BLOGTOBER: AUTUMN GOALS

I can't believe that it's Autumn already! Every blog that I read at the moment is expressing their love for Autumn and I have to say i'm definitely on the Autumn bandwagon. We had such an amazing summer this year (in my opinion) with some little heat waves, I feel like I hardly had my umbrella out all summer and spent the whole time in shorts which is exactly how summer should be. As good as the summer was i'm now excited to layer up, get my winter coat out of the closet and get cosy under a blanket with the fire on. Autumn will always feel like a new start for me, September has always been filled with starting school/university or for the last 5 years a house move and with this year being no exception I always feel like a refresh in Autumn. It's the perfect time to start getting organised before the end of the year so I can head into the new year in the best way possible. The weather has been the most perfect Autumnal weather, with crisp mornings accompanied by a blue sky, it seemed like the perfect time to go for a walk in the park with Mila's new pram (well not new she's now in the big part of the pram) and reflect on what I want to achieve by the end of the year. With that in mind here are 5 Autumn goals that I have come up with.

1. Get exercising again

So it's official i've not exercised in a whole year! I felt so ill at the start of my pregnancy, so although I was running a lot in the first 10 weeks of pregnancy as soon as the morning sickness hit it all fell by the wayside and I never went back. My aim is to get back into exercising everyday again, whether it's a 30 minute walk, a run or even some Yoga which I used to love i'm determined to get back into it.

2. Get into healthy eating habits

My partner Joe will be the first to tell you how much cake I have been eating over the past year. It's not even just cake, it's anything sweet and it's now got to the point where I need to curb the habit. At the moment I feel like I eat sweet food even when I don't really want it so I really want to get back into it being a treat again - if anyone reading this has any tips for what has worked for them then please let me know! When you're at home a lot of the day the biscuit tin is way too inviting.

3. Get organised

Having just moved house everything is just everywhere at the moment, I can't wait for everything to have it's place but personally it takes me a while to work all of those things out. By the end of the year I would like to have worked that all out and be organised all ready for Christmas.

4. Get back into cooking

In order to achieve my goal of having healthier eating habits I feel like I need to get back into cooking more and finding interesting recipes as when I have tasty meals to look forward to I feel like I enjoy healthy eating far more.

5. Keep blogging after Blogtober

I really enjoy blogging and although it takes a little bit of time to come up with different posts being 12 days into Blogtober and having  posted every single day so far shows me that I can do it if I put my mind to it. The point of me doing Blogtober was to get me back into blogging and I feel like after posting everyday posting once or twice a week should be breeze (hopefully).

BLOGTOBER: MY GUIDE TO PUMPING

To anyone that doesn't breastfeed i'm pretty sure that this contraption probably looks like some sort of modern megaphone - at least it did to me when I first saw it. For breastfeeding mama's this little godsend is the key to freedom, a couple of hours away from baby or even just to give you a break from feeding, my breast pump was one of my best friends whilst I was feeding Mila. However when I first looked into pumping I was shocked how little information there was out there. I had zero clue when to pump, how much to pump and how long I could go without pumping again so I thought I'd compile a little list of the things that I found out when I started pumping. I am by no means an expert but these are things that worked for me personally and didn't affect my milk supply as that was always my biggest worry.

What pump should I use?

I went for the Avent pump and I found that it worked really well for me and was one of the cheaper options on the market. I would always use the pump on the medium settings, I started off using the pump on the highest setting and it made my breasts ache after using it. Once I started using the medium setting that all stopped.

What time of the day should I pump?

I would normally pump in the morning or before I went to bed as that is when I found that I had the most milk and could easily pump 3-4oz.

How long should I wait to start pumping?

I started pumping once or twice a week when Mila was 4 weeks old. The recommended time to start pumping is 6 weeks but I found that starting at 4 weeks actually helped to regulate my supply as I was making too much milk. Mila happily took to having a bottle at 4 weeks old and easily went back onto the breast after having a bottle.

