Lil penguin| 11th month
1 more month to go before she turns 1!! OMG, where did all those months went to???
She isn’t that helpless fragile baby I once held in my arms anymore, every single day she gets much more daring and independent (still needy mostly but oh well).
Being with her everyday makes time feel almost non-existent at some point, constantly asking myself “eh, what day/ date is today ah”. It so severe that I can’t even remember when are the trash collection days XD So a note to self, leave the house more often and try to reconnect with the outside world instead of staying cooped up inside all day if I can help it.
You know how some people are just lucky that one day their little bundle of joy decides to just sleep through the night (STTN), instead of thanking the heavens; you see these moms post online asking if it’s normal, should they wake the baby to feed. Lady..please i WISHED my kid does that so I don’t have to go through the trouble of sleep training. Ugh.
At 11 months even after almost 2 months of weaning off the oppai, lil penguin still wasn’t ready to sleep through the night. Oh and she now looks at my oppai, tries to pinch and “pretend to bite” while laughing because she thinks it’s funny. Such a weird kid lol.
Though the danna took over putting her to bed and doing her night feeds (up to 2-4 times a night), we could see that it’s starting to take a toll on both him and me because lil penguin isn’t well rested at night so she gets super irritated during the day, refusing naps and all. The most she would nap is probably 10 mins and go about playing and crying the whole day. Trust me, this kind of endless wailing scenario is enough to drive any sane person insane. Both of us were physically and mentally exhausted, nothing we did seem to help with the situation and just trying to “survive” this stage alone isn’t a strong mental foundation both of us can rely on because we are both at our wits end that it starting affecting our relationship. No joke, children can seriously test your marriage at some point.
I remember ranting out on my IG stories before and the heavens must have read my story (who knows they might be so advanced up there lol) or something to send a senpai mama friend my way. She shared tons of useful website links and advises on sleep training, even a difficult child like lil penguin can be trained. It just requires more patience than usual and consistency.
It doesn’t necessarily work for every baby, so you’ll need to test every single one of it to rule out. So happened my 2nd daughter seems more immune to the “gentler” methods. You need to be strict with her or else she’ll take everything as playtime.
If it wasn’t for those sleep training links and comforting messages, I think I might not be here typing this out today. Not going to mask the fact that this part of baby raising is freaking hard, I know there are more to come and it should be a fact ingrained in my brain by now but somehow when it does come, I still feel as if I’ve been caught off guard. Why is that every single time?? Anyone feeling this way as well?
Sleep Training
Having set a “rough” routine for lil penguin, the “awake” window should not be passed 3 hours or she will get too tired and irritated to sleep and nap at least 2-3 times during the day so she can sleep longer at night did help a lot. During this stage the thought of let them “play until they are exhausted” doesn’t apply because a baby’s brain isn’t wired to sleep immediately after playtime, they are still too excited (and overstimulated) hence they’ll fight through their yawns. Totally makes a lot of sense now.
At home it’s easy to control the environment she is in, so she falls asleep faster but when she is out could see her naps are cut short from usual 2 hr to 30 mins-1 hr instead. This really affects her mood, she would get super cranky due to the tiredness.
After almost a month of training, we could see a tremendous improvement in her mood; she wakes up happy in the morning thanks to the 10- 12hour night rest. Some rare occasions she still wakes up once at night but it’s because she is thirsty or just needed her pacifier. During the day instead of wailing the whole day, I’m able to play and read to her and sometimes do some house chores together but best part of all, I finally have some “alone” time to get things done especially in between her naps and bedtime, it’s a huge blessing because before this I couldn’t even escape for 5 mins to do anything. Was literally stuck next to her all day trying all sorts of ways to comfort her to the extent of wearing out my sanity.
I don’t care what other moms think about me sleep training my kid, especially those who opt “they’ll do it when they are ready, don’t rush them”
Me: *inserts eye roll & sarcasm* Good luck with that lady.
It’s MY kid and my parenting choice which doesn’t affect anyone else but benefits my family overall so I’ll say yes to it. But really for sleep deprived moms out there; you might want to consider trying sleep training.
So that’s her major milestone for 11 months, finally sleeping through the night, YESSSS!
Monkey See Monkey Do
I did notice she was slowly trying to mimic everything we do, stuff like taking and putting stuff into the bag, opening and closing cupboards (while emptying its contents for ME to clean up later huh), she even figured out how to open and close the sliding door by just observing! She is now trying to figure out how to open the baby gate, so far she manages to close it but every attempt to open it has been unsuccessful so I hope it stays that way for both our sakes lol.
She isn’t that helpless fragile baby I once held in my arms anymore, every single day she gets much more daring and independent (still needy mostly but oh well).
Being with her everyday makes time feel almost non-existent at some point, constantly asking myself “eh, what day/ date is today ah”. It so severe that I can’t even remember when are the trash collection days XD So a note to self, leave the house more often and try to reconnect with the outside world instead of staying cooped up inside all day if I can help it.
You know how some people are just lucky that one day their little bundle of joy decides to just sleep through the night (STTN), instead of thanking the heavens; you see these moms post online asking if it’s normal, should they wake the baby to feed. Lady..please i WISHED my kid does that so I don’t have to go through the trouble of sleep training. Ugh.
