The Eberhard Family

Tummy time... Emma can lift her heads up quite nicely. This morning, she was put down for tummy time... and she was playing around and then she rolled herself over. I rolled her back and started taking more photos of her on tummy time... Oops this one is a bit blurry but it's kept because this is the first step of her rolling over... Missed the rolling over part! But here, she's rolled over! So gutted that I didn't have it on video mode. So I rolled her back and turn the video on.. but by then she was too tired and started getting annoyed... :P Sally

28th Sept (12 weeks + 1 day)... We've been suspecting that she can actually touch most of the toys on the play gym at will... Except the little crab which is a little too high for her to reach. Every now and then she gets a bit upset that she can't reach it. I was watching Emma play on the play gym yesterday. Now I should explain, there is a big white stars with 2 little yellow stars. Her right hand is next to that star toy. Like this one on the picture, except she's on her back instead of on the tummy. Now, instead of using her right hand (the closer hand) to touch the toy, she slowly moved her left hand across and touched the little yellow star at the bottom of the white star. Every time she does it, she seems rather happy and was enjoying herself. She's learning new things, being able to do new things as each day goes by. It's amazing! Sally

Well.. it has to happen someday... and it happened today. While I was busy cutting her nails... while she's happily feeding...I cut a little too deep? or whatever happened... out come the blood. I was like ouch! Oops.. sorry!! Hmm...wait, there's no reactions from her.. *confused* So there was some blood on her thumb... and she was still happily feeding away as if nothing has happened... Well... err... I will be more careful next time...^^;;;; Sally

Emma was not too happy earlier, was crying and crying, so I had to hold her and walk around. As I walked to the mirror and stayed in front of it, she started staring at the people in the mirror. Seemed a little confused and curious... she started talking to the baby in the mirror... But before long, she remembered that she was crying earlier... so she carried on... eventually mum worked out.. she wants to be fed again, yes, even though she just been fed like less than 2.5 hours ago!! Sally

I think it's been a few days since she started doing this... only that I've just noticed and clicked... Part of her morning (or unwrapping from being wrapped up for sleeping) routine is a big stretch. With the stretch she actually pushes on her feet and lift up the tummy. She did that a few times when we had some struggling sessions of nappy change. This morning, I put my hand under her, on her back and I realised that she's actually not resting her whole body on my hand. She's lifting her own tummy up. It's quite funny... but yeah I think that's something new.. well at least I've just sort of realised that's what she's doing now :P She doesn't do it all the time but she can lift her tummy up now. Sally

Just a quick note... Noticed that these two days, she's been trying to talk more, and making even more new noises... seems quite enjoying talking to different people.. well baby talk :P Sally

Well, after monitoring 10 nights, she's been sleeping between 7-9 hours. So I think that she is sleeping through the night.... well sort of. Depends on how "early" or "late" the last feed is, but the last 2 nights, she's been wanting her last feed earlier than later, like 7pm! Of course, there's still the cry after 5-6 hours of sleep for her dummy... so I'm not quite sleeping through the night just yet. But it's an improvement. Having said that, I'd really love to be able to sleep 8 hours uninterrupted someday... I guess I will be looking forward to the new years... apparently by 6 months, they do sleep 10-12 hours. So fingers crossed that she will start doing that earlier! :P Why? Because apparently 50% of the babies sleep through the night by 3 months, by that, they meant, a 6-8 hour gap between the last feed and the first feed in the next day. Most people do the last feed around 10pm. But she started doing this 6-8 hour gap thing after 7 w...

Yesterday while Emma was on the play gym happily entertaining herself, I was watching TV... She was all excited and waving her arms and kicking her legs, making funny noises at the same time. Then I turned back to the TV for a while and checked on her again... hey, there's a little toy somehow ended up through her arms...up her shoulder on the left. It's a ring looking toy and I think she must had caught it while she's waving her arms around and the toy slide up her arm. I will find the photo and add it on sometime. :-) Sally

Well, most people say that she looks more like dad; some say mum... so I put our photos onto a website for a test... Result #1 - 50/50 Result # 2 - 16% more like dad... Then I remembered that she looks more like me when I was a baby... so.. I put in my baby photo.. Result # 3 - 3% more like mum... (hmm...) Oh well :P Here we have it :P Sally

Yesterday we were picking out some photos of Emma for printing... came across her photos when she was less than 2 weeks old. We thought, wow, almost forgotten how small she was compare to now. She's still small but you know... she's grown so quickly. It's quite amazing! Now she smiles, talks and tries different ways of expressing her feelings, other than crying. She also seems to understand what you are trying to tell her sometimes. Especially when I'm battling with her for bed time during the day. She'd protest when I put her down in the cot and if I insist she stays in there, she would give you that look of "fine, I will stay here" and then turn away from you. Of course a while later she will cry and I have to go back to put the dummy in or sit there with her etc. :P Sometimes when she wants a bit of attention and you were there attending to her, she's very happy to see you and gives you a big smile. I'm sure there will be more and more exciting ...

