Mila Recommends: Little Playzone

Finally!!! With Mila on the verge of walking, the Baby Jail Condo couldn't have arrived any sooner! It's called the Little Playzone and it's awesome!!! Keeps her safe and entertained, as well as keeps me from having to chase her down every two seconds. I love the colors and the little activity wall... makes it look less like a cage and more like a play area. It's lightweight but sturdy and we put it together easily. I really like that both Jorge and I can go in and visit comfortably! We bought 2 Little Playzones  (one would be too small) but left out 2 of the panels, so it can actually be a bit bigger than this.

The best thing about it is that Mila seems to really like it!

Mila Recommends: Family Tree by Gab Atelier

My wonderful friend Gaby, who is also a graphic artist, made the most beautiful gift for Mila. I loved it so much, it made me teary-eyed! It's sooo amazing!!! It's a gorgeous design of Mila's family tree! I can't wait to frame it!

Gaby also has other designs of family trees on her website where you can purchase your own customized tree. Highly recommend!

Mila Recommends: Humidifier

Mila and I are doing much better from our cold. Mila's feeling better than I am, though. I'm still dealing with some post nasal drip that's affecting my voice and makes me sound like I'm all congested. But I'm doing alright.

So. While Mila was sick, we took her to the doctor because she developed a little cough and we wanted to make sure it wasn't anything serious. Doctor said it was fine, that it was just part of her cold and to get a humidifier and use saline drops in her nose to break up the mucus. We'd been doing the saline drops, along with the my favorite nasal aspirator (which, by the way, was the VERY BEST THING EVER when your child is sick with a runny nose! That thing got all the boogers!!! Loved it! Thank you again, Karina!!!) But we hadn't gotten a humidifier yet. We kept reading how hard they were to clean and we'd been looking for a good one. We struggled with several bad nights with Mila and her cold until finally, after one night with Mila having such a hard time breathing because she was so congested, we brought her into the bathroom and turned on the hot water and let her breathe in the steam. That helped so much!! The very next day, Jorge went out and bought a simple Vicks Warm Mist Humidifier. And from that night on, Mila was sleeping so much better! It helped sooo much! I couldn't believe it! I'd never used a humidifier before and I had no idea how helpful it would be. It even helped me when I got really congested too! Why, oh why, didn't we get this sooner????

I remember being terribly sick with a cold when I was pregnant with Mila and not being able to take any cold medicines sucked! I would cover up my nose with my blanket and breathe in the warm air and that helped so much... I could've totally used a humidifier then. Ugh, where have you been all my life?! 

The Vicks Warm Humidifier worked great. It stayed on all night like we wanted and warmed up a medium-sized room very well. It is hard to clean though. After one use, the heating element had gotten this brown crust on it that was impossible to scrub off. We would clean it every day as much as possible. For $30, it did what we needed it to do and it was totally worth it. From what we've read, all humidifiers are super hard to clean anyway, so if it does get too dirty, we can just get another one. And considering that we won't be using it too often, hopefully it won't get too dirty too soon. 

If you've got a recommendation for one that you use, that's easy to clean, I'd love to hear it! :)

Update on Aspirator Part II

So when I last wrote about the Graco Aspirator I told you how Mila stopped liking it. Well, just like my wise friend Karina said, she's taken to it again! Since she had started complaining whenever I used it on her, I started letting her watch a couple of minutes of television to distract her while I sucked the boogies out. Totally worked and she didn't even seem to notice. Then I realized that she wouldn't complain if I sucked them out even when the tv wasn't on, so it's working great! So happy!!

Mila Recommends: SoundSpa Lullaby Sound Machine

I almost forgot to tell you about Mila's new sound machine that helped during that 8-hour stretch the other day! She has yet to do it again, but ever since we put in the blanket under her crib sheet and started using the sound machine, she's gotten so much better!

So I'd been reading that sound machines are great for babies. That it helps lull them to sleep and helps them stay asleep. You can get one that has different sounds, things like rain, ocean, stream or rainforest. Mila was originally sleeping in her Pack N' Play since she was born and that had a little sound machine on it.  Since she's moved to her crib now we moved the detachable sound machine with it, but the timer would only keep it on for 15 minutes or so. We were always running to reset it so it would play longer. Such a pain! And then, we'd fall asleep and it would eventually turn off so if she woke up in the middle of the night, there would be nothing for her to help her fall back asleep and she'd wake up. So we finally looked into getting a sound machine and found this little gem. It's the Homedics SoundSpa Lullaby Sound Machine with Picture Projection. It's fantastic. You can turn it on and it will stay on all night (has AC adaptor) or you can set it to have a timer for 15, 30, 45 or 60 minutes. We just keep it on all night though. It has different sounds: Rain, Ocean, Heartbeat, Twinkle Twinkle, Rock-A-Bye-Baby and Cradle Song. We use the rain sound the most. Not only does it help Mila sleep, but it helps mom and dad sleep too!

The other great thing about it is that it also has a picture projector. It projects pictures onto the wall or ceiling (the projector is adjustable so you can aim it anywhere) and comes with 3 little disks with different characters. It's really great! Here are a few pictures of one of the disks. It's the one we use the most:

Mila seems to really like it and sleeping so much better now that it stays on all night. I'm totally kicking myself for not getting it sooner!!

