Father’s Day 2016

19/06/201624/07/2016

So today was Father’s Day and my dad stayed at ours last night so that he could come and watch Clara’s swimming lesson this morning for the first time. Afterwards, we decided that seeing as the weather was nice we would take another trip to Leith Hill and go on a bit of a walk. Somewhere along the way we must have missed a signpost because the circular walk took quite a bit longer than it was meant to and we were all starting to wonder slightly if we were still heading in the right general direction!

Following our walk we were all starving so we headed to Regional Thai Taste in Reigate. The food was delicious and Clara was very well behaved throughout the meal, although she did take a couple of swipes at my crispy beef so we had to keep everything on the table well out of arms length!

By the time we got home we were all shattered, and I don’t think I would be alone in saying that we were all a little bit envious when Clara went down for a nap. All in all a very successful and enjoyable first Father’s Day for Jamie and first (Grand)father’s day for my dad.

Weaning – week 13

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This week we had a great little picnic for dinner one evening and got Clara trying a stick of cheese for the first time which she absolutely loved! She is getting a lot better at chewing her food now, and even though she still takes quite big mouthfuls sometimes and then gags on them, she is definitely a lot more confident at moving the food around her mouth. We also gave her a whole peach to tuck into. I took a bite out of it first to give her somewhere to get started and peeled a bit of the skin back to make it easier for her. As it was a flat peach, it was the perfect size for her to hold in her hands and she had a lot of fun with it. I definitely feel like she is getting much more accomplished at what she can handle these days.

A busy weekend

05/06/201604/07/2016

This weekend has been pretty hectic. On Friday, both of my parents were over for the day so Clara got a good bit of quality grandparent time. She is starting to really recognise family members now and is very smiley for them whenever they are over which is great to see.

Weaning – week 11

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We tried out a veggie dhal recipe this week which was really tasty and had a bit of a spicy tingle to it. Clara enjoyed this one so it was a good introduction to foods with slightly stronger flavours. Apparently, the flavour of my milk changes depending on what I have eaten so to be fair I guess she is probably already used to more flavours than we realise! We also gave her some roasted sweet potato wedges which were part of our dinner and she enjoyed holding and chomping on these.

Weaning – week 10

24/05/201604/07/2016

This week’s new foods were tuna, pork & spaghetti. Clara really liked the tuna, which I mashed up with some avocado, but both the pork and spaghetti meals were a bit more of a struggle. I don’t think it is that she doesn’t like the flavour, but she definitely had real texture issues with both of them and didn’t seem to like the way that they felt in her mouth. I think we are going to have to mush her foods up a little bit more than we have been, as ever since we switched to chunkier dishes she has been fussing over them a lot more than she used to.

Weaning – week 8

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This week we tried egg again, although we only used the yolk this time in order to determine if Clara will have an allergic reaction to it. I hard boiled it and then mashed it up with a bit of avocado and she loved it! No vomiting this time so we will test the egg white again soon to see if that sets her off, otherwise it may have been a false alarm which would be nice. We have also tried out buttered toast fingers, peanut butter, rice cakes, chicken and lamb for the first time so it has been a pretty adventurous week!

Weaning – week 7

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This week Clara continued to try new foods, including some Organix red pepper hearts corn puffs (which she loved, and were great as they completely disintegrated in her mouth so I was less paranoid about her choking on these!). She also tried Organix multigrain mini cereal puffs, although given that she is still struggling to get along with the porridge, I think this was a step too far as it is basically all of the lumps from the porridge taken out and combined in one packet! Definitely going to need a little bit more work with this one.

First night away

02/05/201604/07/2016

Yesterday Clara had her first night away from home and we had the opportunity to test out the travel cot properly and see how we got on with it. We went down to Selsey on the South Coast for Clara’s cousin’s 3rd birthday party and decided that it would be easier to stay the night in order to avoid having to set off early from home on the day of the party.

Taking a baby to a funeral?

28/04/201625/06/2016

Taking a baby to a funeral is apparently a topic of great contention on many online forums. Unfortunately, this week we had to make the decision of what side of the fence we stood on as my dad’s cousin Diane had passed away. I was quite close with her, so it seemed obvious that I was going to go along to the funeral and take Clara with me, but it wasn’t until I started to google what a baby should wear to a funeral that I realised that quite a few people online seem to frown upon a baby being present.

Weaning – week 6

26/04/201625/06/2016

This week we introduced kiwi to Clara as part of a kiwi-avocado combo, and she seemed to like it. I’ve heard that this can be a potential allergen but she didn’t have any symptoms after eating it so hopefully we are ok with this one. We will try it again soon just to make sure. We also gave Organix multigrain porridge a try for breakfast one morning, although Clara didn’t seem massively impressed with the texture or taste of this one so we will definitely need to keep trying it in order to try and get her used to it.

Bringing up Bubba

The journey of a first-time mum