The Daily Fuss

Weary Traveler Haiku

 

 

to SEA-TAC and back

checked the bags under my eyes

all in a day's work

Ha Ha, Sucker!

We try to eat well. I try to limit sugar - although I do allow Lei to drink half-water/half-juice. And, we do have gelato or ice cream on occasion.

Candy, however is TOTALLY off limits.

If that were true, then I would not know with full certainty that a Blow Pop lasts up to 200 miles in the hands of a two and a half year-old.

Thank you, Charms.

 

Mish Mash Stash

Last February, I enthusiastically acknowledged the squeezable, organic fruit revolution.  A year later, we keep a stash of  squeezables on hand next to the Luna bars and fruit on our counter top. Leighton happily eats one or two a day for her snack or to tide her over between meals.

Plum Organics is responsible for the original Plum Tots Mish Mash. However, Lei refers to all squeezable fruit or fruit and veggie combos as "Mish Mash" and we don't correct her. It's the best name anyone has invented to describe the dilectible, organic, pureed contents of an ingeniously designed pouch.

I choose to single out Plum Organics products because they have rapidly expanded their baby and toddler food and snack offerings beyond any other company.

For babies, Plum Organics has first and second fruits and blends, training meals, cereals and puffs. And, for Tots, they offer Mish Mash, Fruity Fingerfuls and Fiddlesticks.

Leighton likes everything on the menu, but most importantly, doesn't split hairs on baby versus toddler squeezable snacks - we keep the big wooden salad bowl filled with all the flavors - up to thirty pouches, ready for picking, at any given time.

 
Unadulterated fruits and veggies that keep fresh, can travel anywhere and are packed with mighty vitamins - our kids can snack on them until they're in high-school for all we care.

JUST fruits are a perfect first food introduction for your budding eater. Simple fruit purees with smooth textures offer your baby the very best flavors and nutrition. Using only organic fruit and nothing else, the gently cooked fruits are naturally preserved in a convenient, resealable pouch that's perfect for flexible portions.

Apple, Mango, Banana, Pear, Peach and Prune.

 

Plum Baby second blends come in seven varieties: Blueberry, Pear & Purple Carrot; Sweet Potato, Corn & Apple; Spinach, Peas & Pear; Pumpkin & Banana; Pear & Mango; Peach, Apricot & Banana; Apple & Carrot.

I feel great about mixing these in with the fruit-only varieties. Sometimes it's tough to make sure a toddler gets her veggies.

 

Plum Tots Mish Mash fruit blends are pefect for toddler hands and make great on-the-go snacks. Throw a few in your bag and you are never caught without a healthy snack.

These blends come in Strawberry, Peach and Banana.

 Whole Foods carries the Plum Organics brand and so does Babies R Us and select Toys R  Us stores.

The Highland Park Toys R Us doesn't carry anything other than Gerber products, so I order Mish Mash by the six pack (or palate) from Diapers.com. They come out to about $1.50 each for a considerable amount of organic goodness. It's a good value in my book. Plus, the fact that my kids eat what we eat (just without hot spices and blended in the Beaba Babycook to suit their specific age) means that we aren't overspending on prepackaged baby food in general.

This product review conforms to the Fuss Formula.

Have you tried squeezable smashed fruits and such? Let us know what you think. Please leave a comment and share your fuss with us.

Blizzarre

Tonight, we're staying at a Marriott in the city, near the hospital, just in case Little Sis decides to join us smack in the midst of the worst snowstorm Chicago has seen in years.

There is absolutely no way I would give up my OB or voluntarily deliver anywhere other than Prentice just because I live in the suburbs. Not a chance. So, Marriott it is.

My due date was yesterday. Well, my first due date - the one the doctors give based on how you're measuring. By my own witchdoctory estimation, my real due date is somewhere between February 4th and 8th, but I liked the 31st way better, for obvious reasons, so I went with it.

Admittedly, it felt somewhat bizarre to leave my freshly feathered nest to stay at a hotel in my very own city, against the advice of all local and cable weatherpersons characterizing the impending snowfall as a wintry armageddon. And by the looks of the empty grocery store shelves and line at the pump, the seventh seal was breaking as we buckled our seat belts and fired up the Jeep to head down. Apparently, the National Guard has been mobilized. Awesome.

