14 November 2010

If you haven't tried Rae's (Awesome) Lemon Yums yet you should - they really are awesome. I baked them again last night - perfect!

On 14 Nov Iris and I had our second child. Looks like travelling might be a tough ask for the next while... or maybe not? In fact Iris has been travelling with our daughter A - she was probably 3 and a half months old when she first travelled clockwise around Australia in ten days. It was for work, and it was only made possible by Nana who did a fine job of caring for A while mum worked. Not much fun for anyone though, despite a few travelling highlights.

So - while that happened I stayed at home and cared for our 2 and a half year old son. Easy. Full on at times, but mostly good!

Next time, we will fly with two children. Unfortunately only the baby is free now, so travelling hurts the pocket that much more!

Rae's Awesome Lemon Yums

This is a delicious and fairly foolproof (hey I can bake it!) recipe to impress your friends with:


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Rae’s awesome Lemon yums (Lemon Sponge pudding)

2 T butter

¾ C caster sugar

3 T Flour

3 Eggs separated

1 C milk

juice and rind of 1 and ½ lemons

4 ramekins

Cream butter and sugar

Add flour, eggs yolks, milk and lemon rind an juice

Beat eggs whites separately until stiff. Fold into other mixture.

Put into greased ramekins.

Place ramekins in a tray ½ full of water.

Bake 160 degrees for 30 min.

Serve warm. Cream or vanilla ice cream is yum.

Travelling with a baby - part 1

Travelling with a baby  -  just like (pre-baby) travelling, but on a baby’s timetable!

When our boy was seven months old, we had the opportunity to go to from Australia to Paris for 2 months. We learnt from experience some of the ways to make travelling with a baby more hassle free…

First a word from a few friends of mine. Their response to the idea of travelling with a baby was simply ‘don’t.’  Perhaps this is the best thing to do… but travelling is fun (even with a baby!) and you can see friends and family and feel the same sense of personal growth that you might have felt when you travelled without a baby.

Top five tips for travelling with a baby – 6 to 12 months old:

1. Always remember to breathe. Breathe, keep breathing. Relax, relax and relax…

2. Always consider timing travel to coincide with a sleep… sleeping babies are good travellers.

3. When making your booking, request the seat with a bassinet and always ask for baby food if it is available. If your baby is older than 12 months you should ask at check in time if it is possible to have a spare seat beside you.  For older kids car safety seats can be strapped into plane seats (if you purchased the seat) – but I don’t think it is worth the hassle to take one…

4. Plan your accommodation ahead and make sure there is a cot in the room, or travel with your own portable cot.

5. Prepare the baby bag well in advance. This needs to be as small as possible but still contain enough nappies, wipes, food and drink, books, and toys and a small comfort blanket.

6. Prams… it is definitely worth having a pram. The bigger prams like Bugaboo are more difficult to transport but easier to push over the cobble stones when you get there!

An additional consideration for toddlers - 12 – 24 months old:

7. Take more snacks… by 18 months food seems to be the best thing for keeping our boy occupied and content on a trip.  Sometimes this did affect whether he’d eat a meal once we arrived somewhere, but this didn’t really matter as he was already well nourished.   

Our trip

With the luxury of time on our side, we decided to make our round the world trip in a number of stages. The benefit of this was that we could visit friends and colleagues along the way, we’d not be on a plane more than 10 hours at a time, and we didn’t cross too many time zones so felt less affected by jet lag.

We booked evening flights where possible. At the age of seven months we generally were allocated a bassinet on the plane. Aged seven to twelve months our boy slept through most of these flights. Keeping good sleep habits also helped him adjust to new time zones. Joy!

Note about booking bassinets. We travelled on Qantas, British Airways, Cathay Pacific, Air France, Qatar Air and American Airlines. There seems to be no fixed rules about the allocation of bassinets, except perhaps that the younger the baby the more likely you are to get a bassinet – which makes sense. Qantas did not allow pre-booking of bassinets, but Cathay Pacific and Qatar Air did. The thing that seemed to help us obtain a bassinet was to call the airline a day ahead of the flight and request the bassinet.

Almost all airlines provide baby food, and infant seat belts. Most also have at least one bassinet on board. But strangely American Airlines does not provide bassinets, infant seat belts or baby food on many of its planes (we would not fly with them again unless it was unavoidable – not even for platinum flyer status, sorry George Clooney!)

Was the trip unsettling for the baby?

Yes. But he adjusted within a day or two after each leg.

