Yogi's First Birthday Party!

Today was the big day.  Grandpa, Muzzie, Nana and Pops came into town and this afternoon when Yogi woke up from nap there was a birthday party in full swing.  We decided to do a small grandparents-only party this year and I'm glad we did.  Yogi was excited to see six of his favorite people in one room and Yogi's Mommies didn't feel overwhelmed by a huge party.  A good choice.



This is the smile we got when he realized all the people who had arrived while he was napping.  He seemed really excited and I loved that.

Then it was on to the cake.



We wanted to make a birthday cake that felt like a birthday cake, but was as healthy as we could get it.  After doing a little internet research we found a yummy recipe on the blog Green Parenting.  If you're looking for something along those lines and like spice cakes, you should give this a try.  It was a winner.

Pumpkin Apple Harvest Cake
By Cait Johnson, author of Witch in the Kitchen

INGREDIENTS

• 1 cup cooked or canned pumpkin puree


• 2 large eggs, beaten


• 3/4 cup organic sugar


• 3/4 cup unbleached all-purpose flour


• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon


• 1 teaspoon baking powder


• 1 teaspoon ground ginger


• 1/2 teaspoon salt


• 1/2 cup chopped apple


• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (we left these out for anti-choking reasons)


• Whipped cream or confectioners’ sugar for topping (optional) (we made cream cheese frosting - isn't that part of the baby fun?)

1. Preheat oven to 325F. Prepare an 8-inch round cake pan by greasing and flouring it.
2. Combine pumpkin, eggs, and sugar in a large mixing bowl. Add flour, cinnamon, baking powder, ginger, and salt, stirring to combine. Add apples and nuts, stirring again. Pour mixture into prepared pan.
3. Bake 20 to 25 minutes, until a cake tester inserted in the middle comes out clean.
4. Cool the cake, still in the pan, on a wire rack for 10 minutes, then invert the cake onto the rack, remove pan, and cool cake completely.
5. When ready to serve, turn cake on to a pretty plate and top with whipped cream or confectioners’ sugar, if desired, or serve plain.

**If you make this in a Cupcake pan like we did, you will have to double the recipe and bake for 65 minutes.**

Everyone at the party including this guy:



thought the cake was delicious.  Yogi?  Not so much.  His response was a reprise of the sweet potato incident.  He just stared at the cake and looked up at us as if to ask "What? What do you want me to do with this thing?  Where are the peas?"



We tried to get him in the swing of things, but he wouldn't be moved.  No cake for Yogi.



He was much more enthusiastic about his toys (a tambourine, bongoes, and a Fisher.Price Learning House) and was happy to play while we chowed down on cake and take-out pizza.  We all had a great afternoon and I hope Yogi loved it all as much as I did.

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Just a Regular Day with (Almost!) 1 Year Old Yogi

In my thinking about how to respond to the question from Shroedinger on my Got Ideas? post, I realized that I should make a record of what a typical day with Yogi is like.  When I was first entertaining the idea of staying home with the baby (that was the only way I had to think of him at that point), one of my first questions was what would I DO all day?  It also occurs to me that when Yogi is graduating from HS and I want to relive his babyhood, I might want to remember these little details of daily life.   Shroedinger's question was much more thoughtful than a simple play by play and I plan to address it in a future post, but this is a start.

BEWARE - OVERWHELMING DETAIL AHEAD

6-6:30 Wake-Up

Yogi is a cheerful riser.  I am usually roused by the sound of chattering and/or laughing on the monitor or my wife leaning into bed to let me know that the baby is awake.  He is generally happy to hang out in his crib playing with lovie until I come in to greet him.  But, once he is out of the crib I’m on the clock and milk needs to be forthcoming.  He drinks 4-4.5 ozs at a time these days.

For reasons that I don’t understand, Yogi needs to throw back his head and wail when something like 1 oz of milk is left in his bottle.  The wailing lasts maybe 20 seconds, then he returns to the last sip and everything is fine.  Weird.  The boy DESPERATELY needs to start feeding his own self milk, but that is another post.

7:00ish Breakfast

Each morning Yogi enjoys his super baby porridge (½ cup) with both cinnamon and some kind of fruit (mango, peach, banana).  Four times a week he also gets a hard boiled egg yolk stirred in as well.  It’s a pretty big breakfast for a little guy.

