My Baby Crazy Life: November 2012

Saturday, 24 November 2012

Rant: Guide dogs

Since I was 16, I have volunteered with weekend workshops for parents of blind children and I've made a lot of friends who are visually impaired as well. I have many of those friends on my facebook and I often read posts about funny things or issues that they deal with because of being blind. It's quite frustrating to me as someone who knows a lot of people who are blind and works with people who are blind to have other sighted people think that guide dogs are the solution to being able to get around safely. It's a huge commitment for the owner of the dog (not all people like dogs too). Some people just prefer to use the cane anyways. Also, in order for someone to get a guide dog, they have to be able to get around with a cane WELL, so if they have trouble with a cane, a dog won't fix it because they wouldn't be able to get a dog...

Night time

Well, Carlo has slept through the night for the last few nights! He has averaged 6-8 hours over the last 5 days. He'll wake up between 5 and 5:30 most mornings now. 5:30 is when DH's alarm goes off and DH will change him and bring him back to me. I love my good sleeper!

He's also getting better at self soothing too. If he finishes eating before he falls asleep I put him in his bed and he will wiggle and coo for a while before falling asleep. Usually I'll continue watching tv while he falls asleep just so that if he gets grumpy, I'm awake and ready to pick him up so he doesn't wake DH.

Today we had a nap in the middle of the day. He fell asleep on the boob and I took him to bed, put a swaddle on him and put him down in his bed. He talked a bit but eventually fell asleep. We were in the bedroom for 2 hours... It was heavenly!

Wednesday, 14 November 2012

1 month old

1 month stats:

Weight: 11lbs
Length: 22 inches

Clothing Size: 3 months

Diaper Size: 1

Sleeps 4-6 hour stretches

Firsts: well, this month, everything he did was a first

These included (doesn't include everything of course):

first movie
first thanksgiving
first outing (local touristy gardens)
first cloth diaper (didn't last long because he got rashes)
first smile
first giggle
first shower and bath in the big tub
(my dad loves to share this piece of info so I had to include it here) first spit up on grampa... lol

He smiles a lot more now and giggles and squeals at us when we talk to him. He loves to talk to his gramma and always has smiles for her. He loves to talk and smile at his daddy after bath time (every other day). I often walk into to bedroom to find them lying on the bed talking to each other. It's so cute when DH talks to him in German. He has started grabbing things and bringing them to his mouth to chew on when he is hungry.

After battling rash after rash since he was born with only a few days in between in cloth, Carlo was fighting yeast. We're still using disposable diapers but hope to use his cloth starting after his doctor appointment on monday.

Sunday, 11 November 2012

Dreams

Had a dream the other night that someone made fun of my leg hair... It was terrible. We're talking a WHOLE room of people started laughing at me... I need to shave! But I need TIME to shave. Legs are just so time consuming!

Thursday, 8 November 2012

Things I've learned

you can plan all you want, but sometimes wrenches get thrown in your plans... we've been fighting rash after rash with Carlo. we figured out the problem with the first two rashes but right now he has a yeast rash which takes time and antibiotic cream to get rid of... our plan was to use cloth diapers and not buy any disposables. so far we've bought 2 packages and used other packages that were given to us. we'll be in cloth soon!
it takes at least 30 minutes for me to get out of the house now
just because you don't have sensitive skin, doesn't mean your baby won't... rash #1 caused by disposable wipes. rash #2 caused by prefolds (keep the moisture at the baby's bum). Carlo was sensitive to being wet so we need to use diapers that wick the moisture away or fleece liners. We are using Pampers Sensitive wipes right now (can't use the cloth wipes because of yeast) and those seem to work for him.
sometimes you can be surprised... as soon as my milk came in, Carlo was sleeping 4 hours straight at night... then all of a sudden he's had a few 6.5 hour stretches! it's amazing. He's a great sleeper
my boob is out a lot more at home than while we're out... Carlo eats a lot less while we're out and about. He often naps in his stroller or carseat and basically eats every 2 hours. At home he eats every 1-2 hours but more often 1-1.5 hours.
babies eat a lot... all the time... especially during growth spurts. It was almost useless to put my boob away for the first 3 weeks. He would eat and then root to eat some more after falling asleep...
the newborn cry is so adorable it makes me smile
you really do get used to their noises... Carlo has a grunt and groan he does while eating that means he's got a burp that needs to come out
bottle feeding a breastfed baby isn't easy... he doesn't understand how to use the bottle
their startle reflex is so so so cute!
some babies are noisy eaters and it's kind of embarrassing in a quiet room!
the hungry fish lip face he makes is the most adorable thing to see when he's half asleep
it's very easy to keep him quiet at night... he grunts and groans as he wakes up and I can get him before he's totally awake and give him boob. he rarely cries at night unless he's mad at me for taking him off to burp him
nursing without a cover isn't hard... I don't want to show the world my nipple/boob, nor am I a person who feels confident about her body. I pushed myself to be comfortable with nursing without a cover because it's normal and it's me doing my part to make the world realize that breasts aren't always about sex. I have not been confronted by anyone about it yet and the guys my age that we hang out with seem to be comfortable enough to look me in the eyes and talk to me while I'm nursing. It's still weird for me, but it's getting easier.