Mila Recommends: Evenflo Triple Fun ExerSaucer

This weekend Jorge also put together Mila's ExerSaucer that my uncle Enrique and aunt Laurie got her for the Baby Shower. It's a really great toy, and Mila loves it! I wanted to find the perfect ExerSaucer for her -- one that was interesting and entertaining, but most importantly, one that would last! So I researched it in my Baby Bargains book and found this one that I liked. It's the Evenflo Triple Fun ExerSaucer. It's called Triple Fun because it has three stages. The first stage is for babies 0-3 months, where it's just a pad where the baby can lie on her back and play with the two toys that dangle. Mila really liked it, but she loved it even more when she could actually grab the toys and put them in her mouth, so we sat her up in the Bumbo and put the toys in front of her.

The second stage is the one we are at now, where she's actually in the ExerSaucer, surrounded by the toys, and that stage is from 4 months to walking age. Jorge put it together and he says it was harder to do than he thought it would be. There were lots of peices and he expected for it to come assembled already. It took him a bit to put it together... I have a feeling we'll be doing this a lot! Haha!

She's still familiarizing herself with the toys but right now her favorite is the dragonfly because it's the only one she can put in her mouth. I think she'd like it more if she could put more of the toys in her mouth. It also has sounds and lights and says "1-2-3" and "A-B-C" and also "Red-Yellow-Blue" which she seems to like. One of the toys plays a song if she moves around, without her having to touch anything. I like that feature and at the same time it drives me nuts. I like it because Mila seems to like the lights that it shows when it plays, but it drives me nuts because I'll hear it so often I get the "Red Yellow and Blue" song in my head. I'll even hear it in my head as I'm trying to fall asleep! But hey, as long as she's happy, I'm happy! It also has 3 different heights for when she gets a bit taller.
 

The third stage is from walking age to 24 months, and it converts into a little table.

I'm so glad that she'll be able to use this toy for a while! Kids grow so fast, I'm all about longevity of toys!!

Update on Aspirator

So after using the Graco Nasal Aspirator that I told you about on Mila repeatedly this week because of her cold... she's caught on and she no longer sits still when I vacuum her nose. Still works better than the blue one, but now she pulls away and if I insist, she'll cry. Ugh. So much for the miracle aspirator! I can't blame her though. Who wants to have anything shoved up their nose? At least this one is better at grabbing the boogers than that blue one we got at the hospital. Oh and it comes with 2 aspirator tips (one for dry boogers and one for wet ones) and I already lost one. Arg! Good thing I can get a replacement tip online. So hard to remember where I put my head these days! :/

Mila Recommends: Twilight Turtle

Mila isn't crazy about diaper changes. I can't imagine I would be either. But she doesn't complain all that much during the day. Unless it's 4am! Then she'll scream bloody murder!!! She HATES it! So Jorge and I have been looking for something to distract her during that nighttime diaper change. We've started using the Twilight Turtle - Constellation Night Light. It's really great. It has a light in the shell and when it's turned on it shines stars onto the ceiling. It is AWESOME! It shows 8 constellations and comes with a booklet to help you identify them. I would have loved this as a kid! It shines light in green, blue or amber. I like the green because it shines the brightest. It runs on batteries, so it's really portable. It also shuts off automatically after about 40 minutes so we use it as a night light in her room. It doesn't calm her down completely all of the time, but it really does help. It distracts her and sometimes she even reaches for the stars projected on the wall to try to grab them! I love that it's multi-use, it's good for kids of all ages and it's educational as well! It also comes in the shape of a lady bug.

Mila Recommends: Graco Nasal Aspirator

Since Mila's been congested, we've been using saline drops and then use a nasal aspirator to help clear it the boogers. I hate using the nasal aspirator. I actually have memories of my mother using it on me when I was a kid --yeah, that's how traumatizing it was! Awful! I hate using it on Mila. Our friend Karina got us this one and she said it worked so much better on baby Liv than the blue one they give you at the hospital. It's the Graco Nasal Clear Nasal Aspirator. It worked really well! It's a battery operated nasal aspirator. At first I thought it would be scary for her, but since it also plays music (genius!!) Mila thought it was a toy and actually sat still to listen. She usually fusses a lot and even cries when I try using the blue one, but with this one, she was great! Not only that, but I could actually see the boogers that came out. With the blue one, you couldn't really tell. This one is easy to clean, easy to operate and even came with 2 nasal tips: one for dry boogers and one for wet ones. It worked really well, especially on the wet ones. No fuss, no muss and a happy baby -- well, as happy as one can be with the sniffles. At least not a crying baby! Just thought I'd share this great baby product! Thanks Karina for sending us this! You came through for us again!!!

First Sniffles

Mila's had a few boogers here and there for the past week. Just a couple of the dry crusty ones. I figured she was just developing them, cuz everyone has boogers, right? Well last night they started getting worse. Now she has the full-on sniffles!! She's snorting a lot and I hear congestion. Last night we woke up and found her with her nose smushed up against her mattress, snorting, trying to breathe! Ugh, it broke my heart! Poor baby!

I called the pediatrician and he said it could be a cold or allergies. We weren't sure what it was so we cancelled our Tuesday playgroup and our Wednesday Mommy and Me class this week just to be safe. The pediatrician said if it's a cold it would last 3-5 days. Sound like forever!
We have her 4-month check up this week, hopefully she's feeling better by then! Get well soon my little girl!