Hellobee Boards

@krsmall: Thanks so much. I know rationally that even if I decided not to pump, that decision would be just fine, too. I think that so much of the stress from BF comes from the fact that Tyler was low birth weight (5 lb 5 oz) even though he's now up to almost 8 pounds I still get nervous he is going to fall behind together. I'm glad Brennan is doing so well! I should send you some of Tyler's preemie clothes to hold Brennan over for the next few weeks : )

@winniebee: That's how my EASY got messed up: because he was sleepy. When he woke and did E, then I tried for A, but he went right back to S. I think EASY is a great aim, as I've noticed that he eats so well when we manage it.

@MsMini: And maybe Nico didn't grow very much longer because he cheated on his first length measurement with his giant conehead!

@cvbee: Question for you... when you're doing your bicycle legs, does your LO spit up much? It seems everytime I do them, she ends up spitting up more than she farts. This morning she spit up right into her eye

@cvbee: Nice! I bet you feel rested today!

@LAGS: Fantastic job on the weight loss! Smart idea about the bella band. My muffin top is disgusting. We're only up to a couple months pp, and it will soon go away ;). I won't miss the code orange alerts that we've been having everyday. If I don't get out for a walk by 9am or past 8pm, then it is too hot to do so. I need to plan better and get us out the door right after his am feed so we can at least plan for a couple of walks a day!

Thankfully, it wasn't an ear infection! My ear popped shortly after I woke up and I started to feel back to normal by the afternoon. The day before sucked though. Not gonna lie!

He started sleeping 8-10 hours a night out of nowhere last week. I really hope that everyone's LO's start to sleep! We all need our sleep!

So all of this time, I was having issues with bf'ing. It seems to be improving. I am having better luck with it than bottle feeding the past couple of days. He hasn't spit up a single bf'ing session whereas he has spit up every single bottle feeding session.

How often are you lo's smiling? Mine smiles, but barely these days! He seems to spend the majority of his time sleeping then fussing for more food. I love those open mouth smiles. They melt my heart.

its been forever, since I've caught up on here! reading back through the thread, its amazing to think all of us were preggers on here just a short while ago and so much has changed! Lily will be 2 months tomorrow! i feel like over the past week she has just blossomed, and is smiling all of the time, so much more alert and is chatting with us! such a fun new bonding experience! We have not yet made a ton of progress on the sleep front however Lily sill only sleeps 1, 3-4 hour stretch per night and then she is up and down every 30 minutes to an hour until about 6:30 a.m. when she will sleep with me in bed for about 2 hours. She is in her crib now, but I am ending up having to sleep in her room on an air matress because she is up so often. Hopefully it will get better soon, but i'm somewhat convinced that I just have a light sleeper on my hands, because none of her naps are great either, unless she is sleeping on me. Also on the topic of DTD, is anyone having pain? I was cleared to get back into the act at 5 1/2 weeks, but since hubby and I have not been able to do it even once, because I have such excruciating pain! I start to sweat it is so painful! we're able to do other fun stuff, but it's getting old! I put a call into the doc. today, but am waiting to hear back. Just wondering if anyone else is having pain...
Anyways, love seeing pictures and hearing about these growing little ones

@marriedandlovingit: The open mouth smiles are indeed the best. Make sure you catch at least one good one on camera. I post a photo with an update to Facebook every day (all my fam is far away and they insist on pics....if I miss a day they will start asking!). So normally I get a few comments, but the day I posted an open-smile photo for the first time I got soooooooooo many 'likes' and comments. But even though Nico smiles, he doesn't do it many times a day. His best window of smiles is when I talk to him when he first wakes up from a nap, and also sometimes strangers talking to him will turn on the smiles too. Now I feel obligated to make him smile for every photo, but I am trying to fight that urge because I don't want to be like that.

@MsMini: Nico is having conversations with me too, but not during breastfeeding. That is really cute that Sawyer does that! And Nico is definitely not into standing yet. Sawyer sounds so strong. Does he like tummy time? Nico is only getting strong in his arms lately. Actually, last night he broke out from his swaddle, so the 2nd time I put him down I switched to the 'really strong velcro' swaddler. I was amazed to see in the morning that he had broken out of that one too!

