kim through
   the looking glass

Wow, that title seems odd.

While I’ve been witness to a few of Gil’s pees and have been able to make the cue sound (’pssssssss’), I’ve never purposefully caught one.

Until just now.

I’ve read everywhere about how you’re most likely to catch a pee just after a nap, since babies tend not to want to soil their sleeping area.

Makes sense to me - what other animals encourage their young to do so?

So as Gil was waking from his long afternoon nap (12-2:45PM today!), I removed his (dry!) diaper to nurse him and observe his cues. He nursed a long while on the first side with no sign of a pee and then pulled off, arched his back and straightened his legs. I held him in the basic under-thigh hold over our potty insert.

And he peed!

I made the cueing sound as he peed and aimed the stream a bit and he finished. I offered again after the second time, thinking he might have to poop, but he didn’t.

Yay for our first Natural Infant Hygiene success!

***UPDATE***

Just after I hit ‘post’, Gil came off the second side doing some fussing and leg stretching. So I figured, ‘what the heck!’ and took him over to the potty. Took off the (still dry!) diaper and held him over it in position - immediate pee! I was so taken aback I didn’t manage to cue him until pretty well after he finished. He was still a bit squirmy, so I said, “Do you need to poop?” and made a grunting sound, being sure to flex my abs. And my little man pooped! Wow. I can’t believe this crazy stuff works

I was recommended the book Diaper Free: The Gentle Wisdom of Natural Infant Hygiene (Ingrid Bauer) by a number of parents on an email list in which I participate. At first the idea of Natural Infant Hygiene (NIH), or Elimincation Communication (EC) as it is often called, totally grossed me out - after all, aren’t babies and diapers part and parcel?

I figured it couldn’t hurt to read the book and maybe it would give me some interesting things to try with Gwen, so I picked it up from my library and dove into it. People, I love this book!

The idea behind NIH is that babies are born with the ability to consciously relax their bodies and urinate or defecate just like an older child or adult, but that we train them to use a diaper instead. From pages 98-99:

“Elimination Communication begins with the baby’s awareness of subtle sensations, which indicate the filling of the bladder. The baby may then signal the parent, or the parent may anticipate the need through timing or intuition. The parent holds the child over a receptacle and make a familiar sound. The child then voluntarily relaxes and releases the urine before the bladder has become uncomfortably full. Over time, as muscles strengthen and conscious control increases, the baby is able to retain and hold in larger quantities of urine for longer periods of time if necessary. This occurs gradually with no particular focus or effort as a natural and inevitable consequence. About the time the sphincter muscles fully develop, the diaper-free baby achieves consistent continence.”

Bauer then goes on to contrast this with conventional potty training, in which a child has learned to pee in its diaper only when the bladder is very full and it cannot hold any more urine. When we then ask that child to begin using a toilet or potty to urinate in, he or she must contract the sphincter muscles and make it to the potty or toilet to release the urine. These kids just literally don’t sense the subtler signals that their bladder is sending to their brain in order to pee voluntarily before the bladder is full until much later than the toilet learning has begun.

I think one of the most interesting things I learned in this book is about the differences between the Western world’s concept of ‘toilet readiness’ - that a child cannot possibly toilet train before at least 18 months because they don’t have the ability - and the Eastern world’s belief that children are quite able to communicate effectively about their elimination needs. I enjoyed this quote a whole lot - from pages 70-71:

“One of the most glaring problems with the concept of toilet training readiness is its heavy ethnocentric focus. The “readiness” theory can only even begin to be considered viable if one pretends that the vast majority of the non-Western world does not exist … Millions of mothers around the globe know that babies are “ready” and aware from birth. The empirical evidence is overwhelming and stretches back for eons. Why has the experience of the majority of the world’s mothers and babies been ignored for so long? Are only modern North American and European babies subject to this maturational lag?”

The book then describes the suspicious timing of the release of scientific literature to promote the ‘toilet readiness’ theory by Dr. Brazelton during the year the first disposable diapers - Pampers - were released. Not to mention that Dr. Brazelton happened to sit for a time on the Pampers Parenting Institute Pediatric Roundtable. Coincidence? I happen to think not!

The book is filled with stories and instructions as to how best support your child’s elimination - whether you start at birth, after a few months, or start later with a toddler. I’m planning to start pretty early with Love Bug - we’ll see how it goes!

Here are some other resources for learning about NIH:

• borntopotty.com
• diaperfreebaby.org
• tribalbaby.org - Learn about Elimination Communication
• Free to EC! My Journey to Elimination Communication

I think I just upped my crunchiness factor again!

While Dave and Lindsey (my brother-in-law and his girlfriend) were staying with us recently, Lindsey and I were discussing crafty projects we could make for Christmas presents. We discussed handkerchiefs, market bags, reusable vegetable bags for in the fridge, sandwich wraps, and snack bags.

We didn’t get around to any of it before Christmas … mostly because she was gone through November and December! (She was, however, still good enough to be crafty in her Christmas presents!)

When she arrived again in January, we happened to go on a trip to Ottawa Street - Hamilton’s fabric and antique district. While there, I purchased some cotton as well as some rip-stop nylon.

These things are easy and fun to make! I won’t even BEGIN to pretend that I’m a decent sewer - in fact, I would definitely consider myself to be a novice. So if you’re concerned you won’t be able to figure this out, I say you can!

