Being organised when preparing for a baby is something that ensures that you’re as prepared as possible when your new addition arrives home. While being organised once you are home is just as important as it can make times like the witching hours a lot easier when you know exactly where everything is as you go down the list to things that maybe causing your baby to cry.

Even with a decade of child care under my belt, I can at times be extremely unorganised. You can ask T and he will gladly tell you that out of the two of us he is the one that ensures that everything goes back in its place a lot more than I do. That’s not to say I don’t do those things, he’s just the one that ensures that it is done promptly and not three days later. Hearing that, you would probably be surprised to hear that I am actually a planner. When something big is about to happen, I make sure that I am on top of it as much as possible in the lead up to the event. T is also a planner as well, so between the two of us we can usually get things done promptly.

5 Great YouTube Channels for Your Kids

YouTube has become one of the big entertainment centres for people, especially as it allows everyday people to be creative in a way that TV didn’t allow before it. Despite this, there have been a lot of channels and videos pretending to be for children when they’re actually not, making it hard for parents to be sure what is safe for their child to watch.

One of the things I try to make sure that I’m on top of is the current trends in regards to what kids are interested in or not. It makes it a lot easier to make sure that they are viewing things that are appropriate for their age and that they are protected from the dangers of everything being online these days. YouTube is thankfully one of those places that are very easy for me to keep an eye on because it’s just a matter of hearing about a channel or video and sitting down to look through it myself before letting the parents I work for know what is going on.

Believe it or not, that is actually how I found Tik Tok but that is a story for another day.

Since I’m on YouTube a bit for professional and personal reasons, I wanted to share five of my favourite channels that are aimed at children. Some of them focus on developing skills while others are just or fun or to learn something interesting.

Apps for Baby

These days you can get apps for just about anything for your iPhone or Android. On my phone, I have apps for things that range from social media to comic books as my phone is one of the few things that I have on me at all times.

When it comes to caring for children, it makes sense that there are apps that you as a parent or as a child care educator may have on your phone to make it easier to keep track of things or to have reminders easily on hand. With a few of the families that I have worked for, I had access to a tablet that worked as a communication book between me and the parents so they could keep as informed as possible regarding what was happening with their children.

As a new Mum, I had a number of apps in mind that I was planning on downloading to keep on my own phone. Some of them are simple tracking apps while others hold a more educational focus, but they all allow me to ensure that I have the information that I need on hand should I ever need it and there have been times when having it on hand has helped me a lot.

AJ's One Month Update

Time has amazingly flown. It feels as though I have just blinked and suddenly AJ is a month old.

I would like to say that it has been all smooth sailing but it hasn’t. Even with over a decades worth of child care experience, I’ve found myself challenged like never before with this tiny human and while I knew that having my own was not going to be the same, I’ve found myself in this funny middle ground where I know what I’m doing but at the same time everything is new.

This is why I wanted to document this new journey. I wanted to be able to share what life is like and show the journey that we go through as this year is going to be a big one and that’s not just because AJ was due. We’ve got a number of big changes happening in the next couple of months alone.

So buckle in as this is a long one!

A Wet Valentines Day

My first Valentine’s Day as a Mum started off very interestingly. 

If I’m completely honest, I totally forgot that Valentine’s Day was coming up. Since AJ’s birth, my days have all kind of blurred together and I’ve only looked at a calendar when I needed to know a date for some paperwork. So I didn’t know that it was Valentine’s Day until I came downstairs at 8am to feed AJ and was scrolling through Facebook. I didn’t feel bad that I forgot. T and I don’t really do Valentine’s Day. I’m not one for flowers, I prefer to get a plant than cut flowers, and neither of us really feel like going out and doing things.

As I scrolled through Facebook, my sleep-deprived brain forgot about the day before and the vomit filled day we had had. For the past week or so I had been noticing symptoms from AJ that made me suspect that she had a mild form of reflux. Not bad enough to disrupt her sleep but enough that if we didn’t do certain things during her feed it would result in her bringing up part of it. However, if we broke up her bottle and burped her multiple times during it, then kept her upright for 20-30 minutes afterward the vomiting wouldn’t occur. We may have to contend with some spit up but she would look a portion of her meal.