A Pot of Curry

I went grocery shopping for the first time today in about seven weeks. Things have changed. There's plexiglass at cash registers. People are wearing masks and gloves. There's a designated person wiping carts at the entrance. Entrances and exits are marked separately. There's tape on the floor marking six foot distances. Traffic on the roads was a lot lighter as well as people shopping overall. (Granted, I did go at 8:30 in the morning...which is early even without our current situation.)

The lady who normally checks me out at the register was working. I wasn't sure if she'd recognize me without my daughter and with a mask on, but she did. We chatted for a bit since nobody was in line waiting to check out behind me. I told her I had two kids now. She didn't believe me. I showed her a picture. She said she couldn't wait to see both of them again. Mentally, I thought about how many more months it would be before I would ever venture outside with my two young kids.

Upon arriving home, I completely changed everything I had worn out and threw them directly into the washing machine. Times have changed. Sadly, they're never going to go back to the way they were. Masks and gloves in public may be a part of our new normal. Social distancing may always be on our minds. But life will eventually go on.

In some ways, I've been grateful for this virus. It forced me to stay home in a time when I would have stayed home anyway. Convenient, right? I've known women who are at the mall or taking their baby out DAYS after giving birth. That is not me. My body has proven to me that it takes time, sometimes longer than normal, to put itself back together. With the quarantine this year, I've appreciated being able to accept that without feeling like I'm depriving myself of anything.

I've appreciated the time at home with my family. My husband was blessed to have six weeks paternity leave from his company. This was a drastic change from two years ago when our daughter was born and he was given one week paternity and took one week of PTO. Looking back, watching one baby at two weeks old by myself at home would have been a piece of cake. Part of me is still anxious and terrified about him having to return to work (at home) and being "left alone"with a six week old and a two year old.

In other ways, it's been a huge pain. We've been to the grocery store two times since having a new baby. I miss using fresh ingredients to cook. Normally, I almost never buy frozen or canned vegetables. I don't really know what to do with them. The texture is different, and sometimes, so is the taste. We've been eating a lot of prepared frozen foods, which, back in my childhood/teenage days, I may have loved. But being an adult now, it gets old pretty fast.

We haven't been able to have as much help as I had thought. My in-laws didn't come. My dad hasn't come over. Friends have dropped off food occasionally, which has been really nice, but I miss seeing people. I was texting a friend and telling her, "T loves to be held. I wish I could give other people the privilege!" He was quite tiny when he was born, not even 7 pounds, and he went down to almost 6 pounds at his lowest, but he is shaping out to be quite the chunky baby. At one month, he was just under 10 pounds, and I'm pretty sure by 5 weeks he went comfortably over that. (Yes, I know, this is small compared to other people's standards, but when he weighs 8.4% of my postpartum weight, not even my normal, that's pretty significant!)

Lastly, it has impacted my work. I am self-employed and run my own business so I knew by taking a maternity leave I was going to be giving up 2-3 months of income. Not a problem.

So where's the problem?

My substitute was an older lady, and when this virus came about, it was decided she would not teach students inside her home. Also, being a substitute who wasn't familiar with my students, online lessons were not likely and my students did not wish to take online with someone who wasn't their normal teacher. Originally, I had been thrilled over half my students wanted to take lessons with the substitute this year - significantly higher than two years ago. I was also very excited to have her as my substitute as well. Unfortunately, none of it panned out.

As a result, my teacher instincts and concern for my students decided to shorten my maternity leave by a month. So instead of starting the second week of June like I had intended, I am now starting the second week of May. I am teaching a lighter load of about 6-8 students, but it means adding the slightest bit of work to my already busy daily routine. You also have to understand though that the longer my students go without lessons - whomever the teacher may be - the more difficult my job is to teach them again when they return. It's a catch-22. Yes, it is my personal decision to do this, but no, it was not the original plan.

When my daughter was born, I went back to work when she was 8 weeks old, and that was planned. I told myself it was too soon and I would need more time with my son. Well...that isn't happening. He will be 7 weeks old when I start teaching again. So, if we have a third child, does that mean I'll go back to work when he/she is 6 weeks old?! Ha...

As nice as it's been to humor my homebody introverted self for the last month and a half, life will eventually need to resume. We can't stay home forever in fear of getting the virus. But we will also never leave our house with the same carefree mindset we used to. Shopping trips will need to be meticulously planned, and stopping by two or three different stores at once to snag the best deals is probably a thing of the past (at least for me.)

Tonight, we'll get to eat our pot of curry with fresh vegetables and chicken.

Stay smart, even if the state is reopening.

All Diapers Are Not Created Equal

In the middle of this quarantine, toilet paper, hand sanitizer, hand soap, paper towels, disinfecting wipes, and disinfecting spray are just some of the items which fly off shelves and are nowhere to be found. Not so high on the list because the population who needs them is smaller would be diapers, baby wipes, and formula.

We got lucky and stocked up on diapers with no intention of being in quarantine for 1+ months after our son was born. How did this happen? Last September, I bought a Groupon for a Costco membership which included extra perks of coupons. One of the coupons was a $25 off $250 purchase online only. I didn't intend to use the coupon because when was I going to spend $250 in a single transaction online at Costco? The coupons didn't expire until the end of February 2020, so I held onto all of them including that one, but didn't think much of making an online purchase.

Fast forward to early February. That flyer included a sale on Huggies diapers. I finally had an epiphany that I could use my coupon towards buying diapers since that was an impending need for the next year or more of our lives, and we were going to be buying diapers for two for an unspecified amount of time as well. So we front-loaded our diaper purchase and were able to use my coupon.

