My homemade baby food.

I've decided that I'm making Saoirse's baby food from scratch at home!  It's way easier than I thought it would be and way, way less expensive.  I started her out on rice cereal which she liked, but a box of Gerber one grain rice cereal was about $3, that she went through in a week.  So I decided to make my own rice cereal.  Now, making my own cereal won't save us TONS of money but I'll save wherever I can and that's saving about $5 every two weeks, excluding the massive amounts of formula you use with the Gerber cereal.
I bought an $.80, 1 lb bag of brown rice that will last me for a couple of weeks at least.  You want brown rice because it has more nutrients than white rice because it still has the shell on it.  Rice cereal you buy at that store is white rice that had the shell taken off (along with all of the nutrients) so they then 'added' the nutrients back in.  It seems like a waste of time to me and completely unnatural.

1/4 cup brown rice
1 cup water
2 oz formula or breast milk

I'm still trying to master grinding up the rice, and all I have is a blender so I make due.  You can also use a food processor or maybe even a wheat grinder.  This is the part that takes the longest.  You put small amounts in the blender at a time so it will blend evenly/blend at all.  Try to make it as fine a powder as you can, it's alright if it's not super powdery because you're going to blend it again after to make it for small babies.  I store this powder in a jar and use it when I need it.

Boil 1/4 cup rice powder with 1 cup of water for 10 minutes while whisking constantly to keep lumps from forming.  Once the ten minutes are up add the breast milk or formula then blend to puree for little babies. I noticed the first time that it seemed kind of paste like after I blended it, but my daughter seems to like it so it doesn't bother me.  Refrigerate until you need it and microwave the amount you need until it's at least not ice cold.

I like to make this in big batches so I will cook once and it will last me several days.  I think I doubled the recipe and it lasted about 3 or 4 days.


Next, I made Sweet Potatoes and Carrots

1 sweet potato
or
3 full sized carrots
water

Boil, steam or bake the peeled sweet potato or peeled carrots.  I like to boil them because it's easier for me, when I do I use just enough water to cover the sliced sweet potato or carrots.  I'm not sure how long I boil it for, just long enough for the pieces to get soft enough to easily cut through with your stirring spoon.

Let cool a little.  Put in blender with a little of the water you boiled it in and puree!  It's ready to eat.  You might have to do this about once a week or once every two weeks depending on how much your baby eats.

I like to put the pureed food into an ice cube tray and freeze it so it lasts as long as I need it to or make a bunch, put it in ice cube trays then store it in freezer bags to use when I need it.  Veggies should last about 6 months in the freezer.  AND ice cube size is the perfect size for baby!  Just microwave 1 or 2 cubes when you want them.  Super easy.  Super affordable.  Super healthy for babe!  And they'll LOVE the yummyness of the food.  I'm pretty sure Saoirse could bathe in the sweet potatoes and be the happiest baby on the block.


I think the reasons I wanted to make my own baby food was first of all, the expense.  Each jar of baby food is about $.70 or $.80 which is going to add up if your babe is eating 1 jar 2 or 3 times a day.  I also want to give Saoirse the best start to life by not filling her body with a bunch of preservatives.  Preservatives that are supposed to preserve the food and preservatives that help keep the color of the food to something appetizing.  That's too many preservatives and too many dollar bills for my taste.

My tomato soup.

Alright, so last night I made some seriously DELICIOUS homemade tomato soup.  This was not without trial and error, but I finally made it perfectly after trying different methods to delish-ify.  Here is the recipe.

Okay, fine, this isn't a picture of *my* soup, but it looked a lot like this.  It really didn't last long enough to take a picture of.

6 medium tomatoes
1 green bell pepper
1/2 large onion
3 garlic cloves
1 cup tomato juice (or V8)
pepper to taste

2 beef bouillon cubes

2 1/2 Tbsp butter
2 1/2 Tbsp flour
1 cup milk

Remove the skin of the tomatoes by "blanching" them or put them in steaming (not boiling) water for about 10 minutes.  Then put all of the tomatoes in cold water for a couple of minutes and peel the skins off.  They should come of easily with your fingers.  Core the tomatoes, cut them in half and put in a blender along with the quartered bell pepper, onion, garlic and tomato juice.  Blend until the desired consistency.  I enjoy a little chunky, but you can puree it if you want.  Put the blended soup in a pot along with the beef bouillon cubes and pepper and boil it for about 15 minutes, stirring occasionally.

In another pan melt butter and whisk in flour until smooth.  Slowly pour in milk while whisking vigorously to keep lumps from forming.  Whisk constantly for 5 minutes and pour this gravy into the tomato soup and mix it in (only do this after the tomato soup has boiled for at least 15 minutes, so time it right).

This is even MORE delicious if you smash up Ritz crackers into your bowl of soup.  This serves 2 people.

