June 08: All we want for Christmas is a good night's sleep!

[bitofasnowqueen]

New thread!

hi, we're back from germany - we had a crazy five days with very little sleep from Fraser (rolling and travelling don't go well together!) but I'm sure he'll settle at home. It felt mean to let him cry at nights when he was in a travel cot and had rolled over and squished himself so he ended up in bed with me every night.

Fraser has gotten out of the Bumbo several times, landing on his head. I think they are particularly unstable for smaller babies (Fraser's only 15 pounds).

sponge congrats on getting back into your jeans!

I know I'm late to the party but I'd highly recommend getting a 0/+1 stage seat that can be installed rearfacing from birth to 13 kgs. We kept DS1 rearfacing until he was 2 since it's safer. Then we just turned the seat around. I'm planning to move Fraser into it when he starts complaining about being in his seat as with the rear/forward seat they are higher up and can see out the rear window. We've the britax one.

deb and 5gomad love the picturs! Deb, we picked up some boy-tights for our DSs in Germany too. Spiderman and Batman ones so that no one thinks they're girls clothes

josey your poor DS! On another note, when does your DH get home? Mine is off again tomorrow with a 6am check-in (we got home two hours ago - DH and DS1 are at Sainsbury's and I'm typing while breastfeeding). gotta love life in the oil industry!

neenz got this from her website

Hello all,

Just been to a lovely thanksgiving service for an old family friend who dies while we were away, Mum and Dad had the after service reception at their house so DD was meeting and greeting and DS was handed round from pillar to post and was very good. I have also been organised and have been and bought all my stuff for weaning, so will be making purees tomorrow to start sometime this week but to be honest he is not interested. I did read my Annabel Karmel book as well and was interested to pick up on that babies should be weaned by 6 months as an aid to speech development, if she knows then why don't our HV's?

Just uploaded Isaacs first food photo

oooh! Huge weaning success here. Fraser's not been to interested and refused to eat anything but me while we were away but then tonight he gobbled down 100mL of butternut squash and rice cereal. What a relief! He's 26 weeks and I'm really struggling to feed him myself and wont take a bottle so I'm very very very keen on him eating his purees!

Great news Aberdeen, I tried Ethan on sweet potato today and that went down well.

And I just ate 5 days of chocolate from all three of our advent calendars. Mmmmm, heaven! I thought it would confuse DS1 to eat more than one day at a time and since DH is heading offshore, he couldn't complain if I ate his....

Aberdeen, that was quite a sacrifice for your child, to save him from that confusion . If Fraser won't take a bottle, how do you feed him? Are you back at work? I know you're bfing. I'm just asking because Iestyn really, really won't take a bottle. Not with a bigger teat, not warmed, nothing. And the variety of cups weren't much of a success either. [stressed mother chained to baby by the breast emoticon]

Poppy doing well on facebook! The carrot was again a disaster, but apple puree was ok. ( I didn't make it, Peter Rabbit did...)

SnowQueen sorry about the reply - it should be bilingual but I was in the Welsh department so we are all militant there. I have e-mailed you back now.

Had a lovely afternoon in Wimbledon where I spent a pile of money in The Pier. Totally random.

Now off to investigate doidy cups.

Essie It's just the breast in this house.... once in a blue moon when he's starving he'll take the bottle after screaming the house down for DH. He'd never take it from me though. I'm not back at work this time until May but last time I went back at 6 months and DS1 amazingly started taking a bottle happily on the first day at nursery (I was in a complete panic).

thats good aberdeen.. will keep trying as bound to find something she likes - I suppose today was a step forward as she laughed and spat it back at me whilst blowing raspberries instead of crying.

This may be of no help re: difficulty drinking from a bottle but i have found thesevery useful with babypearls. She didn't seem to drink very much for a while when she first tsarted eating three meals a day but would drink her milk from them. The whole spout is soft like a teat, which I think helped. Now she has a bottle first thing in the morning and at bed time, but she has her other milk feed (2.30pm) in this....

FiveGoMad... LOL at speech linked to weaning - it nearly kicked off here a few days ago over that . Josey said Olivia's paed said she should wean to help Oli's speech and a few of us were like 'no way that's ridiculous', which understandaby hurt Josey's feelings.

I think that is why some people keep hearing that the guidelines are going to be changed again. I wonder what the weaning militants will think of that.

HH, interesting that she doesn't seem to have researched the nutritional impact of BLW. I will read her book with interest but my insticts tell me BLW is a load of crap . It is fun seeing them feed themselves tho - and I am glad that the BLWers have made me realise that babies this young can feed themselves and that choking is a very small, almost non-existent risk. But the amount of food my two get down their throats by themselves is virtually nothing. They would be BFing day and night. I will follow all your BLW exploits with great interest (if any of you are BLWing?).

Essie have emailed you back!

Neenz, I have an RL friend who is BLW - has been doing so for about 4 weeks now and her LO is already eating loads (and sleeps through every night ). She did try once to spoon feed her last week but DD totally refused to take it. She now spoon feeds herself (mum loads the spoon). My friend is very happy with how much her DD is eating and delighted at how well she is doing with self-feeding.

I'm planning to do BLW.

I don't think it's anything new tbh - parents have been doing it for years, it's just now it's been given a name and 'status'.

I'm not sure what you mean by it being a load of crap - it's just a different way of feeding your baby!

Different strokes for different folks!

Excellent post Sponge. I wanted to write something along those lines myself, but you have done it for me. We all make our own choices about what we think is best for our LOs, and I imagine they will all turn out just fine in the end.

