All-in-1 Travelling Bib

We eat out most of the time during the weekends because I can't cook and we wanna give my mum-in-law a break. When we do, we often bring along Baby Boy's food jar, a spoon and sometimes a bib to feed him with. Sometimes we don't bring the bib or forgot to pack the spoon because there were just too many things to pack.

That is, until I got a B.Box The Essential Travel Bib from Little Baby. It's an all-in-1 bib that even comes with its own spoon!

B.Box Essential Travel Bib
(Design: beep beep)

Comes with an ergonomic rubber spoon

I love all the cute designs that it comes in (see the other designs here) but thought the cars one suited my boy the most. I absolutely adore the bright colours!

Close up of the design

The unique thing about the bib is not only does it have a pocket to catch whatever food that drops from your baby's mouth, the pocket actually doubles as a holder for the bib and spoon!

Pocket at the end of the bib

Fold the bib into the pocket to store it

Put the spoon in and zip it up!

You can either wash or wipe the bib when you get home (or at the nearest toilet, depending how OCD you are). The bib also comes with a strap so that you can hang it on your bag, the stroller or anywhere you want.

Close up on the strap

Hangs easily on my stroller and in my bag

Out on an outing

Feeding Baby Boy with the B.Box spoon

Baby Boy took very well to the bib and spoon. I personally find the spoon very easy to use, not too big for baby's mouth and not too small that it can't hold enough food for the baby. It is now a permanent resident in my diaper bag =)


GIVEAWAY!

If you would like to give the B.Box Bibs a try, great news! We are giving away a B.Box Travel Bib (worth S$24.90) to TWO lucky winners each!

Prize Sponsored by Little Baby

Simply follow these steps to qualify:

(1) Leave a comment on this blog post on the age of your child and his/her favourite food
(2) Enter the above entry into the Rafflecopter widget below

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The other entries are optional but you may enter them for more chances of winning! Good luck! =)

Terms and Conditions of this giveaway:
a) This giveaway ends on 25th February 2015 (Wed) and is only open to readers living in Singapore.
b) Participants must complete the entry above and enter them into Rafflecopter in order to qualify. Other entries entered into Rafflecopter must also be completed (I do check!). Incomplete entries will be disqualified without notice.
c) Limited to one prize per household.
d) The winner/s will be drawn randomly via Rafflecopter and must respond within 3 days after being contacted otherwise another winner will be drawn.

Disclosure: Complimentary bib was received from Little Baby Singapore for the purposes of this review and giveaway. No monetary compensation was received; all opinions are my own.

Thermos Food Containers

Sometimes it really doesn't pay to be a cheapskate.

When my girl started eating solids more than 4 years old, we needed a container to bring her porridge with us when we went out. The container needs to be light and able to retain the heat of the porridge. Although I liked the super cute Thermos Food Jars, I thought it was too expensive. Thinking that all food containers are created equal (and therefore I could save a buck), we decided to buy the much cheaper version at $10 only.

To our dismay, the cheap version could not retain the heat of the food for more than 2 hours (not surprisingly). Eventually we relented and bought the Thermos Food Jar, which lucky for us was on discount at Isetan (cost us only $29.90 instead of the usual $49.90).

We bought the very cute Spongebob Squarepants, which is now no longer in production
(On hindsight I should have gotten the pink Dora the Explorer but I didn't know if my girl liked Dora then)

What a difference a quality food jar makes! We brought it with us everywhere and it has kept the baby food warm for up to 8 hours. I truly regretted not buying one earlier!

Of course when we had Baby Boy, we knew we had to get the same for him. Coincidentally, Thermos Singapore kindly offered to send me one and I love it!

Thermos Hello Kitty Food Jar

I know, I know, it's Hello Kitty and it's pink (ironically my girl had used a blue food jar *sigh*) but it's so cute! Anyway, real men wear/use pink right?!? *laughs*

Curious.. What's this?

Close up of the details

The vacuum insulation and stainless steel interior and exterior of the food jar retains the heat of the food for a longer time. The jar is also leak-proof so you don't have to worry that your food will spill out (that happened to me before with lousy containers and it was really very inconvenient).

