Special Topics

Kim Hawley 0:02

Hello everyone, this month's special topic is about creating yes spaces, what they are, how to use them, how to think through them, how to set them up.

Kaely Harrod 0:14

So when you're thinking about a yes space, it is an environment where you can say yes to your kids. So you're looking for safety things for perspective for needs for them to be able to freely play and explore, and not have to put limits on them in that space. Now, the idea is that you can say yes, and you can do that, because you've already removed every reason that you would need to say no, so you have to be very intentional about it. And in my experience, honestly, it sometimes takes a couple times of using the space to realize if you've actually made it a yes space, because them interacting in that space is somehow sometimes the way that you find things that need to be removed. But it is something that you're not necessarily I mean, maybe that's just me, I hear, I hear you laughing!

Kim Hawley 1:06

I am laughing because my oldest was the kid that would go into a completely childproof area. And find something in five minutes that like no other kid found in forever. We have a friend, Kaely and I who owns like a family yoga company. And they'll be like dozens of toddlers through the space in any given week and Ian will come waltzing in as like a two year old and Beeline right to the only dangerous thing in the room that dozens of other toddlers didn't get into. So yeah, like it takes some time if you have one of those children.

Kaely Harrod 1:40

That, that is Liam as well. And I remember distinctly when he was like 18 to 24 months like in that range. Our pediatrician, who We adored in New Jersey, she was like, have you like baby proofed your space, and I was like, Liam can open the front door, like unlock it and open it and run down the street. It's like, so yes, our space is baby proofed. But Liam is not a baby proof child. So he also was the kid that could pop off like the door handle things. Which came in handy once when I accidentally locked myself in the basement. But, that meant anything we did to keep him in the front door didn't work. And we eventually, like just made a way for it to not be, you know, for him not to be able to unlock it and open it. But as a little kid, like he would climb on things he would like get into things, he would open things. And we're just like, you're not supposed to be able to open that, like what is happening. So anyway, yes, it sometimes takes more work depending on the child.

Kim Hawley 2:50

Yes. I will talk about I think safety proofing, in a little bit more detail. But yes, spaces are more than just about the safety. It's really thinking about a space and environment, with your child's perspective in mind and the types of things they like to do and really setting it up to be a place they can explore and challenge themselves and removing all the safety issues. And knowing that realistically, you might not have a room or like a whole area that can be a yes space. I live in a row house in DC, our downstairs is very open. We don't have separate play spaces. Like yeah, it was our living room. And so all we could what we did do is like how do we make this as yes space esque as possible. Some people will do like a corner, and then maybe do a little bit of getting around it if you have a kid that actually will tolerate such things and not just not um and so taking the idea and really adapting it to your space rather than think of it as like it must be a purely this or that kind of concept.

Kaely Harrod 4:02

Yeah. Well, and part of it is also your mindset in this space of setting it up where you're letting your kid explore the things that are there. I think sometimes as parents, it's really easy to come to like toys and things that you expect your kid to interact with, with expectations of what that interaction should look like. You know, like I remember having trains, I mean like we should treat them like trains and my kids are like these are not trains today that are dump trucks you know, or whatever. It's like, Mommy, what is wrong with you like these trains are not going on the track. That's the last place they should be. And so part of it is coming to the space with an open ended idea of what creativity and play should happen there. And then having things in that space that allow that from your kid too. And I think this goes so nicely with what Heather was saying a few months back that like being undisturbed in play is one of the ways kids learn, you know, so having them have full rein in that space gives them a lot of freedom to learn and explore. And that's so so beneficial to them. And it also helps the fact that there are other spaces that inherently are way less. Yes, esque. That's not that shouldn't be said. But lots, lots of lots less of a yes, space. And so that kind of balances that out, too. If you have a kid that is like a major risk taker in less safe spaces, you know?

Kim Hawley 5:35

So, and if we can allow a little risk taking risk taking in a yes, space, that's awesome as well even set them up for that.

Kaely Harrod 5:44

Yeah, exactly.

Kim Hawley 5:45

So sort of saying started with some, I'm like, what did the Yes, space is? Yeah, before we sort of go into deeper on some of these things is, is the environment is set up around your littles needs, from a safety perspective, from a, from a environmental perspective to encourage that, that play a little bit of risk taking movement, to be in a space where it is designed around their needs, and we've taken out the things we would say no to like the safety thing and, and giving them that environment to really just explore and play and learn.

Kaely Harrod 6:28

Yeah, well, we're gonna dive into like some of how to how to do that, right, like some of the nitty gritty of that. And we'll start with safety proofing, which we already touched on it,

Kim Hawley 6:40

Or how our kids defy it, you mean!

Kaely Harrod 6:43

our kids, were, were anti safety, safety proofing. So one thing that I find really helpful in terms of safety proofing a space is get on their level, and see what your kid can do, because it looks so different as your kid develops, right? So like, I was chatting with a client about this the other day that their kiddo is about to start like barrel rolling and scooting around the room. And she does a little bit of that they have a lot of low outlets that they have things plugged into that are then up on a shelf. And so I was like, Okay, the first thing she can get to is all of these cords and pull things down on herself, you know, because she doesn't know what is and isn't stable to like stand up on and things like that. So anything she'll grab onto and try to like pull herself up, you know, and if there's something that can fall down, it will fall down on her. So sometimes it takes like laying down on your belly, or like crawling around the room to get a sense of where things are. What could be a concern for your kiddo, depending on how mobile they are, and how much of a risk taker they are.

Kim Hawley 7:48

Absolutely. Um, a big thing to think about is also like is your kid a climber and even if they're not assum they might be so anchoring furniture, so you don't have to worry about it quite so much. Doing all the outlets, you know, safety proofing them. I like the ones that go over, like that used to actually swap the outlet plate. Is that what it's called? But you swap the whole front off. And then like when you plug it in it you have to slide sideways before you can plug it in. Because that means if the kid pulls something out. It's still it's automatically proofed. Yeah, future proofed as opposed to like something separate that you shove in managing cords managing blinds managing things that could get tangled in, you know, one of the logical things that you should be doing in your home, regardless of whether you're coming in with this kind of yes space mentality. But it's even more important because they're really trying to create that environmental safety and breakables, right, anything that's really important to you should probably not be in that space, that you're not just gonna hurt themselves with but could just break something of yours that you don't want broken and let's just put it away for a few years.

Kaely Harrod 9:14

Yeah. So when you were talking about outlets, I was thinking that newer outlets you have to have like even pressure on both sides of a plug in order to push it in. So it like takes a lot of effort to push in. Yes. And so that we had those the like sliding ones you know that that like slide shut when you pull a plug out, but now our whole house has the like the you have to really put some effort into plugging. So unless you've plugged a separate outlet into that, then it's pretty baby proof. Because you because you have to be plugging a cord in correctly evenly. You know what I mean?

Kim Hawley 9:50

Yeah, so depending on what how recently you've had outlets updated in your house. Yeah, you might have more newer ones or you might not

Kaely Harrod 9:59

Yeah, yeah. Well, in generally speaking, the the little like plugs that go into an outlet are not all that great, the kids can really easily pull those out. And they are persistent. I mean, children are determined to do the things that they want to do. And so I would say those are some that I would consider the least safe option. And I mean, aside from just leaving the outlet uncovered, you know, the other thing you can do, if it's an outlet that you're not going to use, or you're not regularly using, is just put a solid plate over it, instead of putting some kind of plug cover until the kids a little bit older, and you or if you start to use it, you know, so in the house we lived in, in New Jersey, there were like 9000 outlets, more than we would ever need, until we covered a bunch of them just with like a plate. Because we didn't, we weren't even using that. And they were all on the frickin baseboard.

Kim Hawley 10:50

Oh, wow,

Kaely Harrod 10:50

really light, we're like, all right, where the kids could get them. And so we just like, covered them all with solid plates. And that was, and you can get them at Home Depot or wherever, you know, like a hardware store. And that's not hard to do. So.

Kim Hawley 11:06

And then, you know, speaking to the mindset and the safety thing kind of coming together, really not being afraid of mess and risk. Because we're creating a space where the risks should be manageable, like it should be an appropriate amount of risks. And that the mess that they can make should again, be manageable to clean up, if it's something that you would not want them making a mess with. And let's put it away and take it out selective times when you can cope with that kind of mess. And so sometimes I am really, I have to catch myself, even with my kids older now, this one being like, Please don't make that mess. But I'm like, Okay, it's really not the end of the world as long as we have a plan to clean it up. And so you just kind of be like, Okay, this is the space where everything they have at hand and make a mess, it's not the end of the world, this is good. If they're jumping and bouncing around and climbing, we've really made it safe. So a little bit of risk taking is okay. And that can help kind of create that safe environment because you're not like overreacting, right? Oh, what do you do, like, you know, kind of doing that. It's really easy as a parent to go in, like, I don't want you playing with like that just like you with the trains. And it's take a breath, take a step back, creating a space where we can just let them kind of free, free play and see what comes out of that.

Kaely Harrod 12:26

Yeah, well, and one other thing I would just mention around mindset is also all around like, mess, specifically, you decide what's in that space. So I remember when my kids were really little being like, oh, there are all these amazing things online that we should be doing. And it seems like so much work to put them together and then clean them up. And at some point, I was like, who decides like which things we need to be doing? You know, so we would do some of the things only outside or we would do some of the things like only on the day when I was like up for cleaning it up, you know? And they don't know that. Like it's different. If you have that in their space, and then you're like, No, not today, then of course you're taking away that like yes, space that it is, you know, but if you just remove it from the space, then you don't have to do that. And then if you are like I do not have the capacity to clean up whatever it is, then okay, just don't, it doesn't have to be in there today, you know, and that's like, really okay, and I think the more we give ourselves permission to live, I mean, our next topic is going to be about this self compassion, right? But give yourself permission to be like, today's a hard day for me. We're not playing in the rice bin or whatever, like that's okay, you know, it is totally fine for you to be like I just can't do that today. So we're gonna play with like the rubber blocks that don't hurt anyone and are easy to clean up and I don't step on and get stabbed in the foot you know, like that's fine. And so giving yourself space to look at it and say like, Okay, this space won't stress me out. And it will also be fun for my kiddo you know?

Kim Hawley 14:02

Yes, yes, absolutely. Um, in setting up the spaces I think maybe Heather mentioned this in her play talk. Not only should you get down at your kids love look for safety issues but getting down to your kids level to look at is this a fun space like we set up like play if you have a playroom or their bedroom is maybe your your space or wherever you're living and we set them up for our benefit like our Oh, this is cute. And like, unless you're deep into the world of Montessori design, you're probably not setting up your kids spaces really thinking about what level are they at developmentally? What is your viewpoint? And that's another time we're getting down on the floor to crawl around to set up to really say how am I interacting with this environment? What's at eye level? We are My little was going to actually be, and set up their toys and things you want them to interact with at that level with that perspective, and that can really shift how you store things, you know, what you're putting out and how you're doing it. Rather than just standing in the room and going, huh, how do I want to get these toys in here? You know? Yeah,

Kaely Harrod 15:22

yeah. Well, and and also think about what your kid loves to do, and what you can kind of provide a space for. When we first moved to DC, we lived in a tiny apartment, and really really all three of my kids, but two out of the three, especially the youngest two have to climb on things like they have to it's like a daily need of theirs. So one of our Yes, spaces kind of was a park with ropes that they could climb, you know, and we were like this is where you can literally climb on anything you want, you know. And that means that's gotten out of your system, you've like really fulfilled that need of yours, that love that you have. And then we go back to our space, it doesn't actually have say things to climb on. And we can't we had a small enough space that we couldn't, we couldn't have some kind of climbing anything in there that was safe for them, you know. So we use an outdoor option for that, that allowed them that need to be fulfilled. So if your kiddo loves something like climbing or sliding or whatever, you can have things you can also like outsource some of that spatial need to parks and whatnot.

Kim Hawley 16:30

and if you have a little bit more space, there are cool things you can set up inside. As far as slides go.

Kaely Harrod 16:37

Your little climbing thing is so awesome.

Kim Hawley 16:41

Oh, yeah. So we had this we actually had one of them when we were kids like it's not even like a new thing. It was this set of plastic tubes interconnecting things and platforms. And you could build a bunch of different configurations. Yeah, we had it our house when we were younger, had like an old barn. And my parents like finished just enough part of it. So it was like our outdoor play house. And so we had like these little tables and chairs and things made up that it was my favorite house growing up. I loved it. So yeah, we also had the best climbing trees. So um, but there's also the what is it? Piccolo triangle thing. I always get the name wrong. But something along those lines. There's a couple of different climbing things that you can do indoors if you have a little bit of living room space for it or playroom, space basement base. And then there's simply using your couch cushions and other things to make like crawling obstacle courses, say safe places to jump and safe things to climb on. Ella my youngest could climb before she could walk. Yes. Like as soon as she could crawl, she could climb quite competently. So like,

Kaely Harrod 17:55

she was really good.

Kim Hawley 17:57

I mean, she would just start climbing up like, you know, we get a couple packages haven't dealt with them yet, which is like the story of our life. She's like climbing the boxes or climbing the treadmill. Like climbing onto the table. It's just like so trying to create safe places for even your crawling kiddos to crawl over things, climb things, and then your bigger kiddos maybe would like some of those structures. If you have a space or like Kaylee did with her family taking it outside and just creating it. But the one thing we don't have space for inside, but we'll try to create other versions of yes inside and have a yes space for climbing outside.

Kaely Harrod 18:33

Yeah, yeah. Well, and it can, it can look like things that they normally can't do by themselves either. So like if you have a toddler that's a little bit older, and they love like, my kids still love building forts out of like blankets, and chairs and roaches, and whatnot. But when they were little, they couldn't do it well on their own. And my husband really hates the mess of forts because he's like, it took things from five different rooms that they're all kind of messy...

Kaely Harrod 19:05

So there will be days where I would be like, I'm up for that today. Like I'm up for helping you build it. I'm up for helping you put it away, you know, and then I'd be like, Hey, guys, we should make a fort. And they'd be like what you know, and so that can also be kind of a temporary space that you're creating where you're like, we I know you love this thing. And so I'm giving you this, like, concentrated time of doing this thing that you love that we don't always get to do. Yeah, and you have like freedom in that space, you know? So maybe not technically a yes space.

Kim Hawley 19:37

But I mean, we can take the concept I think and do a lot of fun things with

Kaely Harrod 19:43

Yeah. So Kim mentioned already having like a corner or something I really... well, we've lived in a bunch of different spaces. So our house in New Jersey was a row home that was long and skinny so we can kind of section off a part of the down upstairs to be a yes space using baby gates. And we use the baby gates just so that they couldn't get into the kitchen, which we weren't able to really baby proof. And Liam couldn't get out the front door because he would just leave. And so we were able to kind of like section off one part of it. But I really like those octagon, is it an octagon??, like shaped gates that can be all different sizes, you know, like it has panels, because it's not like a tiny space. And you can put it like in whatever space like make it the shape of the space that you have, if that makes sense. Or like this. So I find those are better than like a play yard kind of thing, or like a pack and play that's like so small, and really restrict restrictive in terms of movement and whatnot, you know,

Kim Hawley 20:49

one, if we're thinking the same thing, they can be free standing. And you can really make like an arc like, like a big section. Yeah, to like, block off against up against a wall or a section of a room. Right? Yeah, and create a nice space. And they're all good way to separate kids and dogs and various ages in their play spaces. Well,

Kaely Harrod 21:11

and they're also great for like, if you have a fireplace and you want them around there, or you have like a TV area that they can't really baby proof very well or something like that

Kim Hawley 21:19

Right, section off the spaces. So the main space can be more of a yes, space.

Kaely Harrod 21:23

Exactly, exactly. So you just get off the things that are not safe or off limits for lack of a better word. So

Kim Hawley 21:30

yeah, yeah. And you know, I think, thinking about mindset and perspective, as a parent, one of the things that yes, spaces can do is they can be a lot of work upfront, especially for the persistent kiddos like Ian and Liam. But they also can take away a lot of stress and anxiety, because when you're in that space, you've theoretically already thought through a lot of the the big safety risks and the big off, please don't break that really nice bowl over there kind of things. And so you should be able to really just go with it, and let go that kind of worry and anxiety and stress over them getting into stuff if you've set yourself up. So the initial work is a bit, maybe, depending on your spaces and your kiddo. But once you're there, you can kind of just be like, Yeah, you know, maybe every few months, you make some adjustments, because their development is changing. But you can really just let go of worrying about what they're getting into in that space. And that can be really freeing.

Kaely Harrod 22:31

Yeah. Well, I think there's also a lot of intentionality in how we talk about things, and especially in Attachment Parenting and responsive parenting, like, those spaces are very intentional about what we do and how we say things, right. And so sometimes that can be mentally exhausting, if it's not kind of your natural instinct. And so this kind of space also creates a scenario where you're not necessarily needing to do that as much. So I think once it's cultivated really well, it can be a lovely, like, relaxed space for you as well. Because you're like, you're allowed to do whatever you want in this space. And like, I don't have to monitor that or remember how to how to say whatever thing that I want to say to you. And I can just like sit here with you and drink my coffee or drink my water and like let you be free. You know,

Kim Hawley 23:24

like, Oh, that looks fine, that you're jumping on that. Oh, that looks great that you're dumping that out? Yeah, what did you find in there instead of being like, I don't want you jumping out or Why are you jumping on that?

Kaely Harrod 23:34

Yeah, or like, oh, no, that box is not for playing or this? Yeah. And we have we have an example that talks about, about jumping on the couch. So, So I think one thing that's really important in a yes, space, is to think through what are the limits and boundaries that you have as a family and what is actually safe in your space? Right. Kim and I have talked about this before of like, your kids, like do something on your couch that my kid like my kids are never allowed to eat on the couch at the moment because we have a newer ish couch. But they used to eat whatever the heck they wanted on the couch because we had a super old futon. And so that boundary has shifted right and and like our like our expectation at dinnertime is that we're going to sit together at the table, but not all families have that expectation. And so you're also setting the space up based on your own expectation and boundaries as a family. And I think like Kim's example that she wrote out that I then expanded on was if you if we tell a kid like no you can't jump on the couch. And if that's your boundary, right like if in your family, there is no jumping on the couch, then having something else in the space that they can jump on to redirect them to or having the How to not be part of the yes space. So that it's not something you have to reinforce. Yeah. can both be helpful?

Kim Hawley 25:08

Or like, let's pull the cushions off. Yeah, jump on that cushions on the floor. Yeah. Right. You know, like, let's modify. Yeah.

Kaely Harrod 25:20

Yep. And one of the things when, when I was thinking about that example, specifically is that in my like communication stuff, and around doula work, I talk a lot about communicating something in the absolute simplest form when you're talking to someone in labor, right? For children, it is similar that like, if you say, don't jump on the couch, jumping on the couch is the main part of that sentence, right. And so that's actually highlighted in some ways for them. Where if you say, like, hey, let's jump on the cushions on the floor, you're not mentioning jumping on the couch. In that phrase, you're not saying No jumping on the couch, or don't jump on the couch, you're instead giving them a clear view of what you want them to do, or what they are able to do safely. Right. I was reminded of this yesterday, we went to the swimming pool, and the lifeguards are always saying walk instead of don't run or no running. And I'm like, Oh, yes, that's a perfect example of this. Like you're telling the child what you want them to do, or what they can safely do, instead of telling them what they're doing incorrectly, you know. And so in a in a space, what you want to also do is have I mean, for one, think about your language, but also like, have a space where you have removed as much of that, so that you aren't doing that in the, you know, in the way that you maybe wouldn't normally do.

Kim Hawley 26:45

Yeah, I love I love that you highlighted that. Because I'm notoriously bad at remembering to do that. Like it's one of my things and was like crud, rephrase, because it's like, it sounds more positive. And you're right, you're emphasizing like they're hearing the language of what you want, instead of hearing what you don't want. Yeah, and it just sounds more positive, and it just makes you received better. And isn't like encouraging their brain to go in the direction of what you don't want them to do, like, junk through your food. Oh, my food? Like, no, let's keep our food on the table or Yeah, or you know, on our plate, right. But it's also just, I'm terrible at remembering to even still nine years I am too. I have to catch myself when I'm feeling frazzled, and just remind myself in those moments. Yeah.

Kaely Harrod 27:28

Well, it's funny because for me like I do it really well at a birth but I'm I have a hard time remembering it with my kiddos, in part because when I'm saying something like that, it's when they're doing something they know is like off limits, or should they shouldn't be doing that. I'm just like, seriously. And so then I'm like, stop right down the hallway or stop whatever, you know, and I'm like, I'm doing exactly what I teach people not to do. But I'm not applying it in my own scenario.

Kim Hawley 27:55

So no, yeah, I would love to hear like if anyone has already started doing this. Creating Yes, spaces in your home. We'd love to hear what's really worked what you found really helpful, especially for the parents, you know, with younger kiddos. And like I said, I think Montessori is really good at creating things for this kind of space. I don't love everything about Montessori. But I do think that they do a good job of thinking about spaces with the child's perspective in mind and then up charge everything. A good friend of mine who Kaley also knows she is always joking about like throw Montessori or wedding on something and you can automatically like exponentially bump up the like charge like once in cookies. That's $5 Once a Montessori wedding cookies, that's $500

Kaely Harrod 28:55

a Montessori wedding. That's amazing.

Kim Hawley 28:59

I mean, we just started throwing them together. Bingo. I know. It's just like, it's

Kaely Harrod 29:03

also true for baby stuff. So yes, you're like, here is this thing. And this is the baby version. I'm always telling parents that like, this is the exact same thing. It's just more expensive with a baby on the cover. Yes.

