Parenting Tips for your Babies and Toddlers

1-3 month old babies see things best when they are between 20-30 cm away. By 3 months, babies have a greater range of vision.

• Provide ways for your child to see, hear, feel, move freely and touch you. Your baby will slowly establish trust with you.
• Slowly move colourful things for your child to see and reach for. A simple, homemade toy, like a rattle, can attract your baby’s interest by the sounds it makes.
• Smile and laugh with your child. You should soon see your baby smile in return.
• Talk to your child and copy her sounds or gestures. You should see her slowly focus on your face and try to imitate you in return.
• Help your child follow an object. When he sees it, move it slowly from side to side and up and down. You should see him try to follow the object with his eyes.
• Encourage your child to reach for a safe object. Try something like a plastic cup. You should see her try to grab or touch it.
• Cut out simple pictures of familiar things, people and animals. Try to get pictures showing lots of different colors, textures, scenes and faces. Talk about the pictures as your baby looks at them. You should observe how your baby listens to what you tell him and participates in his own way.
• Play a game with your baby. Place her on her stomach and slowly walk your fingers toward her. Then quickly and gently tickle her saying: “here come my fingers, here they come, closer and closer, they got you”. To change the game, make your fingers creep slowly or quickly, or wait different amounts of time before tickling her. You should see her show delight by laughing or squealing.

At 6 months, your baby can eat anything except honey which should not be given until she is a year old.  

• When asking a question, give lots of time for the answer. Count to 10 in your head. If no answer comes, then answer the question yourself. Try an easier question the next time.
• Say your baby’s name as much as possible. She will look to see who is saying it and will try to reach out to the person.
• Never speak or sing too loudly, as this may scare babies.
• Smile as much as possible and provide your baby with comfort and trust.
• Give your child clean, safe and colourful things, such as a wooden spoon or plastic bowl, to reach for and touch, or bang and drop.
• Make simple picture books, puzzles, hand puppets and dolls to develop your baby's curiosity and help him learn new things. To make a simple puzzle, just glue a picture on a piece of cardboard or other material and cut out the sections.

Toddlers are especially happy when they see that they are making the adults around them happy as well. 

• Give your child things to put into containers and take out. She will try to take them out and put them back on her own, which is great for the development of eye-hand coordination skills.
• Give your toddler things to stack up. He should try to stack more things on his own and make them fall down, or will stack things up until they fall down.
• Ask your child simple questions and respond to your child’s attempts to talk. She should be willing to interact by responding and/or asking further questions.
• Try to talk about different realities with your infant, such as nature, pictures and things from the surrounding environment. You should see your toddler move around and be willing to explore the environment.
• Watch what your toddler does and name it: “You are filling the box.” He will be happy to show you what he learned and will gain self-esteem.
• Play with your toddler and offer help: “Let’s do it together. Here are more stones to put into your box.”These discoveries should make her happy and more confident.
• Use every opportunity to engage in a conversation, including when feeding or bathing, or when working near him. He should soon begin to understand what you are saying and be able to follow simple directions.
• Turn simple questions into games: “Where is your toe?” or “Where is the bird?”. You can look at pictures and talk about what you see. She should show more and more curiosity and willingness to communicate about what she sees and hears.

Did you know?

Children learn better when they are taught how to behave well instead of being scolded for behaving badly.

• Ask simple questions and listen to the answers. Encourage your child to talk: “What is this?”, “Where is the window?”, “Which ball is bigger?”, “Would you like the red cup?”. You should see your child’s growing interest in interacting with you and responding to your questions.
• Read stories to your child and ask questions about what you see in the book. You should notice your child memorizes and tries to repeat what you read.
• Help your child learn to count by asking “how many” and counting things together. Your child will make mistakes at first, but learn from repeating things many times.
• Offer your child circles and other shapes cut from coloured paper to compare and sort. She should be happy to try sorting things and will learn how to match and make relationships between different objects, colours and shapes.

Raising a Baby for First time Parents

Raising a baby, especially for the first time, is both exciting and challenging.  This is a time for developing the bonds that will last a lifetime providing the child with the inner resources to develop self-esteem and the ability to relate positively with others.  It is also the time for parents to begin to discover who this new person really is.  Each child is unique and it is imperative that parents learn to understand, respect, support and encourage the unique characteristics and abilities of each child.

