Yet another reformat

I seem to do this often lately, as though I'm trying to work through some kind of past quarter life identity crisis. Which, I'll be honest, I feel like I have been going through since my first child was born.

While I haven't done that much work revising this entire blog yet, I am contemplating one final move and making that the final, solid identity for myself online. About time, right?

This past month has been quite the ride. Feels like it's been a year, to be honest. There was much that I had to review, re-assess, and just generally figure out not just about myself but the life I want to have, how we want our family to be...those kinds of things.

It wasn't an easy year, 2015. Yes, it came with a very welcome reason to celebrate but at the same time, it was a year filled with many upheavals in various aspects of life.

We continue. We move on. We learn. As I've been saying over and over, one day at a time. Here's hoping that my new online home will be the final one but if it's not, well, there's nothing wrong with learning more about myself as I get older, right?

Reclaiming My Son

Wow is this about to get very personal.

In my part of the world, it's actually quite common to hire household help for whom we provide room and board in exchange for their services in cooking, cleaning, and general household maintenance. The labour isn't exactly cheap and it wasn't until just two years ago that the government saw fit to mandate proper laws on the matter. Plus, depending on their pay scale, it is our burden to bear if they fall ill and require extra medical attention and other such unexpected expenses.

Being Mama

MOMMY MONDAY

Last week, I failed my kids in the most horrible way possible.

It was one of those bold yet bad moves, really. My older son was sitting by himself in the back row of our car and I was in the middle row with our younger son. At night. That time when at least one of them (read: the younger one) should be sleeping.

You can already see where this is going. I didn't. This story has the benefit of hindsight.

The Internet connection failed us. YouTube (see the next mistake right there?) wouldn't load properly. I was nursing our younger son. The older one started screaming for me to fix the iPad. I asked him calmly to wait. At first. Then he started screaming louder and louder until he began to cry.

I kept asking him to wait. I had hoped to put the younger one to sleep so I could give him my full attention.

See that right there? It was one mistake after another. Again, hindsight.

He began crying for Mama. I asked him to wait just a little longer but my patience was wearing thin because the child in my arms still hadn't fallen asleep. I began to tell him off for screaming. In my dangerously calm tone--the one he knew means trouble.

Finally I was able to put the younger one down. (Allow me to diverge from the conversation a moment to yes, confirm that the child was out of his seat. In fact, neither child was strapped in at this point. If our laws were more stringent about this they and I probably would have been better trained with the whole car seat matter. But that is for another time.) I turn and fix the YouTube connection, finally.

But he kept crying. And forcing coughs to get more attention. But mostly crying. For me to hold him. He'd gotten upset and he needed me to hold him.

And I told him to wait. Again. Over and over. Wait, wait, wait.

Toddlers aren't good at that, usually, especially not mine. Not this little boy who would freak out if his toy train derails or falls apart when his bike gets stuck on something. (We are working on this.)

So yes, he fell apart. And when he did, his younger brother did, too. Oh how they cried, screamed, and wailed for most of the ride home! It was excruciating and broke my heart. The older one begging me to put down the younger one so he could cuddle with me for comfort. The younger one wailing because he couldn't fall asleep in his car seat and needed me to hold and nurse him to sleep.

Surely the Lord must have been with me at that moment, holding me together that I would not fall apart along with my two sons. Surely he must have been there when I remembered: I am your mother. I can do this. I can keep you both calm and comforted.

So I did. I hugged both of them tightly and whispered, "Shhh...Mama's here...shhh..."

Over and over and over.

"Shhh...shhh..."

And just like that, the struggling, the tears, the screams...they died down. Both boys closed their eyes and leaned against me. Calmed and comforted.

"Shhh...shhh..."

I failed them in the most horrible way. I forgot my power as a mother. I forgot that if I panicked with them, they will be lost.

I keep feeling guilt over that and thinking I traumatised them for life. But both boys, they continue to cling to me, letting me know that even when I am at my weakest, they love me and find strength in me.

Mother, Mommy, Mama.

This is to remind myself that I am theirs and I will always have the power to soothe my sons. I just have to remember and believe.

Girl Crushes

I realised just now that some of my girl crushes are moms. Maybe as a high school student, I was right about what I said to one of my friends: that we get girl crushes on women we aspire to be like. The term itself is rather funny especially at this point where there are all sorts of gender preference variations. Believe me when I say I don't mean to be insulting/demeaning/whatever you wish to say about it, but by this point, it all confuses me so since it's not the central for this post, I shall stick to what I already have down and leave the gender discussions off for another time.

