did anyone read my last post?

have i lost my readers? or did my last post get screwed up? i accidentally published before i was finished last time. maybe you didn't realize that i went back and wrote more than one paragraph :)

maybe everyone is off having early summer fun. hope you all have a good memorial day weekend! oh, and for those not in the u.s., i hope you have a good regular weekend :)

we've got the beet, we've got the beet, we've got the beet...

yeah! :) we decided to give beets a shot a while ago when we accidentally got some in our produce delivery. i did a simple sauté and really enjoyed them. i purposely ordered more for our recent box. i searched out a new recipe. i found a great sounding one in a new-to-me cookbook called feeding the whole family: cooking with whole foods. it has yummy recipes and includes suggestions at the bottom of each to help include younger family members. for example. i made "nina's famous spring beet soup." it suggested saving some of the cooked beets and carrots for the baby to eat.

nina's famous spring beet soup

prep time: 30 minutes

makes 4 servings

1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil or butter

1 medium onion, cut into thing crescents

1 clove garlic, minced

1 teaspoon sea salt

3-4 cups water

1 bunch spring beets, cut into large matchsticks (save the beet greens)

1 large carrot, cut into large matchsticks

1/4 head green cabbage, shredded (i forgot to get this at the store, so we didn't include it)

2 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice

1 tablespoon tamari or shoyu

1 tablespoon snipped fresh dill or 1 teaspoon dried, for garnish

1/4 cup sour cream, for garnish

heat oil in a 4-quart pot. add onion, garlic, and salt; sauté until soft. add water, beets, carrot, and cabbage and bring to a boil. lower heat and simmer, covered for 10 to 15 minutes, until vegetables are tender.

meanwhile, wash beet greens, remove tough stems, and cut greens into short, thin strips. add beet greens, lemon juice, and tamari to soup; simmer another 3 to 5 minutes. serve at once, garnished with dill and sour cream.

for babies 10 months and older: remove some cooked beet and carrot pieces from the soup and puree or serve whole as finger foods. go easy on beets for babies (only a teaspoon or less at a time) as they have a strong cleansing effect on the bowels. (we just gave arden a raw carrot stick)

my input- i loved the soup. i forgot the cabbage and i don't think it was lacking because of it. also, the sour cream and dill were a really nice touch. i liked the tangy taste they added. i didn't use fresh squeezed lemon juice. i used one of those plastic lemon squeeze things you can get in the produce department. also, i had intended to add barley to the soup to make it more substantial. forgot to do it. i'm going to try it next time. it was a good meal, but not totally filling enough. the book suggested serving a tempeh dish alongside for a full meal. i figured making one dish while taking care of arden was enough :)

arden has been enjoying carrots for the past few days. we've been giving her earth's best carrots and yesterday we let her gnaw on a carrot stick. i think the carrot stick felt good on her gums. she isn't quite back to her usual happy self. i'm wondering if another tooth will come in. her sleep isn't horrible, but not awesome. she wakes up twice to eat and go back in the crib. then the third time i bring her to bed with us. i would love to take out one of those feedings. all in due time.

we've gotten into a routine for her morning nap. i've been wanting to get her away from napping in my lap. so now about an hour and a half to two hours after she wakes in the morning, we go to my bed. i nurse and once she is asleep i move away. i can then take a little nap too if the night was particularly rough or i can get up. she's been sleeping wonderfully this way. more often than not, she's slept for about an hour. this is a big improvement.

she can sit by herself now too. on sunday, she sat unassisted for 15 minutes. she doesn't always do so well, but it's neat to see her improve. she even caught herself a couple times when she was about to tip over.

she's really working on trying to move. she did a little bit of an army-crawl this morning. yesterday, when i went to wash her diapers, i left her playing in her room on the carpet. when i came back she had pushed herself backwards all the way to the wall between her car seat and a duffel bag of extra clothes for her. she didn't know how to get out of that space :) it was cute.

we're loving all the new things she can do. there are struggles because she has a very strong personality. but we love our big, little girl. she is amazing.

