Baby care: Your guide to feeding, bathing and understanding your newborn

Caring for your newborn can be a nerve-racking experience: trying to distinguish normal behaviour and development when you have nothing to compare with can be stressful! We've collected our top baby care advice on breastfeeding, bath time, and everything in-between.

Have you learned to distinguish a happy squeal from a hungry sob? What about a coo or a babble? Discover what your newborn could saying in our guide to understanding baby babble, below.



Your newborn: A parent's guide
Calm your worries with this parenting primer explaining the many quirks of a new baby.

Bringing baby home can be a scary prospect. Every little quiver, unexpected rash or erratic breath can send a new parent into a tailspin of worry: Is this normal? Why is she doing that? Should I take him to the doctor? Knowing what quirks to expect from your newborn can help ease your mind -- and keep you relaxed at home instead of worrying and waiting at the doctor's office.

Guide to breastfeeding
A comprehensive guide to proper breastfeeding technique.

Breast-feeding is wondrous, but it's also sound science. It helps to understand the science to know why proper technique is necessary. After delivery, as estrogen and progesterone levels drop, the level of the milkmaking hormone prolactin rises, and your baby's suckling stimulates nerve impulses that set off a biochemical response which keeps it high. Prolactin not only aids milk secretion, but also has a calming effect on the mother.

Bath time
Your newborn won't be very keen on her bath right away -- here's how to get her comfortable and keep her safe.

Who could have guessed that washing a newborn would require such skill and thought?

Here are tips for first-time parents from Helen Coomb, a registered nurse at Women's College Hospital in Toronto.

Understanding baby babble
Find out what your baby is trying to tell you, PLUS learn to stimulate more communication.

Baby's first word -- that major breakthrough in her progress toward speech -- is still weeks or months away. But by six to eight months of age, she learns how to alternate her gaze from your face to an object. This allows her to use unspoken communication to get what she wants. The baby gazes at a toy, then at her mother or father, then back at the toy. The meaning is clear: I want that. When the parent responds by handing over the object, there has been an exchange of information. That's real communication.


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