ILX Parenting 5: I'm a big kid now

Yeah there's no evidence of the "good for their lungs" thing. However, I think Dr. Sears is also a bit misleading and unreasonable on crying, because he kind of makes it sound like crying always corresponds to a specific, meetable need and as long as you respond, there won't be much crying. That's not true with K around bedtime (we tried everything), and she's generally a pretty calm baby. Or at least, her "need" is to sleep, and she has trouble doing it, and we can't always make it happen.

"it is harmful to prop a baby up too young"

I've not heard that it's harmful, but I think the idea is that you kid will learn to prop themselves up faster if you aren't doing it for them.

The crying thing is tricky, because crying is not "good", but it's also not always "bad" either (and as your child gets old they'll cry for different reasons a lot of which you can't or probably don't necessarily want to help).

I would go out btw, even if your mom let's her cry for two whole hours (which is pretty unlikely since your mom is not a monster and babies aren't that persistent) it's not going to cause some crazy long term trauma or anything. See your friends, relax, and when you come back you'll still have a needy baby.

write your mom a ten page guide to taking care of babby. it'll make you feel better when you go out and everyone can get a good laugh about it afterward

As the baby gets older you also may see more self-awareness about crying, and you'll also notice and become sensitive to different kinds of cries. One thing I find amazing is that K has a specific cry, almost a word, for "I want milk" that she does when she's first hungry (or sometimes just when she wants the comfort of mom and isn't hungry), and it sounds almost like "lait". OTOH there are some cries I haven't figured out. I attribute most of them to "I'm tired but can't fall asleep" and hope I am right.

well we're getting into the toddler zone for sure - seeing a lot more sudden tantrums (usually related to being tired or hungry or not wanting to wear a diaper but also just occasional random tantrums). objectively i know it's normal - evie's also dealing with changes, like finally being bottle-weaned and going to day care - but it's hard not to worry about it too, like we're doing something wrong. yesterday was the first time i took her to day care and she cried when i tried to leave - i think the novelty has worn off and she's realized it's something that's going to be happening regularly. also she wants to eat all the time, which we're trying to figure out what to do about - don't want her to be hungry but she really does want to eat constantly it seems like. i think this is related to the bottle-weaning - she was used to getting bottles of whole milk through the day, now she's missing those calories. hopefully we'll get her on a more regular eating schedule.

Raising my sweet Lil' Bee, I'd see pictures on the Internet of shit smeared on the walls and wonder Who in the hell would have kids that do this?

No shit on the walls yet, but my dear son is now in the habit of stripping off his diaper and running around naked with a mud butt. Boys are awful.

haha, yikes!

yeah we're at the point where tantrums seem to be the default mode of expression for sylvie. she can just turn it on! just need to be patient with it, i guess, try not to get too frustrated. difficult though!

we've avoided any massive diaper issues so far but she has reached in her diaper and grabbed shit out a couple of times

it is funny how fast the tantrums come and go. she was pissed this morning because i made her wear a diaper and she ran in her room and was screaming and crying and then it got quiet and she came out wearing her little backpack and smiling

The other morning K woke up in her co-sleeper, stared straight up at me with the sweetest eyes and then pooped extremely loudly.

Dalton's also started the tantrums which is also coinciding with my wife weaning him from the boob so he's got plenty more to be frustrated about. We've got a vacation to Portland coming up and I'm actually kinda concerned how it's going to work since it'll be the first where he's not going to be able breast feed on demand at night... I'll probably be putting him down but we cosleep on vacations so if he wakes in the night it may get awkward.

Hammer's biggest tantrums come when we tell him that the pantry isn't his personal tree house.

even though having a potty-trained kid brings its own weird baggage (like having to visit very single restaurant/park/attraction restroom multiple times each visit), i am SO GLAD to be done with diapers.

August has this shirt, it's a soft all cotton long shirt that buttons and Tera and I both think it's her favorite shirt. She always goes straight to sleep in it and sleeps well with it on. Is it possible that a 7 week old baby can prefer a certain shirt over others?

If it's softer or texturally different, I think it's totally possible. I doubt it's for aesthetic reasons though, although who knows.

Happy Pappy Day to all Dads!

J. shaved his beard just about off last night and had been worried about August recognizing him ever since. Honestly, it didn't seem to phase her.

well not forming memories prob helps

They have facial recognition per National Geographic the Science of babies :) just watched that today.

Yeah but I think babies recognize their parents by other means too. OTOH when I was 3-4 and my dad briefly shaved his beard it totally freaked me out.

i think its episodic memory that develops later but I did LOL

Madolin Lucille Smith was born at 326pm yesterday, weighing 7lbs, 7oz, and 21 inches long. Despite a difficult delivery, including an emergency c-section, mom and little girl are both healthy. She is absolutely perfect.

congratz!

yayyyyyyyyy

mazel tov!

