Feeding Baby Cow’s Milk

Posted on August 26, 2016 by llpitlwp

Feeding Baby Cow’s Milk

Why do experts recommend waiting to introduce cow’s milk until a child is 12 months old?

Source: Cow’s milk: When and how to introduce it

Our grandson just turned 1 year old! A baby’s first year of life is marked by so many growth and development milestones but yet it seems in the blink of an eye they are standing, cruising and then walking.

Obviously this is a grandmother’s perspective as new moms know it seems like forever before a newborn sleeps through the night and then forever till he sits up, crawls, holds his own bottle and begins to eat some “real” food!

At the one year mark our baby can now begin to drink cow’s milk or milk other than breast milk or formula which will make some trips away from home a slight bit easier. Prior to one year an infant’s digestive system is not ready for the high concentration of protein and minerals in regular milk. In addition cow’s milk is deficient in iron, vitamin C and other nutrients nor does it have the healthy fats for your growing infant.

horizon_milk

When your baby is mature enough milk becomes a staple in his diet with all of its calcium and vitamin D. Calcium helps to build strong bones and teeth as well as regulate blood clotting and muscle control. Protein is also found in milk along with energy providing carbohydrates.

The big question is usually how much milk should your child be drinking. Here are the AAP recommendations.

According to the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP), most kids will get enough calcium and vitamin D if they drink 16 to 20 ounces (2 to 2 1/2 cups) of cow’s milk a day. Offer 1-year-olds whole milk (unless they’re at high risk for obesity).

Don’t offer more than 3 cups of milk a day or your child may not have room for the other foods she needs to round out her diet. If your toddler’s still thirsty, offer water.

Happy Birthday to your 1 year-old!

Rainbow Cake

1st Birthday

It is exciting times… toddling to 2!

Baby Development at 6 Months

Posted on March 9, 2016 by llpitlwp

Baby Development at 6 Months

Can you believe that 6 months has gone by since your baby was born? In some ways of course in other ways the changes in him can make you wonder were did the time go since he was just in a swaddle?

Baby development is slowly happening each and every day right in front of you. It is not dramatic but it is subtle and so much fun to see these new abilities and changes.

At six months he is becoming more physically active and more social. What have you noticed?

Here are some highlights of baby development at 6 months of age.

Rolling over and rolling around when you are trying to change his diaper and not staying put any longer when you lay him on his play mat on the floor. His muscles are developing and he is holding his head up better and perhaps he is even sitting up.
Now that he looking around more he is also becoming more social. He will even flirt with you and crave your attention as he also begins to develop stranger anxiety. His crave for your attention is making him engage in behaviors and crying that he knows will alert you to him. It is now time to give him some positive feedback when he does positive things which just about always at this point because the time will come when some of his attention getting behaviors will not be so cute and endearing.
Foods- When you begin to give your baby some solid foods on the recommendation of your doctor don’t be surprised when his stools change and become more stinky depending upon what he is eating. If he does get constipated try to give him some baby strained fruit and veggies to help him out as firm stools can be really uncomfortable for him.

My little grandson seems to be right on target with his baby development, he is wowing us with his little baby nuances and new abilities. Although he does not yet sit up fully on his own his head is well controlled and his is exploring his environment every chance he gets. Safety has become more important with regard to his new love of rolling around whenever and wherever possible.

He also has tasted some yummy foods. Organic foods are preferred by mom and dad but it is not easy to always find them in the baby food aisle a their local grocer. So grandma gave baby and parents a present a baby food processor, the Baby Brezza Food Maker, which should thrill everyone with it simplicity of use and clean-up with the bonus of preparing really healthy delicious food and one that was not available when this grandma was a young mom. I also order baby food online, delivered right to their door.

I can’t wait to see what happens during the next month of my little grandson’s life!

Source: Your 6-month-old’s development: Week 1 | BabyCenter

Baby Development at 5 Months

Posted on February 1, 2016 by llpitlwp

Your Baby Development at 5 Months

Homing in on sounds Your baby now realizes where sounds come from, and he’ll turn quickly toward a new one. One of the easiest ways to engage him is to jingle a set of keys.

