Honestly...I don't see a problem pecking your kid on the lips.

I ABSOLUTELY hate when other people do it. MY in laws do it all the time. I mean if they get cold sores and aren't even showing my baby can get the herpes


So sorry about Amelia. Hopefully she is turning a corner!

6/2/2012 11:51:05 AM

Don't worry. If your kids don't get it from the in-laws, they'll get it sharing juice boxes in preschool

6/2/2012 12:05:10 PM

Bye bye little vampire. Finally got his first central incisor. The other bud seriously looks like it's about to pop.

6/12/2012 8:43:53 AM

Same here, LK. I noticed the tooth poking through a couple of nights ago.

6/12/2012 11:11:46 AM

Vampires to Zombies. My boys have started biting. Its only me or each other (they dont bite their mother or any other kids).

I'm kinda vexed about how to stop it. They only do it when they're tired and hungry (has to be both). Unfortunately giving them a snack is just reinforcement. Also they think it's generally hilarious.

I'm pretty sure they're too young to understand spanking. I have no interest in biting them back or slathering myself in something fetid. Anyone have an idea I could use.

[Edited on June 12, 2012 at 2:17 PM. Reason : yes, the bite is accompanied by an Aaaaarrrrrrggggggnnnnnnnn sound]

6/12/2012 2:16:55 PM

Well, at least you're one step ahead of most parents. You know what is causing them to bite.

A developmental specialist gave us some advice that is just generally wonderful. Instead of telling your child what not to do, teach them what they should do.

Very young children act out in very primitive ways: hitting, biting, screaming, etc. We have to teach them that it isn't appropriate behavior. A lot of times, we forget that their behavior has a purpose and we need to replace that negative behavior with something that is acceptable yet fulfills that need to communicate. When Silas starting hitting us to get our attention and express frustration, we did two things: taught him an acceptable way of getting our attention and then labeled his emotions. I would take his hand and rub it on my arm or face, telling him "Gentle touches." Then I would show him how to express himself: "I need help." And taught him the sign for help. Or "I am hungry." And taught him the sign for food. With consistency and repetition, even the youngest toddler will quickly pick up on the new behavior because they want to please us and it actually accomplishes something.

I think it is also worth mentioning, since your children find it funny, that it really helps if you can refrain from yelping, shouting, screaming, or any other excitement when they bite you. Because they have yet to develop empathy and they're learning cause and effect, the grandiose reaction is rewarding. I also think that when infants and toddlers start biting, it's prime time to start laying the foundations for empathy.

And if all that is tl;dr and you think that APing is just a bunch of bullshit. They're not too young to remove from the situation and give a basic time out.

[Edited on June 12, 2012 at 6:38 PM. Reason : .]

6/12/2012 6:35:52 PM

FWIW I bit as a young child. My mom bit me back & I stopped

Now I only bite when I'm drunk & want attention

6/12/2012 6:41:14 PM

The kinder and gentler version of biting your child back is to take their hand or arm and push it back against their own teeth to teach them that their teeth cause pain. But with twins biting one another, I would think that they might already get that part.

6/12/2012 6:42:41 PM

Quote :

"I'm pretty sure they're too young to understand spanking. I have no interest in biting them back or slathering myself in something fetid. Anyone have an idea I could use."

My niece went through a biting phase. It stopped pretty quickly when my sister would make a big deal out of being bit, acting like it seriously hurt, and all that stuff. Being overly dramatic , but not for the attention, because the attention was never on the child's act of biting, but on the "pain" from the biting. Once my niece realized she was hurting people, she stopped doing it. Since she wasn't getting any attention (negative or otherwise) from biting, she had no incentive to keep at it.

6/12/2012 8:18:41 PM

So, I found out today that my brother was surprised with TWINS for his first child experience.
They are excited, but freaking out at this point. She just started her second trimester.

I was wondering if anyone could recommend any books, magazines, or something I can buy them with info that could help them.


And just out of curiosity; Was there anything that you gave up when you had kids that even a few month or a year before you wouldn't have thought about giving up? Anything from foods, to hobbies, to lifestyle?

6/12/2012 8:21:33 PM

Weekly meet ups at the bar with my husband's coworkers. Late nights. Video games. Crafty things. Blogging regularly. Being able to just pick up and go. Artificial food dyes. Fast food has died a quick death. Make up.

