Afghans and Honey

Today was a day of good food!  This morning, I made some Afghan biscuits (my favourite biscuit to make at a minute's notice, since all the ingredients are normally in the cupboard, and they store really well).

The recipe I use is from the brilliant New Zealand cookery book, Ladies, A Plate, which I have mentioned here before - it is a compilation of dozens of classic recipes from women around New Zealand.

Here is how you make them - I seriously suggest you try baking a batch, they really are ridiculously good, and dead easy to make:

AFGHANS

Cream 170g butter with 100g brown sugar.  Add (sifted together) 180g plain flour, 3 tablespoons cocoa and 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder.  Mix, then knead in (with your hands) 2 cups of cornflakes (crush them first).

Roll teaspoonsful of the dough into balls (about the size of a large cherry), then flatten each ball slightly with a fork.  Allow about 2cm in between the balls, for a little spreading.

Bake at 180 degrees for 12 - 14 minutes.  Cool on a rack.

To make the rich, fudge-like frosting, gently heat together in a small saucepan 3 tablespoons of water, 45g caster sugar and 45g butter.  Once melted, bring to a rapid simmer for one minute (do not stir), to form a light syrup.

Pour about 3/4 of the syrup into a bowl containing 190g pure icing sugar sifted together with 3 tablespoons of cocoa, and beat well as you're pouring.  Add a little more syrup only if needed - you want a thick, smooth, fudgy icing.  As you use the icing, you can add a little more syrup or plain hot water if it starts to thicken and cool.

Spread a good, thick layer of icing onto each biscuit (about a teaspoon per biscuit), then place a walnut half onto each one as you go.

Leave them to set - they will keep well in a tin for a few days.

At dinnertime, Tabitha tried an Afghan.  She liked it, but after eating about a third of a biscuit, she dropped it and went back to her chicken and vegetable pot pie!  I don't really have a big sweet tooth, perhaps she is taking after me.

This evening, The Daddy brought home a jar of honey he was given at work - from an apiarist in Blackburn!  A man has a little colony of bees in the middle of the nice bushland area of Blackburn, and produces his own honey.  We have a great big jar of it - and it is excellent.  Tabitha can't try the honey, as honey should never be given to babies under the age of one, as there is a small but serious risk of deadly botulism poisoning.

Apparently, keeping bees in your backyard (urban apiary) is the latest trend - keeping chickens is so last decade!  This is an interesting article about all the beehives in Paris.

Yum yum!

For some reason, Tabitha loves to nibble and gnaw on a lime, as if it were an apple.  She must like the subtle lime zest flavour - she is quite zealous about it, and will hurriedly crawl over to it if it rolls away.

Can you see Tabitha's sneaky friend (partner in crime) in the background?  They are a funny little pair, peas in a pod - they seem to do things together, sitting and playing together, cuddling together (even when poor Possum is getting mauled, he seems to handle it with good grace).  Possum even brings her toy mice, dropping them in her lap, for her to chew on (eeeeewwwwwww!!!).  I spend my day trying to stop that.

Tabitha has been pulling herself up and standing up for well over a month now, but she has suddenly become obsessed with getting up and down - she will pull herself up, then carefully squat down.  Repeat x 100!  She must be developing killer leg muscles.

We made date scones and took them to visit our friends Marilyn and Jill at the Wondoflex Wool Shop in Malvern - I take scones, and in return, Jill fixes up any knitting mistakes I've made, or helps me with tricky patterns.  It's a lovely way to spend a morning or afternoon - Tabitha potters around, looking at all the wool, while I sit in the comfy armchair drinking tea, eating scones, and knitting.

For lunch today, Tabitha and I had roast chicken and some roast vegetables (zucchini, green capsicum, carrot and potato).  She loved that roast chicken - I actually have never seen her eat so efficiently and effectively as today.  She picked up and nibbled all of her chicken, and a decent piece of each vegetable.  All in all, quite a bit of food, with significantly less 'mush and wastage' than in the past.  Watching her eating skills improve so rapidly just blows me away - I spent all of lunch just grinning and laughing at her, which she in turn found hilarious, of course.

The Good, The Bad and The Ugly.

The Good:

Tabitha slept in until 8am this morning.  8am!!  Sure, I fed her at 1 and 5am, but it certainly was a lovely treat to just naturally wake up, of my own accord, and when the sun is already up.  I don't know why she slept in, and I'm sure it won't become a regular thing, but when you're a mother you learn to give thanks for small blessings!

Also, I have finally lost all of the baby weight.  Tabitha is nearly 9 months old (8.5), so I think that it's true what They Say:  "it takes 9 months to gain the weight, so don't expect to loose it in 3!"  You can't really try to loose weight quickly when you're breastfeeding - you could place your milk supply at risk - so you just need to plod along, eating sensibly, exercising.  Between breastfeeding, which uses around 300 - 500 calories a day, and baby-wearing (walking around all day with an 8kg weight strapped to me!), the weight naturally slipped away over the past 9 months, without having to worry too much about it.  I know it's such a petty and unimportant thing, really, but I am feeling much healthier, stronger and more 'me' now, so I'm happy about it.