How much should I pump?

When I first started pumping I had no idea how much to try and aim for to pump. I actually had the issue of having too much milk so I could easily pump 3oz from one breast and do a top up of one more oz from the other breast. In the end I would try and do 2oz from each breast to keep it equal and also in the hope that it wouldn't stimulate me too much to make even more milk. Somehow that seemed to work for me.

How much milk will my baby have?

At 4 weeks old Mila would have about 3oz and slowly worked her way up to having 4-5oz by 12 weeks old. If I was leaving Mila for the evening then I would try and pump two bottles in advance just ensure that there was enough milk for in case she wanted more.

How should I store my breast milk?

I treated breast milk the same way that I would treat cows milk - so I would refrigerate or freeze if I wasn't using the milk straight away. Otherwise I would feed it straight to Mila within an hour or two of pumping. Mila happily had the milk at room temperature but if it was frozen I would put it in a bowl of hot water to defrost. Any milk in the fridge I would use within a couple of days and milk in the freezer I would use within a month.

How long should I wait till I pump again?

This was what I struggled with the most - if I had pumped earlier in the day and Joe was going to feed Mila the pumped milk, should I pump whilst Joe was bottle feeding? In the end I decided not to on the advice of HV as she said that as long as i'm doing the same number of stimulations each day it shouldn't affect my supply. I could generally go around 4 hours without feeding without needing to pump/feed again, but I just went with how I felt. If I felt like I needed to pump then I would otherwise I would just wait until Mila's next feed.

Pumping when you're away from your baby

When I went to Notting Hill Carnival and went on my first night out I had to be away from Mila. By that point Mila would happily have formula if I couldn't feed her for whatever reason but I still wanted to continue breastfeeding when I got back. I was away from Mila for the day when I went to Notting Hill Carnival, so I breastfed before I left - (two feeds in the morning) then I missed the afternoon feed and expressed in the evening. I then expressed again before I went to bed and again in the morning, ready to start feeding Mila at her 12pm feed. It was much easier when I went on a night out, I just breastfed her before I left, pumped before I went out and then pumped when I got in and pumped again in the morning. After both of these occasions I didn't use bottles with Mila for the following week after and just concentrated on breastfeeding to keep my supply up, that seemed to work well for me. The only time that my supply started dipping was when I stopped expressing and Mila started feeding less in the day as she was getting so distracted, so in hindsight I wish I had kept up with it as it probably would have helped to keep my supply up.

So those are my top tips for pumping. If you have any questions or any tips yourself then please do let me know even though i'm no longer breastfeeding it's always great to know for future babies or to spread advice amongst other mums.

BLOGTOBER: OUR TRIP TO YORK

As I mentioned in my last post we were up in York to watch my mum run the Yorkshire marathon over the weekend. Having a mum as a marathon runner definitely has its perks as we get to discover lots of great cities when we go and watch her run (see post about Dublin here). This time we got an Airbnb which was a great idea as it was like a home from home and meant that we could all chill together in the evenings. It also provided a good amount of space for Mila to roll around, note: she does NOT stop rolling so that was a pretty important factor. We stayed at this Airbnb if you're interested, the place was great and it was a brilliant location but our host wasn't the best at communicating - but that's a story for another time.

We spent Saturday having a quick mooch around the city, followed by a lovely italian dinner at a restaurant called Caesars, I would highly recommend. Sunday was spent roaming the city of York spectating and cheering my mum on at the marathon followed by a takeaway indian from The Raj - another great find. Having been preoccupied with the marathon for most of the weekend we didn't have that much time to take in the city and all of its sights so we spent this morning having a wonder around. With it being Monday morning it was so quiet which was lovely as it meant we could take pictures tourist free!

We pretty much all ordered the full English breakfast apart from Joe who got the vegetarian version (we recently watch 'The Truth About Meat') and the food was as good as the interiors. Everything was cooked perfectly and they added a great twist on the baked beans by adding a bit of spice. I'd love to go back and try their lunch and dinner menu as well.

