New Things

1. Sly has started on solid foods. He's only 4 and a half months, but he seemed ready for it. There are certain things you're supposed to look for. One is that the baby is showing curiosity about food. And recently, he's definitely been watching very closely every time I'm eating, following the food with his eyes as it travels to my mouth. He's just about doubled his birth weight, which is another thing. Also, he's been much hungrier lately, and I feel as if my milk supply isn't able to keep up with his appetite!

The World Health Organization as well as The American Academy of Pediatrics recommend breastfeeding exclusively the first six months. But, both say, if you are going to start solids earlier, wait at least four months. Well, we thought it was a good time to start him now, and I don't regret the decision. We feed him a small bowl of baby cereal once a day, and he gobbles it down.

I don't have any pictures of him eating (which surprises me, actually. My first child, and I didn't feel the need to document that huge milestone?!), but here's the little high chair we rigged up to make it easier to feed him. He's nowhere near big enough for it yet. So we replaced the wooden board meant to serve as the seat with the one that's meant to serve as the footrest. And we put in a Bumbo seat, since he still can't sit on his own.

We committed so many safety "no-nos" to achieve this, so I'm not even going to mention them.

One drawback to adding solids to his diet: it is making him poop up a storm! I think that's normal...? Because his digestive system is still getting used to the new type of food. But we're going from one dirty diaper every 2-3 days to 4 dirty diapers a day! Glad we're already going to the cloth diaper store on Saturday, because our meager supply is not lasting as long as I'd like between washes!

2. Last weekend, we took down all our Christmas decorations. Since we were already making a huge mess, and moving furniture around, we decided it would be a good time to play around with how the downstairs rooms are arranged (we have just a tiny living room and huge kitchen. No dining room, unfortunately). Tom and I have both been feeling slightly bummed about having to renew our lease for another whole year. We just don't have the money to move yet. So we wanted to do something to "freshen up" our place for the new year. We tried really hard to reorganize the living room. But the space in there is so tight, that nothing else really worked at all. In the end, we resigned to just leave it (or I should say, "put it back") the way it had been before, with only the slightest change: we oriented the coffee table at a 90° turn from where it had been originally.

Our big change. haha

BUT we made a nice improvement in the kitchen. We switched the table with the microwave cart and rolling cabinet. The space is somehow just so much cozier and easier to use now. We're very happy with how it turned out. (Excuse the darkness of the photos - I foolishly waited until dusk to take them.)

Notice that we use the kitchen to house items such as baby toys and cat scratching posts. I wish we had a bigger house! You can also see here some of the paper snowflakes that are decorating our ceiling for winter.

Having the table nearer to the fridge and oven might provide a handy extra prep surface for cooking/baking.