True Story.

Product Review- Re-Play Plates

Just a short product review. I really love these plates, deep sides, divided, durable, affordable and made from recycled materials, what more could you ask for? Connor is getting the matching cups, bowls and utensils for his birthday from his Nana.  I highly reccomend these to any Green Mom or just someone looking for a good children's plate!

Cloth Diaper Store Review

So just a little review. I have never ordered from jackbenatural.com before, but I just received my first order form them, and I am super impressed. My order received free shipping (over $10) which gives them an A+ in my mind, plus a free sample, which is always fun. There was also a packet of flower seeds (random, but still fun), and on top of all that in my order there was a potato or flower sack type bag, which would be cool for toys or maybe buying fruit at the grocery store. To add to the coolness of my order, there was hand written note thanking me for my order, and I earned $.79 to use on my next order. I will definitely be giving them my business again, and I haven't even used what I ordered yet!

Cloth Diaper Review- BG Freetime

A short review of the BumGenius Freetime Diaper

I give the BG Freetime a B+ as far as all in ones go. It's great if you aren't a pocket person, and it dries quite a bit faster than the BG 3.0 AIOs (which are my favorite diaper) I'm an aplix person but my husband prefers snaps, because they last longer. I only had the opportunity to try the aplix freetime, and I did get a good fit with Connor. It fits a lot like a BG 4.0, I just prefer pockets. The floppy inserts tend to bunch up for us. I think this diaper would work very well for a girl, or a skinnier boy. All in all, a good diaper, just not for us. 

Adventures in Baby Food- Saga #4

Keep in mind this blog should be read from the earliest post, to the newest, if you have not read my blog before :) Thank you for reading!

Hank, Connor and I at a Cancer Benefit in March

Saga #4, The Sweet Potato

Sweet potatoes were one of my son's favs.  We would buy about 1-2lbs at a time, a small amount goes a long way. Sweet potatoes are very thick and starchy, so quite a bit more water goes into thining these guys out than bananas or apples. 

Peel and chop, then steam. We do 1 cup of water for 20 mins in our veggie steamer. 

Once steamed, let cool and place in the batch bowl

This one I don't have an exact a amount of water to use,  start with a cup, and work from there. 

Puree. Add more water if it is extra thick, then puree again. 

Place in containers, and freeze.  Like most of the other foods, sweet potatoes are good in the freezer for about a month, don't forget to label!

Cost analysis-

2lbs of sweet potatoes- Approx. $2.50

2lbs of Sweet Potatoes makes about 45oz of baby food, depending on the consistancy

45oz of store bought baby food - $7.28

Adventures in Baby Food- Saga #3

Connor "reading"  5 months old. 

Tale #3
Banana Mash


Bananas are my favorite baby food, they are super easy, and C LOVES them. I thought I took pictures, but I can't find them, 


-peel bananas 
-chop them into smaller peices to fit in blender
-add a small amount of water to taste
    -add more water for "1st foods" Connor is 7 months old, we only add a splash of water to the puree. 
-pour into containers
-enjoy!






Cost Savings-
Cost of 5oz of store bought baby food- $1.04
Cost of 1lb of Bananas (makes about 16oz of baby food)  $.99

The Many Mysteries of Parenthood...

Where do all the Nuk-Nuks go?


Why is it that everything that is really cute and on sale, never come in the size your baby needs?


Burp cloths... just... burp cloths....


How is that children always seem like they are covered in honey.... even if there is no honey or honey like substances in the house??

Adventures in Baby Food- Saga #2

Baby Food Tale #2
Carrot Puree




As we last left our heros in the kitchen covered in applesauce, we are not moving on to something much more disgusting to us as adults, but so yummy to babies, the carrot puree! Yum!

Not to state the obvious, but... start with carrots! 1 pound is what I start with. 

You can buy baby carrots pre-peeled to make things a little easier, but whole carrots in our area are around 50 cents cheaper per pound. 

Chop and steam the carrots. Depending on your veggie steamer (check the manual if using an appliance type steamer) but we do 1 cup of water for 25 minutes. 

1 pound of carrots made about 16oz of baby food. 

