Yesterday Rob was his usual awesome self and did SIX wash/dry cycles of our recently acquired prefold diapers to prepare them for their first use. Yes, SIX. Luckily, we have a washer/dryer in our basement, but this still means running up and down two flights of stairs throughout the day to get the job done. It would have taken me days to get that sort of task done at this point—I feel so out of shape! At any rate, I couldn’t sleep between 2:30 and 5:30 this morning, so I decided to go into the living room and read. As I passed the baby’s room, I see the cat snuggled up in the laundry basket with all of our freshly washed diapers. I couldn’t yell at him because it was so cute—and he managed to hop out of the laundry basket before I had a chance to snap a picture. I’m sure I’ll have many more opportunities to get a picture of him in the act.

One thing I want to share with some other mommies (you know who you are) is the very awesome “Top 100 Baby Purees” by Annabel Karmel. Rob got me a copy as a Christmas gift, and it was actually the first baby-related item that we purchased:

Our ambitious plan is to grow veggies in the garden, and then cook them, puree them, and finally can them for later consumption by the baby. If that turns out to be too much work, I’ll just buy the veggies from the store once the baby is old enough for solids, prepare the purees, and then freeze them. Either way, we really want to avoid the crappy cans of baby food at the store. I want to know what is going into my baby’s food, in the same way that I want to know what is going into my own! The store-bought baby food looks really gross anyway, and to be honest, some of the purees in this book look kind of delicious. The book contains sections on weaning and food allergies, and is organized into different “stages” of weaning, (e.g. 6 mos, 7-9 mos, 9-12 mos etc). The thing I like about the book is that some of the purees contain meat. I know that some people prefer to raise their children as vegetarians, but I am not one of them. The chicken with sweet potato and apple sounds especially delicious. The other thing I really like about the book is the introduction of spices. I think it’s great to introduce babies to foods that aren’t the typical bland and tasteless offerings that characterize what most people initially feed their babies. Cinnamon, vanilla, garlic, and parsley are just a few of the spices that are used in the recipes. These spices exhibit antimicrobial properties that are no doubt good for babies.