Here is me when I was getting quite enormous.  Don't I look surly?!  The Daddy was dragging me on a walk up Hanging Rock, and I was Over It.  I put on around 20kg with the pregnancy, which doesn't seem too much, until you realise that the baby only weighed 3.5kg!  This photo was around 38 weeks, I think, when we went to Hepburn Springs for the weekend - we stayed at this lovely little Japanese Ryokan, and the kind woman there stacked two futons on top of each other, because she wasn't confident I could climb up and down onto one!

The Bad:

Our older cat has really ramped up his hunting.  It is most upsetting.  Mice actually scurry across our back fence line, and he just sits and picks them off.  I am thankful that he doesn't catch native wildlife, and I know that the rats and mice are introduced pests, but they really are sweet little creatures, and it makes me so sad when he catches them.  He has a bell and all that, but he is just an excellent hunter - sometimes bringing in multiple catches in one day.  Sometimes I can save them - if he brings one in alive, and I convince him to drop it straight away, I shoo it into the bathroom, leave it alone in a dark, quiet room for an hour to calm down and de-stress, then gently shoo it into a box, and go down the front of the block (well away from out back yard) to release it into the shrubbery, where there are plenty of places for a mouse to hide.  

Does anyone have any tips?  They aren't allowed to roam, we have cat-proof fencing, but I can't really stop him catching them from within our little garden.  Sometimes the brazen things even creep inside through the open back door to snatch cat food!  I've tried two bells.  I've heard of some sort of sonar product - does anyone know if they work?

The Ugly:

My skin is freaking out at the moment!  I feel like I'm a teenager again - the perky bust and ability to stay up all night, I would welcome...  But instead, I just have dreadful skin.  I can't understand it - I've been drinking 3 - 4 litres of water a day (hello breastfeeding), eating fairly well, exercising (well, as much as usual).  I am not happy about it.

Visits from friends!

Yesterday was busy.  In the morning, Tabitha and I went to have brunch with Tabby's Great Nanna (a sprightly woman who catches two buses from her home in Mount Martha for a visit, and regularly travels overseas on her own!).  We ate at Capitol Kitchen at Chadstone - they have a good kids' menu for babies, with toasted sandwich 'soldiers' of either cheese and vegimite or cheese and ham, then I just add a few bits from my own salad, and it's a nice little lunch for Tabitha.

In the afternoon, Tabby's godmother Sophie came for a visit.  Tabitha was thrilled, because Sophie is endlessly patient and a source of long cuddles.  Together they sat and untangled some of my wool collection, too - bonus!  Sophie competes in Roller Derby, and I took Tabitha along to a bout late last year - she had a great time (lots of people to watch), but it was quite noisy, so this year I will be purchasing a pair of baby earmuffs for her to wear when we go along to watch.

Also in the afternoon, my friends Ruby and Christina came over for a visit - Christina hadn't met Tabby yet, and Ruby has just gotten back from a work trip to New York, and came bearing gifts for Tabitha!

Ruby went shopping at Estella NYC, a designer baby shop frequented by celebrity mummas (I am told).  She had an appointment with a stylist at Estella, for work, and tried very hard to keep a straight face while the guy gushingly pointed out all the items worn by 'celebri-babies' such as Shiloh Jolie-Pitt tee hee...  Anyway, despite the high 'wanky factor', the store is full of cute baby clothes, and Ruby brought back a few bits and pieces for Tabitha.

These pants ('as worn by Shiloh') are super-comfy, and remind me of Happy Pants from the 80s:

This is a cute and comfortable onesie for warmer weather - it will actually fit her perfectly when we are in the US in May:

She also brought back a sweet little noise-maker which meows, and a solar-powered swarovski crystal!!!  Apparently the stylist would not let her leave without buying one, insisting that "all the top celebrity babies have one of these!"

I managed to scoot everyone out the door just in time to quickly feed and cuddle Tabitha, before rushing out to meet my best friend Amy - she took me out to dinner, as a 'baby-free treat', at one of my favourite restaurants, Yu-u.  Dinner was fantastic, around ten small courses of incredible Japanese food, and a little sake on the side.  This was only the second time I've been out to dinner without her (the other time was for our wedding anniversary in October last year) - and it was fun!

Baby Led Weaning - Ten Steps

Here are some of the 'key points' of Baby Led Weaning, adapted from the brilliant book Baby Led Weaning:

How do you get started?