As there are so many places on MN to go for a ruck, what say we keep the June thread the friendly supportive place it has always been?

We have started BLW here. He seems to be enjoying himself and having a go at everything (banana, rice cake, apple, carrot, green beans, and surprisingly satsuma and kiwi fruit). There was evidence of banana poos in the nappies today too. I have some funny photos that I will upload once I get them off my Mum.

Hi Guys

Sorry for my lack of a festive name, I can't think straight at the moment!

Josey So glad to see you stayed, there is no better place to vent your emotions than mumsnet!

I am using purees but trying to do a bit of blw as well. My friend of mine started blw at 6 months with her twins and by 7 months they were eating toasties and everything!
I bought one of those munchkin net bags sponge was talking about and they are fab, it means I can give Mia things without panicking about her choking, she loves grapes!
I found carrot puree was best accepted, I use british carrots (they tend to be sweeter) and she loves pieces of apple and broccoli florets were a hit although I don't know how much she ate and how much ended up of the floor!

Mia also nose dived out of her bumbo! She is a similar weight to fraser Aberdeen although haven't had her weighed for 3 months she was over a stone on my scales a few weeks ago so I guess about 15/16 lbs.

Argh DD1 is still up, dont know if its excitement over the tree or because of her cold or her head grrr!!! DS will be 9 tomorrow and Im trying to sort out his presents for when he gets up, DD wants them all though, god the stress lol!

PMSL at weaning convos again, maybe its not the weaning boards, maybe its just the topic that somehow turns everyone into Nippy Sweeties

BLW is probably better for speech as its the chewing formation that is the most improtant so I believe...Oli cant BLW for obvious reasons Im just happy she will let me shove some down her cake hole.

5gomad, my HV does know because she said that would be one of the main reasons she would advise.(however I think she is an exception to the rule)

I saw a thing about the milk till a year, cant remember who said, my HV is also very keen for me to get plenty protien and Iron into Oli;s diet because there natural resorce disapears by 6months(Josey Ducks for cover)

AH lol at the advent, DH home Friday night that will be 25 days on my own WTF!!!I will be an old grey woman by his return.

Thanks for the comments on the photos, can I please add that the one of Olivias chair, Im not an irrisponsible mother, those items are safe as she cant pull them off and swallow bits, they are there to help with vision. I suddenly thought some of you might think I was putting my child in danger and call S.S

Ali How are you getting on with the banana, Mia really has a problem keeping hold of it, it keeps shooting out of her hands and she gets quite frustrated!

Josey Your photos are gorgeous, olivia is just beautiful as is your other little girl and as for your ds in his kilt - awww!
I will post some photos of Hamish as a pageboy in his kilt as soon as I get them!

Katyjo, banana is tricky. Gill Rapley suggests washing the banana with the skin on, then cutting it into lengths . With each length you remove half the skin so that it is like an ice cream cornet. The skin is easier to grip. It worked yesterday. Or mashing onto rice cakes worked well. First attempt ended up with me offering banana on my hand like a tray, P could not get a grip so he dragged my hand to his face and faceplanted into it. I really must sort some photos out.

I'm doing a lazy mum combo of BLW and purees. While we eat Fraser gets food to play with but then I feed him purees. No reason you have to follow one route or the other. Fraser loves both (although eats very little), the fun of BLW and the attention from me feeding him (poor neglected second child).

Oh, and breastfed babies are supposed to get a vitamin supplement from 6 months I think, I gave one to DS1, better go buy a bottle for Fraser!

On another note - I've a two year old for sale here. He's driving me mental today and I haven't managed a coffee yet. All offers considered - Josey, maybe your DD1 would like him for Christmas? He's housebroken

(And Josey - happy birthday from Miss Duncan to your DS!)

You could maybe stick him on ebay aberdeen?

Loving your use of nippysweetie josey - it's always been a favourite turn of phrase. Along with bumpingyourgums.

Re: bumbo's - S hasn't fallen out yet (he's got a bebepod which has a tray attached so I don't know if that helps keep him in). However he does arch back a lot so he gets very limited supervised use of it now. He does like watch cbeebies in it though!

Loving the image of faceplanting into your banana hand alipali. I'm enjoying listening to everyone's weaning experiences. We're going down the puree route here after much research, but will start giving S suitable finger foods to explore as soon as possible. I might look into one of those mesh feeder things - are they any good?

AH i'll swap you for Isaac who was up from midnight to 5am alternately snuffling, crying and clawing me - although he wasn't hungry just full of cold, calpol doesn't seem to help though

sbbp thanks for your defence of blw, i am fed up of having to defend my choices in rl and was hoping not to have to do it here as well. even had to do it with the hv yesterday as she asked if i had started weaning and when i said i had offered him toast she said i would be better off with baby rice nas it is blander(sp).

isaac went for a rich tea biscuit yesterday as well

The vitamin drops issue is interesting. Previously I have always been told that bif they are eating a varied bdiet they don't need them but that may have changed. I normally start with the abidec drops at 12 months when breastfeeding stops. But I admit that may be a habit thing.

Hedgehog sorry to hear about Isaac. Have you tried Olbas oil or similar in his room to help clear congestion? S is full of the cold at the moment too, so you have my sympathy.

Shockerooni, that your HV not supportive of your weaning. I really wonder how much time they spend keeping up to date with guidance, ideas etc. Someone in my HV team praised me for trying to hold out to near 6 months for weaning and in the same breath told me to make sure I was giving chicken etc by 6 months because the current advice was that they needed protein by then. It's like she skimmed through the up to date guidelines and missed out alternative sentences!