That sounds so cold and clinical, doesn’t it? “Feeding update,” as if it’s simply medical news that I have to share. It’s not, of course, that simple. Feeding — eating — are complex activities, bound up as they are in shared history, memories, nurturing, and love. I literally tear up when I see another child my son’s age greedily stuffing Cheerios or strawberries in her mouth. I wince when my friends lovingly tell me that their child was a picky eater, too, and that Hunter will grow out of it. (If only he were just picky, I want to shout!)

He still refuses to eat. I have been taking him to occupational therapy at Children’s Healthcare (CHOA) and I have enrolled him in a state-run program called Georgia Babies Can’t Wait. (Ironically named because it takes months to get in the program.) While we haven’t had a therapy visit yet with GBCW, I am excited about starting with them because their therapists come to the home. I believe Hunter will respond much better in his natural environment. He freaks out when we step into the small, claustrophobic therapy rooms at CHOA. “Let’s go in this small room where he won’t feel so overwhelmed,” they tell me and I think, “so small he can’t get far enough away from YOU.” You see, he’s still going through that stranger anxiety phase.

In order to qualify for the GBCW program, a team of occupational and speech therapists came to the house last week (week before last? It’s all a blur) and evaluated him. He had to be moderately behind in two developmental categories or severely behind in one to qualify. As a mother, this was a gut-wrenching directive. I want him in the program, but I don’t want him developmentally behind on anything! In the end, he was perfectly normal with motor skills, speech, and all other categories except feeding, in which he did have a severe delay. He’s at 6 months on the chart (instead of 16 months). <sigh> So we qualify.

In the meantime, we took him to a pediatric G.I. to determine what’s going on with his reflux. It’s important to make sure there is no pain with eating, or no structural defects, so all we have left to work with is the behavioral issues. She ordered an upper G.I., which we had this morning. The radiologist said it looked normal. They were looking for narrowing in the esophagus or anything else that might be causing him to choke and gag when he tries table food.

So that’s where we are. He’s on the highest possible dose of Prevacid for his age/weight to control the reflux. His “insides” look fine. We have behavioral food exercises we work on in therapy and at home (called “snack therapy”). We are working on a progressive de-sensitization program. Right now, we put food on his tray and encourage him to play with it, touch it, but we never, ever, suggest he eat it. (Weeks ago, he was hysterical at the thought of even TOUCHING a pretzel. Now he will happily shove it in a cooked carrot and make a tower.) We are working up to getting him to kiss the food, then lick the food . . . beyond that, I cannot imagine.

When he’s 16 and eating me out of house and home, I will not complain. This I promise you!

For those of you new to this issue, here’s what went down at our first appointment with an occupational therapist. Our 2nd visit was much more productive. For starters, we saw a therapist who specializes in feeding issues with infants (vs our first visit with one who did not). She explained some of the reasons why this happens: one of the most common causes is infant reflux (GERD). Basically, as our son started trying finger foods, he choked and gagged. She said that chewing is a learned skill and he “learned” that it’s more trouble than it’s worth because it caused him discomfort.

She likened it to an adult getting sick from eating undercooked chicken or drinking too much. We’d avoid the offending food or beverage for a very long time!

The protocol to “fix” this is a 6-12 month program with weekly visits. <sigh> I don’t mind really schlepping him out there weekly. I just mind that he has the problem. Poor little guy. I worry that we’re setting him up for a lifelong uncomfortable relationship with food – something I thought was primarily the domain of women! (Only half kidding.) Is he going to hate food? Love it too much? Undereat when he’s older? Overeat? Use food as a weapon, a comfort, or something else? And how am I the one qualified to help him through this? I totally stress eat or stress starve.

This is not good.

