Thursday, December 23, 2010

The big sister

The big sister loves her brother although she sometimes showed it the wrong way. Whenever she is back from the babysitter, the first thing she will ask about is 'where is baby?'. She likes to stroke his hair, touch him, disturb him and play with him. Whenever he cries, she will try to console him and ask him not to cry. Whenever I am bathing or changing Zac's diaper, she will want to be involved, either standing at the side to see and touch or play with everything from lotion or baby bath etc. She will also help with bringing his hanky, diaper, napkins or whatever we ask of her.

She likes to ride her tricycle in her house and will sometimes bang into Zac's bouncinet with Zac in it sleeping. She sometimes like to rock the playpen again with Zac in it sleeping. Sometimes when I am with Zac she will want me to pay attention to her but with a little bit of explanation, she will understand and stop demanding. Never once she will hit Zac or do anything nasty to him.

Although she is not even 3, I am quite proud of her.

Zac's Update: 1+ month

At 1+ month I can:
  • smile a lot
  • look you in the eye and interact
  • goo goo gaa gaa occasionally
  • drinks 5oz of mummy's milk every 2.5 - 3 hrs
  • demand to be carried when I want to be carried
  • sleep and play whenever I feel like it be it day or night
I am currently at 5.39kg and had my 1st Pneumococal jab, 1st DTP & Polio & Hib jab and Rota Virus. I also had my very first hair cut.

Before

After

Thursday, December 9, 2010

The Panda Mummy

Zac is now 1 month 9 days old. How time flies. During the first month with aunty Foong around I was enjoying the moments, was telling myself and papa that 'hey it wasn't that scary after all'. After aunty Foong left, the reality finally kicked in. I was so tired the first few days that I didn't have the mood to do anything, not updating my blog account or reading any of your posts etc. Apart from looking after a baby, I had to do housework, do dishes, look after a hyper and attention seeking 2 year old, I was simply exhausted.

Having to adjust myself again to such hectic lifestyle was certainly no easy task, especially at my age. On the first night alone with Zac I was so scared. I wasn't sure if I could manage him alone. I thought I came up with a good idea by letting him latch whenever he was hungry thinking that I could get some sleep, you know where people always say you can let the baby suck sideways while you are both sleeping and you can continue to sleep?! It didn't work! He sucked for like 5 - 10 mins and then fell asleep or puke. 30 mins later he wanted to suck again and this went on for the entire night. I was horrified and zombified. The subsequent nights I didn't let him latch anymore. Although he wasn't sleeping through, at least he will sleep for 2-3 hours before the next feed and it was definitely much better than latching (although I still had to wake up to express frequently) and papa could help in between.

The first few nights was tough. My body was trying to adjust to the new schedules and I almost gave up. Thankfully it got easier after a few nights. Although occasionally Zac refused to sleep at night (and sleep all day), he wasn't that difficult to deal with. We had to introduce him to the pacifier (something we didn't have to do with Hayley) as he would scream very loudly the moment he was awake asking for milk that he would wake the sister. This boy got no patience!

I also had to learn all over again on how to bath a baby, picking up his signals on how he liked to be carried, what the different type of cries meant etc.. things I have long forgotten. As things got easier with Zac, it was a different story with Hayley.

We're not sure if she's trying to seek attention or she's just simply getting naughtier as she gets older. Our main problem with her is that she is a very picky eater. You can feed her something be it porridge or rice and it will take her ages to finish it. You can give her a slice of apple and again it will take her ages. Sometimes she will pretend to vomit and actually end up really vomitting out the food to tell us that she didn't like it. A few times we lost our patience (because it is becoming a habit) and actually smacked her but she will still repeat the same the next day. She's also very hard headed and will not listen to anything we say. She is really testing our patience. We constantly tell her how much we love her and spent time with her so she won't feel left out. I also heard from a lot of mummies with 2 kids telling me the same thing and they assured me that it will get better over time and all I can do now is hope that it will come sooner.

And oh, here are some photos of the little boy:



My boy who loves to smile, and he's got a dimple too just like me :-)

A cute little cake on his fullmoon courtesy of aunty Jessie

Zac with aunty Foong.
Aunty Foong cried the day she left as she really loved Zac :-(
She even called the following day to ask about Zac and me.

Zac at the fullmoon party, sleeping through.