Headbath

On every packet of infant food and formula, there's a "note" that says mother's milk is best for an infant for at least 6 months. A month ago, I had (rather imperiously ) written about the benefits of delaying solids and starting E with something called Baby-Led Weaning or BLW. The central tenet of BLW is to allow the child to decide what to eat and how much of it to eat. I was completely convinced of its benefits when we started E on solids. For her first meal, she was given a tray of steamed carrots, beans, and apples. She gnawed on everything for a bit, and then dropped it on the ground to our very grateful dog. E's first meal Since E doesn't have a genetic history of food allergies, I was introducing a new fruit or vegetable every 24 to 48 hours. As such, she tasted pear, beetroot, broccoli, and potato. The warning that the book by Gill Rapley contains about BLW being messy should have been in red lettering; all caps; in bold; underlined; in ...

Sleep is crucial to a baby's developing temperament. Come to think of it, sleep is crucial to anyone's temperament. Every evening around 6, my three-month old would stare at me with sleepy yet alert eyes, willing me to do something. I had no idea what. But I knew that the fussiness would start in 15 minutes and go on for two hours until she wore herself out after an evening of crying and making me cry. One evening, the proverbial straw had broken my literal (upper) back. Supine, I googled infant sleep and got pages and pages of self-proclaimed experts unable to reach a consensus about how often infants need to be asleep. Some comments on these websites led me to bunch of books, all of which I bought. Of them, I found the following three books to the most helpful. Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child, by Dr. Marc Weissbluth  ( ₹454.50 ) . Solve Your Child's Sleep Problems, by Dr. Richard Ferber  ( ₹773) ; and The No-Cry Nap Solution, by Elizabeth Pantley ( ₹475 )....

Since my last post, I thought it might be a good idea to log E's routine at 6-months just so I can see how much it changes over the coming months. Her routine is based on recommendations made by Dr. Marc Weissbluth in his book Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child . Morning E wakes up between 6 and 7 AM in the morning. She has dropped her morning mini-catnap so sad for slumbering me . She spends time literally frolicking with her dad till 8 AM after which I wrap her in our Flo carrier and take the fuzzball out for a walk. We're back by 8:30 AM and we start the naptime routine for her morning nap. I draw the curtains, change her diapers, nurse her, and then set her down in her crib by 8:45 AM.  She wakes up from this nap by 10 AM. I use her nap time to steam some fruit or veg so that it's the right temperature by the time she wakes up Pro-tip: freeze a porcelain plate and chuck the steamed produce on it to get it to the right temperature for baby . She gnaws on h...

It's hard watching your baby cry when she's getting vaccinated. For the most part, the doctors seem sad to do it too but our general attitude is that it must be done and baby will cry.  Unless your paediatrician is like this guy: E doesn't like it when I use the nasal aspirator on her. So I took a tip from this doctor and turned it into a game (minus the flinging tissues a tree died so that a baby could laugh. Fair trade ).  Yeah, turn stuff into games. Babies like that. Now to show this to our paediatrician.

As we celebrate 6 months of E  the one E I haven't dropped ba-dum-tss  here at Headbath, I'd like to revisit the topic of her sleep. I jokingly refer to our efforts at training her to fall asleep (see here , here , and here , in chronological order) as our life's greatest achievement.  But babies are drunk little monkeys anyway. What Works In the three months since we started sleep training with E, I've found the following tricks to be very helpful in getting her to sleep and stay asleep. An  unchanging place to nap  - same room and same surface. She still sleeps in our bedroom but I shifted her napping spot from the family bed to the crib after she turned 5-months old. We took a trip to Kerala and when we got back, I wanted to see if she'd accept the crib and she did - no fuss! For a while she napped in her crib but slept at night in the family bed. However, since she turned 6-months old, she sleeps in her crib even at night. We had no transit...

Starting a baby on solids is a momentous occasion in any parent's life. Among Keralites, this is marked by a special ceremony where the baby is fed a few grains of rice with some salt and jaggery  by every overzealous member of the family . A taste of foods to come, as it were. Look at the moisture on Shobana's forehead. While we have decided to forego this 'choroonu' ceremony, we still need to introduce solids to our exclusively breastfed baby. As E approaches the 6-month milestone, I've noticed that she now looks at me hungrily when I eat something, and sometimes, even mimics my chewing action. Our relatives started inquiring about her solid intake when she was around 4-months old, which is when, traditionally, babies are fed a strained paste of ragi or millets. This was generally given to babies whose mothers had an insufficient or nonexistent milk supply  American babies were fed donkey's milk. Imagine that!  but over the years, it has now become...

Since this was our first time travelling with baby E, we were quite nervous. Understandably. I had everything planned out - from the time we were to leave home to the time spent completing airport formalities to when and how many feeds E would have prior to boarding. Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL Fortunately, the extended BIAL is supremely comfortable. It's like someone with an actual brain designed it - from the tables provided at security check (to rest your bag while you pull out electronics or a baby) to the heavenly little feeding room that I visited. Yes. Those are actual dispensers of baby wash, lotion, and cream. I was beyond touched. I had, like, tears in my eyes when I saw how these feeding rooms were designed with care - two lock-able stalls each featuring a soft pleather couch, a tiny crib (pictured) and an outlet with a tiny holder to hold your phone while it charges. Common to both stalls is a sink with a surface next to it (that I'm...