Baby decides to pee right in the middle of it all while the diaper is off! Now you have to wipe up, change the baby’s clothes and when you’re done, wipe and wash the changing pad.

This was what we were doing on an almost daily basis with Alex until we happened upon a great idea.

When we were in the hospital right after Alex was born, the hospital had blue absorbent pads that were thin plastic on one side and cotton on the other. They were meant to go on the bed to absorb any fluids that leaked.

We thought these would be ideal for the baby changing table. We went on the hunt and found them for sale online. We bought a case of them and couldn’t be happier. Now when Alex decides at an inopportune moment to pee, we don’t have to go into a mad dash to clean it up and capture it before it soaks the changing table mattress and everything else.

It’s also nice when she has an explosion in her diaper as no matter how careful you try to be, you will end up with a huge mess. Now, we just place her in the middle of the blue changing pad and clean her up. If any of the mess gets on the pad, we just fold it up and throw it away.

At five to ten cents per pad, it’s a lot better than trying to wipe down and sanitize the changing table mattress every time there’s an accident. Trust me, you will agree it’s well worth it the first time you have an incident at 3am and you don’t feel like spending 10 minutes cleaning up.

Another great use for the blue under pads is to keep in your diaper bag for on the go changing. They have more than come in handy several times when we’re out on the road all day and finding a family friendly bathroom is out of the question. In these cases, we just stopped somewhere, spread out the blue changing pad on the car seat and change Alex without any worry that she may mess up the car seat.

It’s also handy when you don’t want to put the baby down on a public changing table, etc as you don’t know how clean they are. Well, just pull out the changing pad and when you’re done, just throw it away.

Blue Disposable Under Pads at Amazon.com

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The doctor then pulls out a chart and looks up what percentile the baby falls into. He announces that she is in the 50th percentile for head size and the 25th percentile for height and weight at 3 months (11 pounds 14 oz and 22 and 5/8 inches tall).

She was also in the 25th percentile for her 2 month checkup and although the doctor said there was nothing to worry about, it did bother me. Considering that my wife and I were both large babies, it didn’t make sense to me.

Finally, an idea comes to me. I asked the doctor if the percentile chart takes into account that the baby was born a month early. He gives me an Ah ha look and replies no it doesn’t! The charts assume that the baby was full term.

He then went on to say that if he adjusted the chart to account for her  being a month early (by taking her current height and weight and applying it to the two month old chart), Alex suddenly jumps up to the 50th to 75th percentile.

Now THAT makes a heck of a lot more sense to me and I am so glad I asked.

Have a similar experience? Let us know by leaving a comment below!

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My first thought is that this is some hippy touchy feely crap that is either going to be nonsense and incredibly boring or just complete garbage. I figured if there was any truth to any of it, we’d have heard about it by now since people have been writing  books and teaching baby classes forever.

Well, I was to be proven wrong.

The DVD sat on top of the TV for a week or two. My wife would mention that we should watch it from time to time, but I would always find something – anything else to do to avoid having to suffer through it.

Finally, wifey adamantly declares one day that we are watching it and that’s it. I reluctantly pop it into the DVD player and we watch.

The DVD starts by telling the story of the woman who made it. Basically, she discovered as a kid that she has a photographic memory for sounds. When she had a baby, she started to see patterns in the different cries her baby let out. She was then able to further identify the cries by noting what made the baby happy for each particular cry.

She found that all babies have at least five distinct cries for things such as hunger, tired, burp me, tummy gas, and discomfort (too hot, too cold).

The DVD goes through each of the sounds, then shows ten or fifteen different babies making those sounds while crying as an example of what it sounds like.

What’s hysterical and was my holy cow moment, is that I was feeding the baby while we were watching the DVD. The scene for “Burp Me” was playing right around the time that little Alexandria was finishing her bottle. I picked her up to burp her and just then the example scene comes on with a dozen babies making the “Burp Me” sound. Well, Alex starts making the exact same sound. First the baby on the TV, then Alex, then repeat. I started laughing thinking that maybe she was immitating the TV  babies, but then I thought better since she’s only three months old. It’s a bit too early for her to be that sharp.

Well, sure enough, within abot 10 seconds, Alex let’s out a hearty burp and stops. We paused the TV and went to change Alex and get her ready for bed. We brought her back to the couch and continued watching the DVD, we watched the rest of it including the sounds for the baby saying she’s tired.

