Last night she decided to play this game at 11:30pm after about 3 hours sleep. Her eyes were wide open, she hit the cot with her hands, grabbed the bars to pull herself up. She practiced crunches and finally rolled over and greeted us on her tummy through the little spaces between the cot bars as if she was a little happy lion in a cage.

She smiled at us like a little old lady without teeth and she tried to talk to us with her recent added babbling sounds, such as “wa wa wa wa”.

I can’t believe this is happening. My husband and I were both very sleepy. I tried all the means to make her go back to sleep, just like what I have been trying in the past 7 months.

I rocked her, I pat her bottom, I made a pace, I danced and bounced around, I sang the songs, I breastfed her……I dim the light and I turned off the lamp……I picked her up and I put her down……I asked her gently to go back to sleep, I talked to her nicely saying it is the time for bed, I threatened her and I beg her to stop…… It made no difference, or if it ever had, what I have done only make myself more sleepy:-(

No, she hasn’t been sleeping a lot during the day. The truth is, she never has been;

No, I didn’t do anything different during the day lately;

No, I didn’t give her medication and I have not been drinking any caffein drinks myself (or maybe I should start to think about it, just be prepared for the night like this);

This is just her choice. I dare not discover how a 7 months old’s brain is operating. But thank you so much for making my life so interesting. I love you so much

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Anyway, let’s talk about the sling. I have been wanting to sew one since I was pregnant, but too scared to start as I don’t know if she would like it or feel comfortable in it.

After Vivian turned 4 months old, I have realised, she seemed much calmer when I was holding her on my shoulder instead of putting her in her pram when we were out and about, especially when she was tired, sleepy or bored.

The problem with that was, at that time she was about 7 kg+, if I held her, I can’t do anything with my hands pretty much all engaged on her. Also it is really a lot of hassles to take the pram everywhere, you know, getting it in and out of the car all the time and all the folding and unfolding, wheeling it on rough, steep or muddy road tracks, having to walk a long way to find a lift because not being able to use escalator in the shopping center and always occupying a lot of spaces in the public area, bumping onto other people’s heels…..

I was initially interested in a sling design using sling rings, but I found it too hard to get appropriate metal rings and a bit dangerous using them after I tried with one of my big poncho scarves, as I found that baby’s head can easily get touched to the metal parts, which is probably the last thing you want in the world. Plus, there was always something not right when I was positioning her into the sling and she seemed not very happy in it, so I didn’t press on.

Then I found this pouch sling and liked its curve design at the bottom and not requiring rings. I was immediately attracted to it. That night after Vivian fell into asleep, I quickly did measuring, cut the fabric and machine stitched the seams.

I started at 8:15pm and finished the whole thing at 10pm. Yes, this is how quick this sling actually takes, given that I am not really a seamstress expert and had to do French Seam for the first time in my life, plus, I cut the first piece much shorter because I measured wrong way and had to join two broken pieces together to make up:-(

To be honest, I had the impulse to wake Vivian up to try it on immediately but certainly I wasn’t so that stupid to wake up a slumber

Now you can see the photo, not too bad, right? If I could change anything, I would next time make the sling shorter. The measurement I used is 27 inches, but I think maybe 26″ could have been just right.

Recently I used it a lot, especially taking her to Fyshwick Fresh Food Market on Saturday. She seems comfy in there and I did get some pram-pushing parents looking at me (actually my sling). There were even a couple of times, Vivian started to drool on it and turned her head back to my chest as she was kind of sleepy and I felt that it could have been a place she could even doze off.

The new brain research says that wearing your baby (using a baby sling) gives a healthier (stimulates your baby’s physical growth) and smarter baby, promotes strong attachment (as they need to develop communication skills and a trusting bond with you first BEFORE true emotional stability and independence can occur), and certainly the freedom for parents. Plus, it’s proven to reduce your child’s day and nighttime crying by up to 43%. No wonder one of the basic strategies to getting baby a good night sleep is to use a sling during the day.

Anyway, if you want to make one yourself, this is the best tutorial I found on the Internet, very comprehensive and helpful!! I would love to make at least another one for Vivian, and honestly I wish I could make one for each of my new mom girlfriends if they ever asked me to do it. It would be perfect for any newborn.