We were told to do homework:

1. Put finger food on his tray at every meal. Do NOT try and offer it to him. If he throws if off the table, we are to pick it up and say “food stays on the table.”
2. Feed him only easily accepted foods. Don’t try anything too textural or that we know he won’t eat.
3. After the meal is over, have him help us “clean up” by picking up the finger food and throwing it into a little trash can (paper cup or bowl).
4. Then, we do an “exercise.” They gave us a thing that looks like a toothbrush, except it has bristles all around the tip. (Like a miniature blow dryer round brush – the size of a toothbrush.) We are to touch it to our lips three times, saying “Mommy’s turn . . . 1, 2, 3,” then touch it to his lips saying “Hunter’s turn . . . 1, 2, 3.” We have to do three sets of this.
5. When this is done, we are to recount what we did and praise him. “You ate your yogurt and helped Mommy clean up and did your exercises. Good job!”

So how’s it going? Well, much better after a VERY rocky start. The first few days, he screamed and cried every time we did the brush. It got to where he would scream and cry as his meal was ending because he knew what was coming. Now he lets us do it and even occasionally smiles during it.

He also showed an interest in playing with his baby food. OK, so he still won’t touch a Cheerio or a puff (except to throw them in the “trash”) but at least he’s touching food! Christopher (my hubby) thought he looked like Pooh with his hand shoved in the honey pot.

We have our next appointment tomorrow. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Look at that cute face. It’s a chubby little face. You’d never guess that this boy won’t eat anything that isn’t pureed. (Sorry; I can’t figure out how to put the accent on “puree.”) And I mean nothing. We’ve tried:

• Cheerios
• Puffs
• Every fiddlestick, cruncher, toddler finger food thing-a-ma-bob
• French toast
• Cake, muffins, pancakes
• Cheese
• Cottage cheese (this is even too lumpy for him)
• Soft cooked veggies
• Teeny, tiny bites of strawberries
• And dozens more

He refuses, cries, and if I get the food in there, he coughs, chokes and spits. He has acid reflux (or had it; I’m still giving him the medicine for now just in case) and it’s possible that foods with more texture irritate his throat.

We were referred to an occupational therapist who specializes in feeding issues. It took four weeks to get an appointment. Four long, agonizing weeks while his non-eating habits solidified. The day of his appointment, they called to say the therapist was sick and the earliest they could reschedule us was three weeks out. So we waited. That day came – last week – and my phone rang. This time, the therapist had a family emergency, and would I like to reschedule?

NO THANK YOU VERY MUCH I WANT TO BE SEEN TODAY!

Actually, the scheduler was very nice and jumped through hoops to find someone to see us that day. The problem was, the therapist we saw usually works with older children, not infants, so we left feeling about as confused as when we arrived. We’re scheduled to go back next week to meet with someone else. <sigh>

In the meantime, we have to do a food challenge once a day. We are to take a pureed food, like carrots or sweet potato, and put chunks of the same veggie in it. We tell our son to “take his bite” and wait for him to take it. We’re supposed to ignore the tears and if he puts his hands up (which he sure does as he tries to bat the spoon away), we are to lay our arm over his arms (push his arms down; don’t restrain his hands) and insist he take his bite. If he still refuses after 20 seconds, we are to smear the “bite” on his mouth (I guess the thinking is he’ll lick it off, which my son never does). If he takes his bite, we’re to praise him and offer a reward of food or a toy.

I should have asked the therapist to show me how to do all this, not just tell me cuz I’m not sure I’m doing it right. Plus, our little guy just swallows those soft chunks. It’s just like a Level 3 food. He doesn’t chew. (She did test to see if he could chew and he does know how, so that’s something.)

We reward him with yogurt because that is his favorite thing in the whole world. There isn’t much he won’t do to get his yogurt at dinner.

It went well the first two nights, but has been awful every night since then. I was so exhausted at the thought of it last night that I didn’t even try. My husband did it one night and he said he clenched his jaw so much that his neck was sore.

This is not fun.

I’m confused and unsure if we’re doing the right thing. I hope this next therapist is better. I’ve heard that there are groups that come into your home and work with your child. If this next appointment isn’t more useful, then I will look into that . . . and probably have to wait forever to get an appointment again.

Anybody out there who’s been through this successfully? Care to share your insights?

