Weezy Wednesday: Avocado

Here is the much anticipated Avocado Debacle Debut!

I’m With Him ehhm Them

So I have a really controversial new boyfriend.  Brakes is okay with it.  He is crushing on my new BF a bit too.  His name is Dr. Richard Ferber and I think I love him. A lot. 

You see, Dr. Ferber managed to give me what no other man has managed to give me in the last 6 months;  several consecutive nights sleep. 

Many of you have heard me lament discuss Eloise’s inconsistent sleeping habits.  Yes, I understood that lack of sleep is part and parcel with new babies; we knew that going into this rollercoaster.  What we did not predict is what lack of sleep was going to turn me into.  Brakes is a type-A personality who fine-tuned his working-through-exhaustion skills while getting his PhD (did you know I married a doctor?).   The only time I practiced work-through-exhaustion skills was when I made it to class after a wild night partying freshman year of college.  Lets just say, I become insane I don’t manage well with no sleep.  So after an official six months of feeling like death and complaining about it incessantly bravely muddling through my exhaustion, Brakes and I had a heart to heart.  Brakes took scientific data (I told you he was a doctor) and determined that Eloise sleeps less than an average adult which is about half as much as she should be sleeping.  This, combined with a crazy wife, convinced Brakes that drastic measures needed to be taken. 

I did some research.  It turns out we had been informally following Dr. Sear’s methods for encouraging babies to sleep for several months.  It obviously was not working so we had to change our strategy.  For weeks my very wise mom had been urging me to let Eloise “cry it out”.  Being stubborn and independent, I refused to listen.  I did not feel comfortable allowing my child to cry herself to sleep.  Shudder.  I was admittedly indignant and self-righteous (and just generally an ass) in these conversations with Mom.   However, when I happened upon this video at www.babycenter.com, I realized that CIO was something I just might have to succumb to… besides it was invented by a doctor, how bad could it be?

We had a plan.  We would put Eloise to bed, awake in her crib and let her cry at 5, 10, then 15 minute intervals.  When the interval was up, we would briefly go to her, rub her back, give her a kiss, then skedaddle out of her room. 

The first night she made it through the first two intervals.  By the 15 minute check point she was sound asleep and sweetly sucking her thumb.  I wiped the tears from my face, sipped my hefty glass of wine,  and Brakes and I congratulated ourselves on our stoic parenting abilities.  Eloise slept all night.  The next night we had a repeat performance however she was asleep by the 10 minute mark.  For the last week Eloise has been taking 2-3 good naps per day (for the first time IN HER LIFE) and sleeping all night. 

In fact, she is so much better at communicating what she wants, as well as putting herself to sleep.  For example, I never realized that she wanted a third nap each day.  Now she gets fussy and if I carry her back towards her bedroom she stops whining, if I turn and go into another room, she wails.  If I do an about face and go back to her room, she is quiet until I place her in her bed where she rolls over, grabs her blankee and sighs contentedly. 

It is like having a completely different baby and it leaves me with some actual time on my hands for blogging and painting my toenails cooking and cleaning.   And that, my friends, is the reason I would cheerfully enter into a polyamorous (did you see that True Life?! Umm, yeah.  I told you I had time on my hands) with Brakes and Dr. Ferber… or, as I like to call them, my Doctor-Double.  Flame all you want but I have a baby that sleeps through the night… and just look how happy she is: **It should be noted that I do not advocate the Ferber method for everyone.  Our child happened to respond to this method positively and did not cry/scream for four hours.  The parents out there who have dealt with that, hats off to you!  Brakes and I would for sure have broken. 

My Blog World Has Been Rocked!

Okay people, as my less-than-stellar camera skills hint at, I am not a technological genius (insert your best Ross impersonation here).  In fact, I had to trade smooches with my high-school boyfriend so that he would make me an email account.  I needed it to apply for college- I was that far behind the curve. 

