Thought of the Day – 9/12/13 – Swaddle Me, Part II

(Apparently, swaddling is on my mind today.  Here is Part I).

I really suck at swaddling our daughter.

Despite my best efforts, tips from my wife, and watching YouTube videos, my attempts are usually a train wreck.  I either cover her up like a mummy or make it so her arms break free in 12 seconds.  In general, my swaddles end up looking like I wadded up a blanket and threw it at my infant daughter.

This made me think:  certain businesses should offer swaddling assistance to new parents.

Think about it:  You and baby head down to the neighborhood burrito place (Chipotle, Qdoba, etc).

Baby gets wrapped up safe and tight by a professional with thousands of hours of experience.

Daddy gets a delicious carnitas burrito.

That, my friends, may be the ultimate definition of win/win.

Don’t call the authorities – this is not my kid (thanks Google!)

 

Thought of the Day – 9/12/13 – Swaddle Me

The idea of swaddling babies is odd to me.

I understand the benefits (maintains their temperature, helps them feel safe, comforts them, leads to longer, better sleep, etc.), but the concept is so foreign.

You know that old joke about the first person to milk a cow (and specifically, what the heck were they doing?) – I find swaddling to be in that same vein.

Who thought:  “You know, we should take our precious and incredibly fragile baby and put her in a straight jacket while we sleep.”?  This is the kind of logic that can only come from sleep-deprived new parents.

Nighty, night, Baby! Sweet dreams!

This leads me to a follow-up question:  when is it no longer appropriate to swaddle a child?  I know that I’d like to keep my 4-year-old from waking up a 6:30 on a Saturday morning.  And a good swaddle will probably be really important during her teenage years.

Thought of the Day – 6/28/2013 – Your Baby So Ugly

Here’s a thought that’s been bouncing around in my head for a while:

Do you think there are parents out there who look at their babies and think “Gosh, my baby’s kinda homely lookin.”?

I ask this not to be mean (or because I have encountered any ugly babies recently*).  I’m asking honestly and sincerely.

*Seriously, your baby is very cute.  Just not as cute as mine.

Not at all relevant, but it cracks me up.

Look:  I truly, honestly believe that my daughter and my son are the cutest kids in the history of children.  They were extremely cute babies, and they get cuter every day.  My guess is that most parents feel the same way about their babies.

But I also truly, honestly believe that there are some uggo babies out there (again – not your kids.  So very beautiful!)  Do their parents look at them and truly, honestly believe they are the absolute cutest babies around?  Or do they have a spot, deep down in the depths of their unconditionally loving heart where they think “I sure hope this kid is smart/rich/good at sports, because looks won’t be enough.”

Thought of the Day – 5/18/12

Have you ever stopped to consider just how wonderful and amazing today’s world is?  Think of all of the things in the world that can be purchased and delivered to your door step with the click of a mouse.  For example:

Yesterday, a box of nipples* showed up at our house.

*Not like that, you perv.  Get your head out of the gutter.

Nipples for baby bottles – the slow flow one we were using for the little guy meant a 5 ounce bottle of formula was an hour-long project.  Now, the Hungry Man can get his Enfamil on in about 20 minutes, burp and all.

And if that is not progress, I don’t know what is.

*   *   *

Addendum:  At one point, I had the title of this post as “Mail Order Nipples”, but I didn’t want anybody to have to answer for clicking on that link with their IT folks.  Plus, since my post titles drive a decent amount of Google traffic to me, I didn’t want to get flagged as an inappropriate site.

 

Baby Lessons

With a newborn in the house, I have been learning a lot over the two plus weeks we’ve been together.  For example, I learned three new lessons tonight:

1. The boy is three times more likely to spit up on me if I am wearing a black shirt.
2. If the boy spat up on a black canvas, we could sell the resulting modern art for thousands of dollars (assuming there was a way to mask the smell).
3. It is really tough to get the smell of spit up out of your goatee.