Holy S*

Okay so when I thought about parenthood I never thought, "I can't WAIT to stick a suppository in my baby's butt when she hasn't pooped for 4 days".

Never. Once.... I promise.

But desperate times call for desperate measures. Tonight, after 4 days of no poop for Sienna, the pediatrician said it was time to try a glycerin suppository... We tried water, prunes, pear juice, cycling the legs. We tried tummy rubbing. We tried tummy time. We tried exercise. 

So after work I loaded S in the car and set out to the pharmacy. She is super attached to mama lately, so holding on like a little koala I just carried her in on my hip. [side note, i always thought people who dont put shoes or socks on their kids out in public were weird. babies don't need shoes. fact. i was this mom today.]

I went into the baby aisle and then thought, no, suppositories won't be here. Why would they be? This aisle is for normal baby things- and this is sort of not the norm. I headed down the stomach issue aisle next- I mean come on- I am already friends with that aisle- and found "glycerin suppository". Read directions. Directions say "for kids under 2 use infant or child suppository". Well it can't be that abnormal if they have a whole bottle dedicated to the little ones! Of course, Rite Aid didn't have the infant kind so we went with the child kind.

Put S back in her car seat. Tell her on the way home I am sorry about what is coming when we get home and she plays with Sophie. She giggles. She clearly has NO idea. Get home. Google "glycerin suppository dose" for 5 month old. Find multiple baby center posts saying to use 1/4 of a child size suppository. Think in my head (my mom always says, where else would you think?) okay how do I break this into 4 pieces? I cut it with scissors after "sanitizing" them in a bag I usually sanitize breast pump items in. Oh my goodness, thankfully I have a patient baby who is playing on her playmat while I do all these crazy mom things.

Walk into room with 1/4 suppository. My poor baby. I tell her sorry again and we go for it. Quick and easy. And no tears! Just a very shocked look on her face and then.... she pushed and pushed and nothing.

I decided on a half hour bath to relax muscles.

See bubbles. MORE BUBBLES!! GET THE BABY OUT OF THE BATH!! Too late. Poop in the bath. Times two.  At least she pooped! I have never been so excited about poop. Thank you Sienna for bringing mama back to reality and the basics of life sometimes. Rinse baby. Put baby on towel. Baby now has poop on her. Clean bath. Put baby BACK in her bath tub.

Text Jamie: Small bath tub shit
Jamie answers: Haha!

You wouldn't have been laughing if you were the one cleaning off the baby. And the tub. All this to say, we have to try again tomorrow because the poor kid is still stopped up.

Like I said, Holy S. The things that you learn as a mom.

xoxo,
Pooper Scooper.

17. That's a lot.

Currently, as of today, the count rolls to 17.

I know 17(!!!!) people who are pregnant.

SEVENTEEN.

Seeing as I think my friends are the greatest people on earth, the world is about to become a pretty awesome place in the next year or so.

(google image- but HOW CUTE?!?!)

Is this the next baby boom... or are we just really grown ups now?

Chances are.

Until you crash, what have you done?
Is there a better bet than love?
What you are is what you breathe, you gotta cry before you sing.
Chances are we'll be the combination.
Chances are come and carry me.
Chances are waiting to be taken and I can see.

Chances are the fascinations
Chances won't escape from me.

-five for fighting-

Love this song.

Sometimes a girl just needs a good *gush*

As I lay here on my bed watching some rom com (I seriously don't even know the name of it, but it looked cheesy enough to only need 20% of my concentration), I'm listening to the rain slamming down on our roof. The noise of mother nature's latest storm is louder than the televisio, louder than S's sound machine.

But Sienna is fast asleep. Butt in the air. Not a care in the world. This must be what they mean when they say sleeping like a baby. I glance at her in her monitor every minute or so and I just cannot help that my heart fills up with butterflies when I look at her. How is she five months old? How did she suddenly turn from the tiny growing babe who made the second line on the pregancy test light up to a full head of hair fiesty newborn... to a baby who I know? I know her heart is going to be full of love and goofiness like her mama. I know she's going to be smart and inquisitive and smile all the time like her dada. She just makes me gush with love. Every day I fling open the door after work and my eyes dart around the room to find her eyes. And when they meet we both smile the biggest smiles we've smiled all day. This is what life's about.

