Hana at 4 weeks old with hand and feet rattles

I was thinking about what someone said to me recently about how things on blogs are filtered. We filter all the bad and nasty stuff and write only about warm and fluffy things. I totally agree. In reality, looking after a baby is hard work. Its hard work but satisfying at the same time. It can suck at times and sometimes I feel lonely. Sometimes I feel like people think I’m a little bit nuts especially when I talk about potty training (elimination communication or EC) my baby from newborn. On the blog I talk about cloth diapers and EC and flashcards. But in reality I do have “off” days on which my baby is in disposables, I don’t offer her pee breaks and I don’t flashcard at all. I just concentrate on getting us both bathed. When H comes back, sometimes we eat pizza in bed cos I’m breastfeeding and too tired to get up! I guess the key thing is not to get too stressy about it. I don’t flashcard when I don’t feel like it. I put her in disposables when I’m too tired to cloth. Its easier to parent when you don’t take the whole thing seriously. And I always think  whatever we do or however we parent, the end product or how the child will turn out is not in our hands.

H has been trying to maintain the weight loss he’s achieved during Ramadan and has been eating a lot of salads. I’ve been trying to come up with new dressings and salad combinations to keep things exciting. H steers away from cream based dressings but occasionally he allows himself to have a Caeser salad. We use the Caeser’s dressing from the bottle as I have no time to make it from scratch now! But I still find time to make simple vinaigrettes. I recently bought a bottle of hazelnut oil from Culina’s and made a basil and hazelnut pesto to dress his salad with. Pestos are great as dressings and the possibilities are endless! I saw a beetroot pesto and Jones the grocer and was really intrigued by its pretty pink hue. I can’t wait to come up with more combinations. Its one of the reasons I bought my new kitchen gadget, a food processor..! Another reason I made such a ridiculous purchase (I mean with the baby and all, who has any time..) is because Giant stopped bringing in halal sausages. So it looks like I have to start making my own cos H keeps on talking about those sausages!

I was surprised Culina sells parmesan at a price 50% cheaper than cold storage!

I don’t routinely shop at Culina’s but there are some things we just can’t find elsewhere. We get our olives in olive oil at Culina’s. Everywhere else its sold in brine and these olives are really really delicious.

Another thing we often get is french butter. Carrefour carries it too but occasionally its out of stock. This is not good for post partum weight loss..

Culina carries a range of Tetsuya’s truffle products. I’ve only had it once in scrambled eggs last Sunday. My mom on the other hand has been spreading it on her buttered toast every morning!

Thanks for all the comments and saying hi! Its nice to be in touch with old friends as well as make new ones!

Here are some cloth diaper updates.

She outgrew the smallest setting on her Fuzzi Bunz small sized pocket diaper pretty fast! I hope they last till she’s 8 kg as the diaper claims it will..

When she’s in her cloth diaper I need to make sure I’m using bigger, or at least longer rompers. How the pocket  cloth diaper works is that you can adjust the absorbency by stuffing the pocket in the diaper with “inserts”. You can adjust the absorbency of the diaper by putting multiple and different thickness inserts according to your needs. I find with the thinner inserts that the Fuzzi Bunz came in, I had to change her after I’m guessing 1 pee which means a change every 1-2 hours depending on how much she feeds in that time. I use the Bumwear thicker inserts and they seem to last longer perhaps 3-4 hours.

The China diaper! They seem ok.

They’re just waaay too big for her so I’ve gotten loads of leaks! I’ll have to wait for her to grow into it. This is NOT a one size diaper as it claims. My Bumwear one size diapers fit her as they have so many buttons and ways to adjust its size. My only issue with the BUmwear dipes are that they’re still not absorbent! When I called the store, they said use adult detergent without fabric softeners as the Pigeon baby laundry detergent is not suitable for cloth diapers.

I’m confused, aren’t babies supposed to use clothes/dipes washed with only baby detergent ??

