New, bright and shiny MARCH 2005 thread

[ZoeC]

Thought this was about due, hope that's okay

Well, no solids here (forget who asked that, sorry) - except she licked my finger when I was pureeing some apple but I don't think that really counts ). I have icecubes of carrot, apple and pear ready in the freezer though but really she's fine on milk and I'm in no rush.

She's now all formula fed though - we did mix feed for a bit but she quickly forgot how to draw the hind milk so was getting less and less from me, plus we got thrush again so I really wasn't sorry to finish to be honest. I much prefer the routine we can have now and am just pleased she got 4 months of breast first. It really was as much as I could do and stay sane.

She is such a smiley baby it's untrue - you only have to glance her way and she beams, it's so nice to see. She naps better too - 2/3 hours in the afternoon plus a small nap in the morning - and that helps her be happier I'm sure. She was 15lb a couple of weeks ago by the way.

She's 4 months, 1 week and 3 days old today.

Cristina well done and good luck misdee with the driving.

I keep meaning to take rebecca swimming as I'm sure she'd love it but I haven't figured out how I'd manage two of them in the pool and changing room yet, maybe I'll talk dh into going with us at the weekend - that'd help. Dd1 is so lively and into everything I'd probably lose her while looking after dd2.

Hello all,

Freya is on two big meals a day (between 5-8) teaspoons at each sitting. We had baby rice for a week then just started adding things. She has had a few jars, mashed banana, banana and apple puree, sweet potato and broccoli (which she really liked.)

She is now on baby rice with a little fruit puree and then veg puree at lunch with fruit puree for afters. She really likes her food and looks disapointed when all she gets at tea time is milk.

Just go with your instinct if he is enjoying the rice try something else for a day or two.

I have tried reading books on weaning but am a little feed up of constanly reading "you should breastfeed only for the first six months". Then you have the other end with people such as mother in laws and so on, saying how they had there children on three meals a day at four months.

I work in a school and had one mum tell me how all of her kids, five i think, where on solids at eight weeks!!!!!

While i know the last is crazy for want of a better word you do just need to go with the flow. They will let you know when they want solids and then when they want more.

REALLY not trying to sould like a know it all, sorry if i do. Freya is my first and she has been a very steep learning curve.

Carve123 - are you in Kingston then? I'm in Wimbledon. I have been to the Odeon here for the parent & baby screening a few times. I'll miss tomorrow's as I'm taking DS for a grommet op.

Sylvia had a bit more of the carrots today and she's asleep now, the first nap of the day. She's just too, too nosey to eat or sleep during the day nowadays if we're doing something.

I have tons of courgettes from our allotment and was thinking of making some for Sylvia. Do you think it'd be too early for them? I'll freeze some anyway. I guess I could just find something interesting to do with them for ourselves. OMG that sounds rather obscene now.

MSP I know what you mean with these changing guidelines for weaning. I weaned DS at 4 months, 5 years ago, now I was going to wait till 6 months for DD but she really seems ready and I've been giving her crumbs of rusks and teaspoons of other solids. It helps me to know we don't have any allergies in the family and that all will be OK in the end anyway.

Cristina7 I live in Dorset by the way just realised that you asked that ages ago.

Cristina7, courgettes is a great early food for babies and I have some ready and waiting in the freezer. When you puree it down, it goes bright green and looks quite revolting but my friend (who has already given it to her 20 week baby) says it goes down a treat. However, because it's water based she said it isn't that filling and that next time she's going to add it to baby rice to make it a bit more of a substantial meal.

Don't you fret about driving to me. I am used to driving all over the country with my job which I'm on mat leave from and I have a company car and get free petrol (lucky girl hey?), so once the babies are more settled with routines and stuff, I'll come to you and we can invite anyone else who wants to meet up. We should aim to have a Christmas Meet to celebrate our new little ones first christmas.

What does anyone else think?

