Today, not too sure exactly why, she decided after a short sleep after the 10am and supposedly 2pm feed, she wanted some company.
That's fine, we could do that. But then, she decided she wants to cry... about 2 hours after the previous feed.
Then the crying will go on for a good 20-40 mins.... with some breaks in between.
I'm beginning to wonder, perhaps she didn't quite have enough to eat but she refuses to eat more... and a bit later, feels a bit hungry but not quite all that hungry yet? Who knows...
Why would babies sleep while feeding when eating is part of survival? Doesn't make a lot of sense but oh well....
*sigh*
Sally
We've started to notice that little Emma won't always be happy to go back to sleep in her own cot after feed.
Sometimes she will sleep for a bit, then wanted to sit around where mum and dad are... then she will eventually be happier and will sleep. Most of the time, you don't really need to pay too much attention to her, she will be happy as long as she's around people.
I guess slowly she would want to be playing a bit more... and I guess that's when we call in more visitors to help entertain her from time to time.
:-)
Sally
Wednesay night, we had a good night, as the little one finally is sort of back to the normal 4 hourly feed and has a gap for 6 hours. (well sort of 5 hour sleep for us if you count from start of the feed).
But last night, seems like every now and then, her feeding pattern still goes a bit funny. She woke up after 3.5 hours I think... fed her a bottle and then another hour later, she cried once. I was like no no no, I need my sleep. So she wasn't too bad, that was just a grizzle. But still very sleepy...
Oh well, we will see how it goes today.
Sally
Little Emma is starting to experience the delay in response time from the mum today. If she grizzles like she does normally and a few more cries, she gets some attention.
This morning, mum was too sleepy so she took her time to attend to Emma. There was some cries, then pauses, then more cries and pauses then more cries.... by the time mum got there, it was actually quiet. But no, as soon as she sees mum... *cry*!
What does this tell you? :P
Well other times, it'd be these loud angry cry for a few minutes before something happens.
She's going to experience more later. Because her eating pattern after the injection has totally been thrown off and became rather weird. So after the lunch time feed, she refuses to drink anything from the bottle after sleeping a lot on the boobs. Guess what? She's going to find the next feed a long time to come. And crying might not work anymore! Hopefully this means she will start eating properly when she is being fed. Mum hopes anyway.
:P
Well, 7 weeks on, and we are still waiting for that golden moment - the baby smiles at you! Yes, not just any random smiles but at you.
She's definitely smiling a lot more, some very big one almost look like laughs. But not smiling at us yet. And they all say, when the babies do smile at you, you'll feel that all these hard work and hassle is worth it.
I will tell you what I think when we get one ;)
Sally
After 7 weeks of looking after this little one, I've slowly come to a realisation and conclusion... I'm not much of a baby person.
I probably knew it all along but not really know it. I've always like kids and love watching them. But my affection for babies aren't as strong. I'm not sure if it was because we've never had a baby amongst the cousins (as our ages are very close to one another) or that we never had pets before... I just don't know what to do with little things. Especially ones that don't really give you much feedback.
For once, I've finally understood why the hubby used to say, he wishes that the babies come out 3 years old. Already can talk, walk, toilet trained and all. I think I work better with kids at that stage, too.
I think I can do most of the housework well, even be very efficient to get the kids ready for school and get them out of the house etc, pack lunches and prepare dinner etc etc.
Babies... apart from feed, cry, change, burp and you kind of have to learn to just talk to them and make up stories of what they might be saying... so you can keep yourself entertained while doing the very similar repetitive tasks with the baby. Sometimes, you think you've done everything, but they are still crying, which is a bit hard to understand.
I guess it may be that they use "crying" as a way of communication, which somehow makes you feel that all you get is "complaints" and "unhappy" feedback. Because we associate crying mainly when more negative than positive. So it doesn't really fill you with much confidence and delight I guess.
Overall, although babies are cute and all, I don't really think I'm a big baby person. So I guess in a few more months, years.. it'd be better :P
I think it's good to understand yourself a bit more. I don't think I've realised how much I like my freedom as well... until I don't have it anymore! :P
Sally
Last Wednesday morning, Emma had her 6 week injections. Then the rest of the day she was a bit more sleepy and slept more.
Things started to get a bit more restless from Thursday. Even her eating pattern is a bit off. Thursday afternoon / early evening, she was fed around 5-ish. Then within 3 hours, she was hungry again and wanted another feed. Normally she lasts for 4 hours from the start of the feed.
