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Updated: Nov 1, 2018 106 Comments · by

Washable Wednesday: laundry BY SHELLI SEGAL Women’s Celtic Braid Wrap Dress

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Women\'s Celtic Braid Wrap DressThis wrap dress looks great for work — not only is it machine washable, but the print will hide a multitude of sins, and — should you be uncomfortable with your post-baby waist, like me, some of the comments specifically note that it’s forgiving in that area. The dress is $138 at Amazon (also available in a pink, and as a jumpsuit). laundry BY SHELLI SEGAL Women’s Celtic Braid Wrap Dress (L-all)

Sales of note for 9.10.24

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  • Old Navy – 40% off everything
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Comments

  1. bloated? says

    I am about 6 weeks pregnant… and none of my clothes seem to fit anymore. Is it only going to get worse from here? Am I only going to get bigger? I feel like I’m about 5-7 pounds heavier than my normal weight (though some of that started before I got pregnant).

    I know it’s different from everybody, and this is sort of a dumb question to ask on the internet. I guess I was just curious to see if anybody actually gets smaller (stomach-wise, not so much losing pounds) between now and the next few months. And any tips on how to plan for maternity wear — especially for a month long trial later on.

    Also, how long did you wait to tell people? Family/close friends? Announce at work?

    • noob says

      I started wearing my ‘fat’ clothes exclusively within a week or so of getting a positive test. Some of it was a bit of pre-pregnancy, post-Thanksgiving weight, but some of it was bloat. I was also eating a lot of carbs due to nausea.

      I just bought a few things that were one size up, some of which came in handy postpartum, including the above dress in a different print!

      • anonmama says

        This dress looks great for postpartum but I was wondering if it is a true wrap dress or mock wrap? I need more true wrap dresses because they are so easy to nurse/pump in, but I’ve been fooled by mock-wraps before!

        • noob says

          If it’s the same as the one I have (I’m pretty sure it is) it’s a true wrap dress and there’s enough material to not have to worry about a stiff breeze exposing everything. I actually have it in two prints, found them at Nordstrom Rack about a year – year and a half ago.

    • anonmama says

      I immediately looked pregnant with my pregnancies, but then between weeks 10 and 13, the bloat went away and I was left with a smaller, easier-to-hide little bump. After 14 weeks was when a legit belly started to form. I found that hiding pregnancy in weeks 4-10 was much more difficult than in weeks 10-16 for me.

      I rotated through dresses with scarves/blazers/long necklaces, a pair of motherhood maternity dress slacks that were normal in the front but had an elastic band in the back (so not quite “real” maternity pants, but definitely room to breathe), and elastic-waist skirts.

      Good luck!

      • RDC says

        Yes – this was my experience too. And at the beginning I felt so bloaty/cramps that wearing pants with a regular waist (or even the low-rise elastic bands, or the belly band) was sooo uncomfortable. I found dresses much more comfortable in the early weeks even though I usually wear pants. The bloating did get better and from about 10 or 12 weeks through to 16 or even 18 it was much easier to hide the belly with jackets, scarves, etc.

    • Newly pregnant says

      Congrats! I did not get smaller, although I think I experienced less bloat and more I’m-eating-all-the-pizza early weight gain. Even though I was gaining weight (especially in my chest), I felt that I didn’t really start to look pregnant until about 20+ weeks, so what I did in the meantime was buy a pair of non-maternity jeans in a larger size and wore my more forgiving clothes. Pants went out the window early – I mostly stuck to dresses and skirts. You might want to buy an inexpensive dress or two in a larger size that will work in this stage and also work when post-partum. When those stopped working I knew it was time to get into maternity wear.

      Depending on when your trial is you may want to have some maternity items ready to go. Assuming you have a black suit, a plain black maternity skirt and black dress pants might be your best friend. I found A Pea In the Pod the best resource for those types of items.

      ETA – we told family at about 11 weeks. A lot of our friends found out earlier due to circumstances (large parties, me not drinking, someone else semi-announcing it to everyone). I told work at about 20 weeks (I probably could have waited a little longer, but felt that it was a good time to tell since I was halfway through the pregnancy).

    • CHJ says

      I went up about one size almost immediately, all from bloat. I bought a new pair of (regular, non-maternity) pants at the time, and I’m so glad I did because I ended up wearing them for a couple of months when I went back to work but wasn’t back down to my pre-pregnancy size yet. I wouldn’t hesitate to get a few extra clothes in a bigger size to accommodate the bloat – you might get use out of them on the other side. Congratulations!

    • PregLawyer says

      For pants, get a Bella Band or something similar. I’m at almost 6 months and am still wearing my normal jeans with the band. It just allows you to not zip them up all the way – the band covers the zipper and keeps your pants up. It’s been a godsend.

      • PregAnon says

        Love this thing. I’m sitting here at work in jeans, bella band, and a sweater. Works great!

