apr, 12th - baby signals...

day 64:

There are of course, plenty of baby books that promise to provide the secret to producing a contented baby or probably more accurately 'a baby that allows for contented parents' ie. a baby who doesn't disrupt parents and their sleep too much. For me, the approaches suggested in most of these books are quite brutal, rigid and not particularly appealing. In fact, Limi may even be starting to think, (perhaps because I have been known to suggest this), that Gina Ford makes up all the less fun rules in our house. 'Blame Gina Ford not me that you have to go to bed' may have been even been uttered over the past weeks.

Anyway, a book that I did buy and enjoy is the brilliant Baby Sense. Its tag-line is - 'understanding your baby's sensory world - the key to a contented baby'. Yes, it does promise the 'contented baby' but in my own words: it attempts to explain how to read and respond to their body language signals in the early months.

Some signs are easy and I worked these out by myself:

- a wailing baby = unhappy

- a smiling baby = happy (although, can also be wind for the first 6 weeks)

- a baby with their eyes closed = asleep

- a baby with their eyes open = awake

- a worried baby = you are dancing around the living-room and they are concerned that they have inherited your lack of rhythm

But, all my natural deductions aside, what the book does provide, is insight into the stages that babies go through before they reach a point of complete stimulation-saturation or in other words...a meltdown (usually in public places and a LOUD advertisement of your failings as a parent), and provides practical solutions for stepping in and reducing the situation to more of a slight-thawing!

Fortunately, Limi doesn't appear to be easily stressed...although below, I have captured her in a classic Baby Sense 'uncomfortable' stance.....hands in tight fists and arms held close to the body. I'm deducing that she's concerned about being subjected to more posing dressed only in a nappy!! Still I tell her...you have to suffer for your art.