babyyogi

Will has been trying so hard to crawl these days.  It has been a joy watching him struggle and giggle on his tummy as he pushes up lifting his tummy off the floor.  Yesterday he started to scoot in a circle!!!  This was an exciting time for the little guy given that up until now he has only been scooting backward.  We are still waiting to see his official crawl.   But I felt it was time to reward his efforts witha little baby massage!

Palm Massage and Finger Rolls

Waiting until he is nursing I decided to give his hands a much needed massage.  Taking his palm into my hand and doing a roll between my thumband index finger.  Will was drifting to sleep so I decided to dress him in his nighty sothat he will be warm for the rest of the massage.

With baby so relaxed it will be easy to do finger rolls. Take your baby’s entire hand into your hand. Opening baby’s hand, gently extend a finger and gently roll the finger between your thumb and fore finger.  Repeat this technique for each finger.  

Stary Night

Goal:  Trust in a greater intelligence

Affirmation:  Infinnate possibilities

Having trust in my current position and knowing that being home would open new doors for me allowing not only my baby to grow at an astounding rate was wonderful.  The Universe had my back.   As I have mentioned my son was born early and being at home allowed him to grow on souley breast milk.   At our two week well baby visit I remember the pediatricians face when she saw him weigh in and how happy she was calling us breast feeding champions.  She then told me that he could not have grow faster in the womb.  Being constantly feed thru the umbilical cord babies grow at about two ounces a day in the womb in the last month and that is exactly what my son had done outside of the womb.  Making my son’s weight in the 90% for his age.  It was as if he had not been born early.  I too had made personal changes and developments at home in-between breast feeding sessions.  I was able to cultivate my yoga practice, my baby massage skills and write down my meditations.   Knowing that the universe had my back meditation was crucial to my development of my skills.  

Meditation

Deep belly breath beginning.  Imagine stars surrounding your being and your babies being.  You are floating above the earth not touching or bound to any gravitational pull or law of physics.  You and your baby are at the center of everything and everything is circulating around you.  The energy of the universe is connecting and protecting you.  It runs thru everything and can be felt and channeled with thought.  Feel the energy pulsating in your body, like static electricity buzzing lifting the hair on your head and neck,  your energy is mixing and feeding your baby in the form of breast milk.  The universe is generous with possabilites, seek and follow energy paths that require the least amount of effort.  As you make decisions recognize that you now have an additional life that is dependant on your decisions.   Keep your goals set with out conflict or competition.  Stay focused knowing you are supported in a constant state of growth.

Will really enjoys his Baby Einstein jumper.  After a 30 minute session of jumping, pressing buttons, spinning dials and playing music his legs and feet are tired.  Below are a few of the techniques I use to relax his legs.   Leg Kneading:  Time to knead the calves and thighs.  Start with the whole hand lightly gliding over the whole leg from the ankle up to the hip.  Hold the ankle in your hand and sweep up the leg with the other hand.  Then form a U shape with your hand allowing baby’s calf to rest in your palm.  Knead the calf  with strong relaxed hands, then move up to the thigh, repeat kneading technique.  Repeat on other leg.         Ankle Press and Roll:   Taking baby’s foot in your hand, with your thumb and fingers gently massage baby’s ankle with a pressing, rolling motion.  You can do both ankles at the same time, one in each hand.  When massaging the heals be sure that baby’s hips remain on floor or surface of the bed.                              Foot Massage:   Holding baby’s foot in your hand, so that the thumb is on the bottom of baby’s foot and your fingers are on the top.  Gentle press your thumb into the toe pad, then the arch and then the heal.  Repeat this sequence a few times.  Finally pinching the heal between the thumb and fingers.

When learning to crawl tummy time is super important.  Will is now almost seven months and trying so hard to crawl.   His tummy still does not come off the floor.  It is so fun to see him on his tummy, legs kicking, arms and hands pushing up trying so hard to lift his Buddah stomach off the ground.  I feel that arm kneading techniques are able to relax my baby and comfort him even when he gets frustrated with the possibility of crawling.

