Category: How to

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How to Get Your Baby to Sleep like a Baby

Congratulations on your new baby! Such a sweet little bundle of joy, it’s just heavenly isn’t it? At first any whimper will make you leap right out of bed in the middle of the night to attend to every need. In a few weeks though, you’re frigging tired. You need this little sweet pea to sleep on some kind of consistent basis so you can function. Let’s face it, coffee ain’t cutting it. The whole “sleep when the baby sleeps”, is crap. Especially if you have other kids, or a husband, or a job, etc. You feel like a zombie and need some sleep, like yesterday. Don’t worry, I’ve got you covered!

Side note: this is not to be used in place of solid medical advice from your child’s pediatrician based off your child’s specific health needs or medical conditions.

I was Tired Once too

I am no sleep expert but I am the mother of five beautiful children, four of whom all slept through the night by 10 weeks old. This includes a set of twins, which happened to be the last pregnancy. Don’t get me started, thats a story for another time.

Notice how only four of my five slept through the night early on? Well its simple as to why, my first didn’t sleep well at all. In fact, she didn’t sleep through the night until she was about six months old, maybe a year. I can’t remember, it was a blur. Like many older siblings, she is the reason for the following sleep routine plan. I was not going to go sleepless for that long ever again. So from my second child on I started doing this routine at the suggestion of a more experienced mother. Thank God for her because it works!

For the first month or so every baby slept on my chest. I slept sitting up in a recliner or propped up on the couch. These snuggles are not only the sweetest moments that you will every have canoodling with that little angel, but remember how they were JUST inside your warm, safe, quiet, womb? They do and the outside world can be a pretty big adjustment. Ever step out of a sauna into a room that is 30 degrees cooler? It won’t take long before you need to warm up. Plus by sleeping on your chest, your baby can smell you, hear you breathe, maybe even faintly hear your heartbeat. Whether you breastfeed or bottle feed, this sleeping situation will help your baby feel safe while transitioning to the outside world. Which will help YOU get some sleep.

Set a Nightly Routine

Consistency is key, vital in fact, for this part of the routine in order for it to work.

Start wherever you are but begin to establish a nightly routine. If you are consistently getting two hours of sleep out of the baby from 11pm to 1am. Start there. Every night at the same time, without fail, you need to make the following happen. Give the baby a nice warm bath. Don’t forget that they just came out of a nine month warm soak! This will be relaxing for the baby.  Give baby a little rub down to keep their skin soft. I think I used a bedtime lavender infused lotion but you can use any type of moisturizing lotion or cream after the bath. Next get baby all snuggled up in their jammies, swaddle them  and feed them. Whether it is bottle or breast doesn’t matter. Let them get a full belly. Think about it, wouldn’t you be sleepy after all that?

Now once baby begins to nod off, put them in their crib with whatever type of sleep aids, room darkening curtains, etc., you plan on using consistently to help them stay asleep. I had a small fan that provided white noise but wasn’t pointed at the baby.

Set the Tone for the Night

Once baby has nodded off into Sleepyville, then no more bright lights, no more loud voices in the nursery. Everything is about sleep from here until morning. Baby needs to eat again? No worries, feed them, burp them, and then back to the crib. Low/no lights, low voices, with little to no talking, all business. I only changed poop-y diapers at night, just wet waited until morning. As your baby gets older and grows then it will also be able to sleep longer, so now you have established a nighttime routine that leads to them in their cribs. As their length of sleep progresses, then so will yours!

Need to Change the Bedtime Start Time?

Once you get this going consistently for at least a week or two then you can gradually start moving bedtime forward by 30 minutes. 11pm was super late for us so we kept inching the ritual forward until we hit the bedtime that worked for us. Once the pattern is established and your baby knows what to expect, then you will have more control or the bedtime itself. As they start sleeping longer it will be easier too. First the routine is about establishing the ritual so the baby knows what to expect then you can play with the timing.

Deep breath and relax! You got this whole parenting thing!

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How to Make a Legit New Year Resolution

Happy New Year! New Year, new you? Is that your resolution? Every New Year millions of people make vague and half hearted promises to themselves that often don’t last through January. It has been said that a goal without a plan is just a wish, so how do you make a resolution that you can actually follow through with? I have 5 simple steps to nailing a legit resolution down and making it happen!