Things I’ve learnt

-its much easier to cloth diaper a 1 month old than when she was younger. When she was younger she wet small amounts and often. Now that she’s bigger she wets a larger amount but not as often so her diaper is dry in between pees. This means less diaper changes

-I wrote off prefolds too early. I’m actually using mainly prefolds in the morning when I’m more energetic and up to diaper changes. I realize that prefolds are the key to early potty training. I’ve also deviced better ways to wear a prefold and it seems to work for me. I will post more about this with photos.

-I figured out my diaper laundering system. I use the wet pail method because Hana is still young and there is no drowning risk like that with crawling babies and toddlers. This is what I do and works for me. I bathe Hana in her tub in the morning and keep her bath water. I then use the bath water throughout the day to rinse out her wet diapers. I then put the rinsed out diaper in a pail which has water and detergent for a presoak. If the diaper has poo in it I use a diaper sprayer or bidet (the hose by the toilet bowl) to spray off her poo and then give the diaper a good rinse. I rub detergent on any stains if there are any remaining and put it in the wet pail. I then run the whole load in the machine with her clothes and swaddle blankets, towels, sheets etc. every other day. I’ve presoaked and prerinsed the dipes so I think its ok to run it with her other stuff (Some may not agree with me here). My machine has 3 rinse cycles so my dipes end up really clean. I hang them out on a rack in my balcony to dry. So far I’ve not had any stink or stain issues. With only 10 pocket diapers I’m forced to use my prefolds and practice elimination communication with Hana. So far I ration my pocket diapers to be used only towards the evening when I’m really tired. I’ve never actually run out of pocket diapers this way. The other thing is that they dry really really fast. So after just a couple of hours on the rack they are ready for use. The inserts take longer though, thats why its advised to buy 2-3 inserts for every 1 pocket diaper.

- I’m still using disposables when I go out and at night. When I go out I don’t want to be bothered with diaper changes, its already a lot trying to handle her with everything else going on. I use disposables at night because H does the diaper change and its too many buttons to button up if we use the pocket diapers. There is a long row of buttons from her feet up to her diapers of her sleep suit which H takes some time to unbutton and do up. If I were to cloth diaper at night I would buy velcro tabbed pocket diapers rather than snap closures.

-so far my disposable usage has remained at about 1 pack (about 50 dipes) lasting 18 days thats about 3 dipes per day.

Hello Farhan,
How are u dear?
well alf alf alf mabrouk – congrats..
 
She is really wonderfull…
She filled my eyes tears, we all wished we can hug and kiss her , u know
the mixture of fareast and lebanese realyy gave a wonderfull child
 
May god bless her….
U can’t imagine how dad is happy.. she is the first grand daughter…
 
Hoping you are better, and feeling fine.
My regards to my dear brother and tell him that we all miss the young dad..
 
 
Regards to your family and many kisses to Aunt 
 
Reine

An email from my sister in law. Today I learnt that Singapore is included in the Far East(note that I highlighted and underlined the word fareast and it wasnt in the original email)! I’ve always thought that when people referred to the Far East here it meant China, Japan, Korea etc

But from Wikipedia:

Significantly, the term evokes cultural as well as geographic separation; the Far East is not just geographically distant, but also culturally exotic. It never refers, for instance, to the culturally Western nations of Australia and New Zealand, which lie even farther to the east of Europe than East Asia itself. This combination of cultural and geographic subjectivism was well illustrated in 1939 by the Prime Minister of Australia, R. G Menzies. Reflecting upon his country’s geopolitical concerns with the onset of war, Menzies commented that:

“The problems of the Pacific are different. What Great Britain calls the Far East is to us the near north.“^[3]

Far East in its usual sense is comparable to terms such as the Orient, which means East; the Eastern world; or simply the East. South East Asia and the Russian Far East might now be included in the Far East to some extent due to recent Chinese migration to Russia, and the Korean diaspora in Russia.

Just a little teaser..

The next post is going to have cloth diapers and photos!

