Observations

- Isabel can sit now leaning against me (left)
- For the most part, she loves being upright during the day
- She loves looking up at the carousel of dogs and hearts that Auntie Sue gave us (right)
- We found out the amount she eats before bed has nothing to do with how long she sleeps. I used to think the more she eats the more she sleeps.
- She discovered her tongue at around 10 weeks and now is playing with it a lot
- She gets anxious if these is no noise around her, so we always have music or the TV on around her.
- She loves making noise now (cooing sounds) and responds to us talking :-)

-Lei

I am sleeping 7+ hrs finally!

You may think, wait a minute, didn't you say your baby has been sleeping 11 hours a night? What's the big deal in sleeping 7+ hours?

For me, it is a big deal to sleep 7+ hour straight through, because even when Isabel sleeps more, I usually have to get up to pump. Before, I would have to get up after 5 or 6 hours because I get so engorged. Then after pumping and washing everything (which can take 30+ min), I may not be able to sleep anymore until later.

I have basically done that now for almost 12 weeks. Even if I get a total of 8 or 9 hours of sleep a day, it may take 3 different sleep times which is very different from sleeping straight through. I guess it's because I never get to the deep sleep I need to fully feel rested.

Only in the latter of last week and some of this week, I have been able to sleep 7.5 hours without getting up. I feel so different after that: 1. I realize just how tired I used to be when I slept less and more fragmented, 2. I feel physically much stronger since I am getting better quality sleep.

Things are finally looking up and I am on my road to full recovery soon :-)

- Lei

Inspired

Last week, I started doing Windsor Pilates at home. It's only a 20 minute work out, so I thought it was a good place to start my exercise routine.

I was shocked to find out during my first try that I couldn't do a single roll up (a slow sit up that requires you to use your stomach muscles to curl up your back all the way to sitting). I knew these were hard but I was still surprised when all I could do now was lift my head. I had no stomach muscles! I ended up using my hands to push myself up through the exercise.

Afterwards, I was sad and wanted to cry. I guess I didn't really understand how much a pregnancy and a C section would affect my body. That same day, I came across a story in my Stanford Magazine about Ben Wildman-Tobriner, a Stanford alum and an Olympic swimmer who is destined for a medal in 2008. He had the worse injury of his life last year in the fall. He torn his left pectoral tendon completely off the humerus and had to have surgery. I can't imagine how he must have felt with the Olympics less than a year away. Did he sit around and mope? No way! As soon as his surgery is done, he started training his body again "arm in sling, running sprints next to the pool while breathing out of a snorkel with half of the snorkel hole covered" For the full story, click here

Long story short, he only looked ahead and trained one day at a time until this May when he almost recovered his full strength and is ready to compete in August in China. Needless to say, I was inspired, like Ben, I must look ahead. I may not be an Olympian, but I have determination and a fresh perspective now.

I already made so much progress since giving birth. I couldn't even get out of bed without help the first day I came home. 11 days later, I only could walk outside for 10 minutes and very slowly. Now, I can walk pretty much any where including hills in my regular speed. I realized that everything takes time and baby steps. As long as I don't give up, I will get there.

Since then, i have done the Pilates work out three times - still using my hand to do the roll ups and I am planning to attend my first Bikram Yoga class today. I know it will be hard but just to show up for class is another baby step forward. :-) I am also planning to take Isabel to a baby yoga/massage class this Thursday and perhaps I will try the Bar method in a few weeks.

I am looking forward to getting my body back!

- Lei

What a Party!

We celebrated Jaime's big "30th" bday party yesterday at Bubble Lounge - the last part of his birthday celebration this month. It was a blast. 20+ of Jaime's friends showed up. We had a table in the back room and talked the night away. Jaime looked handsome as always. I guess I am biased. For more photos of last night's activities, click here



Last night was also special because it was our first night out at a club since Isabel was born. Bubble Lounge was perfect as it is only 3 blocks away from our apt. Isabel also cooperated and fell asleep at 9:30 pm until 7:30am the next morning. We were also lucky to have found our wonderful nanny, Agnes, who stayed with Isabel while we were out.

All in all, a great way to welcome a new decade for Jaime!

