Back to work week and meal planning!

Here we go, my first week back to work and our first with with our nanny (in order to protect her privacy, I'll just refer to her as Nanny or the nanny on here).  Today, our nanny starts and tomorrow I'm back to work.  I hear a shortened work week is the way to go and it's best to ease back into things, we will see!  Meal planning is even more important now that my time is limited so I spent a few hours planning and prepping this weekend, thanks to a 3 hour nap, to ensure success during the week.

Prep work:
Paleo fudge-added toasted coconut as inspired by Danielle and these things are amazing now!
No bake energy bites
Paleo blueberry muffins

Meal Plan:
Sunday-Burgers on the grill with guac and bacon, green beans, strawberries
Monday-Roasted Chicken in tomatillo sauce (crock-pot) and butternut squash risotto (carry over from last week)
Tuesday-quesadillas with left-over chicken
Wednesday-Bratwurst on the grill, spinach salad
Thursday-left overs
Friday-Out to dinner/take-out?

I'm a little nervous about returning to work so let's see how thing week goes!

Meal planning

Meal planning has been tough lately, I'm working with limited ingredients (due to dietary restrictions for H) and limited time ( um, I've got a baby and we were out of town over the weekend). I'm traveling again at the end of this week so here's what we've done so far:

Sunday- burgers and sweet potato fries on the grill
Monday- stuffed shells from the geezer for C. (I had a meeting and I'm not eating dairy still)
Tuesday-meatloaf from the freezer, sautéed green beans and mashed sweet potatoes
Wednesday- chicken noodle soup (perfect for a rainy day)
Thursday- C's on his own
Friday-grilled marinated chicken and bn squash risotto (dairy free- made with chicken stock and coconut oil).

Next week I return to work so meal planning/ prep will be even more important! I'm going to stock up at the farmers market/grocery store and hope to get some prep work done this weekend!

Any tips/tricks tidy I should know for speedy meals?

Time Flies-11 weeks old

Time has been going sooo fast!  I can't believe that Henry is 11 weeks old today, it seems like just yesterday we were bringing him home from the hospital on a cold, snowy January day.  Henry has been advancing and growing every single day!  Just yesterday, he learned to roll from his belly to his back.  He also is becoming more vocal and will "talk" and "sing" to us.  Henry smiles as well and we think he's getting close to laughing!  He's enjoying baths more and is kicking the water in his little tub. He is starting to reach for toys and other objects in front of him.  We get so much joy in watching him grow and change.

I did a full 7 days of strict elimination and then started adding foods back into my diet.  I started with fruits and veggies (except broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, onions), then peanuts, dark chocolate (no dairy) and a little bit of wheat products (graham crackers, pretzels, wraps).  I haven't added beans, eggs or dairy yet.  We think it's been helpful but since we started probiotics at the same time (and he grows and develops every day), it's really hard to stay what is working and what isn't.  I'm considering getting him NAET or muscle tested for allergies so we can speed up the process of identifying what (if any) food sensitives he has or if it's just colic as he still has fussy periods.  I thought maybe it was just normal but my Mom said none of us ever cried like Henry does, like he's in pain sometimes.  As our CNP Allyson said, he will continue to get more rugged and durable every day.    

Shortly, I'll be returning to work and we've decided to have a full-time (40 hours per week) nanny come to take care of Henry.  We chose to have someone come to our home to care for Henry because on the days I'm working from home I'll still be able to breastfeed, he will get individualized care and there is less chance that he will get sick because of less exposure to other little ones.  In a couple of years, I want to transition him to a day care setting for socialization, possibly a Montessori school.  Finding the right person to care for him has been a process!  I found someone I really liked but she decided to work for another family instead...bummer.  I've been reminding myself that the right person is out there and they will come to us.  We have more interviews scheduled for this week and I'm hopeful to find a good fit for our family.  After all, they will be caring for our most precious asset!