Bonym, so sorry to hear about Grace's eczema. I know what a worry this is as my best friend's children both had it really badly and she had to do wet wraps at bedtime and all sorts. Now grown out of it at 5 and 7 so good luck to you with this. Have a nice week away and try not to worry.

Leogalea, Harrison is only just settling into a daytime nap routine now at 20 weeks. A book I read by Marc Weissbluth (Healthy Sleep Habits Happy Child) says it takes until 4-5 months for a baby's brain to mature to enable regular and consistent daytime naps and that these usually don't happen until night time sleep gets better (clearly not the case for Harrison who is still waking at all sorts of times!!). I have for some weeks now been putting him into his cot for his morning and lunchtime naps (roughly 9.00am and 12.30pm) and in the past week or two, he has started to just close his eyes and go to sleep when I put him down. He's also got real good at doing this at bedtime. One thing I've recently introduced after reading that book, is to have 'wind down time' before his naps of about 15 minutes, so we usually have a cuddle, sing a few songs and watch Bob the Builder or whatever else CBeebies has to offer or we read a book.

Not sure if any of this might help but it's taken some perseverance but finally, we seem to be achieving stress free 'going to sleep' times. He still wakes anywhere between 3.00am and 6.30am so we've still got that one to crack!

cristina.....courgette will be fine

Cristina7 - I am very impressed that you have an allotment. I just wouldn't get round to doing all the jobs that need doing. I am growing tomatoes in the garden at the moment, but have got horrible feeling they are going to ripen while we are on holiday! What a pain!

Am meeting a friend at Bluewater tomorrow for lunch which will be nice. Her little one is about 8 weeks younger than Freya. DS1 is going to a friend's house for lunch and play cos he will be very bored sitting around and talking about babies!

Freya is becoming really good fun now, laughing out loud at DS1 and really interacting with everyone. DS1 loves it, he loves to play the clown and enjoys it when people laugh at him.

Grace's skin seems to be improved today so the hydrocortisone is obviously doing the trick - sproutfeet, thanks for the tip about putting the epaderm on first - the gp didn't advise me either way, and I had been doing it the other way around, so thanks for that.

Carve - they do "The Big Scream" at one of the independent cinemas here in Cardiff on a Friday (same sort of thing that you went to by the sound of it). I've not tried it yet but might start going once dd1 is back at school in September.

It's our 2nd wedding anniversary today . Weren't able to get a babysitter so had a lovely meal in the garden tonight - very romantic .

hi

sorry i have been neglecting the march people. serena had her scan today on her bladder and kidneys, all fine, phew!!

she is rolling more , which shocks dd1 who comes running into me shouting 'serena has just rolled off her mat, come quick' lol. she has been cheering daddy up at the hospital the last few weeks, lots of babychat happening. her face just lights up when she seems him. its lovely to have him being able to hold her again.

misdee - good news.

Hi Misdee - was wondering how things were going. Good that you received some positive news for once.
Lauren tried some carrot this evening and liked it. Tried it after her normal sweet potato and she was very curious about the bright orange colour and eyed it a bit dubiously until she tried it. She's on between 8 and 10 teaspoons per meal now and doesn't have any problem polishing it off. Slightly alarmed at how much heavier she seems since having started solids. She shows no sign of reducing her 4 big bottles a day which the MW said she should be doing a bit now. She's getting quite a little tummy!
She's been a bit off her normal sunny self for some days now and although I'm pretty sure it's just the teething, it's bothering her quite a bit. Gave her some muti and it seemed to cheer her up. She had some more before going to bed so hopefully she'll have a good night. Anybody got their first teeth yet?

Happy Anniversary bonym! you had a lovely evening for your romantic garden retreat. Glad to hear Grace is getting better.

Adam back to eating anything in sight after his day of refusing everything, we reckon he must be teething. He is so funny, just sits in his bouncy chair looking expectantly at us with his mouth open.

Was wondering if anyone had been swimming with their little one? We are going to go in September, he should love it as he really likes his bath(got a tummy tub so he is submerged most of the time). I was a little concerned about the temperature of the water? Also how long should you take them in for? Any advice would be gratefully recieved.

