When Amy and I first learned we were expecting a child, my inner organization freak when crazy trying to make a list of all the things we would need to amass for the perfect nursery. Some things were obvious. We needed a crib, a changing table, something to store the baby clothes and maybe a rocking chair. But it wasn’t immediately clear where we needed to draw the line when it came to diaper genies, baby wipe warmers, pacifier clips and the multitude of other random nonsense that can fill a baby registry. In the spirit of hindsight being 20/20, here’s a few things I can’t live without and the other items where I should have just spent the money on beer.

The Good

1. Diaper Genie – This magic trashcan keeps the nursery from smelling like craptastic diapers. It is easy to empty and it is easy to switch out the liner (trash bag insert) after you do it once or twice. It also is near impossible for a dog to get into this trash can, which is important if you want to avoid finding your family friend with a shit eating grin. All in all, the Diaper Genie is worth every penny.
2. Swing – The kid swing has to be one of the greatest inventions ever. We used the kid swing to soothe Matthew too many times to count. We went with a battery operated model, which was nice because we didn’t have to constantly crank it. However, it sucked ass when the batteries died on us. If you go with the battery operated model, keep extra batteries on hand.
3. Baby Einstein DVDs – As much as I may loathe these DVDs simply because I have seen them so many times, I have to admit that they are the best thing for keeping your kid’s attention. There’s something about the way the videos use bright colors against a white backdrop that keeps the kid’s interest like nothing else. I don’t care if they make my kid smarter and I don’t care if I’m a bad parent by playing a video. All I know is that these fantastic DVDs somehow made my screaming kid stop crying at sit still for a while. What more could a sleep deprived parent want?
4. A nightlight – Having a neat nightlight in your kid’s room is a surefire way to help get them to sleep at night. We had one that did a star effect on the ceiling. Now we have a fish lamp that makes it look like fish are swimming around the room. The nightlight is a simple and cost effective way to give your kid something visually appealing to look at as they fall asleep. It also gives just enough light to help you avoid walking into the crib when you do the obligatory welfare check to ensure that yes, you kid is in fact still breathing.
5. Pacifiers – You never can have enough of these things when your kid is young. Keep a couple in the car. Stash an emergency supply in a drawer. Eventually you’ll have to wean your kid off them, but in the meantime they are a godsend.

The Bad

1. Bottle Warmer – Someone convinced us that we needed to buy a little crock pot thing that would heat a bath of water, which would then be used to heat a bottle. Spend your money on beer. Use the microwave instead. You’ll need to shake the bottle a bit so it is equally warmed, but you’ll have a hot bottle a lot faster. Plus, we left that stupid bottle warmer on by accident a few times and it becomes a fire hazard when the water eventually evaporates.
2. What to Expect When You Are Expecting Book – I think we received 8 copies of this book from various friends and family. My wife read some of the book, but I found that I learned what I needed to know by going with my wife to the various doctor visits. Besides, this book really is more of a worst case scenario tomb, which means it scares the crap out of you more than it actually helps prepare you for parenthood.
3. Prenatal classes – I asked all of my friends if they felt the prenatal or parenthood classes were worth the time. I got a few neutral responses, but no one said it was the best thing ever or that it gave them all the info they needed to be a parent. We skipped the classes and our kid was born just fine. I left the delivery to the professionals. I didn’t need to sit through a magic of childhood video to make me any better at fetching ice chips while my wife was in labor.
4. Wipe warmer – Someone bought us a warming device for the baby wipes, which seemed like a good idea. But I found that it was a pain in the ass to refill the thing. We ended up just using regular old room temperature wipes and the kid didn’t seem to notice. Again, save your money for beer.
5. Baby Monitor – If you have a big house, then maybe this could be of use. But here’s the thing, you’d need to be half deaf not to hear your kid wailing in the middle of the night. We often would wake up upon hearing the faintest sniffle. I sure as heck didn’t need a baby monitor walkie-talkie thing with flashing red lights to help me understand that a baby was crying in the next room. My one caveat to this is that I did find it entertaining to see if I could fart or burp loud enough to make all the lights light up on the baby monitor. So there was some use for this overpriced walkie-talkie.

Agree/disagree? Let me know in the comments. What are the items you wish that you had left of the baby registry?

1.  Days

2.  Blessings

3.  Calories

Mad. Busy. Busy. Mad.  Son 1 aged 5y 2m is sick with longing for Christmas. I am sick with desperation.  Between now and Christmas, there is Wonder Nanny’s birthday, Elegant Aunt’s Big Birthday, Godfather 2’s birthday, and a Wednesday Friend’s 4th birthday. And I need a card and present for Golfmad Uncle.  Whose end-of-November birthday we missed. We’re seeing them next weekend.  So we also need Christmas presents for Golfmad Uncle, Elegant Aunt, Granny and Granddad by Friday.   And a birthday tea for Wonder Nanny on Tuesday. And then Christmas presents for Nanna, Elder Sister, Elder Brother, Sister In Law, Teenaged Niece and Teenage Nephew, Younger Sister and Godfather 2 by the time Nanna leaves for her Christmas Visiting. But. Being positive. Perhaps The Man has already sorted it all out. I have bought presents for the boys. And I have bought cards for Wonder Nanny. No idea where they are though.

I had Son 1in with me when I was woken by a crying Son 2 aged 2y 3m. The Man liberated him from his cot, and he came trailing upstairs. “Mummy back from party.” We started slowly, the boys watching telly, The Man out in the garden because it wasn’t raining, and me doing everything else.  A phone call. A colleague’s teenager has been taken suddenly and dreadfully ill and is now facing paralysis. Yesterday morning their life was normal. And now it’s shattered.  Two weeks before Christmas. In my thoughts all day, and I’ve only got as far as resolving again to Stop Shouting At My Children. 

