Parent Thread

My daughter did the sign language learning when she was in day care, it actually was really good. She picked it up pretty quickly and I think in turn helped in her communication once she really started to form words. What's neat about that is when she started to talk pretty well, she was still using signing to go along with the words.

Guess I have to start posting in this thread instead of the pregnancy thread since the kid's actually here now...

Quick baby update, Luke will be 3 weeks old in a couple days, still in neonatal intensive care, but gaining weight and up to 3lbs 5oz(from birth weight 2lbs 8oz). Hope to have him home in about a month. He's still damn tiny

Pic from our trip to the hospital tonight:

Damn he's tiny, but so cute!

Just a FYI, long story below, but it WILL end in a question: Skip down to the last sentence if you don't give a shit about the rest.

Hey there. I'm still a fairly new parent at this point. My daughter will be 17 months old next week. For the first 3 months, I wasn't the best parent because she didn't really do anything except lay there asking for food or whatever... As a result, I would play video games and stuff while pretty much ignoring her, only rocking her chair or picking her up if she got fussy. That started to change at around month 4. She began to crawl, and my wife and I loved that. I would still mostly ignore her, except for when she could possibly get hurt. I'll admit that it was shitty of me. Then at month 5, I heard her scream from upstairs... she climbed an entire flight of steps. We had to quickly stop that, so we put up gates around the house. Crisis averted for the time being.

Turns out she loves climbing. We bought her a few climbing toys and she used them a lot. I was doing work around the house and had a 6 foot ladder set up... she climbed to the top of it while I was in the rest room and started freaking out that she couldn't get down. God damn kid, settle down. You don't HAVE to climb on everything!

She began walking a little before her first birthday, and she's been... interesting ever since. My wife and I had to come up with new and inventive ways to keep her from climbing on everything. One of her favorite things to do was to run from our computer room to the TV room, climb the couch then up onto a half wall directly behind the couch. Then drop from that onto the computer desk (other side of the wall). Then climb down to the comp chair, back down to the floor and run back into the TV room. It was an endless circle. So we bought some 4 foot tall metal dog gates. Something that she couldn't pull over onto herself, but something that would keep her from running the circle. We also had to pick our trashcans up off of the floor because she'll pull EVERYTHING out of them to play with paper and shit. She's a monster like that. Adorable, but a monster none the less.

Anyway, since month 5, I've pretty much given up on gaming. I can't focus on a game the way I like to while my daughter is running around. As a result, I've turned to watching various shows. That way I can play with her on the floor while also picking up the story from whatever I'm watching at the moment. She sometimes looks at the screen (if there's music or whatever in the background), but she mostly ignores it. Unless of course we pop in something for her specifically while my wife and I do something else, like make dinner or work on the house.

Anyway, we don't like absentee parenting that seems to be abundant in this day and age... just toss your kid in front of the TV and forget about him or her until you hear a complaint for food or whatever. Sometimes there's a necessity for TV, but usually there isn't. I've read that TV can be detrimental to a child because there's just so much auxiliary input that it overloads them. Nothing in life can compete with all of the sounds and colors that you see in an average shitty cartoon these days. As a result, your kid doesn't want to do anything except mindlessly watch TV. We're definitely trying to prevent that from happening with our daugher...

Anyway, on to the question: For those times when TV is a must have, what would you guys suggest? I don't want the crazy twitch television that seems to make up cartoon network. I do need something that will hold her attention while my wife and I are unable to entertain her for a bit. Live action is fine or maybe older cartoons that weren't super colorful. We just want a normal kid, not a spaz from too much TV watching.

Suggestions please!

And if you give a shit, here's a picture of her from memorial day. She climbed onto the table... imagine that:

I'm not a parent but I used to be a kid who grew into the most intelligent and well-adjusted individual I know. I thank old school Sesame Street and Mr. Rodgers for that. You can't go wrong with either of those.

Little Einsteins is good, as is Super Why. LE infuses the show with classical music and teaches a lot of different facts about composers and music reading etc, along with a lot of other stuff. Super Why focuses on letters and reading, my wife hates it since they mess with the stories they use but I personally don't really care about it.

Just for reference, my 1st daughter is 2 years and 8 months old and Mickey's Clubhouse is pretty much crack for her and every other kid I know around her age. It's probably not too bad, but I think there may be a bit too much going on it.

I remember watching a lot of Ren and Stimpy. Go for that.

Cad_sl said:

Get an iPad and load it up with educational games.

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That's another thing I want to avoid. I'm definitely addicted to just "the internet". I don't really look for anything specifically, but I read countless websites and twitters of some comedians that I like. I don't even really watch porn on it... it's just a matter of looking things up (like this message board, for example). I know that I'm not really getting anything from it, but I still read nonsense EVERY night. Hours on end.
I don't want her to end up as a slave to the computer the way I am. I want her to have a social life, more the way my wife has.

It's strange, half of the time I'm usually bored shitless while in front of the comp, but I still do it for at least 6 hours a day, between work and home. I don't even have facebook... I just read this shit. I think it might be too late for me to get over it, but I want more for her.

First get some Baby Einstein DVDs and as she gets around 3-4 she'll will move on to sesame st and little einsteins.

My sons use our first gen iPad. The only thing loaded on it are interactive children's books and educational apps. My 2 year old only uses it if we're at a restaurant, flight, or just anywhere he needs to be entertained for long amounts of time. With my older son (7), we only let him use it if he does all his homework and reads us 2 books. Then he may read on it or do educational games. We will also let him use it on weekends sparingly.