A week after he was born, I came across a Facebook Marketplace post for free diapers of assorted sizes, and the seller was located a mere 10 minutes from us. My husband went out to pick up these diapers and they sat in our garage untouched for about 3-4 days to let any virus/bacteria presence die off, hopefully, if there was any.

One morning, I went out and sifted through the diapers, sorting by size and brand so we could organize them to use in an orderly fashion. I used empty diaper plastic sleeves which I had saved (that's another story...) and lined up the diapers to form essentially an entire box of diapers = probably over 100. The majority were size 1 with a little bit of newborn and size 3. We were able to use the size 3 for my daughter, and my son used up all the newborn and we're currently using up the size 1.

Now, if you don't already know, diapers come in a wide variety of brands and price points. The inexpensive diapers are inexpensive for a reason and typically aren't the ones you want to buy. My favorite brands for the budget would be Huggies and Kirkland diapers. Both can be found at Costco, but I'm not trying to advertise.

The diapers we got for free did not include either of these brands, but included a wide variety of other brands. Here is a photo I took of all the different brands placed side by side.

These are seven different brands of diapers (I think) with seven different styles/cuts. I took a second photo with three very distinct diapers and various differences in shape/style.

As you can see, the diaper on the left is shorter compared to the two on the right. I actually compared it to a different brand of newborn diapers and they were almost identical in size. The two diapers on the right are approximately the same in height, but the width is visibly different and one is skinnier than the other. 

I could go into much more detail about the elastics on each one, and which ones have pockets, but that's a conversation we should have privately if you ever want to discuss different diaper brands and which ones I think are better.

Remember:

- a cheap diaper is not worth it if it causes leaks 

- an expensive diaper is not the best just because it costs the most
- fancy brand names with big reputations don't mean anything

Main Takeaway: If you're having a baby for the first time and don't know what brand of diaper to get, or are curious what brand of diaper to get, consult someone who has used diapers before, or read blogs online to see what other moms have preferred. Don't simply find what's on sale and stock up or trust a big brand. DO experiment yourself with various brands if you have the luxury to be able to do so.

Happy changing!

Mamalogues: Strange Times

We live in strange times right now. It's been even stranger to have a baby during these times. Nobody could come visit us at the hospital. Our own daughter wasn't even able to come visit. We haven't had anyone over at the house to see the baby since he was born including our own family. We don't go to the grocery store if we can help it and mostly live off pantry staples and frozen foods. Some people have come to drop off some groceries or meals here and there, but we haven't asked anyone for anything because we don't want others to risk going out on our behalf.

Our daughter decided to rebel after we picked her up to come home with us after baby brother was born. Every day since has included tears and tantrums of some degree and her sensitivity right now is off the charts. I can't even open the cereal box for her if she wants to open it herself without a crying fit ensuing. We're lucky the second child is rather calm and likes to sleep. We joke that our daughter was a handful as a baby, and now that there's a new baby, she is STILL the handful.

I can feel the postpartum depression creep in at times. The foods I couldn't eat when pregnant, I now still can't eat because of to-go only rules and closed restaurants. Let's face it - sushi is not a to-go kind of food. And even though Asian cultural confinement says you shouldn't go outside for a month after delivery, it's still depressing to think that after my month is up, I still can't go out anywhere as I please. On the bright side, it means I don't have to worry about loading up two kids in the car by myself to go out.

I remember after my daughter was born, I struggled with the same kind of emotions in a different way. After my husband went back to work, I was left alone at home with a new baby whom I barely understood how to take care of. I still felt like I was crawling in the dark, feeling my way around, desperately trying to read nonverbal cues. Music was what helped me get through it. I'd go and play piano for a bit while she slept, and lucky for me, it didn't wake her up.

I would do the same now, but a needy toddler doesn't appreciate it when you don't pay attention to her for more than five minutes. When I've tried to play for a bit, she will actually come up to me and say, "Mama, nano [sic] all done." Clearly she dictates my world as well.

Being sleep-deprived and listening to a whiny toddler is not a good combination. Although my body is used to running on less sleep than the days pre-kids, sleeping two cycles of 2-3 hours and then being up and running for 13+ hours is exhausting. Factor that in with a defiant two year old and you have a recipe for disaster. It's an understatement to say that life at home is tough right now.

I miss my students. I stopped teaching a week and a half earlier than I anticipated because of the virus. I also caught a minor cold the week before I delivered 😬. My substitute plans fell through because of the virus. Part of me feels obligated to start teaching (online) earlier than I originally planned instead of leaving my students hanging for two and a half months. Part of me wants to start teaching when I originally planned. A tiny, tiny part of me thinks I should use the virus and the fact that I now have two kids two and under to stop teaching for a while. But I really don't want to do that.

My daughter's birthday was last week. There were no presents. There was no party. But we celebrated in our own small ways. I looked up a cake recipe without milk or eggs because we need to ration the supplies 😂 and she helped me make it. Then I made a homemade frosting.

I let her mix the batter.

...and then I had to grab a second fork and help her mix.

She was more interested in the candle flames than the cake itself and only had like two bites. Oh well. I’d like to say she’s not that interested in sugary treats, but if we had the chocolate cake from Costco, she’d probably be eating it up by the mouthful...

And of course, in To family fashion, we made her a homemade birthday card. I told myself before her first birthday that I’d hand make her a card every year for her birthday. So now she has two. 

I was filling out my son's baby book. There's a spot for world leaders, the price of gas, the price of a house, and popular movies. But there's no spot for world events, no spot for me to write "Coronavirus" or "Covid-19". Both my children will inevitably learn about this in their history books. But I'll tell them: we lived through this.