Making your own baby food

I'm a cheap frugal person.  If I can (easily) do something for way cheaper, I will do it.  Since my whole adult life I've either been a student or a stay-at-home parent, so after studying and chores are done, finding ways to produce stuff for less is a good economic use of my time.  I'm not a couponer or anything, but I generally cook my own food and shop sales.

That's part of the reason why I nurse (it's so much healthier, and formula makes poop smell gross, and formula costs money, and bottles are equipment I'll have to wash, and I'm just lazy like that!) and that's why I don't buy baby food.

I was at the grocery store the other day, and I happened to walk by the baby food aisle.  Now that Mace is eating solids (and boy, is he eating!!) I buy rice cereal to mix in with stuff, but that's it.  I figure a couple dollars for a big box of ... powdered rice/oats (whatever!) ... is an okay thing to spend money on.  I can't make it myself.  But then I look at the baby food, and think, "75 cents for a baby's-fist's-sized jar of ... peas?  I can buy a whole POUND of frozen peas for a buck!!"  How hard is it to boil some peas and stick 'em in a blender?

I guess then the question is, "If you make your own baby food ... do you have to make it in small batches or something so it doesn't go bad before your baby gets around to eating it?  Jars of baby food are preserved."  Simple solution: Freeze it!  When Carmen was a baby, I read that you can put your homemade baby food into ice cube trays and freeze them.  Then when it's time to eat, you just thaw the food cubes in the microwave and feed them to your baby.  Voila!  I fill ice cube trays with pureed food, then when they're frozen I transfer them into a big plastic Ziploc bag so I can make another batch of baby food.  Easy peasy.

This is the website I use as my guide for feeding my baby.  I love it, and it gives me ideas of the new foods I can introduce to my baby and when.

Mace started eating food at the beginning of November (he was about 6.5 months old).  We started with rice cereal mixed with milk, then introduced applesauce and bananas and zucchini and whatnot.  Applesauce is easy because you can buy it in BIG jars.  Just be sure to buy applesauce that's just apples and not sugar.

Sometimes Mace wasn't a big fan of the new food I'd introduce to him.  So I'd put the new food into a bowl of applesauce-rice and feed him mostly applesauce and a little bit of the new food, then increase the amount of the new food in each spoonful until he was eating the new food without complaint.  Other times, I'll take one thawed cube of food (carrots, zucchini, sweet potato, whatever) and mix it into a big bowl of applesauce.  I figure the flavors are mild enough that he won't notice the difference, and most of his nutrition comes from milk anyway.  Supposedly.  That kid eats so much it makes me wonder how he packs it all down (but he refuses to nurse more ... he wants food and squawks for it!). :p

I love how communicative Mace is about food.  When he wakes up in the morning, I nurse him, and about 20 minutes later we all have breakfast together.  Usually Mark makes bacon and eggs (sometimes I do) and I put Mace in his high chair.  He bounces around and kicks his legs and smiles and grunts at us, and when I *finally* have his food ready, he LUNGES at the spoon and gobbles up whatever I'm feeding him.  And when he's still hungry, he grunts at me and cries.  If we're out somewhere and he's hungry and he sees us eating, he cries and reaches towards the food and growls "Rawwwrr, aaarrrgggghhhh!!!  Um-um-um-um!!" until I let him have a little taste of whatever I'm eating that is OK for him to eat (if I'm eating out, I always try to order something that contains something Mace-friendly, or I stick a banana and a spoon in my diaper bag.) and then he lets out this really cute content noise, like, "Aaaahhh, mmmm-nom."

And it kind of makes my heart burst with love for him.

One of my favorite foods to feed him is banana, because we cut the banana in half and scoop the fruit out with a spoon.  It's very self-contained and easy to do.  Some people like giving their babies solid foods in little pieces to play with in their hands and feed themselves ... but I think that's very messy, so I'd rather be a clean control freak and spoon-feed them myself.  When Mace gets teeth, I'll give him little bits of food he can chew on (like red bell peppers) that won't get all mushy and messy and gross.

Our schedule goes something like this:
Morning - nurse, breakfast
Then I try to go to the gym after he takes a brief nap
Noonish - nurse, lunch
Afternoon nurse
He takes a short nap at some point in the afternoon, either before or after the afternoon nursing, depending on when he gets cranky
Evening - nurse, dinner, bed.

Most of the time, the food is some kind of combination of vegetable cube mixed with applesauce, and half a banana.  Mace eats 1-2 bananas a day. O.o  And yet he still poops (bananas and applesauce can constipate.)

