Any March & April 05 mums/moms want to chat?

[Erin M]

Ankie - I have been avoiding starting lunch for that exact reason  :lol:  but I'm guessing I can't hold off on it for that much longer.  Generally, I just shovel food into Katie until she stops showing interest and then we stop.  Solids aren't the primary source of nutrition anyway at this age.  I think I might have mentioned it before, but we definitely don't catnap here if Katie takes two long naps.  I read somewhere that when babies get ready to drop a nap, they go back and forth for a bit needing it, and then not needing it, so it's normal to go back and forth.

Richelle and Sophie - welcome and jump right in whenever!

[Richelle]

Thanks for the warm welcome Ankie & Naomi!

For the whole feeding solids thing I know how you feel!  I decided to diverge from the book's advice and feed my dd solids then formula right after.  I also find that if she is hungry she responds better to eating and it doesn't take forever!!  She fusses a bit sometimes but I just get the food into her mouth as fast as possible :oops: ! 

I may be very lucky that she has a huge appetite - she started on solids at 4months.  I have just started introducing veggies and fruit and she loves it so I am not having too much trouble.

She is also not doing the 45 minute nap thing anymore so that is good so she is having a catnap still.  I thought maybe she was ready for 2 naps but now she sleeps straight through the night so I am not going to mess with success.

Thanks again for the great welcome! 

How many of you ladies are working moms?  I have been now for a month and am still having trouble adjusting ...

[Colesmom]

Welcome Richelle.  I love all the boards on BW but this chat thread is definitely the best.  It's great to have moms to vent to that have los the same age as you!  It has been my lifesaver the last few weeks.

Thanks for posting pics everyone.  It's so much fun seeing what everyone looks like.  Naomi...I love that pic of Riley.  She had so much hair when she was born!  You look great too.  There is NO WAY I would post the pic of me in the hospital.  I looked horrid.

Erin...we haven't had the time change here yet.  I think we pretty much had to follow suit with you guys and do it later.  I think it would have messed up too many things with stock markets etc if we didn't co-ordinate with the all powerful US of A :wink:   I don't even know what day they do go back!

Judy-I just saw your post as I was writing this (I scrolled down to look at something and voila, there you were).  How many hours are the girls getting at night?  7pm til ?  To give you an idea, Cole is typically getting 11-12 hours at night, and his naps are 1.5, 45 and 45-1.25 for a total of about 14.5-15 hours.  IF the girls are getting 12 hours at night and 5 during the day I think that's a lot of sleep, but what do I know :?

Last night he slept 6:40pm-5:30 am and I think if he was down earlier he would have woken happy and played until 6 like the other day.  I am now waking him from catnap by 3:45 for a 6:15 bedtime.  I'm really tempted to say that your girls could do with two naps and an early bedtime.  I experimented with Cole's bedtime starting at around 8pm.  He used to go to bed at 9 or 10 so I figured 8 was a good start.  It just kept getting earlier and earlier.  I find if he goes down after 6:15 he wakes in the night or early in the morning. 

Could you stretch your girls just a smidge (5-10 min.) during each awake time to get them to go down by 6pm?  I KNOW it's crazy early and I don't know how that would work into the sched. with the other two girls.  I've heard you need to have an earlier bedtime at first when getting rid of the catnap anyway. 

What time do they wake from catnap?  maybe they aren't tired at 7:00 when you're trying to put them down if too close to when they woke and hence not settling for an hour?  coles last A time is 2.5 hours.  Yesterday he was so tired and 2.5 A would have meant a 6:40 bedtime (because I let him take a long catnap-oops). I put him down at 6:10 and he settled pretty well...BUT woke at around 6:35 and cried a few minutes until 6:40.  It's like he's not ready until being up 2.5 hours even if he had a 30 min. catnap.  not sure if any of that helped...maybe, maybe not!

I am going to work out now on my Bowflex which has been dormant for months!  I decided it's time to get back into shape I'm going to try to do weights 30 min. M/W/F and run 30 min T/TH/Sat.  I'll run when DH gets home since Cole will be sleeping

alright, I've babbled enough as usual.  keep the pics coming!

Traci

[Richelle]

Thanks again for all the warm welcomes!!

Oh my Judy-Twins?!!?  You are my hero-I couldn;t imagine!!

