March Mamas 2012 Baby Group (Closed Group)

[emera35]

Waula, my HV is of the, 3 meals and 3 feeds at 6 months camp, so pretty opposite to the advice your friend's were given. To be honest, if they enjoy food and are still gaining, then who cares if they get their nutrition from milk, or food? 2 good feeds could easily supply the 500ml recommended.

I'm offering food 3 times a day and boob 4/5 times, and a bottle of ebm in the evening. Like you, some days F goes for the boob every time, others she has a little go, just for the form of things but doesn't really feed. She looks well and is happy and energetic. That's enough for me! x

 

[crowned]

Hi lads! Glad to see there are still a few on here, although this thread has definitely slowed down a LOT since the inception of the fb page!!

Loo, are you putting D to bed with blankets? There's no way A would keep hers on if I tried, so she sleeps in a sleepsack to avoid that problem. Works perfectly!

 

[lozza1uk]

I need to buy more sleeping bags, his toes are at the end of the 0-6 ones we've got!!

 

[loolindley]

We use a sleeping bag for night time sleeps, but a blanket during the day. Only because during the day we don't always have access to a grobag.

Lozza, good luck today. Nice to see Z is keeping in line with growth regarding sleeping bags

We are on 4 feeds (3 ff one bf) a day, but she's not on 3 meals a day yet. I've been reading through the blw book again and it stresses to give food after milk so they are not hungry. We have been waiting an hour or so which could explain the frustration because iDVD she is a bit hungry and can't get the food in her mouth she'd probably be grumbling over that. Who knows.

She had a crap day yesterday. Was just not happy at all and didn't want to nap, but was so tired she wasn't happy. I had no idea what was up. I hate days like that. Feel like such a crap mum. Today isn't shaping up to be any better as she has been awake since 5.30.

Think we are going to try the sleep training that MsC posted last night. It's a touch more hardcore than what we were doing, but we don't seem to be progressing past the sitting next to her stage where as this way is a bit more no nonsense.

Question. What do you lads class as morning and an acceptable time to get up and out of the cot. D always seems to wake at 6, but in reality, that's not a great time to start the day, especially if she is so tired she needs a nap an hour later. Should I be trying to get her back to sleep at 6ish, or should I just accept that's what time she wants to get up and get up with her?

 

[wondertwins]

Good question, Loo. I wonder the same thing. One or both of the boys frequently get up between 5 and 5:30. Since we need them awake at 6:30, I'm never sure what to do. My rough rule has been, if they wake up crying, that means they need more sleep. Also, I don't feed until after 6. But there are plenty of times where they'll need a nap again by 7 if they're up at 5.

 

[emera35]

I don't let Roh get up before 7am, even if he wakes at 6.45am I send him back to bed. With F though if its 6am or after I'll do her morning feed. She tends to doze then until 7am anyway. Its also very common for them to want their morning nap pretty early. If F wakes properly at 7am she invariably wants to sleep again by 9am. Anything before 6am I consider a night waking and treat it as one.
Don't know why I'm sounding like I have much success though, F still wakes at 11pm and 3am pretty much every night! At least its reasonably predictable I suppose. I guess at some point soon I'll get more hardcore with the 3am wake, as that's the killer really.

 

[lauraclili]

Emera, how do you encourage them to drop the night feeding? Astrid is pretty much insisting on being fed at 11pm and 4am at the moment and nothing else will comfort her.

 

[vitfawifetobe]

Loo - E will wake at 6ish and i give her morning feed then she will go back down for another hour or two ( ive even seen three lol).

Loz - We are the same - so strange as she was soooo tiny when we started using them - our bubbas are growing too fast

L x

 

[emera35]

Laura, I won't stop the night feeds until I'm happy F is eating enough. When she is though (probably a couple of months or so time) I'll hold out from feeding her for half an hour after she wakes for a feed, then 45 mins, then an hour, then an hour 15 mins, etc until the middle of the night feed (approx 3am for us) hits the morning feed. I did something similar with Roh as even though he slept very well (10-4) from about 8 weeks, he didn't drop that 4am feed without persuasion. It can be a week or so of them having a bit of a strop in the night, whilst you hold out, but if you distract them, soothe them any way possible, and even offer some water in a bottle/cup, eventually they get the message that they won't be fed so might as well stay asleep. If it won't work with F then I'll assume she still needs the feed and try again a few weeks later. X

 

[lauraclili]

Thanks. She's demanding food every hour and a half at the moment and I know she can't need that much be ause eats and feeds well during the day... Hmm.. I'm going to have a bit of a think about sleep.

On the plus side she has about three hours napping in the middle of the day today

 

[citymouse]

G has been waking once in the middle of the night, between 12-3 usually, and I just bring her in bed and feed her and go back to sleep... bad mummy! But it makes it so much easier to feed her when she gets hungry around 6--she just grabs the boob and starts eating, lol.

She's been so hungry lately at night--I think because daytime is too distracting--that I haven't even considered dropping the night feed.

In the new house I may start putting her to bed in her own room and then bringing her into our room when she wakes up. Having a baby next to the bed has had what you might call a detrimental effect on Mommy and Daddy's romantic lives... to put it mildly. Let's just say we put the "NT" into "NTNP." More like NTNNFP -- no need for prevention.