I’ve also been wondering, since my blog now has nothing to do with food (except the banana leaf photo in the last last entry which was an attempt to post something food related, I took the photo with you in mind)  and everything to do with BABY, are you still reading?

It seems that you are, based on my stat counter. Are you an old reader who just reads along? Are you interested in babies or are a mummy/mummy to be yourself? Are you reading hoping for a recipe or some food (I miss cooking n baking so so much..)? Who are you? Let me know!

PS. my blog needs to be cleaned up and some parts updated! I’m not sure when I’ll find the time!

Some handmade cards that Hana loves. The high contrast black and white cards are her favourite compared to the math cards (red dots on white background) and her reading cards which are colourful words.

I have been meaning to write about her first month but its such an overwhelming task, I just don’t know where to start! I have a couple of friends who are expecting their first baby soon and when they visit time is too short to permit me telling them all the things I wish I knew about looking after a baby.

So here goes..

Things I Learnt in the First Month

1. Baby cries a lot in the first week

This is the toughest period as the baby is unhappy just by being out of the womb. I felt like she was crying all the time. Old Malay belief was that she was crying as her umbilical stump hurts and it would stop when the stump dropped off. The stump usually takes about a week to drop off and this would be the time the crying stopped! The first week is tough as you’re still recovering from the pain of labor and having to deal with the responsibility of caring for a newborn. In the first week, my baby cried for hours on end at night and slept the entire day. I was exhausted. Having help around the house and a confinement lady to care for me really helped.

2. Baby wants to be carried all the time

My Indonesian helper modelling the sling carrier

The warmth of the your body and the sound of yourheartbeat is very comforting to a baby so they want to be carried A LOT. This excludes the time that you’re breastfeeding so she’s in your arms what feels like every single waking minute of your life. This is very problematic when you have to shower and use the toilet. It also causes loads of muscle aches and pains as your arms aren’t used to being in a cradle position for extended periods of time. I ended up with really numb forearms which was where her head rested when I carried her. I also have wrist pains which I’m still plagued with! The sarong sling is a real godsend. I can carry her in the sling and still type with both hands. I can also do laundry and do simple chores around the house. I also have my meals with her asleep in the sling. When I’m active and moving around she sleeps really well in the sling as I think it mimics the rocking motion in the womb. Carrying her is also really good exercise and I go for walks with her inside as well. She usually wakes up only when I stop walking, a lot of times to feed and the sling makes discreet nursing in public really easy. I even walk around with her feeding in it!

3. Well meaning advice can be really annoying

Trust me you’ll get lots. Just listen and nod. And forget about it! I’ve gotten really strange advice from what to do with the placenta to licking my babies face first thing in the morning before brushing my teeth to get rid of her “milk rash”!!

4. I love my breast pump

I started pumping and storing breast milk when Hana was 2 weeks old. This increased my milk supply by a lot when I froze everything that I pumped as my body just produced more milk to keep up with the increased “demand”. This started giving me engorgement problems when Hana started sleeping thru the night. Yes, she sleeps thru the night from 1st week on with just 1 or 2 night feeds. My theory is because I cloth diaper her during the day, she doesn’t sleep for long periods of time at all as she always feels wet and wants a change! Of course this is just a theory.. I’m not sure what other cloth diapering moms observe.

Anyway, When Hana was 3 weeks old I started getting H to give her expressed breast milk from a bottle when he came home from work. This gave me time to shower, prepare dinner and wash up. Something which I really looked forward to at the end of the day. Cooking is never a chore for me! I’ve also managed to leave her with my mom for short periods of time to sneak out for a meal with H and grocery shop. Yup, marriage and baby makes you do really domesticated stuff even when you’re out on a “date”.

Another thing I found really useful is a bustier for hands free pumping which I bought from mums and babes for S$71.  Otherwise it got really boring having to sit with both your hands occupied and just waiting for the machine to do its work.

5. The colic hold is a life saver.

Yati first told me about the colic hold and Hana LOVES it.

