:baby_symbol: Parenting advice - you're gonna get hit
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If you are going to use formula I would recommend getting one of these bad boys:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Tommee-Tippee-Closer-Nature-Perfect/dp/B00BG6304A
It's worth every penny and saves so much time (precious, sleep deprived time). Also, unlike a lot of other baby junk, you will be able to sell it once you are done with it.
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We only boiled them once a month or so when they started to turn icky.
It's been a while, but IIRC, it was much easier clean them while they were "fresh", rinse them in cold water, and then hot+soap. In fact, we only had one bottle just so we wouldn't leave it standing -- they turn nasty really quick.
I would be careful with microwave ovens. A few years back there was a big scare about phthalates in the plastic bottles (among with a bunch of other chemicals) that were released when the bottle was heated. Don't know how much of it was actually a cause for alarm, though. But since it is easy to avoid it is better to be safe than sorry.
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I'm sure all prospective parents say this, but we're hoping to breast feed. MIL reckons formula at night helps them sleep better so we might try that, and I guess it's worth having formula around for emergencies.
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You probably already realize this, but even if your wife breast feeds, you'll still need bottles for the times baby needs to be fed and mom isn't around for whatever reason. Whether you put formula or expressed breast milk is up to you, but either way, you'll need the bottles.
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You'll need a pram/stroller. I'll just leave this here and let you decide for yourself whether you think this model is good for your baby.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgZCk7tMOYc
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This one seems safer
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we're hoping to breast feed.
If it works, it is of course much more convenient and better for the baby because a lot of antibodies are transferred along with the milk.
formula at night helps them sleep better
It does. However, the production of milk is based on the amount of sucking (is that the term?). The more the baby tries to eat, the more milk will be produced. So if you start to replace a meal here and there (regularly) with formula, there is less sucking, and thus the milk production goes down.
They also evolve in discrete steps, so from one day to the next they will not get enough food and will want to feed much more often (being cranky because they're hungry and not getting enough to eat), and it takes a day or to for the milk production to step up.
it's worth having formula around for emergencies
It is. At the very least (I mentioned this earlier), keep a package at home for when you just get back from the hospital in case the milk production hasn't started properly yet. Hope to throw it away if you're aiming for breast feeding, but it takes a lot of stress away to know you have the package there. Nursing is to a large extent about not being stressed.
We got the advice from the Swedish Nursing Maffia to not use a bottle in the beginning since the kids learn the wrong technique. Instead, we fed with a teaspoon.
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Swedish Nursing Maffia
Ha! We had them too.
Only one kid was formula-fed... I highly recommend having a schedule, and simplifying whatever process you use.
Don't see how @Mikael_Svahnberg got away with just one bottle - it's basically the same amount of time to wash ~4 as to wash 1 and it seems easier to wash just a couple of times a day.
Man, I remember the total sense of relief I had when he started skipping the 10 and 2 o'clock feedings... Two four-hour stretches of sleep a night!!
(Wife was working. I was full-time parent).
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In order to be able to apply rating adjustments based on such courses, ...
Pendant-ry aside, I was thinking and kidding around about insuring and bonding for genuine bona-fide security folks - which is probably far less professionally done than we'd like to think.
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"should", yes. My wife had a couple of dozen ultrasounds with her first pregnancy, and the child was determined not to let us know whether it was a he or she.
We didn't have that many, but we went to a radiology school (where you could get it done for cheap) after her normal ultrasounds didn't work (daughter had her legs crossed). My wife drank a big sugary coffee thing before (they always want the bladder full anyways, which is really fun for the ladies) and so my daughter was much more active that time around and they got a good look.
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Since it will be about a decade and a half before @Jaloopa has to worry about teen drivers, maybe we should go back to giving him more immediately useful advice.
Yea, Yea, fine....
One last story. The local paper is carrying a story about the local drivers-ed school getting closed by the DMV and several kids who are SOL and have to re-take drivers ed because there's no record of completion...
Really long article for what amounts to a FWP, but juicy details at the end
"well maybe there were signs of trouble"... "they were using typewriters to fill out the paperwork"... "my friends and I scratched our heads about why we spent the class time watching movies and British TV shows [ed-Top Gear]"... "the instructor gave us one-hour breaks [ed -in a three-hour class]"
I think I'll be happy to send my kids to some place that puts them on a skid pad and does some emergency braking and manouevering*...
