Juicing Update

It's my 2nd full day of juicing and everything's good so far. I initially thought that the juices will be totally horrible but they honestly taste good, especially when chilled.

This has been my routine for the past two days:

Morning - drink calamansi + hot water

- drink a cup of juice

- work out

Lunch - full meal (no more than 400 calories)

- drink calamansi + hot water

PM snack - drink a cup of juice

Dinner - drink a cup of juice

- drink calamansi + hot water

I feel good so far and I have never experienced any headaches nor dizziness, not that I wish for those things to happen. I feel food that I have somehow included vegetables into my diet which I have never thought possible before. 

Hello, Juicing!

My recent string of (minor) illnesses prompted me to take a step back and look at my diet. I've never been a veggie eater (except for potatoes and munggo) and this has been nagging my conscience for the longest time. Right now, my idea of diet is calorie counting -- I try not to go beyond 1000 calories per day but it is a challenge of course simply because I don't get to make my own meals. Plus, I work at Bonifacio Global City where all these yummy restaurants are just wanting to be tried.

Sooo, my mother has recently purchased a juicer and this is now my chance to try my luck in JUICING. I've made a simple plan based on recipes and articles that I've read online.

Don't judge me yet, I'm a beginner at this (napaka-guilty naman). I'm starting out this weekend. I hope to succeed in this new health venture =)

Bottle Free After 3 Days

I am happy to report that my little project worked and we are now completely bottle free after 3 days! 

I predicted 3 days of agony for my little girl and I was right. On the 2nd day, she cried a little less than the first day. On the 3rd night, she didn't wake up at night anymore to ask for milk. I'm so proud of my baby girl.

Yes, I would have to admit that this actually made me happy but sad. I felt like crying while I was packing her bottles because it meant that my daughter isn't a baby anymore. I wanted to cry again when my husband told me that we should pack the sterilizer away. Yes, I'm a very emotional mommy. Don't you wish they can be babies forever? 

Of course, there's always a disadvantage to every situation. Now that my daughter doesn't drink milk from a bottle anymore, it proved my long-debated point that she is just a mere comfort nurser. You see, my husband was so against the idea of weaning her off the bottle because he was so worried that our daughter will get hungry. I kept on telling him that Zoe's just a comfort nurser. My problem now is that she rarely drinks milk from a cup. I still want her to drink 2-3 glasses of milk a day to help her bones develop but it seems that this is becoming a challenge for us now. Is yogurt milk an acceptable alternative? She seems to feast on her dutchmill drinks so much as if it's on buffet.

Bottle Weaning Day 1

Couple of months before Zoe turned three, we've been conditioning her mind that she won't be drinking milk from a bottle anymore because she's already a big girl. When she celebrated her 3rd birthday, we still couldn't get round to weaning her off the bottle because my husband felt really bad about it. 

Well guess what. Yesterday, my bestfriend who lives in New Jersey messaged me with an idea on how to wean Zoe off the bottle. Before we took an afternoon nap, I told Zoe that we will go to the mall and buy any toy that she liked but we will have to use her milk bottles to pay for them. She pondered on it for a while and said 'I want to buy a xylophone'. We had a little talk about the consequences and she agreed. 

At the toy store, it took her almost 2 hours to decide on a Barbie piano, a Little Tikes xylophone, and a couple of Play Doh sets. In the end, we got her a mini-fridge Play Doh set, a cheaper xylophone, and a Disney Princess cup. I told her that it's very important to choose the right cup that we she will use to drink her milk from and we let her choose the cup that she liked. Before we went to the cashier, she opened the backpack to say goodbye to her bottles. It broke my heart but I knew we were doing the right thing. She counted all 13 bottles at the cashier and was very happy to get her toys. Of course she didn't know that her dad came back to get the bottles :P

At bedtime, she drank milk from her cup but when she was about to sleep, she suddenly blurted out 'I want..(milk)'. She literally stopped herself from finishing her sentence. She wailed for about 15 minutes before she finally fell asleep. At around 230AM, she woke up and asked for milk. We had to tell her that her bottles are gone and we asked if she wanted to drink it from her cup. She cried for about an hour and Dan had to carry her to comfort her. It was really heartbreaking to take something away from her but we felt that it was really time.

My baby fashionista

Gone are the days when babies and kids can only be dressed up in cheesy character outfits. Being a slave to style myself, I love dressing my little girl up. However, I still limit it to playful and young styles that are comfortable. I see a lot of kids nowadays who wear heels, see-blouses, sky-high dresses and skirts -- totally inappropriate and uncomfortable (tacky even)! I believe that kids should still look like kids but there's always a decent and classy way of dressing them up.

Here are some of my baby fashionista's outfits.