At 11 months even after almost 2 months of weaning off the oppai, lil penguin still wasn’t ready to sleep through the night. Oh and she now looks at my oppai, tries to pinch and “pretend to bite” while laughing because she thinks it’s funny. Such a weird kid lol.
Though the danna took over putting her to bed and doing her night feeds (up to 2-4 times a night), we could see that it’s starting to take a toll on both him and me because lil penguin isn’t well rested at night so she gets super irritated during the day, refusing naps and all. The most she would nap is probably 10 mins and go about playing and crying the whole day. Trust me, this kind of endless wailing scenario is enough to drive any sane person insane. Both of us were physically and mentally exhausted, nothing we did seem to help with the situation and just trying to “survive” this stage alone isn’t a strong mental foundation both of us can rely on because we are both at our wits end that it starting affecting our relationship. No joke, children can seriously test your marriage at some point.
Lil penguin, when you are reading this post one day, I do hope you realised how much both papa and mama went through just to raise you though both of us know nothing about raising another human being. Just like the rest of life, it’s going to be journey full of question marks but we’ll eventually get through it whether in one piece (or not).
Yep crying penguin
Bed time story reading, music, white noise.
It doesn’t necessarily work for every baby, so you’ll need to test every single one of it to rule out. So happened my 2nd daughter seems more immune to the “gentler” methods. You need to be strict with her or else she’ll take everything as playtime.
If it wasn’t for those sleep training links and comforting messages, I think I might not be here typing this out today. Not going to mask the fact that this part of baby raising is freaking hard, I know there are more to come and it should be a fact ingrained in my brain by now but somehow when it does come, I still feel as if I’ve been caught off guard. Why is that every single time?? Anyone feeling this way as well?
Sleep Training
At home it’s easy to control the environment she is in, so she falls asleep faster but when she is out could see her naps are cut short from usual 2 hr to 30 mins-1 hr instead. This really affects her mood, she would get super cranky due to the tiredness.
After almost a month of training, we could see a tremendous improvement in her mood; she wakes up happy in the morning thanks to the 10- 12hour night rest. Some rare occasions she still wakes up once at night but it’s because she is thirsty or just needed her pacifier. During the day instead of wailing the whole day, I’m able to play and read to her and sometimes do some house chores together but best part of all, I finally have some “alone” time to get things done especially in between her naps and bedtime, it’s a huge blessing because before this I couldn’t even escape for 5 mins to do anything. Was literally stuck next to her all day trying all sorts of ways to comfort her to the extent of wearing out my sanity.
I don’t care what other moms think about me sleep training my kid, especially those who opt “they’ll do it when they are ready, don’t rush them”
Me: *inserts eye roll & sarcasm* Good luck with that lady.
It’s MY kid and my parenting choice which doesn’t affect anyone else but benefits my family overall so I’ll say yes to it. But really for sleep deprived moms out there; you might want to consider trying sleep training.
So that’s her major milestone for 11 months, finally sleeping through the night, YESSSS!
One of her favourite spots behind the TV lol
I did notice she was slowly trying to mimic everything we do, stuff like taking and putting stuff into the bag, opening and closing cupboards (while emptying its contents for ME to clean up later huh), she even figured out how to open and close the sliding door by just observing! She is now trying to figure out how to open the baby gate, so far she manages to close it but every attempt to open it has been unsuccessful so I hope it stays that way for both our sakes lol.
She started sitting on her small chair more often especially in the TV room right next to our sofa before overturning the chair. Think she is finding gold underneath it haha.
She recognises her senbei* packet now so whenever she sees a new pack in my bag she’ll help herself to it and try to bite through the packaging to the point of crushing the entire senbei inside!
*rice cracker
Nothing in the house is safe from her anymore, hiding doesn’t really work because she’ll turn the house upside down almost immediately and I gave up folding clothes because she goes through our clothing rack and throws everything out. Apa ni woi??
I wish she would be more observant when I am FOLDING the laundry instead (-__-) help me fold please!
The scariest part is when she tries to climb the stairs, we get so worried that she’ll fall one day. She’s a real fast climber, like I said earlier in this post she is a real daredevil and your shouts motivate her to move faster (she’s abit sesat) *eye roll* No signs of independent walking yet but climbing stairs, checked.
Growth
Malaysia Trip
Covering her eyes while she sleeps haha
She took my seat while i went to toilet
She got to meet her Godmom & Cat aunty YingTze
Was planning to bring her and the danna around town but no thanks to haze we had to stay indoors for the week we were there. Such an unlucky timing because on the day we left it was starting to clear up *sobs*.
It’s okay penguin, that means more visits back to Malaysia next year lol.
That’s all for her 11th month updates, we planned to celebrate her birthday in Disneyland and it’s her first time there! Lil penguin definitely have her weird quirks, but that makes her unique to us, I just hope she doesn’t end up with super lame puns like her aunt (my youngest sister) or else my poor brain is going to melt having to hear it daily lol.
With her youngest aunt
Bonus picture, she giving the "eyes" to papa for the bag haha XD
Finally a slightly well rested mama,
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