October 2014 // thread 5 // baby's first Christmas

[JeannePoole]

Welcome back!

(Dear greetings cards manufacturers: 'Baby's First Christmas' does NOT necessarily have to include Baby being liberally sprinkled with glitter from your shoddily-made merchandise.

Except that, as I'm rapidly discovering, it does.

Re baby groups: not been to a single one. Almost certainly not planning to. I'm a proper antisocial old grouch at the best of times and it just doesn't appeal, especially when it means dragging me and DS out in horrible cold / wet / miserable weather. Add to that the fact that I'll almost certainly be twenty years older than most of the other mums, and... just nope.
And anyway, that's why we're all on MN instead, isn't it?

I go out all the time, usually with one or two of the women I met at nct. We've got things in common other than children though, so go to museums, walking up hills etc. I also go swimming once a week, to a sling library stay-and-play every couple of weeks, to a drop in centre every couple of weeks, and also go to the cinema lots - baby club is twice a week at th art house cinemas in my town. This is usually followed by lunch or cake/coffee or the pub. I'd go mental if I stayed at home more than one day a week, I need adult company.

I'm moving to my mum's for January while we have work done on our house and I'm dreading being in a village away from such good social options.

Our Christmas is finally over - just feeding pip then we're off home, can't wait.

Thanks yellow yes feel things are different since introduction of dairy. I think your right, maybe lack of sleep is a wonder week thing but not the extra puking... He is quite happy though so can I just manage the intolerance by cutting out dairy and maybe soy but I don't need meds...

Sazzle if you can manage without meds that's definitely for the best!

Panda puppet - best present for 11 week old baby EVER.

kirstie your wee girl is gorgeous loved her wee outfit!

My baby just hurst her fathers feelings, everytime he spoke to her she was basically shouting at him with wee angry grunts, then when i spoke to her she was all smiles & giggles. Taste if his own medicine as dd1 his number one fan .. Total daddy's girl, hopefully dd2 is going to be a mummy's girl ?

This time I haven't done anything yet with ds2 - apart from the odd coffee with froends. With ds1 I did loads with the NCT girls and lucky to have a neighbour with baby of same age. Planning to do water babies in feb though and I might do Gymboree as well but don't see much point in baby and toddler groups as think my 3 year old will find them too small and not much point with a baby who can't even sit up yet!!

I think the weather definitely affects my motivation to leave the house. That combined with faff of getting anywhere on time, fussy feeding times and dislike of awkward small talk just about seals the deal for me

That said, defo want to try one of those mummy / baby daytime cinema showings at some point

Fedup yep there's noooo point taking Lil to toddlers for her sake - we go because my and DS's best pals are there. Fate I'm on the committee of ours too and trying to avoid the chair role - our chair is 8 months preggers with DC2 - I do a lot to help but don't have time to be chair. If baby / toddler groups seem cliquey its worth remembering that the turnover of members is pretty rapid as kids outgrow them fast - so chances are that those Mums who look like they've been going forever have only been going a few months and were new themselves pretty recently. The best way to make pals is to help - with packing away toys, making snacks, tea etc. There's a couple of Mums at ours who rock up just in time for the snack to be ready and piss off before we have to put all the toys away. Presumably they assume we're paid to wait on their children rather than unpaid volunteers who'd like a little bit of time to play with our kids at the group too! The golden rule of baby / tots activities is to pull your weight. I'm shit at multitasking but I can now BF and stack chairs at the same time as entertaining a toddler.

All this talk of baby groups has put me to shame! I must get organised & do something. I tried going when I had DD and didn't really like the ones in the church halls but I enjoyed the courses - swimming, baby yoga, baby sensory & pram fit. There is a baby massage class near me, must enrol in the new year. Still don't think I'll try the church groups, I'd rather meet another Mum at the school gate or the like.

goats I go out every day- at the very least we go for a good walk, but often for lunch out similar with friends. I just don't go to any groups.

Baby has only woken once between ten thirty last night and now. A record! I've been awake for an hour, though. Booo. Here's a thing- I want to start moving her bedtime to a bit earlier. She's usually downby 9.30 (last night was a bit of a grim one) but I'm worried that I'll end up getting less sleep, because she does a long sleep at the beginning- four out five hours- and then usually wakes every three. So if she was going to sleep before me I really wouldn't sleep much. Any thoughts anyone?