      • Merabella says

        It is also great for maternity stuff that doesn’t quite stay up on its own yet, but the regular pants aren’t cutting it anymore. I had some maternity leggings that I didn’t quite fill out the full belly panel, but fit everywhere else, the bella band was perfect for these, as the regular leggings were cutting into my early 2nd trimester belly.

  2. Noelle says

    For the trial, I would try to find some empire waisted black or grey sheath dresses (I found a few of surprisingly good quality in the Liz Lange Target collection), and then wear those with blazers/jackets. It won’t be as formal as what you normally wear for court, but my experience was that jurors/judges were much more forgiving wardrobe-wise when the lawyer in front of them was visibly pregnant. I also invested in 3 maternity suits to get me through my pregnancy (I’m a prosecutor, so in court quite frequently). You want things that will accommodate your growing bump, which is why the empire-waisted dresses were pretty key for me. Good luck!

    • JJ says

      I had a four-day federal jury trial while I was about 20 weeks pregnant. I bought a few skirt suits a few sizes larger than my usual size and wore those. I didn’t button the jackets and wore maternity tops under the jacket. They actually came in handy when I came back from leave and still didn’t fit in my regular suits.

      Now I have literally four different sizes of suits hanging in my closet and one day when I get some free time (ha!) I’m going to take the larger ones to the tailor and have them taken in. One day.

  4. Another Body Complaint & Semi-Revelation says

    I am 7 months pregnant. I am wearing a button-down shirt. I feel like I look like Kim Jong-Il, the former dictator of North Korea, in his button-down jumpsuit.

    Then I realized, men wear this kind of thing with their belly guts all the time. If they DON’T wear a button-down shirt, they look weird.

    So, going feminist here, but BRING IT ON. #hormones

    • ANP says

      This made me laugh so hard! Thanks for the chuckle.

      Signed,
      6.5 months pregnant and feeling the same way

  5. Newly pregnant says

    I’m having baby name anxiety. I feel the weight of naming someone, and I’m trying to envision this baby as a kid, in college, as a professional, in her love life, etc. and whether any of the names my husband and I are throwing around will work across all of the facets of her life. This is basically a never-ending spiral.

    For those of you with kids, how did you settle on a name?

    • No worries says

      I’m probably more chill than most people here.
      But don’t most names work across all facets of life? I mean, I can remember being in middle school and thinking the name “Hillary” was really trendy – and here we are with a Senator and Secretary of State with that name, maybe even a serious presidential contender.
      Remember Madeline that girl who pooh-poohed the tigers at the zoo – and, similary, she’s been SoS.
      I have a rather ethnic name and even that works. Condeleeza – hello?!

      I am sticking with political people because I hear them more often, and they seem like more real people in a way that celebrities don’t, but really, Heidi Klum is a super business-woman and her name is the same as that Swedish girl on the mountain with the bread and the friend in the wheelchair.

      Seriously, your kid will be fine.

      • Newly pregnant says

        That’s so true. Thanks for this! I’m getting so caught up in finding the “perfect” name, but really, the tiny differences between all of these names is unimportant.

    • Anonymous says

      Haven’t named kids yet, but DH and I throw them around all the time….we figure if we like a name now, and still like it once future babies are born, chances are we won’t regret it in the future.

      In regards to the weight of naming someone, I recommend listening to the Freakonomics podcast titled “How Much Does Your Name Matter?”

      ETA, I also agree wholeheartedly with everything “No worries” says above. I think people (including myself) mostly worry about what to name their kids because they want to convey a specific message about the kind of people they are.

      • Lyssa says

        We did this, too. I think that we picked out both a boy and a girl name around 2002 (both were characters in now-long-ended TV shows that we watched, though the kids are not *named after* the characters, just that we heard the names and decided that they were nice.)

        Once you get into the habit of calling the kid that (even before he/she is born, if you’re finding out the sex), it starts to seem natural and as if there could be no other name really quickly.

    • Tradition says

      I’m Ashkenazic Jewish, we name our kids after people who’ve passed away in our family, with a broad definition of the phrase “naming after” – it’s not usually an exact-name Junior style, it usually starts with the same initial or has the same meaning, could be a contemporary or cross-gender updating of the name – think “Jennifer” named after Grandpa Jacob or Grandma Yenta (because there’s no J in Hebrew), or a Brian named after Grandma Barbara.

      My husband is not Jewish but liked the idea, and surprisingly it meant a lot to his family, too – we did not reveal the name until after birth, and his family was crying happy tears. I was really suprised. We chose a Hebrew/Jewish version of some names of his grandparents that have passed away. I’m really surprised by how it does keep alive a lot of family stories, telling a new kid about people from before his time (in this case, from before my time, too – people I never knew).

      • PregAnon says

        Me too! The first name is after my Great Uncle that both of us were close to, and we’re using the first initial of both my FIL’s middle name, and husband’s grandfather’s first name that passed away last year. I think it is working out well.

