It is unbelievable how much Noelle changed between five and six months. She went from not being able to sit, to having no problem sitting at all. She went from barely wanting to eat any food, to chowing down two "meals" a day. She grew from 25 to 27 inches, and gained two pounds. During all of these big changes, I have a whole new list of must haves for you.

My first is always having a stash of clean blankets around the house. Not only do we not want Nono playing in animal fur on the rug, the drooling almost doesn't stop. So, we always have a blanket down where she's playing. You know, like a baby drop cloth.

Next, frozen pacis! Dad came up with this one. We have teething rings, but then she has to hold onto it, and I feel like that gets a bit cold on her little paws. So pop a paci in the freezer (we usually keep a couple in there), and when baby's teeth seem to be a bother, a freezer paci should do the trick.

Now that Nono is eating more foods I'm totally loving cooking for her. It's seriously, SO EASY. I told you about my first baby food adventure when I made sweet potato puree. Since then, I've whipped up peas, corn, more sweet potato, and mango. Peas and corn were especially easy. Each of them can be bought in your freezer section. Empty the bag into your Beaba Babycook and follow the instructions to steam, then blend into the perfect puree. Mango? Just as easy. No cooking necessary. Just peel, chop and blend. Seriously, each of these foods takes no more than 30 minutes. And, most of that time is the food steaming, when you can be doing something else. I would recommend two of the multiportion silicone trays. I never commit myself to more than one baby food item prep per day, so two are plenty. After the portions are frozen, I pop them out and store them in a labeled Zip Lock freezer bag.

I could go on and on about all of the products that I love (and the ones I could do without), but I think three is plenty for now. If you're interested in hearing more about our must haves, leave a note and we can chat.

First Edition
Second Edition

Today was my first adventure in making baby food. I decided that I wasn't going to make any food until I knew what Noelle liked to eat, or didn't, so I wouldn't be wasting time or food. Now that peanut has tried a few different foods, we grabbed a sweet potato at the store and made our own puree!

I was given the Beaba Babycook as a gift at one of our baby showers. I've been excited to use it for a while now, and am so happy to have it. The Babycook is so easy to use, and I'll definitely be making more baby food in the coming months until Noelle eats more solids. I love that you can do everything in it - first steam, then blend.

ingredients: 

sweet potato

liquid reserved from steaming potato

how to:

cube sweet potato

steam in Babycook on number 3 setting

transfer steamed potatoes into blender

add reserved liquid to steamed potatoes until you reach the consistency your babe likes

store in silicone tray in freezer (each pod is a 4 oz serving) or in whatever tupperware you like

*I put some in the freezer and have portions in the fridge for this week

*Nono doesn't eat that much at once yet, so I stored 2 oz portions

The great thing about making this myself is that it's so cheap! Sweet potatoes at our market are $0.69/lb, and I made over two cups of sweet potato puree for baby girl. 

Thankfully, today, she still likes sweet potato!