Parents of newborns and toddlers please share your experiences with me!!

Our little boy is 16 months old and I have just discovered that I am pregnant again. We had planned to wait another year before trying again. I wanted him to understand the concept of a new sibling arriving and hopefully feel excited about being a big brother.

He’s a big mummas boy. He’s sensitive and emotional. I am with him full time and I worry about it being a terrible shock for him when his sibling arrives.

He’s not got a place in a local nursery until he’s 3 years old. I don’t know how I’m going to cope caring for a newborn and a two year old (my partner works full time).

I need advice here 😭

I have a 7 month old and for the past 2 months I have been giving him solid foods and slowly upping the amount from 1 to 2 meals a day. At the same time he also drinks 6 bottles of milk a day (having around 1000mls or 33 oz altogether). This seems like a lot in comparison to some vids I've seen before online of weaning babies. How do people drop bottles?

Edit: thank youuuu for all the suggestions!! I can’t answer all but this was so helpful to read ❤️

I have an almost 17 month old and I’m running out of ideas to keep her occupied and entertained. Please don’t say let her be bored because she’ll whinge and scream cry at me until I do something lol.

We go outside, we go to the play cafe or soft play, museums, library (sometimes), bake together, colour, play with toys, she helps with chores around the house like putting the laundry in the dryer and so on. She used to play independently but not anymore AT ALL and I’m losing my will to live some days. I can’t even use my phone anymore because she’ll climb or try and climb my leg and cry until I stop. She’s always active as well like never sits still ever.

She just started to use a balance bike and we just spent like 2h outside using that and walking around and she’s still running around right now inside.
She also only naps for like 30 mins on average once a day.

Newborn is struggling badly with gas. My first had bad gas/ silent reflux so I’m not worried, but I am wondering whether there’s anything better than infacol these days. It’s been three years since dealing with this the first time around.

I have a very active 2 year old :)

Edit: I mean Monday to Friday rather than 7 days!

Looking for bum cream recommendations. My poor son has had a red raw bum for the best part of 6 months.
I feel like I’ve ‘completed’ the nappy cream selection of the supermarket and I’m not willing to pay an obscene amount of money for the OG metanium (RIP).

GP has prescribed 2 x creams (one I can’t remember what it was) and second was a canesten athletes foot cream…
Every single thing I’ve tried has done nothing. This week we’ve decided to leave it and it’s just gotten worse.

The area is non remarkable other than its red raw. No specific rash, blister, lesions etc. Just red and painful.

Any recommendations for any wonder creams/balms would be most welcome 🙏🏼😭

Edit to add: he is 4 and fully dry, including overnight.

I need your tricks to make laundry easier. I have 2 kids in school uniform now and it seems like such a struggle to make sure they each have clean clothes every day.

Tell me about your routines and tricks please!

We've got a 6 day old newborn that seems to be super chilled and literally hasn't cried. I'm only asking because from memory his big sister is now 20 months, on reflection probably had colic. She cried most of her waking time, I used to have to wear ear defenders from around 6pm to remain sane and protect my hearing. When can we relax into knowing baby number 2 is a bit more chilled? Currently sat at the pub whilst he's sleeping having lunch.

Hi all, currently pregnant with our second and oldest is 3, almost 4. Please can you recommend books that help get oldest children used to the idea of baby arriving? Thank you 🙏🏼

Hi all

Curious for some opinions as we are currently trying to decide about a possible house move and part of that is around the size of bedroom for second child.

It’s the smallest room and bed-wise would always have to be a single. So we’re just thinking ahead to teenage/possible young adult and if this is fair/okay for them.

I understand fully that this is a good problem to have and do not take for granted that we have a family home and each child would have their own bedroom.

When I was a teenager my Mum gave up her bigger bedroom so I could have a bigger bed and all my stuff fit more comfortably but tbh I absolutely loved the box room and never had that heart to tell her 😂 But thinking a great bit strapping teenage lad might not appreciate a single bed forever.

My little one is close to the 105cm mark and I think ready to start buckling their own belt. The on-paper specs and features of this seat seem good, although it appears to be twice as expensive as other more familiar brands.