Friday evening was worse, 4pm feed, then 6pm she was given a bottle of formula. before 8pm, hungry again and a bottle of 70ml breast milk was given, then eventually she was happy and went to bed and slept for a few more hours before needing to be feed again.
Saturday and Sunday, she has been rather restless and harder to settle. Needed to be held to sleep a lot more, leaving two very tired parents.
We started giving her pamol from Sunday evening, thinking the injection might be why she's unsettled. (Even though the dad was convinced that it was the switching to S26 formula from Thursday early evening. So Saturday, we got more Karicare ones) - but later found out, well it's probably not the formula.
Today, she's been on 2-2.5 hourly feed after the 4:30 am feed. Until dad came home and that feed she had some formula top up. (was too sleepy to drink the top up in other feeds).
Still quite a bit harder to settle... we wonder if she's also going through some growth sprut?? Or it is a combination of injection + growing?
Really hope that it will be gone soon. We gave her some pamol tonight anyway.
Fingers crossed.... coz I'm really missing my sleep now :P
Sally
My cousin and his wife (Meg) treated me to a full body massage this afternoon. So Meg came to pick me up and she also booked herself in as well.
I must say, I really needed this. It was the first time I'm away from the baby for a few hours, without taking her out or worrying about rushing back. During the session, I slowly drifted away and I hope I didn't snore...
Now I can feel my back and shoulders all sore... usually happens after a good massage. Hmm....
I can really get used to this but yeah :P can't really afford to get use to it :P But once a while, it is a rather nice treat!
:)
Sally
Today we got our water bill. Because we've lived at my parents place for 38 days out of the 85 days of billing period... we've only used 8 kl of water.
Each kl is at the unit price of $1.199 (from 1st July), which means the maximum charge is less than $10.
But instead, we were charged a $12.5 minimum charge.
So, let's say if we were just very conservative in using water... so we try to save water and not waste them.. we still get charged a min charge... and the standard $450 a year waste water charge.
*sigh* This is how our government encourages us to save water?
Oh well... such as life.
I guess I better shower more often then :P
Sally
After the injections yesterday morning, she's been a bit more sleepy.
I had to wake her up for feeds last night and she was still quite sleepy and didn't drink that much. Then only woke up 4 hours later 12:30am for another feed.
Then she was back to bed and didn't really wake up again till after 5:30am.
Now it's time to go wake her up for feed again :)
Sally
Monday afternoon, I had a few visitors. My girlfriend and her sister-in-law and their babies. Well the sister-in-law, Elaine and her newborn baby. My gf and her almost 14 month old son.
I just finished feeding Emma, so they only saw a little bit of her and she was put to bed. I told them they can go into her room to look at her, it doesn't bother me or her... but they think it'd wake up Emma.
Eventually she was crying for nappy change, so a few photos were taken after she's been changed... her little hands are waving around and I think that was before she realised she was hungry (yes, hungry again within 3 hours for some reason!) and start crying again.
Oh and I was told that I am not holding the baby right ^^;;;; doh!
Anyways, have a look at the photos on Elaine's blog:
http://blog.xuite.net/elaine200501/momo/12999688
Of course if you can read Chinese, you can have a read, too. There's a reference to a blog post on my gf's blog...when her son, Ethan first saw Andrew :P The expression on his face was priceless :P
ps. Elaine's due date was 1 week before my one, but Emma was born 4 days before her boy :P She's a little gutted about it... just enough for her to write that blog post :P
Sally
Little Emma is 6 weeks old today. There's the Well Child check up by the GP and the immunisation injections to be done today. She's booked in for the check up in the morning at 9. The Plunket nurse suggested a morning appointment, that way just in case if she's unwell after the injections, there's more time to give her a few doses of pain relief before bed time.
The GP had a good check of Emma but didn't take very long though.
Her head circumference is 37cm now. 1cm bigger than when she was born. So hopefully means she's growing more brain. It is also evident that she can't fit the smaller hat that auntie Jo made her now.
Her legs, eyes, ears, heart...etc were checked. Everything was okay, she is moving her heads fine as well. The doctor gave her some perscription for baby panadol and some bath oil and cream for her dry skin.
