On Raising A Bicultural Baby

Bicultural: of, relating to, or including two distinct cultures.

Sixtine is French. And she is also Canadian. I don’t know if it is me and my naturally-inclined way of stressing out, or if other first-time mothers of bicultural children have felt this way but it can be very overwhelming to make parenting choices when both cultures don’t see eye to eye.

It affects every aspect of everyday life, especially in the food department…To give you an idea, food is not introduced the same way, one tells me that 3 bottles of 7oz a day is enough and the other tells me that milk should be baby’s main source of nutrition, one is more into attachment parenting, the other favorites independence in children…One sells formula at about 12 euros, one sells it at about 30ish dollars which tells me that Canadian want to discourage women to formula-feed or encourage them to breastfeed if you prefer.

As a first-time mum, (of bicultural children or not), it can be tough to feel confident with your choices, let alone when cultures come into it. I feel divided and overwhelmed.I just want to do the right thing. But what is the right thing? My husband tells me to keep doing what I am doing, but do I know what I am doing?

Her Toy Story

1. Plastic globe that rolls and rolls!
2. Purple wooden crocheted teether by mjolkig
3. Bunny wooden teether by little woodlanders
4. Teething toy with crochet chocolate, coral, and teal wooden beads and two wooden rings. Wooden rattle by nihamaj
5. Wooden rattle Rollo by Haba
6. Pull and Push beads toy
7. Wooden rattle by Haba
8. Oball rattle
9.  Bidiboo Animals Rattle by Janod

I bought number 7 a few days ago for a very excited baby! My mum said she had far enough toys. I honestly don’t think that Sixtine owns a lot of toys per se and apart from books, I very rarely get her any. I absolutely love wooden toys as they are so pretty and safe for baby! They also give room for imagination!

However, Sixtine has been crawling for a bit now and she favorites everyday life objects to toys. She still has a thing for books and she is now showing actual interest in them. Whenever we sit to read, she keeps still and carefully touches the book we are reading, listening to each and every words. She even laughs at times, to express how much fun she is having.

I usually pick a few toys for the week and put some away so that she doesn’t get bored! But I think she is now readi-er than ever for a treasure basket and I am excited to see how she will approach them!

What is or what was your baby’s favorite toy and why? 

Summer Is Finally Here!

How Do You Find Time To…

My life is nothing like it used to be since the arrival of our baby. And it is a good thing. I have been tagged by Rachael, over Little Red Farm to do a “meme” (what does that word ever mean anyway?!). I never answer memes because it isn’t really my thing but I will do for her. She has a lovely blog you should check out by the way!

So….how do I find the time to….

Do the laundry – Good question. It is easy to run the wash, the hardest part is the folding and putting away process! When Sixtine was under 6 months old, the laundry was crazy! She was suffering from reflux and both her clothes and mine had to be changed two or three times a day (I have to confess that I was more likely to change her clothes and keep my spat up on shirts or pants on! Who cares?!)

 Write a blog post – I write mostly when baby sleeps and hit “save draft” or late in the evening. My family comes first but writing this blog is something I like to take the time for, it is my own little thing, I enjoy doing it and no one ever said you should stop enjoying yourself because you were now a parent. I started blogging in February and my goal was to post once a day but I haven’t been doing that for a while…Paris is too busy for me!

Spend time with your other half? – My husband and I are very close and we spend as much as possible together. During the week: when he gets home we chat about our days, and he takes over with baby while I do things I wasn’t able to do during the day. I cook and we eat supper. Once that’s done, we get baby ready for bed, he reads her a story and we put her to bed. And then, the world is our oyster! On weekends: we mainly spend family time together and enjoy it fully. We have a lovely babysitter who comes over and looks after Sissi for us so we can go to dinner, the movies or anything we want to do without her. My sister-in-laws are also great babysitters (with children so even more fun for Sixtine!)

Be the parent you want to be – I try really hard. I read a lot, mainly to get informed. And I always try to understand my child’s perspective rather than “adultify” everything. It helps me a lot. ie. The teething situation. It is sometimes hard to keep calm with a baby crying what feels like 24/7…when that happens, I try to remember how much she is going through rather than thinking that she is whiny. Instead, I try to let her know how much I love her by supporting her and giving her as much attention as she needs.

Find time for yourself – Oh that! I find it hard as a stay-at-home mother. I don’t like to get ready in a rush so I always make sure to pamper myself when I know my husband can look after the baby while I do it. I used to wear make up all the time, and would never go out without my hair done…what ever happened to me!? If I have to make a confession, my husband and I have been geographically apart for two months and I am going to need a whole day to get presentable for his arrival.

I am staying in France at my mum’s and she looks after the baby sometimes so I can go out with my friends, or go to the movies. I wonder if I will ever feel OK to leave baby with someone else just because I need to get out of the house by myself.

My questions:

- Find time to read: I absolutely love reading and I haven’t read a book (that wasn’t baby or parent-related) since I had Sixtine. I really miss it…the thing is, I only read in bed or in the train. Now all I want to do in bed is sleep or spend time with my husband. And there are no trains on the island. I have just started reading French Kids Eat Everything by Karen Le Billon and although I am only a hundred-pages through, I highly recommend it!

- Find time to dance: I dance in the shower, for my daughter, and my husband. But I don’t dance enough…I miss dancing. I think I will sign up for a dance class in September. I owe it to myself.

- Achieve your goals and dreams: I want to be the best woman I can be for my daughter. All she needs is happy parents that love her. I give myself the time to think of what to do to improve myself as a person.

Now for the tagging! I chose Bellissimom, An Everyday Story, Debut Dad and Mum of Three Boys.