And in an hour or so when J arrives after soccer, my heart will skip a little beat. Just like it always does when he opens the door and makes this house my home. And... and, anddd while we are still a little lot tired these days from baby world, it's the tiniest things that remind me that our marriage is quite simply my favorite. It's the hand that reaches over to my side of the bed and rubs my back after Sienna's middle of the night feed. It's the silence that doesn't need to be filled with words when we share a glass of wine after putting our daughter to bed. It's the fact that even when we are busy, I see a random text message that makes me smile pop up on my phone mid day.  It's the fact that the future is a given, and I'm always daydreaming about our next adventure together.

How did I get all of this? How did I go from that 16-year-old drama filled teen dreaming of "one day" to living it? No matter how it all came about, one thing's for sure, these two make me the happiest.

my favorites about two months ago. tiny s!

ER. Remember that show? This was NOTHING like that.

We had our first trip to the ER with S. Let's start with saying that she is now totally fine. And while I am glad trauma wise it was not like the television show ER, I think having George Clooney there may have made everyone feel better.

Yesterday morning while Sienna was playing, she went to stand up by pulling herself (what she gets for being over zealous) and tumbled back. When one tries to catch a baby tumbling, and cannot get two hands behind their back, baby grabs your hand. And then their elbow sometimes pops out of socket! We didn't know right away. At first we thought she was just being a tired fussy one but her cries got louder if we picked her up and she refused to nurse. Then we realized she wasn't moving her arm. After being the crazy concerned mama I am and calling not one but three friends (one has a hubby in ortho, one has a dad in ortho, and one has a pediatrician sister) to ask if this is ped vs ER worthy, we decided to take her to the ER just to be safe. Besides, who doesn't want an ER visit to spice up their Tuesday morning?

We were all a bit shaken, but S being the normal amazingly laid back baby she was didn't cry unless we touched her arm. She let us put her in a gown, poke and prod, and was such a little trooper. I know she's only 5 months but I was really proud. Don't worry, she never let go of Sophie with her right hand between hugging her and chewing on her.

Pretty much right away they knew it was her elblow. Not one but TWO physicians tried to pop it back in. Fail x2. Then xrays! Baby xrays. We felt so awful for her but she babbled through the xray while holding onto me with her right hand. She majorly missed nap time. So daddy was a good enough bed for the time being. I also wasn't allowed to feed her until after the xray results! Hungry baby!

We finally got the ER attending to come in post xray reads. The scans were clear and her elbow was still not in place. Every time she moved, she screamed. We needed this fixed! So this doc said she was going to try one more time. I held S tight and that doctor used some blunt force to pop that elbow... and it was fixed!!!

We were so relieved. So 3 doctors, 4 hours, 7 xrays, and one elbow popped in later, we were on our way. Everyone was exhausted. Someone fell asleep on our way home.

Today we are all better! We survived! S had some soreness last night but after 1 dose of tylenol she seemed back to normal. She is the best best natured baby ever. One ER trip down, hoping to not have any others to speak of! The trials + tribulations of parethood!

PS it's most common in girls and in the left arm- check and check! Hoping this never happens again!

Beaba Baby Food!!

I put the Beaba baby food maker on my registry because.... it was cute. I figured making baby food would be healthier for little S and that I am all for anything healthy for her. I mean if I am going to attempt to breastfeed this whole first year, I want to give her other options that are also good for her. So while we had to purchase some organic pears and prunes last week to uh.... get things moving for her... I really wanted to make her real first foods!

I whipped out the Beaba [oh my goodness this is such a cute little machine!] and decided sweet potatoes would be my first attempt. Directions- easy peasy. Just cut up the sweet potato into pieces, pour water into Beaba, and turn to steam. I figured I could handle that part!

J brought home the biggest sweet potato I have ever seen. I think it weighed a pound. I peeled, cut in half, then diced the smaller half. HALF of a sweet potato. This is important when you see how much it makes!

I didn't even do a great job of cutting it up... but it apparently worked just fine!

