Here’s what the rocking horse looks like right now, after the sanding action:

I will try to paint it on the weekend – I hope it’ll turn out ok!

As I’ve had sort of an emotional meltdown today, there won’t be any other updates just right now, but I will try to post again sometime this weekend.

This weekend, I’ve been busy sanding down a wooden rocking horse that I bought on ebay – for our Munckin, naturally. Here’s what it looked like when it was delivered:

I’ll go and get white paint for it this week. After that, I am not sure what to do with it, I’d like to add some sort of a floral pattern, but can’t seem to decide on anything. Hm…I’ll post progress pictures soon. Hopefully.

Our little Munchkin is almost nine months old now! I cannot believe how extremely fast she’s developing. She’s been semi-crawling (moving across the floor on her belly, dragging one leg like a wounded soldier) for a while now and continuously practices getting up on all fours. She’s ‘talking’ so cutely with us, too. We still have no teeth to report, but I am told not to worry about that until she turns one year old.

When she was seven months old, we started our girl on solid food and by now she really likes the pumpkin-potato combo (sometimes mixed with chicken) that I am cooking for her. Apart from these foods, she now eats and likes apples, bananas, cereal and rice cakes (unsalted, of course). We’ll be starting her on the next meal (lunch) next week. I am still nursing my Munchkin, of course, but she also likes to drink water. Unfortunately she can’t seem to figure out the Avent Magic Cup. She does drink out of a regular cup, but that’s a really messy thing and she always ends up totally wet, so I am hoping to find some sort of a better solution for that eventually.

Our baby girl by now has also gotten over her first mildly serious illness – she suffered a really high fever between 39.6 and 40 degrees Celsius over a period of six days! Most of this time she spent snuggled into the crook of my arm, too weak to even crawl or play, alternating between nursing and sleeping. It was really heart-wrenching to see her that way. Unfortunately I’d passed my flu on to her, so we were both doing less than stellar for a while. This period was also where I realized again just how much it sucks to be completely alone here – there’s noone I could turn to when things get a bit rough. When you’re too ill to take care of your own child properly and have to spend most of the day seated on the floor for fear of your circulation failing, it does not exactly make you feel great. Nothing I can do about that, though, so henceforth I’ll just hope not to get sick anymore.

In July or August, if everything pans out, my baby will start daycare. I can’t even begin to tell you how much that bothers me. She’s so tiny yet, it just breaks my heart. Alas, I need to finish my uni studies somehow and in order to do that (and to eventually make money) I need time to study.

On a lighter note, I will busy myself with the gift list for our Munchkin’s birthday over the next few weeks. There are so many things I want to get her, I need to prioritize. For today, I will leave you with a monster load of pictures.

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Our neighbours have been treated to an extra dose of daily screams lately – courtesy of the Munchkin. Whenever she’s lying on her belly, she pulls her legs towards her belly, pushes her little butt up in the air and sort of pushes or slides forward a tiny bit. This technique does not yet quite seem to yield the required results, so our Munchkin gets annoyed quickly and voices her displeasure. I know this is all part of the learning process, but I still find it a bit sad that she’s trying so hard and not quite managing to get anywhere. Anyway, I am assuming she will get a handle on the crawling business soon enough. Which reminds me that we need to start baby proofing the apartment – a tremendously tedious task in our tiny and cluttered living space.

Tomorrow we’ll have our U5 examination (the six to seven months general examination). I’m always a bit anxious before these appointments, feeling like a test could potentially be failed – can Munchkin do everything she’s supposed to be doing at her age? Is she properly developed? She’s also supposed to get the next round of shots in the course of this appointment, but I am not so sure it’s going to happen. Her temperature has been relatively high for the last few weeks and we haven’t really been able determine the cause of that. The last doctor we went to said it’s possible that she just generally has a higher core temperature, but he said it needed to be checked out – as soon as she’ll have a temperature of over 38 degrees Celsius for three days in a row, we’ll be back at his practice to check her blood and urine.

By the end of her sixth month, Munchkin will try solid food for the first time. I really want to cook for her myself – I think parsnips will be the veg of choice. I am reading a very good book on baby nutrition and hope I’ll do everything right in that department. I might be overthinking things sometimes, but I’d rather be overly obsessing about these things than to make the wrong decisions right from the start.