As I am typing all of this I am trying to teach Nico how to fall asleep for his nap somewhere other than the wrap carrier. I think it might be working. I've got him in his snuggabunny chair, all wrapped in a blanket. He's fallen asleep this way once before. He fussed, so I put the vibrate feature on. I do have my wrap-sling on and ready to go, and my dog is hoping that it comes down to needing the wrap because then she will get a walk. We can't walk far though because people are coming to install air conditioning today. Yep, we gave in and bought air conditioning even though we don't have much money. It will help, since the crib is upstairs in our loft bedroom....in the past, on hot nights we would just sleep downstairs in the guest room.

I am going to continue typing so that I resist the urge to rescue Nico from his fussing. He's not crying, just fussing. I think sleep is going to win.

Hey, so I was totally brainwashed to think that it is best for baby to have only breastmilk/formula until 6 months. Then yesterday I was reading in ParentsCanada May/June 2012 magazine that now 'they' are saying we need to introduce solids in the window of 4-6 months because (oppositely to what they thought before) if you don't introduce food in that window then they have a higher chance of allergies. Let me see if I can find a like for you. http://www.parentscanada.com/baby/should-babies-go-on-diets

Food for thought! I'm going to do some google searches to look into this some more. (PS. Nico is still not sleeping yet, but he's not making any noise now and his eyes are really small.)

@LAGS: I just wear jersey dresses constantly these days but plan to wear the bella band with some shorts that I want to squeeze into!

@Mrs.M57: Hi and welcome back! I'm 6 wks PP and was cleared for DTD earlier this week, but I can't even go there yet!

@cvbee: @msmini: your babies sound like they are at super fun ages! Every age is fun in its own way, and I know I'll miss these little infant days but I can't wait until Tyler starts interacting more (and I know DH is excited for that, too!)

@cvbee: @marriedandlovingit: SO jealous of your sleeps!!

@marriedandlovingit: glad that BF is going better for you and you don't have an ear infection. Tyler doesn't smile yet, at all, though it sometimes looks like he wants to!

Thanks for the encouragement re: feeding. I do feel miles better after making the decision to exclusively pump (well, mostly pump - I did nurse him a little this morning b/c I missed it!) I'm much less stressed about his screaming and how much milk he is getting. I feel like this weight has been lifted and I can focus on enjoying our time together. Pumping is in a way more difficult than nursing (Tyler takes longer to drink a bottle and then add 15 minutes on to every feeding with pumping....which is hard to do during the day when I"m by myself).

Food for thought - I think part of the reason my weight loss plateaued is because though I was BFing Tyler, he wasn't taking much from the boob and I was not pumping, instead supplementing from our frozen milk stash. My supply is less than 1/2 of what it used to be when I had the oversupply issue. Now, I can pump 3-4 oz each pumping session if I am lucky whereas before I could pump 3 oz a boob. I'm hoping with some aggressive pumping (pumping for 15 mins after every nursing session) and water intake over the next week, my supply will go back up so that I do not have to pump as often to keep up with Tyler's needs.

Tyler is 6 weeks today. He is a very curious and "active" infant (as far as infants can be). He has great head/neck control and is always craning his neck to see what's going on. He also loves "standing" and "jumping' and doing baby sit ups (where he lies at a recline and I pull him up). It's hard to burp him these days because he wants to "stand" all the time! No smiles from him yet and really not much cooing either. He also really loves his baths, especially baths with mom or dad!

He is still fussy after feedings - I do think he has tummy troubles despite all of the burping I do and the gas drops. He is rarely relaxed after a feeding - even the last 1/2 oz or so via bottle, he fusses and then gets rigid and fusses and it's like he's trying to move stuff around. I made an appt. with the pediatrician for next week to discuss reflux. He doesn't spit up much but from what I read, he could still have it. Sure, he will outgrow it, but if we can figure it out in the meantime, I'd like to.
Sleep is fine, was better last week - he had a 4 hour stretch from 7-11 last night but then was up every few hours to eat (6 week growth spurt?) though one time I thought to myself he could not be hungry, so I picked him up, cuddled him for a minute, gave him a paci and put him back down and he slept for another hour.

My sister had her baby on Sunday - a little dumpling named Henry who was NINE lbs TEN oz and 20 in long. Chubber! Tyler met him yesterday and even with Henry's hospital weight loss, he is a full pound heavier (and maybe a little shorter). Made for some cute pictures!

@MsMini: Liam won't go to bed until 11pm or midnight either. We just play with him while we watch a movie and the when he gets sleepy I nurse him and we all go to bed. He sleeps for about 12 hours per night, waking about 3 times to eat.

