We don’t get out that much and are rarely around other kids, save for The Boy’s weekly Gymboree class, but this weekend we had a play date with a nineteen month old.
It went much better than expected. They played outside and The Boy got dirtier than he’s been since the poop-in-his-nose incident at birth. He ate a muffin, fell into a bush and had his first argument over sharing a toy car.
It did my heart an enormous amount of good to know that he can communicate with other kids, that our MS-related semi-seclusion doesn’t mean that he can’t keep up with day care-raised social butterflies when he does get to spend time with other kids. The Boy didn’t freak out and come running to me or to Hubs when the older kid bounded into our house and grabbed all of his toys. I’m so glad that he held his own against an older kid whose favorite word appears to be “mine!”
Yup, yesterday was everything I imagined it should be. Lots of giggles and squeals, lots of dirt and destruction, and tears of exhaustion followed by a nice, long nap at the end of it all.
Monday, August 30, 2010
Friday, August 27, 2010
My Word On Cloth Diapering
We’ve been cloth diapering since The Boy was a few weeks old. 13 months and counting and we’re still going strong. Now, as I begin my research into cloth/eco friendly training pants, I realize that cloth diapering and using cloth wipes is second nature. That wasn’t always the case.
So, in honor of more than a year of cloth diapering experience, here’s a synopsis of my year raising a fluffy-butted baby.
I was a bit biased toward BumGenius 3.0’s from the get-go. I saw them in some schmancy boutique and bought one to bring home to Hubs to see what he thought. He shrugged and said they seemed fine, so I collected a total of fifteen Easter egg colored diapers before The Boy was even born.
The thing I liked about them was they resembled, at least to my inexperienced eye, a disposable diaper. I liked the idea of the only extra step being to stuff them with inserts.
Even though The Boy was big enough to wear them from birth, they looked so incredibly huge on him that I just couldn’t bring myself to break in the BG’s. After asking around, I learned that they’re meant to look like comedy pants so, at 3-4 weeks, we made the leap to cloth diapering and haven’t looked back.
The next step on our path to hippy-dom was acquisition of cloth wipes. If you’re handy with scissors and have some old shirts, you're good to go. I, however, splurged on approximately 30 tiny pieces of overpriced flannel.
At first I googled a wipe solution with which to clean The Boy’s precious bum – a bottle full of water with a few drops of baby shampoo and tea tree oil – but we quickly realized that water is all that is needed. Before removing a dirty diaper I layer a few wipes beside The Boy, squirt enough water on them to soak through the first and dampen the others. Hubs prefers to remove the diaper and, um, see what he's working with so he knows how many wipes to dampen. Either system works fine.
Butt cleaning and diapering solutions in place, I started experimenting with different brands of cloth diapers.
The first was GroBaby because of the cost. The near-constant peeing and pooping of a newborn meant that we had to use the washer and dryer daily. Wanting to have enough diapers to allow us line-drying time, I looked to GroBaby’s multi-use shell and snapable inserts as a more economical alternative to the BG’s.
Big mistake.
Maybe my kid was just born with the bladder of a camel, but he always soaked the GroBabies. So much so that I think we were only able to re-use the outer shell like every other week.
Lesson learned.
The next non-BG diaper got was a Happy Heini’s one, because it had a supercute cow pattern on it. It’s still going strong, but it’s the only HH brand that I ever bought.
Then there were the two FuzziBunz diapers. I got them because I heard raves about the snaps(as opposed to the Velcro on the BG’s), but I found the snaps tricky to do up quickly on a wiggly baby and the back never quite went up high enough, always leaving a bit of baby butt crack exposed.
The final diapers we settled on, and were actually quite happy with, were Thirsties shells with either Kissaluvs or Thirsties cloth diaper on the inside. They’re a bit more prone to leakage than the BG’s, but are still pretty absorbent and have grown really well with my quickly growing boy.
