Tip #48: Make your own fruit concentrates from dehydrated fruits

In the search for how to make prune puree for adding to yogurt to aid in my son's digestive system, I found the best way to do this is to rehydrate prunes and puree, adding extra water as needed.  This turns out to be an awesome way to make concentrated fruit purees for adding to cereal and yogurt, without having to buy baby food.  To make apricots for example, rehydrate by steaming them, I found about 30minutes to be sufficient.  Next, puree them with water as needed, now freeze in ice cube trays! Now you have yummy fruit with all the fun fiber.  Because of the skins, this is definitely for a baby at the age that can handle a bit of chunkiness in their food, about 9months I believe in most cases.  When you buy the dehydrated fruit, watch for what agents may have been added (sulfates for example are often used), but in most cases you can find fruit with no additives at places like Trader Joe's and Whole Foods.

Tip #47: Encourage standing with toys

A friend of ours gave us a great tip.  Once their daughter had started pulling to a stand holding one toy, they would tempt her with another toy to encourage her to let go and stand all on her own.  Worked with ours too!  Turns out there's an irresistability to holding as many toys as possible to little ones.

Tip #46: Thicken baby food with rice cereal

I've had a hard time replicating the consistency of store bought foods.  My husband pointed out one day that one of the ingrediants is often rice flour.  One day when I had used too much water, I added baby rice cereal and it was fixed!

Tip #45: Teething bags are fantastic for sore gums

We picked up a Sassy teething feeder for our guy recently, and what a wonderful way to soothe sore gums. So far we've used chilled apple and mango slices and it's calmed him down almost immediately. I've also used a clip from a pacifier to attach it to his clothes/bib since he has a tendency to throw it. (Use with supervision of course)!

Source: Friend

Tip #44: Make pumping as fun as possible

I know..funny title huh? But, I have found that pumping is a drag. I love nursing, but could do without the hassle and stress of spending about 40-minutes a day (sometimes 60minutes) in a little antechamber off of the women's bathroom in the building next to mine. There's not a lot of work I can do while pumping, so I've tried to make that time as relaxing and stress-free as possible. Here are some of the things I do (by the way I bought a netbook specifically for this):

• Blog
• Watch Netflix streaming
  
• Listen to podcasts (This American Life and Planet Money are my favorites)
• Knit
• Read a book
  

Tip #43: Time medications if they have sugar

I have just learned if you are giving your child a medication that is suspended in a sugary syrup that you should not give it to them just before bed. We just started a course of antibiotics and we have gone from a sleepy baby to a jacked-up-on-sugar baby.

Tip #42: Home daycare age separations

When we started to consider home daycare, I contacted a friend's mom who has run one for a long time. The best piece of advice I got from her was to consider the age ranges in the daycare. Since we would be looking for an infant spot, she recommended infants and 2yrs+ toddlers was a great mix, but not to go somewhere with a lot of kids in between. Kids around 12-18months who are still learning to walk and have no perception of babies underfoot are a bad mix with infants. Since seeing kids this age I highly agree! We found a place with a very good split in ages and a method for separating the older kids so that the crawlers can have a safe space all to themselves.

Source: Friend's Mom

Tip #41: Alphabetical feeding

Once you've introduced solid food, and done so for long enough you have more than a few foods to give your little one, it can be hard to remember what they've had recently. I saw a tip to feed your baby alphabetically, so you roughly give them a diversity of food, e.g., applesauce, avocado, bananas, peas, plums, sweet potatoes, etc.

Source: From Parent Hacks which a friend of mine told me about recently. A very cool site with an array of tips.

Tip #40: An alternate baby book

We keep a blog of our life in general, and since getting pregnant and having a baby, it has allowed us to keep all our family and friends up-to-date on his development. It's chock-full of pictures as well. At the end of his first year, I plan to make a book (you could use iPhoto or a web-based photo album kind of place). The book will basically have every blog post that pertains specifically to him or our family. For example, I have lists of foods he likes at certain ages, posts on when he got his first tooth, when he started crawling, weight and height updates etc. Plus, pictures of us apple picking, playing at play groups, and so on. With the blog, we also have the date of when those things happened, so when he hits 12-months old, I'll simply copy pictures and the blog text into a dated book to have printed for us and grandparents.

