Parent Extremis

There are an interesting variety of watch-dog type sites that comes to mind when I think of all the times that we, as parents would appreciate an extra eye on our children. Nannycams and hidden cameras are all too common inside our homes, but what happens when the nanny goes for a walk? Does she cross streets safely while pushing your child’s stroller? Does she demonstrate extreme and laudable safety? How do you know?

1. A new site, How’s My Nanny (Howsmynanny.com) gives each person who signs up a mini-license place to put on their stroller. If you see one on a stroller you can report praise or problems, anonymously, and the parent is notified via an email.

2. Parent Pager. The parent pager is a device that comes in two pieces, one is attached to the child, and the base to the parent. If the child wanders beyond fifteen feet of the parent’s device an alarm sounds notifying the parent. Also similar is the GOTCHA, sold online for $59.99.

3. Nanny-Cams. There is a website, Know Your Nanny that sells a plehtora of hidden cameras and accessories all of which help you to spy on your nanny. I’m not going to delve into the shark-infested waters of controversy on this one but suffice to say, a little spying is okay, to ensure peace of mind and safety of the kids and all that … but undisclosed taping can be illegal in many states and also violates a certain trust you should have with anyone watching over your children. So, use wisely. Many parents choose to tell their nanny that they are recording or recording in one room, also so that they can watch their children when they are away. I highly suggest you read THIS before opting for any home surveillance system.

Julia wrote about vaccinations awhile back and she basically said everything that I felt. So perhaps you can just go read her posting and then we’ll be done? Oh… you actually want me to put actual words here? In this space? Oh. Alrighty then.

Wow. I never should have attempted such an often times controversial subject this early on a Monday, but my goal isn’t to say what I feel is right or even try to sway anyone to vaccinate or not to vaccinate. Ultimately, it is a personal decision. I will say that the arguments are in favor of vaccines as they are overwhelmingly safe. The public health defense being is at the top of PRO list, as is personal health. It is much better to let your child get a short-run, controlled fever than say, a case of the Mumps. There was an outbreak of the Mumps in 2006 which was a real reminder that we have let our guard down in terms of diseases once thought to be eradicated, or at least, totally off of our radar.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) have a very extensive web page detailing recommended vaccine schedules and a chart that suggests how to catch up when vaccines have been missed or skipped for whatever reason.

The biggest vaccine controversy today is a concern that vaccines have contributed to the rise in Autism rates. However, there is no proven link. In the past two decades the number of available vaccines has grown quite a bit, and coincidentally, so have the rates in diagnosed Autism. At this point, this is really is a coincidence, there is no proven scientific research demonstrating any link.

It is difficult to watch your babies getting shots but it is ultimately better to have the sting of the shot than the disease it is preventing. Some pediatricians recommend a delayed vaccine schedule for babies who were born prematurely or who have stronger reactions to the shots. This option should be discussed with your pediatrician if you think it would benefit your child.

Four new flavors of Stage Two/Second Foods dinner are now available from Earth’s Best Organic. New flavors include the following: Beef, Carrots and Corn Country Dinner, Chicken and Brown Rice Country Dinner, Chicken Tomato Pastina Country Dinner and Harvest Squash Turkey Dinner. All the dinners are 100% organic.

They also make organic formula and a soy-option is available too. You can purchase these items anywhere that baby food is sold. Also, visit the Earth’s Best website for direct purchase information.

So far I have fed Noah almost exclusively organic foods from Earth’s Best. I like their variety of flavors and foods. The website is very useful and full of nutritional information as well as general baby-health and baby-eating advice too. Each foods nutritional and allergy facts are also located easily on the website.

In the wake of a recent tragedy, a friend of a friend just lost a baby, an 18-month-old baby who drowned in a hot tub, I think it is important that we all take a minute and read over some good tips to keep our kids safe around water, specifically, pools. It’s summer time and we all want to take a dip to cool off. Young children and babies have no concept of the dangers of water and also, the double edged sword is that they are fascinated by water and can get away from us and out of sight in the blink of an eye.