Had I known 14 months ago what I know now, I would have bought 20 BumGenius 3.0's, 10 Kissaluv's cloth diapers, 3 Thirsties covers, 40 flannel wipes, 2 wet bags and called it a day. We have something approximating that now and it works well for us.
We cheat and use disposable diapers when we're out and about, and always have disposable wipes around in case of emergency. That said, we're almost exclusively Earth-friendly, carbon-neutral, crunchy, or what-have-you and it's been remarkably painless. And it will save us cash in the long run!
I'd seriously recommend cloth diapering to new parent.
Now onto my search for potty-training dipes!
So, in honor of more than a year of cloth diapering experience, here’s a synopsis of my year raising a fluffy-butted baby.
I was a bit biased toward BumGenius 3.0’s from the get-go. I saw them in some schmancy boutique and bought one to bring home to Hubs to see what he thought. He shrugged and said they seemed fine, so I collected a total of fifteen Easter egg colored diapers before The Boy was even born.
The thing I liked about them was they resembled, at least to my inexperienced eye, a disposable diaper. I liked the idea of the only extra step being to stuff them with inserts.
Even though The Boy was big enough to wear them from birth, they looked so incredibly huge on him that I just couldn’t bring myself to break in the BG’s. After asking around, I learned that they’re meant to look like comedy pants so, at 3-4 weeks, we made the leap to cloth diapering and haven’t looked back.
The next step on our path to hippy-dom was acquisition of cloth wipes. If you’re handy with scissors and have some old shirts, you're good to go. I, however, splurged on approximately 30 tiny pieces of overpriced flannel.
At first I googled a wipe solution with which to clean The Boy’s precious bum – a bottle full of water with a few drops of baby shampoo and tea tree oil – but we quickly realized that water is all that is needed. Before removing a dirty diaper I layer a few wipes beside The Boy, squirt enough water on them to soak through the first and dampen the others. Hubs prefers to remove the diaper and, um, see what he's working with so he knows how many wipes to dampen. Either system works fine.
Butt cleaning and diapering solutions in place, I started experimenting with different brands of cloth diapers.
The first was GroBaby because of the cost. The near-constant peeing and pooping of a newborn meant that we had to use the washer and dryer daily. Wanting to have enough diapers to allow us line-drying time, I looked to GroBaby’s multi-use shell and snapable inserts as a more economical alternative to the BG’s.
Big mistake.
Maybe my kid was just born with the bladder of a camel, but he always soaked the GroBabies. So much so that I think we were only able to re-use the outer shell like every other week.
Lesson learned.
The next non-BG diaper got was a Happy Heini’s one, because it had a supercute cow pattern on it. It’s still going strong, but it’s the only HH brand that I ever bought.
Then there were the two FuzziBunz diapers. I got them because I heard raves about the snaps(as opposed to the Velcro on the BG’s), but I found the snaps tricky to do up quickly on a wiggly baby and the back never quite went up high enough, always leaving a bit of baby butt crack exposed.
The final diapers we settled on, and were actually quite happy with, were Thirsties shells with either Kissaluvs or Thirsties cloth diaper on the inside. They’re a bit more prone to leakage than the BG’s, but are still pretty absorbent and have grown really well with my quickly growing boy.
Had I known 14 months ago what I know now, I would have bought 20 BumGenius 3.0's, 10 Kissaluv's cloth diapers, 3 Thirsties covers, 40 flannel wipes, 2 wet bags and called it a day. We have something approximating that now and it works well for us.
We cheat and use disposable diapers when we're out and about, and always have disposable wipes around in case of emergency. That said, we're almost exclusively Earth-friendly, carbon-neutral, crunchy, or what-have-you and it's been remarkably painless. And it will save us cash in the long run!
I'd seriously recommend cloth diapering to new parent.
Now onto my search for potty-training dipes!