      • Manhattanite says

        Me too. We named DD the Hebrew translation of my FIL’s mother’s name. I was surprised that his family doesn’t seem to care (they just love her). No2 is in the way and I really want to name her after my dads dad. He was the first grandparent I lost and I still miss him terribly 17 years later. I like the family connection it gives to name a child after a loved and lost relative. My siblings and I have first names from one parent’s side and middle names from the other’s.

    • Maddie Ross says

      We didn’t 100% decide until minutes after she was born. We had a list of names, but couldn’t settle on one. As soon as she was born, I just started calling her something. Honestly, it still felt weird to call her by her name for several months (despite the fact I loved it). But now, several years in, her name just “fits” her.

    • mascot says

      We didn’t find out sex so we had to come up with a boy name and a girl name. We would privately refer to baby by a possible name for a week or two to see how we liked it, think up nicknames, etc. Then we would switch sex/name. We didn’t discuss any serious contenders with anyone to avoid getting superfluous comments about how that was grandma’s dog’s name.
      Here in the South, it is tradition to use family names and maiden names somewhere in the name. Our child has my MIL’s maiden name as part of their name; she’s the last living relative in the family so it was a nice way to carry that on.
      Besides, if your child hates the name, it can always be changed. Not a quick process, but doable.

    • Meg Murry says

      Unless you are giving a name that is super specifically named after 1 person that ties the name ONLY to that person (the only examples I can think of would be something like Oprah or Condoleeza or Bellatrix), your child’s name will just be “his/her name” and all other thoughts about “will it work when she is a toddler and also a Supreme Court Justice” will be gone. So don’t stress, unless you are naming your kid Ben Dover or something like that, your choice is name will not screw up or set up them for life.

      As for resources, since I thought researching baby names in general (as opposed to picking one in specific): the Baby Name Wizard (both book and blog) were great for me, as was the Swistle baby names blog, and nymbler dot com (made by the author of Baby Name Wizard) is fun to play with for name suggestions.

      • PregAnon says

        Ok now I have to tell a Ben Dover story. My Junior year in high school, we wrote our own production for the spring play. It was hilarious, and the audience got to vote on the ending during intermission. We had a very traditional Mormon student who happened to be cast as the character “Ben Dover.” His parents weren’t having it, so we changed it to “Lee Nover.”

        Yeah, I grew up in one of THOSE towns – no diversity to speak of, very socially conservative. No idea how I turned out normal. Kind of. Probably because I stuck with the theater crowd.

        • pockets says

          I’m sure this wasn’t the intent, but naming a character “Ben Dover” could be considered offensive. I’m surprised that the adults in charge didn’t intervene.

          • PregAnon says

            That was absolutely the intent. It was a comedy with all kinds of inappropriate names.

            We always wanted to do numbers from “Rent” in our yearly dance show. Our Theater director’s joke was always that our town could only handle the more tame version: “Lease.”

    • Spirograph says

      As the mother of a “baby girl [lastname]” who didn’t get a name until hours before we were discharged from the hospital, I totally get the anxiety, even though I agree in theory with everyone who said it’s not as big of a deal. Our big thing was that our kids have “real names.” We call them by nicknames, but as my husband said “you can’t sign ‘kiki’ on a billion dollar business deal.” Both our kids have names with multiple nickname possibilities, so if they hate their full name when they get older, they have lots of natural options.

      I had an easy time vetoing names – nothing gender-ambiguous, nothing that rhymes with Aiden, nothing with a yooneek spelling, nothing that reminds me of someone I don’t like – but a hard time picking ones I liked. My favorite baby name books were ones like Baby Wizard that sorted names into categories (also, I liked the commentary in that particular book), that made it easy to focus on types of names that I like and skip over ones that I didn’t. Although I did read it cover to cover, too, of course. :)

      Word to the wise: do NOT refer to your unborn child by some ridiculous nickname for months before he/she is born. It will be a very hard habit to break.

      • anon says

        Haha, we’re referring to our unborn child as “Thor” because it’s a ridiculous nickname that we knew would never become the real name. But you’re right, we’ve used it for so long (and haven’t picked a real name) that it’s become scarily normal-sounding, and everyone is kindof emotionally attached. There’s no chance that our baby will actually be named Thor, but it’s crossed my mind that it may be a hard habit to break once he’s born :-)

        • Spirograph says

          Yup, we picked a name off of some list of top-100-worst-names-ever that we thought was just hysterically terrible enough that it wouldn’t stick. And it became normal sounding and kind of cute by the time our son was born. He’s almost 2 and we still use it…Mostly just between me and my husband now, we’ve gotten a lot better at using his real name around other people.

        • Anglophile says

          Great minds! My cousin actually nicknamed our baby “Baby Thor” or “BT” for short – he suggested it was perfect because it would work for a girl or a boy, LOL. BT also just happens to be my cousin’s initials but my SO immediately thought “British Telecom.”

          I’m currently at 38+ weeks and we have a name picked out for our baby boy – spoiler alert: it is not Thor. We have taken to calling him by his real name and have actually both struggled not to let the name slip around family and friends :)

        • Anonyc says

          You laugh, but I have totally heard a parent call for a kid named “Thor” at the playground. I was gobsmacked.