- Lei

Good Morning Isabel

Isabel slept 11 hours last night from 9:30pm to 8:30am and she is 12 weeks old today. Wow. Time flies. Every morning when Isabel wakes up, I say "Good Morning Isabel" and she smiles at me. Jaime and I both love loosening her swaddle as she immediately raises her arms to stretch. It's so adorable. See for yourself ... :-)

-Lei

Crying Daddy Soothes Crying Isabel

Okay, so Jaime isn't really crying. He was just making crying sounds and they had a surprising and hilarious effect on Isabel. Check it out...


- Lei

Tummy Time

Tummy time is when we put Isabel on her tummy and see if she can push up to lift her head. Our Pediatrician has been recommending that we do tummy time for Isabel since she was 1 month old (3 times a day). However, we never got a routine down for her until she turned two months. I thought perhaps she would be behind in learning how to do it. I guess I was wrong. See for yourself :-). She is growing up so fast!

Pumping 101

Get your mind out of the gutter, this is not about that! It is about pumping breast milk. You would think that if you spend almost $300 on a Medela Advanced Pump (the best out there), the milk should come out easily and comfortably when you use it.

Boy was I surprised. The first time I used it (I have the one pictured here) was when Isabel was 4 weeks old. I used it for 15 minutes and almost passed out in pain. No one ever told me that pumping actually can be quite uncomfortable and painful. I was also tense. I kept checking to see how much milk was coming out and was holding the shield and bottle the whole time (not a very comfortable feeling).

Anyways, after 15 min, my nipples doubled in size and were in pain and I only got less than 2oz out. Yeeks. I almost gave up after the first time. Long story short I didn't give up and I found out, like anything else with the baby, pumping takes patience, practice, and a lot of learning

I tried bigger shields - didn't work (I found out later the regular shields worked just fine)
I tried looking at Isabel's pictures while pumping to encourage let down - didn't work
I called Medela customer service for help - didn't help too much

What worked at the end was perseverance and practice. I just kept trying different things. I found out
- putting a heat pad or taking a shower before hand helps
- watching tv or thinking about something else help as it made me relax and not think too much about how much milk I am producing
- pump no more than 15 minutes and stop earlier if nothing is coming out for awhile
- buying the hand free pumping bra help (even though it was $30 for stretch cotton with two holes cut out of it, it's worth the money to not have to hold the shield the whole time)

Even though pumping is never as comfortable as when Isabel feeds on me, it is pretty comfortable now and helps greatly in relieving engorgement when Isabel is still asleep. I still have to get up at 4 or 5am every night to pump because I have so much milk and Isabel usually sleeps until 8 or 9 am now. It's worth it though as it gives me the freedom to go out while someone else can still feed Isabel with the bottled breast milk. Feeding her the bottle was challenging at first as well, but that's another story...

- Lei

I Found Our Future Fortune

This jewelry line is going to make us wealthy. I told Lei that she better get to work though. We've got alot of pumping to do:

From Core77:
"French design collective Duende have used a technique that can transform human or animal milk into plastic by solidifying the casein content. The 'Perle de lait' range of jewelry will be on display as part of their collection of objects exploring the relationship of food between mother and child at La Cuisine. This takes the concept of bespoke jewelry to whole new level."

"and we're movin on up, movin on up...to the east side...we've finally got a piece of the piiiiie" - The Jeffersons

- Jaime

Exploding Poop!

Isabel maybe adorable and a darling, but she also has her dark side - namely she poops so much that we have not found a diaper that can keep the poop off her clothes.

We started with Pamper Swaddlers and they worked fine for the first 6 weeks and then for some reason her poop got more powerful. When she poops, it shoots up her back. We still haven't figured out why yet.

So we switched to Huggies Secure and Dry. The result unfortunately is the same. Maybe we are not putting it on tight enough but we don't want it too tight (you should be able to insert two fingers in the waist). She gets imprints off the diapers as it is. It's amazing how baby can deal with such a big thing on their butts.

I guess at least she is not constipated. That could be worse. We are definitely happy that she poops a lot as it's a sign of a good digestive system. We just hope to find a diaper that can hold it all. Right now, we have to change her clothes 1-2 times a day and I am constantly washing poopy clothes every day. It's amazing that I don't mind it at all. I guess motherhood definitely made me change.