And might I add that these are some goodlooking babes (los and moms incl) 

Judy, about your sleep question, with Sophie, when I finally did sort out her day sleep she would sleep for 2+ hour stretches then she stopped sleeping well at night so I adjusted until we had it good and now it is GREAT-knock on wood!! :roll:

May I venture to say, in my very limited opinion, that maybe your girls are sleeping too long in the day?  I found once I cut Sophie's naps she could stay awake longer- I know Go Figure!  She has 2 - 1.5hour naps and a 30-40min cat nap.  She now sleeps through the night with no dream feed.  Bedtime is at 730PM sleeps until 6 or 630AM, her naps are usually very good a few 45 minute ones here or there and a tooth and solids haven't thrown us too out of whack!

Hope that helps!!

Richelle

[Arwyn's mom]

Judy, I also feed Arwyn just before bed. If she stays awake fully and I put her down awake, she will fall asleep immediately. If she starts to fall asleep on my breast while feeding, I try to keep her up and then put her in her crib. BUT, she then wakes up and stays awake for a LONG time, up to 1 hr! This is the case tonight... it is approaching the 30 minute mark.

I don't have any suggestions for you as this is a hit and miss thing with us. Sometimes she stays awake, sometimes she doesn't. I hate it when she doesn't as it is difficult to get her to fall asleep and often I need to go in there and pat/shush (which, I think, is becoming a prop  :roll: . Just when I finally get it to work, it works too well!?)

Sending sleep vibes your way, Judy!

[Taylor's Mommy]

Oh boy girls no way I can catch up, but I read the last couple of pages, and since the lo's change so much so fast, I figuer I'm current!

Anyhow, it's happened!  Taylor has caught her first cold!  She has a runny nose, cough and is all congested.  We just gave her pediacare and some tylenol because she woke up all coughing and sniffly.  poor thing! :cry:   I wish I could stay home with her tomorrow and cuddle

I got Super Baby Food in the mail today so I'm so excited to read it.  I don't know why, but I am confused as h*!# about this solids business!  I have read a lot of conflicting advice-for instance Tracy says to start with fruit first and everything else I've read says cereal.  also she says to feed solid first then bf?  I've also read the opposite.  I think I will post some of my Q's on the solids board.  anyone have any advice I'd love to hear it.  I plan to start full force this weekend since I will be done with work.

Judy-Taylor gets about 4 hours of daytime sleep and then 12 hours at night...if she takes 2 long naps though she won't take a catnap, but 2 shorter naps and she needs it.  how long did you say they are sleeping at a stretch at night w/o a feed?  I've read taht up until 6 months some babies still can only go 8-9 hours w/o a feed.  re. the feed before bed, I find that if she is too tired, she fusses a whole lot so doesn't take a good feed at all.  she is not the type to fall asleep at the breast because of comfort.  if she doens't feed well she will ALWAYS wake up before her 11 df.

Welcome Sophie and Rachelle!  it's hard to keep up with these ladies, but definitely worth the try! :wink:

Traci-totally unsolicitated advice so if you don't want it tell me to shove it!  I read in the Girlfriends Guide to Surviving the 1st Year of Motherhood not to lift weights unless you are within 5 lbs of your prepregnancy weight, or else it will just be bulk muscle.  If you are at the weight though, good job and have at it!

Erin-I looked back at your reply to my question on solids schedule and you indicated Katie took 2 naps and is up from 3:30-7:30.  How do you keep her happy for that long?  Taylor has not cat napped the last 2 days and she has been SUPER GRUMPY!

It feels good to post again-haven't had time the last week!  Enough for now though.

Good night-Andrea

[Little Bear's Mum]

Hi, welcome Richelle, as the other 'girls' have said, this is a great place to chat, vent, ask questions and tell everyone how wonderful you little one is! Enjoy!

Judy, I'm agreeing with the others, I"m wondering if the twins are getting too much sleep during the day.

Traci, I do just what you do, think to myself, "if only I'd done this..... then that might have been different..." :roll: Like at 5am thismorning when I jumped out of bed to try turning on Daniel's music to find he wouldn't settle unless I fed him, because he knew I was there. If only I"d left him, maybe he would have gone back to sleep without me. And then, if only I hadn't put him back to bed and let him sleep until 7.30am, so he had about 13 hours sleep last night, he might not have screamed intensly when I tried to put him down for his first morning nap, so much so I had to put him in the buggy and push him to sleep. At least he then slept for 1 hour. Later today he then had a 1.5h sleep. No catnap today though, as he didn't wake until 3.30pm from his 2nd nap, so too late for a catnap. Hence he's screaming as DH tries to dress him from his bath now.

Ahhhh..... if only.........

Apparently Daniel nearly rolled by himself from his back to tummy just now while on the bathroom floor, trying to reach the rubbish bin. Yay, nearly there!

Better go, very tired boy needing my cuddles and love and food supply.