    • EP-er says

      I took my grandmother’s advice: Yell the name out the back door as loud as you can, like you are calling them in for dinner. Do you feel silly yelling “Apple?” If so, it might not be the name for you. :) We went with really traditional names that we love. We didn’t share the names ahead of time because people feel more comfortable sharing their (negative) opinions before the baby is born. No one (okay, not many people) will look at your baby and say they don’t like the name once the baby is here.

  6. In House Lobbyist says

    No advice but just wanted to add that I felt it much harder to name a girl than a boy for these same reasons.

  7. Shayla says

    Toddler bullying question: Bullying might be over kill, but I don’t think it is, but keep in mind these kids are 2-2.5 years old. My daughter has repeatedly expressed concerns about a kid in her class, let’s call him John. At first I was skeptical that it was that bad, but my husband and I have both witnessed him over the last few months hitting and shoving the other kids. One time he shoved a girl off the 4 inch stage they have in their room, this morning John pushed a little boy all the way across the room (the teacher was helping someone go potty) and I actually told him to stop and that pushing is not ok.

    My daughter says, “I don’t want John to be at school tomorrow,” “John is not nice,” “John hits me,” “Is he going to be at school, I hope not,” and the one that kills me, “I don’t want to be his friend.” I continue the conversation by asking questions about why she doesn’t want him there, or what he does, and we go through what she can do, my instructions are along the lines of “you have to be kind to John, but you don’t have to be friends and you absolutely do not have to ‘nicely’ ask him to stop, you tell him to STOP and DON’T TOUCH ME and he has to listen to you–and you can always walk away and find a teacher” (I tell her to say NO like how mommy says it, and she totally gets it). I shared with her teachers these are the words I want her to use–her teacher shared they’ve been teaching all the kids “please don’t” and “no thank you.” I was taken aback for two reasons: (1) I think these polite refusals are confusing for toddlers–they should be allowed to say NO to someone pushing/shoving/hitting them; (2) the problem is bad enough with John that the teacher said she was working with all the kids.

    Would it be over-reaching to have a discussion with the teachers (director?) sharing my concern about how bad this has gotten, at least in the eyes of my two year old who wishes John isn’t there? And, from my point of view I want them to stop the polite refusals, and make sure that while they are teaching all the kids to say no, that they are also teaching all the kids to listen when their classmates tell them to stop?

    Thoughts?

    • ANP says

      Good job in going with your mama gut! All kids have the potential to be jerks, for sure, but this sounds like an issue you definitely want to address. I’d go to the teachers first out of respect and if they don’t do something about it (or don’t take you seriously), then go to your director.

      I also say this as the mother of a child who is a mostly-delightful 5-year-old, but who was the classroom biter between ages 1 and 2. It made me CRAZY! So embarrassing to get those calls home — but at the same time, I was grateful that the teachers were aware of the issue and working to redirect her behavior.

      • Shayla says

        Thank you, and yes–I can relate with the biting calls. My daughter was the biter in a different classroom and we wouldn’t have known without the teachers saying something because she never did it at home. So embarrassing, but so necessary.

    • D. Meagle says

      Not out of line to speak with the school. Sounds like you have already spoken with the teachers about your concerns, so at this point you might as well get the directors involved. If the situation has gotten to the point where your child doesn’t want to go to school, that is a legitimate concern that needs to be addressed. Also, being polite with the please and thank is all good and fine and important, but not necessarily when you are dealing with an aggressor; teaching manners is great, but so is learning how to stand up and protect yourself using forceful words, not forceful actions.

    • Meg Murry says

      One thing that may be contradicting what the teacher is saying – a lot of schools use the word “friend” in place of “classmate” and even up through 1st grade my son has had class rules like “we’re all friends in first grade” – probably as part of an anti-bullying campaign. So I would slow down on “you don’t have to be friends with him” language since the teacher is probably pushing “we’re all friends!” speak and instead just say “you don’t have to play with him”.

      But yes, complain to the teacher, and if verbal complaints don’t do anything put it in writing (email), especially if you ever see the other child hit or push your daughter. Our daycare was going through the process of getting another child qualified for outside services (and pushing the parents to agree to those services) and the teacher told me to please make the complaints, so that they had it in writing that this was a problem beyond normal 2 year old behavior.

      Could you talk to the teacher and then model some behavior – maybe and in-between, like first saying “don’t hit me, I don’t like that” and walking away. Having one 2 year old yelling at another probably won’t help, but I agree with you that “no thank you” isn’t strong enough. What about, “stop, it hurts when you hit me” or “I don’t like when you hit me, stop”?

      Last, is your daughter at the top of the age range in the class and John at the bottom? There is a huge difference in communication and behavior skills at even 6 months age difference in that group, and even more so at 1 year. How long has John been in the class?

      • Shayla says

        Meg, you make such a good point regarding using “friend”–I hadn’t thought of that. I will definitely change that part of the dialogue because I’m probably confusing my daughter with this.

