Etsy fever

Have you checked out Etsy lately?  I have been on a Etsy withdrawal.  I have my eye on a few items. When you create a profile on Etsy, you can save your favorite items to view every time you want. Inspired by these blue french doors I saw in a eatery in Brooklyn, I'm loving these items right now:

Set of mirrors for a gallery wall or entry way.

Poster frame, hung or stacked against the wall in your living or study.

The Waldorf Rainbow Stacker toy, perfect for sparking imagination and honing creativity. 

Striped green straws, perfect for summer cocktails in the patio.

Zodiac sign print from PaperBlue. Show off your sign strong points by displaying them in a cute frame.

Flower earring studs

Cute Flamingo tee for baby and toddler.

Have a wonderful weekend!

Do you like where you live?

I love our neighborhood of Dupont Circle.  It's a premium real estate land in the District, and even though we are renters, we definitely pay up for the local  amenities.  But in this stage of our lives we wouldn't change it for the world.  Now that we have Emilu, we like to stay as long as possible.  A mortgage is the next sensible step, but we aren't in any hurry especially when this city is not a buyer's market like it might be in the rest of the country.

Everything in Dupont Circle is within walking distance, including supermarkets, coffeshops, locally-owned hardware stores, trendy boutiques, as well as some of the city’s best restaurants and bars. Dupont’s buzz and commerce is Connecticut Avenue, which is bisected by the circle and packed with stores, restaurants, and bars humming with activity. North of the circle, the street is home to traditional favorites like Kramerbooks, one of the city’s best bookstores and popular cafes, and upscale wine bars Circa and Veritas. Hanks Oyster Bar, a local seafood eatery a block from our apt. is a great place to eat and unwind.  President Obama chose Komi, a local restaurant known for its progressive and rich course-meal dinners, to celebrate his anniversary with Michelle back in 2009.

Then there are the intangibles: freebies like the circle itself, which fills up on sunny weekends; a new dog park at 17th and S Street; and miles of bike lanes crisscrossing the neighborhood. On Sunday mornings, residents from all over the city flock to the neighborhood’s farmer’s market, the largest in the city, and pack the coffee houses with their iMacs, and copies of the Sunday NYTimes.

Do you like where you live?  What's so special about it?  Have a lovely weekend in your neighborhood basking in the last weeks of sun-filled summer days.

Creating your own Phone App

If you own an Android phone you can now create your own apps, including creating one for your blog.  I just did it! Now I will be able to blog from my phone with the same capacity as writing from a computer.  Awesome indeed!  I can finally see why an Android was the Smartest phone choice for me.

Breatsfeeding vs. Formula feeding, the never ending discussion

I'm still breastfeeding Emilu.  However, I don't do it exclusively. I give formula at a 50/50 rate.  There are many reasons for this, but the most enduring one was the inability to keep up with the proscribed lifestyle.  Breastfeeding demands a lot. It comes down to a choice because the cons of breastfeeding are there, whichever way they like to remain unseen.  These include sore and painful nipples for several weeks, engorgement effects, leakage, dietary limitations, and constrained mobility or freedom to enjoy the tasks you used to do, and the one thing no one challenges, the myth of shedding faster the baby weight.

Ha! Finally a study says it :  Breastfeeding moms lost weight slower than moms who chose formula from the start. Why?  Because breastfeeding moms had less opportunity to exercise AND because lactating moms consume more calories because the hormone prolactin stimulates appetite and thus prompts milk production.

I finally have an answer as to why I haven't been able to lose the last ten pounds.  But you know what bothers me and also scares me to death.  That they tell women that breastfeeding makes them lose weight faster and they have been able to get away with this. Doctors. My own brother told me so.  It makes me mad because it assumes that women are stupid and vane and in order to make them choose breastfeeding over formula feeding they have to appeal to what seems to be their superficial, trivial side, our Achilles heel, when it's really not. It is in our sociological  makeup to want to be trim.

 

There is no argument that breastmilk is better than formula as long as you keep getting nutritious food and continue to keep a healthy lifestyle, the one you had when you were pregnant.  But today's formulas are just as good in the nutrition department.  Where breastmilk takes the lead is in preventive care, because it contains hormones, anti-bodies and enzymes.

So let's put it to rest: Women should not be shamed into breastfeeding their children. It's just not for everyone. 

Toddling in New York

We drove up to New York City last weekend to visit my brother and brother in-law.  It was a fun adventure.  We put the dog in the front seat and my mother and I rode in the back with Emilu.  We made our usual stop in Delaware and arrived in one piece two hours later.  This trip was sort of an overdue family and friends reunion, packed with good food.  I was glad to catch up with a friend from Miami who has a very cool NYC style blog, and visit with my brother in-law and fiancee.  Here are some pictures of our outings.

Naughty little face, en route to NYC

I love this picture because it shows her multifaceted gestures.  Here I was telling her that we were almost there.

Mom with  Emilu.  Lunch stop in Delaware. 

PIki, our first -class passenger

At the Brooklyn flea in Fort Greene. 

The Techies, Edgar and my brother.

En route to Manhattan

Around Town

Hard to believe it's been a month since I last posted anything here.  Life with infant is full of surprises and very busy.  The only time I have to write anything is when Emilu is taking a nap and I always end up using those small fragments of time to pick up around the house, take a shower, fix lunch for my husband and I, or do laundry.  It's exhausting but so rewarding to be a stay at home mom.

This weekend we went to Georgetown and had lunch and ice-cream.  Emilu behaved wonderfully, she is now getting more used to being out and taking naps or eating outside, if circumstances dictate so.  Here are a few shots of our outing:

This is a beautiful home in the heart of Georgetown.  It has a southern charm that really captivated me.

We use the BabyBjorn when we want to navigate easily around town.  The stroller is nice too but we prefer the carrier for these special occasions.

We  got ice-cream in waffle cones from Thomas Sweet, a landmark of Georgetown.  I had the mocha with chocolate chips and Edgar had homemade strawberry ice-cream.

I hope you had a nice weekend too.

Happy Weekend

Yesterday I took Emilu in for her 2-month immunizations.  She had 5 vaccines including polio, pertussis and tetanus.  She behaved like a champ, only cried when they prickled her in both thighs.  Poor thing slept the whole day and night.  It was the first time she has slept for so long.  I gave her some infant's acetaminophen for pain relief.  She was also diagnosed with thrush, a minor yeast infection in her tongue.  She could have caught it from anywhere, the Pediatrician said.  She's in obvious discomfort when she eats from the bottle.  We are already medicating her for that, hopefully we will see some improvement soon.

Today was my 6-week post-partum checkup and I had the green light for, ahem, sex and, finally, exercise, meaning Pilates!  I'm so happy because I want to regain my pre-pregnancy figure.

Today we strolled with Piki and Emilu to our neighborhood coffee shop.  And Piki decided he wanted to play with Emilu's little pull-out toys.  I still can't believe how lucky we have been with Piki.  He seems to love Emilu.  When he's on the  bed and she is in her crib and starts to stir, he looks at her so tenderly and the love in his eyes melts me.  It also seems to disturb him when she cries, he comes over to see what's going on with her and looks at me to please do something about it.

Emilu and I are going away this weekend.  Here we come Miami!  I will be traveling with both child and dog.  Let's see how that adventure turns out.  Happy 4th of July weekend!  Be safe.