Cristina7 I too am very impressed about the allotment, takes me all my time to get into the back garden to even do some weeding!

Misdee - Glad to hear your good news.

Re swimming - we have taken Freya a few times now. We take along her floatie seat, but to be honest she prefers to be held - perhaps she feels more secure that way. She has already learnt that DS1 is a complete nutter in the water and she looks very wary shen he comes near her as she knows she is about to get a big splash! She is always very hungry when she gets out and has a big bf and then a long sleep.

Awful night last night, DS1 up between 11 and 12.30, no idea why and very unlike him. Might be getting a cold or something cos pretty hot and eczema flaring up a bit. Then Freya decided to wake at 3.30am and thought it was playtime - Mummy didn't agree! Perhaps the 2 of them were in league to make sure mummy had no sleep - pair of little horrors . Hopefully they will settle down as normal tonight.

Well Caleb is almost crawling! He gets his legs underneath himself and pushes up, were putting stairgates and fireguard up this weekend! He's also started saying what sounds like mamama which always puts a big on my face! He's a big lad and wearing 9-12 months clothing, is a happy chap and I love being with him.

Brought up the subject off number 2 with DP, hopefully going to try for another baby when Caleb is 2! Must be mad but i'm really looking forward to it, have even choosen a name

Has anyone's baby actually cut a tooth yet? We've been telling people Caleb is 'teething' for the past 2 months and still nothing.

lol Shalaa - people have been telling us that Niklas must be teething for the past 3 months!!! Still no teeth, I was never convinced but I do think he is teething now! I confess that if people gave me 'those looks' when he was crying in public and told me he must be hungry or some other very unuseful comment I just told them that he was teething !

I think Misdee's Serena had teeth at about 3 months - that's just in case she doesn't managed to answer you. My sister's ds got his first at 8 months so its possible any time.

ANother baby , no idea if we will or we won't, however Niklas is very sociable and i think he needs a companion - glad to hear your test was OK Jambot!

Misdee - great to hear that Serena's scans came back clear!

Bonym - congratulations on wedding anniversary yesterday!

As most of you already know i am a BIG fan of taking babies swimming. We took Niklas the first time when he was around 8 weeks. Advice - take a blanket or extra towel to put on the floor in changing room and beside the pool in case there are no benches. As for getting cold - Niklas usually gets tired before he gets cold, you will realise when your baby has had enough. Don't let the baby get splashed in the face unless she is really confident and just do everything to make the baby feel secure until she feels confident. Splash her feet and legs in the water for a while don't just dunk her in straight away, she cold will shock her. I get down into the water to be on Niklas's level so I can talk and laugh with him - but now he likes to go off in his seat ring on his own.

shalaa - Grace is desperate to crawl! She is no way near doing it but she really, really tries, and if one of us puts a hand behind her feet she will push hard against it and move herself forward a bit .

We took Grace "swimming" in the pool when we went to Sardinia - she sat in her swim seat and although wasn't ecstatic about it, didn't seem to mind it either - she seemed more bemused than anything else, as if she wasn't quite sure what was going on.

I was speaking to a woman who runs baby signing classes this morning and I plan to take Grace along when they start up again in September. She (the woman) reckons that babies are never too young to start and that a couple who were attending her classes almost from birth, started signing at 16 weeks! I am a bit dubious personally, as I don't think most babies have the necessary control over their hands, but think Grace will be round about the right age to start.

We had a better night last night - she woke for a feed at 3am and then fell asleep again until 6.30 - at which time she was ready to start the day! Her eczema seems to be clearing up very nicely, so maybe it was this that was waking her previously.

Well, I being waxed and having my hair cut tomorrow so will be a busy day - in between times I need to to get everything packed as we are going away for a week on Friday. Hope we have a good night tonight as can't afford to be too tired tomorrow!

Hope everyone has had a good day, and wish you all a peaceful night .