What do you really want? Like REALLY want!

Step one is crucial to making a New Year resolution that is going to stick! What do you want? It shouldn’t be a vague, “I want to get healthier.”, “I want to make more money.”, or one that requires another person to be involved, “I want to get married.”. You have no control over other people. Those vague resolutions are just half hearted promises to yourself that you have no real intention of keeping. Come on man, you deserve better than that! The whole point of making a New Year’s resolution is that you are making a promise to yourself that you are going to commit to and make happen. So, I will ask you again, what do you want? Be specific in your goal.

What do you need to do to make it happen?

Step two is laying out the plan necessary to make your goal happen! If your goal is big then you will need to map out the steps you need to at least get started. Did you make a resolution to get healthier? You need to decide how you plan on doing it. If you plan on increasing your activity level then what does that mean? Are you going to go to the gym three times a week? Are you going to walk 10 minutes a day? You will need to be specific but also be realistic. Don’t commit to going to the gym at 5am every morning if you know that you are up until midnight every night. You may be able to get there eventually but what you need now are baby steps. You need to pick a reasonable action that will help you set your plan into motion.

Remember, a goal without a plan is just a wish.

When do you start?

Step three is the one that knocks the commitment phobe out of their comfort zone! Now you will need to set a date and keep it! This is the date that you start moving forward with your action plan to make your goal come true. This is not a random or arbitrary date. This is not written in pencil in your day planner. This is your commitment to your goal and keeping your promise to yourself date. If you don’t keep this date then you are only letting yourself down. Pick a date and start.

Do it for 3 weeks, minimum.

Step four is the meat and potatoes of it all. It has been said that it takes three weeks to make or break a habit. You have mapped out your plan, set your date, and moved forward with making it happen. Giving up before three weeks time is a disservice to you and seriously, you deserve so much better than that. You KNOW what you want, you said so in step one! It’s not going to happen without YOU! You started this now keep it going!

Reevaluate and adjust!

Step five is awesome because you made it this far! You’ve made a promise to yourself and kept it for three weeks. How is it going? If you find that you need to tweak things and make adjustments then now is the time. Be proud of yourself, making a big change isn’t easy and depending on your goal it may have been way out of your comfort zone. Congrats on doing something just for you and following through with it. You deserve it!

 

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Aftermath of Head Lice: Talking to your child

The aftermath of head lice can leave both you and your child emotionally exhausted. We all know that head lice sucks, despite being a common rite of passage for many kids. Your child is embarrassed, you are grossed out, and let’s be honest, other kids can be really mean. How do you talk to your child so they are ready to face their friends at school again?

Let me guess, these nasty little buggers hit you out of nowhere right? You found yourself totally unprepared and overwhelmed the minute you figured out what was going on. Your first response may not have been the best one but once the dust settles, heads are treated, and sheets are in the wash, the next obstacle you face is helping your child emotionally move on. Here’s five simple ways to help explain the who, what, where, why they had it and how to talk to their friends about it.

Who Gets Head Lice?

The fact of the matter is that anyone can get head lice. Well, any human that is. They are most common in young children with girls being more likely to get them over boys. Head lice do not discriminate against anyone really. Clean hair, dirty hair, child, adult, they just love hair, any and all kinds! That means there was no way of really preventing them from finding your head to be the perfect home for them to raise a family in!

What Are Head Lice?

I assume you mean besides gross? Head lice are little parasites that find the human head the absolute best neighborhood to raise their family in. They are visible to the naked eye but can be pretty quick to scurry away from searching fingers. The real trouble is they lay eggs like crazy and those are really hard to see. Even if you have good vision a pair of reading glasses may come in handy in your search for them. Lice are literally thousands of years old, so they are persistent little bastards that breed better than rabbits.

Where Do You Get Head Lice?

99.9% of the time head lice are transferred from head to head by sharing hats, batting helmets, wigs, or sleeping close to someone who has them. They can’t fly, or even jump, they can only crawl. So they really depend on you unknowingly inviting them onto your head. Your child didn’t deserve them certainly and they had to have gotten them from someone else. That means there is no reason to be embarrassed. They just happen.

Why Head Lice?

