Waterproof pads

If there's one advice that I would give to would-be parents when they ask for a list of must-have things,... I'd say multi-use/waterproof pads. Why ?

For starters, the typical infant's layette list includes bedsheets but it doesn't really explain or give an idea of how much one would really need.

In our case, the waterproof pads were a life saver. Prior to using them, we've always had to keep changing the sheets on the bed (crib or on our bed, since we started co-sleeping) because our little one keeps on soiling them. Pee, poo, wet burp, drool, ... name it, and he's done it. The pads were a better option compared to the sheets because we have to take everything out of the bed (pillows, blankets, etc) and put it back to change the sheets but replacing the pad just takes 2 seconds.

I'm writing about this now because my son has been throwing up a lot again the past few nights - he is congested (yet again) and has a hard time spitting up his phlegm. When he coughs and tries to expel his phlegm, other stuff come out. *sigh* On some nights, his cough gets so bad that we've had to replace the pad 3 times (we have a total of 4).

Hope this congestion goes away na.

Tommee Tippee Insulated Cups

We've been trying to transition Swe-cha to using a straw cup for a few months now and purchased these Tommee Tippee insulated cups for him.

The cups look nice and are insulated so they'll keep liquids cold longer and they were spill proof - it was a no-brainer so we quickly purchased it for our son.

The first time Swe-cha used this, he wasn't drinking a lot of water yet so we didn't really notice anything unusual. He liked these cups well enough.

Soon, I started sending him to daycare with these instead of his old sippy cups and the daycare staff told me that he (Swe-cha) doesn't like drinking from these.

We reverted back to the old sippy cups for daycare but we'd bring water for him in these TT insulated cups whenever we go out. We noticed that he didn't like the straw but would often ask us to unscrew the cup and he would drink directly from the cup. As expected, things did get messy & wet a lot.

Tonight, when hubby assembled the TT cup he had just washed, he decided to try it out for himself. He was curious why Swe-cha would rather just bite on the straw but not drink from it, Swe-cha does seem to know how to use a straw because he has no problems drinking from our straws!

Hubby tried to drink.

Then, he called me, "Honey, will you try this ?".

I tried to drink. Nothing came out.

I sucked. And sucked. And sucked. I sucked till I felt the pressure in my eyeballs and still nothing!

Eventually, hubby and I each had a TT insulated cup in hand and we were alternating between laughing and trying to get a drink and we felt so guilty that we kept trying to give this to our child.

And then suddenly - I don't really know how or why this happened - I started getting something. I was drinking!

So I decided to check out Tommee Tippee's website. I figured, we must have been assembling it the wrong way and if we were doing it correctly, then I wanted to write to the company to complain.

1 minute and 17 seconds later, we were disassembling and assembling the cups correctly na and we are able to drink easily - not as easily as it feels drinking from a regular straw and cup (say, your soda from McD) - but there was no resistance anymore. And no more popping of my eyeballs.

*hay!*

http://www.tommeetippee.us/explora/546010_aqua_blue.html

Next time, we will try everything out for ourselves before giving it to our child. Promise!

I take it back...

...again.

So I may have jumped the gun and started rejoicing when I realized that I should be making Swe-cha sleep every two hours as I described in my previous post.

That was exactly what I did yesterday. Come night time, I looked around and saw the same chaos in the house that greeted me every day. Now, where did that extra time go ? The time which I was going to spend cleaning & straightening up the mess ?

Confused, I mentally went over our day and realized that I spent so much time and energy getting Swe-Cha to sleep that I never really saved time/effort at all. Furthermore, after he goes to sleep, there was still the bigger problem of getting him to stay asleep. I'm not really sure how long infants of his age nap, but sometimes, he sleeps for 20 - 30 minutes and he's awake again. Surely, this isn't enough ?

Sigh.