Sorry!

My apologies, but now that the triplets are 10 months old, I have no time to post anymore (let alone sit and breathe!). I'm not going to delete the blog just yet, but I can't imagine when I will have time again to write.

Thanks for reading!

(eat) Gas drops

Apparently we have exceptionally gassy boys. As with most infants, they screamed when they needed to pass gas. But their true gas issues are really from the waist up. We started to give the boys Mylicon Gas Relief Drops when they were only a few weeks old, hoping it would relieve their discomfort. For many, these gas drops do not work. But for us, it relieved the pain from the gas in their stomachs, but not the pain from gas in their bowels.

We would have to burp the boys often throughout a bottle because if we did not, the gas bubbles would want to come up and take all the formula with it causing massive spit ups. We mix large batches of powder formula which creates foam which creates gas in my babies' bellies. So we now add a small dose of Mylicon to every bottle, and it helps tremendously.

Because we go through so much Mylicon, we actually buy the Target brand of infant gas drops. The price difference is unbelievable!

(sleep) Noise makers

(It seems that caring for 3 growing boys has prevented any new posts in a long time!)

One of the greatest inventions ever would be a noise maker, a sound machine, white noise, whatever you want to call it. When the triplets were about a month old and going through a colicky phase, we were desperate to do anything we could to settle the boys and help them sleep. We watched The Happiest Baby on the Block and learned about "shh-ing", and spoke to other experts explain the benefits of white noise. The noise at this age helps distract them and manages to calm them.

So after much research, we purchase the Marpac Sound Conditioner because it actually creates white noise instead of playing a looping white noise soundtrack. We set it up in a moment filled with 3 screaming babies and it was not loud enough. (We have since learned that you can twist the machine to open the vents to make it louder. So we now keep this noise maker in our room and love it!)

Marpac Sound Conditioner


Since the Marpac model did not seem to work at the time, we purchased the Conair Infant Sound Machine. You may be tempted to use the other sounds like "heartbeat", but from our experience, the white noise was the best for settling screaming babies. We even kept the sound machine in the crib with them when they were tiny and not moving. I remember hearing (I believe on the Happiest Baby DVD) that the inside of the womb was louder than a vacuum cleaner. Or was it a hair dryer? Either way, pretty loud. We found that it helped to turn the sound machine up fairly loud (louder than you're comfortable with at first), and once they settle (or after about 10 minutes or so) turn it down and keep it running all night.

Conair Infant Sound Machine

To this day, we turn the sound machine on for every nap and bedtime. The boys are now trained to know to that it is time to sleep when the sound machine turns on. And amazingly, they wake the moment it is turned off. When we were trying to keep all 3 on the same schedule, if two were awake, we would turn the sound machine off and the 3rd would wake automatically!

(eat) Hands free bottle feeding

I will state the obvious: it is hard to feed more than one at a time. I have been fortunate in that I am often feeding the boys with someone else. (I'll post how we do this at a later time.) But for those who find themselves with fewer hands than babies, bottle propping is an option. [Big ole disclaimer: Everyone has an opinion on bottle propping. I never had to do it, but I understand that it is a necessity for many. Never leave a baby unattended while feeding!]

The cheap and easy way to prop bottles is to seat the baby in their car seat, bouncy seat or on the boppy and roll/scrunch up a wash cloth or receiving blanket under the bottle. I had no luck with this as our boys have always been squirmy. But it works for many. Some bottle holders on the market include:

Milk Maid Baby Bottle Holder (Their images are copyrighted.) Soft and light holder conforms to bottle size and rests on the babies chest.
Baby Bottle Huggers Stuffed animals hold bottle and keep the baby amused.Bottle Genie Baby Bottle Holder Soft and flexible, the holder can adjust to fit any baby size.


The benefit of these bottle holders is that you can use your own bottles and the ones that the babies are used to and comfortable with. If you are willing to try a new bottle, I have heard many a praise for Podee Hands Free Bottles. They do also make a conversion kit so that you can turn your own bottles into hands free bottles, but I was not able to get this to work with Dr. Brown's.