In my honest opinion, only God knows why they exist. The good news is that they do not carry disease or infections that can be transferred to humans so they are really just a gross, itchy, but harmless nuisance.

How to Tell Their Friends

We all know that when we hear “head lice”, and we take a step away from the person talking instantly feeling itchy. Although I had them as a kid I don’t remember being teased about having them. I don’t really remember anything other than my mom combing through my hair with that tiny ass comb and hating every second of it. As I was researching during my what the fuck do I do now moment I saw a lot of things posted about the stigma of head lice. As I kid I didn’t really think about it, I was worried for my daughters though. I was afraid that they would be teased, bullied, or otherwise ostracized if other kids knew.

After talking to the school nurse I told them that they could lie, I’m not proud of that. I told them that they could just say that they were home sick. They didn’t have to tell anyone they missed school because they had lice.

My girls didn’t listen of course, and told their friends. They learned a valuable lesson in doing that, I did too. My older daughter said that this friend heard from that friend, who heard from another friend, BUT only one friend came to her to ask her if it was true. They told me that when someone said something to them they simply stood up for themselves. They told everyone that they had to have gotten them from someone else  who had them so what was the big deal? I have to admit that I was proud of them and ashamed of myself. They told the truth, defended themselves and then simply went on with their day. What more could a mom ask for?

 

 

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Dealing with Head Lice – How to Guide

Are you dealing with head lice?

Oh girl, you found bugs crawling in your little ones hair and you don’t know where to start, right? No worries momma, its going to be ok! I know you want these disgusting little parasites not only off your child’s precious head but out of your house, like yesterday. Here is what I have learned when dealing with head lice and the steps you need to take to get rid of the bugs once and for all.

Lice occur most frequently in younger, school aged children, and they can happen to ANYONE. Lice occurs more often in girls but that could just be because girls generally have longer hair. They are gross I know, BUT these resourceful little bastards have been around since the beginning of time. Trust me when I say that no one is more skeeved out than your kid at the thought of bugs crawling around in their hair. They know that momma is going to handle this like the bad ass boss she is.

CHECK EVERYONE thoroughly so you know how many heads we are treating here.

When your little one comes to you and says that it feels like something is crawling in their hair then you need to check, like now! Lice drop lots of eggs and fast! Go directly to a well lit room and check the base of their skull and behind their ears. These are the most common locations for the lice to lay eggs. Adult lice are easily seen with the naked eye but the nits are tiny so if anyone has reading glasses available they may come in handy here. The nits are oval shaped little blobs attached to the hair shaft very closely to the scalp. Once those puppies start hatching you are going to have a serious problem. Adults are good at hiding while you are checking hair so take your time looking around. Once you know you are dealing with lice, then you need to check EVERYONE in the house.

Most research shows that over the counter medications rarely work in eliminating head lice. Even through two rounds of treatment and with you doing everything “as directed”. If you learn nothing else, then learn from my experience. Your best bet is to call your pediatrician right away and get a prescribed treatment that kills both the lice AND the eggs. I will explain why in a minute.

Your head is itching isn’t it? Don’t panic. Just the thought of lice makes your skin crawl but make sure someone has checked your head too.

The Good Stuff

Why do you need the good stuff? You need the medication that kills the eggs too, which is only available by prescription. These little buggers, pun intended, can take up to 12 days to hatch. Then it only takes 6-9 days for them to become mature enough to start laying eggs themself. You can see how this starts to stack up against you quickly. You are going to be chasing your tail trying to find every nit in your kid’s hair for the next month or so before you can declare victory. Go to your doctor and get the good stuff. I told our pediatrician that I wanted “something that will kill everything but those two”, pointing to my beautiful head scratching daughters.

Plan of Attack

Now that you have this lice annihilator in your hot little hands you need to plot out your plan of attack. First thing to do is gather everything that your children have come into contact with for the past 48hours. Place it all into one area to be considered “the contamination zone”. Every bed in the house, clothing, coats, pillows, stuffed animals, etc.. Think of anything that may have come into contact with your child in the past 48 hours and set it aside to be laundered.