[Arwyn's mom]

Hello, got the picture...

The woman in the background is my mother. You can't really see Arwyn... she was napping, wouldn't you know it, through the whole wedding ceremony!

[Nikki~Nathan&Danielle]

Cute pic Ankie!  Here's a pic of me and the kids - it's quite old though!!

Judy, Danielle's getting 11-12hrs sleep at night (mostly 11hrs but with daylight savings arriving last weekend she's been taking the extra of sleep so up to 12hrs again).  During the day she gets an average of 3.25hrs (45min + 2.5hrs).   Maybe start to work towards 2.5hrs activity time if you can for the middle activity of the day - for us the morning activity was the last to extend, but D can now make it 2.5hrs 1st and 2nd activity and 3.5-4hrs for the last one.

Well Danielle's been sitting fully independently today - for a good 10mins or so.  She's suddenly gotten a lot of upper body strength in the last week.

Urrghhhh, don' t know what to do about our solids issue.  Anyone elses bub not take to it and just poke their tongue out and not try to swallow and gag if it touched the back of their throat?

[FrasersMum]

NIKKI - YES - Fraser is NOT INTERESTED in solids...  We've been trying for about 2.5 weeks I guess and he's just not fussed at all.  We've had slightly (very slightly) more success with sweet potato than rice cereal, pumpkin and oat cereal.  That's all we've tried so far.  For an idea - we freeze in ice cube trays (doesn't everyone?) and he takes almost a whole one of those of sweet potato.  Yes, that's our success story!!

I'm not too worried I guess - still plenty of milk for him.  We'll keep persevering.  We're currently trying twice a day.  I can't really see any point in pushing the third meal without any interest from him.  Although anything to try to eliminate the night waking feed right...  That's a whole other story (a whole other post in fact!)

So good luck, let me know how you get on.

In other news - Fraser had his high temp for 4 days - yuk!  Not much sleep either.  But it's back down now so we are focussing on "getting back on track".  A fair bit of work required  :roll:

I've never put a pic before so I'll try now.  This was about a month ago I guess - and yes, that's my little serious guy!  Don't crack a smile now...

[FrasersMum]

OK that didn't work.  I'll try again on Thursday when I'm in the office - that's where I worked out the avatar.  Yes, at work... :oops:   Working hard!

[Anonymous]

Good Morning Everyone,

The one thing my lo loves is eating so we have had no problems with solids, she took to it right away!  I never did rice cereal though, I started with whole oats organic cereal, it is the Earth's Best brand.  It did take at least 2 and a half weeks to get the hang of it.  My sister in law turned me on to it b/c my nephew would get so constipated on rice cereal.  Sophie loves it and never got constipated, I was worried about constipation as she did struggle with constipation when I introduced formula at 4 months.  We have just started introducing fruits and vegetables and the girl LOVES peas - more than the fruit - it is really fun watching her try all the new things!

Nikki and Jo, I diverged from the book's advice and fed Sophie cereal first and then a bottle, I found trying to feed her solids when she wasn't hungry was futile.  Another thing I did that helped Sophie was have a bottle ready of EBM or formula beside me and if she fussed while trying to eat cereal I would give her some botlle while sitting in her high chair.  I think that helped her realize tha she eats in that chair and that the cereal was food too. :wink: 

 I am still very new at this solids thing though and am confused about this #1 AND #2 foods etc...I don't have time with work etc... to make my own food so in the store they have all sorts of weird things in jars with numbers :roll: I stood there for 10 mins the other day trying to figure it all out!

Judy- you may find that if you do try and limit the girls sleep in the day they may go longer at night.  Sophie didn't drop her 4AM feed until I had Solids established twice a day, even then I am surprised she can go so long (11-12hours) without eating - maybe it is just a phase? :shock:

Haley - isn't it strange how these los make us second guess ourselves all the time?  I always put Sophie to bed wide awake, even though sometimes at night after her last feed she is pretty dopey.  She usually talks to herself for a bit and then as soon as I think to myself 'that kid is never going to fall asleep' all goes quiet!


Richelle

[Colesmom]

Andrea  go shove it!  LOL.  I didn't know that so thanks for the tip.  I am within 5 lbs of my prepregancy weight (about 2-3lbs over).  I can thank sleep training for taking off about 4 or so pounds    Sorry about Taylor's cold.  I am so dreading the day Cole gets sick.  I am not sure I'll know how to handle it.
My girlfriend has Super Baby Food and said it's awesome.  good luck!

