Play Food

When my kids play "house" or "restaurant", they like to have pretend food to play with. Only trouble is I really do not like purchasing inexpensive plastic junk food for them to play with. There are some great play foods out on the market today, for example at Ikea they have material veggies in a basket, like we'd get at the Farmers' Market. There are also some good wooden foods out there too like Melissa and Doug, but they are a little out of my price range. Another solution that I've come up with is whenever I finish a packaged raw food product, I let them use the container as part of their play food. It's great! They have spirulina jars, hemp protein powder containers, vega packages, Chlorella and sproutein containers, and a cornucopia of other items. Makes for interesting free play, for sure!

A Day in the Life

Every so often I keep track of what a day looks like for each of my babies. I've got a 15 min. increment of a day where Andrew was about 18 months old. I sometimes make them very detailed, or other times make it just a casual account of what we did on a particular day. These days are a typical day, not some day where we have a field trip out, or some special occasion. I love to look back on these daily accounts to remind me of where we were at that moment in time. It's like a snapshot.

Here's a snapshot of a typical day right now, Logan is 8 months old:

Wake up around 7 to 7:30am. He's full from nursing from 5 to 7am off and on.
Place Logan on the Baby Björn potty and he usually does his business.
Dress him (more often than not!) :)
I shower while James interacts with him and gets ready for the day.
Logan goes downstairs with the other kids and James and sits at the table playing with his toys. He's not super interested in food, especially in the mornings he just wants to play.
Gets bundled in the car seat to take his siblings to school.
Falls asleep between 9:15am and 9:30am. If it's a running day for me, he falls asleep in the stroller and I transfer him when we get home. If it's not a running day he usually falls asleep in the van on the way home from the school. Again I transfer him.

He sleeps anywhere from 1 to 2 and a half hours. Recently I believe he's been going through a growth spurt so he's slept well, even with his teething. During his sleep time I take 15 min. at a time to do housework (thank you Flylady!)in various areas of the house. Laundry is also done at this time. I work quickly not knowing how long he's going to sleep. Every 45 min. I take a 15 min. computer break, juice/smoothie break or reading break.

Upon waking I will take him to his potty again, and more times than not he does a pee. It's fun to see someone so little on the potty! I'll have to take a photo and post it! He gets a some momma milk to fill him up. Then we pick up his brother Andrew from half day kindergarten. Have some park play time on the sunny days and head home on the rainy ones. Then it's lunch time.

At lunch Logan usually tries a new food if it's earlier in the week, or is getting a mix of the ones he's tried already. Still I think most of it still comes back out but he's really keen to try anything I put in front of him. Nori sheets, avocado, and bananas are the three we've done so far. He drinks water and I'd like to begin making very simple smoothies for him soon as well. Andrew gets a real kick out of the faces Logan makes while eating. Again I'll have to take a photo and post it! He also nurses either before or after eating.

Then there's a mix of doing household chores, playing games with Andrew, 15 min. of computer time total - 5 min. increments during the afternoon hours. I usually put him on the potty between 1-2pm so that he's done something before napping again. And this is also when I've been giving him a bath. One of our baths is useful over the kitchen double sink. He baths and soaks there while I do some clean up in the kitchen. Getting two things done at once has been great! Love to start dinner in a clean kitchen. Then he's ready for his second nap. Recently Logan's been falling asleep while I nurse him around 2pm. This presents a challenge as my daughter is done school at 2:45pm. He's usually in a deep sleep at that time and I don't like to wake him. Here's where having your parents just down the street comes in really handy! My mom and dad are great, and at a moment's notice if they are available, they will go to pick up Jasmine. This way Logan usually sleeps from 2 to 4 or 2 to 4:30. There have been times when his morning nap was shortened (due to running errands etc.) that he'll sleep for three hours in the afternoon! Great little sleeper, even with his teething (thank you teething necklace and Camilia). Actually he didn't have either today and slept 2 hours and 15 min.!