Then she was sent to the nurse for injection. The nurse brought out 3 needles... ouch. Before the nurse started, she was already crying, as she was actually due for a feed at that time. So the nurse quickly gave her the 3 injections, which made her cried a bit more. I must say I had tears in my eyes watching her getting her injections. But she's a brave little girl, shortly after the injection... the crying was mainly for food!
There are two beds in the nurse's office with curtains. So the nurse let me stay in there to feed her and she wanted to check her legs again after 10 mins as well to make sure everything was okay.
After some milk, she was a lot happier.
On the way home, I stopped at the pharmacy to pick up all the stuff for her as well.
After we got home, we let her sleep for a while. She woke up a few times crying...first time was for nappies; then was for food.
The Plunket nurse came around 11:30 and checked her for a few things. Also asked lots of questions. After I've explained how she's being fed at the moment (breast milk then formula top up), she was fine with that. She suggested that we should stick to the same brand of formula. (well we've been switching her with different ones :P) She mentioned that with this, it probably means that Emma will be on bottles by the time I need to go back to work. Also told me that once they get a bit older, they will realise that the bottles are easier and may reject the boobs, as they had to work harder for those. I think it's good to know this, so when/if that happens, I know why, rather than feeling rejected.
I've also asked the nurse to weigh her and measure her height (roughly).
She's 4.5kg today (only 140g gain in 5 days, so I think the previous big gain was just part of a growth sprut or something) and she's 57cm now.
After the nurse has finished around lunch, it was feed time for Emma. After the feed, she cried for a bit and I was at mum's. So mum helped to settle her. Just needs a bit of a cuddle before bed.
Then just before I was getting ready to go pick up the hubby, packing up to go home, she started crying again.... we changed her nappy again. She was still crying very hard.... so I gave her 3ml of the pain relief and cuddled her for a bit. And the dummy.
Of course, once she's in the car, she's quite happy. She likes car rides.
Picked up the dad and we stopped by the Plaza to pick up a few things and she was happily staying in the stroller. Once we got home, she was put to bed. Cried a few times but wasn't too bad....eventually went to sleep.
By 4:30, I woke her up for a feed and she was still a bit sleepy but she needs her food. :P
I think she hasn't been too bad after that 4:30 feed. Now the music is on for her and she's quietly sleeping away.... hopefully she will feel much better tomorrow :)
Sally
We've moved back to our own house yesterday morning, and it's been quite good.
In the beginning, there's the sorting out but mostly done. The house is still a bit of a mess but hey... there's plenty of time.
Emma seems to have settled in her own room nicely.
Last night was the first night she slept in her own room and we slept in our room. I thought it'd be a constant waking up - checking on her night... but no, instead... I slept solidly through until wee hour in the morning... almost 2 am when she woke up wanting another feed. Her last feed was around 6:50pm so she lasted for around 7 hours! Wow!! Once we got her to sleep, she slept through. Of course some nights are better than others but I think the fact that we don't really hear her grizzling nearby meant we could fall into a deeper sleep. Hence have a better rest.
I've also decided that I will slow down in the sorting out and cleaning. We've done quite a bit yesterday but the rest can wait. I want to try and rest and relax. Apparently that does affect the milk supply and I think I should try not to be too tense.
I've gotten over the 'guilt' that I don't think I should have, over the fact that I don't have enough milk. Other people can say what they like. I think my little baby is growing quite nicely....she's 4.36kg now :)
Sally
Tonight, watching the little one and waiting for her to fall asleep... noticed every now and then... she will put her hand up and hold the dummy in place...
It's quite funny. Other times, her hands would be waving around and knocking the dummy off...
But I think her hands are still keeping her awake, even though it's nice of her to try and hold her own dummy? Once she falls asleep, the hands waving tends to wake her up again...
So they got wrapped up instead :P
But then it's the trick of trying to put her dummy in and move her head in the right position, so the dummy can stay in her mouth for a longer period... hopefully until she's in a deeper sleep...
:P
Sally
Usually after the evening feed, this little one tends to stay awake and doesn't fall asleep as easily as after other feeds during the day.
Although today, in general, she was staying awake more... not too sure why.
I really can't remember what I did last Thursday but hey.. Thursdays are a bit annoying, as ebs has to work at night. I tend not to have enough time to have a nap during the day, so my energy level gets really low after dinner. So normally I feed her then start sleeping while ebs takes over for a bit while she falls asleep... then I take the night shifts, ie. feed, change, formula, burp and put back to bed... usually one late night feed and one early morning feed...
