diapers diapers diapers

So to kind of cap off the last two entries, I would just like to add a 3rd to talk about why many families, including ours, choose to use cloth diapers.

I had actually made the decision to cloth diaper my children long before I became pregnant. It's something I had never even thought about until I saw a baby wearing a cloth diaper at the daycare I use to teach at. Before then, probably just like most everyone, I just assumed everyone used disposable diapers and that cloth diapers were just what they used "back in the day" - prefolds and pins covered with plastic pants.


..........meh too late at night... will continue these thoughts laterrrrrrrrrrrr...

How to wash cloth diapers

...and here's video #2! Just a quick run through of how we wash our diapers and how quick it easy it really is to do. Below the video, you will also find some great links to the cotton babies website - great resources with all of the facts that you need to know about washing your diapers as suggested by the cotton babies company!
Also, I completely forget to mention what to do about the poop in both of the videos! I added a link at the bottom of the page for the specifics... but just plain and simple - you shake it into the toilet!

How to clean diapers

What to do with the poop.

What detergents are recommended and how much to use.

Cotton Babies Diapers

For quite some time now, I have been wanting to make a video that simply shows the diapers that we use with Penelope and how to use them. Finally did it with the help of my wonderful husband :)
I've just gotten SO many inquiries from others about them and it's great to be able to show what WE use instead of having to hunt down a video of what someone else does.
Not completely perfect... but hopefully this gives all of you an idea of how simple it is to cloth diaper your little one! Give me the right motivation and we'll make a more refined version :P

To get a better view of the diapers and to order them, visit the cotton babies website.

Keep in mind that this brand of diapers is just what we use - there are a TON of other brands out there that also work very well. We've just had so much luck with these that I haven't been able to justify buying/trying more. Other brands that I have used on other babies that I would also recommend looking into are: Fuzzibuns (also available on the cotton babies website), Kissaluvs, best bottoms, G diapers and Kawaii ... available at nicki's diapers. You can also find wet bags like the one I show in the video on that website.

It's Potty Time!

So I'm super excited that we've decided to start potty training Penelope when we get back from California in three weeks! ...and even MORE excited to be going to California in less than two!!! It' just becoming more and more clear that she is ready for the transition. Weaning has been going very well and Penelope is showing many of the tell-tale signs that she is ready! She's been hiding to go BM and even comes and tells me, "mumma POO!" and does the sign for poop. She has also done the sign "potty" when she has wet herself. When either Alan and I go to the bathroom, Penny always comes running sqealing, "POT!" and doing the sign for potty. She even helps us get our toilet paper, flushes the toilet and reminds us to wash our hands. (I've purposely tried to leave the bathroom without washing my hands a few times and she'll grunt at me and yell, "wash! wash! ugh! ugh!" and point to the sink while doing the sign for water.)

I think Penelope will potty train relatively easy. We've tried it off and on to get her use to her potty chair since she was about 10 months old and have had a lot of luck getting her to go on the seat... just haven't actually committed to it yet.

We've known for a while now that we'd be training her soon, but just this week I realized that we need to come up with a cloth alternative to pull-ups as her current cloth diapers just would not work well.
After much research, I have found many kinds of training underwear - but pretty much all of the pull-up styles that absorb like a diaper and fit like undies are either hand made and/or just as pricey as Penelope's current diapers were... and I'm not about to spend another $300 on undies that she's only going to use for a few months.
My solution? I bought this baby!

I am going to attempt to make Penelope's bum genius diapers into pull-ups! I'll have to take the velcro off of them and use the above tool to add snaps to the sides. Below is a comparison of how Penny's diapers currently are (blue diaper) and how they will be with the snaps (green).

With the snaps, I'll be able to size the diaper a little loose, so that they can be pulled up and down easier. The velcro comes undone too easily (especially since ours are super worn out after over a years worth of use) and Penny hasn't figured out how to undo the snaps yet.

BUUUUT ... if anyone out there (hint hint Grandmas and Aunts!) is trying to come up with a good Valentines or Easter gift for Penny, the following would be wonderful :)
Both brands of training pants can be found both on Amazon.com and Nickisdiapers.com

Play Date!

A super fun, relaxed weekend was had at the Primm House :)
We had our buddies, Kieran and Seamus over for a play date for a few hours Friday morning! For the past few weeks, Penelope's favorite place to play has been her crib. She'll bounce around in there with her baby dolls forever if you let her. Well... maybe not that long... but she'll play around for at least a half hour, which is good for her age!
At one point during the play date, Penny asked... scratch that... BEGGED to go in her crib for her baby dolls. Once Penny was in, Kieran HAD to go in too and he was hooked! They ended up playing in there for 45 minutes! I tried taking them out a few times and they would just whine until I put them back in! They had so much fun bouncing around and giggling at each other :)

Penny has a pretty sweet toy called "the busy ball popper" by Playskool. It comes with about 5 of these little plastic balls that pop up, out of it and land in a funnel, winding them back into the toy to be popped back up. Penny loves running around with the balls and throwing them around.

