Two things baby...

Well, I just wanted to blog a little bit about some new developments on the baby front: 1) CCR and I went to the Austin Children's Museum and 2) I have officially started making CCR's baby food.

ACM
CCR and I went to the museum last Sunday during the open to the public free time. That is from 4-5pm. The museum has a place just for those babies that are 2 and under. It's a very sweet area with lots of neat things to do and see. We hung out in the "plush" corner for the duration of our visit, but I put Colton in the plush zone as well as put him on his tummy on a blanket on the carpet. Here's my conclusion about the museum: The 2 and under area is intended for children that are at least sitting up. While we will continue to visit between now and when CCR is officially sitting up on his own, but he will be severely limited in what he can interact with. I'm pretty much his toy whether we're at home or at the museum. Once a child is sitting up, they can take advantage of a very neat texture area. There are mobiles to look at when the babies are on their backs which is neat. However, I also recommend that your baby be at least sitting up because parents don't do a great job of monitoring their children. That goes for babies that belong in this area and those that are too old yet still come in. The baby area is fenced off and has little pass gates that are latched from the outside of the area. If children are old enough to operate these latches, then they come in. CCR was almost steam-rolled twice by children that were obviously older than 2 years. Not that I would anyway, but you CANNOT take your eyes off of your child, and you must be prepared to put your arm out to move a child away from yours or make assertive efforts to protect your child. I witnessed very sweet interaction between a few older children (about 1 year) because I was near a small steps/slide area of the baby zone. It's a great place for exposure to other kids without a formal playdate. The free time was busy, but the baby zone wasn't too bad. I would recommend going during the free time to allow your baby a short time to get accustomed. Just a few words of wisdom: Park in the AMLI parking garage, get your ticket validated at the little window in the lobby of the museum, don't pack a bunch of stuff (bring a backpack as a diaper bag because there's not really a good place to put strollers/bags that is supervised), and bring a camera. I thought at first that the trip would be wasted because I took CCR alone, but it turns out you can hang out, feed and photograph your baby by yourself. Try going by yourself and with your hubby, but you may find that a 2 adult to 1 baby ratio is cumbersome in the museum. I hope that I can go with some friends the next time. It was a lot of fun!!!

Baby Food
Tonight, Doug and I started making CCR's baby food. So far we've been feeding him Gerber 1sts which have been great for testing adverse reaction and traveling. Now we're trying to move into the habit of making his food. We want to start him on a diet limiting processed ingredients and an inundation of salt as well as expose him to foods outside the range of Gerber. My mother-in-law gave me a great baby puree book for Christmas, and I bought a second book from Amazon. They both have great recipes, tips about a particular ingredient and health information. Tonight we cooked pears on the stove and baked sweet potatoes in the oven. I made a pear puree which didn't need any additional ingredients. I also made sweet potato puree which ended up being 2 medium potatoes with 6 oz. of baby formula. I bought neat storage containers and I filled up 30 of my 40 1 oz. containers - 13 pears and 17 sweet potatoes. They're now in the freezer, and we'll start trying them out tomorrow. Hopefully he likes them. He is a mediocre fan of sweet potatoes and hasn't had any fruit yet. We shall see if we're successful. So far his favorites are squash, green beans and carrots - in that order. He's not a big fan of Gerber sweet potatoes (but he'll eat them) and he absolutely detests sweet peas...I'll continue working on that one obviously without pushing him too much. I want eating to be a great experience for him. A few words of wisdom: Involve your husband (Doug offered to help, and it was a great time for us), making the food - even with all of the steps - was very therapeutic, and you don't need to let the food cool all the way before you puree/chop/etc. We steamed the pears on the stove ( regardless of what your recipe says, peel the skins off first) and pureed. We baked two medium sweet potatoes in the oven and then pureed them. I ended up adding 6 total ounces of formula to the mix, but I did it 2 ounces at a time to get the right consistency. If anyone would like the recipes from my books, I'd be more than happy to post them. Just let me know if there is a specific ingredient you are interested in.

That brings me to another quasi-big announcement. We are no longer breastfeeding. When we introduced CCR to solids he naturally stopped wanting to nurse in the evenings. He would eat some solid food mixed with a formula bottle and would naturally fall asleep. So I would take care of the mommy duties after he went to bed. I continued nursing him in the mornings, but that was it. Last Thursday, I nursed him in the morning and then got really sick for the duration of the day. I concluded that I had eaten some spoiled eggs. Not wanting him to eat anything that was bad, I decided I would give him a bottle Friday morning just to be safe. I pumped and threw the milk away. I wanted to nurse until CCR was 6 months old, but he didn't seem to have any problem with the morning bottle on Friday. He had already reduced his nursing time as well as his interest in nursing altogether. About halfway through our morning time, he would lose interest and start arching his back, turning his head and just moving on to better activities. To me, he was letting me know that he was growing out of nursing on his own. When he didn't seem to have any adverse reaction to the bottle Friday morning, I figured he was done with nursing. So we just started giving him a formula bottle in the morning, and he's been doing great. Now without pumping and nursing, I find we go through canisters of formula much, much faster than before, but it seems to be CCR's natural progression as he is getting older. On a side note, I ended up stopping nursing just 3 days before I went to the ER with a kidney stone and they pumped me full of drugs. I am very thankful that the timing worked out such that I didn't have to discontinue nursing while dealing with a kidney stone. I am so blessed to have a baby that has simply grown out of nursing early but at a time when I would have had to do it anyway. My surgery on Monday would have required me to make some serious adjustments. I'm just glad they happened before all of this medical drama. Thank the Lord!