Caitlin is finally registered in Belgium

It has taken us blood, sweat, tears and a lot of money, but our daughter is finally registered with the local authorities in Belgium. After receiving so much contradicting information regarding registration, nationality, health insurance and child benefits, we are finally seeing the end of the tunnel.

The list of problems was long, here some of the more urgent ones:
- In Germany they had a problem with her first name.
- In Belgium they cannot understand that my wife and I have the same surname
- In Belgium they don't accept the German 'Wedding Book'
- We needed a certified translation of such a simple thing as a wedding certificate, and in the end they did not accept it as we could not provide them with an original (a copy of the original, signed by the responsible authorities was not enough apparently).
- We couldn't get health insurance for Caitlin, as long as she was not registered.
- Child benefits gave us the same answer...but today I sent all the necessary information so I hope we'll be able to deal with that as well

Caitlin's Sleep Routine

We created a simple sleep routine for Caitlin. Around 8pm we take her up, change her diapers, put on her pyjamas and sleeping bag, and give her a final serving of breast milk.
Then she gets a cuddle from my wife and I, and we put her to bed. Next we sing a German lullaby called Leise, Peterle, Leise and tell her we love.
Sometimes it works, and she falls asleep, something she needs a top-up of breast milk.

Emiliana Torrini, Tori Amos, Heather Nova

Our daughter Caitlin is getting a good musical education, as she is constantly listening to children songs, mixed with contemporary artists like U2, Tori Amos, Heather Nova and oldies like the Velvet Underground and The Beatles. And now her big favourite is Emiliana Torrini's "Jungle Drum". Every time we sing the chorus and do the drum sounds, she goes wild :)

Picture of Heather Nova in Hanau was taken by Gerd Will and found on Wikipedia.org

Money for a Tree

In the town of Grimbergen where we live, they have an interesting birth incentive: every child that is born in this community, gets a choice of two gifts. Either 50 euro, or 25 euro and a tree. The tree is planted once a year (together with the trees of other babies) in a big gree area.

We choice of course for the second option. Money is something you can find everywhere, but a tree with your child's name on, that is much more special. The next tree-planting session will be in September

Using Sing language with our baby

I recently started using sign language with Caitlin. I read there has been a movement to teach and encourage the use of sign language with toddlers before they learn to talk, because such young children can communicate effectively with signed languages well before they are physically capable of speech. This is typically referred to as Baby Sign.

I have to say that my efforts are met with some cynisicm from my wife, but recent studies seem to indicate that there is some truth behind the theory.
According to a study carried out by researchers like Acredolo and Goodwyn, using sign language with babies has the following benefits:

* larger expressive and receptive spoken language vocabularies;
* more advanced mental development;
* a reduction in problematic behaviours like tantrums resulting from frustration;
* and improved parent–child relationships.

Of course Caitlin is still too young to show any of those benefits, but I hope that in a couple of months we will have our first "conversation".