Ok, I have to say this. I wore my babies a lot, in and out of the house. My youngest came to work with me and spent 6-8 hours in ths sling a day, nursing, sleeping, and playing. I'm all about babywearing. But I also had, used, and L-O-V-E-D the bucket seat. None of my kids hit 20 lbs before a year, and I was sad to have to switch from the bucket when they finally did. I only kept them in it when they were asleep, but in no way do I think it harms a sleeping baby to be let alone when they are happily sleeping in the seat. My oldest child cried just about every moment that he wasn't nursing or sleeping, and one of the only ways he would happily fall asleep was in the car. If you think I had any intention of even risking waking him up to take him out of the seat, you are crazy.
My second was only 14 months when #3 was born (yes, I got pg 5 months PP, exclusively bf with no AF), and he was not even walking yet. When we went places like ped appointments, I would often put #2 on my hip in the sling, and leave sleeping #3 in her seat and strap it onto the handy little universal seat stroller (doesn't have it's own seat like a big travel system, it's just for holding the bucket) so I could manage the two of them plus my 4 yo ds on my own.
I agree that babies shouldn't be kept in buckets all the time, but my philosophy on child-rearing is that if they seem ok, they are ok. I wouldn't leave a crying baby in the bucket. But if you saw me when my baby happened to be asleep in the bucket, and my dh and I were enjoying a very rare and much-needed quiet lunch out, for example, would you assume I was some horrible mother who just lugged her baby around in the bucket all day? When in fact, I'm an avid babywearer and have taught and helped hundreds of parents to babywear? You just never know.
I am an API leader, and I believe whole-heartedly in AP. I'm also a mother of three babies who have all been totally different in temperment and need, and also a woman who has befriended many, many new mothers during the course of formerly owning an AP business. And what all that has taught me is that having babies is very hard for many of us. Especially the first one. The first year with the first baby is, IMHO, one of the hardest transitional periods any of us will ever experience. It turns your life upside down and changes everything. Marriages fail, meds are prescribed, internet addictions are born (lol). I do think than AP and especially babywearing can make a lot of that easier, but holding yourself to a checklist of rules most certainly will not. If never using a stroller works for you, that's great. But refusing to ever use a stroller, or bucket, or bouncy seat, or swing, or whatever just on the sheer principal that you are too good a mother for all that is, IMNSHO, just as bad as rigidly adhering to any other parenting philosophy.
"What doesn't bend, breaks." -Tao te Ching
My second was only 14 months when #3 was born (yes, I got pg 5 months PP, exclusively bf with no AF), and he was not even walking yet. When we went places like ped appointments, I would often put #2 on my hip in the sling, and leave sleeping #3 in her seat and strap it onto the handy little universal seat stroller (doesn't have it's own seat like a big travel system, it's just for holding the bucket) so I could manage the two of them plus my 4 yo ds on my own.
I agree that babies shouldn't be kept in buckets all the time, but my philosophy on child-rearing is that if they seem ok, they are ok. I wouldn't leave a crying baby in the bucket. But if you saw me when my baby happened to be asleep in the bucket, and my dh and I were enjoying a very rare and much-needed quiet lunch out, for example, would you assume I was some horrible mother who just lugged her baby around in the bucket all day? When in fact, I'm an avid babywearer and have taught and helped hundreds of parents to babywear? You just never know.
I am an API leader, and I believe whole-heartedly in AP. I'm also a mother of three babies who have all been totally different in temperment and need, and also a woman who has befriended many, many new mothers during the course of formerly owning an AP business. And what all that has taught me is that having babies is very hard for many of us. Especially the first one. The first year with the first baby is, IMHO, one of the hardest transitional periods any of us will ever experience. It turns your life upside down and changes everything. Marriages fail, meds are prescribed, internet addictions are born (lol). I do think than AP and especially babywearing can make a lot of that easier, but holding yourself to a checklist of rules most certainly will not. If never using a stroller works for you, that's great. But refusing to ever use a stroller, or bucket, or bouncy seat, or swing, or whatever just on the sheer principal that you are too good a mother for all that is, IMNSHO, just as bad as rigidly adhering to any other parenting philosophy.
"What doesn't bend, breaks." -Tao te Ching
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