Wednesday, 7 November 2012

Early routines and Carlo's schedule

With Carlo being as young as he is, he is unable to fall into adult made routines for sleeping and eating (though I will never put him on a schedule for nursing). Here are the routines and schedules that we're following.

Nurse on demand all day and night. I do not schedule his nursings. He eats when he's hungry. When people schedule out feedings because a Dr or nurse tells them that "a ___ month old should only be eating every ___ hours," you risk having your baby gained weight slower than he should or even risk him losing weight. This is especially true with nursing. Baby might only take a small amount of milk at each feeding and nurse more often. He may need the nursings... ESPECIALLY while in a growth spurt. Carlo went through a growth spurt for about 2.5 weeks straight. He would nurse at LEAST every hour and sometimes a couple times an hour. It was rough, but he's calmed down to 1-2 hours now and usually goes about 2 hours if we're out of the house.

Bath or shower everyday at 8 pm. He has a bath with me and gets a full wash down. He loves the bathtub and floating! After his bath, I get to shower and DH takes him to get him ready for bed. He showers with DH and gets his boy parts washed. When that's done, I get him ready for bed and DH gets a shower. This routine ensures that Carlo gets exposed to water daily (on his ears, face, etc) and hopefully will not grow to be scared of water.

No nap schedule. He falls asleep when he's tired, often on a person...

Carlo has fallen into a bedtime routine all on his own. Usually right after he's done his bath, he will nurse a couple times before 9 pm. Around 9 pm he wants to nurse non stop for about 30 minutes to an hour. If he falls asleep too early, I will change his diaper or swaddle him to try wake him. He's usually asleep anywhere between 9:45 and 10:30.

His night nursing routine usually has him up about twice a night. He sleeps for about 5 hours (but always between 4 and 6.5 hours so far) before waking to eat for about 15-30 minutes. This puts his feeding between 2 am and 4:30 am. His 2nd feeding is about 2-3 hours later. I can usually nurse him back to sleep again after his second feeding but by that time, DH is up getting ready for work or already gone to work, so it's not really night time anymore lol. If I get him back to sleep after that, he usually goes about an hour before being up to eat again.

House Routine Changes:

Dishes don't get done at night after dinner. They get done mostly by DH in the morning and if I'm able to put Carlo down in the day time, I'll do what's left.
DH cooks dinner while I nurse Carlo. This means that usually I end up being ABLE to eat my dinner without being interrupted by a baby wanting to nurse. Even if Carlo doesn't act like he wants to eat, he often will eat when offered.
Baby laundry gets done when needed. Adult laundry sometimes gets thrown in the washer if I have time while doing baby laundry, otherwise DH or I will do it on the weekend like we did before.
Yeah... haven't vacuumed in a LONGGGG time lol. I vacuumed Carlo's room because the dog hair was driving me nuts (and carpet is much easier for me than laminate flooring which is in the rest of the house).