Rubber rim in the lid to prevent leaks and heat escaping

Wide mouth allows us to put food into the container and feed him easily

The tip to ensuring that the heat gets retained to the maximum number of hours is to put pipping hot porridge immediately into the container after it is cooked (don't worry, it can withstand the heat as it is quite hardy). Then you can be sure that the food is still hot even after 8-10 hours (tried and tested)!

Of course if you are only going to feed your baby 2 hours later then don't put the food in when it's piping hot because it will be too hot for your baby when he/she needs to eat it later. You'll end up blowing on the porridge while your hungry baby screams for food (true story).

He's looking angrily at the Thermos food jar because mummy would rather take pictures and not feed him when he's famished
(Baby Boy now knows that if he sees this cutesy pink food jar, he'll be getting food!)

Now this container goes everywhere with us! I don't think I will ever get tired of the cute pink! *laughs*

GIVEAWAY!

We are giving away 1 Thermos Foogo Food Jar to ONE lucky winner and 1 Thermos Foogo Straw Bottle to another ONE lucky winner (2 winners in total)!

Prizes sponsored by Thermos Singapore

Simply follow these steps to qualify:

(1) Leave a comment on this blog post on the ages of your children, which prize you would like to win and why
(2) Enter the above entry into the Rafflecopter widget below

a Rafflecopter giveaway

The other entries are optional but you may enter them for more chances of winning! Good luck! =)

Terms and Conditions of this giveaway:
a) This giveaway ends on 30th January 2015 (Friday) and is only open to readers living in Singapore.
b) Participants must complete the entry above and enter them into Rafflecopter in order to qualify. Other entries entered into Rafflecopter must also be completed (I do check!). Incomplete entries will be disqualified without notice.
c) Limited to one prize per household.
d) The winner/s will be drawn randomly via Rafflecopter and must respond within 3 days after being contacted otherwise another winner will be drawn.
e) The winner/s will have to collect their prize at Thermos Singapore’s head office at 16 Arumugam Road. Prizes that are not collected in a month will be given to the next randomly drawn winner.

Disclosure: Complimentary food jar was received from Thermos Singapore for the purposes of this review and giveaway. No monetary compensation was received; all opinions are my own.

My Breastfeeding Diary: 8 Months

I know I keep saying this but I really can't believe that it has been 8 months since I pushed this little man out of my youknowwhere! *gasp*

As I mentioned previously, we have been introducing Baby Boy to solid food little by little (here's some tools we used to ease the process) and he has been taking it very well. He's excited to try food that he has not tried before and eagerly smacks his lips when we're eating, thereby prompting me to feed him a little of whatever I'm eating.

The look that says, "Mama I want to try some too please!"

He still drinks breastmilk every 2-3 hours and only substitutes 2 feeds with pumpkin porridge (he eats others of course but this is his favourite) a day. I still get up every 2-3 hours at night to feed him and it'll likely be this way till he's 1 or 2 years old. I think biologically it makes sense as this constant getting up every 2-3 hours to feed and check on the baby reduces the possibility of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. For mums whose babies sleep through the night, I'm sure they'll instinctively wake up to check on their baby every few hours too. That's just part and parcel of motherhood =)

Pumping at work has been harder as my supply dipped recently. I used to be able to pump at least 180ml (sometimes more!) each time but now I can barely pump 150ml. I have to eat fenugreek and drink red date and longan tea in order to get the amount back up to 180ml. It was quite depressing really. I have a few explanations for this, one being that my pump parts could be old and need to be replaced (I have pumped religiously for 8 months). The other could be that my baby has started on solids and didn't need to drink as much breastmilk.

Sigh, the perils of a nursing-working mum =(

Hopefully I can make it to the 18 month goal I set for myself. Pray that you'll have a better journey than me..

Well who am I kidding? Breastfeeding and motherhood ain't ever easy.


Continue to >> My Breastfeeding Diary: 10 Months
<< Back to My Breastfeeding Diary: 6 Months

This post is part of my series on My Breastfeeding Journey.
Follow me as I battle the perils of milk production and boob-related pain all over again.