Kim Hawley 29:16

Um, but anyway, there's cool, I think there's some cool ideas if you if you look around those spaces, just if you want a search term that might bring up some nice images, if you're somebody who likes images.

Kaely Harrod 29:27

Yeah. Well, and as we have seen, and hopefully you all have also noticed this, we have some very similar temperament and kiddos in the community. So as you're trying to imagine what this can look like for your kiddo, there is probably a kid that is similar to yours who's a little bit farther along in age and so bring that question to the Facebook group or to the parenting circle or the q&a. And we will help you kind of troubleshoot what has what have other people used that you know to fill that need. Are that love or that joy? I know I'm thinking of a couple different climbers in the group that I'm like, I even I have those kids, they're just now nine and 10. So they're a little older. But they but that's you're not alone in whatever temperament thing you are dealing with. And so we can also brainstorm together of how this can look in your space with your kiddo. Because the last thing you need to do is try to figure this out by yourself. So awesome. Well, we will see you in one of the parenting circles coming up. And until then, have a lovely day two

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Kim Hawley 0:00

Oh

Kim Hawley 0:03

hello everyone. Um, we're happy to be sharing our best tips for summers with littles for June special topic, we thought it's been hot, at least in the DC area. And so was a good time to start thinking about summer and summer outings and safety and summer travel and all the things you don't really think about. If this is your first summer with baby out and about or just you know, as as you move through a summer with a toddler for the first time.

Kaely Harrod 0:38

Yep, we're gonna also ask at the end that if you have your own tips and tricks that you have learned over the years or year or months, that you've had a little one, we would love to hear them, either by emailing them to us or by putting them in the Facebook group. Because we know that there are things that we haven't thought of or done, that you all could benefit from hearing from each other. So we're gonna start with safety.

Kaely Harrod 1:10

And one big thing that I get asked about as a birth doula is some stuff for babies, because babies under six months are not supposed to be wearing sunscreen. And so how to handle being out in the sun with babies is a big thing that comes up for me in my postpartum care especially. And so there are some good kind of rules of thumb around this. One is to be out when the sun is not at its peak. So like before, 10 or 11am. And after 2pm is generally the recommendation. But also things like SPF bathing suits sun hats and being in lots of shade. Like, the general idea is that you are going to get hot much slower than a baby's going to get hot. And so have having loose clothing on them and having frequent shade so that they're not just in the sun for long stretches of time, is a good idea.

Kaely Harrod 2:10

And kind of along those lines, I we didn't put it in the we didn't put it in our outline at Classic to us. But one of the things that I remember asking when Jabari was really little was how much clothes to put on him in the summertime. And my pediatrician told us at the time, baby should have roughly like one layer more than you. And so I was like, Okay, so in the summer, he should wear long sleeve pajamas. And he was like, no, he's like, are you comfortable in your short sleeves? Or are you hot in your short sleeves? And I was like, Well, I'm hot. And he's like, Yeah, okay, so he should be in either short sleeves or nothing because you wish you could be in nothing. Right? And I was like, that's fair.

Kim Hawley 2:55

I love that.

Kaely Harrod 2:56

I was like, if you would be comfortable, naked, so would he like Okay, so, um, that I think is also a good like, thing to think through is that we tend to overdress versus underdressed babies, and you'll get a sense of if your baby is too hot, if they're like sweaty in the back of their neck, or if they if you notice, like them having any kind of skin color changes. And so that's just something to keep an eye on, especially as you're feeling out how your baby responds to heat so

Kim Hawley 3:33

and like loose cotton layers tend to be very believable. So 100% cotton. On the flip side, besides SPF bathing suits is actually some cool like SPF kind of like technical almost think like running clothes type things for babies. Because we went on a deep dive when my oldest was little because I was training for a marathon and my husband was going to have him out for a while while I met up for a friend for my long runs once a week, and it was summer. And we were like he hit me and he was under six months. And so we wanted something that would would like cover him completely and ended up finding some really cute little like athletically things which are not the best from you know, doesn't follow the cotton roll but did have SPF and was designed to be breathable. And the other big thing is portable shade you can make your own shade with an umbrella and they actually do sell SPF umbrellas. But you can also just use a regular why and this is something that I personally have used a lot with my kids usually baby wearing. But like I live in Capitol Hill and we walk a lot. We try to walk on the blocks that have the most shade but sometimes that doesn't work. And so I someone The baby wearing group recommended that and I was like, you kind of look a little ridiculous, like it is actually really effective. So that's another just having a little umbrella that you can whip out and create your own shade over your baby. Yeah, that's a nice little trick.

Kaely Harrod 5:16

Yeah. And if your kiddo is over six months, you can do sunscreen, of course, it is. I find still, like, I mean, sunscreen is just harder to make sure that you've applied it everywhere on a very wiggly small one, I feel like so we have always done like rashguard kind of swimsuits if we're out and about, because it's less skin that needs sunscreen, and so more of the skin is covered by other stuff. So that's a good way. There are tons of amazing options now that are like rashguards, or like long sleeve swim suit kind of things. For kiddos that are not super hot, you know, they're made for being out in the heat. And so that's another way to not have to put a ton of sunscreen, on a kiddo when they're a little bit older as well. I know my kids were very wiggly with that sort of thing.

Kim Hawley 6:12

I don't think we did much sunscreen until they were much older because it was a pain. And we did a lot of that like the technical. Yeah, kind of long sleeve, high neck and then like a broad sun high. And then put sunscreen like on their legs. That was easy. Yeah. It's because it was just a pain otherwise, yeah.

Kaely Harrod 6:33

Yeah. And that's kind of how we did it as well.

Kim Hawley 6:36

Yeah. And, you know, we kind of touched on overheating with dressing and, and shade and, and all of that. And that, you know, babies do have more trouble regulating their temperature and even young kids, right, like toddlers, they're out moving, running around, they can definitely overheat if we're not mindful of it, but one of the things that I wanted to really highlight with the temperature regulation overheating is babies and strollers and draping the blankets over thinking, Oh, we're making shade, we're blocking the sun, but you're also blocking airflow. And so there's this they it can get really hot under there, even with those light muslin blankets. And so it's not recommended that you drape a blanket over your baby's stroller as a way to create shade or blockout. The accumulation.

Kaely Harrod 7:29

Yeah, well, and there are I mean, umbrellas are also great for strollers, there are specific umbrella strollers, no umbrellas for strollers, there we go. umbrella strollers are a completely different thing. But there are there are umbrellas that are that are specifically can be attached to strollers if you do not have like a canopy that oh, that covers well. Also, I really love stroller fans. They're fans that basically have like, flexible, like the little octopus legs, and you can twist them around the side of the stroller or whatever I use them at births, twist them around the side of the birth bed. So. So those are also really great for if you have a hotter baby and you're wanting some more air circulation in their stroller or even in their car seat. If they're in that, then that stroller fan can be pretty awesome. So

Kim Hawley 8:26

yeah. Yep. So we want lots of airflow, lots of shade, appropriate clothing, and then just going out in the morning. And you know, once the day is starting to cool down, we have that choice for outings.

Kaely Harrod 8:41

Yeah. And we'll talk in a little bit about things to think through in terms of outings. But timing is definitely one of those. In terms of kiddos, I think especially if you're navigating going out with a kid for the first summer, then it can be hard to figure out like, Well, I mean, it can be hard to figure out for a variety of reasons. But if you don't know how your kiddo will do in the heat, or you're with a lot of people that don't have kids, and so they're just like picking a time based on their own desires, then oftentimes that tend to time it's a time when lots of things are planned, right. And so, right, yeah, all kinds of things. So I think being mindful of that and trying to navigate the timing or having it knowing that you have something during those timeframes that does have good coverage or good shade or good airflow you know, so you're not going to be overly hot you know, just sitting outside in the sun. So yeah,

Kim Hawley 9:42

yeah. Another thing to think about for the summer is babywearing if you do a lot of baby wearing, it's hot in the summer, right? Like there's, there's tips and tricks you can do but you're wearing a little person against you and you both generate heat So there's definitely no way for it not to be at least a little bit sweaty. But there are some better options for summer. There are. There are things that are entirely netting for like if you want to go take your baby in the pool and wear them. There are carriers that have panels of like MASH to get more airflow on babies, or your toddlers back. I have several of them because I wear my kids a ton right up through the toddler years and they don't make you feel cooler, but they do make a difference for them. And then again, shade right bringing out the umbrella covers both of you. And I know a lot of people will get like those. What are they called Kaylee the class that you like, get water on them. And then like put on the back of your neck and they help you pull

Kaely Harrod 10:52

kicker like athletic cloth things. Yeah,

Kim Hawley 10:55

to help keep themselves cool. And sometimes they'll tuck them around baby, I don't know, that, like down the back of a carrier or something like that, to kind of have that pulling on them. I don't know how, like, I never don't deep dive on whether there's concerns with that or not. But I do know people will do that for themselves, like put it on the back of their neck to help keep them cool since baby is adding or toddler is adding. Yeah, you're funny, right? So so being smart about the carrier choice can make a big difference when you're thinking about wearing a little that likes to be worn in the summer. So like if you're wrapping changing up your route, so you don't have as many passes. You know, thinking about a mesh carrier, or one with mesh panels, or at least one that's not as thick, right? It doesn't have this thing of material can make a difference.

Kaely Harrod 11:51

Yeah. Well, and one strategy for longer outings if if it's possible for you is to have a stroller with you and a baby carrier. So that if that baby carrier gets too hot, you can put the baby down, you know, have some just change in position, but also better airflow for both of you so

Kim Hawley 12:13

and then if they get fussy, you can kind of put them back up with their baby. Love long stroller. mochila rights, it's probably a good rule of thumb. Right? Anytime because sometimes babies love strollers, sometimes I hate them.

Kaely Harrod 12:25

Right, exactly. Good to have options in general. So one thing that comes up regularly is using the water and how to be safe about that because of course, summertime is the time that people like to swim. I myself love swimming. It when you have little ones around the water, it's vital to have one adult always in charge of the kids. And that means they're like not chatting with other adults. They're not doing other things. They're like really just watching the kids. One reason for that is that kids aren't going to tell you like, Hey, I'm about to fall in the fall in the water, right? Or I'm gonna run and lose my balance and whatever. And toddlers and even older babies are incredibly fast. And I know if you have a toddler or an older baby, you know that about them. But even younger babies don't necessarily give you a warning that they're gonna get better at scooting around. Right. So one of the things I oftentimes tell clients when a baby is like three or so months old is like you really like now's the time when you have to be careful with movement, because they're not going to say like, Hey, today, I'm going to figure it out, you know, like, they're going to just squirm more than they've ever scored before. And if they're on something, they're going to fall off of it, you know, and that's how you're going to learn.

Kim Hawley 13:42

Right? I never forget pre having the kids, one of my first friends to have kids in grad school, put her like little baby down. We turned her back and he had rolled like barrel across an entire room. Like just Yeah, back to back to front to back. And we're like, holy, yes. Yes. Just do then she goes, Oh, yeah, he could totally roll anywhere. And really, but he's so little like, you know, it was it was an eye opener for

Kaely Harrod 14:11

sure. Yeah. Well, and I mean that like when you know, your baby does that you're obviously kind of more aware of it, right? But when your baby does it the first time, you don't know it's coming. And so that's how a lot of babies fall off beds and fall off surfaces because they were safe yesterday on that thing, you know, and now they're scooting or now they're rolling or whatever. So around water, it's really important that not only you keep them from falling in going too deep, for instance, but also that you are with them if they are in water because they can't necessarily like set themselves up if they fall down like babies can babies and toddlers can be harmed in very shallow water. It doesn't need to be that they're in water that's over their head, right a couple inches. Yeah, yep, just a couple inches.

Kim Hawley 15:00

And I think the other thing that's really important is a lot of times when there are a lot of adults, and this is probably more to round toddler's head into our older kids, when they're a lot of adults, it's very easy to assume that someone else is in charge or pay attention. And a lot of times when we're around water we're chatting, eating or drinking, you know, alcoholic or non alcoholic, like it doesn't matter, like socializing, right. And so, because there are often then a lot of adults, you need to actually know who is the primary person. And if that swapping off you need full acknowledgement from peers popping into like, I've even seen people do things like I'm wearing something specific, like I'm wearing this bracelet to say I'm the person in charge or like different things like to make tangible like, you know, it's your job to be on safety duty. And if you need to, to go pee or go inside, then you get somebody else that you are in charge of these specific children fully. And sound. It's that can be helpful just really to make sure that everyone knows who is who is supposed to be.

Kaely Harrod 16:02

Yeah, the main person. Yeah. And depending on how much time you'll spend around water, there are some safety items like, like floating sort of devices, right, like I always loved with my youngest, we use those life jackets that go on the front of a toddler that are like safe for boating, and all of those different things. But we would use that in the pool, mostly because she wanted complete autonomy. And those of you who've been around for a while are not surprised by that.

Kim Hawley 16:34

You have a child that wants complete autonomy. Yes,

Kaely Harrod 16:37

Mrs was like me want to do so. So then that made it where she could like run and jump into the pool and stuff like that and, and swim around. Because she because she had that floaty on. But when she was probably gosh, she was six, no five, probably like five, almost six, we went on a vacation with a bunch of my siblings. And she was a good swimmer at that point, like all three of my kids were good swimmers. So none of my other siblings who were swimming with them had their own kids. And they would, they're just like, they know how to swim, you know. And she at one point kind of got stuck in the deep end and was like, That was really scary. And she made it to the side. But she was like, I don't think like this. And I knew that I couldn't like I couldn't swim that well by myself for that long kind of thing. So even a slightly older kiddo can get themselves in a scenario where they're just like, Ah, maybe I can't handle this. So that's the other thing to keep an eye. That's the other reason to keep an eye on them is that if they're getting tired, or even if they're doing something that they normally can do, they need to have close supervision, because a water thing needs to be addressed or water emergency needs to be addressed really quickly, you know, so it needs to be they need to be under constant eyes. So

Kim Hawley 18:00

even with floaty things, right, like so other things can be helpful, but they're not a Yeah, both things can cause your own issues. So like, they definitely still need the same level of supervision.

Kaely Harrod 18:12

Yeah, and I don't mean all floaty things are created equal either there. There are plenty of them that are not good to use. But there are some safe some safe options for a little one. Yeah.

Kim Hawley 18:28

And then thinking about food, beading, nursing, the whole range of things. Summer is hot, as we've said. So your little one might want to feed more often remembering that food like nursing bottles, that is their food, but it's also their their beverage like it's also drinking thirst. So you're exclusively human milk fed baby doesn't need more water, right? Human Milk is 88% Water

Kaely Harrod 19:02

do with your stats?

Kim Hawley 19:05

Technically 87.5 But you know that water remnants is setting for the ibclc exam that actually stuck with me unlike some other things that were useless knowledge. Um, so so they might want to feed more frequently. They're they're nursing directly and they're feeding more frequently they're going to get lower fat, more watery milk. No, wait, that's the opposite. They're feeling more familiar. They're gonna get higher fat low. Ignore that. But they're getting their thirst quenched. Right like they're, they're getting, they're regulating their intake to their thirst so so they don't need any extra water. And they should be fine as long as you're paying attention to all those temperature regulation things. Toddlers, older babies who are drinking water right? Already might need some increased water if they're getting hot and sweaty and so monitoring that is good. And then just being mindful like cookouts, you know, get togethers. There's lots of new foods. There's lots of new people and making sure that they're eating age appropriate things right like that. We're not that, that we're being mindful of our little babies who are new to solids. And our toddlers not having things that are choking hazards, and that someone's just aware of what's being offered to them, you know, are the grapes cut up is are they getting a hot dog get sliced appropriately versus just a whole one? That kind of stuff is good to remember, just like we remember around the holidays, we want to remember it was summer socializing? Yeah, yeah.

Kaely Harrod 20:45

Okay, so that's our safety info, do we miss anything cam that you want to add, before we move on to kind of fun stuff to do.

Kim Hawley 20:53

I think that's covers it all.

Kaely Harrod 20:56

So maybe to transition from safety to activities, we wanted to talk a little bit about things to think about when you're planning an activity, and then we'll give you some ideas of things that we think are great activities. And also, this is where we would love to hear from you about activities that you have liked. I know, not all of you live in the DC area. So we won't try to just tell you about the great things that DC has. But things that you can look for in your community as well that tend to be great for babies and toddlers. When you're thinking about planning any kind of activity, we already talked about shade, we talked about having like the timing, you know, in terms of heat, but a few other things that I think are helpful to remember for yourself is some kind of exit strategy. I know that sounds like I don't know, like some kind of horrible criminal thing that you're going to be involved in. But an exit strategy for me is like mentally being willing to leave something that I don't want to leave, right, like something like that, or an exit strategy might be like, my kid gets hotter than I thought they were gonna get. And so we like, abandon the fun family activity that we wanted to do, right. And I think it looks differently for everyone. But for me, it was very helpful with little kids to give myself like mental preparation for that, in case it needed to happen. Right. So then I had kind of worked through, how is that going to look? You know, when when what are some conditions that might that might require a quicker exit. Because in part, I, it was helpful for me to emotionally work through that ahead of time, and not do that alongside my kids, especially if they were going to have three different emotional responses to that exit, right? Because it's not always that a kid wants to leave, when you think they need to leave, you know, especially for toddlers. And so I think that's helpful to think through. And then some logistics like food and bathroom for you. I think, again, if you're planning an outing that maybe you normally did without kids, or you're doing with people who don't have kids, it's really easy to not think about the fact that like toddlers need for food is much has much smaller windows than an adult. And, and as an adult, we can say like, oh, we know we're gonna go and eat lunch in an hour. And so I can handle being hungry for the next hour. But a toddler definitely cannot slash should not be expected to have that same understanding. And so having some idea of what your kind of in between food will be if you know that it's going to be like a brunch that's later than their normal breakfast or a lunch that starts at one and usually at 1130 Like what does it look like for your kid to have the food that they need? And is it helpful to maybe have some things with you to make that happen?

Kim Hawley 24:05

And carrying water?

Kaely Harrod 24:06

Oh my gosh, yes.

Kim Hawley 24:08

Gotta carry water in the summer wherever you go. Because you know, that's just one that you just can't Yeah, I'm just gonna get there she you're gonna sweat it out. So Right. That's a big one.

Kaely Harrod 24:21

Well, I'm sweating. I think I one thing that I was thinking about Kim, when you're talking about the babywearing is I tend to be sweaty as an adult. Oh, if I was taking care of my kids in the summer or wearing like Mrs just basically lived on my back her whole first year and so my the top of my back would get sweaty from her. Yes. And I and which was fine. I mean it wasn't she would get sweaty and I would get sweaty and it was what it was but um, but then if I if I was self conscious about that, then I wanted to have a shirt to change into right? Because I would have a big like wet spot right at the top of my bag. I from her. So I would bring her like if I wanted her to be in a cute outfit, I would bring it with us and not put it on her until we were wherever we were going. And I would have my shirts that I can easily change into also matters, which for me it did sometimes, then that's another thing to think through so

Kim Hawley 25:23

well and I mean, I think that's also true if you know you're going to be walking a bit then in the air conditioning, if they're really sweaty for being on you where you're really sweaty then that you can get really chilled, right being super sweaty. And then you go on like, you know, the blasting air conditioning. So always happens to me in the summer, and I hate it. I hate being cradled. Yeah, I hate that extreme.

Kaely Harrod 25:44

Yeah, yeah.

Kim Hawley 25:47

So yeah, so that's a good strategy. Like, especially for a little one that's easy to change super quick.

Kaely Harrod 25:52

Yeah. Well, and the last thing like kind, I think this kind of goes into exit strategy a bit. But once you get a sense of how quickly or how, what circumstances make your kiddo overstimulated, that's something to really watch for, as you're doing activities in the summertime, partially because, because like overheating or being hungry, or all of those things can lead to like, dysregulation over stimulation and all of that. And so it could happen in a scenario where you're like, my kids not going to be tired for two hours, and then you spend an hour outside and they're exhausted because they're hot, or because they've exerted too much energy or whatever. And so having an exit strategy for for logistics is good, but also being willing to take the temperament of your kiddo as you're going through an activity and decide if it's good for them to continue doing it. You know, even if they're really mad at you about that, you know, like, even if they disagree about their overstimulation, take that as confirmation that they are in fact meeting to go home. But just keeping an eye out for that, because it can definitely happen when you're doing something, you know, that you're not normally doing. So, yeah.

Kim Hawley 27:16

So fun things to do. It's, it's summer, I mean, summer is a great time, but just due to sensory experiences and, and, and get out and water we mentioned from a safety perspective, but water is such a lovely way to get kiddos, outside and playing. until like, besides pools, which are sort of the obvious. water tables, sprinklers, and splash parks are all really fun options to have some water play when it's hot, that that basically any age baby can can experience to certain extent, or any age baby toddler, you know, kiddo. So those are all great options. And like, locally to us in in DC at least we have a lot of just slash parks tucked in, in our neighborhoods and stuff. So I'm looking to see if you have any places like that, that have those water features for kids to play in, can be a really great option. Of course, water tables can be as simple as getting like a big, you know, kind of container thing and filling with water or like actually buying a water table. And letting your kids kind of splash around the mat. And you know, so many fun ways to get sprinklers for mobile babies to kind of Yeah, rent skip and jump throw to cool down. Man, you're in any space outdoor space that you have to kind of get them playing and and enjoying themselves with water.

