OFB Baby Update: Ten Months


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Baby Bucks

General Baby Thoughts

Well, as of last night, we’ve installed a gate at the top of our stairs. And we’ve rearranged the living room so that it’s officially baby proof(ish). Our little ten-month-old is t-r-o-u-b-l-e. Our only saving grace is that she seems to have no intention of learning to walk yet, which means she can only wreak havoc with one hand, as she steadies herself on furniture with the other hand.

Our girl is a daddy’s girl these days. She squeals with excitement when Johnny gets home from work and won’t let him put her down for the most of the night. She’s also “talking” nonstop and tries to sing by going, “Ahhhhhhhhhh” in a sweet, soft voice for as long as she can. We’re always singing (badly, I might add) around the house, and it seems she’s caught on. Simply put, more than ever, our girl seems less like a baby and more like a grown up. We’re feeling bittersweet about it the whole thing.

Financial Baby Thoughts

Our girl’s food and diaper budget has been pretty consistent the past few months. We spent about $50 on food and $40 on diapers and wipes. I’ve started buying some of her pre-made food in bulk from Amazon, so it should (hopefully) even itself out next month. In the past month, our girl has grown six teeth (all at once!), so I’m able to give her more non-mushy food than I did before. Johnny also introduced her to cookies one night, which, as you can imagine, has made her a little less excited about eating Cheerios.

We went a little crazy with clothing last month. Johnny’s grandma gifted Baby Girl with $100 in spending money, so we spent every bit on clothes. We also splurged on a warm winter coat ($35 on sale) and a hat and mittens  ($7 on sale). Utah winters ain’t no joke. I don’t think we’ll be buying her any more clothes anytime soon, but Santa might not be able to resist bringing her a few more :). Now that she’s up and moving around, she’s just so fun to dress up! We also spent $6 on infant Tylenol (thanks to those new teeth) and $10 on a new baby thermometer. So the grand total spent last month on our little gal? $248 (though $100 of it was gifted).

And now for some pictures! As our girl becomes more mobile, it’s becoming impossible to get her to hold still!
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babygirl For the been-there-done-that crowd, does this sound pretty typical? How do we relate and differ? At what point did you give up on keeping your baby clean during dinner?

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16 Comments

  • Reply Brian November 20, 2013 at 10:24 am

    Just waiting until she won’t let you feed her any more. Our little guy decided one day that he was going to use the spoon (poorly i might add) and since thay day he pretty much feeds himself and makes a bit of a mess.

    Of course that evened out because he can feed himself one of those amazing pouches which is great when we are on the go and don’t have time or can’t stop moving.

    As for pictures I have found that the cell phone camera is a no longer going to work and to just volume shoot with the DSLR and hope for the best!

    • Reply Joanna November 22, 2013 at 1:48 am

      Yup, almost all of the pictures on my phone of our girl are blurry (unless she’s asleep). And I agree… those pouches are amazing. Life changing, really. I can feed her in public without all hell breaking loose!

  • Reply This Life On Purpose November 20, 2013 at 11:09 am

    Sounds like you have your hands full! Enjoy every last moment, she’s a cutie 🙂

    • Reply Joanna November 22, 2013 at 1:49 am

      Thanks! Our hands are VERY full, but we wouldn’t have it any other way!

  • Reply Marissa @ Barefoot Colorado November 20, 2013 at 11:42 am

    That face!!! She’s too freakin’ adorable.

    • Reply Joanna November 22, 2013 at 1:50 am

      Thanks, Marissa! I agree, but I am a tad biased. 😉

  • Reply Rob November 20, 2013 at 1:40 pm

    Reading that your little one is a “daddy’s girl” was amusing because it reminded me of our daughter, our firstborn, who at that age looked and acted exactly like your daughter. And, like her daddy, our daughter grew up to be a driving go-getter type A; whereas our younger son, born 2 years later, took after his mom, an easy going type B – as laid back as you can get (but still a high achiever in his own career) – no worries mon!

