One Year Old

My youngest is one year old today! It's so amazing how quickly that first year passes, and yet how it seems to drag on forever while you're in the midst of it.

This boy seemed to take forever to give us that first smile--he was something like 6 or 7 weeks old before we got one. But he hasn't stopped since! He loves his brothers and sisters, and is even starting to warm up to Daddy. Started sitting up at 6 months, then crawled a week or two later. Has been busy working on forming new consonant sounds since then, we're up to 'mama', 'dada', 'baba', and a couple of others that Ican't remember right now. :)

He took his first steps about two weeks ago, and is now taking two or three at a time before dropping to the floor to crawl the rest of the way to where he wants to go. His 7th tooth popped through this week (bottom far left), and he's loving his sippy cup more and more each day.

He's a snuggler and loves to hug and kiss. He'll pucker up and make a kissy sound, too, which is just adorable! He waved bye-bye to some friends last night, which we've been working on for a while, but his timing has been off--you know, he'll wait until everyone has actually left, then wave. :)

Having eight kids has been a challenge, but I've been pleasantly surprised at how everyone just fits in our family. The Lord has put personalities and temperaments together in such a way that every day has it's good moments and bad, conflicts and cooperation, but we all love each other and are happy to have such a wonderful family.

We're so thankful to have this happy little guy as a part of that. He is such a joy to all of us!

Catching Up

Did June happen? It's all such a blur...

There's so much to tell--there were many times when I thought of ideas for blog posts, took pictures, then proceeded to get distracted by the next thing and missed the chance.

I went to the Farmer's Market!



I updated my Ravelry page!

So many things on the needles right now, and all I can think about is what I want to cast on next.

Kids were crazy over the weekend. It might have had something to do with an abundance of sugary snacks and a deficiency of sleep. Also, the full moon. And fireworks. Just sayin'.


homemade patriotic parade, copyright 2009 by mycrazykids

I started using our cloth diapers again. The Happy Housewife had a post about CD'ing today, actually. A couple of weeks ago, we were running low on disposables that had been given to us, and I just decided I wasn't going to buy any more, at least for a while. I knitted up a couple of cute wool soakers and am really happy with how they're working. There's lots of info out there on the benefits of wool, so I'm not going to go into it here. I'm sure you can find some of it at Cloth Diaper Nation. I'm not a member there, but it was recommended by an acquaintance, and looks very comprehensive. So, I just use plain ol' chinese prefolds with a snappi, under the soaker or a homemade polar fleece cover I made a couple years ago. They work really well, too.

The weather cooled off this evening, bringing a shower along with it. After the very warm and humid afternoon, it was quite a relief. The short rain didn't deter my dh from taking off to go 'tubing on the lake with his buddies, though, leaving me a bit disappointed to not have a family dinner together. I cooked a ham in the crockpot on my back porch this afternoon, and whipped up some mashed potatoes and gravy, and some corn to go with it. He didn't know what he missed.

I think I'm gonna go warm up some bread and gravy right now. Sometimes, life is just better with gravy.

Crawling

Well, I'm officially the mom of a crawler. At 7 months, he now thinks he has full reign of the house. Just a month ago, baby H was barely sitting up, and just at his peak of rolling-around-the-room-ness. Then his rear end flattened out so he was a pro sitter, he scooted himself around the room backwards, and finally took his first real forward-crawl last week. The next day, I went into the room to get him up from his nap, and he was holding on to the side of his crib in a semi-stand! Why do babies have to grow up so fast?

So, he's been eating solids for about 3 weeks and is doing wonderfully with that. I start my babies on fruits and veggies, skipping the grains for as long as possible, usually 10-12 months. I think this general philosophy has its roots in Nourishing Traditions, but honestly, I can't remember for sure.

Which leads me to a frugal baby-food tip. You thought I was going to say make your own, didn't you? While this would be ideal, and something I aspire to, I just can't right now. There's no produce in season in my area (yet), and I just haven't gotten it done with store-bought stuff. So yes, I'm using the evil jarred processed stuff. Anyway, the tiny stage 1 jars (2.5 oz) are 48 cents and the stage 2 jars (3.5 oz) are 53 cents at my local grocery store. The only real difference is thickness, which can be remedied if your baby needs something thinner, by simply adding some water or br3astmilk. So I get the stage 2 jars, and just dump the small amount needed into a bowl.

I got the May 2009 issue of Better Homes and Gardens, and on the cover is a fabulous photo of fresh strawberry bars. I tried out the recipe last week and thought it was super yummy--but I think a more appropriate name would be peanut butter and jelly bars. The base is like a thick peanut butter cookie, then it has a thin layer of strawberry jam topped with fresh sliced strawberries. I loved it--just delicious!

Happy Baby Day!

The day got off to a wonderful start this morning--we received a phone call from a good friend at 7:30 a.m. announcing the birth of his first child! This is a young couple in our church who is very dear to us. They were married on our wedding anniversary and started out with a 'bun in the oven' just like we did. They've grown so much in the last 9 months, and it's so amazing to see them becoming parents. We've known the new daddy since he was in elementary school, which is fun (but makes me feel REALLY old). So CONGRATS Ben and Molly!

In other news, DH made the most amazing strawberry ice cream this weekend. He used this recipe which we always use for vanilla, but with more milk to make a 2-qt batch. This time, he added about 3 cups of chopped, smashed strawberries--you know, out-of-season winter strawberries (can't wait for June...). But it was mouthwatering nonetheless, and I personally was responsible for the disappearance of about 1/4 of the batch. It would have been more, but we had company over so decided to share.

Tuesdays and Thursdays are my days off from babysitting. You know, it's only one extra kid for most of the day, and he's really a great kid, but.....it's just such a weight off my shoulders when his dad picks him up (and his 2 siblings that come over after school). My eight kids seems so much more manageable when I'm not responsible for someone else's child, as well.

For supper today, I'm gonna try the wet burritos from The Happy Housewife. I've got some leftover burrito meat (mixed with refried beans) for half of the batch, and some leftover cooked chicken from last night, for the other half. I think it'll work out great. DD made us poppyseed-lemon muffins for breakfast (though she didn't hear the timer go off and let them get a *little* overbrowned), and I just whipped up a batch of granola bars for snacks/breakfast later in the week. Lunch will probably be PB&J today--I'm out of leftovers and we just had ham yesterday. Gotta work on my menus for the rest of the week!