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If you make your own baby food purees, I really like this version of storage containers. I’ve had good luck with OXO products, and if I were in the market for something like this, I wouldn’t hesitate to buy.
I like that these are glass containers, and they can go directly from the freezer to the microwave or oven. Since they’re glass, they won’t stain like plastic, or hold on to any smells. They are also dishwasher safe.
We own the OXO sippy cups, and the straws were starting to split because my son was chewing them, and when we contacted OXO, they sent us new straws.
These containers also have a lifetime manufacturer’s warranty, which is great. The set is $19.99 at Buy Buy Baby. Glass Baby Food Storage Blocks
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And — here are some of our latest threadjacks of interest – working mom questions asked by the commenters!
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- My child eats everything, and my friends’ kids do not – how should I handle? In general, what is the best way to handle when your child has some skill/ability and your friend’s child doesn’t have that skill/ability?
- ADHD moms, give me your tips to help with things like behavior in the classroom, attention to detail, etc?
- I think I suffer from mom rage…
- My husband and kids are gone this weekend – how should I enjoy my free time?
- I’m struggling to be compassionate with a SAHM friend who complains she doesn’t have enough hours of childcare.
- If you exclusively formula fed, what tips do you have for in the hospital and coming home?
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Anonymous says
How many people actually make / freeze their own baby purees? [Factoring in: for people with kids with no dietary restrictions.]
This post takes me back to the martyrdom of moms: it’s not enough to love, feed, and house your child. You must personally grind up their food. I personally masked up what I was cooking for me with a fork and then thought: maybe kiddo will think mashing food with a fork is fun if we make a game of it and let them “help.” Maybe kid will get teeth super fast or have hearty gums. Oh, maybe I should get sheep and shear them and card the wool and spin the yarn and weave the cloth and sew the clothes (my mother merely sewed my clothes from, sniff, store-bough fabrics that were heavy on the synthetics so as to be stainfast and launder easily). The expectations never end.
[If men gestated and did the caregiving, I would put $ on no FT working dad doing this more than one time.]
Anon says
So with the caveat that I am a first-time mom, due in October, I will. I do 99% of the cooking in our household, and enjoy it, and it seems like a pretty quick & easy thing to do while I’m also making other meals. I may be in for a rude surprise, but I’ve known many friends who’ve done it (and who run the gamut in other ways from breast feeding to formula, SAHM to full-time-crazy-hours, etc), and it just doesn’t seem hard or time consuming.
Also, I plan on getting some pouches for on-the-go, but the idea of spending the money to buy individual jarred babyfood for home use just makes me shudder.
anon says
you are a first time mom. you have no idea yet if jarred baby food will make you shudder, sorry.
Anonymous says
I think it’s a great intention…but I think you need to experience going back to work and doing the daycare shuffle and all the laundry and cooking and cleaning and diapers etc…before you say what you’ll do. Especially as a FTM. And to say you shudder at something is a bit pompous. Millions of people buy purées because of convenience. It’s not like store bought purées are poison.
I cook 99% of our meals too but I do a mix of BLW and purées and pouches.
anone says
+1, i don’t know why the naivete of first time mom whos baby is not yet here makes me so annoyed. just trust us, a lot of what you believe will slowly go out the window as your child grows, particularly if you have more than one.
Anonymous says
My kids love sweet potatoes. They were one of the the bestest foods ever. But I do not like them for every meal. For months on end. Even when the meal consists of sweet potatoes and other things (beans! mushy peas! Oatmeal! Cheerios! banana slices). My kids are in middle school and will fight each other for a Stage 2 Gerber’s sweet potatoes. [WHY can they not package that stuff like apple sauce? My kids would buy out a store of it. But they will not take baby food labled as such in their lunch boxes.]
Anon says
This. I cook dinner every night (we basically never eat out and get takeout maybe once every 3 months) and often cook/bake things for dessert and breakfast treats, but fed my kids jarred baby food because the extra step of having to cook/puree/freeze things on top of the cooking I was already doing for me and my spouse was not worth it.
And when you get home from daycare at 5:30 and the babies need to be in bed by 6:00, the extra step of cooking or thawing something is just not worth it.
Lana Del Raygun says
Chill out, she said the cost made her shudder. That’s totally different.
The cost makes me shudder, honestly, and so does the carbon cost of shipping all that glass compared to shipping just the veggies … but I still bought a ton of purees. ::shrug:: We made a few attempts at crushing things through the strainer, but no. Next time (if BLW fails again) I will try again with a little food processor if there’s one that is 100% dishwasher-safe.
Anonymous says
HAHAHA — I enjoyed cooking when I was in a child-free household. Enter quarantine when I am cooking more than I thought possible and it’s food I’m not personally crazy about.
anone says
+1 before I had kids, I could not fathom why people could not make time to cook. Now i have a 3 year and 1 year old and it makes perfect sense why so many of us make the simplest meals possible or have to use frozen foods or eat out etc. No judgement in any way. It’s a herculean effort to raise small children.
Anonymous says
Right?
Like little kids don’t want to eat dinner at 7 or whenever. They want to eat when they are hungry, which is when we are stuck in traffic on the way home AND they have a diaper blowout, so you arrive home with a hungry kid and hazmat situation and dinner is not going to make itself.
I lost weight the first year I had kids. Not intentionally. But I guess self-care was the only thing I could cut back on :( I do not feel bad re not having an insta-ready life; insta is fiction.
Anonymous says
We eat dinner at 7. Most of our friends do 5:30pm and think we’re nuts but there’s no way I can get dinner on the table that early and we like eating as a family. Kids get a snack at 5:30/5:45pm when we get home then I or DH cook. Dinner on the table around 6:45-7:15 depending on the day. It’s been this way since our oldest was about a year old and their whole lives for the younger two. Sometimes they fall asleep in the car on the way home and nap for a half hour or so before dinner. Straight to bed around 7:45/8pm after dinner and they usually wake up around 7am ish.
Just saying this because if you ask my friends, there’s no way kids can eat at 7pm and much easier to feed kids separately first but I actually found that to be more work to make two sets of dinners all the time and this option doesn’t seem to get mentioned as much.
Anonymous says
No doubt you can eat at 7. Cooking only 1 time per meal makes sense. My other challenge was that my kids would be so tired that they would zonk out close to 7, 7:30 if they were lucky. And if I left work at 4, I could beat a lot of traffic on my way home after doing the daycare pickup. Then dinner. Then bedtime. Then log on for some more work in a quiet house: heaven. Except for the weeks of time changes.
A LOT matters on your job, your kids, your commute, etc. But my kid schedule is 100% NOT my before-kids schedule.
Cb says
I totally thought I would but yeah, nope, I did it 2 or 3 times and then went to pouches, jars etc. I went back to work just before we introduced solids. My dad moved over to look after our son for the next 6 months and he weirdly loved hunting down new flavours of things to try, so I didn’t have to buy snack or jars or pouches.
We did lots of fruits and veg that he could serve himself but it was nice to have the prepared foods on hand.
Anonymous says
I was an incredible parent before I had a child.
The one time I made a bunch of puree and froze it for future use my son would not eat it. Meanwhile his daycare provided food. I honestly can’t remember what we fed him on the weekends, but very little was homemade puree.
Cb says
Yep, I remember a spinach mix that my son ate one bite of and rejected. We did packed lunches from 12-15 months and just letting him eat the nursery lunches was the best decision we ever made. I don’t even read the menu – it’s school lunches and I suspect there are more french fries than I’d prefer.
Anon says
Can you please report back after 9 months of motherhood? Lol. I would very much like to hear your reaction then.
Anonymous says
Omg stop. You don’t even have a baby. You have no idea if you’ll do this or not. This is why everyone rolls their eyes at first time moms. Just tell the truth- right now, at 5 months pregnant, you think it sounds like a good idea.
Anon says
I’m totally going to pile on here. This response is ridiculous.
It is one thing to say you are pregnant, and your intention is to make your own, but we’ll see.
It is quite another to make a definitive statement that “you will” and that it “doesn’t seem hard or time consuming” in response to another mom who is actually trying to gather data points. You have no idea.
It is quite possible that you do – obviously, there are people that do. But even then I think you will find that things pre-kid that don’t seem time consuming are quite another story when you have a baby, and to tell a bunch of moms otherwise is just silly.
Anonymous says
On a practical note, I found it difficult to get the right consistency in homemade baby food, and I did not want to buy one of those baby food makers (small kitchen with no space for additional appliances!). So I got jarred purees until my baby was able to tolerate some lumps, which was pretty quick. The jarred phase lasted at most 3 months or so. I find roasting/steaming some diced veggies along with making adult dinner is much easier than pureeing.
AnonLawyer says
Yeah, I recently tried to puree some peas, and they were impossible to get smooth with my stupid immersion blender. I googled it and apparently you’re supposed to put the peas through a strainer too to get the lumps out. I am not straining peas that my baby will eat one teaspoon of. No.