My top recommendation of the trip is where we ventured for breakfast, a really cool restaurant called Cut & Chase. I noticed it when we first looked around the city on Saturday and was struck by the interesting typography and slick interiors that the restaurant offered, when I saw that they also served up a great array of breakfast options I was sold.

So all in all we had a brilliant trip to York and now we all can't wait until mum runs her next marathon so that we can discover another new city, but I think York is one that we'll definitely be taking a trip back to.

BLOGTOBER: WE'RE IN YORKSHIRE

Hello from Yorkshire! The last couple of days we've been travelling through Yorkshire, taking in the sites & breathing in the fresh Yorkshire air. It's been great to get away from London and do some activities that we never normally do. On Friday we took a trip up to the beautiful Malham Cove, being the Londoners that we are Joe & I turned up for the walk in windy & rainy Yorkshire conditions wearing a Harrington jacket, trench coat, vans (as pictured) and other non practical clothing, but we enjoyed the walk and it was worth it to see the beautiful waterfall at the end. Doing such a lovely walk has inspired me to try and encourage us to try and find nice places to walk around near London, it's such a cheap day out and beats walking around the same parks over and over again.

We're currently in York after watching my mum run the York marathon, I've never visited before and it is such a pretty city, i've also been surprised at how great the food has been everywhere, I never really had York down as a foodie city but there really is so much on offer. So expect a post soon featuring my highlights of York. 

BLOGTOBER: MY BREASTFEEDING JOURNEY

Breastfeeding. Where do I even start? When deciding how to feed Mila breastfeeding was my obvious choice, it seemed the easiest way to feed her and there are so many benefits for both mama and baby. I never set myself out any aims of how long I wanted to breastfeed for I just wanted to see how it went and hoped that I would be able to do it as I know that so many women either struggle to breastfeed or can't breastfeed.

Up until 2 weeks ago Mila was almost exclusively breastfed, having the odd bottle of formula here and there. My breastfeeding journey was very up and down. In the first couple of days she latched on brilliantly and I'd say for the first 6 weeks we had no trouble at all - she was gaining weight really well and feeding for a good amount time. The biggest hurdle that I had at that point was getting used to breasfeeding in public as I realy hated it at first, but slowly I built up my confidence. So like I mentioned in Mila's 5 month update the 8 week jabs really changed everything for us. After the jabs she obviously wasn't feeling to great and over the course of a few days was feeding less and less. It got to the point where everytime I would try and feed her she would fuss, kick and arch her back. She was rejecting me and I had no idea why. So we started feeding her a bottle of expressed milk in a bid to keep her hydrated as I was starting to worry that she wasn't having enough. It was a difficult couple of days and it got to the point that she would only feed on me when she was tired so I was only able to do about two feeds a day. I was so frustrated and was starting to think that I was either going to have to pump or we would have to start using formula. We did start using formula as I couldn't keep up with the expressing but day by day I managed to slowly get her back onto the breast. I ended up having to give her the dummy and swap the dummy for the breast and that really helped. In the end we slowly built back up and she went fully back onto the breast however from then on we gave her a bottle of formula every so often.

So from that point on Mila hadn't really had any problems feeding until we hit 4 months. Then suddenly she became the most wiggly and active baby when feeding, pulling off every 2 minutes and looking around and eventually becoming disinterested. It was so difficult to get her to feed and in the end it was taking me about an hour just to try and complete a feed and I felt like I was constantly feeding! We then started noticing a change in Mila, she was up in the night more and didn't seem to be growing out of the 3-6 months clothes, my mum intuition told me that something wasn't quite right so I headed over to the child clinic to get her weighed. It turned out she hadn't gained even half the amount of weight that she should have gained within the last month. I put a brave face on but really I found it quite heartbreaking - realising that the reason she was probably waking up in the night was due to hunger isn't a nice feeling at all. So from that point on we decided to slowly transition over to formula. We still  don't know exactly why she wasn't putting weight on - it could be me not making enough milk, it could be that Mila wasn't spending enough time at the breast to access the hind milk which is the fattening milk that helps them to put weight on,  it could of been a combination of both. The main thing is that it wasn't making Mila happy, she wasn't putting weight on and wasn't sleeping well and in turn it was making me stressed out as well. She's now been on formula for two weeks and we've such a change in her sleep and her overall temperament, she's also back on track with her weight gain.

