eating well for babies - bargain alert!

Kristen at Food Renegade has had an (expensive) ecourse on eating for conception, birth & breastfeeding for awhile - I'd heard of it originally through a blog I read, Mommypotamus. It sounded awesome but it was way too expensive. Now Kristen's making it available for FREE if you preorder her new book! All the details are here. I've ordered it from Amazon.ca, here, for $18.15, and am currently doing the course. So far it's great! It's a mix of course sheets, videos, readings, and discussions. And of course, I'll get a book out of it! Basically I think every woman should buy it, but especially para-reproductive women who are already food renegades in some way will eat it up! Offer expires March 18th, though once you sign up you have access for life (basically, just preorder the book even if you don't have time for the coursework right now!).

I'm enjoying it so far in part because I've wondered whether Ambrose's dental issues have something to do with what he was exposed to when I was pregnant. My diet was better than the SAD on average, but it wasn't nearly as wholesome as it is now - and moreover, I was of course exposed daily to all kinds of stuff at the pharmacy prior to conception, and even though I was more careful to not count the obviously dangerous stuff and make sure trays were cleaned, etc. it's doubtless that it was still in my environment, be absorbed through my skin and lungs. Maybe that's why his teeth have decayed, maybe at some crucial point of his development, some toxic synergy prevented proper tooth formation? Anyway, I'm hoping this course will empower me to integrate a lot of what I've learned since we conceived Ambrose, and all the new info I'll get, to optimize my next baby's chances for vibrant wellness! I'll keep y'all posted!

And now for some snapshoots of our food lately:

Mmm.. bacon on the weekend.

pizza

while the boys had pizza, I had salmon with coconut milk and veggies and spices a la Sam!

Julia gave me her kefir grains - I'm convinced now that mine had been half-dead; like the yeast and bacteria got all out of sync. The milk fermented, and it was fine to use, but it had a funky smell - not bad, but not pleasant and yeasty like normal kefir, either. I'm so glad to be back into kefir!! <3

getting kids to take cod liver oil

"Ice cream", portioned out!

This is the cod liver oil we use - I give Ambrose 1 tsp, so I added 1/2 tsp per serving (see description, below).

This is how it looks oily - with popsicles, the oil floats and never freezer. Ugh! With ice cream you can mix it in.

Oil mixed in - it's like soft serve ice cream. Keep in mind it was already fairly soft when portioned out. Perfect!

The answer, of course, is: ice cream.

1 banana, 1-2 tbsp cocoa powder, maybe 1/2 - 1 c milk, 2 tbsp peanut butter, blended in the magic bullet. Xylitol could also be smart if your baby tolerates it (I used to use it a lot, then it started hurting my tummy; we have a fair-sized bag - maybe I should start that again?) Freeze open with a spoon for 2 hours, stirring to break down ice crystals ever 20-30 m, as per usual ice cream making protocols. Remove from freezer, divide into 12 silicone cups, mix in one dose of cod liver oil per serving (in fact I did a half dose to minimize the flavour, and so that if he demanded seconds I wouldn't worry about killing him). Sorry the light is so bad - I was doing this at night as Ambrose was getting his teeth brushed with dad so he wouldn't see what as going on - which didn't work of course, he came to see where I was, demanded to try, and then demanded a second! Yessss! I figured it out! Mix it into ice cream, folks. Freeze cups and you're done.

Read my family's dental health saga here and here. (The only update worth adding is that I now have a close, in-real-life friend going through the exact same thing, which is really a relief, though we both obviously wish the other wasn't also going through it; thank God nonetheless for the support!)

Read about cod liver oil on the WAPF here.

Summarizing why we go to the trouble, the book Cure Tooth Decay describes various theories, mainstream and alternative, regarding why tooth decay happens or doesn't happen in various theories, across various cultures, drawing on the research of dentist-ethnographer Weston Price, going on to make recommendations for curing tooth decay nutritionally. The cod live oil fits in because our diets tend to be deficient in fish, and their omega-3 fatty acids, and their high levels of vitamins A and D. If you're not familiar with Price you can read the Weston A Price Foundation's basic guidelines in my favourite article, Characteristics of Traditional Diets, or access his book online for free here.

How do you get your kids to take cod liver oil? And what do you think of the W. A. P. Foundation?