loungeroom makeover

I'm redecorating the loungeroom on a strict budget.
As low as possible. I'm using fabrics and things I've already got to refresh the room,make it feel more open and friendly and hopefully make it easier to keep clean.

I've just discovered pinterest and am loving getting inspiration from there. Here is what I've got.

Source: designspongeonline.com via Erin on Pinterest

Source: designsponge.com via Erin on Pinterest

Source: meetmeatmikes.blogspot.com via Erin on Pinterest

Source: lottaagaton.blogspot.com via Erin on Pinterest

the rest of them here

dada date

Myl and Luce had their first outing together last week.

They went to the shops.
Lucy fell asleep in the sling.
It was sweet.

I stayed home and cut out hexagons.

a girl after her mamas heart

Lucy has always liked to suck on her fingers.
Today I was getting some laundry done and walking in and out of where she was. She was going fine for ages but then started to get a little restless. I usually go see her if she doesn't calm down but this time she did.
When I got all the laundry done I went to go see her and this is what I found.

The goose has found her thumb!

She has been trying for such a long time.
She is still sucking on it. Boy it must be good.

I used to suck on my thumb when I was little. I wouldn't take a dummy. So I can't help but feel a little proud that my little girl is doing it too.

the cut

my hair is a little ratty at the moment.
It's been a while since I had it cut.

It's at the stage where I can just put it up but no matter how many bobby pins I put in there, it just doesnt stay in.
When it's out, my hair is best known as a mullet.

I think I'd like a haircut.

The only problem is that I haven't paid for a haircut in four years.
I have been getting it cut as a hair model for a few different salon companies. This has been so much fun even though sometimes I end up with hair like this...

I like to call this my magic rainbow haircut. In my memory I think this haircut was not so bad but now I look at the photos I don't know what I was thinking!

The last haircut I paid for I ended up in the salon for three hours with a $200 bill because I had apparently asked for a colour THEN cut. I don't really remember doing this but it was a lesson I definitely learnt from.

So now I'm not quite sure where to go. I can't really hair model anymore with a little Lucy but I don't know where to go to get my hair done.

I've go a few styles to choose from as well.

Source: theglamourai.com via Erin on Pinterest

and these

Source: dream-out-loud.tumblr.com via Erin on Pinterest

7am project

I only have one photo for this week.
I have fantastic excuses including late nights, lack of charged camera battery etc, feeling like death warmed up on Monday.

I'll try again next week.

Wednesday

twelve weeks old

my little girl is twelve weeks old

We have both been a little unwell the past few days. Lucy got a cold and then lovingly passed it on to me. Yesterday was tricky. I had a very alert and feeling better baby girl but I was feeling a bit like death warmed up. She completely missed her afternoon nap no matter how hard I tried to get her to sleep. She was awake from about 11am to 10pm with a tiny 15 min catnap around 7 30.

Lucy loves to sing and dance. She really likes me singing "heads and shoulders, knees and toes" with all the action. She starts laughing as soon as I start singing.
As you can see in her picture she is getting really strong in her neck and loves a bit of tummy time. She looks up at the world and smiles and coos.

She has a cute little bald patch on the back of her head from where she sleeps at night. I'm still not sure what colour her hair will be. It has bits of brown and blonde and the littlest touch of red.


Almost 3 months! My little girl is growing.

the 7am project

I hardly ever start my day right.

I like to sleep in.
I wake up to feed Lucy but we often spend the whole morning in a magical land of dreams and milk.

Sounds beautiful?
It isn't.

Quite often it's midday before I've had breakfast which is now lunch, I'm running late for something and nothing has been done. Oh, and i'm still in my pj's.

Don't get me wrong. I love doing this on a lazy Saturday every once in a while, but most days in the week? I need to change.

So I'm callling it the 7am project. I'm going to not just wake up but get up at 7 every day and start my day. To help, and make it creative. I'm going to take a 7am photo each day and post them weekly. I may even try make it linkable one day so you can join in on the fun.

Here's my first photo taken this morning at 7am.

 Yep, the sun is up at 7am. I was surprised too.

rain

Source: None via May on Pinterest

I haven't blogged in a whole week.

It's been raining and gloomy.
My mood has oft' fit the weather.
It's hard to do cloth nappies in the wet and cold.
It's easy to feel overwhelmed as the pile of laundry gets bigger and bigger.

It's hard to go out on adventures with my sweet baby girl.
It's easy to stay in bed till midday.
It's hard to find fun things to write about in the gloom.


