Bedtime Stories and Other Stuff

Every night, Jack and I go through the same bedtime routine.  First it's a diaper change, then sometimes a bath, and almost always some bedtime stories.  There are two stories that we read every night, but some nights call for more stories than just the two to help us wind down.  We have read It's Time for Bed  and Goodnight Moon every night since Jack was 3 months old.  He is VERY familiar with them  Usually he sits in my lap, listens to the stories, and sometimes tries to grab the book to eat it.  It's very sweet when he grabs the book like I do, and he sits there holding it open for me to read.  The other night we had a Growth Chart Moment while reading our books.  We were reading Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?  and this time Jack reached for the page to run his little hand over it.  I thought maybe he wanted to rip it up, or just get a feel for the pages, but after doing this with all three of our books, on every page, I figured out that he was touching the picture on the page.  He was touching the bear's face, the little boy's hair, and the fire in the Great Green Room.  (You'd have to know each of the stories to understand.) I was so impressed with this, because up to this point, I wasn't sure what he was really seeing when we were reading the stories.  Now I know he's trying to figure out the pictures on each page.  I wonder if he's figuring out that the words I'm saying go with the pictures on the page. 

Other stuff - Do babies become solid-food-eaters overnight?   While visiting with family over the weekend, and apparently not bringing enough food for my little boy, I ended up giving him some of my food.  Mostly just my pasta, but also some bites of my Fluffy Pink Salad. (And a taste of BBQ sauce, but we won't talk about that). Today, while I was feeding him lunch, I realized he wanted to eat only what he could 'chew'.  I didn't thin down his chicken, which meant he had chicken powder to munch on (do you remember what it resembles?). I also gave him some small bits of nectarine.  He barely touched the pureed sweet potatoes that he usually loves.  I think he just wants to eat big-boy food now.  New baby-food-making adventures await me!

And I think it's finally here.  He's crawling like a big boy now.  Most of the time anyway.  He looks so cute doing it too.  We walk laps around our kitchen island, he cruises around all of our furniture, and now he crawls on all fours.  And I'm proud to say my floors have never been cleaner!

New Food Adventures

Jack is 8 months today. 8 months! We'll be doing our monthly progression photo today, and I'm hoping things go better than last month. I've stitched up Buddy Bear and washed the quilt, so we're ready to go. This 'birth'day comes with a few Growth Chart Moments.

Jack ate his first finger food this weekend. The In-Laws came down to visit Saturday, and they took us out for dinner. I didn't take food along with us, because Jack had just eaten, but because of an impromptu nap on the way to the restaurant, we ended up getting there later than I expected. So, Jack was hungry. I asked if they had a banana for him, but big Italian restaurants don't have bananas. Go figure. So we gave him a bread-stick with no butter or garlic. This was his first time trying out 'finger food'. Not sure I would have started with a bread-stick, but it worked out great! He just gnawed away on it, and it slowly disintegrated. I did have to fish out a few big chunks a few times.

Since he's 8 months old now, I can start trying new foods for Jack to explore. My first new food: chicken! Before I read up on baby food making, I had no idea you could puree meat. Well, I've done it, and I can say - it's WEIRD! I boiled a chicken breast, let it cool, cut it into chunks, and then chopped it in my blender. It turns into a texture that is similar to Moon Sand. I have to admit, that it does not look yummy, but baby food doesn't always appeal to the mommy, right? I tried giving Jack his new food by itself, causing him to make all sorts of 'yuck' faces. Then I added it to some green beans. More 'yuck' faces. Finally, I tried mixing the chicken with sweet potatoes. That worked the best, since he loves sweet potatoes, but it didn't last long. I think chicken is going to be a 'work in progress' for awhile.

Finally, after all the new food adventures, and especially after the bread stick adventure, I decided to give Jack some O-shaped cereal. Let's just say he's not there yet. He looks at them on his tray, plays with them, picks them up in his little fingers, and puts them in his highchair "for later", but he does not eat them. He did try ONE, but he didn't seem to like it. We'll try again later.

Here is a picture from our visit with the Grandparents this weekend. Do you think Jack will fit in to the family? You've gotta love 3 generations of plaid!

