May 09 - weather and jabs = hot cross babies

[Momino]

hope i'm not duplicating

Momino - that sounds good! Enjoy a few drinks

Looby - sounds like you handled the situation with DH well and got a good outcome. Hope he sticks to what he's said and that things continue positively.

Routines - DS is 11 weeks today and I still don't have him in a proper routine. I want to try and get him to start sleeping in his cot earlier in the evening but I want to use a monitor. We have one that someone from DH's work gave us but we need an adaptor as it has an american plug. Guess I could look on Amazon.

No plans here for this evening. Went to see my mum this afternoon with O as it's her birthday.

I do like routines. I think its the teacher coming out in me. I also let DS cry a bit and put him into bed awake. I have been lying on our bed for about half an hour each night while he falls asleep so I'm there if he cries but once he's in bed I don't get him out again just shush, pat and use a dummy and pull the musical thingy. He's getting better and better at getting to sleep and for his naps is even better I usually have to go up once to him after I put him down but then he goes to sleep. I don't have a monitor but we are in a 3 b-room terrace so not a big house but I can't hear DS when we are in the garden as our room is in the front so I have to check him often.

I'm a bit anti-routine, to be honest, as I take the lazy relaxed approach with babies. DS2 sleeps downstairs until we go to bed when we transfer him upstairs. I feed on demand so figure I should let him nap on demand too.

DS1 settled into his own routine and when that happened I was happy to stick with it. He's in bed by 7.30pm and I am hopeful that DS2 will get there too. By the time he goes into his own room at 6 months I hope to have discovered his routine.

Potty-training is going well. DS1 took himself off to use the loo for a number two today so we clapped and cheered and then gave him chocolate to celebrate. We went to the park (by car, so a fairly long trip) and he stayed dry throughout. No accidents today so touch wood we are getting there. I've probably been incredibly silly but we've put him to bed without a nappy as I thought we might as well kill two birds with one stone and get him dry at night too.

Looby glad to hear that you had a good chat with DH about the drinking and sex. I hope it all goes well.

Right, off to check ebay. I've got a bit addicted and have ebayed all the pre-pregnancy clothes that are now too big (yay!) and my maternity clothes, which made me shed a tear. Is that silly, to cry over maternity clothes? Maybe I do want that third baby!

Although DS2 does have a bedtime routine, his days are a bit all over the place still, although i would rather he was in a routine (especially one that involved nice 2 hour naps as at the moment, it seems to be 15, 30 or 45 min naps ). I guess he will be forced into a routine come September as we will have the school run every day so we will have to time feeds and sleeps around this.

I'm just anal!! I demand feed so I think the bedtime is the only routine that I do at this stage but DD always naps at the same time but if we are out or doing something different we adjust it to suit or just change as required. So not too anal .
I'm off car booting today if I can drag DH out of bed. He got home at 3am from work stayed up till 4am and then came to bed. Groped me and woke me up I was so pissed off as I had been up feeding at 3am. Then he rolled over onto me in his sleep at 5am and then DS wanted feeding at 5.30 and 7.30.
I got up and took DD down for breakfast after that so he has had uninterupted sleep. And I'm taking the DCs out this afternoon on my own. He better get up without complaining.

routines my philosophy is the same as llareggub's but we did instigate a bedtime routine as it seemed () H was wanting to go to sleep for 8/8.30pm. Similar to pula we only have 45min naps here, and I agree 2 hour naps would be lovely

Re the above - it seems we just can't get things right in the evenings lately Well, some are ok, but the last two have been particularly bad. We give H a bath around 7.15pm, the idea then is he has cuddles and a feed and goes to sleep for 8/8.30 if it takes him a while to drift off. Except what actually happens is that he's fine up until DH is dressing him, then he starts crying (angry, tired cry). I take him to the bedroom, try to get him to feed but he arches his back and screams at me, then I spend 20min rocking and shh-ing/singing to him until he's calm, then put him down and after half an hour or more of furious finger sucking and thrashing about, he'll go to sleep. Sometimes he'll wake up hungry after 45min but mostly will sleep through until 1am.

It doesn't seem to matter whether he's had a good sleep in the day or not, or when he had his last nap (eg yesterday he napped from 6.30 to 7.15 and we bathed him as soon as he'd been fed and his milk had gone down, but he was even screamier than usual). Sometimes I think he must be hungry, but as I said, he point blank refuses to feed, even after he's calmed down from crying it just sends him back to wher he was.

I know it's not as bad as some people's problems but I'm finding I'm dreading bedtimes which is probably not helping. Anyone got any ideas?

morning everyone.. i need a name check amnesty.. only had time to read not post over last few days.

brownieb hiya & congrats on your lo.. born on my birthday too!

febes i hope your dh has the common sense to be truly grateful for his dc free sleep esp with you not getting much sleep yourself!

spangle your first instinct of the overtired angry cry seems most likely to me.. maybe h is getting totally worn out with his bath making him too tired.. esp if he's conking out for a quick nap.. before long he wakes up recharged & realizes he's still hungry? how about bringing his feed/ bath/feed time forward a bit? esp as he manages a long sleep after. with the thrashing though sounds like trapped wind

Spangle- i was going to suggest splitting his last feed up before and after his bath to help get him through his bath but it sounds like that is what happened last night anyway. S has been doing the waking 45 mins after going to bed thing for the last 3 nights, but think it is wind-related.

Thanks for the advice Fi and pula. I was wondering about bringing his bath forward. We're not actually trying to make him go to bed early, we just want to help him get to a point where we help him go to sleep when he wants to. He loves his baths and maybe it's just a bit too much excitement at a time he needs to be winding down. It's a shame because DH loves doing them but as it is he struggles to get back from work on time.... hmm, thinking about it that might possibly be part of the problem too as H loves his Dad and gets really excited when he comes home.