• Sit the baby upright, facing the table, either on your lap or in a highchair.  Make sure the baby is steady, and can use her hands and arms freely (in accordance with the World Health Organisation's guidelines, weaning should not begin until the baby is around 6 months old - by this stage, most babies can sit upright very well with gentle support).

• Offer your baby food, rather than giving it to her - put food in front of her (on a tray or the table) or let her take it from your hand, so that the decision to take (or leave) food is always hers.

• Start with foods that are easy to pick up - thick 'sticks' or long strips are best at first (think green beans, thick batons of carrot, homemade potato wedges, toast soldiers, broccoli florettes, a strip of steak etc).  Introduce new shapes and textures somewhat gradually, so that the baby can work out how to handle them (for example, a soft piece of banana or feta cheese requires a very different grasp to a lamb cutlet or a piece of rice cake).

• Include your baby in your mealtimes whenever you can.  As far as possible - as long as it's suitable (and most things are) - you should offer your baby the same food as you are eating, so that she can copy you.  Foods can be slightly adapted for ease - for example, a soup or lentil dhal can be spread onto toast fingers.  Furthermore, someone should always sit and eat with the baby - food is a social occasion, and babies love to watch other people eat while they eat themselves.  Sometimes, this means I have two dinners (one with Tabitha, and one later with The Daddy if he has a long day), so I just eat two small portions.

• Choose times when your baby is not tired or hungry, so she can concentrate.  Mealtimes at this stage are for playing and learning - she will still be getting all of her nourishment from her breastmilk feeds.  I find that if I offer Tabitha a 'food meal' directly after a breastfeed, she will spend more time 'eating', and her concentration and interest is better.

• Continue offering breastmilk (or artificial baby milk) feeds exactly as before - this is still the main source of nutrition until the baby is roughly one year old.  When your baby begins requiring less milk, she will naturally take less herself.

• Offer your baby water with her meals so that she can practice drinking while she learns to eat.

• Don't hurry your baby or distract her while she is handling food - allow her to concentrate and take her time.  This is an important safety consideration, and will also help prevent her from becoming frustrated - learning to handle slippery, sticky and soft foods requires loads of concentration!

• Never put food into the baby's mouth - this is a major choking hazard - the baby needs to feel, observe and control her food herself, and an unexpected piece of food in her mouth is dangerous.

• Don't try to persuade baby to eat more than she wants.  Your job is just to offer her a range of interesting, nutritious foods - whether she eats them or not isn't important, as she is getting her nutrition from her milk.  The baby led weaning 'mantra' is 'Food is for fun until they're one'.  Sometimes Tabitha just wants to peer at her food, and perhaps squeeze it between her fingers.  That's fine.  She's still learning!

Yum Cha

This morning we went to yum cha with our friends Stephanie, Amy and Shalini.  Yum cha is excellent for babies Tabitha's age - there is plenty of colour, sound and movement, new smells and tastes, plus pretty much everything on offer is easy for a baby-led weaning baby to eat - steamed dumplings, barbecue pork buns, pan fried dumplings, scallion pancakes, prawn and sesame toast, little chicken pies, Chinese broccoli in oyster sauce.  I think that Tabitha tried almost all of these things!

Here is a photo of Tabitha examining a piece of pork bun - sorry, no good photos of Tabby eating yum cha, since I was too busy devouring it all myself!  Next time I will remember to pause and take some photos.

And a few other pictures from yum cha this morning:

This week, I presented my first 'New Mothers' talk at the local Maternal and Child Health Centre, to promote the Australian Breastfeeding Association.  I was nervous, but it went well, and I'm looking forward to presenting many more.

During the week, I also managed to successfully wrap Tabitha onto my back in our Vatanai wrap, in a 'rucksack' carry.  This is mighty tricky to learn without someone helping you, and I think I nearly have it down pat - we went for a couple of 45 minute walks, two days in a row, and Tabitha was comfortable and secure.  It's nice wearing her on my back, as it leaves my hands free (for preparing dinner, cleaning, grocery shopping etc.) and the Vatanai wrap is lightweight and cool in the warmer weather (and mighty pretty!)  Here is a dodgy iPhone photo - I'll pop up a better photo soon, with a step-by-step tutorial on how to do a rucksack wrap, once I am a little more proficient at this particular carry.

This week, Tabitha also tried Feta cheese (so messy), a homemade spinach quiche (I love making quiche because it is much easier than it seems!), some vegetable curry, baby corn (a new favourite vegetable) and she really enjoyed sharing an almond croissant with my dad, while they sat together and people watched outside a cafe yesterday, while I was in an appointment.

Tomorrow night, The Daddy is staying home with Tabitha, because my best friend Amy is taking me out to dinner at one of my favourite restaurants, Yu-u!  I am excited - the last time I ate at Yu-u was with The Daddy, when I was 40 weeks pregnant - in fact, it was the day before my due date.