Girl crushes. I suppose this can be taken to mean a heterosexual girl's way of expressing a certain level of admiration for another female but in a completely non-sexual way. At least, that's what I've always seen it used as and that's how I'm using it now.

Taking time to breathe

Time has been quite paradoxical these past weeks. I can't believe that my newborn will be a month old in just one more week, and yet it feels like it has been an entire lifetime since I was wheeled into the delivery room.

The difference between the brothers is remarkable.

At this same age, we could barely leave Llew down in the stroller but here I am now, blogging, while Kian sleeps soundly in the stroller. Our feeding schedule is the farthest thing from clockwork precision: thankfully I am all for feeding on demand so it doesn't bother me so much. Of course, it's another matter entirely when my body demands that the baby remove some of the milk that has

Child-rearing Round Two

There are, apparently, many things about newborns that I'd forgotten about.

Like how often they spit up, and that if you have a little boy, you need to be prepared for mid-diaper change "showers".

It's been a week and a half since we finally held our newborn in our eager arms. It was as magical as the first time but more relaxed in a way. We had fewer photos in our hospital room but I've no regrets with that: because of the rooming in policy hospitals now adhere to, my son and I were reunited within hours after delivery (I had to work off the effects of the epidural first and eat my first meal in more than twelve hours) and we were too busy getting to know each other and more importantly, learning to latch again.

D-I-Y: Cornstarch Paint

Credit to Trish Kuffner for this lovely Cornstarch Paint that I made two weeks ago! The link to this particular recipe (and five other paints to try with your kiddo) is here.

I've made cornstarch paint before in the form of, well, basically coloured oobleck a.k.a. liquid sidewalk chalk. My problem with it is that it separates when left overnight and is a little difficult to shake and mix the following day because of the settling.

D-I-Y: Adventures in Play Dough

I'm a typically crafty person. I love poking around the house doing little crafty projects for various purposes (storage, home spa, art), the most recent one being to make non-toxic, occasionally edible, play materials for my kid.

I don't have the photos of the original set of playdough I made for him on me--I may have them locked up in my old hard drive which I still need to unlock somehow--but this one for Homemade Rubbery Goop, which I got off Learning4Kids is, so far, my favourite out of three different versions I've tried.

The link I shared shows the whole step by step process but behind the cut are my own pictures plus a few comments from when I made it a few days ago. I still need to make more--I only have two colours so far but I realised I need more containers to store them in before I present them to my little one!

Another one for "What's not in the books"

I am an only child with limited chances to observe real-life siblings. For most of my life anyway. But I did always think that having siblings would be a wonderful thing, despite all my friends' complaints about theirs.

I understood that there were a lot of things different between myself and my friends who grew up with siblings. I don't believe I missed out on anything but even as a child, I liked the idea of having more than one kid when it came time for me to become a mother. (Yes, I was already thinking along those lines even as a kid.)

The one thing I didn't count on is all the wondering if I would be able to give my second child the same amount of attention that I gave my first.

Sleepless

These have not been the most comfortable of nights.

In addition to going through a little bit of a rough patch with some people over the weekend, this last month of pregnancy has not been the most comfortable either. It is strange; I do not recall my last months with my eldest being this difficult or uncomfortable. Then again, each pregnancy is as individual as the resulting child.

As of my last check-up, we are still in breech position. This terrifies me because if Sid does not turn in time, I will be going under the knife. Though I'd declared that if our second child is a girl I'm okay with being done with childbearing, my husband definitely still wants a third whether our second is a girl or a boy. Going under the knife for a Caesarean section this time around will mean an increased chance of going through that again since going for a vaginal birth after having a C-section can be tricky.

But let's get that out of the way for now and move on to other things.

Why I breastfed (and will breastfeed again) boldly Part III

Note: This post was inspired by this article on GoBreastfeed.com.

This is not the best article covering the subject but this is exactly the picture that inspired me to go ahead and breastfeed boldly: Selma Blair--Very Public Breastfeeding.

It was a light bulb, cue angels singing "Hallelujah", and a bright white spot light shining overhead.

Why not?

Because if that is what breastfeeding without a cover looks like, then geez, no one's going to see anything unless they stare long enough. And that would be rude.