So for the people that I have just tagged here are the (new) rules:

1. Please post the rules
2. When answering the questions, give as much information as possible.
3. Leave a comment on Sex, drugs, rocker…and stroller,baby. This is so we can keep track of the Meme and take a polite nose into everyone else’s lives.
4. Tag 3 or more people and link to them on your blog. Add new questions, delete old questions and play about with the rules.

An Empowering Feeling

In the first few months of her life, I wondered whether my baby loved me and if she knew I was her mother.

And then one day, as I was leaving the room, letting her in the care of my family, she cried because she wanted me. When I got back, a few minutes later, she crawled towards me as if her life depended on it, wrapped her arms around my ankle, and made sounds expressing she wanted me.  I melted and felt so empowered. It made me feel that I was doing something right.

Now that we can interact more, she doesn’t cease to amaze on the many ways she chooses to express her love to me.

It may sound silly to say that my heart is happy, that my baby loves me but eh!

How To Get Over A Bad Day

1. Put something comfy on.
2. Close the curtains.
3. Take your baby to bed with you.
4. Snuggle.
5. Snuggle a little more.
6. Appreciate your baby as s/he squeals with excitement. What a fun treat!
7. Say: “We don’t need anything but each other. You are my best friend and I love you”.
8. It should feel better.

You’re a Hypocondriac or My Pregnancy Test Story

I don’t know about you but I have been seeing a lot of pregnant people, and I have about four pregnant friends this year! It is funny because although I am not part of their club anymore, I feel very close to them. I still feel pregnant in some ways…my baby is a big girl now but it seems to me like I gave birth yesterday.

I remember last year in February, I was working at a nursery school and I thought I had a stomach bug or something more serious. I phoned my mother and said: “Mum, I am either pregnant or deadly sick!” I waited for another two weeks and bought a pregnancy test, the Clearblue brand as I didn’t think I could handle the lines and needed a response right away. I remember getting it in the store while running errands with my husband, and not mentioning anything to him. Unfortunately, the cashier wasn’t very delicate and almost threw the test at him!He said I was a hypocondriac!

I took the test that night to find out one second later (and not in just two minutes) that I was pregnant 3+ weeks! I was in shock! We wanted this baby very much but I never thought it’d work so well, the first time! I stayed right there, without moving, staring at it, with a racing mind, and a hand over my mouth…I put myself together and called my husband who was sitting in the living room, and showed him the test without a word! He lifted his arms up in the air, happy, excited and waited for me to say something.

We talked, and dreamed about this little human being we were soon to be parenting and fell asleep happy. I did another test in the morning before going to work, just to make sure. I was extremely nervous about the results this time as the idea of a baby-us was already so real to us. Again, First Response said “yes”.

I started feeling dizzy and nauseous that day. My husband brought me vitamins and What To Expect When You’Re Expecting after work. I thought it was a very thoughtful, love-ful shall I say, attention. The following day, I threw up for the first time, almost happy, as if getting sick was a proof of my pregnancy. To think it lasted 9 months!

I love reminiscing about that day who changed everything. I love to think about how little Sixtine was at that time and how excited we were, keeping this little secret of ours.

I would absolutely love for you to share your “I am pregnant!” stories with me!

The Joy Of My World

 

 

How beautiful if nothing more
Than to wait at (Sixtine)’s door
I’ve never been in love like this before
Now let me pray to keep you from
The perils that will surely come
See life for you my prince(ss) has just begun
And I thank you for choosing me
To come through unto life to be
A beautiful reflection of his grace
See I know that a gift so great
Is only one God could create
And I’m reminded every time I see your face
That the joy of my world is in (Sixtine)
Now the joy of my world is in (Sixtine)

(lyrics by Lauryn Hill, Zion)

Sigh…Teething Rant

 

She’s teething.

My poor little one has been going through a lot of pain over the last five days and I am starting to wonder if it will ever stop. She hasn’t had a good night sleep for days, she hardly naps anymore, won’t eat much, and fusses a lot (etc.). It breaks my heart to see her in so much pain. She is a very easy baby so I can tell right away when something is wrong.

I am beyond exhausted. I take my hat off to single parents! Parenting with my husband is so much easier but I guess at the end of the day, you do what you have to do.

 

 

Worldwide Culture Swap May Giveaway l UK mini-package

WCS May Giveaway – UK mini-package inside!

 Thank you for all the warm wishes that we have been receiving since setting up this new site!

To give back a little love and in the spirit of culture swaps we are introducing our first giveaway!  Oh and we will post it to anywhere in the world

Each month we will have a competition/giveaway with a different theme and there will be lots of ways to take part so keep your eye out for them.

This month’s theme is the United Kingdom.

The lucky person chosen at random from all entries will receive this wonderful little mini culture swap package with some goodies representing the UK.

The package includes 3 die cast metal models (a London bus, a telephone box and the clock tower from Westminster (Big Ben) as well as a Union Jack notebook and pencil.

 

How to enter the giveaway?

There are lots of ways to enter this giveaway; you can choose to do them all or just one or two but each different thing you do will count as another change of winning. You can:

• Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Pinterest.
• Follow us by email (at the bottom of the page).
• Pin us, G+ us, share us etc – just be sure to leave us a comment telling us what you did.
• Send us a post from your blog that we can feature here (any culture related posts welcomed including recipes, art and crafts and explanations of customs or traditions).
• Sign up for any of our swaps.
• Spread the word about this site in a new creative way that we haven’t listed (just tell us what you did in the comments). 
• For an extra opportunity to win you can also submit a UK culture themed post or email us pictures or drawings to rachael (at )glaving (dot) com.

We will randomly choose a winner on the 31st may and announce it on the site, so be sure to check it on that day!

 

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