Thumbs up for Oatmeal

This week I decided to skip out on rice cereal and try oatmeal instead. I also added a few spoonfuls of apples to it. I think we got a thumbs up. Making progress!!

Tree update

Feel free to form your own conclusions...

Don't just stand there... get your camera!

This is funny. Quote. Of. The. Day.

We are (slowly, but surely) working on our "curb appeal" for the front of the house. One thing we are doing is trimming some of the dead branches on our ginormous trees. Zach and I got this great idea to cut a HUGE (major) branch off one of them. In hindsight, I'm not sure that was a good move, but it's too late now!

We had a metal extension ladder in the backyard that was here when we bought the house, so Zach tilted it as high as he could against the branch so he could start cutting sections off at a time. The section was apparently still rather large, and when it split and started to fall, it hit the ladder and bent it. Our next-door neighboor was holding the ladder (Thank the Lord!) and Zach grabbed onto the rest of the branch.

As we were surveying what we had done, Zach just yells out (and I quote):

"Don't just stand there! Get your camera!"

Ha! I so wish I had the camera at the beginning.

And then here is what unfolded this afternoon...





Now they are working on getting the rest of the branch trimmed. I'll let you know how that goes...

5 months

This pretty much sums up Caroline for September 2010...

We have a really busy fall ahead of us... I sigh (out of exhaustion) just thinking about how fast it is going to fly by!

the infamous teeth

Here are the infamous teeth that sprouted September 1st and 14th... It has been a fun ride.

More products I love

Visit my earlier post here on my favorite baby products for the first 3 months...

*Click on the pictures to visit the link! Target Up & Up Brand baby wipes

Just as soft as pampers sensitive, less expensive, and bigger!

Sophie the Giraffe
must-have for any teething baby. must.



Bumbo Baby Seat plus tray
already great for learning to sit up...
add the tray and there's another way to use it!
Easy to feed and clean up rice cereal that
goes everywhere but in her mouth. just sayin'.
Tommee Tippee Closer to Nature Milk Feeding Bib
To avoid rash in the crevices of their necks
(I found this out too late! Zach doesn't call it her gobbler for nothing! :)
Easy to wash and works perfectly.

Aggieland

Caroline got to visit the Aggieland campus for the first time this past weekend. Here are a few pictures:

Wordless Wednesday (Sunday?)

This was supposed to be a wordless Wednesday post last wednesday...
(Definitely my daughter :)

Firsts!

Happy 5 months, sweet girl. I can't believe you were born 5 months ago today!

The past month was full of so many firsts, and I want to document them before I forget!

First time...
eating rice cereal
rolling from stomach to back (now she won't stay on her tummy at all!!)
sitting up by herself (right now, it's for a few seconds, but she seems to get better each time!)
in the pool (loved it!)
first tooth! (and maybe another one soon following)
really noticing Sadie... She pets her!! It's the cutest thing ever!

She is the light of my life. I think we'll keep her!

touche, sweet girl. touche.

After posting yesterday about how great she is starting to do on cereal, today happened.
Not. Havin'.It.

Caroline: 1
Mama: 0

Touche, sweet girl. Touche.

Luckily, I had my camera. It was pretty funny. Enjoy watching it unfold.

Teething much?

starting to melt down...I can see my bottle, Mama.

Eating, and teething, and rolling- oh my!

Sorry I haven't posted in a while... Miss Caroline has been keeping me busier than ever!
Back in August, we went to the GI Specialist for another checkup, and it was the first time I could tell him... She is doing great! It felt amazing. At that point, she was just over 4 months old, so he told me to start her on rice cereal. I called my sister and was like- what do I do?? When do I give this to her? How much do I make?? After figuring all of that out, we started cereal the following morning. Baby girl did not like it! We did it every morning for two weeks, and then skipped a week because....

She cut her first tooth!!! All last week, she was fussy and was not being herself! I knew she was teething, but I thought maybe her teeth were just moving. One night, it was just gums, and the next morning, we had a tooth poking through! She was so fussy when we would give her cereal in the morning, I decided to take a break on it because of the teething. Then, I realized... maybe it's just not fast enough--she is so hungry in the morning. Maybe I should try giving it to her on her 2nd feeding. This is what I got... Speaking of last week, we rolled over for the first time! I know this is pretty late for her to be rolling over for the first time, but with all of her reflux and spitting up, we didn't do a lot of tummy time in the beginning. I felt like such a goober when she did it by herself because I cried!! Hahah... I am going to be one of those moms.