(Everyone I know in real life seems to imply they make all their own baby food out of 100% organic ingredients, but I’m starting to wonder if they’re exaggerating.)
Quail says
I think this is perfectly reasonable. Both of my kids hated/refused purees from a spoon, so we did a modified baby-led weaning and it was easier to just microwave and mash, or mash up what we were eating, then to buy baby food. I am in no way a martyr mom – this is actually the easiest approach for our family. Same with having a cloth diaper service. For some cloth diapering is a statement thing, for me it is the best way to never have to go to the store. YMMV of course.
Lyssa says
Agreed, and the poster who is due in October (congrats and good luck, BTW!), keep in mind some Anons are being a little over-the-top. The fact is, you will probably find that a lot of things are harder then you think they will be, but a lot of things will surprise you by being easier, too. Making your own purees struck me as very simple – microwave, blend, done. But if you don’t, NBD. (FWIW, pumping at work always struck me as the ultimate unreasonable mom-martyrdom thing, but a lot of people here seem to do it.) Try whatever you want – if it works for you, great, if it doesn’t, no big deal. The absolute best thing you can do is be flexible and give yourself a chance to enjoy that baby.
AnonLawyer says
Right, but the thing is you don’t actually know what your baby will want when you’re pregnant. I was super gung ho on baby led weaning and then it turned out my baby only wanted purees (she’s slowly learning to tolerate some other stuff.)
avocado says
People who don’t have kids yet, or who have kids without strong preferences, tend to assume that parents have the power to shape the baby’s preferences by doing things “right.” Just eat spicy foods while you are BFing and make your own baby food entirely out of strong-flavored vegetables, and baby will grow up to be an adventurous eater! Uh-huh.
It’s the same attitude with sleep, behavior, and everything else. If you just put the kid to bed at 6:00 p.m., make him take two naps a day, and sleep-train the “right” way, your child will sleep for 12 hours straight! If he doesn’t love naps and sleep through the night, you must be doing it wrong. Then you actually have a child who is naturally a night owl or just hates sleep in general, and you realize how little is actually within your control as a parent.
anone says
I love to cook and make all the meals for our family, but decided that this was NOT worth it when baby was 5 months – 10 months and used plenty of store bought baby purees along with foods at home. Both my kids gradually phased out of the pouches after 1 year, but it was invaluable before then. I absolutely would not be grinding and freezing my own purees. such a waste of time IMO.
Boston Legal Eagle says
“If men gestated and did the caregiving, I would put $ on no FT working dad doing this more than one time.” – this is my mindset as a full-time working mom and my kids seem to be turning out ok :)
We bought all the baby pureed food and didn’t make/freeze anything. Not worth the time or energy for us. If any moms here want to and enjoy this, go for it, but I don’t think it’s necessary.
Anon says
There are men that do this stuff! My husband does. I don’t think it’s that unusual.
Anonymous says
Does he fill out day-care forms, too? If so, can we arrange to clone him?
Anne says
haha – a tiny bit with our first, not once with our second. The glass jar, organic stuff is great by me and tbh our second just had a lot of pouches too.
AwayEmily says
Such a huge difference between first and second kid. First kid: freezer full of a wide range of homemade food, making sure to include a variety of flavors and types. Second kid: here, gnaw on this slice of pizza for awhile. Oh, you’re finished? Here’s a pouch, and if you’re still hungry after that you can pick some cheerios off the floor.
Of course, OF COURSE my second is now a much more adventurous eater than my first.
Anonymous says
When I was a FTM struggling with supply but committed to wringing every last drop out of me, I went into the hippy nursing store and have never been judged so vocally and freely in my life. Diet Pepsi in hand (FTM; need caffeine; don’t drink coffee); bad. And what was I doing laundry with? And didn’t I want some ORGANIC cotton thingies ($20 per burp cloth???), etc. etc. I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. That part of the mom contingent made me so, so grateful to work with 99% guys (quant field) who have no clue about any of this.
GCA says
Wait, we’re not required to grow the oats and mill them THEN grind the oatmeal into fine cereal dust and cook it?
Jokes aside, my preferences when my kids were at the ‘baby experimenting with food’ stage were:
Feeding them mashed/ soft pieces of whatever we ate > storebought baby food > making my own dedicated purees.
All faced an equal likelihood of rejection, but feeding them mashed bits of squash or roasted carrots was the least effort for me. The family has to eat anyway, and I enjoy doing most of the cooking, but I cannot be arsed with pureeing and freezing little trays of veggies. Which is not to say this is the only right way to do it, because the effort, time and cost calculations are different if your family eats differently, has dietary restrictions, or everybody in the family hates food prep.
Anonymous says
I think it’s the mentality of “you could be martyring yourself a bit more if you really loved your children.”
I mean, my spouse has a colonoscopy coming up. If he were a woman it was related to child-rearing, there would be blogs devoted to righteously preparing for it, etc. BUT it is so not the case with men — people will give him a medal and a g-d parade if he just shows up for it on time. NOTHING is easy and full of fanfare for women who just do what eons of women have done for survival and gotten our species up to this point. No — we must do more and if we aren’t suffering, we must have left something undone or just not care.
Anonymous says
I made it sometimes. Probably half homemade/half bought. Mostly I just chopped or mashed what we ate (cooked without salt), but sometimes we were eating spicier or later or otherwise not kid friendly. For those times, I’d keep some stuff on hand in the freezer. I usually made it when we were having something we don’t frequently have for dinner like homemade sweet potato fries – I’d boil or roast extra sweet potato, pulse it a bit in the blender, freeze in ice cube trays and then pop into a freezer bag. No new supplies required. I had twins and always using store bought purees was a lot of packaging and lot of baby food to have on hand. I felt like the work of freezing extra from our dinners wasn’t that much more work and made grocery shopping a bit simpler. Plus I didn’t love a lot of the premade combos – chicken and pear just seems gross to me.
Legally Brunette says
Same, I did homemade pureed food a lot of the time but also did some store bought baby food as well. I didn’t think it was that time consuming and I like to cook so it was fine. I also tasted some of the store food one day and thought it tasted really gross, but some taste fine so shop around. If you want to make your own baby food it’s doable – just try and see if you have the time for it.
Pogo says
I did it, but all I did was like, microwave frozen peas and use the immersion blender to puree them. I got a freezer container from “Weesprout” (it had like 8 compartments I think?) and would portion out all his food for the week to send to daycare. For at-home consumption, I used regular old ice cube trays and would pop out a cube one at a time. I also feel like the timeline of purees was so short it was not a big deal? My kid was ready to go on to finger foods pretty quickly, so maybe we were just lucky in that regard.
Anonymous says
I did baby lead weaning… and after making some purees (which my husband did), my kids aren’t puree kind of kids. What I actually did and they liked was taking a banana and just mashing it with a fork until it was a pulp, then feeding them that. I also would just soft steam veggies (in the microwave – I would take ours out and just microwave to death the kiddo’s) and also mash with a fork.
The jarred baby stuff – we had some, I mostly send it with the kids when they’re headed out of the house. We’re all big fans of the pureed mango mixed with plain yogurt. We’re a big Cheerios/Puffs family. This is something that just… it’s all fine. Don’t feed your 2 month old ice cream cake.
Anonymous says
What is baby lead weaning? Kid2 just decided to stop nursing one day. Is that how it works? [My boobs would have appreciated at least some advance notice of this.] With Kid1 it was a gradual taper since I was pregnant with Kid2 and didn’t want to be the person who had two non-twins to nurse.
Lana Del Raygun says
Baby-led weaning is a British term, where “weaning” means introducing solids, not quitting milk. Basically you give the baby whatever food you’re eating, chopped up into finger-food sized pieces.
Anonymous says
How is that baby-led then?
Anonymous says
You let the baby feed itself. It’s a big thing, if you google it there’s tons of info.
Lana Del Raygun says
Because you just offer them the food and they eat it or not. You’re not feeding them the way you would feed a baby purees.
Anonymous says
OK — I thought it was “the baby decides when to wean itself”.
DLC says
We did this too with my second and third kids. I made purees for all of a month and then decided it wasn’t worth the work and moved on to finger food, a la Baby Led Weaning. It wasn’t making the food that I found time consuming, it was the feeding. We try to eat dinner as a family and it was just a lot of work to have to feed the baby separately while making sure the other kids were eating. Now I just toss food into the high chair tray and let the baby eat what she wants. (The Baby Led part is about letting the baby feed themselves)
Anonymouse says
I did it for introducing for introducing things because the quantity was so small – one avocado, mixed with breast milk, into the blender, made an ice cube tray which was several meals worth. And then I did fresh fruit into pouches when we had leftovers in the summer that was going bad. But that was with just one kiddo, and a non-“big” very 9-5 only job. I’ve contemplated giving away the make your own stuff (refillable pouches etc) before #2 arrives as I doubt I’ll make time, but if grandparents are ever able to visit, it’s a good project for them.
Lana Del Raygun says
Do you have a recommendation for reusable pouches?
Anonymous says
One of those icing bags? Except my kid would eat icing from them.