Things your baby might enjoy

Wind chimes
His own name may cause him to turn and look at you
Your baby is learning language from you not from tv or radio
Your baby has a growing range of emotions

He is expressing emotions but not in any complex manner. His sense of humor and his ability to show love are just developing. He can really tell you when he is angry and bored.

Your baby also shows a strong attachment to you by raising his arms when he wants to be picked up and by crying when you leave the room. He may also give you hugs and kisses.

He’ll laugh at your funny expressions and he’ll try to make you laugh too.

Remember always that your baby is an individual and accomplishes these milestones on his own schedule.

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that babies be breastfed exclusively for at least six months – though parents will attest that some babies are eager and ready to eat solids earlier.

More Baby Development:-Starting solids is always a real milestone for baby and for parents. How, what, when are the questions that come up now.

baby development 5 months

How will you know when your baby is ready for solid food?

Here are cues to look for in baby development that will tell you he is ready to try some solid food.

Head control-being able to keep his head in a upright steady postion

Losing his “extrusion reflex”-he will have to stop pushing food out of his mouth with his tongue

He will have to sit well when supported. Even though he might not be ready for a high chair he needs to be able to be sitting upright to swallow well.

Chewing motions. Your baby’s mouth and tongue develop in sync with his digestive system. To start solids, he should be able to move food to the back of his mouth and swallow. As he learns to swallow efficiently, you may notice less drooling – though if your baby’s teething, you might still see a lot of drool.

When he is at least 4 months old and has doubled his birth weight or weighs about 15 pounds.

He seems hungry even after getting formula or breast fed his regular feeding.

He is curious about what you are eating.

Baby development is truly fascinating so take the time to enjoy all these small milestones that are happening.

Your baby is UNIQUE!

Source: Your 5-month-old’s development: Week 1 | BabyCenter

Source: Starting Solids

Breastfeeding…Is it Best for All?

Posted on October 26, 2015 by llpitlwp

Is Breastfeeding always best?

Breastfeeding is a hot topic among moms and also one which can usually ignite a “mommy war” of words and guilt. Breast may in fact be best from scientific evidence which I am not here to argue or interpret.

What I know as a mom, grandma, former mother-baby nurse is this.

If a mom wants to breast feed she deserves plenty of support because breast feeding is not always as easy as it looks. In fact, it can be downright frustrating and difficult for new moms who are dealing with a myriad of changes in their lives.

Non-judgemental support is essential. If you had a positive experience breastfeeding, I am so happy for you but don’t impose your positive experience on another mom. Why? Because each mother/baby dyad is unique.

Early in my nursing career I took a LaMaze Certification with Elizabeth Bing, She was a guru of ‘LaMaze’ in NYC. Oddly to me, she was not a nurse, she was a physical therapist if I remember correctly. So in reality, she had not much experience with hands on labor and delivery and neither did many of her certification seeking students. For many students the only experience they had was their own successful ‘LaMaze’ childbirth.

At that time I had no children but I had assisted many laboring women and I had attended many deliveries. Some were great ‘LaMaze’ deliveries and others were not so much, these were the women that had epidurals, and or pain medication.

Back in the day, how a mom delivered was very judgmental, at least in NYC. Women who were taught LaMaze by Elizabeth Bing were very sad and disappointed if they gave in to medication or epidural. They were frequently devastated if they had a c-section. I felt it was my nursing responsibility to help each mom accept her childbirth experience and accept her healthy baby.

Because of my experiences prior to having my own children, I think it was easier for me to accept the facts surrounding my own childbirth stories. They were not ‘natural’, in fact one was an emergency c-section. To this day, I am grateful for a healthy child. I was simply in the right hospital at the right time. I did not choose to breastfeed for some personal and some medical reasons. With what I knew at the time this was the right choice for me and my children.

I hear so many comments about breast feeding nazi nurses that it makes me sad. A new mom should not be made to think that a nurse is pushing or demanding that she breast feed her baby. A gently approach to a new mom is so much more meaningful after just giving birth. So many times women feel that they are not in control once they step into labor and delivery and postpartum. This is ludicrous. These moms are going home with their babies. So lets quit the judgment at the Labor and Delivery door.

