Making Baby Food ... Again

Made a organic vegetable chicken soup with rice.

Olive oil with carrots and onions, simmering in a little bit of spring water.

All for the best baby in the world! That didn't like it at all! :(

We are Walking!

Baby started walking a couple weeks ago and he's become quite good at it.

He can only walk holding on to his walker for now.

He gets very determined and takes off like he's got some business to take care of.

Better Wipes

So I've been using the wipes the I made and they've been working out well. The only thing that is sort of enoying is the vinegar scent. Eventhough I only used 1 tbsp, the scent is very strong.

I am happy to have found a better solution. My mom found these online. They claim to be free from harsh chemical detergents such as SLS, petroleum, mineral oil, parabens and synthetic preservatives and are made from organic plant-based ingredients. They are slightly smaller than the commercial wipes, but they do the 'dirty' job.

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Another new baby product we found is by Natralia. Not sure if those two are affiliated. The names seem to be almost identical. Natralia products contain certified organic products and are:

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100% Natural plant based ingredients
Hypoallergenic and pH balanced - suitable for sensitive skin types
Artificial Colours & Fragrances Free
Alcohol, Parabens & SLS Free
Naturally scented using herbal and floral water
Suitable for vegetarians and vegans

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The shampoo doesn't lather up as much as other shampoos do, but I guess that's a good thing when it comes to rinsing.

Baby Crackers

We started our son on fruits on veggies first, rather than the traditional rice cereal. We actually chose to omit cereal all together because of it high iron content. Commercial baby cereal is made from grain that has been processed and then milled into a flour. The process strips the grain of ALL vitamins and nutrients. They are added back in artificially which the body does not absorb well. Anyway, I made plain crackers to use as a 'filler' in his homemade food.

Makes about 4 dozen
2 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting
2 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, cut in pieces
3/4 cup milk

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. In a food processor, pulse flour and butter pieces, and pulse until mixture resembles coarse meal. With the machine running, gradually add milk; process until dough comes together. Cover dough with plastic wrap, and allow to relax at room temperature for 15 to 20 minutes.

2. Unwrap dough, and transfer it to a lightly floured surface. Roll into 17 1/2-by-17 1/2-inch square, 1/16 inch thick (if dough continues to spring back, allow to relax again, covered with plastic wrap, for another 10 minutes).

3. Using a knife or pizza cutter, cut dough into 2 1/2-inch squares. With a thin spatula, transfer to ungreased baking sheets. Bake for 15 minutes, until light in color (lighter than mine - didn't get a better picture) and crisp.

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4. Add the cooked crackers to the food processor and pulse until fine. Keep crackers in an airtight container, at room temperature.

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I added 1 to 2 baby spoons to his graded apple, pureed banana and yogurt mixture this morning. Same to his lunch and dinner.

My Homemade Baby Wipes

I've been wrecking my brains about how to avoid diaper rash for our son, especially at daycare where everything seems to be impossible for them to do. Yesterday I came across a site that showed how baby wipes can be made at home. Not only does it not contain harsh chemicals, but it will save a lot of money as well. These can also be made from old receiving blankets, cut into proportionate squares, which can be reused. The wipe recipes I found, didn't work for me. Baby shampoo, which has chemicals (ALL DO! even the 'natural' one's), will stay on your baby's skin all day long until bath time and that's not OK. To have some sort of disinfectant I used organic APPLE CIDER vinegar.





Here's my recipe:

2 cups of bottled water
1 1/2 tbsp of oil (olive oil based with chamomile and others - made myself)
1 tbsp apple cider vinegar
1/2 roll of paper towel

Cut a roll of paper towels in half. Bread knife works best. Remove the center cardboard tube. Combine the liquid ingredients and poor into a refill wipe container. Dip the paper towel roll in and squeeze it and resoak it until all is moistened. Pull wipes out from the center of roll.

Photoshop CS3

Before

After

My dad bought me the newest Photoshop version and I have been so addicted to it. You can do ANYTHING with it! It takes time to learn the basics (Adobe provides classes), but once you do you can do so much, not to mention on a more professional level.

9 Months Old!

Our big boy is 9 months old today! He's 30 inches and 22 1/2 lbs. Some of the things he started doing now:

• Crawling using his knees
• pulling himself up on anything to stand on his feet
• climbing on anything and everything, even Wolfi, my parents German Sheppard
• his k-9 are almost all the way out

This is how we find him, talking up a storm, at bed time:

Crawling while wearing his new beach hat.

Tearing into his new socks.