The American Academy of Pediatrics makes the following statement:

A swimming pool can be very dangerous for children. If possible, do not put a swimming pool in your yard until your children are older than 5 years. Help protect your children from drowning by doing the following:

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Never leave your children alone in or near the pool, even for a moment. An adult who knows CPR should actively supervise children at all times.
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Practice touch supervision with children younger than 5 years. This means that the adult is within an arm’s length of the child at all times.
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You must put up a fence to separate your house from the pool. Most young children who drown in pools wander out of the house and fall into the pool. Install a fence at least 4 feet high around all 4 sides of the pool. This fence will completely separate the pool from the house and play area of the yard. Use gates that self-close and self-latch, with latches higher than your children’s reach.
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Keep rescue equipment (such as a shepherd’s hook or life preserver) and a telephone by the pool.
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Do not use air-filled “swimming aids” as a substitute for approved life vests.
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Remove all toys from the pool after use so children aren’t tempted to reach for them.
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After the children are done swimming, secure the pool so they can’t get back into it.
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A power safety cover that meets the standards of the American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) may add to the protection of your children but should not be used in place of the fence between your house and the pool. Even fencing around your pool and using a power safety cover will not prevent all drownings.

Remember, teaching your child how to swim DOES NOT mean your child is safe in water.

Red Cross Water Safety
Also, the American Red Cross makes the following recommendations for HOME POOLS:

We had some friends over for dinner last night and I was busy running around grilling steak and pork chops and pouring my pasta salads into serving platters and setting the table that I asked my friend to feed the baby. Who doesn’t jump at the chance to feed a little cute cherub like mine?

I made a little bowl of rice cereal and put a spoonful of pureed edamame in it, opened a jar of babyfood peaches and finished off a jar of Spinach & Potato. Noah ate it all. Go figure. He does love his vegetables.

So far he has eaten with success (well, he hasn’t NOT liked anything, so it’s all been successful, I suppose) the following:
Baby Food Peas, Green Beans, Carrots, Sweet Potatoes, Winter Squash, Pears, Apples, Bananas and Prunes.

I have made him pureed organic chicken that I poached in broth, pureed white potatoes, a mixture of pureed bananas and blueberries and spinach. I also steamed and pureed Edamame.

Mah baby loves to eatz zee SPINACH.

AM SUCCESS AS PARENT!!

ALL WILL BE EASY FROM HERE ON.

…

Well … I figure at least until the pureed spinach comes out the other end.

For the most part I have fed him almost 100% organic food thus far. It really isn’t feasible to live 100% organically, at least not when you live in the suburbs of Washington, DC and don’t have a garden or year-round Farmer’s Market or a cat that sheds dollar bills instead of hair. But, I am trying to be open-minded and give him the best start I think possible. Giving him organic baby foods help to eliminate a small amount of the toxins that we get from our environment. So, if I can give him a little head start on the poison collecting, I think that’s a good thing. Now, if only I’d stop eating my mom’s Velveeta Cheese Dip, ’cause it’s not like my breast milk is organic with that shit in my body.

Prior to each well-child check-up I have to do an online survey question thingy about my son that gets sent to the doctor prior to our appointment. It asks questions about his development, motor skills, language skills, and all kinds of confusing questions about whether or not he reached for the poopy-diaper that I left too close to him with three fingers or all five.

I don’t believe in viewing the milestones as expectations that should happen at one particular time, but rather, as long as you see varied improvement and increasing developmental skills in a variety of areas, then you are on a good developmental track.

According to Your Baby Today by the time your baby reaches the six month mark, he or she should be on their way to doing the following, if not doing them already. These guidelines apply to full-term babies only. If your baby was born prematurely, you should expect to see these milestones reached based upon your baby’s adjusted age. A preemie’s development is calculated based on their due date, not their actual birth date, which is the adjusted age.