We went to the library, where Son 1 quickly piled up about 15 hard back books on The Big Pram. And then he found the Christmas Books. Son 2 pulled out paperbacks, DVDs, cushions, leaflets – anything at tot level. Then he noticed the book shelves were shaped like ladders and up he went. I took them home for lunch, Son 2 howling because he wanted a Paper Bag Pie from the Baker’s.  Then Best Friend came round. Son 1 wanted to whoop and hop and run round in excitement. Best Friend wanted to get his toys out and start playing. Son 2 wanted to trash everything the elder boys did. I tried to get him to sleep; he shrieked loudly enough to bubble the paintwork. He was exhausted, but wouldn’t sleep. At 4pm when I had bread and butter to make up for skipping lunch, he had… er… four slices.   Might have been hungry too. Best Friend was a beautifully-behaved joy. He and Son 1 played together for an hour, then I took Son 2 in, thinking I’d let him sit on my lap to watch telly so he could get some quite time. He chose a Baby Einstein DVD about animals, way too young even for him. He was glued to it. As were Son 1 and Best Friend.  Children Are Strange.

In the Spy vs Spy world of bilingualism in our house, maman has just upped the stakes by buying a Peppa Pig Christmas DVD.

Until now, DVDs (apart from Baby Einstein, which were nothing to do with me and which I wanted to hide whenever we had visitors) have been in French and, while hopefully fun for Piaf, they have been purchased primarily to provide alternative verbal “models” of French in the house. Some have been more popular with Piaf, some less so; some have been more tolerable to maman, some less so (Bonne nuit les enfants still mildly terrifies her, though Piaf doesn’t mind it at all); some I have seen so many times I could quote them for you. But the “golden thread”, as we say in the public sector when we want a break from thinking, has been about seeing French as a widespread phenomenon and a gateway to pleasant experiences. 

Peppa Pig, of course, is in English.

I hope it goes without saying (especially if maman is reading this instead of working) that I want my child to be bilingual in French and English, rather than monolingual in French; and that, even more than that, I want her to be happy. Nor, having watched it, can I criticise Peppa. It is witty, intelligent and attractive and Piaf clearly loves it.

Hence my dilemma – because she loves it so much that she asks to watch it even when maman is not there, i.e. at previously Francophone moments. And, hard though it is to confess, I lie. 

I have no problem at all with lying to my child per se. If she takes a notion to play with a favourite doll (or car, or felt-tipped pens, or paper bag) just before bedtime, I will, without hesitation, tell her “no.” If she asks why, I will, equally without hesitation, tell her that, as it is bedtime, the doll (or car, or felt-tipped pens, or paper bag) is tired. If I want her to watch DVD x rather than DVD y (typically because I have seen DVD y many times in the recent past and it is doing my head in) then DVD y will turn out to be “missing” and DVD x presented as a fait accompli.

But I can argue that I make these choices for the “good” of those concerned, be it my daughter’s physical health or my own mental health. What “good” am I defending when Peppa Pig is “lost” until Trotro is in the machine? Peppa is no worse than Trotro, and is definitely better than some of her other DVDs; and, if she is to be bilingual, then how can I honestly object to exposure to her other native language, especially when her mother has often grinned and borne it through interminable episodes of Bumba or Léo et Popi?

And yet lie I do and I still manage to sleep at night. I lie because, though English is important, she already gets vastly more exposure to English language, culture and mores. Though she knows many French words, she will often start by using the English word and need to be prompted with “que dit papa?” before producing the French equivalent. Of the 96 weeks she has been with us to date, give or take, perhaps two in total have been spent in wholly Francophone surroundings. She has all the time in the world to watch Peppa Pig; Petit Ours Brun can’t wait.

All is fair in love and bilingualism.

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Product Details

Features

• Whale shaped prop up pillow
• 2-in-1 electronic crib toy attaches to the play gym or most cribs with straps, Lights and 6 classical melodies are baby motion activated or play continuously for 15 minutes
• Plush multi textured fish
• On-the-go plush octopus with dangling rattle and teether
• Large baby safe mirror

Editorial Reviews

¿Os he dicho que la película que más me gusta es una del Baby Einstein? Se llama “Baby Noah” y me encanta!

Salen un montón de animalitos: la jirafa, el león (recordadme que tengo que enseñaros como sé hacer el león, da miedo!), la cebra, el hipopótamo, gallos, perritos, bueno, un montón de animales… pero, desde este domingo, el Baby Noah ha pasado a segundo término… he decido que lo mio son los animales en vivo y en directo!

Hemos ido a ver un montón de animales, sí, todos ahí corriendo libremente, super chulo, super guapo… grité y grité de la emoción, tanto que el gallo que tenía al lado se puso a cacaraquear, el tío se pensaba que le hacia la competencia (al final me ganó)…

Me encantó! Queridos papas, esto tiene que ser como las natillas, ¿repetimos?

A ver quien canta más fuerte… El gallo o yo

Viendo los patos con mamá

So for all you out there who are parents or are new parents. Guess what Baby Einstein will not make your children smarter. And now Disney is offering a refund to those parents who assumed that those videos would make your child smarter. According to the New York Times this refund is a way for the Disney Company to address a class action lawsuit. OK is it just me or doesn’t this seem like the stupidest lawsuit in the world, worse than the lady who didn’t know her coffee would be hot. I mean come on, children’s DVDs are nothing more than electronic babysitters while parents do things like, i don’t know shower. I want to see the lawsuit against Barney or against Sesame Street, let’s take Blue and Steve or Joe to court. I mean there is no replacement for the parent child interaction, and if any parent thought a movie could do that, then i suggest they sue themselves for gross negligence of a child.

