New arrival

Not mine though. This cutie is one of my colleagues’. We visited her a few days ago.

His birth was so short & quick! His mum started having contractions in the morning, cleared some work while having mild pain until we told her enough is enough and that we’d send her to the hospital at lunchtime. Talk about high threshold of pain!

We got to the hospital before her husband did, and when another friend of ours informed the nurse that “her friend was giving birth”, the nurse looked at both of us (I was standing rite beside my colleague who was in labour)
and asked, “Which one?” Haha!

We dropped her at the delivery suite at 2 pm, and baby was born by 4-ish pm! Was that a fast labour or what?
Such blessings!

—

Anyway, my labour is in a few days away too…. hmm… am praying for an easy one as well and hope all goes well.
Praying for a painless one would be ridiculous and although I’ve been through it, I’m still, well, scared!
At 37 weeks, baby is still not engaged, but her estimated weight is 2.9 kg. She kicks and stretches really hard still.
I guess we’re almost ready to receive her already. The playpen/bassinet has been set up, and there are a couple of newborn clothes ready for her. Later I just have to dig out the manual breastpump. Then again, I guess we won’t be needing that too soon rite? Worse come to worse, literally express manually lor.

Warming up the engines

When we were expecting Adam, I think by this time, his little baby cupboard was ready with his stuff.
Though, some strange reason, I didn’t buy any newborn diapers before his birth…neither did we prepare kain bedung. I recall
Mak went to get them from the supermarket and a small shop selling baby items in the makeshift
Geylang serai market.

Today, I finally brought stuff for the newborn to my mom’s place. 2 packs of diapers & plenty
of washed kain bedung. Clothes? Some are still in the washing machine. I suppose she could
wear Adam’s clothes for the time being. And though I’ve dug out the hand-me-downs from
my SIL (in the big tub we received in 2007), I think it won’t hurt if I got a few more rompers
from the sprees.

Talking about washing clothes, december is really a bad time for dryers to break down.
Actually our dryer had broken down since a couple of months ago,but somehow we managed
to survive. This time, I really need to use the dryer since I can’t find much space to dry our clothes.
I guess things will get rolling after Friday, when I get my pay. haha, teruk betul eh.

Plans

It’s just the 3 of us & baby in tummy this weekend.

My parents have gone to KL with my aunts & the in-laws have gone to
HK for a 9-day trip. I’ll be on leave on Monday & Tuesday too, so I can
take care of Adam till my parents return & get enough rest.

Long weekend huh?

Well, Saturday passed by as fast as I thought. We went to the airport in the morning.
By 11 am we were at Adam’s school, registering him for his 2010 playgroup. I still find it
amusing that a 3 yr old will be going to school next year, even if it’s only for 3 hours. What to pack in bag? A diaper, maybe a milk bottle. I’m hoping I would give birth sometime in end Dec 09 so I could
walk over and accompany Adam for school. Let’s see…

By about 12-ish, we were at an aunt’s place for an engagement ceremony. I didn’t want to go but ended up going in the end. You may disagree, but somehow I’ve always not thought much of engagement parties
and have never viewed them as important or necessary at all. After that, we went home & AH went to
get his brake pads changed coz the car was making some strange sounds.

We had all kinds of Indian food that night, dinner bought by AH.
Murtabak, sup kambing, mee goreng. Gee. I felt guilty eating the calories &
also felt sorry for Adam who couldn’t enjoy the feast coz he slept by 6 pm.
Probably too tired as he didn’t nap at all yesterday.

Today’s not as “happening”. We just have a wedding to go to,
a pink baby bouncer to collect & a baby sale to go to.

Tomorrow? Ayah’s working, so I guess Adam & I will just spend the time at home.
I intend to wash the remaining baby clothing. Our dryer’s spoilt & seriously,
December is just a bad time for dryers to be spoilt.

My nesting instinct has kicked in already but there are just too many things left to be settled.
I hope I can clear all this before baby pops! One of the things I plan to do is also to pack the bag. Yes, the
hospital bag. Let’s see if I can achieve even half of what I’ve planned.

