Time change caught up with Alexa

In her highchair. During breakfast. She's snoring! Seriously, if she was this tired, why did she have to wake us up at 6 a.m. this morning?! Kid needs to learn how to sleep in. Funny thing is that after her 20-minute catnap, she woke up and upon discovering that there was still half a muffin in her hand, proceeded to stuff said muffin in her mouth, along with other items on her tray. As my friend Libby said, "Sometimes you just need to rest up to finish your meal."

Food, glorious food!

We have been on a food adventure with Alexa! We are trying to get her ready to eat table food by the time she is 1, which is coming up soon. So we are introducing a variety of finger foods to get her used to new tastes and textures. Up this week: Egg yolks, avocado, bananas and peaches!

Here is Alexa trying the egg yolks. Babies aren't supposed to have the whites until they reach 1 because it often causes allergic reactions. So I hard boiled the eggs and let her try the yolk. It crumbled a lot, which made it hard for her to eat. It was also a very weird texture for her. I ended up mashing it up and mixing it into a jar of veggies to add texture and allow her to taste it and get the nutritional benefit.

Next, we tried avocado, which is supposed to be an excellent food for babies. Unfortunately, the avocado was not as soft as I would have liked, so it was hard to mash. I plan to try this one again, hopefully, with a more ripe avocado! Several of my mom friends report that their babies LOVE mashed avocado.

The biggest hit so far has been bananas! She LOVES them! She is definitely partial to fruit, as is common with babies. They love sweet stuff. We try to offer her vegetables and meat first, then give her fruit for desert. The bananas were a big hit, both raw like this and also frozen and served in the mesh bags. Go bananas!

And, finally, here is Alexa having fun with peaches! Daddy sliced some up for her. She's already had pureed peaches, but this was the first time she tried it fresh. She made some funny faces, but after she got a taste, she liked it!

Another great day with Miss A!

Today, Miss Alexa got all dressed up and we headed out to Virginia to check out Aunt Chimmy's new townhouse. Alexa loved it! Tons of new carpet space to crawl on and TONS of moving boxes to pull up on! Aunt Chimmy baked a delicious brunch and we had a nice meal while Alexa played on the floor. She then ate some applesauce and played some more! Then slept as we drove home. What an easy baby! Unfortunately, I forgot my camera battery so we have no pictures.

When we got home, we went for a walk and I tried out my Moby carrier with Alexa facing out. She loved it! So much to look at!

For dinner, she had Carrots & Tomato in her high chair! Because... Earlier today, Alexa managed to GET OUT of her Bumbo chair! So, we decided to move her into her high chair, which was a gift from Aunt Jen, Aunt Kelly & Uncle Ben (thanks, guys!) It still seems a bit big for her, but she's slowly getting used to it!

Alexa is 6 MONTHS! So... She started solids!

That's right, our little baby is growing up! It's amazing that she is 6 months old already. So, in honor of Alexa turning 6 months old, she got her first taste of solid food! Well, sort of solid. It's actually kind of mushy. We started with rice cereal on Saturday and have continued feeding her every night! She loves it!

Here are some photos from her FIRST taste of solids on Saturday. She seemed a little bewildered by it all. And she kept grabbing her spoon. And she spit out the cereal and made such a mess, getting it all over her hands and in her hair and all over herself - and us!

Here are photos from Alexa's SECOND night of solids on Sunday. She got a little better at opening her mouth for the food! We make airplane or buzzing sounds to get her to open. She's still spitting a lot out, but some seems to be getting down her!

We'll continue with rice cereal for a full week, then try oatmeal cereal for a week starting Saturday, followed by barley cereal. After that, we'll move on to fruits and vegetables! Fun!

Gear notes: Love the suction bowl from Pottery Barn; spoons from Playtex; bibs from The Modern Baby Co. and bbib from OOTS; spill mat from Mimi the Sardine!

Updates on search for baby stuff!

UPDATE: Stroller search

Click here to read original post.

We were just up in Bethesda this weekend and had some lunch at a street festival in between test driving cars. While there, I checked out everyone strollers and noticed a new brand - Phil & Ted's stroller system, on which you can attach a second seat for a second child! You can use the regular stroller without the second seat, then attach it later.

I saw at least two families with this stroller. I looked it up in my Baby Bargains book and it got an A- so it's a solid brand. And priced at $449, it's a better deal than the $669 UPPAbaby stroller, which also allows you to add a 2nd child seat to.