        Agreed regarding yelling, so I guess I should have been clearer. Mommy’s “NO” isn’t yelling, it’s just stern and direct. My daughter’s version of “no” was more of a whisper. I wanted her to understand that “No” can be forceful and that is how she should use it in this case.

        I thought about the age gap, but he’s only a month younger. I have no experience in child development (professionally, obviously I’m raising one), but my intuition tells me that although there will be behavioral differences with that gap, those differences don’t account for a lot here. Her classroom starts at 2 years, and she’s the third oldest at 2.5. He certainly has no problem at least understanding instructions, when I told him to stop this morning he immediately did so. But, I have never heard him talk. I don’t know how long he’s been in the class, my daughter joined in January, switched from grandma watching her to daycare for socializing (be careful what you ask for?).

    • MomAnon4This says

      As a former preschool teacher and current parent – NO You are NOT out-of-line, if you want to, you can give the teacher a heads up but it sounds like you’ve talked to her a lot. “Classroom management” is a big thing – the teacher gets graded and evaluated on that directly. Moreover, sounds like John (and maybe his family) have ISSUES that a school director may be able to help with. So you are doing you, your daughter, the teacher (obvs. needs assistance) AND the kid and his family a big help.

      Sounds like you’re doing everything right!

      • Shayla says

        Then I bet your one of the better people to ask directly, is it inappropriate to confirm whether they’ve shared these behavioral issues with John’s parents? I don’t want to know what was said, or the details of those discussions, just that something has been shared.

        • anon says

          I wouldn’t ask that specifically, but I would ask “What are you doing about this?” And I wouldn’t necessarily push for them to do something specific, but I would just go with a general feeling about whether they are doing enough or not doing enough, and go from there.

  8. TBK says

    Basic parenting/baby question — my twins will be one in a week. I know I’m supposed to transition them off of bottles and formula at that age. But they still wake up between 4:00 and 5:00am for a bottle most nights, then go back to sleep until 6:00/7:00. I’ve tried slowly decreasing the amount of formula to wean them off of the feeding, but they cry if they don’t get a full 6oz, so they’re truly hungry. I think what happens is A wakes up and cries because he typically cries if he wakes up, and then B wakes up and thinks “bottle!” and then won’t go back down without a bottle. If B gets a bottle, A definitely wants one even if he hadn’t been thinking about bottles until then. Honestly, they drink their bottles so quickly and settle back down so easily that I haven’t really been motivated to put much into stopping these early morning bottles. It’s at most a 10 min disruption and they’re back to sleep. But it’s one thing to pre-position bottles with water and a formula dispenser (which makes making up the bottles a 2 min process, and something easily done in a mostly dark nursery) and it’s another to do something like getting a sippy cup of milk from the kitchen downstairs. I had hoped they’d wean off the 4:00am bottles themselves, but no luck so far. Any suggestions?

    • pockets says

      Three things come to mind: 1. get a cooler with ice (or a mini-fridge if you’re feeling fancy) and keep a thing of milk in the nursery; 2. use a milk that doesn’t need to be refrigerated (ask pedi but maybe you could do a non-dairy milk or parmalat); and 3. continue using formula for that 4 am bottle (you could switch to a toddler formula like Similac).

      You could also try leaving a sippy cup of water in the crib and see if that does the trick.

      • TBK says

        I didn’t know there was toddler formula. Maybe that’s the answer for these morning bottles. They’re not very interested in bottles during the day, but they still love their early morning and pre-bed bottles (and B especially — LOVES LOVES his early and late bottles).

    • mascot says

      How are they one already? (sorry, did that sound creepy stalkerish?)
      Gosh, one of my favorite weekend things to do pre-kid was to eat breakfast early and go back to sleep. I wake up hungry so I understand their wanting to eat.
      You could try just giving them water, but it sounds like they are just hungry early. And the 5am feeding isn’t exactly middle of the night so they are probably STTN without eating. It’s just an early breakfast.
      We went cold turkey on bottles at a year. We’d been working with sippy cups since starting solids so kiddo was pretty adept at them and never seemed to miss the bottle. We did more of a slow transition with formula and mixed with milk until he was used to it.
      I’d probably pick which transitions matter more to you. If being done with bottles and formula matters more, then get those transitioned and come back to the early feedings in a month or two. Could you keep a small cooler in the nursery with the cups of milk in there? Are they temperature sensitive? Cold cups of milk may be more jarring than room-temp formula so they may decide they don’t like them super early.

      • TBK says

        I know, right? I can’t believe they’re one either! B is a cruising pro and is trying to stand on his own (with varying success) and A is doing pat-a-cake and itsy-bitsy spider — how are these my tiny newborns?

        We have a lot of transitions right now (new job and new schedule for me, new au pair arriving soon) and so I’m overall loath to really change anything, especially something as comforting as bottles. I’m inclined to maybe do milk in bottles for awhile and revisit sippy cups in a few weeks.