I see them everywhere… on my computer, on billboards, in the pages of magazines and on my TV screen… dead celebrities drinking champagne and dancing with vacuum cleaners and driving cars that came out decades after they were rotting in their graves.

It’s easy to see why advertisers want dead people to endorse them. Dead people are safe: they’re known quantities. It’s unlikely an ad campaign will get torpedoed by new revelations or scandals. They’ll never be accused of sexually assaulting a waitress in their hotel room or getting addicted to prescription pain killers. And even if we did find out something juicy and new about James Dean or Marilyn Monroe or Steve McQueen, would it hurt their image or just add to their mystique?

Dead celebrity endorsements are big business.

Einstein made $10 Million in 2009, according to Forbes latest annual list of top earning dead celebrities.  All the way back in the 2006 edition of the Forbes list, Corbis image licensing said Albert Einstein was their most requested person. As Tony Soprano might say, “Einstein is a good earner.” Of course, in his case, his earnings go to a good cause. The Hebrew University of Jerusalem gets the cash, including a share from Baby Einstein (Disney), although how would Albert have felt about their recent settlement for misleading claims of jump starting juvenile intelligence? Do you think he’d be proud that being a character in Night at the Museum ended up with him as part of a Happy Meal movie tie-in at McDonald’s?

If you want to hire a dead celebrity like Marilyn Monroe to sell your products, just click on over to the Legends Media Archive. You’ll find advertising-friendly images for dead celebs from John Belushi, Ingrid Bergman and Ty Cobb to Jackie Robinson, Mark Twain and Natalie Wood.

Live celebrities are no better. Some of them have even tarnished their reputations by becoming product hucksters. Are you old enough to remember when Orson Welles did commercials for Paul Masson wine: “We will sell no wine before its time.” More recently, we all had to cringe when Ed McMahon made a Cash4Gold commercial his last role.

But whether you think they sold out or not, it was their choice. Nobody forced them to make those commercials.

The dead can’t do that.

These dead celebrities have been stripped of their most basic right: the right to self-determination, to choose what they do or do not do. They are slaves to the choices of their estates, or of the people who own the copyright on their images.

Some cultures honor their dead. We exploit ours.

There’s nothing illegal about it, although the FTC is considering new regulations concerning celebrity endorsements, according to this blog post by Jonathan Faber, licensing expert and former president of “CMG Worldwide, Inc., whose clients include Marilyn Monroe, James Dean, Babe Ruth, Chuck Berry, Princess Diana…”

One of the proposed new rules is that “Advertisers should only use endorsements of celebrities if the advertiser believes that a celebrity subscribes to the views presented.” (Not a problem for the Marilyn Dom Perignon campaign, since it was her favorite champagne, or Steve McQueen driving a Ford Mustang, which he did famously in the 1968 cop classic, Bullitt.)

But this post isn’t about morality or legality. This post is about marketing.

The point of celebrity endorsement advertising is to make a connection between the celebrity’s persona, the product and the audience. If a celebrity swears by it, that’s good enough for me.

When done wrong, it can backfire. Who would believe that Paris Hilton ever ate at Carl’s Jr. or that Tiger Woods, one of the richest athletes in history and currently the top earning athlete endorser actually drives a Buick.

When done right, it can build a brand. When Brooke Shields said that nothing came between her and her Calvins, Calvin Klein became the must-have designer jean.

But what’s right about using a dead person to endorse your product? Does having David Spade talking to a now dead Chris Farley make you more likely to want to get Direct TV, or less? How many people went out and bought a Dirt Devil because some art director used special effects to force Fred Astaire to dance with one?

I know vampires and zombies are all the rage these days, but can someone please explain to me why anyone thinks a dead celebrity who never used a product can make a convincing sales pitch to the living?

MY GRADE:

There seems to be a split in the world of parenting…

Back when I was growing up, most parents did stuff pretty much the same things:  you fed your kid, you changed their diaper, you let them go down the street to play with the neighbor kids, you made sure they did their homework, you told then not to run into traffic.  Occasionally a kid lost a finger playing with firecrackers, but hey, with that sort of intelligence it’s safe to assume they weren’t going to become a world renown brain surgeon anyway.

Some kids took an interest in learning and became the smart kids.  Others were more drawn to shooting squirrels with BB guns.  They became bullies, and later in life, investment bankers.   There was one fat kid who was picked on.  And another fat kid who was so huge and angry and powerful that he could handle himself.   One kid had corrective shoes and kinda limped but somehow he compensated and was ironically he was the best one at kickball.

Nowadays, parents have split off into two camps:  Well-meaning but overbearing parents and parents who don’t do crap and should just escort their kids to the nearest juvenile detention center.

Right now I’d like to direct my attention to the well-meaning, overbearing ones.  Because you are being suckered.  By who?  Well, kind of by Sigmund Freud.  Or at very least, the hazy concept that Freud put in our modern heads that we adults are just the sum of our childhood experiences.  Like, really early childhood experiences.  Like Zygote early.  As in,  you must read to the child in the womb, and teach him Spanish in the delivery room, and bring the music teacher to the hospital nursery to get them started on piano lessons.  There is no time to waste, because your kid is just aching to become a dead-beat loser and you must put a stop to this as early and often as possible.