Your gaming routine will change as a parent. its just a given. I was a WoW player and just could never find the time to put into it after having kids. This was good thing I came to realize. It got me out more doing family oriented things. I only play about an hour of my Xbox per night if at all. I tend to play FPSs now since I can jump right in, play an hour, and jump out.

As she gets older you'll be able to integrate her into your gaming world. My son and I do Kinect games (good exercise) and he enjoys the Lego series games to the point he creates replicas of what he sees in the games with his real Legos. He plays sports as well and does very well in school. Like all things, it's about moderation and balance.

Look at websites likehttp://www.starfall.comThey think they're playing games, but they're actually learning. It's a good thing to use infrequently.

One thing I would suggest avoiding is that making a screen (TV or computer) the option when neither you or your wife is available. Get paper and crayons, have them always available. Toys, whatever. 10 minutes of colouring a couple times a day is better than 10 minutes of screen time.

This is, of course, my own opinion. Take it with a grain of salt.

Lots of The Simpsons, Beavis & Butthead, and Adult Swim for me. AND LOOK HOW I TURNED OUT. MODEL OF PERFECTION BITCHES.

Going to merge this with the Parent Thread unless there is a big reason it needs its own thread.

lurkingdirk_sl said:

Look at websites likehttp://www.starfall.comThey think they're playing games, but they're actually learning. It's a good thing to use infrequently.

One thing I would suggest avoiding is that making a screen (TV or computer) the option when neither you or your wife is available. Get paper and crayons, have them always available. Toys, whatever. 10 minutes of colouring a couple times a day is better than 10 minutes of screen time.

This is, of course, my own opinion. Take it with a grain of salt.

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This is actually backed up by studies. But it is difficult to do. Yeah, give your kids creative stuff to do, but when you have multiple kids and have to do something like make dinner that takes longer than 10 minutes, it is hard to find a creative task you can give them that will occupy that entire time. Colors sure the hell don't do it. I hate to think I am not properly min/maxing my kids but sometimes I just throw on Powerpuff Girls or something so I can cook a goddamn meal.

When in restaurants, we have stopped with the iPads and the phones. I read somewhere that it creates distance and basically just socially disengages your kid, which is pretty common sense I guess. But I have seen the difference with my own kids. When we go out and play little games at the table or do some creative task or talk, we always have a better time and they are usually more well behaved.

chaos_sl said:

Going to merge this with the Parent Thread unless there is a big reason it needs its own thread.



This is actually backed up by studies. But it is difficult to do. Yeah, give your kids creative stuff to do, but when you have multiple kids and have to do something like make dinner that takes longer than 10 minutes, it is hard to find a creative task you can give them that will occupy that entire time. Colors sure the hell don't do it. I hate to think I am not properly min/maxing my kids but sometimes I just throw on Powerpuff Girls or something so I can cook a goddamn meal.

When in restaurants, we have stopped with the iPads and the phones. I read somewhere that it creates distance and basically just socially disengages your kid, which is pretty common sense I guess. But I have seen the difference with my own kids. When we go out and play little games at the table or do some creative task or talk, we always have a better time and they are usually more well behaved.

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Don't get me wrong, I'm in no way criticising using TV to make life workable. I know it works, I know it's easy, and I certainly do it myself periodically.

When I'm at my best, something like making dinner ends up being something I do with the kids. Give them all tasks, they help make the food, they're more likely to eat the food. I do know parents who do this kind of thing constantly, no TV in the house, no computer/iPad time for the kids at all. I don't know how they do it. I do my best to limit how much time they spend in front of a screen.

My god, you can give your kids crayons? If my three year old has crayons for more than 30 seconds, my walls are covered. I swear she will hide crayons to use on the walls when I'm not looking.

I don't even clean the walls anymore. Fuck it. I'll just paint in a couple of years.

Xarpolis_sl said:

That's another thing I want to avoid. I'm definitely addicted to just "the internet". I don't really look for anything specifically, but I read countless websites and twitters of some comedians that I like. I don't even really watch porn on it... it's just a matter of looking things up (like this message board, for example). I know that I'm not really getting anything from it, but I still read nonsense EVERY night. Hours on end.
I don't want her to end up as a slave to the computer the way I am. I want her to have a social life, more the way my wife has.

It's strange, half of the time I'm usually bored shitless while in front of the comp, but I still do it for at least 6 hours a day, between work and home. I don't even have facebook... I just read this shit. I think it might be too late for me to get over it, but I want more for her.

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Your daughter is GOING to be addicted to social media. Not only is she a girl, but that's the generational trend. Give her access to these things while she's still young enough to listen to you! It will be a lot more mundane for her than it is for you.

I would also suggest having her quote wikipedia verbatim on her very first 1st grade book report. Just so that she learns that lesson young.

lindz_sl said:

My god, you can give your kids crayons? If my three year old has crayons for more than 30 seconds, my walls are covered. I swear she will hide crayons to use on the walls when I'm not looking.

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I wish that were a problem in my house. She doesn't color with crayons... she eats them. She chews on fucking everything. Leaves from the deck? Paper that comes in the mail? It's all edible in her mind.

That's another issue that I'm not sure how to break. She has a blanket that's been in her crib. She didn't really sleep with it at first (usually wrapped in a swaddle or whatever), but she's become quite attached to it. The problem is that she takes bites out of it. It's a year old blanket that looks like it's been hanging in a closet for 10 years while moths devour it. I don't know why she insists on eating string, paper and other shit, but she gets angry if you don't allow her to.