can grow with the babies.  "G" diapers and others require you to buy new sizes each time the kids grow.  Bum genius allows you to snap the diapers into the right size for you. (see photo)

Well, we had an accident the first night - sad, but I had forgotten to add the extra nighttime layer too, so that could've been it.  Daddy watched the baby the 2nd night (I had my first girl's night in almost 3 months) and he put her to bed without switching a new diaper on (oops!) so we wet through that one too around 2am. Surprisingly, I've learned it's very easy to change a baby with a cloth diaper while nursing in the middle of the night. (For those imaginging me leaning over a changing table - please save yourself the brain strain.)  In the rocking chair, the cloth diapers just fold over the bottom.  They're soft and comforting so she isn't phased by it. 

Lessons learned here for the time being:  cloth diapering works great - for the daytime and for parents.  My Dad bought a box of #4 Huggies from BJs so we use them for nighttime and for babysitters (my parents). 

More Lessons: You MUST wash those cloth diapers before 24 hours.  They STINK if you wait. Which isn't the end of the world, but it can get 'stanky' if you leave it around. The sun works great to dry them out. :)

wonderfully delightful compliments

I was sharing some of the surprisingly wonderful compliments my husband has showered me with.  Two years ago, I would have laughed at women thinking these kind words would melt their hearts and well up the eyes with some light tears.

• "The house looks amazing!"
• "I didn't expect such good food." (in response to nice surprises about marriage)
• "Great job on the bushes!" (I trimmed them)
• "Look at Mary's awesome garden."

Who knew?!?! Honestly, I feel such confidence and self worth when I hear things like this.  Yes, it seems super lame to you single people.  Just wait.  Your hearts will light up when your husbands/wives dole out special 'nothing' compliments too.  

time to lower the crib!

On anything. On everthing. Whenever. Wherever. Look out.

It was one morning when I went into her room to get her only to find her staring over the crib rail at me. We lowered the mattress that afternoon!

Pulling herself up on objects and people came so quickly after crawling that it's hard to believe.

She will crawl over and pull herself up on my leg. She will crawl over and pull herself up on her highchair. She will pull herself up on the dog. She pulls herself up on the exersaucer, which leaves her looking like she's providing the percussion for a thunderstorm. Swaying, bending, arching, teetering and (if I can get there fast enough to avoid it) crashing. It spins and rocks, so it's my least favorite thing that she climbs on.

The carpet often provides a safe landing, and I watch her like a hawk around corners and hard surfaces. That aside, she's so proud of herself that I can't help but let her keep doing it. Everywhere!

Sitting Tall

Ellie has gotten the sitting thing down. She actually mastered sitting AFTER crawling. Weird, right? But she's her own woman, clearly!

The sitting makes me laugh at times, she'll now pull herself up to stand up only to fall into a sit. She'll be wailing her sweet little head off when she wakes up in a stranger's house in the sitting position. She'll crawl over to the foam that Nana bought. And climb up to sit on it like an Queen! It's so nice to be able to have her sit next to us on the couch or on a bench.

Fun things all the time!

And we're.........crawling?!?!

The little one had been working on moving for quite some time. She started the wounded soldier/sniper drag around 5 months. Then she started getting up on all fours and rocking (well, maybe teetering or shaking is a better description). David and I assembled a bet that she would crawl within the next 10 days, or before her 6 month mark of 6/8/10. I took the under and David took the over.

Her crawl track finally paid off on June 14th. My Dad was over to offer assistance with the shed construction and we were all outside. Ellie had a blanket in the yard scattered with a few toys. She was up on all fours and rocked herself forward.

Cross patterning like a rockstar. She moved nearly 6 feet. Of course, I shed a tear. Crying as a Mom, when your kids do new things, is so foreign to me, so I challenge someone to explain it to me. It just happens.

The kicker is that once it's figured out, it's all they can do. I had childproofed just in time! And thanks to my loving husband, we switched the dining room and the piano room. Now the room closest to the kitchen is child friendly and she can do whatever she wants with plenty of safe room. Added perk, the dining room now feels lie a real room!

Date Night!

We had the most incredible date night. My parents offered to watch Elizabeth, and Dave decided we'd head to the Mann Music Center (an outdoor half shell amphitheater).

One of our favorites was playing with the Philadelphia Orchestra behind him. Chris Botti, the trumpet master, himself. Awesome show!  Beautiful weather.  I wanted to sit on the lawn rather than in the seats underneath the partial roof.  We packed a picnic basket of red wine, pellegrino, asiago, sharp cheddar, roasted garlic hummus, garlic naan, baby carrots, red grapes, and a cobb salad (with ranch dressing for my awesome husband)!

