When our kids were younger, Heather was a little bit obsessed with putting them to bed at each other’s houses in order to allow us to have nighttime plans with each other. We pulled this off quite a bit when we were rookie moms. With two kids each now, it’s not really worth the hassle; we’re more likely to suck it up and pay for a sitter. Back in the day, however, it was not uncommon for me and Ryan to bring a a Pack and Play to a dinner party and put our baby to bed in our friend’s bedrooms.

When Julian turned two, he started sleeping on a mat at his little preschool. This liberated us from the pack and play, so we’d just bring his jammies and his objects d’securitie (I just invented that expression) and put him to bed anywhere. He is a champion sleeper, so this worked well for us. We went to dinner parties and enjoyed adult company while respecting our kid’s bedtime. Win/Win.

When we left our friend’s houses, we’d carry our sleeping toddler to the car, snap him into his carseat and drive home. He’d usually wake up, look around and ride quietly home where he would fall asleep the second we put him in his crib. Like I said, champion sleeper, and believe me, my second child does not behave this way. So, for those who can pull it off, take advantage!!

Heather, the big advocate of this idea, was once featured in “Be frugal but totally cool,” an article about parents finding ways to use babysitters less. Unfortunately for us, they did not mention our book which includes at least three date night ideas that don’t require sitters. In the picture, she and Alec are entertaining their friends Jeffrey and Ha with a game night, while their kids sleep in their own beds.

Your 43rd weekly challenge is to either entertain at home after your child has gone to bed — or to pack it all up and go out to someone else’s home and execute the  famous  Half-Sleepover Move.

Have you done it?

I am assuming that I am not the only rookie mom for whom leaving my child to be put to bed by a babysitter for the first time was scary. My kid never took a bottle, so I pretty much had to be there for a bedtime nursing for the first ten months. This feeling is the opposite of freedom, by the way.

Once your baby is reliably sleeping between 8 pm and midnight or beyond, you can resume the life you used to lead in restaurants and cafes by making dessert dates with girlfriends or your partner. This is the least stressful babysitter situation possible. Pretty much anyone is qualified to lay on your couch and watch TV while you enjoy a short evening outing, right?

Put your baby to bed the way you like. When you are confident he is asleep, head out to any of your favorite restaurants. Order dessert or a drink. Enjoy ambience. Leave.

This is your 31st rookie mom challenge. Let us know when you try it by commenting below or telling us on our Facebook page. Baby too young for this one? Pick a different challenge.

You probably did nice things to your baby’s room to get it ready for him. How about your own bedroom? Make a small change that will make you happy in your sleeping space. Move a piece of furniture, hang something on the wall, or get rid of a clutter pile. (I didn’t say clean up – just hide it somewhere else!)

Could you put your baby in a bouncy seat so that she can watch you re-arrange your bookshelves?

Every photo of  adult living quarters I considered for this post featured a vase of flowers on the nightstand. If you need an outing, how about to the farmer’s market to select a bouquet? Refreshing your bedroom is our 29th challenge for rookie moms.

Heather and I both painted our bedrooms in honor of this activity. It is one of the biggest impact, lowest cost design changes you can make. Our friend Wendy executed a marvelous makeover of an old typing table with spray paint last week. Check it out:

So what adult furnishings need a little love in your house?

Taking the baby in the pool is both scary and funny.

A kid’s gotta stick his toe into the water at some point, right?

Baby Anneliese is having a blast with Erin

Buy a package of disposable swim diapers or a reusable one, and plan your outing. This is our 27th rookie mom challenge.

If you are alone, think carefully through the logistics of how you are going to change your clothes, change baby, get in the pool, get out of the pool, get on dry stuff and get back in the car. You are not as smart as you used to be and you will probably mess up part of this process and end up walking out to your car in just a bra and towel holding your baby in one arm and a diaper between your teeth. Let me just help you out: Take your stroller with you into the dressing room. That way you have someplace to put the baby, towels, wet bathing suits and diaper bag while you get dry yourself.

This is also a fun activity with a very pregnant friend.