We nicknamed this hold the “koala”. So when she’s fussy and we know she’s fed and changed we would tell her we’re going to koala her and as soon as she’s on her tummy she immediately quietens.

See the similarity in the position?

6. Friends are a godsend!

Especially mummy friends. I found out after talking to Nan that putting Hana on her tummy makes her sleep longer. I do this in the day when I’m around to watch her. Its not recommended in general as any another sleeping position besides lying on the back increases the risk of sudden infant death syndrome. So she sleeps on her back at night.

The other thing that I found so mind boggling was breastmilk storage. Of course I got lots of help and tips here.

7. Fresh air does wonders.

Going for a short brisk walk helps both mummy and baby! I try to get a little fresh air an exercise each day and it helps Hana as she’s usually tired out after absorbing all the sights and sounds so she settles down for a nice nap after an outing.

8. Different holds for breastfeeding helps a lot!

Cradle and cross cradle: These are the classic feeding positions and the ones I most often use in the day.

Football: This hold was the best hold for the first few days for me as with good positioning of supporting pillows (plenty at the back and then stacked up under the arm that is holding the baby) you hardly need to exert any strength in holding the baby. Also she was tilted upright so this made her more awake and alert and I found that I could look into her eyes without getting a neckache. I felt I had to flex my head more with the cradle hold.

Tailor: This hold is when I’m too lazy to pull pillows to support her. Its not very comfortable though as I find myself leaning forwar. But its good when I know she’s not hungry and just wants to comfort suckle for a few minutes.

Lying down: This is a real lifesaver which I couldn’t figure out how to do in the first week. I called the lactation consultant and she gave me some advice over the phone. Once I mastered it, my night feedings were a breeze and I also started having short naps in the day. This also helps when you’ve got an episiotomy and are  not very mobile.

I found that using all the different holds prevented sore nipples as each hold causes the baby to latch onto the nipple differently therefore different areas of the nipple are “sucked” with each hold.

To my friends reading, any first month tips/experiences??

I ate here.

I’m taking forever to finish half written posts.

So look out for-

1. Hana’s 1st month updates

2. More cloth diapering updates

3. My latest kitchen gadget..

I owe some reicpes on this site. So here goes.. No new pictures though, unless you want some photo of squashed chocolate cake in a tupperware. The thought of cutting a slice, putting it on a plate, dusting some icing sugar on top and drizzling some vanilla sauce over while waiting for the light to be just right, taking out my camera and taking a couple of shots then uploading it onto my camera is just too much work! I only have a couple of minutes before Hana wakes. Life on happygrub will take time to get back to normal.

For the first recipe I owe butterflyrubrics:

Its that chocolate tart.

For the base I used this recipe but substituted ground hazelnut for ground almond as that was what I had in my pantry. This tart was inspired by the crispy chocolate tart I had at the chocolate factory. Its a layer of shortcrust pastry, topped with a layer of crispy hazelnut milk chocolate or praliné feuilleté, I used a Pierre Hermes recipe (see below)  and then topped with a dark chocolate glaze. The recipe below will yield two 24 cm tarts.

For the praliné feuilleté
200g Nutella or gianduja
50g milk chocolate, melted
80g feuilletine (substitute with crèpes gavottes or rice crispies)
15g butter, melted

In a bowl mix the Nutella, melted milk chocolate, feuilettine and melted butter.

For the dark chocolate glaze

200g Valrhona Guanaja,melted

2 tablespoons butter, melted

Combine in chocolate and butter in a bowl.

To assemble

One portion of the shortbread would yield two 24 cm tart shells. Proceed with rolling out of the pastry or pressing dough into 2 tart pans with false bottoms. Prick base all over with a fork, Bake at 180C for 25-30 mins till golden and sounds hollow when tapped. Leave to cool.

Spread a layer of the praline feuilette at the base of each tart. Leave to chill in the fridge till firm, at least an hour. Top with chocolate glaze and leave to set for another hour. Before serving, leave tart out to thaw for at least ten minutes.