Anonymouse says
I liked the Baby Brezza Reusable Baby Food Storage Pouches – from the river store – came with a little funnel to make pouring easier, freeze well, dishwasher safe.
Anonymous says
I did. I didn’t find it hard- I cook a lot anyway. I don’t think anyone else needs to. There are plenty of things I opt out of that others find essential.
rosie says
Friends of ours got us a Beaba (or whatever that machine is called that steams on one side and grinds on the other) because they loved it, so someone does. I used it a few times until it became clear that my child wasn’t super into purees, and I’d rather throw out most of a jar of puree instead of homemade puree. I mean, best not to waste food but welcome to having young kids…it was easier just to fork-mash whatever we were having that seemed appropriate.
Anonanonanon says
Yep, didn’t do this. It’s not hard to get organic babyfood if that’s your jam, so really why go through the trouble? My second child didn’t even like purees so it would have been a huge waste.
Leatty says
Not me. We used jars and then transitioned to the pouches (which we still use now even though my daughter is 3). Is it wasteful? Yes. But it was and is so worth it to me. We will be doing the same thing with our next child. I just don’t have the time, energy, or desire to puree baby food. If other people do, good for them. But not me.
Anon says
I make pretty much everything myself. I’m not opposed to jarred food at all, but for me I find cooking purees to be pretty quick and easy (quicker than a trip to the store for us) and I like cooking. I’m talking cooking some frozen fruit or veg in a pot or steaming it and hitting it with a stick blender, baking some sweet potatoes and scooping them out to mix with a little milk, boiling some red lentils that take 20 minutes to cook while I’m cooking other stuff, etc. Then I stick it in ice cube trays and we microwave it for meals. Of course some things like bananas you can just mash straight up with a fork. I think it’s kind of fun playing with spices and flavors and seeing what the baby thinks. My husband also cooks baby food from scratch.
My kid wouldn’t even begin eating non-purees until 9-10 months, like he would refuse to put whole food in his mouth.
Anon says
Also wanted to add I have these Oxo containers and they’re great. I used to send the plastic ones into daycare pre-covid.
TheElms says
I made some food from scratch and had planned to make more, but my kid wouldn’t eat it. She wanted either commercial purees (which were much smoother) or finger food. The books said there was supposed to be a lumpy puree stage but that never happened for us. Go figure.
Anon says
i would say that i started out making it myself, but switched and it was probably 60/40 home made vs. store bought for my twins, but we honestly only did purees for like 2 months bc one of them refused to eat them, so we quickly switched to table food. and now as part of table food, my kids definitely get some store bought things like veggie burgers and fish sticks
Ms B says
The immersion blender that we bought to make purees might have been The Hubs’s favorite baby purchase.
The Hubs does most of the cooking anyway and he made about 80% of the purees for The Kid during that stage (about 4-6 months); the rest were store bought for convenience/portability. The Kid’s daycare was on board with homemade food for infants; we stored the food in plastic freezer jars (which we already had dozens of in the house) in the freezer and then daycare would warm the food in a Crockpot that they kept at low temp to warm bottles and food all day. He also made cubes in ice cube trays, but those we mostly used at home.
What we liked most about doing our own food was we were able to control salt, sugar and flavors. We did veg like peas with mint, green beans with dill, carrots with lemon peel, dal with turmeric and saag with ginger. Who knows if there is any causal link, but The Kid eats a wide variety of things and that allowed us to revert to feeding everyone the same food every night – food that the adults are happy to eat – at a pretty early stage. The Kid even announces sometimes that it is “try new things day” and that is a lot of fun.
Anonymous says
Yes, we made all the baby food for both kids, about 4-5 months for each kid (we stopped purées once eating finger food). I don’t know, it never bothered me? Would either use the immersion blender to purée whatever we had for dinner that night or batch cook veggies and purée. We froze in ice cube trays so we always had a big bag of frozen cubes in the freezer.
More Sleep Would Be Nice says
+1. I didn’t think it was that much work either, and I made most of the first purees this way, but I also didn’t hesitate to use the organic ready-made stuff, either. I also don’t get all these special appliances to make the food – an immersion blender or bullet is perfect.
Anonymous says
Same anon here – Want to clarify I really don’t think anything wrong with jarred baby food. We found it easier to make it. Others might find it easier to buy.
Spirograph says
I never made my own baby purees, ever. If we were already eating something that could be smushed up and fed to a baby, sure, but I have never cooked a separate meal for any of my kids. There aren’t enough hours in the day for that noise. Individual baby food jars and pouches for the win!
signed, mom of 3
Anon says
I’m Anon at 9:01am.
Sorry if my plans bugged the cr&p out of everyone! I don’t understand the pile-on culture where moms get to tell pregnant women “YOU HAVE NO IDEA!” and pregnant women get to tell women who are trying to conceive “YOU HAVE NO IDEA!”. Do I know with 100% certainty what it will be like to have a baby in the house? Of course not. Do I know with 100% certainty that the plans I’m making now will come to fruition? Of course not. Does that mean I shouldn’t make plans, based on the information I have available and knowing myself? Also, of course not.
I mean – I also had a lot of people tell me “HAHAHAHA you think you’ll be able to exercise while pregnant lolz no you’ll be sick and exhausted, don’t even plan to exercise you poor lady you have no idea what you’re in for”. And I’m doing just fine at 6 months, working out every day. So yes, I might have ended up couch-bound and miserable and thrown my plans to stay active out the window – but I planned to stay active, and I was happy that worked out. I don’t know why having a plan is so freaking triggering to other people.
Also thank you to whomever correctly noted that I shuddered at the cost of jarred food, not the concept. Food in jars and pouches is totally fine (and I will 100% grab pouches for myself at airports from time to time when I need a quick something before a flight). But I’d rather make it myself for cheaper for home, if it works out that way.
Anon says
I have two kids and made their food myself … it was not hard, it took like 15 min once a week, and it saved a heck of a lot of money. I also exclusively cloth diapered. If this is a priority for you, you will make it happen, and it will be just fine. The people laughing at you are perhaps defensive about their own priorities…
AnonLawyer says
Well, of course they are. Because women are judged for not prioritizing their kids 100% of the time regardless of the time and expense. So when someone comes in and says “oh, I haven’t done this yet but it’s easy so I will do it” of course people who tried to do it and it didn’t work out are defensive. Your wording – saying that people should be prioritizing this – is SUPER judgmental. (And making baby food takes me more than 15 minutes a week and I don’t make everything myself so shrug.)
Anonymous says
Hahahahaha
Hahahahaha
Hahahahaha
Boston Legal Eagle says
Hey anon, I’m sorry if the pile-on was hurtful, I can totally see how us saying “oh, just wait…” is annoying as I know moms and moms-to-be hear that so.often from seasoned parents. But I think the intent of our responses was not to shame you but to give you permission to do all sorts of baby care and give you an experienced view that whatever you chose, your baby will be fine. Basically, if you want to make all the food, great, try it out. If you end up being too tired at the end of the day, or if the baby doesn’t eat your homemade food, or there’s too much laundry, then please don’t stress yourself out about doing this! This comes up a lot with bfeeding and formula – if you want to bfeed, cool, try it out, if it doesn’t work out or you just don’t want to, it’s ok!
I hope that makes sense. I wouldn’t want you to feel like we’re just over hear laughing at the poor naive mom to be, but really truly, there are just some things that you don’t know until you have a kid, just like I’m sure there’s a lot that I don’t know about kids older than my oldest (all of 4 years old).
Anonymous says
This. It’s like predicting how your recovery will be from a car accident you are yet to have and in your mind you get hit by a tiny smart car and IRL you get hit by a semi and you break your pelvis. You just never know. Even if you are a parent already, the next kid may be radically different. Or some other life event happens. I think we plan and the universe gives a wry chuckle. Especially in 2020.
Anon says
My child is definitely a semi…maybe a monster semi if such a thing existed…. Super high needs (but still developmentally normal other than a speech delay). She will either rule the world one day or destroy it, TBD.
Anonymous says
Nah my intent was to tell someone in her second trimester to step all the way back off of sharing what she’s sure she will do.
Rusty says
Welp, you’re a b. It takes all kinds.
anone says
I don’t think it was at all that you were “making plans”, it’s how definitive and confident you sounded in your initial post that made most of us roll our eyes. The idea that it was the cost that you had a problem with was not easily understood in the way you phrased that sentence, but truly it’s no problem to say you’d like to try. Like everyone says, everyone has their own set of priorities, just know that the more flexible you are in your child rearing ideologies, the happier you’ll be as a parent and the more tolerable you’ll be to those around you.
Anon says
+1 about the definitiveeness in the original post. You doubled down saying how it easy it seemed twice. Your follow up is stating things in a much more reasonable light.
