My Lifesavers as a Mommy.

           All moms have their things.  The things that work for their child to get them to settle down if they're crying or being fussy.  The things that work to keep their child asleep through the night.  The things that might sound silly to everyone else but for some reason just seems to make their child happy.  Jesalyn will be six months old in a couple of weeks (where has the time gone!!!) and as I look back on those months, there have been several things I have used to calm her, but there have only been three that I have used from the day she was born and are still using today.  These three things really have been lifesavers for me.  Without them, I probably would not have made it.  Lets just be honest.  Jesalyn has not been an easy baby.  Jarrod jokes that she's more like our second or third child.  "Your first one is suppose to be easy.  Suppose to get you used to the parenting thing, prepare you for other children."  Let's just say IF we have any more children, we are going to be rockstars after raising our little JesaBear.  Please don't get me wrong.  I'm not complaining. I love her more than words can describe, and I would do it all over again, but she has been a handful.  =)  But as I was saying, the following three things have been cornerstones for our parenting.

This is the sound part of her mobile.  We haven't really used the actual mobile part, but we've replaced the batteries on the sound part more times than I want to think about.  There are three settings, but Jesalyn has always liked the nature button. It basically is just the sound of ocean waves rising and falling.  We use this at night when she is sleeping.  It's set to a timer ,but she got to the point where after it went off at night, she would wake herself up. Luckily it comes with a remote.  Just picture groggy parents sitting up, every 45 minutes, eyes still closed, pushing the button on the remote and falling back into bed.  That is us, every night.  Yes, it stinks waking up so often but it keeps her asleep and we don't have to actually get out of bed to rock her back to sleep.   She's starting to be able to sleep without out, thank goodness.  Last night we only had to restart it three times. 

Every night, before we but Jesalyn in her bed, she gets swaddled.  When she was first born she was too small to fit in an actual swaddler so we used blankets.  She would always fight it at first but once we finished and got the last little material tucked in, she calmed immediately.  This is suppose to be good because when babies are in the womb they're all tight and snug, so while we would never want to be bound up like this all night, they acutally find in comforting.  Any time we put her to bed without out it she would wake herself up with an arm or hand.  This is also good because it also acts like a blanket. It keeps her warm without having to put anything additional in the bed, which is a big no no when they are still babies.   She has gotten to the point where she tries to wiggle her hands out of it now.  It's so cute when we wake up in the morning, all you see is this little girl all snuggled up with three little fingers sticking out of the top.

 And last but not least.  Remember above where I said it might sound silly to everyone else, but works for you child???

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Yes, this is my TV with static on it.  You would not believe how many times we have had to use this.  Apparently, inside the womb is really loud and kind of sounds like white noise, so the sound of static is somehow comforting to a baby. At least that's what they say.  I also read somewhere that babies can't listen and cry at the same time.  They have to choose one or the other.  Whatever the reason, this works.  I promise.  Back before we figured out Jesalyn's issue with her formula this channel would be on the TV for hours.  It actually became a verb in our house.  Jesalyn: crying and screaming   Jarrod: "Where's the remote?  Can you 21 it?"  21 is our static channel. As soon as this channel came on she would immediately stop crying and just look around.  While we don't use it quite so often nowadays, there are still instances when we will.  There are nights, or days, when she has gotten herself so tired she can't sleep, and she's just restless.  We'll flip it over to 21 and within seconds her eyes roll to the back of her head and she's out.  This also works with a hair dryer.     Disclaimer:  this trick will not work if your baby is in real pain. While it calmed Jesa down with her tummy problems with the formula, when she was really hurting she chose the crying over the listening.