Baby Food Cafe

I read about this restaurant where they serve homemade organic baby food to your table.  Neko and I had to check this out.  They definitely didn't nail it.  First of all, the baby food takes 45 minutes, the adult food comes quickly.  Not quite sure what they are thinking.  We ordered some food to take after my lunch.  They served it in a bowl just as we were ready to go.  Their only size is a large soup bowl so you'd have to go with like 15 babies to eat it all.  We got it to go though and I'm psyched to try it. We got carrot and broccoli.  Neko has gotten a little funny about eating.  She is not that into eating from a spoon anymore, she wants to feed herself, but she isn't quite there.  She can't get a spoon with food into her mouth, just the spoon.  She can pick up small pieces of banana and avacado but she doesn't bring them to her mouth.  She loves to suck on pretzels and toast or hard bread so I try to put hummus on it for a few nutrients.  Today I put a half a banana in her hand and she did seem to gum that and eat quite a bit.  In the restaurant, she was sucking on broccoli and eating little bits at the restaurant so I may try more of that.  She has no teeth though so it is scary to give her stuff. 

Diaper Debate

I'm currently debating the cloth diaper thing.  I found an eco-friendly cloth diaper service in NYC but it is a little bit expensive, 30 dollars a week which is about 4x as much as for our somewhat eco-friendly disposable diapers.  It uses the fold-up kind which I've been experimenting as a friend of my mom's gave us some at Neko's shower which are from a service in North Carolina where she lives.  There are a few problems -- they are bulkier and don't seem that comfortable with the cotton the strappy closure thing and the plastic cover, you definitely have a much more face-to-face experience of poop, although that may be because we don't have a disposal bin for them, but most of all you have to change them every time the baby wets, which as it turns out is like every two hours.  With the disposables we only use like 4-5 diapers a day.  So that alone is untenable.  But as a green mom blog pointed out the fact that my disposables are 60 percent biodegradable is a moot point because you'd have to take them apart and separate that part out to get it to biodegrade.  So, I've ordered a couple of the all-in-one organic diapers to see what that is like.  They are super expensive. A pack of 24 of the Bum Genius ones was over 500 dollars but supposedly they are adjustable so you just have to buy them once so over two years (but almost taking that long) you would save money. There is actually a big market for resale of these, surprisingly.  It would be great not to be adding to our ridiculous amounts of garbage as we order in twice a day plus coffees which makes me sick.  And they are pretty cute and comfy looking, the all-in-one diapers.

So tired

Why are we the only people whose baby awakes every three hours all night (that's the good part of the night, the bad part moves to like an hour and a half).  I just don't know what we are doing so wrong and I don't want to do the crying cure as I know she can cry all night, I don't logically know why it would work. I would simply take from that that my parents don't give a s--t about me. 
We went to a really fun movement class yesterday.  Apparently you are not supposed to prop your baby up to sit until they can get into that position themselves.  Whoops, meanwhile we've been letting her sit and play or sit with us on the couch hours every day. Supposedly for proper development the baby should be on the bare floor bare-legged with lots of tummy time most of the time.  Neko is a little behind on both her crawling and babbling, so maybe it is because we retarded her development.  The teacher said she can catch up in no time with three days of practice. Or she could be getting brain damage from lack of sleep. Today she is just waking from her second half hour nap.  What to do?

Onion Cold Cure

We had great success last night with a home remedy suggested by a friend.  Neko has been very stuffed up and we have had desperate nights as she can't get enough to eat and so has been waking frequently. I almost ferberized her the other night. I just didn't have the energy to feed her two hours after she'd just eaten and even after eating she was crying which is very unusual. I dragged the pak-n-play downstairs and was going to just let her cry all night once and for all (more about another friend's experience with The Dream Team and Crying Cure in another post), but when I got back upstairs Regis with his gimpy leg had managed to get her up and quiet her until I could deal again.  So last night, we put the two legs of the co-sleeper on books so that she could sleep at an incline and chopped an onion and put it by the bed.  Was a little gross smelling all night, but we all had a much better sleep than we have had in days. I thought the smell might induce some strange dreams, but not so last night. I highly recommend it. My friend got the idea from her naturapath pediatrician. We also use AYR Saline Nasal Gel which seems to get the nose running and boogers out. I have yet to use the Nosefrida my pediatrician, Dr. John Snyder (until St. Vincent's let him go boo hoo) had me buy. I'm kind of scared.  Check it out and read the reviews, pretty hilarious. 

Karma

Well, for bad mouthing my husband I was punished.  He is currently immobilized on crutches so now I really am responsible for the whole household.  It's exhausting, but kind of fulfilling to just feel utterly spent physically at the end of a day.  Today in mommy/baby yoga during the relaxation we had our legs up the wall and Neko was nursing and they started playing either James Taylor or Cat Stevens, the song where it goes, "we've got time . . . " and I started crying a little. I just realized how precious the time is with this baby, how quickly it goes.  But we will have a lot of quality time, I just need to appreciate every minute.  Even if I die when my mom did at 54, I'll still have almost 20 years with her.  And if the promise of the vegan diet we've been feeding the boys is true then they should live another 15 years, so we do have time as a family.  But, I really want to just savor every bit and I guess the sadness is that this is impossible.  We are so lucky right now being all together.

Going It Alone

A younger friend without many other mom friends asked me today if I am getting other things done.  I said that no, I can't seem to get anything done.  When I've said that to other people with kids they have replied laughng that they didn't get anything done for a decade.  My friend asked if Regis, who works at home, is much help and I shook my head.  I have to say that having a baby is very uneven.  While breastfeeding I don't know how to change that, and even if I weren't I still do pretty much everything unless I ask specifically.  Then I get an hour or two off, but the other 20 -22 hours a day are pretty much me. We aren't the most modern family, but we both work at home, we both wanted the baby, and I had said I didn't want to do all the work.  The only even division of work I've seen is in families with twins or families where the mom is simply gone, like in medical residency or work travel.  The only way I have found to keep from being constantly frustrated with this situation is to think to myself that I am doing it alone and I give myself a pep talk saying: I can raise this baby, do meaningful work, and keep a household all by myself.  Then I'm pleasantly surprised when I do have help.  I think I don't even realize how good I have it having Regis at home.  If I want to go for a run or have to get to a meeting or simply can't take it anymore I can just go.  I can't imagine waiting and waiting for a husband to get home at 6, 7, or 8  to hand off the baby.

Grandfather spoiling

I caught my dad, Bobob to Neko, feeding her cake today at my cousin's engagement lunch.  Not exactly on any of the recommended lists I've read for first foods.  Sugar, wheat and dairy all at once.  Ah well, what can ya do? I asked my dad one day, "Why are you feeding the dogs donuts?"
"Because they love them," he replied.
At least she doesn't have teeth to rot.

Rough Day

Could she possibly be hitting another growth spurt at 7 1/2 months? I just fed her for an hour from 6:30 to 7:30 and had to use my finger to pry her off me since I couldn't take it any more. Now she has been in the crib crying for half an hour. The books say there is a 4 and 8 month growth spurt and they describe it as like 2 days when the baby eats every two hours. But, Baby Neko ate every two hours day and night from 3 1/2 months to six months. Today she only napped twice for about 45 minutes each time and with 20 to 30 minutes of extra feeding to get her down. I don't know if I can take an extended period like this again.