Well I was worried about that too tatty but he actually started sleeping longer when I did it! He wakes about 4 or 5 and back to sleep til 7. I get him down by 8 (usually)

Omg I was just coming on to post about the exact same thing!

We had got r in a great little routine but things all started to go a bit tits up a few weeks ago and we were struggling to get him to go down at 7ish. He seem to naturally want to go down at about 9ish so we went with it. However it started to get later and later and he ended up being awake til 11 but then he was sleeping through til 7 or sometime a small feed at 5 and straight back down.
We've been trying to get him down at seven by keeping him awake from 4.30 and bath bottle and bed from half six he's been going down fine at 7 always wakes after 45 mins (which I know is when the come into a lighter sleep) I re feed him and he goes back down after a bit of a cuddle.

Last night and the night before after his night feed he was really hard to get back down and ended up sleeping in the crook of my arm and last night he woke twice and was unsettled most of the night and slept with me from 2.

Waaah what do I do? Lose my kids free evening or lose my sleep???

Woohoo, we came home and sleep came back too. A 5 and a 5 last night - thank god. The house was freezing - temperature in our bedroom went down to 7 degrees at 3am (this is why we're moving to parent's for a few weeks), but I layered pip up with a 3.5 tog bag and put her to sleep in bed with me and she went straight out. Think part of the problem while away was houses that are far warmer than she is used to.

I'm going to start proper bedtime routine stuff in the new year - at my parent's. Quite looking forward to the challenge. Ha.

Hope everyone had a good Xmas. We see st in laws, nice to be in the countryside but getting bit stressful v has been crying more here in the evenings she'll be overtired but won't sleep and instead of her usual bedtime of 8:30 she isn't sleeping until 11-12! Though she has been sleeping all the way through she's still asleep now.

Re baby groups I went to one once with my first dd and it was very cliquey I got such a frosty reception it put me off and I've never been to another with my other 2. I did look into what's on locally this time but they are all at times I can't do because of school runs.

Im massively impressed at those of you that get your lo's to sleep around 7pm! Weve been doing bath and feed from 7/730 for 3 weeks and i normally end uo feeding in bed from 730-1030 when he drops off for an hour or so if im lucky. Hes really resistant to his cot at the moment, only went in it from 4am-8am last night, but he did sleep next to me from 830-10pm which is fairly unheard of. I want my magical week back of him going to sleep at 1030 and not waking til 4/5am lol :)
What sort of routines are you using/thinking of using for bed time?

We have a sort of routine here of bath, into sleeping bag, story and feed. Sometimes it takes ages to get her to sleep but once the bath is done she stays upstairs. We usually do it at about nine but the last few nights I think she's been ready for sleep earlier than that, so we're going to try moving it back and hope it doesn't screw us too much.

I do a sort of routine of upstairs then breastfeed, change, into his groswaddle (arms left free) then his 2oz of formula ( :( ) and then more breast if he wants then into his sleepyhead once asleep. All takes about an hour or so and starts at 9.30. He normally then sleeps a bit of a stretch (anything from 3-7 hours). I keep thinking I should pull it back but I can't stand the thought of his doing his 5 hours from 7 till midnight or something! What would the rest of the night be like?!

That's my worry too spendide, but it's academic right now because she's wide awake in the evening and just about as far away from sleep as she could be. She's mostly also in a good mood though, so I don't mind her being awake too much.

I'm going to try putting him in his big cot tonight. I've noticed he likes to sleep like a starfish and there is no way he can do this in the Moses basket I'm wondering if maybe his arms banging on the sides wake him up

Yep, I think I'm going to try a big cot too. She likes to move around quite a lot in her sleep and being restricted definitely frustrates her.

Wanted to take baby out for a little walk. Now I've got MIL, yappy dog and nan-IL! So much for a peaceful afternoon!!

Babymoose def prefers his big cot, always woke himself up with flailing arms in moses basket. I really want to try him in a sleeping bag again but he went bat shit crazy last time lol, legs straight up in the air.at the moment we very gently put a blanket over him and run (tiptoe) away. I think one night this week i might try a 6pm bath and see what happens :s