7:30 Walk

When my wife heads to the hospital, me and the boys go for a short walk around the neighborhood.  I've grumbled about this for the last few HOT months, but I do actually enjoy it.  I love going on walks and even if I'm sticky and sweaty when we get home, I know that the dog will be much happier (read less irritating) and that is worth more than a little unpleasantness.

8:30 Nap

Yogi goes downs with two books (whose pages he, and only he, turns) and a brief rock.  Occasionally there is singing.  His current favorite books include:

• It's Hard Being a Bunny


• Where the Wild Things Are


• Mommy, Mama and Me


• Ducks Don't Wear Socks

As soon as he is clearly asleep (this can take a few minutes) I hit the treadmill for a half hour.  Afterwards, I shower, dress, eat breakfast and (when there’s time) reply to and send email.

9:30 Wake-Up

When I get Yogi out of the crib this time I get him dressed.  Then it is time for milk and brief snuggles.  Once he is entirely awake, the day is ON and this is generally our big activity period of the day.  There is rarely a day when I don’t have something planned for the late morning.  During the last few months I have joined a handful of Mom’s groups (which is another post entirely) and found them  to be an excellent way to find fun things to do and play with other kids.  Here is a sample of some of the things we do:

• Playgroup at someone’s house


• Story time at the library (we frequent both the quieter, lower-key branch story time and the fantsy-pants, professional actor story time at the Main library downtown)


• Visits to the zoo (this is actually a clean and shady place)


• Trips to one of the local parks


• Visits to a friend's pool

12:30 Lunch

In spite of his slow start Yogi has become an exuberant eater.   I usually start preparing lunch when we get home while Yogi plays with his cars and books in the kitchen.  He plays with his own toys when he can't get to what he really wants, which is most frequently the remote, my wireless mouse, anything filled with liquid, and the dog's bone.

The lunch menu usually looks like this:

• Plain yogurt with cinnamon stirred in


• Fruit (kiwi or banana)


• Black beans and rice or Tofu bites breaded with ground graham crackers and cheerios


• Avocado

1:30 Nap

Afternoon nap goes the way of morning nap with the exception that Yogi is always a tad harder to get down/slower to sleep in the afternoon.

While the little guy naps, I prepare lunch for myself and eat in blissful solitude.  As soon as I've finished, I clean the kitchen from the mess of both breakfast and lunch.  When that is done, I tackle whatever cleaning is on the list for that day.  Throughout my entire adult life, I have set aside a few hours on one day during the week to clean the house.  That has always worked for me.  Until now.  Now I get only small snippets of time (during which Yogi is asleep) to do things like clean bathrooms, vacuum, mop, etc.  Attempting any of these things with Yogi is an exercise in futility.  So, now I do a little bit each day.  It works and that is the most important thing, but it also feels like it will never end.  I greatly prefer to do it big, do it once and get it over with for the week.  Oh well.

By the time I've finished with cleaning chores, Yogi is usually stirring.  If it's my lucky day and he's still sleeping, I indulge myself in one/more of the following:

• Reading (books or blogs)


• Writing


• Blogging

3:00 Wake-Up

I greet him with more milk and more snuggles.  Probably twice a week, this time of day is reserved for things like grocery shopping or errand running.  If we don't have to TCB, we usually play or go for a walk with the dog.  These days, playing involves:

• Crawling "chase"


• Putting the farm animals into the silo and taking them out (over and over and over and over....)


• Turning book pages


• Taking all of the books off the shelf


• Clapping


• Shaking anything that rattles while spinning in a circle on his tail


• Pulling up on anything and everything


• Pushing the taxi far and wide

4:30 Start Dinner

This is the hardest part of the day.  Yogi is getting tired and ready for milk with Mommy, the dog wants to be fed this minute and I am trying to cook, damnit.  Yeah, it usually feels like that.

5:15 Mommy's Home!!!!

Deep breath.  When my wife gets home she takes Yogi and they breastfeed while I feed the dog and finalize our dinner.  As for solid food, Yogi often eats what we eat for dinner, but there are still nights when we have to make a separate meal for him or add some things.   My wife feeds him while I bustle around the kitchen cleaning bottles and pump parts.  I am eager to start a true "family dinner", but so far it's been hard to give up the "whew, the day is over" dinner on the couch with my wife after putting Yogi to bed.  We do need to head that direction though.

6:00 Bathtime

Yogi LOVES a bath.  My wife takes the lead on bath and the two of them have a great time.  There is lots of splashing and lots and lots of cuteness.   When bath is over, my wife wraps him in his little hooded lion towel and he turns the bathroom light out as they head for his room.  He gets a bedtime bottle once he's in his PJ's and then it's time for the last playtime of the day.

