Batch of links - Baby stuff

- 11 lies the maternity section told me when I was pregnant. Because I can so relate, even for nursing clothes!

- A quick follow-up to my post about dietary restrictions during pregnancy… Last summer, there was a recall on flour, of all things, because of possible contamination with e. coli, but according to this, King Arthur wasn’t affected at the time, and I haven’t heard anything since. I’m not sure if it will become “a thing” (we must now forever avoid raw flour) or not, we’ll see.

- If you are avoiding alcohol, there are still fancy grape juices, PureBlue UnWine with blueberries, and non-alcoholic substitutes for cooking, in addition to regular non-alcoholic wine and beer.

- As it turns out, some raw milk cheeses are safe for pregnant women, and some pasteurized ones are not. This is hard to navigate, especially when combined with lactose intolerance… I’m certainly looking forward to a good brie again, I should get one this weekend.

- It is also recommended to avoid feeding raw milk to children, in case you didn’t already.

- What pregnancy cravings would look like if they were served fancy. I can’t exactly relate, as I’ve had more aversions than cravings…

- If you’re pregnant, you should still get the flu vaccine – in addition to protecting against flu viruses, it apparently cuts the risk of stillbirth by half!

- Here’s why you accidently call your kid by the dog’s name – or call your youngest by your oldest’s name. It turns out that your baby and your dog light up similar parts of your brain.

- There’s a rise in a new type of family: singles who are choosing to be coparents without a romantic relationship. Unsurprisingly, most people pursuing this type of arrangement are “well-educated and financially secure”, and a significant percentage of parents are homosexual. This seems so much more complicated to me than single moms sharing a household, so I can only hope that there’s some kind of reliable algorithm to help would-be coparents figure out if their values are compatible! I’m enough of an introvert and control freak that I think choosing to be a single mom would be easier, but then again I’m really glad I have a great partner with whom to parent.

- Millenials are more confident in their parenting than others, and I wonder whether this has to do with how much they read about parenting compared to previous generations. Or maybe they just haven’t realized how little they know yet. The article goes on with interesting data about how parents from racial minorities and lower socio-economic classes perceive their children’s strengths and weaknesses as results of their parenting, whereas white and upper-class parents think it’s intrinsic to the children.

- Long-lost photos show what hasn’t changed about motherhood in 50 years.

- 24 surprising things about parenting in the United States, as seen by moms of other countries. Conversely, global parenting habits that haven’t caught on in the U.S.

- I’ve shared this link about infant CPR before, but we can all use a reminder.

- I was talking about this with the Engineer recently: here’s a GIF that shows what a baby sees every month for the first year of his or her life.

- What do stay-at-home-moms do all day? Here’s one example.

- I just looked this up on YouTube because I remembered seeing it on Oprah as a teenager: Priscilla Dunstan has decoded babies’ language, based on five types of cries emitted reflexively for basic needs. I can’t say that it’s been this clear with my kids, but interestingly, my youngest makes a sound like the French word “Lait!” (milk) when he’s hungry!

- This mom is confessing her parenting crimes in hilarious notes to her baby (and there’s more on her website).

- Last year, when I read how one Japanese mom’s rant about lack of daycare options for her child actually prompted the government to create 500,000 new daycare slots, I couldn’t help but be in awe. We have that same problem in Quebec; in the States, we don’t even have maternity leave. But one blogger’s viral post was enough to change things on a national level in Japan? Rock on!

- It’s also interesting to read about 24-hour daycares, which I hadn’t heard of in Quebec. There’s more of a need for them in places without maternity leave, decent minimum wages or subsidized daycares, but maybe they do exist there too and I was just oblivious?

- There’s now a smart breast pump, called Willow, retailing for $430. I have to admit that for all it claims to do, the price is surprisingly affordable – functionally, I’d compare it to the Medela Freestyle, which is about $150 less. I actually ended up getting the latter through my health insurance – if you live in the U.S., just go to Pumping Essentials, fill out the form, and they’ll take care of everything. I think this will be a lot less work than the Medela Harmony with which I made do the first time around!

- And here’s a good article about breastmilk that actually explains how a mother’s body can produce antibodies specific to her baby’s infection. (Spoiler: baby spit backwash.)

- Here are three stores that are nursing-friendly; the most useful one is probably Target, given how many there are and how often people tend to shop there.

- An interview with the woman who was the Gerber baby.

- Canadian babies have significantly higher rates of colic than elsewhere in the world, according to a recent British study. This really interesting article offers a new possible (read: as yet untested and unproven) explanation for colic: it might be tied to the same mechanism as SIDS and be caused by “glitches in the development of infants’ neural networks as they transition from involuntary to controlled breathing.”

- Had you heard of harlequin sign in infants? I hadn’t, until my baby turned half red (and I mean, literally half).

- Mothers cradling infants on their left may have a deep evolutionary origin; it’s perhaps not just because we’re predominantly right-handed.

- Some children’s books that we have enjoyed: The Snowy Day, the Llama Llama books (especially Llama Llama Misses Mama and Llama Llama Mad at Mama; though I wish Papa Llama were more present, or anywhere to be seen, actually); Extra Yarn (that *never* gets old!); I Want My Hat Back and This Is Not My Hat (although the third in the trilogy, We Found a Hat, was a bit disappointing).

- As for movies: the Little Prince doesn’t yet sit through a whole movie, but he’s getting there. He’s enjoyed parts of The Incredibles, Kung Fu Panda and The Iron Giant, but recently we’ve been really into My Neighbor Totoro.

- I didn’t know this, but there’s a hotline (1-800-4-A-CHILD) that one can call anonymously to get parenting advice, resources, and a sympathetic ear. The goal is to prevent child abuse by overwhelmed parents. You can read more about it here.

- This reminded me of an episode of Dear Sugar Radio that I went and dug up, about Moms who hate motherhood. It’s worth a listen if you have time, and one of the things that I loved was that the hosts (Cheryl Strayed and Steve Almond) addressed everything that I wanted to say to the authors of the two letters they read on that episode.

- An artist illustrates the silly things kids say, and you can even get custom art.

- Finally, I probably won’t need this for a while given how young my kids are, but it could be helpful to others: a guide about kids and vaping.