Aha! or Duh!!

Libby's been eating baby food for about 2 1/2 weeks so far. And for the most part she's been doing amazing! She's really taken to eating it off the spoon very quickly, she seems to love the different flavors and she's been gaining weight. After the initial huge jump of about 10oz, she's slowed down quite a bit and it at just about 1lb gained over the past 2.5 weeks. Still, that's huge, especially for Libby.

One thing that hasn't gone great is Libby spits up. A lot. I mean A. Lot. She's been a very spitty baby ever since she came home-it's probably a combo of who she is and her surgery. I'm sure having your intestines blocked the entire time you were developing and then having them operated on makes them a little bit testy-even 8 months after surgery. Once she started eating baby food, she was spitting this up. She'd be spitting it up 8 hours after eating it! So the other day I dawned on me that I should move her eating time from morning to evening (she's still only doing once a day of baby food). She doesn't really ever spit up in her sleep and feeding at night means that she'd basically be asleep for 13 hours and letting the food settle and she wouldn't be moving around too much.

So last night I fed her at night and miracles of miracles, when she woke up this morning she hadn't spit up once! And more than that, all her spit ups today have been pure milk, meaning all her baby food last night is completely digested. Whoo hoo! Hopefully this means she'll be getting more calories and nutrition from her baby food now.

Mommy to Mommy Tip

Don't you love the tips that other mommies give you? Specifically the ones that work? I'll leave behind the advice to let my baby sleep in my bed, or in the crib, or to cry, or to pick up or to breastfeed or to bottle feed....I've already decided all those things...but the little tips that help make your day to day better? And are non-controversial? I'll take those! Here's one for you!

Libby is 8.5 months old-but just about 7 months adjusted age. My "What to expect the first year" book says she should probably be sitting up by 7.5 months. She is certainly getting better but she's not really that close. About one millisecond after letting her go, she face plants...or falls backwards. Thank goodness she has parents to catch her. But recently I found a great idea that helps her to sit completely on her own AND keeps her attention for a long stretch! Here it is....
I recently found one of those blocky-beady things in our toy box. It's one of those toys that you put it away and when you look for it again it went and had babies and you find you have 4 more of them. Somehow you collect toys like these but never actually use them. This one is quite sturdy and has 5 different sides with different activities on each side. She is able to put all her weight on it and it doesn't topple over or give and she's entertained. As soon as one side bores her we move to another side. She played with this the other day for at least 10 minutes. Which means 10 minutes of practicing her sitting. Nice!

Food Update!

Libby had her doctor's appointment a little more than a week ago. When I mentioned to the doctor I was concerned by how small Libby was he gave me a look like I was crazy. He said Libby was perfect and it was perfectly okay if she was small. He had no worries whatsoever about her size or weight. That felt like a load off my shoulders. It felt so good to know that our doctor was completely fine with the way Libby was growing.

Even with that, Libby only gained 5oz in a month. Gulp. Not good considering the low average is one pound. So we started her on food. On Monday last week she had oatmeal and-yay-she passed it just fine! No constipation like with the bananas. A few days later I added some coconut milk to her oatmeal. She seemed to struggle passing it but I wanted to preserve. She didn't have pain but it didn't seem to come as easily to her. To help her out, I tried out prunes on her (this was after waiting the 3-5 days per new food). She wasn't the biggest fan of the prunes. She ate only about half as much as she did the oatmeal. Still, she took it. Finally, 2 days ago, she had a HUGE diaper blow out (after having very small ones for the past few days) and she passed all her oatmeal and her prunes. Yay! So today she got prunes mixed with coconut milk. The girl LOVED it! She was super fussy before eating and even when I put her in her chair she kept fussing but after that first bite, she was ALL. OVER. IT. I tasted it and I had to agree, it was yummy. Tomorrow, we are trying pears! I bet she'll like those too. Oh, and her weight gain-going AMAZING! She has gained about 11oz in 9 days! Wow! I guess she just needed a little more calories but wasn't willing to work too hard for them!

So you be the judge-does she like the prunes??

Edit Note: I just weighed her now-she had a poopy diaper so I'm getting an accurate weight-she's up 13oz in just 9 days!! Wow! If she keeps this up she'll gain nearly 3 pounds this month!!

Three Year Old Boy!

This is what happens when you try and take a three year old boy's picture...
And finally you get a good one...
Happy birthday Jamie! Jamie turned 3 years old this past Monday. He's 34 pounds and nearly 38 inches. A big guy! He talks up a storm-often stringing together 12 words at a time. He's so good with talking-I love hearing what he's thinking about! He can jump, and run, and leap and flip. He's discovered he's a B.O.Y. and that he can be as rough and tumble and crazy as he wants!! He can scribble pictures and feed himself very well with utensils. He's picked up letters and numbers and knows maybe 10 letters by sight and 5-10 numbers. He can count close to 10. He likes chicken nuggets, pizza, homemade mac and cheese, grilled cheese and all (and I mean ALL) fruit. Often he chooses fruit over dessert! He hates boxed mac and cheese, eggs, and most vegetables. He's a funny guy and a lover. He's sweet and hugs and kisses and loves to make people laugh. He recently started liking Toy Story and Cars in addition to Thomas the Train. He's a sweetheart and I'm so lucky to have him as my son. Happy birthday Buddy!

