Rash free, finally

Finally, some good news. Her rash has cleared up, leaving tiny stubborn splotches of red. I'm not taking any chances though - so no more orange juice for me. We've also reverted to her old wipes - alcohol and scent free. Now what do we do with the huge case of Huggies cucumber and aloe wipes?!

I'm also getting a slight reprieve at work, now that this issue is coming to a close. I need sleep. Badly. I've been up practically every single night this week, trying to finish a feature I volunteered to write (on hindsight, I should have farmed it out but the itch to write prevailed. Bad idea.) But now that it's done and over with, I feel supreme satisfaction.

Oh and Kayla got her remaining two shots today - no more till her first birthday. Phew! As she grows older, it's going to get harder to hold her down while the nurse stabs her thigh with a needle. And what will I say the day she asks tearfully, "Mommy, why are you letting her hurt me?"

Rash Distress

Kayla has a pretty bad and lousy case of diaper rash, so bad that she's crying and writhing in pain when we try to clean her up. Her bum's an angry red and no matter how much diaper cream we slap on, it's refusing to go away.

We're not sure what caused it either. Pure conjecture: Her butt could be protesting the new diaper wipes we started using on Friday, or perhaps it was something in both her diet and mine. I'm praying it clears up tonight - knowing she's suffering (no matter how minute the pain) and being totally powerless is tough to stomach.

She's crying again now - looks like it's going to be another long, sleepless night.

Munchkin Madness

In the past 30 days, I've received three baby birth announcements in my inbox - gorgeous girls with marvelous moms. There's Auntie Jean with little (name unknown at press time), Auntie Andrea with Leia, the little diva-in-making, and Auntie Yvonne with sweet Annalise.

Bienvenue babies!

Farewell fatty, hello shorty

Miki lost some weight, at least that's what the scales at the doc's say, though my arms tell me differently. She has gone from being in the 75th percentile (for mathephobes like me, it basically means she used to be heavier than 75 percent of her baby buddies) to just a teeny wee bit above average. Her current weight: 16 pounds 12 ounces. And that means we can't call her fat baby no more.

We thought she was thinning out, making up for her weight loss in length - but no. She's dipped below average lengthwise at 25.25 inches. Don't rub it in. I already feel bad since I know firsthand what life as a petite person is like. Don't even get me started.

Roll Over

I couldn't be prouder. Baby Miki has finally figured out how to roll over from her tummy to her back - not vice versa just yet, but I'm not too concerned. And she performs the cutest rolls ever! (I do realize I'm gushing, but I can't keep a lid on my excitement...so bear with it.)

It happened unexpectedly (always does) when I decided she could use some tummy time after a diaper change this afternoon. As usual, she started whimpering after a couple of minutes but this time, she leaned her head way back and used the weight of her pretty big head to flip herself over. I put her back on her tummy and she did it again. And again. And again. And again... I think she's figured out, too, that with this newfound ability, it's farewell forever to tummy time. :)

I had better turn in now... Kayla turns six months this week and that equals visit to the doc's tomorrow for more shots. Owwieeeee....

Poop Panic

Kayla will probably hate me 10 years from now for posting this - then again, maybe she won't. It is, after all, part of her transition from baby human to bigger baby human. So, she's been on a supplemental diet of rice cereal, bananas, and vegetables (sweet potato, peas, and carrots) for the past week - which almost means her poop's all grown-up.

While we usually dread changing poopy diapers (we've had our fair share of leaks and explosions), we've been praying for one for the past three days. My baby hadn't gone to the bathroom for three days - she did a little Thurs & Fri but they were so so tiny. Her doc said it was normal now that she's on solids but real relief came this afternoon when her babysitter emailed to let me know - she had finally gone, half-a-diaper load and the best news in a while! She, however, did cry in the process of trying to go. Poor thing.

We're gonna go easy on the rice cereal and prob stick to more fruits and vegetables. Does anyone have a fail-safe formula that'll fix poop panic for good?

Playing Dress Up

People keep mistaking my little girl for a boy and the most recent case in point was our trip to Vasona Lake County Park on Saturday when a lady came up to her and said "Hey buddy!" (despite the fact that Kayla was in a pink cap, a pink onesie, had a pink blankie, plus a bib that read 'Thank Heaven for little girls!') When she realized she had made a mistake, she quickly added, "Oh, what a cute little... girl."

Sigh. Not the first (and definitely not the last) time this has happened. If pink's not working, I don't know what will.

Happy Mothers' Day

To my mom, my mother-in-law, my sis-in-law, my (soon-to-be-mom) sis, and all my dearest child-rearing friends,

Happy Mothers' Day! Thank you so much for sharing so unselfishly everything you know about taking care of a little one. Your nuggets of wisdom have made my transition into mommyhood a much smoother, and enjoyable one.

Love lots,
Me (and Mikayla)

Going Bananas!

She's graduated from cereal and has just moved on to pureed fruit. After some fruitful (sorry, couldn't resist!) Internet search, we decided to skip the greens and feed her fruit instead. For those not in the know, some experts recommend giving greens before fruits so the baby doesn't grow a sweet tooth and reject peas, carrots, and the likes. Advocates in the opposite camp say the fruit-first strategy is harmless and doesn't turn babies into salad-haters. I chose to stick with the latter, simply because eating off a spoon is totally new to her, and if there's anything I can do to make the transition that little bit smoother, why not? So we opened a jar of mashed bananas, and fed her just one tablespoonful. She made her a face when she got a first taste, but that quickly gave way to squeals for more. My baby likes bananas!