Then, to add to our collective parenting guilt, years later (the 1980’s I believe) there was some study done by a scientist selling a book (surprise, surprise) that suggested that playing Mozart for a baby still in the womb helps with brain development.  (Heck, it seemed to do wonders for Falco)

Next came Baby Einstein, a multi-billion dollar industry based on the notion that tiny children need to watch bad puppetry and stock footage of animals in order to become successful doctors later in life.  Never mind that pediatricians recommend that children not watch any television before the age of two.  For the exhausted, guilt-ridden parent discovering there’s such a miracle toy as Baby Einstein is like striking the mother lode.  Now you can just plop your infant down in front of the plasma screen, pop in a Baby Einstein DVD and rest easily, knowing your child is well on their way to a Harvard MBA.

Only one problem.  Baby Einstein does nothing.  Well, that’s not entirely true.  It could be responsible for delaying language development in toddlers.  So there’s a purpose, I guess.  If you’d like your kid to shut up for a few extra months, keep playing that DVD.  But for the rest of us, this Baby Einstein lawsuit just proves what most of us already knew: if it sounds too good to be true it probably is.  (This adage also applies to The Hollywood Cookie Diet, The Sham Wow, and to a certain extent, Barack Obama.)

Sorry to say it, fellow parents.  You’re gonna have to play with your kids.

Now don’t fret.  I leave you with this optimistic thought:  Albert Einstein himself didn’t have Baby Einstein.  Matter of fact, I’m guessing all he had was a ball of yarn and a pine cone to play with as a child.  Yet someone he seemed to turn out alright.  So what did Einstein’s parents do to raise such a genius?  I’m guessing the most effective thing they  did for their little frizzy haired bundle was give him lots of love (if perhaps not enough haircuts), encourage his interests, and steer him away from traffic.  Just like our parents did for us.

By the way, for those of you bought a Baby Einstein video, if your kid seems particularly stupid and you’re pissed off about it, feel free to apply for a refund (for the video, not the kid).

Last weekend (Friday – Saturday), our baby vomitted a few times + diarrhea.  But the amazed thing I realised about babies is that they are strong indeed. He did not cried at all, he just looked into my eyes ~ not complaining. Maybe he did not want me to worry coz hubby was not around.  *this was actually the first time our son got sick when I was all alone!* 

Angah helped me brought him to pediatrician. Lucky she was around coz it was raining and you know lar parking kat ampang point very hassle! - Well, I’m not totally alone coz my mom, my sister, and angah were there. Thanx guys!

The doctor gave him medicine (masukkan ikut bont**) to stop the vomitting, langsung tak nangis. *Pelik tul coz kekadang bila mak dia nak kasik ubat mengamuk cam apa*

I was wondering whether what I ate that made him sick (coz of the BF) but the doc said that was unlikely to happen.  He said most likely he got the bacteria from daycare coz especially now that he’s crawling everywhere. He also still putting things in his mouth *I tried many times to scold him on this, but he only cheeky-ly smiles back to me…-Any advice, mommies?* 

Other than that, our weekend was splendid. Hubby came home safely from Vietnam, alhamdulilah. I managed to submit my homework on time, alhamdulilah. and our baby is enjoying his Tumbletots class (this was his4th time I think), and I believe he started to appreciate it more hehe.. 

My niece Emy started to ask what I’m going to plan for Ashman’s birthday bash. Haha terasa mcm hollywood moms pulok nak wat birthday party nie. kalau neneknya tau nie mampus…dia agak2 tak baper approve birthday2 nie. 

Below some recap about my boy’s development at this 10 months going 11 (in case nanti makcik dah tua tak ingat all such important things) *jgn kata dah tua, even what happened to him when he is 3 months pun mcm dah tak berapa ingat* 

• Started to appreciate music. He now can play the piano/xylophone his daddy belikan as present tu. (play maksudnya tekan tekan la kan). He recognizes a few songs, the one he loves especially with movements like:

1. If you happy and you know It Clap your Hand
2. Shake Your Silly Hands —> yg nie dia belajar kat TumbleTots
3. Old MacDonald Has a Farm —> from baby einstein dvd

• He knows how to wave yeayy!!! Bila suruh bye2, he’ll wave shyly. cute sangat.
• He understands some words like ball, cat, susu, bird (*pagi2 kasik mkn pigeons kat luar kengkonon mcm kat London ahaks*)
• Dah ada 4 gigi and sometimes suka gigit my shoulder!
• When he’s nursing, his other hand playing with my other b**b, huh? (I don’t know whether nie development ker ape tapi letak jugak la so I ingat this thing hehe).

Anyway he still learning how to walk. When he crawls at 8 months I thot by 9 months dah boley jalan coz yours truly started walking at 9 months ***terer tak? ;)

Then I just found out hubby started walking at 15 months, so maybe our baby take the average of both of us kot? hehe…

Okie everybody, conquer your fear. happy working!

If your dog is fat, you aren't getting enough exercise.

Bear has been drafted to be my exercise partner. Although he doesn’t recall having ever actually signed on for the job, he is always happy to report to duty when called up, running to the front door the minute he hears me getting out his leash. Bear loves going for long walks, and that motivates me to put my running shoes on and get outside on a regular basis. Conscientious Bear, eager to encourage us to do mitzvot and generally do right by us, is just following up on what has been recommended by those studies showing that pet owners (or guardians, to be more politically correct) who walk their dogs regularly lose weight and stay fit. He’s simply doing his part to combat the high rate of obesity plaguing our nation. Not to mention that fact that Bear knows that  he, himself, needs to stay trim if he wants to continue hearing those “What a good looking dog!” compliments from passersby.