Purchase Podee products

(mom) Car seat measurements

As the boys near their 22lb weight limit for their infant car seat, we're starting to research our car seat options. But we're also in need of a new car, so we're wondering if we need to get another minivan or if there is a car/SUV that will fit 3 convertible/toddler seats.

And thankfully, Car Seat Data provides measurements for all car seats. So I can quickly do the math to rule out cars with a 50" backseat when we need at least 54".

Do you have 3 toddler seats in a non-minivan? Please share any stories or advice!

(clean) Pampers Rewards Program

One thing that I never thought that I would be a brand snob about was diapers. With the number of diapers we go through a day, beggars can't be choosers. But I quickly learned there is a difference from brand to brand. [Big ole disclaimer, every kid is different and some diapers that work for us, won't work for you and vice versa. So this is just my experience.]

For some reason, my boys have wet through to their clothes every time I have used Huggies diapers. So we would end up using twice as many diapers and would end up having to do laundry more frequently. So we pay a little extra and use Pampers. We were loyal Swaddlers fans through their largest size (2-3) and are now onto Cruisers. We tried the Baby Dry diapers as well, but one of the boys would get a huge diaper rash every time we put him in one.

So all this is to say that we're loyal Pampers customers. And unfortunately, I just realized - on the boys 8 month birthday - that they have a rewards program! Go to Pampers and sign up for their Gifts to Grow program. On the inside of Pampers products, you will find a small sticker with a code. Enter the codes and the site will track your rewards earned. The rewards are things like books, Sears portrait coupons and free Shutterfly prints. But at the very least, you should get coupons for more Pampers products.

(mom) Make your own custom onesie

I enjoy fun crafts, and amazingly, here is a one I actually completed! I managed to make these for Father's Day. Now imagine me sitting on the floor ironing, because I was too tired to stand, with my belly that already measured as if I were 44wks pregnant. Amusing, to say the least. These make great gifts for new moms and are great for multiples (put their name on the onesie/T shirt to tell them apart). My original goal was to make these for the boys' birth announcement. I had designed their full name, time of birth, and weight for each, but the thought of putting the custom onesies on each and taking a photo where it was all readable for all three at once was a bit overwhelming.



I can't take credit for the creativity. A blog that I love (that has nothing to do with babies) is ljcfyi - here is her post on how to make these onesies.

What you need:
* Onesies (wash first)
* Scissors
* Iron
* Iron on T-shirt transfer printer paper



Step 1:
* We didn't have a scanner, so I took a digital photo of my husband as a child. In Photoshop, I edited the photo (erasing the background and the writing on his shirt) and added the text (which comes from a sign in his parent's house).
* Or, you can open Word and use fun font styles and colors to make your design.

Step 2:
* Print the image out on the iron on paper. (The paper comes in white or black/dark, so you can best match your onesie.)

Step 3:
* Cut the image out. Know that the lines that you cut will be somewhat visible on the onesie. (This is why the example from ljcfyi is so clever because she hides the outline with a stitch. I didn't have the energy to do this...)

Step 4:
* Iron according to the package directions. And you're done!

(mom) Postpartum Hair loss

I had always heard that all of my hair could fall out after the delivery. That happens to other people, not me. Or so I thought. Four months after the delivery, I noticed that my hair was coming out by the handful. I wish I could say that I was kidding or even exaggerating. My hair started to get so thin on the crown and my widow's peak started to resemble Dracula's.

And now I've found that the worst isn't so much the hair loss, but when it grows back in! I now have inch long wispy bangs. The only tricks I know for helping to hide this fun awkward stage:
* Bangs. My side swept bangs now cover the short wispy bangs on one side. But the only problem with having bangs is that you need to have the time and ability to go back to the salon to have them trimmed often. Things I should have thought of.
* Headbands work wonders, according to a friend
* Hats are always good
* Move your part to cover any bald spots

Here's a great article from Babycenter on postpartum hair loss.

