Come out and play

Toys! One of the best parts of being someone's mama is that I get to browse and buy toys. Tiny baby toys aren't that interesting - mostly just soft stuffed things, with an occasional rattle or squeak. We got lots of toys as hand-me-downs from awesome friends, so we haven't bought much.

And of course, like everything else, I have strong opinions about the toys BabyT plays with. We'd like to hold off on the onslaught of commercial licensed characters for as long as possible (Dora/Kai-lan/Elmo/etc), sort of for the same reason I'm not a fan of her (or me!) wearing clothes with a designer name or label emblazoned across the front. I don't need her to provide any corporations with free advertising, nor do I want to start training her so young to recognize these characters then ask for every single item that has them on it. I'm sure that'll come soon enough, so while I have some control over the situation, we're going to start without it :)

I have a real aversion to toys that make buzzing beeping electronic noises. Personally, I find them annoying and overstimulating, so I can't imagine that it's great for my baby. (Kind of like watching TV - sure it's an effective distracter when needed, but day-to-day, I don't want her assaulted with noise and flashing lights. Not to mention it'll drive me batty to hear it all the time as well.)

And plastic. I'm now paranoid about lead paint and BPA, and whatever else is lingering in all that plastic. And every single baby item is made of non-recyclable plastic. I'm not especially environmentally aware, but even I cringe at the amount of plastic we bring into our house. I try really hard to find the large things used, like the ever-popular Fisher-Price Rainforest Jumperoo which has been a favorite since T was around 5 months old:



We got her matching rainforest swing used as well. At least if we're going to bring giant plastic contraptions into our house, they can be pre-owned so we're not contributing to more plastic being sent to a landfill in a few years.

For Christmas, Aunt Susie gave BabyT Jacques the Peacock, who Trillian loves very much, because of his bright colors and cool textures:

Jacques has remained a favorite since December, which is pretty impressive!

One of the toys I'd been eyeing for a while was a set of stacking cups:
I love the pastel colors, and the fact that they're free of some bad chemicals. (Of course, there are probably other bad compounds in the plastic that we think is safe now, so you really can't win.) BabyT got a nice gift card from her Grandma and Grandpa so we used some of it to buy these cups. She likes them a lot and is very intent on making sure they're NOT stacked, nor do they have things inside them. She doesn't like it when you put parts of other toys into the cups or try to stack them all back together. It's pretty amusing to watch her little personality start to emerge.

A few weeks ago we were wandering around Redmond Town Center and saw a very cute little guy in a shop window. He had to come home with us. He's not suitable for babies, because he breathes fire :) TJ is good at naming people and dogs (he gets credit for Spike and Trillian) so he came up with a great name for this little guy. Say hi to Snap!


While we were at Target this week, I spotted a toy that I thought BabyT would really like - her own set of keys. She's always trying to grab mine, which would be fine, except that she likes to put them in her mouth and that's gross for everyone (or "gwoss" as we imagine Trillian would say if she could talk).

This set caught my eye, and when I did some research on the company, they seem sort of interesting - recyclable packaging, interesting color schemes/design aesthetic, and supposedly eco-friendly with good manufacturing policies. These keys do have a "remote" with a tiny light, and four noises each activated by a different colored button. Sounds annoying, right? But the sounds are pretty quiet and short, so they don't grate on my nerves even after the 20th button press. Plus T hasn't quite gotten the hang of pressing the buttons yet, so it's still a fun surprise for both of us when she does.

So that's what we've been playing with lately. What about you? Any new interesting toys at your house?

I hope you choke on the words

Ugh, this has been a crappy couple of days.  But first, the good - BabyT had her 9-month checkup yesterday and is growing well - 23lbs 8oz.  She's apparently now in the 90-95th percentile for height, which is music to this short mama's ears.  I know that's no indication she'll actually be tall later, but it's nice to hear.  (Though I'm not sure how accurate baby length measurements are - T was pretty wiggly.)

But then we also learned that T is low on iron, which means that I'm probably *really* low since she's still getting most of her calories from nursing.  (side note:  hooray for 9 months of breastfeeding!)  So she needs to take this icky tasting iron supplement, with a yummy vitamin C supplement to mask the taste and enhance absorption.  We'll see how that goes.  Giving her liquid antibiotics in her milk didn't really work for us a few months ago - by the end of it, she was *very* wary of drinking out of the bottle. 