Once again, Alex suprises us. Shortly after watching the DVD, Alex starts making the tired noises while being fussy. This was pretty suprising to us, since we thought the baby was too young at three months to give signs she was tired. Our experience with her to this point was just to wait until she was obviously drowsy to put her down. If she was fussy in the evening, we would run around trying to feed her or change her or rock her, etc.

Well, Alex is crying and making the sound that the DVD says means she’s tired, so we decide to give it a try. We put Alex down in the crib. She is still fussy, but we’re willing to give it a try. We put her pacifier in her mouth and kiss her goodnight and leave the room. Within one minute, she was completely asleep. My wife and I were shocked. Suffice it to say that for the most part, the DVD is right. Instead of running around aimlessly trying everything in the world to make the baby happy and stop crying, now we at least have some good clues to start with.

For thirty bucks, it was definitly a good buy and something I’d suggest all parents of young infants try.

You can get it on Amazon (they often have good prices). Click the link below to see the dvd listing.

Dunstan Baby Language — Learn the universal language of newborn babies

Have you used the Dunstan Baby Language DVD or another program like it? Let me know how it worked for you by leaving a comment below!

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If the baby was fussy, it would normally not be for more than about 15 or 20 minutes once or twice a day. The fussiness would usually end with a fart and a suddenly relaxed baby.

On one occasion, my wife was very concerned about how much the baby seemed to be straining. Realizing that we had a doctor’s appointment the next day, I grabbed our digital camera that can make short movie clips and filmed exactly what the baby was doing. I put the movie on my laptop and brought it to the doctor the next day.

Upon seeing the clip of the baby straining the doctor looked up and us and said “isn’t technology great?”. We replied, yes… do you see a problem? He thinks for a second and promptly replies “I’m not impressed by anything you just showed me”…

Hahaha. Unexpected, but very direct answer. He then explained that switching formula can often cause unexpected and undesired results and that a little fussiness a few times a day really didn’t justify changing formulas.

Instead he suggested we buy some baby gas drops like Little Tummys. They are basically baby Gas X. They collect all the little gas bubbles in the stomach and combine them into a bigger one and passes more easily and therefore, reduces bloating.

We’ve pretty much been addicted to them ever since. Alexandria still has come bouts of discomfort from time to time, but nothing terrible.

The problem is that it seems that the baby only has these bouts when we have relatives over. The relatives insist that we are hurting her by not switching formulas. They have the impression that she’s like that all the time.

Well, the pressure finally got to my wife. On an expedition to the baby store, she picked up a can of Similac Sensitive formula saying “we’ll just try it”. A few days later, without my prior knowledge, wifey decided to make the switch. The results were disasterous.

The baby suddenly went from eating about every three hours to every hour to hour and a half. She was constantly hungry and fussy as if she just couldn’t get satisfied. She was also peeing constantly.

Wifey tried to keep this up all day long. I finally decided near bed time that it was time to switch back as I didn’t want either of us up every hour all night long. That made no sense at all.

My wife tried to give her the Similac Sensitive again the next day to see if maybe it was something else that made the baby insane with hunger. Nope. Same result.

We switched back to Similac Advance with Early Shield and haven’t looked back since. I know my wife is still secretly jones’in to switch formulas again, but I am not convinced.

Have any luck switching forumulas with your child? Did it work? Any advice? Please let us know with a comment below!

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I’ve been looking into the topic myself as I refuse to believe that there isn’t a way to get an infant into a routine.

Most of my research has shown that there is a system.

First off, don’t bother trying to get your infant into a routine any earlier than two to three months old. They’re just too young and don’t have any clue what is goining on. They are not self aware enough to get into a system until close to three months.

We got a preview of what was to come as my wife’s sister had a baby girl 9 months before Alexandria’s due date. Things didn’t go well for my sister-in-law and her husband. Her parents came in from out of town to help with the new baby. The problem was that they came for 6 months.

Upon their arrival, her parents decided their sole reason for being there was to keep the baby happy at all costs and that the baby should never cry. They did and outstanding job if that was their goal. The moment the baby w0uld utter a peep, they would go running to her side. They would be on top of her and talking or singing or playing with her every waking moment of the day until the baby would go to sleep for the night. They would hold and rock the baby to sleep.

