Bath time

Parents either love it or hate it. For us we love it. James now runs to us for his bath. However, he wasn’t always like that!

When he was a month old he was great. We bought a baby bath for him before he was born so we used it for him. He loved it. When we held him on his front he was kicking his legs like he was practicing swimming. We continued to bath him the way we were taught in the hospital up until the point he got fed up of it and was showing that he wanted to bathe his own way.

We did let him lie in a small amount of water with me holding his back to give him the sense of support and feeling safe. He loved it so much that he was kicking to his delight! Splashing us in the process. When we were away on holiday I showed my mum our process of bathing. She was laughing so much at him kicking. I don’t know what she did expect to see from him in the bath. It certainly wasn’t him kicking like he was Michael Flatley!

It wasn’t until he was able to sit up unaided that we decided to try him in the bath, without one of us holding him. However, you can probably guess that I was anxious about it. So what did I do? I joined him (cue gasp)!

Yes, I know it’s weird. However, in the end it worked for us! Initially James found it weird and would cry straight away when we put him in the water. I always checked the water was at the right temperature, the old fashioned way, with my elbow. However, it wasn’t the temperature.

We weren’t sure what caused him to be so upset at bath time. I always checked the water was at the same level for every bath. We followed the same process like we did before. So we had to have a good think.

Maybe he was bored? As he was 6 months. Babies need stimulus and perhaps we weren’t giving him enough. We were too focused on bathing him. So we got out the bath toys (don’t know why we didn’t use them in the first place)! James loved them at first as he would chew them, which was great when he was teething. However, he soon got bored with them. So he would simply throw them out of the bath!

So I came up with singing nursery rhymes to him and incorporating hand actions with him. James likes music so he loved it. Again, I don’t why I didn’t think of it sooner! I sang to him some of his favourite rhymes to make bathing more enjoyable for him. James is a big fan of Twinkle twinkle little star so I always sang this last to him. James is now able to do the hand actions to it!

But one thing James didn’t like about bath time is the dreaded hair wash! He would move his head so he didn’t get a thorough hair wash and water would go anywhere. It wasn’t until recently we discovered his love for Baby shark. Yes, we managed to avoid it for over 14 months! So using the tune I wash his hair. It is so catchy! Singing to him the process. This made him happy to get his hair washed now. He even moves his head to the correct position for us with a huge smile on his face.

After a successful bath my husband takes James to dry him. It was so easy when he was a baby and didn’t move much. However, now he kicks and arches his back. Making it more difficult to dry him. What’s worse is James laughs thinking this is fun. So I end up laughing which makes my husband annoyed (sorry). As you can imagine, it makes it hard for him to get James’ nappy on.

Eventually , after James gets dried and his nappy is on. He gets cream applied. We use Child Farm. We used a couple of creams in the past as James has dry and sensitive skin. However, they didn’t work. So we used Child Farm and after a few days it worked. James’ skin is soft and he has had no rashes since the switch! I would definitely recommend their cream as it really has worked wonders for us!

After the cream is applied to him we try and I mean try! To get James to allow us to put his pjs on! With James discovering how flexible he can be, it is proving very difficult, to get his pjs on. As he would roll away to avoid getting his top on. So sometime we need to double tag him. With one of us distracting him whilst the other gets his top on.

Bath time is definitely not for the faint hearted with James! However, the more fun I make it he will respond by letting us do more.

Tell me your bath time tips!

I hope everyone is safe and well. 💖