Baby Food

Jack Sprat could eat no fat. 

His wife could eat no lean.

Between them both they 

licked the platter clean

This Nursery Rhyme has been in my head these days, I think of it when I feed Jack sometimes.
     Jack loves to eat food. He has been interested in what people are eating for a few months now. I remember eating cereal in front of him and he would watch the spoon go from the bowl to my mouth all the time. I felt bad eating in front of him.

     I started making my own baby food for Jack a couple months ago. One of Jack's Christmas presents was a book on baby food(more for me then him). There are some combinations in this book that I never would have thought to try. I have also tried new foods through this. It was a must to try everything before I fed it to Jack.
    Jack LOVES Squash. He makes the most adorable Mmmmm.... sounds when he eats it. We have also tried Rutabaga. I never had tried a rutabaga I didn't know that when you cut into it it smells like broccoli but has the texture of a potato. When you mix it with carrots it has a rather sweet taste.
    I found the cutest little containers to store my baby food at Family Dollar. They are perfect portion size and.... well just cute.
    Jack's newest love this week is Gerber Yogurt. He tried the pear Blend this weekend and it was a hit. He has wanted some every night before bed since he tried it.   

Mr. Cookie Face!!!!

Snowflakes

With winter now upon us in Upsate NY we have been seeing a lot of snowflakes. The other day Jyll was looking out the window in the kitchen and caught the snow falling in the morning sunshine.... to my delight she called me to say " mommy come quick there is glitter falling from the sky" I took a moment to look out the window with her, and it really did look like glitter falling from the sky. I had to admire her child imagination and wonder what it would be like to have glitter falling from the sky. She probably wanted to go and play with it and throw a couple fists full into the air. yesterday was another bright sunny morning and Jyll looked out the window again and said it was a glittery day outside. It made me smile.

Have you ever thought of how many ways you can use a snowflake cookie cutter? We bought a snowflake cookie cutter so that I could make some elaborately decorated sugar cookies for the holidays to sell. I have also been using the cutter to make "snow sandwiches" I cut two slices of bread with the cutter into snowflakes (keeping the scraps for bread crumbs) then I layer ham and cheese cut into snowflakes(just the cheese). Or to my astonishment Jyll's new favorite is a Peanut butter snowflake. No jelly just PB. I have been trying to get her to eat PB for YEARS.... this week she has had two PB snowflakes. This morning I made pancakes per request of Jyll and had a thought why not make snowflake pancakes. I greased my pan and the cutter and placed the cutter in the pan to heat. then poured a little bit of batter into the cutter and waited for it to bubble.... remove the cutter before flipping it should slide right out. Jyll loved them and ate 3 pancakes. SO here are 3 things you can do with a snowflake cutter can you think of any more?

People are like snowflakes we can be similar but never the same. I try to remember that as I go about my day. It has been very trying these days with the holidays among us and a 4 year old who really misses her Daddy and wants to spend the Holidays with him. I am trying to make sense of the whole situation between us and cant seem to find an answer. Do I go back with him to make her and him happy or do I stay true to myself and wait for things to be just right. Jyll asked me the other day if we had room in our family for daddy it broke my heart and I hope one day that she doesn't see me as the bad guy who tore the family apart. I also hope that she will see me as a strong woman who stood her ground.

2 months old

Jack turned 2 months old today. The time has flown by. He is really starting to smile now. Jyll has been in PA with her dad so Jack and I have gotten to spend a lot of alone time together. I have been busy here at home trying to get things done before winter comes. I have to make a whole new set of diapers as well Jack has been growing a lot.I don't have much to share at this time other than cloth diapering has been going well. Jack has a doctors appointment on Tuesday so we will see how much he has grown. He will also be getting shots so please pray that he handles them well.I've added some pictures of Jack

 

I love this photo he is just soo cute!

 

We had a photo shoot in the back yard with Jack and our homegrown pumpkins. I cant wait to carve pumpkins this year I plan on having some great photos from that!

Jyll has "Little Green Fingers!"

Dahlia's

My Jyll has inherited my Mom and Grandmothers Green thumbs. She has enjoyed gardening with my mother sense early Spring this year. We have spent a lot of time making a vegetable garden and taking care of the regular flower gardens that my mother has won an award for in previous years.

We had been debating all spring/summer if we wanted to buy a sandbox or not and decided not to because Jyll has more fun digging in the dirt. We spent a lot of time in the Vegetable Garden this Spring planting: Watermelon, Strawberries, Beets, Pole beans, Lima beans, Peas  Sunflowers, Basil, Thyme, Rosemary, Oregano, Sage, Swiss Chard, Carrots, Potatoes, Cucumbers, Pumpkins and Tomatoes....plus some flowers.Jyll was given a 2 foot square area to plant things in. She planted Beets and some random seed packets in there. Sadly her beets grew better then the ones I planted in nice neat rows!She grew Poppies from seeds about 5 years old. The above picture is of my mom's Dahlia's. These are grown from bulbs. My mom commented the ohter day sayig that these are the best they have looked in years. Jyll helped her plant them this year. Also by the Dahlia's Jyll planted Moss Rose from a packet of seeds from 1997.... the grew and have just started to blossom!

Beets

 

 

 

 

Cherry Tomatoes

Lima Beans

Can you see the baby Watermelon

Beans

 

 

 

 

 

"Giagunda" the Pumpkin!

Canadula planted from seeds

baby pumpkins

more Pumpkins

Sunflower

More Beans

Homemade Apple Sauce!!!!