Here are two posts that really inspired me today.

There are truths in both writings.

Try to read them and not get judgmental.

It is kind of a test of two viewpoints.

Make up your own mind without anger and without pushing your beliefs on other moms.

Whether you breastfeed or formula feed, there’s one mantra that’s repeated over and over again: breast is best. You whisper it to yourself in the dark as the pain of those first latches washes over you, you repeat it to newly pregnant friends, and — if you use formula — you insert it into conversations as a buffer to ward off judgment from strangers. “I know breast is best,” you utter mechanically, “but these are the myriad excuses why it wasn’t right for me.

In a recent Op-Ed in the New York Times, Courtney Jung discusses new evidence that shows we’ve vastly overstated the benefits of breastfeeding, and it’s having a detrimental effect on moms. Like most new moms, Jung was bombarded with information about breastfeeding as soon as she went public with her pregnancy. Well-meaning friends offered advice and strangers inquired as to how she’d feed her baby. Her birthing class even refused to do lessons on formula feeding because it’s “against hospital regulations.”

Source: Increasing Evidence Proves Breast Isn’t Always ‘Best’ Scary Mommy

McKenna went on to say that Jung’s conclusion was wrong.”[Jung] is just plain wrong especially in light of new epigenetic studies that show in both human and nonhuman primates that breast milk significantly alters the human microbiome, setting in place, potentially, a lifetime trajectory of protections (or without it, vulnerabilities) to a variety of diseases and health in general. Moreover, how can we ignore that formula feeding is a risk factor for SIDS?”[Breast-feeding] is especially important for African-American infants whose mothers breast-feed at significantly lower rate than do whites contributing to the enormous survival disparity of black babies compared to white babies.”

Source: Are We Becoming Overzealous About Breast-Feeding? : 13.7: Cosmos And Culture : NPR

Motherhood we are all in this Together.

Posted on July 20, 2015 by llpitlwp

SISTERHOOD OF MOTHERHOOD

This post is a sponsored by Similac.

Thank you for supporting Parenting in the Loop

#UniteMonday

I am so proud to be selected to participate as a Brand Ambassador in Similac’s “The Sisterhood of Motherhood”.

As a young mom I had expectations of what a mom should be which set my path each day as I struggled to take care of my two children 23 months apart in age. Super imposed upon my high mom standards for myself were also my desire to be the “good wife” as well. My plate was more than full. At times difficult to digest all I had bitten off.

I was also a maternal.child, pediatric nurse so I knew and had personally witnessed what could happen if you relaxed your standards especially your safety ones. That alone created in me some serious anxiety which I kept hidden from everyone except my husband.

It was not easy to be a “green” mom. By that I mean, this was all new grass I was trodding upon and I wanted it to grow and flourish in spite of my insecurities and anxieties. Little did I know there were many other moms just like myself and we all suffered from our own self imposed standards. There were no mom bloggers, no mom blogs for that matter there was no internet! However I did watch my favorite stories (soap operas) each afternoon at nap time. The characters were my “friends”, even though I could not talk to them or ask them questions or even comment on their problems. Their lives were of course nothing like my own but it was definitely an escape from the mom and housewife mental institution known as my home at the time.

In the two years following my marriage I delivered two children. They were raised in the 80’s, 90’s. and were born in Miami Florida. It was another world from where I worked in New York City. Even though I had a lot of newborn experience I had no idea what to do when my first born daughter was older than two weeks. I was literally lost thankfully my mother was staying with me and lived close by.

Both my babies were formula fed. The choice was made for me since I was taking Heparin, a drug which helps to prevent blood clots. It was a medication that would cause problems for babies as it passes through breast milk. Although I didn’t like not having a choice I was sort of okay with it because I had seen many moms struggling with breastfeeding and it just scared the living daylights out of me. I had no problem with formula and bottle feeding. For the most part in 1979 and 1981 there really was no judgment passed on my formula feeding decision by any of my mom friends. Actually, I was relieved to bottle feed, since someone else could easily feed my daughter and I could get some much needed rest.

