Tummy Time? No Thanks.

How do you make a child do tummy time when this is what happens:

"No Thanks Daddy..."

"Oh, you wanted me to do Tummy time? I thought maybe you just wanted me to rest on daddy's belly"

"Ummm...no thanks on this little manuever. I would rather just rest my head and take a little snooze.

 Just. Like. This"

"Alright, fine. If I just hold my head up for a few seconds, will you please put me back on my butt?"

7 Months!

Ahhhh, 7 Months.

How I love thee.

Matilda continues to make our hearts bigger and bigger each day.

I'm actually surprised they haven't exploded yet.

She has started clapping.

and you can tell she is just so proud of herself when she does.

She has also started to really show preference.

She will do the reach and face pat for those she is very comfortable.

She will start flapping her arms very excitedly when she sees someone she knows and likes (my favorite part of getting her from daycare).

And she has a willful way of showing me she doesnt' like certain foods (mainly prunes) by turning her head and refusing to turn back my way until there is something else on that spoon.

She is a very happy little baby.

Making lots and lots of noises, and sounds, and babbles.

But definitely prefers her little gremlin noises. Perhaps its because we are always singing to her and it is her way of trying to sing too?

We have enjoyed lots of fun play time now that she is staying up a little longer in between naps.

The work nights still fly by to fast, but I am so blessed to get to pop down and see my little one at work.

Matilda is also trying hard to pick up food for herself. She still suffers from "dead arms and dancing feet" (as explained in a previous post), BUT she has started to attempt to pick up food.

It is pretty freaking cute because she concentrates So. Hard.

And then gets Soooooo frustrated.

There continues to be no concern on the weight gain front. :)

The thighs keep getting juicier.

We had to take Matilda to the doctor last week, so we know her 7 month stats come in at a nice 17 pounds, 10 oz.

Matilda has started getting breakfast at daycare.

It is one of my favorite moments of the day.

After I drop her off, I pack my stuff up and peek in for a few seconds.

I watch her strapped into her high-chair like a big girl, trying to figure out her sippy cup and watching the other kids.

ALWAYS watching other kids. Hopefully these kids are upstanding citizens, because I am pretty sure Matilda will learn all of her 'cool tricks' from them...

7 Months. The best yet....

Down and Out

This weekend was such a GREAT weekend, only to end on a sour note. Nate is sick. Like not "I have a sniffly cold sick".

No. The kind of sick where you aren't sure which side to face the toilet. The kind of sick where you rub your feet together all day because you ache from a fever.

The kind of sick that causes you to self-quarantine yourself to the basement so as to minimize exposure to wife and child.

Luckily, Meghan and Emily were here to help get the massive target run done and accompany Tillie and I to Moose and Sadie's for brunch.

So hold please, while we take some time to recuperate. Well, one of us is recuperating, the other is busy with a baby and keeping the home fires burning...

Fresh Food Fast: Episode 3

Well, our first night of cooking lessons with Emily got off to a lame start because Nate was running a little late from work, and so it was baby duty and dinner duty.

So the lesson was lame, but important: Jarred garlic is crap unless it is an emergency situation.

And this was an emergency so we used it.

But the result was pretty good. We made Pasta with Arugula, White Beans and Walnuts. (Click for link to recipe).

I thought it was pretty tasty, but it was admittedly a little weird at first.

If you make it be sure to add the full amount of arugula. That is where a lot of the flavor comes from, and it is a little bland without it.

Weekend Fling in WI

We headed home for a quick visit and some great snuggles from the Grandparents this past weekend.

Luckily the snow subsided long enough that the "Christmas Cancelor" (I.e. my father) couldn't put the hammer down and say we couldn't come. Yes, he does seem to still weild that much power even as I approach my 30th year...
It was a very fun, low-key weekend. Even though Matilda had a nasty cold and pretty much shot bright green snot out of her nose every time she sneezed, she was in pretty good spirits.

AND....hat pracitice is totally paying off, because now she can sport Grandpa's hat!!

In other news, she did decide to finally roll over this weekend. And after she did it, I felt like she gave me a look that just said: "There..I did it. Can you please just let me sit up now, and forget this rolling over business?"

Dead Arms and Dancing Feet

Matilda has always been highly adept at using her fingers, ESPECIALLY as it relates to putting her fingers in her mouth.

So, naturally one would imagine that this child would dominate getting food into her mouth. Wrong.

