Outings

We went to the zoo the other day, yes, a 7-months old is a bit young for it and most of the time, our baby is either sleeping or feeding in her pram. We saw some seaseals, a hippo, elephant, zebra...etc, she didn't seem to comprehend much but was an experience. After the trip, I think next time for any outings, I'll take the baby carrier, I had a trial on the ergo carrier and it was good, it's more comfortable than the other ones that I got from Farmers which keeps falling down from my shoulders, and easier than the sling I got from trademe. I think it'll last longer than the other ones as well, it's well worth it. I also bought the bubba wrap, but I'm not very good at tying knots and my baby keeps sliding down for some reason.

She's a bit cranky these days, maybe the teething pain, and have a little problem sleeping too, the plunket nurse recommended just leave her crying to sleep, stay beside her but no eye contact to distract her to play, and wait until she get to sleep. I also pat her lightly to try help her to get to sleep. Just found a book called Teeth are Not for Biting [Board book] which is funny book to let baby learn to deal with sad, cranky feelings.

Reading to her is a good idea too, there're some free downloadable story books here, like Cinderalla, tortoise & the hare, sleeping beauty...etc.

6 months

Couldn't believe time flies, when I look at my last post, it was September! Was busy all these months with the baby, housework, looking for part time work...etc. I'm really enjoying motherhood now, as the baby is starting to learn things and I was more used to the routine and what to expect. She's well and picking up new things every day, it's delighted to see that.

About feeding, she seems to be less keen on milk and more keen on solids, I was doing her puree apple, carrot, banana and spinach. The plunket nurse suggest to add vegetables to help her digest better.

Still puzzling as the day care centre I'd like her to join is still on waiting list until April, still struggling to find time for work.

Found something good to start at 6 months: Tips for promoting speech & language development

Planning for the next child

Heard that the best time to have a second kid is either with an age difference of 3 years or 1 & a half year, and it's harder when 2 kids are 2 years apart as they'll both be demanding. If having an age difference between 1 and a half year, pretty much we'll need to get pregnant when our daughter is between 6 months to one year old.

As I'm breatfeeding, I've been trying to keep my healthy eating, but not eating as much as when I was pregnant, as I'd like to lose some weight and my appetite doesn't seem to be as big. Will take Elevit again for the folic acid.

My husband was dreaming to have a boy, we don't really mind the gender for our next child, but I guess we could try to maximise the opportunity. There are many ways we could try:

- the old wives tale like facing the pillow north

- IVF and others described in the about.com site

- time the ovulation, boys will conceive closer to ovulation (when ovary release egg), as sperm for male live shorter

To test which days is ovulation, one way I heard before is to measure the temperature first thing in the morning when awake, our body temperature will rise at ovulation. The Clearblue Digital Ovulation Tests will test the exact day, like a pregnancy test paper, through urine.
Signs of ovulation

But I found it quite troublesome, having to measure my temperature every morning and sometimes my period didn't come on time! The day this month might be different from the next. The Maybe Baby Saliva Ovulation Reusable test kit test the estrogen (the hormone that release at the time of ovulation) level through Saliva, I think I'll give this a go, it's simple, not as expensive as reusable, and it makes sense.


More Useful Resources:

Getting Pregnant FAQ



ClearBlue Ovulaton test FAQ

Good Deal online

Elevit Tablets 100's - Our Price $71.95 NZ$71.95

Post-Natal Depression

Went shopping for some clothes and found that I have up 2 sizes, oh no..., but I'm confident that with regular exercises I'll soon be back to my normal size.

Many friends asked if I have post-natal depression, usually my answer is a quick 'no', I've got my family to support me and the baby is healthy, can't think of anything to complain. However when a friend mentioned that her sister suffers from post-natal depression, and always worries, thinks that she can't cope, and not used to the lost of personal time...etc, I started to realise, yes, I have thought the same way too during my first month. And quite often got into arguments with everyone in the family, felt the lost of freedom and couldn't handle the baby. In addition to that, back pain, tiredness, lost of confidence in my figure, worried that my husband was having an affair because of that, got super sensitive when there's a txt to his phone.

As the baby started to sleep through the night, and I get more sleep and get to know more about what her cries mean, the worries ease a bit. Have found The Proper Care and Feeding of Husbands LP on my shelf, I actually bought this book by mistake before I got pregnant as I didn't think I needed that, we were having a perfect relationship with our own careers. After having the baby, everything in the book seems to set in, all of the problems that the women have in the book are my problems at the moment! Lots of arguments, resenting him on not helping to take care of the baby, not doing the housework, too busy to take care of the housework and the baby than myself, especially my looks, wearing lousy pj all the time and no time to go shopping. And he goes out more, and I resent him more and more arguments.

I think finding this book on the shelf is a blessing. It answers a lot of my doubts ,and have solutions for a long lasting marriage. I have the audiobook on my ipod as well, and the author Dr. Laura's funny expression makes me laugh at my problems. I'm interested in listening to her radio shows as there're so many good stories to learn from. Dr. Laura has a new book, The Proper Care and Feeding of Marriage,I think I'm going to get it as well.

I believe it's important for children to grow up in a happy family, I remember being unhappy as a teenager seeing my parents argued all the time, and strangely enough, children seem to blame themselves for parents' divorce. I certainly want my daughter to grow up in a happy family and know that she's loved no matter what, my goal is to bring her up into a happy and strong person.