Living in South Florida alongside many retirees created a different set of problems.They were a judgmental bunch. A brief story comes to mind. One afternoon I was taken by surprise when I took my daughters to Lord and Taylor and decided to have lunch. Pushing my double stroller I approached the hostess and asked for a table, her retired old self felt the need to ask me if I was going to breast feed at the table. What a relief came over her face when I said “no”.

I am not sure what she would have done if I had said yes but I am sure I would have been told to go to the ladies lounge to feed my child.

This anecdote seems like an eternity ago, although it is no longer 1980 some of the reactions of other moms and grandmas are not all too different today. Surprisingly some attitudes about where a mom should breast feed have not changed . What has definitely changed though is the fact that more moms are breastfeeding and they themselves have become judgmental about how important breastfeeding is in a newborn’s life. Some moms think you are not being a good mom if you do not breastfeed your child and they don’t refrain from voicing this opinion online, or in person. Actually the internet seems to have become the official boxing ring for these critics.

I am now a grandmother and my ideas of what defines motherhood have become less rigid. They are no longer written in pen they are all written in pencil to be changed at a moment’s notice. There is no room for much judgment of my new relaxed standards when it comes to my grandchildren

Grandparents can sometimes have more fun than parents because they have learned along the way that when it comes to raising a child there are very few things that need to be written in stone. We understand what it means to be a mom from a lens that comes with age. and experience. Thank God for this fact.

One of the best parts of grandmotherhood is being able to enjoy grandchildren with out the pressure from within that comes along with being a new mom. From the inception of my blog I have tried to share and support this generation of moms in the day to day. It is a kind of support that my generation of moms did not have.

I feel so fortunate to be included in Similac’s #Sisterhood of Motherhood initiative.It is an honor to be featured with some today’s moms

It is my hope that on this #UniteMonday moms will recognize the fact that we are all in this together to support, nourish, accept and unite every mom who is raising a child. Grandmothers have an important role here as well. There is a loop of parenting and that loop starts with grandmothers and continues with moms and children. We are forever adding to the parenting loop every time a child is born to a new mom and makes another mom a grandmother.

Please get in the “loop” this #UniteMonday and share your parenting stories in comments and on FB and nourish, support and unite other moms!

Thank you Similac and #UniteMonday for recognizing moms.

This post was sponsored by Similac but all thoughts and opinions are my own.

TGIF…Some Weekend Reading!

Posted on October 3, 2014 by llpitlwp

TGIF

Fall Weekend

For too many reasons to list, I have been absent from ParentingintheLoop for awhile.

I missed writing and hopefully will be getting back into my routine.

This week there were so many things that caught my eye while looking through parenting posts. Back-to-school is always a time of year that has been a struggle for me. Getting settled into a routine and the shortening of daylight leaves me sometimes anxious for what the winter will bring. I am an optimist but Fall has its sentimental moments which are not always my favorites.

Cooking is my time to relax and lately I have been throwing my efforts into more healthy choices for all three meals of the day especially lunches. I have been drawn to some interesting recipes and since we have a nut allergy in our family that is something that keeps me looking for homemade food choices especially when it comes to snacks.

Here goes some of my choices from this week. TGIF!

I love granola and most are exposed to nuts in the processing or contain nuts so they do not have a place on my kitchen shelves. I haven’t tried this recipe yet, but it looks very promising and a great snack or something to throw in my bag to munch on while running the day’s endless errands.

In case you’ve missed the commercials and advertising that we have been inundated with since mid-July, it’s Back-to-School time! Parents everywhere are reluctantly turning their attention to that universally dreaded task—packing the lunchbox. While I am a well-known proponent of unexciting lunches, I do like to dazzle the children with a variety of homemade treats.

via Nut-Free, School-Safe, Easy Homemade Granola Bar Recipe :: YummyMummyClub.ca.

Don’t get me wrong, I do not and simply cannot make everything from scratch… with my schedule this is impossible . As much as I would love to do scratch cooking there are some shortcuts that I do take. As a grandmother, I have learned to accept my limitations albeit sometimes not so gracefully. Limitation is not something to which I willingly succumb, being limited makes me feel old but on the other hand I have to be realistic and acknowledge that I cannot do everything. It is better to prioritize what is truly important and let the other things take care of themselves. This post from Yummy Mummy Club Canada made me think about some of the convenience foods that although they sound healthy their ingredient list belies their nourishing label.

