Tonight before Ethan's bedtime, I introduced to him a SNS tube.  It's a feeder tube that I insert one end into a bottle and then the other end into his mouth while he is nursing. This promotes an immediate flow of milk so he doesn't get discouraged or impatient about 'working' for his milk.  Why did I do this?  Because Ethan won't breastfeed before bed (he always gets a bottle and I want to get rid of bottles period if we don't need them!).  So, to my amazement, it worked and he nursed...for 2 minutes.  Let's backtrack a bit... he went down for a nap at 6pm and woke at 7pm.  He nursed then.  So fast forward, he wasn't hungry at 8:15pm.  But he did it and I'm happy about him doing it!  Small success in my opinion!

I made an awesome (vegan) Mushroom Risotto today.  Due to my dairy allergies and Ethan's possible allergy, I have to keep myself interested in making non-dairy foods - foods that I enjoy.  It was fantastic.  It's from the Candle Cafe Cookbook and you would never know there was no dairy in it.  I took a photo. Not the greatest, but it still looks good in my opinion!

I then proceeded to bake... I made a Vegan Snickerdoodle Blondie!  Can I just say OMG Yum!  It took a total of 7 minutes to combine the ingredients and another 20 to bake.  It was from Sweet Tater's blog.  You can find the  recipe here.  Technically the way I made them was not vegan because I used an egg. (Since I'm not vegan, I figured it was ok - plus I didn't have flax seeds).  It was light and fluffy and not too sweet surprisingly.  It was just fantastic!  I highly suggest these. I think I'll be making this for Easter.

What else did we do today?  Well between the major thunderstorms, we took Ethan to the hospital to visit my work friends.  I can't believe it's already been 6 months since I have worked.....I have 8 to go (possibly 9 if I go back in the new year).  (Six months because I was off for 2 months on sick leave due to the gestational diabetes and preterm labour threats).  I have to say I do miss working.  I would not however, sacrifice any  time I could spend with Ethan in this year to go back early though.  I don't think that is worth it whatsoever.  I already lend him out on Monday's to my mom - I don't think I could handle any more long spans like that!

Ethan is loving his playtime lately - alone.  I mean, he doesn't mind if I stick my head in his way when he is playing of course, but he does well on his own.... he does about 15 minutes on his playmat batting at the toys and when we do the jolly jumper, I'm sitting with him, but he does a good 10 minutes.  In his pack n play he would probably hang out for an hour!  We limit that time to 20 minutes (usually I stick him in there if I'm pumping in the morning and park him right next to me).  We are really learning his cries now - he cries when he needs something which is nice.  It's rare that he cries randomly... but when he does, and we can't figure it out it breaks my heart.   I'm chalking it up to teething because I can't figure what else it may be.  Usually the crying involves him sticking his finger in his mouth and pulling on his gums..... poor baby!  All in all, he is doing so well, reaching all his milestones and is such a HAPPY BABY.... always smiling, laughing a lot now - we got a couple belly laughs today!  He melts me!  I just love that little boy to pieces!