Featured Blog Posts – June 2011 Archive (28)

Before your baby…

Dr. Jen answers questions weekly from the 365 Community forums. This week's question is from Erika D. For more parenting advice from Dr. Jen, check out her website or follow her on Twitter.

“Last night my daughter's father and I got in a huge argument over how to discipline our 1 year old. We are not together and were raised…

It’s a good thing kids are durable. I’m often astounded by the resilience of my little guy. In the mere thirteen months of his life, my Jacob has fallen on his head more times than I thought a baby or toddler could take…and countless more than I would like to admit (because that means I didn’t prevent the falls). It occurred to me that infants may not be as fragile as they appear circa his third month, well before I thought he could roll over from his back. Wrong. He rolled right off the bed…

My daughter has always been vibrant and full of spunk. Her personality is beautiful! When she was first born, she would just stare at me with those huge blue eyes and I'd feel the innocent, dependent, full throttle love she had for her Momma, and was overjoyed because that feeling is obviously returned. She never cried unless she wanted something, like a nap or a bottle. She was very straight forward. Happy when she's happy, mad when she's mad, upset when she's upset. Feelings on her sweet…

So, it's been almost 5 months since Katie was born and guess what...I'm drowning in pictures.  Sure, they're all digital...and yep, they're on my computer.  That's the problem.  Most of the pictures I've taken are on my computer.  I don't have any time to upload to facebook or even upload to Walgreen's to order prints!  If I'm not playing with, feeding or just enjoying time with Katie and her Dad, I'm sleeping or working.  Ugh!  Sound familiar?  I'm sure it does.  Here's the worst part--I'm…

   We all know kids grow up too fast, but from some of the things I've seen lately, I think we're giving them no choice, and it's really starting to bug me. First of all, some call them cute, but I don't think toddlers and pre-schoolers need to wear two-piece itsy bitsy teenie-weenie yellow polka dot bikinis. You can say I'm a prude, but I think little girls don't need to show so much skin. If they're showing that much at 3 and 5, what are they going to wear at 13 and 16? With so many pervs…

I got asked THE question again today. I thought I was done with hearing it…well, at least until I had my next baby. Nope. No dice. The answer is still the same: NO, I AM NOT PREGNANT.

I wasn’t one of the lucky ones when it came to losing the post-pregnancy pooch. I have friends who looked exactly like their…

somewhere in between putting cream cheese on my bagel and eating said bagel, tommy made off with the cream cheese. i was too silly/cheap to buy the tub kind, so i'm guessing tommy snagged the foil wrapper and did whatever babies do with things they aren't supposed to have. i didn't notice until much later. i happened to notice it wasn't in the fridge when i was getting a bottle of water or something. i panic when i see it's not on the table either. frenzied, i search the house to no avail.…

for fathers day, i bought my dad the dragon software. my dad is dyslexic so typing is difficult for him, at best. his dream has been to get this dragon software so that he can speak his mind on facebook and to write letters to drug companies and whatnot.

hooray me for making his father's day!

sunday: pawpaw receives dragon.

monday: pawpaw installs dragon. posts on facebook about it and sends me an email thanking me, using the dragon.

tuesday: pawpaw asks to have…

i knew it was bound to happen. i knew even more i'd be able to prevent it.

uh huh.

so tommy's new favorite thing to do is climb the coffee table. somehow, SOMEHOW, the stroller is an effective barricade across the bottom of the stairs. at first, tommy would do this penguin walk up and down the table, too afraid of falling. it's wide enough that he could walk normally, but i took it as a good sign that he was showing fear of falling. i made sure to monitor his strolls. then he…

It's been more than three months since a massive earthquake and tsunami hit Japan - so long, you've probably forgotten the Japanese families who are still trying to rebuild their lives. Not so the 56 top food bloggers and cookbook writers who've been busy making a…

"How do you know when it’s time to adjust your baby's eating schedule, and what you should switch to? My daughter is 8 1/2 months old. She usually eats a solid +7oz bottle in the morning and again at noon, a 6 oz bottle at 4pm, then a solid +7oz bottle for dinner. But lately she's not very interested in her bottle. I think it's partly because she likes to look around and explore, and eating her bottle bores her and takes too much time. Most of the time I just put her on the floor…

This weekend we made the 2 1/2 hour trip to my husband's family to spend a few days (Thursday through Sunday). This was the first time we have gone anywhere while using cloth diapers. It went pretty well, but I am a doofus. I forgot his cloth diaper detergent at home. One rule of cloth diapering - never EVER use anything but the cloth diaper detergent. It can build up in the diapers and cause problems. But what was I to do? I was not about to wash diapers without something to get rid of the…

perspective.

i guess i thought that other peoples' babies just sat there. basing it on an actual experience, of course. i went to dinner with a friend i'd met through the la leche league meeting i'd gone to back when i was convinced tommy was going to die because i was too much of a moron to figure out breast feeding. it was the second time tommy had screamed his lungs out during a car ride and my nerves were already shot because i couldn't find the house the meeting was in(insert…

it's 12:41 am and i can't sleep because tommy's still in the packnplay. until he wakes to nurse, i just can't sleep.

i am hungry.

i was wondering why i never have snacks handy in here.

if it comes in a wrapper, tommy will hear me open it.

if i have to bite it, he will hear me chomp.

if i have to chew it, he will hear it.

if it has any scent, tommy will smell it.

if i so much as LOOK at something with the intent to eat it, tommy…

Okay, so I keep posting blogs about cloth diapering, but it is something that I feel is worth informing others about. I know I had/have a lot of questions about cloth diapering and I figure others out there do, too. I was also asked to keep blogging about my experiences with cloth diapering and I am more than happy to do this! As I am still learning, it will be like an adventure to learn new things about cloth diapering and post them. Here are a few questions that Kia gave me to get me…

One of my favorite times of the day is the middle of the night. Like clockwork, around 3:30 every morning, I wake to tiny hands on my waist and the sweet voice of my 11-month-old son singing “mamamama.” From my side, I turn toward him slowly in my bed without knocking him down—these days I wake to him…

I'm wondering if anyone else has potty trained @ or around 18 months old. My son started telling me @ 16 months that he had "pooh pooh." He would pull on the back of his diaper as he said it. Well, he’s almost 19 months and he's still doing it. I don't have a potty chair as of yet, but am really considering purchasing one. He tells me every time he goes and I think it's really starting to bother him. I have never potty trained this young - my other son didn't potty train until 3 ½.…