Play dates

Tomorrow Hazel and I are hosting our first play date. There are two other moms coming over with their 5-6 month old baby girls. In August I joined a local mother’s group- Peninsula Mommies. Since August I’ve attended a few events, most recently a babywearing event at the mall. Most of the mom’s in the group have older babies, but I have finally been able to meet a couple of moms with younger children. I’m excited to host a play date, especially since the other babies are Hazel’s age. She loves looking at pictures of babies and she really enjoyed the baby wearing event at the mall on Tuesday- she could look at other babies and toddlers for hours without getting bored. Not only will it be fun for Hazel to have other babies to “play” with, it will also be nice for me to meet some other mothers with young babies. I’ll give an update of the play date on Friday.

I have no new pictures of Hazel to share with you today, but I do have a picture of the cute shopping cart cover that I ordered from Goose Hill Designs. The cover is on its way and I can’t wait to try it out with Hazel at the grocery store this weekend! This is a nice alternative to always schlepping the car seat/carrier into the grocery store- especially since we will eventually be moving up to a car seat that can’t be carried out of the car!

The Visit- Part I.

This entry will be peppered with pictures from various parts of our visit with Great Grammy and Grampy- the pictures aren’t necessarily sequential, but there are so many good ones that I feel compelled to add them in. Jered’s Grampy and Grammy got here last week on Wednesday evening around 7 pm. Hazel is usually getting ready for bed by that time, so we tried to keep her up for a bit longer than usual so that she could greet them as they came in. She managed to stay awake just long enough to meet them before going to bed for the night. To say that the introduction was special would be an understatement- Great Grampy was so happy to finally meet Hazel that I could have sworn you could taste the excitement in the air.


The next morning we woke up around 7 and Hazel decided to show off her bubbly personality. She is definitely a “morning” baby- her best time of the day is first thing in the morning, in fact, most days she wakes up laughing and squealing. Great Grammy even got to spend some quality time with Hazel on the floor.


Every morning during their visit we played with Hazel either on the floor, in her command center (see the previous entry) or on somebody’s lap. There was plenty of love to go around the room!








There are at least 70 other photos on our flickr site- so if you’d like to see more shots from our fantastic visit- head over there. Jered will be posting about Hazel’s first solid food experience, which was also part of our visit with Great Grammy and Grampy- we have video and pictures of this too, so stay tuned!

The week ahead

We have a fun week ahead of us. Hazel will finally get to meet her Great Grampy Benoit this week. Jered’s grandparents are coming to visit at the end of this week and we couldn’t be more excited. Hazel has already had a chance to meet her Great Grammy, but it was over 3 months ago and she has changed so much since then! Hazel tells me she is so excited to see them both that she has decided to start waking up in the middle of the night just to check to see if they’ve arrived yet. The past few nights Hazel’s sleep has been a little erratic- it seems we’re having a bit of a sleep regression, she’s waking up somewhere between 1-3 am and again around 5-6. It’s not bad because I’m coming at it rested, but it is tough to have to get up in the middle of the night again after getting used to sleeping until 5 am most mornings! Let’s hope this will pass once the great grandparents get here and Hazel calms down- I’m sure she’s just overexcited about the visit!

I did a major photo update yesterday but forgot to upload these pictures taken from my iPhone at the pediatrician’s office just after Hazel got her shots. As you can see, Hazel’s daddy takes very very good care of her- making sure she always has a comfy place to rest on the toughest of days.

Those shots wiped her out!

We hope everyone has a great week- we’ll post pictures and more updates later this week once Great Grampy and Grammy arrive.

Boom De Ya Da!

When Hazel was a newborn, we found that singing to her would calm her and help soothe her to sleep. Esther has a small problem with this: She can’t remember the lyrics of songs. An unfortunate malady when you are soothing a crying baby.

In my search to find a song we could both sing, I randomly started sing the jingle from a Discovery Channel advertisement. It was both rhythmic and memorable.

We thought we would have to sing the song for a few months, but now that Hazel is smiling, we are singing it more now than ever. The video is below to give you an idea of what makes Hazel grin as big as she can.

The verse is not important, making it up as we go is par for the course, the chorus is everything!

Bubbles and Eating Toys

Here at the Benoit household things are really starting to get fun. Hazel has discovered how to blow bubbles with her incredible amounts of drool, and on top of that, she thinks it’s absolutely hilarious. She will blow bubbles and then laugh at herself, and she just loves it when we blow bubbles back- more laughter ensues.

In addition to the bubble blowing, she is now quite enamored with eating her toys. Pretty much anything she can get a good grip on goes straight to her mouth. We have these little plastic rings that hang from her car seat and she loves to give those a good gnaw. Today I broke out one of the teething toys we got at the baby shower back in April- she loves it! The poor little purple piggy is destined to be soggy from now on…

We’ve shot a few more videos and I hope to have those posted later this week. For now, I leave you with a few great pictures we took this past weekend. This first one is pretty unbelievable- we didn’t do any color correcting on her eyes, they are really that blue!