Do you plan to take your baby into the pool this summer? Have you done it already?

Simple, cheap, healthy baby food nominee of the month: pumpkin.

The fall fruits and vegetables provide a ton of great choices for easy baby food. With all the whipping and mashing, we are pretty much all eating baby food this time of year. One of my favorite go-to, easy peasy options is pumpkin. Just open a can of organic pumpkin (NOT pumpkin pie mix) and voila: baby food!

If you or your baby turn up your nose at this simple suggestion, here are a few embellishments:

• Cinnamon. Sprinkle on cinnamon. Feed to baby. Done. (still too easy?)
• Yogurt. Stir in 2 parts plain high-fat yogurt to with 1 part pumpkin to make more of a custard. Done.
• Applesauce. Mix with an equal part applesauce. Done.

Do you have any more simple pumpkin baby food recipes? And by simple, I’m capping you at 3 ingredients.

Voila, the seventh edition of our Very Rookie Summer series!

Jessica is a rookie mom deep in the middle of her first year in Alabama. Her sidekick is six-month old Holden (great name!). She chronicles their adventures at her blog, Mother of a Homegrown Kid.

As a new mom getting the baby out of the house isn’t the scary part. I love packing him up and driving around. It’s the out in public part that worries me. I never know when he might have a meltdown or an explosive diaper. We’ve been taking him out to eat with us since he was two weeks old without any problems but suddenly at five months he became a different baby in public.

Instead of quietly observing the world around him, he wants to be a part of it. He wants to play and show strangers that he can sit up (mostly) on his own. He wants people to smile at him and he wants to interact with the world around him. His dad isn’t worried about these things at all. His dad faces things head-on and so I am following his lead, putting on a brave face, and going on adventures.

Zoo Babies
We have been on several this summer including a trip to the zoo and a day at the lake. I think I enjoyed the zoo more than Holden or his dad did but he did pay attention to the always entertaining monkeys and several large birds. I particularly enjoyed a mother and daughter pair of elephants and the family of giraffes.

Mama and baby elephant

It was really neat to watch how animal mothers interact with their offspring. I’ve never paid much attention before but I found myself getting teary-eyed comparing animal mother and baby pairs.

My zoo baby

Holden fell asleep about halfway through the zoo but we continued on in the heat and really enjoyed the day. Wearing him around added to the heat but I think he liked being higher up than he would have been in a stroller. He was also comfortable in a new environment having me so close.

Lake Swim
Our latest venture was to the lake for a swim. Holden’s first ever swim to be exact. I was a little nervous but mostly excited about swimming and spending a family day at the lake. We bought a float that wasn’t nearly as cool as it looked on the box but served it’s purpose for the day. I covered the baby in sunblock and passed him over to his dad to introduce him to the water.

He absolutely loved being in the water and in his float

To our surprise he immediately smiled, laughed, and kicked his little legs! We had so much fun floating him around and later playing in the shallow water. He splashed and laughed most of the day. It was great and I’m glad we went. We’ll definitely be swimming a lot more this summer.

I’m looking forward to the rest of our summer and hoping that we find many more adventures that we’re brave enough to try!

Related Rookie Mom Activities:
Activity #96: Go swimming
Activity #257: Meow, bark and tweet at the pet store (a free alternative to the zoo for little ones!)

What?! Yep, a pickle spear for a baby. I discovered this little trick while Holden was sitting in my lap and I was trying to eat a slice of pizza. I handed him the pickle spear figuring he’d lick it, make a face and get on with grabbing for my lunch. Well, he loved it!

Olivia loves this pickle

Recently, I was discussing this unorthodox “food” with some other rookie mom friends and 3 out of 4 of them also gave their toothless kids pickles to make ‘em happy.

Stick a pickle spear in that greedy hand and watch closely to make sure no chunks are gnawed or bitten off.

A local-to-us rookie mom, Jen, told us “The monthly shot (now on 2nd kid, too) with the same toy in the same chair is still going strong at now 33 months. (No, we haven’t figured out when we’ll stop. Kindergarten? When she rolls her eyes & flips us off every month?)”