Luckily, we left in time to avoid much of the traffic pick-up and made it to our room before the conditions completely deteriorated into a windy, snowy, freezing mess. Ryan is at the gym whilst I type, then we're off to Kamehachi for a sushi dinner. It's likely to be a relatively uneventful evening unless we turn on The Weather Channel - then we're back to apocalypse talk, but we're packed and ready for our new delivery anyway. In fact, I'm hoping my water breaks right after dinner. 

We put quite a bit of effort into preparing for Little Sis in just the last few weeks. I finally hung things on the walls, cleared out the third bedroom, ordered the cord blood collection kit, paid the bills, compiled tax documents, took the life insurance physical, laundered everything we own, ordered baby provisions, cleaned the Medela pump and bottles, outfitted the crib, cleaned the basement, tiled the kitchen backsplash and the half-bath floor, tuned up the Jeep, charged the camera batteries, changed the sheets, loaded up at the grocery store, mailed the returns, put bedding on the cradle and crib and had Ryan take a picture of my hugely pregnant self on the way out the door.

Holy crap! I forgot to pack clothes for Little Sis! What a jackass! Oh well. Someone can certainly bring her little bag if she decides to come today or tomorrow. I honestly JUST realized my oversight this very second and I feel terrible about it. My little deuce is already getting screwed in ways my first born did not. It's inevitable, I suppose.

Leighton and Luella are acutely aware that something's up and they're acting out accordingly with temper tantrums, barking at shadows, dancing on furniture and "forgetting" to call potty - both of them. It's a super attractive scenario at our house right now. Thank the sweet lord for Grandma!

Even if the storm passes with no sign of Little Sis, a night out of the house in a comfy hotel during a spell of extreme Chicago weather is not exactly a punishment for us. Still, we are holding out hope that a sudden drop in barometric pressure urges the newest member of our family out of her cozy little spot tout suite.

Come on baby!

Mee-Nee-Ban

You may recall the consternation caused by our family's need for a new car that fits a tall dad, picky mom and two tiny chicks in car seats. 

I was so irritated by the whole, preliminary, car shopping ordeal that I went into denial about it and was such a waddling whiner at every dealership we entered that I left it to Ryan to boil the options down to two before I got involved.

He actually banned me from joining him at one point - no lie.

Ryan was online, every night, checking specs and consumer reports and message boards and blogs, desperately wanting to avoid the minivan at all costs.

When he came to me with the inevitable "Odyssey-or-Sienna" final decision, I didn't say "told-you-so". I just said, "I'm fine with either one." Admittedly, on the inside, it was more of a "WOO HOO! We're gittin' a minivan." Or, as Leighton calls it, her "Mee-Nee-Ban." It's like she's put a cute little Cuban spin on it.

Only the minivan can do what this family needs a vehicle to do. We need sliding side doors, room for two car seats (or five if need be), third row, remote ignition, back up camera, USB hookup, blue tooth, a zillion airbags, latch systems, room for luggage, comfy ride with lots of space. Nothing else made the cut.

So, we went with the 2011 Honda Odyssey. It looked a little odd from the outside, at first, and there's a little less room in the interior than the Sienna, but it's super slick, handles like a car and I wouldn't trade it for the world. I will say that I get passed more frequently in the minivan - regardless of my speed. I guess other drivers (mostly impatient city-folk) just figure I'm a dumb-ass minivan driver and do their best to stay away from me. Admittedly, that had always been my feeling.

I'm a whiz with the key remote - I have the car running with doors opening as I approach my transport. I can get Lei in and out quickly and have even less of an issue going to the grocery store because I get to play with the back hatch, automatic opener for the bag-loader guys at Sunset.

The only thing we decided to skip was the entertainment package. I know. You're thinking "WHAT? Are you crazy?" We try not to let Lei watch too much TV, but she does like movies. And it's annoying enough that she knows the Annie soundtrack is on the iPod Touch in the car. She's like a little dictator. I'll be damned if she's going to watch Annie or Toy Story 3 or anything else every time we get in the car. I'd rather talk to her or play her Music Together tunes.

