NOTTI MUMMY!!!!!

You might wondering what inspired this particular entry... Well, the mother of little girl, yes me has been up to no good again.


1. Finishing her milk at night
Talk about different strategies and techniques in tackling problem. Creativity is the keyword when it comes to getting my little one to finish her milk. Parenthood has became an art, difficult to understand and only creativity is supported! So when little girl refuse to finish 'x' oz of milk, I will pour the difference into a bowl with cereal or rusk for her to eat... For a few nights, I was able to get her to finish the cereal or rusk with milk. *YEAH!*


2. Forcing her to seat in the baby chair
I do not know if it is my expectations that's making her feel miserable. She does not like to sit in the baby chair. It's as though the seat heats up to more than 40 degrees celcius when she seats on the chair for a few moments. After about 6 mouthful of food, she starts climbing out from the chair. It's as though the chair overheated and she HAD TO GET OUT! It's frustrating but is it normal that once they learn how to climb and stand they will refuse to sit?

3. When I am busy in the kitchen... 
I always deem the kitchen as a place of danger and it's usually dirty (from all the cooking, etc). So there were a few occassions where hubby wasn't free to help me with little girl and I desperately needed to get things done in the kitchen! So TARDAH.... This is where little girl will be: 

Yeap... right inside a laundry basket!

Okay other than the last one, I guess I wasn't that naughty, was I? :) 

Milestone Developments!!!

28 October 2009 - hubby excitedly told me that my mother in law (MIL) said that little girl has started to walk without support and that she can manage about four little wobbly steps forward! : )

I told hubby I wanted to see little girl do her small stunt and no matter how my hubby coaxed her, she refused! But she showed it us yesterday! *YEAH!* Anyhow, I am glad that she is progressing. MIL said she will most probably be able walk by next month even before her 1st birthday. I sure hope that's true. I guess it will be fun the day she can walk on her own! But it also means time to spend more money buying shoes! :)

Other than that, she's started to point. When she sees something that she's interested in, she will point at it. But usually I am a bit slow to respond to her pointing! So next time she points, I shall make it a point to ask her what she's pointing at or bring her closer to take a look at the item!

Best for baby? Breastfeeding??

It's coming to the end of October 2009. Today, I took out a calander and began to mark down the weeks till my little girl is 1 years old... And it's less than the number of fingers on both my hands! 7 more weeks to go and it's going to be her first birthday!

Breastfeeding has became part and parcel of my life as I begin to live with expression of breastmilk and learning how to adjust my schedules around it (so that I still have a social life). I always remember the frustrations of a first time breastfeeding mother. From worrying about the painful engorged breast, blocked milk ducts and supply, quality of breastmilk, to battling with the washing and sterlising of pump bottles. All these "driving me up the wall" issues seem to go away one by one as I got myself into a routine of when to do what. When I look back at the breastfeeding days, it would not have been so tedious if I could feed via direct latching.   

From the crazy 3 hrly pumps during the initial 1.5 months ( i.e. i wake up at 3am to pump), to dropping my wee hours morning pump (so I could get un-interrupted sleep), to 4hrly pumps when I return to work (so that I only need to pump twice during working hours), to 6hrly pumps, to 12 hrly pumps (i only need to pump once during working hours).  

As I begin to drop the pumps, the economics theory of demand = supply kicked in really quickly. A lot of new mothers might not know but the dropping of pumps can seriously impact the supply of breastmilk. So if you intend to continue breastfeeding for long, do not drop the pumps so quickly! The largest and sharpest drop in my breast milk supply happened when I streched it to 12hrly. From a yield of 300ml per pump, I now only get about 6oz (which is 180-200ml). It's not too bad because it's just right/enough for one feed! :) Yeap, so now I do not need to stock up milk bags to store extra breast milk in the freezer.

I can attribute the success of my breastfeeding journey (so far) to 3 main factors: CONFIDENCE, DETERMINATION and SUPPORT ( what i term as CDs). 

