Our baby was born yesterday at 1:00pm. 7 pounds 8 ounces born on the due date without any induction

Give me advice this is the first one.

Woot! Congrats!

Just a dog and two cats for us, so I'll leave the parenting advice to the rest of the team.

General advice:

- Don't be afraid to throw money at problems as they arise, for example, when identifying the proper brand of diaper or bottles. Expect you'll be buying one of each until you find one that doesn't leak, etc.

- But don't spend big bucks on things with limited lifetimes. You can spend an unbounded amount of money on a fancy crib and other such things. Ikea stuff does the job, it's cheap, and you won't feel bad ditching it later on.

- New babies are like crack to some people. They need to get their "hit" by looking at your kid. This is, at the least, a feature when recruiting relatives to be babysitters.

- Get out! It's pretty hard in the beginning to imagine going out for a proper date night, no kid. You have to do it. It's essential to your sanity.

Specific useful products:

- High-quality pacifiers: Wubbanub, which have the benefit that, once the kid gets some motor control, the kid can pick up and put back in.

- Don't buy a "diaper bag." Waste of money. Get a messenger bag (e.g., from Timbuk2). These tend to have rubberized interiors (good for hosing out when things get stanky), and they can be repurposed later on when they're no longer carrying diapers.

- Get a red bulb for a lamp you keep for those late-night feedings / diaper changes. Red light doesn't blow away your eyes' dark adaptation.

- There are all kinds of high-tech diaper trash cans. For #1 diapers, they work. For #2 diapers, expect to take more extreme measures (e.g., repurposing old plastic shopping bags to tie up soiled diapers).

- Don't be wooed by the "Baby Einstein" industry. What makes your kid smart is face time with you, not getting sucked into eye candy on TV. However, despite the pediatricians recommendation of zero TV before age 2, there are times that you really, really need 30 minutes to get something done. Baby Einstein videos can turn your lovely darling into a drooling zombie for those essential 30 minutes. Use sparingly.

- A camera to live in the diaper bag. Doesn't have to be the top of the line, although water-resistance is probably a plus.

- A kick-ass camera that you'd never let anywhere near the diaper bag. Remember, "it's for the baby."

- Car seats, in the beginning, are rear-facing. You can get a cheap mirror that mounts on the back-seat headrest that you can see through your own rear-view mirror. Very useful so you can assuage your guilt at not being able to see if your baby is okay.

- There are two schools of thought on car seats. Lots of people are sucked in by the "docking station" car seats. They make it easy to extract your kid from the car without waking him/her up. They're also very heavy and your kid outgrows them sooner than you'd think. We decided to focus on lightweight everything and use a car seat that mounts permanently. This worked well. (If you have two cars with back seats, you should also suck it up and get one car seat for each one.)

- Cool trick: your kid's bed is going to require sheets to be changed, sometimes multiple times in the night. You can lay down multiple layers of sheets (with "waterproof" barriers between), so changing the bed is just a matter of peeling off one layer.

- You can get these fabric padded contraptions for restaurant high-chairs and supermarket shopping carts. There are times when the only high-chair you've got access to have slime on them from the previous kid...

Congratulations!

Congratulations!

Babywise. Because sleep is priceless.

Congrats, by the way.

EDIT: note that above book is highly polarizing. Worked extremely well for both of my kids - sleeping through the night by 11-12 weeks. YMMV.

There's no single right answer for getting babies to sleep through the night. Read a couple of books, try a couple of things. Accept that, barring a miracle, you're likely to be sleep-deprived for the first two years of their life. Don't get stressed about it.

And, absolutely, make sure you spend enough time with your partner. Babies can be quite demanding, which can cause jealousy in one partner (usually dad), which can be destabilising to a relationship, so occasionally take time out to remember why you're together.

Oh, and congratulations. Enjoy it.

Congratulations.

Did you opt for the extended warranty?

pca

Congrats!

Congratulations! There's been some great advice already in this thread plus there are at least two other threads with a bunch more recommendations.

Above all, I think the thing to remember is that every parent and every child is different. Don't let those differences freak you or the wife out. Don't worry about trying to fit into anyone else's mold, because at the end of the day you've got to do what feels right and works for you.

I will say this however, the quicker you can get baby sleeping through the night, the more relaxed both of you will be. Getting to that point isn't a sure thing and like skinning a cat, there's more than one way to go about it.

Don't worry/stress about being extra attentive to baby during the first 6 months - you can't possibly give them too much attention nor spoil them at this age. If they cry, it's because they need something, they're not playing you yet. Getting up with them when they cry isn't likely to set any type of pattern at that young an age, so don't worry about it. Just try to get some rest whenever/wherever you can.


