Babysitting Tip: Carpe diem / Shao-shao-ya
Date: 10/17/17
Baby's name: BabyE (4.5 months old)
Grandfather: PapaNie, the babysitter
of the day.
(The following journal was recorded by PapaNie at the real time.)
7:30am, my daughter fed the baby then
went work.
Today, the baby is left for me and my
wife. I am the babysitter for today. I am going to use present tense to record this one day adventure. So here it goes:
7:30 to 8:00am:
I am PapaNie and this is my granddaughter
BabyE. Hi, I am holding the baby
walking around the house, talking to her, telling her what I see around
the house: "See? This is a photo of your parents... These are new flowers in the
red vase that your mom got from her friends... Oh, here is the laundry
room... see? your mother did not have time to wash the clothes... now, let's go
to the living room ... Wow, the room is neat and clean... Your mom is a good
house keeper, isn't she?"
BabyE seems
like this big touring of her house. She did not make a any noise in my arm but
watches item to item with her big eyes, as if she is really interested.
8:00 to 9:00am:
We (my wife and I) is ready to dress up the
baby to have a "fashion show." From when she was born, BabyE has
been always very photogenic. Don't you think she is a natural little model?
9:00 to 9:30am:
I am reading poetries
and singing songs to the baby, and we are sitting on a sofa side by side , but she
is still too young to sit for long, so in this case I am letting her sit on my
lap and lean her back on me while I am holding her. I realize that the best
music to her ears is human voice. I speak to her constantly, she replies
occasionally with making some baby babbling.
Now, we are playing the ear touching game: This is papa's right ear, this is baby's left ear , this is
papa's right ear ..... after a while, the baby responses with closing her one eye
and/or opening her mouth to the side of her ear I am about to touch. I think this is
a really good game for developing her sides of the brain. The baby seems fully
aware and can respond to my touching and teasing.
9:30 to 9:45am:
This is the feeding time again, I let the baby
drink as much milk / formula as she wants until she is full. That part has
finished without breaking a sweat. Now, I am holding her straight up for Burping. This is done. Now, it is the best time to take a morning nap. The
baby has fed, burping is done, diaper has been changed, but the baby just wants to cry. I was told "Baby
crying is good for her lungs. " Her crying is for no reason other than a
sign of that she needs to take a nap...Yes, it's time to take a nap.
9:45 to 11:30am:
The baby is sleeping. How to make the baby to
fall sleep fast? I place her in a portable car seat. Practically, it is a baby rocking chair. First, she was mad after I put her in the seat, but when I started to rock the chair
she started to get sleepy. The trick is to raise the seat cover and to add a
blanket on the top to block the light. A
dim lighting environment, rhythm sound
of rocking chair plus my humming of a
children's sound, all of these, helped the baby falling to sleep fast.
This more than one hour napping
time is my opportunity to check emails and taking care of my business including
getting some housework done. What a plan!
11:00am:
The baby wakes up. This
is the time for a "mind and body work" -- First,. I put the play mat
on the floor, now she is in a belly side down position, this position encourages her to
raise her head therefore to strengthen her neck muscles. I roll on the floor
with her so that is playful to both of us. This position also let her to
exercise "back kicking." Thanks to the musical kicking piano board at the end of her floor mat,
her each kick makes different music.
As we know that a baby
often has very short attention span. After BabyE plays 15 minutes, she
gets bored and starts to be fussy.
Now, it is the time to
switch to another exercise. This time, I place her is an electrical operated rocking crib.
This small rocking crib not only
rocks gently but plays repeatedly different types of music, some are slow some are fast. When
the slow music comes, I do tai chi, when the disco music play I do aerobic, as
you can see that I am getting exercised! A very interesting thing I find is that while the baby watches me doing these "crazy movements," she starts to imitate
me, doing her own kicking movements in her rocking crib! She gets very excited time to time. Wow, she and I both get plenty workout.
Yes, we repeated these 2
exercises every 15 minutes from 11:00am to 12:00pm.
Now it is her lunch
time.
12:15pm:
Now it is the time to do
the burping and to take another nap.
12:15 to 1:45pm
BabyE is taking a nap now. I
am taking care of my own paper work, etc.
1:45pm:
BabyE has waken up. She
wakes up with a smile (not crying).
I am wondering if it's the time to change her diaper; well, let me call my wife and let her to do that part. We are planning to get ready to take walk in the neighborhood.
The baby loves to go out, as I
know.
2:00pm:
Thank God, the baby's
mother is home! My daughter comes back early today.
I hand the baby to her mother.
(End of the journal)
I was prepared to go
through all those above routine again, if I had to babysit until the dusk.
Well, that was a special
day of spending a "quality time" with my 4.5 moths granddaughter. I haven't
done any babysitting since my daughter was a little girl. How did I do? Have I offered any babysitting tips? Babysitting is a hard job. In the end of the day, you just have to tell the baby and yourself: Shao-shao-ya!(Smile, in Shanghai dialect ).
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