And that became my mantra when I shunned (to my son's delight and comfort) covering up: If you see anything offensive about me breastfeeding my child, you've been staring too long and should move on.

Why I breastfed (and will breastfeed again) boldly Part II

Note: This post was inspired by this article on GoBreastfeed.com.

I look back now and I realise that the challenges I thought I was facing then weren't really challenges at all. Hence ending last week's entry with quotation marks.

Remember I said that I didn't attend any classes to prepare myself for motherhood. Yes, that is the hubris brought on by my way of thinking: there were no parenting classes in the old days. I can do this!

Yes, I am a big fan of winging it.

I remained confident in my ability to feed my child when diaper after diaper was filled and changed. The Drs. Sears were an excellent reference and my husband's cousin pointed me to a local Facebook group for breastfeeding mothers called Breastfeeding Pinays, reducing points for stressing further. We were winging it and we were flying--at least for the first six weeks.

Why I breastfed (and will breastfeed again) boldly Part I

Note: This post was inspired by this article on GoBreastfeed.com.

I am a breastfeeding mom and proud of it.

Or at least, I was a breastfeeding mom until I had to wean my son early this year.

I never knew there was such a big to-do over breastfeeding until I made the choice to breastfeed my eldest. True, I was not a breastfed child; there were multiple complications that prevented my mother from doing so. But when I found out I was about to become a mother myself, there was no hesitation: I was determined to breastfeed my baby.

The Second Child Syndrome

I often hear about parents saying that they've more pictures of their eldest child than their succeeding ones.

Last night I realised, I have been the same way. I don't have as many pregnancy photos this time around. Not that it's any less magical for me but that for some reason, photos have been the last thing on my mind.

I've been trying to capture Sid's movement since Month 6.

(Note: "Sid" is the fetal nickname we gave our second baby. This is not a reference to the gender, though I am still quite old school with this when it comes to grammar and will tend to refer to Sid as male.)

This made me realise that Sid is incredibly elusive. Most times, I feel his movement in the early morning hours when it would be too dark to capture anything on my phone. And while most parents are less paranoid as they progress to the next child, I have been more paranoid with Sid because Llew is so playful that he would sometimes pounce me and accidentally hit or graze my belly with his feet. A minor upside to this is that it's been a way for me to introduce to Llew that he will be an older brother soon. He doesn't care much for feeling his coming sibling move inside my belly but he's taken to randomly kissing, rubbing, and hugging my belly.

Has he accepted that he will be an older brother soon? I'm not entirely sure. But he has been acting strange even by his standards, especially with asking his stuffed animals to be outfitted with diapers. So maybe we have that ray of light there.

Here's hoping.

Coping with the Crazy

In the period between now and my last real activity on this blog, so much has happened and changed that to try and recapture them one by one just for documentation would be just plain silly.

So let's just go ahead and focus on today. Today and everything that is basically the result of those "lost" days.

In brief: The truth is that staying focused on my eldest gave me little to no time for myself beyond sitting somewhere and staring into nothingness. I found that I didn't really like blogging via my mobile phone or my tablet. The speed with which I needed to type so I can quickly capture my thoughts just didn't match the speed with which I could work on either unit.

So eventually, I gave up. Just quietly gave up.

Why is being a parent suddenly a war of methods?

NOTE: I have not blogged much since the birth of my son. At some point, perhaps, I shall retrospectively post a little more on the journey, both the joyful and harrowing parts of it, but for now, I think I want to finish this post that I began long ago.

I've never read Macchiavelli but I am aware of the tenet most famously attributed to him.

There can be multiple means to a single end and in the case of parenting, one never really knows what good or bad was done until the child in question has reached adulthood. On the average anyway. 

I am siding with those people who say "Parenting is hard enough."

Product Review: Three weeks of using the Pigeon Sakura line

FULL DISCLOSURE: I was given these items to test for free. I was actually surprised by the product size, expecting smaller bottles of each. The samples I received are probably worth a month of daily use--very generous of them, I must say.

So last week I posted my initial thoughts on the use of this new line of products from Pigeon:

I haven't started on the powder yet and now that I think of it, by the time it makes sense to use powder, he may be old enough for me to feel more confident about putting powder on his back, at least, to help with sweat management.

Anyway.

The lotion is halfway out. We use that much, yes. Why? Because I personally prefer to use lotion instead of a rash cream. It's lighter, easily absorbed, and let's face it: not all rash creams are compatible with modern cloth diapers and what we are treating is a specific type of allergy, not a rash per se.