On the nest, my online community when I am not traipsing around in blog-land, (and can we just note, how random it is that I even have an online community?  As stated above; I am NOT a web-savvy-gal) it was proposed that we have a weekly blogging challenge to keep things interesting and to get to share each other's fab blogs.  Now that I know there will be people not related to me (or people that I stalk and then guilt into “following” me. Just kidding.  Anyways.) looking at my stuff, I decided it was time to change things up a bit.  Plus it is finally officially Fall and, as you know, I’ll use any excuse to have me a little Fall Decor (FD!  SO EXCITED! OMIGOSH). 

After exhaustive Google searches (Windows Live Writer is my new best friend) and a couple of practice efforts I managed to change my background, design a new (massive, I’m working on that) header, up-load it all, and change my format so my pics don’t publish all hinkily spaced.   (How did I, a busy new mother, have time to rock my blog you ask?  One word: Ferber.  Don’t judge- we did what we had to do.)  Hopefully now Brakes and Gas will be easier on your eyes (though I make no promises as far as the content).  So without further ado:

Challenge #1: Why do you Blog?

I started a blog for several reasons:  

• I had a lot of nervous energy during my pregnancy.
• I suspected that B&G spawn would be so precious, I knew it would be a disservice to the public to not broadcast her to mass audiences.  I was obviously correct in this assumption.

I still blog today for several reasons:

• I am a closeted ethnographer; I believe in the value of documenting lives. 
• I imagine that somewhere along the line, Weezy will look over funny (or completely harrowing) tales of her youth and really comprehend how much she is loved and wanted… and the wretched pain that is childbirth.
• Making the decision to have a baby and then making the very difficult decision to take a break from the profession I love was a lot of changes for me to take on in one fell swoop.  I think the blog gives me an outlet to express myself in an independent way.  It helps me feel connected to the world beyond my little bubble and it gives me much-needed satisfaction outside my roles as a wife and mother.  I think this is important. 
• Lastly, I blog because I require a lot of attention (and you may have noticed, I am quite verbose) and even poor Brakes needs a “break” sometimes.  And blogging is more socially appropriate than having conversations with my imaginary friends in the bathroom.

Confirmation Received

Apparently she swallowed a substantial amount of avocado after all.  Its enough to make your eyes burn…

And yes, I do realize I just openly discussed poo in cyberspace.  I am pretty sure that means I am officially a mommy or something.  TGIF;  Brakes will be home to change the next “residual solids” mess in my kid’s pants.  I’m going to pour myself a glass of wine.  A big one.  It is a good thing she is cute.

Are We Sure She is Mine?

I am sitting here typing this as my newly minted-six-month-old-daughter nurses frantically on my cheech (singular for che-che). This morning Brakes and I got a gander to change things up a bit on poor Eloise. We decided that it is time to start solids. As she looks like me, talks like me, laughs like me, etc. I could only assume that she would eat like me as well. Ummm... not so much.
After extensive research we chose avocado as her first food. It has great nutritional value and it is easy to digest. Plus Brakes and I adore us some guacamole, so we figured it was a safe bet for Weezy's first food. So at 10:00 this morning I mashed up some avocado and shot some Mama Juice into it, while Brakes manned the blender and made us some celebratory 1/2 birthday margaritas (what is guac without a rita?). I am just kidding about the margaritas. Just kidding on the just kidding. Anyways.

We sat Weezy in her highchair, popped on my favorite vintage bib, and set the camera to flash. I rammed my green-slime laden index finger into her unsuspecting mouth. She froze, looked from me to Brakes, took a deep breath through her nose, and then gagged. After the huge gag she shuddered and her eyes accused us of awful deeds. I valiantly kept trying for another 10 minutes or so when her watery eyes, running nose, and panicked expression convinced me to stop.

Through this whole ordeal Brakes sat back and watched. At the end, as we were mopping up regurgitated avocado, Brakes told Eloise, "Maybe you take after me after all; your Mov never met a dish of food she didn't like."

I think he might be right. Brakes is a boob-man too.

Weezy Wednesday; An Oldie but Goodie

Before I became a technological genius and was able to post video's on my blog, my mom, sister, and I took a video of Roscoe and Weezy (then 10 weeks) stuffed into the swing together at the park. I am not sure who got a bigger kick out of it; us or them?

