Blog for mothers overseas ...

[GTE]

check out Motherland enjoy!

[liger]

Hi GTE

Thanks for posting this i just started a thread yesterday about living off the beaten tracks (In Living Abroad; Mosi nets, power cuts....)

We are just down the road from you, in Indonesia I can't write long now but will come back later and have a chat and a good look at your blog when ds has a nap.

Being a SAHM and into attachment parenting is hard in the world of working expat mums with nannies.

Looking forward to chatting more

Liger

[GTE]

Look forward to it!

[belgo]

thank you! I'll check it out.

[Soph73]

Will check this out later, thanks.

[barefeete]

GTE is that your blog? It is FANTASTIC and i got very excited when i read it. I live in Tortola in the British Virgin Islands and so a little less 3rd world but i have been driven nuts by the ants and cockroaches.

I have only skimmed it but am going back now to read more. I loved it and can't wait to read about someone else frustrations with having a toddler and a newborn in the tropics. The talcum powder idea was fab and i might try that with the ants around the cots as i keep finding then in there circling the sick and dribble!

liger - my uncle and his family live in Jacarta and have done for the last 5 years. Lots of maids etc. Not really the attchement thing having a maid to look after your child.

[GTE]

hi yes it is! Glad you like it! Yes it's hard to hold onto what you believe in out here in land of nannies. And I confess I have a helper who wears my baby to market - attachment parenting by proxy! Only comes in in mornings and mostly to help me with those damn ants so I am still doing most of the mummying. But the hard thing is baby wearing in this heat! Off to write about that now actually! My husband loves INdonesia goes a lot for work. I only know Bali

Gx

[liger]

Hi GTE, Barefeete

Really enjoyed scrolling through your blog GTE, when I had a few moments to myself, its comforting to find I am not the only one!!

No nannies in this house but I think I am one of the few who doesn't have one, at least with a younger child, I also do all the cleaning - well that translates to cleaning doesn't get done as often as it should!

I am actually looking for a mothers help, probably similar to you GTE, a few mornings a week to play with ds or help clean just so I can claim a bit more constructive time for myself. Having trouble locating someone though.

There aren't many expat families where we live, and I've found it hard to meet other Mums for lots of reasons. I have felt a bit isolated and had major cabin fever at times, Mumsnet has been a big help.

[liger]

By the way a good anti-cockroach measure is too put down bicarb of soda with a bit of sugar, they will munch happily and their internals will fizz - no more cockroach. Probably not kid friendly if little one thinks white stuff on floor is teetha! Perhaps something to try once they are in bed?

[barefeete]

liger - thanks for the tip. I might use that in the bathroom sink as i have them coming out of the plug hole at night!

I have a mothers help 2 mornings a week. On one day she cleans and the other morning she looks after my 2 year old DS and 6 month old DD + sometimes a friends child to. She is fab and is so good with the kids. It means i can go to the supermarket once a week with no kids in tow (they don't both fit in the trolly anyway which is a nightmare) and pay all the bills. The cleaning did my head in when i first arrived as i was constantly fighting a loosing battle against the crumbs v's the ants and cockroaches. I could not do without Dede.

[debinaustria]

That's a great Blog - I can't imagine your book will be unpublished for long.

You're a brave woman - I live in saudi as a child and we had the ant/cockroach problems but as an 8 year old they didn't seem that bad - put me there with 2 young children and it would be a very different story.

Deb

[GTE]

hello all of you! Brill tip re cockroach we just killed a stonker now. I can't stand them they send me into a frenzy but keeping plugs in helps.

re cleaner totally relate - i was not going to have one and after a week here realised i had done nothing all day but clean. it is never ending and you cant leave plates out and i'm always following jemima around scolding her for eating away from table etc. drives me crazy and i love having someone here each morning to keep it all under control. afternoons are just me and girls normal life as would have it back home love that too - cooking etc. but i am the only one whose friends have to follow me to kitchen when i make tea. everyone else sends the maid!

gotta go hv a v constipated baby in one arm. thanks for encouragement re book send word about my blog and maybe i'll get noticed one day! good luck in finding a cleaner! gxx

[Cocobear]

The home help thing is strange, isn't it? Our housekeeper lives in the staff quarters out the back garden. With her 13-year-old son. It's wierdly feudal, but she's a single mum and has nowhere else to live. I suppose it's at least private, safe, clean and has hot running water.

But I admit I do love using washable nappies, and never washing them myself!

[liger]

I bought the washable nappies with us, but there's no hot water! I couldn't face boiling nappies so its been disposables for us. Ardent potty training starting soon! At least tiled floors should make that more do-able then home.

[GTE]

hi! just to say you don't need hot water for washable nappies. We soak and wash ours in cold water and they are still very white!

x

[liger]

now this has definitely got my attention!

Nothing, and I mean nothing has come out of our wash 'white'. I had initially thought cold water made little difference, but have tried various combintations of techniques and theories, all to no avail!

Tell me what you do - Pleeeasse!

[GTE]

hi so sorry been ill and out of touch! Well I soak em in a bucket with cold or sometimes hot water but not always with eco-nappy soak and then I chuck em in the washing machine with eco-washing powder (ecover - I brought some over from UK! how sad am I?!) and that's it I am afraid! Maybe the sun helps keep 'em white but the poo just doesn't seem to stain. Perhaps that's cos I have superior babies whose poo has a ... talking of poo that was funny. Was just thinking of something clever to say and Bella exploded all over me! gotta go!

[GTE]

ok sorry I am back. Though nothing else to say. I use cotton bottoms, what about you?

[liger]

Sorry you have been ill, hope it was nothing too serious or debilitating.

You are not sad, we bought Evover with us too am just about to run out though, and the hand soap! Washing up liquid long gone!

Okay it doesn't sound like you do too much different from me, maybe its the water. We get ours pumped from the well in the garden, in our previous house here it was tankered in, I hang things in the blazing sun to no avail. I'm not even dealing with exploding baby poo, just the average two year olds daily grime. The cloth nappies have gone unused since the first few weeks. I've been soaking things overnight even.

Thanks, you have appeased my guilt at not being able to keep my child looking respectable, I thought I had been missing the obvious, either that or I was losing my faith in Ecover in a cold wash!

[GTE]

Hurrah! A like-minded soul gxxx