Digigran

See below for further details of the Noo noo

They will guard thee at rest, thou shalt wake on my breast. (Brahms Lullaby)

I seem of late to have got a bit diverted from the main purpose of this BLOG which is to record the development of a digigran and her relationship with her new grandson. I guess this gran also has a lot of other things to think about too. However Alexander is never far from my mind and I melt every time I get to see him.
Visited him on Saturday and he has come on amazingly. He scanned my face to see if he recognised me- something he must have developed at nursey and a faculty all young babies have, as well as the ability to detect the number of people talking together. When I held his plastic mock radio out for him to play with he reached forward and twiddled the object that swirls round. He made lovely communicative noises with gees and gaas and smiles and stood on my knee smiling directly into my face. A genius!
However, I am finding visiting quite difficult because now he is accompanying his mum to the hospital nursery I cannot nip over whenever I am in Sheffield and, of course, this is not a good idea at any time ( see the Modern Grandmother guide by Hugh Fernley Whittingstall's mum!). Life is even more complicated because he is being brought up by the principles laid out by Gina Ford in this. Gina Ford has replaced Dr Spock and Penelope Leach as the guru of parenting. All her parents seem delighted by a system which demands a great deal of self discipline on the part of the parents and is totally different from the laid-back views of the generation who brought up these go-getting 30 somethings. Basically Ford believes in putting the baby down for sleep at set periods and having a very controlled regime of feeding and bathing and bedtimes so the windows of opportunity for visits in these early months are very small. Also it always seems that it is a imperative to keep the child awake if it is not an allocated sleeping time, and yet as all my friends agree, their memories of holding a sleeping baby mark one of life's greatest and transitory joys. No sleeping on the breast in Ford's regime though and she is certainly influencing a good number of new parents , extending her influence with a dedicated website (£40 to join). For a debate about her methods compared with a more child-centred approach see THIS. I'm for the continuum concept, myself, but then, at the time my children were small, I did not have a really demanding job, with tight schedules to meet. I can see that a well organised life style, with a contented little baby is very necessary to enable a less hassled, more relaxed mum, who can concentrate on her professional life. as well as giving qualty time to her child. So two cheers then for Gina Ford who is helping with this.

One of the lovely off shoots of the sleep focus is this NooNoo- a comfort blanket, bought from here. Alexander's, which you see here, is called a woodbug comfort blanket. Ahhhh!

# posted by Digigran @ 4:10 AM