Stroller Madness, Part Deux

Now onto our 4th (yes, FOURTH) stroller, the Baby Jogger City Select Double.

• http://www.amazon.com/Baby-Jogger-City-Select-Seat/dp/B003O95UIQ

It's an incredibly well-thought-out piece of equipment, and I love that you can arrange the seats in any configuration you want (both kids facing you, both kids facing out, etc.), and I love the fact that L and C love napping in it. Speaking of, when we were looking at buying the stroller, the sales guy was doing his darndest to sell us the bells and whistles for an infant: car seat adaptor, bassinet, etc. Wary of making yet another purchase mistake, we passed on the extras, and good thing we did, too! For L, the newborn, we just padded the stroller seat with a Bundle Me and reclined it a little, and the moment we put her into it, we knew we had a winner. She absolutely loves it. Falls asleep in it every time. In fact, she loves it so much that, for a while, we were using it for all of her sleeping needs -- naps and nighttime sleeping. So, unless you live in the 'burbs and use a car seat all the time, don't bother with the car seat adaptor or the bassinet.

The downside of the City Select, of course, is the weight. While maneuverability is amazing, I often feel like Sisyphus, rolling that damn boulder uphill (even when I'm on a flat surface). On the bright side, I suspect my arms will be pretty toned in a couple of months.

And then I discovered this: http://kinderwagon.com/.

Ohmigod, did I make yet ANOTHER mistake, buying the City Select? Is the Kinderwagon Hop the double stroller of my dreams? An umbrella double stroller? Genius! But how many more strollers can a family take????

The Pain Sacks (a.k.a. "Boobs")

This is another one of those "for the ladies only" posts. Gentlemen, continue only if discussions about boobs intrigue you for some reason...

Anyway, another month, another post. All my ambition of posting weekly crumbled when confronted with the reality of managing two kids (even if one of them is only 7 weeks old!). Am still trying to figure out how this two-kid thing works, and, as I'm doing so, I'm realizing the truth to an observation a friend of mine once made: dealing with two kids is not doubly hard; it's EXPONENTIALLY harder. And INFINITELY harder when the entire family (including me) is as sick as dogs. Sigh.

So back to the subject matter at hand: breastfeeding. A true blessing, of course, though it can so oftentimes feel like a curse. If you're like me -- a hyper-producer -- you know what I mean: the constant engorgement, the blocked ducts, mastitis, the pumping schedule, the crazy letdowns (that gag your newborn), the soaked shirts and sheets, etc. With Kid #2, L, the whole process seems a lot less traumatic, for some reason. Perhaps because I've been sick, my body has been producing drastically less milk, which translates to easy feeds for L and no pumping (happy dance!). But in this post, I did want to write about something I discovered when I was breastfeeding C and dealing with constant, uber-painful blockages.

Ugh, those were awful: huddled over a table at 1, 2, 3 a.m., with one of my breasts dunked into a bowl of steaming hot water while I tried to massage the blockages out. And then, one night, in desperation, I turned to Google (to figure out if I needed to go see a doctor about what I thought was perhaps a bad case of mastitis). And there, in the magical world of the interwebs, y'all, I discovered a factual nugget that changed my life forever (or at least that was the hyperbolic sentiment I felt when I first happened upon it). MILK BLISTER: that tiny, miniscule flap of skin that grows over a milk pore, trapping the milk behind it, thus creating the uber-painful blockage. Why hadn't anyone told me about this???? I had to find out about it while scrolling through a comment thread of some obscure website. Of course, back then, I didn't know about kellymom.com.

Anyhow, the solution, it turns out, was a sterilized needle. You'd have to look for the blisters really carefully. Mine were just tiny white specks that looked like they could or could not be part of the nipple. But once I located one, I would just gently scrape the skin away, and...sweet, sweet, sweet relief, as the milk would just come gushing out.

kellymom.com has a lot of information about this here:

• http://www.kellymom.com/bf/concerns/mom/nipplebleb.html

Hopefully, this information will help some of you new breastfeeding mommas feel a little less like you have pain sacks bolted onto your chest. At this point in the game the last time around, I would have happily opted for "discomfort sacks"! Happy pumping...er...breastfeeding, ladies!

A Follow-Up to the Depends Post

For every woman who's been told that Kegel exercises are the answer to preventing/reducing incontinence, this is going to BLOW. YOUR. MIND.

• http://mamasweat.blogspot.com/2010/05/pelvic-floor-party-kegels-are-not.html

It's not Kegels (apparently counterproductive!). It's squats. The tighter the glutes, the less you leak!

A post about preserving your postpartum sanity and dignity

Note: this post is for the ladies. Gentlemen, no need to delve any further, unless you don't mind TMI.

So a week and a half ago, I gave birth to my second little angel. A beautiful girl with large eyes and a disarming lack of crying. She sleeps pretty much on command and seems pretty content with her place in the world. Sleepless nights? What sleepless nights? Last night, she woke up once for her feeding and otherwise slumbered peacefully in the crook of my arm. If only all parents could be so lucky.