And as far as TV goes, out daughter is just a bit over 2 and she still won't pay attention to anything on the tube for 30 minutes. She's been great with the iPad however and letting her choose her own video clips is a real treat. She doesn't get all the words right, but she's singing a ton of songs and the entire alphabet, plus counting nearly to 20. Even if she doesn't know what everything means yet.

Everything I have bought has been off craigslist we got a ton of new stuff we probably don't need from showers though.



These are great ideas I didn't really think of. I even have a waterproof camera laying around I don't use much so I am putting that in the bag for sure.

I defiantly want sleeping through the night. We got a sleep timer for a gift. It pretty much is supposed tell you how long to let the baby cry before you check them and track it. Is the method in this book similar to that or something totally different?

I have read to not let them cry and attend to them immediately for the first three months. How long did you guys wait before trying to get them to sleep through the night?

I have heard this a few places and I always think it sounds crazy that I would be jealous of the baby. We have relatives close so hopefully we can get some baby sitting and do some baby free things so this does not happen.

My wife is breast feeding so right now all I am thinking about is what can I do to help her so she doesn't have to do all the work.

Definitely don't settle for that. A healthy baby (not collicky or experiencing other health issues) should be sleeping through the night (at least 6 hours) by 10-15 weeks. Two years is utterly ridiculous.

I've had flexibility in my work schedule for both kids, so I got up with my wife every two and a half to three hours through the night, got the baby, changed her, and brought her to my wife to feed. It's certainly not as much work as doing all the feeding, but I think that she appreciated that I was up with her at each feeding and that she could stay in bed. I'll admit that I didn't stay awake for the duration of each feeding though.

The first week or two the baby will sleep ALOT. After that, it's a big help to set aside some time to watch the baby so that your wife can shower, do her hair, put on decent clothes and just feel human again.

Number one thing I can think of is- love your child. Keep this in focus and the rest is just details (important details, but secondary none the less).

Due to issues I won't go into- I've been living much of the last two years (our child is two) as if I were a single parent. Because of this I've not exactly made all of the best choices and I've been at my wits end a lot, sometimes just having to punt (I don't have a lot of time and energy to read too many books on the subject). But even through all that, he is bright eyed, happy, and everyone remarks how joyful he is. This is the grace of God, of course, but I also know that HE knows he is loved, and that is evident whenever I walk in the room or hold him. If you could bottle that up, you'd be a millionare.

I guess it sounds obvious and natural, but from what I've seen it isn't. People can spend so much time fussing about doing the right thing and worrying about screwing things up, they forget that babies are pretty reselient to parental mistakes, but if you don't show them affection, that WILL matter.

On a more practical note- I love netflix. Lots of good half hour kids shows and I can just pick them whenever I want. He doesn't watch a lot of TV, but it's nice having the convenience of Netflix.

Avoid buying tons of toys. We had a huge 1st birthday party when he got a bunch of stuff, and since then I've put my foot down for most purchases. We still get a lot of mileage out of those items, and often what he wants to play with isn't store bought anyway.

Two best iPad apps that he likes- "I See Ewe" and "AlphaBaby Free", though actually the phone versions gets more use when I panick at resturants.

Congrats to both Dad and Mom, and the best of luck.

I should probably update my avatar, my son is almost at the cover face with sauce stage.

Congrats.

Babies that are on a regular schedule are easier than those that are not. You will be run ragged without this. Plenty of howto web pages.

Congratulations! Do be prepared for lack of sleep, but don't worry about it. Our first slept approximately 4 hours a day until he was nearly 2, as do all the males in my family, but the girls would have to be woken for feeds - YMMV.

One of the most useful things we did was to make the last feed of the evening from formula, which meant that I could actually do something useful that didn't involve the smelly end of the babies. Invaluable, both for me to get some time with the babies, and for SWMBO, to get some sleep.

Congrats!

Sorry, but I'm calling bullshit. Ours weren't collicky, and they've both been perfectly healthy (apart from the occasional cold or teething pain); they just didn't start sleeping more than 3-4 hours at a time until they hit 18 months.

My point is this: if they won't sleep through the night, it's not something you're doing wrong as a parent. Read some books, try some techniques; see what works for you and your child. Don't get stressed about it.

Yeah, it does seem crazy to talk about being jealous. But: I was. Don't be afraid to discuss it with your wife, or with other dads. Sometimes it's a taboo subject, but if you don't discuss it, it can be corrosive.

There's a load of books out there about how to introduce elder kids to the concept of a new baby, but, IMO, this could equally apply to a first-time dad.

I am pretty sure our dog is jealous. She is acting like when there is another dog around and we pet it. She doesn't do anything violent just comes over and trys to get you to pet her.

