Dec 08 mums - from rolling to sitting and everything inbetwean

[waitinggirl]

there i've done it - hope that is ok.

Helloooooo ladies how art thou? Where is JJ she's been quiet?

Kayz glad the HV was a bit more laid back I guess all you can do is chug on (or at least pretend to). Did you go for a ride in the end? I went for a run near Kedleston Hall where they film some of the Duchess very beautiful countryside and little forest bits. Unfortunately got a blister, I really need new trainers as have had current ones for a year at least I think. I got my timing mixed up and was late to pick DS1 from nursery and looked all sweaty and dischevelled I do wonder what they must think sometimes.

Tracey I had a giggle at you reaching in to pull the carrot our of P's mouth. I think maybe BLW is not for you, she will get quite confused as to what she is supposed to be don't with the food if you take it back out

DS2 enjoyed some strawberry and peach but just to show he is more interested in exploring textures with his mouth rather than the actual eating he picked up the bowl with his fruit pieces in, tipped out the contents and proceeded to knaw on the bowl edge.

I've never heard of Jo Frost but would like to know the rationale behind her bizarre feeding regime. I think your right to be suspicious LadyT, Ive no idea how many feeds DS2 has a day it varies from day to day, maybe 6-8 on average? Actually I'm really not sure. I assume he will drop the feeds as he wants to just as DS1 did. But as with anything else Lady it might have some helpful tips you can pick up. Why is DP so into it? Really for a longtime yet her formula is a much better source of nutrients esp as she'll be on the follow on stuff soon. Like BF after 6 months the formulas change to accommodate the changing needs of older babies.

I actually read some of the BLW book today, but cannot remember any of what I read, bloody hopeless me.

Had a lovely afternoon with the boys, went to gymnastics with DS1 and had DS2 in sling. He fell asleep during the class so I read a trashy mag, one of those ones were all these desperate looking people tell horror stories in their lives. Then we went to a cafe and had a lovely time while DS2 continued to sleep. Then I did some clothes shopping in my favourite shop. DS1 did his best to chat up the sales assistants who thought he was hilarious. Then home to some chilling in the back garden.

Right DS2 is asleep so I'd better go take over DS1 from DH who is off to the gym himself.

Nice to hear from you Verso, how did the interview go?

PMK and Veggie, you both sound like you had lovely days! Well done on your run, Veggie. I think it is going to have to come to this for me - running I mean

I tried to work in the garden (shared garden, I live in a very small flat in a big, strange looking house with a flag pole and a turret ) but it was hopeless because as soon as I did, the bloke who looks after said garden and grounds came out on his little sit down mower, then three other neighbours came out! Not meaning to be antisocial, but I just vanted to be alone and I couldn't very well pick up my rug and go back upstairs as it would've looked rude then. Plus people were nosing at what I was doing which I also dislike.

When DP got back with DD and came out to join us, I gave in. Then we went for a drive to a nice village called Windrush and sat in a meadow full, and I mean full, of buttercups.

Veggie, Jo Frost is from a show called 'Supernanny'. DP likes it because someone told him it was brilliant, the only book you need, and this has become lodged in his brain. He is very susceptible to recommendations. It is a bossy, undermining sort of book which just makes you feel bad. It also contains contradictory advice - eg, in the solids chapter, it says good first finger foods are strawberries and slices of orange (she also says lightly cooked sprouts - ha ha ha! Show me a tiny baby who will like SPROUTS). Then there is a panel a few pages later which says no strawberries until they are one because of allergy risk, and no citrus until they are one because it is too acidic! Also, she is very strong on 'regimes' and her feeding regime (for instance) involves baby being put to bed at 7 and then sleeping until 6.30, whereupon you feed her. She takes a dim view of folk who lie in. I don't know about Supernanny - she is more like Antinanny.

In fact, if there's anyone you really don't like who is expecting a baby, Jo Frost's Confident Baby book, together with a hearty recommendation - "we relied on every word", is the perfect gift.

Although maybe that's what happened to us!

