Hungry Toddler, she is not

This is k's first taste of solids. at 6 months. Echhhhhhh. Poor girl - would YOU enjoy being force fed rice cereal mixed with boob milk? I'm convicted that it's because of this first ick experience that k has since eschewed solids in every shape, color, smell and consistency. My first mistake in feeding her tasteless blah rice cereal was compounded by my second ever-more grave mistake: feeding her jarred baby food. If you've ever tasted jarred baby food, you may have shared my reaction, which amounted to: yelling "what the BLEEP???" and hurling the jar with all its inconsumable contents across the room. On the spectrum of things I never want my taste buds to experience, jarred baby food falls somwhere between 3-week old elephant manure and cat piss on a bush (I don't know why a bush - I just have this image in my head).

I've been blindly and desperately perusing baby recipes, talking to other moms and spending all our disposable income at Whole Foods to get nourish k - all to no avail. K will not eat! Except cheerios and slices of american cheese, that is. She obviously (and justifiably) still harbors deep distrust and resentment over the rice cereal incident.

So this eating strike (not really a strike I guess b/c she never ate to begin with) has me losing sleep and really highlights my Type A personality because I read somewhere that the greatest nutritional deficiency in toddlers is iron. Iron deficiency is dangerous because it leads to slower brain development as iron helps make red blood cells, which carry oxygen to the brain. Insufficient levels of iron in children has even been linked to ADHD. Apparently millions of children are deficient in iron and the parents don't have a clue because the symptons are not always apparent.

Not that I need to give you another thing to worry about...at least this means we should be indulging in more steak dinners.

The precious moments where k really throws it down and makes Hungry Momma proud.

Pop Quiz

How often do you wonder what type of mother you are/will be? This seemingly complex and tremendously important matter can easily be resolved by contemplating the following scenario:

Your nearly 13 month old toddler refuses to take her regular afternoon nap (which affords you time to eat/nap/email/do windsor pilates). You do which one of the following in response:

a) Lovingly hold and coddle her for as long as it takes for her to nap.
b) Let her skip the afternoon nap and go about your daily routine, which includes playing peek-a-boo 10 times 10 to the power of infinity.
c) Plunk her down in front of the Wiggles and make yourself a double scotch, straight up.

Yup, K missed her afternoon nap today, which in a SAHM's world is the equivalent of having a bad hair day on the morning of your senior prom, after your dream date calls to say he's in the emergency room with food poisoning. And there is a meteor-sized zit in that space betwen your eyes.
Needless to say, we all survived this episode of missed-nap (there wasn't a drop of scotch to be found in the house but I did scrounge up some dark chocolate). It is my firm belief that toddlers come closest to their angelic origins when they are fast asleep, as the evidence clearly shows...

The Easter dress

Yesterday was K's second Easter, but as she was 3 weeks old for her first Easter and those days were a complete blur, we celebrated her "first" Easter this past Sunday. We know Easter is not about toxic egg dyes and grown men in bunny suits at the mall. It's not even about having your eyes assaulted with too much pastel color. It's about one thing and one thing only: the Easter dress.*

Those pigtails stayed in a record 59 minutes. It was a special day indeed.

*Ha, just kidding. I'm not a heathen, really.

Another cold!

K has another cold. This makes it her 3rd in 12.5 months (children normally average 8-10 per year but of course k was quarantined from germ-ridden society most of her newborn life). And what does k get to do when she's sniffling and sneezing? Dang near anything she pleases. Which means...we play the fabulous spoon-the-cheerios game!

K is, as of late, fascinated with spoons and the concept of spooning. And what's more fun to spoon than a godzilla-sized jar of cheerios?

When does all the wild and zany fun end, you ask? Of course when the inevitable happens...

For anyone who's wondering, that's k's "you know you had it comin, mama" look.

Does she walk yet?

This the most popular inquiry these days by strangers and friends, now that she is hovering around the 12-month mark. And I normally reply, with a sigh of relief: "Nope!" Relieved because a walking toddler doesn't fit well into my generally lazy parenting scheme. Imagine having to shadow k everywhere at every waking moment! But as you can see from pics, the time is soon at hand...

<>

Plastic sucks, part II

Not that I needed any more research reports to convict me of the evils of plastic, but there is another recent comprehensive report substantiating my paranoia:
http://www.environmentcalifornia.org/uploads/Ve/AQ/VeAQsr6MMu4xA3-2ibnr_g/Toxic-Baby-Bottles.pdf

The above study shows that every major baby bottle on the market was tested for the culprit Bisphenol-A, which is well established as a cause of cancer, impaired brain development, immune system issues, obesity, diabetes, early onset of puberty - in short, BpA is a particularly harmful toxin. And as the study concludes in their testing, every baby bottle tested contained BpA and it leached into [insert your baby]'s milk when the bottle was heated or washed with a harsh detergent! Argh!!!

That's the bad news. There is no good news, but an interesting angle on this is that at least now we have a very credible piece to the puzzle of why such an alarming number of children in the U.S. these days suffer from allergies, obesity, early puberty, etc.

A more uplifting post to come, I promise.

K's 1st birthday she-bang

This is a much belated post but here it is, pics from K's 1st birthday party and a list thrown together of a few life lessons learned the hard way.
lesson #1 - crafting the invite list: leave kids off the guest list at all costs. the presence of kids in your home guarantee spills, food on the floor, vomit, noise at decibels similar to a cargo plane operating at full throttle, and otherwise unmitigated chaos. i used m&ms to bribe them to behave but then one of them started puking on the floor - a m&m overdose i suspect!

lesson #2 - time management: if it's daylight savings time, then remember to change the clocks the night before. otherwise you will find yourself standing by the oven the morning of the party trying to calculate when to heat up the pastry hors d'oeuvres and it will dawn on you that you should have put them in the oven 60 minutes ago because you forgot to change the clocks, the guests are actually arriving in 15 minutes, the baby is still in her pajamas (as are you) and now you have a nervous breakdown.

lesson #3 - the law of putting things in the freezer and forgetting about it: never put a champagne bottle in the freezer and swear you won't forget about it because you will close the freezer and immediately forget about it. that is, until 9 hrs. later when you remember and open the freezer, only to see a mess of slush and broken glass. which leads me to lesson #3.25: never try to lick up champagne slush.

lesson #4 - public floggings: there is nothing wrong with subjecting guests who willfully and recklessly neglect to RSVP and show up at the party anyway, to a public flogging. it is without a doubt a most appropriate response by the hostess toward a guest who failed to give notice about attending the party with their spouse, 2 screaming toddlers and one cat (ok, maybe there was no cat). flogging is recommended because it is more humane than stoning and minimizes damage to your home (as we all know, hardwood floors are a pain to keep scratch-free as it is).

I'm sure there are plenty I forgot and am now doomed to repeat my mistakes. And no, I didn't bake cupcakes for k's party. The mountain of strawberry cheesecake frosting went unused because I ran out of time to bake the actual cupcake. I did bake one on k's actual birthday because I hate hate hate to bake and that's how much I love my little girl (if i can't feel a little smug on my daughter's birthday, then when?)