september mama

the past couple of days have been hell around nap time, and even bedtime, shockingly. i don't know what crawled up rowans butt, but naps ain't happening. she has always been pretty good with them; i.e., she gets tired and falls asleep nursing, i put her in the crib, she naps from 30min-2 hours depending. usually twice a day. lately things go south at step two and end with her screaming until i take her out and say "ok, no nap." she might've gotten 1 or 2 in there recently but not long ones and not worth remembering. bedtime the past two nights has been similar, though we're still getting her to sleep before 8pm... tonight she magically went right out with no fussing (as is her usual manner, the angel) so i'm hoping that at least is over, but we'll see. i don't know if she's having a growth spurt or starting teething or what, but as of tomorrow we institute structured nap time to see if that helps!

as i was explaining/complaining about all this to my mom on the phone, she asked whether i thought it would help to try giving rowan cereal, and for the first time i really pondered the question and came up with a surprising (and slightly distressing) response: why? why on earth would anybody give a baby processed, nutritionally-useless starch rice-product? as one clever poster on a random forum said "it's sweetened wallpaper paste with a vitamin pill mixed in."

this distresses me because i recently suggested it to a friend with a 6 month old who won't sleep through the night--the age-old remedy, give 'em cereal. it worked--and now i regret it as i strongly question the wisdom of taking up stomach space meant for breastmilk with an empty filler akin to soy protein in dog food or "earthworms in the hamburgers." i wish i had kept my damned mouth shut! all i can do is hope the poor kid doesn't suffer from my stupidity... i was just trying to help his mama.

from msnbc, of all mainstream sources:

Dr. David Ludwig of Children's Hospital Boston, a specialist in pediatric nutrition, says some studies suggest rice and other highly processed grain cereals actually could be among the worst foods for infants.

"These foods are in a certain sense no different from adding sugar to formula. They digest very rapidly in the body into sugar, raising blood sugar and insulin levels" and could contribute to later health problems, including obesity, he says.

*sigh*

and if that wasn't bad enough, i, ex-vegan turned...something vegetarianish...have decided that the first food(s) rowan should have are homegrown egg yolks and pureed rabbit from our backyard 'herd.' horrifying, i know. but the fact is meat IS more nutritious than any cereal i could give her, and knowing exactly where it came from and what it ate and how humanely it was cared for and slaughtered, i feel ok with that. of course i am going to give her good things like avocados, sweet potatoes, and plenty of coconut meat and oil as well, but i think rabbit will be her first food. (there is scientific basis for introducing meats first.) interestingly enough, the only real "risk" of feeding anyone too much rabbit is the fact that it is so lean. you can die from only eating rabbit if you have no other source of fat in your diet. good thing breastmilk is so rich in the stuff!

so anyway, i'm thinking about solids now. rowan is 14 weeks, she can't sit up all by herself yet and i think she still does that extrusion thing with her tongue, so we've got a little while... but i'm thinking ahead. i have been giving her tastes of things, like watermelon, peaches, maple syrup... but just touching her tongue with it. the peaches were frozen though, so that was pretty funny. she was very confused by the coldness of it and couldn't decide if she liked it or not. here is a list of things i want to make for her when the time comes:

- rabbit pate (with livers, maybe some chicken too if mel+james continue to eat their roosters)
- avocado, bananas, carrots, etc, as is or steamed and mashed (i cannot wait to see what she looks like after eating mashed beets, rofl)
- boiled fruit purees
- fermented sweet potatoes
- breastmilk custard/pudding
- breastmilk yogurt

naturally i do not intend to buy jars of baby food at the store, because i'm stubborn like that. i also have no problem taking whatever we're eating and mashing it up for her, nor do i agree that babies shouldn't have spices or natural salt (sugar, eh, i don't know). babies in india eat curry, babies in mexico eat jalapenos, right? american babies get fed boring, tasteless crap! i'm going to save her from that snoozefest.

i noticed all of a sudden the other day that she seemed bored... like out of nowhere, i got the sense that the fussing and wanting to nurse she was doing was purely because she had nothing more interesting to do. at that moment i realized i didn't have anything interesting or stimulating for her (other than dancing around, singing, or reading books, which we'd already done that day). parenting crisis ensued, and i rushed to craigslist to see what was out there in terms of baby-entertaining devices. a few hits, but i had trouble deciding and contacting anybody, so as of right now i think i am picking up a walker tomorrow.* in the meantime, however, i was frantic and found myself at walmart using up a gift card we were given on buying an exersaucer/jumper hybrid thing. the seat swivels 360deg and the platform underneath is a bouncey thing but can be stabilized with books underneath it. the only problem is that she is really too small for it! i stacked books up so high the platform is almost popping off its holders and stuffed her in there with blankets to support her, and she's still a little wobbly. it's cute though, and she seemed to like it a good bit. definitely got her attention with the dangly toys :). i hate to buy cheap chinese plastic crap--especially new--but i was desperate and it fit on my gift card.

so it's late and i'm tired and need to pump, but i have more to say... photos, parenting forums, and something off-topic that i can't remember right now. i'll get to it later.


*yes, i said a walker. yes, i know they are "bad" nowadays. i'm annoyed as can be that the main reason that walkers are considered a no-no is that since they started making them "safer" (i.e., bigger, heavier, and generally less baby-friendly) they obscure baby's view of her feet and thus her connection to the fact that her feet are causing her to move... she doesn't get the spatial learning that would otherwise come from seeing how her body interacts with the floor. hence the delays in motor development--which dissipate upon beginning to walk, by the way. so anyway i'm forced to buy a newfangled piece of crap that may or may not impede her reaching the crawling stage, but the fact is i think she wants to move around. so we'll see--i just have to make sure she gets enough tummy time to counterbalance it. except she hates tummy time.