Long haul flying has to be one of the most unnatural ways to move about the planet. It is unsettling for babies and adults. However, our son had very little jet lag, and his day-time sleeping was almost unaffected. His night time sleeping was pretty bad – but that was going on before we started travelling!

Was it fun?

Was it what!! We had a tremendous time on the trip. Challenging, exciting, relaxing and everything you’d expect from a long, mostly summer, holiday! If we could have changed anything it would have been our son’s night time sleeping – but any parent who’s child wakes every 2 hours at night would say the same thing, no matter where they are in the world!

Next time…  what’s in the baby’s travel bag, using taxis overseas, and dealing with jet lag…

This is your face! - a rhyme for kids

Here is a little action rhyme I wrote:



This is your nose
and these are your ears

This is your head
and this is your hair

These are your cheeks
and this is your chin

These are your eyes
and this is your grin!

Nappies: used, abused and reviewed

So you've decided to use cloth nappies. Good for you! After days and nights of research we made the decision to use cloth nappies instead of disposables. There are pros and cons to both and you may find that you use some of each. When you are away from home, it is certainly more simple to use disposable ones...

Cloth nappies are a more environmentally sound option than disposables. Disposable nappies take hundreds of years to break down. In the wrong conditions (buried deep in a landfill where most end up, for example) they may take even longer to break down. A few disposable nappies wouldn't be such a problem, but if you think of a box of nappies, multiple it by 30 so you have a truck sized pallet of 30 boxes, then multiply that by every child under 2 - and you can imagine how many nappies go to the landfill each year. Also, I bought some 'biodegradable' nappies to try (Moltex Oko are actually only 40% biodegradable) and put one in our compost for a year. I dug it up a few weeks ago and was surprised how much of it was still there... anyway, 40% is better than nothing I suppose.

On the other hand, people argue that the water usage for washing cloth nappies makes them less environmentally sound. It is true, washing nappies will increase your household water usage, but merely having an extra human in the house will do that, so therefore the most environmentally sound option is to have no children... and if you take the argument further... well, let's not go there.

There are so many nappies and so many claims about the specific benefits of each brand. It really is a difficult decision. Modern fitted nappies are costly. And you need plenty of them, especially if you don't have or use a clothes dryer (if you can, the sun is a much better way to dry nappies because it disinfects and deodorises as it dries - amazing huh!)



How many nappies?

I think you could use 8-10 a day for a newborn to six month old baby. The poo is often runny, so it discolours the cloth a little, though it doesn't smell bad until they start eating solids. If you had 20 nappies you'd probably have to wash and dry every day. If you have family around (and a drier, in case it rains) then this is probably an option.

Better option - Nappy service. Yaahooo! They take the poo-stained nappies away and deliver nice clean fresh nappies. Also, industrial washing services are generally very water / electricity efficient! Bonus!

After 6 months - 18 months you could use five or six nappies a day. Again, you can do the maths regarding how many you need to buy in order to always have a set of clean and dry ones at the start of each day.

If you are able to connect it to your toilet water supply, a nappy / diaper sprayer is a worthwhile investment. We used a brand called Little Squirt - http://www.littlesquirt.com.au/ which was great. But the Bum Genius featured on the left is similar. More about Bum Genius below...

Which brands are best?

The short answer is - it depends.

There are different materials - some dry quickly, some slowly.
Some materials are man-made (plastic) some are natural fibre.
Some have velcro fastening, others have dome type fastening.
Some are all-in-ones (AIOs) and others use removable inserts.
Some have waterproof outer layers, others need a separate waterproof cover.

The brands we used are pictured and reviewed below:

Blueberry

This is a Blueberry 'Minky'.
Pros: Looks good
Lightweight and Soft
Microfibre insert based (daytime size, or nighttime size) - so they dry quickly.
Resizable

Cons: Not natural fibre (won't break down!)
Velcro is easy to fasten, but may loose its grip over time and older children can possibly open this type of fastener...

This is a Baby Beehinds bamboo nappy
Pros: Natural fibre, soft and comfy
Very renewable resource
Removable inside layer allows for faster drying

Cons: Slow drying

Bum genius

This is a Bum Genius.
Pros: Lightweight
Fast drying
Removable insert
Resizable

Cons: Not natural fibre, won't break down
Velcro is easy to fasten, but may loose its grip over time and older children can possibly open this type of fastener... (but what are you going to do, padlock them on?!)

Imse Vimse

This is an Imse Vimse nappy thingee... 

Imse Vimse makes some nice organic baby products. 

