I feel blessed to have a loving husband, a healthy, prospering toddler and now a another baby on the way. However, as the birth of baby sister draws closer (2 weeks!) I’m feeling a strange mix of nervousness and excitement about having a new baby. Kinda like first day of school I guess.

What will she look like?

What will we call her?

I can’t wait to be reminded of the miracle of life. To know that two people that love each other can make a pure miracle.

How will her personality fit into our household? etc etc

I think all these things are very normal and they make you want to fast forward to the due date with the nod of the head or a ‘I Dream Of Jeanie’ twitch of the nose. But then the anxieties and fear kick in….

What will the labour be like? Can I go through all that again?

Will she have everything in all the right places and be born a healthy little girl?

Do I have enough love to give her?

As a parent will I be enough for her? Guiding her gently whilst letting her find her own path.

I dread the day that as a young woman both her and Goldilocks find out I’m actually just a person who makes mistakes like everyone else. The day my falls from grace aren’t easily covered up and they see through me and find I also have insecurities, fears and worries.

The birth of a child really is a miracle, but at the same time I can’t help but be scared and nervous incase I’m not up for the job! I’m reading an interesting book by Gisela Preuschoff called Raising Girls. Steve Biddulph of Raising Boys fame wrote the foreward which I found very interesting. He also discusses his fears of becoming a parent and offers some sage advice ‘what our kids will remember, and what will strengthen them, is the moments of closeness, honesty and peaceful times that we spend in amid the scramble of life: the parts we fence off and make special, where we refuse to dance to the commercial world’s tune, and build a garden for love to grow’.

With only 2 weeks to go, I hope I can build that garden…………tend to it…………and watch it bloom. Fingers crossed anyway!

Tags: Gisela Preuschoff, Raising Boys, Raising Girls, Steve Biddulph

We recently gave three hip mums the task of road testing drinking products from the WeilBaby range. We had an overwhelming response to this call out. With many of you discussing babies whom did and didn’t drink from bottles to the trials and tribulations of changing from bottles to sipper cups. So hopefully these three reviews will help with the often overwhelming land of bottles and sipper cups (all BPA free of course!)!

Check out three different Mum’s opinions of different products from the range.

 Hip Mum Melanie tried out the Weil Baby 8oz glass nursing bottle.

As a first time mother I was a little shocked/overwhelmed and not to mention exhausted when at 6 weeks old my son developed bad colic and would not stop crying/screaming all day long. This went on for seven weeks - my husband and i tried everything - spent endless amounts of money of different ‘colic’ bottles but none of them seemed better than others and help reduce the pain that he was in.

My son - Kyden is now 16 weeks old and has gotten over the worst of the colic but still gets little gas bubbles stuck in his tummy between his feeds and will wake after 40 minutes (during his day sleeps) with gas build up (he has always been an excellent night sleeper - we are lucky in that aspect)

So when i was given the chance to road test the Dr Weil’s bottle i was more than happy to do so to see if this was actually a bottle that would help him or that i would use for future children.

Kyden and i got to road test the 8oz glass baby bottle and the silicon holder.

Generally we found the bottle to be great - it took Kyden a few goes to get used to using a different bottle but he now loves it. The milk/formula flows a lot slower than other bottles so it took him longer to drink but it did help with the gas bubbles he was getting with all the other bottles and after a few days using this bottle he had a lot less gas build up between feeds. In fact his sleeping during the day increased from 40 minutes to 75 minutes and once or twice two hours!!!!

The bottles are a very trendy design, easy to clean, dishwasher safe (on top shelf) and nice and sturdy. Kyden also loved to hold the bottle while feeding which he has never done with other bottles so he must have loved drinking from it.

The only downside i found to the bottle that being glass it was a bit harder to heat up the formula/milk. With the avent bottles i could take them straight out the fridge and put them in boiling water to warm up but being glass i could not do this. Instead i had to run under water to heat it up slowly so the glass did not crack.

The silicon holder is good idea but make sure you wet it before trying to get it on the bottle.

Overall i found the bottle and the silicon holder excellent and would definitely use them for our next child to he prevent/help colic!!! I will definitely be going out to buy the Dr Weil’s sippy cups for Kyden for when he is older - once again they are so trendy and great as they come in lots of colours!!!!

 Hip Mum Eugenie struck a cord with us when she said her babe wouldn’t take any of the many bottles she had tried (and she had tried a lot!!) so we thought she and her super cute babe were the perfect random review choice to try the Weil Baby 5oz Tritan bottle. Check out the great results below! 

This is Luella now six months old. Adorable - yes, fun and happy - yes, relentlessly stubborn - always! Together we’ve been trying various bottles and teats each day over the last couple of months. Having only ever received varying degrees of resistance (rated by type and duration of tears provided), I wasn’t particularly hopeful when I entered a recent competition to receive the latest bottle available at The Hip Infant, the Weil Baby. Perhaps it was my renewed hope (having never won anything in my life) that made the difference to our typically exhausting and uninteresting 4pm bottle feed attempts. Perhaps it was because she’s getting a little older and the process was inevitable. Perhaps it was the bottle. All I can say is that I am a changed woman. Luella took 40ml straight away on the first day. After a couple of cartwheels, I persevered and she smiled, laughed and openly engaged with the bottle. She nibbled and occasionally sucked, bringing the grand total to 100ml. A minimum she has managed every day since.

