There's Nothing Better than Kissing a Soft Baby Head

Joshua just fell asleep in my arms while he was drinking his bottle. As I kissed his soft little head it reminded me how quickly this all passes. In a few short months he won't be having bottles anymore. I'll have to chase him just to pick him up, much less get him to sit still long enough for cuddles. He won't fall asleep in my arms like that. He's my last baby. I need to be drinking in everything. Sometimes I forget that.

Emma will be nine years old in less than two weeks. It seems like a million years ago that she was that small, and yet I don't know how so much time can possibly have passed. Next week I have to go and fill in the registration papers for Andrew to go to Junior Kindergarten in the fall. This weekend we watched videos of Charlotte as a baby. I feel awful, but I barely remember those days already.

I never understood what grownups meant about time passing more quickly, the older you get. I'm so excited to see what they will be like as teenagers, as adults, as parents, but at the same time I just want the earth's rotation to slow things down just a little bit. I don't want to lose my babies!

I just have to remember: I'm a very lucky woman.

More Drop-Side Crib Recalls

Similar problems as reported with the Storkcraft cribs. In this case, there have been "incidents" in Canada, but none resulting in injuries. In the US there were 10 children bruised or scratched, and one killed, but in that case the crib had already malfunctioned a month earlier and the parents had tried to repair it with DUCT TAPE. Sigh. In that case the parents were charged with child endangerment with death.

The recall affects two models of Dorel Asia crib: the 3-in-1 Carlisle in dark cherry colour with the model number 10H020; and the white Tara crib with the model number DAKM5132C.

The cribs, manufactured by the Barbados-based Dorel Asia in China and Vietnam, were sold at Sears Canada, Babies R Us and other retailers between December 2006 and January 2010.

Owners of the crib are not being asked to return them, but instead to get a free repair kit from Dorel, which will turn the drop-side into a fixed side. Anyone who wants the kit can call the company at 1-866-762-2304.

Graco Stroller Recall

1.5 million strollers in the US, and 28,000 in Canada are being recalled after seven children lost their fingertips in the stroller's canopy hinge mechanism.

The Passage, Alano, and Spree models were all included in the recall. It only affects those models where there is a plastic jointed hinge mechanism with indented canopy positioning notches. They were sold starting in October 2004 and have been sold right up to the present.

Consumers are advised by Health Canada to either stop using the recalled brands or use caution when opening or closing the stroller and to ensure that children are at a safe distance when doing so.

Owners can get a free hinge cover from Elfe Juvenile Products by calling 1-800-667-8184 or sending an email to service@elfe.ca.

Model numbers of the specific products recalled can be found at www.gracobaby.com.

Hi Jason, My Name is Jennipher

Sigh.

So I took Andrew, Charlotte and Joshua to our local community centre this morning. Charlotte had a preschool ballet class, and the boys and I went and hung out in the library. Our community centre ROCKS.

Anyway, not the point.

As we were leaving this morning, I saw one of the leaders from another class stop a mom to ask if she'd left something behind. That was what got my attention, initially. Instinctively I looked at her daughter. Very cute kid. Nametag on. "Quynn."

WHY?

I mean, I know that everyone has different tastes in names, and there will be those who think that our taste is boring (we usually get "classic", but I'm sure for some that's a code word). You want to name your kid "Pilot Inspektor", well, that's your prerogative, but seriously, WHY?

Do people actually picture this little baby as an adult when they're naming them? It seems to be something we all find funny, to humiliate babies: we put them in little sailor suits, or little snowsuits that make them look like Winnie the Pooh. And why not? It's cute, and it's not like they can object.

A name is something different. That cute little baby in the cat ears hat will eventually grow up to be a doctor, or a lawyer, or a teacher, or a sanitation engineer, and they may not exactly suit "Tinkerbell" or "Qwerty" at that point.

But what about the strange spellings? The names are still the same, so what's the big deal, right? What I want to know, though, is WHY? All you're accomplishing is making yourself look like you can't spell and sentencing your child to a lifetime of "No, you spell it A-N-D-R-U."

I know, there are people who will disagree with me strongly. They feel that their child should stand out from the pack. They don't want their daughter to be one of "the three Emmas" (which is the case in my daughter, Emma's, class). I can understand that. I hadn't intended to name Emma the most popular girl's name around. It's not my fault that "Rachel" named her daughter Emma right after my daughter was born. At the same time, I never have to worry about her not being able to find things with her name on it. "McKynzye" might not be so lucky.

Naming your kids is one of the biggest privileges of being a parent. All I'm saying is take a moment and picture your child in the nursing home 80 or 90 years from now, and ask if "Jewelia" will still appreciate their unique name!

Breastfeeding - anytime, anywhere?

I wasn't able to exclusively breastfeed my kids. I'll elaborate on that in another article I'm planning, but it was a physical issue, and as much as I wanted to, it wasn't going to happen. However, I really did want to. I have no issue with breastfeeding moms, and I proudly support those moms who have had to fight for their rights to nurse in public.

However, some things kind of take it a bit too far, in my opinion. A woman in Newmarket, Ontario, just received a public apology after she was asked to leave the stairs of a public (although privately-owned) pool for breastfeeding her 20-month old while sitting there chatting with friends.

This wouldn't bother me on the pool deck. It's the fact that she was actually IN the pool. My guess is that she couldn't get her daughter calmed down, maybe she wanted out of the pool, and mom didn't want to stop talking, so it was just easier to nurse her than to get out and stop talking.

In other NIP disputes I've heard where people told the nursing moms to feed the baby in the bathroom, and the argument is, would you want to eat in a public restroom? So isn't the same argument applicable here? Would YOU want to eat in a public pool? Would you be okay if someone sat down with a sandwich and started eating in the pool you were swimming in?