We liked the idea of this lightweight, natural fibre nappy but it didn't really work for us. It leaked badly. Might have been our own fault, but we couldn't seem to get the thing to do up properly.

Pros: Lightweight, natural fibre 

Cons: Didn't work

  

Itti Bitti D'lish (http://ittibitti.com.au)

Pros: Very soft exterior. Comfy interior too.
Removable snap in insert (you can only use snap in inserts though) Booster insert also pictured.
Very good fit.
Some natural fibres

Cons: A little slow on drying time.
Some non natural fibres
We needed to use a waterproof cover

Mother ease

This is a Mother Ease one size nappy

Pros: very simple
Soft cotton (other natural fabrics available too)
Use with removable inserts
Fairly quick to dry
resizable
Mother ease makes good nappy covers / diaper covers

Cons: Rather bulky
Needs a nappy cover

And finally this is a tots bots nappy...

Pros: Nice slim fit.
Very absorbent (this one was made from bamboo - called a bamboozle).
Good fastening system (easy to fasten)
Removable insert (dome fastener)
Tots bots make excellent nappy covers for this nappy range.

Cons: Takes a while to dry.
Needs an additional nappy cover.

Our enduring favourite was the Bum Genius3.0 (and the Blueberry which is very similar in design). Despite being non natural fibres, the utility value of such a fast drying nappy meant alot to us. However, the Tots bots and the Baby Beehinds were also very good at both are natural fibres and therefore should be biodegradable at the end of their lives... unlike the Bum Genius!

We used flushable nappy liners which were excellent and saved us from having to wash heavy soiling out of the nappies.

Here are a couple of our favourite nappy / diaper covers:

Imse Vimse cover - we like it

Baby Beehinds cover - pretty good

Tots Bots cover - lovely - a good fit on their nappy

 

Mother Ease - we like it

Baby Beehinds wool cover - we like the idea of it, but found it didn't work very well!

Bummis super bright cover - not so good. Noisy! But their nappies might be good.

And a final word, as far as natural fibres go, I think the old fashioned cotton (or other fabrics) squares of towelling are actually very very good. Yes, you need to change them more frequently, and they are a little more bulky - but they're still great!

The thing I learned from all this nappy / diaper research is that in our crazy consumer world (of which I am obviously a part, sorry) we create all manner of confusing choices for our customers where none are really desperately needed. The bare facts of the matter are that there is still an awful lot of poo to deal with - and nothing will change that fact!

The exercise also made me think how wasteful we humans are... but this blog is not about that! So go and choose yourself some nappies! Have fun!

Womb music (an audio file to download)

Here's something interesting... a 57 minute audio recording of the womb. We call it womb music - and you can download it from here - http://www.mediafire.com/?nznotnmdxi2

It is apparently calming for young babies (based on the idea that it reminds them of where they have just been - in utero) and you might find it calming too (you were once there too I guess!)

Just so you know I am for real - Amazon has some other versions for sale - from the following links:



Enjoy. Next, more nappies.

Baby Comes Home - trouble in paradise!

In hindsight, those first weeks home are the toughest we experienced. We thought we were ready for anything, but there is not a book you can read that can truly prepare you. I admit that I certainly can't prepare you. You can go some way to preparing yourself simply by knowing that your life is about to be turned upside down, and your expectations will be challenged... it sounds corny, but if you step aboard that ride, it is in my experience, the ride of your life.  

It turned out our baby liked booby... though those first few days in the hospital were a little sketchy, but by the time we got home Iris had it under control. Excruciatingly sore nipples... but under control. We had friends who'd not been able to breastfeed and knew how difficult it had been for them, so we felt fortunate. For us, breast feeding was great because as long as Iris was there (and she always was) we always had a pre-warmed feed with us, and a pacifier, and a nice emotional bonding device, and... I could go on but the point is breasts are great (even if they aren't the breastfeeding kind).  The formula feeding / breast feeding debate is a sensitive one but I am an advocate of the philosophy that if you can you should, and if you can't there is an option too. I was a bottle fed formula baby and apart from having three eyes (an extra one in my forehead), no one would be able to guess it! (Bad taste I know, but someone will laugh).

I had three weeks off work. Those weeks were a blur where we transitioned from full nights sleep and doing whatever the heck we liked, to very broken sleeps, running on adrenaline, and putting a massive halt on the social calendar.

We learned to hear slight tonal differences in crying and became adept at changing nappies. Nappies in fact became a major focus of our lives. We had already devoted countless hours to reading dodgy websites about the various virtues of different brands. Totally baffled by the choice, we set a middling course and bought a couple of sampler packs.