One thing that the article also mentions, that I want to second, is that you will need to be careful that your lost hair doesn't wrap around the baby's fingers and toes. Someone had warned me about this (and again, I figured this could never happen to me). But after one bath, I was putting one of the boys' sleepers on and just randomly checked his toes for my hair - and there was a strand wrapped so tight that it was completely cutting off his circulation! So now I constantly check all of their hands and feet for loose (or tight) hairs.

Please share any other ideas for hiding postpartum hair loss and regrowth. I could use them!

(mom) Free baby classes

I'm all for free baby classes. Every month Babies R Us has in-store events to educate parents. For example, on March 25th at 7pm, Pampers is sponsoring a "Diaper Changing Know-How Seminar". This is a great idea for soon to be Dads who often do not benefit from many of the prenatal classes and books. They recommend registering at your local store, but I would also try calling to register to prevent an extra trip.

If we had a Babies R Us closer by (and if I was more mobile during my pregnancy), I would have taken advantage of these. So I can't vouch for how good they are, but they seem like a great idea.

Look into classes at your local Babies R Us.

Any other suggestions for free baby classes? Share your ideas in the Comments!

(eat) Burp cloths

Apparently all babies spit up. Probably like most moms, I feel like ours do it more than most. We burp them halfway through their bottle feedings and they have settled into a nice little pattern: belch like a fraternity boy and follow up with anywhere from a dribble to a volcano.

While searching for affordable burp cloths, I found a package of about 25 white washcloths for $9.99 at Costco. Recently, Target had a similar deal for a huge bundle of white washcloths. I am so pleased with them because they hold up well in the wash, are soft on the babies' skin and serve multiple purposes. As the boys are now teething, I freeze them for them to suck/chew on (more on that later) and we also have a few washcloths under the swing to stabilize it on our uneven floor. And they were so cheap, I don't worry if I forget one in the doctor's office.

Because we doing all the feedings in our living room, we keep the wash cloths folded up in a basket under our coffee table. So cheap and easy!

(clean) Washing socks

The boys spent their first 5 months in sleepers (no joke) because I apparently have a great dislike of socks. But as winter was in full force, and they were big enough for their cute outfits, I decided to bite the bullet and open the sock drawer. I have since found that socks apparently taste good to the boys. I find them stuffed in their mouths after their naps. This means that we go through multiple pairs throughout the day so that they have a dry pair covering their toes.

So as a result, I'm constantly washing (and losing) socks. I would be lucky if half the socks made it through the wash. So I started collecting all of the dirty socks in a mesh lingerie bag. I keep it in the boys' hamper and fill it with socks throughout the day. It goes in the wash and in the dryer, and keeps the socks together the whole time!

Purchase a lingerie/sock bag

(mom) Bra extenders

So cheap, yet so useful. I was so excited when I stumbled upon bra extenders at Destination Maternity when I was pregnant. My belly wasn't the only part of me that was rapidly expanding. Simply hook them onto the back of your bra to give you a few extra inches of wiggle room. They typically come in a variety of hooks and colors, so you have many options to match your existing bras.

Purchase Bra extenders

(play) More Tiny Love love

One more thing about Tiny Love mobiles and their greatness... When the boys were newborns, we had a night nanny who specialized in multiples come a few times a month so we could get some sleep. She showed us that you could take the Tiny Love mobiles apart - leaving the music box attached to the crib, but removing the fun parts that dangle over the crib. This was especially important to help them sleep. She wanted to remove any distraction. And when they are older and can reach the toys, you can completely remove that section and just leave the music box for the babies.

So now, we still remove the top half of the mobile at bedtime and put it back up in the morning. The boys have become so conditioned that every morning once they are all in the party crib where the mobile is set up, they look behind them at the music box and wait for the mobile to start. This morning, one of the them even learned how to turn it on and off. Fun for them...not so much for me!

(play) Tiny Love mobiles

Our lives changed the day we put up our Tiny Love Symphony in Motion mobile. The boys would scream, and I mean SCREAM, as they waited for all to get changed prior to getting their bottles. You can't explain "patience" to three newborns. So we put the mobile up (they were all sharing a crib at this point) and they were instantly mesmerized by the motion, colors and especially the music. They hang at an angle and contain pieces that fall, rotate, etc. The mobile technically goes from 0-5 months, but they are now 7 months old and still love it. I'll put them all in one crib (what we've dubbed the party crib) to hang out while I change diapers. They now roll on their bellies and stare at the music box, or try to reach out for the moving pieces (they can't reach them). It will be a sad day when they start sitting up on their own and we have to remove the mobile for safety reasons.