The fact is that if you want to say that nursing babies should be treated the same as anyone else who needs to eat, then shouldn't they have to follow the same rules? Even nursing on the pool deck is technically pushing it, but for the sake of compromise I think this should be considered okay. You can't even say that the child NEEDED to eat right at that moment. This was not an infant, this was a 20-month old toddler. I don't care that the child was still nursing at 20 months old, but you cannot convince me that at that point you HAVE to feed them on demand.

Breast milk may be sterile, but it doesn't mean that others want to swim in it. I know that it's not necessarily true that any breast milk would have ended up in the water, but what if the mom had a really active letdown?

The other issue is would you really want your child eating in a public pool? I mean, breast milk in the water is really the least of the problems. What else is in that water? Chemicals, bodily fluids, bacteria? And now that's on you, so you child is ingesting it off your body. Ick.

Thoughts?

Ontario announces schools for first phase of All-Day Kindergarten

Today Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty announced a list of almost 600 schools that will be part of the first phase of introducing all-day kindergarten. Ontario is already the only province that offers two years of kindergarten, divided into "JK" and "SK".

Personally I'm happy with the development, although I seem to be in the minority on this one. My children's school is not included on the list for full-time programs, so it won't have an impact on us, despite the fact that our family will have two kids in kindergarten next year (one in SK, one in JK). However, I have seen the impact that the JK program has had on my kids, and I think that it could have a real impact on the kids who get to be a part of it.

There are concerns that not all kids can handle that much school at that age (some kids aren't yet four years old when they start school) but I don't really see how it's much different than being in daycare. They're still away from home all day, every day. In this case, they're just being exposed to more learning opportunities and adjusting to the school routine that will be theirs until around age 17.

The one comment that I keep reading is that it's just "free daycare". Personally, I find that offensive, and I'm not, nor have I ever been, a teacher. Kindergarten is so much more than daycare. Yes, there is playtime involved, but it is usually with a specific (if sneaky!) goal in mind. While some daycares do run on an early childhood education curriculum, most home cares do not. I'm also certain that the kindergarten teachers who spent five years at university studying to teach our youngest students don't appreciate being called glorified daycare.

Anyway, if you're looking for the list of schools who will be offering all day kindergarten in 2010-2011, you can find it here.

Phew!

Your feelings about Christmas truly change when you become a parent. You no longer really care about what you're going to get and get more excited thinking about what your kid(s) will look like when he/she/they open their presents. You finally get to play Santa. You get to stealthily plan out Christmas presents, hide them, figure out how to put tags on them so that the kids won't recognize your handwriting (this occurs later in childhood though, of course.) You get to force your kids into those scary Santa pictures!

But it's not all fun and games. You have to figure out how you're going to PAY for all of those presents, and the more kids you have, the more you have to decide: do you scale back and get fewer presents for each, or do you have to keep scrimping and saving even more to do the same as you did with only one child. I remember how full our living room was one Christmas when we only had the two girls. That was the year that we decided that it was time to scale back. Not just because of finances, but because it was honestly scary to see our kids getting so much STUFF. We had a pretty large living room at the time, and honestly half of it was filled with gifts from Santa, from us, from grandparents, aunts and uncles... it was kind of terrifying. So in recent years we've scaled back, and I really don't think that the kids have even noticed.

There are other parts of Christmas that change with kids, too. The Christmas parties. An office Christmas party either means having to find a sitter, or if it's a family affair you have to drag young kids out way past their bedtime to hang out with a bunch of strangers for the night, hoping and praying that they won't embarrass Mom or Dad in front of their coworkers. Friends without kids who have Christmas parties often want them to be adult-only, so you find yourself turning down invitations. You can only afford a babysitter so often if you're going to afford all of those presents! You feel terribly anti-social, but at least you know that friends with kids understand.

And here's the part that we all forget as adults, before parenthood: kids go WRANGY at Christmas. Oh yes, we all THINK we remember it, but we remember it from our own perspective as kids. As the parent, it is a completely different scenario.

I haven't posted here in almost a month. It wasn't for not wanting to, it was because I was either trying to keep myself from killing them, or keeping them occupied, ferrying them here and there, or just trying to calm meltdowns.

There is something in the air at Christmastime for kids. It seemed to start earlier this year than ever before. Maybe because of the addition of an extra child, who knows? But nonetheless, it was NOT enjoyable. A simple, "No, you cannot have licorice for dinner instead of green beans" could result in a full-fledged screaming on the floor meltdown. Night terrors and nightmares abounded. The whining, especially from our four-year-old, made me want to stick forks into my ears.

And then, just when I couldn't take anymore: Christmas vacation. The positive was that I could, most days, take the kids downstairs when they woke up, give them breakfast, and then go back to bed for an hour until the baby woke up. They even started sleeping in on a regular basis! I didn't have to play taxi driver nearly as much without having to take the girls to one school at one time, then Andrew to another school at another time, with pickups all over the place. There were no dance lessons, or practices. In short, it was a whole lot of home time.

The negative: it was a WHOLE LOT of home time. I'm essentially an only child, so I never really dealt with the sibling stuff. It can be wonderful, but when they're fighting, it's hideous. "She hit me!" "No I didn't!" "He took my toy!" "She won't get off the computer!" "When is it going to be MY turn?"

So today, I am officially celebrating. Despite the fact that I'm back to getting up at my usual time, despite the fact that it was -16 degrees Celcius when I took the girls to school this morning, I am celebrating that today I had only the boys here. Andrew had no one to fight with. Josh had a nap. I got to do my WiiFit somewhat uninterrupted. There were not four different lunch orders to make me feel like a short-order cook.

Heavenly!