With my Mama’s hands, everything is gonna be alright, originally uploaded by judebabe.
Babies can be attached to security blankies, plush, booster, pacifier, handkerchief, pillow tags etc…
They love rubbing them against their face or sniff them for the unique yet familiar smell or simply just hold on to the tags right when they get sleepy.
It also calm them in unfamiliar environment.
During my pregnancy, i kinda imagined my baby to be holding on to a little pink cuddles (lil’ pink bear), sucking her pink pacifier and rubbing her cute little eyes.
Which of course, it didn’t quite happen and hence this post.
Amanda would suck the pacifier for a few seconds before spitting it out.
And though she would give the squeeze and hug the teddies tightly, combined with the cutest twist of her body, at the store.
She would throw out all soft toys or cuddles out of her crib, till she is satisfied that she has all the space in her crib (the big crib we got her is supposed to last till she’s 6).
I too got her the softest plush from Bunnies on the bay… And she still doesn’t like it.
They are really soft… Btw
She is probably like me, I don’t like soft toys very much.
In fact, Amanda is very much attached to my hands.
She loves to hold my hands or play with my fingers or rest her head on my hands before she sleeps.
Or when she is unsettled in her sleep in the middle of the night, I just slip my hands through the bars of the crib.
My hand pretty much soothes her.
And on our recent long distance drive, when she’s done with her favorite apps on the iPhone, she fell asleep once I gave her my hands.
Pros – Always available. Zero possibility of misplacing it.
Erm… Hygienic? And not overly attached to a particular smell like those on soft toys or pillow.
Cons – No other substitutes, not even DP’s hands. Have to be physically present at nap time and bedtime.
I do have other sleeping props to help her sleep easier, the Tiny Love music box from her baby mobile, which saves me from singing / humming the same song about a 100 times before she sleeps.
And a Twilight Ladybug from Cloud b, which also acts as a night light, as she prefers sleeping in dark rooms.
I too have the Sleep Sheep, which may have worked on a few occasions when she wasn’t too curious about where the sound of Spring Shower came from.
With these props, I was hoping that i will be able to withdraw my hands slowly to reduce Amanda’s reliance on my hands at bedtimes.
But now that I am mostly home alone with her, I’ll do almost anything to get her to fall asleep early.
Her music box soothes me into taking nap too.
However, I once gave her my semi-wet hands while I was half-way through my laundry.
She looked at me with disgust and pushed my hands away.
Well, I think I know to get her to "quit" playing with my hands when we are ready.
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