This is the best tomato soup I've ever had.  TRY IT!


There are more of my favorite homemade recipes to come!!  Stay tuned.

Her diaper rash

For my birthday Joseph surprised me with an adventure of great proportions!  I'll write another blog for that.  But while on this adventure little Saoirse was in disposable diapers, because we were no where near a washing machine.  For the first time in her LIFE she got a diaper rash.  Obviously I'm pointing my accusatory finger at those disposables because she's never gotten a rash before while wearing her cloth diapers no matter how long she's been sitting in her 'creations'.  Anywho, last night when I was changing her diaper, I had been aware that a red line on both cheeks were creeping their way to full rash status, I noticed that those two red lines looked horrible.  Upon further inspection I noticed that they were raised, a couple of layers of skin were missing on those pesky red lines and she was starting to bleed.  I've never actually really needed to deal with diaper rash before but I did know some tricks to help it go away.  Well, by "tricks" I mean I knew that you could stick them in the tub to help clean off poo so you don't have to use a wipe that all of a sudden feels like you're wiping with thorns.  Normally, when she would look like her bum was getting a little red, I would keep her out of her diaper for a few minutes while I dried the area. This consisted of being fearless and blowing gently on her bum to dry it out.  So anywho, I was searching online how to best deal with diaper rash and/or what cream is best to use (and use on cloth diapers).  WELL, I found a fabulous cure.  Yes CURE.  I don't know why I never thought of it before, but when I came home from the hospital they kindly gave me some Lansinoh HPA Lanolin to help make breast feeding a little less bloody and raw, I just put a little dab of that wherever her rash was and BOOM, 14 hours later the rash is almost GONE.  From bloody to just a little red in 14 hours!  I was amazed.  I've never heard of something working that fast.  Maybe I'm just being a first time mom discovering old remedies, but I thought I'd share with the world in case you're in my boat with an angry baby, bleeding rashes and excess nipple cream.

My precious.

Today is my birthday!  There is SO much cleaning that needs to be done, but I think I'm going to take a day off from that and do some of my favorite things!  First off, I watched Enchanted.  It's SUCH a good movie!  I love Giselle.  She's so happy!  And she has fabulous dresses.

Like I said, fabulous.

Anyway, here are some pictures of my little precious babe.

Wearing her new dress she got from the baby shower from her Aunt Danielle.  Stinking CUTE.

Hahaha.  What a face.  

She probably couldn't get any cuter though.  My little papoose baby.

She had just gotten her 6 month shots about an hour before this.  Poor little thing hated them.  

It's still weird to me that I have a little tiny human being that I take care of.  That trusts me.  That looks up to me to take care of her like I did my mom.  I love being a mom!

Our day so far.

I'm trying to start Saoirse on a new schedule so that she'll sleep through the night.  This new schedule requires just 2 to 3 naps a day and less feedings.  Hopefully (crossing fingers) over the next week she gets used to it and starts sleeping all through the night.  

So to keep us entertained, we watched some Kipper and went to the park.

We probably sat there for half an hour. She was squealing the entire time and actually screamed once. I think it was the first time she's done that.  It was pretty cute seeing how excited she was to be outside.

This is what we're doing right now.  Just snuggling and chilling.  

On a slightly sidely note, as soon as that picture was taken (with Photobooth) and she saw herself and me she got all wiggly.  She's getting quite the personality.  :)  I love it.

Other than that, I'm really tired no extremely tired.  Wait, extreallymely tired.  Yes.  Last night Saoirse decided to barely sleep.  Geez, I hope this new schedule thing works.

My old roommate.

And when I say "old" I mean elderly.

Miss Emily Rebekah Hewlett came on an impromptu visit to dear old Utah a week and a half ago and we had SO much fun!  It was great hanging out with her!  It was just like old times - including the harassment I seem to have no problem throwing in her direction.  No wonder she loves me so much.  She lives in New Jersey now and the day she left there was an earthquake that delayed her flight out of Philadelphia and the day she was supposed to go back hurricane Irene was going through her state.  So she ended up staying a few more days.  No problem.  It just gave us more time to harass each other.

Here are some pictures of the event that I stole from her Facebook.

 These two are so cute!  

 So we might have attempted to take the stroller hiking.  Probably won't do that again.

 If there is one thing I'll miss about Utah, it's going to be this view.  Holy cow it's beautiful!  Taken up in Rock Canyon.

 What's a party without deliciously homemade Pot Stickers?  These little guys are soon to meet their fried death.

Geez we look good.  I love this girl!!  

I'm soo happy Emily came to visit!  It was seriously amazing seeing her!  I can't wait until we see her again. 

My brain is against me.

