What I Love About You ~ 24 weeks

~24 weeks~

I Love...

• that you were able to join use for family Bible time! You are usually asleep, but this past Sunday you were awake and it was precious to see you sit with Daddy the entire time and soak it all in!
• seeing you bounce around in your Jumperoo, and I can't believe I don't have a single photo of you in it! We put you in last week and you've been a daily jumper every day since!
• your sweet dresses and leggings. Your Nanee bought every $5 dress they had at Walmart and you have over 20 sets of leggings to coordinate! I am loving your fall clothes!
• your thumb. Yup, still cute.
• the way you twirl your feet. You are always moving them and it's so cute, especially when your leggings have little adorable bows on the bottom ;).
• your big smiles, that tighten up your fat cheeks and make you look like you might bust with joy!
• seeing you light up for your Daddy. He is so in love with his princess and watching your relationship develop is one of the sweetest things I have ever seen!!!
• how big you are. I have been reminiscing this week and feeling so grateful for you. I am just in awe with how fast our 5 1/2 months with you has flown by. Guess that means we're having fun!!!

Wanna link up? Share what you love about your child (any age), link to your direct What I Love About You post! Feel free to copy the What I Love button!

Swamp Juice

We continue to juice almost daily around here and the boys remind me if I forget ;). The other day our final smoothie was rather green, so we named it Swamp Juice. The boys devoured it like it was filled with chocolate, sugar and everything yummy for a child.

Look how happy they are...


Getting every last drop...
Funny thing is, our Swamp Juice was filled with items most kids would barf at. Even mine would if the items were presented separately! But together, they make a truly delightful Swamp Juice.
We make our juice and smoothies differently every day and always enjoy seeing what we come up with. This was by far one of the favored concoctions. Here's a snapshot of a few of the healthy items that were added this day...

Leftover Odwalla juice, Wheat Grass Powder, flax oil, organic spinach (yup we throw it right in the blender now), Flaxseed Meal. The smoothie also had 2 bananas, an avocado, frozen raspberries, and our fresh juice. I believe the juice was: carrots, celery, cucumber, apple, purple grapes, cabbage, and maybe something I am forgetting-who knows?

We love juicing, it has become such a fun part of our life! I must admit, I wish I had a juicer-cleaning-fairy though.

Feeding the Lil' Bug

So, it's almost that time. I can't believe it. Almost time to offer Ladybug her very first food...ahhh--how did she get this old?

She is exclusively breastfed and eats well. My boys were both BF also, and each had their first food around 5 1/2-6 months of age. I used the wonderful book, Super Baby Food with both of them and plan to with Ladybug also.


I am more confident when it comes to nutrition nowadays so feeding Bug will be easier for me. My plan is to start with ripe organic Avocado, mashed up and mixed with breastmilk until it's really runny.


We will eat only a little bit of this for about 4-7 days and then I will gradually add other healthy items to her diet. With Pac Man (my 7 yr old) I made all of his food, even his cereal-grinding the grains myself!!! I wasn't so dedicated with Krash (age 3), and plan to do it somewhere in the middle with Ladybug. She will eat entirely organic, everything. I plan to make most of her food myself, with the exception of some organic jars of things I don't usually have on hand, but that will come later.

I am not ready at ALL for her to be old enough to eat food, we still may wait a few weeks. But, I do know that my boys are good eaters, and I do believe in giving first foods between 5 1/2-6 1/2 months. Ladybug will be 6 months old on 10/14. I don't believe any eating plan is 100% right or wrong, that's just what I personally feel comfortable with for various reasons.

I hope to post about her feeding adventures, and resources I find to use on our journey! Anyone else who has posts on your blog about feeding your baby, please leave a link in the comments, I'd love to see!

Ladybug Loot

SO, I must be honest. I really, I mean REALLY want to win this one...but I share all of the good things I find, so I am sharing this one too (and yes it gets me a few extra entries to share) ;)

Head on over to my blogging bud, Sarah Mae's blog to read about Smart Mom Jewelry for teething babies!!!! You can try to win along with me!!!!

What I Love About You ~ 23 weeks

~23 weeks~

I Love...

• that your hair is finally long enough to hold a tiny clip! I didn't even realize it, but found a clip in the schoolroom and tried it to be silly, and it stayed!!!
• all of the PINK in our house (ha ha). The boys did a color hunt this morning for school and they added you to the pile of pink stuff! ;)
• that you are in my class now :)!!!! You sit with us every morning for calendar time and I just love it!!! Sometimes you are awake for story time too, you're going to be a genius!
• your cute bibs! You are a drooling machine and you have bibs to go with all of your fancy clothes thanks to Nanee! I don't know how I lived without these things with your brothers!
• seeing your brothers interact with you. Watching the 3 of you giggle together just melts my heart!
• that you can grab at your toys intentionally now. You love to just lay and play for long periods!
• seeing and hearing you blow raspberries! You've been trying for awhile now and finally learned recently, it's such a cute noise!
• your thumb habit. So, SO cute right now.
• how incredibly chill you are. No matter what I am doing, no matter where you are, you're usually just chillin. I can put you just about anywhere and you are fine. Makes homeschooling a whole lot easier!!! Thanks Ladybug, you ROCK!

You are also free to use the header button if you'd like! Just be sure to link to your exact post, and not the homepage of your blog. If you'd like to link back to Lil Ladybug, that'd be awesome too! For the title of your link for MckLinky, if you could put the name and the age of your child like this... (Ladybug ~ 23 weeks) that would be cool.