Thursday, August 26, 2010
My Happy Life
::Warning! The following post may come off as achingly smug to working mamas. That is genuinely not my intention::
I was suffering from a bit of insomnia last night. While tossing, turning and trying to clear my head of all the junk it accumulated during the day(stupid internets), I got to thinking about the very best truism of my life; I am a stay at home mom and I get to spend almost all of my time with my little boy.
Simple, yes. Obvious, most definitely. But how lucky am I?
What an absolute luxury to be here for every milestone, smile and giggle. What an honor to get to teach him things, prepare all his food and endure the mess it makes when feeding him or letting him feed himself.
When I was younger I never imagined I’d be a housewife or SAHM. I thought I had too much to do. Nothing concrete exactly, just stuff. Important stuff.
But now I’m shaming my younger self by admitting that there is nothing I will ever do that is as important as making sure The Boy grows up to be a good man.
So, as The Boy naps, I am thanking my lucky stars to be fortunate enough to be his mom and, more than that, to be his primary caregiver. We are a non-stop, 24-7 Mom and Boy team and, as tired and frustrated as I may get at times, I wouldn’t change it for anything.
Now, if only he’d wake up so I could give him some of that tuna salad I slaved over.
I was suffering from a bit of insomnia last night. While tossing, turning and trying to clear my head of all the junk it accumulated during the day(stupid internets), I got to thinking about the very best truism of my life; I am a stay at home mom and I get to spend almost all of my time with my little boy.
Simple, yes. Obvious, most definitely. But how lucky am I?
What an absolute luxury to be here for every milestone, smile and giggle. What an honor to get to teach him things, prepare all his food and endure the mess it makes when feeding him or letting him feed himself.
When I was younger I never imagined I’d be a housewife or SAHM. I thought I had too much to do. Nothing concrete exactly, just stuff. Important stuff.
But now I’m shaming my younger self by admitting that there is nothing I will ever do that is as important as making sure The Boy grows up to be a good man.
So, as The Boy naps, I am thanking my lucky stars to be fortunate enough to be his mom and, more than that, to be his primary caregiver. We are a non-stop, 24-7 Mom and Boy team and, as tired and frustrated as I may get at times, I wouldn’t change it for anything.
Now, if only he’d wake up so I could give him some of that tuna salad I slaved over.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Last Night's Dinner
Adapted from Guy Fieri's Cajun Chicken Alfredo
I adapted it to make it slightly healthier(the original recipe called for 3 cups of cream!!!), and to add some veggies for The Boy. I also had to omit parmessan because Hubs hates cheese.
It's meant to be the sauce for a pasta dish, but in a fit of migraine-induced derangement I made mashed potatoes instead. Despite my starch faux-pas, it was still a hit with both my boys.
1 Pound of chicken tenders
2 Tablespoons of Blackening Spice
1 tablespoons minced garlic
4 Tablespoons chopped sun dried tomatoes(marinated)
1/4 cup white wine
1 cup frozen peas
1 cup heavy cream
Dredge chicken tenders in Blackening Spice and cook on medium-high at 7 minutes per side, chop into bite sized pieces then set aside.
In same pan, add garlic and sun dried tomatoes.
Once you can smell the garlic, add the wine.
Once wine is almost completely reduced, add cream, chicken and peas.
Let simmer over medium heat for 10 minutes.
Serve with your favorite starch.
I adapted it to make it slightly healthier(the original recipe called for 3 cups of cream!!!), and to add some veggies for The Boy. I also had to omit parmessan because Hubs hates cheese.
It's meant to be the sauce for a pasta dish, but in a fit of migraine-induced derangement I made mashed potatoes instead. Despite my starch faux-pas, it was still a hit with both my boys.
1 Pound of chicken tenders
2 Tablespoons of Blackening Spice
1 tablespoons minced garlic
4 Tablespoons chopped sun dried tomatoes(marinated)
1/4 cup white wine
1 cup frozen peas
1 cup heavy cream
Dredge chicken tenders in Blackening Spice and cook on medium-high at 7 minutes per side, chop into bite sized pieces then set aside.
In same pan, add garlic and sun dried tomatoes.