So if you're reading this and are in between or trying to decide whether to make the switch to formula, do whatever is best for you and your child. As much as I had mixed feelings about making the switch to formula in the end it's best for both me & Mila and as long as she is healthy and happy so am I.

MILA & ME - My 5 month update

My recovery 

I can’t believe that it’s been 5 months since I’ve given birth! In someways it feels like yesterday – I can remember every single detail of Mila’s birth story and I’m sure I will forever, but on the other hand I feel like I’m starting to get my pace as a mother which feels great.

I’d say that it took me about 3-4 weeks to feel completely normal again and feel healed. I remember the most annoying part being the stitches as they felt uncomfortable, itchy and tight until they dissolved. As soon as they had gone I felt so much better. I think it also takes a while to mentally recover from going through giving birth and getting your head around your new responsibility as a parent. For the first couple of weeks I kept feeling really down as soon as bedtime would approach – maybe it was the thought of broken sleep? But I always felt this overwhelming responsibility like my life had really changed and I wasn’t sure if I’d ever completely feel like myself again. 5 months in and I feel like now that we have somewhat of a routine I’m getting back to doing the things that make me feel more like myself which is great.

Weight Loss 

Initially I lost the baby weight pretty quickly, within 8 weeks I was down to my pre baby weight, which I put down to breastfeeding and the busyness of having a new baby to care for. The picture above is from 3 weeks postpartum, a great top that strategically covers my wobbly bits and is great for breastfeeding. Since then however I feel like I’ve definitely put on a few pounds. I don’t know about anyone else but having a new baby just makes me want to eat cake! Like I was saying in one of my posts everytime I put Mila down for a nap I feel like I must congratulate myself with a cup of tea and cake. So my next task is to get back into eating healthy, curb my cake habit and get back into exercising regularly.

Mind set

Like I was saying before it took a little while for me to get my head around the responsibility of having a baby. When I first gave birth to Mila I was so anxious about every little thing! I was constantly on google and worrying about the tiniest of things, but I now have so much more confidence within my parenting abilities, so I feel like I’ve come a long way. Every so often I try and leave Mila with Joe or a relative so that I can have a couple hours/day or night break to do the things that I want to do like go for dinner with friends or enjoy some time in a coffee shop reading a book. It’s the little things like this that keep me refreshed and make me feel more like myself again not just ‘Mila’s mum’.

MILA & ME - Mila's 5 month update

Wow, where does the time go? I was planning on doing these updates far more frequently, but alas, life took over and i've just been enjoying savoring every moment of my maternity leave with Mila.

Catch up
The last 5 months have been everything; exciting, hard, emotional, tiring -  I could go on. We got 3 months in and Joe & I were (foolishly) thinking that this parenting thing isn't too hard, we've got it together. We had been blessed with a pretty good sleeper, generally sleeping from 11-5am with a quick feed at 5am and then waking up at 8am from around 4 weeks old, she breastfed like a dream and I guess the only thing that I used to find challenging was getting her down for a nap as she hit the 6 week milestone. Queue the 8 week immunisations to come in and ruin EVERYTHING. Mila actually ended up having her first jabs at 12 weeks and boy oh boy were they a game changer for us. Sleep was pretty much out of the window, she started waking up more in the night which to be honest I felt like I could deal with, especially after feeling like we had got lucky in the first 3 months. For me the hardest thing was that she suddenly started rejecting the breast. Everytime I would try and feed her she would kick,fuss and generally just get worked up and fustrated to the point that I was so worried that she wasn't getting enough milk. I'm planning on doing a proper post about my breastfeeding journey so I will go into more depth there, but it was a hard time and lasted for about 10 days, at which point she was finally breastfeeding well again. I've learnt that there are always these little things that crop up and I always try to remember that i'm sure it won't be forever, and like with everything she'll change again.

