When I smell like milk 2

A very kind and gracious friend of mine has just told me that she does not notice my milk smell, so that's a relief! She says her baby smells like milk. Sadly, Salma has stopped smelling like milk. She just smells like a Poppet Cuk. ;)

When I smell like milk

Sometimes in a disturbing way, I notice that I smell like milk. It used to be worse when Salma was a newborn, but nowadays if I don't pump, I will notice that towards the afternoon, I will end up smelling like milk. The scent is very subtle to me, but I wonder if others find it strong and are bothered by it! Or is it only me and baby that can smell the milk? It is weirdly disturbing, and I cannot help feel self-conscious about it, especially in the office.

Sometimes the smell doesn't go away even after I pump, which makes me even more uncomfortable. I wonder if it has any effect on others at all? And it is quite strange in a funny way, the way my baby girl gets excited to nurse after a whole day of not seeing me. She will even start to laugh. Then she will fall right asleep after nursing for half an hour or so.

I hope it is the same today, because I am on sick leave, and I have not pumped the whole day. So I hope she goes right to bed when I nurse her later this evening after picking her up. Then I can rest somemore. I don't sleep well when I'm sick. Do you?

Vocabulary

When Salma learns a new word, she will say it over and over. Her new word now is "rabbit". Sometimes she will leave out the "R" and say "abbit". Last night it was always "rabbit rabbit rabbit". And then a few times it was "rabbit rabbit baby". Because now she knows how to say "baby", too.

At first I thought she's just picking up on the sounds, and that she doesn't yet know how to put the word and the meaning together. But apparently, she does. Because... well... I was reading to her a book, "Rainy Day", and the main characters in the book were 3 little children - one little girl, and two little boys. Each time she will point to the picture of the little kids and say, "baby". And I will say, "No, not baby, 'little girl' and 'little boy'." So... she knows that "baby" is a small child, but does not yet know that babies are only applicable for children ages 1 and below. Because ages 1 and above is technically a toddler right? But she gets the point. There were pictures of dogs and cats, but she didn't point to them and say "Baby".

In school, they call her "baby salma". And they call the other babies the same way, so she has gotten to understand that her other friends are all "babies". Which is why when she sees another baby, she will turn to me and say, "baby". And I will reward her by clapping hands and say, "Yes, baby! Clever girl!" And she will clap her hands and say "yay!". Hehehe

When we got to school this morning, I asked her, "Mana rabbit?" ("Where's the rabbit?"), and she looked to the caged rabbits in the corner, and said, "abbit!" So she knows, the animals in the cages at the front of the school are rabbits. But I'm not sure whether she can tell the difference between a rabbit and another animal. But at least she knows that a rabbit is an animal and not human.

The one word that I'm not sure she knows the meaning of is "habis" ("finished"). She will say "abish" even when she's not done yet, so maybe because it's not a noun, it's a little more difficult for her to fathom? Not sure. At the moment, "habis" is the first verb she's learned. Everything else is a noun: mama, papa, baby, rabbit. Oh and 'bye-bye'.. but that's not a noun. I don't know what it is...

Drinking Problem

How do I get Salma to drink more water? She can drink from a straw now and I bought a cup that comes with a straw and a cover (by Pigeon), and she will drink, but after a few sips, she's done and loses interest easily. I'm starting to worry that she's getting dehydrated because her urine has this unusually strong smell. When we were kids, our parents use to give us water with glucose, but I'm told that it's not necessary to do that, because we may unnaturally increase baby's glucose levels and she can become diabetic. I don't even know if this part is true. But will adding a little glucose powder to water make it more attractive for my baby to drink? I really don't want her to prefer sweet things over other flavors.

She has also taken this separation anxiety to another level. When previously she used to wake up once or twice a night, she now wakes up about 4 to 5 times. And sometimes I think she wakes up just to make me reposition her to the other side of the bed (she sleeps with me). I have tried ignoring her to see if she falls back asleep on her own, but she will kick me, pat my face or pull my hair to get me to wake up. It is starting to drain my energy! When I get to work the next day, I will 98% of the time, walk in with a headache due to lack of sleep. Then I'll need a really good pick me up, and I have started craving for sugary foods. Coffee does nothing for me.

She's a happy baby most of the time... most of the time when I am beside her! haha. I really want her to spend more time with her dad & grandparents without me being round. But she'll start demanding for me to be there the second I leave sometimes. I don't know how long this separation anxiety will last. And I hate it how my husband says I "trained her" to be like this. This is not what I wanted. All the experts say that it's best to comfort your baby when she cries, and that's what I've been doing. Leaving them to cry on their own will cause them to have low self-confidence issues later in childhood. And on that note, I think in terms of confidence, she has lots of it, and does pretty well in school... interaction with others, playing, talking, etc.