* or however you Imperial folk spelt that
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but we went to a radiology school (where you could get it done for cheap)
I know, ultrasound... but this made me think:
Yeah, I want to people to practice using radiation on me....
Not exactly the same thing as getting a bad haircut from a barber school. ;)
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If it works, it is of course much more convenient and better for the baby because a lot of antibodies are transferred along with the milk.
Also, while nursing, the kid's crap doesn't smell pleasant but it is much preferable to when they're on formula or solid food.
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Much easier than the chemical steriliser we used at first, which required the stuff to soak for 2 hours and then had to be air-dried.
Why not just use something like Star San? Just mix it into a spray bottle you get from home depot and spray after rinsing in hot, soapy water.
Edit: nevermind, bad for plastic.
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I would be careful with microwave ovens. A few years back there was a big scare about phthalates in the plastic bottles
A more practical reason not to use a microwave is that it can heat the milk unevenly, leading to excessively hot spots, or that's what people said when our two were using bottles.
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We didn't have that many, but we went to a radiology school (where you could get it done for cheap) after her normal ultrasounds didn't work (daughter had her legs crossed). My wife drank a big sugary coffee thing before (they always want the bladder full anyways, which is really fun for the ladies) and so my daughter was much more active that time around and they got a good look.
My wife had a high-risk pregnancy, so third trimester we were seeing her doctor every week. No matter what they did, including vaginal ultrasounds, #1 moved so her legs were crossed and we couldn't tell. By contrast, with the first ultrasound, #2 was like "yo, check dis out".
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A more practical reason not to use a microwave is that it can heat the milk unevenly, leading to excessively hot spots, or that's what people said when our two were using bottles.
I always felt like that was a concern that businesses raised in order to sell $100 bottle warmers. Shake and swirl the bottle and it is well mixed and homogenous in temperature.
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I always felt like that was a concern that businesses raised in order to sell $100 bottle warmers. Shake and swirl the bottle and it is well mixed and homogenous in temperature.
Well, that was why I added "or that's what they said". I was kind of skeptical, but you don't really want to take the chance. $100 warmers, though, that's sillyl.
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A more practical reason not to use a microwave is that it can heat the milk unevenly, leading to excessively hot spots, or that's what people said when our two were using bottles.
Especially silly due to the fact that our kids took bottles straight from the fridge without an issue.
Also, the bottle warmers that we did buy heated via steam and would burn your hand because the outside of the bottle was scorching hot.
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I always felt like that was a concern that businesses raised in order to sell $100 bottle warmers. Shake and swirl the bottle and it is well mixed and homogenous in temperature.
Thought the issue was potentially too much heat... our "approved" procedure was to microwave a big cup (in our case a glass measuring cup) half full of water... pull it out - jam a finger into it to test for safety*, place bottle of formula into cup to warm...
This probably only worked because kid was scheduled, not fed on-demand. As always YMMV.
* obviously, once you'd determined x seconds for the cup this full, the test never failed... but, safety.
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For night time feeds we were strict about keeping it dark and not having any interactions outside of the feed. No lights, TV, toys or playing. The message is that it's OK to be hungry but that it's back to bed once you're done.
We did a dreamfeed, so we gave our daughter a bottle without waking her. This worked well for us but YMMV.
We also found that routine was good around bedtime
This. If you have a good routine it causes less disruption if you have to break it every so often.We only boiled them once a month or so when they started to turn icky.
Good advice but our kids turn icky much sooner than after monthwe're hoping to breast feed
Yes everyone says that but try not build it up. My wife's struggled with both our kids and the "breast is best" brigade just added stress she didn't need. Child 2 is currently 2 months, wife will do a feed ~9pm then go to bed. I give a bottle when sprog wakes, then put her to bed. This means my mrs gets ~6 hours unbroken sleep and I get some 1-1 time. Formula does help the baby sleep longer as it is digested slower.Everyone's different, don't be afraid to try different things and stick with what works for you.