Tonight, I've been sitting here waiting for Emma to fall asleep... I fed her around 6pm... and she's been on and off sleeping... I was going to nap but she was up again... so... I started blogging instead :P
She's normally not too bad, just when she's not fully sleeping, wakes every now and then, she tends to cry a little and needs her dummy. But it means you can't really sleep... not very well anyway :P
Hopefully, the visit to the Plunket Family Centre tomorrow would help... fingers crossed :)
Sally
There's been a lot of talks and investigation etc on the renovation of my parents' place, in preparation of us moving in with them for good...
Kitchen is the place we've decided... we need a new one. Even though the old one has more nice solid wood, even good wood, too... to get a new one everything has to go.
Anyway, after a series of quotes and so on, we then got someone recommended to us for the work.. and he then recommended some other kitchen place....
One thing lead to another... so the builder guy is doing the work to make the garage usable as well as painting the rooms etc etc... but he's got a holiday coming up in Sept... So... he was here to talk about quotes yesterday... his team of builders were here this morning knocking off the wall and doing the work for the garage.
So finally, tonight when ebs comes home... he can park the car in the garage... of course, except that... we would be moving back to Pakuranga for a bit on Sunday... but still good though!
Finally!! Internal access garage! :)
But packing up the kitchen was fun... we were only.. 25-30% done... the builders will be back on Sat to rip off the whole kitchen. Man there are A LOT of stuff! Makes me wonder what it'd be like when I'm packing up my own one for moving! Doh!
Sally
In the last few days, the frequency of Emma peeing on the changing mat, or peeing while being changed... has been increasing.
I don't know if this is something as coincidence or that she's just getting used to it...?
It's not bad if we can toilet train her now but not really fun when you are trying to change her... ^^;;
Oh well, sometimes I'm lucky to put the new nappy on before she starts to do this... of course it means, the next nappy change would be relatively soon.. for the sake of her comfort...
Other times, well... it'd be good if mum's washing machine isn't broken... but hey... we will be moving back to our place this coming Sunday... ^^;;; although, even though we will have enough clothes for her to change, and doing laundry isn't too bad... but still be good if she doesn't pee on her clothes and on the changing mat.... otherwise, have to start changing her by the shower :P
Sally
Just out of curiosity, I found this website a while ago...
Just to see what the average was... and here's some stats for Emma.
Of course I had to find a few converters to get the pounds and inches from kgs and cms.
At 0 months:
your child is 7.3 pounds (3.31kg), and that is at the 43th percentile for weight.
your child is 21.25 inches (54cm), and that is at the 95th percentile for height.
your child has a head circumference of 14.17 inches (36cm), and that is at the 77th percentile for head circumference.
Ref: http://pediatrics.about.com/cs/usefultools/l/bl_percentiles.htm
Sally
Little Emma has turned one month old on Saturday...
What did mum and dad do?
Well... they forgot to take a photo on the day! :P
But they did finally remember that they were supposed to reserve Emma's gmail account for her. So they've signed up a gmail account for Emma... emmaeberhard at gmail! Yah, still available, so better get in quick. Well it'd be a while before she uses the account though.
What else... well they celebrated for her by meeting up with uncle Doug and aunty Cheryl at the Belgian Chocolate place at Sylvia Park. Some nice hot chocolate and waffle. Although aunty Cheryl was convinced that uncle Doug can make better waffles than that... yes... Doug.
Then they decided that they will go visit aunty Jo and baby Jayden... Emma was fed there and even changed at their place...
There was a lot of visitors there and I think Emma was rather amused by looking at all these different faces that she hasn't seen before..
Then home for some more dinner for mum and dad... and Emma. In fact, after getting home, Emma had a round of feeding. Then mum and dad forgot to give her the formula top up straight away... so a bit later, she had a 50ml bottle. An hour later... another 65ml bottle of breast milk instead.... and a bit later, oh yes she was still hungry.... some more sucking from the boob on mum... eventually went to sleep...
Well... that was it pretty much...
Oh mum went a bit crazy with her clothes shopping on the day... don't know why :P
Never bought so many clothes in one go before... but hey there's always a first time.
Sally
Today is an evenful day for Emma.