Hairbrushes and hair accessories need to be soaked in water greater than 130 degrees for at least 10 minutes. To be honest, during the first rounds using over the counter shampoos we did this. Once it was obvious that we had lice again, we just tossed them all and bought new stuff. If you can’t buy new, then boil a pot of water and throw all the grooming accessories in the pot of boiling hot water (turning off the heat first of course).

Make a Clean Zone

Now, the medicine has to sit on your child’s head for about 10 minutes, you now have time to make a “clean zone”. I then went through their stripped rooms and vacuumed their beds and floor thoroughly. I picked out PJs and set them in the bathroom for the girls. Once their heads were done stewing, they rinsed off, got into their PJs and went straight to their rooms, you know, the “clean zone”. They were told that they couldn’t go to other areas of the house without my permission (possibly this was overkill but after dealing with these parasitic bastards for a month, I.WAS.DONE.).

I then, systematically, went through each room that would need to be tidied up, vacuumed and cleaned in the order of importance to our daily lives.

The Aftermath

As far as the laundry, it will take DAYS to wash everything. Everything should be washed on the hottest setting and dried on the hottest settings. Don’t forget to vacuum the couches, chairs, and rugs!

Lice don’t really live long without a host. If something has been in the coat closest for a week without anyone using it then you are probably ok to leave that be. Anything that can’t be washed, like my daughter’s softball helmet, needs to be sealed up in a plastic bag for three weeks to ensure that they are gone.

Remember Momma, lice have literally survived for thousands of years. Clearly they are unstoppable, until they met you that is!

 

 

Head lice?! Ewwww….gross….you must be dirty! OMG Mary has bugs in her hair! Kids can be cruel when it comes to head lice. Check out this blog post on helping your child cope with having had lice. https://asleepbynine.com/parenting/aftermath-of-head-lice-talking-to-your-child/

 

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Beginner’s Guide to Getting Healthy – Your First 5 EASY Steps

Healthy Lifestyle Habits are Easier than You Think!

Me in 2016 – running daily

Do you want to get healthy but unsure of where to start? Does it feel like an overwhelming challenge so you don’t even begin? It’s possible for anyone to improve their health and feel more confident by making just a few small changes. In fact, not only is it possible it is a lot easier than you think! You just have to be committed to yourself and HONEST because you can lie to your calorie counter but your hips know the truth!

Unfortunately for me, but fortunately for you, I have had to get back into shape a few times in my life. I’ve had four pregnancies (including a set of twins) all delivered via c-sections. Then a couple times where, to be honest, I just let myself eat cookies instead of dealing with stress properly.I really hope I have learned my lesson regarding dealing with stress and that cookies don’t fix anything! Does that sound familiar to you? Yeah, I thought it would. So obviously, I have had the opportunity to pull myself out of the cookie jar and strap on my gym shoes several times in my life! Now let’s talk about the first few changes that help get the healthy lifestyle ball rolling!

2018 after I let stress derail my healthy habits

I am ready to get back to running again but the extra weight is really a drag! So I am going to have to crawl before I can walk. Now I want to share with you how I am getting started and just how easy it is to begin.  Here is my beginner’s guide to healthier lifestyle habits.

Your first 5 EASY steps that you can take to start living a healthy lifestyle or regain your previous one!

First step – For one or two weeks start tracking where you currently are regarding activity and calorie intake. That’s it. You don’t have to hit the gym yet or eat salad every day (unless you already are doing that then for God’s sake don’t stop!!) You just want to get your baseline by using a pedometer, activity tracker, whatever you want to track how many steps you are taking every day compared to how many calories you are taking in. Sometimes just seeing this information in front of your face will be motivation enough!

Second step – Now that you know how much you are eating compared to how active you are, let’s try to get those numbers a little more even. Add a 10 minute walk into your daily routine at least 3 times a week for two weeks.

Third step –  Now let’s increase the walk to 15 minutes 5 times a week for two weeks. Be honest, everyone has 15 minutes to give to themselves every day.

Fourth step – Assess your diet. Is it on point with your goals? Your health has more to do with what you put on your fork than how far your shoes travel every day. Follow the 80/20 rule. 80 percent of the time eat healthy and exercise so that the 20 percent of treats and rest won’t derail your efforts!

Fifth step – Assess how you are feeling! You have been doing these small steps for over a month! Keep up the good work and continue to build on your new healthy habits!

