So, Baby Guy is six months old. And adorbs, but you already knew that part. I'm having a tough time with the transition to solid foods. Our pediatrician has been pushing us to start him on solids since our four month appointment which is way too early, in my opinion. And, frankly, I haven't heard anyone quoting from medical studies to support starting solids at a particular age, other than the WHO recommending breastmilk exclusively for at least six months. (Note the "at least".) I get a little irritated when pediatricians resort to scare tactics to force compliance. Some examples: "Breastmilk is deficient in iron after nine months." "Breastmilk is deficient in iron after six months." (Which is it, guys? Get your facts straight.) "You need to increase his caloric intake because he's moving around a lot and needs more calories." (Really? My 86th percentile in weight baby needs a bigger caloric intake? My breastmilk doesn't have enough calories to keep up with him? Pfft.)
So, I'm trying to walk the line between doing what's best for my baby and just digging my heels in. The problem is the conflicting reports. One pediatrician says you need more iron after 9 months. One says 6 months. One says start rice cereal right away, one says rice cereal is just empty calories. I'm being as diligent as possible, doing research and trying to take the advice of my (well educated, experienced) pediatrician, while also remembering to take that advice with a grain of salt.
In the end, like everything else in parenting, I have to go with my gut. I have to do what feels right for me and my baby. I will admit that some of my trepidation in starting solids lies with my fear of losing the breastfeeding relationship. It's a tough transition for me. I am the center of his world right now. I am his Mama and his food and everything that embodies love and caretaking. Soon, he will discover a whole wide world beyond me and the selfish part of me wants to avoid that as long as possible. But the realistic part of me knows that it is better to foster his independence from a place of security, rather than shelter him from the world.
So the short answer is: I don't know. Breastmilk is still, without a doubt, the most nutritious thing he can be eating right now. No one food can replace that. We'll start solids soon, but I'm not in a hurry.
Wednesday, August 29, 2012
Tuesday, August 28, 2012
Nap time.
I have had nearly two (count 'em! Two!) solid hours of Baby Guy napping. So what did I do with my time, you may ask? I trolled the Interwebs. Yep. That's right. I sat on my butt and did nothing productive. I kinda wish I had spent it knitting, but I did (re)discover a fabulous blog: White Chocolate Superstar.
My house is messy and I have a millions projects in the queue, but sometimes it's nice to just veg.
Wednesday, August 22, 2012
Tested: Infantino Fresh Squeezed
About a month ago, I was selected as a product tester* for Infantino's new line of baby food storage system. If you don't want to read the whole post, this is the main take away point: I love it. There are a few things I would tweak or change, but overall, the Fresh Squeezed system is awesome.
The main component is a device that allows you to inject purees into pouches. Pouches are all the rage nowadays because they are so portable. Glass baby food jars are fine for keeping in the fridge at home, but if you are on the go, pouches are the way to go. With the Infantino system, you attach a pouch, put the dispenser on top, add puree of your choice, push down with the plunger, cap, and voila! The greatest thing about this, aside from how easy it is to use, is that you can control exactly what goes in the pouch. No reading labels to check for gross stuff. You puree your own fruits and veggies and you are good to go!
There are two options for pouches: the disposable, single use or the reusable silicon. The disposables are theoretically four ounces each. I say theoretically because there is no indication on the filling station of how full each injector should be to reach four ounces. There are some plastic lines on the sides of the injectors, but I'm not sure if they are intended as fill lines. Since I'm apparently not a great judge of how much four ounces is, I way overfilled the first pouch. Super, ridiculously overfilled. It was oozing back out the top when I tried to take it out of the station and I got pureed sweet potato everywhere. Another tester said the same thing, so I'm really just echoing her sentiment here, but I wish there was a fill line or some kind of indication of how much puree to put in to equal four ounces. Also, it's a little hard to rinse out the injectors with something kind of sticky, like sweet potato. You really need a bottle brush or similar to get the whole thing cleaned out for the next use. Everything else we tried rinsed off fairly easily - peas, chickpeas, yogurt, fruit. Otherwise, it's super easy and fast.
