Continuum concept (ish) Tribe - Page 53

[spottiew]

Originally Posted by sweetpeppers

Even in the tribes she talked about, adults still sometimes played with children, and she says that they were nursed whenever they wanted it. Children weren't made to work ever. They helped when they wanted to, and played the rest of the time. I disagree that watching us take care of the house and do every day things is not go to stimulate intellectual development. Children copy our behavior in their play. I do play with him sometimes when he needs it (he is an only child), but I think my focus stays mostly on adult things. The hardest part about CC is not having more children around for him to play with. I'm a nanny, so that helps with him being an only child.

Can I pop in and ask something? I could not fill my day with 'taking care of the house' even if I wanted to... do other people really spend their days doing chores and projects and 'adult things', etc, day after day? (not sure what the adult things would be? i guess i am not used to following my interests for hours a day like that- my pre-kid life was a fulltime job, not home all day, so there isn't a way to just 'continue my regular life with kid in tow' I only have one kid (age 4) and I think that is different than if you have a bunch... I'm asking becuase it's always been by CC question- what do you 'do' all day... it just feels like there's only so much puttering around that one can do- and that both I and child would go bonkers just being around home like that.

[riomidwife]

Originally Posted by riomidwife

I so agree! Looking back through this thread there are so many unanswered issues....I think the idea had been proposed before but rejected. I think ALL the popular parenting philosophies should have their own forums, not just a thread. Unschooling and homeschooling have their own forums! This is one of the only places online where you can find these conversations happening. I hardly get over to this one because after a certain point it's just too hard to follow the thread. Imagine all that sharing that could happen in our own forum!

I am writing to a mod to ask about having a separate forum. Has anybody else done this? Maybe if enough people request we can get something happening!

[Calm]

Spottiew, I hear you. There is way too much difference between our lives and those of natural cultures. I have a page on my site developing about this, although like most of my life, it is still unfinished (procrastination, anyone?). Parenting, Unplugged

I personally take the angle that you have to change things up for the first few years of the child's life if you want to try to be biologically appropriate with child raising. We simply can't keep things the same AND be biologically appropriate if for no other reason than our modern western lives are so far from natural as to be hilarious.

"Getting into nature" is going to the park, beach or the backyard for most, it certainly isn't thrashing through a jungle or hiking a mountain or picking berries from a cactus in the desert. We don't teach how to build a ground nest out of leaves or a shelter out of bark, we teach how to operate a remote control. The fact that we have a term like "getting into nature" pretty much sums it up.

So we have to make a choice. Keep things the same and struggle with "what to do" all day, or change things up, shake things around and go feral for a while. We learn as much as they do when we do that, but it isn't for everyone. I don't do housework because I can't. I have a fierce jungle baby, who lets me know what he wants and how he wants it and he is demanding natural and I am adapting. Kicking and screaming about it sometimes, yes, but adapting.

What would you do all day if you didn't have a job but also didn't have a child? Aside from "go stir crazy". There's no such thing as boring situations, only boring thoughts. Imagine you are financially independent and finally free of work constraints... what would you do? I'd still do my job occasionally (and I do it for free at the moment, actually), so I just take my son. I also like sitting around, sloth like. It's not everyone's cup of tea but I love it, and my son adapted to that (we have had to adapt to each other's quirks, as ya do).

Usually though, it's not easy. Suburban life is designed to take us away from our homes, into work and then back to cook and sleep. Weekends are also about getting away from our homes, into some activity, and then back to cook and sleep. We don't really "live" in our homes, there's not much to learn in them for the very small. My son goes stir crazy if we're not outside, he starts getting destructive because he isn't growing and learning. I still haven't figured out how to do it in a house, esp as I am not one of those people who can do the homemade play dough thing and water play and whatnot without wanting to rip my own face off. It's just NOT my thing. I don't do "child play". And there are many like me, many more than they like to admit because it's just not the "done thing" to admit you hate playing child games when you have children.

Luckily for me, I am drawn to the parenting philosophies that don't encourage child play and structuring my life around them, but them fitting in with me. I believe child games are for children, my time for them has passed, thank Lerds, and my parents never played with me (they were old folk when I was born) and I benefited from that and wouldn't change it. So I have to create a life for them to fit into. Something that benefits us all. Not easy. Other children were meant to be in a child's life. I see this in all other cultures - except ours, as usual. Unstructured play with different ages, unfettered with adult presence. They only play with us cos we're the only ones there. I find as soon as there are other kids around, I become invisible to my kids. And it is MAGICAL. They don't want to play with me, they don't even need me to "Watch this" and "look at me mom". Their neediness just disappears. It suddenly feels... natural.