This is not Bear's thing. He's a dog going places.

It’s a good thing that Bear doesn’t prefer going to the gym for a workout, because that isn’t my thing either. It really is fortuitous that we both have similar likes and dislikes in terms of how and where we exercise. It is so nice not to have yet another thing I have to negotiate about. Bear knows where his next meal (and the next, and the next…) is coming from, so he knows better than to argue over something like this – even if he did prefer to run on the treadmill or use the elliptical trainer, which he doesn’t.

Bear is not into this either, even though it is a quiet, meditative kind of thing.

The best thing about going for long walks with Bear is that we spend time together in silence. Unlike my children, Bear does not talk to me or expect me to engage him in conversation. Although he does usually (ie. when not distracted by food or squirrels…well, I guess these could be considered one in the same) let me know in his canine fashion what he wants, if absolutely necessary (like to loosen his Gentle Leader Headcollar [a must for being able to control a big guy like Bear] if it is too tight), for the most part he is content to be the handsome, strong silent type.

We know that for the intellectual development of our children, it is crucial that we talk and read with them. Now that those Baby Einstein videos are apparently completely useless for turning our kids into geniuses (Don’t forget to get your refund from Disney if you are eligible!), it’s up to us to do all this verbalizing aloud ourselves. What a pleasure it is to have at least one member of the household neither require nor appreciate being spoken to incessantly. Bear says, “I’m not the chatty type, just use those few command words I know and I’ll be fine. But don’t completely cut out the baby talk. I have no idea what you are saying, but it lets me know that you love me.”

San Francisco Baylands, near Palo Alto

Bear is fine with walking on the nearby Stanford University campus. He likes to pretend he is a student rushing to class as he walks along, absorbing the rarified ivory tower atmosphere. But where he feels most comfortable is out in nature at the Baylands. As much as he loves being part of our family, he likes to get out and commune with nature and fellow non-humans when he can. It’s a real treat for him that when we go for our long walks in the Baylands, we usually encounter more small wildlife than we do people. As both a shomer mitzvot and a creature who connects with and is in awe of all of God’s creation, the beautiful words from the biblical prophet Micah (6:8) come to his mind as we stroll together (Well, maybe it’s more like my running behind Bear as I do my best to restrain him from darting off the path in pursuit of jackrabbits and geese.) : “Do justice. Love kindness. Walk humbly with your God.” It’s amazing how Bear is a baki [someone having extensive knowledge] in Bible and can call up just the right verse to echo what he is thinking or feeling at any given moment. His Bear Mitzvah training clearly surpasses the preparation my sons did for their Bar Mitzvah.

We have a smart dog.

Of course, a dog doesn’t have to be Jewishly educated, or even Jewish, to help keep his peeps physically fit. Any canine companion can lovingly tell his guardian, “Don’t walk in front of me; I may not follow. Don’t walk behind me; I may not lead. Just walk beside me and be my friend.” However, only Bear, being not merely Jewishly erudite but having also spent a good deal of time at Stanford, would be able to tell you that this is a quotation widely attributed to the French existentialist philosopher Albert Camus.

© 2009 Renee Ghert-Zand. All rights reserved.

When I was eight months pregnant, I was forcibly held against my will…at my own baby shower. Fifty of my ex-mother-in law’s closest friends attended. She meant well, but I prefer more intimate gatherings where I know at least a few of the guests. Despite my personal suffering at this tony event, I learned about a revolutionary semi-new product that has magical baby calming powers—Baby Einstein DVDs.

For those of you living a sane childless life, Baby Einstein is a series of DVDs that feature puppets, toys and other brightly colored images synchronized to classical music. For a reason unbeknownst to me, these DVDs captivate babies, giving new frazzled mothers 25-30 minutes of quiet uninterrupted bliss.

I received two of these little charmers at my baby shower. Before long they moved into heavy rotation at our house. I ordered the rest of the set from Amazon and was subsequently notified by email each time a new Baby Einstein DVD was available. I soon became an internet marketing person’s dream. I opened the emails, clicked on the link, and in less than 90 seconds became the proud owner of the newest tantalizing release.

My son’s Baby Einstein addiction occurred during 2002 and 2003 when he was below the age of 2. As soon as he became mobile, new infatuations emerged. We had a long lean Wiggles period followed by the Thomas the Tank Engine and Handy Manny eras, ending with the Cars and Madagascar years. Now my son is seven. He’s into his Nintendo DSi, Wii, laptop and the occasional Matchbox car and Bakugan.

I eBayed off the Baby Einstein DVDs years ago, yet I continue to receive monthly emails from Amazon regarding the flurry of new Baby Einstein DVDs, books, toys and clothing.

I understand how this type of email marketing serves us grown-ups. We like a particular author or band, we’re notified when the newest release is out, we buy their newest release when the economy is good…I get it. I even recall pre-ordering a book prior to its release. It’s great customer retention marketing and works well with adults. It does not work well with the adults purchasing children’s items.

Attention Amazon Email Marketing Team: Please be advised that kids grow up quickly and I am no longer interested in Baby Einstein products. It’s been well over five years since I ordered anything remotely related to Baby Einstein. Doesn’t anyone in your database marketing department have children? FYI, this also applies to puppy products. The wee wee pads are generally not needed after a year (except for my mother’s Yorkshire Terror who pees every time she visits my house) and could possibly relate to other product purchase scenarios that I am too tired to think about now. Please remove me from your email list…unless you have information on how to pre-order that new DSi game my son wants for the holidays.