See what you think. TGIF.

But when I do buy packaged foods—after all, they do come in handy now and again when you’re a busy parent—I rarely read the nutrition facts table. Instead, I skip right to the ingredients list, which is the most important bit of information on the package or box. The shorter the list, the better, and ideally you want to see real food ingredients instead of fillers, stabilizers, and additives.

via 7 Foods Dietitians Won’t Feed Their Kids :: YummyMummyClub.ca.

One of my favorite cook books Homemade With Love is from Jennifer Perillo. She is an exceptional scratch cook and I love her recipes. A few years ago, I had the pleasure of meeting her and actually enjoying a luncheon she prepared at her hotel her in Chicago. I credit Jennie with bringing me back into the kitchen after being an empty nester for several years. If she could prepare such a lovely lunch in a hotel room kitchen I should be able to return to my kitchen easily with her cookbook in my hands.

Jennifer just announced yesterday that her first issue of Simple Scratch Cooking : A Homecook’s Journal for Making Easy, Everyday Meals will be out in October. I am beyond excited to receive my copy soon…in time for the winter when I find the most comfort in cooking a lovely meal at dinner time. TGIF

I’m leaping, and my heart is beating out of my chest as I do so. Finally taking a little control of my professional destiny with this project. So, here it goes…
The first issue of Simple Scratch Cooking: A Homecook’s Journal for Making Easy, Everyday Meals is available for preorder. If you believe in me, and my work, please share with everyone you know. I’m offering a 10% special discount for orders placed by 10/15/14 (use code SSC1015 at checkout). I plan to spend what would’ve been our 10th wedding anniversary on 10/16 packing, and shipping, the inaugural issue.
http://injennieskitchen.storenvy.com/products/9951769-simple-scratch-cooking-a-homecooks-journal-for-making-easy-everyday-meals

Here’s to a wonderful weekend. TGIF everyone!

Christmas Wishes to Jennie

Posted on December 13, 2013 by llpitlwp

Merry Christmas Jennie!

And so, my gift to you is a super easy, really one bowl recipe for gingerbread—or should it be called gingerbread cake? Perhaps I should eat one more slice to try and decide.

via gingerbread cake {a one bowl recipe} – In Jennie’s Kitchen.

If you are at all like me, I am always looking for a gift that is very special at Christmas time when it comes to my family and friends.

Since I love food and trust me most people do…I look for unique cookbooks by unique cooks.

Homemade with Love

is one of those cookbooks.

Jennie Perillo is one of those cooks.

As the year 2013 comes to an end, I am looking back at some of the wonderful people, I have met this year.

Jennie is one of them.

Last spring, I was introduced to Jennie through a group of Instagram bloggers from NYC.

She was launching her first cookbook, Homemade with Love. At first, I was drawn to her by her story.

Jennie had lost her husband suddenly. She and her two daughters were left without their anchor. Jennie found solace in her love of cooking.

As she grieved for her husband, she began to create Homemade with Love.

During her publicity tour, Jennie stopped in Chicago where I live. She did a book signing at a small bookstore.

As luck would have it…I read about the book signing after the fact.

I was so disappointed…

Well, I took to Twitter and sent Jennie a message asking if she was doing any other signings.

“No”!

But I was welcome to stop by her hotel and she would sign my copy.

I was more than thrilled.

Not only did Jennie sign my copy of Homemade with Love but she invited me to a media luncheon which she had prepared in her hotel kitchen. I was actually tasting some of her recipes and they were easy enough to make in this tiny kitchen.

I had fallen in LOVE.

I knew when I read about Jennie and read Homemade with Love…I was being reintroduced to my love of cooking again.

You see, I had been an empty nester after taking care of my own family and my mother and now I was helping to parent my granddaughter…I needed to cook again for a family.

Jennie came into my life and resurrected my love of cooking at a moment when I needed a new inspiration to cook again for a family.

