Operation Find My Hot Bod – A Food Update.

I wanted to write this post last night, but my husband insisted that I go to bed early.  He wouldn’t even let me take my phone with me, in case I sneaky stayed up on Facebook and Pinterest.  He says I get super moody when I’m tired and don’t get enough sleep and he is right.  I’m like a super grump, and probably a total bitch to live with.  D is a rock star though, because I got plenty of shut eye and feel a million times better today.  Thanks D, I love you.

I want to update on how much weight I HAVEN’T lost and how ‘Operation Find My Hot Bod’ is going.  I was hoping it would be going better, but I guess at my age I need to be happy to loose it real slow.

 

So, two things I was looking at changing.  One – eating less crap, more good stuff.  Two – Exercise.  30 day Shred and the Couch 2 5k.

 

Let’s look at food today.  I began doing really well and was entering everything I ate into My Fitness Plan and counting all my calories.  I was trying to eat good stuff and avoid the naughty stuff.  Then we ran out of food in the house and I had some cinnamon toast (with a heap of sugar).

That’s it.  That’s the end of the story.  I now have a problem with cinnamon toast.  The problem is, it is too damn good!  And the problem is, I can’t stop eating it.  And the problem is, it’s a slippery slope.  It starts with just a slice, then two, then some chocolate and soda and before you know it you have spiralled out of control and are chasing a full habit of peanut butter and nutella.  Straight from the jar!

So I have fallen off the healthy eating wagon a bit.  Already.  But this post will hopefully serve a purpose, and that is to publicly shame myself into a cinnamon toast detox.  I really struggle with food.  I like it too much and have trouble maintaining healthy eating long term, especially when there is so much baaaaad stuff in the house.  And especially since it is so much easier and faster to grab a mint slice, than to make a salad sandwich.  I’m time poor.  My minutes where a toddler isn’t clinging to my leg are few.  I used the last of the vegetables in dinner the other night and still haven’t gone shopping to replenish the fridge.  We do have KitKats though.

It is also self destructive when I have lunch at my bff’s house and she sends my home with this:

Nigella Lawson chocolate cake with icing on the top AND in the middle!

And instead of saying, ‘no thanks, I am trying to make healthier choices.’  I say, ‘yes please!’  And then think how I can eat it all before D and the boys get home.

I didn’t, by the way.  Well, not ALL of it.

 

That is pretty much where I am at with food.  I need a proper kick up the backside!  Some days I eat moderately well and others, I would rather not say.  What I can say is this – I can, and I WILL do better.

Magical Milestones – First tooth, first food.

I am not sure how this happened but H is now 6 months old.  How did that happen?  Did I blink?

 

Here I was blissfully unaware that my little baby was getting older while nursing her, and flipping through the pages of a mothering magazine (bought for me by my super thoughtful husband) (actually, is he trying to send me a message that my mothering is no good?) (do I really need to know the ’10 top tips from a second time mums’?) when I am confronted my a Heinz Baby Food ad, and then BAM it hit me – I need to think about feeding H food!

This was a couple of weeks ago and the main reason for a mercy dash to IKEA.  Any excuse to go to IKEA is valid.  I purchased myself a new high chair and a few months supply of dish scrubbing brushes.  Enough to get me through until my next IKEA run anyway.  I ate the meatballs with lingonberry sauce.  As always.

 

When I announced to the family that H would be starting solids soon, J responded with, ‘but she hasn’t got any teeth.’  Well spotted J, but babies don’t need teeth to eat.  I think he thought I was going to give her crisp carrot sticks or something.  Anyway, his point is moot, as she cut her first tooth on Saturday, 1 day before her first taste of food.  1 day after her half birthday.

It is not easy to photograph the teensiest of teensy little teeth but I believe you can juuuuust see it poking through here.

 

There are actually two things you need to introduce your baby to once they start solids.  One is of course food, the other is water.  Exclusively breastfeed babies don’t need water because they get whatever they need from your magical boobs, but once they start eating food they need water to stop their poos from turning into cement.  No-one likes to poo out cement.  Think about it, if you had a liquid diet, say you drank vodka for breakfast, lunch and dinner and then someone fed you a pub roast dinner, your butt would get all bunged up too.

 

Now comes the food time.  What do I feed her and how do I do it?  Do I go down the Traditional Weaning route with purees, or try the Baby Led Weaning where she eats finger food and feeds herself?  I have decided to do a mix of the two, as I did with T.  I am going to do Hazel Led Weaning.

Hazel (or insert the name of YOUR baby here ____) Led Weaning goes like this – you spoon feed your baby some stuff, while they play with and attempt to feed themselves some other stuff.  I figure this is the best of both worlds.  You can make sure they are getting some food into their belly with the spoon, while allowing them the opportunity to try and coordinate their hands and mouth, and maybe, just maybe munch on something in the process.

For these first few days, all I am doing is really just trying to let her know that other things can go into her mouth and they taste funny.  I am letting her play with a spoon, and she likes that a lot.  I am not really all that fussed yet if she is eating, it is just discovery at the moment.

