By Nicola Conville, Body and Soul

Our top tips to help mum and bub.

While breastfeeding gives baby a great start in life, it can also be a minefield of pain, emotion, frustration and even guilt when it doesn’t happen easily. Here’s a five-point plan to help you through it.

Brisbane Times, Life & Style
Understanding when your child is ready to do certain activities on their own can be complicated, writes Emily Dunn.

Image: Appropriate steps ... it is up to the individual parent to decide what age their child can do things independently. Photo: James Alexander

In some ways, looking after babies is a relatively simple caper. Most follow similar developmental stages for walking and talking and parents are filled with pride or fear as each milestone is achieved. As children get older, however, things become more complicated.

At what age are they ready to walk home from school alone? Sleep over at a friend's house? Go to the movies? Catch public transport?

Melbourne psychologist Sally-Anne McCormack says only a parent can judge when they think a child is ready to do certain activities independently. 

''I always hesitate in giving definite ages for when children can do things,'' she says.

''In a grade 6 classroom, you can have young children and young adults in the same age group. Likewise, you can have 15-year-olds who are still children and those who are almost adults.

''It also depends on the context. Some primary school children may be fine to walk to school alone but it would depend on where they live and with what kind of child they are.''

She says children under the age of five should not be left at home alone under any circumstances and kids should not be left alone at night until at least their mid-teens because their deep sleep patterns mean they may not wake for sounds such as smoke alarms. Responsibility for a younger sibling is another conflicting factor.

''It is not fair on an older child to be responsible for a younger sibling,'' McCormack says. ''The parent has to be confident that the younger child is also responsible.'' 

The Roads and Traffic Authority recommends that children walking on footpaths or near roads should be accompanied by an adult until the age of 10. It is also against the law for a child younger than four to sit in the front seat of a motor vehicle.

As children move into their teens, there are laws governing many major life events, such as driving, voting and having sex. The classification board also places restrictions and recommendations on films, television programs and other media.

In many other activities, such as owning a mobile phone, using social networking sites or choosing clothes, the limits are unclear. 

The Raising Children Network last month released the results of a survey of parents' opinions on age limits.

Almost half of the parents surveyed said social networking sites should be not be accessed until a teenager is at least 15 years old, while almost 30 per cent cited 14 as the age when a teenager could go to a shopping centre with friends during the day.

The content director for the Raising Children Network, Warren Cann, says there are three options when a teenager asks to do something: yes, no and maybe.

''No is a clear category - you are not ready to do that or that infringes on my rights or the rights of the rest of the family,'' Cann says. ''Maybe is a way of setting limits. Allowing a child to do something but with conditions attached, such as curfews.''

Negotiating conditions gives teens experience in compromise and the experience of thinking through an activity.

For toddlers, experimenting with autonomy could mean letting them decide between a blue or a red T-shirt. For older children, pocket money can help teach financial responsibility.

''A parent can suggest to the child, do they want to spend or save the money? But they should still allow the child to make their decision and live with the consequence,'' Cann says.

In Free-Range Kids: How to Raise Safe, Self-Reliant Children (Without Going Nuts with Worry), American author Lenore Skenazy rails against what she sees as a generation of over-protective parents, those who are fearful of even letting their children play in the backyard unsupervised.

While the negative stereotypes of the modern parent suggests that children are either over-scheduled or under-supervised, Cann disagrees.

''What you are really seeing on the whole is modern parents sacrificing their own pleasure time to provide wonderful experiences for their kids,'' he says.

''I think this generation of parents will be known as the conscious generation of parents.''

See raisingchildren.net.au

Do you have an opinion on when a child is ready to start acting independently of their parent?

Alison Godfrey - The Naughty Corner Blog

Working mum Alison Godfrey spills her guts on everything from labour to temper tantrums and playground fights in a brutally honest assessment of life as a parent...

After two weeks of non-stop rain I needed some way to keep the kids entertained and some way to retain my mental stability. They were tearing the house apart, toys rapidly flowing through the house faster than a bullet train. I’d lost a third of my skin to Lego and small toy cars. It was time to pay for play somewhere other than my house.

I was sick of the indoor play centre. CJ, 3, loves it. But poor Amelie, aged one, gets frightened every time the ball guns go off - and that is a lot.