Baby Clothes - the early days

I thought I'd outline my personal experiences with useful - and useless - baby paraphernalia.  Honestly, there is SO much that I couldn't hope to cover it all, certainly not in one post, so I will start with clothing in the first few months

WHAT CLOTHING?

In the early weeks, the baby mostly sleeps, feeds, needs changing and sometimes vomits (or frequently vomits, if you are extra-lucky!).  As such, clothing ought to be chosen to best facilitate these processes. 

For nights, open-bottom nightgowns are golden - changing is a breeze, and you don't have to worry about baby getting cold, because you can put socks on them and then they are generally all swaddled and wrapped up like a parcel of fish and chips!  Fiddling with press-studs on suits overnight is just a giant pain - baby wakes up as you fuss and fiddle, and at 4am it's easier to just pull up a nightgown.  Yes, you can put a boy in a nightgown!

For daytime, the ordinary 'onesies' or all-in-one suits are very practical.  You can add a singlet for added warmth if required (Tabitha was born in the middle of winter), and you don't need to fuss with socks because they generally have built-in feet.  The BEST brand I came across was Marquise.  Not too expensive, these onesies were just so, so soft.  The more we washed them, the nicer and softer they felt.  They come in simple, sweet prints (plain white, pastel polka dots etc) and feel lovely against soft baby skin.  We also had some suits from Purebaby, Bonds, Bebe by Minihaha, Petit Bateau, Gaia and others, and while I would actually recommend ALL these brands (they were all good for different reasons), the Marquise jumpsuits just can't be beaten in my opinion!

You can buy the Marquise suits at most department stores and baby boutiques.  For other cute suits (particularly as baby gets a little older and you want to dress her up), this is a great website - www.babi.com.au is a online retailer dedicated ONLY to all-in-one suits.  Those 'excess stock' stores like TSL are also good places to stock up on Bonds and Purebaby - I still buy all of Tabitha's pajamas there.

HOW MANY?

How many outfits do you need?  Well, this is one of the few areas I would recommend Quantity over Quality!  You don't need the most expensive, fancy items, but you do need enough of them.  I found that Tabitha needed her outfit changed at least FIVE times every day in the early weeks - vomit, milk, nappy business etc.  Because I was swamped enough with coping with a new baby, I didn't want the added pressure of frantically laundering her clothes.  So we had around 15 outfits in regular use.  It seems like a lot (I'm positive you could get by with less) but we loved having a big rotation.  Around 3 open-bottom nighties, 8 Marquise jumpsuits, and 5 other jumpsuits.  In addition, we had a few 'nice' outfits, which really only got worn a few times for photos.

SIZES

How about sizes?  Well, I wasn't expecting a tiny baby (I was absolutely massive, and we have a history of decent sized babies in the family) so, on the advice of my mother, I only had a handful of 0000 size outfits.  Maybe eight.  She told me that the baby would really be fine in 000 size from the start - they would just be a little big, and I could roll up the sleeves.  She was right.  I am still glad that we had some 0000 sizes though, because for photos, it was nice to have some things that fitted really well.

I should point out - I put all Tabitha's cotton suits in the dryer.  She was born in mid June, so it was just a reality that we used the dryer a whole lot.  This means that all of her suits shrunk to roughly half a size smaller - so the 000 were actually somewhere between 000 and 0000.

Tabby wore the 0000 for a couple of weeks, then the 000 for a couple of months.  She was in the 00 for a few more months, and now, at 8 months of age, is in 0 and even 1 clothing.  She is very long, so she wears size 12 - 18 month pants and leggings.

NICE CLOTHES

Once Tabitha was a little older (6 weeks and beyond, I'd say), she started to actually wear her 'nice' outfits.  We had some lovely things from Bebe, Purebaby, Petit Bateau and Absorba.  Sweet little jumpsuits with matching bibs and hats.  We had so many nice things (that I had bought, received as gifts, and also from my mother, who seemed to arrive with a beautiful new outfit every time she visited - i.e. daily!), so rather than let them go to waste before Tabby grew out of them, I put her in her 'good' clothes all the time.  I'm so glad I did - babies grow so quickly, and if I saved outfits for 'best', they would never have been worn!

ACCESSORIES

Hats, bibs, socks, mittens, shoes, booties, blankets, jackets, cardigans...  What is useful?

Debbie Bliss Cashmerino 8 ply and the same in a 5 ply 'baby weight' for a lighter weight beanie.

We used loads and loads of bibs.  Newborns seem to always have a little milk dripping around their faces, and changing a bib is simpler than a full outfit change.  Tabitha was a very dribbly baby right up until her first teeth came through, around 5.5 months.  So she pretty much always wore a bib for the first 6 months of her life.  You can find incredibly sweet bibs - I bought every nice one I came across, because I hated ugly bibs ruining her nice outfits!  I found a lot of nice ones by THIS label, and there are also lots of gorgeous ones in little baby boutiques and on Etsy.