So I put the sweet potato in, switched on over to steam, and it magically knows how long to cook it. This is good because I am always screwing up veggies, which are seemingly easy to cook!

 Ta Da! Woohoo. Oh I should add that halfway through the blending process I added about 1.5 ounces of breastmilk to make it a little sweeter for baby since she is used to that taste. Seems to work well for her so far with our attempted pears and prunes.

Then it was time to store. I was given a few beaba freezer storage containers, and while I've read some semi bad reviews about them on amazon (mostly because it's expensive but oh! I didn't purchase this myself so that doesn't apply!) it seemed to work fantastically for me!

Ok so the fun mama crafty side of my LOVES that we can DIY food. I know, I know. You don't need a baby food maker for this. Probably an awesome blender would do the trick. But the cheap saver side of the hubs [and myself since I know saving on food means more $$ for baby clothes purchases] is also super excited. I did the math.

The organic baby food costs anywhere from $1-$2 per container. Each container in theory gets about 2 servings (right now since S is little it gets us 3-4). So let's say, on average... about 50 cents per serving of baby food when we buy the containers. The gigantic sweet potato cost 50 cents total- and I only used half of it to make 7 servings! That's just over 4 cents per serving.  Woohoo. Savinng about 46 cents each time we feed her! Yes, I realize she won't eat this forever, but it's the little things.

Can't wait to see how she likes it tomorrow! Happy cooking!

"No Fail" Vanilla Cake= You can Fail. BUT I didn't! Thank you smarts!

So as I was putting S to bed tonight, I decided I wanted vanilla cake. I will say in retrospect this was a horrible thought to have cross my mind for two reasons. One, it's now 8:30pm [late in new mama world] and the cake is still baking at my normal bed time. Two, baking a cake from scratch when you don't have a cake mix means you eat more batter than normal and need to have a glass of wine while cooking and you're not hungry anymore and would rather be in bed by the time the cake is ready.

I digress.

I googled "easy vanilla cake recipe". I have never ever baked a cake from scratch. Don't judge, I've been busy with things like grad school, residency, and having babies. Fine, one baby. But one baby is a lot of work. So I decided tonight would be a first! Google away.

I found one. It said "NO FAIL". I consider something no-fail when, if the directions are followed, you cannot mess up. I followed the directions EXACTLY. Then do you know what happened? I poured the batter into the pan.... and I thought hm this looks like cookie dough NOT cake batter. I went back and read again. I realized the author forgot to tell us when to put in the milk. So I poured the cake back OUT of the pan back into the {beautiful kitchenaid} mixer and added milk. Thank goodness I've got some brains in my head and feet in my shoes and steered myself in the direction I choose. Name that book. Anyone. Oh also I didn't EXACTLY follow the directions either. I maybe substituted pure maple syrup for vanilla extract.

I baked. The cake rose. The cake smells awesome. I cut a little piece out. The cake tastes... good. Not AMAZING, but good. Fluffy, not dry, and I think I'll call it a mostly success.

Here's the recipe. EXCEPT ADD MILK! Add after you beat the butter & sugar but before the flour.

Leaving this bad boy to cool off and will frost it up in the morning. Because do you know what tomorrow is? Sienna's 5 month birthday! I'll put some yellow frosting on it to celebrate our girl [even though she can't eat cake yet].

Happy caking!

For all my preggo friends... this JUST might be worth it.

4moms has done it again. I posted awhile back about their amazing oragami stroller. While I am not totally convinced it can do the job like a mama can, but this swing/chair seems like it comes pretty darn close.

The mamaroo. Worth a try if you have a little one on the way, I think. (Well and some cash to burn)

Waffle Iron Cinnamon Buns

I am totally guilty of stealing other people's ideas from pinterest, facebook, instagram. And when I saw this idea I was allll over it. I made a mental note to pick up some store bought cinnamon buns and on my next trip to the grocery store added them to my cart. They are as easy to make as one.two.three.

one.  Put separated cinnamon buns in waffle iron.

two.  Take cinnamon bun waffles out of iron.

three. Pour delicious warm frosting on top. 

