Baby on the Way? ...Get Ready for a Lifestyle Change!

After much procrastination, a friend of mine has finally decided to start trying for a baby. Being a person accustomed to a certain lifestyle, I wondered does she really know how much her life is going to be turned upside down?

They say change is as good as a holiday, but when baby arrives it's anything but a holiday!
Many women I feel are still disillusioned and believe life will carry on as always, but the reality is that nappies aren't the only things that will be changing around your house when baby arrives.

Almost everything of your lifestyle - from your priorities to your attitudes, from your sleeping patterns to your eating patterns, from the way you spend yours nights and weekends, from romance to finance -will change, to some degree. Dinner outs may still happen, but fewer of them will be at the latest trendy social spots and more of them at family-style restaurants with high chairs and play areas. Late nights in are likely to replace the late nights out and spontaneous lovemaking is less likely than scheduled "time slots" around baby's nap.

Yes, little babies make a big difference in how you live your life. But while every couple finds that their lifestyle changes somewhat once they become parents, just how much yours will change will depend on you, your spouse, and your baby (some babies are more adaptable than others).

So it's a good idea to emotionally prepare yourself for these lifestyle changes, although it's difficult to exactly predict how hard parenthood will hit you until your little bundle of joy arrives. Remember change is not only challenging but exciting too! Though your life will be different, it will also be in many ways more fulfilling...ask any parent.

Have more baby related questions? Visit http://www.babyonline.co.za/

Pink or Blue?

Are you expecting? Can't wait to find out what you are having? Good news, you only have to wait in anticipation for 8 weeks.

A safe, non-invasive test that can determine a baby's gender at a mere 8 weeks into pregnancy, has been made available in South Africa by local firm, DNAlysis Biotechnology. The new Pink or Blue test determines the baby's sex by characterising minute quantities of foetal cellular material which is released into the maternal bloodstream as part of normal foetal developement. A small sample of blood is drawn for this purpose.

The advantage of the Pink or Blue test is that not only is it available earlier than any of the other methods, but it is more accurate than ultrasound, which depends largely on the position of the baby at that particular time. The Pink or Blue results are available within 4 - 5 working days and is accurate 95% of the time.

For parents who are carriers of sex-linked disorders, such as muscular dystrophy, early gender identification of the foetus is invaluable.

For more info, visit http://www.dnalysis.co.za/

Why Buy Expensive Toys for Kids?

A friend sent me this video clip, it's just too cute not to share :)
Why buy expensive toys for kids when the simplest things amuse them.
Why Buy Expensive Toys for Kids?

Feeding Bottles - Picking the Right One

Never did I imagine that buying a baby feeding bottle would be such a daunting task.

With the wide array of brands out there all promising to be "THE" bottle it's easy to feel completely clueless as to which one is best for baby.

Recently a friend introduced me to Dr Brown's Natural Flow baby bottle. Your probably thinking not another glorified feeding bottle, cutely packaged, doing the same thing as all the others.
Well here's why I think this particular brand is so great:

The Dr. Brown's Natural Flow baby bottle is the first baby bottle to feature an internal vent system that eliminates the vacuum, air bubbles and negative pressure associated with conventional bottle feeding. This unique design gives moms the only fully vented bottle option that creates positive pressure or Natural Flow, that actually mimics breastfeeding - it is the only bottle that works in this way.

Some of the health benefits include:

1. postive-pressure feeding
2. helps reduce colic

3. prevents oxidation of nutrients (Vitamin C, A & E) found in formula or breastmilk

4. bottles are made of BPA-free polypropylene plastic or BPA-free borosilicate glass

To view available accessories, or for more info on Dr Brown's Natural Flow baby bottle visit http://www.handi-craft.com/home.html

Forgetfulness

Wondering why can’t your child remember when you ask him to do something? And when you ask him what he did at playschool, he cannot remember.

Although a toddler (unlike young babies) can store information, they often have problems in retrieving that information from their memory banks. Until their concentration increases they often forget what you've just told them. eg. don't walk on the floor, it's wet. Getting distracted is easy… he wants to get to the toy on the other side of the wet floor. So repeat instructions regularly and try to be tolerant. Limit your instructions to one or two at a time and keep them simple; please pick up your toy and put it in the box.

Retelling information, ie. what he did at school, will also improve as he gets older. In fact, expect the time soon when he will tell you countless, long, long stories.

It is important not to show irritation when your child cannot remember. As he grows so will his powers of remembering. If you'd like to help, the more exercise a memory gets, the better it becomes. Here are four ideas of memory games you can play:

1. Kim's game: line three objects up in a row, ask your toddler to take a good look. Then cover them up and ask what was there.

2. Remember together: After a visit to the park sit down together and remember what you saw and did. If he can't remember, say, do you remember the squirrel? And what else did you see?

3. Magic moments: At supper time routinely ask family members to share a special event in the day.

4. Use reminder notes: Ref the wet floor, put a drawing down on the floor eg. a picture of a bright red line across a pair of footsteps."

For more useful toddler info visit: http://www.babyonline.co.za/

Super Baby Not Little Einstein

Following from my previous blog on "creating little Einstein", I thought it would be worthwhile to go through the first year "course load" of babyhood.

During these 12 months, babies learn have to form attachments to others, to trust, to grasp the fact that when daddy hides behind the chair, he's still there eventhough I don't see him.

They need to learn to use their bodies (to sit, crawl, walk), their hands (to pick up dropped items), and their minds (how to get that toy off the table). They'll need to learn the meaning of loads of words, and eventually how to reproduce them. And they'll need to learn something about who they are (what makes me happy or sad).

With so much lined up to learn, further academic extras may overload baby and even result in neglecting some of the fundamental learning areas. The best way forward is not to try and create a whizz kid but a wonderful child - one who reaches his or her full potential when suitable to him or her. This doesn't mean signing-up baby for classes or surrounding him or her with heaps of educational toys, but rather standing by to offer encouragement as baby accomplishes normal baby tasks, exposing him or her to many stimuli (stores, parks, beaches, zoos), nuturing baby's natural curosity, explaining how things work or what they are used for .

Providing your baby with an environment which is filled with songs, books, talking will boost language skills immediately.

Know you know how to put the super in baby!

For more baby & learning info visit http://www.babyonline.co.za/

Creating Little Einstein

So you've heard about the latest educational toys guarenteed to boost your baby's mental development and send those fine motor skills soaring off the charts? From Mozart CD's to DVD's that promise to reach a reading age of ten by your little ones second birthday.

Maybe you are wondering how parents could buy into these Einstein generating products and programmes - how they can force this on their little ones. Maybe you are considering doing the same with yours. Before you rush off to sign up for the latest baby genius class, take a minute and read on.

Though it is possible to teach an infant a wide range of skills long before they are normally learned, the majority of experts agree that there is no evidence that intense early learning actually provides a long-term advantage over more traditional learning patterns.

In a nutshell, your baby should spend his or her first year being a baby!

For more baby related info visit http://www.babyonline.co.za/