Sunday, 26 April 2015

His sleeping buddies

So what does Ethan need for a good rest? He needs his pacifier even if he's not hungry and also to hold on to his comfort blankie. :)

I'm glad he has found the things that can give him comfort and help soothe him to sleep.

Sweet dreams, my darling! :)

Friday, 24 April 2015

3 Months: Tummy Time Achievement unlocked

Proud mama moment for me yesterday when Ethan could withstand time on his tummy and support himself with his arms and shoulders.

We were told by the therapist to help him strengthen his neck muscles which seem to be a lil weak at 3 months.

I did not start tummy time with him till recently. At 3 months, he hated being on his tummy and would struggle real hard and cry the house down. Then, he realised that it was futile to resist and just happily rested on his tummy with his head on the mat wheh i turned him over. Even earlier attempts (B4 3 months) were punctured by my soft-heartedness when his cries pierced through the air. Such attempts were less than 1 minute. haha! I tried to justify and rationalise with myself that he was probably not ready and it might be too early, let's wait till his neck is studier.

Then, I started to see pictures of fellow January babies being able to enjoy tummy time, support their neck and prop themselves up. Haha, a big wake up call indeed. Coupled with what the therapist said, I have been diligently doing tummy time for him for the past 2 days and I'm glad the results are good. :)

Next up would be to work on the flipping! :)

Monday, 13 April 2015

Whose toy now? :)

The Charlie Brown that you see here was my little bro's favourite when he was very young. This isn't the exact toy that he adored but it was an extra that we bought - just in case. Yes, it was that precious to him.

Fast forward to today, I can't believe Ethan would have the chance to hold the same toy as my little brother and this toy is about 20 years old already. What a blessing. :)

For whatever reason, I always feel emotional when we discover things from the past, especially things with good memories. And I'm sure, this Charlie Brown is filled with sweet love and memories passed from Ethan's beloved uncle to himself.

Wednesday, 8 April 2015

Ethan at 2 Months

I shall pen this down before Ethan turns 3 months old!
 
Just a few weeks have made a world of a difference. I'm thankful that I live in an era of technology where taking down snippets of our lives is much easier and accessible. Thankful. :) However, the greedy person in me wish for a camera to me with me 24/7 so as to be able to capture down all the wonderful moments. Wait long long, Mavis.
 
So, it's move on to the updates on our Ethan.
 
HEIGHT & WEIGHT: around 7kg
We brought Ethan to our assigned PD at KKH when he has just turned 2 months old for a routine check. At that time, his weight was at 7.05kg and his length was 60.5cm.
Normally, newborns would put on about 1kg per month and that would mean, at 2 months, Ethan should be around 5.5kg. Naturally, we were concerned if he was overly heavy or if it was a concern at all. However, doc was pretty cool about it as Ethan has the length growth to boot his weight increment.
 
Our lil Ethan and his little muscles bring a lot of fun and joy to the family. :)

Because of his good growth, he can no longer fit into most of his newborn  or 3m clothes. He is mostly wearing clothes tagged 6m to 1 year.
 
HAIR: His hair is still brownish in nature. It has a strong tinge of bronze. Almost like I've done some highlights on his hair. He still has a big turf of hair on his head; thick and fluffy. It's very much thicker in the front but much sparser at the back, probably because he has been sleeping on his back all this time. I've seen a few strands of small hair on his pillow so I think he is starting to shed his hair like most babies do.  I want to try growing it out for him to see how it would be like but the daddy doesn't seem too keen. HEHE!!
 
EYES: Ethan's eyes are still in a dark brown-black shade.

What amazes me is his ability and willingness to hold long moments of eye contact and then smile sweetly to melt my heart. :) To me, it's like his way of telling me... hey mum... I know you love me. I love you too. :)

MOVEMENTS: Ethan enjoys moving his hands up and down and kicking his legs whenever he is having fun with his toys. Same goes when he's upset. Haha. His kicks are pretty strong , must say! 

He has started to like grabbing onto his swaddle cloth. I think the cloth gives him comfort as very often, he would be able to fall asleep while holding onto the cloth. Apart from that, he likes to rest his hands on my chest when feeding. He has also learnt to grab people's clothes. 

As for his legs, he loves to 'stand' on his legs which I think is still too early for him so I would try to minimise that as much as possible.

With his legs, he's able to shift himself up or down the bed so we can put him too close to the edge. 

SPEECH: Ethan likes to talk very much. Whenever I talk to him, he would always look at me in the eyes and smile, before answering me with his baby talk. He is usually very soft and goes "aaawww oooohhhh..."

We observed that there were several occasions when he shouted out "nen" or "nen nen" and most recently, "ma". We are very well aware that these sounds carry no meaning to our Lil baby at such a young age but we just couldn't help by rejoice when we heard them. :)

MILK INTAKE: Due to a few episodes of bad merlioning, we have decided at the start of his 2nd month  to direct latch Ethan rather than bottle feed like before. This has helped very much with the merlioning issue and it has also reduced a lot of anxiety in both mummy and baby. This is because I don't have to worry about warming the bottle quick enough when he's hungry and Ethan would have food in the quickest time possible. He used to take as much as 160ml till 180ml and looking back, I feel that it's too much. I have no idea how much I'm giving him now but I would give him only one side of my breasts each feed.

LIKES:
- He loves his Fisher Price musical mobile. Like totally L.O.V.E. haha! My mum was telling me that I should buy one for him after she has observed him looking at the moving fan and the flaps of the air con. So off we went to search for the musical mobile... He can stare at it for a long time and very often, he would be cooing and moving his hands and legs in delight. 

- He likes to have conversations. He loves it when people look at him.in the eye and need chat with him and he would reply with his own  baby language.

- He likes to be carried, especially for bedtime and when he wants to look at his surroundings.

- He loves to have his head stroked when he's about to fall asleep. :)

- He likes looking into mirrors. Looking into the mirror would make him smile and kick in delight. 

- Weird but true, his favourite part of the house is the kitchen. Whenever he's crying or being fussy, a walk into the kitchen would almost always calm him down immediately. 

- He likes white noise - specifically that of the washing machine.

- He enjoys long walks and bumpy rides so he always sleeps very well when we are out. 

- He loves our old bear, Oli. He would look at Oli, reach out to it and try to touch it and also try to have always conversation with him. What surprised us was how he managed to grab Oli and brought him up a short distance. We thought since he likes bears, we should give the other toys a wash so that he could play with them. But nope, he only likes Oli and Oli only.

- He loves pooping. You will always see a cheery and active Ethan post pooping. 

Dislikes: 
- He dislikes getting his nails cut. Or to be more specific, he hates to have anyone touch his fingers or hands. -_-

- Till now, he still cries bloody murder most of the times during his bath. 

- He dislikes waiting. Waiting for anything that he wants, that's it.

- He dislikes being left alone. He likes to be surrounded by people and have conversations. 'Me-time' is totally not his type of thing. 

- He dislikes being changed out, specifically when we have to touch his hands or when we have to pull sth over his head.

- He dislikes tummy time. While he can hold his head quite steadily for a while, he dislikes having to push and support his head when on his tummy. 

- He used to love lying on my tummy with his tummy to mine. He would then rest his head on my chest. Gradually, he became more active and loves to hold his head upright, turning left and right with ease. We rarely carry him in a lying down position anymore unless he's going to sleep. 

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Time really flies and by the time I go back to work, I wouldn't be be the first to witness all these growth in him. Till then, let me enjoy these magical moments with him. :)