I read the survey, and have a few comments

Section II.
#3.  I would like to see a half year breakdown between 3, 4, and 5 years.  3, 3.5, 4,4.5, 5 years.
# 4. Part a.  It states on average up to 5 years - that might confuse some parents if their child to date is only 18 months, it might be less confusing to state on average how often was a child read to from birth to current age.
#4. Part f, item i.  To what does 'Doman's Complete Program' refer?  Does that mean just the 'Teach Your Baby to Read' program?  Or the Program described in 'How Smart is Your Baby'?  This item needs clarification.
#4, Part h, I wasn't even aware of FleshCards - it might be useful to provide links to the identified programs, that would also be useful for the LR, YBCR, and other programs mentioned.
#6.  What about a choice of 'I believe in Early Learning and am Currently using it, or would use it again'

Sorry, DadDude, current baby is awake and needs a few Doman Stimulations, I will try to provide comments on Section III later tonight.

DadDude,
Your posts are always very thought provoking and appreciated.  I am curious why you are even less convinced of Doman Math?  What is your thought process/experiences with this?  How does your concept of Math as a language differ from reading as a language?

I think hold them as much and as often as you can, they are only little once and for such a small period of time.

I have a Mei Tie carrier that can be used forward or backward.  Sometimes he is fussy in it and I try dancing with him, music, or distraction.  For white noise I use an electric toothbrush, the vibration also seems to help and it is small enough to tuck inside the Mei Tie.

Is passing him off to someone else to hold an option?  I try to get my partner to hold my son while I eat or shower.

I use the crawling track to set him down, he does cry a little, but then at least he is getting his exercise.

I cut up the old receiving blankets that were worn out to make my own baby wipes.  I sewed 4 layers together in a 5"x5" square.  They are small and easy to handle yet thick enough not to get anything on my own hands.  I just wet them with warm water at the sink before I take my baby to the potty.  I wash them with the cloth diapers.

When I am out and about I use GAIA bamboo baby wipes, but yes the do contain some chemicals but they are still better than others.

Instead of stickers I used a bingo dabber.  It was only slightly smaller than Doman's recommendation and worked very well.

What do you say to others when they start asking you when you are putting your kids in play school/preschool/Kindergarten?  Any succinct good one liners that gets people off your back without going into a big long discussion?

I am currently considering the unschooling idea, but I am having difficulties with the leap of faith/trust it takes?

I am hoping to find a few unschoolers who would share their stories. 

How did you come upon/evolve into unschooling? 
What books/websites/documents did you/do you consider important to read to prepare and continue unschooling?
What ages were your children when you began unschooling? 
What type of teaching/schooling were you doing before unschooling?
Do have moments where you lack faith in the process?  If so, how do deal with them?
Anything else you might like to share that might help would be appreciated.  Thanks.

Just thought I would share my solution to heating the crawling track for a newborn.

My baby was born in December in SK.  I wanted to follow Doman's physical program as best as possible, but I was concerned about the heat.  It was -20 Celsius when he was born and will likely be around that for the next 2 months.  It is not financially feasible to heat my entire house to Doman's recommendation of 28-30 Celsius.  I looked into space heaters and portable fireplaces, but they all seemed unsafe for my 3 year old.

I finally settled on putting the Asics crawling track inside the crib and I am using a heating pad to heat the crawling track from underneath.  The heating pad keeps the track warm for the baby at a very reasonable cost. As the crib is up against the wall, the cord is safely away from the toddler.

At 3 weeks old now, the new baby is only crawling 6-8 inches in his 5 minute sessions.  During his daytime nap he crawls most of the track and wakes up.  I have not been putting him in at night - I have been co-sleeping instead.

I did part time EC with my DD starting at 6 weeks.  I used cloth diapers in the house when I wasn't ECing.  I used either cloth or disposables outside of the house.  Not sure if it is because I only did it part time, but my dd still isn't fully fully potty trained at 3 years.  I still have a pee miss about once a week.  We are close, but still not there.  However, I realize that EC is about more than potty training, it is about connecting and bonding.

I started ECing my DS at 2 days old.  He is now 10 days old.  I am catching most of the dodo's but very few pees.  I have been using cloth diapers as backups.  Outside the house I have been taking a baby bjorn potty with me for the dodos and using cloth diapers because I miss most of the pees.

Taking the baby bjorn with me means a bigger diaper bag, but I would rather that than clean up a dodo cloth diaper.  He seems to associate that green potty with dodo and was happy to see it during the Christmas holidays.

Outside of the house with my dd I did lots of holding her over the toilet and she didn't seem to mind that.  Of course, once she could walk she didn't want to be held anymore, but that did work from about 1 month to 10 months old.

I decided to try the crawling track with my 1 day old baby.  I was thinking in my head that he wouldn't go anywhere.  However, I was taken by surprise, he crawled the length of the Asics crawling track in about 15 minutes.  I only have 2 sections of the track, so according to my calculations he crawled just over 2 feet.  I didn't realize that was even possible and I am still trying to process the reality of it in my head.

He is now 4 days old and the results are still about the same, about 2 feet is 10-15 minutes.