I wish I had an answer, but I don't. I resent our culture, can you tell? We've isolated the family, esp the mother and children, from the rest of the world, from our communities.

If anyone has any ideas, I'd be open to them. Let's start a commune, a good one, on a river bank, with tire swings and nightly campfires. Woot.

[D'sMama]

Originally Posted by Calm

If anyone has any ideas, I'd be open to them. Let's start a commune, a good one, on a river bank, with tire swings and nightly campfires. Woot.

I've so been wishing for a commune lately! I moved from the city to the suburbs last fall while pregnant. The isolation is overpowering sometimes. Being in a house, alone, with a baby and no one else just feels so unnatural. But it's what I do. (Of course we get out every day, but driving in a car to go shopping among strangers with little interaction... not much better.)

I need a village. I think every mom and baby does.

[Calm]

I need a village. I think every mom and baby does.

Me too.

[EnviroBecca]

EnviroKid and I have gained a lot from commuting on public transit. We are out in the world, even if it is the urbanized world rather than "nature"; we are among other people of many types, interacting with some of them; he is learning many things about adult life; it's a shared experience that connects us; and he's integrated into what I did before he was born, in that I still have the same job, to which I've always commuted by bus, and commuting together makes him part of my workday even though he doesn't actually come to my workplace (usually). I think it's a lot more continuum than traveling by car, anyway.

As far as having a village, I've probably mentioned this in the thread already, but we have a wonderful "village" at our church. Although Christians are a minority in our neighborhood, the church is near our house and our neighborhood business district, and probably 2/3 of church members live within two miles of the church, so the building certainly feels like part of our community. We share that building with a mostly-stable group of about 100 people of all ages who get together for various projects and social events as well as worship. Twice a month, we have a potluck dinner for which we all pitch in to set up tables, chairs, and dishes from OUR building and then clean them and put them away. There's a really strong, pleasant sense of community around owning and using the space and its furnishings together.

[Periwinkle]

Originally Posted by spottiew

Can I pop in and ask something? I could not fill my day with 'taking care of the house' even if I wanted to... do other people really spend their days doing chores and projects and 'adult things', etc, day after day?

ITA. This was the point I made in my last post about how cleaning house all day and doing laundry is NOT what MY children need to be doing all day to develop into the adults that need to function in our society. I do a whole lot more than that, and involve them (or try to) in almost every facet of my modern, cultured, intellectual life. (not saying I'm some cultural diva, lol, just compared to doing nothing but tending house and doing traditional activities all day, the modern life of the typical American much less someone who values reading, art, etc. is WAY more varied)

[zansmama]

Originally Posted by Calm

CC lead me to believe that they don't need a view, that they just want to be held. Well, that turned out to be a load of hogwash.

I guess I never got that... just the opposite. It seemed like the babies were having constantly changing views, what with going into the river, fetching water several times a day, bouncing on mom's back while she danced, etc...
Also there were a lot of interesting other people about, and a whole jungle to look at...
Anyway, I think that by 16 months, the toddlers were mostly following the big kids around, no? maybe he just needs some more kids to hang out with.

Btw, I didn't see you mention it, so I don't know for sure: are you still nursing? Maybe if some of your holding time went to nursing, he would be content for longer periods... just an idea...
With ds, I definitely felt like he was happiest when around other kids.

[zansmama]

Originally Posted by riomidwife

Curious where you're getting this from? My understanding was that even among traditional hunter-gatherer cultures there is still much variation in the timing of crawling, walking, etc., with a strong genetic component.

My son was in-arms most of babyhood, with very occasionally hanging out on the floor. He did not begin crawling until 8 or 9 months, and began walking at 15 months, which is when his papa began walking. In my own personal experience I see a trend in larger babies walking later.

I guess I was under the impression that CC babies walked earlier in general as well...
Ds also walked at 9 mos...
Maybe it's a muscle tone thing?

[major_mama11]

Hi everyone! What an awesome thread! Just stumbled on this and have been going back and reading the old posts the past couple days. I read the book a month or two ago (first book I read while DS was a newborn actually), and it gave me a lot to think about. I will be posting more soon...

[jrose_lee]

Babies and "choke-able" pieces

Hey! I'm looking for everyone's thoughts on babies (ds is 5 months) and small pieces/toys. What is everyone's experience with this? Ds1 is 3.5 so we have some smaller toys around now.

