Witness my little cousin Aidan a couple years ago

BWAH! I'm thankful I purchased one of those plastic mats to put under the high chair.

I had two kids in diapers (well, training pants for one) that I fed that way and then would let them into the front yard to play with the hose.

Definitely a summer thing here. But yeah. I'm going to do that.

Feeding naked leads to pee in the food.

I used to say we ought to feed 'em naked in an empty tub and just fill it up after, though. Instead, I'd give them their messiest meals (the ones I was letting them feed themselves) right before bath time.

Susan, some babies nurse exclusively for a year. One of me s-i-l's is very nervous about choking. My niece was probably on the same track as Annabel. She is gorgeous, and brilliant, and funny, and all good things, at age four.

Cheerios are a great finger food. Arrowroot cookies are great, because they can't choke. Once you're at a point where you and your doctor agree Annabel should be eating finger food, the real secret is small, irregularly shaped pieces.

to use a fork for something other than stabbing his sister

Given who his sister is, is this really a proper goal? :)

VW, that's sweet, the doggie pillows.

Yay Cashmere (or, your family) for the restitution-and-not-jail.

This tattoo has come in handy in exactly the situations Hubby mentioned. It's worked so well that he added his Social Security number.

Bwhahahahaha! That's hysterical.

Infectious disease is becoming a huge problem because we've basically set up a system to incubate things like TB and then release it back into the community

Sure, not to mention AIDS.

A church in my hometown had a pastor named Jimmy Jones, born well before the name became notorious.

My high school principal was named Jim Jones. He went by "Mike" (which I assume was his middle name, but whatever).

(Mine *was* a fairly deep knife wound that left an icky scar, but palm wounds tend to hurt like a motherfucker.)

Ooh, me and my "I fell down the stairs and got stigmata" palms agree. Plus, six weeks later the big spot scars are still pink.

Nobody ever expects the firebombing of an insurance company.

They really should actually...

Bwhahahah!!

Happy birthday ita! Hope it's been good. If not, then kick the crap out of it.

I thought, and probably even said here, that I was going to make my own baby food because it was better for her and tasted more like adult food and was therefore better for her palate.

HA!

I'm too busy. And while I'm not a super-paranoid mom WRT choking, it's kinda nice to buy stuff where I know if it were a major choking hazard for a baby Annabel's age, Gerber would've gotten their ass sued long ago. So we have their fruit puffs and biter biscuits and so on, not to mention all kinds of pureed baby food.

She's had little bits on non-baby food. We gave her a tiny bit of bread DH made in the bread machine last night. She looked perturbed, then swallowed and asked for more. And if I hadn't cut my hand, I'd have made pumpkin bread and gave her the leftover pumpkin puree. But most of our food is unsuitable for her in one way or another, and I'm too lazy busy to cook her a special meal when Gerber makes all these nice jars of ready-to-serve.

Parenting=doing all the things you said you'd never do, and laughing at your idealistic plans.

She can probably eat green beans if they're soft enough. When Ben was about her age, we went away for the weekend to Loon Mountain, in NH. There's a great restaurant there (or was, it's been years) called The Common Man.

I brought a jar of some sort of Gerber meal, and we ordered him a side of green beans. He was happy as anything to pick at them, and we actually got to eat dinner and talk. I only remember, because at that point, it felt like a major triumph.

I thought, and probably even said here, that I was going to make my own baby food because it was better for her and tasted more like adult food and was therefore better for her palate.

HA!

Yeah, I thought I was going to do all that stuff, too. I did make applesauce a lot, but that was about it. Have you sliced up a banana for her? (Assuming she likes bananas--some babies object to the texture.)

I'll have to try a sliced-up banana next time we have a nicely ripe one. I tried a mashed-up one instead of the Gerber puree back before she tried finger foods, and she didn't much like it, but that was months ago.

Happy Birthday, ita!

My god. I got home and ate dinner, then threw on sweats with every intention of doing a rewrite on the writing sample I put together last night. Instead, I passed out for an hour. I made myself sit up when the roomie got home so I can watch Veronica Mars, but I still feel so sleepy I might as well be drunk.

So no edit tonight, say me.

I'll have to try a sliced-up banana next time we have a nicely ripe one. I tried a mashed-up one instead of the Gerber puree back before she tried finger foods, and she didn't much like it, but that was months ago.

O kind of gagged at this first, but once he got the hang of bananas, he loved them. He's not really adept at picking up pieces, since they're so slippery and slimy. He likes them mixed with cereal or plain yogurt a lot.

I thought, and probably even said here, that I was going to make my own baby food because it was better for her and tasted more like adult food and was therefore better for her palate.

I've tried once or twice but I realized that Gerber's industrial kitchens are probably more sanitary than mine and baby food is very regulated in regards to contents, so I rely on the jarred stuff. It's so easy to just grab a jar out of the cupboard. And I'm all about the easy.

Sooper Seekrit Message to Susan: You rule.