Random fact of the day: applesauce constipates (you lose a lot of the fiber when you peel apples) but apple juice helps loosen things up (because of the liquids and sugar).  Both are made of apples, but have different effects.  But if you REALLY need to help your kid empty their bowels, PRUNE JUICE.  You can either give it to them in a bottle, or mix it with baby cereal.  Rice cereal will also contribute to constipation, so you might want to switch to oat cereal.

Okay, enough about poop.

My kid sleeps from 7 to 7.  Sometimes even later.  HOW DID I GET SO LUCKY?!  And he started sleeping through the night in September, after we moved into our house and gave him his own room (instead of, you know, our closet.)

I used to wake Mace up to nurse him around 10 or 11 before I went to bed (you know how cows love to be milked in the morning and feel uncomfortable?  I HAVE SO MUCH EMPATHY FOR COWS.  YOU MEN HAVE NO IDEA.) but then there were a few nights where Mace was not interested in nursing and seemed cranky that I would wake him up in the middle of the night.  Your body adjusts to your nursing times, so now I no longer get SO uncomfortable at night right before I get to bed.

I love having a 7-month-old.  They are so much fun, and expressive, and playful, and AWESOME.  Sometimes I wish he wasn't so clingy, but the nice thing is that since he has an older sister and two cats, there are bunch of other people around to entertain him.  I just can't leave him in the same room as Carmen for a long time, because eventually she leaves and he gets lonely and upset.  He can craw, but he hasn't yet figured out how to switch ROOMS.  He'll just beeline towards a toy and stuff it in his mouth.

Well, it's either a toy or it's cat food.  NOM NOM NOM.

Thoughts on breastfeeding

Excuse currently in my head: I can't write this post because I haven't posted Mace's birth story yet!  It makes no sense to suddenly write a post about nursing because you barely even blogged about being pregnant and giving birth to a baby boy!
And this is what I say: You know what, self?  It doesn't matter!  Just write!

Disclaimer: This post is probably going to be TMI for some people, so if you don't want to hear about babies and boobs and nursing and leaking and body issues, stop reading now.
/disclaimer


I have a love/hate relationship with breastfeeding.  I nursed Carmen until she was 20 months old, and Mace is so far exclusively breastfed.  It's just so much easier to pop a boob into a baby's mouth than it is to pull out a bottle and mess with measuring out water and formula and making it not too cold.  The tap water here tastes like dirt so I'd have to use cold, filtered fridge water, and I'd have to warm it up to a bearable temperature and ... I get tired just thinking about it!

Thoughts on breastfeeding in general:
Pros:

• It's so easy and convenient!  You know your baby is going to be hungry every 2-3 hours (more often if it's growth spurt time) and since you're the mom, you're there, and you can feed them without having to prepare anything.
• Breastfeeding helps your waist get smaller faster, because the hormones associated with breastfeeding help your uterus clamp down to its original size.  (con: there is a LOT of cramping in those early days of breastfeeding.)
• You get to eat more food and supposedly you lose weight (and burn thigh fat?) more quickly.
• Your kids are healthier, since your antibodies strengthen their immune system.
• Breastmilk is superfood.  Seriously, it does everything.  My pediatrician told me to put it in Mace's eyes to open up his tear ducts.  It helps clear up baby acne.  Colostrum (and possibly breastmilk?) can be used in the early days to soothe sore and cracked nipples.  It cures ear infections, too.
• Breastmilk baby poop is a million times better than formula poop.  It smells better and just seems cleaner ...
• Babies are less picky when they start eating real food, since your milk tastes different depending on what you've eaten.  Unfortunately, most of my milk is made of chocolate, so I'm a little screwed in the variety department ...
• You get snuggles!
• I want to repeat "it's so easy and convenient and cheap and eco-friendly!" about 21938873 times.  Why spend money on something inferior?  STICK IT TO THE MAN. etc etc.

Cons:

• Let's face it.  It's a little gross.
• I leak like crazy the entire time my kids are breastfeeding, so I have to use nursing pads.  It feels kind of unsexy.  But, pro!  They are super-cute cloth nursing pads from WeeEssentials!
• Every time I get dressed, I have to think about accessibility, and whether or not my particular combination of nursing pads, bra, and shirt make my boobs look funny.  It depends on the thickness of the shirt/bra.
• Mace was very tongue tied.  That's when the frenulum (the thingy under your tongue that attaches your tongue to the bottom of your mouth) is attached all the way to the tip of the tongue and you can't stick your tongue out at all.  It makes it hard for a baby to latch on and suck because they need to stick their tongue out slightly to ... well ... make it all work.  Go Google it. =p  We went to the ear, nose, and throat doctor in May and he performed a frenectomy (fren = frenulum, ectomy = cutting out) so his tongue could be free and things are a lot easier now!
• Making milk takes work.  Work takes energy.  Energy creates heat.  I am very, very hot when I nurse (haha, I said I'm hot!)  I have recently discovered clinical strength deodorant.  IT IS AMAZING WHY DID I NOT USE THIS WITH CARMEN.  But feeling like you can boil water on your chest when it's also 90-someodd degrees outside?  Not fun!!
• If my boobs think it's time to nurse and my baby doesn't, it's uncomfortable.  Nursing and hormones in general are uncomfortable.
• Nursing hormones kill your libido.
• You never quite feel like your body is back to normal.
• It's hard to sleep on your stomach at night.  Too much pressure on chest = uncomfortable and leaky.
• My mother gives me dirty looks when I'm nursing at home without a cover and my brother is in the house.  I'm sorry if it makes him uncomfortable ... but I'm his sister and I'm feeding my baby and just because I have boobs ... I'm his sister!!!  Maybe I'm a shameless dirty classless hussy, but I think people need to freak out less about nakedness.  Hello, locker rooms?  And who hasn't seen some family member streak across the house in a towel at one point or another?  It's not sexual.  It's not an everyday occurrence, either, but still ... chill out.  (Maybe it's because I had college roommates who would lounge around the room in a towel/underwear for a little while after showering or before bed ...)
• It's a huuuuuuge time commitment.  Feeding a baby always is.  But think of this: Breastfed babies will eat every 2-3 hours for the first 6 months of life (because that's how long it takes to digest) until they start eating solid foods (ie. non-breastmilk).  A feeding usually lasts anywhere from 5 to 20 minutes.  Let's say a baby eats for 10 minutes every 3 hours.  That's 80 minutes a day.  If there are 30 days in a month, that's 240 minutes of nursing a month, which is 40 hours.  Every month, you spend a whole work week nursing your baby.

Thoughts in general:

• Yes, I'm one of those people who nurses in public.  I feel uncomfortable with the idea of other people staring at my boobs, so if I'm in a place where there are a lot of people (such as the outlet malls, Target, a restaurant, a party/wedding) I like to cover up.  I'll also generally try to cover up if I'm around unmarried male friends; but if I'm at home, or with family, or with female friends, or in an un-busy place, or I'm at the beach ... I may or may not cover up and people can choose not to stare because I'm not drawing attention to myself.  I'm not exactly sure how nursing on a busy public beach is different from nursing at a busy Target, but they're psychologically different to me when it comes to feeling like I'm an exhibitionist while nursing.
• I love my nursing cover (got the black one from Udder Covers).  The stiff band around the neck goes out enough that I can look down and see what's going on but nobody else has to stare at my nipples while Mace and I tussle over whether or not he's going to start eating yet.  He's light enough that I can carry him around with one arm and walk around and window shop.  One time, Mark and I were at the store and I nursed Mace the whole time while Mark pushed the shopping cart.  IT WAS AWESOME.  I was thrilled not to have to sit down and feed Mace, and not feel awkward by walking around the store half-exposed.
• All of my complaints about nursing seem kind of superficial and selfish.  I mean, come on, "nursing makes me feel less sexy"?  The convenience and lifetime benefits of nursing far outweigh a few months of temporary discomfort and self-consciousness.
• I will write about the World Health Organization (WHO) and their breastfeeding recommendations some other time.  I have a lot of thoughts on the subject.  Frankly, I think they're kind of obnoxious in the way they present their goals.
  http://www.who.int/nutrition/topics/exclusive_breastfeeding/en/
  And this article does a pretty good job to summarize how I feel:
  http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2012/06/04/moms-need-more-support-to-breastfeed-exclusively/
  
  But the phrase "more support" sounds like mothers need their hands held and to be pushed and prodded into exclusive breastfeeding.  That sounds kind of coercive and forceful and makes me feel uncomfortable ... like, what, you're going to guilt mothers into exclusively breastfeeding?  Yeah, like that's gonna work.  Can't we give moms props for trying, and keeping with it, and for continuing to nurse at a 6 months or a year even if the kid's been fed a couple bottles of formula?  Because it's not like the world's moms aren't nursing at all.  They're just (gasp!) using a product that's available to make it so they can go out for more than 3 hours without having to pump for it.

I'm sure there's plenty more I think about the subject, but that's all I've got for now. ;)

Perceptions of reality ...

I had an interesting moment earlier today.

