I'm a full-time mummy

Almost to the middle of October this year, I received an email from Miss Karen of Whimsical Articles asking whether I would be interested in reviewing the products in their online store. I was still in the midst of settling down with baby Carolyn (barely half month old then) and hence decided to keep in view for the time being.

A few weeks later, I emailed them again asking whether I can review two of their products which I think our 2 kiddos would be using and enjoying and here is the review for the 1st product.

Description about the sponsor:
"At Whimsical Articles, we also wanted our children to have fun too! And so we lovingly handpicked every item for the kid’s crafts - to help encourage our little ones to develop creatively and have endless hours of fun! From products that one child can do at home; to the products that can be done as a group and not forgetting crafts which can be made during parties. Your child will have loads of fun! These crafts will help your child to create masterpieces and keep as keepsakes for years to come!"

Firstly, my initial impression as I browsed through the products in Whimsical Articles website is their products seem interesting, in fact I have been searching for similar things – art/crafts supplies that we parents can get for our children, something that we can just buy over the Internet and get our kiddos started. No need to crack head to think what crafts to make etc etc. 

The reason why I requested to review the Melissa & Doug Wooden Bead Set - Sweet Hearts is so that I can let both my older 2 kiddos try it out. I have similar beads which I bought a year ago (China brand) for our boy but those beads are bigger, made up of alphabets, numbers, animals and shapes. I thought this brand we are reviewing should be very good since it is quite a popular brand and I like that the colors are not too overly girlish or too gender confined. I mean, I can picture myself using the beads to teach our kiddos about shapes, colors as well.

My feedback on the product's packaging: The beads are packed in a handy wooden tray and there is over 120 beads and 5 cords and they come in heart shape theme and lovely pastel colours such as purple, lilac, pink, baby blue, peach and so on. The beads are placed in its respective slots in a transparent plastic compartment layer which I promptly threw away as seriously, being a mother of 3 kiddos now, I really have neither time nor patience to arrange and keep back the beads into their own slots accordingly. I would really appreciate a proper container or cover for the beads but then, again, this is because I threw away the plastic compartment layer.

My feedback on the product: The quality of the beads is very good, unlike the China brand beads that I got for our boy a year ago. The colors are striking and eye catching and there are no jagged edges on the bead, all smooth to the touch which is good for little kiddos' fingers.

The cords are quite thin and both ends are covered with plastic, kinda like shoelace string you know? I was hoping the string would be bigger but then these beads are meant for children 4 years old and above.

My feedback on kiddos using the product: The moment I opened the packaging, I poured all the beads into the wooden tray and told our kiddos to go crazy and make mummy something! Our 4.5 years old boy immediately started hogging all the cute beads and taking them out by batches and put them nearer to him on the table. I took back all his beads and poured them back into the wooden tray and used this opportunity to teach him that he must only take the beads from the wooden tray and to string the beads one at a time and not be greedy.

As for our 2 years old girl, I gently guide her through the process to string the beads. Yes, I know this product is meant for children 4 years old and above, but trust me, I am sitting right next to her and monitoring her as well, so I know the risks associated if this product is being played by younger children. Anyway, I slowly guided our girl to hold one end of the cord, then I get the bigger heart shaped bead and teach her to look out for the holes in the bead, and to slowly string the bead through the cord. She took a few attempts to get it right but the beads she strings did not go through completely so I guessed we need more practises on that.

Summary: Of course at this point in time, it is still too early to expect our girl to be stringing up a bracelet or necklace for me to see and as for our 4.5 years old boy, oh well, being a boy, even when I asked him to make me a necklace, he ended up making me a rattle snake! On the other hand, we do enjoy the time we spent playing with this product!

I definitely see the potential of this product being played with over and over again in future as you can also use it as educational purposes, for example: stringing beads of the shape sizes, or colors or patterns and so on. This definitely could make a great gift option as well :)

You can get this at http://www.whimsicalarticles.com/kids-crafts/melissa-doug-wooden-bead-set-sweet-hearts.html

Whimsical Articles has also offered a special discount for my blog followers. Below are the details of the discount:

Purchase RM180.00 or more and get additional RM15 off on top of the already discounted products.
Customer can use this voucher as many time as possible. Valid from now until 31st December 2013.

Steps to get the discount:
1) Log in / Register as a member at www.whimsicalarticles.com
2) Add in the products to purchase into cart.
3) At Check-out, place in Coupon Code : IFM2013
4) Please check that products total is more than RM180 before code can be used.