Once the baby is older and feeding itself (which it will do from around 6 months if you do Baby-Led Weaning, which I cannot recommend enough), I suggest you use the technique of 'double bibbing' - cover the baby up in a long-sleeved bib (Silly Billyz are the only brand I've found that make these small enough for a 6 month baby - just roll the sleeves up a little), then pop a 'pelican bib' over the top to catch larger bits of food (these are the moulded plastic bibs that turn up at the bottom).

Socks are a must - the easiest way to keep little feet warm (I didn't bother with booties or tiny shoes - so fiddly, too easy to slip off, and they seemed far less comfortable on tiny new feet than simple socks).  You may have heard parents moaning about how hard it is to find socks that actually Stay On - it's true, 99 per cent of socks out there seem to slip straight off!  Luckily, the socks I stocked up on while pregnant turned out to be absolutely brilliant - they are soft, stretchy, and NEVER fall off!  The socks I used and recommend are from Bebe - here they are, though I bought them at David Jones.  I am actually really grumpy that they don't make them in a size larger than 6 months, since I haven't been able to find a single pair of socks that stay on, now that she's grown out of the Bebe ones.

We never bothered with scratch mittens.  I have seen babies wearing them, and even know a woman who wraps her baby's hands in tiny tube socks!  If you find your baby is gouging at their face, by all means try some, but we never found the need for them.

We had a couple of knitted jackets and coats - I picked out a few patterns that I liked from the knitting shop, along with some lovely wool (some of that Cashmerino DK), and my father's elder sister, a masterfully skillful knitter, whipped up some lovely little woolen jackets.  Truth be told, she didn't wear them all that much - new babies are generally so well wrapped up that they don't really need a jacket.  It's not really until they are a little more mobile that I think jackets and coats are useful - certainly from around four months or so, if the weather will be cool, a woolly jacket is worthwhile.  But I guess my point is, don't bother with buying or making them in tiny sizes.

Blankets - oh yes!  Blankets, bunny rugs, muslin wraps, waffle wraps...  These are all incredibly useful.  Here is what I would recommend - again, remembering that Tabitha was born in the colder months:

• A couple of 'waffle blankets'.  These are similar in weight to a traditional flannel bunny rug, but I think they are superior for wrapping, as they have a slight stretch to them, which allows them to wrap closely and firmly to the baby, and not come untucked too easily.  You want a decent size - a metre square or so is good.  Waffle blankets are also (thanks to their raised square pattern) warmer than most similar weight baby blankets, without being too bulky.  A good quality waffle blanket is more expensive than a bunny rug, but they wash and wear really well and are much more durable.  We had three in regular rotation - two white and one pale pink.

• A few traditional flannelette bunny rugs.  Actually, we had more than a few!  In my pregnancy madness, I obsessively bought these.  It seems like every time I saw them for sale, I bought another one.  I think we had around 15.  No, I'm not joking...  Honestly, though, they were (and still are) darn useful.  I didn't use them to wrap Tabitha up all that much (I preferred the slight stretch of the waffle blankets, and most bunny rugs are too small to use for swaddling past the very early weeks) - but I did find them SO useful for just having around - throwing over her as another layer when asleep, putting under her on the carpet for tummy time, laying under her in case of vomit while I was feeding etc.  In truth, you can use cloth square nappies for most of this stuff, but having super-large versions was useful.  That said, you might find 3 or 4 useful - you probably don't need 15!

• Speaking of cloth square nappies...  A stack of flanellette flat nappies is always handy, for mopping up spills, catching errant breastmilk or wee, laying down under baby on the change table etc.  You can also get a packet of muslin square nappies (I got a pack of pink and white ones from Mothercare that were cheap and great quality) - I find I used them more, as they are softer.  I still use them all the time (on the change mat, catching breaskmilk leaks in the middle of the night while feeding).  I suggest about 5 - 10 of each sort.

• In terms of actual 'blankets', I cannot tell you how brilliant I found a large, square, plain old knitted blanket!  I used a pattern from my local wool shop, and knitted a couple of them in different colours.  It is the simplest pattern - cast on three stitches in 8 ply wool on a pair of 4.5 circular needles (80cm circulars).  Knit 3, then continue in plain knit, increasing on the third stitch of every row.  When you've used 5 balls of wool, start decreasing on the third stitch of every row, until you have 3 stitches left on the needles.  Cast off, sew in your ends.  This blanket ends up being around 80cm square, and is beautifully stretchy because it is sort of knitted on the 'bias'.  Actually - stay tuned, I'll do a proper post about it soon, with some photos.  It is the most wonderful blanket to have for a baby - warm, soft, stretchy and simple.  Any time we left the house in the cold, Tabitha had one of these tucked around her, over the top of her swaddling.