Good evening everyone,
Yikes to old Supernanny LadyT. i have seen her on TV, but I always turn over so I can't really comment. She is rather austere looking and has big ankles. Scary. Her sleeping regime sounds like Gina Ford though. That's what my friend does, she has not got up past 7am for the past 6 months. Overall i have had less sleep than her but at least if DS is alseep at 7am i don't wake him up, I am blissfully asleep as well!
The book I have says to be careful of citrus and berries as some babies can have a reaction. My book is Annabel karmel which I believe is also somewhat reviled in a similar way to Gina on here, however, I don't really find the book annoying. It just has recipes in it really. I am totally planning on the "winging it" form of weaning a la Indith though. A bit of both puree and "here you go, chew on that", and see how we go. Have not properly started yet though (but he is not 6 months yet). Unfortunately booked a holiday on the week he is 6 months so am going to have to decide whether I can hold off starting properly til after or start properly the week before so I have an idea what I am doing! Hopefully it will work out.
LadyT has your DP read the Jo Frost book? Does he like it as it sounds awful! My DH is similar, he rushed out and bought a Gina Ford book cos he liked the idea of a routine, even though I stropped about it. Then he read "get up at 7am every morning" and changed his mind . He also agreed it was awfully written as in "Do what i say or the world will cave in, and if your baby doesn't sleep and you have disobeyed a word of what I said, it's not your baby being different, IT'S ALL YOUR FAULT".
Yikes to all the pg scares. pmk I may be joining you towards the end of the year but not sure yet. Depends on work and how i feel, but in principle I would like two children close together, like me and my brother.
jj and njan yes to the meeting up that week! (15th was it?). any day should be fine for me, apart from Tues as we have swimming lessons. Anyone else up for a wee trip up to Cambridge?
veggie cool about the run. I would have snuck in a ride today apart from DH has nabbed this evening for bike riding. so i am home alone. I did ride to swimming and to buggy fit though so i suppose I got some exercise. Might try and do a ride tomorrow eve if the weather is nice.
verso great to hear from you and hope the interviews went well.
Right i have not posted in ages, so have missed loads of people out. Does anyone else get inertia about posting, even if they have been lurking, if they haven't posted in a while. I get worried I will miss people out. Even though i clearly will anyway. Must post more often as that would fix the problem!

Get up at 7am? I'm lucky if I get a lie-in past 5:30am these days - though as DD2 is sleeping through until then I'm not complaining!

LadyT I would hate being observed in the garden too. It's a meditative and pleasantly solitary activity, gardening, and having an audience would be most disconcerting! Interview went v well, thanks! They called me back a couple of hours later to say I'm through to the final round!

MY LAST DAY of maternity leave tomorrow and I have another interview to prep for . Will be busy early on (ie 5:30am?!) and then may go for a little light retail therapy in the afternoon...

P.S. Have to admit I watched a few of the "supernanny" programmes. V entertaining how she always started off stern with her hair scraped back and what appeared to be reinforced concrete underpinnings and then when she returned to sort out the family she'd have tumbling locks and a much more approachable demeanour. (I watch too much Gok evidently. Ahem.)

Mom forgot to say - i'm trying to ditch the dummy, since he's waking in the night ever since we returned from our trip (well except 3 nights out of 2 weeks) If it's not teething waking him then he has to get off the dummy as it's usually what he cries for.

SL yay join me yes! A few more of you who want to have more lovely babies will come around soon....
Also, how do you ride your bike to Buggyfit? Don't you need your buggy? Or do you have one of those Chariots that swaps to a Buggy like a transformer? dh is currently on a campaign to get one of those. I was wondering if there is one of those front mounted seats for little one's around this age or not much bigger? ie: mini size?

So are the Londoners meeting Thurs so Arti can make it? Need to work around my new gym regimine nah actually might have to show prospective tenants around so would like to arrange that around my cheerfulness

Verso crossed - WELL DONE on your interviews.... especially at a time like this! Yes do the retail therapy for sure!
Yeah I must admit I like Supernanny and the naughty step and all that too, we practise it on the dog, however that weaning / book sounds a little odd

verso yes I know I am lucky that he sometimes sleeps past 7! Not often though and he does still wake in the night.
pmk yes I have a Chariot and swap it to buggy mode when I get there ....

PMK we have a wee ride, which is a brilliant front mounting bike seat (as well as a chariot). The baby needs to be able to wear a helmet and sit independantly and for a considerable period of time. I think we started using it with DS1 at around 8 months he was sitting and crawling by then. I can def recommend the wee ride, but I have friends who swear by the rear mounting seats.

I have watched that supernanny a couple times. I didn't mind it, I'm not a big fan of the naughty step but I liked how she put the emphasis on the parents and what they were doing wrong. Usually the parents thought it was the childs fault.

Oh and congrats Verso on getting to the next round. Sounds like you are in a talent show!

Oh and I don't want to say what time my boys sleep in til as I have a fear that if I do they might suddenly stop and start waking at 6am. Suffice to say they have their mummies ability to sleep deeply and long.

Morning,

Well done Verso That is great. I agree with going for the retail therapy!!

The boys normally wake between 6 and 7 but occasionally they will sleep longer or wake earlier.

Hope everyone is ok today. It's not sunny here anymore

Well both my girls slept past 6.30am this morning which is my criteria for success nowadays (& thanks to dd2 is rarely achieved). I remember when I read Gina Ford while preggers with DD1 and I was horrified atvthe idea of 7am starts so threw the book away. For the first 8 months of DD1's life she slept past 8am and I laughed at those foolish Fordites... Then the 6am rises started,followed by 5.30am. By 18 months we were often seeing 5am itself. 7am sounded like a luxurious dream and now, thanks to dd2, it does again.

