When our daughter was small and we had unresolved night awakenings I would ask our local contact Mom for her magical solutions. Her first response was always “How’s your couch time?” BTW this is a common response from all GFI alumni, be prepared….

Ok I’ve Gotta admit when our baby was an infant I found this question pretty annoying, I mean really she doesn’t know when we’re doing “couch time”, right?

Here’s a refresher on the “Couch time” idea, if you need it.

Once we have kids its our natural tendency to place all our free time and affection upon them. They are just so crazy cute! And we’ve all done the work to get them asleep at a a reasonable hour so we’ll catch up with our spouse then. Hmmmm…..

Actually, babies and children need a structured time during their day when they see Mom and Dad lovingly communicating and not focusing all their attention on baby. It provides a sense of security on their world which mostly consists of YOU and Your spouse. (If you haven’t taken GKGW I highly recommend this lesson by Gary Ezzo, it was moving for me.)

Here’s the how-to. We put our daughter on a blanket near us with a toy or a book. We tell her Mommy and Daddy are going to do couch time and she must play quietly on the blanket until the bell (kitchen timer) goes off. We started with a couple of minutes and have worked up to 10-15 minutes (depends on if we really have that much to discuss). There have been a few couch times that were short because of her wailing so loudly we couldn’t really hear each other. However, we continued to make it part of our evening routine and she now has come to accept it and even enjoy it!

Guideline: this is not the time to discuss heated subjects. As a matter of fact there are days we know that this excersise almost feels like a show to us but one we lovingly do because we have now seen results of the security it has provided our daughter.

So we work on our couch time, and I’ll admit being married to a pastor and working part-time myself some days it just doesn’t happen. But here is what I have noticed over the past few months. If we miss one night its cool. If we miss two nights its iffy-she may wake up at her favorite “Mommy hold me” time, 3am. If we miss three night its definite-I will see her at 3am, might as well set my alarm.

Needless to say, couch time is really important to me too. Side note: my love language is “quality time” so gazing into my husband’s eyes as we “talk” about our day isn’t so bad for me.

Related post – Ask GFI: Couch Time

One of the most fun times was introducing our daughter to the amazing tastes of food! What funny faces and great pictures! It can be challenging for some babies to make the transition so here are a few guidelines to get you started.

Once baby has overcome the initial time period of tongue thrusting and has learned how to take in rice cereal and baby food well, it’s time to start introducing solid foods.

When you first put your baby in the high chair begin training “High Chair Manners” by teaching your baby to keep his hands either under or down on the tray while Mommy feeds baby. Physically hold baby’s hands in this position until you baby understands the expectations and starts to do on their own. This is one of the first steps in teaching self-control and you will find this practice rewarding in the long run!

The highchair is also a great place to begin teaching sign language. Teach “Please” first. When your baby indicates he would like something say the word please and take his little hand and slide it across his chest a couple times. This takes many months but persevere and the results will be a wonderful help to your family. Other signs to work on once “Please” has been accomplished are “More”, “All Done”, “Down please”, “Thank you”. For a complete list of signs and diagrams see Babywise II.

My previous post discussed example timing of how to work your baby’s eating to your times. Until the age of one a liquid feeding should precede a meal.

Many Mommies choose to wean during the time period between 9-12 months, and begin formula. In our busy lives today its common for breast milk’s supply to decrease and therefore the need to wean to a bottle. Remember to be careful how much formula you give in comparison to a diminished milk supply. If  given too much baby may not show interest in eating the new food’s. Slowly decrease the amount of formula a little bit. Babies and children have a perfect internal mechanism that lets them know when to stop eating both liquid and solids. Another option is to give half of the bottle feeding prior to a meal and then offer the second half after. If refused then you know they have a had enough.

At each meal continue to feed baby food first with “little hands down”. Then soft finger foods can be placed on the tray with instruction given that baby may now pick up the food. Parents may enjoy dinner while baby is working on the finger foods.

Ideas include bananas, soft cooked veggies and fruits, cereals. While whole milk is not to be given until one year old Yogurt may be introduced at 9 months. Between 9-12 months most babies tire of baby food and are more interested in what is on your plate. We cooked our daughter’s food without seasoning initially to ease her into our family’s favorite foods. You can introduce all your family favorites mashed and cut small. Of course watch for choking concerns.

I took advantage of this time period to do some research on new healthy and nutritious ideas for our family. I have changed and added many foods since the addition of our daughter to our family.

This transition is a slow but very fun process, hope these tips are helpful and happy eating!

In the first year of my daughter’s life I had numerous questions, and the most challenging ones were all the many transitions we went through with eating and sleeping times. The first few months of feedings were alot about learning the cries of our daughter and evaluating her needs. We had learned about parent directed feeding in theory but there was definitely a learning curve. Most days it felt a little like a guessing game that I got just a little better at some days. It was when she was able to get on a 4 hour routine we really were able to relax and enjoy the consistency in our new family’s life.( For a more detailed explanation of Parent directed feeding please see Babywise or Along the Infant Way.)

Here’s an overview of the first feedings and an example of what the 4 hour routine looks like for our family.