6/12/2012 10:16:09 PM

Interesting. I did not expect food dyes, fast food, or make up.

6/12/2012 10:27:21 PM

Food dyes are linked to hyperactivity in children and boy do I have a hyperactive one. We will occasionally get fat food, but I'm very aware of what a McD nation we are and don't want to leave that legacy to my children. And I just don't feel like wasting my time to do make up.

6/12/2012 10:34:10 PM

Plus eating out is just more of a hassle. Especially with multiple kids. If you're going to go through the effort of getting everything together and set up it feels silly to waste that on fast food. McD's will get their hooks into the kids eventually, no need to start them off early.

Travel, of course, is the exception. You can usually count on one of the newer McD's to have a changing table in the men's room (I always appreciate this) although I still prefer Chili's ,On The Border, or Cracker Barrel when traveling (all three have a company policy of having changing tables in the men's room).

I'll try and find the name of the book my wife read for our twins. It was something with a twin-pun name but I can't recall off the top of my head. There are usually support groups for parents of multiples in bigger cities. If your brother is in the Triangle then send them over to TMOTT. You don't even need a membership to go to the meetings.

6/13/2012 8:22:56 AM

Re biting: Ryan bites for attention or bc he's actually trying to kiss us. I just keep being consistent with "no bite" or "ow that hurts" and showing an alternative hoping it will stick. Same with drawers. We have a drawer and a cabinet in the kitchen that are ok to play in. If he opens another I just steer him to the ok drawer.

Also getting him to be easy with the dog is hard that it prolly doesn't help that she's super super sweet and great with him. She's ridiculously tolerant of him grabbing her. So yay for that but we worry about him around other dogs as a result.

6/13/2012 10:38:39 AM

One of my cats is a great mommy cat. The boys love her. One has almost learned "don't grab the kitty" and the other is getting there. They both still pet a little too hard, but this cat has the patience of a saint. She even let's David use her as a pillow for a while.

Oh, and she complains during bath time. We think it's because you're not supposed to put kittens in the water, but we may just be using what I call Occam's Furby. The most adorable explanation is the one you're going to go with (Furby's are either creepy or adorable, most people default to adorable because they want to).

6/13/2012 10:44:33 AM

Quote :

"We will occasionally get fat food"

I think everyone should start calling "fast food" "fat food"

Researching daycare is seriously stressing me out. Maybe I'll just pull a Cartman to find a nanny.

6/13/2012 10:45:48 AM

speaking of babies + pets, what's the best way, in you guys' opinions, to introduce dogs to a new baby?

we have a border collie mix (mia, 9 yrs) & an australian shepherd mix (suki, 5 yrs). both are very smart, but mia is the dominant dog. suki is a little more needy but not in your face about it at all. i've read about slowly backing off how much time you spend with them & stuff, but we hardly do much for them as it is. they just lay on the floor, sometimes in the same room as us, but more often in their crates (by choice) or in the room w/ their crates. mia sometimes brings a toy to chris for him to throw for a couple of minutes at night, but that's about it. i'm not really worried about lack of attention, just how to introduce them to the baby at first.

6/13/2012 10:58:27 AM

We didn't have any problems with our dog; I think that your baby kinda smells like you. You might want to take his or her blanket and throw it in the crate a few days in advance to get your dog really used to the smell.

Of course, our dog is a chihuahua and just avoided our kids until they were old enough to start dropping food on the ground.

6/13/2012 2:50:04 PM

Our 75 lb. lab did great with our little guy from day 1. We introduced very slowly, just letting her smell and investigate. For the first week or two she was very tentative, keeping her distance until she could figure out what this little thing was.

We had to have a come to Jesus meeting a couple of times when they started playing together, b/c she got a little too excited, but she learned that it's her responsibility not to run into him or anything, they do great.

It's amazing how most dogs just seem to know to be gentle and accommodating to babies. My dog would never let an adult pull her ears or tail, she's pretty headstrong. But the little guy can do just about anything and she just gives him affection. They're inseparable, it's awesome.