New *Quick and Easy* Meal of the Week

A friend of mine does a New Meal of the Week post every so often (we both have kids, so those of you reading with kids know that "of the week" is code for "whenever I get a chance to do more than just catch my breath"). I am in a stage/funk where I'm finding it hard to find inspiration and motivation to cook more than 10 minutes at a time. I think it's a combo of being tired at the end of the day and the last thing I want to do for an hour is cook, having a baby who likes to start her witching hour at 5 pm-the exact time I start dinner, and kids that no matter what I make act like I am spoon feeding them wall paper paste.

So since Christmas I've been looking for E.A.S.Y. and quick meals. I thought it might be nice to post some of those for you-to at least give you a jumping off place on where you might be able to do a quick and easy meal.

So without further adieu-the first installment of...

Quick and Easy Meal of the Week!

Creamy and Cheesy Pasta

Ingredient:
-1 can cream soup (I had a homemade version of this-it's easy to google it and find a recipe-so showing is the powdered mix that I mixed with milk to make a substitute can of creamed soup)
-1 8oz container cream cheese
-Any spices/herbs of your liking (I had some Tastefully Simple Italian-type-seasoning to use up)
Cooked Pasta (for serving)
Directions:
1. Combine ingredients except pasta into a saucepan or a mini-slow cooker. Mix together, stirring as cream cheese starts to melt. If you are using a mini-slow cooker, it will cook on high for about 1.5 hrs or low for at least 3.



2. Once melted/combined well and heated through, pour over pasta and serve!
We served this with easy baked tomatoes. Halve and seed whatever tomatoes you have around. Stuff with bread crumbs (you can add herbs or Parmesan cheese if you like), and drizzle with Italian dressing or any other vinaigrette. Bake for about 15 minutes at 350. They turn into almost a tomato butter-very soft and almost sweet. Yum!

If you decide to try out this recipe, make sure to add salt to your liking. I found it needed quite a bit, but you may have a saltier can of soup than I did. Also, feel free to add in more cheese-Parmesan or Mozzarella would be lovely!

Oatmeal!!

This morning we tried Libby on oatmeal. It's been 2 weeks since the first time she tried food. She had 6 days of food-4 days of banana and 2 days of avocado-when we realized she was backed up. So she hasn't had food in about a week and a half now. She is cleared out and has had several normal BMs for her. So this morning we decided to try oatmeal with her. I did buy the store bought stuff even though I usually make baby food. I figured it might be even more refined and help it pass better. I decided to try oatmeal because I have read that it's a food that doesn't usually constipate.

I have to say, Libby took it REALLY well! 2 weeks ago when she first tried food she kept sticking her tongue out. That's usually a sign that she isn't ready for food. She did it most of the time all 6 days of eating food. Today she did not do that at all She opened her mouth, took it off the spoon (last time I had to let her suck on the spoon to get her to take it), and she opened her mouth for more every time the spoon came near her. I am so pleased to see such a big difference in just 2 weeks! Let's hope that this means she'll be good to go on baby food from now on!

Three Years Ago

Three years ago I was 39 weeks and 2 days pregnant, a full 8 days past when I delivered Anne and I thought I would be pregnant forever! I truly thought this baby would never come out.

(Only 37.5 weeks along in this picture)

Adding to the stress was the fact that if this baby wasn't born within 36 hours our midwife was going on vacation and we'd have a stranger deliver our baby or maybe even no one at all!

Right around 9 am I emailed some people at our church and asked them to pray that the baby would be born soon. John had just taken Anne to an all day playdate and I had ever intention of enjoying my very last day of freedom before I was the mother of 2 children. I planned to watch a little TV, clean up, go to my chiropractor appointment and maybe grocery shop. My chiropractor appointment was at 10:30 but for the life of me I couldn't get off the couch.

9:30 ish came and I knew if I didn't get up I wouldn't get in a shower. I reasoned with myself that it was worth not showering to lay on the couch another 15 or 20 minutes. At 10 am, knowing I couldn't really put off getting up any longer, I headed upstairs. I made it to my bed where I promptly laid down again. Fifteen minutes passed and I still couldn't get up. I was just so tired...and now starting to feel...off. It was about 10:15 and I called John and said I was feeling off and I thought he should come home. He asked if I could wait 30 minutes to see if anything happened and as I thought about it, I flashed to a mental image of me, alone in the hallway, in full labor. I told John that it would be better if he came home now just in case. Within 15 minutes I was in full blown labor, though I didn't know it. I called the midwife, and while it was ringing I unlocked the front door and locked up the dog. All the walking made my contractions feel better so I doubted if I was in real labor. I told the midwife all this and she decided it didn't matter if I was in labor or not, she would come immediately. She left her house within 5 minutes of talking to me and drove the hour and 10 minutes it took to get to my house.