I haven't gotten another 8 hour stretch out of him, but he still sleeps for one six hour stretch, then a couple 2-3 hour stretches. He is a terrible napper though, never sleeping more than 30 minutes at a time. Today I'm starting to just put him in his pack n play, even if he doesn't nap for long, just to get him used to napping there instead of in our arms.

Liam just loves "standing" too! If we just lay him down he'll fuss until we stand him up. He also loves just staring at people, especially me. He'll just look into my eyes happily for quite a while. It is so amazing how their brains are developing! I'm finding being a mom to be much more rewarding now that he interacts with me and smiles in response to things I do.

@marriedandlovingit: Glad your ear is better! Liam has started smiling a lot these past few days - usually right after he wakes up and then when I'm getting him into position to nurse him. He knows when food is coming and he just lights up!

So, I've been having bad wrist pain for about a month now and the past few days it's been so bad I can barely lift Liam. It's called De Quervain’s Tendonitis or "mommy wrist" and happens from lifting the baby under the armpits and letting your wrists fall backwards. I started a thread about it and apparently it's fairly common. I've been icing it and taking Tylenol and ordered some wrist braces, so hopefully it will start getting better. Do any of you have it? It's so painful and I hate not being able to lift the baby. He will be 2 months in a week and is already only a pound shy of doubling his birth weight so I'm wondering if his rapid weight gain has contributed to the tendonitis.

Well, typing is irritating my wrists, so that's all for now.

How does everyone get their babies down for naps? Do you hold them until they fall asleep, or put them down awake? Do you let them cry? I can't get Willa to nap for the life of me unless it is on my bed and I snuggle next to her.

@Mrsdaredevil: I look for DS's sleepy cues (yawning, etc) and then I swaddle him and put him in his swing. It usually does the trick. He also sleeps on walks or in the car.

@Mrs.M57: It is fun! He was trying to "jump" today by pushing up really fast so I would lift him up, he loved that as well. DH is convinced Sawyer will be one of those babies that skip crawling since he hates being on his tummy and loves standing.

@duckduckkristen: Sawyer teases me with sleep as well, I had 2 nights in a row with a 4 hour and a 5 hour stretch of sleep, then last night I only got 2-3 hour stretches of sleep (doh). It is amazing to be able to make your baby smile, it makes you feel special doesn't it?

@marriedandlovingit: I had the opposite headache effect. I got migraines before pregnancy, and they stopped the moment I got pregnant, and still haven't come back. If breastfeeding keeps them away I might have to keep BF until I am ready to get pregnant next!

@Mrsdaredevil: When I notice Sawyer is sleepy I will either cuddle with him on the couch (if I want a nap as well), or put him in the swing. If he falls asleep nursing or being held and I don't want to nap, I will put him in the pack and play in our living room with a blanket.

@winniebee: Wow I can't believe that you and your sister had such different-sized babies. Funny!

@MsMini: That's impressive that Sawyer can flip himself onto his side at tummy time. Nico hates tummy time 50 percent of the time. 25 percent of the time he only uses tummy time to plop his mouth onto his fist to suck it. The last 25 percent of the time is when he enjoys tummy time, but I think he does better 'work' when he is mad about it. Oh, and yesterday night at yoga, we were doing a tummy time move and I almost laughed out loud because I felt suddenly sympathetic to the screaming babies at tummy time.

Oh, speaking of yoga, last night I finally successfully made it to yoga. I don't think I told you gals, but last week when I tried, I started getting ready too late (like, I didn't even know where my yoga clothes were!) and by the time I was driving there I realized I was going to be late (and I had forgotten my mat) so I just went home. But last night was my first successful time!! 2 things about yoga.

1) Not enjoying my new vagina. TMI, sorry, but I have to tell someone! So, now when I do inverted poses (even just lifting the hips up, or down dog---which we do in between almost everything!) air goes into my vagina and then what goes in must come out. It was awful. It was all I could think about for the whole warm up and I did my best to control the situation. Then we stood up and the first 3 or 4 poses I had extra air coming out of there and it made noises. Soooooooooooo embarrassing! I did a google search about it and kegals will help but will take a long time. Some people said just wear a tampon for class and I think I will try that next week and see how it goes. (I know, probably not 'good' for me, but if it helps, yoga is good for me overall so I'm okay with it).

2) It was DH's first time watching Nico and I guess it was maybe mean of me to give him the 'bedtime' shift. He said the first hour was great and the second hour Nico cried his head off and DH couldn't figure out what to do. (Nico was obviously tired, but Daddy doesn't yet have the go-to-sleep thing down pat). Hopefully he'll have better luck next week because I am definitely going to yoga once a week from now on.