The average six month old should be able to sit up on their own; rock and pivot on their stomach, roll from back to stomach and stomach to back (NOTE: Noah first rolled from stomach to back then he forgot how and would get stuck on his stomach and cry out for me until last week when he remembered that he can roll onto his back by pushing up and leaning over. Silly boy.) Doctors will often ask about their dexterity, specifically, how many fingers they use and if they are scratching and digging their fingers and toes into the floor to reach for toys. Some charts include the skill of eating a cracker but many doctors advise against introducing foods until the six month mark, so if you are still just trying out rice cereal and baby food peas and bananas, don’t stress on this one.

By six months of age your baby should have doubled their body weight, if not more, ahem! tripled! … and then some!

By this time a baby will start saying vowel-consonant combinations which frequently come out as VERY high pitched screams, often, dangerously close to your ear. They start expressing fussiness when you take a toy away and they will reach for it if it is too far from their reach.

For a more inclusive and in-depth list of milestones, click here to read what BabyCenter says, or ask your pediatrician.

My baby. He turns SIX MONTHS OLD in two days.

More tomorrow about the typical six month milestones, what to expect, look forward to, dread … and much more.

Summer over at The Attached Mother wrote a great piece about unassisted home birth. It isn’t for me, especially after I had an intervention-intense first labor due to some complications beyond my control, but for the right mother with a healthy pregnancy, it sounds incredibly empowering and exciting.

Just a few days ago when I wrote this entry about keeping your family and kids on a schedule I was trying to work out my own choices of late. But, just a few days later I’m doubting my own words. Today, for example I was was all whiney about how it was a bad day and I was tired and WAH! I had a bad day.

We had a busy weekend and took a trip to a baseball game in Baltimore yesterday for Father’s Day so naturally, I was tired today. Monday is usually a tough day for me; recovering from the weekend, alone again because Marc is back at work, no plans yet for the week but still a long TO-DO list that I am ignoring. And, Noah woke me up a few times last night. There, I established legitimate tiredness. Why do we feel we need to defend ourselves and explain our tired? That’s a whole other entry for sure!

Bad storms were in our afternoon forecast so naturally I used that as an excuse not to go outside for a walk-jog with the dog and the baby. After a long day in the house of not really getting dressed, not showering, and just operating on a three hour cycle of feed baby-change baby-sleep baby-check email-eat a snack-cuddle with baby-watch more television- I grew a little irritable and that led to some anxiety over my lack of ambition to get off my fat ass.

After I put Noah to bed I got to thinking that maybe, maybe trying to keep a tighter schedule might do me good. It might allow me to have the exercise time I know that I need. It might actually be better for me to eat at certain times of the day rather than when I get hungry and risk skipping meals and having a lunch that involves dipping the spoon into the peanut butter jar and then covering that heap of delicious nutty smoothness with healthy raisins (WHAT? They are high in iron).

NEW GOAL: Get on a damn schedule. Don’t stress it just try to find some natural rhythm to the day and possibly even get a shower and exercise, but not in that order.

How scheduled are you with your kids and home life schedule? I’ve met mothers who have their kids on a very tight schedule where they wake at the same minute each day, eat meals within minutes of the same time each day, ditto on naps, outings and playtime.

FACT: Children do function extremely well on a schedule. When they are learning to understand their world and many things are uncertain a schedule can bring comfort because it means there is more predictability and therefore, certainty.

I keep a relative schedule with Noah but it isn’t too tense. We don’t get up at the same minute each day, but more like, within an hour of the same time. He takes a nap about two to three hours after he wakes up, so that means maybe ten o’clock but also maybe eleven thirty. I still nurse him whenever it seems convenient for me and necessary for him. So, eating isn’t really scheduled at all with the exception of morning time, he nurses first thing in the morning and last thing at night before bed. He does nurse in between a few times and also has a small meal of cereal and some baby food vegetable.

