13 months as a parent

It has been a few months since I'd last updated this blog. A lot has happened since my last update. Chloe will be 13 months old in 1 hr. Time flies. She has grown from a 3kg newborn to a 9+kg year old baby. And Nic & myself has also grown as her parents. From anxious new parents to parents who are apt at taking care of their precious daughter.

Since her arrival, Chloe has changed our lives. There had been a bit of pain initially but the joy of having her around has overshadowed the initial 'torture' that she had put us through. Chloe can be quite a character, with lots of animated expressions on her face. A few days ago, my dad, who seldom sees her, was surprised that a little baby can come out with so many facial expressions as he watched her entertain herself while we waited for our turn to collect her passport at the Immigration Centre. Her animated expressions were also captured by my friend, Maryann (owner of The Studio Loft), who took a lot of lovely photos of Chloe at her studio.

I wanted to keep this post short as I wanted to regain my momentum of updating this blog so that I can try and record down Chloe's various milestones religiously. Some of the milestones that have happened but were not recorded here were:

• flipping at 5 months
• started solids at 6 months
• able to sit without support at 6 months
• sitting up on her own at 7 months
• 1st words "ba.... ba" (father in mandarin) were uttered at 9 months
• pulling herself up to a standing position at 10 months
• crawling at 11 months
• learning to walk at 11 months
• teething at 12 months

So, till the next update, which should be quite soon, here are the photos that were taken at Maryann's studio, enjoy.

Cruel parents

I haven't updated my blog for a while as I've been extremely busy since I've returned to work in March. However, I felt that I've to put up a post today as I am extremely depressed today. Not because of work or my family. But because of a newspaper article that I'd read this afternoon. A 10 month old baby girl from Taiwan just lost her life due to the stupidity of her parents. What happened?

It was reported that on 19 Apr, in Chunghua, Taiwan, a drunk father took a dare from his live-in girlfriend in a fit of anger and threw their 10 month old baby girl into a pot of boiling water! Even though the baby's mother rescued her immediately, the damage had been done. The poor young life suffered burns on 90% of her body, only her neck and head were saved. Doctors had described the pain as "being cut by a thousand knives". After 4 days of battle, this barely a year old baby died this morning at 10.05am :(

After I read this report, I became very disturbed and very depressed by the story. Why? The picture of the crying naked baby (and she looked very cute) looked like any young healthy baby. And being a new mother of a 5 month old baby, I couldn't bear to think how I'd feel if this happened to my Chloe. My heart cried out for this baby.

I was very angry with the baby's parents. How could her mother give such a challenge to her drunken father? How could her father even bear to do this to his own flesh & blood? How can a 10 month old baby, who'd only just arrived into this world all innocent & raring to take on the world, be subjected to such torture? I simply can't fathom this and I'm not sure if I can sleep at all tonight because this news is just too bizzare. I was so enraged that I'd event commented to my colleagues that this crazy father should be put in a pot of boiling hot water himself & let him experience what his daughter went through!

Having just returned to work from my maternity leave, I take turns with Nic to come back early and give Chloe a wipe down and feed her before we put her to bed. Today, eventhough I had tons of work not completed, I had the extreme urge to want to come back home as quickly as possible, to make sure that my Chloe is ok and to hug her & tell her that I love her very much & will take good care of her.

I pray that all parents will take good care of their own children whom they've brought to this world and no other babies will go through what this Taiwanese infant did. You can read about this here here.

1st day of many smiles

Today is memorable for me. For the 1st time since Chloe was born, today is the day she cried the least. She smiled a lot today and it made everyone happy to see her gum-filled wide grin. I'm still trying to figure out how to make her smile while playing with her because she's not afraid of being tickled. And she does get mood swings, yes, even 2 month old babies have their moods!

So, it was a great day for me today when she started the morning by greeting us with a wide grin.

In the afternoon, after a couple of hrs of nap and a nappy change, she smiled happily while looking at the hanging mobile in her cot. I'd taken a photo & videos of her happy self. Will upload the video later, here's a photo of her in her cot.

Now I only hope these smiley days will continue and she'll cry less. It's quite frustrating and heartbreaking (at times) when she cries because I try every method under the sun (short of giving her a doze of Vodka) to sooth her & they don't always work. It made me sad that I've a cry baby at hand, I want her to be a happy baby and I hope I'll be getting that soon, wish me luck :)

1st birthday as a Mummy

Yesterday was the 1st time I celebrated my birthday as a mother. I guess being a mother means giving up the usual birthday celebration that I'd have, which includes shopping to buy myself a present. Was home the whole of yesterday taking care of baby Chloe cos Nic had to go back to the office to work.

Most of the day was uneventful as it was just another daily routine of caring for baby Chloe. But the highlight of the day came in the evening, when I finally made baby Chloe smile & managed to capture it on camera too :D

Below are some of the pix taken yesterday to commenmerate my 1st birthday as a Mummy.

A pix with baby Chloe

X'mas ang pow from maternal grandmother

Baby Chloe's 1st time on the LG playmat that we'd just bought for her

1st glimsp of baby Chloe's smile

Finally managed to capture her looking at the camera & smiling :D

4 weeks old, not a girl, not yet a woman

Baby Chloe is exactly 4 weeks old today. On Sunday, we'll be celebrating her full month. Gosh, time flies, I can't believe I've been a mother for 4 weeks! It'd been very eventful journey, especially the 1st week. I'm slowly geting used to baby Chloe's tantrums & understanding her a little better now. And Nic & myself are building up resources so that we can care for her better.

