OMG, I can't believe how fast that year has gone. Zara turned one on Saturday, and my parents and one brother came up for the day.
DH also built a sandpit- not specifically for Zara's birthday, it just worked out that way. She loves it anyway!
First, some random cuteness...
Ooh, fire...
And the sandpit!
Happy birthday beautiful girl!
Happy New Year!
We've been away, so I haven't been posting for a little while... so here's a big photo post from our last few weeks :)
We were at my parents' place for almost two weeks after xmas:
Went to the Maritime Museum in Sydney, to find Malachi a submarine:
And here's the submarine! Malachi and I went through it, though I didn't have the camera with me, so unfortunately didn't get any photos of him inside it. He was very impressed by all the hatches we had to climb through, and he looked through two periscopes. Zara waited outside with my parents and my brother.
Got a new climbing frame, after our trampoline mat died:
Zara had her first go at painting:
And Zara'a CRAWLING! I've never had a crawling baby before- Malachi walked at 10.5 months without ever crawling, then figured that out sometime past 12 months. Zara's been 'almost crawling' for about a month, and she's finally got the leg movement co-ordinated with the rest of her body, and she's off! Getting into everything and enjoying it immensely :)
...was yesterday, but Zara didn't sleep well in the evening so I didn't get time to post this.
We had an all-day summer fruit feast to mark the Solstice.
It started with fruit salad for breakfast...
Berry & Brioche Bake for lunch (must post the brioche recipe, it was yummy as!)
Fruit punch to drink...
A passionfruit souffle for dinner, which collapsed when DH took it out of the oven, so wasn't worth taking a photo of, LOL, but it tasted alright, and a blueberry cheesecake for dessert.
We also opened the first presents (one each).
This is our Summer Tree :)
And Zara the Cherry Vampire
A big photo post!
Malachi being a 'diney-saur' in a costume he came up with. Very creative I thought!
Yes, the costume is a green towel :D I asked what kind of dinosaur he was- apparently a worm-eating one!
And two beautiful people in a boat :)
Gotta love creative play :)
Actually just realised that the boat pictures came first, cos his hair's long there, and short in the dinosaur ones :P Oh well.
Oh, and one more... Malachi after deciding that putting porridge in his hair was a good idea! I can't remember exactly how the conversation went, but I said that porridge was for eating, and Malachi said it wasn't. I suggested it was for putting in your hair, which he thought was an excellent plan! He's so funny :D
I've been meaning to post about ECing for a little while, but haven't gotten around to it. I've got a funny EC story now, so there's my motivation!
For anyone who doesn't know, EC stands for Elimination Communication, and basically it means you learn your baby's cues for when they need to go to the toilet. Just like they'll let you know when they're hungry, bored, tired etc, they'll also let you know when they need to do a wee... if you listen.
This is NOT 'toilet training'. It's more the parent that's being 'trained', but I think mostly it's another way to communicate and be in tune with your baby. See Tribal Baby for more EC info!
I heard about ECing before Zara was born, and had vague thoughts about giving it a go, but didn't get around to it. Then one morning she woke up and I offered her the breast, but she pulled on and off and squirmed all around. I thought of some stuff I'd read on Tribal Baby about 'plucking' on and off the breast being a sign for needing to do a wee. I thought to myself, "Maybe I could give that EC thing a go."
It was Sunday morning, and I'd had a big whinge at DH about being tired the day before, so he came and got Zara while I stayed in bed for a little while. She had her night nappy off and was nakeybum. After she'd been up for a while, I heard her making a sort of squirmy, uncomfortable noise. I thought, "Put her on the toilet..." About 5 seconds later, I hear DH say, "Oh, Zara!" and I knew she'd done a wee. That was when I decided, yep, we'll try EC with her.
We've been doing it for a bit over a month now, and it's been really quite easy. We catch most wees and poos most days. She only wears nappies at night, and to go out- but even most of the day nappies are dry now, even after being out for two or three hours. We had one day, last week sometime, where we had NO misses at all! How exciting! :D
Anyway, on to the funny story- a few days ago, Malachi, Zara and I were in bed. I'd been trying to get Zara to have a sleep, but she wasn't too keen, despite being tired. Before I'd taken her into bed, I'd put her on her little toilet, and she'd done a wee. She was getting a bit whingy, so I sat her on my stomach, with me lying down. She made some noises, and Malachi said, "She said 'weee! weee! weee!' She need to do a wee!" I said, "Mate, she only just did a big wee. I don't think she needs to do another one yet." But... a few minutes later... LOL! So I got wee'd on, and apologised to both Malachi and Zara for not listening to them.
This has been my biggest EC lesson (and one I still obviously haven't quite learnt!) - don't assume that she doesn't need to do a wee because she's only recently done one! And listen to the three year old!
Yes, my Zara-girl is 8 months old today! Here are some photos to show off her beautifulness and her abundance! (thanks Other Rach for that term, I love it!)
We're doing baby-led solids with Zara. It's also known as baby led weaning, but to me 'weaning' means the end of breastfeeding, not the start of other foods. Anyway, basically it involves following the baby's lead as to when they're ready to start other foods, letting the baby regulate what and how much they eat, and not feeding them bland pureed mush.
I was planning on using this approach with Zara anyway, and she made the decision to start when she was 5 1/2 months by grabbing a bread roll out of my hand, and shoving it in her mouth.
To start with, the vast majority of the food that went in came straight back out again, somewhat soggy but pretty much intact. Slowly, she's started to swallow more of the food, as evidenced by her changing poos! (Luckily they're still mostly breastmilk poos, just slightly chunky, so they still smell nice!)
Mostly she eats fruit- she's tried pear, apple, banana, watermelon, kiwifruit, rockmelon, strawberries, blueberries, orange, mandarin... and probably more. She's also had bread, pasta, rice, carrot, zucchini, eggplant, mushrooms, tomato, olives, capsicum... etc etc etc.
She still has no teeth but still does pretty well chomping up crunchier things!
Obviously you need to be sensible with what you feed a small baby- no nuts or anything- and make sure they're supervised in case of choking, but evidence suggests that babies are far less likely to choke on food when they are controlling what goes into their mouths than when they're being spoon fed.
Anyway, the original point of this post was- I was watching Zara eating roast potato for dinner, and thinking about how good her fine motor skills are compared to other babies I've looked after of the same age (Malachi, and babies I cared for when I worked in childcare). She can pick up an individual blueberry, or olive slice, and get it into her mouth with pretty good accuracy. I imagine this extra practice and development of her fine motor skills will give her a headstart with drawing, writing and other similar skills compared to babies who are spoon fed... it's amazing how all these skills tie in together, and how much our babies can actually do for themselves if we follow their lead and trust them.
