a cookie baking day

Today was one of those days where the stereotypes about London weather were dead on. It was the type of gray, drizzly day that cries out for staying in all day, baking cookies and reading library books while drinking herbal tea and listening to Norah Jones. Oh, and lots and lots of cuddly napping. Given the weather and my sorely aching quads (victims of Sunday's overzealous postnatal strength training effort), baby yoga plans were quickly scrapped, and Jack and I accomplished the napping with glowing success all morning.

Unfortunately we had to leave our bed fort this afternoon and venture out to the Southbank where there was a great trunk sale (is that a British phrase or an American one? I get confused now) on a particular luxury item that will be a perfect Christmas gift for a hard-to-shop-for relative. I think it was worth it--but just barely. Jack seemed content in his Bugaboo, under the raincover, which made me wish for the millionth time that there were Bugaboos for adults. I was walking back over the (formerly) wobbly bridge looking at St. Paul's and realized I don't really dislike London like I did last year at about this time. Don't get me wrong (and please don't freak out Mom, we won't stay here forever, or even any longer than we need to), I'm not totally sure I actively like or prefer living here, but sometime this summer I grew out of the active dislike of London.

Then we came back for an afternoon of cookie baking, while I told him all about how Nonna and I always used to bake cookies and go to the library on rainy days. Since we've just gotten a few orders from American food importers in, we're flush with big jars of peanut butter, so we decided to make peanut butter cookies. In lieu of the library, I considered going to the book store down the street, until I realized that Jack has an entire bookshelf full of his own books, many of which we haven't yet read. That's in large part because I've jumped the gun a bit on his reading level and have tons of non-board books (which just aren't tasty enough for Jack), but also because he has a few favorites that seem to satisfy him quite well for now. So we had several read-throughs of his favorite book, "Little Fish," which is about a little rainbow fish who runs into sea creatures of various rainbow colors in his efforts to his find his mummy, which are (spoiler alert) ultimately successful. When I just couldn't stand any more Little Fish, we delved into a bug-counting book that came in a lovely package we received from Grammy and Granddad today.

Jack is now refusing all solids again, including sweet potatoes. Despite my best efforts to further water them down, he acts like the food is too thick and is making him gag. I really need help from Ben, who is amazingly adept at getting Jack to eat anything, on this one, but his work hours have been nutty again this week. Hopefully we'll be able to give solids an early morning try again tomorrow.

Oh, and I forgot to mention in yesterday's post that Jack is now so wiggly that Dr. Hay kept referring him as a "little dynamo." Yes, my calm, observant, Zen baby is now back to being as active as he was in the womb. His new most dangerous trick is flipping over onto his stomach while we attempt to change his diaper. Makes me very glad we have a European-style changing table (baby faces changer rather than being on his side) that lets Jack roll over without flying off the dresser.