If we need movies for a long road-trip, we'll just hang an iPad off the back of my seat for little Lei.  That way, we can remove it when we're done and have it on reserve for special occasions ONLY. I know it seems like the most obvious feature for kids, but we felt differently about it at the end of the day - that it would do more harm than good to include it.

So there you have it - one more way we have slipped further into suburbia. However, this slip was a good one and didn't take much adjustment on my part. The only problem is that now, I look positively drunk trying to back the Jeep out of our driveway without a backup cam. Oh well. If you see me, just mutter under your breath (dumb-ass minivan driver). I won't be offended at all.

What the Fuss? Little Black Dress

For me, the perfect dress meets the following criteria:

1) Fits well and Looks great

2) Travels well and Doesn't wrinkle

3) Wipes clean and Dries quickly

4) Doesn't hug the tummy

5) Can be sporty and Sexy

6) Is comfortable and Comfortable

This dress is a myth you say?  

Nope. The Patagonia Bandha dress is all of these things and then some. That's why it's made the list of Fussworthy Must-Haves.

Patagonia says: "Light, sleeveless, sexy and fully mobile, the Bandha's V-neck drops into a knotted bodice with a high waist and an A-line drape. Made from fabric (92% nylon/8% spandex) originally developed for climbing tights, the dress has enough resiliency and shape retention to shake off wrinkles and dust. Below-knee length; 46" from shoulder to hem (size M). Recyclable through the Common Threads Recycling Program. "

I bought two of these dresses last year from the Patagonia store and am excited to give them another spin this summer.  Black and Seaport Blue look as perfect as the day I bought them.  

The Bandha dress is $75 and worth every penny. Just pull it on and you're instantly polished. You can wear this to dinner, the beach, running errands or camping. You could wash it in a river bed, be dry in ten minutes and look amazing.

Okay, that may be a stretch. But, let's be honest. On any given day, being a parent can be as challenging as scaling the face of a cliff or negotiating frothy, white-capped rapids. So, you may as well look unbelievably put-together while you're doing it.

This product review conforms to the Fuss Formula.

One tip I got from the Patagonia sales associate - hang it dry to keep it looking new. Heat from the dryer can break down the elastic.

Daddy Wisdom

" It's difficult to make things easy and easy to make things difficult." Ryan loves to apply this little nugget to any number of situations. The thing is ... it works. It works so well, it's kind of annoying.

For example, it's a pain to clean up the kitchen and put the dishes away immediately after dinner. But, the longer you leave the ziti to cure in the Emile Henry baker, the more of a pain in the ass it will be to scrub it off. Deal with the difficult and make things easy by eliminating work for yourself.

Or, let's say you HATE heading to the gym. No wait ... you loathe the gym. No wait ... I loathe the gym. WHATEVER. No matter the level of detestation, my life is far less complicated with arms (not thighs) attached to my shoulders and a smaller butt. So, difficult gym now, easy peasy, meltdown-free zone when getting dressed to go out on Saturday night.

Ryan's wisdom can certainly be applied to matters of the financial persuasion.  Saving cash sucks for most people - myself included. It takes planning, dedication and a certain amount of restraint. For me, it feels like an sadistic exercise in self-deprivation - empowerment and torture rolled into one effort. However, the future will be far easier with some cash in the bank. Duh. So simple, yet so tough to follow.

As difficult as it may be to make things easy, the reverse is true. It's easy to pick a fight and say something you'll regret. It's easy to grow complacent in a relationship, take your partner for granted ot blame them for making you absolutely nuts. And when you have kids, you have even less time for yourselves. It's no secret that relationships require cultivation and this fact is Ryan's number one reason for bandying about this favorite bit of daddy wisdom.

I'm exhausted with a splash of nostalgic today (Leighton turns one in a few weeks) and I leave tomorrow for a girls' weekend in Napa without Ryan or Leighton (or Lue for that matter). I miss my squad already and crave some purely relaxing one-on-one time with my wonderful husband - free from discussions of house hunting, grocery shopping, the effing gym class schedule, laundry or diapers. I wouldcharacterize this past year as chaotic joy. Now, we just need to do a little extra nurturing to make the coming year a little easier on us.

