Parenting Check in July 27

[karlamo]

Hello Everyone!

Welcome new dads kevinandjesse to the group!

What's new with everyone?

Parenting
foodislove
megd893
calsurb
andstilltrying
jazibel
kh826
karlamo
jgy
sherminator
mahler5
wittyandwaiting
kona
strings
mrsnorris
2mrsks (mrs&mrsk)
jennicole
amberreva

kevinandjesse

QOTW:  Anyone have a parenting topic/question they want to bring up?  A gadget you're interested in or a "how do you handle..."?

[karlamo]

R is 17 months this week. He's entering into his last month as an only child. Live it up R! This will be the last time that you get 2 mommies undivided attention:) In all seriousness I actually read some really good advice about preparing your toddler for a second baby. The recommendation is before the baby arrives, teach your toddler to wait. So if they ask for milk/snack whatever, make them wait like 5 mins. The truth is they'll be waiting once the baby gets here so don't jump up right away to meet their needs every time they ask for something. We are down to our last 4 weeks before Moka gets here. Last night I had yet another reality check of how will I breast feed Moka and chase R around the house? Especially when Moky starts cluster feeding every hour. I anticipate a lot of bf while standing and chasing R around. It'll be like TOGO meals for them, haha.

Over the weekend we bought a wagon from a tag sale that we happened upon. It's those tykes 2 type ones. He LOVES getting pulled in it and won't let us stop. He even started pulling it himself up and down the cul de sac.

So remember last week when I was bragging about my awesome sleep, yeah, well, that was short lived. He's back to 12am wake up and 4 am wake up. Le sigh, I give up. It won't matter in 4 weeks anyway so why bother.

[kh826]

William is 13 months.
We went to a wedding on Saturday, and he stayed with J's cousin. It was the longest that we have ever been away from him (about 7.5 hours), the first time that anyone other than J's parents have watched him, and the first time that anyone other than us has put him to bed. I was soooo anxious about it, but it went really well. I cried like a baby when we left him, but it all worked out. J's cousin has 2 boys (5 yrs & 10 months), and William loved playing with them. He played hard, skipped his nap entirely, and went to bed like a champ with no tears. We picked him up at 9:30pm, and he was fast asleep. I picked him up out of his pack-n-play and he cried for about 10 seconds (he was startled and disoriented), I put him in the car and he fell back asleep. We got to J's parents' house (where we stayed Saturday night) and he woke up again, and I changed his diaper, gave him a kiss and put him down around 10pm while he was still awake and he rolled right over and went back to sleep. I was so relieved and impressed.

On Sunday we spent the day at J's parents' house and took Will swimming. He LOVES the pool. He had a great time splashing around. We had a little cookout and then drove home around 5pm. It was a nice time, but a LONG weekend. I think William (and his moms!) will need a couple of days to recover and hopefully catch up on some rest.

William has been going through a vocabulary explosion. He is a new word or phrase (usually two words together like "all done") almost daily. He mimics us constantly when we are talking to him. Yesterday he said "pool" and then he kept saying it over and over again. It was really cute.

He is taking more steps without holding onto anything. On Friday night he walked across the living room (about 7-8 steps), and then on Saturday he did several runs of about 5-10 steps at J's parents' house and her cousin's house. He still isn't consistent with it, and he wobbles and then plops down on his butt, but we are seeing some progress. He can walk pretty far when holding onto one of our hands, but I think he lacks confidence and maybe a little bit of balance to do the same kind of distances solo. I think it won't be long though before he is more confidently walking on his own.

What he lacks in confidence for solo walking he makes up for in confidence for everything else. This kiddo has no fear. He climbs like a monkey! Everyone keeps saying, wait til he is fully walking, then he will truly be into everything, and perhaps it will increase somewhat, but I cannot picture it b/c he is into EVERYTHING now! He is a speed crawler. He climbs and shimmies along the wall and furniture. He pushes chairs across the kitchen to use them as walkers. I just can't imagine him being more mobile than he is right now -- it just seems like he has no limitations to where he can go and what he can get into. Which scares me. HAHA

He has learned to say "again" ... which is cute, but now we repeat things even more than we did before because after every book we read he says "again, again!" After every little song we sing he says "again, again!" Sometimes we try to redirect to a new book or a new activity after the 3rd or 4th repeat in a row, and we have about 50% success with that. Sometimes we just have to read "The Little Blue Truck" 15 times in a row. Ugh!