Once you can smell the garlic, add the wine.
Once wine is almost completely reduced, add cream, chicken and peas.
Let simmer over medium heat for 10 minutes.
Serve with your favorite starch.
13 Months
The Boy’s First Birthday Post – One month late
My son was born thirteen months ago, more than a week late and weighing 7 pounds 11 ounces. It was a med-free vaginal birth, a testament both to my stubbornness to let MS affect my birth experience and to my fear of needles.
After 36 hours of labor I finally got to meet my son, screaming and with meconium coming out of his nose. I blubbered to Hubs, “look at what we made.
I bled a lot, so much I nearly needed a transfusion. I also tore badly and had trouble getting rid of all of my placenta. So, after holding him all too briefly, they took The Boy from me and sent me to have surgery.
Hubs went with The Boy and I went under, waking up a short time later totally looped(it was not long after Michael Jackson died and I kept asking the nurse if they gave me what killed him) and wondering where my family was.
Here's a picture of him when he was new:
We brought the Boy home two days later. Both completely ill-prepared, I relied on Hubs’ diaper changing experience. It entailed only the few diapers he’d changed since The Boy was born, but it was greater than mine.
Since then I’d venture to say that we’ve both changed hundreds of diapers – though it feels like thousands, or even millions.
Always super alert, The Boy smiled at two weeks and laughed not long after that. He rolled from tummy to back at his one month check-up and back to front around five months.
He started belly-flopping around six months and relied on that as his means of getting around until he was almost a year old, where he quickly went from crawling properly to walking. He pulled himself up and scooted around on furniture and people from around seven months, but has been a bona fide walker for several weeks now.
He has gone from loving his playmat to his Jumperoo to his wagon to his bike.
Pic of bike to follow
He began his year relying on breast milk and now he resembles something more like a garbage disposal unit, eating everything he can fit in his mouth.
He is clever and sweet and silly and mischievous and dramatic. He is more than we could have hoped for when we decided to get pregnant two years ago. I love him more than anything and am so grateful to have him in my life and to be able to call him my son. I can only hope that I am worthy of such a blessing.
Happy 13 month birthday, Baby Boy!
Love, Your Devoted Mama
My son was born thirteen months ago, more than a week late and weighing 7 pounds 11 ounces. It was a med-free vaginal birth, a testament both to my stubbornness to let MS affect my birth experience and to my fear of needles.
After 36 hours of labor I finally got to meet my son, screaming and with meconium coming out of his nose. I blubbered to Hubs, “look at what we made.
I bled a lot, so much I nearly needed a transfusion. I also tore badly and had trouble getting rid of all of my placenta. So, after holding him all too briefly, they took The Boy from me and sent me to have surgery.
Hubs went with The Boy and I went under, waking up a short time later totally looped(it was not long after Michael Jackson died and I kept asking the nurse if they gave me what killed him) and wondering where my family was.
Here's a picture of him when he was new:
We brought the Boy home two days later. Both completely ill-prepared, I relied on Hubs’ diaper changing experience. It entailed only the few diapers he’d changed since The Boy was born, but it was greater than mine.
Since then I’d venture to say that we’ve both changed hundreds of diapers – though it feels like thousands, or even millions.
Always super alert, The Boy smiled at two weeks and laughed not long after that. He rolled from tummy to back at his one month check-up and back to front around five months.
He started belly-flopping around six months and relied on that as his means of getting around until he was almost a year old, where he quickly went from crawling properly to walking. He pulled himself up and scooted around on furniture and people from around seven months, but has been a bona fide walker for several weeks now.
He has gone from loving his playmat to his Jumperoo to his wagon to his bike.
Pic of bike to follow
He began his year relying on breast milk and now he resembles something more like a garbage disposal unit, eating everything he can fit in his mouth.
He is clever and sweet and silly and mischievous and dramatic. He is more than we could have hoped for when we decided to get pregnant two years ago. I love him more than anything and am so grateful to have him in my life and to be able to call him my son. I can only hope that I am worthy of such a blessing.