I'm feeling sort of exposed today and in the sharing mood. I'd love for you to share back. Please leave a comment and discuss your fuss with us.

Fungineer

I hate that so much time has lapsed since my last post. Getting ready for the holiday was more challenging than anticipated.  Great ideas were fleeting and I hatched several posts. I just couldn't finish a single one to my satisfaction - including this one which was originally entitled "Daddy Wisdom" and had an entirely different point.

So here we are with less than a week until Christmas and I'm BACK IN THE SADDLE; Fuel-injected with holiday spirit. To kick off the next twelve days of Christmas we are visiting Ryan's parents. We just drove five and a half hours from Chicago to St. Louis with an eight month-old baby and a six year-old yorkie. Our other baby.

The ride was actually kind of fun.The girls sat in back, with our Captain at the helm, alone up front with legroom, talk radio and whatnot. We watched a few DVDs, read some, ate and drank some and even slept a wink or two. We slept precisely 45 minutes of the 330 minute voyage, but who cares when good times are in full swing? RIGHT?

Ryan has many MANY good qualities. For example, he's the family Fungineer (fun engineer).  He plans shit - really plans it. My husband even reminds me of my own father in that he peruses the paper, web and other obscure resources for the goings-on about town and ACTUALLY MAKES US DO STUFF. And the crazy thing is - we always have a blast doing it. He also shares my father's irritating opinion that when you tell him you "really have to pee" during a road trip, you can actually go 35 miles more than you think without dying. WRONG!

Anyway, for this car trip, Ryan surprised us with a portable DVD player and the ride would have been far less successful without it. Note that he picked it up at Walgreens - the same place he procured both the Boogie Buster and the Vick's Vaporizer.

Incidentally, have never noticed any of the foregoing items at Walgreens. Moreover, if he had told me that he was going to stop and pick one up on the way back from emptying the Jeep's contents into storage to make room for the Bugaboo that I refused to bring along because we can just use the umbrella stroller that came free with our Big Girl carseat, my head would have exploded. The moral of this story is that he was spot on with the Boogie Buster, vaporizer and DVD player and probably with the Bugaboo too because we are having our picture taken with Santa in some swanky mall situation and we would look silly with the umbroller - but whatever. I'm over it.

Last week, the Fungineer escorted we (one of us decidedly "wee") ladies to Gethsemane Garden Center and brunch thereafter at M Henry. While Ryan and I struggled with installing the Big Girl car seat, Leighton warmed up the car.

That night, he took us to see the Lincoln Park Zoo Lights. It was an impressive little event.  l was positive Lei was too young to enjoy it, but I was wrong. She had a blast.

The point I'm finally making here is that I have a tendency to resist ideas that aren't mine. Somehow, the Fungineer pushes past that glaring personality flaw, makes some whacky plans for us and we all have a grand time together. This quality lends credibilty to all of the other things he does and says. I love him and trust him. And, it's always good to trust your partner. I can't imagine how this post would have turned out if I didn't.

Who is your family Fungineer? Post a comment and share your fuss with us?

Cry It Out

So, I finally got some sleep.

I'm sitting at Boston Logan, enjoying a beer and internet access, missing my family and ... I am not sleep deprived. It's strange. No Leighton. No 3 AM feeding. Yes. Still. At 6 and a half months. I miss home terribly, but I had a great time in bean town. I worked. I toured. I slept! I barely even remember getting up once to pump.

Prior to my Boston trip, we attended a wedding and my fifteen year, high-school reunion.  I must have told everyone I met that I was exhausted, because somehow, the conversation always turned to my sleep deprivation and the fact that Leighton is not yet sleeping through the night.

On the subject of baby sleeping habits I discovered that there were two distinct factions of parents. One group owned the oh-so-annoying story of "she's been sleeping through the night since eight weeks."  The other group was the "cry it out" contingent.

If I had a nickel for every person who told me to gear up for two nights of hysteria followed by blissful slumber, I'd have at least five bucks. Still, I can't imagine that Dr. Ferber thinks that leaving a child in her crib to sob until vomiting is a great idea.

On my business trip, a colleague and mother told me to apply the Ferber method gently and gradually. This seems like a far more time-consuming but equally more pleasant option.

