Wordless Wednesday - Baby Times Three

Our babies at 1 day old

Week In Review - Ten Things Of Thankful (41)

Today was a glorious day, filled with enough things to be thankful for to be done with the ten. I actually managed to go to bed at a decent time. After wiping a poopie butt at butt-crack in the morning I also got tons of cuddles from our little Violet who rather came to bed with me than return to her own. Lily and Violet both got up at 6; I made them breakfast and we agreed that they'd brush their teeth and then play until about 8 while I would catch some more zzz's. In return, there would be a surprise in for them. So after I got up and ready for the day, I packed the car with two excited girls to head to IKEA for a mommy-daughters breakfast and then playtime for them at Smalland and serious exhibit viewing for me for the next two hours. Back home, hubby made breakfast for the girls and we had some quiet time. The rest of the day was filled with dancing, cooking, talking to my mom / grandma, and playing outside. The weather was just so beautiful, perfect t-shirt weather, so I went to the store to have the first grilled sausage dinner of the year. Can't wait for more of these to come this season!!

Besides this perfect day, there were still tons of more things to be thankful for this week:

1. Figuring out another task at my work, being thrown into cold water by my co-worker. I was pee'd as hell first, but now I'm actually glad I had the opportunity to learn yet another part of the processes our team is dealing with.

2. Not working for 3 any more come Monday. One of my co-workers is back, and I can't wait to hear all about her 3 weeks of backpacking in Thailand!

3. Having gotten closer to a girl I obviously went to college with back in the days but didn't remember at all at the reunion 2 years ago. She's working as a free-lance translator now and is going to have a baby about a month before our little one is due. Can't wait to spend more time with her!

4. The opportunity every new day brings. I was pretty uninspired around New Years this time, but by now I have tackled a few more areas I definitely need to improve, and it's not going bad so far.

5. A new microwave, which is going to nuke the raspberries to go with my vanilla ice cream later.

6. Getting business cards!!  I know it's completely shallow, but I'm excited like a little girl having gotten a pack of them on Friday..

7. Working out with the girls. Besides running with Lily every once in a while, I'm starting doing yoga with them in the evenings now. Violet was too tired today, but Lily loved it!

8. Spring having arrived early. Many trees are in full bloom already and I'm excited that we're not going to miss the beauty while we're in TX.

9. Our girls loving me even though I'm the most sieve-brained person one could imagine. I had totally forgotten Lily's trip to the planetarium last week, and therefore didn't pack her a drink. She mentioned it during dinner, but added that it didn't matter as she drank a glass of juice before heading out that day. Love that girl!!!

10. Finally getting our car washed. It was much, much, much overdue, but eventually managed to overcome the spirit of procrastination.


Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!!

When It's All In The Genes

The other day, I was sitting in the waiting room at my doctor’s office for my annual check-up and cancer prevention exams. As I leaved through the magazines that were lying around, an article on the new boom for fertility centers in Germany caught my eye. Luckily, the Mr. and I didn’t have problems in this regard, but unfortunately we know a few people who did. Following the informational article, there were a few stories of women or families struggling with infertility and the option of reproductive medicine they chose, from freezing eggs for later use via IUI and IVF to plain old adoption.

One article written by a woman in her late thirties caught my attention. She is now the mother of a little boy that she and her husband had adopted as a baby. Before they decided on the adoption, they had gone through several years of highly stressful and expensive fertility treatments, including three IVF cycles. The first of these cycles had resulted in a pregnancy; however, the baby died 4 months into the pregnancy due to severe genetic disorders and was born still.

As a little bit of background information: any and all genetic testing on embryos prior to implantation is strictly forbidden in Germany. This had been decided by an ethics commission formed by the government during the regulatory process for reproductive questions. Many reproductive options such as egg donations and surrogates are illegal altogether here.

While I definitely understand the idea behind the law, which wants to prevent parents to approach the doctors with a list of preferences in their child-to-be (i.e. catalog child), I strongly believe that the law has gone too far. I am against genetic testing on embryos for gender, eye and hair color, height, etc.; however, it seems cruel to me to implant an embryo who is destined to never be born alive into a woman, who, at that point, is probably way past 30 and has gone through years and years of hoping, waiting, and disappointments, along with often painful exams and diagnoses.

