PS Mommy Thread-Newborn to 12 months!

[sunnyd]

Hi mamas! Things are still pretty crazy around this house, so I'm sad that I haven't been able to keep up with you since H was born 2.5 weeks ago (what?!).

Right now our biggest hurdle is nighttime. She will eat right before she gets put down, but will usually wake up when she's being swaddled, and poor DH sits up with her for an hour or two until she falls asleep again. Then she'll poop and have to get unswaddled, changed, and reswaddled before she falls back asleep. Ack! It's a loooong process. Last night she pooped 4 times in 40 minutes!! There HAS to be a better way, right? We finally got a noise machine yesterday, which she seems to like, but she still needs to be asleep before going in the pack-n-play or she'll scream 2 minutes later.

MP, H has the same Houdini abilities to break out of the Halo. You can hear her grunting as she works her arms out. I'm wondering if we should abandon the swaddle altogether and leave her arms out!

BF-ing is still kind of a crapshoot for me. It was horrible the first several days, then we worked it out. Then we introduced a pacifier to calm her during fussy time and kind of regressed a bit. But it's tolerable enough for now and I've been pumping a little bit. She only goes 10-15 minutes on one side every 2 hours or so. Ooh, speak of the devil, she's awake!

Catch you guys more soon, I hope! Just reading this last page has been helpful!

 

[FrekeChild]

I don't know how many teeth are coming, but it freaking better be a lot of them. This kind of sleep deprivation hasn't been experienced since she was 7 weeks old!

 

[Buttons]

Flying post from here, just wanted to say Happy Hallowe'en from my Wee Bee!

 

[amc80]

Happy Halloween!

 

[monkeyprincess]

Ahh, Buttons and amc, your boys are SO cute!

Here's my little pumpkin, who was not too happy about wearing a hat or posing for a picture

 

[sunnyd]

My itsy bitsy spider!

 

[Skippy123]

awwww, all these cute babies :: heart be still::

 

[PilsnPinkysMom]

Meow! Happy Halloween!

 

[ello]

Great work "mummies"!!! You all have such beautiful children. Here's our little lion...

 

[CharmedOne]

They are all so yummy Just completely adorable!

 

[Kunzite]

Predictably, Thing 1 and Thing 2!

 

[NewEnglandLady]

I can't get enough of these adorable halloween pics!

I had to stop at three costumes. Poor Katie was sick (virus + ear infection) and running a fever all day yesterday. Probably didn't help that I dragged her in the office for two meetings.

 

[Skippy123]

OMG, CUTENESS OVERLOAD!!!!!!!! squeeeeee Looks like a wonderful Halloween! I love all the baby pics!!!!!

 

[ello]

Thing 1 and Thing 2 - ha ha ha!!!

We're also guilty, my guy has 3 outfits. A superman outfit from nonna, lion from his uncle and here's one daddy picked...

 

[lliang_chi]

Costume parade! Here's Ethan in his pumpkin costume.

 

[parrot tulips]

LC - Great job on Ethan's pumpkin costume!

AFU - This is Ava's last day of "technically" qualifying for this thread. She turns 1 tomorrow! I can't believe how fast it went. We're celebrating at home on Saturday. Off to run errands, trying to get ready for the party (thank goodness Ava isn't mobile yet, since I'm doing most of the prepping solo). Will post pics when things have settled down.

 

[Skippy123]

LC - Great job on Ethan's pumpkin costume!

AFU - This is Ava's last day of "technically" qualifying for this thread. She turns 1 tomorrow! I can't believe how fast it went. We're celebrating at home on Saturday. Off to run errands, trying to get ready for the party (thank goodness Ava isn't mobile yet, since I'm doing most of the prepping solo). Will post pics when things have settled down.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY AVA!!!!

LC, awww such a cute pumpkin! Ello, love the black and white

 

[monkeyprincess]

Will you ladies talk to me about your sleeping arrangements and sleeping routines/rituals for your baby? I feel like we are not doing a very good job of establishing routines/rituals, but I don't know if that is normal at this point or not. E will be 3 weeks tomorrow. The big problem is that neither DH or I are good sleepers. We both rely on sleep aids (me more so than DH), and we have never been a couple to both go to bed at the same time every night.