Is anyone really concerned with baby choking on a small object? There must be some reason for concern or else people wouldn't worry about it?

Can I hear thoughts on the safety of letting babies have smaller toys etc?

TIA!

[Abraisme]

Originally Posted by Calm

Spottiew, I hear you. There is way too much difference between our lives and those of natural cultures. I have a page on my site developing about this, although like most of my life, it is still unfinished (procrastination, anyone?). Parenting, Unplugged

I personally take the angle that you have to change things up for the first few years of the child's life if you want to try to be biologically appropriate with child raising. We simply can't keep things the same AND be biologically appropriate if for no other reason than our modern western lives are so far from natural as to be hilarious.

"Getting into nature" is going to the park, beach or the backyard for most, it certainly isn't thrashing through a jungle or hiking a mountain or picking berries from a cactus in the desert. We don't teach how to build a ground nest out of leaves or a shelter out of bark, we teach how to operate a remote control. The fact that we have a term like "getting into nature" pretty much sums it up.

So we have to make a choice. Keep things the same and struggle with "what to do" all day, or change things up, shake things around and go feral for a while. We learn as much as they do when we do that, but it isn't for everyone. I don't do housework because I can't. I have a fierce jungle baby, who lets me know what he wants and how he wants it and he is demanding natural and I am adapting. Kicking and screaming about it sometimes, yes, but adapting.

What would you do all day if you didn't have a job but also didn't have a child? Aside from "go stir crazy". There's no such thing as boring situations, only boring thoughts. Imagine you are financially independent and finally free of work constraints... what would you do? I'd still do my job occasionally (and I do it for free at the moment, actually), so I just take my son. I also like sitting around, sloth like. It's not everyone's cup of tea but I love it, and my son adapted to that (we have had to adapt to each other's quirks, as ya do).

Usually though, it's not easy. Suburban life is designed to take us away from our homes, into work and then back to cook and sleep. Weekends are also about getting away from our homes, into some activity, and then back to cook and sleep. We don't really "live" in our homes, there's not much to learn in them for the very small. My son goes stir crazy if we're not outside, he starts getting destructive because he isn't growing and learning. I still haven't figured out how to do it in a house, esp as I am not one of those people who can do the homemade play dough thing and water play and whatnot without wanting to rip my own face off. It's just NOT my thing. I don't do "child play". And there are many like me, many more than they like to admit because it's just not the "done thing" to admit you hate playing child games when you have children.

Luckily for me, I am drawn to the parenting philosophies that don't encourage child play and structuring my life around them, but them fitting in with me. I believe child games are for children, my time for them has passed, thank Lerds, and my parents never played with me (they were old folk when I was born) and I benefited from that and wouldn't change it. So I have to create a life for them to fit into. Something that benefits us all. Not easy. Other children were meant to be in a child's life. I see this in all other cultures - except ours, as usual. Unstructured play with different ages, unfettered with adult presence. They only play with us cos we're the only ones there. I find as soon as there are other kids around, I become invisible to my kids. And it is MAGICAL. They don't want to play with me, they don't even need me to "Watch this" and "look at me mom". Their neediness just disappears. It suddenly feels... natural.

I wish I had an answer, but I don't. I resent our culture, can you tell? We've isolated the family, esp the mother and children, from the rest of the world, from our communities.

If anyone has any ideas, I'd be open to them. Let's start a commune, a good one, on a river bank, with tire swings and nightly campfires. Woot.

I'm in! Where should be build our commune?

[Abraisme]

Originally Posted by zansmama

I guess I was under the impression that CC babies walked earlier in general as well...
Ds also walked at 9 mos...
Maybe it's a muscle tone thing?

DS was held all the time (cc style) and he didn't crawl till 10m and walked at 12m. I think it has more to do with genetics than attachment parenting or muscle tone. DD is 10 weeks, held most of the time, but she's still pretty weak. Not much I can do about it, it just is that way..

[zansmama]

Originally Posted by jrose_lee

Hey! I'm looking for everyone's thoughts on babies (ds is 5 months) and small pieces/toys. What is everyone's experience with this? Ds1 is 3.5 so we have some smaller toys around now.

Is anyone really concerned with baby choking on a small object? There must be some reason for concern or else people wouldn't worry about it?

Can I hear thoughts on the safety of letting babies have smaller toys etc?

TIA!