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"breast is best" brigade
Those people are nazis. They made my wife feel horrible when she was not able to breastfeed our first. She had a "friend" (not the term I would refer to her as...) that put formula feeding as akin to child abuse. Don't let them get to you as although breastfeeding is best, the difference between it and formula is not groundbreaking.
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Hear hear! There is such a stigma about this so I almost don't know where to start. Happy mother=happy father && happy baby. Whether that's with breast milk, formula, or tibetan yak milk is entirely your choice. Don't let anyone make you think otherwise.
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I've been wondering what a business analyst do. Now I at least know to which end of the process you're attached. :-)
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You are going to see baskets made for washing bottle parts in the dishwasher. They seem like a good idea, but they are useless. You are going to wash bottles way more than you run the dishwasher. Just do it all by hand.
While this is true, those baskets are great for containing the parts of sippy cups that your kid will be using when they start transitioning away from the breast and/or bottle. And (buttuming you have sufficient) you can get away with washing those cups when you run the dishwasher. So while you may not need those baskets now, they will be useful in 9 months to a year.
The bottle drying racks that look like a patch of grass look gimmicky. They're not. They work great because they adapt to anything you want to put in them, all bottle sizes and they never look dirty.
QFT
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those baskets are great for containing the parts of sippy cups that your kid will be using when they start transitioning away from the breast and/or bottle
We were never able to find a sippy cup that would really work with those extra parts in them. We always had to remove the leak-proofing valve things to get enough flow. This led to the occasional mess when our son would knock them over, but it led us to help teach him how to be more careful.
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Schnaps glass. Perfect size for a kid's hand, and makes them feel all grown-up. Plus, there's like 16cl of mess to clean up, and they're made to be rather stable.
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We found the microwave steam sterilisers to be very helpful. It's a plastic thing that has a tray for water at the base, a frame part which has appropriate holders for all the bottle parts (enough to do four bottles at once), and a cover. You put water in the bottom, load it all up, stick the cover on and microwave it for five minutes - done.
There are also countertop versions that you plug in and push a button, if you have the space. Then you just need to rinse everything and stick it in the sterilizer. Honestly, I think it's easier to just wash everything by hand since you have to stick it under the faucet anyway.
I'm sure all prospective parents say this, but we're hoping to breast feed. MIL reckons formula at night helps them sleep better so we might try that, and I guess it's worth having formula around for emergencies.
If your wife is able to breastfeed, keep in mind that some breast fed babies refuse formula. They just don't like it for one reason or another.
Don't see how @Mikael_Svahnberg got away with just one bottle
If he used the bottles with the liners, then he only had to wash the nipples. Makes it really easy to get away with just one.
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@abarker said:
those baskets are great for containing the parts of sippy cups that your kid will be using when they start transitioning away from the breast and/or bottle
We were never able to find a sippy cup that would really work with those extra parts in them. We always had to remove the leak-proofing valve things to get enough flow. This led to the occasional mess when our son would knock them over, but it led us to help teach him how to be more careful.
If your kid doesn't like to suck fairly hard, this can be an issue. If your kid doesn't mind, then there are plenty of options. Fortunately, my kids don't mind.
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He would bring a sippy cup to me and tell me it wasn't working. I tried to drink from it myself and it was difficult. I ended up just junking the silicone restrictor things.
But, as has been said a few times before, but it bears repeating: All kids and all parents are different. There are lots of "right" ways to do it, and only a few that are objectively wrong. Do what works for you.
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If he used the bottles with the liners
AM I THE ONLY ONE HERE WHO UNDERSTANDS STRONLY TYPED BABY BOTTLES????
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sippy cup
Cunning pro-tip with multiple children... I had several types, but would give each child his/her own type... so I would know which child should return it to the sink.
When they can only crawl they really really resent it when you ask them to take another kids sippy cup to the kitchen ;)
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AM I THE ONLY ONE HERE WHO UNDERSTANDS STRONLY TYPED BABY BOTTLES????
YOU MIGHT BE THE ONLY ONE WHO SPELLS IT STRONLY.
Â
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What happens if you add a sippy cup to a baby bottle?
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I was hoping for a reply that would allow me to go on a nonsensical rant about how that means it is not strongly typed. I R disappoint.