Another mom suggested we get diapers that are for bigger babies. We may try that next. We still have 120+ Huggies diaper as we always try to buy bulk. She goes through so many. Wish us luck!

Lei

Growing up fast

It's not me as I don't want to ever grow up even after having a child. Isabel on the other hand is growing up fast. We swear we can tell that she is gaining weight every day.

- She looked me straight in the eyes today and smiled for awhile (I cried from joy)
- She can now fall asleep on her own at night as long as she is swaddled
- She sleeps 7-9 hours straight at night (we are the luckiest parents in the world)
- She can play on her own in the crib when we turn on her music toy for about 20-30 min sometimes (especially in the morning)
- She is making many more sounds and can laugh out loud at times

We are still working on how to soothe her in public. She gets fussy sooner in public as if she is not used to being out of the house. She gets quiet as soon as we get in the elevator to go home. It's like she knows she is going home or something. She does the same when we drive into the garage.

It's amazing to watch her grow and see how she figures things out. I am in awe of the process.

- Lei

Not all pacifiers are created equal

Before I had a baby, I thought a pacifier is a pacifier and babies would automatically like them. Boy was I wrong. Apparently you have train your baby to use a pacifier and you have to try several of them before they like one.

We started with the NUK brand since it's "recommended by orthodontist" - not really sure what that means but sounds official. Their pacifier looked funny to me though because instead of looking like a nipple, it is kind of flat. Regardless, we tried it. Isabel used it once or twice but for the most part didn't take it. We couldn't figure out if she was too young or she just didn't like pacifiers. We hoped it was not the latter.

One day a month ago, I was shopping at Safeway and came across another pacifier - Soothie (the blue one in the photo) and decided to try it. First of all, it looks a lot more like a nipple and thank goodness Isabel took to it right away. I heard some moms have to try 3 or 4 different brands before finding one that their baby likes.

Isabel does not always like it though. Sometimes she would push it out with her tongue and it happened a few days in a row a few weeks ago. I started to think wow maybe she already got tired of it. Good thing I talked to another new mom, who told me it's important to be persistent and sometimes even push the pacifier in a little because when a baby nurses, she would lick the nipple first to stimulate milk let down. Well, when she gets a pacifier, she may think it's your nipple and starts licking and if you don't know the difference, it looks like she is pushing it out with her tongue. In fact, she is just learning the difference.

Knowing that, I became more confidence in using it and happily Isabel uses it regularly now every day. It's saving us hours of fussiness. Who knew using a pacifier was such a science!

- Lei

Isabel is 12.5 pounds!

Isabel turned two months old on July 2. She gained another 2.5 pounds to 12.5 1bs and grew another inch to 23 inches. Her head grew an inch in circumference as well. She is now at the 80-90 percentile of her age. She also received 4 shots that day. Poor baby... She was a strong girl though only cried for 30 seconds!! She had a fever for just one day (normal reaction to immunization shots - happens to 30% of the infants). She didn't even fuss that much when she had a temperature of 100 degrees. All is good now. We are so proud of her.

Here are 3 video clips of her at the doctors... so cute!!!

Isabel Hates the Breast Milk!

So a funny thing happened yesterday. Isabel spit out the breast milk. She hated it!

Fortunately, it was my cousin Isabel and not baby Isabel. Big Izzy was visiting us yesterday from San Diego. Maybe it was the future nurse in her, but she said she's always been curious at what breast milk tasted like. After I cringed at the thought, I told her to have at it (but told her to wait till I covered my eyes .... ewwwww). She ended up gagging and spitting it out saying that it didn't taste like she thought it would be. Go figure. Sorry Izz!

- Jaime

Clean Bill of Health

Went to my final OB appt on June 26th, where she cleared me for ALL activities. :-) as long as I take it slow. I am already walking a lot more and up the hills now. I still have stomach pains and she says that's normal.

She also said my uterus seem to have shrunk normally so I can have more babies. She is already talking to me about giving birth vaginally next time. I can't believe it, but I guess it's good she thinks I can even though I had a C section. I am not sold though. Good thing, we don't need to decide for awhile - I hope. Perhaps about 3 years, if I had my say and the stars are aligned again for us to conceive easily. Keeping my fingers crossed :-)

- Lei