Well, I have heard that breastfed babies have a stronger gag reflex... according to this theory, it is bottlefed babies who create the choking baby statistics... actually, I can't recall ds ever really choking, and he was always putting little things in his mouth...
I have also heard that you should encourage your little one to "spit it out" instead of reaching into their mouth to take it out: this helps them develop their own reflex more.

[EnviroBecca]

I might have been worried about my baby choking if he had been inclined to wander off on his own, but he always preferred to play near me (or another adult) so if he had choked we would have been right there to help him, so we were not particularly concerned about letting him play with small objects. Also, he did not show much tendency to put small things in his mouth; he was not very orally oriented, and what he did chew/suck on was usually parts of bigger things. We did set aside a few toys due to concerns about choking, for example a ball filled with very tiny plastic foam pellets inside stretchy fabric--he liked to chew on it, and we figured that if he bit it open, he could aspirate the pellets very suddenly and they'd be hard to get out of him!

As it turned out, the only times he choked involved food, not toys:
1. He experimented with eating crackers while lying down and put too many in his mouth at once. He was in my lap at the time, so I just turned him face-down and let him cough them out.
2. At 2 years old, he was eating raw snowpeas in the car when he inexplicably fell asleep with his mouth full and choked. I was glad EnviroDaddy was riding in back with him so that he noticed right away and could start pulling food out of his mouth even before I stopped the car! This is just the sort of dumb thing people with an intact continuum are not supposed to do , but accidents do happen.

[Periwinkle]

Originally Posted by jrose_lee

Hey! I'm looking for everyone's thoughts on babies (ds is 5 months) and small pieces/toys. What is everyone's experience with this? Ds1 is 3.5 so we have some smaller toys around now.

Is anyone really concerned with baby choking on a small object? There must be some reason for concern or else people wouldn't worry about it?

Can I hear thoughts on the safety of letting babies have smaller toys etc?

TIA!

A baby too young to clear a small object from their mouth (e.g., <6-9 months) is too young to be on the ground near such objects. I'm sure that CC would say that a baby should still very much be "in arms" at this stage and part of that is to protect the baby. An older baby... say a 15 month old who is capable of eating real foods (not just purees) - things like Cheerios and peas and bits of meat or whatnot - should not have much trouble with pushing a small Lego out of their mouths. There's really no difference between a small Lego and a small pebble, wood chip, nut, seed, etc. But the important thing is that a baby even this age was in the constant company of a knowledgeable caregiver who could easily swipe something chokeable like an almond out of the baby's mouth if they had trouble with it.

[Holiztic]

Hey all. I have not read CC and don't have it in me (okay, I do really, I just don't have the time) to read through all 53 pages of this thread! Forgive me for just jumping in!

I think I just get the idea of CC without knowing anything specifically about the book's ideas. Please feel free to tell me if I have it wrong.

We did on-demand bf, co-sleeping (still do), in arms etc until he could walk. Did not own a single item for holding or confining a baby (bouncy seat, walker, excersaucer, pack n play, etc) or for "entertaining" either. He was in a sling or in my lap.

Once he could walk we decided to get a stroller. We've hardly used it. He walks everywhere we go, unless he's just too pooped, then I'll carry him long enough to get home or somewhere to rest. (except when DH is around, when DS is carried everywhere--see later question)

We never baby-proofed, we just taught him what he should and shouldn't do. He's always used "real" everything. Plates, glasses, table knives, etc. He walks in the grocery store with me and is quite "well behaved". I don't know if this is CC, but I always just believed kids will live up to what we expect of them and what their world is made of.

Ds has always eaten at the table with us, what we eat and when we eat it. We talk to him and we talk to one another. No toys, TV (well, never any TV, but certainly not at meals!) Well, we now have a 2.5 year old that will sit in his seat for up to 1 hour (at all three meals) never less than 30 minutes. Eats all of his food, mostly quietly or with conversation.

Our typical day is about 60-70% me working around the house (I cook everything from scratch. Everything. I work in the kitchen 3-4 hours a day while DS plays on his own He'll check in with me or ask for something for his play. He's never "entertained" during this time though I'll suggest something for him to do. He rarely whines unless he's hungry or overtired. The other 30-40% is meal times (together), playing outside, errands, or reading. Sometimes I'll play with him, but often I do yard work or read while he'll play quietly in a pile of leaves or around a tree for up to an hour.

I notice on the days that I am really tired or ill and sit more, he becomes fussy and clingy. Is this in line with the CC idea?

Okay, that was just to see if I am even accurate in thinking I am CC. Feel free to tell me I'm not. Maybe I should just read the book!!