We do allow him some limited screen time (I know a lot of people don't at this age, and that is fine, obviously - hopefully no one here will judge that we do allow a little bit). He will watch a 30 min episode of Curious George a couple of times a week, usually I turn the evening news on at 6:30 while we are playing ball and reading books in the evening before bed, and he typically ignores it entirely, but it is on. Anyway, we were at my in-laws for most of the weekend, and my FIL has the TV on a lot -- mostly sports. It was so funny, because my FIL was watching a baseball game, and he picked Will up and put him on his lap and William was GLUED to the TV watching the baseball game. He only sat there with him like that for about 10-15 mins and then we went swimming, but it was so funny to watch him watching baseball with his Pops. Pops was super excited that he seemed to be into it. Of course Pops kept talking to him about the game and explaining to him about the players, and William sat there and pointed at the screen and said "oooohhhh" and "wowwww" hahaha... then something good would happen (I know nothing about baseball) and his Pops would get excited and William would clap. It was super cute. Apparently William is very good at picking up on emotional/social cues. I was impressed that he was ooing and ahing and clapping to mirror how his Pops was reacting to the game. Anyway, I thought it was cute, and now his Pops is already talking about his first in-person baseball game experience. Oh boy!

We are so lucky to have J's parents. They are so awesome. William adores them, and the feeling is mutual. I also love that he has such a good male role model in J's Dad. I think it is nice for him to have that connection with him.

QOTW: Here are some random questions for this group...
*Double stroller recommendations?
*How old was your kiddo when he/she was totally done with bottles and exclusively using sippy cups?
*When did you get your kiddo fitted for their first pair of shoes? Did you go to Stride Rite? (We have been buying shoes at Gymboree, Carter's, etc., but we have yet to actually take Will to be fitted for a "walking shoe" -- usually he does most of his walking at home in bare feet at this point). Any pointers for the first shoe fitting?

[2brides]

I hate when we have a conflict re: our parenting decisions with my father. Seriously, I am over 40 years old. I have been a parent for 9 years. L and I get to decide what is best for our kids and make decisions.

My father just bought a (new to him) small Mercedes convertible. He already has a old (1962) Ford convertible (not to mention a Volvo SUV.) Last night he asked which car the boys would rather ride in while in Maine (we are vacationing together next month.) I told him neither - since the Mercedes doesn't have a backseat and they aren't old enough to ride in the front seat and the Ford is so old there are no seatbelts in the backseat. He pushed a bit, but backed off when I told him no.

I talked to him this morning and he said, "the boys are going to ride in my car..." :shock: :angry: I reiterated that no, they aren't legally allowed to ride in the front seat and they aren't riding in a car with no seatbelts. He kept telling me it was fine for them to ride in the front if the car didn't have a backseat. Maybe it is - and maybe if that was the only mode of transportation - but L and I are renting a car with a full sized car - with a backseat and seatbelts. He would not stop pushing that "it was fine and they would love it" until I finally said, "Look. They are my kids and I get to decide what I think is safest for them. And based on my experience working in an emergency room where I see kids who were not properly restrained in cars get seriously injured, I am not taking a chance when there is a safe and appropriate vehicle available." Hell, my kids are still in high back boosters when most of their friends are no longer in boosters at all. I know he will say something to the kids, "I wanted to take you for a drive in my convertible, but your mother won't let you..." and hell will reign down.

I am not a helicopter parent. I don't try to put my kids in a bubble - but car safety is a pretty big priority for me and outweighs any fun my kids will have riding in a convertible. And it isn't as though they aren't going to have fun on vacation!

I am questioning my decision to vacation with my father....

[2brides]

*How old was your kiddo when he/she was totally done with bottles and exclusively using sippy cups?15 months we were done with morning/nighttime bottles. I was so happy to stop washing those Dr. Brown bottles!

*When did you get your kiddo fitted for their first pair of shoes? Did you go to Stride Rite? Yes, we went to Stride Rite. Both kids actually ended up having wide feet and we knew we could get them properly fitted. We didn't buy them until about 13m when they were walking outside the house (ie. IL's patio, the park, etc.)

[Stringy]

M is 2 and almost 3 months just rolling along as a seemingly big kid all the time now. Talking and singing constantly. Skipping naps occasionally (by talking and singing to herself and her animals in her bed for two hours) - sometimes throwing herself on the ground in this hilarious dramatic way if we say something that angers her (but does it without crying, usually, just this dramatic flop). We are taking the lazy approach to potty training, in that she has a potty and can sit on it when she wants, but we aren't pushing/bribing/rewarding or anything at this point. She sometimes sits on it with one of our magazines and its adorable, but has yet to deposit anything into it. The last thing I want is a battle of the wills over it.