So far, Chloe sleeps, wakes up, screams for attention or food, we feed her, then, depending on her mood, either she sleeps back on fusses around for up to 5hrs before she sleeps again! And she likes being carried, which is very tiring on us.

Now, we've discovered a couple of ways to make her less reliant on us carrying her. 1 way is to put her on the stroller. I guess a moving stroller does calm her a little and she can sleep in it. Gotta make full use of the stroller, since it's quite a big investment for us.

And yesterday, we bought a rocker chair for her. At least she can join the rest of the family in the living room in the day time, rather than being couped up in her baby cot everyday. Judging from her reaction, she seems to like it, so far, I hope it lasts.

As baby Chloe grows, I've begun to discover many cute traits about her. Such as she's quite a messy sleeper, like me. ie her hands are spread out and she's begun to turn from the original position where we place for her to sleep, almost a 90 degree turn. It's a good thing that the cot is still big enough for her to do her turns. And she'll raise both hands & legs when she's scared, sort of like saying "I surrender".

Below are some pix of her sleeping patterns & other pix taken throughout the past 4 weeks.

A new addition!

Motherhood came 2 weeks early for me. Baby Chloe (who is due today) was born on 31 Oct (yes, she's a halloween baby, & she'd arrived 1 day after our 4th wedding anniversary).
It started with a regular visit to my gynae, realised that I'd lost 100g in a week & I'd commented that baby was a little quiet that morning. Turned out that the umblical cord was around her neck & I'm already 2cm dilated! (Didn't even know that I was in labour!)

I'm one of the fortunate few, labour was fast for me, about 5hrs. My good friend, Maryann, was in labour for abt 12hrs for her first born (who also happens to be my godson). And baby Chloe popped out to see daddy & mummy, weighing 3.02kg, measuring 50cm in length.

It has been almost 2 weeks since Chloe's arrival. The 1st week was very stressful, especially for me as I wasn't prepared for her arrival & had to quickly adjust to attending to her needs. And she was hospitalised for a day for jaundice plus waking up several times at night to feed her but still have her crying. It's a good thing that Nic was with me, else I'd have a nervous breakdown as the addition of sleepless nights took a toll on me.

I'm fortunate to have a caring & supportive hubby and lots of concerned friends & colleagues who spent time helping Nic & me understand more about Chloe's needs.

So, into the 2nd week and I'm less of a basket case and have learnt not to react to her every whimper. Sometimes, it's good to let her cry a little, exercise for her lungs, or so I heard. And we've also managed to settle on Chloe's chinese name so Nic went to register her birth today. Hooray, Chloe has a birth cert now!

It's amazing, the new discoveries I make everyday abt Chloe's behaviour/character/actions, etc. Everytime I look at her, I can't believe that this cute little fella had been in my womb for 38 weeks & is now a part of me. Everyone's telling me that the 1st few months will be tough but it'll get easier so I'll just have to patiently go thru this initial phase. It's a lifetime commitment and I'm partly responsible for her so will do my best to bring up this tiny life.

[Comment from baby Chloe: I'm almost 2 weeks old & I've given daddy & mummy quite a few headaches, what with my screams (which they don't seem to understand) & cries and me being a "London baby", cos I'm awake at night. I think the biggest scare that I'd given mummy was my hospitalisation last Thur for my jaundice. Mummy cried at the hospital admission counter. Daddy had to console mummy. Dr Ong, my pediatrician, said that 1 of the reasons I had jaundice was because I wasn't getting enough breastmilk from mummy. And it didn't help that I only liked her right breast!

I hated the cold plastic container that they placed me in for the phototherapy treatment for my jaundice & screamed real loudly. I'm not surprised that made daddy & mummy even sadder but they had to make me go thru it so that I can recover from my jaundice.

Daddy & mummy visited me in the evening and mummy breastfed me and I sucked on her for about 30 mins! Thankfully, it was only a 1 night stay (I heard mummy & daddy were glad to have a break from my night 'activities' so that they can recharge themselves) and I was home by the next afternoon.

Eversince my discharge, daddy & mummy are not taking any chances with underfeeding me, they supplement my meals with formula as well. I'm happy as long as I'm fed. I love sleeping so much that I can even sleep in my own poo! heh heh... ok, yawn.... back to my beauty sleep, I hope mummy doesn't wake me up too soon]

For memory lane....

Today, I started the first of my weekly visits to my gynae. At 37 weeks of pregnancy, my movements have become clumiser as Chloe grows & my tummy expands to it's max. Chloe weighs 3kg now, in fact, she's close to 3.1kg now. A good sized baby & a lot of people can't tell that she's so big by looking at me now.

And at this stage, Chloe is considered fully developed. With her head turned, we should expect her arrival anytime now. What I'm going to miss most when Chloe is born would be her turns & kicks while she's in me. It feels weird to have something growing & moving in me, I feel like a host to a baby alien sometimes (you know, like those Alien movies), but at the same time, it's an amazing feeling & bonding which I have with her that no one else will ever have.

And today, we went to my 1 of my best friend's studio to take pix of me in 'full bloom'. Maryann runs The Studio Loft and 1 of her specialties is taking pix of pregnany mummies, classified under her studio's sub label, Bloom.

Nic, my ever sweet & accomodating husband, accompanied me for the shoot. We started out a little awkward as we had to smile & laugh happily for the photos but it was really fun and we had some good shots that we can keep for memory and share them with Chloe when she's older. Here are some of my fave shots.