We've introduced rice cereal. We tried it with a spoon on January 5th. She made lots of faces to let us know she didn't really like this new idea of ours. We tried the spoon on a couple days. Then Gene left for a conference in Pheonix and I was a little busy doing everything so I skipped the spoon feeding. Then the day before Gene was supposed to return to Lincoln, Mena got sick. Our little girl was actually a pretty good sick kid. Between bouts of vomit and diarrhea, she was smiling and talking to me like everything was just fine. She was sick for about 5 days. January 18th we decided she was 100% back to normal and we tried rice cereal again. This time we followed my mom and sister's advice and gave her the rice cereal in a feeder bottle. She really enjoyed the rice cereal this way. Once she's gotten used to the texture, then we'll try the spoon again.
Here's Mena on New Year's Day. Surprisingly, she was in a good mood. Dec. 30th the vibrating motor on her bassinet broke. She went cold turkey to sleeping without vibrations. For a few days, she wasn't getting any naps during the day. Then she'd finally crash late at night. After about 5 days she was napping and sleeping at night without any trouble.
Before I ever got pregnant, we'd seen a friend use a Maya Sling to carry their baby around. We thought it was great and bought one when I got pregnant. I'd tried to use it a couple times when I was on maternity leave but Mena would scream every time I put her in it because she couldn't see anything. I waited until she could hold her head up and I tried it again, but wasn't able to get her into it so that she was happy. So finally I just went to Target and bought a "Jennifer-friendly" baby carrier. Now Mena can happily accompany me while I'm getting things done around the house. She can face me or face out and next summer we can put her on either Gene's or my back when we go for hikes at Mahoney State Park.