And what causes it? Could this all be stress-related because we moved when he was 10 months old? He got a new nanny at the same time so there were a lot of changes. And then he started cutting molars, caught a cold, then a stomach virus, then another cold, and an ear infection. All within about 2.5 months. Can that much stress cause a baby to delay his development in one area? He’s on track with everything else, I think. He used to eat puffs and gnaw on teething biscuits or cookies – not often, but he did do it occasionally. Just will not do it at all now.

Here’s the other frustrating thing about this food challenge program. He’s not really doing anything different by eating chunky sweet potatoes than if he were eating a Level 3 food (which he eats every day). All I’m doing is pissing him off by making him wait for his yogurt. If I gave him the yogurt first, he would then eat those sweet potatoes like no big deal.

The therapist didn’t teach us how to get him to take finger food, which is the real problem. I don’t want to force his mouth open to shove a puff in there. I guess we’ll learn that next time.

Reader Marie posted a comment last time I blabbed about this that she is going through the same thing with her son who is two months younger than mine. One of the great things about the Internet is the opportunity to connect with people like Marie to share our stories and swap tips. For those of you who are going through this, too, we’ll keep you posted on our progress!

Since we recently moved into a smaller house (while we build the new house), we did a lot of purging of stuff we don’t need or use. Not surprisingly, a lot of the unused stuff was baby gear. I remember when we were pregnant, friends and family gave us so many hand-me-downs that it looked like a baby bomb went off in the house. Lucky me, I have a friend, Catherine, who is a professional organizer so she helped me go through it all. But she’s not a mom so we did keep a lot of stuff we just weren’t sure about.

So if you’re about to be a new mom, here are a few things you can probably live without (although everybody is different) or that will have surprisingly short shelf lives.

Monitor. Yeah, I said it. We had two sets and never used them. They baby sleeps in your room (but not in your bed) the first few months. When we moved him to his crib, his room was right across the hall and we could hear him. Even if we were downstairs with the TV blaring, we heard him if he woke up. Babies are plenty loud.

Wiper Warmer/Bottle Warmer. If you get them used to warm wipes or warm bottles, you’re hosed. Try and do room temperature as often as possible. (If you have a refrigerated bottle of breast milk or formula, warm it up just to room temp. I have a friend whose 13 month old still wants her milk HOT because they warmed her bottles up too much when she was an infant.)

Receiving Blankets. Most of them are too small to use as swaddle blankets. They’re too tiny to really wrap the baby in the stroller. I suppose you could tuck them around in a car seat. But here’s the deal: you’ll get about 20 and only use those teeny tiny ones for a month or two. Get some bigger blankets you can use for swaddling.

Mobiles. I thought it’d be neat to have two mobiles – one for the crib and one for the changing table but our mobiles didn’t fit either. We rigged one for the crib and it was useful for a few months. This is one of those short shelf life things. Once they’re sitting or pulling up, you have to remove it from the crib so they don’t pull on it and get tangled up in it. Get a mobile but don’t spend too much on it! And make sure it’ll fit your crib.

Diaper pail. We used it at first but they do get stinky when the babies get bigger. And when they’re tiny, their diapers just don’t stink that much. By around 8 months old, we gave up on the diaper pail. We take the stinky diapers to the kitchen trash. (But first we wrap them in a glove \which helps keep the stench in.)

There are many, many other things, I’m sure but these are the ones that come immediately to mind. How about you? What were some things you found you could totally live without?

I wanted to subtitle this post: How to Outsource an Entire Birthday Party because in essence, that’s what I did. I fretted about it for about a minute; after all, I can use scissors and glue and could probably have made pinwheels and decorations myself, but given that we just moved, have a new nanny, have had too many illnesses to count, have a stove with a finicky oven (meaning no way was I going to attempt a cake), etc., etc., it seemed wise to just buy everything. But — and here’s the catch — I didn’t want it to look like some pre-packed party from the party store. I wanted it to look creative and unique and just like I did it all myself, which many of the party  goers thought. Haha! Fooled them!