This went on for 6 months straight. By the time the grandparents left and went home, they had completely convinced the baby that no one in this world is ever alone and that the minute you wake up someone is there until you fall asleep again.

The problem here is that the child now cannot be left alone without freaking out. You also cannot get her to fall asleep unless you are right next to her or preferably, holding her. She wakes up terrified if no one is there.

One reason babies can’t fall asleep alone or go back to sleep when they wake up in the night is that her parents are trying to be sneaky. When you let the baby fall asleep in your arms then bring her to the crib and gently put her down while trying not to wake her, you are confusing her. All she knows is that she fell asleep in mommy or daddy’s arms. She expects to wake up in the same place. When she wakes up in another room in her crib and no one is there, she is confused and unhappy. Since she can’t get up and go back to where she wants to be, she cries for you to come and do that for her.

My niece’s parents are now miserable. Wifey and I showed them a book we bought that had a section on training a baby to sleep well by itself. It says you should have a nightly ritual that you do with the baby.

At around the same time every night, you perform this ritual. For example, give her a bath followed by her last bottle. Now read her a story or sing her her nightime song. Rub her back or help her relax for a bit then give her a kiss and leave the room.

If she starts crying, let her cry for 5 minutes then go back in. You can comfort her by telling her everything is ok and place your hand on her chest. You cannot pick her up or engage her. You should not stay in the room for more than 5 minutes even if she keeps crying. If after you leave the room she continues crying, you should now wait 10 minutes before going back in and repeating the steps above. The third time and each time thereafter, you should wait 15 minutes before going in.

Watch the clock if you need to, but do not go in any sooner. The baby will eventuall tire herself out and fall asleep on her own. If she wakes up in the middle of the night and is dry and fed, repeat the steps above.

It is important that you don’t wait until the baby is already asleep before putting her in her crib. She needs to know she is there and fall asleep there. This way, when she wakes up there at 3am, she’ll know where she is.

Now, it will take some patience and tough love to do this. Despite being given this information, my sister-in-law and her husband are still battling with their daughter to get her into normal sleep habits. The primary reason is that they can’t stand hearing her cry for so long. They feel bad and feel like they are being mean. The truth is that by letting her cry, they’re also letting her tire herself out and teaching her how to settle herself and learn to fall asleep on her own, which will help with the middle of the night wake up calls.

Another reason they are having trouble with this system is because again, they feel bad because the few nights they’ve tried this, the following day, their daughter gets upset every time they leave the room and is more afraid of being left alone.

Again, I think this is to be expected considering that they child has always had someone on top of her at all times her entire life. By strictly sticking to the plan above, they will teach their daughter how to be comfortable falling asleep alone and as a result, make her more comfortable with being alone for short periods while she’s awake.

She just needs to be ok with the idea that she is ok alone and hasn’t been abandoned. You will not teach her any of this by giving in because she’s crying and reinforcing her bad behavior.

Have you successfully trained your child to sleep through the night? Are you dealing with this situation now yourself? Please leave a comment below and let us know how it went!

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Since my wife’s sister had a baby 8 months before Alex was born, we had an idea of what to expect. My sister in law and her husband, started out by keeping the baby in their bedroom. Every time the baby would wake up and cry, both of them would get woken up and both would be up until the baby went back to sleep, even though only one of them was actually changing or feeding her.

While this is very noble and full of camaraderie, I am completely against it. The two of them both looked like zombies for months.

Wifey and I talked about it and decided the best approach for us to try is for us to split up. Since my company allowed me to take a couple of months off after the baby was born to help my wife, we were able to get more creative than we would have been had I needed to go back to work right away.

Since we had converted our guest room into the baby’s room, we already had a bed in there. Instead of both of us getting up all night, we’d split the duties. One of us would sleep in the room with the baby and take night duty.

In the morning, the one that slept through the night would take over and let the other one sleep late to catch up on sleep. This way, at least one of us is always fairly fresh and functional.