After I got off the phone with her, I went into the computer room and got on hands and knees, rocking on the birth ball during what where, absolutely no doubt now, full blown contractions. They were so painful and intense there were a few I thought I might pass out from and then there were at least one or two that I was sure I had left my body and was watching myself from above. During the contractions I felt like I had to go to the bathroom and realizing I couldn't worry about that, I went into the bathroom and got on the toilet to labor. That's where my doula found me when she came at about 11 am. John arrived home about 20 minutes later and the second he walked in the door he knew I was ready to have this baby!

Sometime after getting on the toilet, I started pushing. It was the most amazing thing ever. I never had the urge to push with Anne, despite birthing naturally. With Jamie, I didn't have an urge either...I just PUSHED! There was no conscious thought to do it, my body just took over and did it. The doula and John asked if I was pushing-and during labor I have an odd habit of saying no to everything-so I told them no. One or two pushes later (while still on the toilet, mind you) I told them the baby was crowning. The convinced me to get off the toilet and onto a birth stool. I did. One or two pushes later I felt Jamie crown all the way, and worried because this was the part that hurt the most with Anne. I didn't need to worry because scarcely one push later and his head was out. Almost no pain at all. After his head was out I had to actually push hard to get his body out. It slid out easily but with Anne (and later Libby) they both slid out on their own basically after their heads were born. With Jamie I had to push! He was out, tumbling head of heels into John's waiting arms. Despite the midwife leaving right away, she missed the birth by a full 20 minutes or so. As Jamie tumbled safely into his daddy's arms, I saw immediately he was a boy and told John so. My baby was here!!

He went into my arms immediately and did not cry. I was worried, hoping he was okay and breathing but I saw his eyes shifting back and forth and knew he was fine. Milliseconds later he cried!

That was 3 years ago and now I have a fun loving, sweet hearted, funny, rough and tumble boy on my hands! Happy birthday Jamie!! You are my sweet little guy and I am so thrilled to have you in my life! I love you Buddy!!

A Plan

Libby is so small-like I said she is below the 5th percentile for her age. I just did some reading/research and saw that babies can eat coconuts without any problem! So I just went out and bought a can of coconut milk (ingredients are coconut and water) and after she does 4 days of cereal I will start mixing her cereal with the coconut milk. Let's say a prayer that this helps her gain some weight (and also that her doctor visit on Tuesday reassures me that he is feeling good about her weight-he has thus far). I also found other high calorie foods she can eat:

-Egg yolk
-Prunes
-Sweet potatoes (this and the above were the highest calorie baby foods per oz)

So when I got home from the store tonight I went online and ordered some cans of organic coconut milk and some organic baby cereal that has added DHA in it. Let's hope that within the next few weeks we see Libby chub up even more!

8 Months Old

Libby is 8 months old!

There isn't too much to report except that she is still itty-bitty. She goes in on Tuesday for the official weigh in and length check. I know she's still under the 5% mark on weight (though if you adjust her age she is actually at 5%) and she's probably still close to the 20% or so for height. She is growing just like Anne grew although she definitely has some Atwood blood in her-she's got nice chub to her cheeks and her legs.

The other new/big thing she's doing this month is she is moving all about! She isn't crawling but the rolling is out of control! We can put her down in the center of the room and stand back and watch and she practically does laps! She'll go from one end to the other to the other-touching several of the walls! Just last week I think she figured out that she can be purposeful in her rolling. Ie, that it gets her somewhere. She hasn't acted on that yet but I swear I saw her roll a few times and saw something different in her eyes-like she realized "Hey you mean that this gets me somewhere I want to go and *I* control it??" We'll have to see if she skips crawling and decides to roll until she walks!

We tried food about 2 weeks ago and after 6 days of food (4 of banana and 2 of avocado) poor Libby was so backed up and in such intense pain! We stopped all food until she passed her poo normally. It took her about 7 days! Poor baby! At least once a day we were in the tub with her rubbing her tummy and cycling her legs trying to help her go. But finally she's passed it all! Since her check up is in Tuesday I'm just going to wait and get some advice from the doctor on when to try again. He may say wait a few weeks or a month or maybe he'll tell me to try again right away and see how it goes. Either way, I will pick a tried and true non-constipative food when we do try again!

So that's it on Miss Libby for this month! She remains the sweetest little baby ever!