The Occasion: My son’s first birthday

The Location: Our temporary rental (while our house is being built). 2BR, teeny tiny, so we limited the guest list to 20.

The Theme: My son loves anything that spins so I came up with the idea to do pinwheels. I also wanted a “color story” and focused on orange and yellow with pops of red.

The Planning: I did nearly all my research online (surprise, surprise) and used Evernote to keep track. You can see my notebook here. There are all sorts of random pinwheel things I found, including pinwheel jewelry (I contemplated wearing some) and shirts for Hunter to wear. I’m a HUGE fan of Evernote and will tell you more about it next week for Tech Tuesday.

The Vendors:

• Email invitations: I contacted Ariana at Becoming-Mom, because she just opened an Etsy store and she designed some darling pinwheel invitations for me. (If you haven’t read her blog, yet, you should check it out. It’s one of my favorites.)
• Pinwheels, pendant banner (with pinwheels), pinwheel favor boxes: Twirlie Whirlies Etsy shop. She could not have been more pleasant and fun to work with. I picked four papers from her selections and she made pinwheel after pinwheel for me. They were “real” pinwheels, too (meaning they spin) and the pendant banner she made is SO cute that we’re putting it in Hunter’s room. The stuff was perfectly packaged and really, really cute.
• Photo banner (also with pinwheels!): This custom banner was made by MaryHadALittleParty’s Etsy shop. When it arrived and my husband saw all the photos of Hunter, he got very choked up and quietly asked me if there was a way we could preserve this for him some day. I emailed her pictures from each month of the last year and she picked the ones that worked best in her format. She stuck with yellow, orange and red circles and added some pinwheels to the end. Really sweet.
• Pinwheel repositionable wall decals: These were a stroke of luck: bright, colorful pinwheel wall decals from Flair4All. I also bought some alphabet decals from them to spell out things like “Happy Birthday.” These are all going in his room as decorations. (I figure even though we’re only here for six months, I can totally use a lot of this stuff to decorate his room!)
• Food/Cake: The cake was made by a local woman who works with a friend of mine, so I don’t have a link to share with you. I gave her very little direction beyond “pinwheels” and love what she came up with. The food came from SouperJenny’s, which if you’re here in Atlanta, you probably already know about. The only catch with the food is that the party was on Sunday and they aren’t open on Sunday so we had to pick it all up Saturday. Our fridge is WAY TOO SMALL so we had to drop it all off at a friend’s house. The same friend who knows the Cake Lady. Good friends.
• Lollipops, candy: I found all the candy at a local candy store and got the jars at the Container Store. If you don’t have a candy shop locally, Google “whirly” or “swirly” lollipops. Lots of folks sell them online. I also got the favor boxes at the Container Store.

The Result: My dad, sister-in-law and niece came in for the party which was soooo nice. My best friend, who is insanely busy with her own kids, was able to make it (we held the party on Sunday to work around her kids’ schedule), as were several other close friends. Hunter was a bit overwhelmed by all the people. He did NOT smash his cake. Just kind of looked at it like, “Huh? What am I supposed to do with this?” All in all, a fun time.

OK, enough talk. Time for some pictures!

Today’s post is a two-fer, meaning I’m including it in both the Works for Me Wednesday series AND the Wordless/Wordful Wednesday series. For more great Works-for-me-Wednesday tips, check out WeAreThatFamily. And for more great pictures, go to SevenClownCircus, 5MinutesforMom, and WordlessWednesday.

Obviously, he doesn’t look like he’s starving because he eats baby food, but he will not put one bite of finger/table foods in his mouth. He’s about to turn 13 months old and the doc is referring us to an occupational therapist. Anybody had any experience with this?

We’ve tried everything: those melting puffs, Cheerios, CAKE, small bits of cheese, cookies, and more. When he was younger (7 months till about 10 or 11 months), he would gnaw on a teething cookie or those little Arrowhead cookies but he won’t even take that now. He used to eat the puffs, occasionally. He refuses it all and freaks out if I try and force it, which I suppose I shouldn’t do. About a month ago, I could force the first bite and then he usually would eat more bites, but I can’t even get him to do that now.

