Baby Tricks

When it comes to babies, everyone has lists of products that have worked or haven't worked for them  -this brand of baby shampoo, that diaper.  I'm no exception, but instead of a specific product, I thought I'd mention a few concepts that I've stumbled across in the last nine months - a smattering of odd tips.

Closed Captioning
When Thumper was a newborn, he slept quite a bit, and through mostly anything - the vacuum cleaner, police sirens, certainly the TV.  As he's gotten older, not so much.  We have an open-plan one-bedroom, with the bedroom right in the middle of everything, so I've learned to be a stealth rogue.  If I want to watch TV while he's asleep, it basically has to be quiet enough that I can't hear anything.

On the other end of the spectrum, if we want to have the TV on in the background while we eat, we don't expect to hear much - that's Thumper's Jumperoo time, and between the jungle music, the springs, and the happy squeals, we'd drive ourselves nuts if we even tried to add anything else.

Thus, closed captioning.  It's been an entertainment-saver.  Pre-written captions like those on Netflix are generally pretty good, and live captions like those during football games are fun in how wrong they can be.  

Dry Shampoo
Before Thumper was born I bought a can of this, wondering if I would ever need it.  Well, I'm still on the same can, but I admit I've used it several times.  Yes, it would be better to just be clean, but sometimes events conspire such that it's just not gonna happen before you have to be seen by others, checking the mail or running to the grocery store.  This makes me feel just slightly more human in those instances.  However, I must say, I'm not a fan of the smell or general feel of dry shampoo - it's strictly for those "desperate times call for desperate measures" situations.  But once that stuff is in my hair, it keeps me from forgetting and pushing the shower back even further, so I suppose it's a win-win.

Inverted Zippers
Baby footie pajamas are freaking adorable, but they're all a bit of a pain when it comes to changing diapers in the middle of the night.  The ones with snaps aren't a terrible option, but they can be confusing before you get the hang of them.   The ones that zip up seem like the answer to all problems, until you realize that whereas snaps let you isolate the lower half, with zippers you practically have to undress the baby completely to change a diaper.  Neither one of you will be amused in a cool room in the middle of the night.

Hence the best of both worlds: sleepers with an inverted zipper, that unzips going up from the bottom.  Faster, easier, puzzle-free.  Thumper's sleep sacks have inverted zippers as well, so that's handy (nothing more annoying than using the convenient inverted zipper on the sack, then having to reach up to his collar to unzip his sleeper).  You'd think every set of pajamas would have these, but I've had a surprisingly hard time finding them.  We currently have two pairs, that are the Circo brand from Target.  I went back to get more in a bigger size and they were mysteriously gone.  I felt betrayed.

The Anti-Zipper
Zippers are great on baby clothes.  However, on adult clothes?  Not so much.  I recently bought a zip-up hoodie and didn't think much of it, until Thumper tried to bury his face in my chest (he's entered a shy phase).  If it's closed, there's that uncomfortable metal lump right in the center; if it's open, he's navigating between yawning metal teeth.  I'm sticking with pullovers for now.

In other news, yesterday I randomly woke up to this:

so guess whose crib is now on the lowest setting?