Emma's toddlerhood #1

Statistics: Emma is currently 8kg. She was unwell for almost 3 weeks and has lost some weight. Not exactly related to her statistics, but anyway, she has shaved her head for the 2^nd time. It am no longer upset now as her hair is sprouting out fast and even!

Health: She has grown another 2 teeth, each on the upper and lower. This makes up to a total of 8 teeth.

We are glad that she is finally all well and off antibiotics after almost 3-week long of sickness battle.

We brought Emma for her dreadful pneumococcal and mmr jabs on Saturday, few days after she turned 1.

1. She was slightly warm and lethargic after the jabs. She vomited twice on the day of jab and once the following day. I wondered if it was due to the jabs or was it because of the formula milk that I started her 2 days before the jabs. Hence, I stopped the fm after 4 days and she got well on Mon.

2^. As expected, it followed with fever from MMR a week after the jab. Fever went as high as 38.4 degree C and it fluctuated for a couple of days. We gave paracetamol when her temperature went up to 38.2 degree C. She ended up with some cough and runny nose. She vomited a few more times when she coughed. I diffused essential oils and brewed some chinese medicine soup for her on Saturday. She eventually recovered without medication on Sunday.  

3. With all the discomfort, Emma has been sucking her thumb more and another mishap strike. Emma was hospitalised for cellitisis and abscess. Read more here.

Diet: Her feeding routine is still the same – 4 times solid and 4 milk feeds. She has been eating much more after she got well. Look like she is trying to make up for her weight loss. I finally made veg stocks from my favourites – corns, carrot, potatoes and pork. It tastes really yummy!

I introduced fm (Frisco) right after she turned 1. She took it well and I was so happy. I started off with one feed a day - 30ml of fm in a bottle and topped up with another bottle of bm. Thereafter, I increased 30ml daily for her morning feed. So all in all, she has taken 300ml over the 4 days and I stopped as I wasn’t sure if the vomiting is from the jabs or fm.

Now that she is well, I had reintroduced fm again. Hope to share some success story next month!  

Sleep: So much for a 11 months of good nights, Emma started to wake up once/sometimes twice at night and earlier than before after we stopped her from sucking her thumb 2 weeks ago. For slightly more than a week, especially at the hospital, I need to carry her to sleep. These few nights are full with hits and misses - on good nights I could put her in her cot and accompany her till she fall asleep at around 9+pm or we got to carry her to sleep.

Social/Outing: We went to the S.E.A aquarium for her birthday celebration. She was pretty amazed by the sharks and had fun practising her walking. The aquarium trip makes me miss our Okinawa holiday so much!

Other than going to church and parents’ places, we also had our first 4d3n “staycation” at NUH. ;P Glad that she was feeling fine throughout the stay.

Activities/Milestones: She is growing so fast and picking up many new tricks and skills.

We are impressed at the rate she learnt to walk, she is walking rather steadily and over a longer distance like the entire living hall. She walks alot now and rarely goes on her fours other than getting down the steps between kitchen and living hall. She loves walking around to explore the house.

We left a kitchen drawer that has all the relatively safe household stuffs like tissue box, cotton pads and cloth “unlocked” so that she could entertain herself while I get busy in the kitchen. She learns to open and close the drawer without getting her fingers jammed. She is also gaining greater control over her fingers. She is able to peel stickers, her dried skin from her thumb, grab spoon to feed herself/us at play and doodle on pen too.

She is getting really loving and sweet. I love to have her walking into my arms for a cuddle. Just last weekends, I asked for a kiss and she gave me a speck on my mouth (Awww)! Besides, she is more cheery and cheeky. Simple things like the word “aiyo” makes her laugh. She would even lean her body forward and laugh with both of hands covering her mouth. Lol. She makes fish mouths and blows bubbles.

But she does get frustrated when we remove her stuffs from her hands and after a long period in high chair. I believe that there are more to come as she grows up and develops her mind of her own. Prays that we are able to teach and discipline her well.

Her vocabulary is expanding. She has greater understanding of what's happening around and could follow some instructions. She said more words like bear, up, down, 站, 坐, "amen" and "ok". She “dances” to songs - wheels on the bus and row row your boat. Her eyes lighten up when she see our belly buttons. She look at her belly button when we say bi zai. She kisses, give flying kisses and head bumps when asked to. She look up and down when we show her up and down. She still loves waving, clapping and tipping fingers.

Mummy’s update: Following last month’s update, my throat has finally recovered after 3 weeks. However, I (and hubby) suffered from food poisoning/stomach flu with diarrhea and vomiting the same time got unwell from the jabs. Too much of sickness around lately, I pray for good health! Am now 3kg below pre pregnancy and wow, I never thought I could go back to my wedding weight. However, I am not very happy (yes, for the very first time) with this weight loss as I am feeling a little weak. In the meantime, I am wishing that Emma could wean off thumb and breastmilk soon! ;D