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I was hoping for a reply that would allow me to go on a nonsensical rant about how that means it is not strongly typed. I R disappoint.
You know how in every Star Trek with a computer.. how Kirk like winds out some illogic to kill it?
I'm feelin like that...
What??
But I'll take a shot...
You can't add them the operator wouldn't be symmetric... if add the bottle to the cup the valve clogs, but no vice versa
Wait, dang,
I'm mixing up objects and their values/contents ... dang dang dang.I work with numbers! Algorithms, not language design... ehlp me, jhep...
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Yes, buy lots of bottles.
My daughter used the Avent bottles. We later replaced the nipples with sippy tops and get to reuse bottles. Plus with the domes over the sippy tops they don't leak the way most sippy tops do.
We also got her on cold milk within first 3 months. That made things easier. I do remember being fearful that cold milk was actually harmful one time when she was younger and we were in a car and I was desperate because she was hungry. Babies not being good at regulating body temperature and all that.
We only sterilized the stuff we bought in the first month...after that soap and water.
I remember waiting on my husband when I was being discharged after the birth...with the sudden realization, "Oh I'm the mommy." Little bit scary (he has kids from his first marriage and I deferred most parental duties of them to him).
Congrats!
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Hey that reminds me. We switched to regular milk when she was super young—don't remember exactly but I'm thinking around 6mo, basically as soon as we were able to supplement it with solids—and it was great for nappy times. Perfect little round lumps of putty like a rabbit or an antelope. A lot less vomiting too.
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We have an old smartphone (now simless) we use to run a white noise app. It really helps get them off to sleep, and then keep them asleep. Don't be afraid to turn it up to 11 to get their attention.
Also, super pro tip: whenever you're caring for your child on your own, don't refer to it as "babysitting". It annoys all women.
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Perfect little round lumps of putty like a rabbit
Things you didn't want to know about rabbits:
[spoiler]Rabbits engage in autocoprophagia. Their digestive systems are adapted for living in arid, nutrient-poor environments. They produce two types of feces. One is relatively soft and sticky, which they eat to extract residual moisture and nutrients. The round lumps of feces one typically associates with rabbits are the result of the second pass through the digestive system.[/spoiler]
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we're hoping to breast feed.
So were we, with all three of ours. #1 and #3 never really managed to get it working in the first place. #2 seemed to have figured it out, but he wasn't gaining weight and was always irritable and cranky... turned out that even though he seemed to be feeding well, he just wasn't getting much. Once we put him onto formula he started gaining weight properly and instantly became a much happier little boy, presumably because he wasn't hungry all the time.Basically – and this applies to a whole swathe of child-rearing issues – just go with whatever works for you and your kid, and don't worry too much about what other people tell you you should be doing.
$100 bottle warmers
We used a large enamel mug, which we half filled with hot water from the kettle (or thermos, if we were out for the day; the thermos would hold enough water that we could warm up three bottles from it). Stick the bottle of milk in there until it was warm enough, easy and cheap and pretty quick.
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Basically – and this applies to a whole swathe of child-rearing issues – just go with whatever works for you and your kid, and don't worry too much about what other people tell you you should be doing.
This. I don't know if it's been said but the only indispensable piece of advice is this:
All children are different. Even great advice might not work for you.
We found stuff that worked for our first didn't work for the second (13 months later). This was across the board... feeding, burping, comforters, pacifiers/dummies, sleeping.
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Related to this: make normal amounts of noise when the baby is sleeping. That way they get used to this and you don't have to sneak around.
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Not only is it beneficial to you (not having to sneak around), it is beneficial to the baby (he/she won't grow up to be someone who has to have a perfectly quiet, dark environment to sleep).
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@Mikael_Svahnberg said:
Related to this: make normal amounts of noise when the baby is sleeping. That way they get used to this and you don't have to sneak around.
Not only is it beneficial to you (not having to sneak around), it is beneficial to the baby (he/she won't grow up to be someone who has to have a perfectly quiet, dark environment to sleepYeah, we did this as well. When they're little they'll sleep through a fair bit of noise if they're used to it.
Haven't had anything loud going on the house for a while so not sure if that's still true...
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You should simulate artillery strikes while they're sleeping, so they'll be prepared for WWIII also.
