Monthly Archives: August 2013

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The benefit of dolls

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Saturday, 31 August 2013: One Hundred and Fifty Two Days Old.

I think I’ve finally discovered the benefit of having dolls as a kid.

I was a horsey girl myself; the only doll I had was a single, solitary Barbie and that was simply so I had someone to ride the toy horses around.

But today, as I stared at the pink mess of Ayla’s atrociously painted toe nails, I found myself thinking that maybe a doll or two might have been good practice.

Poor Ayla…. her mummy is certainly no source of fashion info, no vault of make up secrets, no hidden trove of hair-do treasures and definitely, absolutely no teacher of nail polish application.

Who knows if a doll can teach a girl all those skills, but I guess we’ll find out soon enough…. As soon as Ayla’s old enough to go down the doll aisle herself that is, ’cause I can’t stand those creepy unblinking plastic eyes or the spine-tingling sound of a doll calling out “Mah-mee! Mah-mee!”.

BUT, in the meantime I can teach Ayla how to bake a cake, how to gut a fish and how to write a blog… does that count? 😉

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The good things in life

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Friday, 30 August 2013: One Hundred and Fifty One Days Old.

When I say Ayla helps me appreciates the good things in life, I really honestly mean it.

Not only does she open my eyes to the little things, but keeping this blog for her is a daily reminder to focus on what’s great in life.

I read a blog today called “Sometimes my blog is as superficial as Facebook” and for a moment it had me questioning my own integrity and the integrity of An Ayla A Day.

Sure, the journey into motherhood hasn’t all been smooth sailing; my hormones have given me some wicked mood swings, my brain sometimes feels like its a runaway train and there has been moments where I’ve felt like coping was a far and distant dream.

But when evening falls and it comes time to write this blog I choose not to dwell on the sad, the bad or the impossible.

When I look back on the day, every day, there are great, happy and beautiful things to focus on… These are the things I want to write about, the things I choose to remember.

Admittedly the bad days are few and far between, but I’d be lying if I said they didn’t exist. It’s just that Ayla has become my shining light and now every day I find something beautiful or positive to celebrate.

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Outside

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Thursday 29 August 2013: One Hundred and Fifty Days Old.

Ayla loves being outside.

If we’ve spent most of the day in doors, by around 4pm Ayla starts to get grumpy.

Today, she just wasn’t happy with any toy I gave her and she cracked it with every place I put her.

So after a while we went outside and I laid her on a towel on the grass.

Ayla was so happy! She even started giggling when the breeze picked up and blew across her bare skin.

I spent ages twirling a blade of grass in front of her and Ayla was mesmerised as if it was the most beautiful thing in the whole world.

And when the birds flew overhead Ayla would strain her neck to watch them, if only for a moment more.

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Moods

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Tuesday 28 August 2013: One Hundred and Forty Nine Days Old.

Ayla reminded me about moods today… About how we can choose the mood we want to be in.

Ayla is awesome at it; she can go from sad to happy in an instant, and stay that way.

I think it must be because babies are fundamentally happy.

Most (unfortunately not all) people know nothing but happiness in their early days as babies so to be sad or angry is against the norm.

Ayla never chooses to be sad – her chosen state of mind is happy – but if something does make her upset she goes straight back to smiling within moments of it being resolved.

It made me remember what a wise man said to me once; bad moods don’t exist, unless you let them.

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Hubby’s birthday

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Tuesday 27 August 2013: One Hundred and Forty Eight Days Old.

It was Hubby’s birthday today and the three of us had a wonderful day.

Ayla gave her Daddy some fishing lures so we set off in the car with the boat and The Dog to try them out.

It was a beautiful day to be out in the water and Ayla loved it. She watched intently as Hubby and I flicked lure after lure into the sea, and when she saw The Dog panting to keep cool she thought she’d give it a go too!

We didn’t catch any fish but we were grateful for the chance to try, and when we got home we had a long, cool dip in the pool.

Ayla’s been swimming in the pool a few times now, but today was the first time she actually seemed to enjoy it!

It was because she’s finally worked out how to splash, and she kept at it for ages until both she and Hubby had big droplets of water running down their faces (video to be posted soon!)

We ended the day with a birthday cake, of course, one that I made a decorated myself, and Ayla helped her Daddy blow out the candles.

Ayla and I are so lucky to have such a special man in our lives… Happy Birthday Daddy!!! xxxx

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Interest

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Monday, 26 August 2013: Twenty One Weeks Old

Ayla’s started to take an interest in our pets.

Whether she’s happy or sad, as soon as The Dog or Cat Cat come close Ayla goes quiet and freezes.

It’s cute to see her watching them; she must be trying to workout what on earth these strange furry creatures are.

It helps that both animals seem to have taken a liking to Ayla too.

Whenever I take Ayla outside The Dog gives her big slobbering kisses (he’s 45kg so his tongue is as big as her head).

And even Cat Cat slinks up to Ayla looking for a scratch nowadays, but I bet that will only last til Ayla starts pulling her fur!

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Out the window

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Sunday 25 August 2013: One Hundred and Forty Six Days Old.

Any scrap of routine Ayla had up until now seems to have gone out the window this past week.

I was expecting it though.

I’ve read and heard lots of stuff about how babies tend to go through a phase where their routine becomes non-existent, and I’m guessing that’s what Baby Ayla’s going through now.

I’ve been finding it hard to summarise the true extent of the routine change up in less than 300 words, so I’ll try explaining using dot points…

Over the past five days Ayla’s had (in no particular order);

  • 1 x day of no nap at all
  • 2 x days of two 30 minute naps
  • 1 x day of three 3 hour naps
  • 1 x day of the two 2 hour naps
  • 2 x days of not being hungry at all
  • 1 x day of feeding every 2 hours
  • 2 x days of feeding every 4 hours
  • 2 x nights of 5 hour sleeps
  • 2 x nights of 10.5 hour sleeps
  • 1 x night of waking at 2am, 3am, 4am, 6am

It’s been interesting, challenging, and a little stressful, but I’d be lying if I said I preferred it any other way.

To be honest, Ayla’s routine wrecking phase has actually come at a good time for me… our reno’s are on hold temporarily, Hubby is at work, and I’m having a TV series catch up week.

But I think the key here is “phase”. I have no problems at all with this being temporary, and I look forward to the end when Ayla has discovered what works best for her.

Then, I guess it’s just a matter of hoping that what works best for Ayla lines up with what works best for me so we can both get our groove back and I can get the washing done.

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Ayla vs The Superberries

Here’s the video I promised to post earlier this week.

It’s footage of Ayla trying her first proper baby food “Pear and Superberries” by Rafferty’s Garden.

We only gave her enough for a little taste but she LOVED it!

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Hypo

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Friday, 23 August 2013: One Hundred and Forty Six Days Old.

Ayla’s always happy, but I’ve never seen her hypo happy before, and that’s what she was last night.

For about two hours Ayla was hyper actively playful.; she was grabbing her toys and shaking the life out of them, screeching at the top of her lungs, kicking her legs and waving her arms like she was trying to fly.

And all the while she was grinning from ear to ear and laughing her head off.

I was a bit worried at first, because I had a flash-forward vision to about two years time, but then I remembered to kick back and enjoy the hypo for what it was – pure happiness wrapped up in a pink cocoon.