Conference moira::parenting_v3

   > 				  My daughter weighs 12.5 as
   > of last week.  Is she gaining the right amount of weight?
    
    Without knowing her birthweight I don't know. 12.5lb seems reasonable
    though. 
    
   > Also, it looks like a tooth is coming in. She is drooling a 
   > whole bunch, is that a sign?
    
    	Yes, also red cheeks, sticking her fist in her mouth, nappy rash
    (do you call it diaper rash?), crying more than usual, off her food
    etc. You can blame almost anything on teething, but drooling is an
    early sign (at least it was/is with my two).
    
    		Ian G.
    

    
    An overall recommendation would be to try to avoid comparing your
    child to others.    If she is healthy and happy and your pedi is
    pleased with her growth, then don't worry that she is growing at
    a slightly slower rate than another child.  She is probably growing
    faster and weighs more than yet another child!   If you're just
    curious about growth rates in infants, I belive that there are
    growth charts in Penelope Leach's "Your Baby and Child" (I hope
    I have the title right!) towards the rear of the book.  Percentile
    rankings, like the pedis uses, are displayed on the charts.
    
    Carol

    From some books, baby really doesn't need solid until 6 months old.
    Before that age, usually it's for practicing.   The 1st to try though
    is usually rice cereal.
    
    For a 4 months old, I would say the best food for growing is still
    the formular.
    
    -also a first time mom

    
    
    	Well, my daughter is almost five months old now but she
    	weight about 14 pounds at her 4 month visit.  I started
    	with cereal then graduated to fruits because it didn't
    	seem as though formula alone was enough.
    
    	She'd scream bloody murder as soon as you took her bottle
    	away.  I introduced cereal, fruits and now vegetables
    	because I didn't feel she was satisfied.  
    
    	Someone else mentioned a good point - try not to compare
    	to other children.  It's quite obvious that no two people
    	are alike and it's the same with children.  As long as
    	she's happy and is eating, don't worry.
    
    	She currently eats three tablespoons of cereal with a 
    	2 oz. jar of fruit or vegetable mixed in.  Afterwards,
    	she'll have an 8oz. bottle.  
    
    	I give my daughter what she wants until she decides she
    	doesn't want anymore.
    
    	/Kim

    Kim,
    
    Rebecca is having 2 teaspoons per 1 ounce of formula.  So if she is has
    a 7 oz bottle she will have 14 teaspoons of cereal.  She has been on
    cereal since she was 4 weeks old.  Her pedi put her on it because she
    was spitting up too much.  She will have 2 jars of fruit per day.  
    I will try vegetable next month. She is going for her shots next 
    wednesday so we will see how much she weighs then.  
    
    I will try not to compare other children with her, that is right!
    
    just-a-to-nervous-mom
    
    

    Could this be????  I weighed my daughter last night, who is 5 months
    old.  And low and behold she weighed a wopping 18lbs.  I couldn't
    believe it.  I first weighed myself and came up with the right weight,
    and then put her on with me and subtracted my weight.  Came up with
    18lbs.  She is still so petite.  I can't imagine her gaining 4lbs
    in 2 months.  She has been eating solids since last month.  She also
    has cereal at every feeding.  She needs to have this in her bottle
    due to a problem she has.  My question is, has anyone else's kids
    weighed this much??????
    
    

re .6:   Hahaha!  Yes, it's possible.  My older son David weighed 18 lb 14 oz
	 at his 4-month checkup.  At that point, I think he was down to gaining
	 "only" a pound every two weeks (the first couple of months, he was
	 gaining a pound a week!).  Since we have nothing but tall, skinny
	 genes on both sides of the family, I never worried about his
	 weight.  He is now (surprise, surprise) lengthening out and his
	 weight has held about level for almost a year (he's almost 4).

							cheryl

    Our daughter weighed in at 15 lbs 2 oz at her two month checkup!!
    I was shocked!!  She's still on only breastmilk... She's three months
    old today and I don't want to know what she weighs!!!  :)
    
    Actually, I'm glad that she's healthy and happy -- that's what really
    matters...

    	I have a question about size and weight in newborns. Spencer is now
    7 weeks old (I'm back at work and Marc is staying home with him until
    December) and we just can't seem to keep this kid in clothes. He
    currently wears 18 month clothing and has literally outgrown a size
    every two weeks.

    	Marc went to a Mommy and me class yesterday (they're not just for
    women anymore) and weighed Spencer and he weighed 15 pounds!

    	Spencer is not chubby but has a very long torso. As he is being
    breast fed they assure me that I can not overfeed him.