Baby Food Organization

This is my What Works For Me Wednesday organization tip.

This organization tip isn't very exciting, but it definitely works for me.


When Jack turned 6 months, I was excited to start making baby food. He didn't eat a lot at first of course, so I had a lot left over for freezing. I originally thought I'd purchase the fancy baby food cubes which stack nicely and keep things easy and clean while freezing your homemade baby food. But then I figured out that they're just glorified ice cube trays. In order to do anything I can to save us money, I decided not to buy the fancy cubes and just get a set of ice cube trays. I bake or steam the food, throw it in the blender to puree' it, and then freeze it in ice cube trays for a few hours or overnight. I then put the cubes in freezer bags and toss them in the freezer.


This was fine for a while, but then I had bags tossed all over my tiny freezer, and I was going crazy with the disorganized mess. (this may seem strange to those of you who know me, but I really hated not being organized with my baby food). In order to solve this mess, I knew I just needed a box of some sort. But I didn't want to purchase anything new (even though visions of cute little colorful sorting baskets came to mind). So, I found a box that was in my pantry, not in use, and tossed my bags in it. It was big enough to hold a few bags, and small enough to not take up a lot of freezer space. I can't close the lid, but that's ok for me. It adds vertical space to store my bags.

Check out what works for others and to get entered into some GIVEAWAYS at We Are THAT Family.

I'm "Crunchy"

The other night, Hubby and I were invited to dinner by one of his co-workers. It was such a nice invitation to come out to the country and enjoy a casual evening with new (to me) friends. They had a great home, yummy food, and CUTE kiddos! I enjoyed the visit especially with this co-worker’s wife, because she and I had a lot of similarities. She used to be a teacher (taught kindergarten for 7 years) and then became a stay-at-home-mom when her daughter was born three years ago. She could completely relate with my sadness from not going back to my classroom this year for the first time. The other big connection for us was our love of our laptops and the internet. We both feel like we need our connections online. And both of our husbands don’t understand this at all! So, needless to say, we bonded.

During the evening, we shared our baby and parenting stories. I think mom’s can go on for HOURS talking about our kids and their stories. While we were sharing, she said to me “you’re crunchy!” It was not meant to offend me, and it was said in jest mostly. But it got me to thinking. For those of you who don’t know, ‘crunchy’ refers to being ‘granola’ or ‘hippy’ or an earth-lovin’, organic-eatin’, tree-hugger.

Am I crunchy? Let’s see.

1. I use cloth diapers on my son. I love how cute they are. That’s one of the main reasons I use them. They also keep Jack from getting rashes, and they hardly ever leak. And they’re saving us money.



2. I breastfeed. I used formula for one week when Jack was born, and I was waiting for my milk to come in. Since then, we nursed for every meal until we started solid food. And we don’t use bottles much, since I’m staying at home and don’t have need for bottles very often. I have my home-made cover (Hooter Hider) for when I am out in public and need to feed Jack. I’m also getting pretty good at feeding him in the van. This has saved us a ton of money.



3. I make my son’s baby food. I never realized how easy it was. I can make sure he’s not getting any unnecessary sugar or ‘other’ ingredients that aren’t good for him at this age. I’m hoping it’s saving us money.



4. I’ve only purchased one toy for my son. He has toys, but they’re from family and friends. All of his toys from me are containers and boxes. He LOVES the empty oats round containers. This is definitely saving us money.



5. I use a ring sling. It seemed like it would last us longer than a baby carrier, since they only last through a certain weight. As long as I can carry his weight, I can use this sling for years. I bought it for 50% less than the original price. So that saved us a bit of money.



6. We got rid of cable. Jack doesn’t need to watch TV yet. And it’s another distraction during the day that I just don’t need. (The internet is enough) This is definitely saving us money.


7. I meal plan and make sure we eat at home almost all the time. I grocery shop every Monday to get what I need for that week’s meals. Since we rarely eat out anymore, I think we’ve saved money on food.

So, do you think I’m crunchy? I’m thinking I’m more thrifty than crunchy, but you can be the judge. I do own a tye-dye shirt.