Wow, only 10 days left! How fast has time passed. It felt like only yesterday when we found out I was pregnant and now baby is itching to get out.
I remember seeing that fateful stripe come up on the pregnancy test and it felt kinda surreal. I don't think it had hit either of us at that stage what it really meant – that in less than 40 weeks we were going to have another person in our lives, one who was created by us no less.
Ok, enough sentimental talk for today! So what have I been doing? As most of you know, I finished work last week. My lovely work friends, Corina and Suzanne, were so kind to organise a surprise party for my last day. I've had some inkling that they were planning something, maybe a nice lunch. But when Friday lunchtime came and went and nothing special happened, I didn't think about it again. By about 1.30pm, my manager, Michael, very seriously took me aside and said that he needed to discuss my future with the company. As he hadn't had lunch, he took me to a Korean restaurant across the street so we could talk while he ate. And that was the slowest I've seen anyone eat a bibimbap (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bibimbap)! So after an hour of serious discussions, Michael got a sms from the managing director to return work at once. Naturally, I thought he was in trouble for something until I walked into an empty office only to be greeted by everyone I've worked with for the past 2 years in the kitchen screaming 'SURPRISE'! And what a surprise it was – table full of food and the whole kitchen (and my desk) decked out in pink and blue balloons and ribbons. It was so great to feel so loved at your work place and when it was my turn to thank everyone I had to keep it very short to stop from bursting into tears (I blame my hormones, I'm usually a great public speaker!). So to everyone from work who might be reading this, I thank you for your friendship and I look forward to returning to work in 12 months' time! Feel free to raid my stationary :)
I think this is the first time since I turned 16 that I haven't been in active employment of some form so it takes some getting use to. I have been getting up at the same time as Dave – not because I don't enjoy a sleep-in, but after a whole night of sleeping on my side, I'm usually sore and wanting to get some circulation happening. I then start the day with breakfast and a bit of light reading (thanks to my buddy April, I'm getting into Pride and Prejudice and Zombies – yes, zombies, it's the original Jane Austen text with added zombie scenes, very interesting indeed!). I then get straight into more murdering mayhem with an episode or two of Dexter (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dexter_%28TV_series%29). I seriously hope that all this reading and viewing of bloodiness doesn't affect the psyche of my unborn child! After lunch and a couple of emails to-and-fro with Dave (awwww...yes, we live together but we email/phone each other everyday, how lovely :) it's usually nap time. I don't know if it's the body getting lethargic from digesting food or it's baby or I need no excuse for a nap, but around 1.30 – 2pm each day I just can't keep my eyes opened. After, at times disturbingly long, 2-hour nap I'm up and ready to start planning dinner. While all this must sound very lazy and involves very little body movement, I do try to get off my butt as much as possible with my many trips to the bathroom, answering telemarketing calls from India and a light walk around the block. Last night I even pumped up the music so I can shake my hips a bit while cooking, until Dave came home and joined me in the silliness – it must be amusing for our neighbours to see a heavily pregnant woman and a fully grown man do all those silly moves – if you ever get the chance, ask Dave to show you his signature move: the Siren :)
As this might be the last entry before baby's arrival, I hope you've enjoyed travelling down this new road with us and we hope to have great news for you all VERY SOON!!!
Love,
Vivian + Baby
At last week’s antenatal appointment we finally got the confirmation that baby is facing the right way for birth. And it took 3 different midwives, no less, to figure this out! It was a bit of a concern when the first midwife told us that baby could be breech (see explanation of breech birth here). She then brought in her colleague who couldn’t tell for sure and they were going to give me a scan. Just as we were getting excited to see our baby again, we were told that the scanner is broken and this more experienced midwife was going to have a feel. So after being prodded and poked by 3 people and feeling like the latest medical experiment, we were finally told that “yes, definitely head down”. Phew!
Another exciting purchase this week was our custom made Crumpler baby nappy bag (see picture). We’ve been big fans of the Crumpler bags for ages and we already have a couple of them. So when we couldn’t find a decent nappy bag we thought a custom made Crumpler would be the perfect way to go. We selected a laptop bag from the range (they don’t exactly specialise in baby products) as it has all the compartments suitable for nappies, wipes, bottles etc. For the design, we turned to our good friend Laura, who is a great graphic designer. She had already designed our baby shower invite so we simply tweaked it for the nappy bag. The design of the cow is inspired by our baby’s birth year – the year of the Ox. We took the design into the store and spoke with their designer, Chabi, who was great help. It only took her 2 days to complete sewing. When we arrived to pick it up we were the envy of everyone there, as our bag had been on display on the front window. So the first piece of art for our baby, he/she is already so spoilt!