Today, I've noticed that... not only Emma is drooling... she's definitely been rubbing her cheek and ears more. The hair on the top part of her ears have came off too from these constant rubbing. She also seems to have some tummy pain or something... Started eating her hand more... (wiping the drool on the mitten at the same time) Oh wait, there's more... she's also seem to have red bums. Now there's some dry patches in red just under the lower lip, probably due to the constant licking (pushing her tongue out) and the saliva drying off on there... making it look rather sore actually. She cries in her sleep even during the day.. not too sure what's going on there. She also doesn't feed a lot from the boob and between 1.5-3 hours later, wants another feed. *sigh*

Last two early mornings around 2:30.... she woke up crying. Well with her eyes shut and really struggling, wiggling around.... but still sleepy... then eventually there were some farting sound came out and she was better. I really wonder if she's having some sort of tummy problems, so was in pain... Now during the day time, sometimes she sleeps fine, sometimes refuse to sleep in her cot. Has to be around us... Oh well... I guess I will ring around to find out what we can do for her. Sally

Slowly, what we've been doing now is, during the day... still breastfeeding, then change, then try to offer a bottle of formula (50ml)... but then, we will sit with her for a little bit, then put her down to the play gym to play for a while. As she starts to yawn more and more frequently, then it's time for bed. But if we are too slow to do this, then she gets a bit upset as she's over tired. Then what I find is, you have to hold her up and walk around for a bit to settle her... eventually she will be better and can be put to bed. Well, of course, still lots of dummy runs, as she still gets upset when the dummy falls out. ^^;;; Oh well... but yeah... so I basically try to do other things while she's sleeping.. and sometimes it's amazing what you can do within those short time :P Sally

Well, we fed her around 8 last night and didn't feed her till 5:15 this morning. Yah! But that actually was quite a bit of "work". Around 1:30 am, she cried, so we put the dummy in. 2:30, again, so dummy again. What's been happening the last few nights is that, she's not really sleeping through without waking up and needing attention. So there's been a few dummy runs to help her get back to sleep. I don't know when this started or why this is... she used to be able to either sleep through or put herself back to sleep without crying for attention. Anyways, so I think from 3am, there's a few more times... till 4:15, put the dummy in, had 30 mins of peace... 4:45, then 5am... She was still relatively happy just sucking on the dummy when I took her out for a feed at 5:15. You see, if she's happily sucking on the dummy, usually means she's not really that hungry yet. Sleeping or getting some comfort is still better than screaming for food. I was det...

Yesterday... we finally have Emma sleeping a bit more during the day... Rather than up most of the day... because babies at her age are still supposed to sleep quite a lot! She's also back to taking her formula top up after the boobs... so that's good. She still goes a good 6-7 hour gap long sleep at night... just been up a few times in between and after the 2:30 am feed... so I had to get up and put the dummy on a few times... otherwise it's not too bad. Hopefully she sleeps better tonight :) Sally

Today, we went visit our friend, Jo and her baby Jayden, who's about 4 weeks younger than Emma. We as Sarah, Emma and I. The dad decided to stay home and do some housework...which beats marking apparently. While we were there, Jo noticed that Emma was drooling, so she asked, "Is she drooling already?" I said yes, not a lot but more just before feed I think? Then at the back of my mind, I was thinking, I think she started drooling about 1-2 weeks ago... at first I thought she was spilling but then it wasn't.... it was just her slobbering all over the place. Then Jo said, that usually means she's started teething. I was like, what?! She's way too young for teething, she's only 9 weeks old! Surely not. Then she said, well there are some babies who are born with teeth... Then I started checking inside Emma's mouth.... and thought... oh dear! I'm not gonna have her on my boobs once she has teeth! :P I guess we will wait and see... Sally

Yesterday, 5th Sept is when Emma turned 9 weeks. After the top up feed around 6pm, she finally fell asleep on the couch with us... in the living room, warm (well hot) fire going on and TV noise in the background. Then just before 8pm, silly parents had to wake her up by striping her off and insist that she has a bath :P Yes, it's time to clean her! As she woke up, must have realised that she's a bit hungry still, so the crying began. There were a few breaks as she started to remember that she does like her bath.... but soon she remembers that she also wants her milk. So there was more screaming and crying, which are ignored by the parents... still drying her, putting cream on her and dressing her... but where's her milk all these time?! So the little princess was not happy and carried on crying. Finally, when mummy put her on the tri-pillow for her feed, she knows her food is ready... there were some obvious breathing and sniffing... as if she was really crying crying, not ...

Well, normally we thought, when the baby cries.... and if they'd accept it, you give them the dummy and they normally stop crying. Or they spit the dummy out and carries on crying. Now, can you be sucking on the dummy and cry at the same time? Well... the answer is... yes :P Sally

I tell ya, this visit from the grandparents is great! Lots of things changing with little Emma. The first two nights that they were here, we had a good 6.5 hour gap at night!! Then a 7 hour one.... then well... gone backwards a little to 5 hours.. But there's definitely signs of her sleeping longer periods. Once we had a 8.5 hour gap! I can definitely get use to that! So hopefully before long, she will be sleeping 10 hours.... or 12 hours!! :D Wooooo hmm... sleeeeeeep.... Sally

Not too long ago, when you put her down at the play gym, she'd only stare at them and never seem interested. But since grandma's been here and playing with her at the play gym, we discovered that she starts to stare at them with interests... not only that, she would be so excited, smiling, laughing and all... making funny noises, new noises that we haven't heard before! Of course, after a while, there will be the familiar "noise"... crying :P Sometimes because of nappies, sometimes because she is too tired... then it's nap time :) I think just during that one week, she's grown and developed a bit... it's quite amazing how fast they change... :) Sally

We had a rather busy week... hence the lack of posts. On Friday, 24th Aug, the grandparents arrived from Christchurch to see their first grandchild for the first time. That night, we had takeaway dinner at home and after feeding time, the grandparents had a go of holding her.... they were talking to her and she was smiling at them, and trying to talk back in her way... After that, I've noticed that she does smile at people more and would interact more. I guess I never really notice that because I'd put her back to bed after feed rather than playing or talking to her... :P Sally