    	I realize that clothing manufactures make their clothes on the
    small size (planned obsolescence) but 18 months for a 7 week old? It
    just *sounds* so huge!

    	My questions are:

    	Is this a typical growth spurt pattern? Do babies start leveling
    off at some stage? Are we going to have to buy a bigger place just to
    keep the baby in?

    			Wendy

    18 month clothing at 7 weeks and your son only weighs 15 lbs.?  Are you
    sure?  My son is 16 months old, he's 32 inches tall, weighs 22 lbs. and
    is still wearing some 12 month clothing (provided they're made well)
    but mostly he wears 18 month clothing.  Most of the 24 months and 2T's
    that he has are way too big.  As a matter of fact, he still has a few
    outfits that are size 18 months that he won't be able to wear for some
    time yet.
    
    Lori B.

    My son is 14� months old, weights 23 lbs, is 32� inches tall and wears 
    either a 12, 18, 24 month clothes (depending on the make).  
    
    18 month old clothes for a 7 week old sounds so big.  Although my
    husbands brothers youngest son was wearing that size at 3 months.  
    
    How much did he weigh when he was born?
    
    In answer to you question:  Yes, they do level off after a while.  My
    son had his first growth spirt at 2 months and then again at almost 4
    months.  I would know when it was happening because he would sleep more 
    and he would eat more.  At almost 12 month he seems to have leveled off
    and hasn't really grown much lately.  I have a feeling the next growth
    spirt is not too far away.
    
    Kathy

    
    	Spencer was a big baby when he was born, he tipped the scales at 9
    pounds 11 ounces and he was 21 1/2 inches long (he was two weeks late).
    At his two week check up he was 10 lbs, 10 oz and had grown 3/4 of an
    inch. Since then he's just grown like a weed.
    
    	He really is in 18 month clothing at this point, much of it is
    because his torso is so long (not wide but long) that the 12 month is
    not long enough from the armpits to the groin. We've learned to not buy
    anything that has feet attached as those are the first pieces of
    clothing to go. We can squish him into some 12 month clothing but we
    reserve them for the second or third outfit of the day as they just
    don't cover all of his body.
    
    	While we're talking about cothes here, does anyone know of where I
    can get "stretchies" the kind that babies wear that are extra long or
    extra large (a baby shop for tall and large maybe). The ones that they
    sell now only go up to large and that is too small, they are great
    under his sleeper and I'd like to try to find more. What do babies
    graduate to when they can no longer wear those?
    
    	I'm not worried about his health, as he appears to be a very
    healthy baby, but he is so long that I have difficulty carrying him as
    one should carry a newborn. People pick him up assuming that he is a
    three or four month old and then are surprised at his lack of neck
    muscle tone (although he is getting stronger and stronger).
    
    	I guess that I'll just have to get used to a very long baby,
    perhaps he is destined to be a basketball player and perhaps I am
    destined to always have a sore back.
    
    				Wendy
    
    	

    
    
    
    We saw the same thing as you did Wendy... We found that the sizes of
    clothes today do not seem to reflect the sizes of babies today...
    
    Our son had some medical problems early so we didn't get the 7 week
    growth spurt, but once those medical problems were cleared up, the
    weed just kept growing...  And we have the same long torso and short
    legs that you seem to have...
    
    He's now 14 months and won't fit into anything less than 24 month
    clothing.. And most of that is tight... We're into a lot of 3T's
    and a couple of things 4T's (yeah, its big but he doesn't seem to 
    mind..)
    
    
    John
    

Wendy,

I can relate!! My son was also big at birth: 9lbs 14oz 22 1/2 inches (9 days
late) and has the same problem with clothes, although he was in 12 month size
around 3 months and is just now approaching 18 month size at 5 months. There
was a period of about 2 weeks when he fit in infant size Medium clothes, then
it was size Large, which is now on the snug side.  However, it does seem to
have levelled off - at 5 mos. he's 20 lbs, 29 inches and fits in things longer.

I look for the two-piece outfits to solve the long torso problem, or just bigger
sized one-piece suits that can be rolled at the cuffs.  I use whatever size
Onesie that fits as the bottom layer, to reduce drafts in the midsection... As
for sleepers - Carters makes some two-piece ones where the pants have feet and
the shirt & pants snap together at the waist.  I've had trouble finding size
18 mos. blanket sleepers too - the 12 mos. size are too small and the 2T size
are too big! I hear that Sears Winnie-the-Pooh sleepers are the most durable
but haven't gotten there to check the size selection...

I don't know of any particular places that carry XL stretchies, but I'd recom-
mend staying with the good brands, because the cheaper ones tend to trim the
fabric whereever possible and it ends up being too tight too quickly... When the
weight range is given, that sometimes helps, too. A baby store for long & large
would be a great idea!! Especially these days when so many babies are born bigger.