A very big thank you to The Hip Infant and Dr Andrew - the Weil Baby bottle is not only the best looking bottle I’ve seen or tried, but it’s also a good size (for the less inclined feeders among us). And, it comes with all the pre-requisites we expect but don’t always get - it’s BPH free and easy to clean!

And finally what better person to try the Weilbaby 120mls training cup in purple and the Weilbaby 240 ml drinking  cup yellow than hip mother of twin boys Alex and Jake, Andrea.

As a mother of 15 month old boy twins who are very fussy about their bottles and cups I was interested to see how they would respond to the Weilbaby products. I have tried alot of different training cups with the boys and have found that alot of them either leak, break, have fiddley valves to put in or are very difficult to drink from. I have also found that Jake and Alex will happily drink water from most of them but not milk.

Jake and Alex have put these cups through their paces and I am happy to report that we love the Weilbaby training cups and they are still in one piece. These cups are BPA free and come in a range of bright, trendy colours rather than just clear which I found is particularly useful when trying to remember who was drinking out of which cup. The cups come in two different sizes, are quick and easy to assemble/disassemble with no fiddley valves and have handles which are not only slim line but can be easily removed. The cups are really sturdy, do not stain and have withstood being washed in the dishwasher and dropped or in some instances thrown from the highchair with barely a scratch on them. 

Now for the thing I love most about these cups -they don’t leak. No matter how much Jake and Alex shook them they could not get them to leak all over their highchair so they could play in the mess (like all cups they do leak if you squeeze the spout) and I did not have them leak from under the ring at all.  Also, a bonus for me is that they will drink their milk from them (Yeah no more bottles!!!!!)

As with any products there are a few cons to Weilbaby cups. They are expensive so they probably wouldn’t suit someone buying for multiples. When the boys were babies they were having up to 14 bottles a day between them so that either makes for a very expensive purchase or alot of washing up throughout the day. However, you pay for what you get, quality.

Also, my husband found when washing the bottles by hand that milk gets stuck in ridge in the bottom of the cup if it isn’t rinsed straight away and the bottle brush we had couldn’t get in the groove to get it out. The only other thing I was wondering was if replacement spouts were available and if there was a hard spout available that you move onto as your child progresses.

Thanks Hip Infant for letting us try out the Weilbaby training cups.

Andrea rest assured there are replacement spouts available!! Thanks to all our hip mums for their honest and valued opinions!

Tags: bottles, BPA Free, sipper cups, Tritan, Weilbaby

Spring has sprung!

I love spring and I love September. Blue skies. Green grass. First visit to the beach for the warmer season.

I’m always suprised at how trees that have been just sticks for months suddenly show signs of life and green shoots come out of no where! Flowers start to bud and there’s ‘that’ smell in the air when you go for an afternoon stroll - you can almost smell the green growth, buzzing bees and soon-to-bloom flowers.

What a lovely time of year!

Happy Spring!

I’ve done recipe Tuesday Choc Chip cookies before. But I recently tried this Bill Granger recipe and it’s a winner! Not only do they taste good but the house smelt delish too! Goldilocks and I ate a little too much of the raw mixture. Why does raw cake mix and cookie dough taste so good? But the cooked result was even yummier! So much so that they didn’t even make it to an airtight container but were snapped up by family and visitors from under the glass cloche before I could even say ‘tupperware!’

125g unsalted, softened butter

1 1/4 cups tightly packed brown sugar (I thought they were a little too sugary. And next time would reduce to 1 cup or maybe just a tiny bit under 1 cup of sugar. But you can decide for yourself)

1 tsp vanilla essence

1 egg, lightly beaten

1 1/2 cups plain flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

Pinch of salt

11/2 cups chocolate bits

Preheat the oven to 180. Place butter and sugar in a bowl and beat until light and creamy. Add vanilla and egg and stir to combine. Stir in the sifted flour, baking powder and salt until just combined. Fold through chocolate chips.

Place spoonfuls of cookie mixture on a greased and lined baking tray, allowing room for spreading. Cook for 15 - 20 minutes until they turn pale gold.

Allow to cool on a tray for 5 minutes beofre placing on a wire rack to cool further. Makes about 16.

**HIP TIP** Bill suggests making double the mixture and rolling excess into a log and keeping in plastic wrap and foil in the freezer. So when friends pop in, or you just need a sugar hit thaw slightly and place 1cm thick rounds on a baking tray and bake as per above recipe!

Tags: Bill Granger, Choc chip cookies

We are crazy about this cow and we know you will too!