6/13/2012 3:21:31 PM

^that's awesome. they, especially mia, already know that if we call something a baby that it means it's little, not a threat, & to be gentle. we started that with mia when introducing her to foster kittens (and later other puppies). she hasn't met any human kids in person, other than barking at the screaming ones in my back door neighbor's yard, but hopefully that word will help.

6/13/2012 3:45:20 PM

Ditto to all said. We didnt do any special introduction or blanket sniffing. Just did it. Sabrina (55lb lab shepard mix) took to him on her own time, and we've had no problems. She only yelps (twice total...the second just happened 10 min ago actually) if he was to man handle her too much for her liking, but those other times she just takes it. He crawls all over her, and she's genuinely concerned when he cries. The colic phase she constantly stayed by his side like "fix it! Can't you see he's upset?!"

[Edited on June 13, 2012 at 6:59 PM. Reason : ]

6/13/2012 6:56:04 PM

mom has offered to take the dogs & keep them at her house the first few days after we come home from the hospital. y'all think this is necessary? i don't really, but thought i'd ask.

6/13/2012 7:42:00 PM

We dropped her off on our way to the hospital, and my mom took her home ~1 hr before we got there so she was there when we got home with Ryan.

6/13/2012 9:06:53 PM

Does the dogs have unfettered access to the baby's crib? Do you plan to put the baby down on the floor with the dogs right after getting home?

I really dont see much in the way of opportunity for your dogs to try anything, and even if they do it's not like you're just giving up on whatever normal training or discipline method you use on the dogs.

Also you're not going to want to put your baby down in those first few days, and when you do someone else will likely want to be holding the tyke.

6/13/2012 9:10:26 PM

i think mom's reasoning was more along the lines of giving us a chance to figure out what to do with the kid for the first couple of days & not having to worry about the dogs (feeding, going out to pee/poop, etc). i don't think it would be a big deal, but i've never had a kid so i thought i'd ask.

6/13/2012 10:29:48 PM

Yeah it really wasn't. Plus it gave hubby something to do while I was breast feeding. I also wanted to get out, so once I felt ok to get up and about I resumed our walks.

6/14/2012 8:18:32 AM

idk if this has been answered before, but for those of you who cloth diaper, which detergent do you use?

7/12/2012 10:33:19 PM

this doesn't answer the question, but we WERE going to use cloth diapers... and more than 2 months in we are still using the disposable kind

7/13/2012 12:05:55 AM

lol, well, whatever works for you!

chris's mom was awesome enough to buy us ALLLLLL of the cloth diapers we will need (newborn fitteds & OSs) plus a bunch of extra liners/inserts & some of the disposable inserts as well. anyway, i've been washing them w/ the sample bumgenius detergent but we've only got 2 of those. i've read a bunch of stuff online about what people prefer & what people say works best, but wanted to here what people i "know" are using.

[Edited on July 13, 2012 at 7:20 AM. Reason : ]

7/13/2012 7:20:16 AM

^^yeah i wanted to use cloth, but was overruled. after seeing how much output my kid could produce I was glad we went with disposable. however, i think switching to cloth once he was more regular & less often (around 3 mos) would have worked well for us.

and i know i could switch now, but i'm wanting to start potty training ASAP

[Edited on July 13, 2012 at 10:10 AM. Reason : ]

7/13/2012 10:09:43 AM

http://www.childsown.com/

So awesome! I love this idea.



hahaha...that little kid even drew a penis. Kids. Love them.

Another website because that other one is not taking orders anymore.

http://www.sunnylittlestudio.com/

Or do it yourself if you can.

[Edited on July 13, 2012 at 9:32 PM. Reason : neato idea.]

7/13/2012 9:19:53 PM

Quote :

"I decided to get Parents magazine to get some ideas for the kids I nanny for. If you go to parents.com/2yearsfree you can get 3 years of Parents magazine for 7.99. I thought maybe some of you would like this deal."

[Edited on July 14, 2012 at 9:16 PM. Reason : ]

7/14/2012 9:15:58 PM

#prekidproblems



[Edited on July 18, 2012 at 5:46 PM. Reason : ]

7/18/2012 5:46:11 PM

heh. What's this "sleeping in" thing of which you speak?

