First baby advice

[renaz]

Yes! Cod liver oil is awesome. Mine get the fermented stuff, no flavouring. Told the big one it makes your brain smarter, the little one just did what the big one did, she was only 18mths at the time.

When I take it, I squirt it under my tongue with a needle less syringe then drink milk straight away, floats to top of milk and you miss most of the flavour. Impossible getting the little one to do that but she doesn't mind the taste and regularly asks for oil. It contains natural vitamin A which connects the speech pathways in the brain. She stopped grunting at me and was talking in sentences within a week.

You can rub it on the souls of his feet now as a baby and it's fine for him. Stinks but works! Once he's eating food you can mix it that if you find that's easier. The girls get about 2ml each a day, not sure on the doses for kids under one, I'll find out and get back to you. Hopefully not now though. Hopefully the little one will go back to sleep. Sigh.

[EyesWideOpen]

Hahah renaz, so glad to hear I am not the only person here punishing my daughter with cod liver oil..... I take it regularly

myself. It dropped my blood pressure 20 points and kept me off any medication for high blood pressure. Seems I had

worked out the dose for my daughter of about a teaspoonful. She actually like the lemon flavored stuff, the one I use

is Carlson cod liver oil for kids. I buy it from Amazon and have friends take it over for me.

[renaz]

I started taking it for me first, totally fixed, ah, some female stuff after having babies. All back to normal now, thank goodness.

I started giving it to the girls mainly for the big one as she's mostly vegetarian. Nope, my girl will grow and form properly, IMO human children need animal fats to do this. We are animals, our brains are made up of roughly 60% fat, that would be animal fat! So she gets the oil and continues to live on white bread sandwiches, weetbix, raw veggies and fruit.

Be really careful about the brands you use, especially since Fukushima....I've always used the Green Pastures fermented one as is the cleanest as far as I know. They do a butter oil as well which works synergistically with the FCLO for awesome health results. My teeth don't hurt anymore, we drink raw milk here too.

The Green Oastures is expensive buyi usually manage to get it in a co-op.

[eezergood]

The real problem is getting it here!!! But i have family visiting from the UK next month so it will go on the list

[eezergood]

Waterbabys - or similar, does anyone know of baby waterclasses available Phuket?? Also what age do you guys started or have started to take the little ones into the water?

FInally what flotation aids did you use? Swimava etc.......

[IMA_FARANG]

it is recommended that babies start eating solids at 4-6 months, not giving them any solids until 18 months is not recommended.

Porridge, mashed banana & rice, after 6 months can introduce meat & fish.

http://voices.yahoo.com/delaying-solid-foods-breastfed-babies-risks-2857246.html

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/starting-solids/AN02145

Just a couple of articles on the subject.

-----------------

To start young children on solid foods "really mostly liquid foods at first" you make a thin gruel (NO big lumps ... mostly liquid).... and don't try to feed it into his/her mouth. at first Just gently place a few drops on their lips for them to taste.

If it tastes interesting, they will quickly get the idea and (if your lucky) they will want more.

But do not overfeed them when your just starting solids .... because their digestive system may need time to adjust to eating solids ... and that can be messy at the other end.

Remember .... you're doing the washing and cleaning up at that end.

[EyesWideOpen]

Waterbabys - or similar, does anyone know of baby waterclasses available Phuket?? Also what age do you guys started or have started to take the little ones into the water?

FInally what flotation aids did you use? Swimava etc.......

I started my daughter in the pool at around one year old. She was so happy the first

time she went, she was actually shouting for joy. So now at 3 years old, she uses a floating ring to get around in deep water, and also has water wings for her arms.

She understands the idea of swimming, and can kick her legs very well, but she

cannot actually swim. Maybe I am a bad swimming teacher. Which is odd

as I am a pretty strong swimmer, and am one of the very few people who have

swum across the Mekong River at Luang Prabang, Laos...... :-)

Here she is at about 1 year old

Edited September 9, 2013 by EyesWideOpen

[eezergood]

Great pic, with these new (i assume new) swimava style aids you can take them swimming from a young as 1 month! Just need to be around 5.5kg, i read an article telling how good it was for muscle growth. I guess we jjust need to try & see?