In fact the nappies we bought were not very useful in those early stages. The young fellow grew so quickly, and the poo was so frequent and gooey that we found a much better solution!

NAPPY SERVICE! Each week the service would deliver 50 clean white cloth nappies (USA: Diapers) to our door. Each week they would collect very dirty ones. This saved us so much time, so much waste and so much mess... and it only cost $40 per week. I would definitely recommend this - even as a gift - in those early months.

There is an awful lot of nappy changing! By the way, an excellent device for fastening (terry towelling) cloth nappies is the Snappi. They do a fab job - so you don't need to use safety pins.    

You can get them here: Snappi Cloth Diaper Fasteners - Pack of 3 (Light Blue, Bright Blue, White)

and find out more here: http://www.snappibaby.com/

After 3 months we started using our own reusable cloth nappies. We put significant research into making our decision - so I'm going to devote a whole entry to it! Nappies, boosters, night time nappies, bamboo, micro fibre, washing machines, squirter hoses, nappy liners... and so on to follow!

At the hospital

I have to admit that this part of the journey is a bit hazy. I can remember the highlights. Meeting the young man for the first time. Those wonderful first noises and actions he made. Cutting his umbilical cord. The meconium poo and the first bath and massaging him with olive oil... but not the kind you eat ok!!

There was learning how to put on a nappy - we had a few ideas, but the midwives had lots of new techniques to show us. The smell, a wonderful odour of fresh warm skin, without a hint of sourness.

We stayed at the hospital 4 days. Our heath insurance afforded us a private room (though this was not guaranteed). We were happy with this. I stayed on a very uncomfortable sofa bed each night. I didn't want to miss out on anything. We braved the hospital food and supplemented it with better takeaways. Sushi was a hit. A highlight was the visit of a friend who sneaked in a bottle of bubbly, two dozen oysters, half a crayfish and a fantastic dessert. Unbelievable. In hindsight we seemed to be drifting in some kind of pleasurable dream bubble.

Midwives were overall fantastic, though we didn't like the one who tried to extract and feed our boy breast milk with a syringe (without a needle of course). Our other problem with the midwives was the variable nature of their information. Sometimes it seemed we were getting very old fashioned advice. Not to say that it was totally wrong - but we just seem to like a more open minded approach.

After 4 days it was time to go. I had the baby safety capsule strapped into the car. I wasn't entirely sure how to use it. (There's a tip - work this stuff out before you try to use it for the first time! This is serious business, please read up on this stuff!)

It was strange to be home. I now had three weeks off work to help Iris and to start to get to know this new boy!

Baby day part 2

Iris had an epidural. Instantly she fell into a state of relaxation, well, more relaxed than she had been anyway. Everything slowed down. The staff took a breather - leaving the room for a few minutes and giving me the opportunity to take a few good long tokes of the nitros oxide gas that was on offer (albeit not to me.) For the entire time she'd been in hospital Iris had a doppler sensor strapped around her middle. It produces a rhythmic squelching sound - the babies heart beat. After the epidural and while the staff had left the room, the doppler beat began to slow triggering a new high pitched alarm. Staff rushed back into the room and rushed to stabilise Iris' condition - it was all a blur to me and I am not entirely sure what they did, but in a few minutes things were back to normal.  

I think it was about noon when the obstetrician returned and urged for more push! Iris was fully dilated, and the baby was in a good position for the delivery, however the baby was suffering from being in that position for some time. An amazing sight - a head was showing. The birth was becoming more and more visceral. There was increasing amounts of blood and ever louder moaning. The obstetrician decided that an episiotomy was necessary. It was a very quick snip and it did seem to speed things up...

By 2pm Iris was exhausted and was struggling to find more energy. The obstetrician used a Kiwi brand (I found this amusing as I am from New Zealand) vacuum pump to assist the final stage of the birth.) I had heard about the use of these vacuums but I had no idea what they looked like - a photo is below - (certainly not much in common with a vacuum cleaner!)

With an enormous final effort summoned from deep within her, Iris pushed and our baby slipped quickly out and into the waiting hands of the obstetrician.

It's a boy!

The umbilical cord was snipped long, the midwives did a quick vitals check up on our son and I snipped and clipped the umbilical cord to its proper length.  I could hardly believe what was happening... a new beginning. A new life. Wow!  