I asked her to show us what she’s got.  Here are photos from months 7, 10, 13, and 32.

It’s never too late to start, friends!

P.S. A did-do is something that you did, rather than a to-do!

‘member those candy hearts that say “Me Too” or “Love Ya”? They’re called conversation hearts. A few years ago, Rookie Moms reader, Veronica, suggested that we use our babies to make cards with this Valentine’s Day theme for our family members this year:

Pay homage to the throwback days when you made Valentine’s for every kid in the class! Have baby pose with a cut-out construction heart and matching attire. Once you have a keeper, use Photoshop or your favorite scrapbook program to add fun, quirky sayings to the “conversation” heart!

Be creative and come up with one for everybody on your recipient list! You can send it as an email attachment or have them printed as a 4×6 picture at your local photo center for an instant keepsake!

I just read that the new conversation hearts say “text me” and “tweet me”. Sigh.

Our friend and once-rookie mom Kristen Chase, aka The Mominatrix, has challenged moms across the nation to participate in a 30-day program during which we’ll have one new task per day, all aimed to improve your sex life and self confidence.

Tomorrow’s challenge? Wear a thong. And make sure your partner knows it.

I think I can do this.

The Mominatrix assures us:

If you’re worried that you’ll be required to swing from a trapeze or have sex standing on your head, then you’ve got the wrong idea. While circus skills and flexibility can definitely enhance your sex life, this challenge is going to focus on you feeling sexier, not on a possible second career option.

I am excited to have The Mominatrix coach me through this adventure: 30 sex-related tasks in one month. I took a sneak peek at her book The Mominatrix’s Guide To Sex and trust that she is the right woman for the job. Plus, who doesn’t want a resolution that encourages the purchase of lacy bra rather than a sports bra?

Moms who just gave birth (Sex? OUCH!), The Mominatrix has been there.  Three times.  She will help you get back in the saddle. (Oh god, did I just write that?) Or back on the horse. (Seriously?)

So make this January the one that starts off with a bang. We’re in! Are you with us?

Follow along at The Mominatrix Blog.

We had a board book that I didn’t like too much. The illustrations were too wishy washy and there were too many words. We also had a board book that I loved, by Todd Parr, called This is My Hair. Bold illustrations and simple text. Plus funny. I decided I wanted the first book to be more like the second book. And I needed a Father’s Day gift for my husband.

So, I painted over the cover of the book, put stickers on it and pasted all sorts of stuff on the inside. The main theme was “This is my dad”. I made a cartoon-like image of my husband’s head and copied enough of them for each page of the book. Then I pasted it over various environments that I cut out of magazines. I hand wrote the captions. I did not worry about letting the original contents of the book show through. It was obviously hand-made.

I think it looks really messy and amaturish, but visitors to our house seemed to be very impressed. So, I share this idea with you so that you can impress your own visitors. Feel free to copy my ideas exactly.

Apparently there is a whole art form called altered books, where people collage on the pages of regular books. They make some amazing stuff. My version is less than amazing, but it is a board book that my son and husband read together – and it’s made by me.

When I am queen of the universe, I will never ever have to do another dish. Nobody in my house will leave the cap off the toothpaste or leave a wet towel on the floor. And if, by chance, I ever do it, someone will pick up immediately after me without any judgment or dirty looks.

Part of our task master (AKA referee)

Since I’m not the official queen of anything and I still hate doing dishes, Alec and I used the Nest’s Task master checklist as a means to divide up our regular chores. TheNest.com is a sister site to wedding-planning site,The Knot, and it’s for newlyweds. I only got to use that site for about one month before having to turn my allegiance to BabyCenter and The Bump (the daughter site) but that’s a story for another day.

The Taskmaster List divides up the sweeping and dusting but also gift buying and vacation planning. What’s fun about this activity is the feeling of relief you will get when it’s done, and the pleasure of seeing it all written down.

What’s lame about this activity is that it might also cause you to face your own June-Cleaver fantasies or shed some light on your mate’s primal Neanderthal leanings. Or maybe that was just me.

Go on, get started on your own chore list!