Here she is discovering her first taste of something other than boob:

Whoa Mumma! What is that? That don’t taste like boob, or my thumb!

OK, it’s not that bad. I’ll take 2 spoons please.

Theo watches, like a dude.

 

The next part of the food introduction phase is the ‘watch out for the horrid change in poo consistency and smell’ part.  This part I am not looking forward to.  So far, after 1 day of the tiniest bit of food that got in her mouth, poo remains the same.  I know this because last night H pooed in the bath.

Does anyone remember that T liked to poo in the bath?  Well, H is following in the brothers footsteps.  Except she does it 18464 times more often then he did!

 

It usually goes like this:

Fun, fun, fun!  Two babies in the bath!  Splish, splash, splosh!  Bubbles come from H’s butt.  Uhoh.  Is it just a fart?  Wait….  Nope, just a fart!  Splish, splash, splosh, fun resumes.  And then shhhhplurggge…  H giggles.  Wth?  Oh crap, H crapped in the bath.  ‘D!!!! quick H shat in the bath again!!!’  ‘T, time to get out!’  (rinse off T with water from upstream)  Throw baby #1 at husband.  Grab baby #2, rinse her off.  Rush off and get babies dressed for bed.  Come back to clean bath, by which time it has become a swamp of orange poo floaters.

Joy of joys.

 

One day in the (hopefully) not too distant future, my babies will learn that poos are best done on the toilet so their mummy needn’t wash poo out of baths no more.

Time to share the sprinkliest of baby sprinkles.

2 weekends ago my mum hosted a baby sprinkle for me.  A sprinkle is kind of like a shower but more so for peeps already with kiddos.  More emphasis on just celebrating another little sproutlet and gettin’ jiggy with your posse rather than getting all goo goo gaa gaa over the mother to be.  Less newborn luxury items, more nappies.  Less ‘baby shower games’, more cool and fun stuff.

Those who have sprinkles include mums with big age gaps between babies (not me), mums who are finally having a different gender baby (me!) and also self indulgent mums who just like to be the centre of attention but have already had babies and a  previous baby shower but are looking for any excuse to have a party (also me).

I had a baby shower when I was pregnant with T and it was lovely.  We did all the baby shower games and typical baby shower stuff.  My loveliest of lovely friends celebrated with me and we had a super special time.  I didn’t want to have a ‘repeat’ party so Mum and I set out to make it different and special.  I was also super clever this time around; with my shower for Theo, my beautiful bestie hosted it for me, but me being a teensy bit of a control freak, quite possibly took on a bit too much responsibility and ran myself a bit ragged preparing.  This time, still a control freak, but a smarter and more realistic control freak, knew I just wasn’t going to be able to do everything, delegated some food jobs to those who were willing.  My mum of course was super helpful in the lead up and preparations for the sprinkle, which definitely made things easier for me.

The obvious difference between T’s shower and LSP’s sprinkle was the fact that we were celebrating a sparkle princess this time, so the party of course had to be themed accordingly!  After being shouted to my first ever high tea lunch by my mother in law, I knew that my sprinkle would be the perfect occasion for a sparkly fancy pants, dress up high tea.  I also did not want to play any ‘shower games’ but still wanted something fun for my guests to do, so I began sourcing ideas on Pinterest.  Heaps of pins that gave me ideas can be found on my Pinterest Baby Sprinkle board.  While you are having a look, feel free to follow.  We ultimately decided on making beautiful baby headbands for LSP and writing out our wishes for her which I can make into a booklet to read her when she is older.

I am now going to show you a truck load of photos.  I can hear the excitement!  I’ll show you all the bits and pieces and a few of me in my new favourite dress.  I’ll even wrap things up with my latest bump shot which is now 2 weeks old.

 

The Preparations

The table all set up and pretty before the guests arrived.

Each setting consisted of a sheet to write your wishes for Baby Girl Marini, High Tea menu and plan and a matching bottle of spring water.

The two best ‘wishes’ of the day came from my bbf, Cassie with ‘I hope you grow in proportion’ and my sister in law, Wendy with ‘I hope you always wash your hands after a poo’. Gold.

What to do when you have no idea what to call your baby.

The drinks station (can I just say that my Pink Lemonade was TO DIE FOR) and ‘make a headband’ station with all bits and bobs required to be super arty farty and creative.

The lolly buffet. Guests fill their bags with whatever they fancy together with their sweet smelling soap from Lush. Thank you for sharing my special day!

 

Foooood.  The High Tea.

I had helpers with the food.
My mum made the Tomato, Basil and Bocconchini Bites and the Mini Fruit Salads.
My mother in law made the Ribbon Sandwiches, Scones and Raspberry and Chocolate Mousse Cups.
Cassie made the Zucchini Slice and the ever amazing Coconut Cupcakes.
I made the Pink Lemonade, Sugar Onesie Cookies and Peanut Butter Balls.

Are these not the most amazing beautiful cupcakes you have ever seen? Trust me, they tasted even better than they looked!