What I really wanted to ask is this: DH is not like me. He STILL says things like "honey, can you watch him/play with him, I need to use the bathroom". I keep saying "he's 2, he's fine" I keep explaining that the reason DS clings to DH and fusses and constantly demands DH do this and do that and DS almost exclusively throws tantrums when DH is around is because DH JUST watches/plays with DS. He never tries to DO anything else. Like he's the babysitter.

Would reading the book help? He's a reader and very open to written materials when well written. I just want to make sure its right for our situation, as his free time is pretty minimal.

Thanks!

[riverscout]

Originally Posted by Calm

Spottiew, I hear you. There is way too much difference between our lives and those of natural cultures. I have a page on my site developing about this, although like most of my life, it is still unfinished (procrastination, anyone?). Parenting, Unplugged

I personally take the angle that you have to change things up for the first few years of the child's life if you want to try to be biologically appropriate with child raising. We simply can't keep things the same AND be biologically appropriate if for no other reason than our modern western lives are so far from natural as to be hilarious.

"Getting into nature" is going to the park, beach or the backyard for most, it certainly isn't thrashing through a jungle or hiking a mountain or picking berries from a cactus in the desert. We don't teach how to build a ground nest out of leaves or a shelter out of bark, we teach how to operate a remote control. The fact that we have a term like "getting into nature" pretty much sums it up.

So we have to make a choice. Keep things the same and struggle with "what to do" all day, or change things up, shake things around and go feral for a while. We learn as much as they do when we do that, but it isn't for everyone. I don't do housework because I can't. I have a fierce jungle baby, who lets me know what he wants and how he wants it and he is demanding natural and I am adapting. Kicking and screaming about it sometimes, yes, but adapting.

What would you do all day if you didn't have a job but also didn't have a child? Aside from "go stir crazy". There's no such thing as boring situations, only boring thoughts. Imagine you are financially independent and finally free of work constraints... what would you do? I'd still do my job occasionally (and I do it for free at the moment, actually), so I just take my son. I also like sitting around, sloth like. It's not everyone's cup of tea but I love it, and my son adapted to that (we have had to adapt to each other's quirks, as ya do).

Usually though, it's not easy. Suburban life is designed to take us away from our homes, into work and then back to cook and sleep. Weekends are also about getting away from our homes, into some activity, and then back to cook and sleep. We don't really "live" in our homes, there's not much to learn in them for the very small. My son goes stir crazy if we're not outside, he starts getting destructive because he isn't growing and learning. I still haven't figured out how to do it in a house, esp as I am not one of those people who can do the homemade play dough thing and water play and whatnot without wanting to rip my own face off. It's just NOT my thing. I don't do "child play". And there are many like me, many more than they like to admit because it's just not the "done thing" to admit you hate playing child games when you have children.

Luckily for me, I am drawn to the parenting philosophies that don't encourage child play and structuring my life around them, but them fitting in with me. I believe child games are for children, my time for them has passed, thank Lerds, and my parents never played with me (they were old folk when I was born) and I benefited from that and wouldn't change it. So I have to create a life for them to fit into. Something that benefits us all. Not easy. Other children were meant to be in a child's life. I see this in all other cultures - except ours, as usual. Unstructured play with different ages, unfettered with adult presence. They only play with us cos we're the only ones there. I find as soon as there are other kids around, I become invisible to my kids. And it is MAGICAL. They don't want to play with me, they don't even need me to "Watch this" and "look at me mom". Their neediness just disappears. It suddenly feels... natural.

I wish I had an answer, but I don't. I resent our culture, can you tell? We've isolated the family, esp the mother and children, from the rest of the world, from our communities.

If anyone has any ideas, I'd be open to them. Let's start a commune, a good one, on a river bank, with tire swings and nightly campfires. Woot.

Sometimes I start to wonder why I come to MDC, and then I read a great post like this . You have summed up so much of what I have been feeling and thinking lately.

I've been bouncing between just wanting to throw my hands up in the air and take an if you can't beat 'em join 'em approach and just go thrust myself right into modern mainstream culture to just wanting to say screw it all and give away all our worldly possessions and move to some hippie commune in Costa Rica or something equally as drastic. The rest of the time I try in vein to make the two worlds meet which just leads to frustration. I felt I had sort of a decent balance going on before I had my second child, but things have sort of gone to crap since.

[EnviroBecca]

Holiztic, it sounds to me like you are pretty CC! Your husband might benefit from the book, but he might benefit even more from some of the articles on the Website, and they are shorter and don't cost anything. "Who's in Control?" and "Restoring Harmony" probably are the most relevant.