Bonym, we too are starting signing classes(sing and sign) in September, around 6 months I was told is the ideal time to start as babies start to know that these hands are theirs and are more purposeful with them. Can't wait, I am already signing milk, eat, drink etc to him so he gets used to it. He watches my hands when I do it but I havee no idea if he puts the two things together. Should be fun though.

Adam rolled over for the 1st time yesterday! He was on his front and then ended up on his back, looked alittle bemused as to how he got there. Almost did from back to front but not quite. I got the video camera out but after he'd done it three times as I started the video he decided he'd had enough of that so Daddy just had to take my word for it. He is sitting up for the vast time of about 3 seconds too! Aren't they great fun.

Leogeala, thanks for the swimming tips. I have found an internet site called Aqua-Vie that do swimming lessons for babies in hydrotherapy pools andthere is one about 5 mins from us so we are going to give that a go. Need to find some swim nappies though!, all the ones I have seen so far start at around 20lb! might need to get the gaffer tape out to secure them round his waist! Anyone seen any smaller nappies? need around 11lb.Thanks.

Can't do links, but try this thread for swimming nappies:
Nappies and Potty Training - Cloth Nappies - Which nappy for swimming?

Sproutfeet - both Mothercare and JoJoMamanBebe do swimming nappies in smaller sizes. You can also get disposable ones from Huggies called Little Swimmers.

Hey all, have I been away from this place for this long. Can't catch up on all the posts but I hope you are all doing well.

Hi Norash. Hope to hear your news - it's been a while. Anyone else's little one having bad dreams. Well at least that's what I think they are. Lauren does this at least a couple of times a week and twice last night. She suddenly starts screaming blue murder and it lasts about 10 seconds. Went in to her the first time and by then she'd stopped screaming. She looked at me but turned her head away, closed her eyes and went straight back to sleep. The second time I didn't go in and all was quite the minute the crying stopped. Hope she's not going to get those horrible night terrors you hear about some children getting. We are going away for DD's dad's 70th birthday. DD's brother has a house by a river about 2hours from Cape Town, so we are going down with the whole family.First time we are going away with Lauren so hope all goes ok. Have a list a mile long of all the things I have to take. Tons of clothes for her as now she's on solids the mess she makes is unbelievable.

Norash! Great to hear from you ! Even if you can't catch up on the thread would love to have an update on how you and Kieran are doing!

Bonym - have a great holiday!

Have had completely rubbish couple of days.
Got burgled on Weds, took loads of stuff inc all DS1's DVDs and digital cameras which had all the piccies on of Freya from the day she was born (should have downloaded to pc, but they took that too). All we have left is a few prints that DS1 took with the disposable camera that we got for him (thought they were rubbish photos at the time, but now they are lovely). Getting grandparents, friends etc to send us everything they have got.
Am obviously very upset, but am trying to focus on the fact that everyone is ok and that they have only taken stuff.
Have only been here 3 months, and so not a good start to living here. If I hear one more person say 'I've lived here 25 years and never been burgled', I am going to punch them!!!!
Anyway, I have got to go out today and leave the house empty for the first time since it happened and am a bit worried. Tho, as DH says 'There is nothing left to take'
Sorry for ranting, will post a nice message when I am feeling calm again!
Hope all babies are well, Freya is lovely!

JoPG, so very sorry to hear your news. I can't imagine how sad you must be at loosing your pictures as they're something you can't get back but hopefully you'll get a nice collection from friends and family (my parents have more pictures of our children than we do!).

Also had a horrible few days but nothing on the scale of Jo. Harrison is teething again (I think) and he screamed inconsolably all day yesterday, I had to go to him 4 times after I put him to bed as he woke up screaming and I was up with him at 1.00am, 4.00am and 6.00am. In between DD had a bad dream and I had to see to her as well. She thought a robber was going to come into the house and steal her.

DH slept through it all and asked me this morning if I'd had a good night! The final straw was there was no milk this morning and I couldn't have a cup of tea ... in very bad mood now!