PS Mommy Thread-Newborn to 12 months!

[JGator]

Jfo, tell your mom you expect the colds/sickness to decrease dramatically after L has the tubes, and think of all the immunity she is building up! She should be super healthy in no time! Sorry the surgery has been delayed though. Hope you and L can hang in there till the 21st. K didn't seem to have any reaction to the milk - I am not sure how much she drank though. Hopefully, she will transition to it well in few weeks when we get the green light from the pediatrician.

 

[Dandi]

Hi gorgeous mummas, just checking in to let you know I'm still alive! Oscar will be 10 months in a few days, and is just soaring along picking up new skills, it astounds me how fast our little babies learn! He is clapping, waving, and saying lalalala, a welcome change from dadadada He is starting to pull himself up to standing, and is a bottomless pit as far as food goes. Daylight savings has just started and it doesn't start to get dark until about 8:30pm, so the poor little guy is pretty confused as far as going to bed goes, it's still broad daylight! I've blacked out his windows and that has helped a bit, but I've had to scale his bedtime back half an hour to 7:30pm, I'll gradually move it back to 7pm (I hope!) He still sleeps until about 7:30am, so it's not that big a deal.

Here's the little devil trying to attack me with his green rake he plays with in the bath. And yes, his arms are that fat

 

[JGator]

Dandi, Oscar looks like such a happy, fun little boy! I am so jealous of the amount of sleep he gets. You are one lucky Mommy!

 

[amc80]

OH goodness, look at those arm rolls!

 

[tammy77]

I have been meaning to post since Hannah was born and finally got the chance to type a long one out, but my phone just ate it when I went to find a picture to attach!

I'll have to come back for a more proper post, but I want to ease into the thread and introduce Miss Hannah Marie now!

She was born on October 4th at 9:36 am via repeat cs. She was 6lbs 9 oz and a little peanut all around! She lost abit in the hospital and was 6.0 when we discharged, but had started to put weight back on when my milk came in on Sunday night. She's a great little nurser, sleeps pretty well so far and is just the most beautiful baby I've ever seen. yes, I know I'm biased! She is darn cute though!

I'll come back for a proper catch up and post more soon. If I don't sleep now, I'll regret it for sure!

Hopefully these photos come through!

 

[tammy77]

I meant to ask last night....did any of you have a sleepy baby? Hannah eats pretty well and isn't too fussy except for taking several tries to get a latch, but I can't seem to get much alert time with her eyes open.

 

[amc80]

I meant to ask last night....did any of you have a sleepy baby? Hannah eats pretty well and isn't too fussy except for taking several tries to get a latch, but I can't seem to get much alert time with her eyes open.

Hi Tammy, congrats! B was really sleepy. We had to wake him every 2-3 hours the first two weeks just so he'd eat.

 

[monarch64]

Congrats, Tammy77!!! Hannah is beautiful!

 

[tammy77]

I meant to ask last night....did any of you have a sleepy baby? Hannah eats pretty well and isn't too fussy except for taking several tries to get a latch, but I can't seem to get much alert time with her eyes open.

Hi Tammy, congrats! B was really sleepy. We had to wake him every 2-3 hours the first two weeks just so he'd eat.

Hi Amc! Thank you so much for chiming in. It's nice to hear that another mom had a similar problem!

Monny, thank you! We're quite taken with her.

She had her first follow up since being released from the hospital and it went well! She's still a tiny bit jaundice, but she's gained almost 4 oz since Monday, and her little head is growing too. Anyone that follows the preggo thread knows that we've worried about her possibly having microcephaly based on serial growth scans. As it turns out, she does have a petite head, but it's on the charts and is proportionate to her little self. She was at the 10th percentile at her appt, up from 5th when she was born. Go Hannah! okay, I'll stop tabling about percentiles and all that. I should be trying to sleep now that she's passed out after her feed.

 

[Dandi]

Tammy, welcome!! Hannah is just the most gorgeous baby girl I hope you're getting enough rest, it sounds like you are off to a great start with your little lady!