7/19/2012 10:59:59 AM

did any of you use those SIDs monitors (snuza, angelcare, etc)? that's something i'd not considered until i saw it brought up in a pregnancy forum. what's the general consensus on these things?

7/21/2012 8:54:10 AM

Nope. I was my own SIDS monitor.

7/21/2012 9:29:46 AM

Nope. I wasam my own SIDS monitor.



and

Quote :

"Do not use breathing monitors or products marketed as ways to reduce SIDS. In the past, home apnea (breathing) monitors were recommended for families with a history of the condition. But research found that they had no effect, and the use of home monitors has largely stopped."

[Edited on July 21, 2012 at 3:24 PM. Reason : http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmedhealth/PMH0002533/]

7/21/2012 3:19:51 PM

Like they said.

No. Our kids slept in our bed. You don't need a SIDS monitor.

7/21/2012 7:39:24 PM

Had the cribs next to the bed for the first year. Also always had a fan blowing air through the cribs. I don't onow if the fan helped but it definitely made me feel better.

7/22/2012 9:30:25 PM

good deal. thanaks for all the replies.

7/23/2012 9:27:39 AM

When did you all start the transition from purees to table food and how did you go about it? Brantley is 9 months and I'm starting to think he's ready for table foods (eats puffs with no problem, has good pincer grasp, is VERY interested in what we're eating, tries to grab out food, tries to grab the spoon, doesn't seem interested in being fed, etc). I just don't know where/how to start?

7/27/2012 12:23:32 PM

We skipped purees except for a small introduction and went straight to table foods, but I don't remember how old she was. Go ahead and start offering the same things he's eating as purees in small bites and see how he does. There really aren't hard fast rules. Not unless you want to play it safe and start thickening the purees or served fork mashed (lumpy) first.

7/27/2012 5:38:50 PM

Yeah a lot of parents don't even bother with purees anymore. In a lot of countries the norm is to go straight to table foods.

http://www.babyledweaning.com/

7/27/2012 6:40:24 PM

^Thanks for posting. This is exactly it!

Amelia turned her nose up at most of the purees, but was all about eating chunks of soft banana, carrots, peas, avocado, potato, rice, & certain crumbly breads. I ended up doing things like adding the purees that I had bought into pancakes and muffins for her.

It's pretty awesome to just pull her high chair up to the table and feed her bite sized pieces of whatever the rest of the family is eating.

OH! Plain spaghetti noodles are awesome! My daughter loves playing with them and eating them.

[Edited on July 27, 2012 at 8:18 PM. Reason : .]

7/27/2012 8:15:40 PM

hm... i didn't know parents skipped purees... I might look into doing that, but we are planning to make our own baby food anyway


how old did most of you start subbing in baby food for milk/formula?

7/27/2012 8:44:35 PM

In most cases parents start by offering food first, then following it up with the breast or bottle. You'll see a lot of variation with when parents start this. . .4 months. . .6 months. . .it just depends.

No matter what you are feeding (purees or table food) the child really isn't eating more than a few tablespoons of food in those first months. Your total volume may drop by a few ounces, but usually not enough to drop more than a bottle a day. Most of the eating that a child does during this introductory period is really just exploration -- learning different tastes & textures, how to chew and swallow. Real competence and significant calorie intake really doesn't occur until around one year of age.

It's around one year that many parents begin to drop off from the breast or bottle and start offering meals with a cup. Every kid is different, but anywhere from 12-18 months, you'll see their intake of breast/milk/formula drop off significantly in favor of solids.

7/27/2012 9:47:55 PM

One of my boys wouldn't eat purees or any other kind of baby food except for rice/oatmeal cereals. So we ended up transitioning from milk/formula to purees to soft foods pretty quickly. Bananas and grapes (peeled at first) were our best friends.

7/28/2012 10:15:30 PM

I should really stop lurking a thread I made

What's the general consensus on age for hair cutting? The lady that cuts my hair said we should wait till 1.5 years or so, just seeing what else is out there

7/31/2012 11:59:39 PM

depends on how much hair your kid has. my nephew had hair to his shoulder blades by 1 year. my coworker's almost 2 year old still just has really short little baby curls.

[Edited on August 1, 2012 at 12:17 AM. Reason : ]

8/1/2012 12:16:55 AM