Kaely Harrod 28:56

Yeah. The other thing about water stuff with sprinklers and splash parks specifically is that those actually are a bit safer for like littler babies especially well, I mean, like if you have a baby who's mobile, but they they like to be on their own right they like to explore things by themselves then they can crawl through some things like sprinklers right and so that can give them kind of a lovely bit of autonomy if they're in a safe space to do that and they're and they can you know explore in a different kind of way so yeah, when we first moved to DC, Mrs. Was to and our our like rule for ourselves was that we had to go anywhere we went had to have water. So we're like, is there some kind of water we can play in? Like, can we get into a fountain is there something to get wet with? Because it would be so hot that I'm like even just going wherever we're going we're going to need to cool down. And so that was like that was our gauge. Is there a bathroom? or is there water? It's hard to

Kim Hawley 30:03

say good things. Yeah, can I forget that the emerse was too it's

Kaely Harrod 30:08

crazy. Yeah, she

Kim Hawley 30:09

was. So sort of the flip side to waterplay outside in the heat is indoor play spaces can be a really lovely on those god awful ridiculously hot days. And, and those usually have a baby like a little teeny tiny section for like little teeny tiny babies. And I know in in DC we have several that have like coffee shops and like food and you can really just go, you know, yeah, no pay $20. And, like, let your if you have older kids, let them climb and tumble and play and then you know, get a coffee, have a snack like those really hot days. If you have like an indoor play space, it's a really great place to, to get out to see other people. And for those toddlers and preschool age kind of kids to get some running and climbing in if it's just too miserable and high for playgrounds. And they need to get some of that energy out.

Kaely Harrod 31:16

Yeah, well, this isn't something that we had on our list. But I remember at when our kids were little or so before we moved here, in New Jersey, there were a bunch of big fields that would have like, I don't know, they'd be like historic, whatever places. And they're just enormous fields that you could go and picnic and whatever. But they were they would be these big old trees there and you would have a huge amount of space that was shaded. And so we would sometimes go and just like sit on a blanket, and the kids would crawl and run around, you know, like that. That's also a really great sensory thing for them. I think with little ones, it's easy to overcomplicate it and need to make it like something really like fancy, which still exciting. Right? Exactly. But truly, like crawling around in the grass is a new experience, you know, and, and just being outside and hearing things and seeing different different bits of nature. That's also a hard part of how kiddos learn. And so even just something so simple, like that can be really nice, especially if you're meeting up with someone that has older kiddos and they can like run around and your kid can crawl right or, or vice versa, if you have two kids and one needs to run and one needs to crawl that was our thing, or two need to run and jump and one needs to crawl, then finding some spaces around you that have good shade, but also just open space that's safe for them to do some exploring on their own, you know.

Kim Hawley 32:49

And then other indoor things like museums, we are in DC and I know somebody else of course we have Ciceronian museums, and that's just be fun to go check out some of the more kid friendly things just again, being out but in the air conditioning can be a nice option. So thinking about things like aquariums, and just other indoor things like that, but you know, some kids are going to be a challenging environment. You guys are gonna really love it, and it can be a really fun outing.

Kaely Harrod 33:26

Right? Yeah. And again, like, taking stock of your kiddos, temperament. When you're planning this, if your kid is a kid that like you go to an indoor aquarium, and that feels like you're it's gonna be a nightmare than an open field where they have very few limits. That's a perfect scenario for that kid, you know, because they literally can do whatever they want in that scenario. There's very little to hurt them there. You know, like, that's a perfect Yes, space kind of, but outside and they can still explore, you know,

Kim Hawley 33:59

versus a kid that will be like, captivated by watching fish swim by Yeah, and find that fascinating. That can be you know, a nice space for them to kind of occupy their brain a little bit. And be inside. Yeah, right. Yeah. So we would, I think we got everything that yeah, for activity to do. Um, and we'd love to hear anything that you all love to do. And then we thought we'd wrap up this video on summer tips with travel. We think we last really talked about travel back at the holidays for those of you that have been around since then. Or watch that video. But summer often comes with more travel so we thought we would just touch on some travel considerations here as well. Yeah, so in the name of me being the sleep coach.

Kaely Harrod 34:57

Like you have to do the first one

Kim Hawley 34:59

I First thing on there is thinking about safe sleep wherever you're traveling. And often if it's your first trip, it can be hard to think about, oh my god, what does that look like. And honestly, sleep. Safe Sleep is one of my least favorite things about traveling with babies under a year, and even younger toddlers, because you just don't know what you're gonna get right like, and of course, if you're bringing like a pack and play or something with you, then you do know what you're going to get. But if you're not, if you're either seeing what your hotel has, or you bet share, or you're planning to buy a chair for traveling, then you're kind of like, we're gonna get and get well we get so thinking ahead, if you have a baby who will sleep in a Travel Crib, and you can bring that that's lovely. I actually really like the kind where you can sit down the side. And then kind of almost, if you if you normally like snuggle your baby to sleep, it's much easier to kind of snuggle them. So you can kind of treat it like a sidecar. Like I'm with them. Yeah. So I like those personally. Um, but then just thinking about, you know, doing a quick safety check, if you're going to be bed sharing how soft is the mattress, are there any gaps, some families will actually pull the mattress off the bed frame, even when they're traveling to make a floor bed. or rearrange some furniture, push beds together, pull furniture away, just doing some basic triaging, putting baby in between them, so that you and a partner create bumpers, like a buffer to the edge of the bed. You're right about that. And just you know, kind of giving, I think it's an all around safety check also, like beyond sleep, to see what your baby is likely to get into, because my children always get into stuff when they're teeny tiny into hotels, because, you know, exciting is cords to pull this outlets to poke at. And if there's a kitchen, then there's doors to open. And there can be knives in those doors. And it's like endless things to think about. Um, but also don't overcomplicate it, just just, you know, do a quick check. And, you know, go through that.

Kaely Harrod 37:05

Yeah. Yeah, and if you're flying, you want to think through car seat logistics. So there are a few things to think about here. One is if you want to use the car seat on the plane, that is considered the safest way to fly with babies and toddlers. But I know not everyone does that. So what that looks like if it is a if it is a car seat that's approved for that. So most, I think all at this point car seats that are approved for cars are also approved for airlines. But it will say it's not FAA approved is what it will say on the label. And then also the logistics of what your carseat situation will be when you get there. So one thing is that car seats are not considered safe to put under a plane because like to check like just with random bags, because of the jostling that happens to them in the underneath the belly of the plane is my only way

Kim Hawley 38:06

of saying that. I mean, they get thrown around, they get slammed around. We don't know nothing is damaged. I will say lots of parents check them but yes, not recommended. So just you know, you'll see people doing it. Yes. Yeah, right.

Kaely Harrod 38:20

Yeah. Yeah. And thinking through like it, depending on how old your kiddo is, it might be, it might be possible to like have a car seat. If you're traveling to family, for instance, if someone there has a car seat, that's the right size for your kiddo that can sometimes be a solution. We did that with some of the toddler years when we were like, Okay, do you have a booster seat on that side? Okay, then we're gonna, like fly without it. And then you'll pick us up with the booster seat in the car, you know. So we did that for many years when we were flying to see my family. But just think through those logistics ahead of time. Some airlines if you have like a baby, like an infant in lap kind of scenario, some will let you use a car, see if there's an empty seat on the plane. So that's another thing to look at. I know southwest did that for many years. And we I think they still do. That's how we flew oftentimes is with our kiddo in the extra seat to sit on the plane. So yeah, so think through that if you're flying.

Kim Hawley 39:31

Um, and then summer is a time for lots of changing routines as we take trips and visit family and things and this is just your chance to pause and remember that it's okay to be off routine when you're traveling. And it's okay to try to stay on routines when you're traveling. Whatever makes the most sense, and likely it's going to be a little bit of both, right? Trying to keep some of your predictable rhythms can be very helpful. All, but not to the point that it's limiting your ability to, like do stuff. Yes. Especially if you have kids that are pretty flexible. So it's okay to get off routine a little your kid will get back on track, your baby will get back on track, everyone will get back on track, expect it to take a little bit on the like, coming home side of travel. Everyone to settle back in sleep to settle back down routines to kind of settle back down. But it's okay. Okay to keep them up past bedtime. It's okay to skip a bedtime routine. It's okay to fudge their naps a bit. Just know your child and know where those breaking points are where it doesn't actually make sense to do that, right? Because every baby and toddler is different. And some. You know, if you do that, then it's it's not worth what happens. So just kind of feel that out with your kiddo.

Kaely Harrod 40:51

Yeah, well, and along those lines, this reminded me of when we were flying with our kids, when they were little pre COVID. We flew with them kind of a lot. We regularly had super early flights, I swear my dad would just sabotage us with the 6am flight really was logistically figuring out like what time of day made the most sense when you have a napping kid, right? Where like now, it's gloriously easy to just be like, we could fly, whatever, because my kids are old enough to handle that. But we would do, we would bring the kids to the airport in their pajamas. If it was a morning or late late evening flight. Because first of all, they loved pajamas. That was like one of their favorite things. But they would be like cozy, then they could sleep if they needed to sleep. But if we were getting them up at like 5am for a flight, then we just grabbed them out of bed. You know, like that was it it was it took no preparation at all. And we would give them food on the way usually like something like super simple. But they also thought it was like really fun and exciting as toddlers to be like in their pajamas running around, like in the real world, you know. And so if you have a toddler that that seems like it would be exciting for them, that can be a good strategy. But also, if your kiddo does typically like go to sleep and a particular thing, and you're wanting them to sleep while you travel, whether it's in the car or on an airplane, having an idea of like kind of doing some of your normal sleep stuff to help that happen can be really helpful because it can kind of trigger like that same Oh, it's you know, it's time for sleep sort of thing.

Kim Hawley 42:35

Yeah. Those associations can be helpful. Yes,

Kaely Harrod 42:38

yes. Associations. There you go. That's the word. Go ahead.

Kim Hawley 42:46

I was gonna say to our last last point about travel is, you know, being mindful of who you're going to be traveling with or visiting and how much parenting value wise and approach wise, you're in alignment. And so it's lovely when you're around lots of other parents, or extended family that is very responsive, parenting supportive. And also, for a lot of you that's not the case. And so it can be stressful to have family and friends, you know, all off, you're off routine, and there may be stepping in unhelpful ways. Or why didn't you just do this? Why don't you just do that. So to make sure you're planning, either having a separate space, like you're staying with a little bit of your own space, or creating that space in some way, so you can have a break from maybe the unwanted advice or the feeling like you're on display, because everyone's like, Oh, those silly people who are doing their responsive parenting or not parenting in the right way, you know, can be really helpful.

Kaely Harrod 43:55

Yeah, one one thing we didn't have on our list, so that was the last thing on the list.

Kim Hawley 44:00

Well, okay, so bonus thing from Kaylee, because we never stick to our outlines. Totally. Oh,

Kaely Harrod 44:04

yes. Well, as I was talking about pajamas, I was like, we didn't really talk about car travel. Um, so a few things to think about logistically with car travel is safety regarding food. So what I see sometimes with toddlers in college while I'm what I did with cartridge car travel with toddlers was to feed them more than typical, because you're like keeping them happy with food, right? But in our situation, learn from our mistakes. We had one major delay in a travel that we had, and Jabari, we fed him so much food, I don't even know. We were just like, our whole strategy of keeping him happy is to like have food available to him at all times. And then he puked like this. And he was just one and he wasn't sick. Thankfully, it was like not like, you know, it wasn't a virus kind of thing. But we were like later I remember talking to my mom about And she's like, do you think it's all things that you bet? I was like, oh, maybe. So that's one thing to keep in mind safety wise, like what things are, they are choking hazards, etc in the car, but also just like kind of keeping your normal routine as much as you can. And then to think about like, like really having, having a broad sense of arrival is good in car trips, because things like needing to go to the bathroom needing to breastfeed, if you're breastfeeding, your kiddo, like, all of those things logistically make the trip longer. And so for me, when I would start a car trip with like my toddlers, which happened a lot, and we're moving here to DC, I'd be like, Okay, it says, two hours and 45 minutes. And like, three hours later, we're halfway there. And I'm just like, No, it's gonna be a seven hour trip, you know, but I think it's helpful to keep in mind, like, Okay, this is a two hour trip if I just drive and never stop. But I probably am going to need to stop a few times, I have small children. And so maybe this will take me four hours instead of two, or maybe, you know, and, and having some space for that mentally again, but also logistically planning for that, like, I don't have to be there in two hours, they're just not an event that starts in three hours, you know what I mean? So that you have some leeway there. If your kiddos need lots of stops.

Kim Hawley 46:29

Yeah, I was gonna say stop also, just to get them out of the car seat to move their body. I feel like there's probably a time limit by which you should take kids out of car seat every so do you know what that is? I don't know what that is, we'll talk about what it is, like two hours is sticking in my head for some reason. Um, but we can double check that. And if you have a kid that sleeps really well in the car, then chiming it for naptime can be a nice way to get like a good chunk of driving that way. And of course, if you have a child that doesn't sleep on the car, that that's not a good strategy. But for the good car nappers, I'm leaving right at naptime. And if the nap you think is gonna be the longest nap can be a good way to get some driving in without writing a fussy, fussy little one.

Kaely Harrod 47:15

Right? Yeah. Yeah. So we would really love to hear from you all, either your tips and things that have worked well for you, or also things that you would warn against doing? If that's the case?

Kim Hawley 47:29

Travel sales? I mean, definitely, definitely. We've all been there and done that if you've traveled with your little one.

Kaely Harrod 47:37

Yes, yes. I think one of the things that I love doing when I travel or when I'm just anywhere, and there's like a small toddler losing their mind, is tell that parent like we've, we were that family a bunch of times, you know, like that kind of mindset. And now I have tons of siblings that have kids that are toddlers or babies and there'll be like, what if she screams, I'm like, she probably will at some point, she will like, that's because she's a kid, she's a baby, you know, so she's gonna not love it at some point. And that's okay. Because most babies do that sometime when they're traveling, you know, and embracing that you might be that parent this trip, but maybe not next time. You know? Depending on the temperament of your kiddo. I think that's helpful to remember too, that like traveling is hard with little ones and also worth it if you're doing something fun and seeing family etc. But it's okay that it's like hard times tricky. So

Kim Hawley 48:42

no, no, bring your questions to the q&a at the end of the month. And also if you have something more pressing course the Facebook group or parenting circle. And you know, Kaylee, maybe we should put up a post in the Facebook group for folks if they have any tips and tricks they want to share. And then oh, yeah, in the Facebook group, definitely send them to eyes and we'll, if we get a good number, we can make a little list and include it with this for future parents.

Kaely Harrod 49:16

Yeah, for sure you're learning from all right. We will see you all on at one of the parenting circles.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

Coming Soon!

Coming Soon!

SPEAKERS

Heather Boyd, Kaely Harrod, Annie, Kim Hawley

Kaely Harrod

Here we go. And Kim is going to introduce Heather.

Kim Hawley

Oh, goodness, hello, I'm mostly going to let you introduce yourself. But for folks watching the recording, we have my good friend and sleep coach and occupational therapist and amazing human: Heather with us tonight to talk about play and development. And Heather, if you want to share anything about yourself or anything, you know, we kind of jump in, go for it.

Heather Boyd

Sure, yeah, I was so excited that you invited me to this talk, Ken. Because I mean, you and I know each other through the sleep world. And it's just so fun always to get to talk about the things that I enjoy talking about play is one of them. Though I'll admit right off the top for any parent that feels they're not inherently playful. I'm not that playful, as a parent, either! Hands up from Kim, I'm not that playful, but you probably will find great relief in this chat, in terms of play and development. And you may find some inspiration as well, that may just kind of give you that little change. Where and to kind of open up some playfulness.

Heather Boyd

So in terms of who I am, I am attachment based sleep coach in Niagara, Ontario, Canada, and an occupational therapist have 20 plus years now. But my real experience with play is through parenthood, I have three boys. Now they're ages seven to 12. So even in looking at my notes to prepare for tonight, their play is changing and their expectation of my involvement in their play is changing. So if you find that some of what I talked about doesn't hit the nail on the head development is always changing and evolving. So, you know, play does too; play is inherent to that. So play is one of the topics that we touch on. And it's always fun, because it pulls in everything about development into this nice little bowl of confetti that you get to have a little bit of fun with. So we can talk about motor development. And we get into the details of how movement works. And we can talk about mealtimes and how to help our children have healthy eating habits and eat enough of the right foods and have peaceful mealtimes. But all of it can be pulled into play, we can use playfulness to kind of congregate all of those things together in a way that makes a lot more natural sense in terms of how human beings work, how we parent, how we raise our kids. And even with in that team, building out those little pieces, the development, bringing in the play command kind of loosened things a little make them a little less serious, a little less about work, and a lot less about whether you're doing it right.

Heather Boyd

So that's it in a nutshell. I figure I have my notes that I want to cover but I absolutely don't mind getting interrupted, I would much rather this be kind of an ebb and flow conversation. So whether it's by chat, if you're muted or whether you're popping on I, I roll with it. So interrupt often or whatever; you're meant to do that. So I wanted to start by just talking about or asking us to think about what is play, because we use the word a lot, but we may not actually slow down and think about what is play. So I wonder for those of you here if you can think of an example of something that you consider to be play. And it could be something that you do yourself or something that you see or hear your child do. What's an example of play, which is a lot easier than a definition.

Annie

Like everything my child does turns into something that's playful

Heather Boyd

Well that hits the nail on the head of a lot of what I'm going to talk about Annie! We're in the process of putting your house up for sale. So literally 95% of their toys and belongings are in bins in the basement to make everything look polished. And they were in the walk in closet today with stuffies and blankets and pillows that I didn't even know had been taken off of the immaculately made bed for showings. And I look in there, I'm like, Oh, my goodness, like, my priority is always to keep things running smoothly. And their priority is to play. And so I said, "where did this come from? And as long as it goes back, and..." then I interrupted myself and I said, "Look, I don't want you not to play, especially since we don't know how long stuff's going to be packed up in the basement. I don't want you not to play." And my 10 year old said, "Yeah, mom, play is our job!" You are right, it is your job.

Heather Boyd

But it is a wonderfully unpredictable, no rules, no job description kind of job. But he hits the point that play is a child's work. It is how they learn. It is how they navigate social relationships. It's how they take risks and try new things. It's how they discover new abilities that they have, all within the context of play, and experimenting and trying something new, which as adults, we sometimes forget, in our own lives to have that kind of playful approach to learning. We get used to learning in a course where we open up a textbook or we listen to a lecture or attend a conference, or, you know, learning officially or keeping notes and, and bullet points of what we're trying to capture. And yet if we think about the times when learning was easiest for us, either one of two things was happening either it was very playful, like a game or something fun and joyful. Even if it wasn't play, per se, it was fun and joyful, or, and or we were so immersed in it, because it was so fascinating to us that we were in flow, right and that there are parallels between what we can do as adults where we get flow where you the whole world drops away from around you, you're not paying attention anything. And you're just absorbed. And if you didn't have young kids hours could pass by with you immersed in something. And that flow, we don't always get as adults, we forget about how nice that flow is, as we kind of put out fires and manage life. But children find flow all the time. And it's part of play for them that that flow happens. And it's part of I mean, developmentally, they have not a great concept of time. But it's part of why time just passes so differently for children because they just get into that flow of play.

Heather Boyd

So I wanted to point out to, you know, when we're looking at what is play, Gordon Feld is someone who I draw on a lot. And he talks about how when we work, our eyes are ahead. So we're looking ahead at what is the goal? What is the outcome? If we're looking a little less ahead, we're looking at what are the steps we need to take, what is the next thing that I need to do right now. And we have an agenda. So it's goal oriented, but with play, it is not looking ahead at all is just in, right in the present, without any agenda without any goal, without any outcome that they're measuring. They just play. And that's, that's all it is. There's no reinforcement needed.

Heather Boyd

In true play we don't have to tell our children to play a certain way. They just spontaneously come up with it. It is spontaneous. It doesn't require any encouragement or comment. And in fact, and this speaks to one of the questions I think that came up in the group. And that was sometimes commenting on play. because don't we want to just get in there and like, support what they're doing. So we comment on it. Sometimes just commenting on it interrupts that player; interrupts that flow. Interrupts what we start to see in kids when they start to play, which is the ability to play without us supporting them where we can, literally and sometimes as parents for the very first time, sit back and watch without being involved. And as a parent, I remember when that first started to happen, because it felt like I had a job to do like I was supposed to engage my child in order to grow them intellectually and socially and emotionally. And I realized that I would be interrupting their flow and their play if I did that. So I I paused and thought, and I relished in that pleasure of just watching them and seeing what they did, and biting my tongue and sitting on my hands to not interrupt them and just to watch, knowing that if his play if the flow kind of slowed down, what what does a child who's well attached going to do? They're going to look for you and the look over in there, you are just relishing in their play and what an amazing way to reconnect with kids during playing when you haven't even interrupted them at all.

Heather Boyd

So that's that's kind of where I start with plays is looking at it from that perspective. And I think it comes down again to this idea that play is really where they develop all their skills, we don't need to set up an environment that makes them practice walking, walking is just fun. We don't need to set up an environment where they're going to even learn they're, you know, learning, I don't know how to stack blocks, we don't really need a step by step process, we don't need a textbook to tell us how to help kids learn to stack blocks, they just manage somehow to figure it out in play. And the same with rolling. And crawling and sitting. These things unfold. And they unfold when there's joy in them. That joy is what drives us. Partly because they don't care what the outcome is. They just care about feeling good and right in the world. Does that resonate with anyone? Any thoughts on that so far? Okay, I see a lot of head nods!

