A Daily Routine

As a new mom I find myself with a lot of questions. I want to make sure that I am doing everything I need to do to help Payton live an enriched life. I want her to be happy, smart, nice to others, etc. If there is anything I can do to help her be all those things I want to do them.

I remember talking to a friend of mine that I used to work with. She made the comment that she thought it was good for her daughter to be in day care because the care givers were trained in early childhood development and she wasn’t. That made me a little nervous when thinking about raising Payton; after all I am not trained in early childhood development. Thus came the thought “What do I do with my baby?” You can only sing Twinkle Twinkle Little Star so many times and she can only look at the same toy for so long, right?

Then I remembered the Supernanny. Have you ever watched Supernanny? One of the things Jo Frost suggested many families to do was to make a daily routine for their kids. She says that children do much better when they have structure. I think parents also do better with some structure. :o) I am the kind of person that can’t seem to make dinner if I haven’t planned a menu for the month. Anyway, I decided to make a daily routine for Payton. Payton’s schedule goes like this:

7:30 – 8:00 Nursing
8:00 – 9:00 Bath/Play
9:00 – 10:00 Breakfast
10:00 – 12:00 Nurse/Nap
12:00 – 1:00 Lunch
1:00 – 3:00 Play
3:00 – 5:00 Nurse/Nap
5:00 – 6:00 Play
6:00 – 7:00 Dinner
7:00 – 8:00 Play
8:00 Nurse/Bed

If you are like me, you may try and follow the schedule to the “T”. However, from what I have read the times aren’t meant to be restrictive or set in stone. For instance Payton may sleep until 8:30 or she may only nap for 1 hour, I don’t worry about it. I just keep going with whatever is next on the schedule.

Payton and I have both done a lot better since I have put together a schedule for her. I get to have a plan for the day and she, for the most part, has an idea of what to expect next.

Now the schedule doesn’t totally help my thought of “What do I do with my baby?” So in addition to the schedule, I have been trying to come up with a list of games/activities to use with Payton during the “play times” in the schedule. My goal is to have different types of games/activities to use at each play time. For instance, during the morning play time we usually spend time in her room reading books, singing songs, or playing with toys. During the afternoon play time we may go to a play date, for a walk, etc.. I signed up for the weekly emails from BabyCenter.com and in those emails they suggest game/activity ideas that you can do with your baby. They are great! I have been trying to keep a list of the suggestions I like so that I can easily reference them when I think “What do I do now?” I also have a couple of books with game/activity ideas that I can pull ideas from.

I will have to share my favorites in a future post.

Does anyone have any fun game/activity ideas that they really enjoy doing with their wee one? Or does anyone have any good or bad experiences with using a daily routine?