Geez, time is flying by so incredibly fast – I can’t believe our Munchkin is six months old already! Next year in August, she will be attending a creche, a situation I am very much struggling with. If money did not dictate my decision there, I would not yet give my little girl into childcare. I just can’t imagine not to have my Munchkin around me all the time – ever since she was born, she’s been with me. The Laddie has taken her for a walk without me once or twice so far and I could never fully relax when he did. I just really want to be with her, no matter how stressful things can be sometimes. Soon enough, she won’t want to be around me all the time, so while I can, I must take advantage of the fact that so far she can’t even crawl away from me and my hugs, cuddles and kisses.

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As you have no doubt been able to deduce from our lack of posts, we have not yet organized ourselves any better since our last blogging appearance. I seriously don’t know when, if ever, we will get back to any sort of routine in our daily life. Things like that today aren’t as important as they used to seem, though – it’s just so amazing to see our Munchkin grow and learn more every day. She will be 5 months and 3 weeks old tomorrow and she’s SO adorable! She rolls from her belly onto her back and the other way round now, she smiles a lot and even sometimes graciously bestows a laugh upon her humble parents. Here are some new pictures for you!

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Apart from our Munchkin, things around here still are a mess, to be frank. The Laddie and I are struggling in many areas and can’t seem to clear our heads quite long enough to sort anything out properly. Something has to change, as we both very clearly feel the strain of it all take its toll on our happiness and general wellbeing. First things first, though – the Munchkin and I are battling a viral infection. I am worried about my baby girl, as she hasn’t been quite well for a little while now. I’ll go and take her to the doc again as soon as possible. Also, I will definetely try to get back to blogging on a hopefully regular basis. I hope you’re all doing good out there!

About a year ago, we purchased a bed from a company called Dolphin Furniture (based in Denmark). Fantastic wood and great workmanship…or so it seemed.

This is something really hard to describe, so bear with me.

The bed can be “configured” into other uses. A junior bed, to a full cot, to something that resembles a baby balcony. We thought we would put it into baby balcony mode and go go gadget screw driver, the masterpiece was complete. I then placed the standard thickness mattress into the bed and watched in confusion, as the protective bar was just a little too high. How high? Well, let me put it this way: Munchkin would not get over it, or under it. But if she were to slip her hands or feet in, they could easily get stuck at the knee or elbow. If she pushed hard enough, I am sure she could trap her head and it would hurt! Rather than take the risk, I remove said bar, which so happens to also obstruct the baby’s route to mommy heaven. The bar is out and there are four screws that kept it in place (two at the headboard and two at the footboard). I remove the footboard without much fuss. But the headboard is a different story. The screws are not really standard hardware store kit, one half of the screw is made for wood, the other half is like a screw for a nut or bolt. What happens is that the wood half goes into the headboard and the bolt half has a strange metal cap that screws in and allows for the bar to lock into place.

So I start turning the cap and thus the screw – the cap falls off, leaving the screw in the wood. Oh crap, the screw is stuck. I try and put the cap back in and tighten it more (making the screw and all go deeper into the wood), but the cap is too lose to the screw and will not come out. After about a minute of tightening and seeing it does not work, suddenly the cap comes lose, taking the bolt with it and the other half of the screw is stuck in the wood.

Yes, by hand, I twisted a metal rod to break in half. Hulk strong, but damn! So the wooden part of the screw has this dangerous sharp bit still sticking out, that is completely round and too small to get with the pliers or to get it out a different way. Did I mention that the screw below it is also stuck?

We contacted both the seller and Dolphin for help in the matter, as it is plain to see that we’re dealing with a failure in the parts here. You should be able to configure the bed…I mean, tha’s why we bought it.

The reply was less than helpful! In short: Your fault! We won’t replace and anyways, we don’t make that bed anymore.

SO MUCH FOR THE FREAKING GUARANTEE!!!!!!!!!! Lifetime, my arse!

We have recruited our fleet of lawyers to write a nice letter, explaining to them in more precise terms that the bed simply failed to do its job.

It’s a fine line though, because I broke it…but was it really my fault?

Yes, folks and friends, breastfeeding is awesome! People might wonder how one can get so enthusiastic about something like this, but I gotta say, getting our Munchkin back to nursing properly has changed a lot around here. I can go places with her without worrying about what to take with me, I always know I can feed her whenever she needs it. Feeding her this way has enabled me to socialize again, too, which I really needed at this point. I am currently trying to find bilingual playgroups that I could go to with our Munchkin, but it’s proving difficult.