35 weeks

At 35 weeks, baby’s weight is estimated to be between 2.5kg to 2.7kg.
Still not engaged & no blockage around cervix area.
I’m hoping to go natural again, insya-Allah.
The doc will be on leave quite close to our EDD but then again, these
things are beyond our control, so I guess we can only pray.
I’ll be seeing the doc again in 2 weeks’ time. I wonder if
I can make it this time round, coz during Adam’s time, that little boy
just couldn’t wait!

I have some thoughts about baby’s sleeping arrangement,
sleeping habits, latching on habits & other baby-related stuff which
I feel like penning down. But I just don’t think I can do that right now.
Later perhaps. When I’m done with the visits & whatever paperwork I’m left with.
One of my greatest fears is not being able to clear work before I go.
2-4 casefiles are OK, just not like, 15 of them. Paiseh lah.

Early

Someone very close to us gave birth to her baby boy 11 weeks early.
This has made me think a lot about the miracles of life. It’s really amazing!
Mother’s well and baby’s still in NICU. Everyday we pray for baby to grow well enough and have little complications, so that one day he’ll be back home where he belongs, and some day, join his other baby cousins for some playtime.

Just a site I found while I did a raw google search on preemies.

http://kidshealth.org/parent/growth/growing/preemies.html

Mixed up

I should be in my 34th week now. I intend to work till my EDD which has changed from 3 Jan 2010 to end Dec 2009. I hope I can last till then.

I feel a bit nervous now actually because during the pat 2-3 hrs I’ve been having these tummy aches. I don’t think they’re contractions lah, but they still scare me quite a bit. I *really* want to clear my work before I go!

My tummy is quite big now and though I’ve not gotten much backaches and my hands / feet have not swelled up as badly as when I was expecting Adam, I get tired quite often these days. I feel like slouching alllll the time. I can still touch my toes though. I still carry Adam once in a while too coz he still needs some babying sometimes.

One of my fears previously was not being able to attend to Adam during my 2nd pregnancy. I’m glad it’s not as bad as I imagined lah. I’m happy we still have good times with Adam & still get to bathe him, play with him, read to him etc. But Adam’s got a bit of a tummy upset again. I wonder why

That’s why I’m having mixed feelings. Nervous, excited, worried, happy, all at once. It’s hard to explain. It’s just in me this time round. Hmmm…

Town trip

I took a day off work to bring Adam to the dentist last Thursday.
I’m still feeling lousy that despite eating sweets very rarely and making effort to brush his teeth regularly,
Adam has developed child tooth decay . It began with a little stain, and then now, to me it looks bad,
although the dentist said it wasn’t as bad as I thought. Maybe he has seen worse cases, so Adam’s teeth
is nothing. It still mattered a lot to me though… sighs.

Anyway, we explored the town for the first time today!
I thought some stretch of town is quite child-friendly; they’re quite well-barricated,
so toddlers can walk around quite freely. Of course we went on a weekday, so
the crowd was non-existent.

At the dentist, occupying himself with the rack of books and toys

Fiddling with some gadget

We took the shuttle bus that brought us to Liat Towers. Adam loves taking buses.

Alighted at Liat Towers & we took our time exploring the place. l

Look, we’re about to get up close and personal to Ion! We didn’t really walk around Ion though, coz
Adam saw the MRT station and was eager to hop on one.

And, I finally got Adam a concession EZlink pass! He’s at least 92 cm now, and as much as I think
it’s quite ridiculous that I’ve got to pay fares for a 2 year old toddler, I guess it’s not that bad after all lah.
I don’t really feel guilty now when Adam gets his own seat. I mean, we’re actually paying for this ride,
so the seat is really an entitlement!

We got seats in all our train rides that day. Quite happy that Singaporeans aren’t all that self-centred.

Adam’s 1st EZLink card! He was really thrilled that he got to tap his own card to enter and exit the train stations.

Guess where?
We made a stop over at Raffles City. Ibu liked it for its distance from home, while Adam liked it, for, the water fountains!

