My Personal Experience with our First Newborn

With baby number two only four weeks away I am beginning to give sleep a lot more thought than I think I did first time round.

Three and a bit years ago when wee Cadell was born, we just did what we thought was best to get him settled and sleeping and the long hot summer nights that he was born into to.  We also took a great deal of advice from Gina Ford's "Contented Little Baby" book.  Although very rigid, and at times she seems extremely structured and strict, her advice worked well for us and for Cadell.  By two weeks old he was sleeping 8 hours straight 10pm-6ish am.  Not long after that he was sleeping 12-13 hours straight.

Cadell went straight into a cot at 2 days old.  We wrapped him at night, but it was too hot for wraps during the day.

At 15 months we thought we would attempt the cot to bed transition.  It took him one night to start sleeping in his bed happily and at first he cut back a little to about 10 hours sleep, yelling out "Mum!" when he woke, but again settled in for the longer haul after about a week or so.

Our happy little man in our first attempt in his bed "toes in" as we used to say.

 
Just before Cadell turned two he went through a stage of "Night Terrors" waking at around 10pm screaming, looking fully awake but on another planet completely!  If we tried to comfort him, he would strike out at us as if we were trying to hurt him.  It was horrible.  Two things worked, one was going to see a homeopath who helped me gain a better insight to his personality, and secondly I would go and wake him or at least get him to stir about 15 minutes before he would normally wake screaming.  This disrupted his sleep cycle and allowed him to get through without the night terrors.

When he turned two or about that time he realised he could get out of bed all by himself!  So we would have a little early bird climb the stairs to our room often in the dark.  We solved this with an "Ok to Wake" clock that we set to glow green when its ok to get out of bed, which works the majority of the time!  He still on occasions gets out of bed just after midnight, and sometimes just needs a cuddle and to be put back in bed, other times he needs us to snuggle in and sleep with him.

Now he is three years old.  He still loves and needs his sleep (long may it last when a newborn is coming!) He has a lunchtime sleep for anywhere between 1-3 hours depending on the days activities and sickness.  And sleeps for 10-11 hours at night.

On overseas trip where we all generally slept in the same room, it was hard for Cadell when we got home for him to sleep in a room alone.  He's holding up an Eifel Tower key ring.

He is at a stage now where we have had the most difficulty with his sleep in all of his life.  We could probably remedy the situation better by keeping to a better night time routine, but perhaps we're too lazy!  He is often not a sleep until 8:30-9pm.  We eat together at about 7-7:30 so as I say this doesn't help our VERY slow eater.  Then it's shower time, brush his teeth and story in bed.  Even if we manage to get all of this done and he is in bed by 7:30 he will be up and down several times, insisting one of us lie down with him, and he won't stop talking or singing until close to 9pm.  Many people suggested to cut his day time sleep right back to an hour or less.  All this did was make him horribly grumpy all afternoon, and he still wouldn't go to sleep any earlier!  So I now just leave him to sleep during the day, and as it is getting darker at night much sooner he is returning to his better sleep habits.

Although last night after or usual routine, and telling him to try hard to get to sleep early because we had to get up early.  He yells out to me while I'm in the office "Mum I need some chocolate or else I'll be upset" I said "Well good luck cos there's no chocolate in the house!"  Cheeky Monkey.

So we have quite a text book child as I understand it, no wonder I am worrying what our second will be like!

20% OFF ALL DUVET COVERS SALE!

We start the FIVE week countdown until our second baby arrives with an awesome 20% off all duvet covers.  This includes our own Munchkins Hand Quilted brand, and the beautiful Whimsy Range.

Since there's is 20% OFF for this week only you should also grab the matching cushions and sheets sets available.

Like us on Facebook to keep up with "New Munchkin Countdown Specials" every week.

Making Space for the New Munchkin

As our family will be growing in about five weeks time, we have decided its time to seriously reduce the amount of stock we have stored in our house!

Also as my puku keeps getting better it is making getting in and out of the car when its parked in the garage amongst precariously stored stock a little tricky, as it is Cadell gets himself in the car, then we back out, then I do up his safety belt – not so great on a rainy day!

So we have some super amazing specials happening in our five week countdown til birth, watch our facebook page closely for more details.