Currently, we have an unconventional setup. The pack n play (along with an angel care video monitor and motion sensor) is set up in our main living room. DH and I tend to take shifts or we will both sleep on the couches in the room with the pack n play. During the day, I open the windows, turn on lights, turn on the tv. In the evening, we have the tv on and sometimes have it on at night (DH will sometimes listen wtih headphones). We have a white noise next to the pack n play to drown out noises.

E usually gets at least one three hour stretch of sleep at night (the time varies), and the rest of the night is shorter stretches. During the day, he usually naps pretty well, and per our pediatrician's suggestion, I wake him up after he's been sleeping 2 hours during the day. However, he often is really sleepy and hard to keep up while downing his bottle.

Should I be bathing him and putting him down around the same time every night? Should I be setting up his pack n play in a different room? The only options are our bedroom, but we've kind of been using that as a place to for us to be able to go to when we want a stretch on uninterrupted sleep, or his bedroom. Should I be putting him in his crib in his room?

Just curious what others have done and how it worked out. At what age, did you have somewhat of a routine?

Also, we were hoping to travel 6 hours to visit my family for Thanksgiving in three weeks. Would it be crazy to attempt that and to stay in a hotel with a young baby who doesn't have an established routine?

FINALLY, E usually downs a bottle of 3 oz. of formula every 3 hours during the day and when he wakes up and seems hungry at night. I have offered him more sometimes, and last night, he took 4 oz. for one feeding. Does that seem like a lot for a 3 week old?

Thanks in advance for any advice!

 

[amc80]

Mp- we just started a routine and B is 12 weeks. His starts around 8pm and he gets a bath (long bath because he loves it), then a bottle, then bed. That's about it. It works though and by 9:30 he's usually out. I remember thinking the same thing as you, that he needed to be on a routine. I think at that age babies are just too unpredictable.

As far as a trip, we went on a 7-8 hour road trip when B was 4 weeks. Stayed in a hotel. We had no issues. The only hard thing was feeding while driving. I bought a car adapter for my pump and just pumped on the road. I was a little worried about his crying waking up other guests so I made sure to feed him at night as soon as he started fussing so it didn't get to that point.

4oz does seem like a lot for that age, but if he's keeping it down then I'd say it is fine. I think b was at 2-3oz at that time (breast milk though). He's now able to drink 4-6oz at a time. Anything else comes back up.

Speaking of, there is a county wide norovirus thing going around the schools, including his daycare (which he just started Monday). Any signs (throwing up or loose poop) and they are sent home for 72 hours. Well, I got the call yesterday that he had thrown up. I was skeptical that he had the virus though because he acted totally normal, and no fever. Well, last night he projectile vomited all over me. Twice. I don't think he knows he is sick though. Poor little guy.

 

[FrekeChild]

MP, for the first two months, we just did whatever worked and kept us sane. She pretty much did whatever she wanted, when she wanted.

Pic from Halloween.

 

[S&I]

MP, I just wanted to chime in and say that E is still way too young to have a set routine. If you read my past posts, you'll see that I had the exact same concerns as you. A didn't get a routine until he was closer to 3+ months, and even then, his routine developed naturally. It wasn't anything that I enforced on him.

For daytime naps, he demanded to be held. He would wake up immediately if we tried to put him in his crib, and start crying. Even now, my dad tends to hold him while he naps because our dog will randomly bark and scare him awake. At night, he sleeps in his crib in his room with a small light, noise machine, and humidifier. From the start, we had A sleep in his crib. His room used to be one of our guest rooms, so there was already a bed in there. We left it in there, and just slept in the room with him until about 4 months.

We don't have a set time for his bath - it's more like whenever we get home from work and he seems ready for a bath. After the bath comes his bottle. Then I nurse him to sleep. It can range anywhere from 7pm to 9pm. He's learning how to soothe himself when he wakes up in the middle of the night, so he's also started fussing/crying when I first put him down now (whereas he used to just continue sleeping when I put him down after nursing). The last few days, he's stopped crying before I can walk to my room to turn on the monitor.