During the week I watched a show about parenting and was given an interesting piece of advice that I’d like to share with you all. It’s not a good idea to praise your child by saying ‘you’re very clever’ when they achieve good marks at school or show you one of their drawings. That actually teaches them that ‘cleverness’ instead of ‘hard work’ is your measure of success. Instead, you should say ‘you must’ve worked very hard’ or ‘I like your use of colours’ which shows that the process leading to the achievement is what you value. As the realisation of becoming a parent dawns, there are always concerns about your abilities – what’s the right thing to do/say, how will your choices influence your children, what is the best way to bring up your child? Whilst I don’t believe there is one set of ‘rules’ that you should follow or that there is such a thing as being the ‘perfect’ parent, I hope that we’re equipped with enough life experience and dare I say, wisdom, to be at least ‘ok’ parents.
So we’re now down to the last 4 weeks – 2 more weeks of work, and hopefully 2 weeks at home. I’m less than 4kg lighter than David (yes, all those sweet treats are turning into bits of me) but feeling good in general. I’m starting to have more and more strangers (guy at the convenience store, mailroom guy, people in the lift) ask me questions like ‘how much longer now’ or ‘boy or girl’. Sometimes I’m tempted to reply with ‘what do you mean?’ or ‘I’m just a bit bloated today’ just to see how they’d react, but I’d feel bad to deny our baby’s existence. So I just smile and nod and answer the same question for the 10th time that day. I guess that during late pregnancy is the only time strangers are allowed to openly ask you questions about what's under your clothes.
It's now the final count down - 24 days to go!
I admit, I'm on facebook. Vivian made me do it. No, actually, Vivian did it for me. I sat on the couch while she set it all up, added photos, a few friends, etc. I told her what password I wanted, that's about it. The rest is history; as these things go, it went viral, and now one year later, I already have 12 friends on my list.
I think someone once worked out that it's officially the worlds biggest time waster, costing employers around the world billions in wasted productivity. It's bloggerhea. Basically, you fart, and you go on Facebook, and say: 'I just farted'. And then friends can leave comments like: 'eewwwww!!!', 'me too', 'hahahaha', or 'I sharted and now I need a change of underwear'. And if you're passionate about the subject, you can start your own 'I farted' group, and then try to get as many people possible to join.
Since signing up I received several messages from people looking for a particular David van der Meer, asking me whether I was the one they once knew. I had to disappoint all of them. It does make you wonder about the other David van der Meer's out there though. One of them apparently speaks Spanish. But that's just an educated guess because the message went something like: ¡Ola! Commo estas bientador el gustas David van der Meer? Si no, haba da habla. Gracias.
Another one is a travel agent somewhere in Australia. I found that out after he sent a friend request. Then he invited me to join the David van der Meer's group that he started. I didn't have the heart to tell a namesake that I think he's a bit of a tool for doing such a thing, and instead joined his group. He had three already, me and himself included. The third one probably spoke Spanish, but I never checked, and now I can't, because both he and the group he started vanished from my facebook page, without leaving a trace. He must have realised himself the severity of what he's done, and he's now hiding in shame.
I can't really blame my parents for giving me the same name as him, especially since he's a couple years younger than me, and will just have to live with it. But a bit of research on my behalf can save my future offspring years of considerable embarrassment.
This week I looked up other people with the same names as the ones we've decided giving our kids, and I'm pleased to say that nothing untoward came up, so both names are still 'go'.
I only found two Xxxx van der Meer's, one that lived 400 years ago, the other once did a bungee jump somewhere in Africa, based on his Facebook profile picture.
I found three Yyyy van der Meer's. Two are on Facebook; one that likes to be seen clutching a Starbucks mug, and another that just doesn't like to be recognised at all so instead putting up a blurry and somewhat suggestive image of what I assume is her dancing with another guy. The last one authored an incredibly boring sounding book on law that presumably married some Polish bloke while deciding to keep both surnames resulting in a really bizarre name.
In the mean time, I have come up with another nickname for baby. During our last visit to the midwife she had some trouble figuring out whether baby was in the right position. Basically, both ends of the baby felt like a bum. I've been calling it Baby Bumface since, although Vivian doesn't seem to like it as much. In fact, she doesn't like it at all.