I think that she's convinced herself that one of those balls are going to fit in her mouth one of these days...

Easy day today, but too lazy, so no picture :P
Babysat baby Elle today - Penny loves it at their house, so she was happy all day. Made cavatappi pasta with asparagus, pine nuts and parmesan cheese for dinner - always a hit! Talked to my big brother on the phone, played for a bit and put Penny to bed around 8:30pm!
Already looking forward to the weekend - hoping to get a lot of cleaning and organizing done!

They get along so well :)
We had a nice, slow start to our day. Penelope and I didn't have to be to my friend's house to babysit until 10:45... and since Alan worked really late last night, he went in late this morning. It was so cute to see how much Penelope and her buddy, Kieran missed each other the last two weeks. (Kieran is the younger of the two boys I watch... him and Penny are less than 3 months apart... I have been watching Kieran and Seamus every Monday and Wednesday for over a year now, but had the last two weeks off for Christmas.) You could hear Kieran squealing in delight as soon as he realized we were coming through the door. I don't think the two of them were apart the entire time we were there (with the exception of nap time). It's cute to see their friendship develop over time and to see the special relationship they have now :)

...it always amazes me, how quickly a child can mess up a perfectly tidy room. The above mess was created in about 30 seconds...

...I also want to point out Penelope's pretty new rug! Originally $200 at Pottery Barn Kids... I got it used for $15 on Craigslist!

No photo today - Alan had to use it for work... and he didn't come home until after Penny was in bed :(

Weaning, day 3 went well! I was afraid how it would go once another baby was around as Penny can sometimes fight for my attention but all of Ellie's toys kept her occupied well. She still asked a few times... and even had a bit of a melt down during the "witching hour" when we got home... so it was a good thing that Alan was coming home late today, I was able to make dinner early for her!

Penelope has been so awesome. I'm incredibly proud of how big and independent she is! She can feed herself with a spoon and is good about taking small bites of larger pieces of food. She can take her shoes off and can put them on by herself (on but now buckled). She can put her hat on and take off her shirt... if she has elastic banded pants, she can take those off too. She can wipe her own mouth and dry her hands when I clean her up after meals - she even likes to wipe down her place mat! I get to actually tuck her in at night now... I use to have to nurse her until she passed out and then quickly lay her down without waking her up. Now I nurse her about 45 minutes before bedtime and she plays nicely until it's time to tuck her in. Even if she doesn't seem super tired, she gets that it's bedtime and will let me lay her in bed - after giving Daddy and the puppies their hugs and kisses, of course. :)
She now sleeps all night - if she wakes up, it's usually around 6:30 ... if I nurse her, she'll go back down for another hour or two.

Love that baby :)

Today Penelope got to run around "outside"! Well... kinda... we went to the Mitchell Park Domes for the day! Residents get in free on Mondays, so since I didn't have to babysit today we got to go! It was so nice to let her run around and get some fresh air - it's been too cold to even let her play in the snow. We had a few days that were in the 50's this past week, but those happened to be the days that she was sick!
Surprisingly, there weren't that many people at the Domes today... usually their free days can be a bit more crowded, but I guess everyone is worn out from the Holidays still. As for Penelope and me... we HAD to get out of the house. Alan went back to work today and we're also on day #2 of weaning Penelope off the breast. She was pretty upset when she couldn't find Alan anywhere in the house - she really liked having him home all of last week and 1/2 of the week before. Needless to say, she was pretty fussy all morning - so being able to get out and run around without having to pay admission or parking was a God send!

Day #2 of weaning is going well! I don't want to take it away completely yet... I'm still nursing in the morning and before bed. I haven't decided when I'll give those two feeding up yet. For now the goal is to not nurse during the day. Usually this just means that I have to be more creative to keep her active and to have a sippy cup of whole milk on hand. She actually only asked twice for it all day! Tomorrow will be the real test though as I go back to work. We'll see how well she does when she has to compete with another baby for my attention. She usually wants to nurse just so that I have to hold her!

Put me in the Zoo

So my New Year's resolution is to keep up with this blog better. I find it comforting to be able to look back on my posts and see how the time line in my memory differs from reality. I hope that someday I can come back and reminisce about my sweet baby girl when she is grown... and I hope that she will be able to too.
Today we went to the Milwaukee County Zoo. I had actually thought that it was a "Family Free Day"... because it said that it was on their website... but apparently their website was wrong... we paid anyway and had lots of fun! It was about 19 degrees today, so we were sure to bundle up. Most of the exhibits have indoor areas, so we hopped from building to building, bundling and unbundling Penelope each time. With it being so cold, there were hardly an other people there - but the building were nice and warm. It was nice to be able to let Penelope run around and discover the animals on her own, on her own time without having to worry about her getting lost in a sea of people. I would have to say that the birds and the fish were by far her favorites.