This next one is a photo of the origin of Hazel’s newest nickname- Goat Head. Jered thinks she looks like a mountain goat in this picture. I have to agree with him. I give you- Goat Head Benoit.

Hazel really loves tummy time now that she’s gotten better at pushing up on her hands and lifting her head up- this is one of my favorites.

And finally, evidence of the drool factor. I have never loved a messier human being.

Hazel’s First Road Trip

Yesterday we decided to make an impromptu trip up to Bowie, Maryland to visit Preston and Rob. We were a bit unsure how the whole thing would go since the longest car ride Hazel had been on was to Williamsburg and back (30 minutes one way). We packed up all our gear and headed out yesterday afternoon. We were careful to orchestrate the whole thing around Hazel’s feeding and napping schedule and that proved to be very beneficial for us. We got all of our stuff ready to go and packed the car, and then waited for Hazel to get hungry- we fed her and then packed into the car for the drive. She slept the entire way up!

Once we got to Bowie, Hazel was very hungry and ready to get out of her car seat. We got her fed and changed and she was content to sit in her stroller and “chat” with Preston and Rob for a couple of hours. Jered got her pack n’ play set up in the room we were staying in and around 8 pm I took her upstairs for our usual bed time routine. By 8:30 she was fast asleep (we were smart and took the baby monitor with us, so we were able to go downstairs without having to check on her every so often). We were able to spend the rest of the evening relaxing as she got her beauty sleep.

This morning around 7 Hazel woke up happy and hungry as ever- once she was fed and changed she laid down for another hour long nap. Jered and I were able to have coffee and breakfast while she snoozed. Once she was awake for the morning she came down and sat at the table with us as we lingered over breakfast. She didn’t fuss at all- just chatted along as we ate and talked. After her mid morning snack we all headed out to IKEA for a little shopping. Jered carried her in the Bjorn and she took a little nap during the first part of our shopping trip. We got to walk through the store at our usual leisurely pace and she eventually woke up and enjoyed people watching as much as we did. We found a few really neat things for Hazel’s room which is now completely finished- a few new lamps, two round orange carpet “dots,” and an awesome treasure chest toy bin. On top of that Preston and Rob got Hazel a toy Crocodile to guard her toy chest- it was quite the exciting outing.

After IKEA we headed back to pack up our stuff and feed Hazel- after she was fed and changed and we were all packed up we started our trip back home. We ran into a little bit of traffic- but nothing too bad considering it is a holiday weekend. Hazel slept the first hour or so of our car ride back, and was awake and happy for most of the next two hours. We stopped off just outside of Richmond to grab a bite to eat and feed Hazel- and then finished the drive home. We are absolutely blown away by how well she traveled! Thanks to Preston and Rob for a great little weekend get away- it’s too bad I have to work tomorrow or we could have stayed longer.

A follow-up to the Cloth Diaper post- Part I

So we’ve had quite a bit of chatter related to the cloth diaper post I wrote a few days ago, so I thought I would post some pictures and explain a bit more about the different types of diapers we have over the next couple of days. I am going to start with the Bum Genius 3.0 One-size pocket diapers that we have. These are probably the most like disposable diapers in that they are super easy to use- no folding, no pinning or snapping, just put the diaper on the baby just like a disposable. The other fantastic thing about these is that they are one-size, they have adjustable snaps that grow with Hazel so we don’t have to keep buying diapers every time she grows, making the initial investment well worth it! Here is a shot of 7 of our 8 BumGenius diapers, the 8th is currently on Hazel’s bum.

One of the perks of these diapers is that they are really cute- not as trim as a disposable but quite fashionable as they come in a variety of colors. Aside from aesthetics, the BumGenius 3.0’s are great because they are really easy to use. The diaper itself is stuffed with a microfiber insert (it comes with two inserts, one regular and one newborn and you can double stuff them at night for extra absorbancy). Here are a few pictures of a half-stuffed diaper and a diaper that has been stuffed and is ready to go.

This is a photo of the microfiber insert next to a diaper that is in the process of being stuffed.

This is a ready-to-go diaper, all stuffed and ready for diapering.

So how do these diapers work? Are they a giant mess? The diapers are super easy to use, once they’re stuffed (which we do as soon as they come off the drying line) they are put in the diaper caddy so that they are ready to go whenever it’s time for a diaper change. All you do is put it on like a regular diaper. Simple. Now to the second question- this is where I was the most anxious about cloth diapering, the poop factor. These diapers work like regular disposable diapers in that they go straight onto the bottom there is nothing between the diaper and the baby so if the diaper is soiled it gets soiled. This was scary to me until I washed the first load of dirty diapers. The washing process is a little bit involved, but once you get the hang of it and set up your system it’s really very simple. The dirty diapers go into a dry pail (no soaking beforehand) lined with a washable laundry bag and get washed every 2-3 days. The odor is contained in the pail pretty easily because the bag gets washed every couple of days and I have little baking soda fresheners in the bottom of the pail. When it’s time to wash the diapers are first put through a cold wash with half the recommended amount of detergent for one load of wash. It is very important for the detergent to be free of dyes, perfumes and enzymes (All Free and Clear works great!)- perfumes and dyes can deposit residue on the diapers decreasing their absorbency which can lead to leaks.
After the first cold wash you wash the diapers again with half the amount of detergent for one load of regular laundry in Hot water with a warm rinse. Then the diapers are dried- we are line drying to try and make the diapers last through a couple of kids!

