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My toddler really likes to feel his food. Just really squish it within his hands. Like he really gets in there and extrudes it. Be the play doh fun factory. Then he gets upset that there is food on his hands ‘oh no!’ ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
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Feb 12, 2023 20:45
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We do the yucky spot thing for our son but frequently it's not good enough for it to just be in the yucky spot. It has to be completely out of both his reach and his line of sight. So, I do a lot of floor cleaning.
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Feb 12, 2023 21:29
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We realized kiddo had a hole in the seat of his pants when we were out today. So cue him repeatedly putting his hand on his hip, sticking his booty out and going “I have a hole in my BUTT.” Adorable but we had to discourage him from sharing his announcement with strangers 😂 Also almost had a meltdown at my friend’s salon where we were trying to get him a haircut. His dad said his hair was looking a bit shaggy, so he was like I DONT WANNA LOOK LIKE SHAGGY. 😭😭😭 We had to convince him that the haircut would not make him look like Shaggy from Scooby Doo.
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Feb 12, 2023 22:11
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Zoinks!
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Feb 13, 2023 02:57
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Forehead temperature: 104.7°F, 105.1°F, 104.9°F Oh gently caress dammit dammit dammit Rectal: 102.0°F solid Wut... Great job Exergen designing a thermometer that fucks up wildly when skin gets clammy or sweaty. Good thing that never happens during a fever.
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Feb 13, 2023 03:27
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My kid now comes up to any adult in the room, walks backward sticking out her butt and says “check” every time she farts!
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Feb 13, 2023 03:40
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I feel like I’m going through a really tough stage. At the end of every day I’m at my wits end and completely on edge. The amount of stress that builds up throughout the day is getting to be overwhelming. When I get stressed like this I shut down and can’t do anything, so my wife ends up shouldering much of the load. This in turn makes me feel guilty because it’s not fair to her that I sometimes ask her to take care of the kids while I decompress. I know parenting is tough especially with twin 3 year olds but I feel like I’m doing something wrong. I feel like I’m not doing a good job managing my stress. I’m not enjoying being a parent right now. It was their third birthday party this weekend and my main thought was “oh god what are we going to do with so many new presents in the house we have so much poo poo already” instead of just enjoying their party and having fun with them. I wish I knew what to do to enjoy this more and stop worrying/stressing out so much.
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Feb 13, 2023 03:57
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Been there before. For me it was realizing that I had to let stuff go. I couldn’t reasonably expect to keep my house as clean as I’d like. I couldn’t study or workout as much as I’d like. I couldn’t watch movies or play games I wanted to. But I could usually do one small task and read one chapter or watch one show at the end of the night. You just have to realize no matter what something is going to stress you out and give you grief. Do you want to worry about finding room for toys or worry about not enjoying the day and shutting down? Also sometimes you just need a loving break. Nothing wrong if that happens earlier than it does for your wife. The breaking point comes for all parents at some point.
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Feb 13, 2023 04:06
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Mind_Taker posted:I feel like I’m going through a really tough stage. I was hitting burnout after Covid lockdown + newborn + illnesses and I had to start seeing a therapist. I was getting overwhelmed and depressed and started having anxiety issues. I wouldn’t quite shut down but I would have racing thoughts and decision paralysis so bad I felt like making a grocery list was going to cause a panic attack. After attending therapy for about a year and going through some more crises along the way, I have made some decent progress against it. I also started working out and running again (with significant prompting from the therapist) although with my aging dad bod I think I’ve tweaked my ankle. Exercise really is a magic bullet for mood as stupid as that sounds. It’s easy to feel guilty about taking exercise time and leaving more responsibility with your wife - but if you’re already shutting down, why not go do something else? It will eventually raise your mood and help you avoid the shut downs entirely. Anyway sorry for rambling about what worked for me, just trying to shoot some ideas out there. I empathize with you and all the responsibilities that you have as a parent. poo poo is loving hard. Keep on trucking.