Plus, we just bought a house in a new town, and she will be starting school in september (around when we move) - so I see no reason to punish all of us by actual potty training. She's gonna be a mess as it is with those two transitions.

I think she was done with her bottle around 18 months. And it was mostly MOTN she needed it - never during the day. But she has all kinds of nighttime issues. And, it happened really randomly one day without warning. The key was to never look back!

I don't remember with shoes. I never got her fitted at stride right. I think see kai run smallers were her first real-ish shoes. They were good transitionals.

[karlamo]

2brides, High five for car seat safety! My wife and I are very strict with car seat safety. We're at the age where we see so many kids being turned FF just cause they hit 1 year old. R will be RF till he maxes out.


kh826, R had been taking a sippy/open cup since he was around 11 months. At 15 months is when he stopped taking his daycare milk in bottles. It was totally NBD and they just put his milk in a sippy one day and that was the end of that. I sometimes still use a bottle cause he thinks it's fun to drink from it but 99% of the time it's a cup.

For shoes, another Stride Rite here. He got measured and he's get this, an extra extra wide. Seriously, I didn't even know that was a thing. The kid has Fred Flintstone feet.

[2brides]

Carter had XX wide feet too - fovever. His are still wide which is a point of much contention to my brand name wh@re of a son. Nike doesn't come in wide and actually run pretty narrow. We were at the shoe store for an hour + looking at shoes this weekend because none of the shoes he wanted fit him and none of the shoes that did fit him was he interested in purchasing.

Gray grew out of his wide feet.

[kh826]

2brides - I am so sorry you had to deal with that situation with your Dad in terms of car safety. It is absolutely your (and L's) decision, and no one else's. Further, I think most parents in today's day and age would agree with you whole heartedly. We are also super strict on car safety. I think there is zero reason to take any risk at all when it comes to safety in the car. In my opinion, the stakes are just way too high and there is nothing (comfort, fun, etc.) worth risking a child's safety in the car.

Stringy - Wooohoo on the new house! I am curious what town you are moving too (I am from the Boston suburbs originally). Good luck with all of those transitions!

I am super relieved to hear all of you say that your kids did not totally transition away from bottles until 15-18 months. William still gets 1-2 bottles a day of WCM. We offer him milk in a sippy throughout the day, and he drinks water in a sippy throughout the day, but he still takes his bedtime milk in a bottle and sometimes will also have milk when he first wakes up in the AM in a bottle. He just doesn't seem ready to give up the bottle completely, especially before bed. I didn't want to push him before he was ready, but I have known some parents who have insisted that at 12 months, bottles are automatically done. I have one friend who said at 1 yr, the "bottle fairy" comes and takes away all bottles and replaces them with sippy cups and that is it. I was a little worried this was a "thing," and that having a bottle beyond a year was an issue. I'm glad to hear that isn't necessarily the case!

[kh826]

Williams' feet seem really wide also. We haven't had him officially measured yet, but there are certain shoes/styles that we have tried on him ourselves that definitely don't fit. We had a hard time finding him sandals for the summer for that reason. We have been hesitant to do the Stride Rite thing until we felt he was really walking outside since he (including his feet) seems to grow SOOO fast, and Stride Rite is pricey. I didn't want to pay $40-$50 for shoes he would outgrow in a month. I do think we probably need to take him to be fitted soon though...

[Stringy]

Jul 27, 2015 11:35:25 GMT -5 kh826 said:

2brides - I am so sorry you had to deal with that situation with your Dad in terms of car safety. It is absolutely your (and L's) decision, and no one else's. Further, I think most parents in today's day and age would agree with you whole heartedly. We are also super strict on car safety. I think there is zero reason to take any risk at all when it comes to safety in the car. In my opinion, the stakes are just way too high and there is nothing (comfort, fun, etc.) worth risking a child's safety in the car.

Stringy - Wooohoo on the new house! I am curious what town you are moving too (I am from the Boston suburbs originally). Good luck with all of those transitions!

I am super relieved to hear all of you say that your kids did not totally transition away from bottles until 15-18 months. William still gets 1-2 bottles a day of WCM. We offer him milk in a sippy throughout the day, and he drinks water in a sippy throughout the day, but he still takes his bedtime milk in a bottle and sometimes will also have milk when he first wakes up in the AM in a bottle. He just doesn't seem ready to give up the bottle completely, especially before bed. I didn't want to push him before he was ready, but I have known some parents who have insisted that at 12 months, bottles are automatically done. I have one friend who said at 1 yr, the "bottle fairy" comes and takes away all bottles and replaces them with sippy cups and that is it. I was a little worried this was a "thing," and that having a bottle beyond a year was an issue. I'm glad to hear that isn't necessarily the case!

