Diane Sawyer was on Sesame Street.
I just love lazy mornings! Keenan woke up late (9:00 a.m.) again, so it was nice to sleep-in a bit! Since my husband is off today, we were able to have some family time this morning: eating breakfast together and watching a couple of Elmo’s World and Sesame Street episodes. Keenan rarely watches TV (he hasn’t really shown an interest and we are just too busy with other things!), so this morning was a treat! Ever since Keenan met Elmo at Sea World last week, he has been infatuated with him! He has wanted to watch Elmo on TV, sleep with his Elmo doll and wear his shoes! As you can see from the pictures, Keenan was mesmerized!
I had to take a picture of this: Keenan watching Sesame Street (Feist was singing her song, “1234″) while wearing Daddy’s shoes…too cute!
I did it again, I forgot to take a picture of breakfast this morning, which was my “usual,” with half of a banana (sliced) mixed in it. So, I snapped a quick picture after I finished, sorry! I’m still working on the whole picture thing!
Sorry, this was after I finished my “usual” breakfast. At least, you can still see some of my latte that I was drinking!
For lunch, I had my “typical:” turkey sandwich on an Oroweat sandwich thin with lettuce, tomato and Costco’s yogurt jalapeno dip! In addition, I had a few baby carrots and a nectarine that I shared with Keenan. He ate leftover chicken, eggplant and carrots from last night’s dinner. Speaking of nectarines, do you like your stone fruit firm or soft? My husband and I always butt heads over stone fruit. I like my fruit to be firm (which he says is “rock hard”), while he likes his fruit to be soft (squishy and over ripe, in my opinion) and juicy. Fortunately, Keenan likes firm fruit, so that is what I buy!
On another note, I have received a couple of questions in regards to jogging strollers and introducing solids. Yes, I know these two things are totally unrelated and random, but I thought I would address them here.
Jogging Strollers:
We have the BOB revolution and we absolutely LOVE it! It is our only stroller, so we bought the car seat adapter to use when Keenan was an infant. It was a perfect stroller for us, because it is so versatile. In addition to jogging with it (as soon as I was cleared to exercise again at 6 weeks postpartum), we took it everywhere: shopping, going to the beach, walking, some hiking and traveling. It rides very smooth and it is so easy and effortless to push. You can walk over any terrain and the stroller still rides smooth. The catalyst for choosing the BOB was when my niece was born. My brother and sister-in-law had a Graco stroller, where the car seat locked right in, and when we took a family vacation in Spain and France, it was horrible on the cobble stone streets. It was so bumpy and rough, we had to carry the stroller! After that trip, my husband and I knew we wanted to get a stroller that had pneumatic tires and rode smooth, once we had children. When I found out I was pregnant, we did a lot of research and stumbled upon the BOB. We tried it out at REI and loved it! We have taken it with us on four trips and each time, it was very easy to travel with. It even rolls over soft sand! We folded it down, took the front wheel off, strapped the wheel, and put the whole thing in a large plastic bag (that we got from our airline, or you can buy a big package of extra large clear garbage bags at Costco) and gate-checked it. So far, the stroller has been fine and it has been our savior to have in the airport. Needless to say, I highly recommend the BOB, if you are in the market for a stroller. (I can take pictures of my husband breaking down the stroller for travel, and describe the process in another post, if anyone is interested.)
At the beach in San Diego!
Introducing Solids:
When my friend asked me what food I introduced to Keenan first, it brought back a lot of memories that I thought I would share. It seemed that everywhere you read or even who you talked with, the universal “first solid food” recommendation was rice cereal. Luckily, my sister-in-law told me that rice cereal constipates your baby (she experienced it with my niece), so she recommended starting with oatmeal or barley and to not even introduce rice cereal. I listened to her and started Keenan on oatmeal, making it myself by using whole oats, grinding them in a blender or food processor and cooking them with my frozen breast milk. I made big batches, poured the oatmeal into silicone ice cube trays and froze them. When it was time to feed Keenan his oatmeal, I would pop out a cube or two (depending on how much he was eating), place them in a microwave-safe bowl and heat for about 1 minute, until thawed. Of course, I would have to wait until it cooled before giving it to him. For added flavor and nutritional benefits, I added ground flax seed and cinnamon. Keenan loved it, in fact he ate oatmeal every morning for his breakfast until he was 15 months old! We started him on solids when he was 7 1/2 months old, rather late, according to the American Academy of Pediatrics. Our pediatrician follows the World Health Organization recommendations, which at the time, stated if your baby is exclusively breastfed, then solids don’t need to be introduced until 7 months. Since we visited my brother, sister-in-law and niece (for her 3rd birthday) in Montreal when Keenan was turning 7 months old, we waited until we got home from our trip to give him solids. Up until then, he really never showed any interest in our food, so it was perfect timing. When he ate oatmeal for the first time, he devoured it, so he was completely ready! When did you introduce solids to your children? Do you have any helpful tips for those who are just starting to introduce solid foods to their babies?
This afternoon, we are off to CrossFit for our second-to-last workout before we leave for Alaska (we are going to do one more WOD tomorrow morning, after I help out with the morning class) and then it’s dinner. On the menu for tonight is my Grilled Corn Salad (which we made for 4th of July) with chicken! It should be good!!
OK… “The Husband” needs to set some things straight, here: I do not like my fruit “squishy and over ripe”. I swear on my grandmother’s ashes, Melissa likes to eat fruit that you could use to drive nails. No joke. Compared to that, a perfectly ripe, juicy peach would seem like a bowl of mush. I promised myself that I wouldn’t let Melissa corrupt our children with her hard-fruit insanity.