In fact, after we strap her into her highchair, she all but forgets she has arms let alone hands with fingers attached that are perfect at picking things up.

If you put some food in front of her, she will do everything she can to get it in her mouth including screaming until you feed her and licking the tray with her mouth EXCEPT attempt to pick the food up with her hands.

Enter--Dead Arms and Dancing Feet.

This isn't the best representation of dead arms because she doesn't attempt to pick up the nectarine with her mouth, but you can see she has no interest in activating her upper limbs to obtain gastro-intestinal delight.

She does however keep her little twinkly toes moving non-stop. This is a common occurrence. Put this child anywhere and watch her feet dance. Just like she skipped rolling over, I think she may skip walking and go straight to dancing. We shall see.

Fresh Food Fast: Episode 2

We are loving our new cookbook so far and have made a few good things from it. With Emily in town for the 'semester' we are really excited to have someone else to cook for (and with). Nate says we are going to give her cooking lessons.

In reality, I think it will be more like 'how to keep your baby entertained while you try to whip something edible together' lessons. Either way it should come in handy.

We tried our hand at Ginger Lime Chicken with Carrot Couscous. Click for recipe!

Here's the deal:

1) We adored the couscous. It will absolutely be a new staple side in our house.

2) Both were ridiculously easy, and tasty.

3) We did breasts instead of thighs, so ours got a little dry. If we do breasts again we would alter the cook time slightly.

Matilda also got to try something new....this is going to be a very tricky one people. But the hint is that she LOVED it (if you can't tell). This was literally the first face she made after trying this new food. HINT: her Mom and Dad both love it and it goes great with a bowl of chips.

Pinterest Planning

If you aren't on Pinterest you are missing out.

Missing out on loads and loads of fun ideas for crafts, photos, recipes, party planning and more. 

It is great for storing all of the ideas you have, and for organizing all of those ideas into easy to access and organized online-folder.

The only problem is that there is so much possibility, that one can get caught up in only pinning and not actually bringing to life any of these fabulous ideas. 

So for the past few weeks I have been implementing a "Pinterest Plan" which essentially is a rule that I don't get to pin a bunch of new stuff if I don't do one of my previous pins.

Enter this weeks activity: fun photograph with Tillie! I was inspired by a photo that I saw pinned, and decided it was to cute to not do with Matilda.

I am still getting used to my nice camera and truly do not know how to use it so we take lots and lots of bad pictures to get a few decent ones.

But it is worth it. And Matilda likes the camera, and being nudie. A combination that could cause problems later in life, but for now it is making for some ridiculously cute photos.

Fresh Food Fast

Nate and I are excited to continue our tradition of rocking out a new cookbook every year. It all started in 2008, our first year of wedded bliss. And we are kind of coming full circle with our book choice.

Year One was Great Food Fast, a Martha Stewart best. Then came Nigella Express, which was probably our least favorite thus far but ironically drives a lot of traffic to the blog off of Google search words. Year 3 was filled with lots of great recipes with Cooking Light's, Way To Cook. And year 4 was Magazine Cuisine, any and all recipes we found and fell in love with from magazines we subscribed too.

So Year 5, we are bringing it back to Martha in her 2nd book, Fresh Flavor Fast. 

We have been rocking the whole meal-planning deal the last month, and decided to use the left-over pork tenderloin that we had grilled (ummm, in January people..how great is that) to do our very first recipe from this book:

Pork Enchildas with Green Sauce.

I don't have a picture, as in the past. Let's keep it real. By the time we get Matilda down, and get dinner ready we aren't up for playing around with trying to plate food, get the camera out and attempt to create some decent light.

BUT, I do have a link the recipe. Check it out here!

It was very good. We made it and stuffed it the night before, but I would recommend waiting to stuff them until you are ready to bake them to avoid the tortilla getting soggy. Also, we didn't use any cheese and it was still delish.

I am thinking this one will get repeated when we get fresh tomatillo's from our crop share. Yum!!

Translation Tuesday: Fruit Snack!

We were graced with our first ear infection over the holiday's.

And Matilda got her very first prescription for amoxicillin.

Enter: the fruit snack.

Or as I would like to call it, our first attempt to totally rodeo-clown our kid into thinking something is more fun than it sounds like.

Nate: "Tillie, it's time for your fruit snack. So yummy and delcious."

Translation: "I am getting ready to jam 4ml's of this nasty pink substance down your throat."

