Happy Easter, Baby Claire!

I was really torn how much to celebrate for Easter for Claire.  No offense to my nearly six month old, but I know she can't really understand what's going on, so I didn't want to go all out in vain.  However, last night I went ahead and set up all the gifts from the Easter Bunny (she knows who he is now, we met him at Bass Pro Shop... long story, but at least she didn't scream!  She actually patted him on the face when she was done with her picture). 

Of course I bought the tiny basket back when we had TWO gifts for her.  I didn't expect to keep adding to the stash!

This morning when she saw her haul, she smiled so big.  It made it worth it to spend the extra time setting everything up for her.  The best gifts by far were the glow worm (which she picked out herself on a recent shopping trip--Matt wanted to get her keys to chew on, but we couldn't find any). 

Just before the one and only nap of the day.  Notice I bribed her with a blankie (which I've pretty much been able to break thanks to some nice hand-me-down sleep sacks that finally fit!).  And glow worm plays music and lights up.  She looks quite angelic. 

She also liked the little soft bunny rabbit.  Of course, I'm sure that's not an age appropriate gift, but it didn't say.  So I just watch her with him.  She loves how soft he is!  She got a really adorable big duck/chick thing from their toy exchange at day care, and he's super soft, too, but a little hard to drag everywhere with us. 

We are still having trouble getting her to sit up.  She thrusts herself back because she wants to lay down (then roll over, then try to crawl), but it's kind of a scary move since if we weren't behind her, she'd slam her head on the floor!

Of course she got other things from us--but who is excited about books and clothes when there are toys to play with!  We didn't hunt Easter eggs (where's the challenge, right?) but we went to both grandma's houses.  My mom made an adorable bunny cake.  It was kind of odd cutting into him to eat, but he tasted just like chocolate, so then I didn't mind. 

Don't be fooled... this rabbit would kill you and everyone you loved if he had the chance...

And of course Claire wore her very beautiful Easter dress.  It was a gift from a family friend at my baby shower.  The only complaint (my only complaint ever with baby clothes):  All those BUTTONS!  How do clothes makers ever envision a mommy buttoning like six buttons down a 24 week old's back!?  It's harder than you'd think.

You can ALMOST see her two tiny teeth in this picture.  I think she's starting to get the top set, all these pink cheeks!

But Claire was perfectly sweet for pictures and posing with her bunny rabbit.  She spent a lot of time complaining (she's a little under the weather today) and playing.  She skipped most of her naps today (the best nap she got was this morning when she got to sleep with her glow worm since our trusty sleep sheep needs a battery).  But she mustered the strength to be nice (enough) to all the hands on her.  I, of course, too TWO naps to counteract a weekend full of activity and a morning of getting little Claire all dolled up and ready for a day out on the town.

So sweet... she's so funny.

I'm looking forward to next year's holidays when she'll finally start understanding something special is going on.  I'm sure on some level she knew today wasn't normal, but I look forward to her excitement hunting eggs and playing with her toys (for real playing, not eating them).  She's such a sweetheart, though.  I'm very proud she made it through today!  I nearly didn't!

Can't wait for next year!  Thank you, Easter Bunny!

Who Stole the Pea Puree?

Baby food rounds two and three have been a great success!  As you've previously read, I made a whole batch of delicious carrots in preparation for baby Claire's six month veggie milestone.  Since we have a deep freeze, I can store the food a bit longer, so I figured I'd go ahead and get a few more veggies out of the way. 

First up, peas.  I used frozen peas.  I won't lie, I had a dumb moment trying to think if I'd ever seen fresh peas in the market.  I couldn't even imagine how you'd buy peas fresh.  Then I was eating a steam fresh veggie pack and out rolled a pea from what I thought was some kind of bean/pod thing.  Oh yeah.  THEN I remembered you had to buy fresh peas in PODS.  Well.  I'm still glad I went with frozen.  I'm reasoning that it was easier anyway. 

It's not easy being green...

 I read that peas can be a challenge to get smooth because sometimes the outsides don't mash up well.  A lot of people recommend straining your peas because they never get it smooth enough.  But look at mine!  Smooth as can be!

The secret of the ooze?  Does anyone watch Top Chef, where they made pea puree and someone stole it?  Who would eat this but a baby?

I didn't see anything gross in there, but I knew better than to taste, because the grossest thing of all about this puree was that it was made of peas (not my favorite veggie--probably another reason I don't know anything about them!)

But they froze up so pretty, I was pretty tempted.  I kept imagining lime popsicles.  Again, I knew better. 