And then the doctor mentioned that she was a little concerned that T wasn't trying to pull up to standing yet.  My mama intuition (such as it is) isn't actually too worried about it, given T's size, since that's a lot of weight to try to move, and the fact that she's doing fine otherwise (feeding herself, sitting up like a champ, social and smiley, even with strangers).  But of course there are the inevitable comparisons to other babies we know that are her age, and they're all mobile.  So if she doesn't start pulling up by 11 months, we need to go somewhere to get her evaluated.  Ick. 

2 months is pretty much an eternity in BabyT-time, though.  2 months ago, she was barely eating anything I'd put in front of her, and now she's an expert at picking up and getting even little pieces of stuff in her mouth, including the beans from the spicy black bean soup I made.  2 months ago, she still needed some support to sit up and would often flop over.  Now she can sit up with no support, lean waaaay over to get a toy that's out of reach, and comfortably sit for 30 min+ to play with her toys.

Given that, I think, in 2 months she'll be in good shape.  The doctor pointed out that she's already using her 'pincer grip' to grab things.  I thought she was still working on it, so that's good news.  Which means we might be able to break out the Cheerios - yippee!

And speaking of food, I'm now running into what is probably the first of many times I live to eat my words with respect to raising a kid.  The advice I've read and gotten from our doctor on introducing solids to babies advocates a very slow approach - introducing a new food only every couple of days, and starting with just individual fruits and vegetables, then rice, then other grains, then yogurt and cheese, etc.  So if you follow the recommendations, it would be nearly forever before your baby could eat complicated table foods. 

When T was around 2 months old, I read a book by a local Seattle food writer called Hungry Monkey: A Food-Loving Father's Quest to Raise an Adventurous Eater.  It was a very entertaining read, and got me excited to introduce T to "real food". 

Since we have no family history of food allergies, I figured after we got through some of the first fruits and veggies, and a few grains without incident, we'd just be able to go hog wild on the rest and start feeding her what we eat. I was pretty disdainful of the uber-careful approach to introducing things. Especially after yesterday's doctor's appointment, where she told us we should be getting to a point where T should be eating 3 meals a day around the time she turns one.

And that all came to a screeching halt today. I brought a yoBaby yogurt with us to lunch so we could feed it to T while we ate. She had a few spoonfuls, and once we cleaned her up, her mouth and hands turned a very bright red, which then started spreading up to her ears. By the time we got home, there were little bumps and she was getting itchy.

This was her third yogurt experience, and I did notice the first two times, that she got a little bit red around the mouth. Plus there was the vomiting incident with the tomato soup (which had cream in it). But I wasn't sure at those times whether there was really a correlation. This was REALLY obvious.

She wasn't having any other issues (no breathing problems, thankfully!) but I figured I should call the doctor just in case. And of course we didn't have any baby Benadryl in the house either. Sigh. The nurse who returned my call said their diagnostic protocols said we needed to go to the ER at Children's Hospital because her reaction was so immediate after eating the yogurt and that we needed to call 911 *if* she started having any breathing issues.

Not exactly calming advice - I was pretty sure she was fine, since she had just fallen asleep and the rash was already fading. But it's not something I wanted to take a chance on, so I woke her up and we drove over the lake to the ER.

By this time the rash had totally faded, and T was smiling at all the nurses. Our ER experience was surprisingly quick, and we got sent home with a prescription for an Epi-pen (but the doctor said it would be very unlikely we'd ever need it) and a recommendation to *not* give her any more dairy until after her first birthday. He mentioned that allergy testing was pretty unreliable for babies, so we might just need to try dairy again after 1 and see if she's outgrown the reaction. He also suggested that we go a lot slower with introducing solid foods - one at a time, and wait several days to make sure she's tolerating them.

So much for eating what we eat. And I'll have to figure out a cupcake recipe for her birthday that has no dairy in it. And now it sounds like I'll need to put more effort into pumping milk for her, to make sure we don't run out of our frozen supply, since milk-based formula is not an option anymore.

In the grand scheme of things, none of this is a big deal. Lots of people have bigger issues. And Chublet is still healthy and happy, so that's really what matters. But this was a tiny little black rain cloud over our otherwise blissful existence.