    • JJ says

      For both my kids, we had a very similar morning routine and kept them on bottles until 15 months or so. Most of my friends had kids who were still using bottles at 2 years, so I didn’t feel too out of place. But at one year, we replaced the formula in the bottle with whole milk.

      If this routine is working for you and your life has so many changes going on right now, I wouldn’t rush bottle weaning yet unless you want to.

    • Nonny says

      Here’s another perspective: maybe they’re not ready, and maybe that’s OK. My LO is now 14 months and even though she is perfectly adept at sippy cups, she still takes bottles of milk to daycare for the time being, and I still BF her before bed and first thing in the morning. She finds both her bottle and the BFing to be comforting and if she’s not ready to transition away from those yet, I am OK with that. The time will come when she is ready – we may force the issue a bit with the daytime bottles, but for morning and night I am going to follow her lead.

      I know *they say* babies and toddlers are supposed to do X at age Y. But we all know that they all develop at their own pace….My friend’s boys lost interest in BFing and bottles at 10 and 11 months, but my daughter hasn’t yet, and that’s just her….

      • Liz says

        Are you still pumping and doing bmilk at day care or cows milk now? my little one is 9 months and I am starting to think about the transition from bmilk In a few months. I made a commitment to pump for 12 months (approximately) and I am feeling really nervous about how the transition away from bmilk to solids and cows milk will work. My daughter is on the small side and while she is eating 3 small meals of finger foods (thank you day care!) per day, she has recently started taking more bmilk. 18 oz instead of 12- 14. I am keeping up by pumping 3x a day but pump sessions are lasting longer. I was hoping as she started eating more solids I would be able to drop a pump session!

        • Nonny says

          I stopped pumping at almost 12 months. However, I had to supplement with formula beginning well before then as I never had a great production rate with pumping. By the time I stopped pumping we were using a 50/50 mix of formula and bmilk anyway.

          I went down to 2 pumping sessions at about 10 months because I just couldn’t take that many breaks at work anymore. Honestly, it was a big relief. I gave myself a huge guilt trip over supplementing with formula, but there was really no need for that.

    • Momata says

      My kid also loved her first-thing-in-the-morning liquid nutrition. At a year we weaned and switched to putting whole milk in the bottles – I fill a bottle the night before and just leave it in the refrigerator, so all that’s required is stumbling downstairs to grab it. I’ve often thought of putting a mini-fridge on the second floor.

      She started taking water from a sippy cup with meals at around 9 months, but we didn’t get rid of the bottles for her milk breaks until around 13 months. Now she gets a sippy of milk first thing in the morning (although she doesn’t go back to sleep anymore!) and a couple cups of milk during the day. The nighttime bottle was the last one to go, at 14 months. I gradually cut the milk with water, then switched her over to a sippy of water, which is what she still gets at night. She fussed a couple of nights but seems over it now.

    • Lorelai Gilmore says

      We’ve always done this very gradually. First, transition from formula in bottles to milk in bottles. Then, slowly transition from milk in bottles to milk in sippy cups – and cut down on the amount of milk in bottles.

      But I think this takes time. When my 19-month-old was just turning 1, he was a bottle monster and I couldn’t imagine how we would possibly give up the bottles (especially while he was going to bed at night or first thing in the morning.) But we slowly tapered, he got now, he hasn’t had a bottle in months. Every kid is different and every time table is different. I really think that the instruction to give up bottles at age 1 is more of a recommendation. As long as the twins are getting most of their calories from solid food, there’s no need to make everyone miserable by forcing the transition earlier than need be.

    • Anon says

      Wait til things settle down a bit with transitions and then try giving them water — most young children actually can’t tell the difference between thirst and hunger and it’s much more likely they’re waking up thirsty (especially if you’ve started them on solid food).

  9. Anon for this says

    Okay, need some sort of advice here. I’m 6 months pregnant, married, and am a lawyer with a good career and plan on working full time after I have the baby. Finances are solid.

    I live in the same city as my sister and parents. My sister is single, in her early 30s, and in a decent job, but not one that is very lucrative. She is a serial monogamist, but always ends up breaking off the relationship she is in. She really wants to have kids and is worried that she is running out of time. Her solution is she wants to get inseminated. Now. She can’t afford to pay for her current lifestyle (my parents subsidize her mortgage, gym membership, etc.) and my parents would be paying for any daycare. I’m not sure what her plan is for back-up care, but I’m assuming my parents will essentially be co-parenting her child.

    I think this is a bad idea. I think it’s premature, and I think it’s unhealthy to be this financially dependent on parents/grandparents. I haven’t really weighed in because I feel like it’s not my place. But now I’m starting to get a little uncomfortable with the relationship my kid(s) will have with the grandparents. It just seems like it will be an unbalanced situation. Grandparents will be devoting more time, money and energy to my sister’s child(ren) than mine. I just don’t know how I feel about it.

    Does anyone have any thoughts? Does anyone else think this is strange?