London meet girls - I may have a problem tomorrow. I forgot we have a tour of the local primary at 2.15pm. I would have to leave Kensington Gardens at 1.30pm. Is that going to be too early for you LadyT?

Ooh am jellus, arti, thusly --> . 6:30am eh? The luxury! in mah dey we were lucky to sleep past 2am... sometimes we woke before we went to bed...

Sorry. Am burbling. Had spectacularly pants night but not on account of the girls (though each woke once during the night because of the heat) so am knackered today. Had a major rush of anxiety at 3am about going back to work tomorrow and the interviews and maybe starting a new job and leaving DD2 at nursery and then finally got back to sleep and had a dreadful dreadful realistic graphic nightmare (which is still with me, visually). Methinks I am a tad stressed! I guess it's to be expected really... I need to take up running or something >expires in a fit of hysteria at the ludicrous prospect

Verso: I'm getting worried about work as well, esp the commute, and I'm not back till Sep. Talking to some more cm's later this week, hopefully I can find someone in time! Am seriously considering looking for another post next year...

what's with all the DHs having opinions on parenting books, routines etc?! My DH rolls his eyes if I even mention a book!
And all the talk of next baby I can heartily recommend a 4.5 year gap! It's not what I would have chosen really but it's how it ended up and works fantastically
P did a massive vom in the night. yak. It was in her hair and everything! She only had 3 feeds last night - but Lu was up twice asking for more water too - I'm glad it's cooling down a little now at night
I cleaned my bathroom and my kitchen! I sat P in her highchair (which makes her look even smaller than she is!) and she watched me clean and smiled lots!
Veggie I tihnk you're right about BLW not being for me! We did purees then mashed then lumps then normal food with dd1 so I think I'll just stick to what I'm happy with! P is LOVING her purees!
I've no idea what my highchair is - it's a chico something and was given to us - it's huge and heavy and chunky and definitely not ideal for us - takes up to much space, hard to move...but a free highchair is a free highchair! With dd1 we had a cheap BabiesRus (stupid name) one and loved it, but we gave it away to someone!
Well my house needs rescuing from its post-breakfast-everyone-rush-out-to-school state...

quick question for you lovely ladies... what is all this about having to give vitamin drops to babies who are bfeeding when they begin solids? i heard they will be deficient in a and d vitamins. also - what is follow on milk - why would i need to use it if i am carrying on bfeeding?

re: parenting books. i get so angry when my dad tells me it is so wonderful to see me now not referring to any of the (small library of) books and trusting my instincts. i have to point out i HAD NO INSTINCTS to begin with - i didn't understand why my baby couldn't play with any of her toys from week 2, why she cried when she needed to sleep, the fact that she needed to sleep 1.5 hours after she just woke up completely flummoxed me etc. so parenting books have their place. although... we've now only got 1 or 2 which we consult, mainly for health related stuff and developmental stuff.

i had another question. cannot remember for the life of me. squawking coming from the pram - must dash

oh, other quesion was about bumbo trays - bought one yesterday so i can feed her for a bit before committing to a highchair... if anyone has one, do you know whether i can pull ntyhe two parts apart once i've put them together? no instructions alas and don't want to break it but want to be able to travel with it

Wg yes it comes apart again! Don't think you can get them in easily with the tray on so would be a major flaw!

WG- veggie willknow more but my understanding is that BF babies don't need any supplements ever. Some HVs think they need iron but that is based on a misunderstanding about the levels of iron in breastmilk and how easily it's absorbed. With DD1 I saw a paedoatric nutrition consultant at the hospital because DD1 was allergic to formula. She was a leading expert and assured me that BF was a perfect combo with solids and my DD needed no supplements. For the first 14 months that is what we did and it worked perfectly.

Sorry about my early waking post girls. On re-Reading I realize it sounds like u am indulging in competitive suffering and also being a bit patronizing. I got the tone a bit wrong & am now all embarrassed. I most remember not to post before coffee!

No no nooooo! Don't be embarassed, arti! (Didn't realise there's a name for "competitive suffering" - I must have missed that when I was off-thread .) I didn't take it that way at all.

I agree re the BF babies not needing supplements. DD1 didn't have any and she's fine. She now has those chewy vitamins that are like sweets - but mainly as an insurance policy because of my scatty and somewhat haphazard approach to cooking nutritious meals for the family (ie I scrape together whatever is easiest usually .)

WG with you on the book comment, btw. My Mum has a tendency to come out with similar choice things at times too...grrrrr

Oh bother. See what you've all done? I've sat down post-cleaning (the glamour) and have been drawn back into the thread when there's important business shopping to be done! Cheerio for now!

Morning all. DD asleep in sling so time to do some catching up!

