Sunday, March 20, 2011

Sunday Surf: Lazy Sunday

Welcome to the Sunday Surf! Here are some of the best links I've read this past week.

Due to an early morning working on a guest post, a late morning spent putting the same puzzle together three times (can you tell Mikko likes it?), an afternoon playdate with some super-charming girls, a completely gratuitous dinner out downtown with a side trip to the carousel at the waterfront, and a much-needed pregnancy-excusable nap, I'm late getting started on Sunday Surf today. Ah, Sundays!

I somehow thought I hadn't read much this week, but my Reader shared items queue is chock full. If I put off sharing another week, it just might burst. So let's get to it!

(Just noticing: I think I must have been reading on my phone, because I don't think I commented on, like, anything. Oops!)
    2-lana-soaker
  • "Cloth Diapering Papa" from Anktangle: Fun interview to get the perspective of those who are rumored to be hardest to convert to cloth diapering (though Amy & I never faced any opposition). My own CDing papa's got a picture there!
  • From Aruban Breastfeeding Mamas
    • "Single Mothers, you CAN succeed!": I'm not single, but I thought this post was insightful and genuine. Wendy discusses the downsides and fears of single parenthood but sums up the strength she's learned:
      "It takes two to make a kid, but if only one is left, that one is certainly capable of raising a well-adjusted, integrated and loving human being. …

      "Even though to some the pain of singleness feels like birth pangs, I dare you, I challenge you to parent your child as if you did have a partner, treat your child as if you had infinite amounts of patience and love your child as if you lacked absolutely nothing in the world because in fact, your child loves you even if you lack everything else in the world. "
  • "Installing Speed Bumps to Television Viewing" from childhood101.com: Love these speed bumps! And they really do work. We have a marble run, a puzzle, a remote control car, and some Duplos competing with the television for attention right now, and frequently winning.
  • From Laura's Blog, her latest awesome analyses on birth weight and maternal conditions:
    • "Relationship Between Baby's Birth Weight and Diabetes": There's a significantly bigger increase in baby birth weight with mothers who have diabetes pre-pregnancy than with mothers who have gestational diabetes, as compared with non-diabetic mothers. Either GD mothers control their GD very, very well, or fears of macrosomia due to GD are dubious.
  • Via Laura's Blog, I liked this article: "Push to Reduce Rates of Early Term Induced Deliveries" from WSJ.com:
    "For an unborn baby to develop fully, obstetrics groups firmly recommend 39 weeks in the womb—and not a day less, if labor will be induced without a medical reason."
    I was already a big believer in letting babies decide when their birthdays should be, but I had no idea so much development happened in the very final weeks. Stay in, baby!
    Visit Natural Parents Network
  • From Natural Parents Network, in a week on Healthy Eating:
            Just as a little light at the end of the tunnel for anyone going through the picky-icky stage: Mikko just in the last several days has been devouring food and has consented to eat foods he hadn't touched since he was an oh-so-malleable baby-led-weaning toddler (back in those halcyon days when I could afford to be sooo smug). He ate a bite of cucumber! He consented to eat pizza! (I know — big whoop, but seriously, he refused any form of melted cheese for so long.) He ate bread with visible herbs in it without flinching! I know I shouldn't be saying this in a post, or the internet curse will take over (actually, it's probably because I recently blogged the opposite that he's made this turnaround), but it's really been so heartening to see him expand (re-expand) his tastes — and his appetite. I wonder if a growth spurt is in our near future!
            My recommendation, to myself all along, and to anyone playing along at home, is to continue making eating, food choices, and mealtimes positive and mainly child-directed (obviously, you as the parents get to help decide what choices to present, but I'm not about refusing Mikko's suggestions) and to continue offering plenty of good and varied choices and showing your own appreciation of them, and the finicky stage will pass. Eventually.



You can find more shared items during the week at my public Google Reader recommendations feed.