I know I'm being played like a fiddle when I trot into Leighton's room at 2 AM to replace the nukka that's fallen out of her sweet little mouth. But, I choose to believe that she enjoys the pleasure of my company; Her manipulative intentions are more good than evil. If she realized that in the course of an evening I am jerked awake by her cries more often than I would be if riding the Eurail through the Pyrenees, through the night, unable to recline, in a smoking car, with the lights on, she would certainly stop. Right?

So, I'm interested. How many of you out there just let 'em cry it out? And, how much torture did you withstand before you began to crumble? Please post to comments and share your fuss with us!

What the Fuss? Freestyle

I work. I mostly work from home. This work requires me to schedule client meetings every week. Sometimes work requires travel. Still, I love my job and my situation.

This makes breastfeeding less convenient than it would be if I didn't work and never left the house without Leighton. However, I live in the real world and the truth is that I may have already given up on breastfeeding if not for my pump. I can't live without it.

I have a Medela Freestyle breast pump. It is the first pump I have ever tried and it's fantastic. I have seen other pumps - in action - and I believe that mine is the most effective and efficient pump ever.

It weighs less than a pound and fits in the palm of your hand, your purse, suitcase etc. The two speeds for expression are fantastic. That is a feature I couldn't do without. At the time I bought it, this pump retailed for $379.00. I got mine on eBay, new in the box for $280.00. It's worth it at full price, but I had time to spare and was on the prowl for a deal. Yay for me!

I spent the past two days in Minneapolis at my company headquarters for a team meeting. This was the first time I'd been away from Leighton for more than a handful of hours. I went to the fancy pharmacy up the block and bought the Medela cooler bag that holds six 8oz glass baby bottles and two more ice packs. 

I use the glass because they stay colder longer and heat easily by running under hot water. Plus, I think the plastic bottles smell and taste plastic-ish. We drink Oberweiss milk because it comes in glass bottles, so why shouldn't Lei's milk get the same treatment?

At five months, Leighton is still nursing every three hours with the exception of night time sleep. She'll go for six hours easily. She takes in roughly four ounces per feeding, maybe a bit less. I'm using the amount I get when pumping to surmise how much she may be getting. So I figure she eats 28oz each day, give or take a few. I was confident that my cooler bag will handle twelve feedings and I wasn't scheduled to be gone for the full twelve.

The whole experience was much better than I had envisioned. I pumped at the airport. They don't have privacy rooms for feeding at Midway, so I sat in the ticketing area with my Hooter Hider and got to work. I had to pump before I went through security because I needed to check the bag with breastmilk. I put the beginnings of my stash in the cooler, used the Medela wipees to clean my pump parts and checked my bag.

Within three hours, I had reached my destination and was roaming the halls of our five-building headquarters for a place to set up my milking operation. Every building on our campus had at least one privacy room with a fridge, sink, chair, ethernet connection, magazines etc. It was a little slice of heaven to slip away, every three hours for a legally protected activity, knowing that I was still doing the best thing I could for my baby who was hundreds of miles away.

The Freestyle has a strap situation so that you can pump both sides simultaneously and hands-free. I don't always use it that way. In fact, if I pump at home to increase my stash, it's at night and I just do one side at a time. I can move it around and manipulate it to get more milk out that way. But, when I'm short on time or need to get back to the meeting, I can do both sides in 8-10 minutes. That is truly incredible.

By the end of my trip, I had five, full glass bottles clinking around in my bag. I packed the cooler into my suitcase and informed everyone handling my bag that there was precious cargo on board. The TSA agent assured me that no one intended to rifle through my bag to steal the fruits of my labor.

I hope those of you who are pregnant, working mothers-to-be seriously consider breastfeeding. It's rewarding and great for your baby. Working, even outside the home, doesn't need to be an obstacle to participating in what could be one of your favorite parts of motherhood.

This product review conforms to the Fuss Formula.

We would love to hear about your experiences - good or bad. Please post a comment and share your fuss with us!

Rocky Road Trip

The longest distance we've traveled with Leighton in the car is the ninety miles from Chicago to my parents' house in Milwaukee. Until today, that is. My husband's parents live in St. Louis - a mere 288 miles from Lincoln Park.

