5 Months Post Partum

Emilia is doing so well as a 5 months old baby. She's been turning and trying to speak in high-pitch, which is incredibly cute. As a matter of fact, I just found out that she can kind of sit on her own now. What a large stepping stone!  There is one downside though, as I am still feeding her breastmilk, as she gets older, her consumption also grows as well. So at night she will wake up 3-4 times out of hunger which makes it really difficult for me to go to work the next day. The pediatrician did mention that she can start having cereal when she's 6 month old, and that should help her to sleep through the night, but we will see. So far, I am pleased that she's on the right track.

Pool Day

The weather is really nice in Houston these days. It's getting warm, but not to the point that is blazing hot. Perfect day to take Emilia to go swimming! However, Emilia is kind of overwhelmed by the water and cried as soon as she gets dipped in the water.

Finishing up PhD

I'm so proud of my hubby finishing up his PhD. It's definitely been a long journey, but we are looking ahead. Ready for the new chapter in our life. California here we come!

4 Months Post Partum

Took Emilia to see the doctor for her 4 months checkup. She is doing fabulous! She weighs15.2 pounds and her height is on a 79 percentile range. Can't believe she's a tall baby. Pretty sure she didn't get that from me. Haha...

Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day everyone! This is my first mother's day and I'm truly blessed to have Emilia in my life. She brings so much joy to me everyday. I can't imagine living my life without her anymore. :) Enjoyed a nice brunch with my husband and mother-in-law at the Backstreet Café. Totally love their brunch menu. The crab cakes with scrambled eggs is to die for!

Working Mom

I'm not going to lie. Being a working mom is not a walk in the park. It's a lot of work and commitment, especially when you're going back to work as well as breastfeeding your baby. Luckily, I'm not alone out there. In the office, there's a mother room that is readily available to us and to my surprise, there's a few working mom out there who's doing the same thing as I am. Pump and work! I have to say, meeting these fantastic ladies just made my pumping session that more rewarding. This is us enjoying a good lunch!!! Cheers to us!!!

A Treat for the Moms

It's been a while since I had my hair dyed. Ever since I found out I was pregnant, which is a year ago, I refrained myself from dying my hair as I worry that it might be harmful to the baby. Then after the baby, I was just too busy and tired to even think about dying my hair. Luckily, my husband was nice enough to offer to watch the baby so that I can go out with my mom to relax and get a new treatment. What a sweetie.

 

 

 

 

 

Happy 3 Months Old

Took Emilia to get some photographs taken at Picture People today. That place gets pretty crowded on the weekend. Since they were so busy, the photographer didn't spend much time waiting for Emilia to smile at all, the end result is that she looked kind of upset in every single picture, so we ended up not picking any of the pictures. After the long wait at the photo studio, my hubby and I went home and took some pictures of Emilia. I'm pleased to say that the quality turned out to be pretty good. :)

11 Week Post Partum

The weather wasn't so nice this weekend, so our plan of visiting the park got canceled. Instead, my mom and I decided to go on a shopping spree and we found this cute little bunny hat and bib for Emilia. She looked so precious with it. Emilia is now able to lift up her head up and look around. Yeah!

Happy Bath Time, Emilia!

I love giving bath to Emilia. She always seem to enjoy it so much! There's many time where I catch her falling asleep in the tub, it is soooooooo cute!!!

 

 

Happy Birthday My Dear Mom and Hubby

Today is the last day before my sister goes back to Canada, since my mom and hubby's birthday are coming up and they're also very close together, we've decided to celebrate it together as a familly.






This cake is so yummy! Loving the taro flavor a lot!



My sister also got me some baby gifts for Emilia! So sweet!

I love this story book so much! It is so cute! Already read it once to little Emilia! :)

3 Week Post Partum

Emilia is 3 weeks old today. She eats about 8-9 times a day, roughly about 3.5oz per meal and have used lots of dirty diapers already. In addition, I have noticed that she doesn't really like using a pacifier. Everytime I put one in her mouth, she tries to spit it back out. Here's a picture of her swaddled up on a swing. She loves being on the swing with the ocean music turned on in the background.

What's also exciting is that my sister came from Canada to visit me and Emilia. It's so good to see her, it feels like forever. It's funny that she says that she can't believe I'm a mom now! Haha... She also recently got engaged over the New Year's eve. I'm so happy for her! 

2 Week Post Partum

Little Emilia is already 2 weeks old! She sleeps and eats a lot now! Every meal she can eat 3.5oz of breast milk! Good job my little princess! Hope that you grow fast and be a healthy happy baby!

There's five little babies that stays here at the Yue Zi Center. 4 girls and 1 boy. 

