What Hadley Ate This Week: Lunch

I didn't take many pictures of Hadley's lunches because they all follow the same basic formula: 2 veggies, 2 fruits, and half a slice of low-protein cheese. Every now and then I will throw a pb&j into the mix. These are not the only fruits and vegetables she eats though. She has a pretty wide variety of fruits that she enjoys so I try to mix it up as much as possible. 

Sweet potatoes, green beans (she still prefers the baby food kind over real green beans so I go with it--it gives her more variety), raspberries, mandarin oranges, 1/2 slice of cheese, and PKU formula ("milk").

Carrots, squash, pineapple, raspberries, 1/2 slice of cheese, milk & marshmallows

PB&J (low-pro peanut butter and bread), carrots, pears, grapes, 1/2 slice of cheese & milk. You can see somebody's grabby little hand that was ready to dig in. :)

What Hadley Ate This Week: Breakfast

I feel like Hadley has a pretty good variety of breakfast foods. I mean, I only eat 2 or 3 different things for breakfast, so I think it's reasonable for a 2 year old to do the same. 

About half of a gluten free pop tart, coconut milk yogurt, & PKU "milk." She gets 1/8 teaspoon of a tyrosine supplement in her food daily and I usually put it in yogurt or applesauce.

About half of a gluten free waffle, yogurt, and milk.

Oatmeal (she is still able to have the Gerber kind), about half of a small banana, and milk.

Cereal bar, yogurt, and milk.

Series Introduction: What Hadley Ate This Week

Most of the time when I explain what PKU is and what is off-limits for Hadley's diet (which is a lot!), people want to know what she *can* eat. To give you a better idea of the kinds of food Hadley eats on a regular basis, I thought I would show you her meals from the week. There are things other than what will be shown here, but this gives you a general idea of the type of food and the quantity. We are on a very strict phe limit per day so everything must be weighed to a precise amount. Her formula is very filling so that helps to keep her tummy full and get in the necessary calories. I decided to break up this series into 4 posts: breakfast, lunch, snacks, and dinner. If I tried to do it all in one post it would be pretty "picture-heavy."  Some of these foods (like the goldfish, for example) will become off-limits as she gets older and is eating a larger quantity of food at each meal. I hope you enjoy! 

Stay tuned for the first post of the series! 

That time the washer exploded...

What a week it has been! Hubs has been out of town all week so I knew the potential for something to go wrong was pretty high. It always does. On Monday and Tuesday it was the coldest temps we've had in almost 20 years and things were pretty miserable. In an effort not to completely kill our central unit, I kept the heat a good 10 degrees lower than normal. We bundled up and survived. I'm positive that toddlers are impervious to extreme temperatures because Hadley didn't care one bit. 

On Wednesday the weather was much more tolerable. Wednesday is also my laundry day. Yeah....the pipes apparently didn't get the memo that it was above freezing again. I put a load of laundry in and went about my business until I heard Hadley saying "A puddle! Splash splash!" Cue major mama meltdown over the 1/2 inch of standing water in my kitchen. 

Thank goodness for my dad who left work to bring me his wet vac! He helped me clean up the mess and calmed my nerves. I think the floor itself will be fine (fingers crossed!) but there is some damage on a couple of pieces of the trim. I'm pretty sure I can fix that myself though. It also leaked onto the carpet in the closet so I've had fans blowing on it trying to dry it out. 

I haven't touched the washer since and I'm seriously afraid to attempt to run the dishwasher. 

You know the saying "one day we'll look back on this and laugh"? This will not be one of those times. 

Happy 2014!

I have to say, 2013 was one of our better years and 2014 has some big shoes to fill. I'm usually not one to make resolutions, but I will admit that I have made few (we'll call them goals) for this year. I'm ready to see what this year brings!

PKU-Friendly Christmas Treats

Even though Hadley can't have the "traditional" Christmas food that most people look forward to, I want her to be able to have some special treats to enjoy around the holidays. Here is a look at some of the low-protein treats she was able to enjoy this year. 

The weekend before Christmas, we made a PKU-friendly (and less messy!) alternative to a gingerbread house--waffle cone Christmas trees! The waffle cones themselves were not PKU approved, but I knew she wouldn't be interested in eating them anyway. I had a feeling she would only want to lick the icing and the skittles--and I was right. 

On Christmas Eve we made low-protein cookies for Santa and Hadley got to help cut them out and decorate them with sprinkles. Poor Santa didn't get to eat his cookie though, because Hadley assumed they were all for her. :)

On Christmas morning she got an extra special breakfast treat. She was very excited about her strawberry and banana candy cane!

She also got some phe-free cotton candy in her stocking. Overall, I think Hadley had a wonderful Christmas and I hope that I can continue to find fun ideas for her to do during the holidays so she never feels left out just because of her dietary restrictions.

DIY Car Play Mat

Hadley is VERY into cars right now so I thought she would enjoy a play mat where she could drive the cars on the roads. After looking at the prices of some play mats, I thought surely I could make her one for much less! I also needed one that I could roll up and put away instead of leaving it out on the floor all the time. 

Once again, Pinterest to the rescue! I found this one at While He Was Napping (http://www.whilehewasnapping.com/2011/03/felt-play-mat.html) and decided these instructions were the clearest that I had come across. Plus I really liked her layout of the buildings. 

Then it was off to Hobby Lobby for the supplies! I spent around $10 for all of the felt, which included a pack of green and a pack of black that come in roughly 3x3 foot squares. I already had plenty of hot glue sticks at home. 

The first step was to lay out the big black square which would be the road. I used pieces of paper to mark roughly where I wanted to put the various buildings.

Then I used a piece of white chalk to draw out my roads around the buildings. I drew very lightly with the chalk so that I could rub out any mistakes that I made. 

Then it was time to cut out the road. 

I flipped the cut out road over so that the chalk lines weren't visible. This meant all of my buildings needed to be flipped as well so it was a mirror image of how I first laid it out.

Then came the fun (but oh so time-consuming) part of cutting out the buildings. 

And more cutting...

I glued all of the roads and buildings to the large green piece of felt with hot glue. Lots and lots of hot glue. 

All total, it took me about 7 hours to complete this project, so it was more time-consuming than I anticipated. Hadley absolutely loves it though, so it was worth it. It probably wouldn't have taken as much time if I hadn't wanted to fill in with the little details like flowers, but I think it makes it much more colorful and fun. 

There are a couple of downsides to this mat. Felt attracts cat hair and little fuzzies which is annoying, but I figure I can just go over it with a lint roller periodically. Also, the durability factor is questionable, but only time will tell if it's able to withstand a toddler. I can touch up with more glue as needed. 

Here's a look at the finished product!