stills… a perfect sunday

last sunday was nothing less than perfect. we had a baby party with all the zoeti’s pals from nursery school in the morning, we discovered a garden in the centre of the city where we live that i’ve never seen before, and took a ride to the first local feast of the season. in the evening i was deeply tired but zoeti had a lot of fun and spend some time as a family with no worries such as cleaning or cooking is so precious!

my little butterfly!

she absolutely loved the place chosen for the nursery school party! and the teachers have painted the faces of almost every kid! we definitely have to keep in mind the place for the long, cold, rainy winter!

in the afternoon we discovered a secret garden right in the centre of our city (ok… it’s not so secret, but it’s always closed! find it open was a fluke!)

  and in the evening we joined a local feast for a horse race!

as i said… a perfect sunday!

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   "a portrait of my family, once a week, every week, in 2013"

Zoe Tiare: last lesson of our mommy & baby swimming course. i loved it and you learnt how to use a lifesaver all by yourself! i’m proud of my little fish!

me & my belly: 31 weeks. trying to get in touch with mother earth.

my favorite of the last week are: lamb’s portrait with her noise maker, these two little sisters and jessica’s portrait.

jodi’s project here

first baby’s list: review and advices

many of my friends are pregnant for the first time and talking with one of them yesterday i thought about my baby's items list that i made with my first pregnancy...
i found some advices very useful and i want to share them with you! on internet you can found thousands of websites with tons of list for a newborn baby so i’m not going to state the obvious. this one is very detailed and you can check what you already have, others like this one tend more to the essential.

the hospital
where i live the hospital give you a list of item to bring with you, including  how many  dresses and onsies for the baby, nightgowns for mommy, personal hygiene’s product for the mommy (all the things that you need  for the baby is provided from the hospital). the only thing i can suggest, based on my personal experience, is not to buy 4 nightgowns if you’re not going to wear them again; it’s a waste of money! i bought just 2 and  i added one pajamas, fully opening on the front. unfortunately i’ve lost it,  so for this pregnancy i bought a pair of gym pant with a low-cut tank top, easy to take off for breastfeeding but reusable even when you’re not breastfeeding anymore. plus i don’t like the “sick air” that gives you a nightgown in a hospital bed! another suggestion about nursing bras: i bought one and i found it very unconfortable! it’s easy to take off the front part but not so easy to put it in place again! and my solution was… to use a bikini top! it’s easy to move left or right for an easy access, easy to wash and super easy to dry, if the birth is in spring – summer it’s not so strange if somebody sees you with a bikini under a shirt… for me it was perfect! yes, the breast support is not the best so i didn’t use it everyday exclusively, but i avoided to buy a lot of bras that i could have used just for 1 year (or less).always remember all documentation relating to pregnancy (of course!). this time i think i’ll write a message inside my folder: please do not cut the umbilical cord before it stops beating and keep the lights as low as possible. my first delivery was a dream: three midwives just for me, the light was descreet ( no beacons pointed at me!) and i remembered to say about the umbilical cord. but this time i’m going to go to another hospital so… i just want to be sure to have exactly the same experience (at least for what i can control!). it’s up to you if you want some music during the labor: i took my ipod with me but i prefered the stillness of silence.

back home
back home you need just very few things. do not buy everything “just in case”… for example a changing table is useful (you can change the baby even on your bed or on the floor like i’m doing right now with zoeti – who is too heavy for me and my growing belly!) but buying tons of creams or even a soap it’s unnecessary. for the first days you can just wet the baby with some warm water (no soap and no bath until the umbilical cord stump falls) so your sink is just what you need.
of course you need diapers, but try different labels before buying 10 packs! and you can definetely wait to buy a baby hair brush: look if it will be useful (zoeti was born almost completely bald and i’m using the hair brush only now!).


 a cradle is useful if you’re not thinking about co-sleeping. zoeti slept    with us for the first 4-5 months so i almost never used the cradle that  my cousin lent me.  after we bought a crib where she slept until a month ago (now she’s sleeping in a  big normal bed). we bought our at ikea (the one in the picture) and i was  pleasantly surprised!


 the nursing pillow can be replaced with some normal cushions and buying 3-4 baby bottles if you want at least try to breastfeed your baby, can be a waste of money: you can’t give him/her anything other than milk for the first months so your small baby bottle can be unsuitable for a 6-7 months old (the teat will be for sure!)
the choice of a stroller was the hardest for us, not only because we’re talking about a large amount of money, but also because you have to consider a lot of things! we decided to privilege the lightness and the dimensions when closed. i didn’t want to have a bulky, heavy stroller! of course the aesthetic side is important but not fundamental. i love three wheels stroller and they are perfect for where i live (near the montains), but it’s not easy to find a light one. in the end we choose this one:





we love it! it’s perfect for us: easy to close/open, light, easy to clean. it’s a TFK  Buggster S.