CONFIDENCE: As I mentioned in my earlier post, I believe that breastfeeding is a confidence trick. Do not self doubt because nature made women the best nurturers of the little ones... (Then again, I also believe that not breastfeeding does not make you any less a nurturer/wonderful mother. Because if you think so, you'll be so stressed up/obsessed that it will negatively impact your breastmilk supply!) 

DETERMINATION: I was very decided on breastfeeding and aim to give my girl breast milk for a year. Of course there were people who will say "Aiyah, more than 6 months, enough already lar. Can stop liao lor". But my answer to them is always the same "Haha... it's almost 1 year, so I give my girl breast milk until 1 year lor.". 

SUPPORT: The all important factor which comes to play when I just feel like giving up. My husband's support, my mother in law (who shared with me on the other uses of breastmilk - like curing sore eyes, etc). And not to mention, my work place (i.e. my bosses/superior were OK with me pumping during office hours and the office enviornment - i.e. meeting rooms without windows and doors where I could lock to express milk).

Seriously, if my little girl can feed directly, I would not have been marking the weeks to stop pumping. (Yes! To all those who told me to stop after 6 months, I would continue to breastfeed beyond a year!)

Special Outings....

This post is dedicated to what I term "special outings". These are considered extra-ordinary because we normally don't visit these places... 

1) Singapore Botanic Garden

In the beginning, I was full of energy and little girl was curious about the greenery... so we walked from one visitor centre to the other visitor centre (nearer to Orchard/Gleneagles). After the visit, we went to Ikea Alexandra for dinner. And I remember that little girl was such a darling! She actually sat in the chair to finish her dinner (it was Only Organic lamb stew with porridge + bits of tofu). 


These photos were taken sometime early September. I finally found the photos!!! 

Hubby did a little tweaking to the camera and voila - little girl and I became the secondary focus in this photo. I simply LOVE this photo!!! Little girl was also introduced to a mirage of (only) colourful flowers (because mama loves colourful things. LOL!). 

Hubby forgot the tripod, so we used little girl's stroller!!! Not bad eh? :P

2. East Coast Park

Headed to my grandmother's place today. Since we were in the east, we decided to drop by East Coast Park. The sound of the waves were loud and it was getting dark by the time we were there. It was a really short "stay" there since little girl was not too comfortable. We headed for MacDonalds to get little girl washed (since we let her play with the sand). 

Told hubby, we would visit ECP (not the expressway) but at an earlier time when there was more light and better pictures could be taken... HAHA...

Put her near the water and let the waves touch her feet... She did not like the feeling of the wet and course sand on her feet...

 

Playing with sand!!!!

Birthday Celebration - Have it or NOT??? *Hmmmmm....*

Little girl is now 10 months old officially! :) In another 2 months, she will be 12 months old! I have not decided if a birthday party is in order or should it be a small personal family affair... A lot of mommies have made thier plans and booked a place for the party. So if I want to have one, I have to start planning!

One Sunday, a neighbour invitied me to her daughter's birthday celebration. It was a small affair among some of her friends, close relative and neighbours... A neighbour who was staying on the same floor as us became the official photographer for the event!

The birthday party is in Aug (after national day) and it's been two months. Better late than never!

My neighbour was so facinated with my daughter that he took many single shots of her!

 
 
 
Some shots with the photographer's daughter. For some reason, my little girl allowed her to carry for a long time. The reason why I mentioned this is becuase during this period my girl will frown or start crying if held by a stranger! *hmmm....* Is it sisterly love then?

I thought these are pretty nice shots of my little girl with daddy! My curious little girl! Trying to push daddy away so that she can reach for the lens of the camera!

How can I not post a photo of her with me??? At this time, little girl is not not very proficient in standing so I had to help her else she'll be falling all over the place!

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
To end this post, a family photo shot (ok ok, it's not fantastic! But have to make do, since little girl was getting restless. It was 1plus in the afternoon, well beyond her nap time!)

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
PS: We were in red because it was post national day! And what better way then to wish my neighbour and her baby a Happy Birthday!

An update on the Baby U Photo Shoot!

Finally laid my hands on the CD of photos from Baby U Studio (http://www.babyu.com.sg/). There were a total of 50+ photos above the photos which I had selected for developing... Anyway, I picked out a few more here for u to enjoy! :)