I received no monetary compensation for this review, I was provided with the product by Whimsical Articles in order to facilitate my review. All opinions expressed in this post are my own. Please do your own research when purchasing products, as your opinions may differ from mine.

Yesterday we had an appointment for baby Carolyn's audiology test. She failed her hearing test right after birth for her right ear. So she had to do the test again and thank God she passed it.

During the first test when she was a day old, the hospital staff suspected amniotic fluid went into her right ear which blocked her hearing. Hence they scheduled another test which was yesterday.

What happened during the test, the critical criteria is the child must be sleeping when the test was carried out. Luckily Carolyn was sleeping throughout the journey (almost an hour car ride) and was still sleeping when we reached the audiology department so we immediately proceeded with the test. I had to switched Carolyn so that her right ear faced outwards, easier for the hospital staff to place the test equipment on her right ear. We can immediately see the results of the test once it reached the passing level.

Thank God the hospital has such test now as we never had this test for our earlier 2 kiddos. That's all for now, thank you for reading this post of mine. Feel free to ask and share if you have questions or feedback!

I thank God for the 3 wonderful children we are blessed with. I thank God that although they have jaundice, we know and have experience through 3 times and know what to do and how to handle the jaundice episode.

Please google around if you do not know what is jaundice. For Asian babies - especially us Chinese who have fair skin, the first thing to confirm that your child has jaundice is to look at the whites of his/her eyes. That's the first AND last place to see the bilirubin still in your child's body. Another method is to gently press your child's skin and the imprint left after you pressed will show you whether she/he has jaundice or not.

With our first child, Benjamin started having jaundice on day 5. Being a first-time parent, we don't know what to do and upon advice by the antenatal class trainer who did a post natal home visit for us, we sent Ben to his birth hospital for further check-up. The results showed he had high levels of bilirubin but due to the insufficient rooms/beds in the NICU unit, we stayed overnight at the peadictric ward. That night, Ben roomed in with me, his metal cot underneath the bili lights next to my bed. The moment he cried, I picked him up and sooth him and nursed him. 

It goes on and on that the next day, I was told to go back home and expressed my breastmilk instead and Ben was placed in the NICU unit as his bilirubin levels shot higher (due to me keep taking him out of the bili lights the night before) At home, I keep expressing every hour, as much as I can, just so we can packed as much breastmilk as possible to feed Ben while he was in NICU. His level dropped back to normal the next day and he was discharged and we came back home.

With our second child, Alyson started having jaundice on day 5 as well. But this time, we decided not to bring her to the hospital as she is nursing, sleeping, peeing, pooping as normal and active alert as well. Her prolonged jaundice lasted nearly 2 months. The mistakes we did with our second child is not having enough faith to believe that the jaundice is going to go off. We were not able to contact our pead for days (he was involved in an accident) and hence not able to consult his advice.

At my 6 weeks post partum check-up, my gynae said that we should get our child tested as she is still yellow. Results showed she had bacterias in her urine (I have no idea how the urine was collected) and we were given antibiotic for her to finish off in 5 days course. Few days later, we managed to get hold of our pead and brought our 2nd child to see him. He checked her and confirmed everything is fine, notihng wrong with her liver or anything and explained to us that urine test results can be easily compromised if the collection method is not thorough.

Meaning, if the hospital staff just collect the urine over the child's diaper then for sure there will be bacteria. The right method is to use a syringe/needle to suck out the urine from the bladder itself but this process will be painful for the child. Anyway, we did not finish the antibiotic after that. Coincidence or not, Alyson's jaundice went off a week after that.

With our third child, Carolyn started having jaundice on day 5 as well. This time the signs are all same as her sister. Nursing, sleeping, peeing, pooping all normal, active alert as well. So we decided to let it run its course. The annoying part of a prolonged jaundice is everytime I posted some pictures of Carolyn, there will be people commenting she is still yellow. Yes, we know that and as a parent of 3 kiddos, all whom had jaundice, we know well enough this is breastmilk jaundice and it will go away on its own, in its own time.

Look at the pictures of Carolyn below, how the yellow in her eyes and skin shows and slowly goes away week by week. I am happy to share that her jaundice is going off soon!

** Disclaimer: Do note that this post is my sharing of our experiences with jaundice in our 3 children, we do consult with the pead to confirm there is nothing wrong with our kiddos' liver or other factors such as blood incompatibility etc and most importantly is our kiddos were nursing (exclusive breastfeeding), sleeping, peeing, pooping, active and alert as usual so there was no cause of alarm for us.

That's all for now, thank you for reading this post of mine. Feel free to ask and share if you have questions or feedback!