MY LIST

So - if I had my time again, what would my shopping list look like for the first 4 or so months?

• Around eight size 0000 jumpsuits and nighties, including one or two 'nice' ones for photos in the early days;
• Around 15 size 000 jumpsuits, with a couple of nighties, and a few 'nice' outfits with matching bib/hat;
• 5 size 000 size singlets;
• 3 beanie hats - one stretchy cotton, one light wool, and one chunkier woolen one;
• 10 bibs - cute ones, since they are on all the time, in all the photos.  Also, plain white bibs stain much quicker;
• Around 6 pairs of socks;
• One or two knitted jackets / cardigans in 000;
• A dozen muslin and/or flannel flat nappies for spills etc.;
• A few flannel bunny rugs;
• Two or three waffle blankets;
• One or two lovely knitted blankets;
• A few lightweight muslin wraps (like a bunny rug but made of sheer muslin, these are useful for wrapping and swaddling a baby in warmer weather or if you are somewhere heated indoors.

I'm sure I don't need to point out that everything needs to be washed before use - many clothing items and blankets have a chemical layer from manufacturing and processing, and who know what floors and surfaces these precious little jumpsuits have touched on their way to the shop?!  I set aside a couple of days and washed, dried and ironed every single item, from socks to bedlinen to dresses and jumpsuits.  It was actually fun to do - yes, ironing dozens of tiny singlets does seem like fun when you're pregnant, nesting and possibly a little crazy...

So.  That's a fair bit of information!  Soon I will post on the assorted 'stuff' babies need / don't need in the early months - furniture, nappies, prams and carriers, car seats, toys etc.

Maternity Clothes

Becoming pregnant can be sartorially daunting - maternity clothes tend to be unflattering, overpriced, and made of nasty fabrics.  My entire maternity wardrobe consisted of:

• A very flattering white shirtdress that tied at the back (I still wear this, it is good for breastfeeding, and people are always surprised when I reveal it is 'maternity wear').
  
• An identical shirtdress in a navy pinstripe.
  
• A 100 per cent silk long-line top in a beautiful blue and white swirly print, which tied at the back to add some shape and definition (wore this with leggings, jeans, and a tight black pencil skirt).  Here is a photo in the top - although it is not the top at its best, worn with jeans, rubber thongs and messy hair at the beach:
  
  
  

• A really brilliant Isabella Oliver wrap top.  I bought this in black AND purple, and wore them both to death - with jeans, and the black one worn with a fitted black skirt and heels was an excellent substitute for a Little Black Dress.  I wore the black one with lots of colourful Hermes, Pucci and Missoni scarves, and always felt well put-together.  These tops were also brilliant in the first couple of months post-partum - they wrap to fit the body, so will fit perfectly no matter what state your midsection is in, and they are just so easy to breastfeed in.  Here I am in the black wrap top, with a non-maternity stretchy tight skirt, at my godfather's 50th birthday:

• Maternity jeans - I bought two pairs (one straight leg, one skinny), both by Maternal America.  These fitted so brilliantly, and were dead comfy.  So many people commented, "wow I can't believe you're still in jeans!!" not realising that they were maternity jeans.  Little comments like this are lovely to hear when you've gained 20kg!
  
• A loose, oversized t-shirt style jersey dress in blue and white stripes.  It wasn't the most flattering piece in the wardrobe, but was so comfortable and fitted well from week 8 to the very end.  I wore it with leggings.
  
• Speaking of which - I bought three pairs of good quality maternity leggings.  Great decision, I don't think you can truly understand how bloody uncomfortable most clothes are until you are actually pregnant!
  
• I bought a lovely blue slinky jersey dress from Isabella Oliver for my baby shower.  It made me feel pretty and toned and curvy and was worth every cent - I also wore it to a couple of weddings at the end of the pregnancy.  Here I am with a friend at my baby shower.  Sorry, you can only see the top of the dress, but trust me that it is lovely.  I am 38 weeks pregnant here:

• I also bought a fairly unattractive red print dress.  I don't know why - I was getting desperate for clothes I could wear to meetings (my clients were surely getting sick of seeing me in the same two shirtdresses!), and it seemed okay in the store.  In reality, it made me feel fat and my arms look like giant sausages.  I didn't wear it much!

I also picked up a couple of non-maternity pieces:  some denim shorts, a nautical jersey t-shirt, a pretty crepe kaftan, a Ted Baker empire-line dress that I managed to squeeze into for the first few months.  These items were useful, but I cannot overemphasise how important comfort becomes towards the end, and if nothing else, maternity clothing tends to be designed for comfort.

I didn't discover Isabella Oliver until more than half way through the pregnancy, which is a dreadful shame -  I probably would have bought almost all of my maternity wardrobe from them if I had come across it earlier.  If you know any pregnant women, please direct them to the their website!