Kaely Harrod

One thing I was thinking, as you just said, that is then...I mean, my kids are your kids ages, they're eight to 11. But I remember being like, look, this is how you stack the blocks. And so then, as a parent, primarily, our role is to just have, have the environment ready for them? What does that look like? You know, because I am a person that's always like "tell me how to do that, obviously!" haha

Heather Boyd

Yes! We tend to be analytical, right? I just want the steps. Just telling me what to do. Not to mention that when kids are little, we don't have a great capacity for creativity, right? Like, please just give me the steps. If I can, I'll just order the thing. And it'll arrive in the mail, like pre-setup, right? So there's two thoughts that come up from that one is indirectly related to what you've asked, and then I'll circle back. And if I forget what you've asked, by the time I circle back, just remind me. But the first is to think about environment, I think that's the crux of it is you're setting up a container and environment that has enough without too much in it, to spark curiosity to spark enough of a challenge that they're going to explore. But to also trust that your baby is driven to explore. They don't need very much at all, in the way of guidance to learn these things, if they are safe, so that the environment is safe enough for them to explore without it being a significant risk. So they can take reasonable risks, which isn't just physical risks, it's the risk that that block is not going to stay on that first one that it's going to fall the first 20 times before they get it stacked that first time. So setting up that environment for safety and for risk taking. And for time and practice.

Heather Boyd

Now, when we think of practice, we think of like mastery, right? We're going to practice this so that we can achieve or I'll use another achievement, we're looking for the achievement at the end. True mastery comes from this, again, this natural flow of play that I mean, we've all seen kids do the same thing over and over and over and over again. And it's not like us trying to learn to play tennis or learn to bake bread where we're trying to practice and it's, it can be hard. For Kids, it can be hard too but the driver is not the achievement. It's the pure joy. There's this force of development unfolding, that creates these conditions where they just want to try again and again and again. Which means the less that we interfere, the more they can just try to move towards mastery on their own.

Heather Boyd

We can talk about futility and frustration a little later today. But because there is a role for us in helping kids navigate futility and frustration and I think when we understand the role of futility in development, it can be a little easier on us as parents to let that happen in a guided way. But it really is about setting up the environment. When I say not too many toys, you know we're looking to have experiences that spark their curiosity with open ended play and I will get back to open ended play as well. But one thing I wanted to suggest that is a fairly easy thing to do as a parent, depending on how old your kiddo is and how immobile, but to consider getting down on the floor in the same position that they are spending time and if they're on their back and they're learning to roll, then get on your back. If they're starting to prop up on their tummy, get right down on your tummy on the floor, and pay attention to what the environment is like down there.

Heather Boyd

How often do we actually get down, like literally at a child's level? So what does it look like? What does it sound like? What is within reach? How different is it down there? And is is it set up for them to have their curiosity sparked that way? Or is it set up to look like most living rooms look or play spaces? Like where you assume kids are upright and walking? Or that you're the one that seeing most of the things? And you raised your hand did you have a thought on that?

Annie

There was a bug but I have been thinking a lot about my son and like he's almost two, and he's in a nanny share with one playmate that he sees and we're trying to make the decision of do we stay with you know, one playmate, do we go with a nanny on our own? Do we go into a preschool where there will be more kids? I just wondered if you had thoughts on you know, at what point do you need that extra social stimulation as well.

Heather Boyd

I'm going to borrow again from Gordon Neufeld work around parents really being the the lead here and social emotional development. Now there is value in having peers and age peers. And it's important to have some exposure because, gosh, if they thought that every interaction was going to be like a parent child interaction, it's it's a rude awakening when you realize that the other two year old is just as belligerent and stubborn as they are. But you wouldn't want that all the time. Right? You need those cushioned interactions. That's what really develops the social emotional. So there's no right or wrong answer there really, except to say it's okay not to rush. If the reason for doing it is purely to for social interaction with age peers, you can wait a long time for that. It really isn't until much later like in early elementary school. And then for really peer to peer relationships even later than that, like getting into adolescence. Depending on temperament of course, I have one really introverted kiddo and one really extroverted kiddo. So their social interaction early on looked very different. And yet, even then, and you know, we're coming out of a pandemic, or hopefully, we're still in it now. But, you know, the last two years have been a very different social landscape for parents coming into parenting, for raising babies for navigating social and interactions and social opportunities.

Heather Boyd

And the worry has been the heavy burden that's carried is are my kids missing out, like we're talking very young children, they are babies and very young children missing out on social interaction with their peers. And I don't believe in general that they are, I think, with parents who are engaging and curious and interested, who have the support because of course, our worlds got very, very small. When there were full lockdowns, that's, that's very artificially small and not good for us. And if we're not feeling good about it, then we're not bringing our best selves to the day, but in general, less really is more when it comes to that that peer interaction and having it be still adult guidance, that you're still there to help them navigate the social piece. So hopefully...well that's a long winded answer...and all sorts of stuff including pandemic and lockdown

Kaely Harrod

It was a great answer!

Heather Boyd

Great. Yeah. And it, you know, it speaks as well to and maybe it's worth mentioning now, of course, all through the caveat of temperament that different temperament traits are going to need different things. But in general, when we look at when do kids need to have say organized activities, and again, I'm going to make some generalizations here, but it should at least take the pressure off of the Woulda, Shoulda around organized activities and extracurricular early early on. With very little babies, the extracurricular are for you, as a parent, right? You can't spend...well it's awfully hard...And parents that have spent time with a baby during the pandemic in lockdown know how hard it is...it's hard to spend time exclusively with your baby without getting contact with other parents who are going through similar things and have babies of similar ages for a shared experience. But it is rarely for the baby. Later on, you know, we talked about organized sports, for example, and I'm going to get into my definition of what play is and what play isn't in a moment. But organized sports isn't quintessential play at all. And maybe I should jump in with what is play first. And you'll see why organized sports aren't, and why it may be worth waiting longer than we think we should. When I had one of my son's in soccer at age three. It was a ridiculous Gong Show. It was fun. And it made us feel good as parents, but I don't know really how much value it brought brought him he enjoyed it, but it wouldn't have made a break, you know, make or break his entire childhood to go or not go with it.

Heather Boyd

So the first basic principle of play is that it's open ended. Okay, so that means like, there's not a fixed set of rules that you have to follow. It is limitless in many ways. And the best example I can give that's really vibrant, is to picture an Elmo doll for a moment. Just that you have an image of a furry stuffed animal, it's red, it talks in like first person pronouns. Me and Me, Elmo, I think I haven't heard Elmo for a while now, but it has a certain voice and has a certain language like phrase, has a name, has a personality. Those are very fixed traits that go with Elmo. Like that's just who Elmo is. Compare that to a sock that you've sewn two buttons on, and they don't even have to match because you just found the buttons that you could in the drawer and you sew them on. You don't even put a mouth on it, but you found some yarn, so you put some hair on it. And you look at the sock puppet and you think well, that is...well, it could be a horse, or it could be a bird, or it could be mom, like they could put their hand in it and pretend that it's you. It could have any name you want to give it, it can have any voice you want to give it and it can change on a dime to turn into an oven mitt for the play kitchen or can be used as a duster if they're cleaning. And so the the options for playing with an open ended toy are much less limited than a closed toy.

Heather Boyd

Now, I don't want to diss too badly on Elmo, because there are a lot of kids that love Elmo. We escaped that somehow. I knew I had a very low threshold for tolerating Elmo, so we managed somehow not to have an Elmo house. So I'm not dissing on Elmo. But it is saying if you had to pick between a limited set of toys that was open ended, versus a limited set of toys that were closed, the open ended have staying power. The other great example I have is in looking at you know this, and I'm going to jump ahead here and what I wanted to talk about, but it flows nicely right now, the cult of achievement that we have. I think it's Kim John Payne in Simplicity Parenting who talks about this cult of smarter sooner, the idea that we somehow need to push development so that they're reading sooner, and they're writing sooner and they're achieving more earlier. We do that at the expense of play. And when we know that play is the basis for all this development, then when we don't need to be in a rush for that culture of achievement. Right? There was something else I wanted to say about that piece, and I can't remember it was another open ended. Oh, it's why some of the best best toys are the ones that your child will be able to play with for literally years, and the way they play with them will be different, but it's the same darn toy.

Heather Boyd

The best example of that is the humble wooden block. If you have a set of wooden blocks, that I mean real wood so they have weight in your hand where you get some of that feedback of gravity in your hand, where the texture and grain of the wood or even the colors that it's been painted or any designs carved in the side, and you take a very young child who's sitting and they'll start by just picking up the block with whatever grasp they can manage, they can manage it before you know it. They're trying to combine blocks by clapping. So they're probably already figured out how to clap with their hands or at least put their hands to midline. And then they're clapping with blocks. And then before you know it, they're trying to put that darn second block on the first block and missing or pushing too hard or not letting go. And then by the time they're my kids ages, they're still playing with blocks. But now they're like train tunnels. And they're, they're nucular explosions spraying the blocks everywhere. And they're using them as tools in different ways. And so that's the humble block!

Heather Boyd

[Kaely asked in Chat for the author of the previously mentioned book] It's Kim John Payne. He is the author of Simplicity Parenting, and he has some wonderful information. His book Simplicity Parenting is worth listening to, I don't think it's very long. And the only, the only suggestion I have is don't feel guilty reading it, if you have an abundance of toys, and you feel like it's a conflict with what he's saying. Just soak it in and like guide you moving forward, you don't need to like abolish 90% of the toys, although sometimes that feels really good, too. So yeah, that's open ended play.

Heather Boyd

But the other part of the definition of play or the principle of play is that there are no rules. Now for us as adults, I know that that's a tricky concept, because most of the games we play have rules. Chess has rules. Soccer has rules, even tag has rules. But for playing at the very basic level play has no rules. Or if they do have rules in terms of child development, those rules are changed by the kids themselves. Now for very young babies, you may not see this really clearly. But I encourage you to just be curious about whether there are rules that they are making up or showing up earlier than you think they are. And it would be in the way of them dictating to you what their expectation is around this play, whether it's peekaboo or building a fort, you may find they actually are they're developing this idea of how this game is going to unfold. But it's not in a rulebook anywhere. And it's going to be different next time. And the pure joy as a parent, when you see your kids grow into this idea of children creating the game themselves, is once they are interacting with age peers or with other children. And I'd say you know, six years and up, you'll start seeing this more clearly, sometimes younger, again, depending on temperament, you're going to see kids create games with each other and navigate rules in ways that wouldn't make sense if we think that play and learning develops when we dictate it when we tell them how to play or tell them what the rules are.

Heather Boyd

The games my kids make up at Forest School are elaborate, and creative, and still have rules. And if someone is added to the game, the rules have to be explained or shared with them. And that child also contributes new rules to kind of evolve the game. And it really is amazing, at least for me, I feel like it's such an amazing thing to watch. Other basic principles, principles of play, is that it does involve risk and failure and adaptation. And maybe this is the time to talk about futility. And when you think of futility think what what happens when your baby has something not work out for them. It's like you know, a freakout, a meltdown, frustration, the realization that they don't control everything about what they want, what they see in their mind, what they want to achieve is not working, either because the law of gravity is way stronger than their desire to build a 20 block tower.

Heather Boyd

Or whether the size of the paper can't possibly be made into, you know, a huge castle, like physically, the physics has its rules to write. And those are not very malleable rules. So this idea is that part of what comes out of play is hitting this wall of futility. And it's not an easy wall to hit. And yet without it we can't grow and develop as human beings. We simply can't. We wouldn't develop a threshold of resilience and adaptation when things don't work out.

Heather Boyd

One of the things that is hard as a parent is to see your kids hit up against that wall of futility and then just see what do they have to do with it because If we can't, or maybe more to the point, we shouldn't try to fix it. We're not there to fix the fact that gravity's not going to allow them to build this 20 Block tower, at least until they get really finess-y with it. So what do we do? Well, we figure out that the way that they're going to develop, play and to continue to develop their their skills in all domains, gross motor, fine motor language, feeding, everything social skills, is to figure out how do you go from hitting this wall where it doesn't matter how hard you try, you can't get through it. So you go from, like, realizing there's a wall to complete meltdown and fury, right, like you're furious and angry at the world that this is not possible. And then once the anger kind of dissipates, kids will get to tears where they're crying. And as a parent, it can, it can be hard to think, "Well, I'm their protector, I'm their nurturer, I need to, you know, to just help them fix this." And instead, we can look at being the ones who collect them, right? To gather them up and hold their feelings of tears, because it's through tears, that they're going to have adaptation, they're going to realize that they couldn't do it, they feel that sense of grief that what they were trying to do, or the friend they were trying to play with, who didn't like the rules and walked away, you know, the grief that comes from that they can't make their friend play with them, they can't make that tower taller, but they can come to tears, and then adapt to that by realizing that it's okay, it's a grief, it's a loss, right, that grieving, and then through that they can adapt and, and build on their play and skills in a different way. And it I'd say that, it's hard. As a parent. As we're responsive parents, we, we bring it it breaks our hearts when they're upset. But our job is not to fix that it's to provide that container for them. That veers a little off of play. But since childhood is full of these moments of frustration, it's probably worthwhile having tackled that. Any thoughts on that? Or questions coming up so far?

Annie

My question is: what is an appropriate amount of grief and frustration that the child can show? Because my son feels things very deeply and persistently and he can cry for half an hour, sometimes when we're trying to set you know, gently, set boundaries that you know, are meant to keep the house or himself safe. And it just happened this afternoon and I just sat there with him while he cried for half an hour.

Heather Boyd

I've touched on temperament without actually talking about it. So maybe this is a good time to kind of unpack temperamental a little bit. Because there's no finite time, other than to look at, you know, take time as like a fixed thing out of it in terms of like our watch and look at it is more like it being a wave that you watch come to a crescendo and then slowly dissipate. And what I have found in the piece that temperament pulls in here is that highly sensitive, kiddos will have waves that are bigger, and waves that crash harder. And that last longer. Because their highly sensitive nature just makes all those things bigger, like everything feels like more, and it takes more time for that wave to wash away. I have one highly sensitive kiddo. And I remember my friend saying like "when my kid is crying and upset, and she was an attachment based parent, I know that I can handle 10 minutes of anything." And I was like just 10 minutes?? That's all?? Yeah, I'd be able to handle that much too. And yet, what I found was that over time, that you know, it's, I suppose it's like building a muscle, right? You're building this capacity to know that the wave comes and this is something highly sensitive children have to figure out that the wave comes in, that you hold on tight because it's a big wave, but the wave passes. And it's only through hitting those moments of futility that they learn that the wave does pass they will feel better. And sometimes it can be not so much, you know how long, but do they have age appropriate tools for managing the big waves that come. Like breathing, I always start with breathing. Because even very young children can model breathing, they might be too upset to do it. But if they see you getting upset, and using breath, as a very, very first tool for calming their nervous system down and helping ride through, even if they're not ready to come down, to know that they can ride through that wave, and it does settle.

Heather Boyd

So that's a vague answer, maybe, but it might serve you well, through those big feelings. And I think what I see over time, and there's a little kiddo in our social circle that I'm thinking of, in particular, as he matures, like naturally gets more capacity for everything, endurance, how much he eats in a meal, and how he handles feelings. I'm seeing all of the tools in his toolbox, his emotional toolbox, that his mom just set the stage for. She can't make him use that tool, but she can model it. And when he's seen that enough, that model fits in well, and then he can too. Because I mean, nothing interrupts play more than being so upset that you can't even talk right? But it's it's still part of that big process of unfolding development over time. And it does take patience to ride through those waves when they're happening, but to also trust that those waves are going to get more manageable for your child over time. Okay, that again, that's a long winded answer, but I love that topic. Because it's these highly sensitive kiddos, yes, I'm seeing a lot of nods, they're intense. To the point where you just think, what on earth? Is this ever going to end and this is ever going to get easier? And it does

Kim Hawley

Annie, I remember sitting for like 45 minutes, my oldest on the floor while he just screamed over something that seems so insignificant. Like to me, but was obviously huge to him. I know, just literally 45 minutes of him sobbing hysterically. You know? Like he was never going to end. And now he's nine and you can look back and be like, Oh, you did actually slowly, you know, get that emotion regulation. And it becomes more manageable.

Heather Boyd

Kind of over time till you like oh, yeah, I remember when it was like that. There was something that I thought of when you were talking Kim that fit in with what you were saying that I lost it, I'll come back to it, if it makes sense to come back. I think one of the things that's worth bringing up too, because we're talking about setting up the environment, right, you're setting up this is physical space, but it's also emotional environment, for taking risks for play for curiosity, is to look at when you're setting up the environment.... I've lost my train of thought it's been one of those days for me. Do I have it in my notes? No, I guess not. I don't know I've lost my train of thought completely on that.

Heather Boyd

But I will say though, is that the the temptation is to make this practical, right? Like we're very goal oriented. And so when we see children playing, we sometimes think it's frivolous. And it's not, it's anything but regardless, and I've remembered what I was going to say about environment. There's a researcher, Carl Dunst, who works with or worked with babies and children with developmental delay. And he wanted to figure out how do we support their development. And at the very basic, like basic level of his principal was natural learning environments. So not contrived, not set up with like academics in mind, but things that go with the natural family rhythm. He talked a lot about the family flow of the day, like setting aside time to work on a particular skill in very young children, is not nearly as valuable as figuring out how to make those things unfold naturally while you're making dinner, or while you're doing daycare pickup, or while you're reading a book. And that those are things that create real meaning, create connection and attachment and build the skill which is way nicer than having homework right? Having homework as a parent where you need to be working on this, that or the other which, for me, it may be worthwhile talking about things like tummy time and the work that we need to do with babies.

Heather Boyd

Now, I have an interesting perspective on tummy time. I guess I'll start by saying that we know kids need to develop this skill. We know that crawling is valuable for all sorts of reasons from head and neck control to shoulder girdle, which impacts grasp, to hand eye coordination and distancing like seeing close and far while you're moving, all these things pulled together. But I also think there is value in looking at movement as being like a transition, which can make it so much more playful, because it's not just about being on your tummy, it's about having fun moving from back to tummy and rolling back and forth between the two positions. Or one of the questions that was brought up like my child is not sitting unsupported, yet do we practice it, play with movement and transitions, playing a game where you're moving them from left sideline into sitting and back again, and get that movement going. When they're stationary, it's because they're working on something else other like sitting there working to pick up something with their hands, or they want to see from sitting or they want to, you know, just be up, it's a totally different world when you're upright versus on your tummy. So don't get stuck in the stationary positions when you're playing. And just by moving your child between positions. It's naturally more playful, because movement is very tapped into our sense of play and playfulness, right? Yeah, so the natural environment and and using movement instead of necessarily kind of the homework of X number of times on their tummy to develop the skill. And it's really like, it's not natural for us to spend as much time sitting as we all do, right? Where we're moving. We're moving movers, we move from position to position. And when we get restless, what do we do? Well, we shift our weight, like, it's all these movement pieces that bring that in. And when we think of play, for children, in particular, it's not stationary play at all until they get into video games or till they're reading or, you know, much later in, in this childhood period. But movement is where the play really is.

Kaely Harrod

Can I ask a follow up question on that? Sorry. I think my Wi Fi is off just enough to interrupt you, I apologize. So I also am a birth and postpartum doula. So I work with lots of really little babies. And one thing that so many clients asked about is when a kid kind of compulsively does a new thing, right? So like, they're rolling to their back. And every time you lay them on their stomach, they just flop over, like they can't not do it. And then they stop doing that. My instinct, and maybe the reason I'm asking this, I want to know if this is accurate, but my thought, in that is that they're kind of like mastering that and then they move on to something else. And they can still roll if they want to. But they're choosing it rather than feeling like every time they're on their stomach, they have to do that skill of rolling over. Is that right? Is that how that's working?

Heather Boyd

My view is yeah that's what's going on. Because we, you know, if it's Tuesday at 9am then this is what we work on, it's going to be hard, it's going to be a slog, but they are exploring. When they exploring or just the movement itself, like, you know, even just the feeling in their inner ear of rotating that way, for the first time, voluntarily for them to be able to do that. It just gives them these sensations, right, these sensations and feedback to their brain about their body and space. And they'll do it more times than we could ever imagined doing something over and over again. And then it's integrated, but it doesn't mean it's fully mastered. And they move on, but they'll return to it as a functional, a functional activity. So yeah, it can be that. You know, a lot of parents get worried about this repetition. Right? And I think that at the fundamental level, if you're worried about the repetition, ask yourself whether your child is getting stuck, or they're getting stuck in this movement. And stuck is in two senses of the word: 1. are they getting stuck physically where they're blocking their ability to move. For babies where you may think "Well, are they going to start pushing up high enough to rollover?" Well, if they're flat on the ground with their hips really wide apart, like their feet in a big V, you can't roll when you're like that you're blocked. You're like one of those very stationary stable bases on a tall crane, where it's like, it's planted there, and they're not moving anywhere. Well, that's stuck. But it may may be appropriate depending on their age, like they just need stability. But once they get comfortable with movement, those legs start coming in because they're unsticking themselves and making it more risky, and tippy toppy, which is vulnerable, it feels weird and uncomfortable. But they're driven enough to experiment. And they master things and then those legs come in, and they push up high enough till that first alarmed rollover accidentally, right?

Heather Boyd

So there's that getting blocked that way. But then there's also getting blocked and stuck in not building on what they're doing. So a child will do something over and over and over and over again. And they're learning and they're nuancing. And they're finessing it. And we may not be able to see what the changes really are. But the quality of movement is changing. And if instead they're taking comfort in repetition, because of the comfort of it, that taking a risk to do something else is too much, then we'd be looking at how do we help unstick them in that way in terms of taking risks and trying new things. And we see that really clearly in kids on the spectrum. But we also see it in kids who are, you know, a bit risk averse, who are nervous, who may have had unsafe movements or experiences before where risk taking has not panned out very well for them. So they play it safe, and they get a bit stuck in their play, too. So that's my thought. But yes, the repetition is normal. When I see it, it's exciting.

