Hello Kitty!

Clover just had her 2 month appointment this week...well, more like 2 1/2 month appointment. Poor baby got 3 shots, but the Hello Kitty Band aid made it all better :).
She screamed of course, but she was fine. She slept through the trip to the grocery store on the way home.
Everything else looked great. She weighs 10 lbs. 14 oz. and is 23 inches long now! What a big girl!
That night she slept for a record time of 13 hours straight. She is quite the little sleeper :)

Grandma Kay is coming to town!

Two weeks ago Grandma Kay and Aunt Kit came to visit Clover! This was the second time for Kay to see Clover since her birth and the first time Kit got to meet her. Clover was on her best behavior, hamming it up to both of them. It was a great visit and we all had a lot fun!

Never leave the house without pickle juice....

My sister in-law gave me a bottle of this at my baby shower and I soon learned that this stuff is like liquid gold!! We never go anywhere without it. It’s called Colic-Ease and you can only find it online. . It’s made up of dill weed seed oil (hence the smell and taste of pickle juice ;) ), caraway seed oil, cinnamon bark oil, clover bud oil, and cardamom seed oil. It’s all natural and calms Clover down the second it touches her mouth...as though she knows relief is near :)

At first I had trouble trying to spoon feed it to her so I went to PCC and bought a couple of empty tincture bottles. I keep one in my diaper bag and one at home. I measured out that 4 dropper fulls equals 1/2 teaspoons, which is the dosage for newborns.

I give it to her for every feeding as a precautionary and in between feedings as needed. If I'm nursing her I just give it to her at the beginning and if we feed her a bottle we just mix it right in! This is a MUST HAVE for all new parents!

Cradle cap be gone!

Like every other Mother I was seriously dreading when Clover developed cradle cap. It's just yucky and if you're anything like me, it takes a lot of self control to restrain myself from picking at it. Picking at it makes it worse too because it causes the oils to spread. I asked around to all of my girlfriends and spent an entire afternoon googleing remedies for this. I tried a few things I came across, but nothing really seemed to work very well. It was finally the nurse at Clovers Pediatrician that suggested using the little funny brush that we came home from the hospital with to scrub her scalp with when we shampoo. I thought, Oh! That's what that things for? HA! I had no idea what it was when we got home and unpacked, but for some reason I held on it it.
The nurse was totally right. I started using it just as she suggested every time I shampooed Clovers hair. Ta Da, cadle cap be gone!

Smooth as a baby's bottom

As you can see the Chickpea (or Besan) Flour worked great! Clover's skin cleared up within days and looks so smooth and beautiful. I washed her face with the paste twice a day for 3 or 4 days and it was totally gone. I stopped doing it after that and noticed it starting to creep back up on us so I started it up again. Now I just wash her with it during baths which we give her about every other day and that seems to keep it away!

This was a little tricky and annoying at first and I tried to find a way to make it more efficient so I didn't give up on it since it works so well. First I made a big batch of it and put it in a jar to keep up with her bath things. Well, that didn't work because it started to rise and smell like yeast, haha, I should have know this as flour and water are used as a starter for homemade breads.
So, now I keep the flour in a small tupperware by the tub with a little dish. Each bath I just pour a bit of the flour into the dish with a few drops of water and mix it with my fingers to spread on Clovers face...kind of like a mask. When I'm done I rinse it out and it's ready for her next bath! The consistency, in my experience, doesn't seem to be all that important. Over time you'll learn what works for you. I tend to like it a little thicker. When it's too runny it's hard to keep it from running down into her eyes and mouth while applying it.

You should be able to buy this at any grocery store, but if you have a local Indian market I would suggest checking there. I purchased ours at a local Indian market called Mayuri and it was only $2.99 for a huge bag of it. Can't beat that!