Of course, that is all we have done.  I need to get at the rest of the Doman evaluations, hoping someone will respond to my flashlight post soon.  I would like to do that during his next awake period.

Oh, I love being a Mom to a new born.  So many possibilities 

My baby is HERE!  Birth was wonderful, no drugs, natural vaginal, and although didn't feel like it at the time, rather a short labour.

We are on day 4 and I am ready to start doing Stage 1, Visual Competence, of the Doman Program.  The first evaluation is the Light Reflex.  I don't know what kind of Household flashlight to use????  I am worried about using too bright of one and hurting his eyes.  Has anyone done this?  What did you use?  Any suggestions?

Today is my due date and I have walked a LOT in the last week.  I had a lot of braxton hicks around 36/37 weeks, but in the last week there hasn't been any. 

I hadn't heard of pineapple before, but I think I will walk to the grocery store and buy a pineapple and some juice.  At this point in the game, it couldn't hurt.

I am ready to hold my baby in my arms and name him/her.  Oh, and start with the crawling track, and infant stimulation cards, and breastfeeding, and baby wearing. I think I am mostly ready (or at least as ready as a mother ever really can be!)

I weaned very very slowly.  I started the process about 20 months, reducing the feedings one at a time.  I removed the day time ones first, starting with late afternoon, then lunch, then morning, until I was only feeding at bedtime and during the night.  I used distraction and sippy cups of milk or water.  It was sorta a 3 steps forward 2 steps back process but I did eventually get to only night feedings.  Then I moved on to eliminating the night feedings, they were much harder.  I replaced a feeding with reading books instead.  I admit to reading for more than hour to get her to sleep some nights, and then again reading for an hour in the middle of the night to get her back to sleep.  A lot of nights I just gave up and breastfed instead.  Slowly I started to see that 1 or 2 nights a week I could get her to sleep without feeding, and then it was 2-3 nights, etc.  Again, it was a slow process and there where weeks we went backwards.  Around 29 months I was down to feeding her at night or to bed only once per week.  I admit that I was actually sad, I was a little sorry to see our bond fading.  We are still really close, but after wanting her to sleep without feeding when it actually happened I cried.

Of course, now I am happy that she can fall asleep with me just laying beside her.  She is sleeping longer/better so I am finally less sleep deprived.  Weaning has meant a little more freedom for me, which is good since I am due any day now to have a new baby.

I remember being really really frustrated and exhausted when she wouldn't sleep.  I would read the books and try the techniques, and they always seemed to fail.  Which then made me feel like a failure that I couldn't 'make' her sleep.  Of course, due to sleep deprivation, I'm sure I wasn't thinking straight either.  I would be frustrated during the day that I couldn't get the easiest of tasks completed.  I can say that I fought with her sleep pattern until about 16 or 18 months and then I finally just gave up and accepted it.  Accepting her for who she was - sleep patterns and all - was such a relief.  I wasn't any less tired, but I did feel better.  I just let it be o.k. that my house was a MESS and the only thing I was really accomplishing was bonding with my daughter.

I also struggled with lots of family and friends telling me I needed to 'make' her sleep.  I eventually just learned to ignore them.  I could beat my head against a brick wall, or I could accept that my daughter didn't like to sleep.  Acceptance was much much easier on me, her, and our bond.

I really feel for you, not sleeping and having a baby that needs you all the time is difficult.  It is really difficult to Give that much of yourself that often for such an unknown long period of time.  It is even more difficult if the family and friends around you won't/don't understand the breastfeeding relationship and don't support you.  Hugs and Karma to you.

My daughter never slept through the night until she was 2 1/2.  I breastfed and just came to accept that she would wake up 2-3 times every night.  I was an exhausted mother, but I just tried to nap/sleep whenever I could.  I found co-sleeping and breastfeeding made it slightly easier to accept being awake a few times in the night.

She is now almost 3, and will sleep through the night about 4-5 times a week and the other 2-3 nights a week she is only waking up once and wants a glass of water and will fall back asleep within 30 minutes.

I know it doesn't help now, when you can barely keep your eyes open and everything else in your life is on hold because you are too sleep deprived to do much, but this phase will pass.  At some point, your child will sleep through the night.  Until then perhaps consider just accepting your child for their needs, regardless of the time of day.

I read Dr. Sears and Pantley and a few other books, and tried many techniques, but in the end nothing worked or changed my dd sleeping, accept time/age.  I found it easier to just accept it, and let myself be o.k. with it, vs fight her.  I found it easier to respond to her needs 24 hours a days if I cut back on my other commitments.  It is (and sometimes still is tough) to give up so much of my life to meet her needs, but I remind myself, they are only little once, and I can have my life/activities back in a few years, she will never be little again.

Good Luck to you, sleep/nap whenever you can, and hopefully this phase will pass quickly.

My daughter has asked for Plants from her Aunt Michelle.  I think that is a wonderful homemade gift - a hand decorated pot with a small houseplant.  Aunt Michelle has started to take small cuttings from her houseplants to plant into new pots for Christmas.  Inexpensive and environmentally friendly