It's a three-wheeled stroller with a sporty look, so it would be most comparable to the Baby Jogger and BOB strollers that we were considering. AND, you can attach the Peg Prego infant car seat that we want to it. Hmmmm....

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Breast pump

Our birth class teacher and three other women in the class all said go with the Medala Pump in Style breast pump, hands down. No other contender. That's easy.

I looked at the options and the one that made the most sense was the one that comes attached into a shoulder bag (above link), priced at $279. You can get the same pump with a shoulder bag that it comes out of for $329 so that you could use the shoulder bag later on after you stop pumping. I don't need to use the bag again, so I think it makes sense to save the $50 and go with the standard pump.

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Baby Monitor

Video or audio? That is the first thing to decide. A good friend of ours said that with the audio, they were constantly running upstairs to check on the baby when they heard a sound. Then they got the video one and could just check on the video and not run upstairs and disturb the baby. That makes sense. So we decided to go for video.

Our friend recommended the Summer Infant video monitor. So did our Baby Bargains book! That makes it easy. We found a great monitor -- Summer Infant Best View Hanheld Color Video Monitor with 2.5" screen -- that has video with zoom and it's digital so there is minimal interference with neighbors.

Right now, it's out of stock at Buy Buy Baby. But it's available AND costs $30 cheaper at Amazon.com! (Update: Back in stock at Buy Buy Baby! Still cheaper at Amazon.com, unless you have a 20% off coupon for Bed Bath & Beyond, which you can use a Buy Buy Baby!)

About high chairs . . .

Granted, this is not something we need right away. In fact, we won't need a high chair until Lima Bean is old enough to eat solids, so at about 6 months. Still, we looked into which high chair to choose because I have a feeling I won't have time later. 

According to my Baby Bargains book, some 9,900 injuries each year can be attributed to high chairs. So we need a safe one! That means the nice-looking Eddie Bauer (rating: D) and funky-looking IKEA chairs (rating: C) are out. Eddie Bauer chair below:

Which ones are recommended? 

Our book recommends the Fisher-Price Health Cair (rating: A), followed by Chicco's Polly high chair (rating: B). As you can see, the Fisher-Price chair (below, top) is a bit... colorful. It's priced at $113 while Chicco's Polly chair (below, bottom) is $139.

So, decision done. We chose the Chicco's chair.

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UPDATE: Fisher-Price's Zen chair is also rated highly. While it's not sold at Buy Buy Baby (where we are registered), it is sold at Amazon. And check out how cute it is! Plus, it's about the same price ($144.99 with free shipping) as the Chicco chair ($139 + shipping)... 

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The book also gives high marks to Boon's Flair high chair (rating: A) but notes that this chair doesn't recline, a standard feature on most chairs, and the chest buckle isn't tight enough for smaller babies. It's priced at $219.

Another chair that gets high marks is the Stokke Tripp Trapp (rating: A-). This chair has a seat and footrest that adjust, so you can use it from 6 months to 8 years. But the baby rail ($69) and seat cushion ($45-55) are extra and it doesn't come with a tray either ($89). So, the quality is excellent, but this is probably better for an older baby. And it's expensive -- $249-299.

The Peg Prego Prima Pappa chair, below, is nice looking and stylish and recommended by Buy Buy Baby, but my book says the tray is too high and too far from the back of the seat, creating a "Grand Canyon between your baby and her food." 

The chair is also notorious for collecting food in every nook and cranny, making it hard to clean. Plus, it's priced at $219-264. What the book says: "If you like the looks of the Prego, save yourself $80+ and get the Chicco Polly instead -- same styling, just easier to use and clean." 

Like I said, we'll just go with the Chicco Polly. 

Of course, there is also the very stylish and modern-looking Bloom Fresco and Bloom Nano (rating: B). The Fresco (below, top) reclines while the Nano (below, bottom) doesn't. Parents seem to like them, according to my book. The Fresco costs $399 while the Nano is only $179. 

Another interesting high chair is from Svan of Sweden (rating: B+). The all-wood Svan (below, top) converts from a high chair to a chair for toddlers and then older kids. But it has no recline and the height must be adjusted with an Allen wrench. It costs $259 and cushions are $40 extra. Svan also makes a simple wood high chair, the Anka, (below, bottom) for $179.

So where does all this research get us? Back where we started. We're going with the Chicco Polly. Or the Fisher-Price Zen chair!