Liana at three weeks

Here's our girl relaxing in her rocker before her evening walk. For the past week she has been a big feeding binge. She always seemed to be hungry. Today she's very mellow and sleeping a lot. Possible growth spurt might be on the way.

Pudding hiding out

Ever since we brought Liana home, Pudding has been spending a lot more time in the cubby hole of his cat tree. We think Liana intimidates him. He has never met anything noisier than him.

baby on the go

Here in Singapore woman practice confinement the first month their baby is born. During confinement, neither the mother nor the baby leaves the house unless there is a very good reason like seeing a pediatrician. Mothers also eat special food like herbal soup and dishes with lots of young ginger. Some mothers don't even shower during confinement. Instead they take sponge baths.

I've been taking Liana out every day. People always ask the typical baby questions -- boy or girl? how old? When I say that she's three weeks, people are suprised, especially the Chinese, that she is out of the house so young.

Liana goes with me shopping, to places of officialdom like the embassy and Immigration Authority and to the park. We go to the park everyday. I think that she's the better for it. She's often fussy in the late afternoon (but not colicky, thank goodness). But when I pop her into the baby bjorn and go out for a 30 minute walk, she settles down, relaxes and then goes to sleep. Our walks make the evening much calmer.

Getting stronger

People told me that newborns change quickly but I was not expecting so many changes with Liana within just a week. Already she has become much more adept at using her body. She is more able to get her mouth in the correct position for breast feeding and she can grip things much more tightly. She can also show her emotions more readily on her face and her eyes are focused most of the time (when they are open.) I know it has been said by probably every mother, but I have to put it in my blog. Sometimes the trite expressions sum things up the best. Babies are truly wondrous little beings.

Liana meets the world

After a bit of a delay, our daughter arrived on September 4, 2009 at 2:08 pm. At birth she's 3.55kg or 7.8lbs and 53 cm or 20.9in. She's healthy and a very good eater. She's already putting on weight and is much stronger. She's also acquired new expressions. At first she had only two expressions -- surprised and furious. Now she has a range -- surprised, furious, blissfully milk drunk, intent and happy. Most of the pictures below were taken the first few days.

With Grandma Jo

Dara, Liana and Leo

Kid, this is sunshine

Leo and I visited the doctor today. The baby is doing very well but is not really indicating a strong desire to come out and see the world so we scheduled an induction for Friday morning. Ready or not, kid you are going to see the sunshine by the weekend.

As part of the check, the doctor checked the baby's heartbeat with the CTG machine. The machine tracks contractions at the same time. In the 30 minutes the machine measured the baby's heartbeat, I had 4 contractions. I didn't even know I was having contractions. I asked Leo to tell me when the contraction line spiked so that I could know what they felt like -- nothing at all like what I expected or how others described it. It felt like the squeeze from a blood pressure cuff except that the squeeze moved from my midsection down to my pelvis. No doubt they will get more intense. However, I'm glad that something is happening.

Still waiting

I keep thinking that I will have some big news to post on the blog... but the baby has not decided it's time. Tomorrow we are going to the doctor to discuss what happens next.

The good part is that my mom is arriving tonight and can be at the birth.