Source: Grandma suggested this as an alternate to remembering to write into a more traditional baby album.

Tip #39: Safe kitchen toys for endless entertainment

On the same vein as Tip #38, introducing new objects is important developmentally and it also ensures ample entertainment for baby. I've been introducing my 6-month old to safe kitchen toys while I cook and he hangs out in his exersaucer. It's amazing how interesting a plastic measuring cup, a funnel and a wooden spoon can be! As always, make sound judgement as to safety.

Source: I apologize, I can't remember where I heard this.

Tip #38: Rotate your baby's toys

Our pediatrician recommended that we put away some toys occasionally for a couple of weeks and reintroduce them, and keep a rotating cycle. This way they never get bored. I can confirm they are quite excited again to see a toy that a few weeks ago they played with all the time.

P.S. Sorry for the long absence. Life has gotten busy, but I'll continue to try and post as much as I can.

Tip #37: A wet cloth can help a teething baby

Wet a wash cloth with cool water and let your teething baby chew and suck on it. It worked wonders this weekend with our very fussy baby.

Source: Daycare provider

Tip #36: Put a shirt around the bottle to help a breastfed baby take a bottle

Sometimes a breastfed baby has a hard time adjusting to a bottle when you decide to introduce (or re-introduce) one. One tip I've heard is to wrap mom's shirt (one that's been worn and smells like her) around the bottle while someone else gives it to them.

Source: Lactation Consultant

Bonus Funny Story: Hopefully, the person who told me this story won't mind if I share it here (it's anonymous right?). Her husband was having problems getting their baby to take a bottle and so she set a tank top out for him the night before for him to use to feed the baby her bottle in the morning. When Dad came back into the room in the morning, mom said "Why are you WEARING my tank top?" Dad said: "But you told me to use it when I gave her the bottle!"

Tip #35: One spoon to eat with, one spoon to play with

It's important for your baby to learn to the action of eating with a spoon when you start to feed them. I keep two spoons in the rotation, one to eat with and one to play with. For that reason, my favorite spoons are actually the Take N' Toss spoons. All parts of them are fine for baby's gums and they are a good size for a small mouth.

Source: Leader of Mom and Baby group.

Local Resource: Library calendars for free literary fun!

The Arlington library (main branch and Fox branch) are fantastic resources for free children groups; ranging from reading, to music, to play. Here are links to the events calendar of local libraries, make sure to check them weekly for the schedule (I've highlighted fun infant groups that appear to occur weekly at each, there are programs for older kids as well).

Arlington
Events Calendar Here
Robbins Library, 700 Mass Ave
Fox Branch, 175 Mass Ave
Tuesdays, Robbins, 10:00-10:30, Sing-a-long (get there early to sign up)
Thursdays, Fox, 10:00-10:30, Sing-a-long

Cambridge
Event Calendar Here
Boudreau Branch, 245 Concord Ave.
O'Neill Branch, 70 Rindge Ave
Valente Branch, 826 Cambridge St.
See addresses for other three branches through link to library above.
Mondays, O'Neill Branch, 10:30am, Toddler Time (Stories and Songs for 0-3 years old)
Tuesdays, Valente Branch, 10:30am, Toddler Time
Wednesday, Boudreau Branch, 10:30am, Toddler Sing-Along (all ages)

Lexington
Events Calendar Here
Main, 735 Mass. Ave
Thursdays, 9:30am-9:50am, Baby Laptime (0-15mo)
Thursdays, 10:30am, Toddler Time (16-24 mo)

Medford
Events Calendar Here
Main, 111 High St.
Fridays, 10am (Oct. 2, Nov. 6, and Dec. 4), Sing Alongs

Somerville
Event Calendar Here
Central Library, 79 Highland Avenue
West Branch Library, 40 College Avenue
Tuesdays, Central, 10:30-11:00, Sing-a-long
Thursdays, West, 11:00-11:45, 'Babygarten'

Tip #34: List of foods to buy organic for your baby (and you!)