The cost savings for this one are as follows- 

Cost of 5oz or 1 package of  store bought carrot puree- $1.05

Cost of 15oz of store bought carrot puree- $3.15

Cost of 1 pound of whole carrots $1.05

Cost of 15oz of homemade applesauce $1.05

Carrot puree is good for about 3 days, unless kept frozen, for best taste, use frozen foods within 30 days.  Keep that in mind when choosing amounts of food to make. We use dry erase markers do write down date on container if not using containers with date dials on them. 

Thanks for reading! 

Kaelee 

Little Man's First Photo Shoot

Little Man's first photo shoot. 

11/8/2011

First Snowfall of the Season

This is Connor seeing snow for the first time. Love. 

SuperPoints

SuperPoints is a pretty cool site where you can earn points by either pushing the SuperLucky Button, or by completing offers. Everyone starts out with 30 spins of the button a day, and you get more when you invite more people.  I've already traded in $10 in prizes, and I've only been doing it for a few weeks. It's really easy to get started, all you have to do is get an invite from someone who is already a member, and confirm your e-mail to start earning! If you would like an invite, just let me know, I earn points for you joining and confirming your membership, even if you don't like it and decide not to keep earning! 

Cloth diapers and You

Cloth is not for everyone, if you are going to exclusively cloth diaper your child, there are a lot of things to consider. What kind of diapers do I use? What kind of soap do you use to wash them? What do I do with them when they are dirty? How do I wash them? Am I going to use cloth wipes as well? How does that work? Some of these questions you just have to answer on your own through trial and error, some you can figure out by reading articles online. 


This is what we have found that works best for us. 


When getting started, pick a couple of different cloth diapers that you would like to try, and order them, or find them used. If you are not sure that you are going to be able to continue cloth diapering, or are only going to cloth occasionally, don't spend tons of money on your starting diapers. If buying used, make sure the person you are buying from took care of the diapers correctly, and that you can see/feel the diapers before you actually buy them. 


After choosing your diapers, decide what you want to keep them in clean and dirty. We use baskets under our sons changing table to keep them in when they are clean. 

  

When they are dirty, we keep them in a trash can that we purchased at Target for around $15. In the trash can we use Planet Wise wetbags, that we purchased online for about $15 each. Planet Wise has a wide range of wetbags in a wide range of colors. We also use Planet Wise wetbags on the go, when we use it, we just dump the diapers in the dirty storage, and turn it inside out, and put it in our dirty storage can until wash time. 








We have a variety of different diapers we like to use, My favorites are FuzziBunz and BumGenius. The FuzziBunz One Size version (adjustable to different sizes) run a little small, but if you chose the perfect size, they work really well. They are one of my least leaky diapers. I also like Kawaii diapers. Kawaii is my husbands favorite to use. Their one size diapers fit a wide range of sizes. They fit Connor when he was first born, and they still fit him now that he is 24lbs. We also have what are called "prefolds" which are more of the diapers that our mothers and grandmothers use to use, they are just... better! And you don't have to use diaper pins with todays prefolds, if you don't want to. We use what are called Snappies. We use our prefolds as back-up diapers for the most part, just in case some of them aren't dry by the time we need them, or we just get busy and don't get the washing done in time. Prefolds are an inexpensive way to try out cloth diapers. Econobum diapers are a great one to use if you are unsure. A trial pack is only $11.95, and that comes with 3 prefolds, and 1 cover. Other options are All in ones (AIOs) which are just a one piece diaper (so nice!) it just takes those a little while longer to dry, so keep that in mind when you are purchasing! My favorite option is the pocket diaper, which is a cover, and a removable insert. They dry more quickly, but they do take a little more time to put back together (stuffing the insert back into the diaper) than the AIOs, and the prefolds, I just pull off the rack and into a basket. 


Here is our washing regiment:
-After diapers are soiled, we shake out any solids into the toilet and remove the inserts and place them and place them into our diaper trash can. 


-I usually give myself 1 days worth of clean diapers. Depending on the age of your baby, you may been 5-10 left clean for 1 days worth. What we do, is once a month we count how many he uses in a day in his baby journal. 


-When I'm down to the number of diapers I need for 1 day, I take my dirty bag into the laundry room and dump the dirties into the washing machine, and run a cold rinse to combat staining. 


-Replace the wetbag in the trash can with the clean one. I usually spray my can with lysol, in case there is an odor. 


