April Munchkins 2013- enjoying our wonderful babies!

[ReadytoMum]

Thanks for all the support ladies!! I really appreciate it. I was feeling pretty miserable last night, but feel a little better today. I always had a little hunch that we were having a boy... so I feel like their 'likely male' comment that we are in fact having a boy! I don't want to get too excited about it though until I can go back and have someone tell me for sure though.

In other news... today is 20 weeks!! Hurray!

 

[ukgirl23]

hooray for 20 weeks tomorrow readytomum!! xx

erm to defrost breast milk you can take it out the day before and put it in the fridge to defrost over night or in bowl of warm water like doggylover said, however to warm chilled breast milk I did use my microwave, it's quicker, I zap it for 20-30 secs then shake it and its good to go xx

 

[ukgirl23]

I found this ..

Defrosting breastmilk

The safest way to defrost is to transfer the breastmilk container to a refrigerator and allow the milk to thaw overnight. If the container remains in the fridge, the milk should be used within 24 hours of thawing (LaLeche).

Frozen breastmilk which has been defrosted outside of the fridge but then placed back in the fridge once in a liquid state should be used within 4 hours (LaLeche).

If defrosted breastmilk is allowed to warm to 'room-temperature' (68°F), it needs to be used immediately (BFN).

Do not use a microwave to defrost breastmilk. Breast milk must never be re-frozen.

Storage in a freezer/deep freeze

These guidelines DO NOT refer to the small freezer compartment within a standard refrigerator.

If you intend to freeze unused breastmilk, freezing should take place within 24 hours of expressing.

The Breast Feeding Network (BFN) advocates that breastmilk can be stored for up to six months in a freezer that has a constant temperature of -18°C or lower. However, Unicef’s "Breastfeeding Your Baby" document advises that breastmilk can be kept in a freezer for just 3 months.

It is important to remember that in order to meet your baby's nutritional needs, your breastmilk composition changes naturally in line with your baby’s growth. Considering this, I therefore recommend that frozen breastmilk should ideally be used within 3 months of expression.

 

[Steph82]

Yay on the 20 weeks Readytomum!! Sorry about your scan experience but at least you get another scan?!?!

UKgirl, I LOVE the name Bentley!! It was on my top list but OH didn't like it . We have decided on Grayson, so we are both really happy with that choice

Nimbec, lol on answering the phone! I work in an International company and constantly receive calls from Brazil, Germany, Mexico, etc. The problem is, that half of them don't even try to speak English. They assume I know Spanish and Portuguese . No fun!
I'm right behind you on the fruit and think its ridiculous that we stay a papaya! After all, my belly is still growing!

As for freezing BM, I was thinking of getting the bpa free bottles that attach right to the pump, and freezing those?!?! I read that if you use the bags, you have to transfer it to a bottle anyways, so may as well skip a step .
Will a bottle warmer work for frozen milk as well? If so, it may be worth adding that to the list of things we need???

Lily, I went to bed last night and felt HUGE! woke up with morning with a much smaller bump! I think my dinner may have been a bit to much

Anyone else get heart palpitations every so often? I read up on it, and it looks like it may be iron deficiency?!? Would make sense, since I have had no desire for meat lately and it happened over the weekend (when I forgot to take my pre-natals ).

 

[ukgirl23]

Thanks steph! I love the name Greyson!! CUTE! well the problem with freezing liquid is that it expands and if it is confined to a solid it could possibly break the bottle or split/ crack it which isn't great. Plus ideally you want to defrost BM in the fridge over night and by morning you would need to use a fresh steralised bottle. Plus in the bag it would defrost much quicker xx

I have palpitations anyway caused by stress lol but you can get them in pregnancy if you are anxious or just because your heart is working harder. You have loads more blood during pregnancy so your heart is pumping harder. Water and deep breathing helps xx

 

[maybesoon]

Ready to Mum, sorry your scan was so weird. I have never heard of them not being able to talk. Our US tech talked the whole way through ours and we were able to ask questions and grill her about the accuracy of her gender prediction Hope your next one is better, or at least that your doctor will be able to answer your questions from the images.