 

[JGator]

Hi, Tammy, K was 7 lbs at birth and went down to 6 or less when we left the hospital. She also has a smallish head - I think it's currently in the low 30%. She also fell asleep a lot at the beginning during feeding. Our LC suggested a few things to wake her up including taking all her clothes off except for the diaper, wet wash cloth to the forehead, and taking your hand and stroking from the front of her forehead backwards to get her to eat. She also said if you do the opposite - stroke from top of head towards brows, it calms them (apparently this works in horses too from what she told us!). Good luck. I know it can be stressful when you have a small baby who loses weight after birth. And, congratulations, she is beautiful!!!

 

[monkeyprincess]

Congratulations again Tammy! H is such a cutie, and I'm glad she is a good baby! My little guy was very sleepy the first couple weeks during the day, and I would sometimes wake him if he didn't get up after 3-4 hours to eat. It was sometimes a struggle to keep him awake to finish a feeding. Night time was a different story though! I hope your family is doing well and adjusting to the new member!

Dandi, O is such a cutie! I agree, he's got the most adorable arm rolls!

JGator, hope K has had at least a couple good nights this week! You must be exhausted! We were up with Ev a couple times last night, and he has been up a few other nights this week too. I'm hoping it is temporary.

Jfo, darn, I'm sorry you had to push the tube procedure back. Really hoping she stays well for the next few weeks. Poor little pumpkin. That must be so frustrating for all of you!

Hello to everyone else!

Things are going full speed around our house. We close a week from today and move in next Saturday. DH packed up the basement, office and most of the garage (which is where most of our junk is hiding), and after Ev's birthday on Sunday, I'm going to tackle the kitchen and bedrooms. Ev is keeping us on our toes. He can seriously crawl faster than I can walk these days, and we are constantly having to protect him from himself because he is fearless and thinks he can pull himself up on anything and let go, even though he doesn't know how to stand on his own or walk yet! Two more days and I have a one year-old! I really don't know how that happened!

 

[JGator]

MP, Happy 1st Birthday to Ev! How was the party?

 

[monkeyprincess]

JGator, the party went great! It's a little frightening how much Ev enjoys being the center of attention I guess I'll start posting over on the other thread now, but I thought I'd post a couple pictures of the party. Hope all of your little ones are doing great, and I'll see you on the flip side!

 

[tammy77]

MP, it looks like EV had a fun birthday! I can't believe he's already a year old! I'm sad to see you guys graduate just when we're able to join, but so happy that EV is thriving.

H is a whole 10 days old today. It's amazing how much she's grown already. She's more alert daily now and is starting to make all kinds of funny little noises. My favorite is when she sort of growls after sneezing. Speaking of, I know she's not sick but she has a sneezing fit of 3-4 a couple of times a day. It's cute and really funny when she gets annoyed and makes her noise.

I think nursing is going well. She's having a bunch of wet diapers (like 10 per day) and between 6-8 BMs. I can't imagine her needing more milk with that kind of output! she has her tie week checkup a little early, on Wednesday. I really can't wait to see what she weighs, I'm hoping she's regained her birth weight. I'll actually be really surprised if she hasn't, just by the way she looks and feels to me.

I'm still having some weird pains and random extra bits of bleeding. I have my appt on Wednesday though so hopefully I'll get some answers then. I just don't remember having uterine pain this far out. I know my last one was quite a while ago though. At least my weight is dropping! I've cut way down on dairy after some unfortunate bouts of rotten egg smelling baby poop, lol. So I've dropped about 17 lbs since the morning of my cs. I am hoping that it continues, I still have about 20 to go to get to my pre preg weight.

Enough rambling from me! I need to commandeer my laptop instead of posting on my phone so I can catch up with everyone!!

 

[tammy77]

Dandi, thank you! We love our little lady to bits.

Hi, Tammy, K was 7 lbs at birth and went down to 6 or less when we left the hospital. She also has a smallish head - I think it's currently in the low 30%. She also fell asleep a lot at the beginning during feeding. Our LC suggested a few things to wake her up including taking all her clothes off except for the diaper, wet wash cloth to the forehead, and taking your hand and stroking from the front of her forehead backwards to get her to eat. She also said if you do the opposite - stroke from top of head towards brows, it calms them (apparently this works in horses too from what she told us!). Good luck. I know it can be stressful when you have a small baby who loses weight after birth. And, congratulations, she is beautiful!!!

JGator, thank you for chiming in. I thought I'd responded, oops! I've started making sure that I only stroke her forehead front to back now and strip her down as needed! It's working pretty well. That said, she's having a lot more awake periods in her days. She is so calm, it's almost alarming. I'm sure I'll be eating my words soon though!