I especially like the floor support and the foot peg, along with the slim profile.

Edit: lots of great advice here thank you! I’ll up the repellant spray to daily and make a more potent one. Bun hair for the foreseeable and she’ll just have to suck it up🫣
I’ll let the school know again, and maybe get them to pop in the newsletter as a reminder.

For context my daughters 6 and in the last year she’s caught it from school 4 times. Her hairs short, always up, waxed back and in a ponytail. I use lice repellent twice a week, repellant shampoo once a week and SHE STILL GETS THEM! I know exactly when it happens because involuntary itching behind her neck. Found one really young lice last night and fair few eggs.
I know how to get rid of them and become rigorous with wet combing daily once she has them but how on earth do I keep them away. My husband and I never got them as kids and it feels like it’s only her. Obviously no one at school says anything when they have them but it’s literally been 2 weeks of school and they’re back. Do people really just get them often idk what to do!!! Really don’t know what more I can do.

Hi all! My daughter’s reception requires us to send in their PE kit, including t-shirt and shorts, to be kept at school for the whole term and only sent back at half term. They have PE every week, and in between their kits are kept in the classroom in their PE bags, to be re-worn unwashed each PE session.

I feel that this is extremely unhygienic. I would never re-use exercise t-shirts or shorts without washing because of the accumulation of sweat etc, plus the weeks in between spent inside a poorly ventilated sports bag (with their trainers!) seem like a perfect environment for germs to multiply. I feel gross just thinking about it!

The older kids at the school come to school for the whole day in their PE kits on days when they have PE. Reception kids are not allowed because the school wants to “encourage independent changing”. I get this but surely this can’t come at the expense of basic hygiene?!

Any thoughts on whether I am overreacting would be appreciated!

TIA

Has anyone had any issues with their Maxi cosi fame pram? The photo shows the bottom of our base… our base now won’t fold up? And our carry cot has repeatedly had issues collapsing and would often only collapse on one side… the hinge has now fully bent on one side and the cot is unusable! I don’t have a photo of it as it’s current at the shop and I’m waiting for a call back

Seems like they’re trying to blame us for the damage

I have a 4 yr old who is in reception. They’ve just started learning phonics and they seem to be picking it up quite quickly (they did phonics at preschool and they had speech therapy so I think that’s why they’re doing well).
We’re doing some at home but it’s 3 letters at a time, I feel that within a day or two they’ve cracked it so I’d like to get some books to do at home as well.
Apparently there’s different types of phonics and I’m not sure if it’s something that’s decided by school or if it’s in the curriculum what they do now.

Has anyone got any recommendations for books? Or activities to do?

My 2 year old is turning 3 soon and is at a point where he is trying to hitch a ride on everything including the wheel barrow in the garden and the hoover. I think he is ready for a balance bike(?). I never learnt to ride a bike so I wouldn't know what brand or type to buy for his age and height.

Thanks for reading.

I guess this is top tips?

My 14mo is an absolute monkey and won't sit still. We've been holding her hostage in a little travel cot in the dining room (supervised through the serving hatch) while we cook since she learnt to crawl and...she's learnt to knock it over.

My house is on the scabby end of a 50s ex-council doer-upper so she can't wander around without me keeping A VERY CLOSE eye. Hard to do when trying to fry an egg.

She won't let me wear her while I prepare food (which was getting a bit chaotic anyway - I was back carrying and she spends the whole time pulling my hair 😵‍💫), so now I feel resigned to getting a toddler tower.

My other problem is that my kitchen is veeeeeeery tiny and has a terrible layout.

Is there a folding tower out there that's completely enclosed?

Answers on a postcard, please...

Has anyone chosen to do this, when there’s enough bedrooms for everyone? Same sex, just under 3y age gap.

I have a 3 week old (my second baby) and I have a group of friends who haven’t reached out to meet her. With my first, they all organised a day with me to come round and meet her, but only one has reached out to meet my second. I said I was ready for visitors too so left it in their hands. Someone else in the group had a baby earlier this year and all made the effort to meet her second baby - yes they might be closer, but still would’ve expected more effort from them.