-Cori (who also has a perpetually sore back and a future basketball player)

    While it may not be offically possible to be over-weight when
    breast-fed, my cousin's child was breast-fed only but looked
    like a sumo-wrestler-plus at six months.  He had rolls of fat
    on his arms, legs and neck which made him look as though he 
    had no upper arms, no upper legs and no neck.  He had an apron
    of belly fat which hung down to cover his groin completely.
    I'd never seen anything like him before in real life--he looked
    like the pictures in the Guiness Book of World Records.

    Now that he's older, he's just extremely fat.  His parents are short
    and slim, so it wasn't expected.  But it was funny to meet this
    human tank at six months and know he weighed as much as my son, 
    who was almost two at the time.

    		-John Bishop

    Sounds ok to me, Wendy. Although my son wasn't quite that big at 7
    weeks, one of the kids in my mother's group was. He's now 15 1/2 months
    old and is perfectly normal. And I do remember Andy rushing through
    the sub-24 months clothing only to level out at 2T and 3T. 
    
    Sue
    

    Regarding clothing sizes... for the first year or so, the standard
    procedure for an AVERAGE-sized kid is to double their age to get their
    clothing size, e.g. an average 6-month-old will wear 12-month sizes,
    9-month-old will wear 18-month sizes, etc.  Once they get over a year,
    their growth slows down (my son wore 2T's for almost a whole year). 
    Now, a kid that is almost 10 lbs. and 21" when he's born is far above
    "average", so I wouldn't be surprised at what Wendy says. 

. . . and idea that made so much sense, they've evidently stopped using it.

My youngest is now 8, so I've been away from the baby-clothes-buying business 
for a while, but I remember toward the end of my career that I started to see, 
-- instead of the "18 months" etc. sizing -- "w to x pounds, y to z inches".  
That threw me at first, because I knew all the sizes in "months" terms, but 
didn't have my children's weight memorized, but once I got used to it, it made 
so much more sense to me.

Actually, other than premature babies or infants with health problems, I don't 
remember any kids who wore a size smaller than their age; I knew very few who 
wore the same size as their age; I knew many, many, who wore a size larger 
than their age.  And it was interesting to me that when my son was smack dab 
on the 50th percentile of the growth chart, he was wearing sizes greater his 
chronological age.  

Sizing by weight/length would eliminate a lot of the guesswork and needless 
anxiety among parents.

Clay

    
    Wendy,
    
    I've had one of each type of child. The first was huge, the second
    small/average.  My husband has several dangerously overweight family
    members - so of course I worried that I had given birth and was raising
    a "MOOSE".  His growth levelled off at about 12 months (26 lbs) and now
    he's a whopping 48lb seven year old! (25th percentile).  I guess its
    ingrained in me, but I worry much less about him being thin that I did
    about him being heavy!!!
    
    To answer your sleeper question, Sears has stretchies in larger sizes,
    they aren't fancy but they launder well.  Another plus is that they
    have plastic insets in the feet. Not useful for infants - but our
    18 month old who wears size 12-18 months destroys the cloth only
    insets.
    
    Lots of love to you and your family ....
    
    Rochelle

    Boy can I relate.  My son was 10 lbs. 4 oz. and 21 in long when he was
    born.  He barely got any use out of his 3-12 month clothes.  He did
    taper off though.  He's now about 14 months and wears 3T which is
    somethimes big, but for some reason, the 2T outfits don't fit in the
    middle.  Russell was 33 in. at his last checkup - Way off the chart for
    height.  He's somewhere around 26 lbs now and I think another growth
    spurt is about to begin.
    
    Wendy,  I don't know where you're located.  If you are anywhere near
    Raschels in Westboro, MA. you might check there.  I think they carry
    Xlarge strechies.  I gave up on them and dressed Russell in sweatsuits.  
    
    Good Luck!
    
    marianne
    
      

    
    Both my daughters are in the 90th percentile for height.  I gave up
    on 1-piece outfits very early.  Because of the way they are built,
    (long on the torso), I bought larger size tops than pants.  E.g, 
    sweatshirts were a size 3 and sweatpants were a size 2 etc. 
    I hated to see sweatshirts that were forever going up above the
    belly-button exposing the tummy, especially in cold weather.

    I have the opposite problem.  My daughter is very thin and long.  She
    has NEVER filled out any clothes, they just too short.  She wears 12-18
    months clothes and is only 9 months old.  At three months she was
    wearing 9-12 pants and premmie-3 month tops.