Cute, cuddly and full of curiosity, babies are amazing to say the least. A baby can brighten a room with its smile, melt a heart with its laugh and provide a whole new perspective on life.

But we already know this about our little ones. What you may not know is that babies are not only filled with sweetness, but also the subject of a plethora of astonishing facts that prove babies really are the most remarkable little things on the planet.

Prepare to be blown away by these 16 riveting revelations about your little one’s first year of life.

1. Babies are born to boogie.

Talk about tiny dancers! Studies have proven that babies are born with an innate sense of rhythm. While they may not be able to bust a move quite yet, research shows that babies have an instinctive ability to respond to the rhythm and tempo of music and may even find it more engaging than speech.

2. Newborns have natural aquatic instincts when in water!

Babies are born with a “diving reflex” known as bradycardic response, which causes their body to naturally adapt to their surroundings when submerged in water. Bub’s heart rate will slow down and he will instinctively hold his breath when under water. What’s even more incredible is that, like fish, babies can actually breathe and swallow at the same time for the first few months of their life. They learn this talent while in the womb but begin to lose this ability around the 6-month mark.

3. Babies are born with 300 bones.

That’s 94 more than adults. Where do the extra bones go? They fuse together during development.

4. Smiles are reserved for human babies only.

That’s right. Human infants are the only species that smile at their parents. Aren’t we blessed?

5. Newborns don’t have kneecaps.

No kneecap? No worries. Babies make do without. In fact, a baby’s kneecap, also known as the patella, doesn’t develop into hard bone until the little one enters preschoolerhood (between the ages of three and five).

6. Babies go through around 3360 nappies in the first year.

That’s A LOT of late night trips to the baby aisle. And A LOT of wipes! What’s even more incredible is that newborns tend to wee every 20 minutes until their little bladders start to develop. Good thing nappies are so absorbent and Red Nose Baby Wipes are so gentle on baby’s skin at change time.

7. Infants first recognise the colour red.

Some experts suggest newborns can only see black, white and grey while others suggest they can see different hues but they are incredible blurry. However, the first colour infants recognize is red. The last colours? Blue and purple.

8. Babies grow at an insanely speedy rate.

Babies double their birth weight by five months and triple it by the first year (approximately).

9. They also grow about 1 to 1.5 cm each month.

If they kept this rapid growth up, by adulthood, babies would measure in at 51 metres tall!

10. Newborns are tear-free.

They cry but they don’t produce real tears until approximately the age of three weeks. But, thanks to an overload of emotions and an influx in hormonal balance, new mums tend to make up for their missing tears during those first few days. Call it sympathy tears. And blame the hormones.

11. Their stomachs are the size of a walnut.

That’s nuts! No wonder they require constant feedings.

12. Babies lose the hair they are born with.

All of it. And usually by the tender age of four months. While their original hair falls out, a whole new head of hair grows in its place.

13. Babies will sleep, on average, 5400 hours in the first year.

Considering there are only 8760 hours in a year, this seems like A LOT! But remember, babies sleep only a few hours at a time, especially during the first three months. And this is only an estimate. Every baby is different and many don’t get the memo that they need to sleep this much (and for 8 hours at a time).

14. Babies deprive their parents of approximately 44 days of sleep.

And that’s only in the first year. Good thing they are so cute!

15. Their tastebuds only recognise sweet and sour.

Salt isn’t brought into the equation until around the age of four months.

16. Infants have supersized body parts

You probably noticed your little boy’s bits were especially prominent at birth (you can thank the swelling for that). While the swelling will subside, your babies’ head and eyes will remain supersized during the first year.

A newborn’s head accounts for 1/4th of his body length while the adult human skull is about 1/7th of the total body length.

And babies’ eyes? They are already 75 percent of the size of their adult eyes.

Incredible, right? And this is just the beginning! The first year is only the start to a life long journey with your little one, filled with memorable moments to make, fascinating facts to uncover and amazing adventures to experience together. Prepare for all the messy moments along the way with Red Nose Baby Wipes, Australia’s most trusted brand of wipes for baby, toddler and beyond.