So, the whole Baby Einstein thing is a sham. Honestly, did anyone really believe that plopping a toddler in front of the television to listen to whatever it was, was going to produce little geniuses?  Do we really believe we can manufacture prodigies? Just as Baby Einstein was exposed as a scam, I saw an infomercial on some program that could get toddlers to read. The entire thing showed parents holding flashcards up to their toddlers while they read. It’s disturbing to me to see parents on television coaxing their toddlers to read something from a card while sitting in some sterile, toy-less room.

What happened to just letting kids be kids? Don’t get me wrong. I hope for the best for Kid One and Kid Two when it comes to my kids’ achievement, but I realized a long time ago that I can’t force development on them. They need to develop on their own terms–for their sanity and my own.  I can help by having fun with them, playing games we love to play as a family, singing songs, baking cakes, going fishing, and all that. Novel concept, eh? What good does it do any kiddo to sit for hours on end staring at flashcards if there is no time left to discover the wonders of chasing a firefly? What we’ve done is made learning more complicated and less tactile. Why do you think little ones are constantly putting things in their mouths? They want to use all of their senses to learn. They don’t want to just process information.

Instead of reading flashcards to toddlers to have them process the words back, we should be read stories that can be found inexpensively at a bookstore or free at a library. Let them discover the fascination of what words can do when they are strung together to create a vivid story or a sing songy rhyme.

In the end, wanting our children to be baby Einsteins is a bit misguided anyway. Einstein himself wasn’t a baby Einstein in the sense that modern-day parents want their children to be baby Einsteins.  Einstein was a slow learner and mischievous. So, if we really want our toddlers to be like Einstein, perhaps we should encourage them to develop slowly and be mischievous rather than sit them in front of a bunch or random, floating words.

M.O.M.

Just when you thought the expectations placed upon us parents couldn’t possibly get any higher, now we can’t even yell at our kids. That’s right. The New York Times just ran a piece about how parents are damaging children by yelling at them. (The Charlotte Observer also ran the piece.) And I’m not talking about berating kids with the “You’re no good” kind of yelling none of us reading this would dream of doing…no, it’s just raising your voice that’s wrong. Just having a mere moment of frustration could damage your child’s psyche. Forever.

Articles like this make me nostalgic for the “good ‘ol days” when parents could bellow, “Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about!”, toss kids into the front seat of the car unrestrained, feed them nitrate-laden bologna sandwiches on Wonder Bread and party through pregnancy with a martini in one hand and a cigarette in the other…all without a sliver of judgment, self-imposed or otherwise.

Parenthood now is a list of do’s and don’ts a mile long. Women pregnant today can’t even eat soft cheese for cryin’ out loud, much less have a sip of wine without incurring the wrath of somebody armed with the latest study on fetal alcohol syndrome. And allow yourself to fantasize about just once, just once, instituting the “children should be seen and not heard” philosophy in your house. But NO! Parents must let children express themselves — heaven forbid they are forced to stifle any emotion. We must also give them every learning opportunity, from playing Mozart to them in the womb to teaching them sign language at age 1 then Spanish at age 2. Yes parents, your every waking moment must be devoted to your child. Thinking about turning on Little Bear for Junior so you can go take the first shower you’ve had in 4 days? Not so fast. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends NO TV for the first two years of life. Not even Baby Einstein is okay anymore. (Good luck with that shower.)

Yet, you’ll notice that the New York Times article is not backed by any statistics or studies. It’s just someone’s opinion. Who are these people determined to impose perfection on us anyway? Do they realize that perfect doesn’t exist? Do they even have children of their own? I wonder, as does Amy Wilson (author of The Mother Load) in her blog on the article:

“…according to Dr. Ronald P. Rohner, director of the Ronald and Nancy Rohner Center for the Study of Interpersonal Acceptance and Rejection at the University of Connecticut, yelling “is a risk factor for families.” A risk for what, Dr. Rohner does not say, but I am fairly certain that the MALE Dr. Rohner never stayed home with three children under five.”

Wonder why they didn’t ask Nancy Rohner what she thinks?

Is it any wonder moms are yelling? It’s the only thread we possess connecting us to what’s left of our sanity. Maybe someone could do a study on how my kids’ whining and arguing over ABSOLUTELY NOTHING affects MY psyche.

Or, a study on how growing up with robotic parents who always smile and speak softly and never make a mistake leads to children unable to function in the real world.

I think Amy Wilson gives the same advice at the end of her blog that I would give in this one:

“I would like to conclude by quoting me, Amy Wilson, director of the Amy Wilson Center for the Study of Whiny Children and Overtaxed Mothering at the University of My Apartment:

Do the best you can. If you yell at your kids, tell them you’re sorry and give them a hug. Then, try to do the best you can.”

Now THAT sounds like a real expert opinion to me.

Sara Ellington is the author of The Mommy Chronicles: Conversations Sharing the Comedy and Drama of Pregnancy and New Motherhood (Hay House, 2005) and The Must-Have Mom Manual (Ballantine/Random House, April 2009) now available at Target!

Disney recently offered refunds to all the parents who bought into the notion that Baby Einstein videos would make our children smarter.

The Balloon Boy escapade was an unfortunate example of greedy parents trying to engage the nation’s emotions in order to get a reality t.v. show out of the hype.

Time Magazine and other studies have recently shown that women are more liberated, have more choices and more power, but are less happy than 40 years ago.

So what do these three things have in common?