    So, as to dinner time attempts at baby cleanliness – forgetaboutit and no worries, mon! 🙂

    • Reply Joanna November 22, 2013 at 1:57 am

      I wouldn’t mind if our second child (whenever that day comes) is a bit more laid back! Our girl has a strong enough personality for all of us, I think! But it’s a good thing… it’s helping Johnny and me to be more laid back. Not sure how that works, but there it is!

  • Reply Halsy November 20, 2013 at 3:15 pm

    At home we always just put her in a diaper at dinner so if she makes a mess it’s ok. When shes eating in public we use pouches ( she only made a mess once and it really was my fault) and non messy finger foods to eat on her own. Then we spoon fork feed the messier stuff such as Mac n cheese. She will get less messy as she goes though. It’s so nice once the expenditures get pretty predictable! Our girl goes through a ton of diapers each day(can’t wait until she’s potty trained!) and we use pampers and pampers wipes so I’d say we average about $40-50. Food is hard now because our girl needs daily prune pouches and I still buy some toddler pouches and that goes in baby category and all her other food just goes into our grocery budget. We’ve never counted stuff in budget/money spent on girl if it was a gift/gift card. So far we haven’t bought much for winter as fall items have transferred and hoping gparents get her some sweaters for Christmas. We got her coat on clearance last year for less than $10 so we’ve only bought mittens and hat for $11 and 2 fleeces for $20 total. We bought her 2 books to prepare her to be a big sister for $8. Thankful for the months like this month where we spend less! We are trying to keep the same budget amount when we add our newest addition so it will be interesting to see where we can cut
    Costs!

    • Reply Joanna November 22, 2013 at 2:02 am

      Congrats on expecting baby number two! What an exciting time. That’s great you’re sticking to such a set budget now. I’m sure it will help you be able to prepare when your next little one comes along.

      And great idea on putting the babe in a diaper at dinner time. If I did that, it would probably save me a lot on stain remover each month! 🙂

  • Reply Tarynkay November 20, 2013 at 3:47 pm

    That last picture is just too much. It is ridiculous how adorable your little girl is!

    We have never tried to keep our son clean during meals. I just saw it as a losing battle from the beginning, I don’t know. He has always fed himself table food (we never did purees and we never spoon-fed him) from about six months on. We found these great full coverage bibs on Amazon- they have long sleeves and tie in the back like a smock. As he got older, we worked on table manners more and more and he learned to stop mashing banana into his hair and so forth. At two years old, he usually doesn’t need a a bib anymore, though it depends on the meal.

    We do cloth diapers and wipes, so we never had that expense. He eats the same food as we do, so we never paid for much baby food. And we have been amazingly lucky with hand me downs. Our biggest expenses by far have been health insurance and the loss of my salary, since I stay home with him. Those are pretty huge, though!

    • Reply Joanna November 22, 2013 at 2:08 am

      Thanks, Tarynkay! She has just recently realized she has control of her tongue, and I swear it’s always sticking out these days!

      I will have to search for those bibs on Amazon. Her sleeves get absolutely covered in food during meals. I look forward to the day when our girl does more than just laugh when I try to tell her “no” about how she handles her food!

      Also, way to go on cutting down on expenses! And I think your little guy will really appreciate that you decided to stay home with him!

  • Reply Emily November 20, 2013 at 4:08 pm

    The two babies I nanny for just started eating solids in the last month or so and I have resorted to stripping them both to their diapers before we even attempt food, it was just waaaaay too stressful for all of us to deal with a bib/wiping them down all the time.

    • Reply Joanna November 22, 2013 at 2:11 am

      Good call, Emily! I think there’s some part of me that is in denial. Every meal I’m determined to keep her clean, but it never happens. It’s high time for her to be stripped down!

  • Reply Jennifer @ Budgeting in Baby November 21, 2013 at 11:33 am

    I am not looking forward to Emmett starting solids. Due to food allergies we will slowly be introducing solids, he will probably only have solids once a day until 9 months old. When we only do one solid meal a day it will be right before bath time so that we can strip him down and he can go straight into the bath tub.

    • Reply Joanna November 22, 2013 at 2:13 am

      You’re smart to plan to feed Emmett before bath-time, Jennifer! I give our girl a bath every other night, and on those nights, I let her go hog wild with her food. If she gets messy, so be it!

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