Watching his “Water show”

There was also a washroom for parents & little kids. The height of the sink was just nice for kids.

Step 2 – dry your hands after Step 1 – wash them well.

Happy after being able to wash & dry his hands.
It’s quite rare that I’d let him do these things on his own!

It’s time go back now. Enough damage for the day. Adam returned home with a crane truck from Robinson’s.

He looked on curiously at the crowd about to enter the train. Hope you enjoyed the short town trip with Ibu!

I was so thankful we survived the trip that day. No cars, just public transport. Ok ok, so we took a cab home after alighting from the train station but I so have a valid reason for that, heh.

At 33 weeks now, I’m getting heavier and get more tired quite often, but I surprised myself by being quite energetic that day. Oh well, guess we were having so much fun, fatigue takes a backseat sometimes.

Not sure why I am blogging thru a phone rather than the laptop!

Ah and I had a peaceful sunday night. I got to watch the devil wears prada and both of us enjoyed a home made fondue with fruits. All cos adam slept early at 7. Must have been tired out from this morning’s water play and short nap.

While we enjoyed the couple time, we didnt deny that it was quiet and we kinda missed having that little toddler fuss around, playing with his toys and have us say ‘No!’ every few seconds.

Ahh, the bitter sweetness of parenthood.

Scooting Sunday

At first it was just a trip to the playground without the scooter.
After some time, Adam asked for his new scooter toy so we went back to get it.
Luckily the playground was quite well-cushioned. That’s about the only place you’ll play on until
we get a helmet for ya, okay!

We went to the airport for a quick dinner with Adam’s aunts & cousins too and he sure had a fun time
running “races” up and down a quiet stretch of slope near T2. It did look a bit funny tho – he was the smallest one running all his might among the 3 bigger kids. Not that he cared one bit of course. Could tell from his endless laughter and cackles.

The language divide

While Adam started speaking rather late, his vocab & speech have developed quite rapidly over the past few months.

He speaks more Malay than English, most likely because he’s under the care of my mom, who is a strong advocate of speaking in Malay. While she reads and is well-versed in English, the idea of little kids not knowing how to speak in English just makes her cringe. I guess that’s why she’s on this mission to ensure Adam speaks Malay well. And yes, Adam has had his fair share of Alif, Ba, Ta too (or rather, A-, Ba- Ta- in Iqra’ terms). As for me, I try to do the A-B-C bit.

Personally for me, I think I speak more Malay than English too. I speak Malay most of the time even at work and I’m quite proud to say that I am able to speak Malay well enough to save my life! As such I’m quite comfortable speaking in Malay to Adam most of the time. However, I do speak to Adam in English at times too, and read English books to him. His Ayah speaks more English to him, so I guess that’d suffice.

Anyway, actually I was just going to blog about this. Adam has a neighbour who’s about 3 mths older than him. Just a while ago, after collecting a tennis ball he threw out of the window, Adam actually called out to him, “Bye Daniel!”. I heard Daniel’s mother greet Adam and say,”Adam, where are you go-ing?” And Adam explained, “Take ball outside! Throw outside at tingkap!” And Daniel’s mom went, “Oh, Okay!”.

I was amused, and so was Adam’s ayah. I guess he attempted to speak English well enough but couldn’t quite find the word for tingkap in English. Or maybe he thought his language is universal and everyone would understand what he said, haha!

Someone once commented why Adam spoke so much Malay. Actually I was tempted to answer, why not? Wasn’t it good to be well-versed in one’s own mother tongue? What’s the big deal about being able to speak in English when grammar is out of the window anyway?
And I think it’s quite sad when a kid can’t even give a decent reply in Malay, or responds in English when an answer is being asked in Malay.

But me being me, I just smiled. Inside me I was happy Adam could speak Malay & understand or speak when needed when spoken to in English. I believe he’s progressing the right way as long as we keep speaking to him as much as possible (both in Malay & English) since this is the age they absorb language to their best ability.

Plus, with Singlish almost everywhere these days, I guess I won’t need him to speak Queen’s English anytime soon!