7:15 Bedtime

My wife puts him to bed and they go through a similar routine of reading and rocking.

7:30 Dinner for Mommies!!!

Once Yogi is tucked in we collapse into dinner on the couch.  Afterwards we watch about 45 min of TV (usually Top Chef, Project Runway or Brothers & Sisters).  Once the kitchen is clean, the dog has been out and the coffeemaker is primed and ready for duty, it's time to relocate.

It's a glamorous life for sure!

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I Also Function as an Excellent Baby Sled

If you've been wondering what would happen if you fell down a flight of stairs while holding your baby, I have the answer for you.

You would pull the baby to the center of your body, taking the hit in your lower back and clattering into the kitchen on your tailbone.  The baby will be resting in your lap, rattled but physically unharmed, when you begin the work of unfolding the heap you have made of yourself on the kitchen floor.  If you know what's good for you, you will make your way directly to the Advil bottle.

I know this because as you've probably guessed, this is how I started the day.  Promising, no?  It turns out that falling down the stairs doesn't have to be the death knell for any possibility of a decent day.  After making it past the initial shock (OMG Yogi could have hit his head!!!/Do I have a broken rib?/How am I going to make it through the day when it hurts.so.much?!!) and having my Dr wife guide me through a "move this, wiggle that" phone session that ended in her assessment that I would make it after all, a funny thing happened.  While Yogi played happily on the floor with his books and his taxi, I sat in his rocking chair (we had made it back up the stairs without event) and cried.  The kind of crying that is loud and ugly and makes it very hard to breathe.  Based on when he went down for nap, I would say that this lasted a good, long time.

By the time that Yogi crawled over with the book he wanted to read before nap time, it was over.  Something had passed and it was time to read a few stories and put the baby down for nap.  It still aches when I breathe deeply, stand up, sit down, or bend over, but I feel better somehow.  I've been foggy for the last last few weeks and it seems that falling down the stairs has been just the thing to burn it off.  I feel like I have a voice again and if I've also got an achy back, swollen eyes and a few bruises, I'd have to say it was worth it.

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Got Ideas?

Last month I signed up for an online writing class.  Unfortunately, I'm finding the class to be less inspiring and considerably less critique-oriented than I had hoped it would be.  This means that instead of being engaged in the world of a short story I'm creating, I'm finding myself struggling to care about what even happens to these people.  Not the best angle from which to write.  But..... I very much want to write and am hoping that perhaps I could pick up the slack here on Love Invents Us.  I've got some post ideas swirling around in my head, but I so very much enjoyed the participation on my Whatcha Reading? post, that I'm going to try that again.

So, if you're reading this I am talking to you.  Is there any particular topic that you'd like to read about or are there any questions that you've had while reading this blog that you'd like to have answered?  I'm open to at least entertaining any ideas you have and hope that you will play along.  You can leave your idea in the comments or send me an email at loveinventsus@gmail.  Thanks in advance for humoring me.  ;)

 

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Dead Last

It's summer and I wish it wasn't.  I'm all for seasonal changes and think it would be dull to live in a place that didn't have a distinct spring, summer, fall and winter, but summer comes in dead last in my seasonal rankings.  I've never been a fan.  I'm not the hang out by the pool type and if the thermometer is going to read 105, I'd like to be in a yoga studio thank.you.very.much.  The only thing I think summer is reliably good for is watermelon.  I could eat watermelon every day.

Spending the summer at home with a dog and an 11 month old is challenging.  Unless we can get out the door my 7am, it's too hot for walks and walks are our saving grace around here.  I should mention that when I say "too hot for walks" I'm not being a pansy.  I am heeding the advice of the Weather Service that has had us under heat advisories for WEEKS (when will it END???).  When Baker misses his walk one day he's a little clingy and mildly irritating.  When Baker hasn't had a walk in weeks, he is 60 lbs of nightmarish need.  He barks, he steals Yogi's toys, he mopes, he throws up on the one rug we have in the entire downstairs, he licks Yogi's face whenever I'm not watching,  he makes your life miserable.

This morning I rushed Yogi through his breakfast and got us out the door and in the stroller just as my wife was leaving for work.  It was certainly hot, but every so often there was a breeze and I strolled us down the shadiest streets I could find.  Now back at home I have a satisfied dog, a napping baby and a more peaceful feeling me.  Maybe we should do this more often?

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