He eats Level 3 foods but prefers Level 2. Since he has eaten some table food before, I’m guessing it’s not structural (as in, an underdeveloped gag reflux or something) but he gags and chokes and coughs like it’s KILLING him when we try to get him to eat anything not pureed.

We have an appointment with a specialist next week (speech pathologist) who works on feeding issues.

I’ve read that babies need to get off the baby food because the table foods help them develop chewing muscles which helps them with speech, plus it’s easier to get his nutritional needs met. I’ve also read that this is slightly more common in babies who’ve had reflux, which my son had (maybe still has; I’m not sure).

Or could it just be that he’s a little behind? He didn’t crawl until 11 months. We did just move and got a new nanny. Maybe he just wants “comfort food” and for him, that’s smooth, pureed foods?

I literally couldn’t sleep the other night because this was worrying me so much. I’ll postpone the worry until we see the therapist next week. The pediatrician did say they see this texture aversion often and it’s correctable. I just don’t know anybody who’s dealt with it before. Do you? Let me know if you know anything!

GUEST POST FROM CARA:

Thanks to all of you who attended Amy McCready’s “The Art of Cosequences” free parenting Webinar last night. And thanks for being patient during the initial technical difficulties! I hope you found her instruction and tips to be of use (as I have found after using them with my two boys), and if you’re interested in learning more (and there is A LOT more to learn!), I encourage you to sign up for her online course at Positive Parenting Solutions.  

Thanks again!

GUEST POST FROM CARA:

Did you know that Amy McCready, presenter of tonight’s free parenting Webinar (at 9pm EST), was recently featured in a New York Times article, “Shouting is the New Spanking?”

Here’s a peak into what Amy has to say:

“I’ve worked with thousands of parents and I can tell you, without question, that screaming is the new spanking,” said Amy McCready, the founder of Positive Parenting Solutions, which teaches parenting skills in classes, individual coaching sessions and an online course. “This is so the issue right now. As parents understand that it’s not socially acceptable to spank children, they are at a loss for what they can do. They resort to reminding, nagging, timeout, counting 1-2-3 and quickly realize that those strategies don’t work to change behavior. In the absence of tools that really work, they feel frustrated and angry and raise their voice. They feel guilty afterward, and the whole cycle begins again.” (Excerpted from the NY Times online)

Want to know what you should be doing instead of yelling? Come to our free Webinar tonight — hurry and RSVP while there are still spots left! Oh, and did I mention it’s free? And it’s not the kind of ”free advice” your (helpful) mother-in-law freely gives you… this is really, truly helpful, targeted, tested tips that will make life with your children so much more enjoyable!

GUEST POST FROM CARA:

As a mom of two little boys, I’ve experienced the many highs and lows of child behavior. And with that, I’ve run the gamut with methods and tactics for discipline. Some things have worked, some things worked for a while and some things have really backfired. When we come off of a bad behavior week (you know, the times when something goes disastrously wrong every. single. day.) and I’m at the end of my rope, I’ll try anything — short of electric shock therapy (for me, not the kids) — to get back on track.

And that’s exactly where I was when Sherean approached me with the opportunity to review a parenting course from Positive Parenting, and co-host a free Webinar for other parents at the end of their rope. I jumped at the chance! I buckled down and sat through the online video Breakthrough Course… and loved it!  I started implementing the new tactics right away and not to sound cliche, but I really did see immediate improvements. Now, I’m not going to tell you that my boys are at 100% (or even 75%) every day, but at least now, I have effective tactics and tools for addressing behavioral issues.

So here’s the cool part for you: by reviewing this course, I get to provide you with a FREE Webinar called “The Art of Consequences,” which applies to kids ages 1-16, presented by Amy McCready (founder of Positive Parenting) that will teach you:

The free Webinar will take place on Wednesday, November 18 at 9 p.m. EST. RSVP for your “seat” here.