PM me if you want. I always want to know where karlamo lives too

I've heard of the bottle's gone at 1 thing..but really, they are still babies. It doesn't cause any harm for them to have a bottle every so often. They are only little for so long. Its not like they are taking them to kindergarten. I'd be more worried about constant pacifier use (like not just at nap/rest/quiet times) up to age 2 then 10 minutes with a bottle. Kids certainly nurse that long all the time!

[2brides]

Do you live near an outlet? We have a Stride rite outlet near us. They will measure and while shoes are still pricey - they are a bit better ($25-$30.)

[karlamo]

kh826, we did the outlet. We paid like $30-40 but they have lasted him for 5 months so far. When they fit them, they make sure it's not a snug fit and that there's room to grow so I doubt you'll be buying shoes every 2 months. Unless of course William is baby hulk:)

[kh826]

I will definitely look into the outlet situation. I don't know!

We DO jokingly call William Baby Hulk sometimes! Which is so funny in this context. He is just SO large. We encountered this weekend for the first time William interacting with another child who thought he was WAY older than he is. William's 5 yr old cousin was playing with him on Saturday, and basically expected 2+ yr old reaction from William. He was getting really upset and saying things like "Will isn't listening to me, he doesn't understand the game. Will won't answer me, etc." We had to keep explaining to this 5 yr old that William is a baby and he doesn't understand. The 5 yr old has a little brother who is 10 months old, and this 10 month old is WAYYY smaller than William. I think the 5 yr old just didn't understand that William is a baby, he is just a big baby.

I digress, that doesn't have anything to do with shoe size... and I'm not saying my child looks like a 2 yr old, I don't think he does, but he does look older than 13 months, and to another child I can see how that could be confusing.

Sorry, that ended up being completely unrelated!

[calsurb]

Hey everybody I'm still here! Our lil Sarah is 7 weeks and we're chugging right along. Breastfeeding has been our biggest challenge, but last week we weaned her from the nipple shield and she's been eating like a champ. I even nursed in public at a big concert last night and it was fine.
We also gave her a pacifier for the first time and she loved it. We're not sure how we feel about it, but it totally worked. I'm thinking we might use it in early mornings and middle of the nights. Any advice, friends?

[kona]

My baby turned 1 yesterday! We had a great day, DW took off the afternoon and we went to the museum and then to Chipotle for dinner. She had such a good time. Today was her 1 year check up and it went great.

Sunday is the party. We will see how it goes. We need to get some baby proofing items and I hope to install them tomorrow.

Sleep is still elusive at this point. I feel like we wasted the money on the sleep consultant. I'm kind of done trying to 'fix it' at this point too. She will sleep when she sleeps, I feel like I have little control over that.

I can't believe that I have a 1 year old. Maybe this is an UO but sometimes I miss my old life. I think my dtg is awesome and I love her to pieces but I do miss alone time and the time to train. I hope to find time for both of those before we TTC #2 later this year.

[2brides]

As hard as it is right now, yes, kids learn to sleep when they learn. I had a kid who did not learn to sleep through the night until he was 3.5 years old. Fast forward six years and he goes to sleep easily and doesn't wake for 10 hours! :-)

It will happen for you! :-)

[karlamo]

kona, fist bump for no sleep solidarity. My 17 month old has YET to STTN. He's never done it, not even once. We too paid for a sleep consultant and while it didn't fix our problem, it did help with some good tips. At around 14 months his sleep improved immensely. He went from 6 wake ups down to 1-3 a night. Lately we are getting a nice long stretch from 7-4am and then he's up to nurse and up for the day at 5:30. Not great but for us it feels like a breakthrough.

Does your daughter nurse? I ask because R still does and he loves the boobs and isn't ready to stop nursing at night.

As for missing your old life, totally normal and you're not alone. It doesn't mean we don't adore our kids it means we are human and miss those moments when we had time for ourselves and our partners. Just this morning my wife said to me, "what did we ever do a Saturday mornings before kids?" I was like go for a run, make an amazing breakfast, and sit on the couch and watch tv. We'll get that life back one day when our kids are older. As for today, I was up at 6am, and out the door at 7:15am pulling him in his wagon and he was loving it:)

[kona]

karlamo thank you, you have no idea how much I needed to hear all of that!

ETA yes she nurses and she also LOVES her boobies