And of course, a few photos:

Meal planning and bleeding dogs

Now that I'm following the (very boring) elimination diet, I don't have much desire to meal plan but here's what we have going on for the week:

Monday- left overs (chicken and rice, sweet potato fries)
Tuesday- roasted chicken and vegan butternut squash risotto (bn squash, chicken stock and rice)
Wednesday-chicken
Thursday-chicken
Friday-out to dinner with the family (probably chicken)

As you can see, I'm eating A LOT of plain chicken, sweet potatoes, squash and rice. I also eat almonds and smoothies with almond butter, almond milk and banana. We are hesitant to say this is making a huge difference at this point but I'm going to stick it out for the 10 days and then evaluate. Chris isn't following the diet so he is adding spices and condiments and extra veggies to his meals-lucky guy!

Spring has finally come to Cleveland! We've been enjoying lots of walks with the dogs...until yesterday when Lila was bitten by a Great Dane who wasn't leashed. I didn't notice her injury until we got home and found blood around the house....and then more blood right as our first nanny interview started. It's a small wound on her leg so we aren't taking her in to the vet unless it isn't healing properly (don't worry, I called the vet to find out what to do). Here's a photo of Henry on the walk, pre-dog bite and our injured puppy.

8 week well check visit

On Wednesday Henry went to the pediatrician for his 8 week well check visit. We met with CNP Allyson, who was awesome! She spent an hour with us answering questions about sleep schedules, vaccinations, development and gas :). I'm so so glad that Chris was able to meet me there, two sets of ears is better than one.

Here are the stats: 10lbs 8 oz and 22.5 inches long. H received two vaccinations (we are breaking them up so he doesn't have so many at once). There were a few areas of concern-both ours and Allyson's:

1. Gas. My oh my, our baby has gas! I wouldn't mind except it really bothers him (like crying in pain, wakes him up at night). H is starting on probiotics and I'm going to "food jail" (aka the elimination diet) to find out if its something I'm eating. Common causes are dairy, eggs, peanuts, soy, green veggies. Once this is under control it should help with issue #2.

2. Sleep schedules. I return to work in 3 weeks and we need to be on some sort of schedule around here. H had been getting up every three hours to eat and had gas in between so not much solid sleep for momma. I'm a light sleeper, especially when it comes to our baby so I was getting very broken sleep. We are working toward a set schedule with 2 hour naps and power feeding (feed every two hours) in the evenings to fill up the tank before bedtime. We are going in to soothe at nighttime wake ups and see if he goes back to sleep and if not, then feed. Allyson said at 10 lbs Henry should be able to go 6 hours at night between feedings. She also said the nighttime feedings were also contributing to nighttime gas (what goes in must come out).

3. Congenital Torticollis. Basically, the muscles in the left side of H's neck are really tight from his position in the womb so he favors turning his head to the right. We are going to see a PT a couple of times to get some exercises to stretch it out. (Wish our favorite PTA Brittany lived closer :)).

All in all, a very productive visit! It was do nice to have time to discuss our concerns and work through them with Allyson. Even though its only been 2 days, we think things are improving! There seems to be less gas/ fussiness and H is sleeping longer at night-he slept from 9pm to 4:30am last night! Amazing!

And now, for some photos:

Hey, I have a tongue!

Our smiley boy!

Bath time!

Post-bath, moving quick!

Playing makes me tired!

Meal Planning

After spending some time in DC and being out of town for Easter (hope you had a happy Easter!), we are back at meal planning!

Monday-turkey/black bean quesadillas (thanks to C's mom for sending us home with left-overs turkey)
Tuesday-Roasted whole chicken and oven roasted squash
Wednesday-Crock pot pork loin
Thursday-left overs
Friday-out to dinner for my birthday :)
Saturday-left overs

Since I've been home for lunches, I've been stocking up on greens and trying to eat salads with lots of protein (chicken, ham, hard-boiled eggs).  Chris packs his lunch almost every day and usually has left overs, so I try to plan meals with extra servings for him to take for a day or two.

I'm also whipping up some no bake energy bites for snacking (or sometimes 2 of these become my breakfast).

Here are a few photos from Easter:

Chris, Sonya and Henry (8 weeks)

"Ohh, let me touch the baby."  Luke was very good
with Henry!