(When we do get back, erm, on the wagon, we will be preventing, though.)

 

[citymouse]

Awesome nap, Laura!

 

[wondertwins]

Mouse- I definitely understand the mood-killing effect that having a baby right next to you can be. Baby monitors can be just as bad at times. We've finally had to adapt when our romantic lives occur to ensure maximum sleepiness from the babies, and we turn the monitor down to the very bottom setting. Kinda pathetic. Also (and I shouldn't be admitting this, but it's too funny not to share), DH frequently declares "MVB" (Most Valuable Baby) status for one of the twins. If a baby has the audacity to interrupt mommy/daddy time, he is instantly excluded from MVB status. So far, that hasn't seemed to motivate their behavior.

 

[lauraclili]

Haha wt, that's hilarious!

Sleep training has started here. I feel awful but I know it'll be for the best if it works

 

[lozza1uk]

Laura Ive posted on your other h
Thread but let me know how you get on!

Wt - any chance you can email me your sleep training journal as I couldn't open it on phone and can forward it to DH to print then. Email is first name dot last name @gmail.com.

Mouse, we're also ntnnfp - I find the floorboards between us are a great form of contraception (he's still sleeping in the spare room in the loft)

 

[Sillysmiles]

Lozza - glad to see that Z is healthy, hopefully he takes to eating well and he's ready to start sleeping better after your holiday.

Laura- good luck with the sleep training!

The day D slept in her crib was great, she even started the night in there. Lasted 3 hours. It was a one day deal but nice. DH and I even had some alone time and dtd for the first time, not pleasant really but glad to get it out of the way hopefully next time will hurt less. I am not really pushing the crib because first week in oct. D and I are going to go spend a week with my parents. Taking her on a plane for the first time by myself, a bit nervous. After we get back then we plan to get her to sleep in her crib, or at least nap and start the night there. She still wants to eat at least 2 times a night and I am lazy so I'll probably just bring her to bed when she wakes up.

 

[citymouse]

Lozza & Smiley, glad to know we're not alone. I do think my plan of settling her in own her room will be a good thing on that front... It's not like we're in the room with her at the beginning of the night anyway, so I won't feel guilty about her being alone, especially knowing that I'll swoop in and bring her to our bed when she wakes up.

We had our first projectile vom tonight. I had given her rice cereal and some pumped milk. I'm wondering now if something in the pumped milk didn't agree with her.

After all the experimenting with food eliminations, I have a strong suspicion that beef is a bad one. I happened to notice from my food log that her two best days were days after I didn't have beef. So we'll see!

How long after a vomcano do you wait to feed them again? Hmm...

 

[Josiejo]

I'm sorry I haven't really posted much, I feel ashamed of myself! If it helps, here is James's schedule:

7am - wake and 8 oz hungry formula
9.30am - baby porridge
10am - 11am nap
11.30-12pmish - 8 oz hungry formula
12.30 - 2pm - nap (sometimes will only be an hour)
4pm - 4.30pm - nap (hoping he will kick that at some point)
5pm - dinner (I used heinz powdered dinners atm)
6.30pm - 8-9oz hungry formula

He will then go to sleep from about 7pm till morning (he doesn't wake up at all)

He is in his own cot in the nursery (which he shares with my 19 month old - who incidently wakes up all through the night atm)

Hope this helps with some things xx

 

[Glowstar]

I'm a definite I never get up before 6.00am kinda girl!!! and that is severely pushing it!! I will get up if he really won't settle at all but 9 times out of 10 I can get him to go back to sleep until anytime between 7-8.30am but this morning it was 9.00am

If DH had anything to do with this I routine I think our sleep pattern would be all over the place but I suppose I've been pretty tough from around 12 weeks-ish when he started to sleep for long periods, albeit getting up between 3-4am. Basically I just stopped getting up and that's when we started settling him instead of feeding him. It worked because it only took a few nights and he just stopped waking up.

All these things really do depend on individual babies though. I think I have been truly blessed with a a baby that hardly ever cries It just seems to take a lot to make him properly cry/versus light whinging. I don't think this is down to my parenting skills just his personality.

I feel for all you ladies starting sleep training, I left it far to late with DD2 and ended up doing it much later down the line, like when she could scream MUMMY!!! for hours on end so I do think doing it now although really difficult and emotionally draining is a fab idea. It does go against all your instincts as a Mum though because the first thing you want to do when they cry is pick them up! I would advise roping OH's in for when it gets particularly tough and get out of earshot for a while

 

[lozza1uk]

Glow - I'm sure it is your parenting skills, or third time lucky!!

I suspect I'll be better at letting him
Cry than DH who gets a bit anxious about it. Like last night he was screaming at 3am while I changed a nappy and after a minute i could hear DH yelling something (which I ignored).

Awful night here, partly his cold I think, he sneezed loads! Took from 3.30 to 5.30 to get him to sleep, in the end I gave up and put him in the buggy in the kitchen, pushed him to sleep and left him - lasted til 8am! Had to leave rhyme time after 15 mins as he was exhausted.

More carrot in his poo this morning though, I'm impressed with how much he must have swallowed at his first proper attempt!