 on internet you can found a lot of models and solution but i suggest you to chose it as soon as you can: sometimes (almost always!) you have to pre-order it and then wait until 1 month to have it… yes, you don’t need a stroller with a new born, but if you buy a combined system, like i did, with stroller and baby carriage the waiting list is the same.
my friend sent me this picture about one of the most   amazing stroller i have ever seen! it called Taga Bike and   you can switch between a three-wheeled bicycle for you and baby and a stroller with a roomy basket. it’s wonderful, but somehow scary at the same time! i don’t know how big could it be when you close it but i doubt that i can easily put it in my little car!

party decorations!

 
as i already mentioned here, zoeti’s birthday theme this year was supposed to be la pimpa (an old italian cartoon about a red & white dog) but find something about it seemed impossible, so we changed into a red & white party!
the banner is made with paper (i was supposed to make it with textile, but i hadn’t enough time and what can i do after with that?!) that's the tutorial i used to make it.


i made pinwheels and had a lot of fun!! i have found some nice pattern on internet, printed them and followed one of the thousands tutorials you find… super easy!
 
candies and m&m’s…. i love them! only the red ones of course (even if i added a touch of pink …. but it’s a girl birthday after all!)
 
ok… the menu was kind of tricky… 4 pregnant ladies, all of them toxo negative (i have already explayned what toxoplasmosis is here) means a lot of responsability! so one tray of sandwiches was just for us (toxo free) and the other had parma ham (and we can just dream of it!). all the tomatoes were washed 4 times to kill everything on them and the fruit skewers (no pictures of them sorry) were made with fruit washed and peeled. 
no problems with chips, olives and breadsticks! i had bought also some gluten free snack for a celiac friend.
i’m pretty proud about the result… what do you think? can i have a future as baby birthday planner?!

Happy birthday Zoe Tiare (part II)!!

the party girl

thanks for the beautiful presents!!

i love you, my beautiful little miracle!

have you ever try to have three little kids ready for a picture? it’s an experience!

beautiful babies, amazing mothers and mothers-to-be, friends, women… i wish you all the best! and Carlo, let’s hope there will a little boy in one of those bellies or it will be very hard for you next years, my little men!

my partner in crime, my love, the best daddy in the world!

           
yes guys… like last year our little one had two birthday parties! yesterday we invited our closest friends for an informal buffet and few talks. i’ll post about the party decorations tomorrow (i can’t overwhelm you with thousands of pictures, right?!) so let me show you a little bit of our sunday afternoon! it’s always a pleasure having the house full of nice people, especially since it’s not always easy to be able to see each other often (if you have a kid you know what i’m talking about!) and this year the party was super special in a new way: four (yes i said four!) baby bumps, ladies & gentlemen! i’m already looking for a nanny for next year! zoeti had fun with the other two littles, even if we had to keep an eye on her (carlo is just 10 months and amalia almost one year, so… still so little!). there were balloons of course and toys and sweets and too much potatoes (am i right, zoeti?!). no birthday cake this time (i’m still having nightmares about those four tiramisù .. ) and i made cupcakes instead.
seeing you so happy, little angel, makes me want to have a birthday party every weekend! but maybe for the nextt two or three weekends we can just play with all the balloons you have in your bedroom ok?!

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"a portrait of my family, once a week, every week, in 2013"

Zoe Tiare: playing hide and seek, your favorite game right now (even while you’re eating!)

Me & my belly: 30 full weeks! (can you see that my belly looks like a zero?!?)

my favorites last week were: this portrait in the fog, this sweetness, and the Lu Elle's one who makes me smile every time!

thanks again jodi! 

strawberry tiramisù

 

the tiramisù is a cake typical of Veneto (the region where i live) and i love it! unfortunately during the pregnancy you cannot eat it because there are raw eggs in it but i found some recipes to make it without eggs!generally tiramisù is made with coffee (picture on the right) but i used strawberry instead since it’s more fresh and the theme was red & white.

what you need:

• savoiardi (a kind of biscuit)
• strawberries (500 gr)
• 250 gr of mascarpone
• 250 gr of fresh cream (to whipped)
• 70 gr of sugar
• 3-4 spoons of milk

first of all wash almost every strawberry (keep 5-6 for decoration) and whisk them with the milk.
























use a strainer to remove all the seeds from the strawberry smoothie
















mix well the mascarpone and the sugar.

then add the whipped cream (mixing gently from down to up to not “sag” the cream)














Start with a thin layer of cream, then put the savoiardi and wet them with the strawberries pureed (or drench them into the pureed before). Add cream and keep in this way (wet savoiardi and cream). end with cream and garnish with fresh strawberries.







keep it in the fridge for at least 4 hours.




i don’t have a proper picture of the result… but i think this one is better! zoeti loved it!!