We kicked our shoes off and spread our blanket - hearing Chris Botti under the stars and with a city skyline in the background...it just doesn't get better. 

So grateful.

Real food!

Oh a new land for us!

I went back and forth on when to start her on food. People ask if she seems interested in eating. I'd mentally think, well, she's interested in directing everything to her mouth, so how can I tell?

ss a treat for my Mother in Law for our delayed Mother's Day, we introduced E to bananas. Her Aunt Molly smashed that bad boy up nicely and while Nana held her, Daddy took pictures and Aunt Molly fed her. Fed her is a nice way of putting it. She wasn't so sure what to do with the mushy cream stuff aiming toward her face on a shiny long thing. I'll consider it a success since she swallowed most of it. We tried banana again a few days later.

Now fast forward to how she acts today. As soon as the spoon comes out of the drawer, as soon as the tray slides into position, as soon as her Mom sits down in front of her with a bowl of something - it's on! Squeals, grunts, grabby hands and head thrusts toward the food begin. Don't take a break, don't be too slow in delivering and don't run out of food early. She will advise not too pleasantly her disdain.

She's an absolute riot to me. She loves everything; I'm going to put a running list of new foods on the side here.

Comedy Hour

Elizabeth has been checking herself out in the mirror on her playmat. So today, she kept looking at me saying, "Mom, there's nothing on the other side of this? How dumb do we think I am?!"

Driving Already..that was fast!

Tiny Cherub

These were quick shots from when she was supposed to be sleeping, I found her like this.

Sleep Update

We're not sleeping through the night, but we do wake up only once - I feed her once and we all go back to sleep.  This is a thankful reprieve since she was waking 6-7 times a night for a week there...but it was clearly teething.  Wow, it was crazy, because we couldn't figure out how to make it better.  And when you're in the thick of it, as usual, it never feels like it's going to get better.   But, as usual, it does.  So we're going to just enjoy this pattern of good sleep while it lasts...until the next disruption. ;)

Lesson: don't try to fight it.

6 Months! What?!?!

It can't be 6 months already! I can't believe my baby girl is 6 months-old! Wow.

Tricks: she's dragging her body all over the place these days. She's able to sit up, albeit with poor posture. When she's on her belly she will get up on all fours and rock back and forth. Dave swears he saw her take one or two movements forward (aka crawling), but we made a bet that both of us need to see it for it to count as legit. This morning she pulled herself up on her crib to a slanted standing position. Craziness! I guess I have to change my viewpoint on where the dangers lie!

Life: is surprisingly going well sleepwise. She's been sleeping much more consistently now that we've started solid foods. After months of sleeping best on her belly, our baby is now a side sleeper. She seems to sleep best on her side. She'll flip back and forth without waking up. With the megaheat that we've had recently, the window air conditioner has been on almost nonstop! I liked the energy saver. Setting, which regulated the air temperature, kicking on when it got past the temp. Here's the bummer, every time it would kick on or turn off, she'd wake up! The sudden change in noise brought her out of sleep. So. We've just kept the air conditioner on a higher setting, and we let it run.

She's probably going to need white noise once we take it out in the fall. Sigh. Can't win 'em all.

Teaser!

We don't dare talk about it.

We've become as superstitious as hockey players refusing to shave their beards during the playoffs.

If you kid sleeps through the night suddenly, you don't tell anyone, for fear of taking for granted that it might never happen again.

That great nighttime storm two nights ago provided our first full night of uninterrupted sleep. Around 5:45 I ran down the hall to her room, Dave must've heard me scurry and followed. I gently touched her shoulder, didn't feel anything. I tried her arm, and still no discernable movement, so I began pocking her to evoke some sort of response as my panic started. Dave shouted in as much of a whisper as he could, "what are you doing?! Don't do that!"

I couldn't help it! And fortunately she didn't wake up until after I hopped out of the shower.

She made it through her first night alive; she can do it again. Just have to make sure we don't talk about it.

"We make plans and God laughs."

Week 23

Tricks: Finding and attempting to eat all of the things we should stay away from (see pic) - babyproofing here we come!!! Still mostly moving backwards instead of forward on crawling flat, but she's moved forward a few inches here and there.

Life: We're realizing that we need to childproof!!! Ah!

This is how changing diapers looks these days...

Flip on over kid! 

First Major League Baseball Game!

Baby's first game: Phillies vs Pirates. 7:05 start. Dollar Dog Night!

Sent from my Verizon Wireless BlackBerry

Alert!

