Too old to celebrate??!

In Nov, I celebrated my 30th birthday and to be honest ever since I hit 26 and above.. all birthday celebrations are quiet affair.

I guess gone were the days where I will party like crazy... nor do I have the energy to stay up till 1am.

So birthday celebrations are just a day to pamper myself with either massage, hair cut or nails treatment. And thereafter a simple dinner with some friends or just with my loves one.

This year, my big "3" celebration is alot more simple...

I just spend the day off to my tummy massage with bottomslim, head out for a session of yoga and head back home to celebrate with hubs and dani girl..

I guess the next and all the birthdays will be celebrated in such manner but I'm not complaining... Cause I simply have this birthday day off! ^_^v

My cake from Chocolate Origin

This year, my birthday celebration got meaningful. Cause this girl is part of my world!

Have a great day!

Xoxoxo,
Felicia

Mother's Day off - Comes with a Price.

I often wonder if it's the hot weather recently in SG or my weird hormones in work, I feel frustrated easily.

Simple things that my hubby does, makes me feel annoyed.
Like when I'm supposed to meet him at this work place and when I reach, I couldn't hold get of him. Because he is smoking in some restricted area and the mobile reception is lousy. I get pek chey trying to call him several times.

Or things like whenever I decided to take leave from work to do my own stuffs, he will pop out something and I gotta change my plans because of his suggestion.

Now that I'm a parent to Danielle. My off days usually comes with a price. Why? Because I gotta to pay the nanny extra to look after her on weekends. And I dun get the nanny to look after her every weekends cause it's so precious for me to bond with Danielle. But I'm still Felicia, I still need 10% of my energy and time to be spent on myself.

And I get very pissed off if that off day, I can't get my errands done or things / place I cant go.

I wonder why these people just don't realised that as a mother, it's damn rare for me to have my off day all to myself.

Why can't they just let me go do my yoga, pamper myself with spa, do my hair or nails?

End of my auntie gumbling...

Babies don't Keep..

A poem from Ruth Hulburt Hamilton depicts motherhood..

To remind me that as a Mother.. I have to place Danielle first and let the rest (unimportant stuffs) go...

Mother, oh mother, come shake out your cloth!Empty the dustpan, poison the moth,Hang out the washing and butter the bread,Sew on a button and make up a bed.Where is the mother whose house is so shocking?She's up in the nursery, blissfully rocking!
Oh, I've grown as shiftless as Little Boy Blue(Lullaby, rockaby, lullaby, loo).Dishes are waiting and bills are past due(Pat-a-cake, darling, and peek, peekaboo).The shopping's not done and there's nothing for stewAnd out in the yard there's a hullabalooBut I'm playing Kanga and this is my Roo.Look! Aren't her eyes the most wonderful hue?(Lullaby, rockaby, lullaby loo.)
Oh, cleaning and scrubbing will wait till tomorrow,But children grow up, as I've learned to my sorrow.So quiet down, cobwebs. Dust, go to sleep.I'm rocking my baby. Babies don't keep.

Taken when Danielle is around 2 months plus

I do agree that as a new mum.. I'm still trying to balance out my own needs and my baby's needs.

See, I've been me for the past 29 years. All these while, I've been taking care of my own needs and wants.
And now that I've Danielle.. I've to learn to put her needs and wants before myself.

This is something that I have to learn. Cause there are time where I still wish to go holiday alone without her.
(Sounds like I'm a bad mum eh..)

When that little thought cross my mind,  wondering if I can go holiday and leave Danielle with her nanny?? I will take her pictures out and see. See that she has grown so much over the span of 4 months, make me let go of the thought of gg away.

Cause I don't want to miss every milestone and achievement that she has hit. Babies don't keep.

You will always be Daddy's Girl & Mummy's World

Taken when Danielle is 4 and half months old

 Right now, this girl is able to flip over to her tummy and lift up her head high.
Able to hold her own milk bottle (for a little while)
She is also starting to recognize places and people. She knows where is her infant care, her nanny place.
She knows that these places are where we place her in the daytime so that mummy and daddy can go to work.

I felt miserable that her nanny / ah gong / ah ma even daddy is bonding with her much more than me. Esp this whole week cause it's the peak season at office.

Tomorrow is Saturday, decided to forgo yoga this week so that I can spend the weekends with her.

Can't wait to bring her out for walks and spend some bonding time at home! Going to stock up some pictures books and gonna read to her!!

Have a great week!!

Xoxo,
Felicia

Wish me Luck!!

Yesterday was the last day that I will be having a helper as we've send her back to her country this morning. And we are thankful that all is done without much drama. Guess she must have know that we going to send her back but didn't expected it to be this soon.

To be honest, ever since we have a helper, the cleanness at home is much much much better.... however, my helper is way too young. She is that kind of person where you have to constantly remind her if not she will forget to do things. To make things worst, she can't get along with my mother in law.

Apparently, my mother in law says that when my hubby is not around, she will act like she couldn't be bothered much with my mil. When my hubby is around, she will act like very busy. Mop floor, wash this, clean that. Fold clothing, look after baby etc....  But in fact, in the afternoon, she is damn free!! She can spend the whole afternoon, sit next to my daughter... and just watch her sleep... Ai yo!

So this afternoon, first time without much of my helper's help.. I managed to settle Danielle's feeding, changing diaper and coaxing her to sleep.

