tres chic custom co-sleeping!

i love love love this little custom co-sleeping roll-away bed that interior designer david kaihoi made for his daughter.  it is so genius!  i recently stumbled across it in house beautiful's "is small the new big?" issue this summer.  what i love most is that kaihoi proudly displayed that his daughter co-sleeps with him and his wife.  ok, fine, they live in a postage stamp-sized (yet fabulous) new york city apartment and would not be able to actually wear clothes from the closet next to the bed if it didn't roll away, but at least he showed it in the photo---so kudos to him!!

co-sleeping questions answered : teleseminar with dr. james mckenna and api

on monday june 28th at 9pm est, attachment parenting international will be hosting a teleseminar called "settling the cosleeping controversy" with co-sleeping guru dr. james mckenna.

check out the list of some of the great planned questions and register here.  price is $19 for non-members.

if you're pregnant or a new parent, i highly recommend that you check this teleseminar out or read more on mckenna's studies here.  you may also want to review my co-sleeping and bed-sharing category.

photo via here.

need a travel bed for your toddler?

if you don't like dealing with the hassle (or ick) of cribs on vacation or at grandma's house, but are not comfortable putting your baby/toddler in a raised bed, this is a perfect product for you.  it is a soft portable bed by wagamama that rolls up for travel.  there are 2 sizes offered--we ordered the large for our toddler, which can also double as a playpen liner.

there are a few organic fabric options, plus the entire site is 15%-30% off right now!!!

a beautiful baby crib...from ikea!

i must admit that it never even crossed my mind to look for a crib at ikea, but recently i have seen one looking quite chic in a few design spreads.  it looks so beautiful and simple without bumpers and fancy bedding.  it's the sniglar and is $80--the mattress has two height placements, and the side comes off to become a toddler bed later.  i cannot tell how/if the wood is treated, but ikea is usually pretty on top of their game when it comes to consciousness and safety.

of course, if you're up for attachment parenting, you may not need a crib.  we got a beautiful expandable stokke sleepi bassinet/crib and really only used the bassinet part---for a few months (came in handy as it was small, and i could roll it around the house).  our 18-moth-old son naps in a hammock and has always slept either in our bed or now beside it on a futon.

don't forget to get an organic mattress if you buy a crib!

photos via here and here.

night weaning, night fourteen...

ok, today is actually day 19, but night 14 was a REALLY big night. please don't be scared by the numbers here.  we are doing gentle weaning that is not that different from bed-sharing.  you can read about our exact set up in my first night weaning post.

on evening 14, i did some doll roll playing to show my 15-month-old the old "[his name] go night night...mama go nigh-night....no nurse nurse."  i then repeated this during the night whenever he woke up.  on a side note, he had been doing pretty well in this new set up of sleeping separate from me.  nonetheless, he was still putting up a good fight/couldn't fall back asleep sometime between 3-6 a.m. which would always end with me nursing him back to sleep....it was the only way.

weeelllll, on night 14 when he woke up at 3am, i just held him and repeated "[his name] go night-night...mama go night-night...no nurse nurse." he wasn't that psyched about it and ended up crying for about 20 minutes in and out of my arms.  sometimes he didn't want to be held and was just walking around the room crying.  i was gently talking to him and trying to console him.  it was hard for both of us, but i realized that night weaning just isn't going to succeed unless eventually i actually STOP nursing at night.  i felt like 14 days was gentle and gradual enough, and i knew he wasn't hungry.  i knew this because there were nights when i would nurse at 3am, then he'd be up an hour later and ready to nurse.

so after the 20 minutes of crying on night 14, my husband took him, gave him a paci, quickly busted out some tibetan monk zen chanting shit on his iphone, and rocked him back to sleep.

ever since then, my son sleeps basically through the night not only without waking but without nursing....yea!!!!!  sometimes, he wakes just for 20 seconds, and i give him a paci and a quick cuddle and say "[his name] go night-night" and he goes right back to sleep.

