Lazy Sunday

Ryan has finally gotten to the age where he is really starting to enjoy lazy Sundays. His favorite is when Uncle David comes over to watch football.
Okay we are off to watch some more football and eat more food! How could you not enjoy such a thing (especially when done in PJ's)?

New Pictures! 21 Weeks

Eating Grass

When we go outside to play, Ryan eats grass and dirt with no problem, he doesn't even seem to mind it. When it comes to peas however there are sour faces and gagging.... Apparently in this case he takes after his dad (with the peas- not the dirt)

Adventures in Baby Food

I have started the process of making baby food, So far so good. I researched everything before starting and again as with most things involving babies different people say different things, some of it contradicting. Everyone (except probably Gerber) agrees that making your own baby food is healthier then ready made. When canned baby foods are made, they are cooked at such a high temperature that it kills a lot of nutrients (they need to be able to store them on the shelf for 2 years).
It is also much less expensive then canned foods- I got one organic sweet potato for $1.50 and it made 7 full size portions of baby food (which in the store cost 89 cents each for organic).

For all you none-parents your eyes might glaze over the next part, feel free to stop reading whenever you like.

First step was to get baby food containers. I settled on Baby Cubes because they are BPA free, you can microwave, dish wash and freeze them. They also travel well because they are individual containers.

Then I researched what foods were the best:
- Things like Carrots, beets, broccoli have higher level of nitrates, it seems like for those it is better to buy ready made. Baby food companies make sure to get low nitrate produce and they test all the time (I don’t have this capability so I will leave it up to them).
- You also can’t add salt, spices, citrus, peanut butter, sugar, honey etc. Babies systems are too immature. Better to go straight up- I do puree and breast milk blend so it is easier for him to eat.
- When to introduce foods is important. Babies are continuously developing; you don’t want to give them something too early that their bodies won’t respond well too. From what I have read the best things to start with are: apples, sweet potatoes, pears, peas, bananas and avocados. The first solid to give them is rice cereal- I use organic brown rice cereal- but I can’t make that from scratcdh so I’m not talking about grains here.

- I have also read that babies develop most of their taste for food between 6-12 months, so you need to introduce them to lots of flavors during this time.

Then I got cooking: To keep the nutrients it is best to steam or bake the fruit or veggie. Boiling foods can take away some of the nutrients. (You don’t have to cook avocados or bananas- babies can handle these foods raw).
- I steam mine and put them in a food chopper, it got out all the lumps
- You can add water, formula, and breast milk to make it the right consistency.

Ryan eats 2 servings of solids a day followed by breast milk and the other feedings are just breast milk.

So far I have only made sweet potatoes, but they turned out very well. I am introducing one new food a week to make sure he doesn’t have any allergic reactions- and if he does it will be easily traceable. I think I will do bananas next.

I’ll keep you updated if I come up with any genius baby food purees.

Baby Monitor

When Don and I were buying baby stuff I insisted on the best baby monitor. We got the one that has a motion detector on it; piece of mind is wonderful thing. So there is this little board that goes under the mattress and detects Ryan breathing. When it doesn’t detect breathing in a few seconds it beeps once as a warning (incase you have picked up the baby without turning off the monitor). Last night the dreaded beep sounded- I honestly don’t even remember getting out of bed or getting to his room, I was there in less then a second I am sure of. He had managed to scooch his whole body to the very corner of the crib with his head pressed against the bars and so had moved his whole body off the censor. I moved him over and he was fine. Now 20 minutes later I am wide awake. Yay for the censor working, boo for the misadventure tonight.

7 Years

Don and I celebrated our 7 year anniversary last week (from the time we started dating). I think the true measure of a relationship is how you can deal together when life changes. Since Don and I have been together we have: driven back and forth from MA about 7 times, backpacked for a month through Europe, lived in Wales together, lived in a shoebox size apartment, moved to a new state on a days notice, lived with my mother, dealt with death in the family (on both sides), graduated from college, lived in different states from each other, been together 24 hours a day for months at a time, lived through planning a destination wedding, lived through the hormones of pregnancy, and lived through the first 4 ½ months of Ryan’s life. That is a lot of life together (over ¼ of my life in fact).

I have said it before and I will say it again, I have no idea how single parents do it. Parenting is hard; the biggest challenge is that it is 24/7. I love it, I really do, last night I wanted to wake Ryan up because I missed him (luckily Don stopped me). When you have support you can get a moment for yourself and feel good about yourself so when you come back to your child you are so much better of a parent.

Don tells me almost everyday that he appreciates what I do. He does night duty, which means that while I get to sleep through the night he gets up at least once (sometimes 2x) to feed Ryan. He tells me I look beautiful when I brush my hair and put real clothes on, but more importantly he tells me I am beautiful when I am in sweatpants covered in rice cereal (he even seems to really believe it!). He is loving and calm when I am dramatic and miserable which can kick me out of the mood. He smiles when I walk into the room. So this is my shout out to Don and what a great husband and father he is. I am a much better mother and person because of it.

Celebration!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY UNCLE DAVID!!!!