All this is to say that babies do what they want and don't always follow a strict schedule. E is still so young, and you aren't creating any bad habits in him. You're doing a great job! 3 hours for the first stretch at night is great for E's age, and it's typical for the second and third stretches to be shorter. A went through the exact same thing. The last two stretches would be 2 hours or less until he just wouldn't go back to sleep in his crib around 5-6am. Now he's STTN until around 8am, but I'm sure it'll change after the time change this weekend. Also, if E is drinking 4oz when he's hungry, let him. Babies will stop when they're full, so no need to worry about over-feeding him. There are lots of growth spurts in these early months.

We haven't taken A on any super long car trips yet, so I can't help with your Thanksgiving plans. If he sleeps well in his car seat though, he'll probably be fine?

Love seeing all the Halloween costumes! Such cute babies everywhere!

 

[pancake]

MP - I'm with S&I, I do not believe in putting babies on a schedule at this age. I know there are many parents who swear by it, but to be honest I suspect that the babies that do well with it have the type of temperament which makes them very adaptable (I have one of these babies!). I think it is definitely important to have a predictable routine (we're eat-wake-sleep in our household, or were, anyway!) so that your bub knows what is coming next, as I think predictability is comforting for all babies. However, I wouldn't be trying to do anything on a set time schedule at this stage - probably not until after 3 months.

At 8 months Dot is on a schedule (give or take 30 minutes) but that was very much led by her. As I mentioned, though, she is a very adaptable, easygoing baby, so I think the fact that she thrives on a schedule is not surprising. I have many friends whose babies have much less predictable naps and timings through the day and their babies are thriving on that too! Just important to remember that babies are just small people and the same variations exist between them.

Early on - we were not fans of waking sleeping babies!!! So if Dot slept a long stretch during the day, we let it go as we knew she would get the hang of night and day in her own time. Sleep begets sleep, too - the more a baby sleeps, the better he/she sleeps, if that makes sense. So we let her sleep. She had all of her naps in the bassinet and we tried to put her down awake (although early on that was hard as she would fall asleep after a feed). We swaddled for all sleeps, day and night. She cried more towards the 6 week mark, as is typical, and during that period we did hold her until she was deeply asleep sometimes. Around 7-8 weeks we worked quite hard on getting her to fall asleep in her bassinet again, and I have no idea whether it was what we did that worked, or whether it was just that she got over that developmental hump and just went back to doing what she was doing before

At E's age Dot was only being bathed maybe 2-3 times a week, and always just at a time that seemed convenient - usually 7-8pm or thereabouts. Her bedtime only became rigid around 4+ months, and it just gradually got earlier until it settled at 6:30. She now goes to bed at 7pm, and it's like clockwork - her body is totally accustomed to that time.

I can't help with the long car trips as we didn't do any, but we did take Dot interstate for a weekend at 10 weeks and stayed in a hotel. It was perfectly fine except that when she was sleeping during the day, I couldn't really DO anything as we were in a single room rather than having a separate bedroom.

Loving all the H'ween babies!!!

 

[missrachelk]

Baby sleep!!

Can anyone weigh in on nursing to sleep and cosleeping? We've had H in our bed since day 3 of being home - those first 2 nights she would only sleep being held so its a big improvement. She still will nap on her dad or I almost every day but otherwise the only thing that's working for us is cosleeping.

We would seriously be doing CIO to be able to get her to sleep in the bassinet at this point. Is this fairly normal / expected? I guess some babies sleep better in their own from the beginning? I know that since we're not firm on expecting her to sleep on her own that e aren't pushing it but I would like to get her into her own bed even the bassinet sooner than later! Don't get me wrong cosleeping is great - we go to bed around midnight and get up around 9 and some nights there is no crying at all just me switching sides for her. Some nights are worse of course but overall we are all getting much better sleep than I expected for 4 weeks!

Should we start putting her down when she's deep asleep during a nap to get her used to it? Moving from the bed at night isn't happening usually she's up the instant I move and we nurse back to sleep.

Mp other than the bed and wake times being pretty consistent we don't have a routine either!

 

[amc80]

Apparently B has passed the norovirus on to me. The good news is he feels a lot better. The bad news is it seems to have killed my milk supply. Going to buy some fenugreek to help...hoping it is temporary though!