Heather Boyd

And I will give one example of my son who had a little blankie. And we had one of those IKEA bins we used as a diaper container, one of those IKEA long tall white ones with a big, fat lid, like it was a high lid like two inches tall and you can take the lid off and put it on the ground, it's not flush to the ground, you can lift the lid up, and there's all this space underneath like two inches high and then eight by eight inches, lots of room under there for a little blanket. So you put the blankie in and shut the lid. And it's like it's disappeared, you can't see it. But he's figuring things out. And he opens the lid. And there it is, and he takes it out. And then he closes the lid. And you can see everything is very deliberate. Like he has to think, where is it, lift the lid, take it out, shut the lid. And then He repeated it. And so it seems like a simple task for us. But at that stage in his development, there were a lot of cognitive pieces to that activity, like he had to remember it was there, he had to remember the steps that he did, he clearly wanted to shut the lid, while it was empty before opening it and putting it back in. So sometimes it was empty under there. Sometimes the blankie was there, and over and over and over again. And it was one of those times that I just stayed out in the hall. And just I did not want to interrupt it because I thought if he even hears the floor creek right now, that may be enough to take him out of that flow that he has. And eventually he looked up and he, you know as kids do, he invited me in to like, show me it without so many words. He didn't have the words to invite me and but clearly he was inviting me and just showing me this thing that was so cool. And I'd had the privilege to get to watch him do that and master it. So yeah. brings that playfulness brings some of that kind of joy to us too. When we're watching for it.

Heather Boyd

Well, we are at the end of my points. Oh, actually, no, I've got more. I forgot about this. We've talked about the cult of achievement. And I pulled this from I think from Simplicity Parenting recently when I was adding to these notes. And it's worth reiterating this idea of the importance of play and what play looks like for kids versus adults. And that play is not something that kids do until they're old enough to work or old enough to go to school. Play is what they do to learn everything. And if it's something that we can keep like that we can keep on playing, because I don't know as someone who's not inherently playful or who maybe through parenting has gotten awfully serious, right like there's a lot of things that I need to manage. So I go into like corporate mom mode of managing things. And if we think of play isn't just something we do until we're working age or have a have a job, and that we only get to play on vacation, or we have to join a sports league or some other club to get play, then we're missing an opportunity to weave play into our day to and that, to me would be a really good, wonderful gift to give your child is your ability to play, not for them, like not to play with them. But to play in a way that's meaningful to you like what does play mean to you? What brings joy to you? Because I don't know, I feel like if we all knew as adults how to play, I think our quality of life would be better. Maybe even our life expectancy would be longer. Be interesting to explore that.

Heather Boyd

I did want to talk a bit about a few resources. And then I think that's it for me unless there were other questions. One of the really good resources, and it comes out of the Rochester Museum of Play. There is a journal of play that comes out of there. And it's a beautiful museum. If anyone is ever in Rochester can drive there, we're close enough to make it a day trip from where we are. Phenomenal place. And there's a research journal that comes out of there, that's all on play. The other resource worth mentioning is Gordon Neufeld has a course all about play. Now I haven't taken it, but I've taken other courses from him. And some point I'll take it but I'm sure he pulls a lot of things from the other courses. But his lens is through attachment and looking at play through an attachment lens. And there is another...oh for the for those with toddlers in the group. Because it can be hard to add playful activities and keep kids busy. And you know, we slip into entertaining them a lot, which is part of you know, part of getting through toddlerhood is navigating that. But the there's an Instagram channel called Busy tToddler. And she's got lots of great, very playful, fun activities that have an engaging, some of them have a learning component. But kids haven't realized that learning is supposed to be boring and hard yet, like learning is really fun for them. Couldn't we all just I mean, I love to learn. But It's different for us than how kids view learning. But it's good.

Heather Boyd

The one question that I don't know, that I answered fully was around how much work to do to support development. It really is amazing when you set up an environment and I again, I don't mean just physically, but when you thoughtfully put together an environment that has enough space, has enough time, has enough interest that matches or is matched with or is just beyond what your child can do then things unfold. You know if that's what they need for that unfolding to happen. And to have that secure attachment with you to be able to take risks safely.

Heather Boyd

I'll say in terms of the challenge that kids need, in terms of what's fitting, we, as adults sometimes balk at the hard work, right? We would love things to be easier. So we look for the shortcuts, we look for the thing that's already partly done. But for children, when they're playing, whether it's a game or a new activity, we need to remember that when we're playing, we don't want it easy. We don't play sports, because it's a shoo-in that we're going to win. It can be hard, and sometimes we lose but if it were easy, like if the other team never showed up, and it meant you won the game. We wouldn't call that very fun. We want it to be a challenge part of play can be that it's a challenge. So for kids is the same thing. The challenge doesn't turn them off. You know, they they are driven for that challenge. And that challenge brings so much to them and so much value. Sometimes it's hard to find the right level of challenge. It's going to be a lot of misses. But that's part of the journey of figuring this out too. Is just playing around with that edge of you know at what point is it total futility for them and they miss the opportunity to even use what you set up, you know, on the floor. And sometimes it will be too much of a reach, but too easy doesn't do them any favors either.

Kim Hawley

Yeah. There's so much of this environment stuff reminds me of Reggio Emilia, which my Kids' school is Reggio Emilia inspired. And like that's all about, like the environment is provocation or learning in play. And it just it fits so nicely in with that. So it's kind of cool.

Heather Boyd

Neat. I know a little bit about Reggio Emilia, because we almost sent our kids to a preschool that was that and yeah, it's, you know, so much goes back to environment, you know, and how we set up the space. Maria Montessori spent a great deal of time and thought on environment as well. And I know there are some overlaps between those two philosophies. And we know it allows us to focus on the thing we have control over, too, we don't have control over how our child's development directly will unfold. But we do have the control over setting up an environment that is provocative, I like the word provocation. You know, that challenge, right? Just challenging enough to incite some curiosity.

Kim Hawley

So can I ask you to speak briefly to play when we have siblings? I know, Augusta I don't know if she's able to unmute and chime in. But we have a couple members also not here tonight that have siblings, like baby plus toddler and any thoughts around play in those dynamics, both like between siblings, and also just as the parent?

Heather Boyd

Having been through this with three kids and realizing, you know, I look back and I think of my eldest and what I expected of him. And it wasn't till later that I think back and holy moly, he was really young when I expected him to do that. And the thing is, he did it anyway, like he somehow managed to meet this really mature expectation of whatever it was at the time based on having an infant brother and then having another infant brother. And so in one respect, you know, birth order does impact the environment, right? The the whole dynamic of the family is different. And so, inevitably, a three year old, who is the eldest in a family of two is going to be taking on different responsibilities and having different opportunities too. It's not just what they, you know, they're being asked to do it's the opportunities they have too, and a compassionate or opportunity to see someone whose needs are higher than theirs, which can be both a rude awakening, and a real privilege in growing through independence, right.

Heather Boyd

Keep in mind, it's a gift that they have the privilege of being, you know, drawn up into a new role. But you know, it's also an opportunity to also kind of use perhaps language around just what you see from the other from your younger sibling, or from a younger child. Like, oh, I noticed that she smiles at you when you come in. Oh, I noticed that she seems really hungry, what do you think we should do? And it can still be very playful, and it's connected, but it doesn't ignore that most of the time, you're going to be navigating two kiddos at the same time. And that those moments where they're alone with you can still be delicious and special and magical. But you're not necessarily losing out on everything by not having more of those magic one on one time. You can use that language, especially with three year olds. They are starting cognitively to make shifts that are pretty exciting. And you can observe and put words to what you're seeing and, you know, that can develop in its own right, have a special connection that you have with them around, connecting with them more verbally than you would have been if even if they were the only child. You wouldn't be talking to them the same way that you would when there's another baby in the room and you're talking about what they need to So that's not a very specific answer. I think it's a complicated one that I like, hacked my way through with my kiddos. And it wasn't easy. And again, every stage of development, I'd look back and think, wow, they seemed so old. But now that my youngest is that old, I realized that wasn't old at all. So now, yeah, anyway, those are my thoughts. That's mainly based on personal experience, not any, any foundation of evidence, but those are my thoughts.

Heather Boyd

So in one respect, it's going to look different for them. And it can be helpful to just remember that they are young, but it is still okay to have expectations. The other piece, and I think this came out really beautifully in the question, the way that it was asked when I read it in by email, Kim, is this idea of when you're playing alone with the eldest child, there's this magic and this youngness, right? It's like it was before the second child came along, where it's much more basic and, and connected and simple. And then when you're navigating, like, you know, don't hit them with that or don't push them over or just wait because I need to feed them first.

Kim Hawley

Personal Experience is awesome.

Heather Boyd

I have lots of it!

Kaely Harrod

I love the perspective of thinking about it being a really, like, great gift for the older kid, you know? Because I think sometimes, when we have babies added to toddlers it sometimes gets like, worded as if the older kid had no choice. And they got thrown into this scenario, that now they have a sibling, they have to, like kind of deal with, you know, rather than, like, the special, unique role that that is for them. And the great gift that it is for them to have that in their life. You know, I love that perspective, because I think when I was in the throes of it, it's also hard to see it that way when everything's just exhausting, you know. But thinking of it as like the awesome opportunity that it is for your older kid to learn what it's like to interact with their younger sibling, you know, rather than just being like, sorry, I can't play because the kid has to eat, you know?

Heather Boyd

Well, and we don't tell the three year old that, right? Because they may be like "oh yeah, really, Well, then please return. Please return it!" But when we can feel like yeah, this is actually doing so much good for you then our mindset changes.

Kaely Harrod

I know. I feel like, Augusta, I can imagine your three year old responding to that. You're welcome for Wilkie! I love that mindset, though, because I do think, I think when I mean my little ones are very close together. And so I remember thinking that like Jabari got a lot more attention from me, before Liam was here, you know, and Liam and Jabari both got more attention before Emrys was here. But they all wouldn't be the kids that they are today if they didn't get the dynamic of having all three of them. Now Emrys is going to chime in. :)

Heather Boyd

Yeah, well, and you know, and relationships can be pretty volatile, when they're little. Especially with by second born, we had to keep my eldest son and second born separated a great deal, I really had to monitor that. By the time the third came along. And my eldest was part of the attention that my youngest got, like, you know, it's we have this, this video of him picking up he's like, I think he has tummy troubles. And he picked him up and he rubbed his belly. And he only like, nearly threw him off the couch when it looked like he was going to spit up. But you know, aside from that, it was this tender moment, another video of him sticking my youngest in a little cart that had wooden blocks, he took the wooden blocks out, stuck the baby in the cart, and then was zooming around the house and then decided to go to the bathroom and like, didn't quite clear the door. And it was a jolt, but the kiddo stayed in the cart and you know, off to the bathroom, the eldest went and then came back to pick up the cart and keep going. And I think you can't create that kind of dynamic as a parent. Like, I could just watch it while I was, you know and that's like, that's a gift for me too. Because then it's someone else giving a totally different kind of play and totally different kind of relationship I can't give because I'm me. And I have a different relationship.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, yeah, for sure. Well, I guess then Kim, are we hearing your kids? :)

Heather Boyd

You're hearing Ian Yeah. Bennett's been you know, attempting to settle Ella down and Ian's in the hallway talking.

Kaely Harrod

I was trying to identify which child I was hearing.

Kim Hawley

You're hearing our how lovely sound carries in a DC row home.

Heather Boyd

Oh, yes. Yes.

Kaely Harrod

Annie and Augusta. Do either of you have questions that you didn't get to ask?

Kaely Harrod

If you can't unmute that's okay. [reading the chat] No more questions. Okay. Perfect. Heather this has been amazing.

Heather Boyd

It was fun. I had fun doing it.

Kaely Harrod

We so appreciate you. And we will the recording will be up for folks. The recording will be up and we will put a transcript with it as well, so that folks can read or watch it. And yeah, Kim, do we have anything else?

Heather Boyd

No, but sometime, Heather, I want to talk to you about play in multi age groups, because watching the kids on our block play throughout the pandemic has been absolutely fascinating. Like with the age spread, and it's just so interesting. Like, I don't know, that's not really relevant for today.

Heather Boyd

Because my kids homeschool and so it's always been a you know, the challenge now is the 12 year old that none of them are, especially during the pandemic, we didn't even know where those were are the 12 year old homeschoolers, I don't know why. But yeah, it's fascinating to see how different their play is. Relative to our elementary school old friends, I haven't quite figured out because of course, every group is different. But it's yeah, it'd be the thing I would miss the most about the way that we're schooling them or educating them right now.

Kim Hawley

Yeah. And like our kids are all in, in typical elementary schools. But then like, we have a very social block. And our kids are always running around ferrell, playing together, like between nine and two in various formats. So it's just it's fascinating to watch them. Because we're usually out hanging out on the block socializing adults, and they just wander and run and we just try to keep them running into busy streets.

Kim Hawley

Anyway, this has been so fun. And I love that I actually understand some of the Nuefeld references now. The intensive, it makes me feel so much smarter. Yeah. Thank you so so much for taking the time. And, and letting us record and sharing all this lovely perspective and knowledge. It's awesome.

Heather Boyd

It's my pleasure

Kaely Harrod

One last question for you, Heather. How can people follow your work? What's the best way to connect with you if they wanted to?

Heather Boyd

I'm most active on Instagram right now. And it's Heather Boyd. dot O T. And my website is Heather boyd.ca.

Kaely Harrod

Okay. And we'll link to the references that you mentioned, we'll put links to all of that and Heather's information so people can connect, because we would love for them.

Heather Boyd

I'll add one more reference than that. I wanted to point out Dr. Peter Gray, I think he's affiliated with Rochester Museum of Play. And he does a lot of work around play, and the importance of play. He also studies education and learning styles and homeschooling. But he has a great book called Free to Learn. And it's all about very unstructured, free play as a basis for learning well into childhood, which may be of interest.

Kim Hawley

Thank you. And Heather, like we said in the beginning is an awesome sleep coach who has a lot of the same values that I do. So when you're, you know, filling up your social media feed with awesome attachment, folks. She's a great one to follow.

Heather Boyd

Thanks.

Kaely Harrod

Thank you again for coming. We so appreciate you taking the time it has been lovely.

Heather Boyd

Well, it was it's been fun. Thank you. Have a great night.

Kaely Harrod

Of course you too.

Kaely Harrod

Hello there. So this month, we are talking about all kinds of sleep stuff. We are starting with separating these out a little bit because they could all be very in depth videos. And so we want you to be able to watch them, or watch only the ones that make sense or watch them in small chunks or something like that. So this first one is diving into how sleep works and what is biologically normal. You guys know that Kim is our resident sleep expert. And so, Kim is going to start us off with why sleep training is not biologically normal. And then we're gonna go from there.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, so talking about sleep training could be a whole special topic in and of itself. And maybe we'll do that at some point. But especially for the folks in the membership who have not worked with me, or have younger babies, and haven't spent a lot of time thinking about this. To start off with just highlighting that sleep training is pervasive in our culture, which I'm sure everyone knows, regardless of what you think about, like how much you've reflected on it. And we live in a sleep training culture. And sleep training is a product of history, and a product of changing norms. And something that emerged, the roots of it emerged around the end of the 1800s, beginning of the 1900s. And it was literally the birth of Pediatrics was around then we had some, you know, super privileged white male physicians who basically decided how babies should behave, and how we should parent them out of their opinion. But because they were doctors, and because medicine was in its very early stages, because we were shifting away from allowing women to actually have power over parenting, to look into experts these ideas that they had became culturally defining of sleep. And they've hung on, they've hung on through the rise of behaviorism, they've hung on through the beginning of actually systematically researching sleep. And then the real, real big push behind like sleep tuning, as we think of it today that started in the 80s. And so a lot of our ideas about sleep, even in the responsive world actually circle back to sleep training, beliefs, and not biological norms. So the folks who came up with a lot of our ideas about how babies should sleep, knew nothing about development, biology, or lactation. And so again, this is a huge topic, and we can definitely dive into it more. Later on or in the q&a, I have a blog post on the history of sleep training, if folks want to see that (we can post it). We wanted to contrast that because it's really important to understand that, that informs almost all of our beliefs about sleep, and that there's a big gap between that cultural idea of sleep training culture and those expectations, and what's actually biological normative. And we as parents get stuck in that gap a lot. And that can be a really hard place to be.

Kaely Harrod

Well, in part of the getting stuck there is that when we're starting out with a newborn, they of course, don't know the cultural norms. And so they're not coming out like, I know, you expect me to sleep for eight hours straight.

Kim Hawley

Exactly. They didn't read the book, they don't know what your pediatrician says. Right? They don't know that, like your mother in law says if they, you know, it has to sleep like this or else like, yeah, they're born with evolutionary hardwired needs, and those needs are adaptive and why humans have survived. And that is what is informing their sleep.

Kaely Harrod

Right?!? Yeah

Kim Hawley

And you're hearing that, right? Like, our babies are born. And they expect continuous close contact and that, is who we are as primates and mammals. Versus like, sleep training advice, treats us like nesta cash mammals, right? Like, oh, I can feed my baby, change my baby, put them down in their sleep space, and they should be content separate from me. Mm hmm. And that's not who we are. Right? Like, yeah, definitely.

Kaely Harrod

Well and I think it's interesting, right? Because every time I have this conversation with folks, or when I'm talking about, like, even just skin to skin and attachment kind of stuff. I'm like, okay, I'm a birth doula. So I am regularly gone overnight. Right. And my husband does not sleep as well, when I'm not in bed with him. And that's like, not seen as weird. You know, like, if I were to say to a dear friend, like, oh, yeah, Delonte doesn't sleep that great when I'm not here. They will probably be like, oh, yeah, same, you know, like, I don't sleep well, when my husband's gone either or my partner is away. If you're used to sleeping with someone in the bed with you, you do typically sleep better when they're there, because that is what you're used to. Right. And the same is true for babies. But we somehow managed to like view it as a negative thing. Yeah.

Kim Hawley

And it's not them being used to it. It's been biologically hardwired to expect it. Which I think is really important, because so many people think that, Oh, it's a bad habit, if you bring them near you, and you hold them a lot and use a lot of contact sleep, it's like, actually, that's what they expect. Very strictly biological perspective, because...think about most of human history, you put that baby down and walked away, they were vulnerable to predator, right, they were vulnerable to not being able to maintain their body temperature. And it was not, it's not adaptive for baby to sleep independently, it was a baby at rest throughout most of human history up until really just a couple 100 years ago, or less, depending on sort of where you were in the world and where you were, socioeconomically.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. And this is needed and important.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, yeah. Um, like, we think about independence being the most important thing in the first year when think about sleep training culture. But the reality is attachment, attachment, attachment, attachment, this is literally the most important thing we do in the early years, besides, obviously feeding and keeping our babies safe, but attachment is part of keeping them safe. And the flipside to that is separation is one of the most stressful threats to young babies. I don't say that with any sort of judgment, because we live in a culture where separation is going to happen. But we view it as no big deal. And to most babies, it is a big deal. And that doesn't mean we should avoid it at all costs, like sometimes we need to have it, that's fine. But we need to understand that, like, babies in particular, attach through the senses to being close to you through proximity, right? And same for young toddlers. And that separation can be really stressful, and we need to, to support them sort of with that thought in mind. And if it's not for your baby, then you found the right window. And that's great. You know, if it's not for your toddler, that's okay. Um, but babies' jobs and young toddlers jobs is to keep that proximity. Right? Yeah, to have those behaviors that seek you for that attachment. And that's really important.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. So let's dive into how sleep actually works. It is obviously a biological function. I think we at this point in our lives, as adults understand that our bodies need it, it is something that you choose, like, you can't, I mean, you choose but you also like if you don't choose it, your body reminds you that you have to do it right, you kind of pass out at a certain point (Kaely's rambly segway!). So how does that look for little people?

Kim Hawley

Well, I think it's important to also know that you can't force yourself to sleep. Mm hmm. Like it is something we choose as in like, as an adult, you go in and go, I'm going to get ready for bed, and I noticed that I'm tired, I'm going to do these things that help me fall asleep, but you can't make yourself fall asleep as anyone who's ever had insomnia knows. And you can't make somebody else fall asleep. So that's important, because we can't make our babies or toddlers sleep and that's not actually our role. Our role is to support them. And to set up the right conditions and context for sleep to happen. And I think this is a really big shift for a lot of people from, I must control sleep, I must force my child into a schedule. As opposed to: I'm setting up the conditions for sleep to unfold.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. And supporting it rather than forcing it, I think, is a big mental shift. Especially because part of the cultural push in it and part of this, like, the shift in cultural norms is that intense, loneliness of parenting, when you're the only person taking care of a baby or a toddler, when it's like: Well, okay, when the baby sleeps, you can take your shower, or you can eat your lunch or you can do whatever. And so then your ability to get through the day is so hinged on your kid's ability to sleep well and sleep separate from you. And so then there's a level of desperation that also comes with that, you know, and that I think also adds to that desire to control not only just control for the sake of controlling but control because otherwise I can't do anything by myself because I'm doing this by myself alone as the only adult, when that is not the best and also not historically normal, right, like the part of this attachment was with multiple, capable loving family members, you know?