Again, once he wakes up he sits on the potty and usually goes. I don't force the issue. If he's fussy, or he hasn't gone within about 5 min. I thank him for trying and we go on with our day. He nurses sometime between his nap and dinner. Then I wear him while helping to make dinner, or getting homework done with the older kids. We all sit together for dinner and he experiments with his food and drink once again while sitting in his great hook on chair by Chicco. I highly recommend it! He's really figured out how to drink from a straw, the sippy cup is just a teething tool at the moment. Although I must say about 1/3 of the water goes in him while the other 2/3 comes out when he uses the straw.

He plays alongside us as we get the older two ready for bed, and do our evening routines. If he's fussy he nurses and is fine once again to play. Once the big kids are clean, brushed, read to and cuddled (he is a big part of that too) we settle in together and he nurses to sleep between 8:30 and 9:30pm. He's a pretty good sleeper in the evenings. He can sleep anywhere from 4 to 9 hours in a row. I'd say it's consistently around 5 hours to begin with. So he starts the night on his own but when he wakes I'm right there beside him and nurse him back to sleep. Sometimes he doesn't wake again until morning and other nights he needs more momma time. Best sleeper of the bunch at this age though.

And then it's 7am and the ebb and flow of our day begins again. With kids I do find they like routine but I've never been one to enforce a routine. Logan's happy with this rhythm right now (since spring break) and who knows how long it will last as it seems that once you find they settle into a routine and you get comfortable with it, it changes again. But for now I'm enjoying a little bit of consistency. And there you have it, a little glimpse into the Life of Logan as it goes this April, 2011.

Kristen's Giveaway!

I've been following Kristen's Raw for some time now, and she's got a babe just a couple months older than Logan. She's doing a huge giveaway this week! You have until the 13th to enter! Do it fast! Here's the link.

Good luck! Let me know if you win!

Gardening with Li'l Sprout!

Now that it seems spring has finally sprung here on the west coast, my thoughts have turned to gardening. I look gorward to playing in the garden with the kids. They love to taste food fresh from the garden. Today I was blessed to receive this article in my in box. In it are some great ideas for gardening with babies and kids. Serendipity, love the timing!

Here is the article at Mothering, enjoy!

Happy growing!

Logan's First Foods

My little baby is growing up so fast...he's finally started eating solids. I've put off giving him solids until he seemed ready. There was much conversation about this in our family. My husband wasn't sure it was a good idea and kept asking each day when I'd give him some real food. I like the quote, "Food before one is just for fun". So long as the child is healthy there is no real reason to force solid foods on the baby. My parents, friends, my in laws all started questioning me about why Logan wasn't eating solids yet. I'd simply answer, "because he's not ready yet". I did purchase a scale though and found out that he's 21 pounds at 8 months, he's not hurting for nutrition! Loving the scale. I put him on it before a feed and then again after a feed and he takes in about 8 or 9 oz. I will only weigh him once a week just to see how he's gaining. I like not having to go to a germ infested doctor's office, or public health office to weigh him. So it's been nice having it at home. Logan seemed happy to be at the table with us at meal times, just playing with his toys, until recently...

His sister Jasmine (now 8) was ready for solids far before 6 months but we waited until then and she nearly jumped out of the high chair when I fed her her first solids, rice cereal. We always joke that her first solid food was page 59 from the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit edition that she'd found on the coffee table and ingested before daddy could get it all out of her mouth! Jasmine's always been a very good eater, and enjoys her veggies, whole foods and international flavours.

Andrew (Age 6) is another story. He is an extremely picky eater and it is incredibly challenging when it comes to getting something healthy into his mouth. In retrospect I believe I started solids too early with him. He was disinterested in food at 6 months and although he was just able to sit up, he was also crawling and did not want to be kept in one place long. He too we stared on rice cereal at 6 months. He would eat it but not with any enthusiasm. One food he used to LOVE was Avocado...not anymore, he always makes remarks about my avocado when I eat one. Maybe had I waited things out until he was excited about food, perhaps he'd like more variety now. Come to think of it I would get the gag reflex every time I tried to eat salad while I was pregnant with him. So either he made me feel that way or due to my inability to get many greens down me I inadvertently have made him a picky eater. Either that or the joke that Andrew's first food was fishy crackers! Jasmine had left them out from and he had five in his mouth, at about 5 months of age not knowing what to do with them. I quickly got them out and had to laugh as dairy and wheat were two things my kids never ate until they were almost 2 years old!