Soooo at the end of this lonely evening Saoirse is in her room crying by herself while my head tries to recuperate from the screams of a teething babe.  I can FEEL a migraine seeping through the cracks of my tired and withered brain.  Super, I love a good migraine.  Bring it on.  Seriously though, Saoirse is really starting this teething thing (that's what I like to say when she's inconsolable) and she is NOT happy about it.  She seems to be allergic to her bed (on top of her allergy to clothing) which makes it oh, so difficult for me when I put her in there to sleep.  Then I think, I'll just put her in her bouncer for a little while, then that turns into an hour of bouncing.  On the plus side, my calves will look great in no time.

I guess I'll go try to console her with a diaper change and maybe MAYBE a feeding.

Being a mom is hard.

In the meantime, this is our new favorite song around here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U7mPqycQ0tQ

Her favorite toy.

She seems to have lost her book.  

At least she stopped staring at me.

Our little Zoolander.

SO, while I sit here thinking about how GREAT it would be if Saoirse would get at least a 45 minute nap in (alas, she enjoys anything but napping, including her tired cries and screams) I think of how cute she is getting and how wonderful it will be when she gets over this "not napping" thing she's doing.  This morning after feeding her I was laying next to her in bed trying my hardest to go back to sleep but failing, she was just laying there very awake, but looking around our room and just enjoying laying next to mom in the warm blankets.  It was soo awesome.  I caught a glimpse of her at 2 years old, coming to lay next to us in the morning to wake us up.  It's so strange how old she's getting!  I can't believe it.  In just a couple of weeks I'll be the mother of a 6 month old.  That's when all sorts of crazy things start really happening, like her crawling and the end of my leaving anything within her sticky grasp.  Right now, she's still only rolling to the left (I like to call her my little Zoolander) and trying so desperately to move in a forward direction.
P.S. weird fact, I was sitting on the couch writing this very post and heard what could only be the scratchings of a little mouse in the wall only to find Saoirse on the other side of the wall with her limbs through the crib slats playfully scratching said wall.  My crazy little Zoolander...

Anyway, here are the latest and greatest of the little drool bucket.

This is how every picture of me turns out, I swear.  She's turning into her mommy!  I love it!

Daddy and baby enjoying some time in the grass.  Saoirse seemed to be a little confused by the scratchy carpet.  When we laid her down in it the look on her face made me think she thought she was being eaten by some huge monster.  Hilarious.  Oh yeah, and I guess, her welcome for giving her the palest skin in the world.  She will have a lifetime of slathering on thick layers of sun lotion.  

This was taken yesterday and she remains the cutest baby ever.  P.S. after seeing this picture, I realized how stinking LONG her hair is getting!  Crazy.

A couple of weeks ago we packed up the fam to head down to Manti, Utah for the temple wedding of one of Joseph's favorite mission companions.  The groom was born in Taiwan and came to the United States for the first time ever just a couple of weeks before the wedding!  He married a girl from the States (Joseph thinks she's from Montana).  They're pretty cute together, he speaks Chinese to her and she speaks English to him.  It seems to work pretty well.  I mean, they got married.  ANYWAY, the Manti temple is BEAUTIFUL.  I am still shocked by it really.  See for yourself...

Yes I took this picture.  I know it should probably be in National Geographic or something.  

Super awesome Temple, super awesome people, super awesome day!  I hung out outside with Saoirse while Joseph attended the Sealing.  Have I mentioned how I LOVE sealings??  They're the best thing ever.  They're so magical and they always make me cry - whether or not I know who is being sealed whom.  Heavenly Father is so great!  He has provided us with a plan that makes it so we can be with our families forever.  That's FOREVER people!  What an awesome plan.  What the heck, it's seriously the greatest thing I've ever heard of.  How do I know it's so great do you ask?  Because I am sealed to both Joseph and Saoirse for time and all eternity and it feels awesome to know death can only separate us for a short time.  

Her allergy.

So, the mothers room at church used to be kind of cool I thought.  But the longer I attend this elite club of mothers who need to feed their babe during church the more I realize that putting a bunch of women in a room together who have virtually nothing in common creates awkward situations and conversations.  As I was leaving to go to Relief Society after feeding and changing Saoirse, a woman walked in with her son that I've spoken to on numerous occasions without awkwardness.  She said hi to me and took one look at Saoirse and said to me "Is your baby allergic to clothes?  I noticed that she isn't wearing anything and she wasn't last weekend either."  UM.  What?  Seriously?  "Uh, no, she gets hot when she's swaddled so I don't put anything on her."  Who asks that?  What the heck??  Well, I guess I should put something on her when we go to church - I did realize that taking a naked baby to church is unusual, but did it warrant that question?  It's hot outside, like I'm going to foof her up in some dress that's ridiculously hot and sweaty.

Well, here's a cute video.  The cutest one ever probably.  Blogger has been weird uploading videos so I hope it works.