All of these recent media stories are the result of someone else telling us how to think. Baby Einstein told parents to believe in something that should have been obvious if we simply applied good sense – no television program can ever be a substitute for good parenting. Balloon Boy’s parents told us to believe them when they purported their son was in a runaway balloon, and the propagation of reality television shows led them to believe they, too, deserved one. And Time Magazine is now telling women how we feel, comparatively – even though most of us weren’t even adults forty years ago.

Whatever happened to thinking for ourselves? Are we so afraid to believe in our own discernment that we are willing to believe whatever the media tells us? Many people complain that media has too much power, that the media even caused the economy to become worse than it might have, by spreading fear and panic. Yet, when is it time for us to take responsibility for allowing these things to happen?

Instead of spending time listening to subjective media sensationalism, we need to spend that time investing in ourselves. It’s time to be our own proponents and take a proactive stance. We need to become our own advocates and have personal accountability, especially in the business world. We can start by asking the right questions – or the Question Behind the Question. That is, “What can I do to improve this?”, “How can I contribute?”, or “How can I make a difference?” We can become even stronger and proactively grow in the right areas by identifying our Strengths and working towards those, in our daily, weekly, and long-term career goals.

Howard and I wrote about the Baby Einstein recall in this week’s Perpetual Post.

__________________________________

When did television become ‘educational’? When I was a child in the 80s, it was pretty much understood that TV was a free babysitter. It was not how you taught your kids how to read. It was how you taught them how to stay out of your damn way while you made dinner.

These days, programs like Baby Einstein encourage parents to teach their infants about the world through the magic of passively watching television. After all, is there a better way to learn about shapes and colors than by watching shapes and colors on a TV screen? Why explore the world around you when you can watch a DVD in which someone else shows it to you? The ‘Baby’s First Impressions Head to Toe’ video, found on brainybaby.com, even claims that “your child will enjoy watching other children on screen demonstrate how a hand can do many things, like hold, touch or clap.” Now, why didn’t I have a video to teach me how to do things with my hands when I was a baby? How did I even make it this far in life? (Also, since when can a hand clap by itself? Maybe these DVDs are a little philosophically advanced for the zero to three month age group).

It gets better. There’s another program called “Your Baby Can Read”, which teaches frighteningly tiny infants to memorize flashcards. Flashcards! They’re not just for older students with motor skills anymore! Somehow the idea that you should be forced to memorize a flashcard when your first instinct is still to put it directly in your mouth is unsettling. A video on the website, YourBabyCanRead.com, shows 9 month old Andy raising his arms in the air after being shown a flashcard that says ‘ARMS UP’. This is exactly the sort of young overachiever they look for at Yale. (As long as Andy doesn’t burn himself out by the time he is eighteen months old.)

Baby Einstein videos are now receiving negative publicity because studies have shown that infants who watch television early in life end up with a shorter attention span than those who have limited or no screen time before the age of two. They also have smaller vocabularies and are less verbal — although this fits nicely with the irony that as a baby, Einstein himself was a little slow on the uptake. Perhaps this was intentional on the part of the creators of Baby Einstein.

Across the board, baby DVD websites also tout the idea that watching a video fosters ‘interactions’ between parent and child, and encourages them to spend quality time together. Somehow I doubt this. Let’s face it, television is not ‘interactive’. Watching television together does not encourage socializing and intimacy. If it did, my boyfriend and I would know each other a lot better than we do. Television encourages staring, mouth-breathing, and drooling—all of which babies instinctively know how to do. No $15.99 DVD necessary.

Even though I hate the idea of a baby watching television (after all, she’s got her whole life ahead of her to spend staring a screen, especially if she ends up with a desk job!), if they’re going to have educational DVDs, they may as well encourage our children to develop useful skills. Instead of teaching your baby about shapes and animals, teach them how to play Scrabulous, or help them create a profile on Facebook. You’ll be building skills they’ll be improving upon for their entire lives. They’re not really social skills, but by the time those kids are in grade school, they’ll be the only skills anybody has.

Before I became a parent, I paid NO attention to parenting. Now that I am a father, it has become a consuming pursuit. Being a non-conformist in every sense of the word, I look for ideas that go against the mainstream. That’s why I was thrilled to read that these Baby Einstein videos have been shown to be less than effective at helping kids to become happy, grounded and curious children.

But they have allowed parents to park their kids in front of the video screen and get some much needed rest. While I can appreciate and empathize, I do believe that we are doing a major disservice to our kids when we do this. Every time I am exhausted but I need to be front and center for my son, I remind myself of my duty and I say to myself:

 “Don’t be a lazy father.” Short of abuse, there may be nothing worse than a lazy father.

My first exposure to Baby Einstein was when a friend propped his child in front of the TV and exhaled at how content and mesmerized his baby was by the activities on the screen. Unable to forget my Psych Ops training in the Army, I wondered if there wasn’t something in the videos that made kids become entranced, immobile, silent and compliant.

“Put your kid here,” said my buddy, “He’ll love it,”

My son would have no part of any quiet play on a beautiful summer afternoon. He only wanted direct, outdoor engagement. We went on the swings and yes, I was getting tired. I had been a long day. But my son was hanging on to the swing with a smile a mile wide. My friend’s daughter was consumed by Baby Einstein. Somehow, instinctively, I knew where I wanted to be on this issue.

I recently read a passage in the new book NUTURE SHOCK by Po Bronson and Ashley Merryman, citing research that showed these videos to be detrimental to a child’s development.

Of course Disney (the makers of the DVD) rushed to Baby Einstein’s defense, citing the oft used excuse of “Flawed Research.”

 (The Flawed Research excuse is what’s keeping anti-pesticide activists like me at bay for the time being)

I’m convinced these DVD’s and many other baby items deemed indispensable to a child’s development are actually genius marketing creations that are designed to help relieve parents of their burden (responsibility) of engaging their children.