You can see our new little friend in the lower, right corner of the above picture. His head just peeking over the corner of the plaque. He was so interested in us that he tried to squeeze his cute little head through the wires. Penelope kept grunting that she wanted to hold him.

We had to have spent the most amount of our time in the fish and reptile building. Penelope had so much fun standing on the window ledges and watching all of the fish, pressed up against the glass.

Happy Holidays 2010!

We hope everyone had a very happy Holiday season this year, as I know we did! We had a very laid back schedule this year, but we still had a lot of fun. We were able to spend some time with my family the weekend of the 11th and Penelope had a blast! Above is her and her cousin, Zoe Jane - they're both getting so big! My brother's family was super blessed this holiday season, as they learned that they will be having a baby boy this coming May! (Among all of my cousins and I, we have 10 children - all of them girls! So our family has been waiting for this for a while. It's doubly special since my brother is the only boy from my generation of grandkids that can carry on the Geurink name - now that role will go to baby Charlie Michael! )

Penny passed out on the lap of my Mom's brother, Mike :)
I thought this was really funny. Penny actually fell asleep in that same spot last year, but on the lap of my Grandma!

Penny got a new baby doll from my brother and his family - she absolutely loves it! It's so sweet how she loves on her little "bee bees".

Santa came to the family Christmas party! He was so sweet with all of the kids, they each got to come up one by one to sit on his lap and tell him what they wanted for Christmas. He even had a sack of gifts to give everyone!

Penny getting some help opening her new "choo choo choo" from cousin Anna.

All of the great-grandkids waiting patiently for their gifts!

The Geurink family at their Christmas finest! Alan and I, my father, Michael holding Penelope, my mother, Jean, big brother, Jeffrey, his wife, Jessica holding Zoe Jane, and my baby sisters, Michelle and Mikala.
We were actually scared that we weren't going to make it to the Family Holiday party that night, as we had a blizzard - about 12 inches of snow! (You can see that Alan came to the party prepared, wearing his snow boots!)

Penelope and her "pup-puppies"!

We had a bit of a scary start to our Christmas weekend. 2 days before Christmas Penelope came down with a fever of 103.5 and was having some trouble breathing, so we had to take her into the Emergency room at our local Children's hospital. She was diagnosed with bronchiolitis, where the smallest air passages swell up and make it difficult to breathe. Luckily she responded to an albuterol treatment, so she didn't have to be hospitalized.
For about 4 days we had to give Penny regular doses of albuterol with an inhaler - which she HATED. It took both of us to give it to her - one to hold her and one to hold the inhaler. Not fun. Besides sounding like a veteran smoker and occasional wheezing, Penny was just like her usual self. Would have made for a pretty sad Christmas if she hadn't been in her typical happy mood.
She was still able rip open all of her gifts with as much enthusiasm and we hoped and she had a blast!
Fortunately we had been planning to stay home in Milwaukee this year any way. We wanted to be able to start our own family traditions this year - usually we either drive to my parents' house in northern Wisconsin or fly to Alan's mom's house in California. This way we were able to get our first REAL Christmas tree! Penelope woke up Christmas morning to a wonderful sight in her livingroom!

Santa's first visit to the Primm home! Penelope was a very good girl this year :)

Grandma Mimi got to watch Penelope open her gifts from Santa via Skype!

Penny and Daddy playing with all of the new toys!

Merry Christmas!

You would never be able to tell that she was super sick by looking at these photos! She was in such a good mood and LOVED all of her gifts!

...Penelope also loved playing with the ornaments from the tree!

Penny is in love with the new kitchen set and baby doll high chair that Santa brought for her! She is so smart! She pretends to wash her hands in the sink, feeds her baby doll with a spoon and baby bottle and even brings food from the fridge for Alan and I to "eat"!

Alan and I were able to spend the whole week after Christmas with Penelope, which was perfect since she wasn't feeling well. By Tuesday she was completely back to normal and checked out perfectly at her doctors visit. There is a chance that this could have been a nasty sneak peek of how Penelope will react to getting the flu - I had the same problem when I was young. Instead of getting the flu, I had chronic Bronchitis. Especially since I have asthma, and Penelope has eczema, there is a good chance that this could also mean that she could develop asthma. Fingers crossed that that isn't so! If all of that yuckiness wasn't enough, Alan came down with food poisoning on Wednesday and we welcomed molar #3 into Penny's mouth!

Funny thing is that since both of us were going to be home this week, we had planned to wean Penelope off of the breast. Obviously this ended up not being the right week for that!