The flip side, of course, is all those postpartum annoyances they DON'T tell you about. All that postpartum goop (sorry, Gwyneth) and...drumroll...full-blown incontinence. WTF? No one told me about incontinence! I never had it with C, so what gives? (After much thought, I've decided that the main culprit was the lack of exercise while pregnant with #2, among other things.) So, ladies who've just had babies, I have two words for you: ADULT DIAPERS. I don't know why I never thought of it with C -- dealing with those horrible disposable undies and bulky pads was just the bane of my existence (the constant worrying about leaking, etc.) -- but better late than never! As a new connoisseur of the adult diaper products, my recommendation would be Depends (Depends: because your dignity depends on Depends -- haha). But really, any adult diaper product would be better than what the hospital provides for you.

So there you have it. When life throws you a curve ball, get a longer bat.

Sneaky Spinach

So the summer is drawing to a close -- as is the deceptive illusion of perma-vacation. Ergo, back to a more consistent blogging rhythm...until Baby #2 arrives, that is (which, fingers crossed, should be around the end of this month). Although, come to think of it, I'm sure I'll have a whole host of new tidbits to blog about!

Wanted to post something about nutrition this time around...or the lack, thereof. There was a time, during C's earliest months (before the introduction to solids), when I had the most glorious fantasies about the immaculate diet she would be fed. Dairy-, sugar-, and meat-free and nothing but whole grains and organic veggies/fruits and plant-based proteins for this child! But C had other plans: namely, she turned out to be the worst eater on the planet. It got so bad that, at a certain point, I was just happy if she shoved a donut down her throat.

She has, since then, slowly morphed into a satisfactory, if not solid, eater (and, if at day care, a champion eater, apparently!), and I know that I have a repertoire of staples in my pantry/fridge arsenal that she'll happily eat whenever offered. Vegetables, unfortunately and not unsurprisingly, are still (for the most part) non grata. I figure I'm not the only parent with this dilemma, and I've shared the following trick with enough parents who hadn't thought of it themselves that I thought I'd blog about it. And all you need is a reliable pair of kitchen scissors!

I've discovered, basically, that I can sneak raw baby spinach (and ground flax seeds, come to think of it) into just about anything I serve C. As long as it's cut up small enough (ergo, the kitchen scissors), I can sneak it into her yogurt, her pasta, her eggs, her rice, her cream cheese (accompanied by cinnamon raisin bagel, of course), her pizza, etc. The sky's the limit! Somehow, the texture and taste of raw baby spinach are both innocuous enough that C doesn't seem to notice and/or mind the tiny green strips stuck in her food. Hallelujah! This trick has been the saving grace of many of C's otherwise "empty calorie" meals. I wish I could say the same for broccoli. Sigh.

Anywhooo, I figure that one of these days, when she's old enough, I'll have to force the confrontation with the dreaded vegetable -- undisguised and in its full-form glory. But until that day arrives, why make life difficult for all involved?

P.S. Feel free to share your own feeding tips/suggestions!

Brain Rules for Baby, by John Medina

I know that most new parents barely have the time to take a quick shower, much less read an entire book, but I would strongly, strongly encourage expecting parents and new parents to read this book. A lot of the information overlaps with another book I recommended, NurtureShock, but there's enough new information in here that can really change the way you parent your child. Medina's a scientist, first and foremost, but he makes the science incredibly accessible, and he's funny to boot. But instead of writing a tome here, I'll just let you read the product description on Amazon. Hope it proves titillating enough that you purchase (and read) the book ASAP!

• http://www.amazon.com/Brain-Rules-Baby-Raise-Smart/dp/0979777755

Hold the Lipstick

If I were ever to categorize my blog entries (which I really should, I know), this one would be filed under a "WTF?" tab.

So I think I'm a conscientious mama who tries my best to navigate a middle ground between neurotic obsession and complete laissez-faire, especially when it comes to steering C clear of toxins. For example, while I read all food packages religiously to avoid products with ingredients whose names I don't recognize, I cede control when it comes to C's diet at day care (thankfully, C's day care providers are usually very good about feeding the kids wholesome meals).

Another example: I spent a while researching all-natural nail polishes (yay, Piggy Paint!) to paint on C's precious little piggies, but when C decided a couple of days ago that she just had to try on some L'Oreal Infallible Plumping Lip Gloss, I thought, "Eh, what the heck?" And so I gave her the bright red lips she wanted. She was tickled silly and looked adorable with the lipstick smeared beyond the contours of her little lips, and I thought we had had a wonderful bonding moment...until a couple of hours later, when we removed the lipstick. "Owwie," she said, and I was stunned to see what looked like a burn along the right side of her mouth. The damn lipstick had given my baby a chemical burn! WTF? Since then, the burn has scabbed over, and it doesn't seem to bother her, but the whole incident has just freaked the bejesus out of me. How toxic is this makeup that we mommies have been applying on ourselves? I've since looked up the list of ingredients for this lipstick and other fine makeup products in my kit, and, suffice to say, I'm ready to chuck most of my conventional makeup and replace with organic makeup products. Better for mommy and a better example for C (eventually).

In the meantime, for playing grown-up with C, Burt's Bees Lip Shimmer will do just fine, thank you very much.