She is absolutely perfect

:-)

congratulations ..

congratulations!!!!!!

congrats! and beautiful name!

awww congrats!!

congrats!

my parenting observation of the day: it is amazing how many different ways a two and a half year old can hurt herself while sitting at the breakfast table.

tylerw : thank you. first lol i have had in a long long time.

[of course i'm not lol'ing at the distress of the child, just the sheer chaos that feeing a young'un induces, and the scope of panic it creates in parents - oh, and how i wish i could confirm it gets easier .. ]

haha, yeah. she didn't do any serious damage, it was just amazing how many times she bumped her head, bit her lip, poked her leg with a fork, got her legs caught in ... something i don't even know what. maybe we have a genius physical comedian on our hands here. maybe.

maybe we have a genius physical comedian on our hands here. maybe

most kids @ that age are "geniune physical comedians".

the hard part is stopping yourself from laughing out loud.

[wait until she swears .. i.e. copying you/mum .. its a massive 'oh oh .. ' moment that never failed to make me bite my lips hard]

Beeps responds with "What the hell?" to so many incredulous situations that we're just content in knowing at least it's not WTF she picked up from us.

K is already teething, and one of the bizarre things she has started doing as a result is trying to get the cloth of her sleep sack into her mouth by putting her legs all the way over her head.

Beeps responds with "What the hell?" to so many incredulous situations that we're just content in knowing at least it's not WTF she picked up from us.

hahah .. tis only a matter of time.

and then comes the whole : 'thats a word for adults' era.

or am i the only f&cker who still swears now that i'm a parent

[note : i very rarely swear directly to the kids, its only in passing when something is crap on tv/driving etc]

oh and teething .. :(

all that mouth slobber and fingers applying gel etc ..

good luck with that hurting.

hopefully it doesn't last too long.

I've got it from both angles - I've got the dramatist learning her lines by listening to me and her mother.

Then I've got the scientist - observing, observing, observing - and figuring out in his two-year-old mind how to disable the child locks on the Honda's door.

With Sarah, we basically said "you can say whatever cusswords you hear us say," and tried to keep it clean around her until her late teens. At that point she was doing a lot of writing and was figuring out where coarseness had value and where it didn't, so we loosened up and now we all basically cuss like a bunch of Bukowskis.

phew.
at least i am not alone.
this new world of puritanical excess makes me feel like i am one loose mouthed mofo if i happen to slip in a 'bloody this, bloody that', whereas in reality i am not like that at all when the lads are within earshot.
i think you are spot on re its all about the value of the word and its useage.

With Sarah, we basically said "you can say whatever cusswords you hear us say," and tried to keep it clean around her until her late teens. At that point she was doing a lot of writing and was figuring out where coarseness had value and where it didn't, so we loosened up and now we all basically cuss like a bunch of Bukowskis.

― Biff Wellington (WmC), Thursday, June 21, 2012 4:30 PM (5 hours ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

this was my experience, minus the explicit license to swear (though it was tacitly given, like a lot of other things...which of course made both my sister and i downright puritanical in adolescence). dropping an f-bomb around my parents for the first time and having it go unremarked was like asking to borrow the car and getting a 'sure nbd'. which probably says something o_O about my upbringing but w/e

congrats BLAM! how exciting!

propriety!

xp

Yeah, I had a similar experience to Evan which is probably why I have a mouth like a sailor now but I guess the important thing is that I know when it is and is not appropriate so it's not like I walk around saying "fuck" at work all the time or something.

BLAM - awesome :)

At age five or thereabouts, Alice used to say "What the ..." a lot (that's not censored there, she'd pronounce it "What-the")

Eventually, we had to tell her to stop, it was always funny but it did sound like she was stopping herself from using the f word.

I can recall she almost let one slip one time.

Mum: "Clubs"
Alice: "Oh F..(GMPF!)"

all that mouth slobber and fingers applying gel etc ..

hopefully not benzocaine?

this was my experience, minus the explicit license to swear (though it was tacitly given, like a lot of other things...which of course made both my sister and i downright puritanical in adolescence). dropping an f-bomb around my parents for the first time and having it go unremarked was like asking to borrow the car and getting a 'sure nbd'. which probably says something o_O about my upbringing but w/e

― catbus otm (gbx), Thursday, June 21, 2012 10:11 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

This was pretty much my exact experience and i remember having a negative, almost physical, response to saying 'shit' among friends. Now I swear like a sailor but I have a finely tuned mental censor which turns my output PG around certain people and in certain places without having to consciously restrain myself.
Unfortunately this doesn't work around the kids and I'm starting to feel pretty bad about what they are taking in.

My wife and I have no self-control about swearing in front of the kids. He's allowed to swear, except in certain company, but he does it way less than we do. We discourage him from swearing around my parents, who use cusswords on very rare occasions, but secretly encourage him to swear in front of his cousins, whose parents swear in adult company but not around their children. Lisa and I will swear in front of BOTH her sister and the kids specifically to get lectured about "appropriate language in front of the children" and then blow her off. This is probably terrible of us, but we don't really mean any harm.