Kim Hawley

Yeah, yeah, we were supposed to have extended family to support us. Yeah and that made it easier to get things done with baby awake or asleep. Right versus now we don't even help people troubleshoot how to get stuff done with baby awake, it's all about, get them sleeping, so you can get your stuff done. Right? So for humans at any age to sleep well, right, we need to be tired, obviously. And we need to be able to relax and sort of down regulate, and we need to feel safe and secure. And if we are not tired, sleep is not going to come. If we are not able to relax, we don't feel safe, we don't feel secure then even if we fall asleep, that's not going to be as good of a quality sleep. And, and so when we think about these things for our babies and young children, you can see how a lot of popular sleep advice isn't creating these situations, right? It's not creating these conditions for sleep. And that is why it doesn't come back to making sense with biology.

Kaely Harrod

Right? And how it's not supportive of good sleep long term, either. Like if you're falling asleep, because you're crying yourself to sleep, that also is gonna lead to a poor sleep quality, which in turn, has impacts down the road. You know, I think sometimes in sleep culture in sleep training culture we're like, well, eventually, they learned to go to sleep. And I'm like, Yeah, but it's not that simple. There are other underlying things, you know, that are impacted. So three main factors that regulate. Okay. Today, I hear my children yelling in the hallway, which breaks concentration just a tiny bit. Also, we're recording this on a day when all the children are home from school.

Kim Hawley

Yes, yes. Yes.

Kaely Harrod

So those three factors are circadian rhythm, homeostatic sleep pressure and our sleep architecture. And I'm introducing those because Kim knows all of them and is now going to tell you about them!

Kim Hawley

Yes, okay. So circadian rhythm is your body's internal 24 hour clock. And it regulates a whole bunch of stuff. And sleep is just one of them that we are talking about right now. But it regulates a lot of things for sleep. And our youngest babies don't have an established circadian rhythm. So if you think newborns, fourth trimester kind of period first few months, they don't have that circadian rhythm that begins to emerge around three months. And so as babies turn the corner into being older babies and toddlers, they have an established circadian rhythm. But all humans need us to support that circadian rhythm. And I'll talk about that a bit in our one of our next sleep videos. But when we're thinking about circadian rhythm, light is a powerful regulator. And so we need light to dim in order for our bodies to release sleep hormones like melatonin, and an actually like physiological cue to sleep. So, as you can imagine, in modern Western cultures, there's a lot of things that can disrupt our circadian rhythm. And that day night healthy difference.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. Well, and then the homeostatic sleep pressure is the need to fall asleep over the time, that your time the time that you're awake, which gradually increases, right. Is this also... Okay, so this is my first question for you, based on the fact that I don't know this as well, is this also where like, if we talked about getting a second wind that you've kind of gotten to the point where you could naturally fall asleep for whatever reason you don't? And then it like, resets in some way? Or is that not connected to this?

Kim Hawley

No, a second wind is more like your body releases a bunch of alert chemical, like hormones. Oh, things like cortisol and adrenaline get you through when you your body's saying, I'm sleepy time to sleep, and you're not able to for whatever reason, and then you get a second wind and you're pushing through to great yourself. So homeostatic sleep pressure, sleep pressure builds over your wake time. For us that's all day, for a newborn, that's like what you know, an hour maybe for a nine month old, that could be, you know, three to four hours, right? For a two year old, that's half of the day on either side of their nap. So this is very loosely, the concept that awake windows are based on, follow up those though awake windows are completely not evidence based, we have zero research on them. So some of you, if you're watching this and have worked with me, you know, I use them, roughly. But they're experiential, and they're based off other sleep. info that you kind of work backwards and get them. So anytime you see a sleep schedule, it hasn't really precise awake windows, turn the other direction, close the tab, walk away, because that is not how it works. So sleep pressure, you get that second wind, when you get a little bit overtired, your body's pushing back past the point. If your sleep pressures low and you're trying to get a baby to nap is not going to happen. If they get that second wind, and you're like, oh, it's time to nap, but you have the second wind and they're hyper orsomething and you're upset, it's also not going to happen. Like you have to calm them back down before they're able to really go to sleep. Yeah,

Kaely Harrod

that makes sense. And I think one of the things that is important in terms of the wake windows that you were talking about is I often see them talked about as if they're super static in each age range. And that's what is not evidence based at all, like everyone does have awake windows, everyone's awake windows are slightly different. But saying like, a nine month old should have this number of awake windows and this long always and applying that across the board is what is not evidence based?

Kim Hawley

Well, I mean, the concept of anything being numbered away from it was we actually don't have a lot of good research on when kids drop naps out. Again, that's experiential, right? And obviously, if they're taking two naps, then they're gonna have three periods of weakness, generally speaking, right? And we can deduce that because we know how much kids sleep at night, we know how much they roughly sleep during the day. Right, and you can kind of work backwards. And then experientially, we know not about a lot about how naps need to be spread to support good quality sleep, but they're like, when I'm using awake windows, they're They're big. They're arranged. Yeah, when you see them as precise. Yeah, yeah. That's not evidence based. And also, obviously, it varies from child to child, and it changes as they grow, right, like eight months versus 10 months, your your baby's gonna barely be able to be awake for a little bit longer. Even over that amount of time. And so yes, we all build up sick pressure, that's evidence base. And yes, we can loosely use some concepts of what is generally typical, like as a range to help kind of pin down for babies that are hard to read, or parents were really struggling with, with nap placement. But we don't want to get in this trap of like, well, in three hours and 25 minutes, you have to take a nap. Mm hmm. Right, right. Even if that is typically your baby's awake window, right, even if you like, because there's going to be variation from day to day and child.

Kaely Harrod

Right? Yeah, that makes sense. So then the last one is sleep architecture, the rhythm of moving through different sleep states. So Kim, take it away.

Kim Hawley

Because our sleep cycles, we all have sleep cycles that we move through different states of sleep. And babies and toddlers sleep cycles are different than adult sleep cycles. They are shorter. And they generally spend more time in REM dreaming sleep, they're sleeping more lightly. And sleep cycles gradually lengthen and shift over the early years. So like our preschool age three to five age range, their sleep cycles are pretty similar to an adult. Our newborns, of course have the most the shortest and most simplest, and it evolves sort of from there. But if we're talking about babies, you're safe to assume their sleep cycle is, you know, in that 45-60 minute range and a lot of REM sleep. And then toddlers right are going to just gradually shift over those years longer. And sort of shifting towards the structure of an adult sleep cycle. So we'll wait briefly between sleep cycles, and we subconsciously assess Do I have a need in my state, and babies and younger toddlers are having many more of those sleep cycle transitions because their sleep cycles are shorter. And their thresholds for what a need is or felt safety is of course could be really different thanadults because they could feel unsafe because they're not in contact with you. And pretty much all of their needs, they need you to sort out with them. So, when we think about connecting sleep cycles or not connecting sleep cycles, a big part of that is where is their threshold for registering a need, or registering something that makes them feel unsafe, and again, unsafe can just be separation, because that's going to have a big influence on when they cry when they signal for you, or when they just cannot sleep cycles. Yeah. And we all sleep deeper in the first half of the night, lighter in the second half the night. So it's really common for a baby to give you that longest sleep stretch and the first half of the night, and then wake and need more support more frequently in the second half of the night. Which is why all parents should go to bed early and not waste the first half the night except that most don't want to do that.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, well, and temperament plays a huge impact on in this.

Kim Hawley

In everything, right?

Kaely Harrod

Yes in everything. This is my first clue about sleep stuff being different for temperament was that my oldest is incredibly easy going and was the most amazing sleeper ever. And we thought, of course, it was us as parents that were amazing at helping him sleep rather than him.

Kim Hawley

Obviously

Kaely Harrod

And then our oldest two are only 15 months apart. So he was 15 months old and like a three year old in size so also deceptively large and seeming like he's so old. And then our middle kiddo just had more of a need for some kind of reassurance of safety with every wake. Right. And so, where Jabari was naturally, like, I'm safe, I can look around, like, assess, okay, it's good, go back to sleep. And only really, like reach out if he actually needed something, especially as a toddler. Liam was like, "I need you. I'm awake, I need you." Like, "where am I people??" And figuring out how to support his sleep was such a different journey for us. And I was kind of like, oh, okay, so we have no control. First of all, we control over this. Second of all, your personality is a huge part of this. And third of all, all of anything that people say that's based on like, all nine month olds do X, I'm like, That's all a load of crap. It's so based on your child, and I just decided that everyone who says things like that either didn't have children, or only has one kid. And that's how they're one kid. But it really I mean, it's hugely different kiddo to kiddo. And that makes it also really hard when you know, people who have kids your kid's age and their kids seem to sleep "better" than your kid does. It's hard to not feel like you're doing something wrong, you know?

Kim Hawley

Yeah. I mean, I think sleep in the early years is just one of the clearest examples of how much temperament impacts parenting.

Kaely Harrod

Yes!

Kim Hawley

Because it's not just about sleep. But sleep is such a hot button issue with so much unhelpful advice out there for the responsive parenting world. And kind of like some kids have more or less touch needs. Some kids are easygoing. Some kids are highly sensitive and intense. And they're going to be highly sensitive and intense in other areas, also, most likely, but it's really hard when they're highly sensitive and intense when it comes to sleep. And maybe all your friends have higher sleep-need kids, and you have this really low sleep-need kid who barely needs to nap. You know? There's a lot of variation here. And a lot of it comes down to temperament and temperament is genetic. We don't change it, we can't change it, we can work with it, we can support it. But the more intense and highly sensitive your child is, the more positive they get from you meeting their needs. And the more potential negative is not meeting their needs, which is I think, what makes it even more challenging, because easygoing kids, you know, they can also buffer a lot more missed attunement, a lot more lack of responsiveness and do okay.

Kaely Harrod

Right.

Kim Hawley

So, temperament is everything.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, well, and it has a big impact on everything. I think, because in the early years, it is or the early months, it is so much centered on sleep, partially because sleep is a huge part of your baby's day. And because as adults, like we have all, to some extent, I mean to differing extents again. We've had some kind of norm for ourselves prior to having a baby right. And so what's normal for us maybe before pregnancy or before childbirth is definitely not a newborn cycle in most cases, right? So that's also I think what makes it so challenging is that we do have some sleep deprivation as parents during those early months. And that makes it harder to feel like good and like this is good and normal that my kiddo is waking up frequently, you know, like, that's what I should expect. That means they're doing well, you know what I mean?

Kim Hawley

Especially because our culture doesn't support healthy sleep period. So like, a lot of adults don't have good sleep habits themselves. And then you throw a baby in the mix. And a lot of times, we kind of self sabotage ourselves as parents, by clinging to practices that you've always done as an adult, but weren't actually good for your sleep to begin with, and certainly aren't helping you with a baby. And there are a lot of reasons that people do it, like it makes me feel like myself, I need this time. Like, there's lots of reasons but fundamentally, a lot of times, folks would do better with doing whatever they can to get better sleep.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah.

Kim Hawley

So the more resourceful to carve out time for themselves in other ways, but that's just not how we conceptually think of it as a culture. So it's not what most people are willing to do, or what comes to people's minds. We have to change how we think about sleep, because we've probably never actually had good sleep habits, because that's what our culture is like, go go go productivity, productivity, not actually what actually supports healthy sleep.

Kaely Harrod

Right? Yeah. Well, and that leads us into, like, what are our normal sleep patterns, but not for adults, but for children. If you have not yet looked through the ages and stages portion of the membership site that does have a breakdown of normal sleep patterns by like, roughly right, by age and stage. So that's a good idea to look at, especially if you're kind of on the cusp of a new stage, like look at what is normal for like the younger baby and older baby, if you're right in the middle of that, and sort of transitioning into one. So we're gonna touch on it a little bit here. But for more in depth info about that, do go to those age and stage videos.

Kim Hawley

Yeah. And that's, I forget if we have the citations on the membership site. But a lot of those big level numbers, with the exception of awake windows that I've already said aren't evidence based, those are evidence based numbers, they're pulled from really good quality research. And they're the numbers that I use with my sleep clients. As a range, right, because everything is always a range. And sometimes they are outliers. And outliers don't mean there's something wrong, but it is a clue. I think it's really important for our folks under six months to know that light sleep and waking is healthy, normal and protective. From a safe sleep and SIDS point of view. We don't want to overly manipulate situations where babies sleep deep, long and hard when they're not ready to do so. So if you have one of those babies, that's a unicorn that sleeps really well, you can have them in the bassinet by your bed, you're following basic guidelines, and they still sleep long. And you know, if you're nursing and your milk supply is fine, and all that kind of stuff. That's not what I'm talking about here. I'm talking about folks who like, are trying all the things to get a baby to sleep deeper than they're ready to do. So light sleep is protective sleep in the first six months.

Kim Hawley

Waking and night feeds are normal and healthy for older babies and toddlers as well. That's where we see so much misinformation, when you actually look at high quality research over the last like 10 years or so: Babies wake at night. And that is really well documented, the majority of babies are waking one to three times. We have one minority of highly waking babies. And of course you have the minority of babies that are giving you those like 10 hour kind of stretches. But the majority of babies are waking several times a night. If you're nursing, they're likely feeding several times a night. There is not in fact, a difference in waking patterns between human milk fed and formula fed older babies, they wake the same, it's just if you're nursing, you're more likely to feed at all those wakes. If you're bottle feeding, you're slightly less likely to feed at all those wakes. So bedsharing nursing babies that are breast sleeping, they do feed a bit more. But that doesn't necessarily mean that you're getting less sleep because a lot of those feeds and brief wakes, you're sort of in sync insynchronous like the sleep physiology and you're not fully waking.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah

Kim Hawley

so night feeds are really important. For young babies, they're actually still important for a lot of older babies and a lot of old, like, nursing parents to maintain their supplies, especially if you're doing a lot of separation for work and pumping. And especially if you have a reverse cycler baby, like, there's a lot of reasons why those night feeds are actually really important. Babies are distracted as they're learning to crawl, they're busy, they don't feed as much during the day. So it is actually very normal majority of babies have older babies like 6-12 months are feeding at least once at night. Regardless of feeding methods.

Kaely Harrod

Right. Well, and this last point about those normal sleep patterns, that it not being like a linear, (Kaely to daughter: are you need to be in this meeting. Can you go out, please? Close the door?)

Kim Hawley

So sleep maturation isn't a linear straight path, right.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah

Kim Hawley

Babies are going to move in and out of phases where they sleep longer, and when they wake more, and that is, developmental. Um, and I'm really a normal part of sort of ups and downs of sleep in the early years.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. Well, and I think I mean, can you can correct me... (Kids are home during this recording! Also, do you hear my children playing the recorders?

Kim Hawley

I do not, no.

Kaely Harrod

Maybe it's not on the recording. That's why I'm laughing because she came in to get her recorder, and now they're harmonizing.) Correct me if I'm wrong in this, but these ebbs and flows are also very influenced by temperament, Correct? Where like, a developmental milestone, some babies are like, "Oh my gosh, I'm learning to crawl!" and it wakes them up a bunch and others are like, "meh, I'm still gonna sleep my normal sleep pattern." Is that true or no?

Kim Hawley

So these ebbs and flows are what most people call sleep regressions. And there's actually no research on sleep regressions. This is another one of the things that like experientially we can tell you that when there's a lot of rapid development happening, sleep tends to become more more fragmented and need more support. And yes, temperament is gonna affect everything. So it can be a piece, but I've also had folks who like have really easy sleepers up until four months, and then it's like their sleep cycle matures, and they're no longer easy sleepers. So sometimes it's not that straightforward.

Kaely Harrod

Okay.

Kim Hawley

But it's always fair to assume that temperament is going to play a role.

Kaely Harrod

Right.

Kim Hawley

It also depends, like what's going on in their outer world? Are you having a lot of changes, right when they're learning to crawl? And so we have like, change disruption to sleep plus crawling disruption from sleep? Do they get like, you know, 4 teeth, learn to crawl, learn to pull up and say the first words all back to back?? That's gonna be really different. And then sometimes it's like, big, prolonged big upset and sometimes it's not. And, and we don't actually have a ton of research sort of parsing that out. Except for that it is normal to have that ebb and flow.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. Okay. That's awesome. All right. So this is the end of our first section of the sleep info. And we will have another one about sleep hygiene as well. And so pause, if you need to pause, go look at those norms for the ages and stages, and then watch the sleep hygiene video as well.

Kaely Harrod

Okay, welcome back. This is our sleep hygiene video, these sleep videos are split up so that you don't have one long, insanely crazy sleep video because all of them could be their own topic. So this one's diving into simple changes that you can make in environment and routine to help positively impact sleep. Some things are helpful for the whole family. So I think this is something we can all learn from. I'm primarily introducing Kim as our sleep expert again. But I will add to this video here and there.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, so when we think about sleep hygiene, we're thinking about our environment, our routines, our daily patterns, our behaviors, that affects sleep, and that is across the whole 24 hours. So like when we think about baby's sleep, in particular, we tend to think about how are you getting them to sleep? And we think really, behaviorally. And the problem is, we actually have to think about the context of sleep, what are the conditions that we are setting up to support sleep. And if you watched the last video, I said that most adults have bad sleep hygiene. We do. And so when we can think about some of these sleep hygiene, things in relationship to ourselves as parents, we can actually affect the quality of our sleep a lot of times even with wakeful babies, and toddlers. So parents, we're not off the hook as adults, I'm thinking. And I also just want to throw out there that like circling back to temperament, people with easygoing, babies don't need to have as precise of sleep hygiene to get good quality sleep, people with really sensitive babies do often need to have very intentional sleep hygiene. And it does often feel like you have to do a lot more than your friends. Because you do have to do a lot more than your friends. There's a bigger impact here. So as with everything temperament does does play a role.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah.

Kim Hawley

So if you didn't watch the video on how sleep works, I really encourage you to because we are using different environmental aspects to affect things like our circadian rhythm and, and to pay attention to things like sleep pressure. So one of the most important things we can do when supporting sleep is think about light. And that means that during the day, we want to bring a lot of natural light into your house, your home. And we want to make sure that we are going outside every single day. That is realistic, right? Because we aren't meant to be inside, sedentary creatures, we're meant to get lots of fresh air, lots of sunlight, and sunlight, regulates our circadian rhythm. And going outside regulates our circadian rhythm and also helps our mood. So that's also really important from a parent perspective and a child perspective.

Kim Hawley

When we're thinking about circadian rhythm, we want to sort of anchor it and have a roughly regular wake time, and bedtime. Now, for folks with like little little teeny tiny babies, this is not going to happen. And that is okay. So in the first six months, if their sleep timings are kind of all over the place, that's fine, don't worry about it. I'm thinking about older babies, and toddlers, and grownups who want to have a roughly regular falling asleep time at night, waking up time in the morning. And by regular I mean like plus or minus 30 minutes or like an hour range not like it has to be 8pm every single solitary night. We're going for 8:00 and most of the time, we're between 7:30 and 8:30. That's fine. Waking kids in the morning at the same time. Sometimes, you know, obviously you want to find the time that their body is naturally falling into. But sometimes it actually makes sense to wake them up in the morning when we're having a lot of problems with our sleep swinging all over the place. And we all should have this we should all go to bed roughly the same time wake on the same time. We Day weekend. We're not actually supposed to sleep in on weekends.

Kaely Harrod

I'm chuckling only because I'm horrible at this.

Kim Hawley

Well, doula life does not lend itself to good sleep hygiene. I mean, just plain and simple. Nothing where you're on call working night some of the time. So for nurses who are part of the group alos. That's not great for you either. I mean, it's sort of part of the downside. Right? And I do want to say on the regular wake up sleep times...if a once or twice a week sleep in is one of the ways that you cope with fragmented sleep. Also, that's totally fine. Like sometimes we toss out a good sleep hygiene concept intentionally. No one has perfect sleep hygiene. And sometimes it makes sense to say Like, actually, I need my Saturday sleep-in when my partner or mom or someone else takes the baby that makes them feel really replenished. And then the benefit is, is greater than like strict, good sleep hygiene.

Kaely Harrod

Right, right. Yeah.

Kim Hawley

Along with theme of light, we want naps to be in normal daily light and noise and activity, we're not trying to create nighttime with naps. That's not helpful for younger babies. As we're getting our circadian rhythm established, we want that really clear difference between day and night. And for older babies if they nap really long in the dark that can start to mess with their circadian circadian rhythm a bit. Um, so ideally, naps are, are in daylight. And, obviously, don't let like bright sun blaze into your kids eyes. They are not going to sleep, you know, you can pull some curtains. But we're not trying to create super dark here.

Kaely Harrod

Right? Yeah. Would you say that's also true for I mean, you said normal household noises. So like a baby who sleeps at night with a noise machine of some kind or family who sleeps at night with a noise machine? Would you say avoid that for napping as well? Or does it depend on the kid?

Kim Hawley

Depends on the kid, I would say with naps, it is good to make sure that you're not like all sleep isn't in the exact same environment. Okay, because we don't especially from early on, we don't want babies to like only be able to nap in their crib with a white noise machine. Because that's really, really inflexible. And it's really limiting. So if they get a good nap that way, that's fine. But if you want to do one nap as like a stroller walk or a babywearing nap and having them sort of more in normal light

Kim Hawley

Up until the point that that doesn't work anymore. Because some sometimes they'll go through phases where like, oh, they nap really great. And, you know, in the sling and then they can't anymore. And so it's okay to respond to that and create the best conditions, you know, when you see that something isn't working anymore.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah that makes sense.

Kim Hawley

Um, we want to space naps well throughout the day. And so that's going back to the idea of sleep pressure. And very loose, awake windows. We don't want naps all bunched up, right like, being super close together. And then like really big, long gaps. Have awake time because generally speaking, that means you missed some tired cues, your kids getting overtired, pushing through and we're not headed into bedtime in the best place to support the best overnight sleep. So obviously, that rhythm is gonna look a little different for different ages and kiddos and all that sort of thing. But we want to just think about naps being roughly, you know, well evenly spaced throughout the day, so we don't have any huge gaps.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. Well and in those awake times, then having like, super dynamic play can be really, really helpful, especially as your kid moves more.