Carmen loves babies.  I found this "Baby Slide Show" on YouTube and Carmen watches it daily.  "BABIES!!!!" she squeals.

Today, Sadie (the kindergartner I watch) started watching the slide show and was interested in all of the cute Anne Geddes photos.

"Whoa, does someone really take these pictures?" she asked.
"Yes." I responded.
"Of dead babies?????" She seemed really concerned about this.
"What?  No!  They're not dead babies.  They're just sleeping.  She takes pictures of babies while they're sleeping."
"Then why did that one have wings?"
"Because they're dressed up in costumes.  They're sleeping.  She dressed them up and took pictures of them while they were sleeping.  See, sometimes they're just sleeping, other times they have wings, other times they're dressed like flowers ... they're not dead.  Just sleeping."
"Oh."

Phew.

To think Sadie could've grown up thinking all those cute Anne Geddes photos are dead babies .... O__o;

Carmen is a Sweetheart

Carmen wasn't a very snuggly baby, but for some reason, ever since we got our cats last year, she's gotten really snuggly.  I love it!

I know we shouldn't necessarily be encouraging this behavior, but lately when she's woken up in the middle of the night, Mark and I have taken her into our room to let her sleep with us.  Sometimes, she rolls around a lot and Mark ends up going downstairs and sleeping on the couch while Carmen and I take up the rest of the bed.  Sweet.

Sunday morning was one of those nights we let her come in and sleep with us.  Carmen woke up around a quarter to 7,  and the first thing she did when she woke up was roll over, wake me up, and say, "Cheese?!"  ... so I went downstairs and got her some cheese so she would be quiet and let me rest for another 30 minutes.  Hah.

Anyway.  Lately she's been doing a lot of good telling people goodbye.  When I used to drop Sadie off at school, she'd sit in her car seat and cry.  When Dad had to go to work, she'd cry as he left.  Now, all we have to do is tell her goodbye and ask her to say goodbye to [insert name here] and she'll wave happily at them and say, "Buh-bye!!" and be cheerful.  She's still not a huge fan of when Dad leaves for work, but she'll calm down and wave goodbye when he has to go.  How sweet!

She also gives people hugs and kisses when they leave.  It's so much fun getting toddler hugs and kisses!!

Yesterday in church, we sat in the front row with our friends Dorie and Jake.  At the end of Sacrament meeting, Carmen crawled into Dorie's lap and snuggled with her while I fed Carmen some cereal puffs.  Carmen kept closing her eyes like she was about to fall asleep, then she'd wake up and grab for some more puffs.  It was like she couldn't decide if she was too tired to eat or too hungry to sleep.  Ha ha.

Yesterday, she grabbed Mark's face and gave him a big kiss for no reason.  It was so cute!!  And today before going upstairs for a bath, she was snuggling Mark and I asked if I could join in on the snuggle time.  "Could you give Mommy a kiss, too?" I asked hopefully.  She smiled, said "Mm-hmm!", pursed her lips, and gave me a kiss.  IT WAS SO SWEET.

Lately, she's also been asking for us to put her down for a nap.  We'll be in the car on the way to Sadie's school, and she'll be like, "Hmm, nap?" as if, "The next thing we do is nap time!"  And we usually give her a bath around 7:30 so we can put her to bed around 8.  For the past few days, between 7:20 and 7:30, she'll stop whatever she's doing and look at us and go, "Bath?" and go upstairs if we ask her to meet us upstairs for bath time.  Whoa - this is awesome!  She's settled into a really good schedule!

The lesson?  Schedules really are good for kids and they'll stick to them really well if you stick to them.  It's worth trying to get your kid on a schedule when they're young (there's no need to force babies into them) because ... seriously?  Raising Carmen is awesome.  I love it.

I'm having so much fun right now I think I must be crazy to be wanting to get pregnant again some time later this year.  (another baby in 2012? yes, please!)  Then I remember how babies can't crawl or walk or talk or tell you what they need and you have to figure out what their inexplicable cries mean (do you need a diaper change? are you hungry? are you tired? are you sick? are you in pain? are you bored?) and sometimes they cry for NO REASON ... and I dread having another baby.  But then they start to grow up and they are SO MUCH FUN TO WATCH.  Luckily, babies are incredibly, incredibly cute and fun in their own special way ... hopefully I'll be able to handle my next kid.

Being a parent can be so crazy and confusing sometimes.  It's a completely irrational thing (being a parent) but it's so ... fun ... and ... rewarding ... and ... inexplicably awesome ... I love it.  Hah.


Anywho. There's a bunch of random thoughts for the day.