So I decided to try out a kids activity class. I found one that looked like it would use up a lot of energy. It said “all singing, dancing” and guaranteed lots of toys. It cost me $20. It wasn’t worth $3.

The poor woman who ran the class looked like she had been awake all night. At times she stared into space. The singing came from a small old school stereo with the volume turned up to ear splitting levels. The dancing came from her at random intervals and the toys were sacks haphazardly dispersed then packed away in time to the music.

Children wandered about the toys aimlessly, picking them up, feeling them and then packing them back into sacks. The play was so un-engaging that one child had to be removed from touching a powerpoint five times. Many of the other parents were clearly using the service for free babysitting while they had a gossip (hence the powerpoint incident - it wasn’t the parent that led the child away from the electricity). I did my best to engage my children. I tried to dance, I tried to sing. I acted like a lunatic just to keep them busy. That $20 should have gone to me.

The thing that really bugs me is how much people can charge for kids’ activity classes. $20 a pop for a sack of toys and loud music is too much. And what got me about that particular class was how many parents were happy to hand over their cash for no obvious benefit to their children. It really was $20 paid for them to have a chat and not be responsible for half an hour.

Earlier this week news.com.au asked our Facebook readers what they thought about kids sport. So many of them said that it costs far too much.

CJ and Amelie both do swimming lessons. It costs us $26 a fortnight. But I consider that money well spent. They are learning something that could save their life, they are engaged by the teacher the whole time and they are absolutely exhausted after it.

Today I paid $12.50 for a ten minute pony ride.

I once paid $15 for CJ to do painting and play playdough - another waste of money. We now do this at home. I have paid $10 for ten minutes of bungy trampoline. But I flat out refuse to pay the $5 fee per child to enter the petting zoo when I know full well that my kids will want out within two minutes. There should be a refund clause that gives you your money back if the kids hate the activity.

But what do you think? Have you ever felt like you paid too much for a kids’ activity? What is worth it? What definitely isn’t?

Jane Hansen The Sunday Telegraph

Image: Help needed: Federal government childcare reforms have hit both cost and available placements. Source: The Daily Telegraph

 

 

Two weeks ago Zona Shepherd dropped her bundle.

But it wasn't the bone-sapping exhaustion of breastfeeding her five-month-old, or the accompanying sleep deprivation that felled the first-time mother, it was knowing her maternity leave was up and she had yet to secure suitable child care for baby Brooklyn. The stress tipped her over the edge.

"I was hospitalised for severe sleep deprivation and depression. I couldn't sleep, I was so stressed and stressing myself out worrying who was going to take care of Brooklyn, and how were we going to make ends meet," says the 32-year-old from Rozelle.

An internet web producer by trade, Zona has already postponed her return to work twice and feels the guilt acutely. She also feels like a failure because she didn't put her name down on any childcare waitlists until she had her baby.

"I knew I was in trouble. I didn't put my name down when I was pregnant and some put their name down as soon as they find out they are pregnant. By the time reality set in, I was in my third trimester, and way down the list," she says.

Two suburbs across in Leichhardt, Emma Grogan is in the same position. With her maternity leave up in October, she is no closer to finding a placement for nine-month-old Lilliana despite putting her name on every centre in the surrounding suburbs when she was five months pregnant.

"It's ridiculous, I haven't had anyone say they have a spot, they are all full," the 35-year-old says.

In the latest Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey, three out of four parents nominated difficulties in finding childcare as one of the major stressors for family life.

Government initiatives aimed at increasing the fertility rate have worked, with 1.9 births per woman the highest since 1981. But at the same time, federal government childcare reforms increasing staff-to-baby ratios from five children to four have hit both cost and available placements.

Take a snapshot of any high-density city region like Sydney's inner west and the figures speak for themselves. The 5000-plus babies born each year at Royal Prince Alfred mean prams are as prolific as coffee shops, yet the area's 140 childcare centres only offer about 1500 baby spots. It's a big gap and most centres have two-year waitlists.

According to a yet-to-be-published Childcare NSW survey there has been a 20 per cent reduction in available placements for under-two-year-olds in Sydney centres because of the reforms.

"Instead of adopting another carer to meet the ratios, childcare centres have reduced placements," Childcare NSW president Vicki Skoulogenis says.

"If they offered 10 places they now offer eight, if they offered 15, they now offer 12, and so on."

Other providers have put up costs to accommodate the new ratios and they are much more than the 57c a week the government predicted last year.