Kim Hawley

Yes!

Kaely Harrod

Helping them have space to move is very, very helpful. My kids actually slept amazing the last night in part because we took a really long hike yesterday. And so it has a big impact.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, I mean, activity matters at any age, right? Like, and we don't tend to think of it for babies. We think of it maybe more for toddlers once they're walking and running. But like babies need tummy and floor play time, older babies need crawling, and like sitting up and maneuvering time. And certainly toddlers need run, jump, climb, push-pull. What happens when they're awake affects their sleep, you know, like they have to use their bodies and use their brains and maybe have calm activities to recharge if they're getting a bit too much. And that's important at any age that we are, we're moving and we're tiring ourselves out.

Kaely Harrod

Well and in terms of like calming down. Is there a particular amount of time that's helpful prior to sleep to like, limit those active things or does that depend on the kiddo again?

Kim Hawley

It depends on the kiddo. Okay, um I mean, some kids do better being higher energy much closer to sleep and some need a much longer, like relaxation, calm-down time. And so there's a lot of experimenting there. Like ideally we give them some sort of buffer to calm down.

Kaely Harrod

Right

Kim Hawley

But like what that looks like timing wise, is really really varies. Because too much calm ahead of sleep, and then you have a baby that's all wiggly and like, you know, or toddler that wants to go run, climb and play because you kept them calm too long. So there's a sweet spot, but that sweet spot definitely takes some experimenting.

Kaely Harrod

Right. Yeah. Some troubleshooting.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, yeah.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. And then to support the release of melatonin in the evening or like before, so that's supporting the release of melatonin is primarily end of the day?

Kim Hawley

Only end of the day.

Kaely Harrod

Okay, only end of the day. So then like the winding down and also like Dimming the lights is for nighttime sleep specifically not nap. Yeah. Okay.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, um, so, so yeah, so we want dim, warmer lights in the hour before bedtime, we want no screens in the hour before bedtime. That's when we're like parents, as adults, we all suck at. Screens are horrible for sleep. They're horrible from a melatonin release perspective, because they're full of lots of blue light, and all that kind of jazz. But they're also really stimulating. And like screen stimulation is not good for sleep. So it's like, sort of a two fold thing. And bright light in the evening has a greater impact on kids, five and under, under five than adults, because of the way their eyes develop in the retina and all this other stuff, they're more sensitive to light, having a negative impact on sleep.

Kaely Harrod

Oh, that's good to know.

Kim Hawley

So dim lights, no screens in the hour ahead of asleep. And then we want our predictable bedtime routine, which is same thing each night. Same activities in the same order each night, designed to relax baby, or toddler or you. So that you can do that relaxation down to sleep, so whatever a blog post says about the perfect bedtime routine if it is not actually relaxing and enjoyable for you as a family then it's not your perfect bedtime routine.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. And there's a lot of space to make that your own. Like there's it's not a prescriptive routine to include like, the same three things for every family, for instance. If it is a relaxing, and like helpful thing in terms of supporting sleep, then it's super individual.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, yeah, definitely. And just to throw out here for parents of little babies, you don't have to worry about a bedtime routine in the early months. Like, if you know that you really want to have a special sleep song that you sing or lullaby that you sing to your baby, that's lovely. Start that whenever, um, but like, in the early months, just do what you need to do. Yeah, like, you don't need to have a bedtime routine. My general rule of thumb is if you have not started one by around six months, that's a good time to think about starting one.

Kaely Harrod

Okay.

Kim Hawley

But like if you if you feel really up to it, you have a two month old, you feel really great. You're you really want to start something simple. Just keep it short and really simple. And go for it, but don't have it become this thing that makes you feel like pressured and overwhelmed that you need to do it with a young baby.

Kaely Harrod

One, sometimes I'll tell families with a baby that young, I'm like, it's not gonna harm anything for you to have a sleep routine, right? But but with like a two month old, don't do it either with the with the like, hope that it's going to significantly increase sleep amount, right? And also don't do it if it's stressful for you, right? Because that's also going to be counterproductive to the relaxation of the routine itself. I have clients sometimes that are like, we like this, like starting up this lovely little routine, because we want to do it as they're older. And it's easier for us as a family to begin doing it now. And if it's lovely for you all, that's fine, right? As long as you're not going into it with like a desperation that it will make sleep better, or, you know...

Kim Hawley

Yes and as long as it's age appropriate, right, like a two month old doesn't need a 30 minute bedtime routine, right? but like a 10 month old, or a 15 month old might need a 20-30 minute routine. So like your bedtime routine is innately going to change and evolve a little bit. But you definitely can have something you want to do early on at the heart of it. Like, I want a Lullaby and I want to do, I don't know something. You know, you want to do a good night to pictures of all the important people in our family, and whatever that you can do really quickly with like, Oh, I'm noticing my baby's tired. And then we're going to do these couple things.

Kaely Harrod

Right. Well and some of my clients do things like a little bit of massage after a diaper change or something things like that, that are, that are beneficial things, and not harmful at all. But also, if your kiddo is clearly falling asleep at the breast or something, and you can't do that little massage before they go to sleep, it's not crucial to those early months to fit it in.

Kim Hawley

Absolutely, yeah, massage is a good one.

Kaely Harrod

I know, especially clients that need to have some kind of skin thing going on where they have to apply a lotion. Oftentimes, they do that at night before bed and do massage. And it's pretty lovely.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, I have a lot of clients that do that. Also, um, Bath, Diaper, Massage or just Diaper and massage. Bath is another tricky one. Sometimes it's good idea sometimes it's not.

Kaely Harrod

I know, I always tell clients, if your baby hates a bath, please do not do it right before bed.

Kim Hawley

Or if they love it, and it makes them really hyper, don't do it right before either, right? Pull it earlier in the evening.

Kaely Harrod

Right? Right.

Kim Hawley

So there are both sides of that.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, yeah. So managing worry, stress and anxiety? Um, how? How would you see that? That is something that's happening with a smaller kiddo. And maybe, is that an okay question to ask you.

Kim Hawley

This is thinking about our older babies and separation anxiety, right, that we're not asking them to be more independent than they are capable of that time. This is, you know, our toddlers and worries and fears that they're beginning to verbalize. But this is also about how are you emotionally moving through that time, particularly if it's become challenging or nighttime sleep is really difficult. It's easy to get anxious and stressed and frustrated. And, like, anticipate anticipating problems. And we really have to be mindful of our own emotions, because our children pick up on them. And so if you are really struggling emotionally at bedtime, then you need to do some troubleshooting to back it up so that you can go into bedtime less stressed, or less anxious, and more calm, and more present. Because that has a big impact on your child's emotional state, which then has an impact on how their sleep is.

Kaely Harrod

Right. Yeah. So in general, it's nice to keep the temperature low, and well humidified, is that even a word?

Kim Hawley

I don't know. But, I mean, why not?

Kaely Harrod

those those are two things that my kids need, I see an enormous difference in their sleep when they sleep in a cool environment with like a humidifier if needed. They sleep tremendously better. And it's, it's funny because now Jabari at 11, knows that about himself and will set up his environment to help him sleep. So he has like a fan that helps he'll turn on. Yeah, he sleeps next to a window so sometimes we'll crack that if it's a little too warm. And he like is so particular about it, that he finds his perfect environment to put himself to sleep. But it does make an impact!

Kim Hawley

Yeah, a lot of times it's cooler than people think. But we want to aim for somewhere in the 60s. And you know, especially in the winter, dry heat or dry air is just an issue. So thinking about those humidifiers. But you know, you don't need to freeze your house in the summer. It's really just about playing around with like, what happens if we drop the temperature a couple degrees and throw on an extra layer on baby, what will that do?

Kaely Harrod

Well, and figuring out how much clothing a baby needs in the evening is also something that I get asked so much.

Kim Hawley

Yes. All those early months, the pregnant parents and like the brand new parents, it's such a stressor.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, well, and two things that I always say to keep an eye on because part of it is your kiddo Right? Like some of us are hotter sleepers.

Kim Hawley

My kids ran hot like my husband and I do not run hot so it's a tough combination

Kaely Harrod

To sleep with three small furnaces well, Bennet's not as small as the other two.

Kim Hawley

and if you're bedsharing or not, that's another thing to consider. Because you're sharing body heat versus separate sleeping.

Kaely Harrod

Yes. Well, and one of the things I'll tell clients is, first of all, like a temperament, I mean, a temperature change because little ones are waking up throughout the night, you're not looking at like, I'm trying to have you sleep for this long stretch of time and you're going to be freezing cold, right? You're looking at like you have this short little couple hours stretch of sleep. And then if your fingers are cold or your toes are cold, your nose is cold, like those are the kind of areas you're going to notice it first, and then you can add a layer to them. Generally speaking one layer more than you're comfortable in is a good rule of thumb. However, a baby isn't sleeping with a blanket like you might be sleeping with So that's where like a decent swaddle, combined with a comfortable set of pajamas, if they're sleeping separate from you, where if they're sleeping with you, oftentimes your body heat keeps their temperature a little bit higher as well. If your kiddo has too much on, they're usually going to be sweaty along the back of their neck first. And, and again, you're probably going to see that pretty quickly, because you're gonna notice like, they wake up from a nap and they're a little sweaty, or if you're feeding them and they're in your arms at all, I'll often notice this about a baby, I'm helping take care of because my arm is wet where their head was right? So you see that pretty quickly. And then you can adjust their, what they're wearing to sleep.

Kaely Harrod

I will say, though, like skin to skin. Yeah, you're gonna sweat anyway. So just to throw that out there. Like no matter how my kids were dressed, My arm got sweaty from like, if I was in short sleeves, when their face was against me and against my breast, like, they sweat. Like that was just how my kids were, and it did not matter what they were wearing.

Kaely Harrod

So some of that is like you're gonna have to troubleshoot a little bit with your own kids. The big thing is to keep layers safe, right? So you're not adding like a loose blanket if a baby's sleeping by themselves, like in a separate bed from you, or even if they're sleeping with you, and that you're not adding like uncomfortable or stifling sort of layers preemptively right, like don't put them in two or three layers. If you don't know that they're really cold at night. Most babies don't need two or three layers.

Kim Hawley

Or if you're going to layer make sure they're really light layers right now. Yes, yes. Comfortable. Yeah, I am. I tell folks when I'm teaching my sleep class to check their core temperature, like that's our biggest, which is kind of basically what you saw, you know, check their chest, check their neck. And if their feet are freezing, but their core feels good, it might be like putting them in footie pajamas versus not footie pajamas or like socks under the footie pajamas, because socks don't stay on a lot of little babies. Because the extreme of really cold limbs and a comfortable core body temperature can also lead to more waking,

Kaely Harrod

Yeah and again, assessing what is safe in the sleep environment that you are in, right. So like if you're bed sharing a swaddle is not safe. But if you are, if your baby's sleeping in a bassinet near you or in your room, then a swaddle is safe for that right or like a wearable blanket kind of thing. For an older baby that's maybe like rolling around who needs access to their arms. Some babies love those and they weren't great. And if they're in bed with you, they're not necessarily the safest option, you know, so that's part of it, too.

Kim Hawley

And so thinking about overnight, right, our overnight sleep environment, we want to be dark. That's our goal, right? So the contrast to naps, which you want in light, nighttime, you want to be dark. Um, not everybody needs blackout curtains. But if you have a lot of like street lights and that stuff coming in, for your baby's really sensitive like to the summer when they might be going to sleep while it's still light out or you want them to sleep in past sunrise, then heavy curtains can make a difference. Yeah, and for our littles. If you do need night, like light at night for feeding and changing, you want to use the dimmest possible light, or go out and get a red colored nightlight because red does not disrupt the circadian rhythm in the same way.

Kaely Harrod

And then finding some kind of white noise if you do find something like that helpful. Keep in mind the sleep of everybody. One of the things I often talk to families about when they're talking about white noise again, with like, really little babies, right? Is if it keeps you awake, it likely is not doing enough help to the baby to like help the sleep of the whole family. Right. And so introducing something that disrupts the sleep of the parents for the sake of maybe helping the sleep of the baby is not necessarily sustainable. Long term.

Kim Hawley

I hate white noise. Oh, I cannot stand it.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, and I can barely sleep with like a fan running in the room. Like I I can kind of get used to that noise. But even that kind of noise. I it like hums in the back of my brain as I'm trying to go to sleep and I can't do it.

Kim Hawley

So all that's to say is white noise is is an evidence based strategy. However, you do not have to do it, just because you don't want to do and you don't need to and you don't have to do it and you shouldn't do it if it impacts your sleep negatively because it's not something they have to have. It's just something that that does help some babies sleep a little bit better.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah.

Kaely Harrod

Well, and I think again, kind of if you come at it with this desperation of like okay, maybe if we try white noise then our baby will sleep better But you really hate it. I think as a parent, sometimes there is that level of like, well, the baby sleeps and I don't care if I like it or not. It's not such a magical tool that you should do it at the expense of your own sleep. Right?

Kim Hawley

Yes, I would agree. And if you are going to use it, be mindful of volume, we want it kind of conversational level, think what it would be like to turn on the shower or the faucet and have water running. We don't want it super loud. And we want to make sure it's pulled far away from baby. And we don't want it like super close, like blasting in their ears. Because that actually can be problematic, right?

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, So letting in light in the morning,

Kim Hawley

Light helps wake you up. And, you know, falling our theme from earlier about light during the day, right, light first thing the morning helps wake you up. And that's a good thing. And then just thinking more broadly, um, we want...more of a toddler thing... we want to make sure that the sleep environment like the room that they're sleeping in, is actually going to support sleep. And I'm not talking climate here, but just that, like, some babies are really sensitive to really cluttered, bright, stimulating, bedrooms and sleep spaces. Some adults are as well. So we want their room to feel safe and secure. We want them to think about connection, a connection with us in their safe space, not just separation. And also, some littles will do better with a more minimalist room. It's calming and soothing, versus what we tend to think of like Pinterest nurseries that are really actually bright and overstimulating. And so for some more sensitive babies that can have an impact as well.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. And that's, again, back to like some troubleshooting. If you're finding that your baby is not like you're kind of troubleshooting some, like not as helpful sleep patterns, then that's something to consider. Because not all kids are impacted by it the same.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, yeah. And so sort of recapping for our littlest babies who are still sorting out their days from night, one of the most important thing you can do is, is make this day night difference for them consistently, and have daylight and then switch to nighttime and dark and calm and have the contrast there well before their bodies are doing it on their own. And that actually helps them develop their circadian rhythm faster and improve sleep by three months. So having a set time in the evening that you dim all the lights in your house, having a set time in the morning that you bring all the light in keeping naps in light and around activity, when they're awake for long periods in the dark, having a party at 12 midnight, that you keep it as dim and quiet as possible that we're not having active play at midnight. We're feeding our baby and snuggling with them and all that kind of stuff so that we're recreating that contrast for them.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. And having like plenty of active time during the daytime, in contrast, I think having with a really little one, when those wake windows are really short. Or when the like the awake time is really short. I think sometimes that can be a struggle, I'll sometimes have clients ask like, okay, so they're awake for 45 minutes, what do I do? And I'm like, look at them, talk to them, have them on their tummy, like, do stuff with them during those daytime awake periods, you know, so they see the difference also in your interaction with them. And in their playing.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, and then he or put him in a carrier route the sling and like go for a walk. Because that that vestibular proprioceptive input is great. Even if they're sleeping. They're registering the light, they're outside. They're able to look around a little bit. USo obviously, you are interacting with your baby in the dark, like you are because you're gonna to soothe them, you're gonna feed them you're, you're gonna burp them. You're trying to interact them, but you're not going to be like, super high energy playing with them. Right? You're just going to click on here, baby. Oh, what do you mean? Let's take care of it. Okay, you know, because it just makes me want to show that difference, right?

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. Okay. Um, make sure you go back and watch the norms, especially if you have a really little one. If you're in the midst of what some like troubleshooting, do come to the q&a. Now, sorry, go ahead, Kim.

Kaely Harrod

I was gonna say like we are covering basically hygiene here, right. So like, this is not mean this is the end all of ways to support sleep. This is the foundation, the basics of creating a good, good conditions for sleep, but there's of course lots of other things that come into play, to influence your child's like that we're not I'm talking about in this video. So just throwing that out there as a reminder.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. And I know sometimes like many of you who are in the membership have worked with Kim one on one. Sometimes you do need that, like, really specific digging into your kid's situation. And so know that that is an option. I mean, that's, I highly recommend Kim for that. That's something that you feel like you need. But also, I think as parents like oftentimes having some reassurance that what our kid is doing is still within the range of normal, but then specifics to supporting our kid can be really helpful because this stuff is so like what we're sharing today is so general, that it's easy to be like, but my kid doesn't do that, you know, and it's not, it's not hopeless. You can also have some troubleshooting specific to your kiddo. So feel free to bring some of that to the q&a, but also if you feel like you need some more in depth help Kim is a great resource. So yeah. Okay,

Kim Hawley

All right, so for our last sleep video, for the special topic, we are going to talk about safe sleep. And we're going to talk about safe sleep in different environments. So we'll be talking about the American Academy of Pediatrics safe sleep recommendations. And also, we'll be talking about safe bed sharing, and helping you understand a little bit about why there's some controversy there. And how to do it safely, and what that can kind of look like, over time. Because I know for a lot of folks who may be bedsharing don't have a lot of other people in the world.

Kaely Harrod

Well, and what we know about bedsharing, specifically in terms of safety is that it's often not taught how to do it safely. And so then if you do it by accident or unplanned, you're likely not doing it in a safe way. Or you're at least at the very least, you don't necessarily have the tools to make sure it's intentionally safe if you're like just falling asleep there. And so that's part of why we want to talk through this too, because there are unsafe bed sharing situations. So we want to add some context to that.

Kim Hawley

Yes, I strongly believe that everybody should learn about safe bedsharing, regardless of whether you plan to or want to bedshare. And AAP guidelines that most folks get from their pediatrician. And other sources don't do that. And don't give the context to really make informed decisions around not just how we're sleeping, but how we're handling nighttime feeds. And are we falling asleep feeding our baby sitting up and that's not safe and all of those different complexities. So, yeah. And both Kaely and I have bedsharee shared with kiddos. So we'll be sharing from that perspective as well.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. So let's start with a few sleep guidelines from the AAP.

Kim Hawley

Yes!

Kaely Harrod

Do you want to do that or you want me to?

Kim Hawley

So AAP recommends that babies sleep on their back on a firm surface that's free from any sort of soft bedding. So that means no pillows, no blankets, no lovies no bumpers, nothing if your baby is under a year. So I guess it should have backed up and say safe sleep guidelines apply for babies up to 12 months for all sleeps, including naps. So baby on their back on a firm surface, free from soft bedding. And the mattress should fit well within whatever sort of crib, bassinet, the sidecar cozy or whatever it is, needs to fit well in that frame. And we need to be mindful of what's around the perimeter of their sleep space. So Windows, outlets, cords, things like that. And they should be in a smoke free environment. And nursing or human milk feeding, if you can, is part of safe sleep as well.

Kim Hawley

I do want to also highlight that AAP says we want babies sleeping near a responsible caregiver for all sleeps for a minimum of the first six months, ideally the first year, meaning they're supposed to be sleeping near you. That means you can hear them and they can hear you it's not just about you watching them on a monitor. Part of what makes it safe sleep is that you guys are in sensory proximity to each other. And your noises actually help keep them in that lighter sleep that is protective. And also you're able to monitor them better. But it's not just about you monitoring them it is about them sensing and hearing and smelling and that connection with you. Which doesn't mean that you're bed sharing just means that you're in the same room or somewhere in the same vicinity. Once a baby can roll from back to front and front to back when they're on a firm surface, they can roll onto their tummy and sleep you don't have to honestly flip them back. But we do want them to be able to get into and out of that position before we're letting them sleep in whatever position you know they find most comfortable.

Kaely Harrod

And they should have access to their arms at that point as well. So if they're sleeping with a swaddle and their arms are inside the swaddle, their arms need to be outside once they're rolling, because that's a necessary part of them being able to roll over and adjust themselves to a safe position.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, so ideally, we're out of swaddled before babies are rolling.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah

Kim Hawley

That's, that's the goal. And so if you notice your baby's getting close to rolling, you should be transitioning them out of an arms-in type swaddle. And you always want to read your individual swaddle sleep thingy because they all have actually do have quite specific things like this. You know, this is a, this is safe for tummy sleeping, or this not safe for tummy sleeping, you know that kind of stuff. And, and there's of course a bunch of different options. So it's always good to see what the manufacturer says about baby gear,

Kaely Harrod

Well and some of them have the ability to like open the shoulder so that the arms can be out or something like that. There's such a variety of types. The main thing with a rolling baby is that they're able to use their arms. That's a big piece of it. So if your kiddo sleeps best with something on them, like a sleep blanket, sleep sack kind of thing, that those are safe, if they're up to after guidelines, and all of that, right, they're updated. They're not like crazy old and therefore made, like maybe unsafely. But they do you need to follow how it should be used at the stage that they're in, especially if it's a transitional one, that they can have their arms in or out and all those kinds of things.