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Feb 13, 2023 05:10
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Cais posted:Our toddler plates have suction cups which give you approximately 1.3 extra seconds to stop him from upending the whole plate. Another vote for suction cup plates. They're like $20 for three on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B08LXVW7TC I think they all come out of the same factory just get whichever are cheapest
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Feb 13, 2023 06:15
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Shifty Pony posted:Forehead temperature: 104.7°F, 105.1°F, 104.9°F I think it's mentioned in the instructions for ours that it won't give very accurate readings when a fever is going up or down. It makes a little sense - you're interested in the core temperature, but the forehead can be a lot warmer than that if the body is trying to cool down, or cooler if the body is trying to warm up. It does still tell us something, though, which is better than "no, I won't let you take my temperature rectally" does. I see it as a more accurate version of "hand on the forehead" - at least it doesn't stop working if I myself have a fever or just got cold hands today.
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Feb 13, 2023 10:09
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Mind_Taker posted:I feel like I’m going through a really tough stage. I think the exercise and therapy suggestions put forward by others are definitely very solid ideas, but can I add meditation to that. I recently tried the Waking Up app after seeing it heartily recommended by a few different people, and it's made a huge difference to both my depression and anxiety in a short space of time, really helping me to add perspective, keep calmer and not let things get on top of me as much. The cool thing is it doesn't suck up loads of time, either. You can do one of the 10 minute guided meditations per day (though I liked it so much when I was doing the introductory course I sometimes did more than one), then add in your own practice, even just in 10 second bursts, throughout the day, as you see fit. Whatever the case, wishing you the best. Parenting combined with life's other poo poo can be very hard. You're not alone and you're not a bad parent or husband, and there are things you can do to help yourself and improve your situation. Your kids are at an adorable age and it would be a shame for you to miss too much of it, so go work on yourself a bit. You can do it! Good luck.
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Feb 13, 2023 12:37
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Meditation did help me a lot. When my wife was getting my daughter to bed and I had to try to get my baby son asleep while all he wanted was mommy. After those tense moments where you're being as quiet and gentle as possible while getting more and more irritated and wanting to yeet the baby directly into Dreamland, sometimes it's nice to sit very still next to the actually-sleeping baby and meditate on love for a while.
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Feb 13, 2023 12:51
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We’ve used those silicone plates/bowls for a while but have stopped recently. Partly because our kid had stopped flipping stuff over so frequently but also it really seems to make the food taste awful. I don’t know if it’s soap residue not being completely washed off in the dishwasher or what. The other day I ate a muffin that was on the little silicone bowl that we gave to our kid before sending him to daycare and it just tasted like soap. Ate the other half of the muffin that wasn’t on the bowl and it tasted fine. Maybe I’m going crazy but after that we just switched over to regular plastic bowls/plates.
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Feb 13, 2023 14:48
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slave to my cravings posted:We’ve used those silicone plates/bowls for a while but have stopped recently. Partly because our kid had stopped flipping stuff over so frequently but also it really seems to make the food taste awful. I don’t know if it’s soap residue not being completely washed off in the dishwasher or what. The other day I ate a muffin that was on the little silicone bowl that we gave to our kid before sending him to daycare and it just tasted like soap. Ate the other half of the muffin that wasn’t on the bowl and it tasted fine. Maybe I’m going crazy but after that we just switched over to regular plastic bowls/plates. I think you should send that off to be tested or something. I don't think that's normal. (Well, we don't eat out of anything silicone but it's supposed to be food-safe and there's no way it is OK for it to leave a taste residue.)
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Feb 13, 2023 15:01
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I have heard that can be an issue with dishwasher soap and the silicon stuff. We hand wash those, but that may be too much of a hassle.
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Feb 13, 2023 15:06
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Yeah I don't think that is normal
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Feb 13, 2023 15:20
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We had the same issue, it was definitely incomplete rinsing from a lovely dishwasher in our case. Soaking them in some white vinegar solution for a while and then washing them by hand rescued some of them and now we just hand wash everything softer than glass.
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Feb 13, 2023 15:33
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thunderdome winner
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That is potentially caused by using too much detergent alongside a lovely dishwasher, worse if combod with very hard or soft water. Pods are too much detergent. If you have powder or gel, try reducing the amount (a quarter sized dollop if you're us based is a good starting point).