[Mickey Cohen]

my son at 3months

[Neeranam]

Mylax and take it easy

Also, I had a great book - what to expect when expecting and after the baby was born - what to expect the first year - it was very good when I was worrying too much about things like she isn't talking on time etc.

Congratulations, it's a life changing experience.

[Puyai]

These are excellent swimming aids for kids. You take layers of once you child starts to get the hang of it. My sons been using them since he was 10 months. He's now 14 months and when he sees the bright fluorescent carry bag they come in he starts running around the room clapping his hands shouting, pool, pool, pool.

http://www.monkeyswimmers.com/shop/monkey-swimmers/

[Puyai]

A bit of toddler advice for when he is bigger. I never used one of those walker things that roll around

and are supposed to exercise you baby. Current medical advice seems to be there are a lot of accidents

involved with those, so I chose to not buy one. I also never used a stroller, always seemed easier to me to just

pick her up and carry her. Now she loves horsey time, by riding on my shoulders.

When learning to walk, there will be a LOT of falls. A good idea is to have buy a padded sort of helmet that

goes on the head. Easily purchased here in Thailand. It is sort of sickening to see your wonderful child trying to walk, and then

watch them do a full on face plant on their head on a hard floor....... Also starting at around 1 .5 years I started

giving my daughter lemon flavored cod liver oil. A lot of information on this, do your own research. My Mom gave

it to me 55 years ago when I was a toddler, so it is an old idea. If I drink it first, put a happy expression on my face,

tell her it is ya ( medicine) for big people, she will happily drink a spoonful...

At an early age, a baby is sort of like a concept. Since they do not really do a whole lot. But when the personality starts

developing, they start gazing at you with trusting eyes, and they call you Daddy, that is when you will be wrapped

around their finger !!!!!!! :-)

Good bit of advice there, although the helmet thing might be going a bit far! Falling flat on your face is all part of learning! My son took loads of tumbles ( as i'm sure your little one did) and got the bruises to show for it. I think we as fathers should let them get up on their own after a fall. If you make a big deal out of it the crying tends to last a lot longer than if you'd just let them get on with it. Some people don't let their children walk any where, or they're walking right behind them ready to catch them as soon as they stumble a bit, petrified that they'll fall over and hurt themselves. All we're doing there is holding back their natural development. Children must learn from a young age to make calculated risks, no matter how small those risks are! So make your house as child proof as you can and give them the freedom to explore and learn the natural way we are programmed to.

[eezergood]

Agreed, we took our little one to Bangkok this wek - told mummy to ignore the take off and landing, she did and so did he. I dont want to teach him a fear of flying, he was a little star on the plane. Only 1 whimper when he was hungry!

[draftvader]

Agreed, we took our little one to Bangkok this wek - told mummy to ignore the take off and landing, she did and so did he. I dont want to teach him a fear of flying, he was a little star on the plane. Only 1 whimper when he was hungry!

First flight for our little girl was from Bangkok to London via Mumbai (Delhi on return leg). She was 7-8 months and took it perfectly.

Our 2nd flight for our little girl was from Bangkok to London via Moscow. She was 20 months and was really well behaved for 3 out of 4 legs. The last left, Moscow to BKK, she didn't want to sleep, got VERY bored and made our flight very difficult. Luckily our neighbours were a child behavioural expert on one side and a man with 4 children on the other. They didn't bat an eyelid.

All I'm trying to say is, with the best will in the world, enjoy this time when they are young and have very minimal opinions. Once they discover themselves they will let EVERYBODY know!

[eezergood]

He has already discovered if he makes noise he gets attention! and he LOVES attention!

[draftvader]

He has already discovered if he makes noise he gets attention! and he LOVES attention!

I am going to sound mildly condescending, but there is little way around it.....

so here goes. You think that he's loud now? Oh God!