So fingers crossed that she outgrows the milk intolerance, and in the next couple of months she gets moving, and that baby and mama get our iron levels back up. Hooray for babies!

A new mother cries

We've just returned from the Worst Vacation Ever.  Two stressful days in an unfamiliar house with three creatures who needed to be looked after constantly.  We're using this as a learning experience.

I had imagined another mellow, blissful weekend like we had a few years ago on the Olympic Peninsula.  Of course it would be different with a baby, but with both TJ and me around, we'd each get some time to ourselves to just relax.  And BabyT is pretty mellow, so she's usually happy to play by herself near us for relatively long stretches of time.

We rented a house at Seabrook, a totally manufactured "beach town" on the Washington coast.  The drive over there with puppies and baby was pretty uneventful. Thanks to the massive amounts of baby stuff we need to carry around with us (stroller, diapers, her own clothes and toys), we had to put both dogs in the back of the Nitro together, and stuff all of our luggage in the seat next to the baby's car seat (which itself takes up a huge amount of room). We stopped once to feed Miss Baby and get me a diet Coke, but otherwise she napped or entertained herself in the back seat.

The house was lovely, and the neighborhood very nice to walk around in (despite the massive amounts of construction). We bought a few groceries at the Extortion Market located onsite, and TJ made a larger grocery run the next day, to Ocean Shores, which was about 15 miles away.

The bed was king-sized which meant we didn't need to bring a place for BabyT to sleep, and they even had a high chair and Pack N Play, which was a welcome surprise. That all sounds good, right?

But it was surprisingly stressful. The yard wasn't beagle-proof so we had to take the dogs out on a leash every time. We worried about the dogs getting into something or having an accident in the house since it was new and they didn't know where "out" was. If BabyT was on the floor, we had to keep a hawk's eye on the dogs. (We've solved this problem at home by installing baby gates so we can separate dogs and baby when needed.) We had to change BabyT on the floor. Basically, one of us was always watching the baby, and the other one was watching the dogs.  The first night was wretched.  Either BabyT or Peanut was up EVERY hour, as if to say "hey guys, did you notice we're not at home?".

Add to that the fact that I also forgot some of the parts to my breast pump, which meant we'd have no "easy milk" in the bottle for T. Which also meant that *I* was tethered to the baby for feeding. On a side note, hooray for 8.5 months of breastfeeding!

So yeah, not relaxing. A friend told me that vacation with a baby just seemed like the "same stuff, different location". I totally agree. But we had the house for 4 days so I thought we should make the best of it.

Until the Spectacular Vomiting Incident.  BabyT has been doing GREAT with eating solids.  We introduced bread (at Tropea, our favorite Italian restaurant) and a few strands of spaghetti, as well as the usual fruits and vegetables and she was literally eating it all up. But not with a spoon.  BabyT likes to feed herself, yo.

So I figured we were in the clear to just start feeding her whatever we were eating (except for the still-forbidden things like nuts, honey, egg whites and dairy).  I had some tomato soup for lunch on Friday, and for thought it was just tomatoes and spices. (Bad Mama Mistake #1)  So I offered some to BabyT.  She LOVED it.  Even let me feed it to her from a spoon.  She ate less than a tablespoon total, and all was well.  We went out for a walk, and went to the beach to let the dogs run around.  All was still well.  She took a nap.  All continued to be well.

I fed her again in the evening just after her last nap of the day.  As I was getting ready to take her downstairs for a few hours of fun before bed, it happened.  It actually wasn't that *gross*, just alarming.  Whoever said that babies' stomachs are the volume of a closed fist is a dirty rotten liar.  She was drenched, I was soaked, and so were the lovely bed linens (thank god for mattress pads!).   I had never seen BabyT do this so I was freaked out.

And of course, it was after our pediatricians' office closed for the day so we had to leave a message and wait for the nurse on call to return it.  In the meantime there was more (small) vomitiness.  The nurse just said to stop giving her solids, keep an eye on her for fever and more vomiting and give her milk as usual.

At that point I was ready to take my ball and go home.  We were an hour round-trip from the nearest grocery store and at least that from the nearest medical facility, which may or may not have had a pediatrician.  We had a limited number of outfits and laundry detergent.  I wanted to be in MY house where everything is set up the way we need it. 