For Suzy’s cake (a recipe from Pierre Hermes Chocolate Desserts) an almost flourless chocolate torte, here’s the recipe. You can check photos here on Patricia’s blog. I baked this for Elia, Hanna (not the baby) and Fatin (Elia’s 8 yr old sister, I got the age right this time!) who visited me yesterday. Thanks for the gift! Elia and Hanna were in secondary school with me and were a year my junior. My mom thought it was unusual that we would meet up after years of not seeing each other, I explained we got close thru reading each other’s blogs! At least Elia and I, Hanna has a SECRET blog which I’ve never read..

Suzy’s cake

250g Valrhona Guanuja
250g unsalted butter, room temperature
200g sugar
4 large eggs, room temperature
70g all-purpose flour

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 180ºC/350ºF. Butter a 24cm (9in) round cake pan that is at least 5cm (2in) high, line the bottom with parchment paper, butter the paper, and dust the inside of the pan with flour; tap out the excess and set the pan aside.

Place the chocolate in a heatproof bowl over – not touching – simmering water and heat until the chocolate is melted; or melt the chocolate in a microwave oven. Set the chocolate aside to cool; it should feel only just warm to the touch when you mix it with the rest of the ingredients.

Put the butter and sugar in the bowl of a mixer and beat on medium speed for about 4 minutes, scraping down the sides of the bowl frequently, until the butter is creamy and the sugar well blended into it. Add the eggs one at a time, beating for about 1 minute after each addition. Reduce the mixer speed to low, pour in the cooled chocolate, and mix only until it disappears into the batter. Alternatively, you can fold in the last of the flour with a rubber spatula. You’ll have a thick, smooth, satiny batter that looks like old-fashioned chocolate frosting.

Scrape the batter into the pan, smooth the top, and slide the pan into the oven. Bake for 26 to 29 minutes or until the cake rises slightly and the top has lost its sheen. The top may crack a bit and the cake may not look entirely set in the center; when you test the cake by inserting a slender knife into the center, the knife will come out lightly streaked with batter, which is what you want. Transfer the cake to a rack to cool.

When the cake has cooled, chill it in the refrigerator for an hour or two to make it easy to unmould. Turn the cake out, remove the parchment, and invert the cake onto a serving platter so that it is right side up. Allow the cake to come to room temperature before slicing and serving.

Serves 6-8

Solitary sleeping environments for newborn infants are

historically novel, culturally circumscribed, developmentally

inappropriate, and evolutionarily bizarre.

Exerpt taken from here

I started sleeping with my baby daughter Hana out of need rather than want. It started on her first day of life in the hospital. I stayed in a single room and so was allowed to “room in” with the baby. This meant that she slept in a hard transparent plastic cot lined with a baby blanket next to my bed. H was also allowed to sleep in the same room and slept in a sofa bed next to my bed. Since you’ve read my birth story and it wasn’t a gentle birth, when the epidural wore off, I was in a lot of pain. I could hardly move and the urinary catheter was uncomfortable coupled with post partum bleeding, it wasn’t nice at all. When Hana cried, I had no choice but to ask H for help to pick her up from the crib to bring her to me while I nursed. After a while, H tired out from long accompanying me thru labor, became harder and harder to rouse, I then had to resort to calling the nurse. In the end, I just kept her by my side the whole night.

Hana a few hours old in my hospital bed

At home, I was still in pain and popping painkillers regularly. It became too difficult to put Hana in her crib and bringing her to me  at each cry. She didn’t last long in the crib either, she hated sleeping alone. So Hana became a regular feature in our bed. She alternates between being beside me or in between us. She’s now a month old and she sleeps thru the night waking up intermittently, no cries just fidgeting and little noises which wakes me up. I turn her to her side, without either of us getting up or out of bed, and she has a feed. I usually sleep while she feeds and she continues her sleep when she’s done. Some nights I feed her only once when she wakes, some nights she has increased demands, up to 4-5 feeds but usually with no cries or fuss at all and I don’t get up or out of bed. I usually wake H up just once for a diaper change when she seems restless but not hungry and not latching on, this happens once at night.