Moms,
Do not give your 5-month-old fruit juice. Apple, prune, pear, etc.
Love,
Previously Misinformed Mom

Week 22

Tricks: Oh, she's tricky alright! Ellie is now able to, I'll call it, 'fake throw'. In case it's not obvious what that means, it's when she clasps something big so firmly that she's able to show you and then pull it back. Still interested in anything that you're holding.  Maybe the start of sitting up?

Life: Generally good - she got sick and with her new love of putting her hands all over my face, it's no wonder that I came down with the cold too.

Colds are wonderful sources of parental discontentment - we're more exhausted than usual and the baby is incredibly cranky, coughing herself out of naps, trying to eat while unable to breathe, kinda miserable all around.

But despite the cold and weary weather.  We've had a good week.  

Fresh Tomato Sauce

Compliments of my sister, who makes this fantastic sauce while the water is boiling for the pasta.

2 Tbsp. Olive oil
1/2 onion, diced
1-2 cloves of garlic, minced
28 oz. can of crushed tomatoes
S and p
Drizzle olive oil
Bunch of Basil leaves, coarsely chopped

Heat saute pan medium high coating pan with olive oil, sweat onions until transparent, adding garlic for a minute before pouring in tomatoes. Let simmer for 5 minutes, season to taste with salt and pepper, more olive oil, and basil. Serve now for fresher flavor or can continue to simmer for deeper flavor.

Enjoy!

For leftovers, I add chopped sausage, spinach, pinenuts, asiago/parmesan/romano and a different pasta.
Yum!

Comments Please

It's come to my attention that many more people read this here blog than I imagined.

I found this out when I was reprimanded for slacking off on new posts.

Here's the request, please leave a comment, it'll be part of her baby book one day, and it's also a great boost to keep me working at it.

Thanks!!

Week 21

Tricks: Personality growth week. Primarily, she's been destyructive in ways we thought were a ways away...i.e. pulling table cloths, plates, utensils, paper, pens, drinks, lamps, and any other items that are within reach. Not to be overlooked: cell phones, remotes, sunglasses, laptops, dogs ears, and the like are particular favorites.

Life: We feel as though she's learning something new every day! The same old toys are losing their spark, and new ones are being subbed out - thanks to friends and family.

In general, still sleep deprived, dealing with trying to up milk production, so almost every 2 hour feedings. We so quickly forget how exhausting those early days are/were. :)

Dear Babies

Why does the routine that was so successful so well for so long suddenly not work?

We'd love to know.

Much appreciated,
Moms

Apparently not pooping for 6 days isn't really a problem.

Not for adults, but for breast fed babies it's a milk production situation that works itself out. Who knew?!

The first time she hadn't gone in I think it was 4 days. I was driving home from my parents' house and frantically called Dave's cell. He was outside building a shed, so he wasn't able to get any of my 7 methods of communication. (voicemails, texts, screams-just kidding about the screams.) I was just begging him to go get prune juice for me to drink. He said I was yelling at him when I got home. I didn't think that I was, just merely talking loud enough so he could hear me over the wailing.

He encountered another Dad in the prune juice section who was all too happy to share some advice. He indicated that they gave their child prune juice, in a ratio of 2 (water): 1 (prune juice) as early as 4 months.  Since we were right at 4 months, David came home and shared the vast knowledge obtained in the juice aisle with his frantic wife. 

So we mixed up the potion and she gobbled it up!  Here's the hindsight.  The poor baby was HUNGRY.  I've since learned, and it makes perfect sense, that babies grow a lot around 4-5 months.  They need more food and so if they're being breastfed, the supply needs to crank up to meet demand.  When she's not pooping, it means she's not eating enough, which is also why she seems terribly upset and wails in stomach pain - it's called hunger.  I had no idea, so of course, I gave her more prune juice - which she continued to lap up (again, clearly hunger, but what did I know?!)  Then I learned part 2 of the prune juice encounter: gas.  It's the smelly stank of putrid. I kept mistaking the gas for her poop, but it wasn't so.  The poor child had awful gas.

Lesson Here: our bodies are meant to work - let them. :)

Week 20

Tricks: She flips all around these days.  She holds the bottle on her own to feed herself (discovered during the prune fiasco).  She still moves backwards - definitely not forward.  It's still grabbing and sucking on her toes.  She's starting to recognize faces (beyond her own parents) and meet them with smiles.  If you take something from her, she'll let you know she's getting unhappy about it. 

Life: We just can't believe how much she can do.  She's getting so big! She's finally out of the newborn clothes - yes, all of them, even the ones that were huge on her.  I can no longer call her my newborn.  So sad. But such fun to watch her grow and start new things.