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Julia (3 January (2015)) is our firstling child, the elder sister of Luz. We keep track of all her achievements and important changes in this timeline and a gallery of her drawings here.

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She's growing extremely fast and is already 9.2 years old. She seems to be a different person everyday!

Contents

Julia's infancy

Co-sleeping with Julia

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Quite naturally, we have been drifting towards co-sleeping with Julia, not only room but also bed sharing.

For her first month, Julia would sleep in our baby stroller cradle, which in our case is removable. We started by placing it on the floor, next to my side of the bed, in order to see her from above during her sleep. Soon enough Fabrice suggested to plug her onto our (large, 160cm-) bed, between us, and that worked even better since I could help her to sleep quite easily without getting up. Just stroking her head or putting back her fallen-out pacifier. Still, after a couple of weeks, it felt like that extra barrier was not needed and things could be made even easier. Even being so physically close to us, Julia would wake up the moment she was placed in the cradle if not deeply asleep. This was annoying... Specially at 3am after gently and quite successfully breastfeeding her to sleep. Furthermore, the fact that we had a trip to France soon ahead of us made me wish we did not need the cradle (we have a rather small car).

By the second month we decided to remove it completely. We placed Julia on the bed, between us, on her little mattress (in order to give us a sense of the room she was taking) and barricaded by Fabrice's side with a pillow. They say that breastfeeding mothers are really tuned to their babies and would never roll onto them, also tend to synchronise their sleep patterns. I quickly realised that this was completely true and I sleep happily in close proximity without any fear. However, for fathers, things are not as natural. They typically fall into a much deeper sleep and need time to develop the instinct to keep the baby safe. This is why we have this pillow, that is covered by a sheet so that it is fixed and there is no risk of falling on top of Julia.

We also follow all the usual recommendations not to have extra pillows or toys or blankets in bed, not to leave any space where she could fall into and not take drugs or alcohol.

It feels completely natural. It also facilitates breastfeeding since it allows me and Julia to barely wake up and go back to sleep without any problem most of the nights. When she does wakes up, I know it instantly and can react quickly to her demands so that she is never fully awake, does not get to the point of crying and does not choke. Cry-less nights! Already interesting. But cosleeping goes further than just these convenient and practical reasons. I love to sleep so close to this beautiful baby, wake up in the mornings to her joyful smile. If she is a bit excited at bed time, I simply caress her and hold her hands for a little while and she quietly and smoothly falls asleep. It feels right and both Fabrice and me, enjoy it immensely.

Baby-led weaning

Baby-led weaning lets the weaning process in the hands of the baby. This is the method we have chosen and you can follow our progress in our page on "Julia-led weaning".

Growing up with several languages

Cada uno hablamos a Julia en nuestro idioma materno, Elena en español y Fabrice en francés. Este es el método más practicado en el multilingüismo (One person one language).

Las primeras palabras de Julia fueron papá y mamá en el mismo día, mientras viajábamos en el tren nocturno de Moscú a St Petersburgo. Lo grabamos en vídeo.

Pictures

Gallery

Fourth trimester

Second trimester

First trimester

Intrauterine

First costume of Julia for Halloween 2014:

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Links

Regalos de la abuela

Regalos de Julia

De Julia: Cumple de papá

Para su 38 cumpleaños, el 30 de septiembre de 2015 (usando el programa Comic life):

Por Papá Noel 2017: un llavero con su foto del tren del Ríotinto.