So pretty

And then I tried sweet potatoes.  If you know my muddy past of cooking sweet potatoes, you'd know it was a labor of love to even attempt these.  I've only cooked sweet potatoes from a raw potato once, it took forever, and they tasted exactly like the kind you get out of the can.  So I got angry and started using canned potatoes.  They're hard to cut.  They're hard to skin (because they're big).  But I did it anyway, and hey, with a better peeler and a giant kitchen knife, they weren't so bad.  And I still have all my fingers! 

Just add some brown sugar, butter, pecans, and cinnamon, and then we'd have something to talk about!

Two big sweet potatoes made almost 48 servings.  We still have an extra one we'll probably eat ourselves (look how daring I'm getting).  And these DID turn out delicious, even with no seasoning!  I MIGHT have slipped a small spoonful into a serving of cereal for Claire, just to see what she'd do, but she gobbles so fast, I don't think she noticed.  Can't wait for May 3rd!

Just Stick it in Your Food Processor and Puree it, Already...

Hahaha... I imagine myself saying that in the tone of "take this job and shove it".  However, this isn't a negative post!  It's a fun post, because it's about baby food!  Although I took the risk of appearing as if I was going full blown hippie, I decided that I'd look into homemade baby food.  It didn't sound too terribly hard, and if you do the math, even though those tiny baby food jars appear cheap, when you add it up, it ends up saving quite a bit of money. 

I bought this book as a reference and for ideas.  I also did some googling and found a couple good websites like this one that gave me lots of tips.  I decided for my first puree I would try carrots.  Just an FYI on savings, a large bag of carrots will make approximately 24 1 ounce servings.  This bag costs around $2.  A two pack of servings from Gerber costs about $1.  So I technically saved about ten bucks doing just this batch.

We recently bought new pots, so I got to try out our new steamer.  I've never had really nice pots and pans before, so this was quite the treat.  Like I said, I cleaned, peeled, and chopped up a big bag of carrots.  I then steamed them for a little longer than the recipe called for, about 25 minutes, just to make sure they were soft enough (since I used so many).  All I had to do then was throw them in the food processor, throw in some fresh water, and puree! 

My new pot and steamer.  I've never had a steamer this awesome.  I was just excited to get to use it!

Now, there are those out there who will freak about carrots because of nitrates.  But according to the website I linked (plus several other sources)  poisoning comes from well water, NOT carrots.  And always add FRESH water, not the steamed water, when you puree.  There's basically a 0% chance of this happening after 6 months with any type of food.  There isn't a difference in nitrates in store bought versus homemade carrot baby food, unless I could somehow track down organic carrots which MAY lessen the amount.  This is what the AAP says:

"Because vegetables, including green beans, carrots, squash, spinach and beets, can have nitrate levels as high or higher than that of well water, infants should not eat these foods until after age 3 months."
AAP

So, after reading that, I wasn't so terribly concerned.  Considering green beans are another heavily pushed first food, I figured if babies out there everywhere were loading up on green beans and carrots and not getting sick, well, I'm pretty sure my kid will be fine.

I must say, the cooking and pureeing of the carrots smelled delicious.  I was a little disappointed when I tasted it, because darnit if they didn't just taste like cooked carrots.  But hey, if you've only been eating rice cereal, oatmeal, and formula, well, I imagine carrots are quite the delicious treat.

So, I poured the puree into a measuring cup and used a small spatula to evenly fill out my fancy food storage ice cube trays.  I certainly didn't do a neat job of this, but they turned out okay.

Again... these LOOK like delicious popsicles, but I ate a piece that fell off, and they still just taste like carrots.  Bummer.

I stored the frozen cubes in freezer bags (so I can free up the trays for more food yet to be made!) and I'm storing them in our deep freeze.  Most guides say you can store frozen baby food in your freezer for around 6 weeks, and the deep freeze can keep it fresh for 3-6 months.  Since Claire won't start eating these for a month, I was hesitant to start so early, but I worried if I didn't have anything ready to start out with, I'd instantly resort to jarred food. 

I don't want to poo poo on jarred food by any means.  I see a point in it.  I like, however, with homemade food I know what goes in the food I'm feeding my daughter.  There aren't preservatives.  Her food hasn't been sitting on a shelf waiting for her since she was born.  I can also make creative purees, once she's become acclimated to all the different food types. 

I'm curious how she'll take to new foods.  She certainly didn't care for rice cereal at first, even though she eats it now without complaint.

Baby's first feeding at 16 weeks... did. not. want.

She took to oatmeal like a champ--in fact, I think she's eating better in general from her excitement with the oatmeal.  For some reason, I think it might be more filling to her, because she certainly got the point of eating once she started eating it. 

Claire at five months, eating like a hungry little baby bird!

