With my first delivery, postpartum was such a mystery. I tried to dig around some information but it seems like nobody wants to talk about postpartum period. In our culture it is more known as confinement period or berpantang. In Malay culture there are so many pantang, do’s and don’ts and I wonder which are legit or just myths.

Now let’s talk confinement and what it’s all about. Bear in mind there will be some TMI’s (too much information) but may be beneficial if you are genuinely looking for some light. The more you know, the more you can be prepared for it. Also, I can only speak from my own experience and readings. I had normal births for both of my pregnancy so this may or may not apply for those who had ceasareans.

Body Aches

Labour can be very taxing on your body. Hours of labour and prolonged delivery may leave your body aching all over for the first few days. Take things easy, do not massage while having these aches. You may apply muscle ache creams to ease the pain.

Perineal Tear

Once you have a tear, you need to take care of it well. Apart from the prescribed disinfectant, you may wash your perineal with warm salt water (rock salt, sea salt is best) or giving your perineal a warm water bath using a sitz bath.  You may also add salt to this bath. However, upon reading, there is no proof that salt water makes for faster recovery. Nevertheless, the warm bath will be soothing for the perineal area.

Earlier this week I converted prefolds from the traditional flats that you can get anywhere in Malaysia. It is very cheap to make, I got the flats for RM36.90 for a dozen.

So, let’s start with determining the size. For this tutorial, I’m making newborn size, that is 11″ by 11″. I also want a good absorbency, so let’s make it 4 x 8 x 4 ply.

Step 1: Prepping the flats

You can either prewash the fabric to allow for shrinkage or, prewash later, but you have acommodate the measurements for shrinkage. The flats shrunk about half an inch. The funny thing is, on packaging it says 30″x30″ but I got flats that are 31.5″ by 27.5″. Prewash 1-2 times to make sure it has fully shrunk.

Step 2: Cutting

Trim off one edge. Eventually we are going to trim all edges, but I find the fabric is more forgiving when working with the edges.

Then, fold on the long side until we get a measurement of 11.5″ folded. The extra half an inch is to accommodate for serging in case the edges end up wonky.

I feel like having a new baby means a few DIY items. With Sara, I made some blankets, pillows, nap mat and also pregnancy pillow. Now, with the second one, it’s cloth diapering stuff.

So.. this time I made some newborn sized prefolds and also cloth wipes. With Sara, we started cloth when she was over 4 months old. So we have never diapered a newborn. One size is wayyy too big for tiny newborns.

Newborns poop a lot. Most of the time, they need to be changed every 2 hours. That’s 12 diaper change in 24 hours! Now, we are planning to use disposables for the first week as laundry may seem too much. After that, hopefully, we’ll be all set to do cloth. After much research, here’s how my newborn stash looks like. My stash is built based on a small budget, to launder everyday.

12 Newborn Prefolds  

Prefolds are so much easier to use than flats, and for more bang for the buck, I made them my own, converted from the traditional ‘kain lampin’ flats! So.. I only spent Rm36 for 12 prefolds. Woot woot! I also got a pair of those snappi diaper fastener.

7 Small Sized Prefolds
In case the little one grows out of the newborn size earlier, but still too small for one-size dipes.

5 Flats
As backup in case I run out of diapers. These are only the traditional kain lampin that can also be used as swaddling blankets. 🙂

5 Wipeable Newborn Covers
Prefolds and flats need waterproof covers. I guess I prefer wipeable covers so I can use them twice (maybe thrice) before needing washing. I suppose five would suffice. I bought the Happy Flute covers for just RM19 per pc at SweetLunaShop.

4 Newborn AIO
These AIO’s (All-In-Ones) are for night time use where I don’t think I’m up for some origami in the middle of the night. They work like disposables, no pocket or anything to stuff. I got the THX brand for just RM18 each (on sale from RM26!). A lot of people say they are similar to Lil Joey’s NB AIOs.  Actually, I would get more of them, but this is budget cloth diapering. heheh. :p

3 Bamboo Boosters 
I made them my own using leftovers from the wipes fabric. I just made 3″ x 8″ 2ply bamboo terry in case the baby outgrow the absorbency of the newborn dipes before outgrowing the size. Should I need more, I can just quickly whip out from bamboo fleece I have laying around in my sewing room. Easy peasy.

Cloth Wipes
I heard cloth wipes make GREAT wipes. More so than the disposable ones, that are loaded with unnecessary chemicals. I have no experience with cloth wipes, and I have no idea what kind of wipes I would prefer, so I went with the most popular one which is bamboo terry and flannel. Again, to keep my budget low, I made them myself. They are so easy and quick to make. I made 20 of 8″x8″  flannel + bamboo terry wipes, and 8 of single layer bamboo terry as I heard it’s also good to have thin wipes. In total I have 28 wipes.

Oh.. I just love these wipes. They are so so soft and the bamboo terry feels luxurious! Plus, they look so cute! 😛

So that’s it, newborn stash! Now please excuse me, I need to do some laundry 😉

Potty training sounded so intimidating for me. I have no idea how it’s going to turn out and whether I could handle it.

I knew she was capable of being potty trained months ago, but I wasn’t ready for it. I mean, it’s going to be a HARD WORK.  I put it up a long time ..until I realized the second one is arriving soon, and I don’t think I can handle potty training AND breastfeeding a baby. It just sounds like way too exhausting.

So I asked the nursery and happy to find out that they are willing to work with you, yay! Unfortunately, I have no clear understanding on HOW to do it. There are so many questions such as night time and day care. I know it’s going to be hardwork, but what if drama comes into the picture, and how do I troubleshoot it without regressing the potty training process? I know, I know, it sounds like I’m thinking too much, but to me, if I were to spend 3-4 days doing the hard, exhausting work, I might as well go all out. No problems are going to make me give up and try another time, it’s just going to be just as stressful for my daughter and me. Plus, the last thing I want is to make the process longer and tougher.

So, in search for answers, I did google around and found so many different methods to potty train. I could use treats and rewards system, or I could bring the child to the toilet every hour.

Then, I found a PT book  “Oh, Crap! Potty training!” By Jamie Glowacki and I found her method resonates to me the most. Her book made me convince to start potty training ASAP. She covered the HOW-TOs, nighttime, poop, daycare, problems along the way and the troubleshooting. Honestly, I would have trained Sara months ago if I had found the book earlier, instead of waiting to be very very pregnant AND huge.

So, how did I do it? 

For training purposes, I gave her extra fluids to drink. She gets free pass for unlimited supply of Milo, Yakult and Solivite. and I also made watermelon juice.

For now I’m only doing the daytime training although, training day and night is the best. Her naptime and bedtime trainng will be delayed until the new baby arrives when I have to get up to nurse the baby. For now, mama needs to rest for labour and get as much night time sleep as much as I can, while I can!

Now, first of all for a potty training to be successful the PARENTS have to be ready for it. If your child is 20months old, they are definitely capable. Second, don’t expect the child to be able to tell before peeing. It is something new for them to learn. They have ‘forgotten’ or unaware of the sensation of their bodily functions since they have been diapered since born. Seriously, just don’t bank on it. It is our job to learn their pee signals. With time, accidents and practice, they will be able to tell and hold longer.

Day One – Block One

We started with block one. (Blocks are just learning stages, doesn’t translate to days. One block may take anywhere from 1-3 days depending on child).

We started the day by telling her that she’s no longer wearing diapers. when I took off her diaper, she cried so hard, saying she wants to keep her diaper on. Which is funny, because most of the times we struggle to dress her up because she refuse to wear her diaper!