If you’re unfamiliar with the concept, a blog carnival is an opportunity to gather a collection of posts on a particular topic from a variety of thematically similar bloggers. Since I know that many of my readers also have their own blogs, I thought it would be fun and interesting to share a bunch of different viewpoints in one place.
A carnival provides a venue for bloggers to gain more exposure to the larger community, and for existing readers to find new blogs to follow. Continue reading
Back before Oliver was born, if someone had told me he would be sleeping in our room for the first six months of his life, I would have scoffed at them. After all of the parenting and sleep books we’d read, Oliver was obviously going to be sleeping through the night (12 hours worth) by three months old. The plan was for Oliver to spend the first six to eight weeks in a bassinet in our room, by which point he would be sleeping long enough stretches that we could move him into his own room, where he would happily sleep for seven to eight hours at a time.
Perhaps we were a bit naive in that regard… 
Continue reading
First things first: One Fit Mom has a new look! What do you think?
Over the next few weeks, I am going to be very busy organizing, re-categorizing, tagging, summarizing and even re-formatting some of my older posts to better fit the new theme. With 115 posts and counting, this is no small task.
If there are any readers who receive my posts by email, can you please comment below to let me know whether or not my posts get re-sent to you every time I edit or change them? I’m really hoping they don’t, as otherwise, I will have to re-consider exactly how I conduct this editing and organizing project!
Next up, I am planning to start adding some product reviews, to share my opinions on the baby gear and other related items that we have found to be useful (or in some cases, not so useful). Reviews will have Continue reading
Six months old already!
February 9th marked one year since the inception of this blog. Can you believe how quickly time has flown?! This time last year, I had just passed 15 weeks gestation and was lamenting my lack of baby belly; now, I have a six-month-old and am thrilled by my lack of baby belly.
To celebrate this milestone, I am going to recap my 10 most memorable moments from the blog’s first year.
10. Coming up with a comprehensive list of CrossFit modifications early on in the pregnancy… and then being astonished to find Continue reading
As I’ve previously discussed at length, we are following the baby-led weaning philosophy of introducing solids. With the introduction of solids comes the need to offer water with every meal, and ideally throughout the day as well. In the beginning, it is usually easiest and most convenient to provide water in a baby bottle.
We haven’t done much bottle feeding with Oliver, and when we started offering a bottle of water alongside his meals, he seemed disinterested. At first, I mistook his lack of interest for lack of thirst, but I have come to realize (through his outright refusal to take a bottle at daycare Continue reading
Oliver started daycare last Thursday. One of my first thoughts upon entering the centre and seeing 11 other little vectors sharing toys and a single change table was, “Oliver is going to get sick. A lot.” At almost six months old, Oliver’s immune system is far from mature — and everything he touches goes into his mouth. He is still breastfed, of course, but breastfeeding has its limitations, especially when a baby is exposed to a pathogen to which his mother has not been exposed.
The daycare had a notice posted declaring that their recent gastrointestinal outbreak was officially over — that is to say, there had been no new infections within the preceding 48 hours. Apparently they failed to take into account Continue reading
Sorry for the unexpected blogging hiatus. We had a death in the family, so I have been busy and out of town. I will have my next post up in the next few days, but in the meantime, here are a couple of interesting articles for discussion.
1. A new study, published last week, says that perfluorinated compounds (PFCs) may lessen the efficacy of certain vaccines. The study showed that children with higher levels of PFCs in their blood produced fewer antibodies after receiving vaccinations.
Are PFCs a contributing factor to the increased number of “booster shots” children receive in comparison with the previous generation?
Could PFCs also affect immune responses for conditions against which a child has not been vaccinated? Continue reading
Beef and lamb burgers with mock-guac and steamed broccoli (topped with garlic, lemon zest and pine nuts).
Are we the only ones who have this problem? You get home at the end of the day, exhausted from work, housework, child care, etcetera, and it’s suddenly impossible to conceive of planning or cooking a meal — especially one that involves any amount of time or effort.
With that, I present a list of our “go-to” quick and easy Paleo meal options. None of these meals are gourmet masterpieces, nor are they remotely original ideas; this is merely a list of suggestions for those days when your decision making skills are fried (no pun intended) and you just need to get supper prepared as quickly and efficiently as possible, or risk falling prey to non-Paleo takeout. Continue reading
The collection... soon to be disposed of.
When Oliver was born, all he wanted to do was suck. My breastfeeding troubles meant that using my nipples as a human pacifier just wasn’t an option, so we took to using our pinky fingers to help soothe him whenever he cried. This quickly became problematic, as it didn’t allow us to put him down; not even for a moment. So we set out to find a pacifier.
This wasn’t as easy a task as one might expect. In the beginning, he disliked every round nipple pacifier we introduced, including the popular Gumdrop (the lactation consultant had advised against using “orthodontic” or flat nipples). We eventually found one that he would tolerate for five to 10 minutes at a time, but it wasn’t until after two months of age that we finally decided to try the Natursutten natural rubber pacifier, with great success.
I had previously noticed them at a high-end baby store, but wrote them off as yet another overpriced, gimmicky baby gadget designed to appeal to the parent who buys only the best for their child at any cost. It turns out that they are in many ways a superior product Continue reading
Oliver, age five months, enjoys his first taste of steak.
It turns out that Oliver was ready for solids sooner than we expected. Particularly in the last couple of weeks, he has been showing a lot of interest in our food, and while he hasn’t completely mastered the skill of sitting unsupported, he can sit quite upright with minimal support (such as that provided by his highchair). He now has two teeth, with a third that appears ready to emerge any day. He can reach for and grasp items of interest, and can release his grasp on one item in order to pick up another.
While we had, on a couple of occasions, given him slices of apple or pear to taste/suck, this was our first time formally introducing solids in a meal setting.
We were very fortunate to find a secondhand Tripp Trapp highchair (complete with baby set) on Craigslist for an excellent price. I guess it was meant to be, because Continue reading
Hi, I'm Carli! I am a 32 year old mom and fitness/nutrition enthusiast living in beautiful Vancouver, Canada.
I started this blog to document my pregnancy and parenting journey, in order to inspire other parents who may be considering bucking conventional wisdom in favour of following their instincts. This blog highlights my successes, challenges and experiences, and investigates some of the more specious pregnancy and post-partum diet and exercise recommendations.
Click on the "About (me and my blog)" link for more information.