The silicon reusable pouch is a good idea, but it's fairly bulky compared to the disposables. I also had a harder time filling it than the disposables. The directions don't specify this, but I found that I had to squeeze out as much air as possible out of the pouch before attempting to squeeze the food in. Otherwise, there was nowhere for the air to go and the pouch wouldn't fill because of the air pressure. It also seems to hold a lot more than the disposable pouches. I had a lot of room left at the top of the bottle when I filled it with the same quantity as the disposables. I like the disposable idea - reduce, reuse, recycle and all that, but I'm not sure how feasible it would be to stock a bunch of them, whereas the disposables are super easy to fill and store a bunch at once. Maybe if the reusable was more like a bag and less like a bottle? Also, I wish the reusable pouch had come with labels or something so you could label it without worrying about having permanent marker on your reusable pouch. The disposables come with a warning to not reuse them, but I felt pretty bad throwing away the pouch and cap away after we ate the peas. I really wanted to reuse the cap, especially.
There is a spoon attachment you can get for the pouches that is really clever. You thread the spoon onto the end of the pouch and you can feed your baby from them spoon. It's really clever. Baby Guy was pretty interested in holding the spoon and getting pureed peas all over his hands and face, but I imagine it could be less messy for an older baby. It's also a good way to control how much comes out of the pouch at once. If you want a slower rate, put the spoon on. Otherwise, just let the baby have it right out of the pouch opening. I ate the peas that way and it was fairly fast. (And tasty!)
The system has a bunch of fun accessories, too. My favorite was the "Steam n' Smush". It's exactly what it sounds like. A little bowl with a colander and a masher accessory. The bowl is on the small side, but it will hold one small, diced sweet potato, for example. Just put a bit of water in the bottom, put the top on and pop it in the microwave for a minute or two. The steamer basket can be a little awkward to fish out if you overfill the basket, like I did, but it's not an insurmountable obstacle. I was really impressed with how well it worked. I didn't bother with the smushing part, as I wanted to puree everything to a fairly creamy consistency, but if you have an older baby, the smush would be great as it would leave some texture without having everything be too chunky. I would also wager that the smush wouldn't really work with the fill station unless you cooked the veggies super soft and mashed the heck out of them. Otherwise, I think there would be too many lumps to make it through the fill hole. The only thing I would change is I would make it bigger. Or have it available in two sizes (small and large).
As easy as the whole thing is to use, I would still want to make a fairly large quantity of food if I was going to all the trouble of making baby food, so I wish everything came in larger sizes. A fill station with five fill ports would be ideal, I think. Having said that, everything is sized to match right now. The amount of veggies that fit in the steamer is the amount that will fit in the pouches once pureed,. But it would be nice to have a corresponding larger size of everything.
The only part of the system that left me underwhelmed was the Peppy Puree. It's basically a small food processor. I was pretty excited about this part, but ours never worked correctly. I think there is a stripped gear or washer or something in the base, so the blade couldn't catch and turn. It's also really loud, though that may have been a function of it being broken. It's pretty difficult to get the base and the lid properly attached in the beginning. Once you get it on the first few times, it gets easier, but it's pretty stiff right out of the box. Since we couldn't get ours to function properly, we ended up just using the Baby Bullet to puree. And really, any type of food processor or blender will work.
Some tips:
1. Make sure everything is pureed very smooth. Because the injector openings are small, it does not handle chunks well.
2. Make sure you have enough liquid in the mix when you puree. It makes both blending and filling easier.
3. Invest in a small bottle brush for cleaning thick or sticky stuff out between uses.
Some of the combinations we tried:
1. Coconut milk, Thai curry paste (just a smidge), sweet potatoes.
2. Peaches, blueberry soy yogurt, coconut milk.
3. Chickpeas, miso paste, coconut milk.
4. Peas, plain soy yogurt, dill, garlic powder.
Other ideas we didn't get around to:
1. Cucumber, plain yogurt, mint (or dill).
2. Potatoes, veggie stock (or water), curry powder.
3. Pineapple, pineapple juice, coconut milk, plain yogurt.
4. Cooked oat bran, bananas, mango, apple juice.
5. Cooked red lentils, cooked rice, coconut milk, mustard.
The coconut curry sweet potatoes were a hit, but Baby Guy was not a fan of the garlicky peas. It might be too strong a flavor for him since he's so young and relatively new to solids. All in all, I think we will get a lot of use out of this system. It's really easy to use and super fun. And though I wish it came in a larger size, the smaller size allows you to try out a bunch of different flavor combos. I love that you can customize so easily. Need to pack in more calories? Use coconut milk. Need more iron? Put in spinach or kale. Need more fiber? Add some brown rice or oats. Endless possibilities and super convenient pouches. Oh, and everything is dishwasher safe, BPA-, PVC- and phthalate free. Love, love, love.
*I have received the Fresh Squeezed Squeeze Station from Infantino to facilitate my review.
 |
| We got to test all this stuff! |
 |
| The filling station in action. |
The silicon reusable pouch is a good idea, but it's fairly bulky compared to the disposables. I also had a harder time filling it than the disposables. The directions don't specify this, but I found that I had to squeeze out as much air as possible out of the pouch before attempting to squeeze the food in. Otherwise, there was nowhere for the air to go and the pouch wouldn't fill because of the air pressure. It also seems to hold a lot more than the disposable pouches. I had a lot of room left at the top of the bottle when I filled it with the same quantity as the disposables. I like the disposable idea - reduce, reuse, recycle and all that, but I'm not sure how feasible it would be to stock a bunch of them, whereas the disposables are super easy to fill and store a bunch at once. Maybe if the reusable was more like a bag and less like a bottle? Also, I wish the reusable pouch had come with labels or something so you could label it without worrying about having permanent marker on your reusable pouch. The disposables come with a warning to not reuse them, but I felt pretty bad throwing away the pouch and cap away after we ate the peas. I really wanted to reuse the cap, especially.
There is a spoon attachment you can get for the pouches that is really clever. You thread the spoon onto the end of the pouch and you can feed your baby from them spoon. It's really clever. Baby Guy was pretty interested in holding the spoon and getting pureed peas all over his hands and face, but I imagine it could be less messy for an older baby. It's also a good way to control how much comes out of the pouch at once. If you want a slower rate, put the spoon on. Otherwise, just let the baby have it right out of the pouch opening. I ate the peas that way and it was fairly fast. (And tasty!)
The system has a bunch of fun accessories, too. My favorite was the "Steam n' Smush". It's exactly what it sounds like. A little bowl with a colander and a masher accessory. The bowl is on the small side, but it will hold one small, diced sweet potato, for example. Just put a bit of water in the bottom, put the top on and pop it in the microwave for a minute or two. The steamer basket can be a little awkward to fish out if you overfill the basket, like I did, but it's not an insurmountable obstacle. I was really impressed with how well it worked. I didn't bother with the smushing part, as I wanted to puree everything to a fairly creamy consistency, but if you have an older baby, the smush would be great as it would leave some texture without having everything be too chunky. I would also wager that the smush wouldn't really work with the fill station unless you cooked the veggies super soft and mashed the heck out of them. Otherwise, I think there would be too many lumps to make it through the fill hole. The only thing I would change is I would make it bigger. Or have it available in two sizes (small and large).
 |
| Steam and smush! |
The only part of the system that left me underwhelmed was the Peppy Puree. It's basically a small food processor. I was pretty excited about this part, but ours never worked correctly. I think there is a stripped gear or washer or something in the base, so the blade couldn't catch and turn. It's also really loud, though that may have been a function of it being broken. It's pretty difficult to get the base and the lid properly attached in the beginning. Once you get it on the first few times, it gets easier, but it's pretty stiff right out of the box. Since we couldn't get ours to function properly, we ended up just using the Baby Bullet to puree. And really, any type of food processor or blender will work.