I've seen those babies that are really shy and quiet and don't want to play with other kids and I'm glad Salma isn't like that.

Make-up routine

Like other working moms who send their kids to school in the morning, I don't have time to put on my make-up before I leave the house. So I do it when I get to work, usually after eating breakfast. And usually there are one or two other moms taking up the mirror space in the washroom with me, and we all share a laugh with one another when we're doing this routine. There is one working mom who works downstairs that sometimes comes in at lunch time, and she's putting her make-up on then! And when I say 'routine' I'm not just talking about foundation/powder, lipstick, I'm talking about the whole toner, lotion, face-blotter, foundation, powder, blusher, eye-liner, mascara, lipstick. This is the routine the mom downstairs does. And she does it in less than 10 mins too. Or maybe 15. If I pull this same routine, it would probably take me half an hour. My routine is just lotion, powder-foundation, liquid blusher, tudung, lipstick.

One time, me and another mom (Ms. Tan) were doing our morning make-up routine and this blue-eyed young girl was intently watching me put on my blusher (Benefit's Benetint) and as I was dabbing the brush on my cheek and then blending it with my thumb, she asked me, "Are you sure you're supposed to do that?" Me and Ms. Tan stood there for awhile gawking at her with our mouths open until I replied, "Err, yeah... it's a cheek stain." And then the funny part comes next, where the girl replies, "I don't think you're supposed to do that," and stomps out of the bathroom. Me and Ms. Tan start laughing our asses off and couldn't finish our routine until many minutes later. We thought it was so funny, we did that trailing laugh, "hahahahha...ehahaheeee.. eheeee... eheee..." and Ms. Tan couldn't apply her mascara because tears were coming out.

Another colleague of mine, who was not a mom, was standing by the tissue-paper dispenser and was smiling at the whole thing and said, "I guess it's strange to see the way other ppl put on make up!"

And I couldn't agree more! Before I became a mom, I used to think it was so weird (in an interesting way) the way the mom downstairs would perform her make-up routine. She calls it "putting on her face", which funnily enough is the same term my mother uses. Mom downstairs is forty-ish, and has long brown, wavy, bouncy hair, and dresses really hip. She has pretty good skin and is proud about not doing botox. And before I became a mom, I thought it was so funny the way she would do her whole entire make-up routine, right down to putting on the towel-hairband to push her hair back from her face so she can apply her face lotion. But now I understand. Because a woman still has to look good. And if you can't do it at home, do it at office!

Child-proofing your home

Salma is now starting to be more mobile on her own. She has started to "crawl" by scooching her butt forward while she sits. If you don't know what 'scooching' is, it's like sliding but not. When she gets on her tummy, she doesn't really know how to crawl. She will push her butt up in the air, use her arms to lift her head and then do a little push up but that's it. She does a military-style crawl with her face pressed to the ground commando style, but it doesn't get her far. So we call her a lazy baby.

And I am kinda thankful that she's lazy to crawl so that I don't have to rush to child-proof my home. Cos she is not really crawling fast enough to have objects be a danger to her. The baby of a friend of mine has started crawling and has fallen off the bed twice because of it. She left her baby for 2 seconds to go wash her hands in the adjoining bathroom, and before she knew it her baby girl had crawled off the bed. In the morning, I have to do something similar with Salma. She will wake up earlier than me, and once I've nursed her, I'll leave her on the bed to take my shower. Sometimes I will leave her on the bed to play with a toy. Sometimes she will be lying down on her back, on her tummy or be sitting down. And every single time, she has not tried to crawl off the bed. So she's lazy that way. She has fallen off the bed once before, so maybe she remembered how dangerous it was, and just makes the effort not to repeat the same mistake?

Whatever it is, I will place barriers at the edge of the bed, and she has tried a couple of times to peer over the edge, but I'll place her back in the center.

We spend most of our play time on the floor though. And each time I will entreat her to crawl to me, but she will be very grumpy and hesitant about it and would rather I pick her up. I have seen her crawl at school though! Via their webcam, so I know she can do it! But she is just so plain lazy at home. It is almost as if she has a Type A personality in school, but a Type B personality at home. Which incidentally, is the same way I am! I am more Type A at work, and Type B at home. I think it's my upbringing though, because we've always had maids while I was growing up, so hence the Type B personality because I know someone will clean up after me. Which is why I make such a lousy cleaner-uppper. If I were a housewife, and my sole job was to take care of the house, then I think it would be different, because the house would then be my workplace and then I would be Type A there. Yeah, we had to take this survey at work during a Team Building once to find out what Type personalities we were, and everyone thought it was strange that I was Type B at home, because it was obvious that I was Type A at work. There are ppl that are Type B at work, but Type A at home, which makes more sense because they are "boss" at home.

I love taking personality tests. Hopefully, laziness is not part of Salma's personality. Hope that it's just her being cheeky.