Sorry to the ladies having so much trouble at work! I am lucky that my job is generally easy. Just the occasional mean customer or lunatic. No big deal. Plus, I was already preg when I moved here so I just got a part-time job for some extra cash, so I'm lucky to just be there 20 hrs a week or so. I have definitely had some horror jobs in the past though. So, hope things improve for you ladies, and that your wretched supervisors get their acts together and appreciate you!

Do the ads on b&b drive anyone else mental? I mean the annoying rollover things at the top that you inevitably roll over when scrolling through a thread. I am sure I actually think worse of the products and companies after their ads have annoyed me than I did before!

Lily, my bump seemed small too but now it really seems to be getting rounder and more bumpified. I will have to take an updated pic. My belly button is even changing now. I just noticed that over this past weekend. It is shallower than before. I was surprised that it had changed already since my bump didn't really seem that much bigger, but belly buttons can't lie Not much else happening with me. Been doing lots of knitting now that I know bub is a girl. So fun!

Yes Kirstabelle.... Those ads drive me up the freaking wall. They won't go away!!!!

My bump is also starting to change. My belly button is beginning to push out!! eeeekkkkk

Hope you have a great day!!!

 

[LittleSpy]

Re milk storage: Evenflo glass bottles are quite inexpensive (or they were when I bought them for dd). But I will say if you're planning to use them for feeding as well, that many lactation consultants recommend finding a bottle nipple as close to your own nipple as you can to help prevent nipple confusion/breast aversion and the nipples that fit the Evenflo glass bottles are very, very, very far from my own nips. So I ended up using Playtex bottles until I gave up on getting her to nurse (so, 4 months when breast aversion started again big time). And by that point, she wouldn't take an Evenflo nipple until she was around 11 months and I was trying to wean her off bottles anyway. I think I may try Medela Calma this time (but she won't be getting a bottle, if I can help it, until I get ready to go back to work, so around 10 weeks we'll start introducing it). But I digress.

You all know my situation with suspected IGT. So, I just ended up using Lanisoh storage bags for the freezer but the only time I ever used them is when we did an experiment to try to determine the cause of dd's major fussiness and fed her formula for 2 weeks straight while I pumped and saved milk and then fed her just breast milk for a little unde ra week (all I could get in 2 weeks ). We were trying to see if she acted any differently one way or another (she didn't) in order to try to determine if we needed to change her formula or if I needed to change my diet. Other than that, she got every ounce I pumped with her next meal so it was only ever stored in glass bottles in our fridge for just a couple of hours, at most. As ukgirl pointed out, I do like that the bags are sterile, especially early on.

I will say the plastic in the freezer doesn't really bother me. To my knowledge, it's heating up plastic that is the culprit for potentially releasing harmful chemicals. Of course, I have no idea how much research has been done on plastic in the freezer. But since heating molecules excites them and cooling them does the opposite, I'm inclined to assume it's not nearly as bad of a thing. And in our situation, I never had to heat the milk in the plastic bags because we only used them that one time and I thawed them in the fridge. I did warm refrigerated milk under warm water in the plastic bottles, though.

nimbec -- good luck with your 6 million boxes! Hope the phone isn't ringing much. And you can freeze millk in the bottle, but I wouldn't recommend it in glass bottles, especially if you're going to heat it up (rather than leave it in the fridge to thaw). I always ran warm/hot water over it to thaw it quickly.

Readytomum -- what a strange scan! I have a few friends with children in Canada and they have never mentioned anything like that! I wonder if it's just that certain place's policy? As a way to cover their asses or something? I hope you get clarification on everything very soon!

steph82 -- the reason people use the bags is because if you freeze them flat, they take up very little space. Much less than bottles. But yes, fine to freeze in bottles. I had absolutely no use at all for a bottle warmer (and my daughter refused to nurse almost all of the time after about 1 week of age so got pretty much all bottles!). I always ran everything under hot water or she'd get what I had just pumped or room temp formula (we just mixed it on demand since we never knew how much we'd need for sure based on how much I could pump).

Also, while I'm thinking about it, DON'T SHAKE BREASTMILK (or a baby )! It damages/breaks up the proteins. I didn't know that for the first couple of weeks. Once you store it (like in the fridge), the fat will collect on the top and it's insanely tempting to shake it. You can swirl it gently, but no shaking. https://www.bflrc.com/ljs/breastfeeding/shakenot.htm
Of course, if you shake it, it's still okay to feed it, it's just better to not shake it.