But where to draw the line? Assuming the government permits testing for genetic disorders, would that mean that embryos carrying the genes for cleft lip, club foot, an eleventh finger, asthma, or dwarfism will be sorted out? And what would happen if a couple just approached the “right” doctor with a VERY generous donation for his private fertility clinic? Would they have their tall, blond, blue-eyed boy they ever hoped for? And would normal parents without any real fertility issues turn towards IVF just to be sure to have a genetically healthy child?

I certainly am of the opinion that a strict set of rule should be in place; however, why implanting a baby bound to die before being born, a baby that would probably have never implanted naturally. Why not developing a legal framework that is humane to everyone involved, including genetic testing for lethal disorders that will spare much pain and suffering to the parents as well as the unborn child.

What is your opinion on the issue of genetic testing in embryos? Are you for or against it, or somewhere in between? Would you consider IVF as an option to ensure a healthy child even though you can have babies naturally?

Thirsty Thursday - Why I Got Home So Late Today (And Frozen Solid)

 

It's this time of the week again: Thirsty Thursday blog hop, hosted by the marvelous Mar.

Before I hop away today to enjoy some date time with the hubby (he picked episodes of Myth Buster for the source of entertainment tonight), I would like to share what happened today on my way home from work.

First of all, I was late. An hour late, to be exact. Since tomorrow is a public holiday in Germany, our office closed official at 4pm; but I am also on leave next week, so I needed to tie up some lose ends before heading out today. When I got off the bus I went right into the corner store to pick up some chocolate bunnys for the girls and some champagne for the adults at the egg dying get together at a friend's house tomorrow. By then, I'm seriously late. So I hurry up to get home when I see a friend from the neighborhood, whom I haven't seen in a few months. We stop and talk for a minute, until the topic goes to baby. She confessed that she had always wanted a third child. She has two girls a little older than mine and told me that she also had two pregnancy losses after her second daughter, one of them was at 22 weeks. After those losses she developed serious migraine head aches, as she still yearns for the third child that most likely she will never have. I told her that I knew hos she felt; she interrupted me telling me that I couldn't possibly known when I confided in her about the panic attacks that sometimes go on for days thinking about maybe never having the third child my heart yearns for. She looked at me standing in the cold, and then said: Oh my goodness, you DO know....

Here we were, the girl from Kameroon so far away from home, and the girl who has moved across an ocean twice. What are the chances that we two would ever meet? And what were the chances of such an intimate conversation in public, in the cold, in the fading light of a really crappy later March evening? Well, this is life, and I wouldn't want it any other way.

A Mommy Post - MiBaby

Thanks to my Facebook sidebar (yes, I am one of those people who occasionally actually clicks on one of the ads there), I have come across a quite awesome upstarting new website for parents to learn about products, write reviews, and discuss about everything baby-/kids-/family-related. MiBaby was founded by two young men, who wanted to create not a shopping website but a place for personal advice and exchange of experience, according to their personal statements. In my opinion, the succeeded!

What I really like about this page is that the reviews are written by people who actually own and have used the product, not professionals paid by a company. The website is easy to navigate and clearly divided between a personal section, the review site and a forum for discussion. An added goody on this page is their team of experts consisting of a pediatrician, a midwife, and an early childhood development specialist, who answer questions and provide advise. The "magazine" page offers interesting links to external articles all around pregnancy and young family, including official test reports, pregnancy calendars and information on the "baby blues" and PPD.

Unfortunately, the page is only available in German as of now, but if you speak German, go ahead and visit the page at www.mibaby.de

Update: I have learned that MiBaby is set to be released in English in early 2014, potentially including translations by me  :-)


PS: I received no financial or other compensation for this post. All information I researched on the page of received from members of the MiBaby team.

