Snapshots of Cute Stuff 10/30/2010

While I still don't have a photo of Linus taking steps, I did manage to take one of them both standing almost independently.



Ta da! Our very first Halloween costumes! Veda is a bunny, and Linus is a lion... Lionus, if you will.

My costume is... it's a black shirt. That's my costume this year.

With my mom in town, we went to a Halloween celebration today. It was all a bit much, so here's Linus passed out in the carrier with Nana.

The end.

A Typical Day

Here's a "typical" day for us at nine months. Of course, every mom knows that this day doesn't exist, but it's the plan for where we're going and what we're doing when we wake up. When the punches come, we roll with 'em,

7:00 - Wake, breastfeed

After we eat, the babies play on the floor and then in the jumperoos while I eat breakfast and do a little laundry or maybe load a few dishes in the dishwasher. When I've got the laundry going, we read a couple of books, play pat-a-cake, and maybe sing Itsy Bitsy a few times. Stuff like that.

9:00 - Breakfast for the babies, then down for the morning nap

Once they're down, I scramble to get as much housework done as possible. I have a cleaning schedule that I follow, which I'll post later. I find that if I don't have a schedule, I focus too much on a few areas and neglect others.

11:00 - Awake by now, breastfeed

We either repeat the playing on the floor routine or if I wasn't able to shower the night before, I do so at this point with them in bouncies and me playing peekaboo with them to buy some time. There's more reading of books, some verses of the ABC song. You get the idea. Also, I scarf down lunch somewhere in here.

1:00 - Baby lunch and down for afternoon nap

Again, the housework scramble. If I get finished, which is rare, I start on the day's blog post.

3:00 - Awake by now, breastfeed

After we do all of diaper business and get packed up, we head out to either the park or on errands. By this point in the day we're all bored with the playing in the floor business, so getting outside is fantastic. We swing, we crawl around on the grass, we people watch.

5:30 - We've made it back to the house by this point, and I make dinner for the babies. After they eat, I get them set up with a DVD - usually Signing Time. While they're enthralled with the friendly lady who moves her hands (and she even has colorful tape on her fingers!) and sings songs, I make dinner. Ray comes home, and we throw some food down while trying to tame fussiness and pulling Linus away from the fireplace. Little pyro, that boy.

7:00 - By this time, both babies are in some stage of a meltdown. This probably means that they'd like to have an earlier bedtime, but that would mean not seeing Daddy, and that's not an option. I take the fussiest baby up for a bath while Ray has some one-on-one time with the other baby. Then we trade, give babies supplements, and brush their teeth. With twins, bathtime MUST be an exercise in teamwork. There's no other option. By now it's between 7:30-7:45, and I nurse them down for the night. Linus stays down. Veda doesn't (see She Who Does Not Sleep).

And even after being with them every moment of the day, I miss them at night. It's love, true love.

10 Free or Almost-Free Things To Do Outside Your House With a Baby

1. Take Baby to the park and take pictures.
2. Take Baby to the park and put Baby in a swing. But not a super tiny baby.

3. Take Baby to the park, put out a blanket, sprinkle some toys around, and let Baby do whatever he or she is developmentally capable of at the time. Babies love being outside.
4. Take Baby on a walking trail. If your stroller is as beastly as mine, look for a paved one.
5. Take Baby for a stroll around the mall. While it’s best to do this on a day when you have strong financial resolve, an impatient baby can help motivate you to move it along. Babies don’t like waiting in lines.
6. Take Baby somewhere with a patio or a big window. Ice cream or warm beverage-type establishments are ideal. You get a treat, and baby gets to people watch. Lucky for Baby, no one finds his or her staring weird or intrusive.
7. Take Baby to the library for story time. Babies are never too young to enjoy a book or a song.
8. Take Baby to the library and have your own story time. While you’re there, check out some books to read at home and maybe even a little something for yourself. I do recommend using the online catalog to check availability BEFORE you go. Not only do babies hate waiting, but the library is also the perfect place to forget about every book that’s ever sounded interesting.
9. Take Baby to visit a family member or friend.
10. Join the local chapter of MOMS. I happened upon MOMS when we made our cross-country move, and it’s been the key to helping me keep my sanity while we’re away from everyone I’ve ever known. Even if you’re surrounded by friends and family, though, MOMS is still a wonderful organization. Check it out. Shout out to my MOMS gals!