For Zona, finding an alternative is no longer a choice, but a necessity.

For a month, she has been advertising on Gumtree for a nanny to share with another family and she is not alone: Mary Poppins wanted? heads many a post. Once the preserve of the rich and famous, the idea of a nanny has become more affordable as parents opt to share the costs.

"I can't afford the $24 an hour, but if I share, it will be OK," she says. Emma Grogan is thinking the same way.

Sites like Nanny Sharing Connections, which puts like-minded parents in touch with each other, are booming.

"Nannies cost $24 an hour, and it's $12 an hour with two children," site owner Rebecca Singh says.

According to weneedananny.com agency owner Jason Everest, the costs are now on par with day care.

"In the last year, business is up 50 per cent; now with childcare fees going up, the average family can afford it, especially if you have two to three kids or you share with another family," he said.

The HILDA study shows families using a nanny as a source of child care have more than doubled since 2006. Back then, only 3 per cent of families did, but by 2008, the latest statistics, 7.5 per cent of families did.

Mother-of-two Sally Bamford has been sharing a nanny with friend Lucie Strudwick for the past 18 months. She hasn't even bothered putting seven-month-old Roya on a waitlist because she says it's pointless.

Her son Banjo, 2, only just got a placement at a day-care centre two days a week, but she nanny-shares the other two days a week and the costs are similar.

"We couldn't afford a nanny so we share one. We pay $27 an hour or $120 a day and it works out roughly the same as child care," Sally, 37, says.

Lucie has managed to get Amelia, 2, into day care one day a week. The toddler spends the other two days with Banjo and the nanny and Lucie says the cost is comparable.

"It's about the same, but only because we share," the 40-year-old says.

Experiences in the first five years of a child's life can set the course for the rest of their lives, so the reforms to improve early childhood care standards, including the carer-to-child ratios, were well-intentioned. It meant babies and toddlers would receive more individual and better-quality care.

Minister for Employment Participation and Child Care Kate Ellis said the cost was going to be minimal: rising from 57c a week to $8.67 a week by 2012 for a family on $80,000 with one child in full-time care. But most childcare centres have upped their fees as well as cutting placements.

Now, Ellis accuses private operators of thinking only about profit.

"The government will not hesitate in calling out providers who try to account large-scale fee increases to these reforms when they are simply trying to boost their bottom line," Ellis says.

"Community-run centres, council-run centres and private centres, everyone has put up their fees from $10 a day upwards," says Skoulogenis.

Goodstart, the not-for-profit charity that bought the state's 154 former ABC learning centres, estimated its fees would rise between $2 and $20 a day.

Chris Buchtmann who runs two centres says he raised prices by $20 a day, up to $115, to meet the new ratios and fears the costs will send childcare underground.

"Parents are voting with their feet and seeking alternatives. It's obvious what is happening," he says.

John Owens, who also runs two childcare centres, says has not cut his spaces for babies, yet, but admits he has put up the daily price for a baby position to $110 a day and acknowledges it is outrageous.

"It's exorbitant, it's embarrassing, we can't afford the extra staff and it's inevitable we'll cut the placements," Owens says.

According to Skoulogenis, that cost tipping-point is driving parents to seek alternatives like nanny services.

In Lane Cove, Nikki Giteau, mother of 12-week-old Tia, feels she is a victim of the new reforms and the resultant lack of places. As soon as she confirmed her pregnancy at six weeks, she put her name down on waitlists at 15 centres and only one has said it will have a place for Tia, but not until 2012.

"I paid $50 to be waitlisted and one place said, 'Yeah, sure, we'll waitlist you, but there are 850 people in front of you'," Giteau, 32, says. Like many Sydney parents, she cannot afford not to work and will have to go back to her IT job part-time in September.

"Childcare is so expensive now anyway, basically $110 a day and if I share the cost of a nanny with another, my child basically gets one-on-one care instead of being in a centre with 30 other kids."

Felicity Gray of Abracadabra Child Care Services, a placement agency for nannies, says many families also want in-home care for younger children.

"Some parents don't have a choice, but others feel centre-based care for little ones means they are sick more often and mum and dad then have to take more time off work as a result," she says.

Other families, like the Wrightsons from the northern beaches, have schedules that don't fit the 8am-to-6pm model of centre-based child care.