Newborn memories

My baby is 3 months now and seems to lost her baby face, she looks more like a young child now, however, there're many newborn memories that I'll never forget for the rest of my life, like her tiny head moving left and right searching for the mouth while breastfeeding, now she knows where to go. Also, I'll never forget the tiny face smiling after suckling on the nipple, turning her mouth down before starting to cry, giggle when she was sleeping. All those were enjoyable memories for the whole family.

Now that things become more predicable with the baby, it's time my maternity leave payment ends and start to figure out how to make it financially, and who'll take care of the baby if I go back to work. The sample schedule from babycenter gives me some idea if I still want to breastfeed and work. Need to do a test run with my breast pump, and need to stock up some pads and storage bottle or vacuum bags as well.


Bought a manual pump but never figure out how to use it, and friends recommend to try an electric one, and it works! And later find out that when pumping one breast, the other one will go as well, so need a pair of breast shells. Should have got a duo pump, and it saves a lot of time too!

With the high interest rate, petrol and food prices at the moment, I think I'll need to get back to work, but the problem is that the child care centers around my area are all full, except if I want to fit in the part time slot that they have available, and I'll have to look for a job to fit in those part time hours. The other thing is the cost, it'll take away a big part of the part time salary.

The plus side with day care is that we don't need to worry about playing with my baby, they've got all the toys and trained professional to teach and also other children to play with, which is good for her social & mental development, I think.

Support for 1st time parent

We're pretty lucky in NZ I think, once my baby arrived, there's a midwife or nurse to follow up every few days after birth and every 3 weeks up to 3 months. The Well Child book that records the baby's growth and immunisations. There's also a lot of information, courses from plunket and local groups which are offered for free.

There are also coffee groups, new mums groups, pram walking groups offered by Plunket or other organisations. Playgroup offer free sessions at childcare centres around the country for parents, they have session usually grouped with similar aged children so the parents can exchange tips while the children play with all the facilities the centres has. It's a good way to try the centre before using them. I am on a waiting list for a child care centre for next March, I went there on my last month of pregnancy and was quite surprise for a 10 month waiting list! It seems we really have a shortage of early childhood teacher and centres.

There are certainly a lot of choices of early childhood centres, but which one is good? I found a really good site by the Ministry of Education, they have an Education Review Office that generate reports on all registered centres in NZ on a yearly basis, it's a good way to do some research at home before visiting. I have visited a few centres, some has 5 different areas for children from age 0-5, while some only seperate them into 3 groups, some centres has good security that only parents can access, and some you can walk right through without any reception. I'll probably join the sessions offered by Playcentre when I get the time and confidence to take my baby in the car by myself, she cried at times when the car stopped at the traffic light, can't imagine if there wasn't someone sitting next to her.

I'm starting to connect more to my baby now, I found that sometimes I start to miss her when I don't see her for an hour or so when I'm in the study. I enjoy lying in bed side by side with her, looking at the ceiling and talking to her (she coos and ah after I speak, sounds like she's agreeing); watching her smile after feed; wiggle her arms & legs when she plays in the play gym.

After reading some articles in the La Leche League website, it seems normal now that she wants to feed every hour, or only for 5 minutes, or wants feed an hour after she just had a big meal. As it's the same with me as well, I might need a drink of water an hour after my mains, sometimes some snacks, afternoon tea..etc, why ask my baby why she need to feed so much!

There are two main 'theories' to childcare, the baby-on-demand where the parents act according to what the baby needs, or parent-on-demand where the parents have set routines for the baby. Which one is better? I guess it depends on the parents and the baby's character. There were days that I simply don't have time to take a shower, have a proper meal just because the baby needed to be fed or put to sleep or cry...etc. But is it really the way, I thought? So I re-set my priorities, the baby certainly is important, but things like personal hygiene, some free time to handle household matters are also important.

Infant learning & development

Best day of the week: baby slept after each feed, or happily play with whatever I arranged, be it a play gym, an out of tone song that I sang or little games. Burp her after hearing she said 'eh', and gave a loud long burp.

Worst day of the week: sitting on my bed feeding, burping then feeding again, and she cried once I put her down. Keep crying & I couldn't find out any reasons, and stopped crying once her father or anyone hold her, cried again when passed back to me.
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Besides feeding, sleeping and changing nappies, baby seems to have more awake time and will cry when she's bored and need someone to cuddle or play/talk with.

A friend gifted Your Baby and Toddler from Birth to 3 Years: A Step-by-Step Guide to Your Child's Development, has a step-by step guide to child's development from birth, shows some activities that I can play with my baby. Now she's 5 weeks, activities from the book that help develop her skills:

- Talk to him from different places in the room and watch how he tries to locate the sound

- Repeat the same song a few times, babies' memory is developing, although only short-term at the moment

- Tickle the palm of her hand and fingertips with anything soft or furry in texture

- Emotional & Social development, babies at this stage love any kind of interactions. Talking & responding (cooing) to her, smile with her.

- from Your Self-Confident Baby: How to Encourage Your Child's Natural Abilities— From the Very Start, talking to her and tell her what you're doing helps build her language skills and shows her respect. For example, tell her when you're changing her, "Now, I'm going to lift your legs up and take the nappy away...etc"

- Active movement from SPARC has free videos to show activities from infant up to pre-schoolers


Learning from birth - a good resource from Team Up


More games ideas:

Games to Play with Babies


Creative Play for Your Baby: Steiner Waldorf Expertise and Toy Projects for 3 Months-2 Years

Nursary Rhymes Lyrics


Baby gym resources:

MyGym
Jumping Beans, NZ
KindyRock