Christmas, Baby Showers, and Family Fun

After three weeks I think I have finally recovered from our two week trip to the US!   Traveling that far at the end of the second trimester was certainly exhausting and it didn't help that I came down with a sinus/respiratory infection from the second I got on the plane and couldn't make it go away until I got back to Singapore.  I just wish I had felt better so I could have fully enjoyed all the exciting stuff we had planned for our trip.

We spent the first week of our trip in Atlanta with Derek's parents.  We shopped for the baby, celebrated Christmas, had a family photo shoot, and ended it with a baby shower.  I regret that I didn't take more pictures but I was really under the weather and kept forgetting.

Christmas will never be the same!

Baby shower!  Matches our nursery theme: purple, teal, and gray. 

Thanks to Janet, Pat, Roxanne, Judy, and Raelene for throwing a great shower!

We rushed out of Atlanta after the baby shower because I had another one the next day in Aiken with my family.  We were certainly spoiled by our friends and family over this trip!

Beth, Katie, Brett, and Layne also did a wonderful job! Thanks ladies!

As always, my mom did an amazing job on the cake!  It was cute and delicious!  Chocolate with Nutella buttercream!

After the shower we headed up to North Carolina with my family to spend the New Year together in the mountains.  We were just outside of Asheville so we had to make a trip over to the Biltmore.  Derek had never been and I have always wanted to do the candlelight tour.  It was gorgeous but of course they don't allow pictures.

To finish off the trip, we headed back to Atlanta to meet the movers to pack our air shipment.  We packed an entire nursery including furniture, bedding, and clothes into a 5'x5'x5' container.  I did a lot of planning and strategic shopping which paid off because despite Derek's skepticism, it all fit!  The shipment has since arrived and I will do a nursery reveal soon.

The following day we had to head back to Singapore and with all the winter storms, the trip was far from uneventful.  We were supposed to fly through Newark and found out two days in advance that our flight from Atlanta to Newark was canceled.  I got us rebooked on a flight through Dulles instead and that seemed to be promising until our flight from Dulles was delayed two hours and we missed our connection in Tokyo.  We then had to collect our bags, clear customs, and take a bus to the other Tokyo airport to catch a partner flight the airline had rebooked us on.  Thirty-six hours later, we finally landed in Singapore.  Having to do all that sick, pregnant, and sitting in coach was about as awful of a trip as I have ever had.  I'm hoping our baby doesn't make me regret this statement during our two planned trips home next year.

Despite the drawbacks, we really did have a wonderful time and were so thankful we could make the trip to spend Christmas at home this year.  Hoping all of you had a wonderful Christmas, too!

Confinement: Local Post-Birth Practice

One of the questions I often get from locals about giving birth is who will be helping me during my confinement.  I had heard of confinement before I got pregnant and knew it was something I never wanted to do.  It is a fairly common practice here for Singaporean Chinese, Malay, and Indians and they don't always realize that this is almost unheard of in the US.

So what is confinement?  After giving birth and returning home, the mother is to observe confinement for 30 - 44 days to recover.  During this period she must not shower, use air conditioning, or leave the home.  There is also a special diet to avoid 'cold' foods like apples, pineapple, cucumbers and to avoid 'windy' foods like onions and jackfruit.  There are lots of recipes that are special for confinement and the objective is to 'warm' the body and increase circulation to speed recovery.

In order to do confinement, a relative or confinement nanny is required.  This person will prepare all the food per confinement practices and also cares for the baby, night and day.  The mother is only supposed to feed the baby if she is breastfeeding.  Otherwise she is to stay in bed and recuperate.  I think spending 30 days in bed is much easier when you have 16 weeks of government mandated paid maternity leave like they do instead of the 6-8 weeks that we get.

Most of the Singaporeans I know that have done confinement do it because their mother or mother-in-law insists and are either there the whole time or often come to check up on them.  I know many will hop in the shower as soon as they get a moment alone and I certainly can't blame them for that.  I can't go 30 hours without a shower, less 30 days.

One of the things I like that they do is at the end of the 30 days, they have a full-moon party which is to celebrate the baby being 1-month old and the end of confinement.  This is when friends and relatives all come to meet the baby and give red packets.  Red packets always contain money and are given at various celebrations.  This is what they do instead of baby showers prior to the birth of the baby.  My coworkers have asked if we are going to do a full-moon party and that may be one local practice we decide to follow, minus the red packets.

So would you ever do confinement?

2013 Summary and Plans for 2014

At the beginning of 2013, Derek and I decided it would be our year to travel.  We wanted to make the absolute most of one of our last years without children and made some pretty big plans.  We made some changes along the way and had some additional business trips that added to the country count.  So how did we do?

Together we visited:
Phuket, Thailand
New Zealand
Hanoi and Halong Bay, Vietnam
Bangkok, Thailand
Johor Bahru, Malaysia
Shanghai, China
The Maldives
Bagan and Yangon, Myanmar
Siem Reap, Cambodia
In addition we made two trips to the US to see family

Derek:
Beijing, China

Holly:
Pattaya, Thailand
Melbourne, Australia
Three business trips to Houston

My current travel map, 20 countries and counting

2013 really was one of the most enriching years of our lives.  I know we will never regret all the time and money we put into travel this past year because the experiences were truly priceless.  Looking onto 2014 we know that the year will not involve as much travel but will be even better as we get to enjoy it as a family of three.

So what do we have planned for 2014 besides having a baby half way across the world?  Derek and I both have brothers that are getting married this year and we will probably be moving to somewhere else as our assignment ends in August.  We hope to stay abroad and cannot wait to find out where the company will send our little family next.  Its going to be great year!