 

[Dandi]

mp, great pictures! Ev is such a handsome dude, I can't believe he is one already!! Gonna miss you around these parts!

tammy, I love what you said about Hannah's sneezing, I can just picture the growling noise she makes! Oscar used to do that after he yawned, it is way CUTE!

Thanks JGator! He seriously cracks us up all the time. He always has been a good sleeper, for sure. But lately I'm not sure what his beef is, he fights bedtime all of a sudden, and has started waking once a night crying. I thought daylight savings had thrown him off, but now I'm not so sure. He settles after a cuddle and sometimes a feed, but usually he just needs a bit of reassurance. Sometimes though I pick him up and that makes him worse, he screams until I put him down! Is 10 months too young for separation anxiety?! His day naps are fine. Funny boy!

I know amc, aren't they hilarious?!

Does anyone else have problems introducing new dinner meals to their baby? Lately Oscar will NOT eat anything for dinner unless it's spaghetti bolognese, or meat sauce with vegies, or lasagne. He is a meat sauce and pasta nut! I made chicken casserole last night, and he wouldn't even look at it. I put a couple of pieces of it on his tray, and he cried and carried on until I took it away. As soon as I gave him a cheese stick and some fruit he gobbled those down, so he was clearly hungry. He used to like tuna mornay and a few other dishes, but for the last few weeks, it's meat sauce or NUTHIN'!

 

[tammy77]

Dandi,

Aren't kids a challenge sometimes when it comes to food?! My middle DD has always been finicky about what she will or will not eat. I think they go through phases and all we can do is try our best to get them to at least try a little bit of whatever they're resisting. I wish I had stuck to my guns more in that respect with K (my middle girl). At 8 yrs old, the child will ONLY eat peas as her veggie and the kid actually can tell the difference between brands! MIL couldn't believe it until K looked right at her and said "Where did you buy these peas?"! Bhahahaha. Yep, she prefers Trader Joes organic peas and nothing else. She will begrudgingly eat green beans, snap peas and other brands of frozen peas now but yeah...not easy! Ooops, I'm rambling.

AFU: We took H to her 2 week appt a couple of days early today. She's 12 days old and guess what?! Chunky monkey has more than regained her birth weight! She was 6lbs 9 oz at birth, 6lbs 0 oz at her lowest weight when she was 3 days old and in the last 9 days she's blossomed up to 6lbs 12oz! Needless to say, I am very happy about that. I'm also happy that the ped gave us the go ahead to sleep 4 hr stretches at night, if she wants to. We don't go back until her 2 month check up, so all I need to do is manage to control my irrational fear of her getting sick with fever and all will be well in our little world.

 

[JGator]

MP, Ev looked so cute in his birthday suit eating his cake!!! Congratulations on making it to 1 year! Good luck with the move this weekend. See you on the other thread in a couple weeks.

Dandi, K is almost 1 and doesn't eat much real food so I am no help to you. She definitely does not eat what we are eating for dinner! She still only has 1 tooth coming in. She eats Cheerios, puffs, avocado, peaches, pears, rice, and that's about it for real food. We give her baby food/purees including chicken/turkey, veggies, and fruits.

Tammy, yay for Hannah gaining her birth weight and then some! That's great news. I hope you are able to get some 4 hour stretches of sleep. I feel like I have an infant again with the sleep schedule we are on.

AFU, K has been waking up about every hour or so after we put her down for bed at night the last several nights. Usually, sometime around 1am-2am, I cave and bring her to our bed where she sleeps till 7 or 8am. She sits up in her crib, and I usually am able to put her down and pat her for a few minutes without much fuss, but then an hour later, she's up again. I'm exhausted. I think/hope it's teething related, but she only has 1 tooth, and I cannot go through this for her whole mouth of teeth that are left to come in!

 

[monkeyprincess]

JGator, just wanted to chime in to say you have my sympathy. Ev has been sleeping horribly lately, and we have been having the same issues as you with him going to sleep initially, but then waking up an hour or two later, and then again in the middle of the night once or twice. He wakes up and immediately sits up and starts wailing. I thought it was because he had a cold, but he is better now, and I can't tell if any new teeth are coming in because he bites my hand when I check! DH has been going in and giving him bottles and sleeping with him on the floor until he can put him back in the crib. He doesn't like it when I bring him into bed because he doesn't want it to become a habit, but I'm not sure sleeping with him on the floor is a better strategy! Anyway, I'm really hoping it is a temporary situation because DH and I are both exhausted and haven't had a restful night in almost two weeks. Hopefully, it is just a developmental thing, and they will start sleeping through the night!