Tasty Tuesday Revived

On today's menu: Lactation Cookies

This is actually a weird one, because I've never made them before. When I thought about posting this and what I could present, I was just reading through a bunch of Facebook posts, among others by Sara and Shannon from our Atheist/Agnostic Parent Group back in Washington. I remembered meeting for a group brunch at Daniela's house and finding out we were all due within only a month of each other. We haven't been to any meetings for quite a while at that point, so no-one knew that we were expecting as well. We spend quite some time sitting together and talking about the pregnancies and how we planned our deliveries. We all had less-than-perfect birth experiences with our first babies; we all were induced in the hospital and had epidurals. Now, we all were under the care of a midwife and planned all-natural births at a birth center (guess what, we all succeeded!). A few months later, with two babies already born (even though Violet was baby no. 2 on the list she was born first, followed by little Miss Vera only 5 days later; Malcolm was born a little more than a month later), we all met again for a brunch, this time at Rachelle and Chris's home. Even though we didn't spend much time together I can't say enough how much this camaraderie during those months meant to me. It was great just to sit together and talk about our kids and the little ones soon to be born. Shortly after Vera was born, Sara posted this recipe for Shannon and me, and a few others.

Here it is:

Ingredients

1 c butter
1 c sugar
1 c brown sugar
4 T water
2 T flaxseed meal (no substitutions)
2 large eggs
1 t vanilla
2 c flour
2 T Brewer's (nutritional) yeast (no substitutions)
1 t baking soda
1 t salt
3 c thick cut oats
1 c chocolate chips

Preparation

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Mix 2 T. flaxseed meal and 4 T. water, set aside 3-5 minutes.
Cream butter and sugars.
Add eggs.
Stir flaxseed mix into butter mix and add vanilla.
Beat until well blended.
Sift (or not): dry ingredients, except oats and chocolate chips.
Add butter mix to dry ingredients. (or vice versa)
Stir in the oats and then the chocolate chips.
Drop on parchment paper on baking sheet (or just spray Pam on the baking sheet)
Bake 8 - 12 minutes.

Believe me, I baked plenty during the 2 months at home after Violet was born (among others also regular chocolate chip oatmeal cookies), but never managed to try the above recipe due to a lack of flaxseed meal and brewer's yeast. But it's still time, and once the heatwave is over here, everything's possible. May we all have the long and successful nursing-relationship with our little ones!

Little Person, Big Personality

My friend Ebony is currently expecting her second baby. In order to make her son, Toure, feel more included in her pregnancy, I got her "The Sibling Book" (a baby book for siblings) for her and Toure to fill out together over the next 17 months or so. Out of interest I flipped through it and stopped at a page that compared the older sibling to the younger one. This made start thinking about my two girls, and how much they already differ from each other in terms of personality, temperament, likes, and dislikes. It is amazing, how such a small person, who should be utterly occupied by eating, sleeping, pooping, and trying to adjust to the world outside in general, can already display such detailed character and even communicate that to us parents.

The most striking differences between the girls in the first months: Lily was 100% a Daddy's girl. She wanted to be with him as often as possible and was only looking for me when she wanted food (after realizing that Daddy wouldn't give her any, no matter what). Violet, in contrast, is a lot more comfortable with me, even though she also enjoys her Daddy mattress. Lily was very active from the very beginning (her pediatrician was surprised that her motor skills at 2 months equaled those of a 4-months old baby), while Violet takes it easier (who would have thought after how she beat me up during pregnancy). Violet is a very social person, who hates being by herself and loves being held, while Lily didn't mind at all spending time by herself in the swing (as long as it was on her terms; if I needed to attend a lecture, she most definitely had to be there too!). Violet does not sleep well unless being swaddled, and also likes the comfort her pacy provides. Lily in contrast would not even stay bundled up in the hospital and wiggle out of her blankets only a few minutes after the nurses had wrapped her up to a perfect baby burrito; she also didn't care for a pacifier except for a few weeks when she was several months old and teething. Lily was also a very outgoing and outspoken baby (as "outspoken" as babies can be), whereas Violet seems to be a lot more quiet and relaxed, rather spending her time on my or Richard's arm looking around rather than on her play blanket trying to crawl and getting frustrated with herself.

We already notice that, even though they are sisters, Lily and Violet have very different personalities. It will be an interesting challenge for Richard and me adjusting our parenting style to the girls' individual personality. We can't wait to see how they will develop and are looking forward to every new aspect of their personality we discover. Who would have thought that Lily, who doesn't even look at dolls for the most part, would be such a dedicated big sister? Well, having spent time with her before and during my pregnancy I realized how much she wanted a little sibling and how excited she was once she found out that she would indeed get "her very own baby". Seeing my girls together is heartwarming each time, and even though they are very different personalities, we will support them in any way possible to become the best people they can be in their own way.