Arm Knead incorporating a Body Sweep:

Have your baby lying on his or her back.  Be sure to keep baby’s shoulders on the floor or bed during this massage.  You do not want to pull the armup in a way that hurts or dislocates the baby’s shoulder.  Using your whole hand knead with gentle yet firm strokes from the shoulder to the wrist.  Thensweep up from the hands to the shoulder with pinky and palm leading up pass over shoulder palm on baby’s chest, running hand down baby’s side to the back, hip and back of leg down to feet.  

Wrist and Forearm Knead:

Make a circle with your thumb and first finger around baby’s wrist. It’s ok if baby grabs onto your thumb and fingers.  Gently massage your baby’s wrist and forearm with your whole hand from your first (index) finger to yourpinky (milking).  Size of infant’s arm dictates how many fingers you use.

Nasal Clearance

At night I found that Will would get congested so I used this massage technique along with the booger bulb sucker to releave pressure from his congestion. 
Four fingers and palm start on side of the baby’s
head. Thumb is beside baby’s nose.  Thumb strokes the cheek and nasal passages five times.  Joining the hands on
the side of the cheek.  Then the whole hand sweeps down the to the jaw. 

Jaw Release  

Teething has been a real challenge.  Will’s jaw gets a real workout from sucking, crying, yawning and cooing.  With this technique you can help relax the jaw.  

Hand is open as a mitton shape with four fingers on the jaw and thumb below the baby’s lips.  With a very relaxed sweep slowly use the four fingers to sweep the length of the baby’s jaw while the thumb massages from below baby’s lips to his chin.  This will gently open baby’s mouth for only a moment.
 

Shoulder Sweep and Clearing Chest Congestion

 As with all these techniques get you doctor’s permission and take the time to ground and relax using your ritual and resting hands to begin.  Left hand’s four fingers on your baby’s shoulder, thumb on your baby’s chest.  Thumb sweeps from baby’s chest center toward fingers five times and fingers are then dragged from shoulder to chest.  Gently lift whole hand off baby and start again.  Repeat technique with right hand on baby’s right side.

Forehead and Skull Sweep
We all love a great scalp massage. Place four fingers
on top of your baby’s head and your thumb on  baby’s
forehead.  Sweep thumb up from the brow to join the
fingers on top of the head, and whole hand continues
with light pressure on the scull in a round motion.
Use your knowledge of getting your hair cut and
remember what the stylest does when shampooing your
hair and scalp.  The fingers and hand are one unit
working together like one of those hand held back
scratchers.  Your movement comes from your whole arm.
Repeat technique with other hand.

 My baby has been a gassey baby from the start.  Many a night we stayed up massaging his tummy.  I heard that the food I eat would give him gas so as a suggestion I stopped eating green veggies, beans and other foods to help.   He was always breast fed but I was told was gassey enough to have been a bottle fed baby.  I used tummy massage often to help digestion and releave gas pain.   Too funny! My life changed over night, I wen from being up typing on the computer for work to rubbing my babies tummy.   My background working in the software industry to my life revolving around getting my baby to sleep.  I thought working in software six days a week was tough.  I now have a 24 hour day job with no vacation time accruing or stock options?!?! Those software folks have it easy!        Tummy Massage :   With a confident left hand slowly make clockwise circles starting under your babies left ribs, circling around below the right ribs and down to above the right pelvis then left pelvis.  As the baby grows you can use two hands.  When the left hand is in the pelvis area the right hand sweeping clockwise from the left ribs to the right ribs only.  As the left hand circles back to its starting point lift your right hand off your baby.

Welcome to the Baby Yogi Blog! 

Jumping right in … this blog will cover topics such as Infant Massage, Breast feeding Meditation to reduce stress for Mom, eating organically grown foods and Yoga.  This first post was meant as a quick reference guide to teach new parents how to massage / touch their baby in a confident, secure and loving way.  

Always have a ritual before you begin.  Wash your hands before with antibacterial soap to eliminate any bacteria you might have picked up on your hands.   When you are washing your hands be sure that you soap up for 10 seconds before you rinse completely.  Warm hands by rubbing your hands together, relax you body and mind by taking deep breaths to slow down your circulation.   Get grounded and be in the present moment. I always think and say to my baby I Love you William Andrew.   Always ask permission before you begin the massage. Talk to your baby in a gentle voice asking if they are ready for a massage.  I always like to communicate in to my baby just to keep Will engaged and listening to my voice.   