Because I am tallish, clothes that fitted fairly close to the body were generally most flattering during pregnancy - anything vaguely voluminous made me look like a circus tent.  More petite girls seem to get away with loose shift dresses and trapeze dresses over leggings.

I also bought lots of nice maternity underwear - mostly from Cake and Hot Milk.  This is useful in avoiding feeling like a frumpy beached whale.

One of my most beloved maternity buys was, in fact, a non-maternity nightgown from Country Road.  Over summer, it was all I wore around the house, and felt perfectly comfortable no matter how enormous I became.  Here it is - I'm around 34 weeks here.  You can see our decking, half-built, in the background.  We had renovations (decking and wardrobes) going on almost until D Day.  I do not recommend this.  Doesn't it look like I have a full sized beach ball in there?!  Tabitha was a regular sized baby, around 3.5kg.  Which means I put on roughly 16.5kg of non-baby weight!

Sigh.  Looking through these photos, I am looking forward to being pregnant again.  Despite feeling mighty uncomfortable for most of the time, and dreadfully ill for the first few months, it was still, overall, a wonderful time.  I was in complete awe over just what the female body is capable of.

Pinky McKay

Do you know about Pinky McKay?  She is the author of some of my favourite parenting books - if you know someone who is expecting, or has a newborn, a Pinky book is such a beautiful, loving gift.  HERE is a list of Pinky's top tips for helping babies to sleep, well worth a gander.

Tabitha and I went along to the launch of Pinky's latest book, Parenting by Heart.  Pinky spoke for a bit about how important it is for mothers to always listen to their own instincts, and to their babies.  I read three of Pinky's books while I was pregnant, and I felt so prepared for the baby, knowing that as long as I always made decisions out of love, I would never make the 'wrong' parenting decision.

100 Ways to Calm the Crying is a brilliant book - particularly when pregnant, it is such a reassuring read.  It is highly empowering to feel that, no matter what, you will be able to soothe and calm your newborn.  Loads of the tips and techniques from this book are part of our everyday routine, and were particularly useful in the early weeks (newborns do tend to have spells in the evening of Just Crying, no matter what - my midwife constantly reassured me that this was perfectly normal, and at least by utalising some of Pinky's techniques, I felt vaguely useful!)

Sleeping Like a Baby is another winner.  This book helped us learn to 'read' Tabitha's cues, and learn to respond to her.   HERE is an excerpt from this book.

Parenting by Heart, the latest of her books, is a re-release of a previous version.  It has been updated and extended, and is now pretty much a 'how to' manual for the first year of a baby's life.  Parenting by Heart, along with a subscription to the Australian Breastfeeding Association, are my baby shower presents of choice!

I cannot recommend Pinky's books highly enough - everyone I know who has read any of her work raves about her.

Here is a photo of Tabitha and I with Pinky McKay.  'Scuse the cheesy smile:

Miss Kitty-Cat does a Giveaway...

My gorgeous, talented, amusing and fashionable friend, Miss Kitty-Cat, is doing a fabulous giveaway over at her blog Miss Kitty-Cat Goes To Town.  Do drop over and have a look - but no more people asking for the scarf please!

While you are there, look at her top ten clothing staples post, it is most useful.

First Rule of Baby

Do you know the First Rule of Baby?

It is:  A baby will ONLY sleep for a glorious, extra-long, refreshing nap when its mother is DESPERATE to leave the house on time for an appointment.  The chance of this long sleep occurring increases exponentially directly related to the 'me time' nature of the appointment - e.g. a long sleep is far more likely to occur when mumma is planning to catch up with a friend or have a manicure.

A baby will NEVER sleep for more than the usual minimum when its mumma is exhausted and just wants to curl up with a book and a cup of tea.  As soon as the baby hears the kettle boil or a book page turn, it will wake immediately.

The Second Rule of Baby is:

No matter how agonisingly clingy and grizzly the baby has been during the day (involving going to the toilet while holding baby, making and eating lunch with baby under one arm, and sitting on the floor while poor baby gouges mumma's eyes just to keep it happy) - as SOON as Dada walks in the door, baby is a bundle of radiant sunshine!  Laughing, clapping, batting eyelashes, and perfectly content to sit by herself and play with blocks on the floor.

The Third Rule of Baby is:

No matter what baby does (biting mumma's cheek, pulling hair for hours, refusing to nap, vomiting all over mumma for no apparent reason), the mumma always, always, always COMPLETELY adores baby.  Only a lovesick mumma can smile adoringly at rabid baby while it tries to climb up her hair.  Thankfully, this Third Rule of Baby overrides all the other Rules.

Awwww look at those pudgy arms!  I want to nibble them!

Behold the delight of baby Tabitha learning about the feeling of grass between her toes - kept her giggling with joy for a good ten minutes...