I’ve Been Put in My Place

So I was feeling mighty proud of my latest creation for Miss Eloise and I decided it was just the thing to wear to our baby sign language class last Friday. I’ll be honest; I may have had fantasies that the other mothers would writhe in jealousy and demand to know where I had happened upon such an elegant creation. At which point I would humbly, yet breezily, say: “Oh that old thing? That was just something I whipped up in my free time.”

As I sat on the floor with the other babies and moms, I patiently waited for the first exclamation. As I was waiting, I began to smell an odiferous scent. I sniffed. And sniffed again. I determined the smell was a soiled diaper. As my sweet Eloise had already pooped this morning (and what a poop it was!) I was quite confident that the offending stench did not come from my daughter’s adorably clad hienie. I jiggled Weezy on my knee and made small talk with the other moms.

A few minutes later, the stink still had not dissipated and I thought to myself, “Good Lord, these women really need to check their kid’s pants!” I jiggled Weezy some more. Just as class was about to start, I shifted positions, which required bolstering Eloise’s bottom with my right hand. As my palm curved around her tush I spied the telltale feel of wetness seeping through. I froze, looked down, and much to my horror, my fabulous onesie now sported two baby-poop yellow halos around the inner edges of each thigh. And now my hand had joined the fray. Nice.

As I dug around the bottom of my purse, finally uncovering a tacky-too-small-emergency-onesie mixed in among the gum wrappers and hand sanitizers, I knew that this was the universe knocking me off my high horse and putting me back in my modest place. I rejoined the sign language class, not as a triumphant baby-onesie-designer-genius, but as a simple mom with her robust daughter positively bursting out of a dingy and wrinkled body suit rescued from the depths of her very humble handbag. Nothing like poop on the hand to bring you back down to earth.

Eloise's Liesure Suit

With cooler nights upon us, we are pulling out Weezy's warmer jammies. This is Brake's personal fave:

Friday Version of Weezy Wednesday; Hosted by Diana and Lo

We have had a wild week with Weezy's cousin Roscoe and Granmov visiting us while Roscoe's mommy is at a wedding in New York, so we are a freckle late with Weezy Wednesday. To make up for our tardiness we present you with two beautiful guest hosts; Eloise's Aunties Diana and Lo. Without further ado here is Miss Weezy and her first sippy cup experience (best viewed with head tipped to the side... we are working on hiring a new videographer):

Craftastic!

Obviously that nesting instinct is still going strong at the B&G household! I have been crafting up a storm... Just shows what a girl can do with a little alone time. I call the following the $5 challenge. Eloise and I went to the dollar store and spent $5 dollars. We wanted to see how many crafts we could make (and by we, I mean me, as she slept) for five buckaroonies.
Above is what we started with... can you guess what we made?


#2 and #3 were epoxied together to create a cute glass cake plate inspired by Karli's cake plate over at Rocky Bella. Weez baked the cake.

#4 was once was a place-mat but with some batting already on hand, it found a new life as a throw pillow! Brakes said I could not buy anymore throw pillows but he didn't say anything about place-mats! Hahahhaha! I had seen this idea a few places online, but I cannot remember where I saw it first (From now on I will save ideas I plan on using so that I can give proper credit); if I took this idea from you, please let me know!

Last but not least #1 and #5 made six adorable flowered headbands. These are our own design, though I know we are not the first people to think of them. We forgot to take a picture of them all spread out before we brought them over to our friend's house yesterday. They have triplet girls so they really appreciated the accessories! A few headbands attached to a book, stuffed animal, or bottle of wine (If I had triplets, I would need a lot of wine!) make a great hostess gift for a Mama with girl babies!

After so much crafting we have a happy mama, bedecked babies, a refreshed chair, and a delicious cake display! Not too shabby for Mama!

Weezy Wednesday with a Special Guest Appearence

Weezy is very proud to present her adorable cousin, Turbo! He is showing off his new trick! We are very immpressed; he is not even a year old yet! Weezy can barely roll over, but we are trying really hard not to compare our kids.