And Congratulations to Jess, Roma and Rachel who found out today that they Passed the BAR!!!!!! (I'm sure there are others- these are who I know passed)

Love Affair with the Library

I have had a public library card as long as I remember. I love the fact that I can check out as many books as I want. Even if my eyes are bigger then the speed I read, I don’t have to feel guilty for not getting to read them before they are due because they are free. A few years ago the library set up a website where you can even recheck your books online so no more late fees!
Ryan isn’t in daycare so I feel like he needs more social interaction. While I’m sure he is having fun just hanging out with me ALL DAY LONG, I have been trying to think of things to change it up. Well, the public library comes through again. Monday I went to my first baby class at library. They sing songs, blow bubbles and read books. There were like 30 babies and moms there! What does all this fun cost you might ask… it’s the public library so it’s free!
My love affair with the public library continues!

It wasn’t all good of course (my fault not theirs). I was frumpy mom, I don’t know how I got here, but I have. I showed up in jeans and a t-shirt (not a particularly attractive one at that). The other moms showed up with hair blow dried, makeup on and outfits that match! Who are these women? How do they accomplish such a Herculean feat? All I can hope is to do better next week- mothering is a process and I am still figuring it out.

Video: Loving Food

Short clip of Ryan enjoying his food! He is freaked out of the camera so I don't have a lot of videos, I will try and get better.

Too Early

You know you are in trouble when it is 8:00am and your baby is already taking a nap.

This picture was taken at 7:30am.. they were both ready for a nap.

Eating

Ryan started solids! Well they call them solids but truth be told- it is watery mush. His first feeding was Wednesday, so he is 4 months and about 7 days. We started him on this lovely food early because he was out of control hungry. He eats 40+ ounces a day- over 7 ounces at a time and within 3.5 hours he was hungry again. (I think doctors recommend between 32-38 ounces a day). Sure there were times he could sleep for 6 hours, but most of the time he was waking up in the middle of the night 2 times to eat because he was just so hungry. This is not to say we are raising a porker- he is exactly the average weight and height- apparently he has Don’s metabolism.
The doctors warned us that when we started feeding him cereal (rice cereal), he might give us dirty looks, spit it out, cry etc… This was not the case. The only crying happened because I wasn’t feeding him fast enough. He grabbed the spoon and was trying to make it get to his mouth faster. When introducing solids you are supposed to introduce something new no more then every 4 days (in case there is an allergic reaction you can tell what caused it). I am thinking I might make baby food… I’ll let you know how it goes, I’m sure I will make a mess but that is part of the fun of cooking right?

Sleeping

Everyone has different theories on getting babies to sleep. Ryan has developed a new habit of waking up ever 4-5 hours throughout the night to eat. He has also started waking up soon after going to sleep for the night.
Well, some books say you should teach your child to put themselves to sleep by placing them in their cribs while they are still awake, some say you shouldn’t go in the room if your child is crying unless there is a problem. I understand this theory teaches them independence and in the long run we (Don and I) will get.
Here is my problem. I can’t deal with Ryan crying, I just really can’t do it. I put myself in his shoes. When I am alone at night in a house I have been known to freak out a bit… imagine if I were in a crib, unable to move, turn on a light and I didn’t understand what was going on. Babies until a certain age don’t understand that when you leave their sight you are coming back. So when Ryan is crying I imagine him thinking that he has been left alone in the dark all by himself forever. With this running through my head, it isn’t really surprising that I run in there whenever he cries.
The truth of the matter is that I know a lot of very confident, trusting, happy people who when they were babies were allowed to cry it out, and a lot of confident, trusting, happy people who were not. I have a feeling it does more to the parent then the child (my personal observation- a lot of very highly trained professionals disagree).
When I was at my art class Tuesday Don let Ryan cry for 4 minutes and he fell back to sleep on his own. I am way more of a push over then Don. Who knows what we will end up doing a week, month or year from now. All I know is Ryan is a very happy, energetic baby who most of the time gets enough sleep no matter what Don and I have both done to screw him up!

Bar Application

I might be slightly MIA in the next few weeks. I am trying to get in my application to take the February North Carolina Bar Exam. The application is out of control long and requires me to list practically everything I have done since I was 18 (every loan I have taken, job I have worked at, place I have lived, application for law school, transcripts etc etc...) I need 12 references... it seems excessive. Obviously lawyers become criminals AFTER they sit for the bar because they wouldn't qualify to even take the test if they had done anything so much as gotten a speeding ticket.
All this so that I can take a two full day test on subjects I didn't like learning in the first place.

Domestic Goddess

My new project is to learn to cook better. I have a few recipes which I can make on the fly and I am trying to expand that list.

So far I have made from scratch: Chicken Pot Pie, Bread (thanks Jenn), Pizza (including the dough), Chili and a grilled eggplant dish, I have also been trying out new marinade recipes (Thus the steak picture). I've added a few pictures because I know there are people who read this blog who will not believe that I can cook :). later this week I am going to try to make slow cooker ribs.

There have been no major cooking disasters so far, I think this is a project Don can get behind!