Jennie, I wish you a very Merry Christmas and New Year full of new horizons.

Thank you.

Tuesday…Why I Love My “Virtual Friends”

Posted on November 19, 2013 by llpitlwp

Lunch Box

I am going back to introducing some of my favorite bloggers and their blogs. Over the last five years it has been my pleasure to meet many “virtual” friends through an eclectic collection of blogs.

For me, “working” at home and from home has its advantages and disadvantages…one of the disadvantages is the inevitable loneliness that comes with the home-based territory.

Thank goodness, my “virtual” friends are a click away and provide discussions that some of my “real” friends cannot, since they don’t share my work at home status nor are they taking care of grandchildren and to be truthful, I just don’t have that many “real” friends. Over the years, I have made an effort to have a few good friends than a lot of casual ones.

But now with blogging and social media, I have many casual, virtual friends.

As a grandmother, I am thankful for this. I love blogging and I love visiting blogs and social media. Blogs help me understand the world through my children’s generational lens and the lens of my contemporaries. Since I spend a lot of time with my grandchild, I appreciate the world she lives in and also the world that she will inherit from my generation and that of her parents.

YoniFreedhoff is one of my “virtual” friends, through his blog, “Weighty Matters”.

It is a blog that is both serious and humorous. He is a doctor and I am a nurse so his humor is not wasted on me.

Nutrition is something that continues to fascinate me…it is a field that is ever-changing and has life long implications for each and every one of us. Yoni keeps me focused on the new innovative and the old tried and true approaches coupled with a tongue in cheek attitude.

Here is his latest post on a controversial Manitoba Child Care Lunch Regulation Program. It is humorous to a point but there are also serious implications, too much government intervention into how we feed our families, as well as the “stupidity” of those who are interpreting this new “food ~~policy~~ police policy”!

Family doc, Assistant Prof. at the University of Ottawa, and founder of Ottawa’s Bariatric Medical Institute – a multi-disciplinary, ethical, evidence-based nutrition and weight management centre. Nowadays I’m more likely to stop drugs than start them, and love going to work in the morning. You can also follow me on Twitter at YoniFreedhoff

It’s quite possible that the single stupidest school lunch policy on the planet comes courtesy of a strange interpretation of the Manitoba Government’s Early Learning and Child Care lunch regulations (an earlier version of this article incorrectly pointed at the Manitoba Child Care Association as the source of the strangely interpreted policy).

via Weighty Matters: Parents Fined For Not Sending Ritz Crackers In Kids’ Lunches.

A WIC Shutdown: Here is Where You Can Get Baby Formula

Posted on October 8, 2013 by llpitlwp

We all know that the government shutdown has caused problems for those parents receiving formula and baby food from WIC.

Jessica Lawson, the feminist mom has compiled a list by state of where to get WIC aid. It is not a complete list but it is a good resource for those in need.

Lisa Belkin published this information on Huffington Post earlier today.

I hope it is helpful!

Where To Find Formula And Baby Food During A WIC Shutdown.

Summer Dilemmas-Would You Ban Music From Parked Ice Cream Trucks?

Posted on July 11, 2013 by llpitlwp

All I can say is what next?

Years ago, the Good Humor truck had bells,which the driver had to manually jingle when he was approaching his stops.

He also made regular neighborhood stops near my home in a very large New York suburb.

Truthfully, I am not so sure about ice cream trucks in general with all the “safety issues” and “food issues” that plague kids today…

It did make me think however, that I do avoid the ice cream truck on a regular basis and try to make healthier choices like frozen yogurt. I may be only fooling myself but it makes me feel better.

What about you?

“The music is very important to us,” Zea said. “Because when we’re on the street, the kids, they listen to the music and they get excited. So they tell their mothers, ‘hey mom, the ice cream truck is coming.’”

The issue is also raised about how the ordinance may effect the safety of children around the trucks.

“If they stop playing music, then the driver is driving by (and the kids) won’t notice there is an ice cream truck and they might hit the kids,” Ice cream supplier Bob Bakshi said.

via Long Beach Looks To Ban Music From Parked Ice Cream Trucks « CBS Los Angeles.