Of course daytime Hana is entirely different, she’s alert and awake most of the time, hardly sleeps and wants to be ”worn” in my momsinmind sarong all the time! She’s in my arms all the time, or in my lap like right at this moment. I’ve learnt to do almost everything with Hana. Continuing with my daily activities keeps me sane, I feel like I’m doing more than just sitting or lying down feeding her. For her she gets the sensory experience of being around conversation as well as different views of the world as compared to lying down quietly in a crib. Read this for a little more on the “in-arms phase”. 

Of course being anything but super mom, I get tired and sometimes, actually very often, I need a break from this little romper clad diaper wearing milk guzzling wide eyed chubby cheeked being on my lap. That’s where husbands, grandmothers and grandfathers come in very very handy. I’ve also been using my Medela pump and expressing breastmilk for Hana to bottlefeed from as eventually I have to return to work  (in the next 6 months that is). Giving her the bottle makes her accustomed to it when I’m away at work and also for more selfish reasons, it gives me a break from breastfeeding! I can cope with her normal demands but when her system goes into high gear and she goes on a feeding marathon which I’m sure breastfeeding moms are familiar with, my baby can feed for 4-5 hours with ten minute breaks in between!

And makes tiramisu.

What I really really miss is baking!

So you know about my cloth diapering system, prefolds and some pockets.

I currently have 26 infant sized prefolds with 4 diaper covers.

And I hate them! I love my pocket diapers so much more. Perhaps I’ll grow into them when Hana grows out of the newborn period. My issue with the prefolds are that when she wets, she really feels wet and cries and needs to be changed immediately! Usually this happens after I’ve fed her and taken so much time and effort to rock her to sleep. So imagine what happens when she wakes up wet and crying, I have to change her, feed her again, cos anyone who cries feels thirsty, and I have to rock her all over again! I feel like it triples my work as a new mom! It drives me mad.

So I just use the prefolds when I’ve used up my pockets which is pretty quick since I have 4 pockets, actually 6 but my 2 Bumwear diapers are still not in use as despite prewashing them a few times (new diapers are not absorbent and need to be washed before use) they’re still not absorbent! I have to call up Bumwear to ask them whats wrong with my diapers! Anyone has any ideas? My Fuzzi Bunz were functional after just one wash and I’ve washed my Bumwear at least 8 x

I still use disposables at night, going out as well as when guests come (to save me the diaper changes). So far Hana is 23 days old today and I’ve used about 70 disposables, thats about 3 disposable diapers a day. She goes thru about 8-10 changes a day so I guess though I’m not entirely cloth diapering, doing it part time still means less disposables. There’s still room for improvement, I’ll eventually use the prefolds more when she’s a little bigger when I can try elimination communication as well for early potty training. In the meantime I’m accumulating more “fluff” or more cloth diapers and I’m trying out a china brand from ebay called coolababy (photo above). I was skeptical at first, but since Julie (another cloth diapering mom and friend) seems keen to share a package with me, I’m trying 4 diapers first. They’re really cheap at S$10 per diaper compared to S$35 for more established brands. I have no idea about the quality, like I said, I’m a little skeptical but some reviews on the net were good, so I thought of just giving it a try. If they don’t work out, I’ll probably get more Fuzzi Bunz, I’m quite happy with the performance of the dipe so far.

So in summary the lessons I’ve learnt are

- do not use cloth diapers in the first few days of life as the meconioum tarry newborn poo is almost impossible to clean off

-disposables at night means more sound sleep for both baby and parents

-disposables when guests come means you will look like a slightly better parent when your baby is not wailing every half hour needing a diaper change

-I’ll eventually need a “wetbag” for storing wet cloth diapers when going out because there was a time I forgot what diaper she had on and she came out with a cloth which I had no idea how to store when soiled

- cloth diapering is more difficult than I thought it was. Oh, and labor. And breast feeding. And parenting. hmm..