The first night mommy and baby were home from the hospital, I decided to try being the overnight caretaker so wifey could get a full night’s sleep. It didn’t go well. First off, I was paranoid so kept waking up to check on the baby. Then, I had apparently done a crap job hooking up the anti SIDS (movement monitor) and as a result, I got woken up no less than three times by false alarms which scared me senseless. I finally got up and corrected my mistake of only connecting one of the movement pads, which solved that issue. Then came the issue of feeding the baby. Since we were trying to breastfeed only, I had to bring the baby to wifey. Since this was waking her up anyway, both of us wound up suffering.

By the morning, I was totally destroyed and so was my wife.

We decided to regroup and come up with a new plan. Wifey said that since she hadn’t been sleeping well at the end of the pregnancy and had also been getting broken sleep in the hospital, she could deal better with it than I could. Our new plan was formed. Wifey would be dedicated to the night shift and I would take the day shift as well as keep up with house work since I’d be better rested.

The second night, wifey went to bed in the baby’s room early around 9pm and I stayed up with the baby. We were feeding the baby every three hours and her next feeding would be at midnight. I decided I would stay up with her until about 1am so that wifey could get at least 4 hours of continuous sleep.

The plan actually worked beautifully. I put the baby to sleep in her room without waking my wife at around 1am. The baby got up for her feeding at 3am and went back to sleep until 6am. I got up at 7am and took over and let wifey sleep until 10am. The bottom line is that I felt great because I got 7 hours of undisturbed sleep and wifey felt pretty good since she got to sleep for a few extra hours despite it being broken sleep.

We have stuck with this plan since then and it has continued to work. Since the last time the baby gets up with my wife is at 6am, as long as I get her before her 9am feeding, wifey doesn’t get woken up and gets her rest and so do I.

I’m writing this post on the couch with baby Alexandria in her bassinet sleeping. I’m going to wake her up in about a half hour to change and feed her, which will give her a little time to settle back down before I put her to bed with mommy. I do get sleepy towards the end of my night, but it’s not terrible and is a heck of a lot better than being woken up every couple of hours all night and then being z0nked the next day.

UPDATE:

We have officially abandoned the two shift sleeping arrangement. After about a month of wifey doing the night shift, she was pretty much ready to crack mentally. Although she had felt fine about it at first, the constant broken sleep eventually got to her.

We now split the night. We go to bed between 10pm and 11pm. The baby will usually sleep until 2am or 3am. I take that feeding and go back to bed. When the baby wakes up next around 6am or 7am, she takes that feeding. While it does make my night a bit rough, the difference was immediate and dramatic for my wife. She woke up the next day feeling like a brand new person and her attitude came right along with it.

At the end of the day, you have to do whatever works for you, but my advice for the guys that have their wives doing all of the overnight work, give her a break and either take a whole night from time to time or offer to split the work. It’ll help your wife’s whole state of mind and is the right thing to do.

Do you have any tips or tricks on getting your newborn to sleep better? Please leave a comment below!

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Now I’m not the hippy type that thinks you should wipe with leaves or anything, but they made some very compelling arguments.

Considering all of the childhood diseases and conditions that seem to be on the rise whose causes are unknown, why take chances by exposing your child to chemicals and artificial products if you don’t have to?

Do you really know what is in diaper wipes? What chemicals are in them? How they are made? Neither do I. The alternative suggested is simple. Cotton Balls and warm water. They are as natural as anything I can think of and I’ve never heard of anyone having an allergic reaction to this great combination.

Now, again I’m a practical person first and foremost. We did buy a box of wipes at Costco under the Kirkland brand which are hypo allergenic and fragrance free. They are as close to natural as we could find. We decided we’ll use them in situations where warm water and cotton balls wouldn’t be practical.

Our decision was made that much easier when we went to the doctor recently for baby Alexandria’s checkup. We needed to change her in the examination room. I asked my wife to pass me the wipes (referring to the cotton and water), the doctor said “Oh, no you don’t, here use these”. He handed me a jar of cotton balls and some water.

Another thing to consider using is BPA free baby bottles. If you are going to use plastic baby bottles, the BPA free ones are free of several chemicals that have been found in plastics for years that get released when the bottles are warmed up (think microwaves and bottle warmers). These chemicals can get into your baby’s milk and can affect their developement.

We use the Born Free Brand Bottles which are known as one of the first brands to offer BPA free products for babies.

Since it doesn’t take much effort to follow these precautions, why not use them and possible keep your baby a little bit safer?

Please tell me what YOU think by leaving a comment below!

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