 

[Dandi]

Thanks for the advice tammy and JGator, I guess I will just persist! I make chicken nuggety things last night with minced chicken, cheese, broccoli and cauliflower rolled in breadcrumbs and baked, and he mowed through those, and that's really the first time he has been happy to eat chicken. Win! I also tried him with pancakes for lunch the other day but he didn't like them, but today I mixed banana and blueberries through the mixture and he gobbled those up, so perhaps I need to just mix the old with the new? Tammy I couldn't believe what you said about your daughter picking the difference between brands of peas! That's some palate she has!!

mp, I'm so sorry to hear Ev's sleep hasn't been great. Poor mama, I hope it's a very, very brief phase!

 

[tammy77]

Hi Mommies!

So...I don't think I'm ready quite yet, but at what point did you guys start having a half glass of wine, etc. again? I plan to bf for a year and I miss my good red wine! I just don't want to share it with her by accident.

 

[Dandi]

I had a small glass of red on Christmas Day when Oscar was 13 days old. I drank it just after feeding him, waited about an hour then expressed and threw that milk out, so by the time was due another feed (2ish hours) it was well and truely out of my system. It was at lunch time though, I didn't dare have one in the evening, he cluster fed in the evening and seemed to want to feed every half hour sometimes!

 

[amc80]

Hi Mommies! So...I don't think I'm ready quite yet, but at what point did you guys start having a half glass of wine, etc. again? I plan to bf for a year and I miss my good red wine! I just don't want to share it with her by accident.

Alcohol metabolizes in bm the same way it does in blood. No need to pump and dump or anything. If there isn't enough in your blood to where you can feel then you are probably fine. Not that I'm an expert, that is just what I've read.

 

[tammy77]

Thanks for the info Amc and dandi! Dandi, I hear you on the evening cluster feeds! I think I'll end up waiting a bit anyhow, I'm nervous about a recent change in her BMs. yesterday and today she's transitioned to these watery and barely seedy BMs compared to before. They are the right color and don't smell, so I'm guessing it's normal. It just has me spooked about adding anything into my diet right now. I'm also trying to keep my dairy to a minimum in case she's sensitive. No green or blood or anything, just argh. I need to control my anxiety. They take away my window shopping, wine and , and give me 100% responsibility for this amazing little baby that can't tell me how she's feeling. It's not easy for me to remained composed.

 

[JGator]

Tammy, I have only had a few sips of wine since becoming pregnant with K. I often smell my DH's to get a fix. I'm currently pumping, but K gets 95% of her milk from formula. I'm able to pump 3-4 oz per day. I'm planning to stop pumping around K's 1 year birthday and bring on the margaritas and wine!!! I never produced enough milk to dump any so that was never an option for me.

Dandi, those chicken nuggets sound awesome. Do you have a recipe?

AFU, K has been sleeping a little better, but still wakes up several times at night. I've been pretty succesful at letting her cry for 5-10 mins and then patting her - I always need to go in and put her back down as she's sitting up when I go in to her. Last night, she had one cry/wake up session where she fell asleep on her own before I went in to pat her so I consider that a small victory! K started cruising around our furniture last night - she still can't pull herself up on her own without help from us, but I think she's getting stronger every day. She also started scooting around on a ride-on car we got her recently. She used to only go backwards, but she has mastered forward now. She still has only one tooth which hasn't come in all the way yet. K had a play date on Friday with a baby who is 2 months younger. K was so excited. She kept reaching for the baby's face and grabbing at her clothing. We had to keep an eye on her as she is a little bigger than the other baby.

 

[Dandi]

JGator, not really, I kind of just made them up! I just chopped up a medium sized chicken breast into tiny pieces, into maybe 4-5mm cubes - added a handful of shredded full fat cheese, and mashed about four steamed florets of broccoli and four of cauliflower and added them in, mixed through one egg, and rolled a tablespoon full in breadcrumbs, and patted them down so they were a bit flatter, and baked them for about 15 minutes. I reckon you could just throw everything into a food processor too! Oscar prefers food with a bit of chunk and texture, hence why I just chopped and roughly mashed everything. Sorry that's all a bit rough, I don't do much in the way of measuring when I cook!