Fortunately, BabyT was fine for the rest of the night and slept and ate pretty well. I discovered there was cream in the soup, so either she had a bad reaction to the dairy or is allergic to/doesn't tolerate tomatoes.  We're going to hold off for another month or so before introducing yogurt and cheese, and will go back to our "whole foods" plan for solids.

We're all fine but SO happy to be home.  We'd like to try another trip later, without the dogs, will remember to bring all parts to the pump, and will not introduce new foods while traveling :)

Who are you taking coffee, no sugar?

It has been a fabulous food week for me.  The highlight, of course was our 5th anniversary dinner at Canlis on Saturday.  It's so cool to be able to go back to the place we got married on every anniversary (I don't think we've missed one yet!)  Fortunately TJ's parents were in town, so they babysat for us.

TJ is not a food adventurer, and prefers to have a predictably good meal rather than trying someplace new, especially on a special occasion.  I love food, and trying new fancy restaurants and cuisines.  That makes it hard for us sometimes.  While Canlis has always been good, there were times I was yearning to go somewhere else just to try something new and different.

But now there's no conflict, because Canlis got a new executive chef about a year ago.  And he's young (younger than me!  I feel old!).  I recently read an article in a local magazine about how he experiments with molecular gastronomy techniques, but mostly saves those for the tasting menu, while leaving the old standbys on the regular menu.  So it's the perfect restaurant for us.  TJ can get the teriyaki beef appetizer (not on the menu, but TO DIE FOR) and the Canlis salad which have been around for decades, and I can try stuff I've never even heard of on the tasting menu.

Which is exactly what we did.  I opted for the vegetarian tasting menu because I'm always curious to see what awesome chefs can do to make veggie dishes interesting.  It did not disappoint, and even better, I wasn't rolling out of the restaurant with that foggy, overly full feeling either.  Satisfied, but not stuffed.  TJ got (and shared! so nice!) his teriyaki beef appetizer and the Canlis salad (with bacon! yum!).  I had the truffle fries and malasadas (Portuguese/Hawaiian donuts! woot!).  I'm drooling just thinking about the sweet coconut sauce that went with the malasadas.  So yeah, an amazing food experience and I'm already trying to devise ways to go back there more often. 

And if that weren't enough, on Sunday, I got a small delivery from Curry Aroma, a new Indian-Pakistani food delivery service.  Their prices were reasonable enough to get me to try it once based on a Facebook ad I saw (yes, FB ads really do work!) and the first delivery was excellent, so I ordered again last week.  I tend to order things I either don't know how to cook myself or don't want to bother with.  Protein is especially challenging for me.  I hate cooking meat because raw meat is gross.  But I like eating it. 

Most Indian restaurants don't have beef on their menus, so I think I can count on one hand the number of beef curries I've had.  This week I got a dry masala shredded beef curry that blew my mind.  It was the exact same consistency as the Mexican shredded beef in an enchilada, but with Indian spices instead.  A-MAZING.  Not too greasy or fatty, and no chunks of vegetables or sauce to interfere with the meaty yumminess.  Even TJ thought it was good.  I'm looking forward to eating the rest of it, with the Pillsbury brand roti I bought at the Indian grocery store.  Can I just say how odd it is to see a picture of the Pillsbury doughboy on Indian food?  Crazy. 

But wait, there's more!  Last night I went to see Vienna Teng play at the Triple Door, my all-time favorite music venue.  They serve food from Wild Ginger, which I'm not crazy about in general, except for the roast duck.  (Yes, there is a meat trend now.)  I'm not usually a fan of eating cute animals, but for this duck I will make an exception.  With a side of coconut milk roti bread, plus the puffy white steamed buns that came with the duck, I was a happy girl.  (More on the music in another post later.)

And since we're on the happy Asian food trend, lunch today (surprisingly) did not disappoint.  Some folks from the lab I used to work in at the Hutch were getting together to celebrate our former boss's birthday.  Since BabyT and I love an outing, we trekked over to Seattle, to eat at the Malay Satay Hut.  When they chose the restaurant, I was very disappointed.  We have one near home, and it sounds all promising and yummy (Malaysian food and meat on a stick!) but I've been there several times and disliked it each time.

