Just the Girls

Em and I spent four days on our own while daddy went out of town. While I'm sure Em noticed daddy was not home through her constant looking around for him, she was on her best behavior.. mostly.


We stuck to her normal schedule, playing with toys, tummy time, and lots of rolling around.







She tries to roll everywhere - on the changing table, swaddled in bed, etc., so now it's an absolute to keep an eye and hand on her at all times.


In fact, she loves being on her tummy so much that bedtime has become a little difficult lately. She will roll over even when swaddled and sometimes on an off night, she'll struggle so hard that she'll break free of her swaddle and somehow manage to mangle her neatly combed hair. Must say.. this girl has determination. This is how I found her one morning... not the little baby burrito that she initially was.


The family was also in town, so Em and I got a chance to go out and spend some time with Grandma, Grandpa, aunts, uncles, and her cousins.



Em had a great time, and I had got a few hours of babysitting help.

Em and Grandpa napping

Exponential Neuron Acceleration

Em has a whole new world she is discovering! And it is so exciting to be a part of! She helps me put into perspective about all the little things I do everyday and don't even think about, like things that she is excitedly learning to do. And every day, she is getting better at everything.. hand eye coordination, balance, motion, etc. Man, I wish my learning ability is as exponential as hers right now!!

While she hasn't mastered all things yet, she's definitely a young Jedi in training. Here she tries to will herself forward and only a portion of her moved.



Despite not being able to reach her toys on her own, Em is still a happy baby. Of course part of it is learning that she doesn't need to reach the toys on her own, but to train momma and poppa. It's amazing at how much a non-talking, sound-making baby can communication. She has momma trained with her every noise and she knows how to use it well! Here is Em communicating and playing with her toys with full attention from momma and poppa.



She has a wide range of expressions, and also multi-pitches of noise from happy squeals of joy to neighing horse-grunts to the oh-so-cute barely audible baby coos.

Squeals of Joy

Tummy time is not a problem for little Ms. Em anymore. In fact, she has learned that she gets the attention of all her little pal toys when she is on tummy time.

Commander and Chief of Her Army

All in all, momma, dadda, bebe, and toys are having good times! This age is fun. =)

A pro at tummy time!

Oh where, oh where, to find our baby care?!

We've been quiet on the blog for a bit, not intentionally as Em's development right now is exponential! Frankly, time has just whizzed by, and Ryan and I are still trying to catch up to it! =P

I have been back to work for a month now and while transition period should be over, it feels like Ryan and I are still mad in the midst of transitioning. Additional time seems non-existent and getting all the work, sleep, chores, family, personal things done is a rather delicate balance and currently not even at a 50% achievement yet.

Understandable, Ryan and I have been juggling with Em's childcare for the past two months as well. We have interviewed 9, yes.. 9 different childcare potentials ranging from in-home private nannies to home daycare to well-known and pricey institutional centers. I thought it would be an easy process... but alas, the new parents' wishful thinking. We started off looking for nannies with the notion that since daddy works at home, he could check in on Em anytime. Also an in-home nanny could help with light housework. We found a motivated, less experienced child development major nanny whom we thought we could train. While she definitely tried to take care of Em the way we asked her to, Ryan found himself checking in on Em pretty much the whole time. After 3 weeks of trial period with lots of crying from Em, no work being done by Ryan, and paranoid momma still feeling paranoid, we decided to move on to the next option.

We interviewed a few more people for in-home nanny positions and I was quite disappointed to not find one that fit our requirements. I want to differentiate between a nanny and a baby-sitter. A nanny is someone that specializes in the profession of childcare --> knows about child development and has certifications for CPR/First Aid, etc. Pretty much an expert that should know more than first-time parents. Not that I was expecting Mary Poppins, but I was expecting someone that is as up to date as Ryan and I on baby knowledge and knows how to implement. One such example would be the importance of crawling before walking. While it is a debatable topic, we would still want to encourage Em to learn to crawl. And on that note, we are against the uses of a walker as that is statistically shown to impede development. Anyways, yes, we expect a childcare professional to be up-to-date on baby developmental studies and news.

Maybe our expectations are too high. The in-home nanny search resulted in a few grandmothers and a former au-pair. While experienced with babies and children, they lacked the child development knowledge. We did try to do a test run day with the former au-pair, but she ended up being a no show. Then we checked out a couple home day-cares, where they showed us their vast arrays of high-chairs, bouncers, swings, and of course walkers. We knew what that meant... Em would reside in a device all day among the 5:1 ratio of toddlers to care provider. She would not like that as Em loves personal attention. Next we visited three established, highly-rated institutional day-cares, KinderCare, InteliChild, and Discovery Isle. I felt not as paranoid with a structured institution that has checks and balances on the safety of my child and a developmental road map plan, at least shown on paper. The only thing I did not like, again, was the ratio of 4 babies/infants to every 1 child-care provider. With time running out on our end (Grandma was helping out with Em during this process), it looked like the institutional day-care would have to be the acceptable solution.

A twist of good fortune came our way though. Ryan had been carousing a site with listings for available child-care and came across a modern-day Mary Poppins. Yes! I did say a modern day Mary Poppins. A lady with a passion for young children, and no, not for the next pot of Hasel & Gretel soup! Child care is her hobby and not a means for living, as she has cared for over 80 babies including being a foster parent to some. She sounded too good to be true. There were several interviews, extensive background checks, references, web searches and everything!

.........

Now to current time, Em has been really enjoying her time away from home. Instead of child-care, she gets straight up Em-care with full one-on-one attention from someone that has the natural ability to calm and soothe her and experience and knowledge to ease momma's worries. Em-care gives updates every day. The other day Em experienced seeing real ducks in the park. Just yesterday, Em receiving a baby spa treatment - with a relaxing bath and baby massage. Momma picked Em up decked in a "mommy loves me" onesie with no more mohawk, but a pretty pink bow in her neatly combed hair.

Daddy hears less crying during the day. Momma worries less. Em is happy... and so are we. =)