Long time no see...

Life as a working mother, cooking, cleaning and so on has left me little time to update this blog. However my little girl's progress has been exceptional. She's eating lots and have been moving quite alot too. We were recently in U.K. for holiday and now we have returned to our normal routine (if you can call it normal) It takes the baby a bit more time to adjust to coming back to reality compared to adults. So that means a week of sleepless nights. I'm looking forward to having sleepless nights again in February after our trip from Portugal. Let's see how it goes.

Alyssa @ Fat Harry's Fish and Chips - Isle of Wight, UK

Alyssa has started daycare in the newly built one just down the road. That means no more driving km and km away to send and pick her up. The only problem is that we are within viewing range from the daycare and she can see if I happen to come home to clean up and cook. It would give the daycare givers a bit harder time. So far I have been rather sneaky but she is starting to recognize our cars.

I'll run down a back in time update on her growth later today. She's been changing in the way she eats and what she eats. I can't say that it's easier because she's no longer wanting to eat baby food (according to my hubby, 'Who would?') Honestly, they aren't all that bad. It was one of the things I ate during my pregnancy with Alyssa as the portions were small enough and since I couldn't hold my food for the first trimester, I needed some sort of sustenance. I'd say it served me well.

Sleep and sleep patterns

Not much has changed for Alyssa over the pass few months. She was still sleeping relatively well. She started to learn to paddle on her tummy when we were in our trip to visit grandma in Asia. When we got back home she continued to progress. The progress was slow compared to other children and it seemed to have worried the nurse at the health clinic. To be honest it worried me a little but then I thought over on what other parents have been saying about their kids, it calmed me down a little. A week after that incident she started to crawl on her own although very clumsily.

Today 23rd July, she has caught up with most of her milestones. She started dancing a week ago and we manage to catch that on video! Then she started to wave goodbye, show hand signals if she doesn't want her food anymore, bobbing her head for approval and shaking it for disapproval. She also responds to claps on television. For example when the Ellen DeGeneres Show starts and audience are clapping, she'll join in the fun and turns to smile at me for approval or praise :). It's quite refreshing to see how she's growing and am thankful for such a sweet girl (although she can be quite a handful every now and then, what baby isn't? ;-)).

Alyssa still enjoys her naps although it's getting less each day but they can range from 0-3 times a day and each could last from 30 mins -3 hours even! She sleeps well in the night if it's not too hot or too cold. She does wake up and yelp if she is out of the blankey and wants to be covered. It happens once in a while so it's not such a biggy.

7 1/2 months and travelling!

Alyssa is going to be travelling for the second time on an airplane! The first time went relatively well for her but for me, it was a tad too much of an adventure. Alyssa drinks the most difficult to explain stuff in the world, in Finnish it's called 'velli' it's sorta watery (or milky) porridge. I don't really know if there is anything remotely the same in English except oat smoothie O.o or corn smoothie. There are two brands that I know off that make this in Finland. One is Semper the other is Nuticia's Muksu. We use the Muksu mostly because of the variety.


On the development side. Alyssa hasn't been very keen in turning to her tummy as she feels stuck whenever she does that and doesn't remember how to turn back. She's been lifting her butt after visiting our friend's (ex-neighbor) daughter Emilíana since she was showing Alyssa how to crawl. It was hilarious to watch Alyssa as she would be flat on the soft blanket that we put on the floor for her to lie on looking rather poofed. Otherwise she's great at sitting already...She doesn't need much of support but she gets tired easily and can fall over as her balance is still off.


As of 13th of February 2010, we were adviced to put toothpaste on her toothbrush (just a light wipe of it) and brush her teeth. Today she's shown that she's capable of spitting out the toothpaste and if we introduce water to her she'd spit everything out. We would praise Alyssa so she would learn that this is the right thing to do after brushing teeth.

All in all she hasn't reached certain milestones but we are proud of what she can do at this point. As I learnt from talking to many different parents and hearing their experiences that no two babies are the same. Of course there is always a reason to doubt if something is wrong. It's best to consult a professional if you suspect something wrong but most of the time these professionals may give you more reason to be concern than to wipe them away. It's only natural for a parent to be concern of the wellbeing of their child.