A Day in the Life...

Today I had both little Chus at home with me and as usual, we spent most of our day running errands. After getting gas and buying our neighborhood pool pass, we stopped at JoAnn Fabric to buy material for Amanda's Pocahontas oral report. I had prepared for this journey by packing my purse full of snacks. Unfortunately, they had scarfed them down by the time we got to the cutting counter. With no more food to stuff in her mouth, Lex began to scream "out! OUT!" meaning she wanted out of the shopping cart. Thinking we were almost done, I let Alexa out. This was to be my downfall.

Two minutes later, she had tripped and fallen and hit her face against the corner of a metal shelf. The good news, she just barely missed her eye. The bad news, it was a bad cut, oozing blood and I wasn't sure if she would need stitches. So what is a good mom to do? Taking Kleenex from my purse, I staunch the flow of blood, while paying for my fabric and then head out to the parking lot to further assess the situation. Luckily, it didn't need stitches...but here is Lex after her losing battle with the shelf:

Disordered Eating

My little Lex is my tiniest peanut, and that's saying a lot since all three of my girls have just now barely made it onto the growth chart. Alexa, however, was actually characterized as "failure to thrive". This of course, made me feel like the world's worst mother. What was I doing wrong that my child was not growing? Was I not feeding her enough or the right things?

Eventually, we were sent to a pediatric nutritionist who gave us all sorts of helpful advice, like "add fat to whatever she eats". Uh, duh. I was already smearing her cheerios with cream cheese, adding Carnation instant breakfast to her milk, and letting her eat butter plain.

Now that's she's older and can express herself more clearly, I understand that in all probability, it had nothing to do with me. The kid just doesn't like to eat (unlike me, who lives for eating!) Case in point: at breakfast this morning she held the same bite of frittata in her mouth for, I kid you not, 30 minutes! Seriously, what am I supposed to do when she just holds it in her mouth forever? It would actually be easier if she just spit it out. Unfortunately, she was quite happy just sucking on the frittata like chewing tobacco and even posed for this fabulous pic.