Firstly a report on our current dilemma. After Saturday's mammoth sleep we tried again last night with her sleeping in the crib as usual, and us in the back bedroom as we were pretty sure that us going in to bed wakes her up - or at least coincides with a particularly light phase of sleep when she's easily woken. She didn't wake up until 1.30! at which point I went in to her, fed her, put her back in crib and conked out myself on the bed next wake was at 4, then at 6.30 for the day. This is pretty miraculous for us! So the dilemma is, she evidently sleeps better without us disturbing her (for which read, DH snoring ). But, we've yet to try her in the big girl's cot in her own room. And I don't fancy being up and down feeding her if she won't settle back so easily there. And, selfishly, I really like the special times with her an night feeding her lying down and having a big cuddle, and being there when she wakes up in the morning so she knows we're there. What's more important - her getting a solid batch of sleep, or the reassurance of knowing we're with her when she wakes up? Or is that reassurance leading to her waking more often, smelling milk, and saying Right then, I'll wake up properly. She'd not usually that hungry in the night, just slurps for a couple of minutes then out. Oh it's tricky! Anyone experience of weaning off co-sleeping?

We're also trying her with solids but that's quite another story, except to say don't give your baby nappy off time on a dry clean only woolen blanket if they've not yet had their mornign poonami, and they've eaten bits of fruit which might cause their bowels to be (ahem) looser than usual.

and now that i'm talking about her she's blimming woken up. I swear she knows, she njust knows. will forcibly remove laptop from dh tonight and get caught up with everyone's news!

Hello Ladies!

I've been lurking since we got back from our trip to the states for the wedding. Which was fabulous!

We've started weaning here too. I attended a weaning class yesterday and have never been so pissed in all my life!!!! To start... when I got to the clinic they told me I couldn't bring my pram inside and that I'd have to lock it up outside! Maybe I'm just an idiot, but who in the hell locks up a pram? That thing cost more than a NICE bike! Anyway... after a lot of protesting they finally let me put the pram in their staff room. Once I got into the class they started talking about weaning stages and how to puree food. Which was all good info. Then they proceed to start talking about how bad baby food jars are and that you are an awful person if you are feeding your child from jars. So that made me feel a bit like the worst mom on the planet since I've been feeding from jars. I'm not exactly martha stewart when it comes to cooking and doing things in the kitchen. Then after making me feel horrible about baby food jars the dentist came in to talk about baby teeth. She wasted no time in looking straight at me and holding up a lanyard for a dummy and saying these are terrible for your child... and guess who's baby was wearing one?? Mine! I almost got up and walked out! She pointed out that I was ruining my child's mouth and making him dependent on the dummy because he could put it in whenever he wanted. I shot back that he never wears it at home and the only reason he was wearing it was because I didn't want the dummy touching their nasty floor. Plus if it helps to keep him quite while everyone is trying to be able to hear what's being said then I'd prefer him to have it! After that they moved on to sippy cups and yet again was singled out! They said you have to start out with a hard nozzled free flow cup. I asked if it was okay to start with the ones that have a silicon tip to help move them from a bottle to cup and they told me absolutely not! I was told that with that particular type of cup it would rot his teeth out! Someone please tell me how a child could rot his teeth out (when he has none)??? Even with teeth the teat would have to go past the teeth in order for them to drink from either a hard nozzled or soft nozzled cup!!! What a complete waste of time!!! IMO. Okay.... enough ranting about all of that!

With DS we've been giving him a little to eat in the morning and evening. I've also tried giving him the same thing for a couple of days just to make sure he's not allergic to anything. I've also made sure we haven't given him anything with added sugar, milk or glutens etc. So far his favorites are bananas, sweet potatoes and carrots. He always says mmmmm whenever I give them to him and he starts grabbing the spoon and shoving it in his mouth! For those interested, I think the HIPP website has a thing you can print off to help get started with weaning. Of course it advertises their food, but I think you could totally use it for home prepared foods as well.

Also have had a pregnancy scare here as well. Still no period here and I haven't breast fed for a LONG time. Had a total panic attack when we went to the states as I started getting nauseated when eating chicken and beef (same thing I did when pregnant this last time!!) Took a test and it was negative. Nausea stopped as soon as we got back to London though. I think it was all the junk they put in the food back home. Will probably schedule an appointment with OB/GYN just to make sure all is okay.

WG - Vitamin drops for breast fed babies once they are 6 months. The HV told us yesterday in our wonderful workshop that your breast milk doesn't have sufficient vitamin A&D and so once you start on solids you need to give baby the vitamin drops. For formula fed babies it's not until one year since their formula contains the vitamins. But since I came out of that class more confused and pissed off than when I went in, it could all be a load of crap.

As for the bumbo tray... I left the two parts apart. Plus it was a pain trying to get the two parts to lock together so I figured it would be equally as hard to get them apart.