MSE Newborn to 1 year (& beyond!) baby club 3

Sparkles87

Hi Bride, as LO is still little enough - take her car seat and a dressing gown for her. Dry her off and pop her in car seat in dressing gown while you get dressed then sort her out. Much easier. I have no idea what we'll do now LO is nearly too big for her car seat though!

lobey

We've just come back from swimming! All I'd say is organise things you will need afterwards so they can go at the top of your bag- nappy, change of clothes and baby's towel etc. A will happily do some kicking on the changing board while I'm getting changed provided I've changed her first. Just don't expect to have a proper shower or hair wash yourself Also if you have one of those fold out changing mats take that as sometimes the baby changing cubicles aren't free in our leisure centre. Good luck!! X

continualdiamond

The pool I am going to isn't what you'd expect. It's at someones house, they put an extension on to run the business purely just for children's swimming. I had no idea as I had assumed swimming would be at my local leisure centre but when I looked into two companies both used this pool and at 1st I was like where the hell can this pool be, even more so when I went for a drive at the weekend to find it as it took me to a housing estate, I was convinced I was lost, lol.

The company I am going with suggest on the website not to take in car seats to avoid congestion in the changing rooms but I'm going to carry lo in hers and hopefully she will be more than happy sitting in her seat playing with her toys whilst I get changed.

I plan to get myself properly sorted once home as in washing my hair etc. I recently bought a pacapod after recommendations on here and that has been fab packing stuff for swimming as I rolled mine and her towel up and stacked them next to each other as took out one of the pods and kept 1 pod in which has all her changing stuff in.

I'm nervous but also excited as she does love her bath.

BabaMoose

When you get there, I'd go with her and your costumes already on, so it's just a case of stripping down instead of putting them on their and then. Saves loads of time and any fussing.

Definitely don't plan on having yourself a shower/washing your hair when you get out - waiting until you get home is the thing to do.

Definitely good to be as organised as possible so when you get out it's towel, nappy change, dressed then hopefully distract them with a toy and get dry and dressed as quickly as possible yourself. Probably a good idea to make sure you have something quick and easy to slip into and nothing faffy (not that I'm even sure I have anything faffy since I had Jack - it's all nursing tops and jeans).

Be prepared for the first time to not be in the pool for that long as they get used to it, lots of bobbing up and down in the water and movement (zig zagging them through the water etc.) Some children's pools or hydro pools are lovely and heated, but one of our local pools just has one pool - so we were in the shallow end - but the water is a LOT colder than the average bath, so we had some protests. Luckily we'd put him in the full wetsuit rather than just his trunks though so that kept him in a bit longer. Was about 30mins or so I think. Yours might be able to do a little better if they're 5+months though, we were around 3m at the time.

Have fun though! We absolutely love going swimming, big fan of the bath too x

bride2be2012

Thanks for the advice everyone! I can't take the car seat in unfortunately - we are going to lessons that are held in a gym, and other gym members were complaining about car seats taking up all the room in the changing area...

I'm going to try my best to get a shower/hair wash - we moved house 2 months ago and only have a bath, no shower, and was looking forward to washing my hair without using a jug! Roll on next week when DH is off and coming too - he can change baby while I spend 30 mins in the shower, ha ha!

sue1871

Hi everyone *waves*

I can't find the latest list of members but would like to joinuou please.

Bonnie is 6 months old (born 4 Sept)
I'm 42 and a first time mum
We're MSEing as much as possible in that I breastfeed, we use cloth nappies and we're doing Baby Led Weaning
Bonnie's lovely, just started crawling (only backwards so far) and we went swimming for the first time today!

For the previous poster going swimming for the first time I would recommend getting into your costume at home to save time (although make sure you remeber to take knickers with you, which i forhot to do!!), putting all baby's stuf at thd top of the pile in the locker, get baby changed before you do and feed baby before you leave the changing room. We walked to the pool so Bonnie was able to have a lovely sleep on the way home.

Looking forward to catching up on this forum while feeding Bonnie later (thank god for the Kindle!)

continualdiamond

Well swimming was fab. Scarlett loved it, so much so that when she got out of the pool she cried.

The location was just amazing. Cannot believe someone had an extension of a pool to run swimming lessons. It means it runs so smoothly in that it only ever has 8 parents & 8 children in the whole building and you're swapping over so 4 are waiting to go in, 4 are getting out.

It just has one small changing room with 4 changing stations so not people everywhere and I was fine taking my car seat in. I went with my swimming costume on and Scarlett had her swim pants on, I borrowed a swim nappy to see what size I needed to buy her, but next week I will be putting her in her outfit ready so no changing is needed once at the pool.

The poolside assistant stands with a plastic bag ready for you to put baby's swimmers in so you then walk into the shower. Just one parent/baby at a time and then I had her towel ready to wrap her in. Got her dressed 1st, then put her in her car seat ready and she played with her toys.

It did have a separate shower but I didn't bother. Far easier to just come home and get sorted. I just wore joggers and a jumper and slip on trainers so no faffing about.

The lesson was 30 mins and she was totally fine being in the pool the whole time. She splashed about like crazy, only bit she didn't like was being passed to the instructor, she looked over her shoulder at me and just cried. Soon as she was back with me, she was fine.

Now got homework of pouring water over her head when in the bath.

*Nutella*

Bangton wrote: »

Nutella so sorry about the house. . Sounds like such a hassle! I do wish people couldn't pull out like in Scotland!

I couldn't agree more - that's also how it is in most of mainland Europe I think. In addition to the hassle we've also lost over £2500 on solicitors and mortgage-related fees I went to view a house this evening though and I want it! LO loved it too - she didn't want to leave! Now I just need to convince OH - it's not in his favourite area....

lazywife

Agreed with swimming tips to get your cossie under your clothes and take in car seat and don't get showered after. But please don't travel there with LO only in swim nappy, they don't stop wee, only poo. So you could end up with a very soggy car seat.x

lazywife

*Nutella* wrote: »

I couldn't agree more - that's also how it is in most of mainland Europe I think. In addition to the hassle we've also lost over £2500 on solicitors and mortgage-related fees I went to view a house this evening though and I want it! LO loved it too - she didn't want to leave! Now I just need to convince OH - it's not in his favourite area....

Fingers crossed this time Nutella.x