http://www.momsclub.org/

Mr. Linus Gets a Haircut

When I was a kid, one of my aunts was an accountant for a hair salon chain, which put her in the position of being able to give me one of the greatest gifts a kid could ever get but would never think to ask for: practice heads. By practice heads I mean the dummy heads that hair stylists practice on. Deferring to the labels at the bottom of the heads, which also bore the creepy classification of 100% Human Hair, the heads were dubbed the Lindas. The one great shortfall of the Lindas was that their hair couldn’t grow back in. For this reason, cutting the Lindas’ hair was an event. Well, that, and that there was all sorts of set up and clean up involved with cutting hair in a carpeted house.

Because of the great joy I got out of cutting the Lindas’ hair, because I had gained some mild confidence from previous minor trims, and because I can’t fathom what a barbershop visit for a nine-month-old would be like, I decided to cut my own child’s hair. Wanting to do this right, I took to Sally’s to arm myself with a proper pair of scissors and a wee little cape. I also happened upon a $1 tablecloth at Target. Why did I need a tablecloth to cut hair? Why, to keep the clean up simple, silly.

The lesson to be learned here is that one’s hair-cutting confidence is at its highest point prior to the actual snipping. Being the mommarazzo that I am, I decided it would be fun to take some before and after shots.

Before:

Note the length around the ears and at the neck. Yes, this was bothering me.

What I don't have pictures of is the squirming on the kitchen floor, the relocation to Daddy's lap in the living room, the bouncing on Daddy's lap, me giving the scissors to Ray so that he could get to a certain part, me trying to hold him still, him discovering a piece of block on the floor that the dog had chewed up, artfully sneaking it into his mouth, gagging on it, and throwing up. 

Here's the after:

It was a subtle cut.

Next time I'm putting cartoons on the tv and plopping him on the $1 tablecloth in the living room floor... Linda style.

Weekly Dinner Schedule

I like organization. I like schedules. For the professional mom, schedules are especially important, as they help provide a sense of routine and order to what could be a chaotic sort of lifestyle. It was this desire, along with my enthusiasm for saving money on groceries, that led me to create this handy dandy weekly dinner schedule. How does a dinner schedule save money on groceries? Why, because I've built in a few days that help slash the grocery bill. How does that work? Read on...

Here's the schedule:

Monday: Meatless Monday
Tuesday:
Wednesday: Leftovers Day
Thursday: Salad Day
Friday: Fishy Friday
Saturday:
Sunday: Soupy Sunday

Meatless Monday: You might have guessed that on Meatless Monday, we don't eat meat. We do this for three reasons:

1. Eating less meat is good for you. Unless you live in a cave, you know that a diet full of saturated fat leads to all kinds of health problems.
2. Eating less meat is good for the environment. As certain population centers become more affluent, (take China, for example) they will increase the worldwide demand for meat. It simply isn't sustainable for all of us to eat meat at every meal.
3. Eating less meat is less expensive.

What do we eat if we don't eat meat? We do a lot of pasta and pizza. If my husband didn't hate beans so much, we'd eat lots of beans. Perhaps you've heard that they're good for your heart. Shhh... don't tell him, but I've been thinking of sneaking some lentils in...

Leftover Day: In order to make Leftover Day work, you've got to make sure that you made enough food to have leftovers on Soupy Sunday, Meatless Monday, and/or Tuesday. Leftover Day will significantly slash your grocery bill, and as an added bonus, your fridge stays less cluttered.

Salad Day: Given my obvious fanaticism for alliteration, I'd like Salad Day to be on Saturday. Alas, the lettuce tends to get a little too wilty by then, so Thursday it is. Salad Day is a good opportunity to get in several of those vegetable servings that we Americans are so infamous for not getting enough of. It's also an easier/quicker/cheaper meal if you play your cards right. It's nice to get creative with salad day... keeps it fresh.