Happy 13 month birthday, Baby Boy!
Love, Your Devoted Mama
Tuesday, August 24, 2010
Sad baby
The Boy and I have both been fighting colds since the weekend. He picked some bug up whilst sharing baby slobber at Gymboree and passed it along to me. His face is covered in snot. I’ve got a killer headache. We’re both rattling the walls with our coughing. It ain’t pretty.
Life goes on though, and, despite his congestion, he can still concentrate on his alphabet flashcards for a half dozen letters . He also still thinks that all animals, not just pigs, say oink, but never mind.
About the big push to start using my brain again, I’ve actually started reading Madame Bovary, despite my dad’s protestations that it’s depressing drivel. I gotta say, at only 40 pages in I already feel like it’s going much better than the populist book club crap I tried too get through at the start of the year.
I’ve been reading Beatniks by the divine Toby Litt at bedtime when I’m not too tired to keep my eyes open. That’s, admittedly, not very often, but I’m slowly making my way through it. That said, I count Mr. Litt’s books as my kind of brain candy, so I can hardly feel like I’m benefiting from too much intellectual growth by reading his work. Love him though.
The Boy has just bought me the fixin’s for a cloth diaper. That’s a first. If it’s a sign that he wants me to change him there might be hope that he may one day be receptive to potty training.
Life goes on though, and, despite his congestion, he can still concentrate on his alphabet flashcards for a half dozen letters . He also still thinks that all animals, not just pigs, say oink, but never mind.
About the big push to start using my brain again, I’ve actually started reading Madame Bovary, despite my dad’s protestations that it’s depressing drivel. I gotta say, at only 40 pages in I already feel like it’s going much better than the populist book club crap I tried too get through at the start of the year.
I’ve been reading Beatniks by the divine Toby Litt at bedtime when I’m not too tired to keep my eyes open. That’s, admittedly, not very often, but I’m slowly making my way through it. That said, I count Mr. Litt’s books as my kind of brain candy, so I can hardly feel like I’m benefiting from too much intellectual growth by reading his work. Love him though.
The Boy has just bought me the fixin’s for a cloth diaper. That’s a first. If it’s a sign that he wants me to change him there might be hope that he may one day be receptive to potty training.
Monday, August 23, 2010
Open letter to my former hairstylist
Dear Lady Who Destroyed My Hair,
I know that you were proud of the work you did when you chopped off what little hair I had left and gave it a horrendous dye job, but it's been well over two months now and, I gotta say, what you did still makes me cry.
It's not your fault that I cut off my waist-length locks in a fit of postpartum frustration several months before I came to you. Nor is it your fault that I'm of an age where I might seek assistance in hiding the few gray hairs I have growing around my crown. However, when I went to you with a slightly shaggy, chocolate brown bob and asked for you to give me a cut and color that would sustain me until I could grow my hair out to my shoulders, I was not in any way expecting the monstrosity I left the salon with.
I mean, really? Turning me into Kate whats-her-face, hair super short in the back and long enough in the front to hang annoyingly in my eyes. My hair's too freakin' thick and curly for this shiz, even if I asked for it. Which I didn't. You didn't even leave it long enough for me to push it back behind my ears. I have a child!!! But am forced to jerk my head to get my hair out of my eyes like those emo kids on South Park.
And then dying it nearly black and bleaching big, ugly chunks all over. Really? It looks like the Boy was playing with the bleach bottle.
I went to see you because I wanted to feel a little bit better about myself, instead I'm left with a tragic mess on my head.
So, to summarize, eff you hairdresser!
I know that you were proud of the work you did when you chopped off what little hair I had left and gave it a horrendous dye job, but it's been well over two months now and, I gotta say, what you did still makes me cry.