I'm certain this will not be the last of these little tricks.....

It's all the Craze

Planking? Owling? Tebowing?

What's next in the crazy internet-photo craze?

Matilda, being the little hipster she is, wanted to get in on the action, and is ready for whatever is up next.

So let me walk you through the very brief, yet pervasive, photo challenge history.

Planking

Also called the 'lying down game'. The whole purpose of this game (which is the game that started it all) is to take a picture of yourself in an unusual spot lying face down. Think mimicing a wooden plank. Apparently it actually started in like 1994, but had a resurgence in mid-2011.

Matilda didn't care that she was late to the party.

She got her plank on at the Conservatory right on top of a little ladder.

Next, came Owling.

You know, the art of perching yourself on top of somethign like an owl.

And then, Bat-manning

I think this one speaks for itself....

And finally, the most divisive...

Tebow-ing.

As we all know from the over-publicised Tebow, he likes to get down on one knee and take a moment to thank the big guy upstairs for gracing him with his skills and talents that are allowing his team to make the miraculous play-off run they are...

So the internet decided that this would be a fun photo craze as well.

And it is.

Take a knee, Tillie. Take a knee.

As you can see, we have figured out ways to make our own fun in the Hanson household.

And Matilda is at severe risk of being raised as a hipster.

*Note: I'm not going to name names, but for those less technically savvy people out there, if you click on the words that have the underlines, it will take you to a website to show you other pictures of people owling, planking, etc

28 Weeks

Oh, our little Tillie Bean. She is at such a fun age. Growing 'so big' so fast. Still loving to sit up. Her Sophie giraffe. And immediately putting all toys directly into her mouth.

Although she is starting to use her mouth for TALKING! Oh yes. She graced us with her first true babbling: "Baabababababa" over and over again at 5:45 AM on New Years Day.

Luckily I went to bed at 10:30 the night before and it was VERY cute, so I didn't care that it was ridiculously early.

Her thighs keep getting chunkier and chunkier. Pretty sure she take after her Mama in the 'thunder thigh' camp.

Matilda got all bundled up to enjoy our first true snow of the season, which is pretty funny since it January and an inch of snow was about all we had.

Peek-A-Boo is quickly becoming a favorite past-time. We play peek-a-boo pretty much all day long because it gets such good giggles. It is so great that she is actually trying to look for whoever is hiding now. 

Peek!

NYE was like any other night in our house.

Except for the nudie baby in the NYE hat that eventually peed on our chair because her parents got cocky.

Matilda continues to be very serious, focused, intense, etc etc etc. At least that is what everyone that meets her for the first time says. Most likely it is because she is like that in new situations. 

I like it.

She isn't just going to give up her smiles for just anyone. No, you have to work for it.

And she is going to do some serious checking out of what is going on before she decides how she is going to  handle it.

Truthfully, it has always kind of bothered me that people always call her serious and intense.

UNTIL, our new pediatrician (whom I adore) upon meeting Matilda says, "that girl has some GREAT social skills, look at how she looks at me and checks me out...very in tune with what is going on"

That's right..social skills. She's got 'em.

Just don't mistake her not smiling at you for not liking you. She just wants to figure you out first. 

My Parents Were Awesome

No, I am not sucking up to my parents. And sure they were and are awesome

But I am talking about this Tumblr site:
http://myparentswereawesome.tumblr.com/

I love looking at all the old pictures. And I have to say, that now being a parent myself, I do find myself wondering more and more, what were my parents like before they had kids.

Because I think about what Nate and I were like before kids, and how different it seems like we are now. Just think of what it will be like 30 years from now when Matilda is 30. Little will she know that her dad and I used to do secret date nights. That we would always try to have our next vacation planned before we returned from the current one. That we would do spontaneously fun and dorky things. That we used to be social, and get together with friends.

She will probably barely believe it.

Just like I can barely believe that my dad did macrame when he was first married. And my mom and him went downhill skiing as a couple.

But at some point all parents were awesome in their 'pre-parental' lives. Doing stuff that their kids would never imagine. The real secret is figuring out how to keep doing those things once the kids arrive. Or just discovering new things to take up for the sole purpose of embarrassing them in front of their friends, right?

I seem to remember rides to school with my Dad in full hunting face make-up.....

Food Face

It's that time of the week again. When we introduce Tillie to a new delectable food. Watch the video below and take a guess at what we are giving to her. She has a GREAT reaction at the end....