Yesterday I opened a can of red kidney beans to put into a salad we were eating with dinner, and I put a few on Oscar's plate for him to pick up, not thinking he would eat them, but he loved them! His latest food fixation is meatballs, I made little ones with grated carrot and zucchini through them, he practically inhaled them! Little garbage disposal!

Geez, if it's not one thing it's another, If it's not Oscar's sleep I obsess over, it's his eating! AHHH!

 

[JGator]

Thanks for the recipe, Dandi. You are giving me ideas. You are so right about sleep/eating! I obsess over K's sleep as you can tell from all my posts! I just miss sleep so much!!!!

 

[Dandi]

Oh lovey, I'm sure you do, I'm sorry things are still rough on the sleep front for you. I really, really hope things improve for you soon! Oscar woke up twice last night, I have absolutely no idea why. Admittedly I was a bit annoyed when I got up the second time, and to settle him down I fed him and cradled him for a bit, and he fell asleep in my arms. And... I started to tear up a bit! It's been so long since he has done that, I just realised how much I've missed it. They're babies for such a short time!!

 

[jfo]

Hi mamas, sorry I've been MIA again. It's just been so busy lately at work, and that's when I usually have a chance to catch up and write on PS. Wow, there's been lots of activity on this thread!

Dandi, Oscar is growing so big and sounds and looks like he is doing very well! I love how his personality shines through in the photos you share. What a cutie! In terms of eating, L has been getting progressive more picky about what she wants to eat. I think that they just all go through phases and I've read that because you try one food a few times and they reject it, doesn't mean that if you try again in another week, they may turn around and love it!

Tammy, welcome and congratulations! Hannah is gorgeous and I'm so glad to hear that she is gaining weight and nursing is going well for you! I'm looking forward to checking in here every once in a while to see how she's growing!

MP, happy belated 1st birthday to Ev! My goodness, he is SO cute! I love the photos you shared. I'm glad that hear thing everything went well. How did the closing and move go last week? Boy, I bet you've been busy! Looking forward to joining you really soon in the other thread. Please share photos of the new house in the house thread if you get a chance too!

JGator, I have all the sympathy in the world for you with K's sleep. It will get better. She's showing signs that she can settle herself, so that's great. On Saturday night, L woke up 4 hours after going to bed and could/would not go back to sleep for another 3 hours. It was HORRIBLE. I was so worried that she had another ear infection, so i gave her tylenol, but over an hour later, she still refused to go to sleep and would just arch her back and cry. Finally, I took her to bed with me and gave her a bottle of water, which she guzzled and then we both passed out for a few more hours. I was just glad it was the weekend. It turns out it was just a bad night and not an ear infection. It definitely sounds like K is getting stronger quickly! I bet she will pull up to cruise on her own soon!

AFU, we kept L out of daycare for the past week to keep her healthy enough for her ear tube surgery. All went well! She's the healthiest she's been in a long time and she had her surgery yesterday morning and she did really well and has not seemed bothered by her ears unless we put in the ear drops they gave us to help her ears heal. I'm so glad to have this behind us and look forward to far fewer ear infections!

L will turn 1 on Sunday. I can't believe it. We haven't yet transitioned to cow's milk, but I don't anticipate any issues since she eats other dairy like yogurt, cottage cheese, cheese, etc. just fine. Otherwise, she's been a lot more picky with her food. She's been refusing to be spoonfed unless it's her favorite stuff like pureed fruit or yogurt, oatmeal or cottage cheese. Anything else like pureed veggies or meat, she will turn her head away and clamp down her mouth. She loves to feed herself finger foods, so I'm just trying to come up with ways to give her enough veggies and protein in finger foods. From a physical standpoint, she's also getting really fast at crawling. We have our babygates up on our stairs at the top and bottom. She spent a few days at my parents' place last week, and they have two carpeted steps. She practiced going up and down on them so I felt comfortable letting her practice at our house. She now can crawl up and down our entire staircase! It's nuts! She also just started standing indepedently for about a minute at a time in the last couple of days. I wonder how long it will be before she starts walking on her own.

Hope all is well with everyone and hello to all the other mamas!