No waiting 25 minutes to bake! No hard edges! Just quick and easy and delicious. Enjoy!
{Yes, I am apparently on a food kick. Blame my ventures back to pinterest}

Suppli, please.

Pinterest is back in my life after a newborn baby induced hiatus. Though, if I had discovered the app on my iphone prior to a week ago I may have spent the dawn hours nursing S watching the rising sun while pinning away.  Today while pining away- yes pining, not pinning- at photos of Italy and dreams to return to one of my favorite places on earth [rome specifically], I came across the culinary delight I could literally live on for life with no other means of nutrition. Yes, I'd be extremely fat most likely. But happy, so happy.

Hi suppli, I missed you.

In Roma, these balls of rice are tomato flavored with a gooey mozzarella center. In other parts of Italy they are slightly different and called other things. Sicily? Arancine. But my heart and memories live in the tiny pizza places that served these to me for 1euro on my way to classes during my summer in Roma. To me, they will always be called suppli.

Goal of the month: Make these. With this recipe.

{I found tons of recipes online, but the true Roma suppli is tomato sauce mixed with the rice and a huge chunk of mozz in the middle. I mean could anything be better?}

Catch Up!

Summer = busy! I can't believe it's the middle of July! This blog, which is supposed to keep a record of all of the awesome life happenings around the Walls house, has been left by the wayside. I suppose that's a good thing- it means we are too busy living it to record it. Maybe that's how it's supposed to be. But, I want Sienna to look back at this years from now and giggle at her mama writing about how she rolled over the first time. And I want to feel nostalgia about my friends' wedding photos. So with Sienna in bed and J at soccer, I'm sitting myself down with a glass of wine and a huge folder of photos. June was a whirlwind and July has been no slow stroll either. We're loving summer, loving parenthood, and loving having some time for just us, too. Excuse the 100 photos. We've gotta get it all in.

We started off the summer with a bang, with Haley + Frank's wedding. We were there the night H + F met. It was one of my favorite grad school evenings, a SarahAnna birthday production. Fado. Late night cake. And an absolutely unforgettable first encounter of the newlyweds. The wedding was at Grounds for Sculpture and pretty awesome. It was our first post baby wedding too!



June continued with plans, visits, friends, and family. We were constantly loading the car and off on our way [somewhere or another]. Sienna and I had munched on delish snacks and filled ourselves with cute baby games at Lindsay's shower. Baby girl Workman is due in August and Sienna can't wait for a new little girlfriend to gossip with.  That whole being in the moment thing meant I took no photos at the shower because I forgot my camera, but did take this iphone gem of Laurie and S.  We of course had to stop by my parents for Sienna to chat with Stella on their play mat.

One of the best things about this summer is the closeness of my family. I love that Sienna gets to play with Stella [fine, play next to Stella]. And for some reason, all these years later, there's nothing in the world quite as relaxing as flopping onto my parnents couch after a full day of celebrations. Here are the two little tots with grandma, and with gigi aka great grammy.

We continued the wedding celebrations with Melissa's bridal shower in Yardley. True to form, her tailgate-themed shower was quickly embraced even though she showed up in a newly purchased Nordstrom frock. We indulged in burgers, beans, and other tailgate favorites at the Alexander abode.

J's first father's day was a really special and memorable one. It marked the one year pregaversary, Sienna's first chance to make Jamie cute signs, and I welcomed the chance to tell J about 100 times that he is the best.dad.ever. I really don't know anyone as good as Jamie (okay well maybe my own dad gives him a run for his money).  A couple's dinner post S's bed time was the perfect end to the day.

To round out the month, we cleaned up our usual yoga pants and UVA shorts for black tie optional attire. This time a trip over to the Camden Aquarium where we watched Dan + Denise tie the knot. My senior prom was at the aquarium and it brought back memories. *Sigh* Eighteen, skinny, and tan. Fun high school days, but not even close to the best times of my life [aka now].

We celebrated 4th of July, dressed Sienna in stars and stripes, and spent last weekend catching up with some of our favorite family + friends.

Phew! I'm exhausted from catching up. I'm just loving life lately. Happy Summer! xo

happy birthday hubs!

Happy happy birthday to my handsome wonderful husband, who is also the best dad out there. I love you infinitely.