They were introduced to dairy and wheat late as I was concerned about allergies, not because of how I eat now. Then, Jasmine got seasonal allergies and I wondered about possible asthma as she coughed every time she ran a little bit. When we cut dairy out her running cough went away and her nose no longer ran seasonally. Andrew never had another ear infection after we cut out dairy from his diet. They have it occasionally now, when at a party or out for dinner but we don't have it at home, instead we drink almond milk, rice milk and other home made nut milks.

In my first two pregnancies I ate vegetarian, with a small amount of fish at times. I ate absolutely no sugar in the first trimester of Jasmine's pregnancy but with Andrew didn't eat as healthy as that. While nursing I ate vegetarian with both, but ate lots of carbs! With Logan's pregnancy it was all about how much green I could get into my body. I ate mostly raw vegan/vegan or what I've heard termed beegan. I still eat honey at times. I ate more veggies with his pregnancy than I did in the other two combined! I did include some cooked foods, steamed or baked veg, sprouted breads, quinoa, and maple syrup, but kept it as healthy as possible!

So when Logan was not interested in food at 6 months, we delayed introducing anything to him. And waited...and waited. He did not sit up unassisted for any length of time until 7 months. He never grabbed for our food until just the last couple of weeks! He always grabbed for my drinks though so at about 6 months we gave him water in a sippy cup. He can actually drink from a straw better than from a sippy! This will be good for green smoothies, for sure! So this last week, I've started giving him some of what I'm eating in a kind of modified BLW (Baby Led Weaning) type of way. If he grabs for it I give him some. Here's what he grabbed for this week: nori sea weed sheet (this was messy!), banana, and sweet potato. I don't think he really ingested much of the banana or the sweet potato, but he licked it and liked it. The sea weed was another story. He would hold some in his hand and suck on it and I'd tear off little pieces and put it in his mouth. He would suck on it and then reach for more. I can no longer eat it without giving him some! He really loves the stuff.

We're still nursing 24 hours...he's not up as much at night but when he's teething he is much more in need of being close like that. In the daytime he's very interested in what's going on around him so our nursing sessions are short but he's taking in a lot of liquid...so his diapers are telling me. The goal is to keep him hydrated, full and enjoying some fun while experimenting with new foods and tastes. He will eat vegan, mostly raw for as long as we can. The other two kids eat like their dad - the standard North American diet. They eat vegetarian until dinner and even then we eat veggie or vegan about half the nights of the week. It's good to have some influence over how they are eating but I also have to remember that I'm not the only parent in the house and have to respect James' wishes as well. Still working on that though, in a gentle nudging sort of way! :)

Can't wait to see what he'll be interested in next...I'm thinking avocado as I have a few ripe ones on the counter ready for the weekend.

Here is to happy healthy kids! What was your child's first food?

One year ago...

It was one year ago, the month of April was a time of great anxiety for me and my husband. On March 26, 2010 we had our first ultrasound for our third baby. We were thrilled, we were finally going to meet our L'il Sprout - well as close as we'd get until early August. The ultrasound went well, the tech was really friendly but a couple of times she went looking closer than I remember with my last two ultrasounds with the big kids. One time I thought I saw something white in the brain. Then I told myself not to be silly that I was just making up things in my mind and told myself to remain calm and think happy thoughts!

The next Monday we received a call from the midwife. My heart sank. I knew something was wrong. My heart in my throat, my stomach in knots I listened to the midwife talk about a choroid plexus cyst and a two vessel cord.

Of course the first place I went to was the internet, tears streaming down my face as the midwife said that alone these two soft markers for chromosomal abnormalities would not be as alarming. Because they presented together we were told that we needed to do further testing if we were to determine what our baby may be dealing with. This time, the internet served as a source of inspiration as I read about kids with Trisomy 18 that had beaten the odds and lived longer than a year. I read about how many people had experienced two vessel cord pregnancies and given birth to perfectly healthy children.