Judy  So after the girls wake for the 1.5 hours...how long do they go back down for?  In my limited experience with Cole...when his bedtime was too late he wakes and stays up 45min-1:30 like your girls!  I am crossing my fingers for you that the shorter naps work...if not I am still going to suggest an earlier bedtime if you can manage it.

Interesting point about the BF before bed...I think there has been times when Cole has fallen asleep feeding and then not settled right away.  It doesn't happen often though. 

Ankie I love the pic.  Of course she slept through the service, she's in your cozy arms :wink:

NikkiHave I told you how much I love Danielle's chubby cheeks!  Cole never took on that baby fat...sometimes I wish he had more.  As for the feeding...I read (maybe in Tracy's book :?: ) That if they are sticking out their tongue and gagging then they aren't ready yet.  Maybe try again in a week?  Not sure there is any sense in forcing the issue if she's not ready.

Jo  (((big hugs)))  Sorry Fraser is sick yet again.  You just don't ever get a break do you?  As for the pics...at the suggestion of another BW mom elsewhere I use http://www.photobucket.com.  I upload the pic and then copy and paste the image code.  It's soooo easy. 

Now for us.  Cole woke early last night and wouldn't go back down.  Fed at 9pm!  So when he woke at 2:30 I tried to let him settle but he was hungry again.  If he wakes before 3 he'll go back to sleep no problem.  It's after 3am that he'll stay up for an extended time.  He woke at 4:15 but settled JUST before I went in to rescue.  yay for me for holding back.  Then woke at 5:20 and played until 5:50. phew.

made sure he stayed up 2 hours and napped 7:40-9:00.  yay.

gotta run...he's fussing in the exersaucer.

Traci

[Jayri]

Well it seems as though everyone is eitherin the midst of or about to start solids.
Riley has had cereal twice today, and yesterday, so far so good. I think I see her left bottom front tooth coming in, so we are up with night wakings again.
I tried pu/pd, pat/shh, repositioning, but nope none of that, it was food or nuthin'.
At least dh got up and made me a hot choc while I was up though, he has mysteriously pulled his head out of his @## lately   . He has been ordered to take me out for dinner friday night, so I guess I am going out!!
Judy- Riley has only been wanting to do hour long naps lately, but she does go down better at night as she is more tired. Now whether this is a phase I have no clue, but it does make my nights easier.

WOW!! aren't we all some really gorgeous mums, judy, andrea and richelle, you should put yours up too!! I know we would all love to see how beautiful you are.

Well I am off, toodles for now everyone, enjoy your day or evening where ever you are.

[Erin M]

Lovely pictures all - and Traci, love the new Avatar.  What a cutie you've got 

Judy - we operate here on about 11-12 hours of nighttime sleep and 2-3 hours of napping during the day. 

Jo - So sorry that Fraser is sick again - poor little guy - and poor mom to have to deal with it 

Andrea - Katie sometimes gets super grumpy too in that long stretch between 3:30 and 7:30 - she'll only stay awake that long if she's had to 1.5 hour naps during the day - I tend to shuffle her around from one thing to the next to keep her interested, or we'll sit outside or go for a walk.  She's always been pretty stubborn about when she will/won't sleep so if I take her out in the stroller and she doesn't want to sleep, she won't.  Sometimes if she really does need the sleep I'll drive her somewhere just to get her to close her eyes for 10 minutes or so which is enough to keep her going.  I generally just have to get her to 7 because once I start getting her ready for bed, she tends to stop being cranky.  On good days, her dad is home around 6 too, so he plays with her and keeps her happy. 

Richelle - What I have figured out is that the #1 foods are a bit more pureed and are the single foods (just carrots, apples, etc).  The #2 are sometimes mixed (apples and pears) so you want to wait with them until you have tried all the #1s to make sure of no allergies.  (At least that's what it says on the Gerber website).  I think you're supposed to hold off on meat for awhile too.  (Not sure until when.)

Andrea again - about solids - we started with rice cereal and then moved to fruits (bananas, pears, prunes, and apples) and are now working on vegetables (sweet potatoes and squash so far).  I have Super Baby Food, though I haven't quite worked up the nerve to try making it myself just yet.  Strange that I feed more secure giving her the stuff in jars.  I feed her twice a day, once about an hour after her morning feed and then again at 5:30.  She's really only mildly interested in breakfast, doesn't take much.  At night I can get her to eat a good amount - especially if apples or prunes are involved.  I haven't given bananas much because she seemed a bit constipated.  We've also moved on to oat cereal instead of rice too, so that seemed to straighten things out in the pooping department. 

Have to run - Katie's about to pass out on the floor. 
-Erin