Things I Googled When I Was A New Parent

Like I wrote in a post last year, part of my maternity leave was spent on Google (Is it normal if my baby ---?). I'd like to say the Googling stopped after my maternity leave but it didn't. I would still spend the night Googling away the minute the twins fell asleep. Haha. Did you do this too, mamas? What stuff did you Google as a new parent? Here are some of the stuff I can remember:

How To Save P100,000 in Baby's First Year

Though babies are tiny, they come with big expenses. But don't worry, based on my first year of parenting, I've come up with some tricks to help you save up to P100,000 in baby's first year. You can thank me later!

Note: Potential savings in this post are based on the average price of each item and rounded up to the nearest peso.

Inside Baby's Brain

Success! The baby is asleep. This means mom and dad can sleep too, right? Wrong! I bet as soon as your head hits the pillow, there's a big chance your baby will wake up and scream. Why? A new study suggests that babies have sneaky brain sensors that control their reactions whenever their parents are about to have some downtime. Don't believe me? Here's a diagram which makes it highly scientific and 100% legitimate!* Take a look at the incredible findings below to learn what goes on inside a baby's brain.

*You got me, there's no scientific study at all. But admit it, the diagram's pretty accurate, right?

More On Baby Laundry

Baby laundry is a big part of every new parent's life. A few weeks ago, I shared some tips on tackling baby laundry as well as my preferred laundry detergent. We normally buy 3 bottles of it at a time which would last us a little over 3 months. When we opened our last bottle of detergent, I went to the the Human Nature online store to reorder. This was when I found out that they launched a new detergent especially made for babies. Talk about late to the party. So I quickly placed an order to be able to try it.

Three Tips to Tackle Never-Ending Baby Laundry

When it comes to parenting a baby, there are some tasks that seem repetitive and never-ending. Laundry is one of them. In fact, there are even times when I feel like right after folding and putting away a whole basket of baby clothes, another mountain of dirty clothes has already piled up.

I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say our laundry more than doubled when the twins arrived. When they were newborns they would spit up regularly which meant we changed them multiple times a day. And that's not just their side-tie tops. We also change their socks, mittens, caps, burp cloths, bibs and swaddles. Now that they're older, more active and and eating solids, everything from milk, to mashed vegetables to sweat to drool come into contact with their clothes on a daily basis. We're lucky if the twins are still in the same outfit by mid-day.

Thankfully, there are several tricks that can help busy parents like us save time, our sanity and hands when it comes to the overwhelming task of baby laundry.

5 Things I Never Thought I'd Do... Then I Became A Mom!

To say having twins turned our lives upside down is an understatement. Joey and I went from being a newly married couple to a family of 4 with 2 newborns requiring our undivided attention.  Parenting twins has brought about lots of surprises and I found myself doing unusual things that pre-baby me would have never thought of doing like...

5 Surprising Things About Babies

Babies love being swaddled. They also need to be burped after each meal and only sleep two hours at a time. These are some of the most common things people tell you when you're going to have a baby. So you try to perfect your swaddling technique, read about the best ways to burp a baby and sleep in while you still can. You think you've prepared enough but there's still so much that will surprise you! People who've been there probably don't tell you about them because they're kind of gross and embarrassing to share. As for me, I've gotten so used to talking about icky baby stuff so here's a list of 5 surprising things about babies that you won't read in pregnancy books:

How I Spent My Maternity Leave

Before I gave birth to the twins, I had this crazy idea that maternity leave = rest. But a week before going back to work, I was already thinking "What? That was it? My maternity leave is over? I feel like I haven't even fully recovered yet!" Instead of resting and recovering, my maternity leave felt like a temporary job assignment with two super demanding bosses and never-ending shifts. The truth is there's no rest when you're on maternity leave. To illustrate where those 78 days went (I gave birth via C-section), here's a breakdown of how I spent my maternity leave:

Baby Cheeses

When Audrey and Antonino were around 3 months old, I noticed an unusually funky scent while dressing them. So I sniffed around as most moms are wont to do and discovered that the rotten smell was coming from their necks! Now, I've heard stories about baby poo smelling so bad you'd need a face mask just to get through the nappy change, but for me, this was worse! It was like stinky cheese! So I tipped their heads back and there it was - stinky white stuff in their neck folds. It was a combination of milk and drool that slid from Audrey and Antonino's chins to the folds of their necks and stayed there to age until they developed an intense cheesy smell. Joey and I both agreed it smelled like blue cheese.

6-Month Twin Babies Daily Routine

Hey there! It's the twins here. Mommy and daddy fell asleep while burping us so we decided to hack into mommy's blog and write her weekly post for her. We don't really get why they're always saying parenting is so hard. If they didn't have us, who would be picking up the slack and helping mommy keep up with her weekly post schedule? Want to know what's hard? A baby's life. We've been so busy sticking to a strict schedule since day 1! Imagine getting hungry every 2 to 3 hours because of our tiny tummies. Pure torture. Oh well, that was a few months ago but now that we've grown a bit, here's what our day looks like:

Our Super 8 Twin Essentials

Our twins, Antonino and Audrey turned 5 months last week! It was also my first Mother's Day. So in honor of these milestones, I would like to share 8 items which helped us survive our first few months of twin parenting.

A Guide to Blowouts

Before I became a mom, I associated the word blowout with Kate Middleton's perfect signature hairstyle. Nowadays, blowouts have taken on an unglamorous new meaning because of the inevitable diaper blowout. I guess you can say diaper blowouts are a right of passage for every parent but it's something that I really dreaded. Plus, I knew I had double the chances of experiencing it because of the twins.