Homemade Baby Food: Epic Fail

I have been trying a lot of new things recently.  This partly due to staying at home, partly to choosing to live off of one income, and partly due to Pinterest.  I have been crafting quite a bit and made my own laundry detergent.  My new adventure is attempting to make baby food.
Brynlee recently starting eating some baby food.  I realized that while the prepackaged foods are convenient, they are a bit pricey.  $1 for two servings of carrots or $1 for a whole bag of carrots?  
Our blender started smelling like something burning the last time we used it.  So, the logical thing to do was to buy a Ninja on Thanksgiving night.  I'm actually glad I did.  I was attempting to save it for Christmas so that Justin would have something to wrap for me to open.  But, last night I was cooking carrots for dinner and I thought it was the perfect opportunity!

I set aside some carrots before I lathered mine in brown sugar and butter.  Then, I busted out the Ninja. (By the way, the Ninja is not a toy like my mother thought.  It is similar to a magic bullet.)

It worked great at pureeing those carrots! I was quite excited and proud of myself when I put them in the fridge for the next day.

Just remember, pride comes before the fall.

The next morning I was feeling pretty confident, so I mashed up some banana in Brynlee's cereal.  It took a total of about 30 seconds and no extra dishes!

It seemed to go pretty well at first, but then she got a few larger chunks of banana and didn't care for that at all. She wouldn't finish her cereal.

Then, lunch time came.  I was ready! I spooned some of the carrots into a bowl, heated them up, got Brynlee situated and even got the camera ready.  I gave her a bite....and she made the most awful face.   

Ok, she just needs to get used to it. 


 I tried another bite...same reaction.  I tried a few more bites and it just got worse. 

She started gagging like crazy, so I gave up.  I gave her the packaged baby food carrots and she gobbled it up.


So, my first day of homemade baby food:
Attempt #1: Semi-fail
Attempt #2: Epic Fail

I will try again tomorrow after I mash things up more and add more water.  

My Full Time Job

Every day something will happen and I will think "I'm so glad I'm not pregnant right now and I have Brynlee".  Also, something else will make me think "I am so glad I am at home, not working this year!" I have been so much more available emtionally, physically, and mentally to my girls.  Monday after school Kaylie and I went for a quick walk around the block and she told me all about her day! (That would not have happened last year for multiple reasons: I was pregnant, the weather was always hot, Kaylie wouldn't have remembered anything to tell me, I would have been working, etc.
Of course, staying at home is also challenging.  I often wonder how I got everything done while I was working because I am so BUSY! I'm always cleaning, hauling Kaylie to and from the bus, feeding the baby, feeding Myla, cleaning up some more, going to church, grocery shopping, it goes on and on.
One of the biggest challenges has obviously been finances.  I have been working hard to use coupons, shop wisely, not shop, use our food wisely, etc.  Also, I made my own laundry detergent!  It was a lot easier than I thought, but I did make the dry kind.  It doesn't look like anything special and it doesn't seem to do anything when you add it to the water in the machine.  But, how much of suds that are created by store bought detergent are just to make us feel like the soap is really working well?   Honestly, the only differences I can tell so far is that the clothes don't have a strong, pretty smell when they come out (which there are recipes for detergent that can give you that) and I am saving a ton of money.  I guess time will tell if I need to try a different recipe or if the dry one works.