It's quite tiring cause while she sleeps, I have to quickly wash her bottles and sterilise it. Have my lunch. And to make it worst, my sis in law is at home today. Not aware that our helper has left. She like princess lor!! All her plates and cups just left it at the sink after she is done with it, don't want to wash and just sit at the sofa and watch tv!! Damn it, like i'm her maid now. Argh... so lazy till the Fat Cat is meowing at her to feed her. She just tell the cat to wait.

Poor kitty, has to wait for me to come out and feed her. I told her that the helper has left for good liao... still dun want to help out abit. I've a baby to care for okay!!! #$%@(*!

Thank goodness that Danielle is a good girl today...

Tried all sorts of method to make her sleep

Tried to coax Danielle to take her afternoon nap... but somehow she managed to sleep for 30 mins and wake up again... so I pull up all tricks...

Give her pacifier. On the baby shusher apps and relaxing music. Switch on the vibrating mode on her rocker chair... 

And after her 3pm feeding, change of diaper as she pooed... she falls asleep.

Finally she sleeps!!!

Yeah!! A pat on my shoulder!!
Another 3 more days, Danielle will start her infant care. Guess, I'm going to miss her like crazy!!!!

Xoxo,
Felicia 

These are LIFE SAVERS!!!

Motherhood is very new to me.. many things / times, I actually trial and error with my daughter.
Although information can be easily search online but trust me, you won't really understand

Especially when they describe baby's crying... according to my internet's articles. Babies has different types of cry, just that we do not know how to decipher them. Well, I tried my best and honestly, my baby's cries sounds the same when she is restless, hungry or tired.

So here comes trial and error.... If Danielle starts to cry, it's usually because she is hungry. So first thing is that I will quickly change her diaper when the bm (breastmilk is being heat up). Than it's feeding time. Usually after feeding, she will fall asleep (if I'm lucky). If not she will fuss, than we will have to carry her, place her in her rocker and rock her to sleep. Or place the pacifier in her mouth.

Either one of the above will work and keep her quiet.

So thru my 2.5 months of being a mother.. I came to realised these few baby stuffs are really a LIVE
SAVER for me as a new mother!

Rocker Chair - Fisherprice 

Fisher Price - Infant Rocker Chair
Source: Fisher Price website

This rocker chair is the best thing that came into my life. At first I wanted to purchase those old school type of net backing rocker chair but my hub refuse to let me buy..

My step mum purchase this for Danielle for her 1mth old celebration and this is really a godsend.

The moment we place her in her rocker, rock her for awhile, she fall asleep. On those days / nights, if rocking do not make her sleep, we switch the vibrate mode on. The moment she falls asleep, we switch it off. She loves this rocker till she refuse to sleep in her cot... -__-zzz

I still let her sleep in her cot when I can only do so when she is deep deep asleep. 

See how soundly she sleeps...

Bath Seat Support

When I first tried to give my baby her bath... it scare the hell out of me.. Cause she is so soft and slippery and she will move her arms around. I was so afraid that she will slip out of my hands and even if the water level at the bath tub is shallow.. I still can't imagine what will be the outcome.

So for the longest time, I delegate her shower time to my mil or helper. 

It's only till recently, my ex-colleagues gave me this... Now shower time for Danielle is a breeze. I no longer need to panic if she will slip!!!

Musical Mobile

Before Danielle found her love for her rocker chair.. musical mobile makes her fall asleep when we place her in her cot or when she starts to fuss. The moment the music is on, she just keep quiet and listen and sometimes fall asleep while listening. 

Now that she is 2.5 months and starts to focus on sights.. we place her on her cot and train her eyesight and she will focus on those cute dangling soft toy! Good job girl!

Baby Shusher App

Download any of the baby shusher app from either Itunes or Play store.. 

Basically this app just play the "shush" sound repeatedly and apparently babies feels safe and it will soothe them and helps them to fall asleep.

Initially I didn't know about such app and I will manually shush Danielle to sleep... by the time she falls asleep.. I've no voice!

So with this app, I just play it and place it somewhere near her... and I can go off doing my own stuffs.

Another lifesaver!!

Swaddle Sack

Some mothers claims that swaddle sack is damn good for baby especially bedtime!! I belive babies all like to be swaddle as its makes them warms and tight, the feeling like when they are in our womb.

But my dear girl here, only let her swaddle her for the first 2 - 3 weeks... subsequently she refuse to let us swaddle her.. her arms will try to escape.

1 moment she is all nicely swaddle, the next moment, she wriggle her arm out..

So I guess this is good for me till my baby is 3 weeks old.

Stream Steriliser 

Didn't purchase any kind of electric steam steriliser before I give birth as I thought we could use the old school way of sterilising in a big pot of hot water with all baby's milk bottle and stuffs.

But that works if I can a helper who is good and able to help me. Honestly, sometimes I see the way my helper wash baby's milk bottle... *shake head*

Either it's too much liquid cleanser soap used till her milk bottle smells of the liquid cleanser. Or she will place all her milk bottle to wash in the sink that still have those leftover veg and what nots, in the trap sink, Haiz.

And the best part is, if my helper is in good mood, she will use hot water to throughly rinse the milk bottles. If not, she will pour hot water over it and that's it.

So I purchase Avent's Stream steriliser for $99 during the Taka Baby Fair. 

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So far these are my few baby products that are life saver to me.. yet to discover other products that can make my life as a new mother easier! This is a steep learning curve and I think I will master it in no time!! ^_^v

Xoxo,

Felicia