In case you were wondering what would happen if Jim Hensen was a dog breeder

Why dogs are unreliable house cleaners

Juniper has made an excellent helper since she came into our lives. She helps keep the floors clean. She helps keep the baby clean. She helps keep the high chair clean. If there's food somewhere it isn't supposed to be, she's quick to volunteer to dispose of the mess.

Except this. I made a huge mess in the kitchen by dropping a smoothie, and she was entirely uninterested in the smoothie clean up. She wanted nothing to do with it. I told her she was fired. She asked when dinner would be served and started licking herself.

Life Changers

My mom has been sending out a couple of emails to my sisters and I about food and what's healthy, what's not. Which got me thinking about some books I've read that were life changers and go with the emails she has been sending, so I thought I'd give a little book review here. Maybe my sisters and mom will appreciate the review?

In Defense of Food: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." Michael Pollan followed up the very good but very thick Omnivore's Dilemma with this book, and that phrase is what his eating philosophy boils down to. It's not about dieting. It's about eating real food-- not chemicals from a lab, but things grown or raised in a field. Not because other foods are full of nasty things that have unknown impacts on our bodies, (and you'd probably steer clear of if you actually knew what it was and where it came from), but also it's better for the environment. That's "eat food". The rest is probably easier to figure out, so I won't explain what is meant by "Not too much. Mostly plants." Anyway, this book has changed how I make decisions about what food to buy, how I cook, and how I understand American agriculture and our food culture. It's an easy read (quicker than Omnivore's Dilemma!) and it just seemed to make sense, for the health of both for humans and the planet. I take it (like all diet advice) with a healthy dose of skepticism, but the great thing about his approach is that it's just common sense.

I've seen this beautiful edition of Food Rules at Anthropologie, but I'm sure it's elsewhere, too. It's full of gorgeous illustrations; even though I have an older edition, I've been tempted to buy this one because it's so pretty.

Food Rules: A common complaint after reading In Defense if Food is "great, I know all this background information on why I should change my eating habits, but I don't get how to make it work in practice." Enter Food Rules. Here, Pollan explains how to put his approach to food into practice with fairly easy to follow rules. For example, here are some rules:

• "Treat treats as treats"
• "Shop the outer perimeter of the supermarket"
• "Eat whatever you like, as long as you make it from scratch, at home."
• "Don't buy anything your mother/grandmother wouldn't recognize (such as GoGurt)"
• "Don't buy anything with an ingredient you can't picture in your pantry" (xanthum gum, anyone?)
• "Don't buy anything with more than 5 ingredients." 
• "Eat all your meals at a table-- not at your desk or your couch or..." (I'm bad at following this one.)

There are exceptions to the rules, and of course it's hard to follow the rules 100% of the time, but this book made it so simple to put what I read in In Defense of Food into practice. I read this 18+ months ago and I am still grocery shopping, eating, and making food related decisions with this book as a guide. I'm not saying I keep it with me and refer to it while I'm strolling the aisles at Safeway, but it made enough of an impact that I still mentally flip through the rules as I decide what to put in my shopping cart.

And a non-food book: The Happiness Project. This too is a life changer. We read this in my book club, and at first I was hesitant. "Really? A self-help book?" (It is not a self-help book, actually. And if it were, it would be awesome. The book club ladies do not choose bad books.) This is a woman's memoir from spending a year doing things that have been proven to actually make you happier. In the end, she distills her advice to things you can do that really do make you a happier person, and nothing in it is rocket science. Clearing clutter, getting enough sleep (and improving the sleep you're getting), being true to yourself-- all are things that just make you a happier person, it turns out. Some of these things are to help manage stress, some help you stay more organized, some make you a better spouse or parent or friend, but all in all, it adds up to an increase in happiness.

I have to mention that the one phrase she mentions relating to parenthood that resonates the most is this:

"The days are long, but the years are short." (Click the link to watch a video on it.) Countless times over the last 9 months, I've said this to myself as I've gotten out of bed to take care of Xavier in the middle of the night. Yes, I am so exhausted at the end of every long day-- and by the way, they all are long days, when I'm home during the day with X, and going to school at night-- but someday, if I'm lucky, I will look back at this time and marvel at how quickly it passed and how valuable these days of raising my son were. When I remember this phrase, everything changes and the challenges of parenthood on that particular day don't seem as big or important. My perspective changes. The days are long, but the years are short.

Since reading The Happiness Project, I've been following her blog, which has lots of tips that just make life, well, happier.  My stress level has gone through the roof with starting law school, and it's hard to find energy to do the things she recommends in her book and her blog, but the truth is, I'm happier when I do. It's worth it. Because the days are long but the years are short.

So there you have it, 3 life changing books I've read in the last 2 years. Have you read them? If you haven't, you should!

9 Months

(Catching up, 8 month pictures)

8 months

8 months

I feel like I keep saying this, but this is my favorite age so far.

