Well, yes, actually there is. The trick is to have more than 10 kids. This way, you completely lose your mind, and nothing bothers you anymore!
For fessie and tanookie, boy can I relate on “not being my mom”. My mom was in no way suited to motherhood! The most important thing I found, though, is that once you figure out you don’t want to be your mom, you have to figure out what kind of mom you do want to be. Otherwise, you just go through the whole thing improvising full-time, and there goes that all-important consistency tanookie was talking about!
…And we’re expecting the Wee Kilt-wearin’ Lad in three days, while the Kilt-wearin’ Lad (our oldest) is a year and a month old right now. Yeah, sleep will be just a beautiful memory for quite a while…
Did anyone have problems with a toddler’s reaction to a new brother or sister coming home? I just don’t know how the Lad will react to his new brother. He’s always been the center of our attention and I worry that maybe we’ve spoiled him just a bit…I mean, generally speaking he’s a wonderfully behaved, happy baby but, well, I worry a little. We’ll do our best to make sure he doesn’t feel neglected of course, but there will be rare times the Wee Lad needs both Mommy and Daddy’s attention for a little while…
Well - for a while the wee lad won’t have a clue. It doesn’t hurt to tell the wee one that you have to put him down and do X for the older child when wee lad takes a nap. This was your older son gets to hear you telling the baby to wait a minute once in a while instead of always the other way around. Become a creative housekeeper. Let some non critical stuff go.
Also - sometimes one or the other has to cry for a minute. You’re only human. It hasn’t killed my kids yet.
Give your one year old easy things to do and even get him a “baby” of his own. My daughter liked changing and feeding her bear just like mommy did with the baby. I also learned a lot about how my parenting looked to her by watching her imitate me. :eek:
Take some time to be with just kilt wearing lad. More often than not, it seems that even time spent with the elder child has the inclusion of the baby. But I have found that giving the youngster complete attention worked well. Maybe it gave the impression that we were not just trying to fit him but actually taking time for him. It is easy to say but with kids that close in age, but I found it hard to make that time available.
Thanks. Little girls scare me because they grow up to be women shudder
Little G thinks the stray cat he is giving attention to in the backyard is staying forever…but my wife has some allergies to cats. We’ll put it off a little longer but i think a puppy will be coming eventually.
Our kids are twelve months three weeks apart. My son handled the arrival of his sister without a hitch, and its only now that he is six that he is starting to rebel a little. She has always been very demanding and difficult - he has always been easy going and adaptable. Which has meant that everything with her takes forever - at almost five she still wants help getting dressed (or will dwaddle until you are late) - while he is very independant - so she has always gotten the lions share of the attention (not always positive attention, but attention) and I think he is finally feeling shorted.
That’s very reassuring. We’re most concerned about the next six months to a year - we figure those will be the most difficult times for us. Once they’re past that, they’re a little more self-sufficient (to a point, anyway…). I know I’ll be glad when there’s only one kid in diapers…can’t wait for double diaper duty to start.
What other tricks do you Moms & Dads use to manage two at once? How do you maintain your energy? Right now mine are young enough that making faces is enough to entertain them (and doesn’t require exertion!), but I imagine it’s going to get tricky soon.
Well, okay, here’s some advice about entertaining them, even when you’re exhausted. Once they’re old enough to love climbing, you can lay in the floor and play “mountain climber”; this is where the child is the mountain climber, and you are the mountain. Therefore, the only thing required of you is to lay there, and roll strategically so as to keep little hands, feet, knees and elbows out of sensitive places. Finger play is also good, and doesn’t require much energy from the parent; Itsy Bitsy Spider (and anyone who claims it’s Incy Wincy Spider or Eensy Weensy Spider is a communist and should be shot ), I Have a Turtle, The Wheels on The Bus, and many others will keep your tots entertained for minutes at a time. It also helps, as they reach pre-k age to find an activity to do with your child that you honestly enjoy. I buy adult-themed coloring books (Dover makes some good ones) and coloring books for my kids. When they want me to play with them, but I really don’t have the energy for yet another round of Barbies, coloring together always made them happy. Never underestimate the fun of bathing with your child, age pre-k and younger.
You don’t have to ask this mom twice! I threw up some snapshots on a geocities page here just for you guys. (As you can see, IANAProfessional Photographer; she’s much cuter in person.) Can I really be the first in a thread of proud parents to post photos? What are y’all waiting for?
So, am I yet again the only parent of an “only”? I’d like to have another, but it doesn’t look like it’s going to be possible. Anyone else here???
Your ValleyGirl is a doll! Those are wonderful pix!
Hmmm, I’ll have to see what I can dig up tomorrow for posting!