And fwiw, I did make some baby food & worked out all through my pregnancies. But to take your pregnancy working out analogy further, 1) the people telling you you absolutely wouldn’t be able to work out are also in the wrong, no one should be making definitive statements about stuff like this on either end (just like we don’t actually know that you *won’t* make your own baby food), but 2) the more correct analogy from your original post would be like if a pregnant person expressed that they thought working out during pregnancy was difficult, and you as a never-been-pregnant person looked at them and said, “actually, it looks easy”. Hopefully you can see how that would not be well received.
Anon says
“the more correct analogy from your original post would be like if a pregnant person expressed that they thought working out during pregnancy was difficult, and you as a never-been-pregnant person looked at them and said, “actually, it looks easy”. Hopefully you can see how that would not be well received.”
This. 100% this.
Spirograph says
I mean, obviously parents make all kinds of different choices, and FWIW, I thought you caveated your plans appropriately given that you actually have no idea yet what it’s like to have a baby.
Gently though, get used to this (and try not to become a part of it, because there’s nothing more obnoxious than people thinking that their book knowledge or lived experience with their pregnancy or their kid(s) is a universal truth). I’m sure you’ve noticed by now because it starts in pregnancy: Being judged is a part of being a parent. You do you, and try to let what anyone else thinks about it roll off.
Anone says
Honestly though, when you aren’t at that stage yet, there needs to be a lot of caveating and not sounding so sure. It will always be off-putting to a pregnant person when TTC or child rearing ides when pregnant etc when you sound so confident. Again, nothing wrong with plans but the way this person comes off in her original and second post is so annoying.
Spirograph says
Oh, I rolled my eyes too. I just didn’t find it as egregious as some others did, and gave her credit for at least putting the caveat in that she’s still 2nd tri with first kid. :)
I rolled my eyes way more at the 2nd post, because sure! I exercised all the time 6 months into my first pregnancy (when I was 26 and did things like run 10 milers for fun), too. I didn’t understand why people thought pregnancy was hard until like week 36. I probably didn’t have the good sense to keep my mouth shut about it at the time either. I distinctly remember internally scoffing when a mom of 2 told me that I wouldn’t care about my baby eating food off the floor if I had more than one.
Knowing everything about pregnancy and parenting is a phase many of us go through before, you know, being pregnant and having kids. The original Anon should just recognize that she actually does HAVE NO IDEA and stop taking offense, but the rest of us should remember that we used to have all the best laid plans, too, and how much it stung when people laughed at us as ignorant and naive (even though we were).
Anon says
It’s not a pile on culture. You made a comment that induced major eye rolling because it sounded pompous. And then you followed up with a comment that sounded even more pompous. I exercise every day! K great.
I highly doubt “a lot” of people told you that you couldn’t exercise. Nobody is that invested somebody else’s pregnancy.
Cate says
+1 this site isn’t a pile on culture.
These responses all made my morning though. I read some of them to my DH too, which I don’t normally do.
Poster who made baby food for her first and had the second child eating cheerios off the floor? gold. and that’s us! I remember looking over at our second when he was five months and he had a full strip of bacon hanging out of his mouth (courtesy of his sister)
Conversely, we’ve done a lot of purees for our third after doing more “BLW” (which I think is a silly marketing thing for the most part) for our older two. We honestly can’t watch her as closely at meals so I’m much more concerned about choking hazards with her. So she gets more purees!
Anon says
+1 On a ‘moms’ s i t e and as the first to respond to a comment you literally have no experience with.
AnonLawyer says
So basically you’re perfect and other people are lazy. Cool cool cool.
avocado says
“I don’t know why having a plan is so freaking triggering to other people.”
It’s not having a plan that people find offensive, it’s the smugness and the strongly implied certainty that your plan will work out and that the reason other people were sick and exhausted while pregnant is that they just didn’t plan to exercise. I planned to have a perfect, glowing, active pregnancy too. Guess what? I ended up with nine months straight of hyperemesis. I could barely manage a 1.5-mile daily walk. I somehow still managed to commute 2 hours a day round-trip, complete all my 2L cite-checks and various other law school hazing rituals, and hold down a part-time job. But I guess I just didn’t plan well enough to fit in that exercise. Maybe if I had just planned better and tried harder, I would have been spending my evenings at prenatal yoga instead of lying on the bathroom floor praying that I wasn’t about to vomit again.
Anon says
+1, except I was a big law senior associate at the time, laying on the floor trying to hack out a work email from my phone and praying I wasn’t about to vomit again.
Cate says
haha, plus one to avocado, who is definitely not a “pile on” type commenter!
GCA says
I have nothing to pile on further but avocado, gosh, you are a bad*ss.
Anonymous says
My husband did this – loved it. Now that we are into full on solid foods, I make the majority of the food that can be frozen and pulled out (we also rely on cheerios, cheddar bunnys, etc.). But I make many pancakes and little egg muffins for breakfast, zucchini oat muffins for snacks, black bean burgers, quesadillas, and roast veggies (for the fridge) for easy parts of meals for our son. For the puree’s, my husband would spend like 2 hours once a month and make a crap ton of like 8 different purees and freeze them in these giant ice cube trays. And we’d mix that up occasionally with not frozen purees, like mashed banana with avocado. But we also tried to make our own baby oatmeal/rice cereal and our kid would only touch the instant gerber oatmeal. So go figure.
Knope says
Your kid doesn’t need purees. Just start them on normal soft foods mashed up. That is what I did for my infant who is now a healthy 3 year old – things like steamed fruits and veggies, mashed avocado, banana and sweet potato, scrambled eggs in tiny pieces, yogurt. You’re going to have to prep food for your kid like 6 months later anyway, it’s not that hard to just start that a few months earlier!
Anon says
I know this is not what you’re saying and it’s true that babies don’t need purees, but I feel like this is such a weird hot button topic. The old mommy shaming used to be about jarred food vs homemade purees, now it’s about whether or not baby even eats purees at all vs baby led weaning. On the other moms group I’m in people are so anti-puree but in reality all ways are fine. There’s no evidence that shows any of this really matters beyond I think when you introduce allergens.
Knope says
Yeah maybe I came off too harsh here – I’m not a BLW purist whatsoever. I still sometimes fed my infant things from a spoon – yogurt, mashed potatoes, applesauce, etc. – especially at first. I just really was drawn to that method as a concept because it seemed so, so much easier and made more sense than giving babies purees. It takes only a teeny tiny bit more effort than buying jarred food, at a fraction of the expense, without the effort of making your own purees, and the baby still gets the food exposure and nutrition he/she needs.
Anon says
This was totally what I planned to do, but then I ended up with twins who were delayed in fine motor skills and it was just so much easier to spoon-feed them purees for dinner. Weekends they got finger foods, but after daycare all we wanted to do was give them something quick before bedtime.
avocado says
I know (OK, am related to) some incredibly self-righteous and judgmental BLW moms. I think it’s partly because BLW babies don’t actually get many calories from food until they are at least a year old and BLW moms don’t tend to use formula, so they have to invest a massive amount of time into nursing to keep those babies fed between ages 6 and 12 months. Between 6 and 8 months, my baby scarfed down 3 bowls of oatmeal, a carton of yogurt, and 3 jars of purees a day, along with a quart of milk and formula. I can’t even imagine how much milk would have been required to keep her going if she’d just been playing with solid food the way BLW babies do at that age.
BLW is also super stressful and requires constant parental attention during meals. When we are around our BLW relatives, one parent or caregiver has to watch the baby like a hawk every second and frequently intervene to prevent choking. With purees, we’d just spend a few minutes shoveling in the food and then the baby would sit in her high chair with a sippy cup while we ate.
I’m not sure which way causation runs: does the amount of effort it takes to sustain pure BLW cause people to be obnoxious about it, or is it that no one who wasn’t already a total zealot would be willing to put in the effort?
Anonymous says
IDK — the whole term seems misplaced since this isn’t about weaning at all!
Is there a phrase for “we’re letting the baby experiment with self-feeding and watching it like a hawk (but not weaning)”?
AnonLawyer says
I was all into this idea but my baby absolutely hated anything that wasn’t a puree. She’s now slowly getting used to more texture but it’s a process.
Anonymous says
Totally depends on the baby. My first had incredibly strong gag reflex and absolutely needed very smooth purée for several months. Other child, mashed was fine.
SC says
I made some early purees in large batches. One weekend, I just steamed some vegetables (carrots, squash, sweet potatoes), passed them through the blender with some formula, and froze them in silicone ice cube trays. It only took about 30 minutes of active work and lasted a month or two, about the length of the early puree stage. I think I made a second batch at a slightly thicker consistency, and by the time we worked through that, we could mash instead of puree food. We also have a mini food processor, and occasionally, I’d puree some fruit if it was in season or local or especially good for some reason.
I definitely bought plenty of baby food. We bought one 12-pack of jars, but baby ate a pouch for a snack everyday until he was well past 1. I just wasn’t willing to make purees with various combinations of fruits and vegetables like the later pouches have. I also bought tons of applesauce, yogurt, peanut butter, rice puffs, oatmeal, etc., in addition to whatever else was on the menu.