@MsMini: We definitely don't have newborns anymore hey. I miss mine too sometimes. Wednesday at Mom and Baby group everyone said that Nico changed so much since the last time they saw him and he didn't look like a scrunchy newborn anymore.

@duckduckkristen: @winniebee: @MsMini: wow! You all have 'standers'. Nico only uses his legs to kick sometimes. Maybe he'll be a late walker. I'm okay with that. (All the longer before chasing begins?!)

@marriedandlovingit: ha. Serious baby. You never know what kind of personality they'll have eh. I bet his smiles and laughs are around the corner yet.

@marriedandlovingit: It's so hard to know if my nose is 'more' sensitive or not still. Hard to compare that sort of thing, you know? I think it might be sensitive, because DH had a shower and then came to bed and I could smell that the towel he used was not the freshest. He thought I was nuts.

@marriedandlovingit: Happy anniversary!!!

@winniebee: So glad that you figured out Tyler's reflux issue. Those meds are approved for your baby so no worries. Mine is already getting antibiotics because of me and my kidney infection and I suspect he might have gotten a little morphine from that day too. It's like the first scratch on a new car....you want to keep it 'perfect' forever.

@Mrsdaredevil: I put Nico down for naps in a number of ways. It is pretty rare that I can catch him in just the right zone to swaddle him and put him in his crib and he just falls asleep. 80 percent of the time I put him on my chest and jiggle him (either in the wrap walking around or just holding him jiggling him or sitting myself on the yoga ball and bouncing). Once he is fairly sleepy or asleep then I put him either in his crib or in his snuggabunny chair for a sleep. As long as he is calm then he will just quietly fuss a tiny bit for about 10 minutes and then stare for about 10 minutes and then sleep. Every now and then I will nurse him to sleep, but I feel like that is cheating on my EASY goal, but if he doesn't settle then I feed him. Oh, and for night time I always feed him to sleep (already in a swaddle so I can just lay him down after).

@MsMini: glad your headaches are gone. In the early days I think I had a couple of lactation headaches and I was sure glad those went away.

I'm about to have to pull the move-baby-to-carseat-while-he's-sleeping move. I have to bring the Edge in for a maintenance appointment (first one since getting it!). Hopefully I won't wake Nico from his nap. It's all about the naps these days. (Used to be all about figuring out breastfeeding and now naps are my big thing).

PS. quick thought: I'm thinking of offering up my services as a daytime nanny next year instead of going back to work....that way I can keep with Nico. (And for me, I'd be out of work a lot anyways since I'm a supply teacher and the summer would come up).

@MsMini: Yay for surviving the shots! That's awesome. We still don't really have him playing with toys yet... should we? I just carry him around and show him stuff and he does tummy time on a blanket.
@LAGS: Woo hoo!! Congrats on the weight loss. I haven't lost anything in the last 2 weeks and I'm a little worried about it...
@cvbee: Good to know--Gabriel is a spit up machine right now--I actually just hacked off my hair to get him to stop spitting up in it.
@marriedandlovingit: Glad your ear is better! And how is she

@duckduckkristen: willa is 6 weeks, 4 days and weighs 9 lbs 11 ounces, and 19 inches long. She is sort of a little shrimp!

@Mrsdaredevil: Post a pic! Dressing babies up is so much fun!

@cvbee: Great job getting back into yoga!! Do those kegels to avoid the embarrassment! I would die!

@winniebee: I hope the Zantac works for Tyler! Cooper is taking that twice a day and it seems to be working for him. He still spits up like crazy, but he is no longer arching his back in pain.

Thank you ladies for the well wishes for our anniversary! If you all have any ideas on what to do with a baby in tow, feel free to pass them my way!

@pastemoo: It was just a glass, (and I do have a glass of wine per day and usually even time it so I dont need to even give a bottle of pumped) but it had just been a long time in between feedings (I feed on demand, and he just had less demand for whatever reason) so I felt like I was going to explode so had to pump, but it happened to be after a glass of wine so I couldn't save it.

@marriedandlovingit: I will be doing kegals as much as possible, but it might take a long time to fix the problem so I'm going to try out the tampon thing. Yoga is supposed to be about letting the ego go, but my ego can't get over that sort of thing. At the end of class the yoga teacher asked if I would be back and I feel like her subtext was asking if that embarrassed me enough to make me never take yoga again!