 

[monkeyprincess]

Thanks for the advice again, ladies! You're the best. I'll try to quit worrying about routine for awhile. Sure wish these little buggers came with instruction manuals!

Pancake, so you think that if I just let him sleep when he wants to sleep, he will eventually be able to tell the difference between night and day? I just so wish he would sleep at night as soundly as he does during the day sometimes! But I guess I can't force it. The sleep deprivation really does get to me though. I start to get irrational and panicky when I go too many days with too little sleep. Fortunately, DH has been pretty good about stepping up and letting me rest when I get like that.

Rachel, we're way too scared to let the baby sleep on us. I just have nightmares about rolling over on him or something. Fortunately, he is pretty good about the pack n play, but we almost always have to make sure he is in a deep sleep before we put him down. Sometimes during the day, I can shush and pat him back to sleep if he wakes up upset in the pack n play. It's so tough to know what to do, isn't it?! You're lucky you're at least getting consistent sleep. I can't sleep unless I'm away from him because of all the little noises he makes.

amc, sorry to hear about the notovirus. Hoping your supply issues are temporary!

 

[pancake]

MP - the way I figured it was that there are no 2 year olds, 5 year olds, 10 year olds, 30 year olds, who can't tell the difference between night and day! Plus, I found that S was a much happier baby if she had as much sleep as she could get. For a while her longest stretch of sleep was from early in the evening - maybe around 4 or 5 pm until 8 or 9, and I didn't wake her at all ever unless we wanted to give her a bath (which worked for us as if we waited until she woke of her own accord she was hungry and wouldn't tolerate a bath first!).

Later on, the first stretch of the night (from about 9pm) got longer and longer, and she would go 4-6 hours then and then 3-4 hours after that. Then that stretch got even longer, and then eventually two feeds merged. She had one night feed until 4 1/2 months, and then the night feed got later and later and then dropped entirely. All of this was entirely S-led - we never pushed it at all. We did try the dream feed for about a week but it consistently disrupted her night sleep in that she would take the feed no problems, but then wake EARLIER for the next one rather than later!

Re your sleep deprivation, you MUST try and take a nap when E has a long sleep during the day! I was the worst at taking my own advice but then I had a little meltdown at about 3 weeks (that was the week that my hubby went back to work) and my mum took matters into her own hands and decided to come over for several afternoons in a row, make me go to bed, and prepare dinner for me while the baby and I were asleep. I was like a new person after that! I stopped needing daytime sleep after about 5 weeks I think. Once she was on one night feed I really found that my sleep was fine and I didn't have any issues with how long that one night feed continued for.

EDIT: Actually, thinking back... I think I would occasionally wake Dot during the day if she went past 4.5 hours between feeds! But not before that!

 

[lliang_chi]

MP, I think E is doing great if you've got him on one 3-4 hr stretch at night. I think E will eventually sort out day and night. I know it's tempting to put your bubs on a routine, but unless you really need to (i.e. twin mama's, or you need to for your own schedule) I would give E some time to sort out his own routine. That being said, if you *do* need to put him on a routine/schedule, some babies are adaptable and will follow the lead you give them. So it's possible. Just tank him up at night before bed so you can hopefully get as much rest as possible.

I would also follow this "advice" with the disclaimer that Ethan is probably the only Feb baby that doesn't STTN. He still wakes ever 3 hrs after his bed time at 7PM. It's not terrible for us, but I would like to see him get some solid stretches. He also doesn't really nap for very long, only 1 hr or so, but he takes multiple naps, so <shrug> guess it's working for us.

AMC, I'm sorry you caught B's norovirus. I caught hand foot mouth from somewhere (likely Ethan's daycare) and I was MIS.ER.ABLE! I swear it's the meanest virus ever. So after that I've been vigilant about sanitizing my hands before entering and after leaving his day care. I don't so much for his hands though, but I probably should wash them when I get there and when I leave with him.