FP says
So, I did make these and work full time and am generally open to whatever shortcut I can take. One thing I want to point out is that this was actually only a few months of my kids’s lives. I think I started with homemade purees around 4 months and stopped around 9 months. I also had many servings of pre-made applesauce, mashed avocado, and yogurt. I didn’t find it to be a huge imposition and would typically make a large batch and freeze in mini cups once a month. So in total for each of my two kids, I probably spent about 10-20 afternoons doing this. It’s not nothing but it also wasn’t a daily ritual. If you have time, great! If not, who cares? Babies sure don’t. I only did it because I kind of enjoyed it and found it somewhat relaxing (I enjoy cooking generally).
Um, chill. says
I did. Not because I wanted to be a martyr…because I was on a budget and it was the best way to guarantee 1) healthy, organic food and 2) a way to space things for allergies. I’m all for live and let live, and OP’s post is so judgy. I now have the money to “throw money” at problems (e.g. buy pre-made, organic puches). I didn’t have that extra money when I had a 6-month old. So chill. I should add that I had an intense job and did this late Friday nights and Saturday mornings and did the daycare shuffle, etc. Let’s support each other instead of huffing and puffing at what we may incorrectly perceive as martyrdom.
JM says
I did everything. BLW, frozen homemade purees, pouches. I looked like a supermom when bringing food for my baby to bbqs and get-togethers (remember those? hah). The truth is, I had an amazing nanny who made a variety of homemade purees once a week and froze them in ice cube trays. Without her, I would probably have either fed the baby mashed up bananas or pouches every day.
blueberries says
I think I maybe made my own baby food for kid #1 a few times. My career was going strong. I made a lot more baby food for kid #2, but I quit my biglaw job when #2 was a baby.
I would absolutely not add making baby food to my list of things to do if I was also working FT. There were too many other things to do.
Beth says
Neither of my kids really liked baby food from a jar but they loved the squeeze pouches. When they got a little older I would mash up sweet potatoes and make super overcooked black beans and give them premade guacamole but I never pureed a thing.
Anon says
Not me. We did jarred purees and pouches with oatmeal for about a month. We moved into small chunks of things really quickly – leftover shredded meat, shredded cheese, black beans, etc. But if kiddo wasn’t eating something that was a leftover of our meal (oh, those days, I miss them so – super picky toddler now) it was 100% store bought. Our saving grace was that pouches taught her how to drink out of a straw and meant mealtimes at restaurants were exponentially easier (why bringing and supervising a sippy cup was such a mental block I don’t know, but c’est la vie).
Anon says
I stayed home for a year and made baby food on weekends. It’s a time investment. You can do it in about an hour once a week if you can organize it. I knew how because I’d done it as a nanny in college. And I was happy to take plenty of shortcuts (microwave sweet potatoes, frozen veggies, steaming veggies over boiling potatoes, pre made applesauce, canned pumpkin purée, canned beans, freezing entire batches of quinoa, blending leftovers). It’s only purées from maybe four to eight months. If someone said that was important to them and they were home or outsourcing laundry or housekeeping or were one of those people who need very little sleep I’d believe them.
CPA Lady says
I had no interest in it so I didn’t do it. I also hate cooking and meal planning and found it a ton easier to just buy a variety of different kinds of baby food. Because of my lack of culinary skills, I felt like my kid would definitely be exposed to a lot wider variety of flavors that way.
Also… baby food is something that is a very short lived time frame. Maybe 3-4 months between when they start solids until they can start eating mostly”real” food. It seems all-consuming and important at the time (like so many things in the first year), but it goes by so quickly and does not really matter what you do. It’s just a personal preference, IMO.
Anon says
+1 Your last paragraph is so true, about this and so many other things baby. I did make a moderate amount of food for my first, and I remember about a month in I was eyeing this elaborate, expensive baby food making system. Luckily I didn’t buy it, and the next thing you know… they really are just eating chunks of whatever you are eating. I remember at some point looking back and being like, OMG I am so glad I didn’t buy that system, that would have been used for like 2 months in retrospect.
Pigpen's Mama says
This is the approach I took (I do enjoy cooking, but not for myself, on my schedule).
Some purees, but mostly baby-led weaning out of laziness. I wasn’t really cooking for the family, so the LO would get some veggies (usually frozen, but I’d warm them up a little), beans, cheese, etc and just feed herself, either with her fingers or using the vacuum technique.
Because of my lack of interest in cooking things she’d like to eat, the first few years (2ish to 4ish) I cooked separately for her a few times a week, and then the adults ate whatever. Now when I cook, about half the time I make something she (now 5) is happy about eating, usually separating things or putting stuff aside before I assemble, half the time she gets leftovers.
Also, whoever posted the Sheet-Pan Gnocchi a few weeks ago — thank you — my daughter LOVES it. She won’t eat pizza or burgers, and is picky about the shape of her pasta, but crispy gnocchi is a win.
Anon says
That was me! Glad you like it! My super picky toddler won’t touch it (but I love it, so I continue to make it), but I’m glad it worked for you!
Pigpen's Mama says
The first time I made it, I didn’t even try. Actually, the first time I made it, my husband didn’t even get any because he was working in the office that evening. I ate it ALL (over a few days). I’m glad she likes it, but I also don’t really want to share…:)
Nanny vs Daycare says
Would love some thoughts on nanny vs daycare.
We need full time childcare for DD2 starting in September when my 6 month leave ends. DD1 went to daycare at that age and it was a good fit for us – she really thrived having other kids around, even at that young age. Learning to nap around other kids meant that she kept napping when she started at preschool at 18 months (and still does at 3!), while pretty much all of her friends who had nannies rarely or never nap at school.
With all the covid uncertainty, I have been thinking that a nanny for DD2 is a better option than daycare, to be backup if (when?) DD1’s school shuts down, and to reduce family exposure generally (though we are all low risk). But DH and I will be working from home indefinitely, and the logistics of having a nanny and baby in the house while I work are not appealing to me – I think it would be very hard for me to concentrate if baby is crying (because of separation, bottle refusal, not napping, etc). Finding and hiring someone, and managing an employee is also intimidating, especially since so many people are likely trying to hire nannies.
So now, in the last few days, daycare for DD2 is sounding more attractive. Naps and bottles would be handled through the magic of daycare teachers, out of my sight and hearing! No concerns about nanny reliability (we had issues with a summer nanny last year)! More affordable, more hours of coverage, and no need to train/manage someone.
It would be 2 drop offs and pickups, but we have a spot at a daycare 2 blocks from DD1’s school, both walking distance from our house, so not too bad. Either one would only be for a year until DD2 starts at DD1’s preschool. DH and I both have very flexible jobs, and my mom would be available to help cover future covid closures, though of course it’s not the same as a full time nanny.
What would you do?
Anonymous says
Daycare. It’s going to be the best most of the time for your situation.
Anonanonanon says
Would you consider an in-home daycare provider? I had a bad impression of them for some reason, but that’s what we ended up doing for our second and I am so glad we did. Especially in light of COVID, it’s nice to know that when she goes back there will be way less exposure. I found ours by searching the database of the state licensing agency for in home daycares, reading the inspection reports of all of the ones in the zip codes I was interested in to weed out those that had dealbreaker infractions, contacted those left to talk about their hours and weather closure policies, then visiting the 3 that had narrowed it down to. We could not be happier with ours. She gets so much one-on-one love and attention but also gets to be with some other children. Our provider has an assistant and her mother also stays qualified as a staff member, but her mother is elderly and usually contributes by holding and cuddling the babies as much as possible, which was such a huge comfort to us when ours was a baby.
Anonanonanon says
Also, fwiw, our in-home provider never closed because there is always fewer than 10 people in the house. We pulled our youngest temporarily because I’m high risk, but, of course, everyone who stayed has been 100% fine that we know of! So may be less likely to be impacted by COVID closures.
In terms of regular sick days, we had WAY fewer than our friends who used larger daycares for their babies. 1. because of fewer people and 2. our provider did not send them home every time they had a stuffy nose, because by the time one kid did, chances were all 5 did if it was contagious.
Also, no weather closures, because her philosophy was that she is at her home anyway, so why would she close?
OP says
I totally would, but could not find one in my area that was reasonably convenient – most were in the opposite direction of my commute (in the event I need to go into the office occasionally). But this methodology is how I found our current spot, which is different from where DD1 went.
Pogo says
Just wanted to echo that this was exactly how we found our in-home and my experience as well. Ours did have to close per the state directive, but I feel much safer sending him back when she does open.
Boston Legal Eagle says
Some things to consider, in no particular order (both my kids were in daycare from 4/5 months on, until Covid):
I would imagine that a nanny + daycare for your other kid is much more expensive than daycare for two? For me, price would be a consideration, but of course if you get a nanny, the nanny could help out with household work as well. Not sure if that is as necessary with both of you working from home now?
Going to daycare, even without Covid, will likely lead to lots of sick days for the baby, that will happen regardless of when she starts so in some ways it may be better to get this over with when you have the flexibility to work from home.