Babies who are on a parent directed feeding routine begin life by taking a feeding every 2 and 1/2 to 3 hours, by the time they are 4-6 months moving to a 3 to 4 hour routine. Between 4-6 months rice cereal should be introduced once a day in addition to the liquid feedings.

Soon after baby foods are introduced, a new one every 3 days to watch for food allergies. It’s common for babies to take many weeks to learn how to take food into their mouth. Take your time and be patient.

Your goal should be to get your baby on an approximate four hour routine, again this takes time.

Here’s an example of how this worked for our family. These times are approximate within a half hour.

8:00am Bottle / Nurse
8:30am Rice cereal mixed with breast milk, Fruit baby food
10:00am Nap
12:00pm Bottle / Nurse
12:30pm Vegetable baby food, Fruit baby food
2:00pm Nap
4:00pm Bottle / Nurse
6:00pm Vegetable baby food, Rice cereal
Introduce solid finger foods while Mom and Dad eat dinner
7:45pm Bottle / Nurse
8:00pm Sleep for the night

Until your baby is a year breast milk or formula feedings are a must. Remember your baby has learned new physical skills by this time and will be needing the additional calories. Snacks are optional however we found them unnecessary until liquid feedings were eliminated at a year and our daughter was walking therefore requiring more calories.

My next post will cover transitioning baby from baby foods to solids.

Question:

“Our 7 month old has been doing so well with his routine and as On Becoming Babywise II says, he is ready to drop to 2 naps a day. Which is great, but now he has more wake time and what can I do to fill up all that time! It seems we are getting into a pattern of using the same 4 or 5 activities, day after day or I’m beginning to become his chief form of entertainment and not sure this is the direction we should be heading. Do you have some ideas for this age?”

Answer:

When planning wake time activities, and especially when you are working on stretching wake time, it’s helpful to think of the activities in two categories: Self entertainment activities and interactive activities.

Try to plan “baby alone” types of activities for the first half of wake time when baby has just been fed and is well rested. Playpen time is the most obvious, but this is also the best time for trips in the car and walks in the stroller since baby is not as likely to fall asleep which then alters his routine. Then for the second half of wake time, plan more interactive things, like playing with him on the floor or even “reading” a book in your lap. This is also a great time for a bath, and even if you have had playpen time earlier in the day, you can always have it again!

If dinner prep happens to fall in the time that your baby needs more interactive play, try setting him in an infant seat and bringing him into the kitchen with you. When mine were this age, I would do a “cooking show” play by play of what I was doing while I cooked.

Attached below is a list prepared by a mom. It has some great ideas that will actually take you up to age Five!

Activities for Babies

(0-12 Months)

Alone

Pop Up Toys
Mobiles
Swing
Johnny Jump Up
Baby Mirror
Soft Blocks
Toys That Can Be Chewed
Books (Cloth)
Crib Gyms
Infant Seat (To See Things from Different Perspectives)
Bouncy Chair
Rattles or other toys that make sounds

Mom And Baby

Feeding
Rocking
Play Time On Blanket (Mom Helps Baby Develop Skills)
Singing/Eye Contact/Rhymes
Read
Bath Time
Walking

Activities for Toddlers

(18 Months – 2 Years)

Alone

Playtime in Crib/Playpen
Play Center (Theme)
Blanket Time
Magnetic Numbers/
Letters on Refrigerator
Dress Up
Shape Sorting Toys
Limited Free Time
Sit Time with Books
High Chair Toys
Paint with Water
Large piece Puzzles
Nesting/Stacking Toys
Listening Tapes

With Mom

Cooking Time (Real Or Play)
Stamping/Stickers
Rice/Corn Meal Play
Throwing Bean Bags in Container
Reading
Prayer Time [at meals and bedtime]

Outdoor Play all supervised

Walk
Baby Pool
Paint with Water On Patio
Sand Box
Bubbles
Outdoor Toys

Activities For Preschoolers

(2 Years – 5 Years)

Alone

Color
Playdoh
Toys at Table
Stamping
Finger Paint or Paint on paper with water
Peg Boards
Sit Time/Blanket Time
Listening Tapes
Magnet Numbers/Letters On Refrigerator
Water Play at Sink
Books
Computer [limited]
Lego’s
Sticker Books
Puzzles
Chalkboard
Picture Time
Stencils
Room Time
Video time [limited 30 min. per day]
Dress Up
Learning to use a pencil – print letters
Stringing Beads
Lace Cards
Corn Meal/Rice Play
People/Animal Figures
Lincoln Logs
Mini Trampoline

With Mom

Cut With Safety Scissors
Cooking
Reading
Prayer Time
Finger-paint
Games
Crafts
Character Quality Explanation/Stories

Chores (Training)

Watering Plants
Picking up toys on Patio
Sweeping
Putting Silverware Away From Dishwasher
Cleaning Fronts of Appliances
Window Washing
Set Table
Folding Laundry
Dusting
Cleaning Mirrors

Outdoors [*with direct supervision for sure]

Swim *
Chalk
Sand Box
Walking
Shaving Cream on Picnic Table
Gardening *
Water Hose *
Bubbles
Riding/Outdoor Toys
Paint with Water

For a more extensive list, see What Every Child Should Know Along the Way By Gail Martin. It is on sale now at GFI.org.