I highly encourage you to RSVP in advance as the seats/space is limited (yes, even though it’s in cyperspace). Not to mention, once you RSVP, you’re more likely to put it on your calendar — this is your chance to get a new lease on parenting! I have seen first-hand results from these techniques and am so excited to be able to share some of the lessons with other parents who need a break from the crazy.

See you there!

The peepee teepees. Seems like a cute idea but utterly useless. I should know. I bought them for my sister when she had her son 5 years ago. She re-gifted them to me. I tried it once. First of all, it ain’t going to stay on a wiggly baby’s weenie. And second of all, he’s going to pee right through it. Save your money.

There’s a lot of press about postpartum depression. I mean, who hasn’t heard of Brooke Shields squaring off against Tom Cruise over it? I was prepared for postpartum depression. I’d struggled with depression before, mostly in my 20’s, but some in my 30’s, and knew that put me at a higher risk.

What I didn’t know is that you can also get depression DURING pregnancy — perinatal depression, it’s often called. I got it, big time, along with a big wallop of anxiety. So bad I had to see a psychiatrist and was treated for it with medication. Of course, this made me feel guilty and like I was going to hurt my baby. The doctor explained that the risks with the medication weren’t known, but they did know the damage that depression and anxiety could do to a developing fetus. Small comfort, right?

I took the meds and cried. My husband was wonderfully supportive. By mid second trimester, the hormones that were causing those problems went away, I guess, and I felt better. Just like the psychiatrist predicted. But the fact that I had depression during pregnancy put me at an even higher risk for postpartum so we were vigilant, watching for signs. Fortunately, I dodged that bullet.

I felt like such a bad pregnant woman. I hated being pregnant. I felt sick: you name it and I got it. I even got RLS (Restless Leg Syndrome) in pregnancy. The physical problems on top of the depression made for a pretty unhappy time. I remember crying on the couch and feeling soooo guilty that I wasn’t feeling happy. Everyone’s happy when they’re pregnant, right?

I knew I had depression and I knew it was triggered by something in my chemical stew. I’d been pregnant twice before (miscarriages); one pregnancy made it to 11 weeks and I didn’t have anywhere near this kind of anxiety. So the minute I sorted out that this wasn’t “normal” pregnancy hormone stuff, I marched my butt to my Ob and said “help.”

My son was born completely happy and healthy. I was thrilled and am thrilled every single day. He is such a delight. I can barely remember what it was like when I was pregnant to curl up on the couch and not want to read or watch TV or eat.

The New York Times has a piece out today about this and interviewed me for it. It really was hard to remember, even though it wasn’t that long ago. It’s like once the happy hormones kicked in, I developed amnesia about how awful it all was. I would not wish that on anyone. I agreed to be interviewed and photographed for the piece because I hope if you’re struggling, you’ll speak up, too. There is help. You will get through it and you will get better.

Now, for a funny story. Sort of. In my 7th month, I was getting my teeth cleaned. The hygienist told me she knew another woman named “Sherean.” “Really,” I asked, “is she Persian, too, like me?” The hygienist told me that her friend had died. “I’m so sorry,” I said and then I just had to ask how she died. “Postpartum depression after her third child.” Huh? You don’t DIE from postpartum, I said. “Suicide,” she said.

Thank goodness this was later in my pregnancy when I was over the perinatal depression but I was still paranoid I’d get postpartum. I laughed about it — how could you not — but it is a serious condition. Get help if you need it.

And don’t ever go to my dental hygienist.

Sure you can just use cloth diapers or any old towel to catch that spit-up, but I wanted cute burp cloths.  I figured if they were going to be laying around all over the house, they ought to match the decor.  I found TONS of cute burp cloths on Etsy – just like the designer ones at the baby boutiques, only less-expensive, plus you’re buying directly from the mom who made them.  I dug that.

Here are a few of my favorites (the photos are linked to the seller’s shops):

But some of my all-time favorites are the Monster Burp Cloths from Etsy shop Frank and Me.  I think this design is hilarious and the cloths are super-soft (made of fleece).  I also bought some of her little “swipers” (think booger-wiper or wash cloth) and a funny monster tooth fairy pillow for my monster-obsessed 4 year old nephew.  (Big hit!)  How cute are these?  These would be great to stuff in a shower basket for the next non-traditional momma you know.