I'm gonna go out puddle jumping with my little one.
I'm gonna make some rainy day craft.
I'm going to add some Joni Mitchell to the sound of the rain.
I'm gonna make some pumpkin soup and eat it with a crusty warm bread roll.

And then?
I'll have something fun to write about.

Source: etsy.com via Christie on Pinterest

eleven weeks old

my little girl is eleven weeks old

we have been cloth nappying for a few weeks but for the last few days the heavens have opened up and the rain has been pouring down. We have access to a dryer but the nappies just aren't drying right and they are leaking all through really quickly. Lucy wore three outfits yesterday! I thought I had it sorted but now I'm not sure. She used to go the whole night on one nappy but this morning woke up at 5am with a soaked through one. I really love the nappies but they are a bit of  a nuisance at the moment.

However wet her bot gets, Lucy remains a happy little vegemite. She kicks her legs about, smiles and sings away. She had a lovely long weekend with her grand-nana, my mum and dad and her aunts and uncles. She is such a show pony. She loves the cuddles. Anyone will do.

She is getting really strong. She likes to stand up in my lap and can hold her neck up really well. She has a lot of force in her little legs. If she is leaning back she thrusts her little head forward to sit up straight.

She has well and truly discovered her hands. She plays with them and sometimes whacks herself in the face.

laksa

Source: myrecipes.com via Eloise on Pinterest

It's getting wintry here in ole Sydney town.
We have had lots of rainy days that Lucy and I spent indoors watching the rain splatter on the windows. It was actually flash flooding outside and poor Myl was drenched coming home from college but we were nice and warm!

So along with wintry weather comes wintry food.

Myl is a big fan of laksa. It's what he gets whenever we go to $6.50 thai.
Even though it's so cheap I thought I could make it cheaper at home. Here's how.

Ingredients (serves 2)
1 chicken breast
1 carrot
2 small bunches of choy sum
3 mushrooms
1/4 packet of rice noodles
1 tin coconut cream
2 cups water
1/2 tin of laksa paste

you could use other veg if you like or add bean sprouts.

Chop chicken into strips and fry in a large saucepan with cooking oil.
Chop carrot into rings. Chop mushroom into slices. Chop choy sum and leave green leaves to the side.
When chicken is brown add the carrot, mushroom and white parts of the choy sum.
When that is slightly soft add laksa paste and coconut cream. Stir till the laksa paste has mixed into everything.
Add 2 cups of water and bring to the boil.
Add the noodles and simmer for at least 5 mins or until rice noodles are cooked.
Divide into two bowls.
Rip up the choy sum leaves and sprinkle on top.

Enjoy!

no, the picture is not of the laksa I made. It looked pretty similar. I couln't find my camera and the picture I took with Myles' phone made it look like creepy death laksa so I cheated. Hope it inspires.

practical craft

before the little one arrived I made a decision that she would be a sustainababy.

My number one method of procreating sustainably was to use cloth nappies. Emergency c-section put a dint in these plans but now I am fit and ready to start. I'm awaiting my first shipment of pikapü nappies.

It has been pretty mind blowing to see how much waste is produced by using disposables. I feel like I am always taking bags out to the rubbish bin. We have also gone through a heckofalotta baby wipes and while they are ohh so handy for when we are out and about they do kinda creep me out. (How do they stay so wet for so long?)

So the other afternoon I made my own wipes. I bought the fabric ages ago but didn't find the time to make them.

Little Luce was feeling cuddly so we crafted like this...

 I bought 25cm of towelling and cut it into squares with 3 squares along the width. I sewed two squares together with zig zag round the edge.

They frayed a lot so I had to pull at all the loose threads.

They work really well. I just pop them in a washbag so that they don't get stuck in the door of the washing machine.

Easy to make, easy to use and good for the environment. FTW!

Have you made something similar?

ten weeks old

my little girl is ten weeks old

Lucy has a toy called Crunchie. It crunches and Lucy loves it. She grabs it and eats it and stares at it. She is becoming more and more alert every day. She winks and smiles and raises her eyebrows.

She does a cute opened eye thing if you take a photo of her with the flash.

She has started to laugh. It's only happened a few times. She mostly just gurgles but a few times she has been really laughing. It's the best.

She has a bit of a sniffly nose again. It was really sniffly on Saturday night. I put her down to sleep and she sounded like a little baby pig. So I called my mum and she said to drop some saline up her nose. It worked really well and she slept for a good long while.

