i made baby food!

hello lovely people.

 i want to thank my 3 followers for wanting to keep track of my life and my postings. okay, one follower is my husband- but i didn't tell him he had to follow my blogging- he chose to all on his own. good choice M! ;)

today has been a good day! i finally made homemade baby food! i bought organic pink lady apples, for my pink pumpkin (mark's nickname for babygirl brooklyn) and some bananas. recipes for homemade baby food seem easy enough- but still daunting for some reason.. so it took me a couple days to get up the nerve to give it a shot. i used www.wholesomebabyfood.com  to make sure i was doing things right.

homemade applesauce:
wash & peel, then cut organic apples into slices or chunks. put into saucepan or pot and add enough water to just cover the apples. boil gently until apples are soft. *save the water for boiling apples* put apples into food processor or blender and process. add water from boiling to get mixture to a thin consistency. OR you can add breast milk to do the same job. cool the sauce before feeding baby! you can serve it warmed, but remember you just boiled it- so test it before giving it to baby.

YAY! you're done!! easy, right?

<-- here's a pic of my food processor... small but worked well for my small portions. filled 2 jars of bananas and a jar and an ice tray of applesauce...

i put one serving into a baby food jar that i saved from some of babygirl's organic veggies made by earth's best. the rest i froze. you can freeze the batch in ice cube trays- i used pink heart shaped ice trays i bought from Target's dollar aisle!

 

i also made homemade banana's for babygirl, which was even easier than the applesauce! because you don't cook the bananas at all....

bananas for baby:
cut bananas into slices or chunks. add to blender or food processor. blend until mush. and you're DONE! add water or breast milk to thin out. add cereal or yogurt to thicken up.

when saving bananas or apples, or any other fruit that turns brown with exposure to air- add a small amount of lemon juice (absorbic acid) to the mixture before storing.

i read up on the difference between absorbic & citric acid. seems that there is not much difference at all. absorbic acid seems to be more naturally occurring, where citric acid is often created instead of taken from nature. either one is fine and safe for babies, in small amounts. "they" say to wait on giving your young babies citrus fruits before age 1 because it may cause rash & digestive upset due to acidity. but that doesn't count for a dash or two of it to keep the fruit from turning brown.

alright- that's all the blogging i have time for today... i talked mark into watching babygirl for a couple hours so i could get this written and so i could work on some new jewelry pieces too!

i'm currently working on rachel's wedding jewelry- for her and the bridemaids, earrings for sims, and some new pieces for a home jewelry party jaq is hosting for P&Q at the end of the month. more about that later...


enjoy your weekend!!

Rachel's Green Bridal Shower

Hello. sorry i've been gone so long. it feels like ages since i've written on here. i've been a busy girl. i was 50% responsible for throwing my friend Rachel's Bridal Shower this past Valentine's Day. and had a couple of of hurdles to overcome.

For starters- the party was in Columbus, Ohio ( i live in Nashville, TN.) also, the best, and often the only way i could communicate with the other 50% of hostess (Stacey) was through emails. emailing can be tough because you have no verbal reference to how the words would be said by the author. sometimes you read it with inflections that don't really exist. sentences can get missed when reading quickly which can lead to confusion and frustration. once we spoke once on the phone- all those feelings where cleared up and happiness once again ruled the land. 

secondly- i have a 5 month old!! the week before i took the drive to Ohio, she decided to wake up EVERY HOUR through the night, for FOUR NIGHTS in a row!!! How How How could i plan out a 4 day trip, pack for myself, my babygirl and for the shower on NO solid sleep?!?

well, thank goodness i figured it out- i only forgot a couple of things, but nothing too dire or that couldn't be purchased at Target!

Rachel recently became a vegetarian so we decided on a Go Green theme for her bridal shower (oh yeah- and her main color for the wedding is lime green.) an all vegetarian menu was easy for a 2pm-4pm sunday afternoon shower. organic veggie plate served with hummus. garlic eggplant dip served with breads and crackers. organic fruit served with natural cheeses.  all served on recycled paper plates, of course.

 for decorations we kept it simple to not waste earth's resources. stacey (my partner in crime of hosting) bought teacups and mugs for the thrift store and potted small house plants in them. perfect for decoration and sweet as thank you gifts to all of our attendees.

we wanted fun games, and nothing too cheesey- so one of the games was "guess this herb." okay, so i forgot a couple herbs, so it became "guess this spice." HA! no one did very well at it, but it was fun and got people talking. one of the funny ones was celery flakes- found in stacy's cabinet- people were guessing everything on this one, from oregano to vanilla. very funny!

for game winners we gave reusable bags, grow your own herb kits and recycled paper notebooks. good for mother earth and fun truly usable stuff. i wanted some of those bags for myself but we had some ties between winners so i was left with nothing!! oh well, at least i know where they came from if i wanna buy them for myself..

so... that's some of where i've been. busy busy busy. i'm happy to announce that babygirl is sleeping much more again! only waking a couple times a night again. whew! she's working on popping out a tooth- so we'll see how long this sleep thing lasts. haha! she's sleeping now, which is how i've had time to actually sit down and think. and write. but i'm pretty much spent. so, see you next time. and thanks for reading.

<--babygirl passed out at the shower
xoxop