New Baby? What can you do early to prevent meltdowns later?

There are a few things if you start early with your baby they will be easier to deal with than if you wait until the toddler years.

So lets get right into it…

Pacifiers – Yes, use pacifiers. The baby loves them and they are a godsend. However, if you don’t want to be using them when they are toddlers, I found if you stop giving it to them around six months old, they may cry a little or not even notice and then you don’t have the hassle of weaning them off it when they are older. 

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Thumb sucking – If you don’t want to deal with trying to stop your toddler from sucking their thumb in the toddler years don’t encourage it when they are babies. Whenever I saw my baby sucking his or her thumb I would gently take it out of their mouth and sometimes distract them with something else.  I didn’t have any of them become thumb suckers. 

Rotating their blankets – Children can get attached to their blankets or toys to a point in which they won’t go to sleep or want to go anyplace without them.  This can become an problem in the toddler years when you can’t find the blanket or it’s dirty. Your toddler will likely have a melt down or many.  If you start rotating their blanket every two weeks or so they don’t get attached to it and this doesn’t become an issue.  I have to admit I was much better with my first child then I was with the other two with this one.

Feeding your baby 

 A lot of training can be done in the high chair while at home. 

Hands down

When you start to feed your baby food, train your child to put their hands down before they are fed. 

How do you do this?  Gently place their hands on the highchair table and tell them hands down.  Then go to feed them.  If they try to grab the spoon or lift their hands say no and don’t feed them.  Gently put their hands down again. And say hands down. When they listen start feeding them.  If they start to grab the spoon or put their hands up.  Stop feeding them and show them again.  They pick up on this pretty fast that they don’t get fed unless their hands are down.  Their reward is getting their food. This will save you a lot of mess in the long run.  Don’t let them play with their food.  By training them at home you can take them anywhere and not worry about a mess. I didn’t even use bibs.  

Start with vegetables

When you start giving your child baby food introduce them one by one to make sure they aren’t allergic to anything and start with vegetables.  Remember all they know is what you introduce to them.  By starting with vegetables they will come accustom to them and you will find that they like vegetables when the are older. After all the vegetables then I started introducing the fruits which will be sweeter.

Sign Language

Teach them sign language. Babies can learn sign language from ages 7 to 9 months.  Teach your baby while feeding them to communicate with you.  The first signs we taught them was “more”  than “more please”.  You show them the sign and when they do it you give them a spoon of food.  Then repeat.  Then when you see they are getting full you can teach them “all done” sign and they can confirm it with their hands.  Then you stop feeding them.  They will get that all done means they are full.  If they want more they will do the more sign.  Trust me they will be happy to do the all done sign too when they are full.  After a while you can teach them “thank you” and “book”.  I always encouraged the please and thank you while signing. Never too early to start manners. Those were the signs I used the most. It makes mealtimes much more peaceful.  Your baby isn’t whining or fussing to try to communicate with you. It becomes a joyful time. 

Highchair time

After your child is done eating, give them some cheerios, or a book, or a quiet toy like a puzzle so that they can sit in their high chair while you and your hubby eat dinner together.  It makes for a more enjoyable time for all.  Highchair time after a meal is a great way you can put structure your child’s day. It gives you time to chat with your husband or do the dishes without worrying about what your child is getting into.

Structure in your day starts early

Playpen time

I loved playpen time because it gave me time to do things and so did my children because they got to play in peace.  You have to start this early though.  If your child has the freedom to walk around everywhere and then you try to implement playpen time you may be in for a battle. I would start it as soon as my baby could sit up which was usually around six months.  If you start this young they assume it is just a part of the day. You incorporate it usually after breakfast or after lunch whatever works for you. 

Make sure your child is fed and has a clean diaper.  At that age I would sit them in the corner of the playpen which helped them sit up with a soft cloth container of safe baby toys. Then I let them know this is playpen time.  You get to play with the toys until I come get you.  I start out with about 5 minutes, then increase the time a little each day or so.  Eventually you can get them up to a half hour or more.  When it is time to get them out, you come and get them and tell them playpen time is over. Before they can get out you have them put their toys in the container.  Once the toys are picked up you take them to their next activity which would probably be a nap depending what age they are. 

This is an activity that you make a part of each day.  You rotate toys and make them age appropriate as you go along.  Other mom’s I knew were doing the same thing and sometimes we would rotate toys with other families to have a variety and so we didn’t have to purchase more.  You want to keep it interesting for your child. You can start out with a small pack n play and when they get older you move up to a larger pack n play. Make sure when they are able to stand there aren’t items close to the playpen they can reach. Playpen time is a great way for them to learn focusing skills, to play by themselves, and learn to pick up after themselves.  When you get them up to a decent amount of time, it is  a great time for you to get something done like a shower, dishes, take a short nap or care for your other children.  

My children did playpen time until they were around 3 or 4 years old.  They would look forward to it and so did I.  Our playpen was one of the last pieces of baby equipment I let go of.  It was hard to part with. 

Resources

We were blessed to take a course called Growing Kids God’s Way with some friends who were expecting also when were were expecting our first child. A secular version called Babywise books came out afterwards.  In the class we learned a lot of these insights and our friends were doing it with us so we had a great support system. We also learned a lot from another resource!

Joey and Carla Link

This couple helped us along the way as well.  Their names are Joey and Carla Link. I would go listen them speak, or listen to her cassettes, (yes it was a while ago. Lol.) and read her mom notes. Now they have a website called Parenting Made Practical and a podcast.  I presented a few tips that worked for us, however if you want to go deeper and get the biblical perspective and the heart of the reason why we followed these tips to help train a child in how they should go and/or get more educational material you can go to their 

website at parentingmadepractical.com 

Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/ParentingMadePractical

And/or listen to their podcast at Parenting Made Practical Podcast with Joey and Carla Link

They introduce and explain in practical terms:

• How to get your baby to sleep in 8 weeks, I probably should have led with that one. 
• Structuring your day
• Couch time
• First time obedience
• The funnel

   …And much much more. Her mom’s notes are so helpful!

I will write about my experiences, but I want to give credit to this couple who has helped our family and many families over the years and if you need something right away that I haven’t posted they are a great resource!

We have been blessed by their Ministry and so thankful we had them to go to when we needed assistance.  A lot of the world doesn’t follow what they recommend so you may get some flack.  A lot of prayer and work go into it that others don’t want to put in the early years. But years later when people see that you have well behaved children and you see the fruits of your labor from the things you had trained them when they were young, it is well worth it!

I am very thankful we had this class and that is one reason I want to share it with you.  There are many other tools they recommend for parenting and to help you train your toddlers while they are young which will help you so much before they get to the middle school and teenage age years.  They also have insights on the Middle and High School.  There was always a nugget I gleamed from her resources I could use.  If you follow a lot of the concepts Joey and Carla’s teaching you are less likely to have the rebellious teenage years everyone talks about because you dealt with those issues when they were young. 

You and your spouse need to be on the same page and pray often for peace in your parenting decisions. Our Heavenly Father is our ultimate resource. I hope these tips and resources are a help to you. They were just a few of the many things we learned that worked for us. I look forward to sharing more. God bless you and your families. 

Blessings,

Cheryl Bippus

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