I have been in a canning mood lately. My mother and I made some pickles this summer and we made some blackberry jam with my sister.  So last week I decided to use some apples I had frozen earlier this spring. I decided to make applesauce with them they really weren't good for anything else. It turned out good and to my surprise Jyll loved it we went through a jar and a half already this week. I wanted to make more and apples are coming into season here in NY. I went to Frog Pond our local produce market and bought a peck of NY grown Ginger crisp Apples for $4.50. I love Frog Pond I will post about that with pictures at a later date.

So here is my recipe for Applesauce:

7 large NY Ginger crisp Apples peeled, cored, and diced
1/4 cup light brown sugar
3/4 cup water
2 cinnamon sticks
2 whole cloves
juice from 1/4 lemon

Place all ingredients in a sauce pan. Cover and heat to boiling. Turn heat down to low and simmer until apples break apart. Remove from heat and take out cinnamon sticks and cloves.  At this point I add a splash of vanilla and a sprinkle of additional cinnamon. Pour everything into a food processor and blend until smooth. Place in jars. To seal jars place in a large pot 1/4 filled with boiling water.boil in pot covered for 3-5 minutes. Be careful removing jars they will be hot. I use a pair of tongs.


I  hope you enjoy this as much as we do. Jyll helped me cut up the apples last night wearing a princess dress and a veil  and slippers. She had fun cutting the apples into tiny pieces.

Living A Little Green

Cloth Diaper Parade

I have been cloth Diapering Jack now for 4 weeks. He wore his first cloth diaper minutes after coming home from the hospital! I must admit I didn't really know what I was getting into with cloth diapering. I had done some research, and talked with my cousin who uses cloth for her boys. After all of my research I realized that it was pretty costly to start a stash of cloth diapers. There are sites that offer trial packages with many different kinds of cloth diapers. Jillian's drawers does this. (jilliansdrawers.com ) You try out the diapers and if you choose to keep them you pay some additional money and if you choose not to keep them they refund your money. I thought about doing this but really didn't want to spend the money.

I continued on with my research and after going to various sites and finding relatively the same prices all around I dug a little deeper. I started googling free "soaker" patterns. Soakers refer to the lining in a cloth diaper that soaks up urine or it can also refer to shorts or pants made out of wool or fleece. My cousin was making wool soakers and covers for diapers for her coming newborn. I am a crocheter so I started looking for a pattern and then went to buy some wool.This is the pattern I used for my soakers. withatangledskein.blogspot.com/2008/02/little-fire-crochet-soaker-pattern.html  I made them in a few different sizes.

Here is Little man Jack wearing his wool soaker. Can you see all the diapers hanging in the background?

I then became sucked into the cloth diapering world..... I was on the Internet everyday looking for more patterns. That is when I came across some sites for patterns on making your own diapers. I owned a sewing machine so I thought I would give it a try. I started out making more covers out of fabric. Then I ventured on with making my first "fitted" diaper. I then continued on to make my first All in one diaper. I also made a wet bag a wipe bag and nursing covers. 

Here are The first things I made. A cover, an All in one, soaker on the bottom is a fleece soaker and 2 fitted diapers. I am now obsessed with finding fabric deals I try to avoid Joann fabrics unless there is a major sale! I have a mass supply of fabric that I have to start using soon. I need to make a bigger size fitted diaper for Little Man Jack soon he is growing out of his newborn size. I have made around 30 fitted diapers, 3 all in ones, 5 wool soakers, 3 fleece soakers, and 7 covers. I also have 24 prefolds.Oh and I made cloth wipes. It didn't make sense to use disposable wipes with cloth diapers! I can go about 3 1/2 days before I have to wash diapers. 

This is a normal wash day... but now that I have even more diapers it is a little more now. I use Rockin Green Laundry detergent(rockingreensoap.com ) for my diapers and whites. I was turned onto Rockin Green by my cousin as well. I ordered a bag to try and I also won a bag off of a blog that I follow called Green Grandma ( thegreengrandma.blogspot.com ). The blog writer is the mother of a friend from Pittsburgh. You should stop by and check out her blog. I have learned a lot from this blog on ways to live a little bit greener. I love her Vinegar Friday posts. 

In closing of this post I want to say that it feels great to know that I have saved a landfill from approx. 324 disposable diapers in 27 days!

Good Morning Mommy!!!!

I woke up this morning feeling a little more awake than usual..I actually was able to sleep for a bit last night.

I Had Little Jack beside me and Jyll had just came in from her room. I said good morning to her and asked if she slept well...the answer was  yes and it was a great improvement from the night before. She was up all night and so was Jack. Thankfully my mom took the day off so that I could get some much needed rest.

Back to this morning...I decided to change Jack's diaper on my bed (no big deal right) and as I am wiping his little butt he projectile poops all over me. I was sitting cross legged in front of him so my bed was spared but my PJ's were not. Jyll was standing next to me wide eyed.The moment was priceless. Jack then continued to pee. I placed my hand over top to stop any water hose capabilities! Thankfully I had a container of wipes next to my bed. Trying not to freak out due to being covered in pee and poop I calmly asked Jyll to hand me the wipes and open then she asked why... with a little hysteria in my voice"because your brother just pooped all over me and my hands." Jyll "why did he do that" Me "I don't know but I bet he feels better!" I cleaned up Jack then tried to clean up what I could before I changed my clothes...I really didn't want poo in my hair. After putting on new clothes I look at handsome Jack and see traces of a smile and comfort on his face. Jack has been battling a lot of gas lately so this massive poo really did make him feel better.

So here I sit at the computer with Jack and my cup of coffee hoping that he will fall asleep soon so that I can go grab a quick shower and wash away any remaining traces of Baby Jack Poo.What a great way to start  the day. Good Morning to me and to all of you!