Today we had a busy day!  Nap from 8:30am - 10am, then off to swimming lessons ("you put your right arm in, you put your right arm in, you put your right arm in and you splash it all around..."), then chiropractor (for Tabitha AND Mumma), then off to Chadstone to meet up with some gorgeous mums and babies.  Tabitha loves other babies, but tends to kill them with kindness - she crawls up to them, then ON to them, then grabs great big handfulls of clothes/hair/face to squeeze and cuddle.  So I have to keep a hand at the ready at all times!

One of the other babies got a good handful of Tabitha's hair, which has never happened before, and boy did she cry!  "SQUEEEEEAAAAAAAAWAAWAAAWAAA" she called, until I scooped her up for cuddles.  Ahhh, babies...

Then we came home for her last nap, read a Jemima Puddleduck book, then off to bed.

Here are two cute photos of Tabitha eating lunch from yesterday.  You will note that I "double bib" her.  This is a good tip for Baby-Led Weaning - the long sleeve bib stops her arms getting covered in grease/sauce/mush, while the plastic 'pelican bib' catches any solid bits that fall straight down, for easy retrieval.  The long-sleeve bibs go in the washing machine with the cloth nappies, and the pelican bibs go in the dishwasher.  We have around five of each.

The best long-sleeve bibs I have found for Baby-Led Weaning are the Silly Billyz brand - because they come in a 'Small' size, which is nearly tiny enough for a 6 - 10 month old baby (with the sleeves rolled up once).  Because babies fed on purees don't start really feeding themselves until around a year of age, most 'sleeve bibs' are just massive.  The Silly Billyz bibs are available online, and I've also purchased them from Parenthood in Malvern (which is a fabulous baby store).

As I was taking her photo, she bit her finger by mistake.  Ouch!  It is so sad seeing her cry, but it is also oh-so-cute...  poor little baby:

Because she eats such little amounts for lunch and dinner, I buy or cook a large serving or batch, then individually wrap up each serving (each serve is enough for Tabitha, plus a little for me to nibble on too - this is important, because it is best to sit and eat with the baby, so that they learn to eat by mimicking.  They also, of course, enjoy the company).

I keep a whole stash of these little portions in the freezer.  All sorts of meals, for plenty of variety.  Below, you can see:  organic beef schnitzel pieces; lovely spinach and ricotta filled pasta from Yarra Valley Dairy (to serve with fresh basil pesto, a favourite); a veggieburger (75 per cent vegetables with whole wheat flour); and two homemade date scones.  Often she eats what we have for dinner, and if I am out for lunch, I order something for her off the menu.  But having a really decent freezer stash of healthy portioned meals comes in handy - otherwise it's easy to end up feeding her toast all day!

Here is her beef schnitzel lunch - those pieces are each about the size of my palm.  One gets cut into a few strips for Tabitha, and the other goes in a sandwich for my own lunch:

 

The Daddy often doesn't get home until well after 7pm, even 8pm, so on some nights I eat dinner with Tabitha, and on other nights I eat dinner with him.

Photos from the weekend.

I mentioned that one of my closest friends came over on the weekend and took some photos.  She is doing a part-time photography course - her mother is an artist, and I think some of her artistic eye has rubbed off on Ruby.

We will certainly be having a couple of these ones framed for the living room.  I think they are very cute, but I know I am biased...

Here are a couple of Tabitha hanging out in her cot.  By the way, something terribly cute happened this morning - after she woke up from her morning nap, I could hear her awake in her cot, but she sounded perfectly happy.  About 15 or so minutes later, she was still chatting to herself, so I thought I had better go check on her - she was sitting up in her cot, practicing her newest skill, clapping!  She had been sitting there clapping and smiling to herself for 15 minutes.  Awww.

How funny is her hair?!  It is like that naturally - she has a double crown at the back, so her hair grows into a little mohawk.  I call it her 'cocky crest':

Tabitha has loved to be hung upside down ever since we first tried it at Gymbaroo when she was a few months old.  She grins and squeals with laughter - and tries to bite my nose!

Tabby is making a funny face - "oh mumma stop it with these endless kisses!"

Here is The Daddy taking her outside through her nursery doors:

 I have no idea what sort of lens this is but it's a fun photo - The Daddy, Tabitha, myself, and Ruby's lovely legs and impressive biker boots:

More cot cuteness:

Another funny face - grrrrrrrrrr!

Here is a nice photo of The Daddy and Tabitha in the backyard:

 Tabitha playing with her tongue:

Trying to snatch the camera!

Drool.  This is gross, I think, unless it's your own baby.  Then it is Super Cute:

What is this face?!

Peering down at everyone - she looks like a funny little baby space creature.  I like it!

And one of my favourite photos of her and I so far:

Thanks Ruby for taking some really, really beautiful photos!  You can check out Ruby's Tumblr photo blog here - there are some photos of Tabitha a couple of pages in.