Within a minute of his birth he was back on his mother's chest. He made a small hungry sound and pushed his face into her breast.  It dawned on me in a flash how every human being shares this moment of birth - leaving the womb and the safety of 24 hour nourishment for a world filled with uncertainty and surprises. Filled with emotion, knowledge, good times and bad, happiness, sadness, hate and love...

Pre baby prep - books to read

Please excuse a brief digression as I cast my mind back into the months of the pregnancy. When Iris discovered she was pregnant we were overjoyed, but it also raised a single overwhelming question in our minds: What next!?

Iris and I bought a book on the subject. We didn't really know that much about what was going to happen next... so it was time to get informed.  


What to Expect When You're Expecting is a detailed guide to the things that happen along the path of pregnancy. Iris turned to this book on a regular basis.

But while What to Expect When You're Expecting was an excellent resource, it was Kaz Cooke's Up the Duff that Iris chuckled to each night as she read in bed. It is a very amusing book (Kaz Cooke is a comedian) that also contains a great deal of sound advice.   

During the course of the pregnancy we did come across a few other books, but for us, none seemed to replace the two listed above.

And now a confession. I did not read either books. I skimmed through some pages of What to Expect When You're Expecting, but the main way I gained any information from the books was through Iris finding an interesting paragraph and reading it out to me. I admit, my approach was laid back. But my rationale is this:  In 2008 the World Bank estimated that there were 6,692,030,277 people (that's about 6 and a half billion!) in the world. Each of these people was born. Their parents survived!  I estimate that the majority would not have read a book on the subject.  They may have had some advice from family members.  But for the most part they relied on their instincts.  If we rely on instinct, it does get us most of the way.

Books are excellent for sharing experience, and for imparting the wisdom of science - but neither other people's experience or the wisdom of science will get you through the process of having a baby - that is up to you and your partner.     

And now for another confession. During the first week after the birth of our baby, both Iris and I agreed: No books can truly prepare you for this experience!!!!! :-)

Later on, once our baby was born we consulted Baby Love by Robin Barker (I have put a link to the book at Amazon.com below). A doctor friend of mine who'd recently had a baby recommended it to me. It proved to be a very valuable resource - detailing all the answers to baby-related questions that we couldn't answer - and those questions arose very rapidly the day of the birth. 

Baby Love's author Robin Barker is a midwife and the book has been a bestseller in Australia for many years. 

Take what to the hospital???

We had been advised to pack a bag and have it ready to go. In the weeks just before the birth we had solemnly refused to do any such thing. But for some reason, just a day or two before the bubble burst, we had put a bag together.

What was in it?

Pajamas... nice soft flannelette PJs, a little oversized with an elasticated waist. Drawstring waist would have been fine. Nightie would have been fine. In fact, the only thing I can recommend you consider when selecting what to wear in the hospital bed is that whatever you choose will probably end up in countless photos and be sent to people (by zealous email forwarders) who you don't even know... so for the sake of vanity it is probably important that you look good!

Facial creams, tummy butter and so on. Iris loves her potions, and going to hospital is no exception. In fact, it presents perhaps even more of an opportunity. Iris used Loreal Skin Genesis, Aveda Rosemary Mint shampoo and conditioner, and Palmers Cocoa Butter formula for stretch marks - among other things!

We had someone tell us to take a stereo and an ipod. When we first arrived at the hospital I felt like a complete ning nong carrying a portable stereo. But in fact whoever told us to bring a stereo was giving us good advice.  Once Iris was moved up to the antenatal ward, I set up the stereo. The music was very relaxing and provided an important link to home.  During the pregnancy we had played a few CDs quite a bit. One that we really liked was the ABC's Classical Music for Babies - (ABC = Australia Broadcasting Corporation, for anyone outside Australia wondering where that TLA - three letter acronym! - might stand for!)

Food. I recall we took a few snacks - but nothing very serious. The food that was provided by the hospital was fairly low in standard. However, we were fortunate that there were several good food shops nearby the hospital. Our favourite was the pasta shop. But the sushi shop was also excellent (and of course Iris had not eaten raw fish since she found out she was pregnant).

Baby clothes! Don't forget when you come home from the hospital you'll be three (or more!). We had two changes of clothes. They seemed ridiculously large. We also had some spare nappies - both disposable ones that we'd been given and cloth ones that we'd purchased online.

I was able to make a dash home for a few other things that we though we needed over the few days we were in hospital. I was fortunate that the hospital allowed me to stay over each of the four nights we were in. The couch bed was awfully uncomfortable but it was good to be there and I wouldn't have changed it for anything!

Anything else you think you should take? Comment and let me know!