and just for fun. here is a photo of malo chillin' in the co-op bag.

aahhhh!

so we thought perhaps arden was allergic to peas, apples, or bananas (all foods she has recently tried). she's had a cold start over 2 weeks ago. she still has a very runny nose. then for the past 5 days she's had way more poopy diapers than usual. like almost all of them. annndd she's been waking up a lot more at night and fussier than usual during the afternoon.

turns out..... she has her first tooth! i was just playing with her, and, when she laughs, it's the perfect time to check her gums. i look on top. good, good, nothing there. look on bottom. wait, what's that? something white? something barely out of her gums? holy crap, it's a tooth! it's on the bottom, right side.

i'm excited. can you tell :) we'll see if i'm still excited after she bites me... :)

strongest baby ever

i'm cheating and doing another video post instead of writing. enjoy! and sorry it's sideways. i don't know how to rotate a video with my program...

puppy love

our little girl is becoming very interested in olive. she loves to reach out to her and thinks it's funny to get her hands licked.

this video shows massive cuteness so beware :) arden has been shunning the blanket i spread on the floor, while olive loves it. they've decided to reverse positions here. i love how olive seems like she is trying to understand what arden is saying.

stranger anger

a stranger in the grocery parking lot just made me feel like crap. i wasn't able to park as close to a cart corral as i like. so when i was done putting my groceries, and arden, in the car, i left the cart in in front of my car. you know, out of the way, but not the best spot. when i pulled out of my spot the cart moved. it rolled into another car. the tire of the cart hit the tire of the car. no big deal. i stopped my car, moved the cart into the same spot. i did not want to leave arden in the car alone. the woman in the parked car told me to put it away. i said i couldn't leave arden. she said she would watch arden. yeah right. i'm going to let a stranger watch my baby. i told her no and walked to my car. she said "i raised 4 kids and took car of all my responsibilities, like putting the cart away."

f-you lady! because of this inane comment, i got all flustered and as i finished pulling out of my spot i almost hit a car. woo way to make me look even better.

in ended up parking behind the grocery and crying for a while. worrying if i was a good mother. i called anna and she assured me i was. phew :)

i hate that a little comment can do that sometimes. ok, arden is trying to tear my shirt off. more later

i did it lynn!!

hehe :) lynn told me i had two weeks to get up photos of the curtains she helped make for arden's room. i'm attempting to get back into sewing after ummm... 15 years. i finally got the curtains up on saturday. here are the photos 4 days early :) excuse the photo quality.

momma, mommy, mummy, ima, mere...

there are so many names for mother, and today there are so many of us that get to celebrate this day. but there are many still waiting.

i wish all of those that are TTC a happy mother's day. you are special women. i'm making myself cry right now cause i just want all of you to experience such joy wherever your life leads you. even though i don't always comment on your blogs; i am reading them. i am crossing my fingers for you. i think of you often.

i may not know you in real life. i barely know you in the blogasphere, but i care about all of you.

happy mother's day.

ps- i don't mean to exclude anyone with this post. just putting out what i'm feeling right now. :)

second-parent adoption

all done!! anna legally became arden's mommy today. stupid that we needed to do this, but thank goodness it is available. it was formal, yet informal at the same time. one of the clerks took photos the whole time for us. it was really cute. the judge was very nice. our lawyer is great (seattlites, i highly recommend her- lisa schuchman on capital hill). arden was still sleepy from her car ride so we had no embarrassing screaming baby scenes. we were the first adoption in that court (i think it was recently remodeled/built). kind of exciting. they all cooed over arden and congratulated us over and over.

now for the photos :) not terribly exciting to look at, but a great event none-the-less. arden really wanted to eat the gavel, by the way.

court date

we go to the courthouse tomorrow for anna to adopt arden! woohoo! we'll get a photo with the judge and i swear, really, really i do, that i'll post it :)

i, also, want to try to get up the lovely curtains that lynn helped me with tonight. i'm sure you're all anxiously awaiting the photos :) all, like, 5 readers. anyways... more tomorrow!