There you have it! That’s pretty much it for the BumGenius 3.0’s. If you are interested, check out their website for even more info. We use these mainly as our nighttime diapers as they are very absorbent and keep Hazel dry through the night (she is now sleeping 7-9 hour stretches most nights!!). During the day we mostly use prefolds with covers- I will post about these another day as they are just a *bit* more involved. All in all we are loving cloth diapering so far!

How to melt a heart in 10 seconds

We have evidence of Hazel’s new noises and facial expressions on video now. This was taken over the weekend and shows just how amused Hazel is by her daddy- she only does this for him- I have yet to get her to do her little “laugh” for me more than twice in a row. This is the holy grail of baby parent interaction for us so far!

New Sounds from esther benoit on Vimeo.

I need a shot

Thursday was Hazel’s first set of shots. Esther and I knew she had gotten bigger than her last appointment, both in weight and length, but we were not ready for the measurements: 12 pounds and 2.6 ounces, and 22.5 inches. Wow! That explains why she has been sleeping so much better (research shows that once a baby reaches about 12 pounds, they can sleep through the night).

Back to the shots, with Hazel clad only in her diaper, the three of us waited for the five shots to be prepared. Yes, five, two in the each leg and one in the arm. A shot is a little anxiety producing for me, but five, that is down right scary. With a shot for every infantile disease, Hazel was in for a … treat.

Mom didn’t want to hold Hazel, it would just be too hard, so I was left that pleasure. Hazel, sitting on my lap, gets held by Dad to stop her from flailing around, while the first shot is administered. It took a second for Hazel to realized what was going on but when she did, the tears and crying started. Hazel looked around for comfort and calmed down immediately with some soft whispers from me and Mom. The nurses then held each leg as they prepared to administer the second and third shots. This is where the screaming began.

Remember when Hazel was born, we said that she had some impressive lungs? Yeah, they haven’t disappeared or gotten any weaker as she has grown. No, they were in fact more impressive than they have ever been. I now know what a cry of pain sounds like, and having to hear it three times in a day was a little rough.

She had the final four shots administered in rapid succession and responded like any baby would. I was worried that rest of the appointment would be difficult due to her uncomfortable state, but Esther and I were able to calm Hazel down before our doctor arrived.

The rest of the appointment was routine, kind of boring after the shots. The rest of the day, in her recovery, Hazel was remarkable. She was not nearly as fussy as people had led us to believe she could have been. She was awake most of the day, taking short catnaps instead of her normal nap schedule. That was made up for that night with a solid seven hours of sleep.

Her system has seemed to be a little off since then, but as I am writing this, Hazel has finally overcome any lingering side effects. The shots were scary, not for Hazel, she doesn’t know. It was scary for Mom and I. I know Mom cried a little and while I didn’t shed a tear, it was very hard to hear her scream in pain. I’m glad she’s recovered, and I don’t look forward to her 4 month appointment, as it involves 5 more shots.

Our Hazelnut

Today marks Hazel’s 7th week as an outside baby. She has grown so much in the past few weeks, and not just physically! One of the most dramatic changes we have noticed lately is her ability to socialize. She’s not quite hosting backyard barbeques yet, but she is definitely giving us plenty of social smiles (where she smiles in response to our smiles or ridiculous goofy faces). In addition to the smiling, she has also started to grasp things intentionally with her hands. She used to grab at things randomly, but now she will actually grab onto things and not let go until she is done with them!

We seem to be coming up on yet another growth spurt- I’m not sure that this one will be as much of a physical growth spurt as it is a developmental spurt. Hazel has been cluster feeding, which basically means that she and I are attached for most of the day and a good part of the night. Usually when she feeds like this she is also more fussy between feedings and sleeps a lot less. These times are probably the most trying for us, as she is awake a great deal but isn’t easily soothed or settled. Fortunately, when we have experienced these spurts over the past few weeks, they don’t last long. Usually within 2-3 days she is back to her usual calm and content self. I think we are on the tail end of this spurt, since Tuesday her sleeping has been pretty erratic and she has been very fussy in the evenings. She seems to fight sleep all the time. Usually she falls asleep after she’s nursed, but over the last few days she has resisted sleep, to the point where she becomes frustrated because she’s overtired. We are hoping she will soon be over this little spurt of growth- I know I am feeling pretty exhausted! The great thing about these times, though, is that after each growth spurt some new thing seems to emerge. These new things are usually pretty awesome: at around 2 weeks it was the ability for Hazel to be awake for more than 20 minutes without eating, at a month she started becoming more alert during the day and her visual tracking got much better, around 5-6 weeks we got our much anticipated first smile- who knows what is in store for us this time!