A Glimmer of

Tooth!  I thought I saw a flash of white when my baby opened his mouth and upon further inspection, I saw and felt a tooth coming out.  Finally after all those weeks of drooling and chewing and being irritable - the tooth has broken through the surface.  It's only slightly exposed but it's there..front bottom - right side!  Aack! - the baby is getting old!  Next thing you know, he'll be going to college or learning how to drive or something. 

Journey into the Unknown

unknown world of solid foods that is.  So at the 6 month Dr's visit, the pediatrician said we should start the baby on solids maybe 2x a day..baby puree optional.  Just mash the food up - the baby needs to learn to chew.  Pureed food makes a baby lazy.  This puree thing is a trend that they didn't have 100 years ago.. (Our Dr's office is very holistic and the such - they even space out vaccinations so that the baby doesn't get more that 2 vaccines a visit. That is something they do automatically - not something you have to request - and it made me feel more comfortable about vaccines.)  The only thing they can't eat until they are a year old is honey (due to botulism), otherwise don't be afraid.  Don't fear food allergies - you don't have to wait 3 days before trying a new food because it takes a shorter time span if the baby actually does have allergies.  Give them anything except maybe a whole grape because they'll choke on that. ha that's a joke - lighten up, parents. And serve it with water since the food is not liquidy like the baby is used to.  The doc did say baby cereal is filler so no point in giving baby empty carbs - better to give them veggies and fruits and things with nutritional value.  They would probably choke on a whole peanut too so we're focusing in on the softer textured foods.We actually did receive a Baby Brezza as a present.  That is a food processor for babies.  I have yet to try it and even though the doctor said pureeing isn't necessary, it seems like it would be better and easier for the baby to handle.  I could also make a giant batch of food and store it in the freezer.  You can't make small single servings with a Baby Brezza. Besides pureeing, i think the thing also steams and cooks food too, all in one.

The other question was - how much food do you give a baby?  Doc's answer: the baby will let you know when they're done so don't really need to worry yourself with amount.   As a new parent, this all seems so foreign and a bit daunting.  I guess the doctor's point is that you need to ease up.  This is all natural and has been done since the dawn of time.  You don't need to stress about it. 

She did warn us that what comes in must come out so there would be some very interesting #2's...

So far, the baby likes applesauce, plain hummus (lemon hummus was a bust - too spicy maybe) and avocado.  I tried mashing strawberries and bananas into the applesauce, and he gagged trying to eat it.  This morning I tried greek yogurt with a little bit of smashed up bananas.  He didn't like it.  Also gagged.  Maybe too sour?  I'll probably try it again with more banana less yogurt. We did buy some organic baby food - so far we tried oatmeal with apples and pears and he seemed to like it.  He tried a little ice cream and he of course liked that (you know he's mine if he luvs ice cream) but that's not something we can really feed him daily.  I guess we just have to keep trying to give him whatever we're eating that's mashable and hopefully he'll continue trying and tasting and liking all types of foods.

Hijacked!

So date nite was sort of a bust because it was 8 pm and it was an hour and a half wait to eat at Talde.  Boo.  We ended up eating at some Indian joint near by.  It was pretty good.  We ordered a bottle wine but it ended up being way too sweet.  Drank it anyway though.  ha.  By the time we finished dinner around 10:00pm, we passed by Talde and there were definitely tables finally empty and available.

Saturday was a busy busy jam packed day:
9:00 AM dentist appt
10:45 AM appt done
11:00 AM pick up zip car
11:15 AM load hubby, baby and all gear in car
11:30 AM pick up sister and head off to Westchester
12:15 PM arrive in Yonkers - no traffic on the BQE
1:00 PM lunch at 808 Bistro in Scarsdale for mom's birthday lunch.
2:30 PM head off to baby shower in Yonkers - leave hubby and kid with the family.
3:00 PM very early for baby shower even though invite said 3PM. 
6:45 PM leave baby shower even though it wasn't over to head over to cousin's house for son's bday.
7:15 PM reunited with family again. 
9:30 PM leave for Brooklyn - leave baby with parents because they insisted on taking the baby this weekend.  If they had it their way, they would have picked up the baby on Friday night. 
10:30 PM drop sister off at her apt
10:45 PM drop off zipcar - with 15 minutes to spare
Parents assume we would go out after we got home since they had the baby and we were "free".  But who goes out at 11pm anymore?  I head to bed and actually get a good nights sleep - straight.  No 2AM wake up call although my bladder still is on the 7AM schedule. 

Sunday - All day without baby :( 
Check on baby around 10AM and parents of course say everything is fine.
Ask via text what time they will be dropping the baby off....no response back.
Finally I call them around 4:30 and they say they are on their way...my baby was hijacked.
It's not like we did anything out of the ordinary with the baby not there.  We basically sat at our computers all day.  What an exciting life we lead. Pretty sure the baby did not miss us at all.  It's really the parents who miss the baby  more. 

Now baby woke up at 2AM and I fed him...and I can't go back to sleep.  It's 3:48 AM.  Insomnia totally sux.  I am going to be so exhausted in the morning.  I was tossing and turning for an hour. But I thought, why keep tossing and turning? Maybe I should just get up?  My  mind is working/thinking and I can't seem to turn it off. Hopefully work won't be too annoying to deal with today.
  

Friday - Date Nite!

This is a big week.  Today is my mom's 65th birthday.  Tomorrow the baby turns 6 months old!  Friday afternoon is his 6 month check up and Friday night is date night.  Saturday my cousin's son turns 7.  My sister so kindly volunteered to babysit on Friday for date night.  I don't recall the last time me and the hubby went out at night together alone.  It's been quite some time.  Since we won't be doing any romantic dinner on Valentine's day, Friday will be our pre-Valentine's celebration.  We plan on checking out a new restaurant in the 'hood called Talde. The head chef has been on the TV show "Top Chef" and he just so happens to be Filipino.  I am a fan of the show so I was kind of excited to find out this was opening right near where I live.  So of course I've got to show some support - not that he needs it - I mean the place is always packed.  Hopefully we can get seated.  
http://www.taldebrooklyn.com/

I'll review the food if I do get the chance to eat there.

Last night I tried to make a bundt cake and it totally got ruined :(.  I've been on this baking whimsy lately.  There's this site called Pinterest, which I never heard of before so decided to check it out to see what it was all about.  just a lot of how-to's from fashion to hair to food.  you can spend a lot of time searching through so many things.  and so i found this Fresh Strawberry Yogurt Bundt cake and decided to try it out.  Lesson learned - while the cake tastes delicious, when I tried to flip it over, half of it got stuck in the pan and half of it came out - Not enough grease in the pan!  Total Fail - I was supposed to bring it over to someone's house this evening.  My hubby says it's fine but it's a little embarrassing since it's in pieces.

My friend sent me the below link today and it's so cool - this woman takes a child's drawing and turns it into a stuffed animal. Of course not all art can be reinterpreted into a stuffed animal and she'll confirm what's possible but if you check out the site, she does an amazing job on the ones she can:
http://childsown.wordpress.com/
really awesome!! once my child can draw.

so the baby is still attempting to crawl.  right now, he is able to push himself backwards across the floor.  he gets pretty far.  i guess he's still building enough muscle so he can actually kneel on all fours.  that's progress considering before he could only roll onto his stomach and lift his head up.