UPDATE : my son is now 21 months old and, for the last couple months, has been waking up about an hour or 2 earlier than "usual".  i end up getting up and nursing him, but only OUT of bed.  we sit in the rocker to nurse, and often he'll fall back asleep.  i tried nursing him in my bed in the morning when he wakes (for my sleep's sake), but very quickly he got into a pattern of waking up anytime in the middle of the night, thinking it was morning, and wanting to come into my bed to nurse.

photo courtesy of deerfieldcc.com

night weaning, night seven...zzz...

and by zzz...i don't mean that i'm boring myself....just merely drooling on myself.  ok, not really, but this is the first time, since my son was born 15 months ago, that i have had to deal with heavy-duty sleep deprivation.  oye!  more on that below.  we have always done bed-sharing, so sleep has usually been pretty good.  and i'm so happy that i am going through this now instead of when my son was a newborn when so many new experiences are constantly unfolding.

in my experience, there isn't a lot of attachment parenting info out there, so i will continue to share my first hand adventures in case anyone cares and may perhaps find it helpful...

ok, back to night weaning.....

we have been so torn about fully removing him from our room at night, because we LOVE waking up with him and cuddling in the morning.  i cannot even put into words how wonderful it is!

after many months of resisting putting our son in a crib to start to night wean him, we have decided to try a different, more gradual, method. you know, the kind of method that turns your bedroom into one giant mattress.   we brought his twin mattress into our room, and it is next to our already frameless/lowered bed now.   his is about 6" lower than ours which has worked out to be a nice delineation.

it's gone pretty well actually.  here's what i've learned:

1.  i immediately realized that his nighttime soothing methods had everything to do with being on me as opposed to my breast.  so his mattress has a couple of pillows and my usual night shirt on it....perhaps i should have just dressed a body pillow as me...hmmm. also, HE NEEDED WARMTH.  very important.  once he was bundled well in a footed onesie, he slept better.   we don't run the heat at night, and a blanket wouldn't stay on for long.

2.  when he wakes every few hours, i quickly grab one of the queued pacifiers next to my pillow and put it into his mouth while verbally soothing him and cuddling up next to him in his bed.  then, in stealth mode, after he has "dead arm", i slither back into my bed.  i have proudly mastered the art of nearly silent non-sheet rustling.

3.  i nurse him to sleep in his bed, and otherwise once a night around 4am (he sleeps 9pm-8am).  i can tell he's actually hungry at 4am, because he doesn't settle like the other times throughout the night. otherwise, i keep my henley sleep shirt buttoned up completely to keep my breasts on lockdown.

4.  we give him a little snack 30 minutes before bedtime to be sure his belly is full.  the food is high in fiber and low in sugar like avocado, rapini, or mushrooms.  UPDATE : we stopped this after the first few nights...once we felt secure that hunger wasn't the issue.

i'm pretty happy with how things are going.  certainly, the end goal is getting him to sleep through the night, so i'll let you know how that goes.

the only deeply twisted thing that happened once i got him out of our bed is that i had HORRIBLE insomnia for the first several nights---it must have been either separation anxiety or the hormonal change of not releasing relaxing oxytocin all night while nursing.  hence the zzz's in my post title!

UPDATE : please see my second night weaning post for the next installment....

photo courtesy of liza banfield at realsimple.com

sids linked to crib mattresses?

if i could talk you into buying one extremely important item for your newborn, it would be an organic mattress....whether you intend to have your baby in your bed or her own crib.  i have logged many many hours on researching the link between non-organic mattresses and sids, and i think you will be shocked how little information is shared with the public once you look into it.  i came across the site below that has an awesome article on the toxic mattress link to sids, and in order to not write the world's longest post here, i would love to refer you to it:

healthy child

i was a little wary at first since this site sells a variety of organic items including mattresses.  but they have clearly done their homework (otherwise i would never refer them) and list all of their legit references at the bottom of their articles.   plus, they directly link you to variety of safe mattress options which is nice.

click on the additional links within the above article that will lead you to other important topics like:

factors that may increase the risk of crib death (including the vaccination link)

co-sleeping and toxic gases in adult mattresses

sleepless nights during teething...

ok, yes.  this is an all natural blog, but we succumbed to infant tylenol last night (gasp!).   my son has had his first taste of big-pharma--ha! we do bed-sharing, so after 6 sleepless nights of him waking and readjusting himself to latch onto my breast every hour, i assumed this must be because of his discomfort.  he does not show signs of pain at night, but certainly it's the teething that's causing this.  and since he was lying on top of me every night for 2 weeks, my back muscular pain has turned to nerve pain, so i HAVE to get some sleep.

the infant tylenol does help---i'd say his waking was cut in half---so that's pretty good.  and on the upside (i'm reaching here), tylenol does make a dye-free version now---which also does not have high fructose corn syrup (yea!).  as you may know red dye #40 (a strain of which is banned in austria, norway, japan,and sweden), which is in other tylenol infant products, has been know to have negative affects on children such as hyperactivity, hives, eczema, and aggression.

