Category — baby

Happy Monday!!

I learned pretty quick that story time wasn’t an easy thing with a baby who likes to eat anything and everything. I read about these books… somewhere? At $5.00 each, the Indestructibles books are well worth the money. Declan has pulled, bitten, slobbered on, crumbled and crawled over these books and I just smooth them out and dry them off and they are like new!

On a side note, we let Declan play with an old laptop that I have. I believe what I said was “What harm can he do to it?” and before I could finish the sentence he had ripped off the letter C and had it half way to his mouth. Well, that answers that.

Note: This is not a sponsored post. I always appreciated baby product reviews when I was pregnant (heck, I still do!) so I wanted to review a few of my favorite products.

We love love love our stroller. I first posted about it here. We purchased our UPPAbaby Vista stroller knowing it would last us through not only this baby but the next one as well. It includes a bassinet and a seat that can be back facing or forward facing. You can purchase a car seat adapter for it but we didn’t, we instead bought the infant seat cushion and used that. This ended up working out for us because Declan hated his car seat! We only used the bassinet a few times because Declan preferred to be up where he could see what was going on, but we did use it a few times for naps. We still have him facing backwards and have upgraded from the safety bar to a snack and cup holder for him since he loves to eat puffs!

(We are insanely blessed to live here)

(I added this one cause it is just so cute!)

One of the biggest reasons why we chose this stroller is the many options it offers. Bassinet, car seat, rear facing, front facing, sitting up, full recline, double seat, standing area for older kids (that’s right, it can hold up to three children at once!) it is the stroller that grows with your family. When we have our next little one we will purchase the second seat that attaches below the first. No double-wide strollers here! The storage basket underneath is very spacious as well and it is positioned so that you don’t kick it when walking. I would say the only cons were the price, although I would say it is worth it) and that we had to buy a separate attachment to get a drink holder. Those two things aide I would definitely recommend this stroller to anyone looking to buy one stroller for a growing family.

Note: This is not a sponsored post. I always appreciated baby product reviews when I was pregnant (heck, I still do!) so I wanted to review a few of my favorite products.

You find a dirty silicone covered spoon at the bottom of your purse.

Last weekend was grandparent’s Day, and since both sets of our parents became grandparents when Declan was born I honored the occasion by ordering each set a notepad from Pinhole Press. They were a hit and I heard there was some fighting over who would get to use it! Ordering was easy and the customer service was great, I will most definitely be using Pinhole Press again.

This month has been full of ups and downs. This month he:

- Began day care 3 days a week. He still cries when Bryan drops him off, but once he gets past his first nap he seems to do okay.

- Got his first cold. He made it through two weeks before the day care cold began. A runny nose and fever turned into a runny nose and cough. I took him to the doctor and we were told to wait it out. He now just has a cough and is back in day care (he was too sick to go all last week) so I am hoping he doesn’t get a new illness right on the heels of this one.

- While sick he nursed a lot more and ate less of his purees so we didn’t make many advances in food this month. He still doesn’t like fruit purees, although we have found that he likes Watermelon and peaches if we put it in his mesh feeder. He has also gotten really good at eating his puffs and loves to jam the baby mum mums in his mouth!

- Transitioning to his crib wasn’t really working, and then with him getting sick we just kept him in the bed. We keep talking about getting him in his crib but are hesitant to go the Cry It Out route. He doesn’t really know how to self soothe (although he can do it as we have seen it) which is the main problem. We know that this is because of the choices we have made along the way (bringing him into our bed in the first place, letting him nap on us, etc.) so we are just trying to feel out the best way to make the transition. While we have enjoyed having him in our bed, we know that he needs to be able to self soothe and to sleep longer periods of time. We are ready to put him to bed at 7 or 8 and have a few hours of us time. Whether that is spent blogging, reading, watching TV or just catching up on laundry, that extra few hours would be wonderful!

- We booked our trip back east! I am excited to go back (it has been a few years) and to be in New York again. We will have him christened and then have Thanksgiving with my in-laws, it should be fun! We booked a non-stop flight through Jet Blue which I hope will go smoothly. My youngest sister is flying out with us (she is his God Mother) so it will help to have an extra person, not to mention a whole side row of seats, to keep him busy!

- Crawling has been mastered. He is now pulling up on everything and letting go with one hand. He can’t quite catch the cats yet but he is getting there!

Declan will be 7 months this week… The time has flown by, while at the same time has felt like forever. I have crossed a lot of things off the ‘you’re a mom when…’ list, and today I added labeling my kids clothes for daycare. I am not sure how I got to this point, but it feels right.

(iron on tags from this etsy seller)

Note: This is not a sponsored post. I always appreciated baby product reviews when I was pregnant (heck, I still do!) so I wanted to review a few of my favorite products. More posts on products I love will come soon-ish.

When I was pregnant I saw a few fellow bloggers who used the Boon highchair. I quickly fell in love with the look of it. So sleek! So modern! The part about the pneumatic lift and the easy to clean? Sure, throw those in too. I registered for it at Target and some very generous friends gifted us with it. It stayed in it’s box and went into the garage until we needed it. A little before Declan started needing a highchair I started to second guess myself. Do I really need it? It would make so much more sense to take it back, get the $230 credit and just pick up a $20 highchair from IKEA. I don’t know if it was out of laziness or an actual decision that the Boon was really a good choice, but one day it was brought up and assembled and we haven’t looked back.

This thing is awesome. The wheels make it easy to wheel into the kitchen when we want to feed him while we cook. The pneumatic lift is actually very handy as we can keep him high up when in the kitchen, or lower at table height when feeding him at the dinner table. And since it is made out of one piece of material, with dishwasher safe tray covers, it is veeeery easy to clean. I can’t even imagine having a highchair with any sort of fabric on it because Declan likes to do this when he eats (shot courtesy of my husband’s iPhone):

All in all, I say that if you can swing it, get this highchair. You won’t regret it!

This month my little munchkin:

-Mastered sitting up

-Learned to crawl

-Started pulling up on things, which caused the lowering of the crib mattress and the playpen mattress. Baby-proofing has begun.

-We have now worked up to quite a lot of foods. Likes: peas, zucchini, sweet potatoes, carrots and cereal. Dislikes: Any fruit (including pears, peaches, bananas and avocado).

- We are slowly transitioning to the crib. Slowly.

This month will bring day care three days a week. I think I can, I think I can! I got a promotion at work this month and right after thinking “yay! A promotion!!” I thought “I still wish I could be home with my boy…” As you can tell I am still getting over the fact that I am a working mother. I am blessed to have a wonderful job and the best options available regarding who takes care of my son. And it is those two things that keep me going!

We are beginning to plan a trip back east this fall for Declan’s christening. I am going to have to go back through all of my favorite bloggers tip on traveling with a child. Declan will be about 10 months and being on a plane for 5-6 hours with him in my lap does not sounds all that exciting… Also on my to-do list: find him something to be christened in! Any Catholic moms (or dads!) out there? I am sure we don’t do the white dress on boys thing anymore (or do we?!) but at 10 months old what would you put him in?

Happy half birthday buddy! Now I am off to cover up some more outlets…

I am loving the chevron stripes and chalkboard wall in this nursery! (I showed this to Bryan and we both agreed the marriage wouldn’t last if we tried to paint that wall. One stripe was enough for us! ha)

I made up some sweet potatoes for Declan this weekend and ran out of room in the cube ice trays. The heart trays filled in for the last of the purée.