And here's something I never imagined myself doing: making baby food. Yes, we've succumbed to the whole "watch what you feed baby" anti-preservatives, anti-lotsa-sugar movement. We've the tools (Mikey bought a mini Cuisinart blender), and what I need now are recipes. I grew up basically eating rice porridge, Singapore-style, so this whole "boil the pears till they're tender, mash them, puree them, add water to thin" business is new to me. Doesn't help that I'm neither a great cook, nor a master of kitchen appliances (unless you consider the can opener one). I just hope I keep this up... it's more time-consuming, but certainly a whole lot cheaper and healthier than baby food on supermarket shelves.

Not sure if I mentioned this in any of my previous posts: Miki's sitting up on her own now, although she's still not rolling over!! I hate to say this, and don't shoot me... but even my dog picked that up faster.

More than a moniker

Everyone wants to know how their name came about. And here's how we ended up with Mikayla Rae-Ann Hong.

Mikayla wasn't even an option until about eight months into the pregnancy. For the record, I did most of the research and came up with a long list of names I liked - Haley, Natasha, Kayla, Kimberly, Victoria, Sasha, Jade, Shyanne, Kira, Kiersten, Tasha....so on. Mikey shot most of them down, and the ONLY ONE we agreed on after countless evening debates was Victoria. So it was Victoria for the longest time. As for her middle name (which is also her Chinese name), it wasn't as difficult coming to a decision. These were our options: Mae-Ann, Rae-Lyn, Rae-Ann. We chose Rae-Ann, "Rui En" in hanyu pinyin and it means "goodness" and "grace".

Back to "Mikayla". So I started throwing names at Mike again one evening (I mean surely there must be some other name he fancied!), and when we got to Mikayla, he paused, thought about it and said okay. Only because Mikayla, Micaela, or Michaela, is a derivative of Michael, which means "like the Lord".... He wanted his little girl to be named after daddy. We spelled it "Mikayla" because it's easy to pronounce when you break it up :Mi-Kay-La.

It's worked out really well. Now, I can't imagine calling Miki by any other name. Speaking of names, we did a little experiment today and found out Miki knows her name! But she responds only to Kayla (which is what we call her most of the time).

Milk Machine

I've been Miki's on-demand food factory for close to six months now - much longer than I thought I would have lasted considering our nursing relationship had a seriously shaky start. While I did read and hear many stories about how potentially difficult (and painful) nursing can be, it's one of those things that you don't really have a good grasp of until you experience it - or perhaps you harbor hope that things would be different for you. Well, I wasn't quite so fortunate.

For starters, I was too drugged out after surgery to stop the nurses from feeding her formula with a bottle. Then I was still too drugged out to protest when the nurse on night shift decided to whisk Miki off for another bottle feed while I slept. I don't know if our problems with latching was a result of her not being nursed right after birth, or if it was just new territory for both of us. To cut the long story short, what followed was three months of very painful feeds (I'll spare you the details, except to say there were tears and lots of painkillers which didn't help). I must have considered quitting a trillion times, but I could never bring myself to do it - for fear that she would fall sick, and guilt that I'm depriving her of nature's best sustenance just because I've a lousy threshold for pain.

Often I questioned if it was worth it. I dreaded every feed (which was every two hours), I certainly wasn't enjoying my baby as much as I thought I would, and I was frustrated with myself and Miki for not figuring it out!

Things got so bad we called a lactation consultation at six weeks, but the only thing that did was assure me that I wasn't starving her and my milk supply was more than sufficient. That kept me going. Plus the hope that many nursing sites proffered: Things would get better.

And they did, shortly after she turned three months. Today, we're a happy nursing couple, but it's also about time we work out a plan to wean her off slowly. I'm hoping to wean her off completely once she's on solids.

We've started her on cereal one meal a day, three times a week, but she doesn't seem to be taking to it that well. Maybe I'll try baby oatmeal. She seems to enjoy nursing too much to want to give it up. Which might mean I have to put up with the tiring "pump at work" routine for nobody knows how long, and not going out longer than three straight hours. I'm also worried she'll go on a hunger strike - though I think she loves food too much to do that. :)

I'm fortunate that Miki's good with the bottle. I've heard stories of babies who would rather go hungry than drink from a bottle (talk about emotional blackmail). Miki's happy with the bottle, so long as I not around. I'm the numero uno milk machine.

I think I'm ready to wean her - six months' a long time, though close, and experienced mom friends have told me to keep at it for another six. We'll see...

[to be continued]

Loving the Labels

It's been an exhausting print week (the week the mag I work for goes to print), which explains the deathly silence on this blog. The good news, we're almost done. After a readaround in the morning tomorrow, this little baby is good to go.

As for my other baby (the more adorable one), she's really into labels these days - eating them, that is. Only natural since she's at that stage where toes look especially tasty. But it's cute how she manages to locate the labels on every single one of her toys, our pillows, and most recently, our comforter. Into her mouth they go and out they come, soaking wet with her saliva. Ick! Besides licking labels, her other recent talent is shrieking. She's discovered the soprano range of her vocal cords and has taken to exercising them regularly...in the wee hours of the morning. Ugh!

Oh, and she muttered "Wa" the other day...maybe she meant "Ma?" It's fun listening to her talk these days. If I can figure a way out to record it somehow and post it, I will. I'm thinking of getting a video cam just to capture her delightful gibberish. :)