UPDATE -- uck!  it has sucralose (splenda) in it.  i've contaminated my child--seriously, this stuff really bothers me.  what is so bad about just putting natural sugar in?  gosh guys....

more on bouncing babies: baby hammocks that bounce themselves

i cannot say enough good things about baby hammocks.  we purchased one by the kiwi company miyo (photo above) and started using it immediately after my son was born.  he loved it, because it is so cozy and womb-like.  almost like a non-constrictive swaddle (is that an oxy moron?) and a crib all in one.  it bounces gently with his movements ---again, womb-like.  they are typically used in malaysia from birth on up and have been said to help babies avoid getting a flat head--plagiocephaly--which has become a problem in western society from babies always being laid on their backs in their cribs (to avoid sids).

one of the greatest things about baby hammocks is how portable they are...not only can you hang them from a hook and chain (properly drilled into a beam above the drywall) anywhere in your house, they come with a foolproof doorway hanger, so travel with baby is a breeze. we even hung ours from a tree on the beach on vacation!  baby's gotta nap, right?

we had great success with the miyo from infancy until about 6 months (when my nearly 20 lbs son finally said, "get me outta this little thing!").  at nap time, we'd put him in and rock it fairly intensely--like a swooshing---he wasn't lulled by gentle sways and lullabies.

after the miyo, we tried out the kanoe (photo below), and are still using it at 10.5 months for all naps.  kanoe is great because they have a rental option.you can rent a brand new organic cotton kanoe for $40/month.and at any time, you can commit to buy or return it.  it is larger in size than the miyo, so i cannot vouch for how a tiny newborn would do in it, but you can check out their website for testimonials.the kanoe is equally as easy as the miyo to travel with though no doorway hanger.you can invest in a collapsible frame like this though for home and travel.

and finally, the piece de resistance!!  there is an importer of baby hammock bouncers that you can purchase a little machine from that will safely bounce the hammock for you (see it att'd in photos above and below)...how cool is that!?!  the day we started using our bouncer, baby's naps went from 30 minutes to an hour and a half!!  if you use the bouncer with a kanoe, you'll need to shorten the kanoe straps and not use the kanoe spring.  also, this bouncer comes with the previously mentioned collapsible frame.

UPDATE : we are still using the kanoe for naptime for my 22 lbs son at 18-months-old.

something to make your life a little easier as a new mom...

sorry, no, it's not a home-delivered male masseuse or a personal chef for a year. but it is kind of cool...it's a clock that projects the time up onto your bedroom ceiling. if you do bed-sharing, these are particularly fantastic, because you can easily see the time without getting a crick in your neck uncomfortably twisting your head around to see your bedside clock. constantly checking the time becomes somewhat of a pattern if you are still feeding/breastfeeding at night in order to keep tabs on how often baby is eating.

these are atomic clocks which means they synchronize the time with a base station twice a day. plus, many of them come with features like indoor or outdoor temperature (projected) and humidity levels. they project in large red or blue 6" numbers. love, love, love it....

tips for bed-sharing

just to clarify, bed-sharing is different than co-sleeping. bed sharing is having the baby in the bed with you throughout the night. co-sleeping can be a variety of set-ups where your baby sleeps in a co-sleeper (3 sided) crib next to you and may or may not come into the bed with you at some point.

the first days after my son was born, he would either sleep lying across my chest/belly and latched onto one breast or we would side-lie facing each other---his face at my breast, feet at my bent knees.

because i wanted to be extremely safe in the first few weeks as i was feeling out bed-sharing, i found that these little rechargeable night-lights came in really handy. i stashed one on either side of my pillow, so i could easily grab it in the middle of the night to be sure my son was positioned properly. the dim light is better than getting up and turning on a bright light and waking everyone up in the meantime.

if possible, try to have a separate comforter or blanket for you and baby to share.  twin size will work.  this will help you control the covers over you and the baby (as dad thrashes about with his own).

while baby is tiny, you may want to roll up a little swaddling blanket and place it behind his back...running in the direction of his spine.  this will help him stay in place while side-lying.  my son never really needed this, but some may.