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Feb 13, 2023 15:53
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slave to my cravings posted:I don’t know if it’s soap residue not being completely washed off in the dishwasher or what. If you do, your dishwasher might be dispensing too much and you're tasting the leftover rinse aid (which itself is a kind of detergent). I had a somewhat similar issue when we first got our new dishwasher, so I looked up in the manual how to adjust how much rinse aid it dispenses and turned it down one notch, which fixed the problem. If you don't, well, maybe you need to use a rinse aid? It's kind of like fiber, too much or too little can be problematic.
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Feb 13, 2023 16:08
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Dishwashers are the devil and when my child is old enough to reach the buttons I'm going to cover them with electrical tape.
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Feb 13, 2023 16:42
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We use the cascade platinum dishwasher pods. The dishwasher gets everything else clean with no weird tastes/residue. I think part of the problem is any residue is impossible to see. Haven’t tried any food in them after hand washing but will probably do that in the future.
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Feb 13, 2023 16:46
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How do you guys deal with pushy grandparents? My MiL and FiL retired a few years back and moved from somewhere not too hard to get to to a location 8+ hours away from us in buttfuck nowhere. They keep asking over and over again for us to come visit with our kid who is 21 months old now. Our kid definitely does not do great in the car. When I tell them this they offer the regional airport, which I am also not looking forward to as my kid doesn't like to sit still ever and the idea of carrying the car seat and everything else is just nightmarish to me. Neither of us want to do this but I feel like I don't know what to say. We've tried to politely say no but they are just incredibly pushy and dismissive of any of our concerns about the trip. We have money issues right now and time/work issues too but any time we try to use those reasons they offer to pay etc. Any thoughts for what's worked for anyone else?
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Feb 13, 2023 17:12
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I don't like pods. I get why the vendors push them--detergent gel has a standardized concentration, but pods they can make much more concentrated so they're cheaper to ship and take up less shelf space*, and since they're the newfangled thing, they can charge a premium for them and thus are much more profitable. Also my wife thinks they're a greater poison hazard for children. Not to say there aren't legitimate engineering advantages to pods. Given that most people just squirt an arbitrary amount of detergent into their machines and don't use rinse aids, pods can do a lot to make up for that. And if they work well for you, great! But if dishes are coming out of your dishwasher funny it's the first thing I'd change. * There was a Cascade TV ad I saw recently that said something like "Still using gel? You're paying mostly for water!", which is technically true, but also irrelevant as pods aren't actually cheaper per load. ExcessBLarg! fucked around with this message at 17:18 on Feb 13, 2023 |
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Feb 13, 2023 17:12
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hallo spacedog posted:How do you guys deal with pushy grandparents?
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Feb 13, 2023 17:15
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The silicone thing is a relatively common occurrence; silicone can absorb a small amount of oil when heated, which over time gets you that nasty residue. I've heard good things about soaking in a mixture of warm water and vinegar. Haven't tried it, though, since we're traveling for the next few months https://food52.com/blog/21169-how-to-clean-those-slippery-silicone-mats-once-and-for-all
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Feb 13, 2023 17:26
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hallo spacedog posted:How do you guys deal with pushy grandparents? My MiL and FiL retired a few years back and moved from somewhere not too hard to get to to a location 8+ hours away from us in buttfuck nowhere. They keep asking over and over again for us to come visit with our kid who is 21 months old now. Our kid definitely does not do great in the car. When I tell them this they offer the regional airport, which I am also not looking forward to as my kid doesn't like to sit still ever and the idea of carrying the car seat and everything else is just nightmarish to me. As with most things in parenting, you just have to get comfortable with owning what you will and will not do and what you do and do not want to do and being firm about it. You can just say no, that will not work for us right now and change the subject. If they continue to press end the conversation. Offer them coming to visit you as a reasonable alternative if that is something you would be willing to do. If not just say nope, does not work for us and then go on living your life.
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Feb 13, 2023 17:32
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They might be upset, but it is not on you or your partner to manage their feelings. It's your job to respectfully communicate your thoughts and what you are going to do and it is their job to work through their feelings about it.