Even better, Tiny Love has a fantastic multiples program. If you buy one of their developmental toys & mobiles (through them), they will give you another for free. FREE! This link to their site outlines the details of the program. One thing to note: I sent in all of the necessary information, waited the allotted time and never heard from them. So I called their customer service and my information was in the system and they processed the order right then and there. The mobiles arrived within just a few days. So the key is to be proactive.

http://www.tinylove.com/multiple_births_program.aspx

If you do not have multiples, I still highly recommend the Tiny Love mobiles.

Purchase a Tiny Love Symphony in Motion mobile

(top5) Things I learned today...

* Apparently fistfuls of my hair tastes yummy.
* Fun with solids means more food in = more food out.
* I filed the boys' nails and it would seem that although they are shorter, they are much sharper. Mom and baby now have matching scars on our foreheads.
* Strained carrots stain indiscriminately: faces, bibs, sleeves, bums, etc.
* Not all babies crawl forwards! One of the boys started "crawling" today - backwards!

(clean) Fun with boys

Little boys have the wonderful ability to spray you (and the wall, themselves and the plant behind them) when you are changing them. One tip that we learned in the NICU was to cover their piddler with a gauze pad. The trick is to order the gauze in bulk, as opposed to buying the small packages from the drugstore that only contain a handful of individually wrapped pads.

The gauze pads are also great to have around the nursery to clean up any small spit ups, use with water for make-shift wipes, etc. Just check out how many come to a pack and figure out how many you may need for the next few months when ordering. Or you will end up with 15 packs of 200 gauze pads each like we did.



Purchase Gauze pads

(eat) Warming bottles

Many people find bottle warmers to be a waste. I am not one of them. Our bottle warmers ease our (necessarily) meticulous process. But I must say, I was hesitant. Then we were given one and found two on Craiglist from a mom of twins. Because we make all of the bottles ahead of time, all you have to do is turn them on, put the bottles in, set a timer, and then go change the babies.


Purchase the Avent bottle warmer on Amazon

But there are other options. Here are a few I've heard of:
* Microwave (I know, I know, everyone says you should never do this. But it's quick and easy. The microwave creates hot spots, so all you need to do is make sure you swirl the milk around to stabilize the temp. And this is why I love the little infrared thermometer - so you know the exact temperature.)

* Set the bottle in a large cup. Fill around the bottle with warm water. (I tried this but our tap water wasn't warm enough, so this took way too long. And it was hard to find a large container that would hold three bottles upright.)

* Mix the powdered formula with warm water. (This is great for all you folks who can actually mix up formula on the fly. Make sure to test the temperature. Some babies do fine with room temperature milk.)

* Keep bottles with concentrated formula in the fridge. When needed, fill bottles with very hot water. (The cold and hot water should give you the perfect temperature, but it may take a few tries to get the right temperature. This is what we do when we travel. We keep a cooler filled with bottles that have the full amount of powder, but only have the water needed. We also have a thermos filled with very hot water, so all we need to do is fill each bottle with the rest of the needed water and swirl!)

* Crockpot (Keep a crockpot/slow cooker filled with water and leave it on low all day & night. When bottles are needed, put them directly in the water. I'm sure this works, and I love the idea that the crockpot serves an unintended purpose. But I remember my husband telling me the story of his sister's crockpot melting and nearly catching on fire while she left it on to cook one day. I can't seem to get that image out of my head, so I never felt comfortable doing this...)

What am I forgetting? Leave your experiences as a comment.

(mom) Kellymom

Founded by a lactation consultant (named Kelly, of course), Kellymom offers everything you could ever wonder about breastfeeding. The site contains up to date research, often from La Leche League, American Pediatric Association and other medical professionals.

Not breastfeeding? Want to know more about starting solids? Want tips on pumping at work? Want to learn more about postpartum depression? It's all here.