Here's Emilia's little bassinet

Little Emilia wants to play now, she is full of energy already by week 2

Labor and Delivery Story

Having my little one is simply the best experience I have ever encountered. My little darling is born on December 29th, 2013. It feels like I have been pregnant forever with her, as my due date was set to be between December 24-26th, my husband and I have been anxiously awaiting for her arrival since Christmas Eve. We've actually had our Christmas dinner early just in case we were going to spend Christmas at the hospital. :P

40 Weeks and 3 Days

Thinking about it now, it was kind of funny how I have felt like every night during my due date that the baby is going to be here. I would experience serious cramps on my right leg (Yes, just my right leg, my mom said that maybe something is wrong with my left leg, that's why I don't feel it. Haha...) and serious series of contractions. I think they were just Braxton Hicks contractions afterall, because the contractions I had on my actual delivery is WAY different. Instead of getting cramps on my legs, real contractions feels like pain in your abdonmin and back at the same time. (That's how it feels for me anyway)

On the special night, I was actually watching a movie with my husband at 11:00pm. My husband have pulled up a funny comedy for me to watch while we were sitting in bed. Suddenly, I feel a gush of liquid flowing down me. It was not a heavy gush, but it definitely wetted me and a little bit of my sheets. My husband was very anxious, but I kept telling him that I might have just peed myself, even though I didn't think so. I was just so afraid of the disappointment again, since on previous nights I already have a series of braxton hick contractions. Nevertheless, I still decided to start packing up my essentials. I have already prepared a bag for the baby and myself, but there were still items that I was using that I haven't packed yet. At the meantime, my husband was researching online and found out that it's essential for us to rush to the hospital just in case something goes wrong with the baby. He thinks that it's a high possibility that my water broke, so I immediately called my OB at 11:06pm and have reached the on-call doctor for my OB. He told me to go the hospital immediately and so I woke my mom up and the three of us started heading towards the hospital. It's funny that my mom kept mentioning if we stop by McDonald's on our way. :)

Once we arrived, my husband dropped me and my mom off first at the hospital's entrance. Since it was late, we were stopped by a man in front of the desk asking where we were going. I told him that my water broke and he said "Oh, congratulations! Go on!" Then we immediately went to look for the elevators that brings us to the 6th floor "Labor and Delivery". Once we arrived, the nurse took me into the room and checked if I indeed broke my water. She tested if the liquid in my body is indeed amniotic fluid by using a PH paper, which tests the PH level of the fluid. The first time, it was green, that means it was just urine. I can tell from the room atmosphere that we were all very disappointed, but the nurse suggested a re-test since I have went to the bathroom, the surface sample obtained might be just urine alone. She recommended to do another test, that pokes the paper further down to see if there's any amniotic fluid in there. This time around, it was blue color! Indeed, my water broke! We were so excited! The nurse starting hooking me up with an equipment that tracks the contractions in my body. I was having 8-10 minutes contractions apart, she then transferred me to another delivery room. (Room 602, a room I will forever remember)

I was having serious contractions as soon as I was hooked up to the machine. (What a coincidence! Considering I haven't felt the real contractions previously.) Around 6am, my nurse rotated her shift and my new nurse is now Victoria. She is a real funny, full of energy kind of character. She HIGHLY recommended me to take the epidural right away and suggested that it will probably stimulates my cervix to dilate even more if I'm relaxed. I took her recommendation and it is truly a heaven sent! The anaesthetician came to my room shortly afterwards and the funny thing is that he is also Chinese and grew up from the same place as my husband. ( What a small world! This is called faith I believe! ) Anyways, I was scared to death about the epidural. Since all I heard from my friends was that the actual epidural hurts more than labor itself, I was dreading the procedure, but knew I would rather have a short pain than a long constant pain from contractions. The anaesthetician first numbed the area of where needle will go, then he told me to arch my back and injected the epidural in me. I felt a sting, but it immediately went away. NOT BAD! I'm impressed! Very soon, I can feel numbess on my bottom and the contractions seemed to fade away! I'm in heaven again! :P

Right after my epidural, I felt so relaxed that I was able to catch a couple of hours of sleep. I even started to read "What to expect when you're expecting" just to prep myself for the push.

When I woke up from my nap, my mom asked me to check with the nurse to see how much I've dilated. To my surprise, I was already 9.5cm dilated! Wooo Hoo~~!!!! She then asked me to wait another hour or so to see if I can be fully dilated to 10cm before asking the doctor to come down to the hospital. After an hour or so, I start to feel serious contractions again. I started pressing on the epidural button every now and then, but it only allows a new dosage every 20 minutes or so, but for some reason, pressing that button seemed to relieve my anxiety quite a bit. Haha... My nurse came to check on me again after an hour is up, still 9.5cm, so she told me to push a little bit. I did as she said and immediately, I was 10cm dilated. Now, the doctor's on her way!

Before the doctor arrived, Victoria told me to start pushing. She told me to push when I start to have my contractions, with the count from 1 to 10, in a series of three. It was not as much pain as I imagined, but I definitely used up all my energy trying to push her out. At one point, I was thinking to myself that I'm just to tired to continue pushing this baby. Magically, the idea of having a c-section gave me the nudge to continue pushing her. After an hour or so of pushing, my darling girl Emilia is finally here. She weighs 8.1 pounds at birth and have a high 99/100 Apgar rating. It was a real special moment when the nurse put her on my chest, instantly I can feel a strong connection with her.




Welcome my little darling!

 



Mommy's princess





Daddy's Little Girl





Emilia with nana



I was discharged out of the hospital on January 31st. My husband and my mom sent me to the Yue Zi center that day. I was a little sad, since I haven't parted with my husband in a long time and I really wanted to spend New Year's Eve with my family. :( Nevertheless, it is still a great way to end 2013 with Emilia introduced to my life. Wishing you all a Happy New Year!!!!!!!