Chris Wrightson runs his own financial consultant business and often travels to Brisbane and Melbourne, while wife Kristin is an international Qantas flight attendant who often starts at 4am and is sometimes overseas for four days at a time. The three children aged two, three and five are in need of a Mary Poppins or Nanny McPhee to pull it altogether.

"Childcare (centre-based) is set hours and suit people with mainstream jobs, but for people with odd hours and shift work it is impossible," Chris says.

The family is hoping to share a nanny with another family that also has three children and are both Qantas pilots. Chris thinks it will work out well economically, too.

"We're already paying $210 a day in childcare for the three kids. You get some of that back, but you get no flexibility," the 45-year-old said.

"It is comparable on cost, but it's more about convenience for us," Kristin, 39, adds.

The cheaper option of an au pair is also a trend gathering popularity.

Young, usually female travellers from Europe offer childcare services in the family home in return for room and board and some pocket money.

Danielle Wright, a small-business owner and mother of two, has been using au pairs since her son was six months old. Now on to her fifth one, Hannah, she says she can't imagine life without her live-in helper.

"It's absolutely brilliant," the 39-year-old Randwick mum says.

"I pay a quarter of the price of childcare fees and the children are looked after in their own home."

Au pairs, however, are not qualified childcarers and their visa requirements mean they can only work for six months at a time.

"We went over to England and au pairs were huge there, so we thought we'd give it a go. I went back to work three days a week when my son was six months old and I was not nervous at all. I can't imagine us not having one now," Danielle says. "The flexibility is huge, I pay $250 a week for 40 hours and I provide a room and food."

Stephanie Prenzlau, who runs the AIFS au pair agency, has placed 250 au pairs this year and business has doubled in the past two years. All the girls are from Germany and she insists they have been screened closely, but they are not professional childcarers.

"The typical au pair we place is 19 or 20 and wants to have a gap year in Australia before she goes back to start university. She has to have 100 hours of referenced recent childcare experience, good education, a police check, medical check and first aid certificate," Prenzlau says.

Skoulogenis is concerned by the trend, however. The government's pursuit of higher standards has backfired, she says, by sending children into unregulated care.

"My concern is we have high quality care and people are leaving the service because of the impact of ratios and costs and going into unregulated care," she says.

She warns it will get worse next year when the National Quality Framework guidelines require the staff-to-child ratios for older children aged two to three move from one carer to eight, to one to five.

"We're not against the reforms, but you can't roll it out that quickly and expect parents just to pay for it."

Zona Shepherd went back to work this week part-time and the only reason she could was because her husband took time off work. It is not a sustainable solution and she is still desperate for help.

Did you struggle finding care for your children upon returning to work? What advice would you give to parents in this situation?

Wendy's World, Sunshine Coast Daily columnist

When my two kids were little I couldn’t stand taking them to the supermarket.

Well, to be honest, I couldn’t stand taking them to most retail places. It was always a performance and almost every outing was fraught with danger or embarrassment.

Image: Shopping with the kids poses problems, no matter what age. Source: Parents Connect

If I wasn’t dealing with projectile-vomiting from car-sick episodes on the way to the shops I was slamming on the brakes screeching the station wagon to an emergency halt so someone could take an unscheduled wee while trucks thundered past their bare bottom.

I also vividly remember one holiday spending 40 agonising minutes of my life trying to convince a store detective I had no idea why my son’s stroller had made the security system light up like a Christmas tree when I pushed it through the checkout while, during the entire exchange, my son (aka “the suspect”) sat there like innocence on a stick.

But getting back to the supermarket thing, for years the main reason I couldn’t take either of them inside was the constant whingeing. Mine as much as theirs. It was just plain hard work.

Even if I went in for a quick smash-and-grab grocery shop I’d have to play deal-or-no-deal in the breakfast cereal aisle (agree to a box of Co-Co Pops for the weekends on the condition they eat Weetbix on weekdays).

So now that my little darlings are finally old enough to be of some use, that is able to carry the shopping to the car, I brought them along for the weekly trip to the supermarket.

We got off to a good start when my eldest offered to push the trolley – naturally on the proviso that if he saw anyone he knew he could just dump it (and me and his sister).

We made it unscathed through the chippie aisle, all agreeing on the same flavour, the frozen food section presented few issues with the diplomatic “party pack” of pies, pasties and sausage rolls voted a winner and even the lolly aisle, which in years gone by was nearly my undoing, ended up being totally incident-free.