We are in search of a little person 3 years plus to test the fab Goki Jumping Cow. The Goki Jumping cow is an inflatable rubber cow not dissimilar to the Space Hoppers from the 70’s they are a snap to use, simply jump on, hold on and bounce! Our little tester must be full of energy and love to bounce.

Think your little person fits the brief? Post a comment below our Facebook call out and tell us how your little 3 year+ person burns off energy. Entries close in 24 hours so get in quick!

Just a reminder:
- Random Testers are chosen on the basis of the most appropriate person for the job
- All reviews MUST be 400+ Words and MUST be accompanied by at least one photo of the product in action
- Reviews must be returned 2 weeks after testing products are received
- Products are the testers to keep after the review has been completed
- If you have previously been a tester feel free to apply again

Tags: goki jumping cow, online baby toys, space hopper, the hip infant

It’s no suprise that after only a few days in store the Bubeewrap is walking out the door here at The Hip Infant.
Wrapping seems to be one of those things that poses a real challenge to new parents and one thing I think most of us agree on, wrapping in those early days is a necessity to the security and comfort of a newborn.

So we have heard all the fab testimonials from the creator of the Bubeewrap and now we want to hear yours, we are in search of two random reviewers to give the Bubeewrap a go and tell us what you think. All you need to do is respond to our Facebook call out and tell us how you currently wrap your little treasure and how old he or she is. Get in quick we will be announcing our reviewers at 8.30pm 17/8/10

Just a reminder:
- Random Testers are chosen on the basis of the most appropriate person for the job
- All reviews MUST be 400+ Words and MUST be accompanied by at least one photo of the product in action
- Reviews must be returned 2 weeks after testing products are received
- Products are the testers to keep after the review has been completed
- If you have previously been a tester feel free to apply again

When it comes to value for money the Aden + Anais Burpy Bib would rate a great big 10/10. The only product we stock that can be used continuously from birth to 4years+.
Life as a Burpy Bib starts out to put it bluntly as a vomit cloth, it’s unique shaped design means it fits perfectly over the shoulder of an adult covereing all those important bits and ensuring no nasty spills will escape down the back of the neck.

Once baby enters the world of solids the Burpy Bib converts to a bib that is conveniently sized and perfect for covering all baby bits that are exposed even the shoulders, when it comes to early feeders no spot is safe so the more that is covered the better in our opinion!

The Aden + Anais Burpy Bib is created from the same superior quality muslin as their wraps and sleeping bags and are double layered so super absorbant and great for mopping up spills. Available in nine funky designs no matter what your taste their will be one that suits your little hipster. At $24.95 for a two pack of Burpy Bibs they are the most affordable product of it’s kind on the market, if it is value for money that thrills you then this is the product for you!

Tags: aden + anais, aden + Anais burpy bib, burpy bib, muslin cloth, vomit cloth

You know how it is, you surf the web and find ’stuff’, you know things you never knew existed, things that shock you, enlighten you, thrill you or whatever. Being the WWW you remain suspicious that what you are seeing is the truth as more often than not it is likely it’s a fiddled with image or some kind of set up image.

So I stumbled accross these Giant bunnies! Obviously I was prompted to do more research and found myself totally absorbed in learning about all there is to know about these oversized Peter Cotton Tails. Who would of thought such a rodent existed look at the size of them, they are absolutely huge. Aside from looking at them in awe I cannot help but think about the mountain of poop they would create not to mention the amount of carrots required to fill their bellies.

If you are as curious as me check out Creepy Animals and You Say Too

Tags: funny stuff, giant rabbits

In case you are unaware we LOVE Belly Art Inkless Print Kits! Perfect for collecting precious memories, these fab sets make collecting hand and foot prints an absolute breeze.

It’s easy…… simply wipe hand or foot with magic towelette

Stamp hand or foot onto special Belly Art paper

And Viola!

A perfect print every time!

Just in case you need more convincing check this funky little how to video!

But hey why take our word for it, yes this is a call out for random testers! We have five Belly Art sample packs ready and waiting to be popped off to some willing reviewers.
All you have to do is pop a comment below our callout on our Facebook page and share with us ‘Why you would love to be a Belly Art tester, if you have had a horrid foot printing experience please do tell’ and this product is not just limited to newborns either, if you feel you missed the boat and did not get those precious newborn prints it is never too late, each sheet is A5 size which means older tots can get their prints done too.

Just a reminder:
- Random Testers are chosen on the basis of the most appropriate person for the job
- All reviews MUST be 400+ Words and MUST be accompanied by at least one photo of the product in action
- Reviews must be returned 2 weeks after testing products are received
- Products are the testers to keep after the review has been completed
- If you have previously been a tester feel free to apply again

Tags: Baby foot prints, belly art inkless print kit

Happy Recipe Tuesday!

I found these brightly coloured sweet little cupcakes on an equally sweet little blog  titled Spearmint Baby recently and thought I’d share them with you. Great for parties, special occasions or when you just need a little colour in your life! The blog post talks you through step by step how to create these rainbow coloured beauties.

Enjoy a rainbow coloured day!

Tags: Rainbow Cupcakes