C MONSTER NEW FOOD GUIDE

One of my biggest challenges as a parent is to get C Monster to eat fruits and vegetables. To make it less arbitrary to him when I say "you can not have more bread until you eat vegetables", I decided to make him an interactive food guide.   I used the canadian food guide as my example. They have a section where one can create a personal food guide.  I used this to determine how much food a 4-year-old boy should be eating. 

For the interactive guide I just drew and coloured a chart on a piece of paper and then printed pictures of the food groups off the internet.  I cut each one out and attached a magnet to each. Voila: a food guide simple enough a 4-year-old gets it.

The house rules for the food guide are:

• No dessert until all other categories are filled up.
• Once you are done your bread products, that is it for that category.
• Once you have filled up all 4 food group categories, you get a sticker.

Last food diary

Monday April 5th - C Monster's food diary

Breakfast

Almond Milk

Left Over Waffle with Pure Maple Syrup

Breastmilk

Morning Snack

Rest of His Easter Chocolate (not very much)

Lunch

Soy Beans with Butter and Hemp Seeds

Almond Milk

Cashews

Breastmilk

Afternoon Snack (at the mall)

Juice Box - Mango

Peanut Butter Crepe with a Few Chocolate Chips

Supper

Papadums

Almond Milk

Roasted Chicken

Crackers

Breastmilk

To conclude; C Monster does not eat a perfect diet.  We try to sneak vegetables in because otherwise he would not eat them; I can't get fresh fruit in him unless it's blended in a smoothie. 

I want to mention that my bread machine is on the fritz otherwise you would have probably seen fresh bread in C Monster food diary.

Lots done

I feel like I got tones done today - I love days like this.  I picked up the last piece of edging I needed; I picked up a bike lock for C Monster's wagon, I gave plant food to all my seedlings, washed dishes, made iced tea, swept the floors, vacuumed, changed the bed linens, blogged, chopped up some kale to freeze, watched True Blood (yes this is an important part of Monday for me - it's my treat to myself during C Monster's nap), rotated C Monster's toys, changed the shower curtain... I am sure I forgot something.

Looking Forward

Going to the AGO.

To Do, Chickpea - Babble

To Do List

Many people say I am the most organized person they have met; well that is because otherwise I forget everything. Just how crazy am I about making list well lets see - we have shopping list; to do list; cleaning list and so one. I also have a daily to do list this is the stuff that I need to do everyday. I post the list on my white board and as the day goes by check stuff off as it is done.

How do you keep yourself organized?

Beans & Chickpeas

It's not a secret despite my best effort C Monster pretty much only eats pizza, pasta, crackers, eggs, cheese, edemame, peas, corn, smoothies, dried fruit in all forms. I was floored when he started eating chickpeas and black eye peas last night- he even did a repeat performance for supper tonight.

C Monster Babble No More

C Monster is slowly mastering his vocabulary and is developing some favorite sentences here is a peek in his vocab:

• Come papa (this is said every-time he sees a motorcycle; because his papa drives one)
  
• Help mama
  
• Mama Aide
• More mama up vroom vroom (this is said every-time we are in the car and I drive over speed bumps)
  
• Mine Mine Mine
• Meow en haut, down (by this he means the cat is on the counter and should get down)
  
• More juice
• There it is
• Yeah vroum vroum
• Papa this (and points at the toy he wants his dad to play with)
• Papa bye bye vroum vroum (this means papa went to work in the car)
• En haut cho-cho (this is used the describe a train on a bridge)
  

Looking Forward

To more sunny days...

Trying to get food into C Monster

Time 5:20pm - I am officially the most creative chef on the planet. No, not really, I just have an extra picky toddler. All toddlers are fussy in their own way but C Monster is in a class of his own. I like to think his palate is so refined that the my common grub is just not good enough for him; who am I kidding?

Tonight we are having mac and cheese with secret healthy treasures. It's your basic run-of-the-mill homemade mac-and-cheese but I have added about 2 tablespoons of puréed swiss chard and hemp seeds along with one tablespoon of flax oil. Here's praying it goes off well with the C monster.

Time 6:01pm - Christophe actually ate more then one bite of food; I call it success.

Movie Mondays

Christophe meet Yogurt...

Busy Busy Busy

We have been keeping crazy busy so I have been neglecting my blogging duties...

On Fridays we started attending French Circle time at Ella Minnow Book Store, they have a great space in the basement where various mom and baby classes are held. This is also one of the best book stores (for english books) for children that I have ever been to in Toronto. They keep a great selection of books and the staff is extra helpful. They do have a section of french books but not tones.

Christophe has been "eating" apple sauce, peach mush, sweet potato mash and rice cereal. I say "eating" because most of it ends up on him... I have been trying to give him fruit in the morning and vegetable a super time with a bit of the rice cereal. I think he likes the apples but its really hard to tell, he still finds having food in his mouth kinda weird.

On another note Geoff thinks Christophe may have signed the work milk!!! We offered him milk and guess what he was hungary. For the past few weeks Christophe has been opening and closing his hand while nursing. I always though he was just playing but maybe he has been signing...

21 weeks

I think I hit this great easy stretch in the pregnancy. I am sleeping well, eating well, my joints don't hurt as much.... However I am starting to feel fat. According to the scale I am not really that fat I only gained a few pounds from my conception date weight. This is probably due to the fact I exercise and cut down on the amount of junk I eat. However I still feel fat. It's probably because bending down is getting more complicated ( spread your legs then bend need to make room fro baby ) The other day I was vacuuming our vents; what was normally and easy thing to do, turn into this acrobatic feat. (Thanks Lisa for helping) First you sit down because crouching over for that long doesn't happen; then you do the semi splits with the vent in front of you then you can start doing the work. Another thing I have realized is carrying large things get odd you need to make sure it hangs below your belly. Which I find strains my little arms.

On another note I am eating more and more I think I need to be fed at every hour on the hour or I start getting nasty. I am just like a newborn baby don't get fed start crying. No it's not that bad but get what I mean.

Tomorrow I have my next midwife appointment it will be the first one that Geoff misses he is San Fran this week at a tech conference. It will weird not having him there as he has been to every doctors visit with me so far. Last night I called him to say good night to me and the baby. He is going to be such a great dad I held the phone to my belly and he talked to baby.

Oh and I have my car back yippy - it only took 2 weeks.