Please remember that weight didn’t get there overnight and it won’t go away overnight either. You are going to have to be patient and consistent. If you are honest with yourself and your efforts, then it will be a lot easier than you think to get into the healthy lifestyle habit for good!

I also want to note that not once did I mention getting on the scale. That number is not something you should focus on. If that is your only guide then it will be very easy to become discouraged with your efforts. Instead, you should focus on how you feel with these changes! How do your pants fit? How much more energy you have? Are you sleeping better? How is your growing confidence!? I know that these small changes really don’t seem like much at first glance. You will find it is so much easier to make small changes and build on them rather than trying to become an organic vegan/marathon runner overnight. Making small changes and building on them is more likely to be successful in the long run.

Here’s to a healthier you!! Congrats!! You are doing this for you and you are going to kill it!

 

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Finding Balance to Find Peace

 

 

Are you struggling to find work life balance? You are not alone! Every day millions of women just like you and I are trying to find a way to be and do it all. We feel guilty that our house isn’t spotless or we haven’t had a hairstyle since 2004. Did you know that makeup has an expiration date?! The kids need this, the school requires that, your new boss is a jerk and doesn’t care about your life outside of the office and your husband tries to understand but he just doesn’t get that while you look like you are holding it all together you are actually ready to cry or scream or just spontaneously combust.

You need balance.

We can’t do it all and shouldn’t expect ourselves to be able to because it isn’t fair or realistic. We see these snippets of celebrities who are thin, working in glamorous jobs all around the world with their kids happily in tow but what we don’t see is the myriad of staff that are helping them look so put together. I don’t have that. In fact sometimes I feel like I have the opposite of staff and instead have little minions whose job it is is to actually undo whatever I just spent 2 hours doing, but I digress, how do we find the balance so that we are not only surviving our lives but thriving in them? Hint: everyone’s answer is different…..and everyone’s answer is correct.

The truth is you have to figure out what works best for you and your family. If you feel like you are managing working 40+ hours a week, the kids sports schedule, and maintaining your household to your satisfaction then BRAVO! You are amazing! If you feel like you are struggling, stressed, and/or its effecting your health, then it might be time to reevaluate what is really important to you and make some changes. P.S. You are amazing!

Finding Balance to Find Peace

Prioritize

1.) Prioritize your life – what are the three most important things that you have to have/do/be to have a high level of satisfaction in your life? Is it your family, career, a new house, being physically fit? There is no wrong answer here but you have to be honest with yourself and truly define what you consider to be a “must have” or  what the airline industry calls a “no miss”. That means your “no miss” is always the priority and as long as whatever that is happens consistently and to your satisfaction then you will be happy. For airlines a “no miss” is that your plane didn’t crash. Kind of a biggie. However your luggage arriving at the same time as your plane isn’t one of them. They like it to happen, they try to make it happen but it isn’t the priority. Same with your life, figure out the three things that are your “no miss” and focus on getting those right, every single time.

Evaluate

2.) Evaluate what you chose as your “no miss” items. Is what you are doing right now aligned with making them possible? Did you choose being a class mom as a priority but you have an hour commute to your full time job? There is no way you can juggle that for any length of time without running on pure adrenaline and espresso! P.S. that will catch up to you eventually, trust me. Is it starting your own business but you are afraid to take the first step? Did you choose a new career but aren’t confident enough to leave your comfort zone to pursue it? No wonder you are stressed, the life you are living and the one you want are two completely different roads and as the saying goes, “you can’t get there from here”. Only you can decide what changes need to occur to realign your life with your goals; with the things that are going to bring you satisfaction and to truly enjoy the life you’re living.

Seek Advice

3.) Talk to someone who can help you determine how and what you need to do to find your balance. Is the only thing really tipping you over the edge being unable to keep up with the house? Look into hiring a cleaning service. Are you struggling with finding the time to go grocery shopping? Is there a way to order online so you can plan and prepare meals instead of winging it with kids in tow begging for every snack and toy they see. Do you need to make a major change? Something that will kind of change everything, talk about it with your significant other, best friend, mom, whoever you trust to be honest and supportive and really try to figure out how to make it happen. Your happiness is out there waiting for you to have the cojones to chase after it!

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