We are also trialing our Munchkin designs as duvet covers, rather than quilts.  A friend once told me “Quilts are great for cots but not for beds, because you really have to purchase a duvet inner or other blankets anyway and the costs just add up”  for some stupid reason I didn’t consider this even when, a long time before owning munchkins I bought a quilt for my sons bed, then an inner then another plain duvet cover.  So the Munchkins Duvet Covers were born!  We have these listed on Trade Me to test the market out and again try and get some stock moving out so I can fit in the garage.  So far Gracies Garden and On the Farm are proving the most popular.  My favourite is by far the Fly Away design, however its not me buying them so what do I know….

 

Lucky Hamiltonians.  If you live in Hamilton, and take your Munchkin to a local daycare, swim school or happen to be at one of our great birth centres then keep your eyes peeled for our coupon codes to get you a special 10% discount of anything on our website.

After close analysis of our Website analytics I have noticed that we get great referral traffic from touchwoodcots.co.nz however our cots sales are almost non-existent.  I was perplexed and began some investigations.  I had priced our cots at the RRP given by Touchwood, and it turns out our competitors were selling them at $80-$90 cheaper than we were and offering free shipping, so $120 -$130 better than we were selling them.  So after some number crunching and some patience testing on our website, we are now price competitive so I hope our cot sales increase.  LESSON LEARNED: check out the competition!

Business aside, if you’re in the Waikato, today's Times pictured a VERY cute little boy on page 3, that’s our Cadell.

 This photo was taken at our much loved Kowhai Childcare Centre.  We were interviewed as our family is part of the "Growing up in NZ" research.  We are more like the trial run guinea pigs, or as they call us the "Leading Light Pilot Group".  There may perhaps be more photos in Saturday's paper too.  The Waikato Times are covering this as the new research findings at 9 months of age are released today.  Very interesting reading

Too Good to be True - Mobo Shipping Ltd

The things you learn when you have a business and it often feels like everyone is out to scam you!

Several days ago I received an email, very brief, asking for "Change Trays" and could the customer pay by credit card.  No indication of how many, where to ship to, the type of finish, just how much please?  We currently don't have change trays as an item on our website, and if he had been to our website he would've seen the credit card logos on there too.

I have had one these sort of emails before wanting to order just under $1000 (over $1000 needs customs clearance, for duty etc) of soft toys and night lights.  They all want to use their own shipping agents.  With this first one, all I could think was "holy cow! These are the perfect items to stash restricted goods in, and how do I know if their shipping agent isn't going to do that once they get the goods from me?  Then it will look like I have received payment for the contraband, and sent it off!"  Once I responded to his email saying that I had been in contact with customs to make sure it was safe and that I was happy to proceed, I never heard from him again - hopefully scared off by customs as I think my thoughts were his plans exactly!

This recent email, went to great detail over several emails, sending me information, emails and contact names of his shipping agent "Mobo Shipping Ltd" and the delivery address.  I was feeling quite reassured, and thinking of the income off a sale of 15 items priced at around $219 each (over $3000 in total).  But I was still wary.  After some good old Google research into the shipping company name, we discovered a huge scamming operation.

The reason they need to pay by credit card, and are apparently very good at paying promptly, including paying you the money to pay the shipping company, is because they are using stolen credit cards.  Obviously the "shipping company" is in on it too.  So we get the money, dirty stolen credit card money, and then pay the shipping company from our bank account (our clean hard earned money) and send off the goods, happy as a lark. 

Soon the bank will call to ask for the stolen credit card money to be refunded, every cent of what you have just received.  And if for example we have paid the "Shipping company" $1000 of our clean money this is what we end up with...

$1000 out of pocket because there is no way the "Shipping company" will refund us, lost goods in the range of $3000, and $3000 having to be given back to the poor person whose credit card was stolen and used.  And of course severely bruised pride - suckered into the whole thing.

Oh the joys of having a small business and being perhaps a little to trusting and accommodating to these scammy customers.

I have replied to "Darren Luke" telling him, "We prefer to use our own shipping company as we can guarantee safe delivery and tracking of our goods.  I have also been in contact with our Merchant Service who have told us not to accept international Credit Cards, as these are less secure.  We will require full payment by International Money Transfer"  So it will be interesting to see if I get a response, which I highly doubt.

Interestingly, our supplier of "Change Trays" has had three inquiries from their stockists, wanting to know if this sounded legit or not.

"If its too good to be true - it's probably a scam"

Satisfaction for the Soul

I love reading something, sharing something with a friend, or creating something that gives me a deeply satisfying feeling - it just warms the cockles of my heart!