This morning I heard baby's heartbeat for the first time, by pressing my ear to Vivian's belly. It was fantastic. What was even better, when I started talking to it I could hear the heartbeat go up, and baby started moving around quite a bit. I'd like to think that baby was excited to hear me, as most baby books would like you to believe, but for all I know it was baby getting very annoyed being woken up by some giant sending it into sensory overload, and was trying to communicate: 'Shut up, I'm trying to sleep!'.
For now, I will leave you with the faces of two of our baby's namesakes.
We've been slack again with updating this blog but with good reason: we've had some busy weekends the past few weeks and I was also sick for a week. Don't worry, I didn't catch swine flu so all is good. Just a cold/virus giving me lots of mucus which makes me snore at night so David has been sleeping with ear plugs!
So what has kept us busy the last few weeks? 2 weekends ago we attended my colleague Suzanne's wedding. It was a great day with all the bells and whistles of a typical Lebanese wedding. It has been a long time since either of us have been to a wedding so it was a great experience for us. It was also a really long day and I suspect that my cold/virus was caught somewhere along the festivities.
Last week we finally got around to putting the baby cot together. It now sits proudly at the end of our bed (see photo) and we can already imagine how we can keep an eye on baby from the comfort of our bed. I also took advantage of the warm and sunny weather (21 degrees in the middle of winter, crazy!) to wash all of baby's clothes, sheets and towels. So now we're pretty set to go.
Yesterday we had another appointment with midwife Alex. Everything's going well with baby (my tummy is measuring just right) but she did have a hard time trying to figure out baby's exact position. For 5 minutes she poked and kneaded my tummy with the utmost force to the point that I almost begged her to stop. She thought baby may have been hugging its face with its hands so it was hard for her to feel the head. She assured us that baby still has enough time and room to move into the right position (upside down) for the birth and for the last 2 appointments it has been in this position so there's no need to worry. But she did mention that baby felt a little 'posterior'. This means baby's spine is lying on my spine which could make it very painful on my back during delivery. So far I haven't had much back pain so fingers crossed that baby will be facing the right way when it comes to the big day.
Today I attended a breast feeding class. Although most of the information was already covered in our classes with Taryn, it was good to get another perspective. Overall I feel quite confident that I have all the information I need to give it a good start, the rest I'll have to learn with our baby as every child is different. There are also refresher classes available after baby is born and a 24 hour free call line, so I feel very well supported.
On Saturday we'll be doing an all day first aid class designed for babies and children. It'll probably be the last bit of official learning we do before baby arrives, and definitely one of the most important classes.
So we're now at 33 weeks – I feel well in general, have put on a massive 15kg+ but everyone assures me that I don't look it. I do feel less and less mobile and there are more aches and pains everywhere. I don't have any noticeable swelling but somedays I can't help but feel a little 'whale-like'. Baby is as active as ever. And as there's now less room we can sometimes feel little bumps from its hands and feet. It should weigh around 2kg by now (so where's that other 13kg?!). We have started to call it by the 2 names we've chosen, alternating between boy and girl. Although David would still like to Google them first to make sure they're not names of convicted criminals or other nasty characters!
Hope you're still enjoying reading our little thoughts and updates. We hope to continue writing for as long as possible :)
Until next time...
Love,
Viv
Continuing on Dave’s post last week, he felt he should add a few downsides as well re: baby vs. pet. - If they get ill and rack up a medical bill of more than $1000, you can’t elect to have it put down.
- When you go on holidays, you can’t tie it to a tree, because police will most probably make an effort to track you down.
- You can’t blame the breeder if it turns out ugly.
Awwwwww……there’s nothing like a father’s love!
Over the weekend we held our baby shower at my parents’ house. It was a fun filled day and we had a great time with close family, friends and work mates. The weather was just superb so we sat outside in the sun for most of the day. We decorated the house with baby photos of Dave and I, and anyone else who brought their baby photo to share. And we shared funny stories from our childhood as well as tales of unfortunate baby names (yes, Julia, I'm talking about how you avoided being named 'Igor'!).
One of the highlights would have to be the silly games, including 'Guess What's in the Nappy'. Basically it consists of spreading suspect diarrhea looking food items onto nappies and asking everything to sniff/taste to guess what it is. Other games include: speed drinking out of baby bottles, guess the ingredients of baby foods, guess how big my tummy is. Prizes, such as a Kinder Surprise, were given for each game – although my workmate Adam felt like the ultimate winner after winning the 2 hour baby sitting voucher.