The first thing I made was a reusable sandwich wrap. I did a bunch of research online and found that I liked Toward Sustainability’s Homemade Sandwich Wrap the best. However, I didn’t like the idea of plastic actually in contact with my food (after all, if I didn’t care about it, why would I bother making these?). I knew I had a couple of options for waterproof layers - vinyl (um … I don’t like to wrap my sandwiches in reproductive toxins, you?), PUL (not sure about how food-safe it is, and it wasn’t readily available), oilcloth (I’d love to use this stuff if it still exists!), and nylon. In order to keep the waterproof layer away from the food entirely, I decided to use two layers of cotton sandwiching (pardon the pun!) what I opted for - rip-stop nylon.

So I kinda followed the directions and kind of made it up. I quickly realized that I couldn’t just sew it closed and turn it inside out, since it was three layers and not two, so I ended up just folding over the edges of the three pieces of cloth, pinning them together and hemming them. Next time, I’m going to try the two cotton pieces with right sides facing, and then the nylon on top … I *think* that should work for turning it inside-out so that there’s no fraying fabric on the outside!

The second item I made was a reusable snack bag. I again researched a bunch of patterns and settled on the we wilsons’ Reusable Snack Bag Tutorial. I followed this one pretty much exactly, except I again sandwiched the nylon between two layers of cotton so that the food would be touching only cotton. It took a bit of finagling, but I figured it out - maybe the next one I make I’ll take pictures as I go!

The next set I made was much … nicer. As always happens with projects, I think, I knew what I was doing and what the problems might be (although I still hadn’t figured out that I can probably flip the wrap inside-out) and I made the snack bag much bigger - it’s about 6″ by 6″ total, I think. The plaid one is perfect for quick snacks for Gwen, but a bit impractical for adult-sized snacks.

This set was given to Lindsey for her birthday (and in the picture, you can see how the wrapped sandwich would sit).

I bought a bunch of material and am hoping to sew up a few more sandwich wraps and snack bags for Brad as well as some fun snack bags for Gwen and I to use on our outings - it’s MUCH easier to give her a snack bag to eat on the run than a container!

And in case you’re wondering, I’ve washed Brad’s sandwich wraps and snack bag just in my dish water and let them air dry. They both can often just be shaken free of crumbs and used again right away, but if they’re soiled (for example, by an egg salad sandwich!), the food comes right off the cotton with a little swish and wipe

This passage made me smile today as I found it over @ Peaceful Parenting - totally my new favourite blog. If this is what parenting is all about, BRING IT ON!

Manifesto of the idle parent

We reject the idea that parenting requires hard work
We pledge to leave our children alone
That should mean that they leave us alone, too
We reject the rampant consumerism that invades children from the moment they are born
We read them poetry and fantastic stories without morals
We drink alcohol without guilt
We reject the inner Puritan
We fill the house with music and laughter
We don’t waste money on family days out and holidays
We lie in bed for as long as possible
We try not to interfere
We push them into the garden and shut the door so that we can clean the house
We both work as little as possible, particularly when the kids are small
Time is more important than money
Happy mess is better than miserable tidiness
Down with school
We fill the house with music and merriment

Here is the recipe that my midwife office gives out for postpartum herbal baths.

Ingredients:

• 1 oz uva ursi
• 1 oz shepherd’s purse
• 4-6 cloves garlic, sliced or chopped

Instructions:

1. Put all ingredients in a pot with 4L of liquid.
2. Simmer for 20 minutes.
3. Add 1 cup sea salt to the mixture.
4. Let cool and strain into containers with lids, freeze if not used within 2 days. Makes enough for 2 baths.

I was lucky enough for my first birth to have a friend drop off some extra herbal bath that she made up for her homebirth in April before I had Gwen, so I didn’t have to make it! In the above picture, taken shortly after Gwen’s birth, we’re actually in the herbal bath together. It’s healing for both mom’s reproductive system and baby’s cord and is honestly SO SOOTHING. If you’ve got it frozen in containers, just thaw it in the tub while you’re filling it with water. This time, I’m hoping to make a double batch so that I can have a soothing bath more often!

Wow. Has it seriously been almost a year since I went no-poo? I find that hard to believe!!

After this update, where I said that I was washing every other day, I’ve been able to cut back to every 3rd or 4th day. It’s been incredible, really! My hair hasn’t been great lately, but I’m not sure if that’s pregnancy hormones or the fact that it’s longer, or the fact that the seasons have changed and I just don’t care enough to change what I’m doing and figure out what my hair needs in the winter Regardless, I’ve been very pleased with the way my hair has responded to the no-poo method and even use baking soda/ACV rinses on Gwen’s hair. Her hair’s great though - I wash it about every 2 weeks with a water wash or two in between and it looks and feels amazing!

As an aside, this post @ Yarn Harlot made me HOWL. If you want a quick rundown of how I feel about my hair, although I’ve yet to find a hair dresser who is as accepting as her’s is, I’ll let her words speak for me:

The lady who cuts my hair is awesome and I love her.  It’s taken us about two years to get where we are now, which is her totally accepting that I’m never going to take an interest in my hair in any way - other than showing up to have it wrangled.  I’m not going to straighten it or buy $80 worth of product.. I’m not going to discuss it or talk about it’s colour.  I’m not going to do any of the things she talks about, and I do not own a diffuser now, nor do I plan on getting one.  I don’t have a style - I have a cut, and I don’t want to talk about maybe getting a style.  I’m going to show up, say something about how I would like to be able to participate more fully in society and not be held back by my hair, and she fixes it, we chat nicely and I leave.  It works great.

Ah, that’s precisely how I feel!

Well, I took the plunge shortly after my birthday, March 7, and I updated a few weeks later.

I think it’s high time I updated again!

It’s now been 2.5 months since I’ve used shampoo on my hair. Wow. When I say it like that it seems pretty incredible, eh? Read the rest of this entry »