I agree that it’s harder to work with a baby at home, especially if the baby is attached to you. I’m not sure whether the nanny could bring the baby to playgroups now either, so it would involve a lot of time at home and maybe walks around the neighborhood.
I don’t think socialization matters as much for the little ones, but I don’t think it hurts. Personal attention from a nanny is nice, but again, I personally don’t think it makes too much of a difference for baby’s development as long as they have loving, attentive caregivers at the daycare.
So for me, it would probably come down to cost, your own comfort with working from home with baby there, and also back-up availability for sick days and possible closures for DD1’s schools.
rosie says
I think it depends in part on where you are and how likely early COVID closures may hit. I’d much rather be hiring a nanny now than in another complete lockdown (if it were even an option at that point). My spouse & I have very flexible jobs as well, but trying to do them with a toddler and an infant is no joke. I assume that’s what you’re doing now so I don’t mean to lecture, but the prospect of doing this indefinitely is really tough to swallow. And is the layout of your house that you’d all be on top of each other every day, or do you have separate space that the nanny could be with the kid(s) while you are working?
Anon says
We were in daycare but I ended up switching to a nanny for the summer and I would like to find a full time nanny once our current nanny goes back to teaching in the fall. I wanted to send baby back to daycare but some of the Covid restrictions at daycare made me pause. I 100% understand them, but the same time it’s tough for little kids to deal with and I’m comfortable with a nanny situation. We also have the space in our house for it, I think if you didn’t have a dedicated office it may be hard.
Anon says
we have a nanny who we love, but in your case i would do daycare, especially since you have flexible jobs and a parent who can help out with covid closures.
AnotherAnon says
I would do day care.
another childcare question says
Can we talk logistics of hiring live-in childcare? I am thinking nanny mainly because we need someone sooner than an au pair would be able to start.
How much do you pay relative to the going rate for a live-out nanny? How do you find someone? Do you look for someone locally or potentially expand the geographic area for the search? Any thoughts on how to handle the arrangement in light of COVID where everyone is going to be staying home more than usual?
Anonymous says
In my city, you need an agency. You are looking for someone with no kids or family and who has no separate housing situation to unwind. Most FT nannies in my city prefer to live out b/c they have a private life that maybe doesn’t work well in a stranger’s house (many are empty nesters but have a spouse / SO and possibly pets, etc., kids who may come visit, etc.). They are often older but sometimes younger (PT students, etc.). Live in is very much harder to place unless it is a relative or au-pair situation.
TheElms says
Virtual shopping help? I’d like some new summer sandals. I’d like something that slips on and is comfortable to walk 1-2 miles in while pushing a stroller on a sidewalk. I have slightly wider toes. Would like a neutral color. Should I just get the Birkenstocks that have been popular for a while?
Anonymous says
I’m on my second pair of Birkenstock’s. First pair lasted 3yrs. I’d say they’re good for 1-1.5miles for me. Any farther and I need sneakers, but that may just be me.
AwayEmily says
Seconding Birkenstocks (I have the Mayari). The leather ones last for longer than the fake-leather ones.
I also have a pair of Crocs sandals that I love (the “swiftwater” in black). They are surprisingly comfortable, super light, and I like that I can get them wet.
Lobby-est says
Vionics! Their arch support makes such a difference. Comfortable and cute. And they wear like iron.
anon says
+1 to Vionic. Also a pair of Kork-Ease (70’s throwback) has been super comfy since I am on the fence about birks!
TheElms says
Thanks!
Lilac says
This is a big part of what drove us to decide on a nanny just last week. We’re in Mass and I don’t think our governor will hesitate for one second to lock it down if there’s a spike. This lock down we got by because my work is tied to the financial markets and work was very slow for the last few months. I can’t feasibly do my job in a busier environment AND handle another lock down.
OP, can you hire a daycare teacher as a nanny – one you know or one you don’t? We just made the decision to do this last week. DD is 2 yrs 2 mos and we are TTC (in treatments) for #2 right now. While DD absolutely thrived at daycare and daycare helped us by remembering to do things that this over tired first time mom didn’t, like transition off bottle – that was so not on my radar – we just decided to leave for a host of reasons, many COVID related and some not.
We hired one of her daycare teachers as her fulltime nanny. Nanny is outstanding, brings structure to our house and also of course has experience with things like fixed nap times, helping kids meet milestones, etc. Some of that daycare structure will certainly be lost but we’ll be able to get some of it because our nanny is used to that setting (see: potty training, which is coming at us fast and I know nanny can help us with since she’s used to handling 7 toddlers at a time, let alone one..). For the socialization aspect, as soon as it’s safe, we are excited to sign DD up for dance or gymnastics, for nanny to take her to the library story times and other things like that, in addition to socializing with other nannies (a few former daycare teacher friends of hers who also opted to leave amid COVID). It’ll never be the same as daycare, but she’s going to be able to get much of the same types of structure for essentially the same cost as two kids in daycare plus more flexibility to us.
ifiknew says
I have a 3 bedroom townhome. My spouse and I are both working from home. my spouse works full-time and I work part-time. Even with childcare, I don’t have a great place to work other than my kitchen table in the main living area, which means I end up doing most of my work when the kids are sleeping. The desk my husband has is in our bedroom and takes up ALL the space in there. Are there any solutions? I’ve considered closets etc and there is nothing. Is there any one in a similar position?
TheElms says
Are the other two bedrooms kid bedrooms? Could you fit a desk in there and work in there for an hour or two while the kids play in the living room / out for a walk with the nanny? Do you have a front porch or back patio/deck? Could you work on either?
Anon says
Seconding trying to use a kid’s room. Or do you have any sort of basement?
I find that being on a different floor from the kids is key, so am working upstairs in a bedroom while they’re awake and playing downstairs. When they’re napping I’ll sometimes migrate downstairs for a change of scenary.
Cb says
Writing from the sitting room, where our desk is set up in our two bed flat. It’s just really hard. Can you have quiet hours? Could you move some of the kids toys to bedrooms so they are encouraged to play in there.
I try to take my son out for 2 hours in the morning so my husband has some quiet time, and then they watch a bit of television and then go out in the afternoon so I get a bit of quiet.
Anon says
Can you get a really long desk and divide it in half so you can sit side by side?
Anon says
Or an L shaped desk where you each take a different section.
Anonymous says
Do you have any outside space? One of my little luxuries lately has been taking my laptop out to the porch for little bits of time to work and breathe in the fresh air. Obviously not an all the time solution, but an hour or so per day could make a big difference in the amount of work you’re able to get done.
Anonanonanon says
similar position with no solution. I’ve been sitting on our bed every day to work so I’m hidden from the kids (we’re fortunate to have a COVID sitter, but my husband has been in the office every day throughout all of this as a responder). As you can imagine, my back is in great shape….
I’ve spent so much time looking into options and never found anything that would work for me. The only places I can potentially fit a cool fold-out desk or something similar are places where the kids are! I have considered a folding table and chair that I stow under my bed at the end of the day, but haven’t moved forward with it. We are in appx 1100 sq ft not counting our basement, so we don’t exactly have huge empty closets sitting around either.
I’m thinking about rearranging my son’s room to put his dresser in his closet and then put a small desk for homework where the dresser was, and I might use that some during the day. Is putting a floating desk on the wall of one of your kids’ rooms an option? One they could use as an activity table otherwise but you could use as a desk?
The Elms says
Would a C-table and a folding stadium chair (the kind with no legs) make this more comfortable? You could sit on the edge of the bed with your feet on the floor (if they don’t reach get a box) and put laptop on C-table and the stadium chair gives you something to lean against.
AnotherAnon says
No advice but solidarity. I have two-story, 2500 sq foot “open concept” house and there is nowhere I can work where I can’t hear everything going on in the rest of the house. The Elms has good suggestions: DH and I trade taking calls on the back porch. I’m debating sticking a cheap desk in the nursery – I thought WFH was going to be limited (then I thought I was going to lose my job) but it looks like it may be here to stay.
Anonymous says
I am doing a ton of porch calls. The problem is getting dive bombed by a hummingbird while on a video call.
Anonymous says
Do you have a basement? That’s where we located the second home office space. We switch off weeks on who gets the nicer upstairs space vs the basement space.
Pogo says
Yes, good call. DH’s office is about to be relocated to the basement to make room for baby #2.
Anon says
Why don’t you bunk bed the kids (if old enough) and turn the third bedroom into a playroom? Put a folding desk in the new bedroom for you. You’ll have to keep the kids bedroom super boring.
If that kind of redesign wouldn’t work, the other big option to consider is figuring out how to get two desks into your bedroom and making your husband share space.
Sf says
Preschool reopening…I live in a west coast hot spot and our small, private preschool just announced its reopening protocol. I have a 3.5 year old.
Masks for teachers always, masks for kids while inside
Only ten kids max per class, two teachers
Individual buckets/no sharing for high use items (paintbrushes, crayons)
Covid test for the whole family before entering
Less hours plus a “safety and healthy fee” $3000+
Food from home, no water bottles or sippy cups
No parents inside
Social distancing between kids and between teachers when possible (no hugs??)