I said to myself, when I got started on this review series that I would not compare and contrast. However, I have used three different products on my son's atopic dermatitis and here are the results--no photos, simply my reflections on each:

INDIGO JAR OF HOPE: This healed his large red patches in two to three days, getting rid of the raw and red bits of skin, and preventing him from scratching. It didn't make the patch disappear, but it allowed the skin gradual renewal.

HUMAN NATURE BABY LOTION: A slightly lighter formulation compared to its original, this is what helped maintain the moisture levels already corrected by the Jar of Hope. It worked well for several months until the weather changed and became cooler.

Enter the PIGEON BABY MILKY LOTION: Creamy but easily absorbed, and heavy enough for the cold days when he needs moisture locking the most. I have been using it steadily all over his body and it worked wonderfully as far as preventing further dry patches and the one on his thigh has almost completely vanished. Brilliant.

I've noticed, however, that the scent and his sweat do not mesh well. It doesn't smell bad but it is not quite that milky baby scent I've grown accustomed to, my son being purely breastfed up to now when he's begun taking solids. Aside from the lack of assurance that their products are cruelty-free* this is another point of contention that has come out of our near one month of use.

Is the Sakura infusion effective? I believe it is. I have no personal research done on it at the moment but their claims have been quite accurate from my experience. My son has extremely sensitive skin and their product has risen to the occasion and restored the smoothness of his skin.

Will I use it again? As I said before, perhaps I will if I'm completely out of our regular product. Going cruelty-free is important to me but if I do not find a cruelty-free equivalent, yes, I might consider going back to this product if only to prevent my son's allergies from getting worse.

Will I recommend it to friends? A more resounding yes now more than before. With full disclosure on how I came across the line.

Product Review: Pigeon's new Sakura-infused line

FULL DISCLOSURE: I was given these items to test for free. I was actually surprised by the product size, expecting smaller bottles of each. The samples I received are probably worth a month of daily use--very generous of them, I must say.

Straight off, I will be honest and say I am unlikely to use the powder on my son. I haven't read enough evidence on the amount of talc that is safe for children and just having warnings on talc inhalation is enough to scare me off it. I'll review it separately as I intend to use it on myself.

So out of the remaining three, two have been opened.

First was the lotion.

What I absolutely love is the scent. Lingers for at least two hours after application, and that is with a child who sweats a great deal. It is a huge bonus that, for a creamy lotion, it is light enough to be quickly absorbed whether the child's skin is damp or dry.

My son suffers from atopic dermatitis (http://www.medicinenet.com/atopic_dermatitis/article.htm) and our cure for that is simply to hydrate inside and out. The lotion helped improve his skin texture by a lot, stopping him from getting the urge to constantly scratch. You can just barely see the redness too.

Second product was the 2-in-1 baby wash. The scent isn't as heavenly as the lotion but the scent is relaxing anyway. The wash is clear--and no colorant means less source of skin irritant. What I love most is that the lather is very light which means it rinses off easily and the formula is no tears too. Bonus points that it comes in the pump bottle that it does. First, because it can be locked, second, I was able to bathe my son by myself and the large base of the packaging plus the pump made it so much easier to get the product out with one hand.

Will I use these again? Perhaps if I ran out of our regular product. While I do not condemn those who don't go the cruelty-free route, it is my personal choice to go cruelty-free for certain items. These product types are among the ones I prefer to be cruelty-free.

Will I recommend this to friends? Oh definitely. We have and have used other Pigeon products and I find them to be of excellent quality. One particular item needs an upgrade though. I think I'll keep up the reviews to cover that one.

July. Really?

I'm honestly a little upset that my last post was in July. Another month of not blogging after I swore I would do so at least once a week.

Well today is Mommy Day and the topic of the day is Mommy Dressing and De-stressing.

Last Love

This post (https://www.facebook.com/FatMumSlim/posts/10151795553321522:0) by Chantelle, a.k.a. Fat Mum Slim, made me think of the boys--yes, boys--I thought would be my last.

For the record, my husband was not my first love. I had three boyfriends before I met him and the one before him was the one I thought I'd be spending forever with.

I'm not knocking the romance of marrying one's first love off its pedestal, but I have since come to the conclusion that the important thing is to commit to the one who will be the last. Romantic love, that is. And that is what my husband is to me.