Could you ditch the bath completely and do baby massage instead? DS1 used to love a massage and it did wonders for his skin and encouraged him to poo more often. We used organic sunflower oil (poncetastic) and he would go all floppy and relaxed afterwards. You could do bathtime at a different time of day until he is a bit older?

Spangle You could try bringing the bath time forward to 5ish and then putting him to bed before 7 even if he wakes up for another feed treat it as a night time feed (no talking, feed and put straight back in bed etc). DH can do the bath time on the weekends H should get the hang of it eventually and then you will have all evening to yourselves.

Hi llareggub do you know where I can find some good info on baby massage? Sounds great. Do you know if it might help with wind? T seems to be really bothered by wind in the evenings - I quite like the sound of massaging it away and ending up with a nice floppy tired baby!

Re routines we also in have basically none whatsoever, just demand feeding and seeing what happens. Dd settled down into her own routine eventually so I'm expecting ds to do that too. For the moment we keep his moses basket downstairs with us and he naps on and off until we take it upstairs when we go to bed, usually far too late (often midnight - no wonder I'm constantly knackered! But we really appreciate the time by ourselves). I have been wondering when T is going to need to settle earlier in the evening, but sometimes he has his most alert time of the day from 8.30 or 9pm onwards. This happened yesterday and then for the first time EVER he slept from midnight till 7am without waking for a feed!! I even woke first in fact . He was just lying there with his eyes wide open, having a good stare at the ceiling . What a cutie. I'm hoping it's the start of sleeping through (you never know...). When that does happen, over time we'll just bring his bedtime forward with dream feed until he no longer needs that either. Optimistically forward planning! Now all we need is a co-operative baby .

Also spangle we do T's bath in the morning as he loves it too and it wakes him up nicely. Means dh can do it before going to work if he wants, although he's usually having plenty of fun water-fighting with dd while he showers and we attempt to pin her down long enough to get her wet and vaguely resembling clean before nursery . I am not sure whether her terrible twos are infuriating or hilarious!

And by the way, some of you wise experienced parents might be able to answer this for me - WHY are toddlers always so filthy???! I honestly don't know how she does it. Snot, mud, jam, you name it, it's smeared on her somewhere - even if she has, like, NEVER been in the vicinity of the thing in question. Even when we put her to bed clean I'm sure she just wakes up dirty . Or should that be maybe? (I do wash her sheets by the way, it isn't that...)

Thanks llare Febes euromum

I think we will try morning baths and evening massage and see how that goes. The reason we started the bedtime routine was because he would just start getting grumpy/crying around 8pm and wouldn't settle in the living room, though he will sleep through the evening in the dark/quiet of our room. I think he's just too interested in the world around him to go to sleep!

euromum, i know what you mean! wise, i am not, i'm afraid.

spangle, that happens with harper sometimrs. some good advice given on here - will heed it myself.

routines, we're in a very loose one but I still base it pretty much on H's demand. she does seem to love a bath, it must be soothing to them.

last night H slept from 8pm to 7am! she usually wakes at 4/5am for a short feed and sometimes at 11pm but she slept through last night, maybe because she knew i'd had too much to drink and needed the sleep . bless her. she is 12 weeks so hoping this becomes a regular pattern.

Euromum I don't have any specific information on baby massage as I did a course with PFB DS1. It was lovely. We learned the various techniques and DS loved it, as I said earlier. With DS2 I gentle smooth his tummy with the heel of my hand (IYSWIM) from left to right, applying gentle pressure. This usually relieves wind and calms him down. Be careful though, when doing this without a nappy a great big poo can sometimes be the result!

ANother good trick for wind is to lift the legs, and bend the knees towards the tummmy (obviously not forcing it) and I often do that together with the tummy rubbing.

TBH I don't think you can go far wrong by just getting some olive oil and starting at the top of the body, and working down. I did see a book in our local library, perhaps you could try Amazon?

bath time I bath g during the day at some point and ds either first thing in the am or before bed depending on our day and how tired he is. i can't bath g in the evening as she generally feeds hourly from 5pm until 9ish then sleeps a bit and wakes at 10.30ish for her last top up till 6/7..

and before i forget and the evening gets manic.. happy birthday frazzle hope you're having a lovely day.

Just a quick post.
DH reckons he may have swine flu. He definitely has a temperature and also complaining of aching limbs, headache and sore throat. He's in bed and I've given him some paracetamol.
Really hoping it's not and that whatever it is, DS and I steer clear.
Tummum - if you're lurking, any advice?

Ses, I'm not a doctor (or any kind of health professional) but a friend of mine works in Public Health and has been keeping me sane on the subject of SF. She sent me an email recently linking to this which is an online flu survey. It also has useful information about flu treatment.

She also told me that it isn't worth taking the antivirals unless pregnant, or a child under 1, or have underlying health issues. She told me that the antivirals cause pretty nasty side-effects on their own.

I hope he feels better soon. Have you got plenty of paracetamol etc? You might want to make sure you have a syringe in the house in case you need to give calpol to the baby?

Thanks Llare.
I've got enough paracetamol to last 24hrs. I don't have a thermometer in the house but he definitely feels hot.
Will go out for more paracetamol and a thermometer tomorrow if there's no change.

I should be able to work these things out for myself really as I'm a pharmacist but I was just thrown a bit!

Good luck finding a thermometer. I looked yesterday and there were none to be found.

Hi Ses

Sounds like sf to me. Sorry but honestly it wasn't too bad for me.

My Dr advised to take ibuprofen and paracetamol at the same time. Will be back in a min

ses your poor dh