But the wheels came off my trolley when we rounded the health and beauty products aisle.

My eldest spotted a $9.50 can of designer deodorant he just “had to have”. Yeah right, like I’m going to spend $9.50 on his pits? I tossed him a bar of Palmolive, a can of no-frills spray and words along the lines of “get over yourself”.

Tempted as he was to answer back, a girl from his school came into the aisle at that exact moment which was his prearranged cue to exit stage right and pretend I was a total stranger.

That left me standing there with my youngest. She was holding up a tube of hair-removal cream and talking way too loudly about her “unsightly bikini line”. What the?

Oh, she had to be kidding me. This is the same child who waited for 13-and-a-half anxious years for even a whisper of hair to appear “down below” and when something finally appeared practically alerted the media. Now she wanted to get rid of it? All six of them?

This was not a conversation I wanted to be having with my baby in the middle of Woolies.

Suddenly I was yearning for the projectile-vomiting and mistaken shoplifting incidents of days gone by – where the only hair removal was my own, as I tore it out in the car on the way home.

Family Taming is a weekly humour column.

How do you withstand the weekly shop and have you found your trips improve as your children get older?

Alison Godfrey, News.com.au

CJ is once again wearing “no pants”. He’s got a red Thomas the Tank Engine shirt on under a red Spiderman hoodie. But on the bottom he has his blue stripped speedos (ready for swimming lessons). I tell him that he must wear trousers. After protesting, he gives in, but insists they must be tracksuit pants - not the funky grey cords with a motorbike patch that I have picked out. I explain that all his tracksuit pants are in the wash, but he doesn’t believe me. He hunts through his drawers and finally finds a pair I had forgotten about. They are red. So that’s a red shirt, red trousers, red jacket. I’m not impressed and try to tell him that you really shouldn’t wear one colour all over. But then his dad steps in. He tells CJ, of course you can wear red trousers, “they match, CJ” he says.

Beaming from his win over mum, he pulls on the tracksuit pants and parades around the house. I shouldn’t be surprised. Dad often does some very dubious dressing. His outfits always make me laugh.

Last week I picked CJ up from preschool and noticed he was wearing red tracksuit pants with a bright yellow T-shirt, a blue hoodie that is a little bit too small and bright green socks. He honestly looked like the rainbow serpent threw up on him.

I talked to a few of my girlfriends about the “dressed by dad” phenomenon. They all said the same thing. Dads pick out hilarious outfits.

Over the last few months I have seen CJ resemble a tree (brown trousers and green shirt), a McDonalds chip packet (all red and yellow) and an upside down traffic light (red pants, orange shirt, green jumper). One of my girlfriends reminded me today that my husband used to send CJ to preschool looking like an old man in socks and sandals with tracksuit pants.

While it drives me to distraction, my husband quite correctly states: “hey, at least he is dressed”. Yes, that’s true. But I just wish he didn’t look so ridiculous so often.

Strangely my husband always manages to have Amelie looking good. When I asked him why he said: “girls are easy, you just put pink on pink and it will always be right”.

Still it could be worse than dressed by dad. Loads of kids I know insist on dressing themselves.

One of CJ’s friends very regularly insists on wearing two different socks and having his shirt on backwards.

His awesome mum just laughs and says “there’s nothing I can do.” I told her she is absolutely right and luckily her son is very popular, “Just wait, soon all the children at preschool will be insisting on wearing their shirts backwards to be as cool as him,” I said.

But what do you think? Does the dad in your life pick out good or bad outfits? Tell us the worst you have seen.

Lucy - Diminishing Lucy Blog

I'll be honest, when my eldest first started at school; I was a little excited about the concept of sending her off with a lovingly prepared range of foods in her brand new lunch pack.

Now I have three needing lunches five days a week. The excitement has definitely waned. I cannot fake it anymore.

BUT, I also know that it's vital for me to send them off with healthy energy giving food that will see them through the day.

So, whilst lunchbox fodder is the bane of my life, I still attend to it!

Here are my tips –

Establish what your child will eat and happily eat regularly. Often variety is not required, thankfully, but consistency is. My eldest, for instance, can happily eat and ham and cheese sandwich on multigrain sliced bread every single day.