Except for twice - today and the last time I went there with my labmates a few years ago.  I think the secret is Phil, a former coworker, who is from Singapore and does the ordering for us.  He seems to pick the right things, because the roti canai, mango shrimp, and mysterious beef curry were all YUM.  So either they know he's an expert and make it extra-yummy, or he's ordering something different from what I usually order.  I guess I'll never know, and don't plan to go there unless Phil is going to be there too.

Peanut is also enjoying some good food as well.  Our vet told us he weighs too much, which is not surprising since he's become really inactive lately since his knees and arthritis are bothering him.  So we've had to replace a cup of his food with canned carrots.  Which he thinks is the greatest thing EVER.  So it's win-win all around.  Hopefully that, plus the pain pills and anti-inflammatories, will make him a little more comfortable so that we can go out walking again.

BabyT is also enjoying solid foods.  Baby-led weaning is going marvelously well.  She's finally actually eating things - some apple, mango, pear, sweet potato and carrots.  We just steam them and hand her pieces and she seems to have gotten the hang of what to do with them.  It's still really fun to watch, though messy.

And that's the food situation here!  Anything interesting happening for you?

How do I know when it's love?

Stephanie commented on my last post asking how to find a good family photographer and I figured it deserved a post of its own.  I'm sure the Internet has made this task a LOT easier, because most pro photographers have nice websites with portfolios of their work, and you can browse at your leisure (or at 2am when everyone in the house is sleeping!).  I thought I'd also include some other helpful tips for the shoot itself.

The Search
When I was searching for a wedding photographer, I had no idea what to look for or how much it would cost.  I started with one of those local wedding resource pages and just started browsing other photographers' work.  I found one I completely fell in love with, but alas, they were already booked for our date. 

However, I found out the style that I liked so much was called 'photojournalism' - less emphasis on posed pictures and more on just capturing the event and the unexpected details.  So I started using that term in my web searches and found more photographers, and also found a site for the Wedding Photojournalist Association - bingo!  This site gave me a lot more options in my area, within the style I was looking for.

I then browsed a LOT of photographers' sites.  My method isn't scientific - it couldn't be, because what I was looking for was *art*.  So I simply sat back and browsed.  Looked to see whose pictures jumped out at me. 

Some photographers had a style that just didn't do it for me.  Others had a few pictures that caught my eye.  But there were a few where nearly every photo in their portfolio was a WOW shot.  Of course, these portfolios are heavily edited compilations of many events, but I felt confident that if nearly the whole portfolio wowed me, then that was a pretty good bet that I'd like their work at our wedding.

If forced to articulate what I was looking for, here are some of the characteristics:

• Interesting small detail shots, like trim on a dress, or a closeup of a shoe
• Capturing shots with a definite "vibe", almost like you can *feel* what the subjects were feeling
• Few posed shots, but if there were posed shots, ones where the subjects look like they're having fun with each other and not looking *at* the camera.
• Both black and white and color shots, but more importantly, choosing which shots looked better in b&w and which were more suited to color
• Pet photos that capture the "dog soul" 

Since this is an artistic judgment, it's like trying to outline what I like about a piece of music. I can't say for sure, but I know I like it when I hear it.

Some photographers have the gift of being able to capture pets well on film, and some don't, even those with mad skills with people-pictures.  So if you want to include your pets in a family shoot, make sure the photographer you pick has samples of pet photos in their portfolio and that you love the style of those too.  This is why I love Nicole's work.

First Contact
So the next step was to review the prices (if posted) and then reach out and contact the short list.  Because I'm lazy like that, I eliminated anyone who didn't have a way to email them. I asked a few key questions:

• Rates (if not posted clearly) and whether there was a print order minimum $
• Availability for the dates we were considering
• Whether we could get all of the pictures on a DVD and if that was an extra charge

Surprisingly, in this digital age, there are photographers who *won't* give you the digital files or charge ungodly amounts to give them to you.  You need to order all prints through them, and you don't have copies of the pics to share on Facebook, websites, etc.  We're social networking kind of people, and we don't print a lot of photos so this was a deal-breaker.  Obviously, I respect intellectual property and copyright, and try to give credit to the photographer, but I want those pictures in digital form.