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Feb 13, 2023 17:33
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Sometimes your family gets summoned to an ancestors spot. Like Greek tragedies, most problems come from trying to escape fate. If they are offering to pay, ask for luggage money too. How were you as a traveler before kids?
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Feb 13, 2023 17:35
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hallo spacedog posted:How do you guys deal with pushy grandparents? My MiL and FiL retired a few years back and moved from somewhere not too hard to get to to a location 8+ hours away from us in buttfuck nowhere. They keep asking over and over again for us to come visit with our kid who is 21 months old now. Our kid definitely does not do great in the car. When I tell them this they offer the regional airport, which I am also not looking forward to as my kid doesn't like to sit still ever and the idea of carrying the car seat and everything else is just nightmarish to me. So I mean is this a, "we want to see our grandkid every month" sort of thing? Or is it a once per year sort of demand they're pushing? Once or twice per year is doable, but more frequently than that and I'd get pretty annoyed. Just as an aside, you'll probably spend about 6 hours total flying there with the added bonuses of 1) costing way, way more, 2) risking losing luggage, and 3) either being reliant on borrowing their car or having to rent one. So whether all that is worth saving 2-3 hours in the car each way is up to you. I mean at least flying is mostly "active" time where you're moving around a lot... which is of course stressful and exhausting, but it at least keeps the kid somewhat occupied and breaks up periods of sitting still. I mean an 8 hour drive isn't nothing. That's a significant distance whether you drive or fly. It sucks being that far away from the grandparents, but it seems like they made that choice. I know this isn't helpful, but you can't just move out to BFE and get mad when nobody comes to see you. All that said, I'm coming from a place where the nearest family is a 5 hour drive without the necessary food/potty breaks. So we've more or less resigned ourselves to this. And we were on the other side... we moved to where we are because of jobs. Fortunately we have understanding grandparents, but it really does suck. As another aside, air travel with kids is a PITA, but it's doable, especially for that short of a distance. If it's a once or twice per year thing, it's worth putting up with to maintain the relationship.
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Feb 13, 2023 17:50
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ExcessBLarg! posted:How many times have you visited your in-laws since your kid was born? How many times have they visited you? We have gone 0 times since she was born. They have come here 3 times. We aren't particularly close to them. sheri posted:They might be upset, but it is not on you or your partner to manage their feelings. It's your job to respectfully communicate your thoughts and what you are going to do and it is their job to work through their feelings about it. Yeah, I think this is going to have to be it. I think we need to keep telling them it just feels frustrating to me that this keeps coming up with every holiday. They were on us about coming for Xmas (never mind they live in an area that gets extremely icy and snowy, so obviously a great idea) and now they've started in on the 4th of July. KirbyKhan posted:Sometimes your family gets summoned to an ancestors spot. Like Greek tragedies, most problems come from trying to escape fate. If they are offering to pay, ask for luggage money too. I'm not like a huge fan of long car rides in general. I wouldn't be chomping at the bit to make the drive even without the kid. I guess maybe it's my perception that I don't understand why this wouldn't be on retired people to come to us instead of we having to go to them.
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Feb 13, 2023 17:54
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So kids can pretty much sense when you have a day off and make sure to develop enough symptoms to keep them out of day care, huh.
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Feb 13, 2023 17:58
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Yes. My kid has been sick on every holiday weekend and work day off for the past year and a half.
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Feb 13, 2023 18:00
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hallo spacedog posted:I guess maybe it's my perception that I don't understand why this wouldn't be on retired people to come to us instead of we having to go to them. Because they're old and driving 8 hours is a bit much for old people. It's taxing on their body and on their mind. My in-laws have basically said they won't be driving to us anymore. FIL is mid-70s and MIL doesn't drive much. It's only 5 hours but it's still too much for them. (edit: plus they're cheap-asses who, despite having gobs of money, insist on staying in cheap hotels and then complain about how dirty they are... but that's neither here nor there). Crescent Wrench posted:So kids can pretty much sense when you have a day off and make sure to develop enough symptoms to keep them out of day care, huh. Pretty sure they're legally required to get sick on days that you have off from work but day care is still open. DaveSauce fucked around with this message at 18:03 on Feb 13, 2023 |
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Feb 13, 2023 18:00
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Because they're fuckin old, rule the world still, and got a sack of cash. That's why it is incumbent on us youth havers to make the odyssey. They made the trip 3 times, so you gotta reciprocate someday.