Variety can come through seasonal fruit and veggies. This means the economy too. Pinpoint a veggie that your child will happily eat raw and chopped. Then you always have a standby snack. My son will eat raw cucumber over an apple, quite happily.

Bulk buy appropriate snack foods such as sultanas, rice crackers and popcorn. The dinky little individual portions are handy, for sure, but expensive. Buy it all in bulk packs and portion it yourself into little plastic tubs or small zip lock bags.

If you are out of fresh bread, Vitawheat are a great alternative, spread with Vegemite and butter or cream cheese, pressed together.

Check out the school canteen or tuck shop menu. The Department of Education policy on canteen foods is strict. School tuck shops are simply not allowed to sell junk these days. So the canteen presents a healthy occasional treat. (For both mother and child.)

And remember – your child is keener to play at recess and lunchtime than they are to eat. With that knowledge, along with the awareness that I have a further 8000 chances to impress with my lunchbox attempts, I can relax….

Image: Food for thoughts - planning your child's lunch doesn't have to be painful, Diminishing Lucy makes some tasty recommendations. Source: Quentin Jones

What makes a good meal for your kids?

Nicole Madigan Everest - From The Courier Mail's Mother of All Blogs

A recent article claimed Facebook and Twitter were bad for kids, suggesting mothers who use the social media websites were neglecting their children.

Some might say social media is a great way for mothers (particularly those who spend most/all of their time with their children) to feel connected to the community.

I know it’s been that way for me.

And does the fact that we are talking about modern day technology really make it any more neglectful than say, TV? The telephone? Books? Magazines?personal grooming? Day dreaming?

If someone wants a destraction from their kids, they’re going to find one.

But what do you think? Are you neglecting your kids by reading this very blog?

Am I by writing it? I do so as my son is dances to The Wiggles at the moment, while the bub sleeps.

But don’t worry, as soon as I type my final full stop, I’ll read him a book and take them both for a walk.

In fact I can hear Bailey waking up now.

Bye!

Photo: Parents online - is it socially acceptable?

You've just arrived home with your newborn. How, exactly, can you tell what his needs are so that you can more successfully soothe him?

Even though it's not always simple, you are likely to find that after a few days you notice that every time your baby starts to fall asleep he has a characteristic cry.

Or maybe he'll have a certain wail that stops as soon as he is fed. Once you start picking up on these cues and responding accordingly, your baby will take comfort in knowing that he's able to communicate with you, at least some of the time.

If you can't identify the cry, consider the last time your baby ate, slept, or had his nappy changed. If it has been a few hours, it may be time again to tend to each of these needs.

Here are some other techniques to try if your baby just won't stop crying.

Get professional help. Most books save the worst-case scenarios for the end of the list. If at any point you feel that your baby is simply inconsolable or crying for longer than you're comfortable with, or if he seems sick or has an unusually high-pitched cry, then by all means enlist the expertise of your pediatrician without delay - that's what they're there for!

Soothe yourself. Let's assume you've evaluated your situation and don't think it warrants a doctor's intervention. The next step is to take a deep breath and try to relax. Babies can pick up on stress around them and may start to cry if they get negative vibes.

Sometimes the best first step you can take is to calm down, even if that means putting your crying baby in a safe place and giving yourself a quick break first.

Stay snug and secure. Try swaddling your baby snugly. The way we reason it, newborns have all spent 9 months (give or take) accustomed to feeling snug and secure in the very close quarters of the uterus. By simulating this cozy feeling of confinement, the swaddling technique often helps with crying as well as with sleeping.

Keep things moving. Every newborn who's spent any amount of time in utero is simply not going to be born accustomed to sitting still. As a result, you may find that yours takes a while to buy into the notion that the absence of movement and activity can be pleasant and peaceful.

In the meantime, you can try the time-tested methods of movement such as carrying, rocking, strolling, or driving to appease your crying or restless newborn. Vibrating infant seats and baby swings also serve the purpose of keeping your baby comfortably moving as well. Just keep in mind that you'll want to always secure your baby according to instructions, keep an eye on him while you're using them, and look for features designed to accommodate newborns (additional recline, harnesses that adequately secure small infants, low settings on automatic swings, etc).