Sleep: Now that I'm home with X during the day, napping and sleeping have become more routine, and easier because of it. (YAY!!!!!) Plus, we're able to do more activities during the day now that X has dropped down to 2 naps. (Although why are so many things for moms and babies at 9am? That's the most common time [apparently] for babies to have their first nap, so this makes no sense to me.) The downside to falling into a routine is that now X barely naps if he falls asleep anywhere but in a crib. Usually, we can't get him to nap (or nap for long) in the car, in a stroller, or in our arms if we need to. Bummer. He's down to one wake-up  per night most nights. Sometimes 2 if he's hungry at 10pm, sometimes 3 or more when he has a tooth cutting through.

Travel: So far this summer, we've spent a week at the beach, 2 weeks at my in-laws while we were waiting for our house to close, a long weekend in Vancouver visiting my mom, and 4 days days in Spokane. Spokane was tough, but X amazingly kept it together while getting very little sleep, being totally thrown off in terms of routine, and our unusual [for us now] sleeping arrangements (we co-slept in an RV bed for 3 days). He may have done so well because we were more generous in letting him use the pacifier than usual.

Visiting Kenneth's grandma in Spokane

It was hot in Spokane. I loved it, but X was sweaty and covered in sunblock the whole time. 

The new house: The new house with a room just for X has been working out very well. All of us are sleeping better!!! We aren't co-sleeping ever any more, trips to Spokane aside. We are far from being child-proofed though, so the move has been really tricky in that regard. It's hard to live life, chase a very mobile baby, and unpack/paint/take care of a million other new house things. But it's been great to be able to make changes and make our home something that works well for all 4 of us-- Juniper included.

This poor baby has been abandoned on our front porch. Oh wait, that's just an unhappy Xavier.

Busy boy: X is more mobile now... holy smokes, does he take a lot of energy these days. Guess the newfound energy from sleeping more has to go somewhere. He's crawling very proficiently, pulling up, and walking if you hold his hands. He's cruising a little bit too. My mother-in-law keeps saying how her kids walked at 9 months, expecting X to do the same. I think we could still have a month before he walks... but it'll be cutting it close. He has been wanting to walk, trying to walk, and sort of walking (with lots of support) since he's been born-- that's not an exaggeration-- so once he figures out how to keep his balance, he'll be off and... well, not running, but walking.

He plays peek-a-boo with us now, and we're working on waving. He's also started occasionally signing "more", and he makes this funny panting type sound that means "I want that". We're still working on waving bye-bye and mama and daddy. He does not make the "m" sound yet.

We're also still slowly working on infant potty training ("elimination communication"). He did so well the 1st week, but since then it's been about a 20% success rate. We're increasing diaper free time just to try and help him a little... there's no rush (we still don't expect him to actually be potty trained until 2 years old or later), but I'm motivated more by the fact that it will be harder to get him to practice on the potty when it's colder and when he's even more mobile.

Personality: He's still so happy and playful. He can be very serious and observant if he's in a new environment, but once he feels comfortable he just wants to crawl around and get into everything... and put everything in his mouth. He loves to play and figure out how things work, what sounds they make, and how they taste. He's starting to cling more to me now because we're together so much-- it's a blessing and a curse sometimes. These days, he cries when he's left with my mother-in-law on the day she watches him so I can study. But, I know that soon enough he will not want his mama to be so close, so I'm trying to remember to enjoy his clinginess.

His favorite toys are Sophie, my necklaces, a toy musical instrument set, the dog's collar, the dog's leash, the dog, and shoes. Runners up are the pacifier, his socks/shoes, and whatever it is that you are holding and that he wants RIGHT NOW.

He has 9 teeth, and he's working on #10 now. I am SO happy to be almost done with teething. Can't wait to finish-- just 2 more after this one, until the 2 year molars.

Eating: He is eating SO. MUCH. I thought it was a growth spurt... but it seems like it was just him realizing that food is AWESOME because he hasn't stopped eating so much since then.

 He nurses or gets a bottle 8 times a day, but he also eats real food 2 or 3 times a day now. We're mostly past the purees, (although I'll throw a baby puree pouch into the diaper bag sometimes since he likes them, and when we're not home, those can be easier). We keep puffs, freeze-dried fruit, and yogurt melts on hand so we have something that's baby friendly. But he'll eat anything it seems-- cheese, eggs, waffles, hummus, cooked vegetables, chicken, pizza [not my finest mothering moment, feeding my 8 month old Ikea pizza, but he wanted it and I couldn't keep him from grabbing], smoothies, fruit of any kind... and even hamburger (my little sister shared hers with him. He liked it, of course). He might have a soy allergy, unfortunately, but it doesn't seem to be a huge issue if we avoid processed foods.

I'm still amazed at the fact that at 9 months, we're still going strong with nursing. We've overcome mastitis, the heavily distracted 4th month, 3 or 4 nursing strikes, and big problems in the first few weeks of his life. I'm planning to gradually let my supply decrease a little starting in September, but I'm still planning to/hoping to nurse until he reaches 1 year. Only 3 more months to go. Yikes.

I love these 9 month photos-- they are the first that capture him best so far, I think. Crazy hair, big grin, and always on-the-go--that's who our little boy is.