She is becoming much more vocal. She sings along with me and chatters away. She likes words that start with G (gee, gah etc). Her cries are getting louder. She cries when she is overstimulated and sometimes it is tricky to get her to calm down. Myl is a superman at getting her to be happy. He sings to her with his big deep voice and she is in heaven.

She is getting better at feeding (or am I getting better?) Sometimes she is very picky about the side she wants. She will make hunger signs and then wail if I give her one side so I think she isn't hungry till I try the other. It's never the same side though. She is a kook!

We went out for dumplings with my siblings on the weekend. Lucy loves her aunts and uncles. She put on a very good show of smiles and cuddles. Sometimes I think she is better behaved for other people than for me.

I love her oh so much. Looking at her makes my heart ache. Holding her makes me feel so happy. I'm loving being a mama. It is so wonderful.

Attachment Parenting, Part Two: Birth Bonding

Source: mariolacamacho.com via Eileen on Pinterest

As we learned in Part One, Attachment Parenting is a caregiving philosophy based on attempting to build a strong and intuitive relationship between parents and their child(ren).  The way that attachment begins is through a physical, chemical and emotional process referred to as ‘bonding’, which describes the way in which parent/s and child get to know each other.

 

The bonding process begins well before birth - for some parents, even before conception!  During pregnancy, most parents will find themselves beginning to bond with their baby, becoming attached to their child along with their hopes and dreams for their family.  For mothers, the hormonal and physical changes going on in her body give a biological boost to the beginning of this bonding process, a boost which is supercharged during labour, birth and the hours immediately following delivery.

 

According to a number of studies, the hormones and emotions present in the hours immediately following birth make them particularly prime time for bonding to occur between parents and their newborn.  Most parents (or babies!) don’t really need to be told what to do during this time, but if you are keen there are lots of ways to make the most of this unique point in your relationship.

 

First, inform your care providers that you would like some time alone with your baby.  Ask if it’s ok for routine procedures such as weighing, cleaning, and any tests or injections to be delayed for a couple of hours (don’t forget Vitamin K can be administered orally).  Your baby will find it easier to keep her eyes open in dim lighting so see if it’s possible to turn the lights down or bring in a lamp.  Then just spend some time exploring and enjoying each other!

 

Things like holding your baby skin-to-skin, stroking and touching their body, making and holding eye contact with your baby, talking or singing to your baby, are all really enjoyable and beneficial ways to begin getting to know each other.  Breastfeeding during the first hour after birth is recommended for lots of reasons, including that it’s really great for the bonding process.  And while most hospitals now have a ‘rooming-in’ policy, you can take it one step further by bringing your baby out of the bassinet and into your arms as much as possible J

 

Now in an ideal world, every baby would be easily born into a quiet place where time can immediately be spent doing nothing other than resting and enjoying each other. But we all know that the ‘dream birth’ is rarely achieved!  Instrumental delivery, c-sections, stitches, medical complications, or even just sheer exhaustion may mean that other concerns need to take precedence before parents and baby are ready or able to begin getting to know each other.

 

It’s important to remember, then, that while the first few hours after birth are a great boost to the bonding process, they're by no means all-or-nothing! There are plenty of creative ways to get to know your baby in difficult or unexpected circumstances, and the early days and weeks are still an important and special time.  The idea of birth bonding is simply to be aware of the uniqueness of the first few hours after birth, and if possible, to be intentional about maximising the potential of this time to begin bonding with your baby.  But no matter how it begins, you’ve got the rest of your lives together to enjoy strengthening that bond!

 

Love, Nic

 

Resources

William Sears, M.D., and Martha Sears, R.N.  The Attachment Parenting Book. Chapter 4: Bonding at Birth and Beyond

http://www.askdrsears.com/html/10/T101100.asp (link title: Ask Dr Sears: Bonding with your Newborn)

what we wore

This is what we wore on Saturday to go to our friends place. It was so chilly so we got all rugged up and had plenty of cuddles.

Lucy's cute cardi was made by her granny (my mama). She made it during the week before Lucy arrived. It's pretty lovely and reminds me of a week spent with my mama preparing to be a mama myself.

winter

Source: jackandizzy.blogspot.com via Antonia on Pinterest

Source: emmanygren.freshnet.se via Anne Kristine on Pinterest

Source: aviewto.blogspot.com via chelliswilson on Pinterest

Source: 101cookbooks.com via Charlene on Pinterest

Source: christinechitnis.com via Skwurlee on Pinterest