Some tips:
1. Make sure everything is pureed very smooth. Because the injector openings are small, it does not handle chunks well.
2. Make sure you have enough liquid in the mix when you puree. It makes both blending and filling easier.
3. Invest in a small bottle brush for cleaning thick or sticky stuff out between uses.
Some of the combinations we tried:
1. Coconut milk, Thai curry paste (just a smidge), sweet potatoes.
2. Peaches, blueberry soy yogurt, coconut milk.
3. Chickpeas, miso paste, coconut milk.
4. Peas, plain soy yogurt, dill, garlic powder.
Other ideas we didn't get around to:
1. Cucumber, plain yogurt, mint (or dill).
2. Potatoes, veggie stock (or water), curry powder.
3. Pineapple, pineapple juice, coconut milk, plain yogurt.
4. Cooked oat bran, bananas, mango, apple juice.
5. Cooked red lentils, cooked rice, coconut milk, mustard.
The coconut curry sweet potatoes were a hit, but Baby Guy was not a fan of the garlicky peas. It might be too strong a flavor for him since he's so young and relatively new to solids. All in all, I think we will get a lot of use out of this system. It's really easy to use and super fun. And though I wish it came in a larger size, the smaller size allows you to try out a bunch of different flavor combos. I love that you can customize so easily. Need to pack in more calories? Use coconut milk. Need more iron? Put in spinach or kale. Need more fiber? Add some brown rice or oats. Endless possibilities and super convenient pouches. Oh, and everything is dishwasher safe, BPA-, PVC- and phthalate free. Love, love, love.
 |
| This goes in... |
 |
| This comes out! |
*I have received the Fresh Squeezed Squeeze Station from Infantino to facilitate my review.
Tuesday, August 14, 2012
Once more with feeling: etiquette.
Pro-tip for everyone out there in the real world: if you see a woman with a baby, DO NOT ask if she is pregnant. That bears repeating: DO NOT ask a woman carrying a baby if she is also pregnant. It doesn't matter how old the baby is, or how "pregnant" she looks. Just hold your tongue. I mean it.
I have had two or three people ask me in the past month or two ask if I was pregnant. While I was holding my four or five month old son. Look, I get it. I am unfit. I am overweight. I KNOW THIS. I have a mirror. There is no need for anyone else to point it out. I dress appropriately for my weight. I am not shimmying around in tiny shorts and skin tight shirts, but the fact of the matter is that I had a baby not that long ago, the recovery was hard, and I am struggling to lose weight. Sure I lost the baby-related weight easily, but I have additional weight to lose. And having a baby shifts your body around in unanticipated ways. So I am now flabby in places I wasn't before. I AM WORKING ON IT.
FYI rude jerks: babies are a lot of work. I'm doing the best I can and I really don't appreciate your comments. SO STOP.
The next person to comment is either getting punched or tears. Or both. I haven't decided yet. But please, for the sake of all the mothers out there, stop asking if I (or any other woman with a baby) am pregnant.
Rant over. (For now.)
I have had two or three people ask me in the past month or two ask if I was pregnant. While I was holding my four or five month old son. Look, I get it. I am unfit. I am overweight. I KNOW THIS. I have a mirror. There is no need for anyone else to point it out. I dress appropriately for my weight. I am not shimmying around in tiny shorts and skin tight shirts, but the fact of the matter is that I had a baby not that long ago, the recovery was hard, and I am struggling to lose weight. Sure I lost the baby-related weight easily, but I have additional weight to lose. And having a baby shifts your body around in unanticipated ways. So I am now flabby in places I wasn't before. I AM WORKING ON IT.
FYI rude jerks: babies are a lot of work. I'm doing the best I can and I really don't appreciate your comments. SO STOP.
The next person to comment is either getting punched or tears. Or both. I haven't decided yet. But please, for the sake of all the mothers out there, stop asking if I (or any other woman with a baby) am pregnant.
Rant over. (For now.)
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