(top5) Things I learned today...

* Never give the boys prune juice with their formula on the day you're completely on your own. It really works.

* It takes all of 30 seconds in a clean diaper for a baby to have a blowout.

* Never leave the camera on the corner of a low dresser.

* The boys apparently find the quiet nap time routine to be the most amusing show they've ever seen and end up kicking so hard hey bounce themselves in their bouncy seats so hard that their heads actually slam against the back of the chair. Much to their amusement.

* They truly think they are great singers.

(eat) Bottles - make room in the fridge!

For the first few months, we were still learning how much the boys would eat at any given feeding. Now that they are fairly consistent, we wash all of the bottles after the last feed and pour them all at the start of the day. They eat 4 times a day now, but we always have 5 bottles for each in rotation. The morning bottles are always waiting in the fridge so we don't have to worry about measuring before the coffee starts flowing.

Because we go through a large can of formula every day and a half, we hate wasting a drop. So to differentiate the bottles, we put the caps on the ones that contain the least amounts so we know to grab those for the evening feeds.

(And yes, we have two that use Avents and one that uses a Dr. Brown bottle. At one point, two had the same bottle but with different nipple sizes, and one had the different bottle and amount. It was a bit ridiculous...)



What works for you? Leave your experience as a comment.

(clean) Make your own diaper wallet

A new favorite site of mine is Ikea Hacker . Folks send in their hacks to Ikea products. And lo and behold, there was a fantastic post today about how to make a diaper wallet out of an Ikea CD case. It resembles the pricier Skip Hop pronto mini changer, doesn't take a lot of skill, time or supplies, and costs a great deal less.

Make your own Diaper Wallet.

Brilliant.

(eat) Mixing large batches of formula

Having three hungry little men means mixing a days worth of formula at one time. We started with a small Tupperware liquid container when they were eating about 30oz of formula a day. We found this pitcher at Target, but any one will do.


Figure out approximately how much formula you will need in one day. (Once you mix the formula, you should use it within 24 hours.) Measure out the amount of water needed in ounces (large measuring cups will have cup/oz markings). Fill the pitcher and draw a line where the water hits on both sides with a Sharpie marker and write how many ounces. So next time, you don't have to measure out the water, but just fill to the line. As your baby/babies grow and eat more, make new markings on the side.

We use a digital kitchen scale to measure out the formula. By no means is this a necessity, but this has become a staple in our baby process. Grab a clean bowl, set it on the scale, turn the scale on so it is calibrated to 0, then start measuring out the formula. The back of the can will indicate how much you need. For example, when we are making 96oz of formula, we need 400grams of powdered formula.

Dump the powder in the pitcher. We found that a whisk is the best tool for getting out all of the lumps and creating the least amount of foam. Our boys have sensitive bellies, so more foam = more spit ups in our household. This is why we have not been able to mix the formula individually. The shaking/mixing of the formula in the bottles creates a great deal of foam and often leaves lumps of powder.

Purchase the Salter Kitchen Scale

(mom) Baby essentials for less

As for most new parents (of one, two or seven babies), finding great deals on diapers and formula is essential. As a result, Babycheapskate.com has become daily reading for me. Actually getting out and to some of the stores is a different story, but I've enjoyed a few online clearance shopping excursions all thanks to this blog.

Babycheapskate.com
Coupons, online and in-store sales for everything baby related. Want to know where to find the best deals on Pampers this week? Check out this site.

(sleep) Itzbeen

The first 3 months, we depended on the Itzbeen to be our brains. We were so sleep-deprived (as all new parents are), getting only 2 hour chunks of sleep at a time. We could barely keep our eyes open, let alone be able to remember what time the boys' fed or when we gave them medicine. We were instructed by the NICU to never let them go more than 4 hours between feeds. (This, of course, changed as they started extending, then dropping, their nighttime feeds.) So we needed something to do the thinking for us.

The Itzbeen is no more than 4 timers (diapers, feed, sleep, misc). Each has an alarm capability, so if you need to make sure you do not exceed say, 4 hours, the alarm can sound at that time. This was crucial for us to use in the middle of the night when the boys would have easily slept more than 4 hours due to their prematurity.