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I love taking photos. In the past few years, I was so used to keeping a digital camera in my handbag all the time and shooting photos wherever and whenever I wanted to. However, after recently I retired my beloved DC, I felt immediately a big hole in my life and desperately needed a replacement to that.

As you may know that my life, in the last 6 months, has changed so much that I not only lost lots of sleeps, but also was exposed to the risk of losing my sort of lifestyle.

I don’t want to. As I was trying to defend this last freedom of mine, iPhone happened to become the one to help a lot: An absolutely convenient and smart one!

As it is with me all the time and goes to wherever I go, I really couldn’t find anything else that could be possibly better to balance the lack of time due to the obiligations and the desire to ‘create’ more time to do what I love to do.

That’s when I started to love taking photos with my iPhone. It not only helps to keep a visual note of my ongoing life, but also allows my so-called interests to be expressed.

It makes me feel happier and fuller. While the mood is being lightened, the life(style) is being protected. I feel I’m no longer a crazy new mom being a baby slave, but a proactive person who creates positive memories of NOW and THEN.

Please click to visit my newly established iPhone Art Gallery (here) or the iPhone link above in the main menu which functions as an independent blog but also exists as a subsite of my main blog, and I hope you would enjoy the photos just as much as when I shot and posted them directly from my iPhone.

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However, making a Kusudama flower ball is a real pleasure and enjoyable course. A little patience and some imagination or creative thinking are all that is needed. I have just finished a very basic one. It took me a very long time, as I was also doing other projects at the same time. I kind of only made a couple of petals or one complete flower per day. There are total 12 flowers x5 petals =60 petals to make, so I can tell you how badly this project had been teasing me over that period of time, just because I couldn’t make it happen quickly enough to see the outcome.

Anyway, I made it, and it turned out pretty cool and beautiful. I hung it under the kitchen window, so I can look at it everyday. Hope it can bring us some joy and luck.

Another things I made up quickly is called Greek Soccer Ball (they call this Extreme Origami or anti-origami), to celebrate the World Cup in South Africa, the one we totally missed (ignored) this year I can’t believe that we didn’t watch even one game and I got to know who was the final winner a week later. But how much did I really miss indeed? The life is still going, day by day, and I am not getting any more stupid, neither smarter no matter I had watched it or not.

Special thanks to my husband, who took these two photos in a not very ideal lighting environment. He made them look much better than what was really look like

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The size of the beret is to fit a 6-9 months old, so it is still a little big for her now. It’s completely my fault as I thought this was going to be a winter accessory, and the common sense about getting baby wear is, you always prepare something big rather than something JUST fits.

Now I have realised this is not a very good theory at all, as if you look into it, it is totally for the convenience of adults, rather than being mindful to babies. To make the best use of the value of the money, adults try to get their baby to wear one garment longer, there are just too many babies who end up wearing baggy unfitted clothes just because their parents want to save money.

It is really absurd. You don’t want your baby wearing tight and small clothes, but what’s the joy of watching them wearing the opposite, those loose and big clothes either? It is just the same awfulness. Our babies already rely on us to wipe their bottom, they deserve to wear something with right size and appropriate, just don’t humiliate them further.

Now, I have drawn a new conclusion—get the things for your baby when they need them, not before and not after. Get the right size to fit their age NOW, not smaller and not bigger. All I want to say is, cherish the NOW moment, don’t let your adult money value to ruin your baby’s beautiful infant-hood.

It seems I am off the track a bit, anyway, back to this bonnet. I really like this design. It is also super quick to knit up. It only took me about 2 nights (2 hours per night). I know people might have different opinions about those big red crochet flowers on both sides (my mom seems to hate them , but I really don’t care. I have seen Vivian wearing the plain bonnet without flowers, this flower version actually make her look much cuter. I know the size of the flowers is rather dramatic, but it makes a boring bonnet look standing out and very unique.

It fits beautifully to Vivian’s head about 41cm circumference. If you need something bigger or smaller, you have to work out how many more or less stitches to cast on yourself, as the pattern didn’t offer other sizes. I used white chenille for the main bonnet and red merino yarn for the flower and cord to thread through the eyelets which I modified the original lace pattern, as it is not going to show with chenille yarn anyway.

The bonnet pattern can be found here and the crochet Irish flower pattern can be found on Lion Brand website.

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