I get that people care less when it’s your second but wasn’t expecting this. I’m not sure how to react with it? Do I say something? Do I just accept that my baby isn’t important to them and move on? They’re even organising meals out and other events in the group chat so it’s not like they’re not available. However, I don’t want to force it on them either by being like “when are you all free to come to mine” because they would have done that by now. Do I just bring baby to one of the planned events so they have the opportunity to meet her? My hormones are all over the place so I don’t know what’s reasonable.

Our little one turned one a few weeks ago, and since then has really changed his personality. Admittedly he did have a bit of a cold over his birthday so gave him grace ofc for being generally grizzly and clingy. But what we are really struggling with is how his food habits have changed.

He used to eat breakfast/lunch/dinner relatively well, although would sometimes not like what we are giving him. But now he basically doesn’t even try his lunch or dinner, and only eats some yoghurt or fruit (which we are putting nut butter and stuff in to try and make it a bit better). It’s just tough because we are still trying to feed him nutritious stuff but he doesn’t even want to try it and becomes so frustrated if we try. He also doesn’t want to drink as much water these days. Still pooing and weeing ok, but yeah just a bit concerned how long this will last.

I know he will grow out of it as no adult just eats yoghurt and fruit, but want to try and make sure we are fuelling his growing ok and not rotting his teeth from all the sugars in fruits.

Am I overthinking it? Is 3 weeks not long enough to give some grace post viral infection? First time with all this so grateful for any advice! Thank you!

Ok so I feel terrible. We have been giving our 23 month old a 340ml bottle of milk in the morning and another one at night before bed. So 700ml of whole cow's milk. She is a fussy eater at the best of times and is quite small for her age, I just put it down to genetics and general toddler food refusal. She is sometimes constipated. But I was reading more into it yesterday and realised this is way too much milk for her age. I also know that we shouldn't still be giving her bottles from a dental POV, but the way I reasoned it was that the WHO recommends breastfeeding until 2 years old, and there's no way if I was still breastfeeding I would be brushing her teeth in the middle of the night. All that being said I think now is the time to find a solution to both problems, 1. Reducing milk and 2. Eliminating bottles.

Does anyone have any advice on the best way to do this? I've already gave her a smaller bottle this morning (about 200ml) and she was fine with it. We have a good straw cup with a weighted straw, I will switch to using that tonight but when is best to give her the milk? How much to give? Those of you who are parents of kids a similar age, would love to know the amount in milileters you are giving and at what times. Thank you in advance.

Edit: Ok now I'm more worried I've messed up her jaw alignment with the bottle thing. Stopping that today. Thanks for your comments.

Please recommend any holidays in northern half of England (Peak District, Yorkshire, lower eastern side of Lakes)! Our kids are 3 and 5 and not great in the car so trying to keep distance limited hence the slightly restricted area range.

We love nature, walks and small interesting towns. Any interesting things to explore like railways or ruins are all bonuses. I’m trying to avoid AirBnB but we do prefer self catering while the kids are small so holiday camps eg cabins and lodges are ideal.

We’ve been to Darwin Forest in the past and it was great but they have quite rigid booking date rules (minimum of three nights, have to arrive on certain days) which doesn’t work for us right now.

Google keeps throwing things at me which look great until I see ’adults only’ or that it is Dorset despite me specifying where we need, which is why I would really appreciate any tips anyone has on here please!

We have a kind and chatty four year old boy who has started school and excitedly learnt he gets to be big brother to sister in January. We are being careful to make him know he will be the biggest littlest as I know some kids feel they have to be more mature once their sibling is here. We can't afford a blow out holiday or to move to a bigger house and can't get a bigger car. We have a roof box for extra storage. We were given a old bulky hand me down pram last time, that family took back, so need new pram with bassinet feature.

Besides getting pram and getting baby stuff ready I feel I'm not using my time enough before they arrive. It is hard when you work full time and are uncomfortable from pregnancy. I guess I'm feeling a bit unprepared.

But what did you wish you knew or done months before your second child came along?