You know, you guys are gonna think I’m nuts (if you don’t already) but I’m about ready to start sticking to some kind of routine, much as I hate the idea. It’s getting wackier around here day by day & being fried isn’t helping me be a good Mommy. I dread the thought of exerting control, but Ugh! Can the girl whose socks never match find a way to feed her kids lunch at the same time every day? Stay tuned…
The second pic from the bottom is my little one at the Gettysburg DopeFest. She found a mud puddle to play in, but insisted it was a pond! The thing about the third kid is you don’t worry so much about them getting dirty.
I’ll see if I can find online pics of my older ones tomorrow, but tonight it’s late, and I’m going to bed!
Have you ever checked out flylady.net? It’s not everyone’s cup o’ tea, but it’s done wonders for me!
this page has pictures from Jonathan Chance’s housewarming party. Scroll down to the section that’s labeled “Housewarming Party”. The second row of pictures under this section show hubby (wearing a burgundy shirt and playing chess, on the left of the screen) and my youngest (wearing a purple shirt and drawing with chalk with JCs little cutie, on the right side of the screen). Now if you look at the fifth row of pics from the bottom of the page, you’ll see a whole table full of people. The girl in profile in the orange tee shirt is my oldest daughter, and the girl right beside her in the light blue tee shirt is my middle daughter.
JohnT - when I read the part in the “What to Expect” book about how every time you took a bite of food you should ask yourself “how does this benefit my baby” I threw the book against the wall and went for the Ben & Jerry’s. That said, I am kind of enjoying the What to Expect the First Year book.
We started sleep "training’ at about 7 weeks because none of us were getting any sleep. We skimmed through a bunch of books (I liked Jodi Mindells’ book) and kind of cobbled our own routine out of it. It was rough the first few nights (we went in every 3 minutes) but now she pretty much sleeps from 9pm to about 6-6:30 a.m. every morning. Although it works for bedtime, it doesn’t seem to work for naps. She just won’t nap, no matter how tired she is a lot of the time.
I went back to work when she was 3.5 months - and that’s working out pretty well, though I wonder how I’m every going to get anything done. How do people do it? By the time I get home, feed my daughter, feed myself, make sure my husband has eaten, play with the baby, etc., it’s already 7:30 and time to start the bedtime routine (we go for a half-hour walk before she gets a bath or rubdown, last bottle or breast and a few books before we turn out the lights at 9). And by the time she’s in bed, I’m too exhausted to do anything. But the house has to have at least a certain level of cleanliness. As of last Friday, the Poppet is crawling and since we have 3 cats and a dog there’s some dusting and vaccuuming that just HAS to get done - to say nothing of laundry and dishes. How do you all do it?
Flutterby you may find that the early morning classes are actually a good thing. I say that as a confirmed non-morning person. You’re probably going to be up early anyway because of the baby. I used to sleep as late as possible and then try to get ready and rush to work in about 20 minutes. Now that I’ve got the little one I find that my whole internal clock has reset itself -something I wouldn’t have thought possible. It’s nice to have the extra time.
I’m tired just reading that! We call Zackie the human swiffer. I have a motto that we don’t charge extra for the fuzz. Honestly with 2 mobile children, 4 cats and a dog - there is simply no way to get all the fuzzies all the time.
Dishes go in the dishwasher and hubby does the laundry. We split the rest depending on who can/wants to do what on any given day.
A typical day at casa tanookie goes like this: We get up sometime between 8 and 10 am. Breakfast for all. Kids spend a couple hours playing/wreaking havoc. Zackie eats and then naps. The rest of us have lunch. More playing. Lots of “helping” from my shadow. She hands me things from the dishwasher (I do all the non kid friendly stuff before she helps) or follows me around with a sponge or uses her little broom to sweep with. Then we run any errands I might have while he sleeps so daddy gets a little quiet. We generally then watch a movie and have supper and the kids play and then when they get tired we put them to sleep.
Yeah, we have those too. It’s nice to check up and see how much Sophie is ahead of where the books says she is supposed to be.
We, of course, steadfastedly ignore the very few areas where she is behind and dismiss them as “unimportant” or “she would be doing that if we thought it was a priority”.
), I Have a Turtle, The Wheels on The Bus, and many others will keep your tots entertained for minutes at a time. It also helps, as they reach pre-k age to find an activity to do with your child that you honestly enjoy. I buy adult-themed coloring books (Dover makes some good ones) and coloring books for my kids. When they want me to play with them, but I really don’t have the energy for yet another round of Barbies, coloring together always made them happy. Never underestimate the fun of bathing with your child, age pre-k and younger.