    • anon says

      Isn’t this between your parents and your sister? If they want to underwrite her choices, it seems like that’s something they can opt to do. What if your parents decided they wanted to move to Fiji, or give all their money to charity, or volunteer with foster kids? They would be giving their time, money, and energy to something other than your kids, but those would all be legitimate things for grown ups to choose to do. Is this a great choice by your sister? Probably not. But that’s her choice to make. And if your parents want to backstop her choice by investing in a new grandchild, that seems like it’s their choice to make, too.

      • Anon for this says

        You’re right – and that’s exactly why I haven’t weighed in at all. I’m trying to figure out why I’m so uncomfortable with it, though. And I’m trying to figure out if I should prepare myself for any difficult family dynamics. I suppose part of me is jealous – in a sense it would be awesome if I just didn’t have to pay for daycare – but I’m also very happy that I’m not at all dependent on anyone else financially. I don’t think I’d even take their money if they offered it. But even aside from the suspected jealousy, the whole situation just makes me uncomfortable.

    • ANP says

      Anon for this, I wish I could give you a huge hug! We are oh-so-very similar. After years of therapy, I realized that I’ve been the Family Lifeguard pretty much since I could talk: standing at the ready to help others, never a burden on my parents or sib, always called in/on the lookout for a potentially bad situation that could harm/hurt/be challenging for a relative. If this sounds in any way familiar to you, welcome to the club!

      Couple of things here. First, if your sister is like mine (and they sound a LOT alike), she may give up the idea of having a baby and move on to the next shiny object. If the plan does come to fruition, I understand that it’s hard to watch a train wreck unfold but would urge you to make every effort not to get involved. If you are asked to weigh in, do so with caution!

      I also wouldn’t buy trouble and worry about your parents being more involved with your future niece/nephew than with your own kid — it’s about the quality of the time they DO spend together (and when grandma/grandpa is a routine childcare-provider, it can sometimes be less special), and in my experience a good grandparent is able to make every kid feel as though s/he is their favorite. Seriously, my husband’s parents have six grandchildren — and they’ll have eight by midsummer — and every single kid feels SO incredibly special when they’re with grandma and grandpa. Magic I tell you! Furthermore (and I say this with love), if your parents are already hyper-subsidizing your sister’s lifestyle, they’re enablers. They may be wonderful people, but they’re enablers — and it’s OK for your kids to have a wee bit of distance from that type of approach.

      More than anything, I want you to know that I empathize with this. My mom and I are semi-estranged and she’s on a fixed income. I’ve recently become aware of some financial difficulties she’s having and my husband and I are wrestling the idea of beginning to support her. Meanwhile, my irresponsible younger sister quit two separate jobs without having something else lined up and, I just found out, “borrowed” $600 from my mother last summer and has yet to pay it back. My sister has also received all kinds of help from my dad and other family friends, help I never got because I’m so stable and such a good advance-planner. It seems totally unfair and I get the jealousy part — but remember, all of that support and “help” comes with such weird, complicated relationships and strings attached. Take solace in the part where you’re doing great, you have a happy family life and a baby to look forward to, and a rocking career — none of which your parents are subsidizing for you.

      • Anon for this says

        Thanks ANP! Your comment about the grandparents is especially well taken. I need to keep that in mind — my parents will have plenty of love to go around, and it’s healthier anyway for us to have a more distant relationship. And I agree that I should just stay out of it.

        But really, it’s just nice to get some empathy on this. I feel like I haven’t really been able to talk to anyone about it.

        • Merabella says

          It kind of sounds like your sister is a taker, and you are a giver, and you feel like you are being jipped. I totally get that and I do not think you are a bad person for it. It isn’t your place, so you’ll never say anything, but it is perfectly rational to be annoyed/jealous/over the idea that your sister is irresponsible, but get what she wants anyway.

          • pockets says

            so I’m like the PC police today – “jipped” is offensive. I’m 100% sure you didn’t mean it that way and if you know it’s offensive and want to keep using it then that’s you’re choice, but if you didn’t know, there it is.

      • PregAnon says

        ANP that is such great advice. I was also told by a therapist that I was acting like the Family Lifeguard, just sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for someone to start drowning, and then I would go save them. That was maybe 3 years ago? I’ve since stopped doing that and life is SO much better.

        • ANP says

          When I heard it for the first time, that phrase was LIFE. CHANGING. for me. It so perfectly described my entire life/existence/state of being. Agree with you that when I stopped (and I still have flare-ups from time to time), everything got so much better.

          • PregAnon says

            Honestly I still have my little flare ups, too! It’s a hard habit to break. But rarely is so much better than all the time!

    • SC says

      My mom had a similar situation with her sister and parents. My grandparents took care of my cousin after school everyday and often on the weekends. My parents lived at least 3 hours away, and later a 12-hour drive or several-hour flight. But I never felt like my grandparents had a better relationship with my cousin. In fact, I doubt I ever thought about it at all before writing this post.