Nico had his baptism today. He loved it! Didn't cry and was very alert. It was such a special day. And after we all went out for dinner. So exhausted. Didn't even need to jiggle Nico for sleeping tonight. Goodnight. Happy Canada day to my fellow Canadians tomorrow!!! (Will Nico be as scared of the fireworks as my dog?)

So, thanks to the storms in the DC area, we have had no power for 2 days now and it will probably be a day or two more. And this during the hottest weekend ever! Most of our friends in the area don't have power either, but luckily the inlaws do, so we went down there to shower yesterday. We've been trying to go places that do have power during the day just to stay cool, charge our phones, and check email. We are still sleeping at our house though since it's closer to DH's work and we would have to lug so much baby gear if we stayed somewhere else. Oh and also we have a well so that means no water either. Uhhhhg. I hope we get power back soon, but they are saying it could be a week for some people. We are supposed to be having a fourth of July party so I'm really hoping it comes back on before then. Liam doesn't seem to mind though. He's smiling more than ever

@marriedandlovingit: We have the same anniversary! And DH works on the 4th... at 4am, so we can't stay up late. I still haven't done anything for it yet. Oops! One day to think of something.
Glad LO is smiling. Soooo cute!

@cvbee: Congratulations on his baptism! That's cool that he loved it.
@duckduckkristen: We have power in Dale City, if you need a place to go. The storm was awful! LO slept through it but DH and I were woken up by the storm and the tree in front of our apartment (the biggest branch is 30 ft from LO's window) cracked in half!

Well, LO is 6 weeks today, and he woke up at 3:30am. Kept finishing nursing then being hungry It's 4 30 and he's still hungry. I set him in the swing,,,, but he's screaming for food again.

@bpcmarj yay for sleeping through the night! That's such a great feeling!
@mrsdaredevil hope the wedding went well! We have one in 2 weeks and I already have Lily's outfit picked out
@marriedandlovingit love the picture of your smiley little guy! Happy anniversary! We are almost wedding date twins, our first anniversary is today! Amazing how time flies!
@duckduckkristen ugh to no electricity! Especially with the crazy hot days! I don't know what we would do without air conditioning, Lil has been miserable when we go anywhere on these hot days! I think she is hot all of the time like my hubby
@cvbee glad baptism went well, how sweet that Nico was alert and loved it! Any pictures in his cute little outfit? Lily's is in 2 weeks I'm excited for it!
@winniebee hopefully Zantac helps Tyler, reflux is no fun! 6 week growth spurt also=no fun and no sleep! But it's worth it, after we passed it, it seemed like Lily started to do so much more fun stuff! She was much more smiley and figured out how to rollover a few times since! Plus her sleep has improved so much since we are even up to 6 hours sometimes, before the growth spurt it was like 3 hours max! just hang in there!
@pastemoo I know just what you mean about the yoga discomfort, I'm having the same thing! It's so weird stops me in my tracks every time!

@pastemoo: My husband works at 4 a.m. too! We definitely have an early bedtime at our house. I am thinking we won't do anything for the fourth, because my DH usually goes to bed before it is even dark out!

@Mrs.M57: My LO doesn't move at all in her sleep! Weird! I wonder if she will start to move around more when she gets older? Could you maybe try the mesh crib bumpers so that your LO's limbs will stop getting stuck?

Quick Willa update. She is 7 weeks old and growing and changing like crazy. She is just constantly smiling and babbling on to us... I swear it is like she is telling us about her whole day... it's so cute! We are pretty much entirely co-sleeping right now. She does one sleep shift in her crib swaddled, and then after that (it is usually three hours long) she comes into bed with us. It's just so hard to get her back to sleep in there again, and we are all happier and better rested when we sleep together. Once she is older and I feel comfortable sleep training her, we will move her into her crib full time. But as for now, bed sharing is working and we are going to stick with it!

She is still getting up every three hours at nighttime. I talked to our ped and she said that some babies are "2 hour babies," some are "3 hour babies" and some sleep in 5, 6, 7 hour stretches. She said her LO woke up every 2 hours in the night to eat until she was 5 months old. But now that Willa is in our bed it's not as bad because she just goes right to sleep after I feed her. I want to learn how to side-lie breastfeed. Does anyone else do this? I only ever do the "traditional" position, but would like to add more to my repertoire.

Taking her to the wedding went really well. We had to stop once on the way there to feed her, but other than that there were no hiccups! We had to leave early because both the wedding and reception were outside and it started to get pretty windy. I was really worried about her ears and getting too cold, so we took off after the toasts.

Oh, here is a quick pic of her a week ago when she was 6 weeks.