  
Resting Hands   

You can start with the baby lying on your bed or in his crib, babies clothes on or off.  This just depends on your baby’s temperature.  You do not want your baby to get cold so turn up the heat if you decide to practice this technique with baby only in a diaper.    As seen in the image my baby is wearing a nighty on unbuttoned so that his limbs are covered and stay warm.  Hands are warm from rubbing them together.   Place a relaxed, confident and warm whole hand on your baby’s tummy.  Always use the whole hand never finger tips because this can cause a ticklish feeling that communicates the wrong message.  When we are tickled we do not relax.  The baby must relax for resting hands.  Breath deeply from your stomach, you are grounded, focused on your baby  and always thinking I Love You.  Verbally say affirmations.   You are so smart.  You are growing so fast.  Always talking to your baby with a true smile on your face.  It is this feeling of love and confidence that  must be communicated when carrying your baby, holding him or picking him up after he just got a shot at the pediatrician.  He needs to know that you are always there for him in a loving, strong and confident way.As your baby gets older and grows larger you can lay both hands on his chest in resting hands.  The resting hands technique is a great way to begin a massage session.  Just resting your hands on his chest and tummy allow him to relax and look at you.  Think of it as a baby massage starting point. We live in a society that often requires both parents  to work and bring home two paychecks for their family to live comfortably.  In this case I suggest that you bond in ways after work that require a ritual.  Rituals have a way of bonding family members together even when time separates us.  A ritual to incorporate Massage into daily life.  This is a great way for any parent to reconnect with their baby at the end of the day. 

My Baby evening Ritual   

1. Eat dinner together as family

2.  Warm bath for baby

3.  Massage

4.  Read a story

5.  Bed time  

When I was in the hospital after giving birth I was releaved to see that the nurses holding my baby had crafted the resting confident hands skill.   It was the young nurse that lacked confidence and her uneasy hands that alarmed Will and put him in an uneasy state.  As soon as she picked Will up and brought him to the bassinette for the hearing test I could see that she was holding him with awkward hands and seemed to rush in a way that made me and Will nervous.  Wy new born son cried at the attempts to quiet him in the bassinet.  The young nurse’s attempts were superficial, light, fluttery touch and not comforting.   It was this light fluttery touch that I would catch myself doing when I am in a hurry or my mind is focused on something other then my baby.  I have to get centered and focus on my baby before every massage session.  

The skill of massage is one that you will not want to overlook due to it’s importance to your baby.  Bonding with your baby is so natural and easy with massage.  Crafting  the art of resting hands delivers a message of confidence and love to your baby.  When done correctly your baby will develop trust in you. 

Welcome to Baby Yogi Blog.  

Since I was a child I have always been a creative person seeking out creative projects in the fields of Writing and Illustration.  It was this creative side that allowed me to jump right into roles at internet, software and gaming companies.  Working with Artistic Directors in the fields of Illustration, Animation, Web Design and Sound was a great honor but now I am focusing on characters that have been on my mind for the past eight years.  With the birth of my son I am transitioning out of ten years in computer industry as a community and product manager and into my new role as Mom, Author and Freelance Illustrator.  My main focus is my loved ones and the characters and stories that have always taken the back seat to my software career. 

Currently I am writing, illustrating and submitting the Billsby Family Adventures to Literary Agents and Publishers.  This blog will be an action adventure for parents and children.  The Premise is to motivate parents and peak children’s interest in outdoor activities, cooking, preparing foods for their younger siblings and to teach children that eating organic seasonal foods can be an adventure!

Education:

2007 Certifications: Infant CPR,  Yoga: Iyengar, Hatha, Anusara - 200 Hour Teacher Training & Massage: Swedish, Prenatal, Infant and Trauma. 

1997 Academy of Art University; San Francisco, Studied traditional and computer animation. Environmental construction and production for film.  

1995 University of California, Santa Cruz, Receiveddouble major, Bachelor of Arts in Psychology and FineArts 3D Sculpture.