T Bear eats, I mean plays with a cupcake. Marshmallow frosting is fun!

 

Some of the amazing presents.

Yes. A giant My Little Pony!

Cupcake knitted beanie from Fiona. can’t wait for newborn photos in this (with matching nappy cover – hurry up Fiona, knit like the wind!)

Boob Pads.

Some super cute clothes.

Always was secretly jealous of people who had nappy cakes, now I am one of them! A nappy trike from Cassie, Hollie and Kathy.

 

Some photos of me in said dress.

With D and my 2 little babies.

Matching shoes. $15 from target. Win.

 

The sprinkle creations.

All very beautiful and from the heart.

 

And as promised the bump shot.

 

I had a wonderful day and am just so thankful for my beautiful family and friends that made this day so special.  I love you all long time.  LSP will be the luckiest baby girl alive to enter the world and be loved my so many.  My heart swells.  Thank you peeps x.

 

Sprinkle aside, in other news – today marks 10 days until my c-section.  10 days until we meet little LSP.  I wonder if, seeing as walking and moving is getting so damn difficult I can sit on my buttocks and do 10 blog posts in 10 days?  This is my personal challenge to myself.  This is post #1.  Do you believe I can do it?  Not even I believe I can do it at this point in my pregnancy but by jingo I am going to give it a good try!

Baby’s room is almost finished but you can’t expect that post until after she is born or it will give away her name!  Yes, we have finally chosen a REAL name for LSP.  Select few who may or may not have been told the name already – lip are sealed or I’ll kill you dead (said with my craziest wog eyes glaring).  I’ll show you how to decorate your baby’s room on a shoestring budget with nothing matching and still make it look (I hope) beautiful for a sparkle princess.

A self indulgent ‘look at me’ post. Just because I can. This is also a lot about poo.

I started feeling some LSP movement a few weeks ago, I even saw some bumps and nudges from the outside!  It was always on the right side of the belly button, whereas with T his early movement was always on the left, lower down.

Yesterday I had the most horrific upset tummy.  Sore to touch, total constipation pains making me feel sicky sicky gross gross.  I needed to poo or vom.  Preferably poo but I would have been happy to vom too.  Anything to relieve the pressure.  Neither happened.  This made for a very sad me and a very cranky teacher for the poor unsuspecting children I had inmy classes yesterday, one of which was K.

Anyway, as with anything tummy related when you are pregnant, even when your logical head knows full well that it is just your back passage gone on strike, little seeds of worry plant themselves in your mind.  What if something has happened to my baby and now I need to poo her out?  Did I really think such a stupid thing?  No.  Yes.  Maybe.

It was around the third unsuccessful trip to the toilet that resulted in neither a poo or a vom that I began to realise that I had not felt LSP move for a while.  How long?  I have no idea.  Could have been days.  Paranoia tries to invade my mind while rational thought tries to make me remain calm.  I somehow managed to get through the day on a see-saw ride between the two.

This is what my rational mind told me – LSP has just moved into a different position.  She is facing your back now so you can’t feel her.  Your enormously full large intestine has wrapped itself around your uterus so your poo is masking the movements.  OK, my crazy mind told me that.

I tried like hell to poo all night to no avail and went to bed in pain.  I jiggled and wriggled my belly and pushed and prodded and concentrated really, really hard, but I don’t think I felt any movement.  I eventually fell asleep because logical mind told me I was being neurotic.

This morning I pooed.

Tummy still hurts, there is more to come but I haven’t had much luck there yet although some pressure has definitely been relieved.  I also farted plenty and that was awesome.  Once T went down for his morning nap, I drank a cold drink and laid on the couch determined to feel this baby or run screaming to the nearest hospital.

I felt LSP move, on the LEFT!  Sneaky baby.  Also, not so jabby, but more rolling type movemnts so I think she has just moved around to a different spot and is playing with my back bits now.  Rational mind was right!

 

I still need a good shit though.

 

But in honour of a good poo and the fact that there is still a baby in my belly and I didn’t have to push it out of my butt, I am going to share my first bump photo of this pregnancy.

 

 

 

The bump does fluctuate a bit daily, and I had just eaten this –

Zucchini Slice, Chicken Balls and Pork Buns by the amazing Cassie x Yummy! Yes that is my drink in the foreground. No it is not alcoholic.

And this –

Cake Pops by Cassie’s mum, Gail and Chocolate and Raspberry Puddings by Hollie. So Good. My arse thanks you.

at a Melbourne Cup Luncheon hosted by my bff Cassie, but I think it is safe to say that the bump is mostly LSP and a little bit chocolate.

T had fun too.

Did you notice this?

Feta, Watermelon and Kiwi Salad – found on Pinterest.

This was my contribution to the luncheon.  I found it here – at Studiox3 and it was awesome!  Thanks for the inspiration!!!  I kind of failed with cutting the cubes into exact sizes but generally it workout out fine.

 

Thank you for allowing me to share my poo baby.  I can’t wait to watch it grow 🙂  xxx