So, that is pretty much what is going on lately. She is SUCH a good baby! I feel very, very lucky. She sleeps from around 7:30pm-7:30am. Wakes up, gets medicine, eats, and goes straight back down for a good 1.5-2 hours. Then, she gets up again, eats cereal and a bottle, plays for a very short time while I rinse out the dishes, and then goes right back down for another 1.5-2 hours. I have a wonderful sleepy baby!! After that, her naps are much shorter, so that is when we go and get things done if we need to. I play with her after her 3rd feeding, and she goes down for a nap about 75% of the time. If she doesn't go down then, I take the opportunity to run an errand. Then I feed her again, and if she didn't nap after lunch, she naps a short nap then. Around 6:45, she gets her medicine, bath, bottle, and then goes straight down to bed. She is so alert, and it has been so fun to watch her exploring everything. She LOVES Sadie, and smiles at her when Sadie gives her a smooch. :) She goos and gahs and SQUEALS (I'm talkin Mariah Carey octaves here!) like there's no tomorrow.

She is the best! :)

Weight loss--The secret that isn't really a secret

I'm trying not to make this blog "all Caroline all the time" but sometimes, that's just my world. (And I'm great with that!) However, I had a light bulb moment recently and I thought I would share it. It seriously is not earth shattering, but if you have the epiphany like I did, hopefully it will help!

I am not a healthy eater. I am not great at committing to long-term exercise. I am not great at saying no to foods I shouldn't be eating regularly. These are things I have always strived for, but haven't quite had the self-control to do. Up until I got married, I didn't have to worry much about dieting or even just eating right.

However, since Caroline had such a rough start with her reflux problems, I was forced to go on a special diet for babies with protein allergies. I wasn't allowed any dairy products (milk, ice cream, CHEESE (holy moly), butter, etc, etc), Soy (EVERYTHING has soy in it in some form), nuts, eggs, or beef. Most people ask, what CAN you eat? Well...Fruits, Veggies, Chicken, and pasta/rice. And, that's about it.

I hated it from the beginning. It was a constant frustration to look on a package and see soybean oil (on everything!), or butter, or milk, or eggs... It's impossible to go out to eat at restaurants. I really feel for people with food allergies. It is tough!

As I researched more and more, I was able to find products I could eat. Instead of butter, olive oil. Instead of dairy ice cream, coconut milk ice cream. Instead of Mrs. Baird's bread, fresh bread from the bakery. Instead of ground beef, ground turkey.

But, I started to notice that the things I couldn't eat had one other particular thing in common. Basically any processed food has one or more of those ingredients. I can have almost anything that is fresh. I have been forced to cook things in a more "whole foods" perspective, rather than a semi-homemade way... And, guess what? I have lost my baby weight and more. I know breastfeeding has a lot to do with this, because of the amount of calories I am burning daily. But, avoiding high calorie restaurant meals and processed foods has made the weight just melt away.

So, here is my epiphany:
(**I made up the numbers just for illustration purposes. There is no validity to them aside from me using them to explain what I think.)

If you want to lose weight, avoid processed foods. I'm not saying to get on my crazy diet. But, if you focus most of your grocery list on the produce and fresh foods sections like I have had to, you will be able to lose weight. And fast.

Here's my other epiphany. Exercise is SO important. (duh). BUT, Diet comes first. I think of it as 75% diet and 25% exercise. If you just diet, you will lose weight fairly easily. If you add exercise on top of that, it will compound those calories lost and propel you up to that optimum 100% level.

So many times, I see people who exercise regularly not losing weight. It always puzzled me until now. If you exercise, but still eat what you want, it's likely you just aren't going to be offsetting the calories enough.

So, I am not an expert. Or a dietitian. Or a personal trainer. All of those people probably want to strangle me right now. But, I'm me, and I found something that worked. Hopefully I helped someone to have that "a-ha" moment just like I did.

Good Luck!