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The Most Important Things You Need For Your Newborn

July 3rd, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

If you need a list of essential items for your newborn baby then here it is!

6/7 wide neck cotton vests

6/7 babygros or sleepsuits

2 plain knitted cardigans

2 pairs of cotton socks or slip on booties

1 hat (type depends on season)

2 pairs scratch mittens

1 shawl

7 muslin squares

2 soft baby towels

Cotton wool

Nappy rash cream

Talcum powder

Baby lotion

Baby shampoo

Newborn baby nappies

Teething Biscuit Recipes

June 29th, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

Teething biscuits and finger foods are not just about nutritional intake and helping teething discomfort. Giving your baby teething biscuits will help your baby develop motor skills and also start to find out what it is like to eat solid foods. Making teething biscuits at home rather than buying branded foods is one alternative, and would require learning about various recipes for teething biscuits. There are many teething biscuit recipes and making them yourself at home is a good alternative to buying branded ones.

Banana Bread Sticks

1/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup oil
2 eggs
1 cup mashed banana
1 3/4 cups flour (white, whole wheat, or a combination)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

Combine ingredients and stir only until smooth. Pour into a greased loaf pan.
Bake at 350 degrees F for about 1 hour or until firmly set.

Cool, remove from pan, and cut into sticks. Spread sticks out on a cookie sheet and bake at 150 degrees F for 1 hour or longer until the sticks are hard and crunchy. Store in a tightly covered container. Source: Feed Me I’m Yours by Vicki Lansky

Eggl-Free Baby Cereal Cookies

1 cup flour
1 cup dry flavred or unflavored infant rice cereal

3 tablespoons cooking oil
ice water

Directions:
Preheat oven 425F
Mix flour and cereal.
Gradually stir in oil. Mix a little ice water at a time (start with 1/4 cup) until dough begins to form a ball and pull away from the bowl.
Roll out to the thickness of a cracker on a floured surface and cut into desired shapes.
Bake on an ungreased cookie sheet 10-12 min. or until lightly brown. Cool completely.

The obvious advantage to using your own recipes for teething biscuits and making them yourself is that they will probably be more nutritious for your baby plus it can help save you a lot of money. Also, there are many store-bought teething biscuits that contain high sugar levels or other ingredients that can even lead to your baby developing allergies.

So why not give it a go!

Infant teething: Uncomfortable but normal

May 22nd, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

Infant teething is a fact of life for all babies. The effects of teething vary from baby to baby. Some will experience a lot of pain and discomfort, which is terrible for the baby and the parents, and others will barely notice the process.

Teething symptoms

It is not uncommon though for infant teething symptoms to result in niggling upsets.  Babies will each have their own individual experiences with infant teething symptoms varying from instance to instance. However, it is normal for infant teething to begin when the baby is about six months old. By the time he or she has reached the age of three, all of the teeth should have emerged.

The first teeth that tend to appear are the two bottom front teeth, and these are usually followed 4 to 8 weeks later by the four front upper teeth. Then about a month later the lower lateral incisors will appear, followed by the molars, and then finally the eyeteeth. However the order in which teeth appear will vary from child to child and so do not be alarmed if they do not come in this exact sequence.

The way that this problem has been addressed has also been quite different throughout the ages and may to a large extent is influenced by beliefs of medical practitioners and those of the ordinary common person. In modern ways of dealing with the problem, there are many supportive measures used that help with providing relief from pain for the infant.

There are a number of different things that you can do to help your baby during the infant development teething process.One of the best options is to gently massage their swollen gums with your fingers. Make sure that your hands are clean of course, and then just rub gently back and forth over their gums, as this can help to relieve some of the pressure and pain.

You can also give your child something cold to chew on, depending on how old they are, you can use a cold facecloth, a popsicle, or child teething ring, for instance, and this will be incredibly helpful in terms of taking away some of the intense pain that they are feeling from their teeth breaking through the gums.

You want to make sure that you clean the baby’s gums and teeth as they come up on a regular basis, and never allow your baby to fall asleep with a bottle because this will allow the milk to sit on the gums and can result in causing tooth decay.

Teething can undoubtedly be a traumatic time for all concerned but it won’t last forever. It helps knowing that you at least have ways to help your baby through the process. Just be sure to use only recommended methods, and preferably those which are natural rather than resorting to remedies that may contain alcohol or drugs.

How to Get Your Baby to Sleep While Teething

April 1st, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

Teething affects different babies in different ways. Undoubtedly it can be a very traumatic time for some whilst others will barely notice it. If your baby is finding teething tough going you as the parent will not be having an easy time either. Sleepless nights followed by fractious days are no fun but there are things that can be done to help your baby get more sleep while teething.