Supply simple sound effects. Your baby may also crave the soothing muffled noises similar to amniotic fluid waves or the swishes and pulses of mom's heart and blood vessels. You may find the sound of a vacuum cleaner, washing machine, shower running, or human heartbeat (hold him against your chest or play a tape of heart sounds) works wonders.

For some of these efforts, you will also have the added bonus of a cleaner house, clothes, or body! Whether you're musical or not, try singing or playing some music. Some parents find their newborns seem to be particularly soothed by music played or sung to them even before they were born!

Opposites attract. Feel your baby's hands and feet. If they are cold, put on another layer of clothing or wrap him in a blanket. If the back of his head and neck are warm or sweaty, remove a layer (and consider checking his temperature).

See if he's interested in a change of scenery. If it's bright, turn off the lights. If it's dark, turn some on. If it's very noisy, turn down the volume. If it's unusually quiet, try out some of the simple sound effects mentioned previously. Too still? Move around. Bottom line: no actual science involved here - more a matter of finding and fine-tuning your own simple calming solutions.

Hand off. If others are around, enlist their help until you're ready to try again yourself.

Give it time. If all else fails, just hold your baby and patiently wait for him to settle down. Crying in and of itself won't hurt your baby, so if you're not in a mindset to handle it, it's OK to let your baby cry for a while. If you're at your wit's end and need a break, don't feel guilty about putting him in a safe place (such as a cot or buckled into a car seat) while you compose yourself.

MCT

For more on parenting and pregnancy: essentialbaby.com.au

The biggest baby name trends for 2010? Anything decidedly non-trendy.

The tireless search for the perfect baby name isn't always easy on any new mum and dad - even after scouring the web for advice, playing with naming tools, and sifting through mountains of baby-name books at the bookstore.

If you're still on a quest to name baby something cool and trendy, you might want to reconsider your strategy: instead of hopping on the trend train this year, it's looking like more and more parents-to-be will be opting for unique classics they love. Wondering what oldies-but-goodies will trump the rest? Here are some predictions about what's hot (and what's not) this year in baby names.

Little Sophias, Lilys, Isabellas, Avas, and Olivias are already starting to fill up preschools and kindergartens, and it looks like they'll still be going strong in 2010.

How come? These days, parents-to-be are loving distinctly feminine-sounding monikers for girls and kicking the crossover trend (of names like Riley and Dylan) to the curb - at least for now. And don't expect to find any Tiffanys in this bunch - 2010 babes will be sporting classic and simple names, not diminutive and frilly ones.

Also propelling the popularity of these names? Grandma Grace, Great-Grandma Charlotte, and Great-Aunt Abigail. Older relatives' names match perfectly with the current trend, so parents naming their baby Hannah or Claire get the double bonus of honouring a loved one. (While it's tough for us to imagine a baby Judy, Donna, or Brenda today, check back with us in 2020.)

Names to look out for: Vivienne, Stella, and Amelia. Angelina Jolie's Vivienne is just a year-and-a-half old, and the name is already climbing the charts. Same goes for Stella, recently used by Ellen Pompeo and Tori Spelling. And Amelia? It's just plain adorable.

Out for girls: Crossover names

While you'll no doubt still see some newborn Baileys and Rileys in the nursery, in general, these names are losing steam. The one exception is Addison, for its lack of cutesiness.

In for boys: Biblical and Celtic names

Just like with girls, parents of boys are moving away from modern, sometimes made-up names and opting for traditional, often family-inspired monikers.

Names to look out for: Ethan, Jacob, Lucas, Liam, Logan, Gavin, and Aidan. Aidan has been a clear favourite for the past few years and looks to continue its reign in 2010.

Out for boys: Anything that rhymes with Aidan

Except Aidan itself. The super-hot name sparked a rush of spin-offs from Jayden to Caeden to Greydon and far, far beyond. Sure, some of the less out-there variations will probably still pop up, but as a whole, this trend (and the entire made-up name category) is on the outs.

In for both: Twilight-inspired names

Twilight, the hottest juggernaut since Harry Potter, has surprisingly sparked an even bigger following when it comes to baby names. Hot names pulled from its pages include Edward, Bella, Emmet, Jacob, Jasper, Esme, Alice, Rosalie, and Carlisle. Even Cullen - the last name of its dreamy hero, Edward - is also expected be a hit. But while the Twilight craze itself has certainly given major play in the popularity of these names, they just so happen to also fit in perfectly with this year's trend of going back to the classics.