So far he has just been sleeping and we wake him up to feed him every few hours. The first couple nights for some reason he wouldn't go back to sleep at about 1:00am. We were not giving a pacifier because of hearing about breastfeeding issues and I don't want to deal with breaking the addiction when he is three but we gave him one now and it puts him to sleep pretty quick.
We will just have to try and break it before he is too old

Ha! We did the same thing with the first one! We only lasted a few days. Turns out that once the baby is latching on ok, it's no big deal. That pacifier will save your sanity...pop it in there.

Getting her off it wasn't too big a deal either. At around one year old, we started saying that it was only for nap and night time, and making her leave it in the bed herself. At about 20 months, we took the pacifiers with us to the toy store and had her all excited about trading them for some toys (we talked about it for a few days in advance). Then they were just gone. Now that we have them around again for our second one, we catch her occasionally sneaking one, but it's not really a big deal.

Well...we're 2-0 so far and I'm going to go out on a limb and say with 100% certainty (barring health issues) that when baby 3 comes in May, we'll have the same result. (I'll report back and let you know).

Our second one certainly took a lot more work than the first, but I assure you good sleep patterns can be taught.

How old are they when you start trying to sleep train?

We went to the lactation consultant today because we wanted a pump and insurance will pay for it if we go through her. She said the nipple confusion thing is a load of crap too.

I keep telling my wife when he is old enough for bedtime stories they are all going to be about potty training

Now my wife is saying she wants to get portraits done at some chain kind of place like Target. I hate those places because they take a bunch of pictures and they will just sell you prints. I just want the images so I can order from wherever I want. I guess DWallach is right about needing the fancy camera too bad I wouldn't know what to do with one if I had it

The chain photo places here will sell you the digital negatives as well - $$$. I have the fancy camera and a few speedlights, umbrellas, etc. Unfortunately my daughter just doesn't respond to me taking pictures of her as do other kids, so it's always been crazy difficult for me to get good poses from her. A stranger, and obviously one who does portraits for a living, has much better results with her. My wife took our daughter in for some photos in AUgust and I think the negs of the session were $120 or so 0 she only ordered a few prints for family though.

I agree with Roger here. Both our kids have reflux, but that is being medicated. Our oldest even had it much worse than the youngest, and they both take the same medication. Nevertheless, the oldest is a very good sleeper. He's been sleeping though the night since he was a few months old (apart from the occasional exceptions of course). The youngest, who is now 16 months old, is still a bad sleeper. She'll usually wake up once or twice per night, usually between 4 and 5 am. Sometimes we can suss her with a pacifier (dipped in honey - I know it's not the best thing to do, but it's the only thing that works, trust me we've tried everything else), but usually she doesn't stop until I bring her a bottle. Which I usually end up doing, even though I don't want to make a habit of it, but letting her whine isn't an option here since she'll wake up her brother then.
I doubt it's also a case of her being hungry. She eats more than her brother does. The only thing we can think of is that a lot of the times, she just decides it's time for a little "me time" with mommy and/or daddy, so she'll start to whine - even though it's the middle of the night... BTW, that's also a reason why we believe it's just a bad habit of hers: she doesn't cry in the true sense of the word: she just whines and eventually starts yelling if we don't respond quickly enough to her liking.

Baby photos is the biggest scam out there. In my opinion the only one you'll always sucker into because, after all, it's pics of your kids and so there's a BIG emotional factor involved. Women are usually worse suckers for this, but men can be equally bad.

My advise: find a professional photographer which will agree to just do the shoot, and then provide you with the digital stills. This might take some searching, but trust me, you'll find one if you really look. Most of the photographers don't want to do this because they make the most money from the developed photos or posters. But the ones who do agree to do this are usually the better photographers anyway, because they make the most joy out of the photographing itself and not the editing and sales of the photo's afterwards.

We've worked like this for all the photo's of our youngest since her birth, after having learned from several other photo shoots we had done for our oldest. Usually the photos were nice, but we always felt scammed nonetheless because the price of the printed photos was always astronomical (compared to those online printing services - easily ten - tenty times as expensive!). They always tried to justify this by saying that the quality of the paper they used was better or some other reason, which is total BS. The truth is the only reason they only want to part with the digital negatives is because the are hoping you'll keep coming back for extra prints, at the same astronomical price of course.

I was particularly angry with the last photographer we used since she didn't even want to give me ONE digital still I wanted to put on the desktop of my pc. 'Out of principle'. Well, that was the last time we used her services as well, I can tell you. Also 'out of principle'.

That was the time we started looking for a professional photographer which would only do the shoot and then give us the digital originals. We've found one now, and are very happy with the service she's giving us. So happy even, we usually do a shoot with her now every three to four months. My wife now makes the digital photo books herself, by using one of those only photo software packages. The results are very good, almost as professional as the ones those other photographers made for us (which they only made for us because they wouldn't let us do it ourselves....)