Tips For Getting Your Baby to Sleep While Teething

One of the best things you can do to get your baby to sleep while teething is to use store bought teething rings, the best option here being the liquid filled teething rings that can either be refrigerated (some people say to freeze them but I don’t personally recommend this). These work well because the cold temperature soothes and numbs the baby’s gums. This option is better than most others because it is not messy and as well it is completely safe for the child.

Another great idea are Frozen bananas. All you have to do is take a banana and peel it. Cut the banana in half and take off the tips and remove all the stringy pieces. Then just put the banana in a freezer bag and basically leave it there until your little one starts experiencing teething pain at which point you can take the banana out of the freezer and let them bite on it.

Massaging the baby’s gums with your fingers is another great idea, just make sure that your hands are clean first of course, and then gently rub back and forth across the baby’s sore and swollen gums. This works to relieve the pain on the gums by equalizing the pressure going down the gums as is caused by the teeth coming upwards from underneath the gums.

Although it is difficult to see your baby suffering the discomfort of teething just bear in mind that it IS only a phase that all babies go through and inevitably get through.

Parenting Styles – What’s The Best?

February 12th, 2008    Subscribe To Our Feed

Parenting is very much trial and error for most people, but it is often based on what the mother or father experienced themselves as children. However most parents are anxious to do the best they can for their children and most children do realize this – even when they are being told off. Hence whichever types of parenting style you decide on bond of love is the defining influence.

One of the most common types of parenting styles is smothering by the mother and criticism by the father. The mother tries to spoon feed her children at every occasion, and is overly concerned about their increasing need for independence as they grow older. On the other hand, the children can do no right in the eyes of the father, who constantly criticizes their appearance, behavior and performance. This is often a throwback back on the insecurities and problems faced by the parents while they were growing up. An overly critical parent may be reacting to stress at work, or other inter-personal relationships, including with the spouse.

Reaction to Different Types of Parenting Styles

Children, who are raised by a smothering mother and over critical father, may react in different ways. This can either make the children manipulative or, if they recognize that their parents actually want the best for them, make them stronger. They can respond to these two contrary types of parenting styles constructively. Instead of growing up manipulating the mother and resenting the father, the children can face up to the father’s criticism and improve themselves or confront his remarks positively. They can indulge in their mother’s over-protectiveness, or learn to take it lightly, and gently chide her for it.

However, not all children respond in this healthy manner, even within the same family. Some grow up as bullies and sullen people who cannot face a real challenge in life. These are options that children face while growing up, and their emotional growth really depends on their response to the types of parenting styles they have experienced

Different circumstances result in different parenting styles, but it is the various influences during the formative years that determine the type of adult the child will become. Other people such as grandparents, teachers or peers exert other influences but generally, children who recognize their parents’ underlying sincerity and love, however misguided they are at times, can grow up to be strong and tolerant individuals.

Baby Teething Age Varies From Child To Child

November 13th, 2007    Subscribe To Our Feed

There is set timetable for a baby to begin cutting teeth, but typically the infant teething age is determined, in part, by hereditary factors. The average age is somewhere between six and nine months for an infant to begin showing signs of teething, but it can be earlier or later. Regardless of the age at which the infant begins teething, it can take up to two years in total for all 20 of the baby teeth to work their way through the gums.

Many pediatricians point out that by the time an infant is born, the roots for their baby teeth are already formed, waiting for the opportunity to work their way out through the gums. There have been occasions when infants have been born with two or more teeth already showing through the gums. While a typical infant teething age may be hard to pin down, the age any child begins teething is marked by certain common symptoms. An excess of saliva is one of the most common, while an urge to chew on anything that comes near it mouth also marks the beginning of the infant teething age.

With some infants the infant teething age may not start until they are close to a year old and pediatricians stress that being early or slow to begin teething is not a reflection on the health and well-being of the infant. Like many other occurrences in life, teething is an unpredictable process, but it is common that teeth grow out in pairs.

All children will cut teeth and for some there will no pain or discomfort and for others the process will go by hardly noticed. For the few that have a difficult time having the teeth break through the gum tissue there are many treatments available at home that can help the baby and the parents through the infant teething age. Massaging the gums is one of the proven methods to help relieve the pain, whether it is with a clean finger or a damp gauze swab.

Offer your child something firm to chew on such as a raw carrot stick or a rusk . Or you could try a chilled teething ring. Try to avoid giving your baby medicated teething gels that contain local anaesthetics if possible as the relief is very short lived and they can end up causing allergies.

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