I notice on the days that I am really tired or ill and sit more, he becomes fussy and clingy. Is this in line with the CC idea?

Hmmm...it's CC for your child to become upset when you seem not to be your usual competent self. He may be expressing worry about that or about your needs/feelings. I have seen this from EnviroKid at times.

But another thing I've seen, actually moreso when my son was a baby than now, is following my example when I change my behavior due to illness. When he was just 8 weeks old, I got a bad cold and spent most of my time sleeping for 2 days. He cheerfully lay next to me ALL of that time; he slept more than usual, but at times I would awaken to find him quietly entertaining himself by studying his own hand or something like that. At that age he normally had one or more times a day when he cried a lot and could be calmed only with lots of rocking or a long walk, but during my illness he did that only once and briefly. He had no symptoms of illness himself. Now that he's older (and still tends not to catch anything I get--he's incredibly healthy!), he'd rather spend my sick days at school or with Daddy, but he very strongly wants me to be nested in HIS bed and will go to bed early and stay in bed late. He makes demands that don't seem very CC (or considerate)--he wants the light on, he wants me to read to him--but he also seems to enjoy the experience, for instance snuggling up to my feverish body and sighing blissfully, "Ahh, what warmness!"

It's an interesting contrast with the way he responds when his dad is sick. We have the family bed in the kid's room, and because of nursing I've been the one more likely to sleep in there, so he takes it for granted that Daddy's sickbed will be in the master bedroom. And then he's following MY example, not his dad's. I mean, when either adult is sick, the usual routine is that the other adult avoids physical contact with the sickie but checks on him/her a few times a day to offer food, thermometer, or conversation from a distance. When I'M sick, EnviroKid is wanting to be with me, but when his dad is sick, he wants to bring a glass of water and tuck in the blankets and then get out of there--not the slightest interest in hugging Daddy, much less getting into bed with him or moving toys into his room so he can play near him. Then there's the aftermath: Because this approach to Daddy's illness means I am doing all the parenting (helping with clothes, serving food, reading stories, etc.), EnviroKid then acts as if this is the way it's supposed to be, and when his dad is well he resists letting him do anything with him! It's fascinating but really kind of annoying too.

[Not Sure]

I read Holiztic's post this morning, and have been feeling bad for the rest of the day - not that you said ANYTHING wrong, Holiztic!!! I think I'm having a "But what about ME?!
moment, so sorry if I'm a bit needy...

Anyway, I found this thread, and managed to read the whole thing (whew! that took some work! oh wait, should I not call it "work"?!) about a month before dd (my 1st baby) was born at the end of July, and ready TCC during the month of August, and so love the overall concept that I've been trying really hard to implement the ideas presented with dd. Now, we already had a crib and stroller and pack 'n play, but between TCC and some other reading I decided to go with cosleeping (family bed), and the pack 'n play only got used for the attached changing table, so it's in storage now, and we haven't used the stroller at all, we baby-wear instead. I spent the first 2 months of dd's life with her in my arms or, if outside, being worn (she wouldn't let me wear her in the house, she wanted to be held). This meant that I could do NOTHING around the house. I could barely feed myself, sometimes dh had to feed me!, and often went for more than 8 hours without using the bathroom because I thought I shouldn't put her down but she wouldn't go in her wrap unlesss we went for a walk. When I would give her to dh when he got home so I could pee or rest my arms or eat something, he would almost always have put her in her crib or in her floor gym/mat (a gift) or bouncy seat (another gift) by the time I came back, which would piss me right off. But then, I started noticing that she LIKED playing in her floor gym or watching the mobile over her crib (it IS a cool mobile, I like watching it myself) once in a while. In fact, sometimes when she would cry this would be what she wanted, so, I started putting her in there, too. Over the past couple of weeks (dd is now 3 months as of 2 days ago) we've even gotten in a routine of her playing in her gym and then watching her mobile every morning after we get up while I have a cup of decaf and a yogurt. In the afternoon we nurse and cuddle/nap a lot, do yoga together or I massage and bathe her. When it's cool enough (we're in Florida) we go for a walk. It just seems wrong to "containerize" her, but she's not unhappy; in fact, she WANTS to be put down sometimes... and then I worry I'm being too "child-centered," but she's only 3 months old...

I dunno, I'm just a first-time mom who is home alone all day, over-tired (dh does not help w/the over-night stuff), and worries too much and is looking for a little support/validation, I guess...