Tell me your daily routines with babies

[StyleOfTheTimes]

I’m a ftm to a lovely little girl and I’ve asked mumsnet users for advice on a few occasions and always found your advice super helpful. My dd is 8 weeks old and I always wonder if I’m doing enough/ to much with her day to day. I often think about what other people do with their babies and their routines. I live a little way out of town and at the moment my car isn’t really suitable to load all her stuff into as it’s tiny so that’s limiting me on where I can go.

8 weeks is very young for a routine. I just did some walks between feeds and waited until baby was a bit more interactive before doing anything like groups.

Oh gosh at 8 weeks I was absolutely just in a cycle of feed when he seemed hungry, cuddle/marvel at him lots, change him when he pooed, if not doing any of those things try to put him down for a bit so I could eat/shower... that was about it really, no routine and not very much attempted.

It does get a bit easier. What stuff are you worrying about loading into the car? If it's just you and her you should be able to get a car seat, pushchair and nappy bag in there OK.

DD is a very placid baby so we started a baby yoga class once a week when she was 8 weeks to get out of the house. She also had a play mat and a bouncer I could leave her in and she slept a lot. I watched a lot of box sets when DD was a newborn.

She's 6 months now and life is a bit more interesting!

At 8 weeks I went on a daily walk with the bjorn (easier because DD was a summer baby)- she cluster fed so I really got into line of duty- and attended 1 baby class a week (didn’t always make it, sometimes I just had her on the boob for the entire class), tbh she was by far the youngest but I needed to get out of the house for my sanity. Oh and tummy time- but that may have been once she was a bit older

I got through Line of Duty too, an amazing find.

I have a six week old and no real routine - just change/feed/sleep/have a sit down and rest while he sleeps every three hours or so, then do it all over again ad infinitum.

I try to get out for a walk every day, which usually ends up being mid-afternoon. I've no desire to go to baby classes at the moment, but I do have friends over for a coffee a couple of times a week, or my parents or MIL visit.

He has reflux so I much prefer to be at home for feeds on case I need a change of clothes!

Maybe routine was the wrong word? Was more interested in what people do all day with babies of this age? I go for a walk everyday for an hour, we do tummy time/ play mat time, she sometimes will go in her bouncer and I will sing nursery rhymes to her as well. I just don’t know if I should be doing more or if I’m doing to much to soon? It’s like a mine field if you start googling it. My dd isn’t a napper during the day, she’s been the same since birth so I try and fill our time otherwise I’d be rocking a baby all day long! My health visitor has told me I need to “get out and meet people” but I was thinking baby groups might be a waste of time? I suppose it’d give me a chance to chat to adults?

If he's awake and cheerful I'll stick him on his play mat for a bit, or attempt tummy time. That's about 10 minutes every few hours though, so there isn't much opportunity to do anything with him!

Mostly he's quite happy gurgling/farting and looking out the window or at shadows. I'd be interested to see if anyone is doing more.

Hv's can be very good at telling you what you "should" do. Do you want to get out and about more? If so brilliant work out where you want to go and when and hofully baby plays ball, if she doesn't you'll get better together at leaving the house on time.

If you don't want to then don't, at 8 weeks getting out and meeting people was the last thing I wanted to do. I wanted to sit on the sofa and eat chocolate whilst binge watching boxsets and nursing

Sometimes I do want to get out as I can get a bit cabin fevery, unless my dm comes to see us I don’t really see anyone until my dh comes home in the evening. I think it makes it harder as my dd will not nap longer than 20 minutes in the day. It makes the days incredibly long when you can’t just sit down for an hour. I’m either stood up rocking her, walking her round the house or pushing the pushchair round to try and get her to sleep!! Hoping as she gets older she’ll enjoy her bouncer seat!!

I used to (and still do) set myself a task every day to I had something to aim for. It was things like baby class, meet friend for lunch/coffee, pick up bread from supermarket, post parcel, go see PIL. I very rarely managed to get us both ready before 11am!

Getting out and about was really important for me so I just used to walk for miles listening to podcasts but I appreciate I've got a LO who loves the pram and will happily nap!

The right amount of activity is the amount you're happy with. There is no such thing as too much or too little as long as you're happy with it :) If you're feeling isolated or depressed maybe try to get out a bit more, but if you're feeling overwhelmed or like you can'y keep up then do less. There is no right way, it's just what you feel like doing. This is how most things are in parenting, it's a bit of a shock if you've been used to things having a definitive right answer in life that you can get right or wrong. There are a few definitive things in parenting, that are backed up by research (safety guidelines, that kind of thing) - the rest of it is entirely based on opinion no matter how much people/websites/books like to tell you you "must" do this or that.

What you're doing sounds fine but it's also fine to do twice as much or nothing at all. They don't need stimulation at this age as being alive is stimulating enough, but it can break the day up to do things so it's a good idea to if it makes you happy.

Try not to obsess over naps. At that age I went with the theory of "happily awake time" (Useful table, probably not useful everything else gentlesleep.com.au/baby-awake-times/) and if he'd been awake for longer than about an hour I knew I should not do anything too "fun" and just do things which I knew were likely to induce sleep - breastfeeding, cuddling, or putting him in the pram at home or in the pram/car seat to go somewhere. If he slept - great. If he didn't - not to worry, just keep cuddling him if he wasn't happy to go down. I didn't expect to get much done in the house and tended to do that in the short bursts that he slept not-on-me or laid down looking at his mobile or something. And TBH I tended to use those short windows to grab food or have a wee!

Baby groups at this age aren't for her, they are for you. Up to you if you want to go. I found them helpful but I am quite sociable and go a bit crazy if I don't speak to other adults. If you're more introverted you might prefer to stick to arranging coffee with people you already know (but it can help to make friends who are not working full time).

Thank you everyone! It’s nice to know I’m doing things I should be!