Three meals

04/08/2010 - Cozy Thai
Knowing that we probably wouldn't be eating out for some time, the night before I was induced, we ate at a local Thai restaurant. The food was quite westerised so Lara was able to eat the Massumam curry and curry puffs. We also had chilli basil stir-fry(not hot) and Pad Thai. Needless to say, we were a little anxious about what was in store for us the following day.



07/08/2010 - Hospital meal:roast chicken with veges.
Hospital meals were ok, the portions quite small. I had to order side sandwitches a couple of times to satisfy my hunger. I also ordered the occasional jelly and ice cream for Lara as treats when she visited at night. Food was bland, but at least I didn't have to cook any of it myself.

29/08/2010 - Yum char.
Our first meal out after the birth of Sam. Lara's grandparents and wei-po came along too. Sam slept through most of the meal. He grizzled and Lara started to feel unwell again (she had temperature the night before) towards the end of the meal so we had to leave in a rush. No pictures were taken.


On a different subject, not to do with eating out but food-relalted. Mum is here and she's been cooking pork trotter soup, chicken soup etc ,to help increasing my milk supply. Feeding is almost a full-time job itself especially in the first couple of weeks when I fed all hours all day. It was great to have hot steaming soup all the time and not to worry about cooking at all!

Toilet training (2)

To lessen the effect of Lara holding poos in and getting stomach aches, a GP friend recommended "Parachoc" and told us the story of him mixing it for his son in the morning, licked the spoon and wanted to go to the toilet on the way to work. However, Parachoc didn't seem to have the same effect on Lara (we think Lara's problem is more psychological), "Yakult" and prune juice worked better. To avoid constipation, we changed tactics and repeatedly told Lara to ask for a nappy when she wanted to poo. She has been doing this since March. I think deep down Lara feels embarrassed, because she never asked for a nappy in daycare. Also she sometimes asked indirectly for a nappy, for example asking to go to bed during the day because we put a nappy on her when she goes to bed.

A few weeks ago, Lara did a poo by accident in daycare and was very excited about it. We felt the time might be right to try toilet training again. To encourage Lara, Grandma bought a new bike and told her she could have the bike if she does poos in the toilet. So far this has not worked. Lara would rather give the bike away to another girl than doing poos in the toilet. I don't really want to push her and make her hold poos in again. For the moment, the bike sits high in our lounge.

Will it ever get used I wonder...?

Finally here

Meet Samuel, the youngest member of our family!

Sam was induced on his due day (the 5th of August). Because of a previous tear, doctor didn't want him to come out too late and too big. I had hoped for an ealier delivery as I was 1.5 cm dilated two weeks prior, but he was not ready to come out early. His birth was quite uneventful, everything happened according to plan. Well, everything except it looked like Simon might miss it initially.

I went into the hospital at 7am, had the gel applied at 8am, had my water broken at 1.30pm and Sam was born less than 2 hours after that. It was a lot shorter than Lara's birth. And thanks to better pain management, I was more aware of what was going on. It was great that I only had to push 3 or 4 times. The midwifery care in the hospital were excellent. I ended up staying for an extra night to get the feeding right and that helped greatly. This is the best delivery outcome I could hope for.

Sam is average on the growth charts (Length:50cm HC:36cm weight:3.7kg) and has long tiny legs and arms compared with Lara. I'm getting used to this newborn phase, the frequent night feeds really tired me. The good news is Sam is finally gaining weight. If only he would sleep more at night and my life would be perfect(considering)!

"Keep thinking don't give up" and others

Lara loves to sing and dance. She asked me to record her and then asked to watch it again and again. Here are some of her 'performances'.

Maybe it's "keeping trying, don't give up"?