Those burp cloths are fast-becoming my son’s “lovey.” Here he is cuddled up with them the other night. Isn’t this sweet?

Just a reminder: these are all items I actually own. Nobody sent me anything to review. Everything I blab about is something I own, know someone who owns, or want to buy.

I’ve been super busy working on a couple of presentations for upcoming speaking gigs. I love doing the research but find myself distracted because we also have to finalize the plans for the new house (more research) and pack up all our stuff with an 11-month old who has picked NOW to start getting wigged out by new people, places and things.

So it’s stressful but it’s a good, happy kind of stress. My husband and I are going to build our dream home — and it’s going to be pretty “green” (environmentally friendly) with great energy efficiency. Our baby is going to get to grow up in this new house which will be healthier for him and the planet. And we’ll be living in a neighborhood that I LOVE. I really can’t wait.

In the meantime, I’ll be a little nuts and I’m sure it’ll be reflected in even more random posts than usual. Bear with me!

Open in the browser right now:

Another cute owl mobile that didn’t make my owl post. I saw this on Gifts Define Facebook page. It was a custom order and I said, “hey, you should make that available in your shop,” and they did – the day after my owl post went live. I wanted you owl-lovin’ folks to see it, though, as I think it would make a darling addition to an owl or woodland creature themed nursery.

Pregnancy Posts. I am loving the pregnancy posts at DesignMom. DesignMom is pregnant (with her sixth!) and is posting pregnancy stories from other women. They are well-written, some touching, some funny, but all of them made me smile. Even though I HATED being pregnant (something I’m going to tell you more about next week).

My Best Friend’s Birthday. Today is Terri’s birthday. She is my best friend. You know the one you can call for anything, any time. We’ve known each other for 17 years and through a series of jobs and coincidences, have actually lived in three states, worked at the same companies, and lived in the same zip codes. She is an amazing woman and I wanted all of you to know it. Here’s one of my favorite wedding day pics of the two of us. Even though you can’t see our faces, I think it says it all. HAPPY BIRTHDAY, T!

While you’re here, don’t forget to check out our giveaway. You could win a $75 Zutano shopping spree! (My little munchkin is wearing Zutano in the above pics.) Deadline is midnight tonight!

Looking for more great photos? Grab a cup of tea or coffee and check out these sites that host more Wordless Wednesday entries: SevenClownCircus, 5MinutesforMom, and WordlessWednesday.

A good friend of mine is going with an owl theme for his daughter’s 1-year birthday. I sent him some ideas the other day and then I noticed on our Facebook page that one of this blog’s readers, Courtney, is going with an owl theme for her daughter’s nursery. I posted some  links for her, too.

And then I thought, duh, maybe other people would like links to cool owl stuff for babies? So here you go, by request, sort of, my list of owl stuff.

Bedding: Pottery Barn Kids Brooke Collection

Toy Box: Etsy Shop ModMomFurniture

Mini Owl Stuffed Animals: Perfect for a baby’s room or party favors from Etsy seller AprilFoss

Wall Decals: Repositionable fabric decals (forest creatures) from Etsy seller LoveMaeStore

Mobile: Check out this bamboo, laser-cut owl mobile from Branch (eco-friendly shop) – not pictured above but it’s cute!

Birthday Party or Baby Shower:  Cupcake toppers and party decorations from Etsy seller CiaoBambino

Perfect Little Owl Outfit: Zutano Owls print (register for our giveaway – deadline TONIGHT at midnight – and win it!)

Hand-Made Owl Shoes: These baby shoes from Bugaloo are sooo cute! I just ordered a pair for my son.

Looking for ideas for your nursery or party? Or just gift ideas in general? Email me at sherean at gmail dot com and I’ll see what I can rustle up.

This post is part of the Works for Me Wednesday series, hosted by WeAreThatFamily. Lots of great tips and tricks there every Wednesday!