 My son’s favorite toys continue to be the BPA free bottle top and a non-treated wooden spoon which he loves to bang on an old cooking pot.

Ray Salomone   Personal Trainer and Wellness Activist

www.GrecoRomanWellness.com

Blog: www.GrecoRomanWellness.wordpress.com

The Most Provocative Wellness Blog on the Planet

Eat Fresh, Whole Foods. Exercise Intensely

PLAY ROUGH AND LIVE LIKE YOU MEAN IT!!!

 Contact Me Directly at: Ray@GrecoRomanWellness.com

Coming Soon to bookstores:

The Greco Roman Road to Wellness

by Ray Salomone and Dr. Katina Ioannidis

Amazon link:

http://www.amazon.com/Greco-Roman-Road-Wellness-Old-World-Times/dp/0982139209/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1243604904&sr=8-1

 During my vast amounts of free time, I am also a fiction writer. My first novel, PEACE BE WITH YOU, a psychological drama of addiction and redemption, was published in 2007.

This is the Amazon link:

http://www.amazon.com/Peace-Be-You-Raimondo-Salomone/dp/142414812X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1256656950&sr=8-1

 My next novel, HUMAN TRAFFIC, a story of love and vengeance, will be finished sometime in the next decade.

When we look at all the brands that exist our there, we realize that they have often opted to go for the good old traditional means of advertising. Mostly because they are afraid of taking the risk on something that is significantly new and most probably because they just don’t know what their return on investment will be like. I guess I would react the same… after all what we know about social media is not much.

Coming from someone who lives in a place that is still embracing social media, it makes a lot of sense. Coming from a marketer- kudos to those companies who have realized the importance of social media in branding. One of my all-time favorite ‘risk takers’ is Baby Einstein.

Relying on social media, this brand captured the over $14.2 billion dollar baby market, offering parents products that are created from a baby’s point-of-view, while at the same time promoting child-parent interaction, making their products loved by babies and trusted by mothers. With a $100 000 dollar investment, the creators of Baby Einstein created a presence and made significant impact, through its social media marketing, giving it the edge to get noticed by Walt Disney. Now, when we talk Baby Einstein, we talk of a $ 20 Million market worth brand that continues to grow stronger because of the direct interaction and first time experience it gave its customers. Can you tell me of other companies that have taken the high roll on social media?

Moving on… have you seen Toyota’s Prius latest campaign to promote its iPhone application? Oh my god. Pure and utter genius! Take a look and tell me what you think?  These people get it. They know that social media is all about the product and the buzz.

The point is that we need to embrace this new marketing paradigm, and start building our marketing strategies accordingly to be able to provide more innovative adaptations of consumer related products and services. Social media is an opportunity that cannot and should not be ignored. Only the foolish have not come to terms with this realization yet.

Elizabeth over at Bleakonomy amused me with this article about Disney admitting the Baby Einstein products are not educational, and may actually harm children’s development.

Get your refund information here. Unless your kid *is* a genius. In that case, enjoy your Disney and ignore me, because I’d be arguing that Jr.’s mental bandwidth is due to your stellar parenting and excellent genes not some lame gimick. Silly me.

Heck, let your kids play with or watch whatever you choose. But for heaven’s sake, let’s someone please tell those people who really believe that they will change their child’s life with a DVD that it’s marketing, not science.

And consider a pop on over to the Campaign for a Commerical-Free Childhood, where they support my refusal to show my kid anything that makes him want characters on his Band-Aids, shoes, or underpants. Why? Cuz I ain’t advertising their bullshit products on my kid. That’s why.

(Yup, Peanut is still getting movie day every Wed for one hour. Too late, AAP, you said age one when he was born and we held out that long. For a year (from age 1 to 2) he only got half an hour—once a week—and it was all Signing Time, which I personally found hugely educational and useful to his vocabulary, his signing, and his fascination with other children. He didn’t get any TV before age one, barring accidental restaurant exposure to organized sports (blech) and one afternoon when he napped in the same room that we watched the first half of Brokeback Mountain. Now *that*’s educational.)

著名媽媽阿四寫了一篇愛因斯坦，回水，說電視害人不淺。我也乘她勢芙蓉風雅寫一篇唱反調。不是真的反對她，只是提出一個不同的論點和爭取點擊。

***

大摩今年最紅的一篇研究報告是由一個臭乳未乾的十五歲intern寫有關時下青年喜好（原文見下）。結論很簡單：你反不反Baby Einstein也好, 未來沒電視, 沒DVD。

Baby Einstein不是問題所在, 問題是人。

試問自己:

我們現在看電視多?

還是上網多?

跟人交談多?

還是電郵短訊寫博回博多?

看電視是集體頹廢, 互聯網是個人頹廢。

看電視是思想毒藥, 互聯網是關係毒藥。

要反Baby Einstein, 不如反互聯網,

要反互聯網, 不如反一反(省)自己。

***

但無論我們反甚麼, 不反甚麼, 末路是人必走的方向, 只是快慢的分別。

預知這個大勢不難, 看看藝術發展方向就可以。因為藝術是一個有前瞻性的指標, 永遠行先人一步。一千年前有唯神主義, 一百年前有唯物主義, 十年前有唯我主義, 現在有解構主義。

有沒有Baby Einstein電視互聯網, 我們也正在破壞我們建立的一切。

我寫博, 你看博, 已是邁進人類一大步。

後記

媽媽阿四竟然寫番篇文quote我, 無死啦.