My Must-Have Tools for Introducing Solid Food

We have started introducing solid food to Baby Boy since he turned 5.5 months, a few months ago. It began with pureed apple and banana, which he immediately spat out.

"Maybe he's not ready for food yet," I told my mum-in-law in Chinese.

However, he seemed to be perfectly okay with cereal and pureed pumpkin porridge that we had introduced him later. It turns out, he does not like apples or bananas or fruits of any kind for that matter!

Now that we have to put effort into preparing Baby Boy's food (there's zero preparation required when I'm breastfeeding directly) and feeding him, it does help to have some useful tools to aid us.

FIVE WEANING ESSENTIALS:

[1] Baby Food Maker

Home Food Maker 
Get a multipurpose one, such as Pigeon Home Baby Food Maker, as it allows you to:
1) squeeze orange juice,
2) grate apples, potatoes, etc
3) grind porridge, pumpkin, carrots, etc
4) store food in the fridge after preparation
5) feed baby directly from the bowl after preparation to minimise extra washing

Pigeon Home Baby Food Maker

If you're rushing for time, you could also use an electrical hand blender instead of preparing the food manually. It's more expensive but you'll be able to save time and make a larger batch of food to store for future.

Porridge Cooking Pot

Pigeon Porridge Cooking Pot

If you think that this is another ordinary container, well, think again. This container actually helps you to make porridge in a rice cooker while you're cooking rice for the family!

Photo credit: Pigeon Singapore

Definitely very convenient and time-saving! =)

[2] Weaning Spoon

Feeding Baby Boy with Pigeon Feeding Support Spoon

My mum and mum-in-law, the ones who does most of the feeding of my boy (lucky me I know *laughs*), tell me that Pigeon Feeding Support Spoons are better than ordinary spoons as it fits perfectly into Baby Boy's tiny mouth. This is vital, especially for babies that are still learning to sip and swallow.

[3] Bib

Feeding can be a very messy affair as babies are still learning how and what to eat. If your baby is in the beginning stages of weaning, make sure that you get bibs that are absorbent as most of their food will be watery. You may even consider getting the Pigeon Disposable Bibs, which allow you to throw them away after every use.

Pigeon Disposable Bibs

As your baby progresses to eating less pureed food, you may want to get a bib that can collect the food that is dropped from your babies mouth onto his lap.

[4] Easy to Use Containers

Feeding Support Set
A great tip that I've learnt from fellow mummies is to cook a big batch of baby food and freezing them, after which you can heat them up when its needed. We use a combination of various baby containers (which were also used to hold my breast milk) and Pigeon Feeding Support Set.

Pigeon Feeding Support containers can be nicely stacked on top of each other
and comes with Feeding Support Spoons

Pumpkin porridge frozen in the container, ready to be fed to Baby Boy when he needs it

Feeding Dish
Another useful container that we like to use is the Pigeon Feeding Dish, which is great for transporting baby food when out and about with the baby.

There is even a small section in the Pigeon Feeding Dish for grinding food before feeding for greater convenience

A feeding spoon attached to the lid of the dish

The dish comes with a feeding spoon that is attached to the lid so that you do not have to find a way to store the dirty spoon after feeding. Simply keep the spoon in the dish and wash everything later. Very convenient =)

[5] Baby Starter Food & Drinks

Pigeon baby crackers, snacks, biscuits, packet drinks and easy to prepare food packets

I don't know about you but my babies have always been big foodies. Even after a heavy meal of pureed porridge and breast milk, sometimes Baby Boy still wants to chew on something. So we give him some Pigeon Baby Crackers (he's not old enough to eat biscuits yet as he doesn't have teeth) to snack on. Both Baby Boy and even my girl loves the baby snacks!

Both my kids love Pigeon Baby Crackers!

Even my girl loves the Pigeon packet juice

My kids love the food and drinks and it's really convenient to take around with us when we're travelling.

What are your weaning must-haves? =)


Related Post: If you're preparing for baby and breastfeeding, check out My Must Have Tools for Breastfeeding.