First there's the first GP visit and GP said she looks fine and healthy... everything is fine... except after the GP pressed her tummy... she spilled quite a lot of milk onto the GP's bed ^^;;;;;
Then we took her out for a car ride to a few kitchen places then to Sylvia Park again. She was fed there once again... and she peed on the changing table as we were changing her.... ^^;;;
Then there was more feeding then the Plunket nurse was here. Also checked her out and her weight is 3.91kg, an increase of 50g since Monday....and head is 36.8cm, an increase of 0.8cm since Monday's check.
The Plunket nurse kindly explaind each check and what she's looking for, eg. the hip joint, checking for dislocation; the head, checking that the skull at the back is closed and front is open for more brain growth; checking her head measurement to make sure she's growing and checking her ears and checking her mouth and tounge to check for signs of infection etc...
Then the nurse asked me if I had any tummy time for Emma. "huh?" I wasn't sure what she meant. So she put Emma on her tummy and checking how she's doing with lifting her head up...
The next thing we notice is, she tried to use her arms to lift herself up and was lifting her head up nicely... and oh wait, there's more... she rolled over by herself from on her tummy to on her back! Yes, she rolled over!
Well done! says the nurse and said she's a very strong baby!
Oh wait, did I say Emma peed on the towel on the floor after weighing and checking her?!
The nurse asked me to carry on feeding her while she does some paper work. Then she noticed that Emma was sleeping on the boob while still sucking but actually not feeding!! All these time, I've been tricked to think as long as she's sucking it's fine!
Anyway, the nurse suggested that I keep the appointment with the Plunket Family Centre and they can help with the feeding and will show me some video on sleeping as well.
The nurse also showed a few ways of putting Emma to sleep; although I think she's been fine putting herself to sleep. Nonetheless, more tips are better than none. She also said part of babies putting themselves to sleep, some would cry for a bit. If that happens, walk out and come back after 5 mins... then try rocking the cot again...with the shiii sound.
She also showed me how to wrap Emma with her hands under her chin. Oh and that's when the gift from Winston and Shirley came in handy... she needed a bigger wrap than the nappy I have. So Emma is tightly wrapped..
Although I still wonder if that is better than not wrapping her, as she still seems to take over 30 mins to fall asleep...
Anyways, so it's been a busy day for Emma and lots of cleaning after her! :P But hey, that's better than crying!!
And I'm happy that she's starting to show signs of responding to unusual sudden loud noise (eg. dad's sneezing and other mum's opening and shutting the microwave at the parents room...) and most of all, her being able to roll herself over!! Although does that mean it's the end of changing table soon? :P
Oh of course, after the last feed.... I temporarily put her to bed without wrapping her much... she's been sleeping nicely since then! Hopefully she sleeps heaps more tonight!!
Speaking of sleeping, nurse also suggested putting her on some schedule soon. Bed time by 7:30 and maybe another feed (dream/sleep feed?) at 10:30pm (dim light and no playing, 15 mins boob with formula top up) to get a longer night sleep! So we will have to work some schedule out for her soon then!
Sally
The little one has been packing on weight nicely and the advice of don't spend over an hour feeding her (ie. 15mins max of breast each side). Feeding her 20 mins each side + formula may be too much. We may have been over feeding her.
So... I stopped giving her formula, thinking maybe she was having too much that's why she was spilling heaps.
The result? In short... chaos and nervous breakdown for the mum...
Because she then became very difficult to settle and for her to go to sleep...
Literately screaming her heads off and crying for no obvious reasons... even when you are cuddling her... that really drive me nuts and really didn't know what to do.
Mum and dad helped heaps, especially mum... helping to calm the little one down and put her to sleep... for as long as she would sleep.
Then eventually, the hubby decided that only thing that has changed was the lack of formula... so we put her back on formula top up...
The result... much happier baby and she actually can fall asleep by herself most of the time, rather than having to be cuddled.... especially when she was fed heaps!
What do you know, baby can give out mixed signals, too... because last night she was still crying and being unhappy... offering food didn't really seem to work? Or did it?
Oh well... fingers crossed and we will see how it goes.
Am really grateful to have Carol calling from Malaysia to give some advices and tips... also my gf Alice calling from Brisbane yesterday for a chat.
Anyways... I think most of the midwives would go for a norm approach in giving advices... but we do have a big baby here and probably just need more food...
As for my milk supply, well there are milk alright, just a little short... so yeah :P I guess we will just keep formula-ing her till she won't take it anymore... :P
Sally
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