I think I can afford the luxury of unpredictable days because I’m not working outside the house right now but I certainly am trying to get more scheduled, if not for the baby’s comfort for my own. I need to get more sleep because I’m exhausted each day and I need to fit in time for exercise. If I knew Noah was going to nap at the same hour each day I could plan better and use my time more proactively.

Scheduling, it’s a goal.

What about you? How tight are you scheduling your kids? Do you schedule everything or just nap and meal times?

I just got an email from another blogger who has a baby the same age as Noah and after reading one of my postings about finally getting the baby to sleep for a nice long period of time, things are about to hit the fan because it is just about TEETHING time. Can I get a collective sigh of URGH.

I think the baby is starting the whole dreaded teething phase. He drools like a fountain and gnaws excessively on his hand, my hand, my shoulder, the dirty washcloth in the bathtub, you get the idea. His top row of gums have puffed up in the shape of little baby teeth. The bottom hasn’t shown too much action so far.

Babies can start teething as early as three months and some don’t show any signs of teeth appearing at their one year birthday but for most babies, the little nubs start cutting through that soft gum tissue somewhere around seven months of age, just for an average.

Sometimes breastfed babies will start to bite when they are teething. They are not doing it to hurt you, but rather because their gums are sore and biting down feels good but rest assured you can teach them not to bite. Moxie has written a good piece about breastfed biters.

The teething ring pictured at the top of this article is made out of all natural maple wood. It is made in the United States and is free of chemicals, most importantly, lead but also there is no potentially toxic gel inside. It is sold on Amazon.

When your baby starts teething and you want to offer some organic means of gum soothing, consider offering them a washcloth damp with cool water at room temperature or one that has been refrigerated for awhile. The cool sensation will gently and naturally numb their gums. Some babies will take to chewing on a pacifier. Even if the baby hasn’t liked a paci in the past, consider showing them they they can chew on it now. Sippie cup spouts are just about the right size to be chewed on. Overall, just choose something safe and large (READ: NON-CHOKE-ABLE) that your baby likes to chew on. Anything that takes the edge off of their discomfort is a good option.

There are also a hot of over-the-counter medicines including Tylenol and Orajel, a benzocaine-product. It is recommended that you speak with your pediatrician before offering any of these products.

In one of the many, many, many baby sleep books I read that left me doubting** not only myself but also the reliability and validity of the many baby-sleep theories out there I recall a passage saying that a baby will naturally regulate their daytime sleep pattern around the age of five months. And dammit, I think that was right.

Just last week, at the age of five and a half months I finally put Noah down for day-time naps that seemed to last a long time and occur at the same time each day. And he only cried for a few minutes and seemed grateful for the sleep.

In his early weeks I let him nurse and nap in my arms while I caught up on some very important Tivo’d television. But, as he got older and I needed to get some things done I needed him to nap in some sort of baby-holding-device other than myself.

It was only about a month ago that Noah’s wake-up time in the morning seemed to be consistent from day to day. So after waking up and nursing and hanging out in bed while I prayed for a brief nap from him, we get up and come downstairs and he plays while I eat breakfast. By the time I have eaten and cleaned up and checked some email and let the dog out he is cranky and whining for me. Add in a fast calming nursed-feeding and he’s back to sleep. Where he used to sleep on me, I now put him upstairs in his crib and he has slept for anywhere from twenty minutes to two hours.

I’m hoping our consistency develops into the two-hour nap days.

** I still think that many of the baby books out there today are theories based in scare tactics: DO THIS or else you are setting your child up for a lifetime of insomia. Please. Parents are just trying to survive, do we really need to add to our plethora of worries?

In a perfect world I would own three strollers. I would have a Maclaren Triumph umbrella stroller for scooting around the neighborhood and going out to ballgames, the Bugaboo Cameleon for the infant-bassinette piece and the utter mobility and resourcefulness, and a Britax Vigour Travel System BUT I live in the real world with a budget and a sense of self restraint and an understanding of what it means to be a materialistic whore.