Fishy Friday: Not only does this day make me dizzy with alliteration delight, it also fits in with the tradition of fish on Fridays. You know you should eat more fish. Fishy Friday reminds you to do it.

Soupy Sunday: Every frugalista foodie knows that soup is a grocery budget's best friend. It fills you up, and often is chock-full of vegetables. If you make your own stock, it's even cheaper. Also, it's super easy to just make a giant pot that can go on to be lunches, fare for Leftover Day, or treasure for your freezer.

What about Tuesday and Saturday? What do I make on those days? Whatever I want. On at least one of those days, I make something to keep in the freezer. On the other day I might thaw something from the freezer.

Being the easy-going sort of lady that I am, this schedule isn't set in concrete. If I'm short on time one day, I might switch out a more time-consuming meal for a faster one that was dedicated to a different day. It saves a lot of time when I'm planning out the meals for the next week and writing the grocery list. And EVERY mom knows that's important.

This Week's Meal Plan 10/23/2010

**Note: The title originally contained a typo: "Mean Plan". Love it.

Age: 9 Months

Day	Wake	Breakfast	Snack	Lunch	Snack	Dinner	Bed
Monday	BF	Cereal w/ pumpkin puree, breast milk, and cinnamon	BF	Cheesy Mushroom and Tomato Sauce with Pasta Stars*, stewed plums	BF	Chicken Bites*, mango chunks, butternut squash/sweet potato puree	BF
Tuesday	BF	Cereal w/ pumpkin puree, breast milk, and cinnamon	BF	Baby Bolognese*, zucchini puree	BF	Yogurt, peach puree, puffs	BF
Wednesday	BF	Cereal w/ pumpkin puree, breast milk, and cinnamon	BF	Cream cheese sandwich, peas	BF	Chicken Bites*, stewed plums, zucchini puree	BF
Thursday	BF	Scrambled egg yolk, toast fingers, apple puree	BF	Cheesy Mushroom and Tomato Sauce with Pasta Stars*, peach puree	BF	Yogurt, Mum-Mum, butternut squash puree	BF
Friday	BF	Cereal w/ pumpkin puree, breast milk, and cinnamon	BF	Salmon sticks, apple puree, cheese bites	BF	Yogurt, Mum-Mum, green bean puree	BF
Saturday	BF	Scrambled egg yolk, toast fingers, plum puree	BF	Yogurt, Mum-Mum, pea puree	BF	Chicken bites*, butternut squash puree, puffs	BF
Sunday	BF	Cereal w/ pumpkin puree, breast milk, and cinnamon	BF	Yogurt, Mum-Mum, zucchini puree, puffs	BF	Salmon sticks, butternut squash puree, peach puree	BF

　
BF - Breastfeed
* - Recipe from Superfoods for Babies and Children by Annabel Karmel

Snapshots of Cute Stuff 10/23/2010

It’s hard to believe all of the progress the babies have made this week. It’s like their development has been in fast-forward.

Last week’s proficiency in standing led to two developments this week. Veda can now stand almost completely independently. All she needs is a little propping from the back to keep from tipping backwards. Linus is now taking steps when we help him stand. No good picture of these activities yet. Eh, it's just one of many reasons to tune in next week.

We also got our first care package this week. My uncle and aunt sent the babies Halloween outfits. Naturally, we posed with the tiny pumpkins.

Veda clearly understands that she's supposed to smile for the camera. Linus is too distracted by the tiny pumpkins.

Veda: "Seriously, Linus. What is up with you and that pumpkin?

We also have a new word. A co-worker from Ray’s home worksite was in town, so she stopped by our apartment to have dinner one night this week. When she was leaving, she told the babies “bye, bye”. To our surprise, Veda repeated it back to her. Before I had finished asking Ray if he had heard it too, Linus, not to be outdone, said it as well!