So that's how easy it was to make baby food!  I'm not going crazy with it, and I certainly do not know if I will actually tackle making meat purees for her (that seems yucky).  I'm also excited that I can make neat purees and offer foods that aren't in your traditional grocery store--like zucchini, broccoli, avocado, strawberries, mangoes... oh the list goes on!  We're excited to try something less bland in only a month's time.  Can't wait to show you Claire's response!  Hopefully she doesn't end up like me--apparently I had quite the fetish for orange foods and my skin stained orange!  Eek!

Claire at Five Months!

This blog has totally turned into a monthly spy on my kid session!  That's okay.  I've been scrapbooking (until my tape runner broke, but I just bought a new one, so, I'm back, baby!)  I also have been making baby food--that'll be an upcoming post!  Oh, and apparently I'm invited to a baby shower for a expecting Momma on Matt's side of the family, so I'm going to make a taggy blanket and possibly a hat for her.  So I swear I'll be doing more than marveling over my child very soon!

Oohhh... what do you have THERE!?

But while we're here, let's marvel over Claire, shall we?  At five months she is knocking out 2-3 servings of cereal a day (rice and oatmeal, now).  She's given up her 10 o'clock feeding, so she's sleeping from about 7 pm until 5:30 am or so.  We had good success this weekend getting her to sleep in until about 7:30-8, but during the weekday we have to wake her up.  She usually takes two good naps a day: one in the morning usually starting around 9 or 10 (depending on weekend/weekday) and then again in the afternoon.  She usually naps around an hour to hour and a half.

A little messy feeding with the left hand to get a picture--usually now there is very little mess.

The eating thing is getting ridiculous.  She went from casual chomper to full blown angry hungry baby bird!  We skipped a few weeks of cereal feeding because she was so sick with a cough and drainage (coughing and baby food is quite the disaster).  When we started back, she started back with a vengeance.  We got the okay to start oatmeal when we took her in for an ear infection (more on that in a few).  I was worried to start oatmeal because so many experts advice to hold off on it until after 6 months.  We won't start barley until then, but I feel okay doing the oatmeal now.  She really really likes it.  She will babble, eat, and cry for more when we're out of cereal.  She definitely knows when it is "cereal o'clock"!

Notice that wide open mouth!  If you don't get the spoon in there in about a second, she'll also start making some noises!  Loud noises!

So, yeah, that ear infection.  We all got sick here during spring break, and I ended up with an ear infection.  We were all on antibiotics, so we thought we were good, since Claire had just finished her course before Matt and I got sick.  Unfortunately, that was not the case, and she got an ear infection.  Well, I had been suspecting that she might be teething.  Thanks to my mother's notes from my baby days, I knew I started teething between four and five months.  So when she started chewing on her finger, I figured that might be something.  Then she got fussy.  We weren't sure if she was sick, so Matt took her to the doctor and she thought she felt teeth, but there was definitely an ear infection (more antibiotics, whohoo).  But then low and behold this week out popped her two bottom teeth!  So I guess it was a double threat of symptoms.  I've also learned that symptoms of teething include bright red cheeks.  I thought she got sunburned, which was strange since we'd had her so covered, but this morning she looked normal.  So I looked it up.  Turns out it's teething... easily solved with some baby Tylenol and some ora-gel!

Such a lovely little sun dress!  She managed to wear this all day without one spill and LOVED it!

Just a size comparison, here is Claire on the same blanket but at two months:

 

 I can see so much growth in my little girl and changes are happening by the day!  Currently she's working on learning signs (thank you, Baby Einstein, for making a DVD of them--it helps me a lot).  In fact, she's watching Baby Einstein in this photo:

And I couldn't believe it, but the video actually had her smiling and chuckling.  Even I can't make her laugh half the time.  Geniuses, indeed.

 I know, I know, you're not supposed to let babies watch TV.  But I have a friend who swears by this DVD for help in signing.  So I feel like it's more of a tool--she certainly pays attention to it better than me!  (And let's face it, that darn Baby Einstein crib thing I have is just a lame TV anyway).  

Oh, the OTHER obsession is rattles.  This thing spins and rattles.  She grabs on and stares and tries to stick it in her mouth.  Kinda funny, kinda gross.

But she's getting a lot of use out of her jumper/bouncer/whatever thing now.  She's still a tad too short, but at least we just have to use a small pillow to help her out.  The one at daycare isn't so taunt, so she can actually reach the ground and usually goes nuts in it.  Well, now she goes nuts in ours, too!

Here is a short video of baby Claire bouncing:

We're currently working on signing, of course, but also sitting up.  Sitting up on our own is quite the struggle, mostly because we are interested in FEET.  And to grab our FEET, we must fall over.  I'm sure she'll figure it out soon enough.  Kind of bittersweet all the things she's able to do now, but I'm looking forward to every new change!  See you next month!