No More Thumb-Twiddling Saturdays

A friend just turned me on to a great site for planning activities with kids. goCityKids.com provides an exhaustive events calendar for dozens of cities, including everything from service projects and museum exhibits to puppet shows and library storytimes. Even better, you can look up activities by indoor/outdoor, type of experience and your child’s age. Definitely sign up for the free weekly events e-mail, which comes on Thursdays.

We’ve lived in our neighborhood for five years, and I’ve just turned up several promising new playgrounds not far from us. Finally, the feeling that you can discover something new to do with the kids!

Using your noodle

Image from Toyspalsh.com

My friend Keelin just showed me an ingenious use of the “Wacky Noodle” pool toy. When her daughter no longer needed a bed rail, she put a Wacky Noodle under the fitted sheet at the edge of her bed to act as a “speed bump” of sorts, keeping her little one from rolling out of bed at night.

What a clever idea! (And so much easier to make the bed over a noodle than a guard rail.)

I also stumbled across this: Poolcenter.com offers bulk noodles to local civic organizations to assist with fitting child car seats. Who knew!

So dry off your noodle and put it to good use, for goodness sake.

Newborn Clipboard

In my entry Newborn Survival Tips, I mentioned creating a chart to keep track of feedings and diaper changes in those first hectic weeks. Here’s a picture of the one we used for our daughters, conveniently hung by ribbon from a peg rack next to the changing table. I always had a vision of covering the bland office-supply clipboard in vintage floral wallpaper or painting it white. Alas, such niceties get lost when you are sleeping in 90-minute increments.

Husband Calling

Image from Flickr

Sometimes the smartest ideas are the simplest. Consider listing your spouse as “Husband (Name)” in your cell phone contacts, so that someone knows whom to call immediately if you lose your phone or if there’s an emergency.

My friend Lisa’s husband Jeff recently left his cell phone at a restaurant, and was reunited with it because he had listed her as “Wifey” in his contacts. She showed up in his recently dialed numbers, so the restaurant called her right away.

You could do the same with Mom & Dad, siblings, or important medical contacts (i.e. “Ob Gyn” or “Pediatrician,” rather than “Dr. Miller.”)

Finding Those "Golden" Rules

Parenting Magazine has a great article on CNN.com about the (occasional) magical rules parents devise that actually seem to stick. Many of them are really, as the author Barbara Rowley points out, "declarations of policy" such as: "You can't be in the room when I'm working unless you work, too"; "We don't argue about money"; and "You get what you get, and you don't throw a fit."

I stumbled on one of those with my three-year-old, who battles us every night on going to sleep. One night, when she was whining "I'm not tired! I don't want to go to sleep!," I pulled the rug out from under her by saying, "Okay, you don't have to go to sleep..." (That got her attention!) "But you do have to stay in bed and be quiet." Somehow, that one has worked, and it has become a bedtime mantra for us.

Do you have any "declarations" that have hit the mark? Click the "comment" link below and share!

Newborn Survival Tips

My friend Cristi at work, a few weeks from being due with her first baby, recently made the rounds to the moms on our floor to ask for "last-minute advice." I remember this anxious time in my first pregnancy, when I realized that for all the nursery-decorating, layette-coordinating, and breathing exercises, I wasn't anywhere near ready to handle a newborn.

I got great advice from my friends and learned a few tricks of my own about surviving those first few weeks. Would the experienced moms out there comment on this post with their hard-won wisdom, too?

Here's some of the best advice I've picked up:

1. Make sure you have a digital clock -- i.e. one you can see in the dark -- in your nursery or wherever you plan to nurse. Put it somewhere you can see it easily, so you can keep track of what time and how long you have nursed. A night light is a good idea, too, so you don't have to blind yourself by flipping a switch for those nocturnal diapy changes.

2. Also have a clipboard, paper and pen ready in the nursery, so you can diligently record said nursings and diaper changes. The pediatrician will want a detailed account when you bring the baby in for those early check-ups. If you want to get fancy, you can make a chart so you just have to fill in: Date / Time / Wet / Dirty / Nursed (which side first? how many minutes?)/ Comments (such as "Is it possible to function on this little sleep?")

3. Zip sleepers are awesome, so you don't have to fumble with snaps, which you will inevitably mis-match in the dark -- and probably in the light, too, come to think of it. When I was pregnant, I thought the "sleep sack" (i.e. nightgown) concept sounded ideal, but it never worked for my kids -- they always ended up with their little chicken legs hanging out in the cold. For reasons I still don't understand, it's hard to find zip sleepers, but I highly recommend getting a few.

4. Set up changing and nursing stations all over your house, not just in the nursery. For changing, it's as simple as a basket of diapers, wipes and a changing pad and some extra onesies. As for the nursing stations, just be sure you have a comfortable place to sit -- with pillows or Boppy handy -- and that you are able to see a clock easily. Have a glass of water, cordless phone, magazine and remote within reach before you sit down with baby.

5. Medela's Clean Micro-Steam Bags are one of my favorite products ever -- the easiest way to nuke the nasties out of bottles, nipples, pacifiers, breast-pump parts, etc. Just rinse everything and put it in the bag with a little water and microwave it. We still use them to keep sippy cup valves from getting gunky.

6. The first few weeks will be harder than you ever imagined. The first time around, I was convinced that the rest of my life would be like this (achey, sleep-deprived, hormonally imbalanced and manic). But it does get easier, very, very quickly. When you are so tired you can't remember your husband's name (or why you thought it was such a grand idea to produce this precious, screaming little creature with him), don't forget it does get easier.

Flip Books for Toddlers

We have gotten a lot of mileage out of a little photo book I put together a couple of years ago to keep our (then) toddler distracted on an airplane trip. It's easy to make one personalized to your child's interests: Clip photos for words your toddler knows from magazines and tuck them into an inexpensive mini-album with plastic sleeves. It's fun to involve your child in choosing the pictures, too.

Ours has been on many trips, and our second toddler now delights in pointing to the pictures and naming what she sees. Even our three-year-old still enjoys it -- she now tells us stories about the pictures. Somehow they all seem to involve princesses, go figure....