After 18 hours of travel yesterday we have finally arrived home. It feels really good to have my own bed back. It''s also nice to have an internet connection. The wireless in Europe was few and far between, and often involved loitering outside of a McDonald's. I am sitting here eating peanut butter (also non existent in Europe) on my toast and catching up on my e-mails & blogs. I will do my best to publish these over the next several days. Here is what I started while in the first leg of our journey -France.
Bonjour! We arrived in the French Alps after a long flight from Vancouver via Amsterdam and Geneva. I will write more about travel with a small baby later. For now I will begin with highlights of our experience in the Savoy region of south eastern France in the heart of the Alps -this is the famous Chamonix.
I've been spending Anika's nap times reading the book "Bringing up Bebe" -a recently published best seller about an American woman's observations of French parenting while living in Paris. This book provides an interesting sociological study for me here while just learning the ropes of parenting myself.
The author,
Pamela Druckerman, observes happy, well adjusted, French kids eating four course meals in restaurants, sleeping through the night from very young ages, and calmly entertaining themselves, and can be said to stem from a few parenting practices that are somewhat different from our North American ideals. I will attempt to highlight them without completely spoiling the book.
Equilibre -Equilibrium or balance. This is an important ideal for each family to have a balance of time and needs of each member. A family is felt to be out of balance if one member is requiring too much attention or taking too much time away from others. Babies in North America are often throwing us off balance at the expense of the parent's (especially the mother's) needs.
Cadre or framework-this refers to certain guidelines and rules which are firmly enforced, but within this there is a fair bit of freedom for a child to explore, and discover his/her own autonomy. It is a parent's job to educate a child. This is the closest translation the French have to "discipline".
French babies sleep through the night at very young ages, some right from hospital discharge. They are almost all formula fed, and I suspect this is the main reason why, but the author thinks it has more to do with the parents pausing and not picking babies up as soon as they cry out in the night. If they can resettle on their own, then they should be able to do this without need for adult attention. Anika is waking once or twice during a 12 hour night time for a full breast feed and I thought that was fairly normal. We won't be trying the "pause" while on this trip, but perhaps when we get home. I find it hard to believe she could go 12 hours without eating, but maybe??? Since writing this her sleep has sadly taken a turn for the worse. With all of the changes of locations and time zones paired with increasing awareness of her surroundings the night wakings have been much more frequent -sometimes even hourly. We've got to get back on track again so I can function mentally.
I had an opportunity to observe some French (and British) children in restaurants and shops in town. Some of the characteristics to seem to hold true. French kids don't throw food, shun vegetables or forget to say au revoir. They have strict rules to follow but this is comforting for them and they know what's expected. Some of the north american and Brit tots could be observed being holy terrors in restaurants and shops.
One of the most memorable encounters I had was at the public swimming pool. I took Anika for a swim one afternoon. DH opted out because they only allow Speedos (no loose shorts) for men claiming a hygiene rationale. You can even rent a Speedo from a vending machine if you forget your own. At the pool we befriended a little girl and her mom from the UK who were living in France. She was taking her daughter swimming because there were no lessons available for preschoolers (the French believe in letting children freely explore the water, rather than have a structured class.Apparently Saturday is "baby day" at the pool when they go to the trouble of turning up the temperature of the water.The lifeguards were quite worried that Anika was getting too cold because her skin was looking so pale. The ex-pat Brit mom and I had a good laugh about that -no that's just her usual white skin tone.
Some of the downfalls of the French parenting style are the lack of breastfeeding and the reliance on nannies and daycares (creches) from an early age because French mothers return to work soon after giving birth.
The book delves into greater detail, so I haven't completely spoiled it hopefully. It is certainly worth the read.
