New Parent Seventh Month Survival Guide

It should be noted that there was not a sixth month version of this guide. I don’t particularly believe I quite survived six months, nor did anything major enough happen to warrant a guide, let alone an update.

In fact, there’s barely been enough in terms of new things I’ve had to learn. It’s been sort of a series of days in which other than learning that teeth hurt, I’ve had the same pretty happy healthy baby who is progressing right along as she’s supposed to.

Or perhaps I’m expecting we’re on the verge of a breakthrough and not seeing the baby steps.

Solids are yummy

I’ve found that baby enjoys the eff out of eating. I’ve also discovered baby food is unusually expensive for what it is. Buy yourself a decent blender and buy some organic in a can and make it yourself.

They don’t add elf magics to your baby’s foods and them sitting around on shelves doesn’t do anything to improve the nutritional value.

Alternately if you’re within the delivery areas for Chubby Bunny Baby Foods, get some of theirs. That’s what Maggie started on, and she loved most of it.

Also get Baby Mum Mums as teething babies seem to like these things. There’re other things that are about like Kix cereal that are also pretty well enjoyed by baby. Can’t remember the name of them, they come in a tube.

I get paid to drool

With teething comes drooling. Have a rag everywhere. Have two. Keep paper towels handy. The drooling seems to come and go throughout the day so it’s not like you’re constantly dealing with a slobber monster, but there will be hours in which you feel like there’s a flood going on.

Diapers – hah!

You’re now a diaper pro. If you haven’t yet had to change a baby on a car in a parking lot, I’m surprised.

You should have two types of diapers – day and night time. I’ve only used one brand of night time diaper as a box lasts three months or so, but yeah, they work. I wish I had known this from month two through month five when we started, but oh well.

We haven’t actually run into diaper rash, but that’s mostly because there’s a lot of changing and a lot of booty wipedowns. Ran into it once as ended up using some butt paste. As our current usage rate we’ll be through the tube about the time Maggie turns 57.

Fold rashes

Maggie’s legs at the moment have baby fat. This fat tends to crease over on itself and create folds. As she moves more, the folds rub, and she ended up with little rub rashes above the knees.

These are pretty simple, just get some baby jelly, cream, etc. Probably could have used the butt paste. Keep the folds clean and lubricated until they fill out.

We didn’t think to check them, but now that we know they’re rashable, we check them every couple of days. It’s fortunately not a fight.

Teeth huh?

Teeth come in, babies vomit and get temperatures although doctors swear there’s no correlation with a fever and teething every parent I’ve talked to says the doctors are wrong. Maggie was throwing up and had a fever a couple of days before we realized there were teeth in her mouth.

But babies get introduced to so many germs you’ll never know without quarantining one.

New seating arrangements

While I’m still sporting the Graco carseat, Kim’s moved on up to the Britax Cowmooflague rear facing car seat. I’ve probably got another two months of this thing before Maggie completely outgrows it, however some babies her age would have outgrown it by now.

So you like sitting?

Sitting has become something Maggie likes to do, but she’s not particularly good at it and you should take care to remove firewood from the area your baby is sitting in.

What is the baby doing now?

Eating solids, gripping things, pulling hair, attacking cats, sitting up, finding farts funny, making faces recognizing music and sounds, transferring things from one hand to the next, and enjoying life. Still refusing to sleep nights anywhere but with us, and us still too exhausted from work and the day to spend all night fighting the loudest baby on the planet.

What can you do for sanity?

I’m suggesting drinking heavily on alternating parenting days one weekend. Getting out of the house can be a life altering event.