Temp checks twice a day and if your kid has 100 degree temperature you need to show two negative covid tests 24 hours apart or an alternative diagnosis from a doctor
Etc
Plus we’re due with our second in August.
1) I don’t know how they can do these requirements in real life (does your school have similar rules/how’s that working?)
2) is there a good reason to stick with the school rather than a pod with five kids and a teacher in someone’s backyard?
More Sleep Would Be Nice says
Wow, these sound comprehensive! We’re in a soon-to-be hotspot, and the rules are: temps of parent/child taken at dropoff, ALL adults inside must wear masks (teachers/staff/parents), small classes/no mixing of classes and rooms. We’re allowed to come inside for dropoff but not inside the classrooms.
I don’t know about the social distancing between kids/teachers — my son has gotten plenty of hugs from his teachers, and that’s a risk I’m okay with for now. Also I think they’re still sharing toys as normal, and they re-started food service a few weeks ago. I don’t send anything to school with DS, except his sheet/blanket which goes straight into the laundry at the end of the week.
I’d love if they required regular COVID-19 testing of families/staff. I obviously can’t police his teachers, but it does sound like they’re self-quarantining except for work as they want to keep their jobs.
anon says
You’re right that this sounds like a lot of work. I have no idea whether it’s too much or not enough.
My 5-year-old is going to camp in a former hot spot that is not doing OK. The camp is for kids who need help with social/emotional/behavioral development (basically, kids with mild autism or conditions that overlap with many characteristics of autism), so that may change what’s practical. For example, I doubt many of these kids could be convinced to keep a mask on all day because there’s a high rate of sensory issues.
So, masks for teachers always, never for kids.
Fewer than 10 kids per class, but there are at least 4-5 teachers rotating through to help address different needs.
Definitely sharing art supplies, toys, etc. Part of what these kids need is practice sharing.
No Covid test before entering.
Food from home, but we are definitely sending a water bottle.
No parents inside–the staff comes to the car to pick kids up.
No social distancing between kids or between kids and teachers.
Temp checks when the kids arrive. Not sure what type of clearance we’d need before returning, but I assume a negative Covid test or a doctor’s note that the fever was due to ear infection or something.
The $3000 health and safety fee seems like a lot to me. But I suppose they could say they’re raising the monthly fee to account for the lower volume of kids they can accept.
Anonymous says
I would not do this- too expensive for too little.
But yes there is a reason not to do a pod in a back yard with a teacher- laws exist! Running an unlicensed day care, which is what you’re suggesting, is against the law and opens all of you up to liability.
Anon for this says
So these are (almost) the rules for the emergency care I’ve been using, and similar to what our state has announced for reopening. It sounds Draconian, but in reality, it is not that scary. LO is so used to the temp checks, stands there patiently for it (and he’s not even 3 yet). At home if he sees our thermometer when I open the bathroom closet he asks me to check his temp lol. They do not require masks for children, but it’s suggested for those above age 3 and LO told me with wonder that “the big kids get to wear masks!” (he thinks it’s cool). He does not seem to care/notice that all the teachers are masked. I have heard no complaints from him about the water bottle/sippy cup situation, which I’ve been told is disposable little cups. As you note, no parents inside (you have to call to be let in so you’re not even touching the door/coming near any other kids/parents) so I have not seen any of this with my own eyes, but the staff are super open about everything and LO would def tell me if he was freaked out by anything.
The only one I have seen them pretty relaxed on because I think it’s just so impossible is the social distancing. You need to balance the child’s safety with the risk. So when he is brought out to me at pickup, he is holding his teacher’s hand. I was also sent a picture on the first day (to show he was settling in) and a masked teacher was reading him a book and he was kinda snuggled up next to her. A teacher also told me that while she tries to distance the kids, realistically they get closer than six feet and do pass toys to one another (though not markers/crayons, etc, which I think are kept in a ziplock for each kid). They wash hands constantly, and tho he’s a beast about it at home, his teacher said LO is a champ and loves handwashing time. The class size restrictions are even smaller than what you mention because this is an emergency setting – I think there are 3 kids in one class and 5 in the other.
Overall, I have felt very reassured by both how rigorous the rules are, how well the teachers are following them while balancing the child’s safety and comfort, and how well LO has taken it all in stride. Kids are resilient. He has been a whole new kiddo since going, and we have been able to focus on our work which in my husband’s case very directly impacts COVID treatments and in my case less directly, but I’m still essential and feel very grateful to be contributing to the efforts to keep supply chains going.
I wanted to share this to help those of you who are concerned about strict measures that I think we don’t kids enough credit. Even a young preschooler like my son has adapted and really, really thrived with the attention (which we were unable to give him when he was home with us). Hope this helps.
CCLA says
1000x this. Our times-of-COVID daycare experience (back for 2+ weeks now) has been very similar to this as well. When I got the list of reopening rules I had images in my head of kids sitting alone in corners being observed from a distance. Talked to the director and felt reassured so we went in with the plan of trying it out for a few weeks to see if it was good or bad for the kids, and it’s been overwhelmingly positive so far.
No additional fee, but we are paying full freight for severely limited hours (8-230). Kids are LOVING it. They do great with temp checks at the entry (parents drop off at gate), they do not seem at all bothered by teachers wearing face shields and gowns. 1.5yo wonders at why she doesn’t have a mask, big sis at 3.5 loves wearing her mask (ages 3+ are required to wear). Clearly not always socially distanced, just not possible, but they do 1-2 kids per table instead of collecting them all in one place, more dance parties, fewer table-based activities, <10 kids in each class. Director reassured us that if a kid gets hurt or something and needs a hug they'll certainly get it. 3.5yo is a reliable reporter of what her day entails and is happy to be back.
AnotherAnon says
I sort of glossed over the exorbitant fee in my initial response. But if you can stomach that, I just wanted to say +1 to all this. My 3 y/o has been back for two weeks and things are just so much better for all of us. I’m seeing fewer tantrums, there’s 100% less yelling on my part, his hand washing skills are a wonderful side benefit, not to mention his mood has improved dramatically due to his ability to socialize again. I am still concerned about the risk to kids, but for us, right now, day care is better than trying to WFH with a sad little extrovert at my side.
Anon from 12:14 says
I couldn’t tell if the fee was one-time or per-month. Per-month would be a dealbreaker because that’s equivalent to tuition! But if it were one-time, and you live in a state where the government has not come through with protections/support, I can kind of see the preschool’s point in asking parents to help cover the extra costs. Our state government quickly acted to support employees affected, and all the daycare teachers at my son’s normal daycare are taking advantage of that, and the programs who applied/were accepted into the emergency program are 100% subsidized by the state.
I don’t think the fed govt is doing anything (SHOCKER). Supposedly some of the SBA loans could go to preschools/daycares, but my son’s normal program was denied because funds ran out.
Anon says
Even one-time would be a dealbreaker for me! That’s basically two months of daycare tuition for us (2 preschoolers in full-time care).
AnotherAnon says
1) My small day care (in TX) is doing most of this and more:
Director and teachers wear a mask at all times.
Kids wash hands upon arrival at school.
Food from home only (this is not new).
Temperature checks are performed upon arrival at school and at intervals during the day.
They’re now limiting the number of kids in program.
Kid uses the same work space all day – no sharing of any supplies or food.
Work spaces are sanitized daily.
Differences: Masks are not required for kids. They spend most of their time outside, but I expect masks to become highly encouraged as we see cases continue to rise in our state.
We’re not being charged an extra fee, but director does all the sanitizing herself, after hours.
I think they let the kids each lunch together outside.
My school has mandated the following:
You must notify the director if you’ve traveled by plane and keep your kids home for 14 days after.
In addition to the temperature threshold, kids are not allowed at school if they have a runny nose. In an allergy-heavy area, this is going to be tricky but I understand the sentiment behind it.
2) This depends on your risk tolerance so I can’t answer this for you. IME a licensed school may have a better ability to mandate/police whether people are travelling, so you could potentially lower your risk better there than 5 random kids who travel/visit grandma all summer. Just food for thought.
TheElms says
How is the no runny nose thing going to work in practice as we move into fall? My kid had a runny nose pretty much from late November through March when daycare closed. Never had a fever, just run of the mill mild cold. Granted it was her first winter in daycare so maybe this year will be better, but still seems pretty likely that she’ll have a cold much of the winter.
AnotherAnon says
That’s a fair point and I don’t really know. Everyone in my family experiences allergy symptoms about 10 months out of the year. I’m going to monitor my kid and if I think his runny nose is due to allergies, I will send him. If the director asks me to come pick him up I will deal with it then. I suppose the simplest answer would be to give my kid Zyrtec all the time, but I’m not willing to do that – he’s 3. I think the director is just being overly cautious. She doesn’t take kids under 18 months (Montessori) so I’m sure she’s just not familiar with the fact that day care kids have runny noses from about 6 months to two years old, at least IME.
mascot says
Wait, a $3000 health and safety fee?? I assume this offsets their decreased enrollment and tuition shortfall?. I live in the SEUS where daycare and private school are much cheaper so I’ve got some sticker shock on this. The rest seems pretty doable.
avocado says
That fee is insane. What are they doing, installing a separate hospital-grade air purification system in every classroom?