I've also left Mila for the first time in the last couple of months, twice with Joe and twice where we left her with grandparents to enjoy time away with our friends. I absolutely adore spending time with Mila, but it was so good to have a break and actually be able to miss her, I think it's so important as parents to have that break because I think it makes you appreciate them more and it's definitely helped me take steps to getting back to myself.

So I think that's a good roundup of what's happened over the last 5 months, onto the update!

Sleep

After a couple of months of the sleep being a bit up and down we are finally getting to a place where Mila is starting to sleep more again at night. For the past 2 months she's been waking up twice in the night. She was going to bed at 8pm then waking at 2am & 5am for a feed. So we've now made her bedtime earlier, she's generally asleep by 7.30pm every night, waking at around 10.30pm/11pm for a feed and then she'll usually have a night feed at around 3/4am and then wake up for the day between 6.30am - 7am (bar the last couple of days where she's decided that 5.30am is her new time).
Nap wise she is usually pretty good unless we're on a really busy day when she sometimes struggles to get a long sleep in. She generally has an 1 hour and half in the morning, 2 hours in the afternoon and a 30 min cat nap late afternoon. We tend to try and get her to have all her naps by 4.30pm in the afternoon so that she is ready for her 7pm bedtime. So sleep wise I feel like we are slowly getting into a routine again which I love as it means I can plan a bit more.

Feeding

Our feeding journey is something that I want to talk about in depth, but at 5 months Mila is now fully on formula. I breastfed with the odd bottle of formula here and there up until 2 weeks ago when we took Mila to get weighed and found out that she had hardly gained any weight in the last month. Being her main caregiver and source of food I felt extremely guilty that she hadn't gained more weight and we made the decision to introduce her properly to formula. We're still finding our feet but Mila generally has 6-7 bottles a day, taking around 5oz-6oz at each feed. I don't know if it's linked but I definitely feel like she is sleeping better since we made the switch and even though we aren't completely sure exactly why she didn't gain enough I have inkling that perhaps I wasn't making enough and maybe she was waking so much in the night due to hunger :( who knows, but it could be the reason. In more positive news we are very excited to start weaning Mila, I've heard a lot about baby led weaning and i'm leaning towards going that way but would love to hear peoples weaning experiences.

Development

At 5 months Mila's character is well and truly shining through. I think the most obvious thing is how active she is. She never wants to sit down, she is always insisting on standing and marching on your legs - it's hilarious, i'm not sure if she'll ever sit up! She's rolling over confidently, she can roll front to back and back to front, but usually chooses to just do the latter and then try and crawl. She's just started trying to push back onto her back legs so I think she could end up being an early crawler. She's such a happy baby and she's at the stage where she is such a pleasure to be around. She can tell now when you're being silly and finds it hilarious, she also loves it when we sing to her. Her favourite songs are anything that include her name, we've edited Miffy the sweet little bunny to Mila the sweet little bunny and she just beams everytime you start singing it. She has her favourite toys which she smiles when she sees and puts her hands out to grab and she can't fall alseep without her elephant comforter - in fact I must buy another for when I have to wash the other one! Oh and absolutely everything goes in her mouth. She actually started trying to eat the bath water last night for fun. I don't miss the newborn stage at all as she's so much fun at the moment, but everytime I see a tiny baby I do feel that sense of nostalgia remembering how lovely those days were.

So I think that wraps it up for Mila's 5 month update. I still can't believe that she 5 months old, when I was pregnant I couldn't imagine anything past 3 months. I was planning to put my update in this post as well, but I think i've rambled on long enough, so stay tuned for my 5 month postpartum update.