Disclosure: Complimentary 1-year sponsorship of mother and baby products were received from Pigeon Singapore for the purposes of this blog post feature. No monetary compensation was received; all text and opinions are my own.

My Breastfeeding Diary: 6 Months

Has it been 6 months already? I can't believe that my baby is 6 months old!

I'm tearing up because it is likely that he is my last baby (I really want to close shop!) and I won't be able to cuddle a baby that's mine any more! *sob*

Nowadays he is a lot more aware of his environment. He recognises when I'm going to feed him and will stop crying where as in the past he'll keep crying till I actually latch him (and even then he doesn't realise it until I prompt him).

We decided to start introducing him to solid food two weeks before he turned 6 months just to see if he was ready to wean. Initially he was really apprehensive when we fed him baby food so we didn't force him. Later on, we tried feeding him some cereal (that his pediatrician introduced to us) mixed with my breast milk and he really liked it. As time went on, he got increasingly interested in what we were eating and would stick his tongue out whenever someone pretends to put something into his mouth.

Sticking his tongue out to try different things
(don't worry, we only let him lick it for taste; of course we didn't feed it to him!)

I took it as an indication that he was ready for us to introduce more food so we started feeding him crackers from Pigeon and pumpkin porridge (made by the mum-in-law of course, you know that this is not my department in the house!).

He loves biting on Pigeon's fish crackers, which are easy to digest

Although he is eating pumpkin porridge once a day, his main meals are still very much my wonderful breast milk which I still lug home everyday after work (I latch him when I'm at home with him though because I really don't like to pump). Pumping at work never gets easy; I'm always grateful for extremely awesome and understanding colleagues. The guys especially are really chill even though they feel really uncomfortable seeing and hearing me pump at my desk and sometimes at unit meetings (yes, my unit people are really cool!). Can't ask for better environment to pump in =)

And even though it is tiring to pump, wash, store (in the fridge the colleagues got me, no less!), work, pump, lug the packets of milk home.. it's extremely gratifying to see all of my hard work turn into chubby cheeks, arms and thighs! *yum*

My sweet little 6 month old boy

I truly enjoy every minute of my bond with my boy, even though it means sleepless nights and dehydrated days. I love you Baby Boy, and your smiles can truly melt any frozen heart =)

Since Baby Boy will be taking solids and slowly reducing his intake of breast milk, I will be updating this diary every 2 months instead of every month from now on. I hope that I will be able to breastfeed him for 18 months like I did his sister (just to be fair, if ya know what I mean. Why? Because I don't want him to blame me one day when his sister graduates from a top university and he didn't and he complains it's because I breastfed her longer than him. I know, I'm crazy).


Continue to >> My Breastfeeding Diary: 8 Months
<< Back to My Breastfeeding Diary: 5 Months

This post is part of my series on My Breastfeeding Journey.
Follow me as I battle the perils of milk production and boob-related pain all over again.

Embracing Talent, Not Just Academic Excellence

In a country that pursues academic excellence like it is the ultimate goal in life (it is not!), I sometimes feel pressured to do the same.

However, after interviewing many young candidates for internships at work, I realised that having good results is not the most important thing that we look for when deciding on who to engage. Some of the most brilliant candidates with the best results ended up being rejected by us because they also had the lousiest attitude. They thought that just because they are smart, they are entitled to get whatever they want! Well sorry to disappoint you, my friend, results are not everything.

That's when I came to this conclusion: I don't just want my girl to only pursue academic excellence, I want her to embrace talent and develop character. To learn how to lose to others and still maintain a great attitude; or be unafraid to fail as victors are those who never give up!

Although my girl may not be the smartest in class, or know how to read (yet), she is a genius in her own way! Well, there are definitely 2 things my girl is extremely talented at:

1) Eating
Yes, eating! I know what you are thinking, "well, everyone can eat!" True, but not everyone can differentiate between expensive and inexpensive food at just 6 months old!

