The summer is winding down and I’ve returned to work after a 5-month maternity leave. The first few days were a complete blur. It’s amazing how quickly your brain becomes mush when you’re on sabbatical. Sometimes I can’t believe how fast time has flown by. Was it really 4 months ago that Maddie was born? I remember the moment as clear as a bell, which is surprising for my poor memory capacity.
Maddie is a really chill baby. She spends her day observing the happenings around her with curious, round eyes. Sometimes when I look at her, I laugh out loud because of the uncanny resemblance she has to Jin. She’s literally a spitting image of him, just in smaller form. They even have the same hairstyle!
Daddy and I use the same 1-guard on the hair clippers
I haven’t really written much about her developmental growth, but rest assured, she is progressing quite nicely. At 2 months of age, we moved Maddie out of the co-sleeper in our room and into a crib in her own room. A few weeks later, she was consistently sleeping 6-7 hour stretches through the night. Now, at almost 4 months of age, she sleeps soundly like a rock from 8pm to 7am. What a relief! I must admit, I’ve been spoiled rotten by two daughters who clearly have a keen appreciation for sleep.
Peacefully sleeping in the cosleeper until Bella awakens her with her incessant singing and dancing
**WARNING** SEMI-GRAPHIC BOOBIE TALK AHEAD
This time around, I have also been able to nurse. After the horrific experience I had with Bella, where I was only able to pump for 6 weeks, I was beginning to think that maybe I wasn’t cut out to be a mom in that natural sense. But after getting the whole breastfeeding routine down with Maddie, I now really understand and appreciate what other mothers described to me; that the bonding time and the closeness you feel with your baby are truly worth one hundred times the pain and effort in nursing.
That’s not to say that breastfeeding is always a lovey-dovey time. Now that Maddie’s more aware of her surroundings, she gets easily distracted while nursing. She often angrily slaps my chest and turns her head upwards to glare at me if I make the slightest noise. When I announce that it’s time to eat, she pumps her arms and legs excitedly and stares so intently at my chest that I sometimes feel like a self-conscious pre-pubescent teenager. One day the little bugger chomped down on me so hard that I yelped in pain. My reaction must have entertained her because when I looked down, she crinkled her nose and smiled mischievously at me. She bit me several times thereafter, always making that same deviant smile, before I closed up shop and slapped her (not literally) with a boobie embargo.
Despite the masochistic behavior, I plan to nurse as long as I can, or until she can stand, whichever comes first. Sorry if others don’t agree, but nursing stops when your child can lift up your shirt to reach for your boob. It’s no longer a matter of bonding when your child sees you as an all-you-can-eat-buffet. This is usually where I include pictures or videos of the topics I write about, but I’m pretty sure pictures of Maddie’s dinner plate would constitute as semi-pornographic on my heavily-regulated website. Maybe a picture of an all-you-can-eat buffet will suffice:
From the looks of it, seems like a delish Chinese buffet. Yummy, my favorite!
Speaking of strange but endearing breastfeeding woes, I just turned my head slightly and smelled sour, dried, regurgitated milk on my shoulder. No guts, no glory!
Here’s a clip of Maddie letting out a lady-like burb as she bounces in her Jumperoo:
For Bella’s 4th birthday, we dressed Maddie up as a fairy to match the Tinkerbell theme (more on the party in a future post). We tried two different outfits before deciding to subject her to the green one:
And finally, here are a few pictures of Bella and Maddie together. I gotta hand it to Bella, she’s trying hard to be a great big sister by holding her and helping me with diaper changes and feedings. Unfortunately, she hasn’t quite mastered holding Maddie yet, as evidenced in the pictures below. Notice Maddie’s gradual descent to the ground as Bella desperately tries to steady her in her arms.
Help me, Mommy!
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