SF says
They said the fee was their hard costs of cleaning, extra teachers for the lower ratios, more supplies, etc. I’m waiting on the exact figures from the school but it’s probably a 20-25% increase.
Anonymous says
Are they hiring new teachers for this? My center has 8 rooms, and 2 teachers per room plus some floaters. In covid times, they are cutting capacity for kids to 8 per room instead of 15-20, but each room will still have 2 teachers. At this point, they’re only using 4 rooms and waiting for more kids to come back so they can bring more teachers back from furlough.
That fee is insane. I’d want to see how they arrived at that number
Spirograph says
Personally, I’m leaning heavily toward backyard. My kids are having tons of fun with the neighbors, and daycare just sounds not-fun this summer. I don’t want to pay a premium for my kids to have less fun than they will at home.
Things that will change my mind: relaxation of social distancing within classrooms, daycare permission to use the pool and playground
Anon says
Had the worst morning with my 2.5 year old and feeling terrible about it. So many tantrums on her end, so little patience on my end. Had to switch shifts with my husband early because I could not take it anymore and now I feel like I’m wasting his and my work time sulking about what a terrible job as a mother I’m doing. No advice needed, just commiseration. Does it get worse than 2.5?
oil in houston says
I’m sure it does, but take it a day at a time, breathe. there are always good days and bad days, and don’t beat yourself up for it!
Ifiknew says
Absolute worst tantrums at that age. I’m still in the thick of it at 3 but it’s getting less frequent and slightly more reasonable. So so painful, I’m so sorry.
Boston Legal Eagle says
My oldest is 4. It gets better, but oh so so slowly. Try to reframe this as not you doing a terrible job because she’s unhappy, but that she’s comfortable enough and developing well enough to let out all of her emotions with caregivers she feels safe with. Which is infinitely easier to do when you’re not with said screaming toddler!
Anon says
Mine is 2.75 and the intensity of tantrums has increased exponentially in the past few weeks (as my patience has slowly dwindled). I hear the tantrums get worse but the frequency is less often, or that’s what I am clinging to. It’s worse right now because there isn’t a break – I had infinitely more patience refereeing lawyer tantrums at work all day and hers at night than I do with hers all day and all night.
Plans for next school year? says
It’s probably too early in the summer to have an answer with really any certainty, but what are your local/state school systems considering for next year? And how are you planning on handling it
We’re in Northern Virginia (Fairfax) and it seems like it could be all virtual or 1 or 2 days in school and the rest distance learning, possibly asynchronous, so a video of someone teaching, rather than interactive video chats. Neither of these seem like a feasible option for lower elementary kids without a stay at home parent (not that it’s a great option for older kids/kids with a SAHP). An actual on-line school, while it may be better able to deal with curriculum and technology, would still need more daily parental hands-on involvement than I think we can provide
I’m so sick of feeling like an inadequate mom and employee. My June 2020 self is wryly laughing at my June 2019 self who was feeling like she was doing a bad job of managing it all.
BethC says
NC is considering 3 options depending on the situation when school opens: 1) Most students attend school in person with social distancing protocols 2) Split approach – some kids on campus, some kids remote OR alternate days on campus (not totally sure) 3) Fully remote
Anonymous says
These were the same options in our county’s survey (in MD) but I have no idea what will actually happen. It’s really frustrating not knowing how to plan, even though I know it’s really not anyone’s fault.
Spirograph says
You’re not in MoCo are you? I just want to make sure I haven’t missed a survey opportunity! I haven’t seen anything from the district soliciting feedback yet, although the end-of-schoolyear message mentions that it will be coming.
I’m very frustrated that there’s so little information available. I fully understand that this is complicated and a lot can change between now and September, but it would be hugely helpful for the district to put a stake in the ground. Something as simple as “we’re committed to in-person instruction for all elementary students at least 2 days/week” or even a negative like: “there is no possibility of returning to a normal, in-person school schedule, we are considering multiple hybrid alternatives” would be a start.
Anon says
I’m in FCPS too, and none of it seems feasible for two-working parent households, which, given the COL here, is most folks (we’re the exception in that DH is a SAHD). I don’t know what the answer is. My main focus personally is on tracking the preschool programs through the county, because we are in the preschool resource program for developmental delay. TBD what that ends up looking like. There are two sessions for feedback this week, I think one is tonight at 6:30 and the other is Thursday, plus you should have a survey in your inbox.
not using usual name for this says
Also in Fairfax, and based on the cluster that was distance learning the past few months, I’m giving up. We’re homeschooling for fall. I don’t trust that the school system will not cave to parental pressure leading to either overreacting to positive cases or fully reopening when it’s not safe (remember when the superintendent stood next to the Local Health Official in a press conference and said he was following Public Health guidance and not closing yet, and then parents got mad and he closed the next day? Also, see every ridiculous “snow” closure we’ve had)
My child will be in 5th grade so he’s old enough to work somewhat-independently. He was a year ahead in Math and reading, so worst-case scenario he ends up back on track? My office is likely teleworking until 2021. I don’t want him to ride the bus, and the car line twice a day on varying days of the week is more disruptive to my work schedule than stopping to check his work or help him login to a website when I’m available. I gave up on county distance learning and we’ve been homeschooling the past couple of months and it’s been going well.
We have a toddler as well, and every version of our childcare options for the fall involves at least a part-time person in our home. That person will be able to help verify he’s finishing his work, etc. so it’s ready for one of us to check and go through in the evening.
Anonymous says
Exact same concerns here in central VA.
I am totally disappointed in the governor’s school reopening plan. Everything is “consider” or “encourage” or “when possible.” No precautions are actually mandated in Phase 3, which is where we will be when school opens in the fall. This gives school districts an easy out. Sorry, not possible to physically distance on the bus! Sorry, we can’t make kids wear masks, we can only encourage it. I thought this dude was a doctor.
Anon says
As I understand the governor’s plan – agree it’s confusing, school phases are different from community phases. E.g., a school can move to a phase if the rest of the area is in that phase, but they need to submit a plan and get it approved before moving to that phase. So assuming VA is in phase 3 for non-school things in the fall, each school system will be in School Phase I and then need to submit a plan to the state to move to School Phase 2. I didn’t really focus on School Phase 3 because I think it will be a long time before schools get there. I’m actually not opposed to that – the issues Fairfax County is dealing with will be very different than say Buchanan County or another rural SW VA district and perhaps different even than say Henrico County or another Richmond suburb, so building flexibility in makes a lot of sense to me given how diverse the state is, but it puts a lot of pressure on the local school district to get it right for their community and their concerns.
Anonymous says
“The school reopening phases are aligned with the existing Forward Virginia phases, through which the state will progress by monitoring public health data and key measures on disease transmission, healthcare capacity, testing capacity, public health capacity to trace contacts of cases, and other relevant factors.”
I read this to mean that when a county is in phase 3, its school division should submit its phase 3 plans and enter phase 3.
OP says
OP here. That midnight change of plans still pisses me off. I had been expecting school to close that Monday and had planned to take the day off and prep for staying at home for a month that day, without a Kindergartener.
I fear they will cave to the “don’t open at all” crowd — they tend to be a little louder at these things. And I’m worried about the disadvantaged kids who didn’t participate at all in DL this last year, I can’t see how changing up the way DL works will really make a difference for their participation.
Anon says
I was very loudly in the OPEN FULL TIME crowd in my survey responses, but I am sure I am a minority. I think it is better to put the kids back in schools and focus on lowering other transmission factors (keeping high risk folks at home, continued teleworking where possible, masks, etc.) than keep kids in classrooms only 1-2 days a week. My social media feed is freaking out though about the possibility of any in person instruction, so I think your fear is warranted.
not using usual name for this says
Yes. That and the national-news-worthy mess up of the DL roll out just left me with a complete lack of faith. I honestly do not blame anyone, especially not the teachers, I think it was really really hard to be prepared for something like this and I sympathize with that. BUT, after weeks of “visit blackboard and google classroom and your kid’s email you didn’t even know they had, and live courses at this time. Wait nevermind it all changed now visit zoom and blackboard and your kid should know the logins and wait nevermind it changed again and this is all coming out in multiple disparate emails and not in one accessible place” I gave up. If I couldn’t keep track of when we were supposed to login where, and where we were supposed to find homework and lessons, how is my kid?!
Anonymous says
I am in Fairfax county as well. I am not sure what we will do but i am starting to research nanny services and au pairs. I am guessing I will have no option but to hire a nanny if I want to stay employed
Audrey III says
Anyone have a twin size loft bed that they love? Only requirement is that it has to fit a desk underneath, and willing to spend to get something that will last through the HS years. Thanks!