Another highlight would have to be the insane amount of food we all consumed. We had some of mum's famous deep fried wontons, my latest favourite recipe of mango scones (courtesy of Master Chef), not to mention my pork dumplings which my friend Rachel claims doesn't taste like pork (I take that as a compliment?). We had prepared enough food to feed another 10 people so everyone was grateful to take home some left-overs with them.
We also received the best gifts for our baby, everything from clothes and burp cloths to towels and toys. One of our favourites would have to be the musical octopus which makes a note when you squeeze its tentacles. I started playing a few tunes on it last night and baby was definitely dancing to it in my tummy!
We also invited everyone to write a little note to our little one in our baby book. It is now filled with beautiful words of love and inspiration and we feel so blessed that our baby is surrounded by so much love.
I know that baby showers are not a common event in Holland so check out this link for a little about the history behind baby showers.
So at 31 weeks, I’m only 9 weeks away (or it could be 6 or less weeks if baby comes early) from the big day. I will be working for another 7 weeks, unless I get so massive that it becomes uncomfortable to travel to and from work.
A baby development update: baby should now be about 1.5kg and measuring around 41cm. So really, it is now running out of room to move around inside my tummy. That doesn't mean it has stopped though! Baby should now start to move to the head-down position to get ready for the birth but our baby definitely hasn't as yet. He/she is still enjoying trampling my bladder from time to time.
I’m full of excitement and anticipation for baby’s arrival, most of all I can’t wait to meet our baby for the first time – what will he/she look, smell, feel, sound like?! As for the labour itself, I’m keeping calm by reminding myself that it’s a natural process, that I’m not sick, and it’s only 1 day of pain for so much gain. Though please check back with me again after I’ve given birth, my perspective might be very different by then :)
During our second last pregnancy class, Taryn talked about the view today's society has that a good baby is a baby that cries very little and sleeps all the time. I couldn't agree more, that sounds like the perfect baby to me! But then she said: “ if you want your baby to sleep all the time, get a pet rock!”. While that particular idea hadn't occurred to me yet, I have long considered a baby as the ideal pet.
Whenever Viv and I get the chance, we'll have a look at a pet shop. As it turns out, that happens at least once every one or two weeks, because that's how often we visit the shopping centre in Bondi Junction (or BJ's as we call it). Vivian usually looks at the designer-handbag dogs, and the tinier and uglier they are, the cuter she thinks they are. I generally look at the cats, and don't really care much for the rest. Vivian might have a look at a rabbit and a few hamsters if they have them, but I can't be bothered with those.
Throughout my childhood I remember there were always pets around of some sort. I'm not sure which was the first one, but I think it might have been a big rabbit. We usually had a rabbit around, although they aren't that much fun. You let it out inside and it will pee on the carpet somewhere, and chew through cables. You hold your finger out in front of it and it will take a horribly painful bite deep into your flesh. Let them roam the backyard and they will dig holes, once even digging itself underneath the fence and escaping into someone else's backyard. As a result, they spent much of their time in a small cage.
I can recall a canary-type bird (I think it was yellow) that we'd let out of it's cage to fly around the living room every now and then, until it one day flew straight into a window. I remember a goldfish who's bowl I managed to smash on the floor (I think... but the fish definitely ended up on the carpet one way or another!). I'm not sure if it was the same fish, but I once asked myself and my parents the question: Why don't fish have birthdays? That same night we turned off the light,s lit a couple of candles, and sang happy birthday for the goldfish. The thing with goldfish is though, they don't live very long, or at least not in our house. I was never too upset when one died, because #1: I got to flush it down the toilet, which I thought was kind of cool, thinking it would end up in the ocean, and #2: we'd go buy a new one that same day.
We went through a dozen or so Russian hamsters, and I think they were all named Boris (Boris 1, Boris 2, etc.). These were mostly my sisters pets. They were cute, but boy was that cuteness short-lived. I think the shortest might have been 3 months. I think they'd rarely get past their 1st year, and if they were really unlucky they would grow some sort of horrible bleeding tumor by the end of it. One lucky hamster escaped without ever being found again, a mystery to this day. And I vividly remember the day my sister accidently sat on one, boy can these little buggers screech! They sure were good to teach a child how to deal with grief, backyard burial rituals, and the beauty of hamster-heaven.