Ladybug Loot

Wanna win 6 bumGenius diapers...yup, that's right..I said 6!!!! Go here and enter along with me!!! Of course I hope to win, but I would be so happy if one of my readers won too!

Point Proven.

I began juicing a couple of months ago and have juiced almost everyday since, with a few exceptions. I did not take my juicer to the beach and was sans juice for 9 days there. Then when we got home from vacation I did not make my initial trip to Whole Foods/Trader Joe's and took my husband up on his offer to swing by Shoprite quickly to get some basics. Shoprite just does not have the organic produce that WF has and the quality stinks at SR. Even the prices are higher there on some things, believe it or not!

So, we went without juice again. We had some organic celery, apples, and carrots so I made a tiny amount of juice for me and the boys until that ran out, but we weren't having our loaded up concoctions each day.

Not only did we go without our juicing, we went without our huge stock of produce that we consume now daily. I had taken for granted how much fresh we were eating. I knew we changed, I just didn't realize how much we had changed in just a couple of months. Both my husband and I were complaining in misery by Thursday, and couldn't wait till it was Whole Foods today (which was today).

What point did I prove?

That I feel so much better when I am eating fresh foods. I have survived on my old diet at the beach and last week for the most part. I ate cereals, didn't eat as often (I am one who will just not eat if we don't have something healthy), ate some extra sweets because we didn't have much fruit. I didn't eat horribly by any means-still eating whole grains, limiting sugar, and eating some fruits and veggies. But it was a change.

I felt sluggish all week. Coffee did not help, I just couldn't seem to gather my mental competence each day to feel focused and alert. I even woke up this morning feeling the same. But I still drug myself to Whole Foods.

Thank goodness I did. I came home and made a huge batch of fresh veggie juice, mixed it into a very healthy smoothie mix (green powder, flax oil, and more) for me and the boys. Then I ate a huge spinach salad for lunch with raw nuts and seeds on top. Then I made this wonderful recipe for my afternoon snack and for the family to munch on later on.

I feel amazing! I don't know if it's all in my head or actually related to what is currently swirling around in my body. Honestly I don't care...I feel better when I eat this way. My entire family feels better. Point proven.

How Could I Live Without It ~ My New Stroller!

We got a new stroller and I LOVE it! It's the: Combi Cosmo EX stroller!
I am not a huge fan of strollers, and I hate shopping for them and of course forking over the money for a nicer one. We have the wonderful Graco infant seat/stroller combo and love it. Someone gave it to us as a VERY surprise gift for Ladybug. I knew it would be perfect for the early months and great for long day trips, but not for the everyday stroller needs as it is huge and heavy.

My kind Mom took me stroller shopping awhile ago and let me get exactly the one I wanted (within reason) for Ladybug and this ended up being the one! At first I overlooked it because it seems to be very cheaply made, but oh it is not!

After taking down, folding up, and putting back up MANY other strollers, I was drawn back to this one. I examined it thoroughly and then put Ladybug in it. She was asleep in minutes ;). A very good sign! Needless to say, we left Babies R Us with this great stroller an have now had it for a few months. It has been tested well.

We love this stroller, it is a perfect lite weight stroller and it hold up to 50 lbs! Even Krash can ride in it if he needs to. The bag underneath is small but has an elastic part at the front so I can actually load it up pretty well!

My mom made a nice sun shade for the front out of a piece of coordinating fabric (the red and white striped part ) we found, and it works great.


I also love that the sun shade on the stroller has a nice window to see her through from the top. I love so many things about this stroller, and she's quite happy in it too!


Do you have a post about your favorite (or least favorite) stroller on your blog? I'd love for you to link it up in the comments...or leave a quick comment sharing one you love.

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What I Love About You ~ 22 weeks

~22 weeks~

I Love...

• that you got to go on your very first ride...
• how adorable you look while you sleep. You have started sleeping on your side this past week and have woken up a couple of times stuck on your belly and you were not so happy ;).
• nursing you. It is such a joy and I hope you nurse longer than your brothers did (they weaned themselves one at 8 and one at 10 months). I love that you will nurse fine under the cover when we are out in public, something your brother's didn't do well!!!
• how HAPPY you were at the beach last week. I know I have said it before, but I can't say it enough. You were, and are, the most joy-filled baby I have ever known!
• how chill you were when we took you out while on vacation. You just hung out with your feet up and played with your ball and smiled when we peeked in on you ;).
• that I finally have some nice pics of you and me!!!! I just adore you and I don't get to be IN the photos with you very often!!!
• your photos with Daddy too ;) even though he gets them lots!!!
• that your grandparents all got to see you and cuddle with you. Nana and Pop Pop drove down for a day just so they could see us! Baba and Nanee couldn't get enough of you all week long!!!!
• how adorable you were when we let your feet touch the sand on our last day at the beach!!!I love how chunky your legs look!
• how sweet you are when you fall asleep unexpectedly, like on our first day back to homeschool yesterday, when I found you like this...

Ladybug, you are 5 months old now and such a big girl. It amazes me how fast time has flown by. I can't imagine life without you.


You are also free to use the header button if you'd like! Just be sure to link to your exact post, and not the homepage of your blog. If you'd like to link back to Lil Ladybug, that'd be awesome too! For the title of your link for MckLinky, if you could put the name and the age of your child like this... (Ladybug ~ 22 weeks) that would be cool.