Esther's Great Love

Esther loves many things.  She loves people (especially babies), and bathing, teasing dad, going on walks outside, swinging at the park, and her mom.  But there is one thing she loves to the extent that it's an obsession.  That would be food.  

Some of the little ways Esther shows how she loves food:

• swinging legs back and forth in her high chair while waiting for food
• slapping hands on her tray while waiting for food
• using her many ways to communicate "I want food" : grunt, whimper, puppy whine, holler, shriek.
• pulling (hard) at mom's shirt to get at her favorite food (often in public spaces...which can be more than a little embarrassing)
• Once she finally gets food, she uses both fists to shove as much food in her mouth at a time
• she has an enormous mouth, which is fortunate for her because it allows her to fit more food in at one time.  And even if mom has to use a big spoon because all the baby spoons are dirty, Esther's gargantuan mouth can handle adult spoons with no trouble.  She still gets her food.
• Esther uses all her strength to push mom's hand away from the banana she is trying to slice.  Relentlessly. 
• Whimpering/grunting to mom if there is too much time between bites...strange for such a happy girl  
• Pounding her fists on the tray if she's eaten everything on it...signal for more food.
• Even if she has food, if Esther see's other (better) food on mom or dad's plate, she will make her displeasure known.
• Once she's finished dinner (finally) and is playing on the floor with her toys, she will abandon them to crawl to a crumb on the floor by her high chair.  Or, if mom and dad are having dinner, she'll climb up their legs and beg for a bite.  Like a puppy.
• She chases after the broom pile as mom sweeps up the food crumbs.  It's a race between mom getting the crumbs in the trash or Esther getting them in her mouth...yuck.  Thankfully mom usually wins.

Some of Esther's Favorite Foods:

• 1/3 of a spaghetti squash (not a small one)
• 2 whole waffles and 1 pear for breakfast
• Asian lentil and Vegetable stir fry...who knew babies go for garlic, ginger, and soy sauce
• Porridge: we rotate between Quinoa, millet, and oat groats...she loves them all
• anything baked or bread-like.  
• snacks: chick peas, french cut green beans, Jo's Os, dehydrated strawberries (also Trader Joe's), peas
• pears and avocados
• prunes  (her only baby food and it's out of necessity)

Let's just say there is a very good reason Esther started having to wear 12 month clothes at 8 months...and why they're snug on her before 10 months.  We love our happy girl!

Dropping out of school...here's why.

Have I mentioned that Chris dropped out of his PhD program?

Well he did.  He is now doing a startup business and our family is living off savings, rental income, and 10 darling piano students and the prognosis is that we have 14 months to get something off the ground before the money runs out.  So here we go!  (This is a longish post so if you're short on time, jump to the last paragraph for the highlights.)

So, about this business.  Chris had an idea come to his mind on July 1st while in the shower.  (I'm told the best ideas come while the shower.  Maybe I should shower more so I can have clever thoughts too.)  I digress.   His idea was a solution to the annoying problem  when working on a task online that requires searching multiple websites.   You know, those times when you have 15 browsers open and you're trying to keep track of everything on a post-it.  NOT HAPPY.  Well, we're working to develop a technology that simplifies your life with the help of Chris's amazing-computer-engineer-genius-brother-in-law Wes Dyer who just quit his job at Microsoft.  (His wife/Chris's sister Amber is a saint)

Initially, Chris was developing the business to make home search easier, less realtor dependent, and to lower transaction costs. The problem is, we don't have millions of dollars to spend on advertising and home buying can't exactly go viral because it's not something we do on a regular basis.  So, Chris and Wes changed gears to work on a task that many of us do very regularly:  EAT.  More specifically, find recipes, plan menus, and cook.  It's something we mothers do ALL THE TIME and let's face it, unless you want to cook the same 7 meals every week, it's takes a lot of research, planning, and work to create delicious & nutritious meals every day.  So here is a tool to make our lives VERY HAPPY.

Dying to know where you can find this amazing tool? It's PASPLORE and can be found at www.pasplore.com. We're still in the early stages, but if you check it out you'll find a great collection of Thanksgiving recipes from food bloggers.  If you sign up for the private beta, you'll be one of the first the menu planning tool that's under production. Oh, and since this is our source of livelihood, baby Esther will thank you if you tell your friends & follow us on Facebook.  Thanks and Happy Thanksgiving!


PASPLORE

First Piano Performance - 7 months

Happy at 8 months