it's easy to nurse if you sleep in a great lounge top like this organic cotton one or this one that will keep you warm and has easy access for baby.  you may need long sleeves, since your upper body will be exposed ---- your sheet/blanket will be down near your belly as to not cover baby.

if the breast that isn't feeding your baby leaks, you may want to keep a little wipe or two handy that you can press against the breast to stop the flow.  these wipes are great (for all sorts of things!).  if you need more support at night, you can wear an organic cotton bra for small or large breasts....and add reusable/washable pads if necessary.  just be aware to not let something moist stay against your breast for too long---in order to avoid mastitis or thrush (yeast).

your body may feel slightly unstable while side-lying, and if so, you can put a pillow between your legs.  my physical therapist says the pillow should support your pelvis by running it from your knee to just below your ankle.  additionally, a pillow behind your back may help.you will have to offer a different breast to your baby every few hours to avoid engorgement.  either grab baby and roll him over with you, or get up on all fours and slide him over.

finally, when baby starts to roll around on his own, you may fear (rightfully so!) that he could fall off the bed.  you have a few options: put your mattress on the floor, roll up a towel and stuff it under your fitted sheet along the edge of your bed, or buy a crib rail like this.  for what it's worth, in 10 months, my son has never fallen off the bed.  he snuggles up to me to nurse every few hours, so he basically never gets too far away.  granted there have been a few close calls now that he's crawling, because he wakes to nurse sort of half-awake and searching for me, which can be dicey if he's on the bed edge side of me.

sweet dreams!

bed-sharing is safe and wonderful

the idea of having a baby in a bed with two adults scares most americans. understandably, the logistics of it all are a little fuzzy until you actually try it yourself.  certainly, most people who have not witnessed it have images of pillows, blankets, and bodies smothering a tiny little baby.  bed-sharing is something that most parents do not plan on doing....particularly since it is looked down upon by most as being irresponsible and dangerous.  actually though, there is an order to it all, and it works beautifully.

from the minute my son made his way into my arms, i never wanted to let go. the very first night, he laid beside me and nursed and snoozed. from then on, it just felt right to have him sleep nights next to me and nurse whenever he was hungry. and it actually allowed me to get some sleep!! granted word sleep takes on a whole new meaning after becoming a mother....but, seriously, it has to so that you can quickly react and protect your child if necessary (wherever they may be sleeping).

when my son was 2 months old, i came across some research on how bed-sharing can actually prevent sids. not only that, it is hugely beneficial to your child emotionally. if you are someone who enjoys clinical trials and research on these sorts of things, check out james mckenna and his mother-baby sleep behavioral laboratory studies at notre dame.  mckenna is the go-to guy on seeing in black and white why bed-sharing is safe and beneficial.  plus, it is interesting to read about how mother and baby participate in a sort of synchronized dance at night---one moving and the other shifting in harmony.

these are the personal benefits i have experienced with bed-sharing:

--a connected, secure, warm, friendly, content baby
--watching your baby wake up and see your face and smile--the meaning of life encapsulated
--continuous sleep in bed while baby nurses when needed
--allows for a different nursing position other than "cradle" (which can help avoid plugged ducts)
--makes for a happy dad who is connected to baby all night and good family cuddling in a.m.
--allows some regulation of baby's sleep schedule (can quickly nurse back to sleep)
--extremely soothing during teething (in conjunction with nursing)
--baby has only woken twice in 10 months--fully awake and can't go back to sleep--in the middle of the night.  otherwise only "wakes" when hungry, then is quickly back asleep again

stay tuned for an upcoming post on helpful bed-sharing hints, including safety tips...

mothering magazine: the greatest magazine known to parentkind

ok, maybe mothering magazine would be a little more perfect if it had a slight bit of a fashion flare---but, nah, it's pretty perfect.  and i guess i'll leave the style-y stuff to cookie magazine.  speaking of cookie, if you feel like most parenting magazines leave you desiring more substance, then you have to check out mothering.

it offers fantastic info on natural attachment parenting.  also, there are great personal experiences that are shared....like last month when a breastfeeding mother wrote about her move to mongolia where breast milk is coveted---often her reserves would be "borrowed" from the fridge if someone in the office was under the weather.

mothering offers a digital ($4.95) or print subscription ($19.95).  if  you are interested in information about and stories of parents who do bed-sharing/family bed/co-sleeping, you HAVE to purchase the back issue no. 152 jan/feb 2009 with the cover story, "who wants to sleep alone?"