Sometimes we fly, but we usually drive so Luella can come along. This was our first trip with both Luella and Leighton, and car was the obvious method of transportation. 

I washed all 26 Fuzzi Bunz before we left so they could air dry (Now desperately trying to prove that cloth diapers have less environmental impact on the environment than disposable per a previous post) while we're gone. I grabbed the little stack of leftover cheaters, pulled one one out to change Leighton and let Ryan load the car.

I've grown accustomed to Fuzzi Bunz to the point that I have trouble with disposable diapers. I can't tell if the little thing is up high enough in the back while I'm putting it on so that it doesn't leave a sag in the crotch. To compound this issue, the only cheaters I have left are a size 1-2 and at four months old and almost fourteen pounds, Leighton has definitely outgrown them. Proud of my tape job with such limited resources, I quickly realized that this diaper looked more like a bikini brief than a full coverage garment. Still, confident that the supremely engineered flavor crystals were more than absorbent enough, I put Lei in her car seat.

My husband is an efficiency expert when it comes to driving. He can mentally calculate the time it will take to arrive at our destination given an assumed number of stops lights and potty breaks plus traffic. Surprisingly, this does not translate to all other areas of his life. For example, it is far more efficient for him to remove his socks and other clothing items and toss them right in the hamper, than it is to first drop everything on the floor and get crabbed at by his wife until he traces back your path of initial disrobement, collects his stuff and subsequently take it to the laundry room. I feel for him on some level. His refusal to embrace the hamper is akin to my ability to do quick and proper math only when seated at a blackjack table.

Ryan rented a full size SUV so we could effectively haul our stuff and sit comfortably for the five and a half hour journey. We packed the Bugaboo and bassinet, Leighton's clothes, Bebe Pod, breast pump and accessories, toys, blankets, burpies, our suitcase, laptops, stuff for Lue, snacks, drinks, cell phones, camera and bag of chargers. Off we went.

We blew Ryan's trip estimator within the first few two minutes of movement. I was so busy rushing around laundering and packing everything all morning that I had forgotten to eat. I turn into a bitchy lunatic when my blood sugar drops. So that's fun.

What's worse is that Leighton's nukka fell out as we were pulling out of the driveway. And, in this rental car, she was seated behind me so I couldn't even reach over to put it back in. She can't sit behind Ryan because he's 6'5" and needs all of the space behind him. The middle seat didn't have clips for the latch system. Just in case you are wondering. The bitchy lunacy and fussy baby made Lue nervous and she wouldn't sit down. In fact, she started panting because of the circus we'd become and also because she and I were sitting in the blazing sun. The commotion made me car sick and I needed to pee.

Awesome. Ryan was super happy. The traffic coming out of the city made the whole deal even more amusing.

We made it out of the city and stopped at McDonalds. We aren't fast food people, but Ryan couldn't fit my sass-delivering pie hole with a Filet-O-Fish fast-enough. Instantly, I was an new woman. Whew! Mom is back!

Once back to cruising speed, our efficiency expert announced that we would not be making another stop for two hours. What?  I fed Leighton "right before we left" at 2:15. Unfortunately, we didn't actually hit the road until 3:30 and it took an hour to get to Micky D's. Since Lei eats every three hours (this week anyway), I reminded Ryan that we would be stopping again in thirty minutes. Utter deflation.

He tried to tell me that she could wait. Lei argued from the back seat. He chose a mile marker that we had to make it to. And we did. Right around 5:15. I fed (sat in the back with baby, Boppy, booby, and blanket over the window), changed our sweaty little peanut and put her back in her seat. She was sweaty because it was 90 degrees outside and no matter the a/c level, she was so snug in her car seat, the cool air didn't quite get in there.

We spent the rest of the ride shivering, while Leighton snoozed comfortably. We made a few more stops, growing more efficient with each, and arrived at Grandma and Grandpa's house at 9:40. Six hours and ten minutes ... not bad. I'm interested to hear Ryan's plan and accompanying rules for the trip home.

Do you have any amusing travel stories or tips for new moms? Please post a comment and share the fuss with us.