The Baby Food Saga Continues

Hello! Hope you all had an excellent Christmas! We sure did! Griffin had a great time opening and playing with presents.

But his favourite part was definitely having all the extra people around. He has been LOVING having all the extra love and attention, and just general noise. I don't know what we'll do when it's just the two of us again. I guess there's always the cats!

Thanks for all the food-eating tips! I tried squash and pears and was beginning to despair. The problem was that he wouldn't even open his mouth. As soon as he saw that spoon, he clamped his lips shut down, waved his arms around, and threw his head back and forth. He wouldn't let the food get anywhere near his mouth. I went on-line and saw this thing about Baby Led Weaning, where they give babies solid food right from the beginning, and let them feed themselves (no spoons!) Of course, he loves that. He's had banana (very messy!), frozen strawberry, and toast fingers. But I really wanted to get some rice cereal in there, because of the iron. So I got sneaky. Now I give him some "real" food, some rice crackers, and his very own spoon. Whenever he lifts his spoon to his mouth to chew on it, I sneak some cereal in there, super fast, with the second spoon. At first, he would make the most horrible faces, but he's starting to get into it now. And after he's had most of his rice cereal, I've been giving him dessert (mushed pears, apricots or apples.) Last night he even reached for my spoon, and pulled it into his mouth. Hooray! Plus, now he has a beautiful high chair to use while eating, which makes him feel pretty special.

So that's our eating saga, as it stands now. Today, I'm bumping him back up to two meals a day. Oh yeah, and my theory about him sleeping longer once he started eating more food has not proved true. So much for that. Now that it seems we've got him eating again, the next great hurdle will be getting him to actually sleep. Lucky for him, he's adorable!

Anyway, I've got to run for now. We've all been pretty busy this month, and I hope to share more soon. Until then, though, Happy New Year!!!

Ho Ho Holidays

Hello! Happy Weekend! We're pretty excited around here, because Jai has the next two weeks off work! Pretty nice. We had a light dusting of snow, which looks very pretty on the ground, especially with the sun shining.

Jai is trying to nap with Griffin right now, but Griffin is having too much fun to sleep.

The other night he slept through the night for the first time ever. It was so amazing! I woke up and briefly (foolishly) fantasized about how great it would be if he just slept like that every night. Actually feeling rested in the morning was so nice. My theory is that it is because he actually ate a good amount of rice cereal for dinner. I haven't really been able to test this theory, though, because ever since then he has absolutely refused to eat any more cereal, and cries if you try to feed him. And subsequently has gone back to waking up every hour or two, all night long. Help! What do parents do in this situation? I tried mixing the rice cereal with apple juice, then with breastmilk, and he's not having anything to do with any of it. I am thinking tonight I will try introducing some other kind of food (squash, maybe?) but even if he eats that, I still need some way to convince him that cereal is yummy. Hmmmm... anyone have any good tricks?

Other than that, we are still working at getting ready for Christmas. Yesterday I made everyone some new Christmas stockings out of felt that I had lying around. I used the stocking my Mom made for me when I was little as the template. It's getting a little worn, and it was time for new ones for the whole family. They were so much fun to make, and came together really quickly - my favourite kind of project!

Anyway, I better run - still got LOTS of baking to do. My peanut butter balls have been sitting in the fridge for two days waiting to be coated in chocolate. Little steps, in the right direction. Tonight, we are heading out to see some friends and eat some treats. Have a great weekend - full of winter sun streaming in the windows, and quiet, potent, moments.

“The rooms were very still while the pages were softly turned and the winter sunshine crept in to touch the bright heads and serious faces with a Christmas greeting.” ~Louisa May Alcott

Ready or Not...

Hello! I can't believe it's already been a whole week since I last posted anything! This time of year always goes so fast. I think by January I'll probably be ready to celebrate Christmas. But it's coming, ready or not.

Griffin and I have been adjusting to settling in for the winter. We've had a few days where it was just too cold to spend any time outside. So we are looking for indoor activities. Since we basically live in one room during the winter, it's been a little bit of a challenge. A few of the toys that were meant to be for Christmas have been wandering in to our play area, in order to stave off baby boredom. Only ten more days to wait!