It's not your fault that I cut off my waist-length locks in a fit of postpartum frustration several months before I came to you. Nor is it your fault that I'm of an age where I might seek assistance in hiding the few gray hairs I have growing around my crown. However, when I went to you with a slightly shaggy, chocolate brown bob and asked for you to give me a cut and color that would sustain me until I could grow my hair out to my shoulders, I was not in any way expecting the monstrosity I left the salon with.
I mean, really? Turning me into Kate whats-her-face, hair super short in the back and long enough in the front to hang annoyingly in my eyes. My hair's too freakin' thick and curly for this shiz, even if I asked for it. Which I didn't. You didn't even leave it long enough for me to push it back behind my ears. I have a child!!! But am forced to jerk my head to get my hair out of my eyes like those emo kids on South Park.
And then dying it nearly black and bleaching big, ugly chunks all over. Really? It looks like the Boy was playing with the bleach bottle.
I went to see you because I wanted to feel a little bit better about myself, instead I'm left with a tragic mess on my head.
So, to summarize, eff you hairdresser!
Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Shoulda, woulda, coulda
I’m trying to begin Madame Bovary but Boy has cream cheese up his nose. His bastard molars have been making him so sad that I’m letting him watch Yo Gabba Gabba and eat his toast while he watches.
I decided to start Madame Bovary(my third attempt) because I wanted something meaty and pretentious to get me out of my year-long sabbatical from using my brain – at all. Sadly, what I’d really like to do is buy this:
From JCrew
And this:
From Baby Gap
And plan trips here:
And here:
I decided to start Madame Bovary(my third attempt) because I wanted something meaty and pretentious to get me out of my year-long sabbatical from using my brain – at all. Sadly, what I’d really like to do is buy this:
From JCrew
And this:
From Baby Gap
And plan trips here:
And here:
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Pins and needles in my arm
I have Multiple Sclerosis, a degenerative disease that strips my nerves of their myelin sheath and my life of the kind of fly-by-the-seat-of-my-pants get-up-and-go that used to define me. I was diagnosed more than seven years ago now. I was living in the London at the time with the love of my life. Since then I moved to Canada, then back to my native Southern California, I married my aforementioned love and I gave birth to the coolest baby ever.
Not bad for a gimp.
Like I think I heard them say on some hideous reality show, I can(still) do what everyone else does, I just do it slightly differently.
Like this morning, for example. My baby, angry from the molars growing in his mouth, awoke at 7 30. I nursed him, ate my Mini-Wheats while giving him some Joe’s O’s(Cheerios for Trader Joe’s lovers), took a shower then had Hubs(who works from home) help us downstairs to the car.
Boy and I then met my dad for coffee. Dad moved Boy from the car seat to his stroller. I can do that, but even my 70 year old dad can get it done quicker than me.
We do all the same stuff in reverse, ending up planted in our living room where I’m left to look after Boy until Hubs finishing work – usually around 7 pm.
Depending on how pissed off my disease is on any particular day, I find keeping up with Boy fluctuates. I loved when he started crawling and I could trick him into coming to me instead of wobbly picking Boy up and killing my back in the process. There are days when I’m too tired to move the chairs that form our baby barricade to the table for lunch time, so I feed him free-range style. It’s messy, but nothing a ton of tea towels and some slipcovers can’t handle.
We have to deal with all the normal stuff of life a bit differently, but the final product remains pretty much the same.
Take the smash cake at Boy's 1st birthday party, the end result of which can be seen above. Good times.
Monday, August 16, 2010
What was I thinking?
Everything I wrote nearly a year ago was clearly BS. I mean, there I was talking about doing something when, in actual fact, I did nothing, blogwise that is.
In real life I've done quite a lot. I managed to survive my baby's first year, keep my husband happy and keep my house vaguely habitable. Not bad.
Now onto the work of writing about my little life.
Hmmm... where to start?
In real life I've done quite a lot. I managed to survive my baby's first year, keep my husband happy and keep my house vaguely habitable. Not bad.
Now onto the work of writing about my little life.
Hmmm... where to start?
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