A choroid plexus cyst is a cyst found in the choroid area of the brain. More are being found in today's scans because the resolution is so high. It is believed that the technology is ahead of the understanding on why some fetuses still have these at 21 weeks while others do not. It may be a normal part of brain development. However in some cases the cysts do not disappear after 26 weeks and then the baby may have a chromosomal abnormality; trisomy 18 is very commonly connected to this issue.

The two vessel cord is something that happens in 1 of 100 live births. It is quite commonly connected to twins, higher maternal birth and multiple pregnancies. Well, not twins, but I am older and this is my third pregnancy. I figure my body knew that I was able to support the babe on just two vessels, heck who needs to waste time on the third one!

My husband and I did a lot of soul searching that month. We'd been told it could just be a variation of the norm and nothing to worry about...easy to say, harder to do. We did a lot of worrying too! Every time I saw a baby commercial on the t.v. I just burst into tears. I would cry thinking about how selfish I was to want a third child (when we'd already been blessed with two beautiful kids already) and wondered how a baby with special needs or a baby that would not survive would impact my other two kids. It was truly heart-breaking. I remember blowing out my candles two days before we went in to the specialist...wishing...hoping.

April 29th, 2010. I couldn't eat that morning I was so nervous - and had a belly full of baby and water for the ultrasound. We didn't wait long. The ultrasound tech took us in, and lubed up my belly...I knew that my life could change in the next instant and waited for the specialist to come in. And there he was, sipping on a cup of joe, as if he didn't have a care in the world...how could he be so relaxed at a time like this?! But his relaxation was contagious. He got started right away and went straight for the heart - as that is commonly affected by a 2 vessel cord. Heart's in good shape he tells us. This is great, that's great, the cyst is gone and look, the baby's giving you the "Thumb's Up" sign! In fact, there was the baby doing just that. I figure the baby was saying, "All is good here mom, stop worrying and get these cameras out of my face!" The doctor told us that there was absolutely nothing to worry about and if we like we could come back closer to the end of the pregnancy to see if the baby's growth was on par with the norm. Sometimes small birthweight is a side effect of the two vessel cord.

We kept asking him to confirm that our baby was not affected by either of these issues. The cyst was gone, the heart was good, the two vessel cord had taken over nicely and it was in fact a variation of the norm. WOW! Best birthday present ever! I could finally breathe. Even with that information, it still stays in the back of your mind the rest of the pregnancy. However, on Logan's birth day when I looked into those eyes for the first time, I knew he would have been perfect no matter what the outcome had been. So full of love and wonder then and now as he grows into such an amazing little person.

Teething time...again!

It is only a matter of time before Logan has a full mouth of toofers (my child speak for teeth). He cut his first tooth at 3 months, but it went back down and didn't make another appearance until 5 months. That was his front right bottom tooth. A week later he had his second tooth. This was the front left tooth on the bottom. Love discovering new teeth. I always wash well before putting my hand in his mouth. These teeth are looking great and pearly white, I guess that's one reason they call them milk teeth.

We have Logan wearing a teething necklace like the multicoloured one here. The multicoloured one didn't seem to work as well as the butter coloured one. The lighter the colour of the amber, the more succinic acid there is to be absorbed by the body. Amber has been used for many years in places like Europe for helping many different ailments. The body heats up the amber, releasing the succinic acid and this helps to calm the baby's teething symptoms. It has analgesic and anti inflammatory properties. We noticed a difference in Logan as soon as he began wearing it.

We got ours here. Logan is the fourth picture in their photo gallery.

He was still somewhat drooly and unhappy so we used this necklace with homeopathic camilia drops and it worked really well. He slept better, was not as cranky during the daytime and no longer shoved his hand in his mouth constantly. We also put ice cubes into a mesh eating contraption so he can chew on that and freeze the area without being concerned about choking. He LOVES being able to do this! We're glad too we can keep him happier naturally!

What do you do to help your little ones with their teething troubles?