The baby fella and I are slowly building up a routine now – I can’t believe how long it’s taken me to get organized. Now other things need to be taken care of. For example, I thought we could stay in our little one bedroom apartment for a while longer, but now I really don’t see how. There is just so little space, it’s crazy – even just doing the laundry on a regular basis has become a problem. I just don’t know how that’s supposed to work in winter, when I won’t be able to hang our washing on the balcony any more. The only problem we’re facing now are high rents for two bedroom apartments. Well, something’s gotta change, so I’ll just keep looking. Honestly though, I find it extremely sad that we’re unable to afford a decent apartment, even with the Laddie’s full-time job.

I want to try and blog on a more regular basis again, too – bear with me, I am still trying to get back to my usual organized self. I’ll leave you with a few new pictures today.

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She’ll only sleep on her belly! I am so unsure how to deal with that. Our little girl has not been properly sleeping in her cot for a very long time now. Because a friend of mine suggested it, I tried putting her in her bed on her tummy after she’d fallen asleep. What can I say? She’s been happily sleeping in there for the last two hours!! Every two minutes I poke her to see if she’s still breathing – that’s how afraid I am of the SIDS. I really don’t know what to do about this…the poor Laddie has been taking care of housework and cooking as well as working his butt off for SO long now – because Munchkin refuses to be left alone or to sleep in her own bed (when lying on her back). Nothing gets done here otherwise. It can’t continue like this, there are things that need done. But at the same time, how can I allow my baby to sleep on her tummy if that’s a contributing factor to cot death? We have a doctor’s appointment coming up soon, I’ll need to ask about that…

Hey there!

For the first time in a looooong while, our baby fella has decided to actually fall asleep in her cot, so I decided to hurry up and write an ickle post while I have the chance.

Nursing issues have been resolved – hooray!! For the last eight weeks, my little one and I have been struggling. A few days ago then, my baby girl decided she wanted to nurse like there is no tomorrow – no ‘tools’ needed anymore! This development makes me very, very happy. And it’s all so handy, too. When she wants food, I can just sit down and nurse my baby. No more fussing with bottles and all that jazz.

Other than that, Sophie is growing and developing very nicely. We just had the U3 this Monday – the required checkups for children are ‘Us’ over here. U stands for ‘Untersuchung’, which means examination. So anyway, we’ve had the hip screening and everything and our Munchkin is totally healthy. She is now about 56,5 cm /22.4 in tall and weighs 5440 grams/ 12 lbs.

Finally, the biggest news for today: We got our very first conscious smile from our baby fella yesterday! She’s 8 weeks old now and we were soooo waiting for it. Today, she smiles quite often when I talk to her – my heart just melts every time.

Here are some more pics of our little one and also a little video – ignore my German babbling, I took the video for my sister.

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When I got pregnant, I was aware that breastfeeding had been an issue for the women in my family for generations. Unfortunately, in most cases there is no way for me to find out why most of the babies in my family have been bottle-fed. Only my aunt was able to enlighten me as far as her own story goes – her first child was very ill, so he was taken away straight after the birth and fed formula while apart from his mother. My aunt tried to feed both of her daughters when they were born, but to no avail – no milk would come. I was told that my mother also was unable to breastfeed my sister and me, but I never really found out any details about that. So during this first pregnancy, I was aware that I might not be able to nurse my child at all – I wanted to, mind you, but I told myself I would not beat myself up overly much if it did not work out for some reason.

So, up until the birth of my little girl, I felt quite confident that I would be able to arrange myself with formula feeding, if that’s what it had to be. Well, what can I say? I seem to have underestimated my subconscious grossly.

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In any case, after a long period of intense emotional struggle, my little baby and I now seem to have come to an agreement of sorts. I get to nurse her as long as she will tolerate it. When she is too tired to continue trying, she gets the bottle.

Phew…now that I am coming to terms with this chapter of raising my baby, I am focusing on having her close to me – I recently acquired a Sling and am now getting an advisor in for that as well, as I seem to struggle with the concept of binding it properly. Since I know it’s really good for my fella, though, I will keep trying. Pictures to follow, if success sets in