      Like ANP said, it was about the quality of time I spent visiting my grandparents. When I visited, it was for a special trip or for the holidays, and they definitely spoiled me. My grandfather would buy every type of junk food sold in the grocery store for me (he wasn’t very emotive, but I think that was his way of showing he was excited about my trip), and my grandmother and I played card games at the kitchen table. If my cousin was there, we sometimes played together, but most of the time she wasn’t too interested in hanging out with my grandparents since she saw them everyday, so she would play or watch tv by herself.

      • Meg Murry says

        I have a cousin that was basically raised equally by my grandmother and her single mother (my aunt) and while I admit I am occasionally still a tiny bit jealous of her relationship with my grandparents, I have to remind myself of how much it pales in comparison to how much she is jealous of the fact that I have a father in my life and she doesn’t, and how much she loves my father but it just isn’t the same as having one of her own. If she does have a child, the child’s relationship with the grandparents may be different than the one your child has, but that doesn’t necessarily mean it will be better, just different.

        Regarding your sister – any chance this “wanting to get inseminated” plan is coming from being jealous of you, and she sees having a baby as one of the things you have that she wants and could do? I think you probably have to stay out of it more than anyone else, if you have the thing she wants. But as to talking her out of it – stall her a little and then once your kid is born leave her alone with a screaming, colicky poopy infant for an hour or two? That cured most everyone I knew from “oh, I’m so jealous, I want a baby” to “oh, ok, maybe I don’t really want the reality right now, just the fantasy”

  10. Nonny says

    So it finally happened: we left the house this morning without my daughter’s lunch box. Luckily daycare isn’t too far from our home, so while I was getting her organized at daycare my SO was able to drive back home and retrieve lunch. The most surprising thing is that this hasn’t happened before now!

    • CHJ says

      I did this once when I was still pumping! We live about 30 minutes from work/daycare, so I ended up going to my office, pumping, and running all the pumped milk over to daycare immediately. Farm-to-table, working mom style.

    • JJ says

      I’m impressed! I’d say at least once every two months we forget the sheets/blankets that our kids use for naptime, and have to go back and get them.

    • anne-on says

      It took you this long? At least once every few months I’ll either forget the sheets/blankets for naptime, or forget lunch. Happily, daycare is only about 10 minutes from our house so its not a huge deal. Equally annoying is forgetting to bring the blankets home on Friday to be washed and then the center is closed by the time I realize!

  11. Nonny says

    A new sleep question:

    Just this week, my daughter has started waking up at night after sleeping for about 2 or 3 hours, utterly inconsolable, screaming, crying and unable to go back to sleep for about an hour (possibly more – on Sunday night it was 2 hours, but I thought that was related to the time change). As well, my SO usually goes in to her (I’m usually in bed by that time) but she just won’t settle until *I* actually go in. When I do go in, I pick her up briefly, give her a little cuddle and then tell her it’s time to go back to sleep – and she does, even if she wasn’t able to before.

    This is brand-new – since doing sleep training back in October, she usually sleeps beautifully (well, until 5 or 5:30am) and before now she hasn’t had any trouble going back to sleep if she wakes up in the middle of the night. She has just gotten over a cold, doesn’t have a fever, recently finished a course of antibiotics for an ear infection. I am sure she is not sick. In the morning she is perfectly happy. I’m wondering whether this might be night terrors. Do any of you have any experience with this sort of thing?

    Thanks!

    • TBK says

      Remind me how old yours is again? Because one of mine is doing something very similar. Last night, he woke up around 9:00, crying inconsolably. Nothing I did seemed to help. I took him into our room (so he wouldn’t wake up his brother) and after a little time lying on our bed, it’s like he suddenly “woke up” (even though he’d been awake the whole time) and would finally look at me and then smiled and laughed and patted the bed. But before that, he looked terrified and just kept bursting out crying, wouldn’t snuggle and wouldn’t look at me. He’s done this a few times in the last couple of weeks. We can’t tell what’s wrong.

      • TBK says

        Oh man, that’s helpful! I had thought night terrors were more intense and so didn’t think that’s what my guy was doing. But this sounds like exactly what’s going on with him. He sounds so pitiful when he cries (when his brother cries it’s like “I’m so angry — rawr!” but when this one cries, it’s like “mommy, you broke my heart, why, mommy, why?” — I hate to say it’s easier to let angry guy cry than sad pitiful one). But we’ve been going in as soon as he starts, and from there it sounds just like in the link. So maybe we’ll let him cry a bit now (and hope he doesn’t wake up the other one!).

    • (former) preg 3L says

      I think it’s night terrors. I replied but I guess it’s in moderation. You can read about it on Alphamom.

    • Jen says

      We have gone through a few cycles of this. Once it was an ear infection, but the other times it was just Life. We thought teething, but that wasn’t it. She got over it after a few days; worst was a 7 day stretch

    • anne-on says

      How old is your child? Ours went through the same thing around 14 months or so? We thought it was night terrors but it only happened a few times. Our ped thought it was probably a dream – kids start to dream and remember what they dream around this age, and sometimes can wake up in the middle of a dream and be scared, but without a good way to communicate it.

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