February 2016 #2

[haquoi123]

We're into thread 2! Can't believe our babies have been here this long!

Wow clumsy, impressive baby! It's the new normal I suppose so the sleeplessness isn't too difficult, although it is getting to the point where I just can't get up anymore and DH has to. That's usually about 5am after a night of it though. I'm more exhausted as DH is so busy I'm doing most of it - the nights almost bother me less if DH had had him during the day. He's around, but working. I can't complain though, baby is a chilled out dream during the day (touch wood it continues)

Doing ok with the sleep deprivation tbh! This is after some sleep training, I think I'm going to try and redo it to stop the feeds once she's established on solids - which will be a while since she's only 5 months tomo and we haven't started yet! Wondering about giving formula at the 10pm feed but since DD dropped the formula feeds I'm not sure it'll work plus the most she ever took was 4oz?!

Clumsy rough rule of thumb with formula is half the baby's weight in pounds. So if baby weighs 10lb, they take 5oz at a feed.

However the key thiing to look out for is 'are they consistently draining the bottle without bringing any back up?'. If so, try adding another ounce to the bottle for future feeds. They may take it or they may not but the option is there.

Caveat - I am only giving formula to ds so I am not sure how this advice translates to mixed feeding.

Haha haq it was impressive but I'd got used to having a full nights sleep so it's really hard now to go back to disturbed nights!

Thanks clara I think 7 is about right from his last weigh in then. Sometimes he drains it and sometimes he doesn't, he's not a very sicky baby though so nothing tends to come back up.

Feeling amazing after our best night ever - fed baby at 10.30 and took to bed. He woke up at 7.45! Bottle and nappy change then he stayed in bed with us all dozing until 10. Amazing! Just a shame I was up at 3.30 pumping...

On bottles, DS sometimes takes 190mls (EBM) but more usually 150, and he's just under 15lbs. Ideally we'd get him to 6 bottles of 180 instead of 7 bottles of 150, but maybe that will start with the night feed being dropped?

Took him shopping on Thursday for the day and ended up spending 45 minutes in the John Lewis family room! 4 tranches of thick green poo which got on his vest and the changing mat and kept coming! He also peed and was sick while pooing. I was using the big rolls of blue tissue paper and I couldn't keep up with him! It was not our finest moment. He hadn't been for 7 days though and felt much lighter when I picked him up after.

Sorry for radio silence here, we have been on holiday! Had a great time but not great sleep so have enjoyed come home knackered. Not sure what babycud is up to but keeps waking for couple of hours and making a racket and slamming his legs into the mattress. Doesn't seem to really want amything though. Around now I usually give up and feed just so i don't have to listen to it for a bit!

Glad some of the babies are sleeping better! Going to try and get mine back down now... fingers crossed for a couple more hours!

troika thanks so much for the night nappies - I've sent you a PM (can you let me know when you reply as I don't seem to get notifications )

troika mine arrived too just as one of our wool soaker got too small, thanks so much! They've been a life saver :)

handbag whaaa? what a kid!! Sounds awesome (in hindsight, of course!) I properly had to read that a couple of times, spluttering!

Bubs is definitely teething here. We're getting a lot of kicking as well cud and very very loud yelling! He doesn't want to be in the cot but then gets fed up of being in bed with us at 4am...

How awesome handbag!

Glad you had a good holiday cud.

haq we have the loud yelling and when he is excited about something he starts shaking his body to get a really loud squeak out its really sweet.

ds is very interested in my food and watching us eat at the moment. Yesterday he grabbed some of my pitta bread and tried to stuff it in his mouth while he was sat on my lap as I was eating lunch. He got quite cross when I immediately took it off him clumsy doesn't share food

How are you feeling monkey?

What are people planning re weaning? We're thinking BLW - part laziness as we won't need to make purées, but it also seems to make sense. Still a few weeks off - DS is 19 weeks old - but it's a big step coming up!

We've just started putting stuff on DDs tray - she has grabbed and made a face mask with some avocado so far!! We're doing BLW but spoon feeding stuff like soups and porridge

Aiming to start weaning at 6 months but I guess will wait and see what ds thinks about that! We are also19 weeks.

He is also curious about our food (and cups of tea, uh oh....).

He has licked some strawberry juice off my finger and inadvertently ate a bit of watercress (!). No ill effects!

I guess we'll start a mixture of puree and finger food soon. Have meeting booked with hv for some advice on how to avoid another fussy eater... will pass on any tips!

Should have said DD is 22 weeks

Ds is 23 weeks and I am thinking I possibly shouldn't have to wrestle appropriate food off him now when he grabs it off my plate but I just don't know, I like to follow the rules which is stupid as dd was weaned at 4 months as advised by hv then and she doesn't seem to have any problems...

handbag I did a mixture of puréed food and finger foods with dd so will prob do the same again this time. I used to love watching dd chase peas around her tray to try and pick them up to eat

Thanks everyone. DS is very interested in what I eat, and makes drinking movements with his mouth she. He sees me drinking! It's very tempting to just give him a crust from a sandwich or a slice of pepper, but I'm going to try and wait. DH is really fussy about food, so I'm trying to eat meals now in front of the baby that are healthy and colourful, and I'm training myself so when he is sharing meals he's getting healthier, home made stuff. Salmon, veg and rice or tomato sauce, seafood and pasta rather than chicken Kiev and wedges!

handbag that sounds like a good plan.

Ds poos every morning on the school run and it always comes out the side of his nappy and covers his clothes and the blanket inside his car seat. I think it's the straps on the car seat that send it out of the side. Anyone have any good ideas how to stop this from happening? School is too far to walk as we have moved which is why he is in the car seat.

Might not be ideal for you, but I'd maybe try a cloth nappy? Like a terry square or shaped nappy, they're usually pretty good at keeping poos in. Just for the school run if you don't want to cloth nappy otherwise

Thanks haq I'll give it a go, where is the best place to get some from?

Off to Drs tomorrow as think Ds has oral thrush

Nappy lady is great for information. I'd recommend bamboozle stretch and a wrap (not sure what type as we use wool wraps) - you can get good pre-loved ones though

www.thenappylady.co.uk

I agree with haq
We have bamboozles for overnight and they are pretty bombproof. We have tots bots wraps which have always been fine although they don't seem to get good reviews. I need some more and motherese rikki ones always seem to be recommended but I haven't tried them. The only thing I would add is that bamboozles do take quite a long time to dry so if you're in disposables the rest of the time you might need to think about how often you want to wash nappies... we are full time cloth with 15 day ones and 5 bamboozles. We wash alternate days (no tumble dryer). With ds1 I switched to disposable once he was out of nappies in the daytime as I couldn't figure the washing and he outgrew the bamboozles!

Do you think I would be able to just use a wrap over a disposable? I don't want to buy reusable as he will be going to nursery in September and they won't let me use them there so washing becomes an issue.

That's strange of a nursery to say that! I suppose a wrap over a sposie would work - although I'm not sure how hot baby would get - PUL and Wool are cooler than disposables, but I'm not sure about both together. Might be worth a Google? Other option is car seat protector and baby just in vest and blankets?

I suppose the nursery just doesn't want extra washing etc. Hanging around.

I do have a car seat blanket so I may get another to use then as I can use one and wash one.

I hope everyone is doing ok.