I had a request on my blog to elaborate on the idea of “Mom, not baby, decides.” I wrote this post and it has been very well received. This is another principle of Babywise that will greatly help you if you can understand it.

In an email Anne Marie Ezzo sent to me a few months ago, she mentioned the idea of “mom, not baby, decides” and pointed out that is true for all parenting philosophies. The mom (or parent or caregiver) is always deciding when the nap will end or start. The philosophies really differ in cues followed and whether or not a schedule is enforced. The mom who gets baby as soon as she makes a peep is deciding when to get the baby up, she has just decided to follow that cue. The mom who lets her newborn sleep 4 straight hours during the daytime, not wanting to wake a sleeping baby, has decided the nap won’t end until baby wakes himself up. Mom always decides.

Sure. But what does that phrase mean in the context of Babywise? Well, it means much of the same. But be sure YOU decide and not let the CLOCK decide. I think parents who follow a schedule can easily fall into the trap of becoming slaves to the clock. Always keep in mind that Babywise is Parent Directed Feeding, not clock directed.

This parent directed idea can and should be applied to all ages of your child. YOU decide whether or not your toddler can have some candy, not the presence or absence of a TANTRUM. Getting this “you” deciding practice down early will make future struggles easier for you.

I can understand parents, especially first time parents, wanting some sort of outline and case-by-case scenario that tells them “if X, then Y.” Yes, that would make parenting easier. It would be more like raising a tree than a human. Now, the steps to raising a tree do vary by the species of the tree as well as your climate, but at that point you can get pretty solid advice on what to do if X happens to your tree. You can tell a problem you see with your tree, ask your neighbor who has lived there for the last 50 years and he can tell you pretty definitely what to do to fix the problem. He doesn’t need to know much more.

Children have environmental factors, just like trees. But they have so much more. They have personalities and tendencies. They have desires and yearnings. And most difficult for the parent, they have agency. They can choose how to act and react! This is a great gift, though many times we wish we could strip our children of their agency. When you add to the mix the parents, things get even more complicated. Parents have personalities and tendencies. They have desires and yearnings. They have agency. Then they have a schema of the world. A parent has been affected by his life experiences: childhood, friendships, schooling, successes, failures, etc.

You can easily see why there can be no “If X, then Y” equation for your children. A book couldn’t possibly be long enough to cover it all. My posts on this blog alone cover over 300 single spaced, typed pages so far. Then you have the hundreds of pages of questions/answers. All of that is in addition to what is already written in the Babywise books.

This is why “Mom, not baby, decides…” is such a valuable concept for mom. Mom is smart. Yes, you make mistakes. Yes, you have to learn things, and sometimes the hard way, but you are still smart. You can take in all of the factors. You combine these variables and analyze them. You then work to problem solve.

Let’s say baby usually goes down for a nap at 9:30 AM. But then baby starts showing her usual sleep cues at 9:15. What do you do? If you were the “if X then Y” mom, you would for sure keep her up until 9:30. If baby really needed to go down at 9:15, then baby would wake up early from the nap and you would be left looking for the next “Y” to solve the current “X.” But this “X” could have been avoided. For the PDF mom, she thinks. Did baby wake up early this morning? Did baby have a rough night? Is baby teething or sick? Did baby go to bed early last night? Did baby miss a nap yesterday? Or simply, was that really the sleep cue? You decide to put her down right away. She sleeps her normal nap length, though she does wake up 15 minutes earlier than usual since she went down early. No big deal. That is better than an hour and 15 minutes earlier.

So mom decides. Mom looks at the variables and decides what to do. She isn’t governed by outside forces, but rather cues, knowledge, and experience. Does that mean mom is perfect and gets it right every time? No. We all make mistakes. We misjudge. We then chalk that up to our experience list and move forward.

“Mom, not baby, decides” works well because mom is better able to analyze the situation than baby. Mom has more experience and more intelligence. Mom can see the big picture. Mom has better goals in mind. Toddler doesn’t get candy because eating a full, nutritious dinner is important to the health and happiness of Toddler, and dinner is 30 minutes away. Candy can be considered after dinner, perhaps as dessert. Newborn Baby wants to go right to sleep after eating, but mom knows having some waketime will actually help him to nap better and longer. That will ensure he stays on his feeding schedule better. So mom works and works to keep newborn baby up for some playtime. It is exhausting for mom and baby, but mom looks past the moment and toward higher goals in the future. Mom doesn’t give in to the tantrum because she knows that will make future tantrums better. She also knows child needs to learn to experience disappointments. Child needs to know that a fit isn’t going to get him what he wants. She knows that giving in to the fit now will only make future behavior worse, not only tantrums.

So keep deciding. Of course as your child grows, he earns freedoms. But that is you decided if and when to allow freedoms. It is you watching the use of those freedoms and making sure he really can handle the privilege and opportunity.