She's so good at it that this becomes a regular occurrence with us:
"Is the food good?" a friend asks me. "I don't know, let me run it through my Food Critic." I replied, feeding it to my girl. She swallows, smiles and asks for more. "It's good!" I declared. And true enough, it was! =)

Her palate is so sensitive, she can tell if something is overcooked or under-cooked, even by a little bit! I half suspect the recent improvements in my mum-in-law's cooking had a lot to do with her! *laughs*

2) Singing

People, even strangers. often comment that my girl can speak really well! And while it is true that she can speak in paragraphs before most kids can walk, I think this is mostly translated to her love for singing!

Her school concert in November is fast approaching and she has been fervently practicing. I'm really looking forward to see her perform on stage for the first time! =)

What is your child's talent?

Recognise and flaunt your child's talent by taking part in a contest hosted by Dutch Lady ActivGold. Simply take a picture of your child performing his/her talent, share it on Instagram and add the hashtags #50xBrightkids #ActivGold (contest ends on 30 November 2013).

The top 50 children selected will each receive $200 worth of Dutch Lady ActivGold products plus $100 gift vouchers and also be featured on their advertisement.

Join in the fun and your child could possibly be 1 of the 50 to be featured! =)

*Personal Note: In case you are wondering, yes, I'm still very much a BIG advocate of exclusive breastfeeding! But since Dutch Lady ActivGold is meant for children 1 year old and above, it therefore does not compromise our breastfeeding efforts! Formulated with 50% more DHA, ActivGold helps children to unleash their full potential and tastes good enough, even for my little Food Critic! =)


Disclosure: This is a sponsored story on behalf of Dutch Lady Singapore. All opinions and text are my own.

Juicy Yellow Goodness

We had potluck at Mr & Mrs P's last week.

Food, food and more food!

And like my cell group member commented, it was like feeding the 5000.. even though there were only 12 of us *laughs*

And amidst the mountain of food that we brought, guess which was our favourite?

Clockwise from left: Salad from Mel's Kitchen;
Authentic Taiwanese baby tomatoes made by our Taiwanese friend; D13 durian

It's obvious, especially if you know us well. And baby girl loves it too! =)

"I also want!!"

She was probably first exposed to it when she was in my womb as I ate a lot of durian when I was pregnant with her. And then one day we were eating durian on the floor, she crawled over to us and "pestered" me to let her try. She was only 7 or 8 months old! *laughs*

It was no surprise that we had a lot of food left over so we played a game of Texas Poker to finish it.

Texas Poker with a foodie twist

The bets are food and loser has to finish everything on the plate! And because of that, we did manage to finish all the food on the table! Zero wastage *grin*

It was fun but I went home feeling sooo guilty, I finally decided to start watching my diet and exercising 3 times a week!

Will blog more about that in my next post =)

Linking Up With:


  

The Only Breakfast I Know How to Cook

I think I mentioned this previously, my idea of a typical breakfast is very unlike my hubby. I love me my bread and eggs (soft, hard-boiled, fried, sunny-side up, scrambled, etc). And that's what I'm going to do =)

Prepared the eggs and olive oil

Look, I'm seriously not a morning person so the fact that I even bother to fry anything is commendable ok *laughs*

I decided to do scrambled eggs because I used to eat it every morning when I was in primary school and watched the canteen lady do it. All you need is eggs, salt and pepper =)

Mum-in-law only reminded me after I finished that I should have turned on a bigger fire so that the eggs wouldn't stick. "Pan hot, oil cold, to fry egg" she said.

Now you tell me.. -_-

Scrambled eggs, bread and jam/peanut butter for breakfast!

I was supposed to spice it up a bit and add ham and sausages but 1) we ran out of ham and I forgot to buy more and 2) I was too lazy to defrost the sausages.

It's just too early in the morning lah.

I like to have peanut butter or jam with my bread *yum*

Introducing my version of eggs to baby girl

I feel embarassed to share my so-called 'recipe' and nearly chickened out of posting this but I made a promise so I was going to keep it! At least I get an A for effort? *laughs*

This post is part of a Breakfast for Champions initiative hosted by Adora at Gingerbreadmum.

Head on over to read about the amazing recipes by the other Singapore Mom Bloggers, which I guarantee is many, many times better than mine =)