Last night while playing, Eliza stopped, looked at her new tricycle (which she calls a bicycle) and said:
“Mommy, my bicycle is sad.”
It took Betsy a few minutes to figure out what she meant, but she was focused on the wheel above. She then went over to the bike, patted it, and said “It’s ok bicycle, I’m right here.”
I made my first batch of Eliza Food today. It went like this:
went into this
then I put together this contraption
and put the sweet potatoes in like this
and then portioned it out into 4 oz tupperware like this
and ended up with this
All in all, 9 servings of sweet potatoes that are, unlike processed baby food, delicious. Plus it’s kinda fun knowing exactly what she’s eating, and being able to fix it myself. I’m looking forward to doing this on weekends, and throwing a weeks worth of food in the freezer for her.
…so that I could order a few of these.
To celebrate the birth of a baby in a way that makes it feel like the kid’s right there in your arms, a rice shop in the southwestern Japanese city of Kita-Kyushu will send out a customized dakigokochi, a roughly baby-shaped bag of high-grade rice to everyone on your birth announcement list. The bag will be printed with the kid’s picture, stats, and a greeting–and it will weigh the same as the kid did at birth.
One of the million reasons that I love Japanese culture. Wish I had a rice bag o’ Eliza!
Eliza now officially has a library! Thanks to the generosity of my good friend Tim, Eliza is now a proud Lifetime member of LibraryThing! So if anyone out there has thoughts of getting her books in the future, now we have a way to double check to see if she owns it…and boy, is she going to own some books.
So I started “wearing” Eliza yesterday in a sling and she really loved it. She fell asleep in there, all snug, while I took the ornaments off the Christmas tree. It looks uncomfortable to see her all squished up in there, but I guess it feels like being in the womb. I’m going to try and use it for a little while very day to get her used to it. That way, hopefully I can take her with me to some meetings and such, and she’ll be content to lie against my tummy. I’m lucky I have a job and work in a department where bringing my baby is okay (at least, once in a while). My department chair has even joked about getting a pack n’ play for her office. 🙂
We’re quickly learning what the essentials are for little Eliza: burp cloths (cloth diapers work best), size NB diapers (we like Pampers Swaddlers), lots of wipes, formula, bottles, sleep sacks, and a hat that fits. We’ve already gone through one of the gigantic packs of diapers and two boxes of wipes, and this is only day 11. She also seems to like white noise, and we’ve been using a fan for this. Jason quickly got sick of the “nature sounds” of one of her crib toys coming through the monitor at night! And she’s so tiny, only Newborn size clothes fit her right now, and even they are a little big on her. Pacifiers seem not to interest her, because she prefers her fingers. She doesn’t like to be swaddled, because she likes to have her arms and hands out.
This is such an interesting process. . . every day we learn a little more about our little girl.
So in the last week or so, we’ve more or less finished Eliza’s room. The way I see it, if we’re to the point of hanging pictures on walls, the important stuff is all done. 🙂
There will be pictures later, I’m sure, but the room is really great. I’ve heard that one of the problems with parenting is that you give your children not what they want, but what you wanted…and I’m absolutely certain that’s the case with her room. It’s great, but I’m hoping that at age 4 she doesn’t throw a fit wanted it to be purple with pink glitter, cause that’s not what she’s got now.
At this point, we’re just waiting for her to make an appearance. 2 weeks ’til due date, so could be any time now.
So yeah, that little ticker on the right says less than 20 days to go. YIKES!
Had third and final baby shower today, got lots of great stuff off our registries and other wonderful goodies. Lots of books, which was fantastic. She hasn’t even been born and already she has a good library. Makes sense, given her who her parents are!
We’re pretty much “ready” for the big day: bags packed and in the car at all times, car seat in (although I need to have it checked this week), diapers, wipes, bottles, crib with a sheet and mattress pad on it, her laundry washed. Jason has put her swing together. Now we just need to put batteries in everything (like the monitors). And of course, it would be nice if I could get my exams and papers graded before she decides to arrive!
Just looked at the countdown on the side of the blog, and it’s under 40 days.
Gah.
On the upside, we’ve now got the bare essentials: infant car seat, clothes, diapers, crib, bottles. Eliza would be ok. But it will certainly be a bunch more comfy for her with a few more creature comforts.
So we head north this Friday to take part in the second of our three showers. This one is in concert with my sister, and is being thrown by my family.
Here’s a shot of our haul from last weekend:
and here’s my favorite gift:
A travel bottle warmer. I know I spend a lot of time in my car, but I’m hoping we never actually have to use this. 🙂