Kim Hawley

Yep, yep. And so there, there are some, some options there. And I'm just going to say, we're not going to recommend specific ones, because every baby is different and how they respond to different swaddles and different sleep sacks and different things. I definitely have some professionally that I like, less. Because the longer we super restrict babies, the longer we're kicking that can down the road of them getting used to sleeping with movement. So like things like Magic Merlin, just to call out one of my least favorite one that's so restrictive, people use really, really long for a really long time. And that's not actually helpful for them to learn how to integrate movement and sleep.

Kaely Harrod

Right? Yeah. A part of that.... Did you already mentioned overheating?

Kim Hawley

I don't know if you mentioned I did not yet. But that's an important one.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. So part of sleep is also making sure that the temperature, they're not too cold, but they're also not overheated. And in general, I think as newer parents, we tend towards overheating versus too cold. Because we're concerned about the possibility of our baby getting too cold. But actually overheating is also a concern. And part of how you check that is their core temperature and see like how, how are they feeling in terms of if they're having like a normal temperature? Oftentimes, they need less layers than you think they need and the temperature at nighttime, actually, the recommendation is in the high 60s, isn't that correct, right, Kim?

Kim Hawley

It's 60-Somewhere, there's a little bit of overlap, some will go down to like mid 60s even. So, some go up to 70 ish,

Kaely Harrod

Right! But certainly not like you don't need to raise the temperature of your house to the mid 70s, for instance, because you have a newborn, right. And you'll get a sense of whether your baby tends to run cold or hot during sleep, as you get to know them more right as they're around for longer. But most babies need a cooler environment versus a warmer environment for sleeping.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, so things like breathable layers that you can adjust as you're interacting with them throughout the night.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, yeah. And as a side note, I think zippers, because snaps are a pain in the tush in the middle of the night. Anyway. I would agree on that. But that's not about safety,

Kaely Harrod

you're free to disagree with us if you have a strong opinion otherwise, we would love to hear! The great snaps versus zipper throwdown, you know@

Kaely Harrod

The heavy debate.

Kim Hawley

Clearly, it's vital. So, so AAP is really focusing on what's called room sharing, or that proximity but separate sleep surface, right. So baby's near you, but on a separate surface. That could be their bassinet, could be their crib or a pack and play in your room. That could be something like an arm's reach co sleeper or Baby Bay, like those kind of sidecar setups. And they are not fans of bedsharing. However, I do think it is really important to say that, the AAP finally in, their last round of safesleeve guidelines, (just in 2016 and I'm kind of wondering if they're going to do a new one soon) in 2016 actually started acknowledging that it is dangerous to fall asleep sitting up with your baby at night doing feeds. So if you are falling asleep or worried about falling asleep, sitting up feeding then you should actually feed in bed, and this is mainly a nursing recommendation. There's just unfortunately not a really easy way to translate this part of the recommendation to bottle feeding. I don't know that you're about to do side lying bottle feed. I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, right. Happy to hear how someone manages that. Absolutely. But if you're nursing, and you are struggling to stay awake during feeds, side-lying nursing in a safe bed sharing setup, which of course we'll talk about, is safer hands down. It's just not safe to fall asleep with your baby sitting up on a couch, or sharing sleep laying down on a couch or glider, recliner, rocking chair, etc. It's just not safe.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah.

Kim Hawley

Likewise, just like a couple of things, I didn't put this in the outline Kaely, but a couple of things that are not safe is like letting your baby nap in a swing and incline sleeper, especially if you're not right there. It's not designed for safe sleep. So you don't put the baby down in the swing and walk to go clean up the kitchen it is not designed for safe sleep. I kind of feel like if you put them down and you're right there, like having your coffee, and they're right next to you, you know, like you're monitoring them is not exactly the same thing. And the other big one, since we already talked about swaddling, is folks with the infant car seat and bringing the car seat in out of the car with sleeping baby and setting it down on the ground them to finish there. That's also not a good idea. Because when it's not clicked into the base, it's not at the same angle. It's not airway protective and then sometimes parents will loosen the straps, and that's really, really dangerous. So ideally we're getting babies out of car seats once they're not in the car to finish their sleep elsewhere whenever possible.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, well, and one of the things that we were talking about before we started this one is that bedsharing - because it's toted as such a dangerous thing, right? is not taught safely. But then also, we fixate so much on the bed, that Kim and I have both known folks who do things like lay on the couch with the baby to feed or sit up in a recliner to feed. And those are actually far more dangerous scenarios than having the baby lying with you on a firm mattress. And so that's part of our desire in diving into this too, is that you have some caveats for when to NOT bedshare like sleeping next to a baby on a couch. That's not a safe thing.

Kim Hawley

Yes, everyone agrees. I think that's what's really important is everyone does not agree around bedsharing and I have a huge bias. And we'll dig into that in a minute. Everyone, including bedsharing, supportive folks agree that it is not safe to fall asleep with baby on couch or like sitting up with them.

Kaely Harrod

Right? Yes. So yeah that's something I think we just need to distinguish, you know, because when we don't plan through or think through, what are the safest ways to do that, then we end up doing unsafe things, just because the nighttime is exhausting. You know,

Kaely Harrod

and I think our messaging reinforces that because what you hear is don't bedshare, you don't actually hear about all these other actually unsafe situations. And that is important. And that's why AAP actually started including that in their guidelines, because people were falling asleep in really dangerous situations in an attempt to not bedshare, thinking that bedsharing was actually the most significant factor. And arguably, it's not significant at all, there are other factors that are more significant and unsafe, but bedsharing really isn't one, when you actually control for appropriate research and risk factors.

Kim Hawley

The Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine has a lovely protocol, it's about two years old for nursing folks. That is really well sited, if you want like a physician document to back you up ever that says that, you know, bedsharing can be a safe and reasonable choice if you're informed and don't have any risk factors. So I think that's a good one for academic, or academically minded things. And, we know, bedsharing is the biological norm.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah

Kim Hawley

It's the cross cultural norm. It's the historical norm. And so, it for a lot of folks makes nightime parenting manageable and feels right. And it's also not for everybody, and that's okay. Bedsharing isn't necessary for you to be responsive or to be securely attached, you know, with your baby or any of that. It's just is a really normal behavior. And so when it works, it's a really lovely tool. And most folks do it, regardless of what you plan to do or not. That's actually documented in the research, especially nursing families, but all parents do actually bedshare at least some of the time regardless of messaging and those percentages vary based on how the data was collected, whether or not they felt they could be honest. It's one of the things I'm sure it also varies regionally and a bunch of other things as well.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. Yeah. Well, and there is some research around it actually improving sleep for parents who are feeding at the breast, especially. Because it's not as disruptive to your sleep cycle to, like, roll over and offer a breast versus getting up and doing, you know, like moving rooms or doing things. Now, obviously, a bedsharing baby still needs a diaper change and things like that. It's not that you never have to get out of bed. But that there is some evidence to point towards actually getting more sleep in that scenario.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, bedsharing safety.

Kim Hawley

Yes, I was gonna say one of the things we will link below is this safe sleep seven, which is one of my first resources that I send to folks who are considering bedsharing or accidentally bedsharing or something like that. Because there are situations where it is not safe. And so it's important to know those so that you're making an informed decision about whether or not your family should do this.

Kim Hawley

Yes. Kaely, do send them the one with the checklist of the sleep surface and everything?

Kaely Harrod

Yes.

Kim Hawley

Okay, cool. That's kind of one of my go-tos as well. Dr. James McKenna, is another really excellent resource. He's got a book or two that are super awesome geared with parents, if you kind of want to dig into it from like, a biological ecology perspective. He's one of the leading researchers on maternal infant sleep in the US. I personally have a huge professional crush on the man, he's so kind. He's one of my original finds, in my early bedsharing, new parent days when I was working in public health on programs aimed at reducing infant mortality, and we were very anti bedsharing and very pro, only AAP is the only way to be a good parent. It was really challenging and he was one of my, one of my finds, thanks to lovely lactation consultants. I never realized he was an anthropologist until I got like, knee deep, and I was like, Oh, wait, no wonder, I love his stuff. But anyway, so safe sleep seven, and also a book Sweet Sleep also by La Leche League International. It's another book out there.

Kim Hawley

But [for safe bedsharing] we have a nursing, non smoking, sober parent, a baby on their back, lightly dressed, not swaddled and healthy. I think I just inverted those, whatever, and sharing a safe sleep surface. So with that, I can kind of step back and talk about some of the risks and the nuance there.

Kaely Harrod

And it's also worth noting that sober includes sleep medication,

Kim Hawley

That's exactly where I was gonna go. Sober isn't about alcohol consumption. I mean, it is. But it's also about any medication that can make you sleep more deeply. Even if it's just over the counter, like cold medicine also or if you have less than four or five hours of sleep total in the previous 24 hours, you are neurologically intoxicated. So that's a whole different conversation about like our medical system, and how little sleep residents have. But you know technically, you are neurologically acting as though you are impaired. So that is thrown in there as well that you should have had at least five hours, not straight sleep, total sleep. And yeah, any sort of medication that will make you sleep more deeply. Smoking during pregnancy and after. Nursing is particularly important in the first three to four months, after four months, it's generally accepted that nursing is no longer significant because babies are more robust. And then we just need a non smoking, sober, competent parent or caregiver next to them. So it's that first four months, it really makes a difference on the nursing front. In terms of a healthy baby. Preterm and low birth weight babies are at some elevated risk. Unfortunately, we don't actually have the research to say when that risk diminishes, because no one's researching it. So it's kind of a use your best judgment. I mean, we just don't have it doesn't exist.

Kim Hawley

So babies who are actively nursing, of course, are not going to be on their back, right? They're going to be on their side and that's fine, right? Like a baby actively latched on their side is fine. It's just about gently rolling them back. And I will say with older babies, older babies are in this really gray area, they're going to sleep, how they're going to sleep, right? Like you can't keep a 10 month old or nine month old always on their back. So I sometimes wish that some of the really big researchers would fine tune this a bit you know, just kind of throwing that out there that, that's why we want to be on firm surfaces and have safe sleep setups, because babies do what babies do when they're older and can move around a lot, right?

Kaely Harrod

yeah, well, in a safe sleep bed surface there are a few different things. One of the biggest is mattress firmness like that the mattress supports anyone who's going to be in the bed with the baby without the baby rolling towards them. So one way that some people check this is putting something on the bed and then lying down next to it and see if it rolls towards you. Right? Checking when the baby is awake, with all of you lying on the bed and seeing if the baby can stay without some kind of denting in the bed where they do kind of tumbled towards one parent or the other.

Kim Hawley

And you can kind of tell pushing on it as well. Some folks can. I can. In the sense that like It's not just about baby rolling towards the parent. It's also if they were to slip on their tummy is the mattress going to form a pocket around their face? This is where memory foam gets really dicey. Because we don't want that to happen. So if they roll on their tummy, and you're on a firm mattress, and it just doesn't do anything, they are able to sink their face in. That's good, right? That's what we want. If they roll on and can like, bury their face in and just rebreathe their own exhalations. It's not good. And so you can kind of tell like you push down your hand or lay somebody onto it, does it bounce back right away? Or does it kind of sink in and then like you have this indentation days and slowly releases we don't really want to see that for bedsharing mattresses.

Kaely Harrod

The other things you want to think about is where is the baby in relation to you generally chest height with the parent who's nursing like in that in that chest area, so that you're kind of they're kind of cradled in where you are, you're sort of the protection around them, if that makes sense. Lots of parents put their arm around so that the baby's kind of in that space below their arm next to their chest.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, and your arm up. Like if you have a pillow at your head, your arm is kind of a block to keep them from wandering up into your pillows. And then you're on your side curled around them. And for little babies, your knees curled around them helps kind of create a C. And that space is free from bedding. You know, but you can have a pillow under your head or at your back or between your knees because it's not in baby's space. But it can sometimes help you feel more comfortable.

Kaely Harrod

And both of you dressed so that you can be comfortable without bedding, right so that you're not cold and in the middle of the night like looking for a blanket to pull on or something like that. But also that the baby is dressed lightly and not swaddled next to you.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, and I will say, I think almost every bedroom parent, I know I've seen some exceptions has a light sheet or blanket pulled up to waist height. Just to be very real. Like, that's what I see a lot. I would take heavy comforters, quilts and douvets off the bed. If your sheet ends up over baby's face, they're they're going to be fine. Right? Like that's very breathable. They can bat it away. Like, that's not a significant issue. Like it's not ideal, but it's not significant. You pull, like a heavy down comforter up. That's a problem. So we want the things that we know are a problem to definitely be off the bed. Or like just having a pillow that you have that's well out of their space. Right. So a sheet, that's fine. Right, but like, heavy covers not so much.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. Um, and then it doesn't. I mean, what do you have anything else to add to that safe sleep environment before we move on?

Kim Hawley

Be mindful of gaps between your mattress and the headboard, the footboard, bedside tables. I honestly feel like this is almost especially for older babies and young toddlers.

Kaely Harrod

Yes

Kim Hawley

Because they are more active and even toddlers who don't technically fall in these safe sleep guidelines because they're toddlers. Even toddlers can get themselves wedged in positions they cannot get themselves out of that are not safe from an airway perspective. And so that's important is finding the gaps around minding sharp things around minding the distance from the bed to the floor. Like, the absolute gold standard would be to have a floor bed.

Kaely Harrod

Mm hmm.

Kim Hawley

But lots of families don't do that. But that would be like the absolute gold standard is having the mattress on the floor. So that that isn't a falling risk. Yeah. And different people have different opinions [about things] like does baby need to be just next to the nursing parent? Can it be between them? What kind of sleeper is the other parent? What is their comfort level and awareness of baby in the bed? There's a lot of gray area when you start to interpret this, especially with older babies in that, they are pretty robust, and so families will have different comfort levels, I feel.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, one thing we did with our youngest she bedshared the longest set of any of our kiddos, I want to say it was right when she was around one. One year old is that we did we had a pretty low bed but not completely on the floor. And so we got like a mesh toddler side rail sort of thing and attached it to my side of the bed. She was a wild, she still is a wild sleeper. But then I knew like she had she would have to scoot herself very far down on the bed before she would be able to like tumble out, right? And so she could do lots of kind of bouncing back and forth between me and that netted guardrail, where I knew if she got up against it, so breathe fine. It was soft, you know, but it created a little bit more of a barrier. Because when she slept between my husband and I, she would like literally like ping pong between us sometimes. But that didn't always work well for breastfeeding. And so for that having her on my side where I could have her between the like, I mean, I was more like in the center of the bed. And then that side row was there, that I knew she wasn't going to try to do that ping pong thing and just throw herself off the side of the bed.

Kim Hawley

Did you get the kind that goes under the mattress and you tighten on the other side?

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, so it like strapped on safely. Yep

Kim Hawley

Yep! That's what we have also, and I'm going to say, in my typical fashion that I work with families, I share things that are not following the guidelines with that caveat, because I think it's really important to talk about what parents actually do. I know lots of parents who do that with babies under a year. It's not recommended to do with babies under a year. I myself did it with my child under a year and felt it was very safe because the type of bed rail that Kaely and I both used is mesh, it looks like the side of the bassinet, and it goes under the mattress, and then it tightens from the other side. So as long as you're being mindful of that there should not be gaps.

Kaely Harrod

There is no gap.

Kim Hawley

There is no gap, it should be snug against your mattress exactly like the side of a bassinet would be. Versus there are some mesh side rails that do not do that. And then they would be more of an issue with baby, right? You're kind of using them off label, because they just go into the mattress and they can create gaps. So of course, it's not recommended to use rails unless your baby's a toddler. But, you know, just to be very real and transparent there. Yeah, lots of parents do that I mean, lots of parents, if you go on the internet, you'll see like pool noodles and stuff like that, which I'm less than a fan of, because it's only a minimal little barrier, and still has its own set of things that you shouldn't really technically following guidelines. Yeah. And yeah, the mesh rails are great.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, and when I mean a pool noodle, honestly would not have been enough for Emrys would have just flopped herself, right?

Kim Hawley

Oh my kids, either. There would have been like, what's this bump I'm rolling over and off!

Kaely Harrod

Yes.

Kim Hawley

Yeah

Kaely Harrod

So bed sharing. So Kim and I have talked some about our own like bedsharing experience. And I think it's, it's helpful to note that with bed sharing, as with tons of parenting things, it is. It doesn't work the same way for every family, right. And it's not something where like bedsharing is actually the most responsive, most attachment based way to sleep with your kid. And so having the freedom to feel out when it works for you, if it works for you, how long it works for you. All of that is very important. And some of it is temperament of your kids. Some of it is your safety, like your situation changes, right if you need to be on a medication or something that you weren't previously on. Or if it's just like "we do this when the kid is sick, and we all need to sleep better and we do it safely. but it's not really our ideal sleep situation." You know, like that sort of scenario. really figuring out what it looks like for you, I think is very important. In our own parenting journey, our oldest, barely ever co-slept with us, like slept in the bed with us. He did sleep in our room, but then the second one slept with us for a number of months. And then would not sleep unless he was completely alone in a space when he was an older baby, almost a toddler. He's a very particular child. And so he got our room, and we slept on the futon for a little while. And then the youngest would still be sleeping with us at 8 if we all slept well like that. But we don't all fit in our bed well like that. And so she bedshared with us every single night until she was like over three, you know. And so I think having the space to feel it out and make it what works for you so that you're sleeping in a safe environment, and whatever way fits the needs of your family and your kids, you know.

Kim Hawley

And it doesn't have to be all night, like lots of families will start out in their own bed and bring them into bed, you know, when they get to the point where they're sleeping more lightly and needing more support. And that is also

Kaely Harrod

totally fine.

Kim Hawley

a thing. And I just want to like playing off of what Kaely just said, I just want to emphasize that like everyone finds a time to move away from bedsharing at the time that makes sense for them. Whether it's a couple months, a couple of years. We do a family bed in our family, because it works well for us. And sometimes we hear worst case scenarios about bedsharing or anything responsive parenting sleep related, right? Um, or we look like "oh, I don't mind bedsharing with my six month old but oh my god, look at that weirdo over there still bedsharing with their four year old." And because we see so much cultural baggage around this issue. Yeah, it's just to say that, you tend to hear the worst case scenarios with responsive sleep stuff. And you can always stop bedsharing. Sometimes that's an organic, easy process. Sometimes it's a process that takes intention. But even if it takes intention, it doesn't mean it was the wrong choice.

Kaely Harrod

Right!

Kim Hawley

It just means that you're ready to move on before your kid is and need to be a little bit more intentional about it. And I see families who need to be more intentional have a really big success with floor beds as they're moving away. With older babies, younger toddlers who could technically go in a crib, but the crib is just a whole nothing layer and floor beds could be a really nice step from bed sharing to having their own space.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, we did that. We did like mattresses on the floor for the kids was our kind of like in betwee. They sort of bed shared with each other. It was as they got older for a short time, and they were old enough for that to be safe. You know, they weren't like toddlers and babies.

Kim Hawley

Yeah, don't do that with the baby under 12 months.

Kaely Harrod

No, no, yes, please don't. My kids were like three and seven and five maybe or something like that. So they were older. And the three year old didn't stay in there. So she doesn't even count.

Kaely Harrod

Sometimes it can be something that we heard... (Emrys counts she just wasn't sleeping in there with them.) Something that we've heard all the time is like, kind of the extremes of naysayers in the bedsharing space, where they're like, "Oh, she's gonna sleep with you until she's a teenager or until she is..." you know? And on the one hand, I'm like, "Well, what if she does like that? How does that impact your life? Right? Like, why do you get to judge me for that if that's what I do." But also, we didn't do that. And she has at eight years old, like she sleeps in her own bed all the time unless she has a nightmare. And then she comes in with us, you know, like, and it hasn't taken five years to transition her out of our bed. And we did that like lovingly and responsibly and all of that. And I think we sometimes like look ahead...either we look ahead anticipating problems that we don't know we'll have or we look back, assuming the thing that we're dealing with is because we didn't do something right before. And I think with sleep, if it's safe, and it's working for you right now, there are very few things that you do that sabotage your sleep entirely in the future, right. And maybe Kim, maybe I'm wrong about that. You're the expert.

Kim Hawley

No, I say that all the time. If it's if it's safe, and it works. It's a great option. And you can always, always, always change things, even if what you did leads you into a place that it's not working. It was working for a while and that's why you did it. So it was actually a really good tool. You just hit the point where it's time for a change and that's that's parenting. Yeah, yeah, that's how it all parenting is

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. And you don't know. I mean, I think we again, we hear kind of like the extremes on the internet, for instance. And so we don't always hear what's normal in terms of just like, my kid started, like, maybe a kid that's not bedsharing started climbing out of their crib. And so they needed to be transitioned to a toddler bed. And that being kind of a rough transition for families. Like that's also a thing, you know. And it's, it wasn't about them not being in a good safe sleep environment before or that they shouldn't have been sleeping in a crib. Like we don't put that on a parent who's sleeping with their child in a separate space. But we do often do that to bed sharing families in a way that's unhelpful. You know?

Kim Hawley

Bedsharing, nursing, responsive parenting, all of them are often scapegoats.

Kaely Harrod

Right.

Kim Hawley

They have very little to do with what is actually going on, but they're easy things to blame culturally speaking. And so we do, or people do, society does parents, physicians do, pediatricians do. When it's just not actually, it's not actually true. And lots of folks like you said, difficult transitions they have this part kids through and it's, it's not always because we did or didn't do something.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah. Yeah. And that's, I mean, it's part of parenting. So...

Kim Hawley

Yeah. So those our safe sleep...

Kaely Harrod

info? recommendations?

Kim Hawley

Definitely bring your questions to the q&a. And we are happy to troubleshoot with you.

Kaely Harrod

Yeah, we will post a few resources so that you have some of the things that we mentioned today to dive into or refer back to if needed. So take a look at those.