Finally, after a small army of pets came and went we wizened up and got a real pet; A cat. Cats are close to the perfect pet, as you can let them roam the neighbourhood the whole day while you're out, they come home in the afternoon, you feed them, they keep you company, that's it. They wash themselves, they don't bark, not even when there's an intruder in the house, and they generally don't run away because you didn't put them on a leash.
Vivian on the other hand, doesn't have too many pet memories. Here memories revolve around pet ducks who through some unexplained mystery from one day to the next where not there anymore. To this day she doesn't know what was the reason behind that, and I never had the heart to explain to her it's because Chinese people, and especially the Cantonese, have this irresistible urge to eat everything with a pulse. I don't know what turn of events made her a dog person, but luckily that won't be an issue for some time yet. Our own pet is on it's way.
What makes a baby the ultimate pet:
- If all goes to plan, you outlive them.
- If all goes to plan even more, they'll look after you when you're old. Ask a dog to do that for you.
- Until they're 7, they'll have no reason to run away, and until they're 10, you can outrun them anyway. Dogs? No leash required.
- They cost you nothing to get. Have you seen what a designer dog costs nowadays?
- Train them well in say, golf, or tennis, and you're set for life. Only horses can offer a similar return on investment.
- If you rent, like we do, you're not allowed pets. Babies however, no problem.
- You can decide yourself what mix you want to have. With pets, you're at the mercy of the breeder and their flavor of the month (Shitzu x Labrador = Shitrador). Instead, we made our own Chutchie (Chinese/Dutch/Aussie), exactly when WE felt like it.
- As a result, it looks like you, instead of you starting to look like your dog.
With the media’s recent focus on the ‘too posh to push’ trend, especially amongst celebrities, we can be driven to think that having a Caesarean is the lazy way to give birth and we should be ashamed of ourselves to even consider this as an option.
Our class on this topic has dispelled a lot of the myth of Caesarean birth for me and I feel a lot more opened to the idea that this may be a real possibility for my own labour (given that about 1 in 3 births in Australia results in a Caesarean).
Under normal circumstances, a woman is encouraged to have a vaginal birth as that is how our bodies are designed to work. But sometimes, this is just not the way it works out. Maybe she’s had previous complications/surgery which would make it dangerous to give birth naturally, or maybe somewhere along the line of the labour something goes wrong. It is such a routine procedure that the risks to mum and baby are minimal.
There are also some advantages such as:
- No pain
- Quick delivery – it takes 5 minutes between the time of the incision to when you meet your baby
- Baby born with perfectly shaped head – as it doesn’t have to pass through the birth canal or have bruising from forceps or vacuum
As we wrap up on the birth itself, we started to learn about taking care of the baby after birth. We were advised of the immediate tests and injections for the baby (the Apgar Score – test of baby’s reflexes and general wellbeing, Vitamin K shot – to help baby with blood clotting). We were also shown some normal yet unusual things we might find on the baby (rash, blue hands and feet, pimples etc) as well as a quick run down of breast feeding (I will be attending a separate class on breast feeding).
But nothing was as interesting as seeing photos of what you can expect to find inside baby’s nappy during the first week. Basically its bowel movements changes from thick black tar, to dark green lumps, to brown mush and then to mustard yellow poo. We were even given a ‘poo chart’ to put on the fridge for a quick reference! I’ve attached this chart in this post for your enjoyment :) Now you’ll understand the reason that on Funniest Home Video they always show clips of dads trying not to vomit while changing baby nappies!
Next class will be our final one. I hope we’ve learnt enough to at least understand what is going on with the labour and those initial days with baby. The rest is up to us – what a daunting thought.
Update on baby – he/she should be around 38 cm from head to toe and weighing about 1kg. Baby should now be responding to light and sound a lot more, and while it practices breathing it may start to hiccup (I’m feeling baby’s hiccups at least once a day now).
Update on baby shopping – cot has arrived and we’ve picked a spot to place it in our room – at the end of our bed for easy access. Still undecided on the pram, the latest one we’re leaning towards is a Bugaboo Bee (see here). It’s a bit pricey but has everything we want whilst being light weight so it looks like a winner. Plus we can get it in a bright yellow colour, how uber stylish is that?!
Until next time…
Love, Viv + Baby
P.S. Can daddy David please write the next post?