One of my very good friends, once a colleague in mainstream primary, then we shared our time pregnant together with our boys being born 3 weeks apart, and the same person who convinced me that Steiner Early Childhood Care was a wonderful option, shared with me one of the websites that inspires her daily routines (rhythms at home with her now three children). 

It is  

I have only spent a few minutes reading the articles but I felt so revived after looking at the website.  It's a pity its northern hemisphere, but still easy enough to find seasonal activities, and celebrations.  I really liked the article on Birthday Traditions, and I will begin to create these for our children too.

That's all for now, will post again soon with a preview of a product we are hoping to stock from Australia to help our little ones with toilet training.

Enjoy your reading!

The Business Blues

I have a case of the business blues…  On reflection I knew this would happen.  I have what most people call a “bubbly” personality, and so I have found throughout my life people perceive me as confident, organized (where they get that idea from I really don’t know!) and with leadership ability.

When I know these are all just lovely euphemisms as follows:

BUBBLY = actually incredibly shy, but I just put on a smiley face and agree with everyone to keep everyone happy.

CONFIDENT = the same as above, but mainly I’m impatient, so rather than sit in a crowd where everyone is too scared to put their hand up, wasting my precious time, I’ll stand up for a job or say my piece.  NOW CAN WE PLEASE MOVE ON! NEXT!!!!  (hardly the patience you’d expect from a teacher I know, but kids are easy to be patient with, they’re still learning, adults – you’ve had your chance, get on with it…)

ORGANISED= this must be where people assume I know more than them (probably because I’m always the one talking in a group) and everyone seems to assume that because I’m a female and a teacher I have everything at my finger tips.  They believe I have a hand bag full of felts, coloured pens, erasers, panadol, tampons, plasters and just what ever may come in handy.  Sadly, I have owned a handbag for just over a year, I never have a pen in it, I’m trying my best to use a diary, but I am still carrying tampons even though I’m pregnant!

LEADERSHIP ABILITY:  This must truly be a euphemism for “No one wants to do it so we will tell Laurene to take charge, she always has an opinion, never says no, and she just smiles all the time.”  Truth is, I hate it when the buck stops at me, I find conflict extremely hard to deal with, and although I think I can delegate I still really want to know what everyone is doing.  Then I’m extremely forgetful, turning up late everywhere and unprepared.

My personality is also such that I’m a little like a faulty sky rocket.  Full of potential, great ideas, I get people excited, inspire people, once I’m lit I take off with full power and fury, and just when I’m on the edge of the atmosphere, I explode… falling….. and crumbling to the ground….

I just get bored and lose momentum.  This is how I feel about Munchkins at the moment.  I am very lucky to have a well grounded, level headed fiancée who knows a thing or two about leadership, management and business.  He also has a vested interest in Munchkins, financially and emotionally, because he has to tolerate me and my moods!

The concept I am currently struggling with is the vast vats of money it takes just to set things up, and with the products we sell at Munchkins our returns or cash flow in is small and slow.  To improve our sales we need to advertise, that costs money, to get money we need more sales, but to get more sales we need to advertise – get my point?  It is very frustrating, but very common I hear, and hope.

I have learnt so much about book keeping and using MYOB but what I know really isn’t even the tip of the iceberg.  I blindly go about entering my invoices and following the steps my great teacher Donna has shown me, only to forget it, stuff it up and go back to her 2-3 months later to have her teach me all over again.  The problem is I don’t really understand anything about accounting – AT ALL.  I didn’t even take Accounting at College.  But I’ll get there.

On the plus side, as there has to be a silver lining somewhere….

Working for myself means that I can run to the beat of my own drum.  If I’ve had enough of looking at the computer, I can go and read my latest book about Steiner Principles in Early Childhood Development.  I can ring a friend with out saying “Gotta go, have to be at work in 10 minutes”  because I’m always running late.  I can go and prospect bricks and mortar businesses to sell our brand.  I can pick Cadell up early and take him for a swim.  Or my favourite activity when Cadell is at day care – just go and sleep while the baby in my tummy is not hiccupping, or kicking out the side walls of my abdomen!

So while I’m feeling a bit low about business at this very moment, I know the reasons behind what we are doing are the best thing for our family and for me right now.  Its just those little parts of my personality that can bring me down, but they will also bring me back up again.