-Once the cold rinse is clean, I pull the diapers apart in the wash if they are stuck together from the spin, and dump in my soap. We use Rockin Green Cloth Diaper detergent, which comes in different scents, as well as different varieties for different water. Run a warm wash cycle. 


-Once the wash cycle is over, I pull the diapers apart once again, and we run another warm rinse to ensure all of the soap and solids have been removed, and to combat odor. 


-Once all of the cycles are finished, I hang the diapers out to dry on a drying rack in our home (when it's cool) or outdoors when it's warm.  If your child has any pollen allergies, you may want to keep your diapers indoors for drying. You also see on the drying rack, a couple of our different wet bags, and a variety of diapers, and inserts. 

Why they are dry, I stuff them (if they are pockets) and fold them and put them in the baskets. The ones picture below are all my pocket diapers. 

Updates- My latest Fluffy Mail!

New set of Econobums, and 3 BumGenius 3.0 Seconds as 

well as 10 new Kissas Wipes

2 new FuzziBunz Perfect Size that I got on ebay! 

Adventures in Baby food

My husband Hank and I decided before our son was born, that we were going to make our own baby food, both to save money, and make healthier choices for Connor.  We have recently started on solids and, because of our family history with food allergies, we are only introducing one new food a week. Which I think is fairly normal. We are currently up to oatmeal, rice cereal, and applesause. This weekend we are going to introduce carrots. After reading several books, online blogs, and watching YouTube videos all about steaming, processing and storing homemade cereals and purees, we chose our preferred process, and started cooking!  I'd like to talk a little bit about our process and expenses in case anyone has considered making their own baby and toddler food, but feel that its to complicated, expensive, or that you simply would not have time. We love it because there is no extra sugars or preservatives, no plastic or glass waste, and much cheaper than store bought foods!


The start up costs for creating your own homemade concoctions can add up, but don't get discouraged, take it one purchase at a time. If you are expecting, register for some of these things for your shower, and let everyone know that you are planning to make your own food. I know having everything in place to start making our own food once our little one started eating solids was big help! 


For our steamer, we chose an Aroma 20 cup rice cooker and food steamer, it's more compact that some of the ones we looked at, and we found it on sale at Target for less for less than $30 (MSRP $54.99)

For our blender/food processor,  we have chosen the Baby Bullet, which we received as a gift, but retails for around $60. It comes with different blades for different foods, and a handy booklet with a few recipes.  Also in the kit was a spatula, and set of small storage containers, perfect for your babies first meals, but may be too small once he starts eating larger portions. Something we have not taken advatage of, but you might want to if interested in the Baby Bullet, on their website they sell a larger cookbook with more recipes, as well as extra accessories. 

Food storage depends on your babies needs at the time, for the time being we are using the storage containers that came with the Baby Bullet, which is pretty cool, because it has a date selector on it. 

We are also using Take & Toss by The First Years. They are inexpensive, come in several different sizes , are BPA free, and as a plus, they are bright, fun colors!  We are also using Take & Toss spoons, they come in a package of 20, which is awesome when you have a baby who throws things. We found them on sale for B2G1 free at Babies R Us. My sister has told me than she does not recommend the Take & Toss cups. 

Our first recipe, as I said, was for applesauce. The cost savings for this one are as follows- 

Cost of 5oz or 1 package of  store bought applesauce- $1.05

Cost of 15oz or 3 packages of store bought-$3.15

Cost of 15oz of homemade applesauce $2.70 (4 apples) 

Applesauce is good for about 3 days, unless kept frozen. Keep that in mind when choosing amounts of food to make. We use dry erase markers do write down date on container if not using containers with date dials on them. 

Our Recipe- 

-peel, core and slice 4 apples

-steam apples, in our steamer it takes approx. 20 minutes to do 4 apples using 3/4 cup of water in the steamer pot

-let apples cool

-add 1/4 cup of water per apple, it is suggested to use the water in the steamer pot for added flavor, if there is any left after steaming

-blend until pureed, we do one apple at a time with 1/4 cup of water for 10 seconds each

-store in appropriate containers, if freezing, freeze in single serve portions 

This makes about 3 days worth for our 5 month old, and we usually serve it along with rice cereal or oatmeal. 

Thanks for reading, let me know if you have any questions! 

Kaelee