During short naps and down times, I have been desperately trying to get projects done. I did manage to finish the legwarmers I was making for Griffin. This sock wool was so pretty, it was really fun to work with. I think I'll turn the remainder of it into pompoms.

And I've been trying to play with screenprinting as well. For my birthday, I got the amazing book, Printing By Hand

and I've been dying to try absolutely everything in it. Anyway, I managed to do a quick screen using drawing fluid and screen filler:

I have no idea what to do with it now. But it was pretty fun to do! When things settle down a little, I look forward to playing with this all a lot more.

As usual, I have big, big plans. Okay, they might not sound that big to anyone else, but at the moment, they seem massive!

a.) finish buying/making Christmas presents

b.) wrap Christmas presents

c.) mail Christmas presents

d.) make Christmas cookies

e.) make more Christmas cookies

f.) clean and babyproof the entire house

g.) shower

But for now, as Griffin naps by the fire, I think I will make myself some dinner, and see if I can read a little bit of my book. Sounds like a little piece of heaven.

A Touch of Christmas Fever

Hello Again! Christmas is drawing ever closer. Almost all the shopping is done. The tree is up and decorated. The cookie recipes are out. The snow is on the ground. Whoooo boy!

We're getting pretty excited around here. We got an amazing tree at the farmer's market for $20 (8' tall and perfect! another one of the things that are cheaper in rural Nova Scotia.) Griffin's been hanging out in front of it on his cozy sheepskin. He likes to touch it, but he's very gentle.

He likes to touch everything!

We had a bit of a slowdown the last couple of days, because our boy has had a fever, and a corresponding crankiness. He's doing really well today, though. He slept until almost noon, but when he woke up he was all smiles, so I've got my fingers crossed that he's almost done with that. He handled it all very well, but it was a very cuddly couple of days. If he wasn't feeling so yucky, I wouldn't mind at all!

Sarah, Erin and I shared a booth at the Annapolis Royal Christmas show. It was good fun - hung out with some great ladies, got a little knitting done, sold some things, watched Griffin smile at everyone. And now those little gears in my head have been turning, turning, turning. Slowly, I am gathering the materials, plans, and drawings. Soon... soon.

VideoPalooza

Hello! It's been a while! The camera was missing in action for a couple of days, but mysteriously reappeared on my keyboard this morning, after I casually mentioned to Jai (at four a.m. last night) that I couldn't find it anywhere. Thanks, Jai!

Griffin had his six month check-up last week, where he was weighed and measured. Our giant boy is tipping the scale at over 20 lbs now! Go Griffin! And the Doctor mentioned that it was time for Griffin to start eating solid food so he can get some extra iron in his system. So...

We have a video of Griffin eating for the first time! It's a little long, so I imagine only the die-hard Griffin fans out there are going to make it through right to the end, but it's all cute :)

So, eating has received mixed reviews. He loves doing it, but he's been getting belly aches, we think, because about an hour later, he gets really fussy and unhappy. I think we'll try a different kind of food, and see if that makes a difference. He just looks so proud to be doing something that Mommy and Daddy do all the time.

Also this week was the First Annual Bridgetown Craft Fair at Midnight Madness. Sarah and I thought we would share a table, just for a bit of fun. It was actually a great time, and good to see people's reactions to some of the stuff I've been up to. Here's some pics of our table.

This Saturday, we're sharing a table with another friend at the Annapolis Royal Show, if anyone in the area cares to check it out.

And we finally made it back to the Tree Lighting Ceremony. We missed the last two years because Jai had to work at the theatre both times, so it was great fun to make it back, watch the Grade 3 choir sing Christmas Carols, and exchange some old lights for some new LED lights. Jai took a video of it, too, so here it is, our Second Annual (After a Two Year Hiatus) Video of the Tree Lighting at Bridgetown Town Hall.

Hmmm, hopefully those videos actually work- I've never done that before.

We're starting to get pretty excited for Christmas around here - hopefully we'll pick up a tree on Friday. I can't wait to see Griffin taking it all in - a tree in the house! Talk about fun. And I'm going to win the lottery tonight, so all in all, we've got a pretty exciting week coming up.

Oh, and I keep forgetting to mention the Bridgetown Video that Jai and I were in. Here's a link to it on YouTube, if anyone wants to watch a video about why Bridgetown is great!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=thQrN4iyG3g