Disclaimer: I typed this before you suggested shaking it, ukgirl, so wasn't aimed at you at all! I'm just trying to remember to share things that no one told me as I remember them.

 

[doggylover]

The other thing about freezing bm in the bottles as opposed to the bags is that the bags are a lot less bulky. They can be squished to fit into the freezer drawers, or into tight spaces and because they are well sealed there is no chance of a leak before freezing occurs. The bottles would almost certainly have to be upright, or on their side, and would take up a lot more space.

I suppose that is only a problem depending on the size of your freezer though!

 

[maybesoon]

Seriously.... If that dad-gum Dunkin Donuts ad pops across my screen one more time on here I'm gonna lose my mind completely.... It's bad enough that it gets in the way of me doing what I'm trying to do..... But darn it.... It's advertising donuts & coffee.....

 

[ukgirl23]

oooh I didn't know that littlespy! thanks for the tip! xx

I just almost fainted on my way home from the school. I felt weird walking up there but on the way home my vision went fuzzy and all the sounds went weird I had to sit at the bus stop with LO's until I felt better I haven't had nearly enough to drink today, I know it's bad but I went xmas shopping and they didnt let me buy a milkshake with my card so I left it and just had lunch. I learned my lesson though, that was awful Hope my little Bentley is okay :/ xx

 

[LittleSpy]

Damn it! I hadn't seen the Dunkin Donuts ad until I read what you wrote, maybesoon! Now it's all over my screen. I couldn't care less about a doughnut right now (what?) but coffee!! Mmmmm, coffee. I know I can have a cup but, just one and it has to be a tiny one which is lame. I'll wait until I get home.

ukgirl -- scary! I'm glad you're okay! Have a big glass of water and relax.

 

[nimbec]

I don't have the donut thing but omg could just eat them!!!!

Ukgirl try and relax! Maybe put a film on for the little ones? So u can put your feet up for a while. Tell them that they need to help mummy tonight by being well behaved - u never know they may listen lol! Worth a go!

 

[maybesoon]

ukgirl.... I'm sorry that's scary! I say put a movie in for the kiddos, put your feet up & relax for a bit. You have had so much going on lately....

 

[Mommabrown]

Oh Ukgirl oh how scary! Take care of You and Bentley..thats an order! Btw i love the babys name!!!!

I hate those damn ads and i craved donuts big time at around 16 weeks!

I am so exhasted lately...they also caught the crazed gunman yesterday so we can finally sleep a good nights rest. We took Ds to the Christmas parade last night and actually had a wonderful family outing. My other children actually called me last night to and talked to me for the longest time. They have not talked to me like that since they have been staying at their dads. I really hope they are seeing how much we love and care for them.

 

[maybesoon]

Amazing news Mommabrown!!! I love hearing that things are finally starting look up for you & your family!!! Maybe a Christmas miracle around the corner for you!!!!

 

[ukgirl23]

Thanks ladies.. Im worried that it might be related to the bleach Aaron washed the walls with earlier too.. our flat stunk of bleach and now my head is banging.. we have all the windows open now just incase. we have a mold issue so we have to wash the walls ith bleach now Im worried about my baby if its making me feel so shitty how is he coping? x

 

[Steph82]

Thanks to all the Dunkin Donuts talk... I had to drive over there for lunch and get a pumkin Latte . I also picked up Munchkins to share with everyone at work

 

[LittleSpy]

LOL, Steph! I'm so glad I work in the middle of nowhere (relatively) during times like this. Will probably stupidly pick up some k-cups on the way home from work (but will NOT get Dunkin Donuts ones, just on principle! ). I feel like I'll definitely be too lazy to fill and clean the little refillable cup. I have to run by Walmart to pick up Maisie's gift that I had shipped to store anyway. Ugh, Walmart.

 

[Steph82]

lol yes LittleSPy, Dunkin D is only 3 min away from just about anywhere I am at any time... I even have a drive through Dunkin D right out the back enterance of my community

Good luck at Walmart ... that place is crazy (especially after work ). Can't you send OH to go get everything??

 

[maybesoon]

Sorry to bring up the ad ladies. It's just been driving me absolutely nuts today! I guess I should consider myself lucky since there isn't 1 donut shop in the town I work.... Otherwise I'd be off getting myself some yummy sweet donuts!!!!