Hey mummies, Lan Jie has been highly recommended on this forum and I'd like to further affirm that based on our last two months having her in our home. She's been a real gem to us and we couldn't have managed without her. This darling of a nanny just left our place 15 minutes ago - her last day- and i am feeling sad writing this! Not only did she show genuine love to our newborn, she also took it upon herself to ensure i ate very well and slept even better, cooked a lot of nourishing and delicious food to boost my milk supply such that i increased from pumping 30ml in the first few days to 240ml before the second month. On top of that, she provided constant encouragement and words of edification in my journey as a new mum. This gave me a very strong mental boost right from the start, which was ultra crucial in my confidence since the first month is super trying for a new mother what with the broken sleep to express milk, undergoing initial baptism fires for breastfeeding, and having to tolerate feeling unwashed amidst the humid weather. Also, I had guests wanting to visit to see my baby and had to juggle my nap times and feeding times around these occurrences. A strong support can really get you through bouts of self doubt mired in fatigue during the first month, and Lan Jie was all that to me.
WORK ETHIC
You know those friends, those ultra reliable and resourceful ones whom you'd want to have on your team in times of uncertainty? Lan Jie is one of those people. I still recall her calling me the day I checked into the hospital to inform me of her arrival schedule on the day that I would be discharged. She said she was taking the first morning bus out from Malacca and would arrive latest by late-afternoon/evening. In the meantime I should take milo after getting home from the hospital in case she hadn't arrived, and just wait for her to appear. "After I get there," she told me, "you won't need to worry anymore".
And she meant it. The whole 2 months she was with us, we saw how she took care of our baby son like he was her own nephew or grandson, talking to him after bathing him, managing his feeding times so that there was a basic structure that we can now follow, giving him little massages sometimes to help with the burping, and going beyond her line of duty to take care of him. Our baby had a flare up on his face due to the hot weather that wouldn't go away and it just looked so red and painful, even though he never cried over it. But Lan Jie said it pained her to watch him that way, and we tried conventional methods to alleviate the redness on his cheeks albeit with little success. Then on baby's First month, I received a tube of gentle nourishing cream meant for babies (shan't mention the brand here) and she stayed up all night to apply it on him on him, dabbing his cheeks w wet cotton buds before putting on the light cream and repeating the process every 2 hours The next morning we noticed baby's cheeks were slightly less red, and the flare up seemed to have receded. Seeing the improvement, she continued this process for 3 nights, applying and cleaning until our baby's cheeks were all smooth and fully healed. Extremely little sleep for Lan Jie, yet she was always bubbly and joyful in the mornings, first to wake up to clean the house, mop the floor, wash up the bottles, and make full set breakfasts that were always piping hot the moment I emerged from my bedroom. And the smiles! she is always smiling no matter the hour.
FOOD
I know another post on this forum mentioned her fried chicken being awesome. My husband loves it too. She's an awesome cook and also extended her willingness to cook to for guests who came over. i never expected that of her and yet, she told me she was happy doing it for my family and close friends when they came to visit. PLUS she made this fantastic curry chicken that had me salivating while watching the rest of my family eat one night as I was still on confinement food then. But her confinement food is equally delicious! If anything, I am darn impressed by her 刀功. Because I don't fancy ginger, she slivered them into such fine threads that the sight of ginger in my confinement food didn't put me off. I am not a fan of confinement food either as I don't like pork. So lan-jie varied my menu so that I could have a taste of ginger wine chicken, pork trotters, papaya soup, herbal soup mixed in with the stuff I preferred- soup dumpling noodles, fried rice, stir-fried noodles, lots of cod fish, vermicelli, some vegetables. And I know I am very picky with my meat, because even with chicken breast, I can leave pieces aside if they aren't cut correctly. But Lan-Jie knows which direction to cut them to make them more succulent, so I really enjoyed having her cook my meals. Some afternoons, I would see her sitting in my balcony patiently peeling the heads off Ikan bilis one by one so she could broil them into soup stock for my dishes. She told me that the stock is good for milk production but the heads were high in cholesterol. When she realized I liked beef, she also concocted this delicious wat-tan-hor (beef Horfun w gravy) for me one and it was the best I had. I also love, love her desserts. Post-confinement, Lan-Jie whipped up a 3-course meal that ended with this signature "black jelly tang shui" for a few of my closer friends who were visiting, which got them talking about her cooking days after. Up to the day she left, I enjoyed a menu that was both deliciously nutritious and so carefully thought through, that my milk production shot up by 800 percent in a span of 56 days.
COMMUNICATION
When you engage Lan-Jie, she will treat your home like hers and take care of it as well as the people who live in it. Upon finding out that my husband is Japanese, she was concerned about whether he could eat what she cooked and asked me for examples of what he likes so that she could make them separately for him. It wasn't necessary in the end because my husband enjoys her cooking and works late rather often anyway. But i appreciated her going out of her way for him all the same. When my husband wasaway at work, it was just Lan Jie and I at home with the baby so I took that time to ask her all sorts of questions regarding certain behaviors in babies and she always had an answer and explanation based on her past experiences with them. She was also a calming influence on my baby and neighbors commented that our home was quiet even with a newborn. Because of her good management, my baby kept to his meal times and sleep times as an infant. She also gave me a lot of mental support throughout. While she encourages BF, she told me that it was ok if I couldn't breastfeed for a while when she saw how sore and cracked my nipples were because they wouldn't be able to heal properly. Her encouragement allowed me to see things from a greater perspective and I continued to BF subsequently without any pressure, making the process much more enjoyable.
HONESTY
One thing you will need from your confinement nanny is trust on both ends. Because we worked on that basis from the start, it was easy to leave my baby in Lan-jie's hands at night. She would wake me up to express milk and feed my baby boy while I did, so I had more time to rest after. I could also have her do grocery shopping by herself as she was accountable for whatever she bought. We set aside a central bag for grocery money for that purpose and believe me, it makes your life so much easier when you have a nanny whom you can trust with the minor and major details.
CONTACT
Do note that she's booked up really quickly. I called her early in my second tri and already I was rather late. Am blessed that she was still available then! 1 week after i transferred her the deposit I learnt that someone else had called her up a few days after I did and was glad I didn't delay it further. I also heard her having to turn away engagements too because her schedule was already full during my confinement. Last i know, she's fully booked to January 2015. So do book her early if you are keen. Her no is
82587522/ +60 17 3930801. I seldom write testimonials but feel that she definitely deserves many good ones. Having her around is like having a kind and helpful elder at home. Am missing her very much as i write! All the best mummies