Check out Authentic Parenting, Baby Dust Diaries, Navelgazing, Momma Jorje, I Thought I Knew Mama, Enjoy Birth, A Domesticated Woman's Adventures (various), Fabulous Mama Chronicles, Kelly Hogaboom (Fridays), The Parent Vortex, Hippie Housewife (Saturdays), Multiple Musings, Motherhood Moments, Mama and Baby Love, and A Little Bit of All of It for more Sunday Surfing! (If you also participate in a regular link list, whether on Sunday or not, let me know and I'll add your link.)

Feel free to add your recommendations in the comments. Happy reading!

12 comments:

Rachael @ The Variegated Life said...

Thanks for linking to that old-ish post of mine! It requires an update, I think, for two reasons. Maybe three? (1) I now understand the distinction between attachment theory and attachment parenting. (2) There's your point about the fact that quality day care is not available to everyone, which is, I believe (3) a result of ideology about motherhood that envisions completely self-sacrificing 24/7 care. Maybe I'll get to that update some time this year!

Mark Clemens said...

Enjoyed the link to the "It's ok to change your mind". I will be telling my girlfriend about your blog as we are trying to have a baby and she would enjoy it.

I Thought I Knew Mama said...

Great recommendations! I can especially identify with The Parent Vortex post.

I have a regular Sunday Surf post if you wouldn't mind adding my link. Thanks!

Meagan @ The Happiest Mom said...

Thanks for linking me--and I can't wait to check out the other blogs you've linked here.

Momma Jorje said...

Oh my gosh! So many great links. I tend to pick out one or two to follow, but I left comments on a bunch of these!

I am also amused that we both posted one matching link on our SS posts. :-D (Happy Candles)

I can not believe that I didn't catch that was Mikko & Sam when I read that article earlier in the week! Though honestly, that shot / angle / facial hair make Sam look quite slim.

Michelle @ The Parent Vortex said...

Thanks for the link love! I'm off to check out some of the other posts now..

Kristin @ Intrepid Murmurings said...

Thanks for linking! It was wonderful to see you Sunday!

Hooray for the newfound adventurousness in eating (knock on wood!). I've definitely noticed a correlation between Emma's willingness to try new foods and her being open to new things other aspects of her life -- like when she is trying new things physically or socially, willing to wear some new clothes, etc, her eating repertoire expands as well. Her cautiousness has definitely always been a personality trait, and when I realized her pickiness with food as just another facet of that I was able to accept it a lot more.

Lauren Wayne said...

@Rachael @ The Variegated Life: I would love to see an update. As to (3): Remember that article that made the rounds that said mothers (mothers exclusively) need to be available 24/7 to their children for at least the first three years? Um…yeah. That's not classist or sexist or completely unreasonable…

Lauren Wayne said...

@Mark Clemens: Glad to hear it! I really resonated with that as well. I think we (and parenting "experts") tend to make consistency into some sort of parenting demigod.

Lauren Wayne said...

@Momma Jorje: That's so funny about the twinsie posting! :) I haven't even gotten around to everyone surfs yet. (Since I didn't even get my own up on Sunday, ahem.)

I'll let Sam know he was unrecognizable. :) Isn't Mikko wee? It's so funny (and incredibly cliché, etc.) to look back and see how much he's grown! I think I'll carry that with me into this next newborn phase — that it really is, even though it does not feel like it — fleeting.

Lauren Wayne said...

@Kristin @ Intrepid Murmurings: That is such an insightful link — I'd never even thought of that, that cautiousness in other things would extend to cautiousness in food as well. Makes so much sense!

I was so glad Mikko loosened up and got into playing with the group. It might not have seemed like much from your perspective, but he really was so much freer than he usually is around new people. Yea for this adventurous phase! However long it lasts. :)

Which reminds me to say as well: Thank you for letting him take the time he needed to warm up. The last time we met with a big group and he was being hesitant like that, people were coming up to him, leaning down to speak into his face, taking his hat away — ack! It did not help matters, so we really appreciated your family's sensitivity. (I noticed even Emma being very sweet in handing me the toys to hand to him.)

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