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Feb 13, 2023 18:01
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Crescent Wrench posted:So kids can pretty much sense when you have a day off and make sure to develop enough symptoms to keep them out of day care, huh. They also have an astonishing ability to know when they will be home for a teacher workday on Friday and pull a one-two Sick on Monday, perpetual motion machine on Friday. There's also their innate sense of Impending Parental Intimacy and instinctual "climb all over both before bedtime so they are so touched out they have to sit on opposite sides of the couch for an hour to just manage a goodnight kiss" response.
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Feb 13, 2023 18:11
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hallo spacedog posted:We aren't particularly close to them. Is there some backstory as to why your partner isn't particularly close to them? hallo spacedog posted:I think we need to keep telling them it just feels frustrating to me that this keeps coming up with every holiday. They were on us about coming for Xmas (never mind they live in an area that gets extremely icy and snowy, so obviously a great idea) and now they've started in on the 4th of July. "Since Christmas didn't work out, why don't you come up in July?" seems like a totally reasonable thing to ask from the perspective that they assume you'd be willing to make the trip at all. hallo spacedog posted:I guess maybe it's my perception that I don't understand why this wouldn't be on retired people to come to us instead of we having to go to them. It sounds like the crux of the issue is that they're expecting your family to make the eight hour trip to visit them, sometime, and you're not particularly keen on the idea of traveling. That's hard because travel comes easier to some people more than others, and if you're the kind of person who has travel anxiety (or plain doesn't like it) traveling with a young child is only harder. I think you need to evaluate how much you value your relationship with your in-laws (which sounds like it isn't much?) and how much you want your children to have a relationship with them. If--for whatever reason--it's not enough of a priority to overcome the travel challenges, particularly as it was their decision to move in the first place, then I think you need to come to that understanding with your partner and then, firmly, tell your in-laws that it's too difficult of a trip for you to make, but offer (if you're comfortable) for them to continue visiting. Who knows, maybe they'll decide to move back? Now, part of the issue is that as elderly people get more elderly travel simply becomes more difficult. At some point it might not be safe for your in-laws to make eight hour car trips. Of course, that should've been a factor in their decision to move out to the boonies in the first place.
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Feb 13, 2023 18:13
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My in laws bank roll my wife so we have to attend every summons. If you are in a similar situation, sorry dude ya gotta go. I'm making the DOOMSDAY ECON cynical read that they sold house and downsized to make good on their housing investment. Don't feel bad about having them bank roll a trip you didn't wanna take anyways.
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Feb 13, 2023 18:19
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On the surface, having you visit them once when they’ve visited three times isn’t an unreasonable request. I’m guessing there’s more to the situation, though. You can say no for any reason, but being very clear with them about what those reasons are and where the boundaries are will save you a lot of sanity. We played this game with my in-laws where we didn’t want to say the real reason (their house was a dangerous hoarder mess with random pills in the carpet for babies to eat) and it instead caused more pain and confusion on their end because they would fumble around blindly trying to understand and change miscellaneous things. They never could quite grasp why we didn’t want the kids there. But giving them clear boundaries allowed other possibilities to happen, like meeting in a neutral third-party location.
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Feb 13, 2023 18:24
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I don't even think my in-laws are 60 yet so they're not what I'd consider elderly. The background is FiL is a cop, they're kind of chuddy in general and they have never had a very close relationship with my husband. We went to Xmas twice when they were living closer and other than like Xmas Eve and Xmas morning I was surprised to find that they just do not spend time with each other doing anything and never really have. I come from like an intensely enmeshed and overbearing family which I also hate but the idea of now driving 8 hours up for some people to basically mostly ignore us for a week is unbearable to me. The times they came down they came down for like 4 hours? We had dinner and then they literally went to their hotel and left first thing the next morning. It just all seems like a stupid waste of my time and sanity.
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Feb 13, 2023 18:49
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