We are at the stage of introducing solid food and I have heard a whirlwind of information regarding carrots and nitrates (part of the information says No carrots! Some say carrots after six months! Others say all the info on nitrate poisoning is really a concern regarding well water and very high exposure to children less than three months of age). Anyway, I decided it was time to look up the Environmental Working Group's list of the 'Dirty Dozen'..fruits and vegetables you are better off buying organic due to their high absorption of chemical fertilizers (one of those is carrots).

• Peach
• Apple
• Bell Pepper
• Celery
• Nectarine
• Strawberries
• Cherries
• Kale
• Lettuce
• Grapes (imported)
• Carrot
  
• Pear
  

TIp #33: Protecting your baby's toys while washing

In order to protect your baby's soft toys, but clean off drool and disinfect as well, put your soft toys in a pillow case when you wash them. Even better, if you have a Boppy cover, or the like, simply zip the toys into the cover whenever you wash it.

Source: Mom's group leader

Tip #32: Diapering a supersoaker overnight

Our son has been soaking through every diaper we've tried on him overnight, from several kinds of cloth to several kinds of disposables. I hit up the Arlington Parent's e-mail list for some advice and had lots of great responses. Here's the summary:

Disposables

• Huggies overnight were the preferred brand by far
• Tip: Add a disposable diaper liner (they are similar to maxi pads). Buy plastic-free, biodegradable liners from gDiapers
  
• Tip: Tuck in the top of the diaper to stop overflow
• Tip: Buy a larger diaper (one mom pointed out with variation in lengths, they may grow out of a size before the upper end of the weight limit is met).
• Tip: Put a pull up diaper over a disposable.
  

Cloth

• The general thought was to add a doubler.
• Favorite disposable doubler: gDiapers
• Favorite place to look for cloth doublers: Diaper Lab
• Tip: Choose a fleece lined doubler for next to baby's skin, it will feel dryer longer.
• Tip: Use more than one doubler.
  

Tip #31: Babyproofing with plaster walls

Pre-1950 it was common for inner walls to be built using a lath and plaster process. Sometimes, to keep the plaster affixed to the wall boards, horsehair was used, and so now this is sometimes also called horsehair plaster and it's ubiquitous in Arlington (at least in east Arlington, where we live). If you've ever tried to attach a load to these walls (even a small load you know wouldn't be a problem in drywall), the plaster crumbles and leaves a large hole. This means if you want to attach furniture to the wall using straps, in order to keep it from toppling over on a baby using it to pull up, you need to find a stud. Studs are 16" apart and not necessarily in a convenient place for your furniture. Instead, you can use an L-bracket on each side of your piece of furniture and drill one side into the furniture, and the other into the baseboard. This will guarantee a solid connection to the wall without relying on studs. However, make sure to use caution when it comes to top-heavy items.

Pics and how-to's coming later. We'll be implementing this process soon!

Source: Neighbor

Tip #30: Remedies for cradle cap (be sure to check with your doctor)

Once you've had a baby, you'll for sure hear about cradle cap. On our baby it looked like dry skin with a yellow tint. I've heard of three takes on removing cradle cap:
1. Rub an edible oil on it and let it soak, then when it's soft run a soft comb over it (our pediatrician).
2. Do the same as #1, but don't let it soak, instead rub it off with a towel (our niece's pediatrician).
3. The same as #1, but after applying, wash the area with baby shampoo and towel dry (a mom's group leader) and then comb the flakes out the hair (if your baby has hair!)

#1 did not work for us. #2 has worked for our brother. #3 has worked for us. Make sure to check with your doctor about their recommendation. The more gently you can remove cradle cap, the better for baby's skin.