We ended up getting one Itzbeen for each child, which is a lifesaver if each is on a different schedule. Thankfully, we really only needed one for all three babies due to their similar schedules. When we started the "cry it out" phase, we started using the Itzbeens for timing how long the boys would cry. Trust me, two minutes feels like two hours, so it is great to have the timer in front of you for proof.

Purchase an Itzbeen on Amazon

(clean) Bums

If I were to nominate one of the baby items we cannot live without, it would be Boudreaux's Buttpaste. We tried everything on our little boys' bums: Desitin, A&D, straight zinc oxide. The A&D ointment literally burned their skin and smelled horrible. The straight zinc oxide (this is what the hospital/NICU used) is affordable, but not great due to its thick consistency. Two of our three babies had terrible diaper rashes prior to using the Buttpaste (hence we had tried every diaper cream on the market). Once we switched to the Buttpaste, they have not had a single rash.

Boudreaux's Buttpaste smells like heaven and is the perfect consistency. Our trick is to buy the tubs and to spread the Buttpaste on with Johnson's cotton swabs. (Q-tips did not work at all due to the cotton pulling off the tip when you tried to spread it.) This prevents you from using your fingers and potentially spreading germs and bacteria in the container. And when you're changing 3 babies in a row, you don't have time to wash your hands in between each.

Purchase Boudreaux's Buttpaste and Johnson's cottom swabs on Amazon

(clean) Washing bibs

This is probably pretty intuitive to everyone else, but it just occurred to me. When washing bibs, I (now) always make sure they are closed (the velcro is secure). Otherwise, the velcro will attach to anything and everything in the laundry. Forget to and the camisole you threw in there on a whim will be ruined when the velcro attaches to the front section that is actually seen by the outside world and rips it to pieces. For example.

Because we use 3 bibs at a time, and that most cloth bibs are sold in packs of 3, I close the matching bibs so that they are secured around each other. It makes it easy to grab the bibs before feeding and know that you will have 3 matching bibs. (This is important when you are giving them formula mixed with prune juice to help with bowel issues and you want to use your largest bibs for coverage.)

(eat) Food Safety Thermometer

One of the "baby" products that we cannot live without is a food safety infrared thermometer. My culinary adventurous husband was thrilled to receive this as a Christmas gift. I'm sure he saw it on some Alton Brown episode and fell in love. Our previous uses for it were to test the temperature of heated pans, oil for frying, and the occasional window to check for drafts. But we have found this to be irreplaceable when it comes to testing the temperature of warmed bottles. You can always do the "test a few drops on your wrist", but my wrist cannot tell the difference between 85 and 110 degrees. I like to know that even though the bottle might feel a bit warm to me, that it is in fact 98 degrees, just as it would be if they were getting breast milk straight from the source.

To test the temperature, remove the bottles from their heating source, swirl them around a few times and shoot the infrared either onto the outside of the bottle or the inside (to test the milk directly). The outside and inside temperatures typically vary, but by only a few degrees. We are now also using the thermometer to test the rice cereal after heating it in the microwave (you can easily see the hot spots).

We use the Fluke FP Foodpro Food Safety Thermometer, purchased after much research. (Yes, pre-triplets, I actually spent time researching infrared thermometers on food safety websites.) I'm sure other models should work just as well, but I highly recommend this model.

Purchase the Fluke FP Foodpro Food Safety Thermometer on Amazon

No expert

As a new mom of triplets, I am constantly frustrated that there seems to be a wealth of baby information available, yet nothing tells me exactly what I should do. And even then, there is little available for moms of higher order multiples (triplets +).

So here I am passing along what processes, products and advice have worked for us. Categories will include: eat, sleep, play, home, clean, save, and mom. For your ease, I created a storefront on Amazon's site which includes all of the products mentioned and recommended. I am far from an expert, and I'm sure there are better ways to do just about everything, but at least you'll have one experience to draw from. Please share your experiences in the comments so we can all learn from one another.

Enjoy!