Making the Decision
Once I got the answers back and have narrowed the list based on availability and budget, we had to make the big decision.  For things like weddings, or family portrait shoots on weekends, you need to book early and decide fast because the good photographers are BUSY.  We got around this for our family portraits by booking them on a Friday afternoon and thus could get Kristi on relatively short notice.

That first wedding photographer whose work I fell in love with sent me a short list of other folks with similar styles, which was super helpful. In the end, I chose one of those and we were REALLY happy with our pictures.
Depending on the significance of the event, you may want to *meet* with the photographer in person before deciding who to hire.  After all, for a wedding, this person is going to be following you around for most of the day, and it's a pretty big responsibility you're entrusting them with.  There are no do-overs. 

We did this for our wedding photographer, and meeting with Bradley was what really sealed the deal for us.  He and TJ talked about motorcycles, he talked to us about his philosophy of work, and showed us some recent wedding photos he'd taken.  We liked him, and really got the sense that he was a professional.  We also felt he wasn't going to be intrusive, which was a big deal for us.  We didn't want to be constantly aware of the photographer, or worse, interrupted by him to "look here at the camera!" or "hey, can we recreate that moment?  I missed it."

On the other hand, we met with another guy who was starting out in the business, and he was sort of timid and shy, and didn't give us that confident "I can handle this" vibe.  He might have done just fine, but our wedding was not a time for experimentation.

Most photographers have you sign a contract and put down a deposit once you've made your choice, and that holds the date for you.  This is especially important for weddings - you don't want to get close to the day and then find out the photographer wasn't really holding the date for you.  It's really hard to find a great photographer on short notice.  For a summer wedding in Seattle, the good ones book over a year in advance.  Crazy, I know.

Your Homework
So you've decided on a photographer.  Some people think the work is done, and you just wait for the day and look good, and get some pictures taken. 

But I picked up a tip from one of those ubiquitous wedding-planning magazines:  make a list of the shots that you want for sure, both candid and posed.  Now, you've hired a professional so you're not trying to micromanage their creative process, but if you want a shot of you in your wedding dress holding your beagle, you need to let the photographer know.  And on the big day, you might not remember the list.

For our family photos, I emailed a short list to Kristi, and asked for her feedback because I wanted to be clear that I wasn't trying to micromanage.  I made the list fairly vague and just discussed the subjects, not the style:

• All five of us (people and dogs)
• Baby and each dog interacting or at least looking at each other :)
• One good chubby baby arms and legs and bare feet shot
• Baby and mama, and baby and daddy
• My husband and Peanut

It's also helpful to ask the photographer what you all should wear (unless it's for your wedding, duh!).  Typically solid colored shirts are good because they're not distracting, and Kristi recommended that we wear shirts in the same color family so they don't clash. 

We also asked her if she needed any 'props' and she suggested a neat idea where we'd all be wearing white, in our bed, with a white comforter and sheets, snuggling with the baby.  That worked out really well, even though it was the last set of shots so we didn't change T back into her white onesie:

For family shoots, ask your photographer for locations if you don't have your heart set on one.  Some people like outdoor shots.  We love our house and wanted to capture that as part of the photos, so we chose to do our family shoot at home.  It made it easier to change T into different outfits, and keep her happy, as well. 

We did my pregnancy shoot at a local park with our dogs, because the lighting was better outside that day (though it was 98 degrees, but that's another story!).

If you're getting pictures done at home, make sure the areas you're using are clean.  You don't want piles of dirty laundry or dog hair-covered blankets in the background of your shots.  Photoshop can only do so much :)

The Big Day

For our family shoot, Kristi advised me to choose a time when the baby was fed and well-rested.  (One out of two wasn't bad!)  This sounds obvious, but really think about it.  If your baby is asleep when the photographer shows up, do you really want to wake her?  How will she be if you do?

Have all the outfits and props, plus any additional payments ready to go.  Once the photo shoot is underway, you don't want to disrupt the "flow" by trying to deal with business details.  Of course, if a baby's diaper needs to be changed, or the dog needs to go out, you'll deal with it, but it's best to get everything else ready ahead of time.  Then again, I'm a planner like that.

And then just do your thing.  Try to ignore the fact that there's a photographer there and go about your business.  Eventually you'll stop noticing him/her, and that's when the magic happens!