Rachel, I'm ashamed to admit it, but on the MOTN wake ups, I do nurse Ethan to sleep. We do not cosleep though, but I have snuggled with him when he hasn't wanted to go do. I've actually snuggled up with him in his crib, but don't tell my husband We moved E to his room around 12 wks. He was swaddled (and loved it) so whenever we put him down, even if he was awake, he could put himself to sleep. When we had to nix the swaddle that's when the monkey wrenches came into play.... Sigh. I miss the STTN days.

Freke, she looks like such a little pixie! I love her expressions. How are things going in CA? Are you all healed up, or still on the mend? What's the verdict on the teeth??

PT, I hope you pop in every now and then. I've been following some of the mamas on the toddler thread so I'll keep following the adventures of Miss A over there. Before you make you full exit, you must post pictures!

AFU, so.... A few new changes in the LC household. I started dropping and picking up Ethan from daycare. For a few reasons, but the two main ones were: Less time at day care for E and J can come home earlier. So now I feel E breakfast in the AM then take him to daycare. But since I'm taking him, he can get up a whole hr later, but he doesn't. J finished reading the excerpts I gave him of Karp's sleeping book for newborns, infants and toddlers. We decided that we'll try to 1) move his bed time by an hr, since I drop him off @ day care an hr later. It'd be nice if he could sleep until 6:30 instead of 5:30 like he has been. 2) we're doing dream feeds @ 1AM to prevent the 2AM wake up. J did this last night for the first time. We'll see how this goes....

Other than that, Ethan's SOOOOO close to crawling. He lays on his bellah and scoots/army crawls by pulling himself with his arms. He hasn't *quite* gotten his knees under him, but he's getting close. On of my girlfriends gave us her daughter's crawling toys. They roll away from them and the babies try to follow them. WHen she first gave it to us, Ethan was still not ready for them yet, but he's at the point where he's totally trying to follow them now. Yay!

Oh and Ethan learned how to clap his hands today. Yay! It's so cute, and he's so proud of himself!

 

[MuffDog]

Thought I'd pop by with a pic of L dressed up for Halloween He was a lion but in this picture, he definitely looks like the scared lion from the Wizard of Oz!

Hope everyone made it through daylight savings unscathed!

 

[parrot tulips]

Rachel - In the beginning, I'd nurse Ava to sleep, then put her in her bassinet. With MOTN wakings, when I was particularly exhausted, I'd let her sleep on my chest, or next to me, since she'd sleep for longer stretches that way. But we always tried to have her sleep primarily in her bassinet. As Ava grew older, she began to resist sleeping on my chest, and when she grew older still, she would have a hard time sleeping soundly by my side, or with me in the room at all. I just followed her lead, and she eventually let me know when she was ready to sleep in her bassinet, then eventually in her own crib, in her own room. For what it's worth, I still nurse her to sleep, and her sleep is fine (last night she slept from 6:30pm to 5am, nursed for 10 minutes, then immediately went down for another 2 hours).

AFU - Ava turned 1 on Friday. This past year really did fly by. We had a party at our house on Saturday, and despite the recent rains, the weather was gorgeous. She's such a sweet, happy, social girl. She LOVES big crowds of people. She's also not mobile yet. No crawling, and she can only army crawl backwards. Makes life easier for us, though I think she'd be happier/less frustrated if she could move...

Some pics from her birthday weekend:

 

[blondebunny]

Hi everyone! Well my little peanut decided he wanted an October birthday and was born Oct 28th at 37w1d.. He's a little peanut at 5lb7oz. We had a rough first night home and Saturday night was super rough as well, but we are trying our hardest! We are having some problems breastfeeding so Ive had to pump to feed him. Im still trying to give him the boob but after about 20 mins of failed attempts I give him a bottle with breastmilk so neither of us get super frustrated. I think he is just having a problem latching well since his mouth is so tiny and I think my nipples are having a hard time staying hard as well so he gets frustrated and shakes his head from side to side to a nut ball because he wants to eat so bad. I still really want to be able to breastfeed him, but boy can it get frustrating! I think I might call a LC this week to try to figure out what the problem is so that I can get him back to the boob and not need to pump all the time. We are having some issues at night. When he feeds anytime between 2-4am he has a hard time going back to sleep. He is pretty fussy and wont go back to sleep no matter what I try. Any suggestions? Thanks!

Alright well introducing Mr. Chase!