DVD watching with new baby
 

As someone who has a two week old baby (first), what is everyone's experience with their dvd watching once a baby is brought home? So far, we have been able to continue our movie watching (albeit with interruptions) but I think our days might be numbered with relaxing on a Friday night with the latest releases.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

Have you thought about giving the baby away before he/she is too attached to you?

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

my daughter is almost 3 now, but when she was on the way, I thought it* would decrease my watching....but when she came my watching significantly increased. For the first 6 months anyway...

* not "it" as in the baby..."it" as in Having a baby around.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

As long as you turn the sound up loud enough to drown out the sounds of a wailing child in the next room you should be Ok.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

dvd viewing could actually go up! but i just hope you like sesame street, baby einstein, barney, and so on :D

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

I don't normally offer parenting advice, but since you asked, here goes. Firstly, never forget how precious a gift you've been given. No DVD, video game or anything else in this world is ever worth taking for granted that you'll have another day with your child.

Secondly, it is not actually in your child's interest for you to drown out noise while he or she is sleeping. It forces him or her to adapt early, while it is much easier. Otherwise, you'll only make it harder on him or her later in life to get comfortable doing things in any place that isn't to their specifications. You might want to shy away from watching more mature items where your child can see or hear them soon, though. They become desensitized sponges in no time at all if you're not careful.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

I was able to watch DVDs during naptime--nothing more relaxing than watching a DVD in a big comfy chair with him snuggled up against my shoulder sleeping.
I was careful with what I watched, and it wasn't cranked up too loud (yay subtitles).
But yes, MinLShaw is absolutely right....my boy is 6 now, and the times he was totally dependent on us and watching him discover everything new and doing his first anything is irreplaceable.....DVDs will still be around when your child is 2, 4, 6, 10, 14, etc years old.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

When I had new babies, any extra time was used for sleep.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

You should watch all the R/PG/PG-13/NC-17 rated movies that are out and that you want to see NOW!

Because once the kid figures out that the TV is for watching stuff, you won't see much of anything above a G-rating for the following decade. (But you will see the G-rated fare again and again, so many times that you will have every line practically memorized.)

.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

I've actually thought what to do with my child whenever I do have one. Give them good movies to see. As a baby..especially one that is weeks old. Almost EVERYTHING is amazing...give them quality stuff to watch. Like...well Obviously Pixar stuff..but also like Singin' In The Rain, Seven Samurai, and etc. I turned out fine...

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

This thread is hilarious. Does watching DVDs really trump taking care of your own child? Haha.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

Hey, watching DVDs is Quality Time. And if your kid happens to be in the same room, then it's Quality Time with your kid.

.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

I was also thinking of introducing the classics to the child when the age is right. Experts says classical music is a good stepping stone for babies, then why not the old Universal horror classics (when the time is right), I Love Lucy, Wizard of Oz, etc. I would like to give her a foundation of good entertainment before they are inundated with popular culture crap.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

Agreed...I've got lots of DVDs from "classic" tv shows and movies I want to share with him.
However, Baby Einstein and Sesame Street notwithstanding, I think it's been decided that there is no real benefit to giving a child, say, 2 years and under, any screen time at all, and there is the possibility of harm. (Not that 1/2 hour of Sesame Street once or twice a week for a 1.5 year old so you can catch some Z's on the couch will stunt them forever, but that it's definitely not worth it to go out of your way to put a young child/baby in front of a screen). Besides, giving the prevalence of dvds, ipods, game systems, portable game systems, and TVs in public places, it'll be all too soon before you have to fight to get them to turn it off.
Music, classical and otherwise, is definitely beneficial to children of all ages; however, I probably would hold off a little bit on Slayer and 2 Live Crew (although my boy has loved the Anthrax song "Got the Time" since he was 4, and once of his recent favorites is Butthole Surfers' 'Dracula in Houston'."
And as awesome and incredible as being a parent and having a child is, sometimes parents need some time to themselves; if watching a DVD is what one parent is into in his "free time", that's perfectly fine.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

My two daughters don't watch PBS, but they do watch the Disney Channel. There favorite is The Wiggles and Handy Manny. Cars, Ratatouille Shrek 2, Kung Fu Panda and Shark Tales are their favorite movies. My older daughter is 2 years-old and she is wanting to go outside more.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

No matter what don't put the baby in the dryer to eliminate interruptions. I heard that that is bad.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

A tablespoon of Nyquil in his bottle should get you through a full movie. As long as you don't do it more than 2 or 3 times a day you should be alright.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

When our 1st was little, I actually watched more movies (napped with her on me in the afternoon, and luckily I had a 5 disc changer so I could watch a lot without waking her). Now that she is 2 and we have a second, our DVD watching is mostly TV on DVD, since you can catch a little bit here and there.

As far as getting the kids to watch what you like, I haven't had much success, but don't really try too hard I guess. She doesn't watch much, but my daughter loves the Scholastic series DVDs, I suppose because they are mostly from the books we read to her.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

You end up staying in alot more, so have more time for DVDs.. but sometimes you cant hear or concentrate on them!

All part of being a parent :)

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

Actually TV on DVD viewing went up for me and movie watching went down. It's much easier to squeeze in a 22 minute sitcom or a 44 minute drama than a 2 hour movie.

That's really not bad advice. Even having switched to mostly TV shows, I still had to give up any mature dramas while the kids were up. I used to routinely watch stuff like NYPD: Blue, ER, or X-files during lunch. Those days are long gone now. :lol:

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

The kid will sleep, and oh yes, there will be DVDs.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

Oh God. My daughter's between 2 and 3 and we can barely watch old Simpsons anymore. Seasons 1 and 2 are OK but I have to skip Itchy and Scratchy. (after season 6 or so, forget it). She absorbs everything. After she goes to bed, we don't use the time for movies (we have no TV) but catching up on other stuff. If we watch a movie, that means losing some sleep, which is precious. I haven't seen a non-G movie in months. I like Nemo (I know every line and can repeat, complete with cheesy Aussie accent, on command) and quite like Monsters, Inc, but, well...

Oh, and the Wiggles are torturous.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

I have 6 month old twins and my TV watching seems to have gone up while my movie watching down a bit.

We are home more but I hate committing to movies I can;t watch all the way through. We get to see some movies after we put them down around 8 but a lot of times we are cleaning up from the day (washing bottles, getting bottles ready, laundry, etc). By the time we are done...well...we are done....

We do watch useless programming more now. We have stopped watching shows like Criminal Minds and CSI around them.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

When the kids slept, we slept... or cleaned. :D

It's funny, right before my first was born, I had all these delusions of us sitting there holding the baby and watching movies. But it just didn't happen. We were so excited that watching movies was kind of an after-though. And any "down time" was spent, as I mentioned above, catching up on our own rest or cleaning the place up.

We have a 4 yr. old and a 2 yr. old now and there is rarely anything non-kid related on the TV anymore. My Halloween/Holiday/Academy Awards Challenge Lists are proof of that. :lol:

When I can, I will suggest a kid movie that I like rather than Barney or Dora or The Wiggles, etc... My 4 yr. old is starting to warm up to watching more/new stuff. Last week, I was checking out the Blu-ray of "Pirates... 2" and my daughter wanted me to leave it on because she wanted to see the "princess" (Keira Knightley) get married.

Re: DVD watching with new baby
 

For all 3 of my kids, when they were new borns and did the "wake up every 3-4 hours to eat and then go back to sleep" deal I got a lot of watching done!

I have many fond memories of holding a sleeping baby while watching Fantasia. (I figured the background music would be good for developing minds!)