I actually have one stroller. And it works just fine. We have the GoGo Babyz Urban Advantage Stroller. I was actually able to wedge my infant carrier into the seat area when Noah was younger and I used it like a travel system, albeit, without the safety and security of pieces that were meant to be used together. I was careful. I love this stroller because it is perfect for tooling around the neighborhood at good exercise-walking speeds. The big wheels do make for a more comfortable ride for the boy. When we go shopping, the under-basket is very sufficient for all my needs and it comes complete with THREE cup holders! Two for the pusher, I figure one for my water - you know for hydration purposes, and one for my Gin, for you know … medicinal purposes.

I have been searching for the perfect umbrella stroller for a few weeks now. I need something light-weight and compact, something easy to clean, easy to get the baby into and out of and with the highest weight limit, because, let’s be realistic, my little boy eats very well and I’d like to get use out of this stroller for a few years.

I had seen a few strollers for about fifty dollars and I was willing to take the plunge until I saw a review in a parenting magazine of the EvenFlo X-Sport Convenience Stroller, retailing for THIRTY DOLLARS. So I just bought that sumbitch right up and it is due on my doorstep in a few days. I’ll review it when I get it. But I’m very excited to have a stroller that I can flick open with one delicate little hand motion.

Noah is taking a nap right now and I just ate lunch and am now sitting at the kitchen counter in utter and total silence watching him on the video monitor.

After feeding him downstairs in front of the television with the dog running around yapping I noticed that he looked tired so I just carried him upstairs and put him in his crib. I turned to close the curtains fully expecting him to wake up and scream about the whole putting-the-baby-down thing and demand a new diaper, another feeding, twenty-bucks for the night, ma! But he didn’t. He opened his eyes just long enough to establish where he was and then he closed them and went back to sleep and that was a whole thirty minutes ago. If past performance is an indicator of future behavior he will be waking up with a scream in about eleven minutes.

But for now, SUCCESS!

Noah’s upset sleep patterns a few weeks ago were due to a period of extreme growth and neurological development. I believe this and I read it in a book too. Since that period of awfulness he has returned to sleeping through the night and he has also mastered, MASTERED I tell ya’ the art of rolling over back-to-front and front-to-back. He’s a little genius!

The book, The Wonder Weeks describes major developmental milestones in a baby’s life and when they occur, approximately. This book doesn’t tell you what to do about them, which is cool because we all know I don’t like being told how to parent. But, by knowing when some major developments are going to occur it prepares you steel yourself for those tough weeks when your baby doesn’t sleep so well or needs more feeding or is just overall clingy and fussy.

EDITED TO ADD: It was more like seven minutes. URGH.

I have always been a big time swimmer. I love the water. My mother had me in a swimming pool when I was about five months old and I honestly believe that the earlier exposure helped me become a strong and confident swimmer. I love swimming as a sport. It is great exercise and because it is an individual sport — even when you are in a relay — it is an individual sport the feeling of moving through the water so sleek-like and strong is extremely transcendental for me. It clears my head and keeps me healthy like no other exercise ever has. Because of my love of the water I want Noah to have the same early exposure. We’re planning on getting him into the pool as soon as the weather and the water are warm enough.

Noah is about four and a half months old right now so by the time pool open and get warm enough for a baby to swim in, as in, NOT 70 degrees, I plan to have Noah in the water as much as possible. He’ll be six months in June so he should fit most of the baby-pool toys in terms of age recommendations.

I’m looking for suggestions about baby swim toys and baby-holders for the pool. I keep seeing a lot of little funky shaped blow-up things with little awnings for the baby under a year of age. We have a pool close by and will be spending a lot of the hot July and August hours in a pool this summer. I would love to get some suggestions or recommendations about what has worked for you in the past. I’m looking for something safe, comfortable and easy to use.