Mad Scientist Effort-Saving Baby Inventions

Most babies like the car.  But on the way home from our daily mall walks with our 5 month old twin grandchildren, Jack invariably ejects his pacifier, then starts yelling about it.  We keep hoping that the car will soothe him to sleep, but nothing doing.  When my husband is driving, I’ve gone so far as unbuckle my seat belt, climb in the back seat, and stick the pacifier back in.  It’s on a tether so it doesn’t get lost.  After the third time I give up and use my own “pacifier”, which are earplugs.  When I’m driving alone, I go straight for the earplugs.

When we get home, we hurriedly fix them bottles, and thus appeased, they get activity time on the play mat, then swaddled for their nap.

Activity time for a five month old consists mainly of displaying toys in front of them.  The idea is that they reach for, swat or otherwise manipulate these toys.  Some toys rattle, light up, or wiggle, but it doesn’t take long for them to get bored.  The five month old brain does not have much sticking power.  Kind of like teenagers or old men.  Ellie thinks up new games, like rolling over to examine the underside of the couch, but Jack’s favorite method of handling boredom usually involves singing the lyrics of the most acidic rock music he can think of.  It’s long been known that rock musicians get their musical inspiration from bored five month olds.

Swaddling is another challenging activity for grandparents, especially with the amazingly strong Jack.  He does not want to hold his chubby little arms at his side while we wrap him up like a burrito.  We’ve been told that we may not utilize our knees or legs across the baby when attempting to wrap them.  Furthermore, it has to be T-I-G-H-T or they wiggle their arms out of the swaddle and wake themselves up.  As we know, the most important rule in baby care is Get Them To Sleep.

"I'M NOT SLEEPY NONNI!"

Being smarter than a five month old takes some effort, but we’ve come up with Mad Scientist Labor Saving Baby Inventions.

The Auto-Paci.  This one is a helmet with a retractable arm attached to the top.  At the end of the arm is a pacifier.  Put the helmet on the baby, especially in the car.  It is voice activated, so when the baby cries, the arm comes down and inserts the pacifier in the baby’s mouth.  Boink.  Silence.

The Remote Control Activity Mat.  First suspend the conveyor belt (included in kit) from your living room ceiling with the included hooks.  Obtain any sort of revolving display stand (not included).  You know, like the kind they display sunglasses, earrings, or watches on.  Get several display stands and attach as many dangly toys to each display stand as you can.  Suspend the stands horizontally from a conveyor belt that snakes around your living room.  Both the conveyor belt and the display cases are operated by a remote control.  Grandparents sit in their easy chair, baby lies on mat.  Baby gets tired of toys hanging over their heads.  Grandparents use remote control to operate the conveyor belt of display stands, each containing many dangly toys.  Presto, new toys appear in baby’s reach.  You don’t need that many toys, they are happy with, roughly, 346.  Your mileage may vary.  Some need more.  There is an exersaucer adapter, sold separately.

The Zippity Slide Swaddler.  Get a short plastic toddler slide.  At the bottom is one of those Christmas tree wrapper things, only instead of netting, it’s got a swaddling blanket attached.  At nap time, hold the baby at the top of the slide and let go.  Whoosh, down the slide they go, through the Christmas tree wrapper, and out they come the other side all wrapped up and ready for a nap.  Easy peasy.

Great inventions, right?  Marketable even.  Not sure what our daughter and son-in-law might think.  I may have to get out the earplugs again.

Look At The Cathedrals They Are Making These Days

Have you ever been to St. Peter's in Rome?  The jaw dropping magnificence and scope when you walk in are mind blowing.  Considering it was built in the 15th and 16th centuries, it is even more astounding.  How did these people even think up something on that scale? Or figure out how to build it?  I mean, most of them lived in little huts or crowded buildings. How could they conceive of such a place?  How could they have ever paid for it?  Soaring ceilings, light, grandeur.



If I lived in a hut or small 15th century house, I'd think it was grand to have something like a large auditorium.  But like  this?  Big thinkers, they were!

Fact is, nearly every little city had a cathedral.  At least it seemed that way traveling through France and Germany.  The opulence is overwhelming.  The thundering organ music and sweet children's choirs, the smoky incense, and bustle of friends greeting each other must have made the community feel like they could really enjoy their building.

We were surprised to even see that the churches were still operating, and what seemed to be paying for a lot of them was the beer gardens that the monks continued to run.  The cathedral was simply a historic side show to the real interest of modern day worshipers, who made a beeline for the beer.

Home now, we go mall walking every morning with the little twins in their stroller.  Round and round we go, and looking up, I realized that the mall was the largest structure in any nearby town.  The food court was one of the highest ceilings of our local area.

It is probably the largest structure that many children ever enter.  I wonder if the height of ceilings in a civilization indicates what the society is worshiping?  The only other large ceiling I could think of in our area is the Tacoma Dome.  So would that mean we are worshiping consumerism and sports?

What is your opinion?  Please comment!

The Straw Bonnet Fiasco: Part 2--Bonnet All Fixed Up Now!

After trying to dye my straw bonnet with Rit dye, having it not only fail and then discovering my glove leaked, thus getting more dye on my hand than on my bonnet, I was very disheartened.  When last I wrote about it, I left off as I was zooming off to the fabric store to see what they had in the way of fabric paint.

My local fabric store is pretty dismal.  Cheapest polyester, thinnest cotton, and woefully out of anything that is on sale or highly desirable.  I found puffy paint, but no fabric paint.  Rats.  But then, aha!  I spied some fabric paint.  A whole tube of it!  Even found some of the color I wanted (black).

I sped home, found a paint brush and applied it.  It went on easily and covered the straw just like I wanted--thick, black and shiny.

I removed the interior of the original bonnet.  The poor dilapidated thing was not going to be in any museum nor desired by any curator for their collection, so I did not feel too bad about re-purposing it.  I added a bit to get it to cover more of the interior of the bonnet so my hair wouldn't get caught on the straw, as well as a velvet ribbon across the interior of the crown which assists in preventing the bonnet from sliding off the back of my head.

I ordered some cotton lace from the Netherlands.  My supplier there never fails me, and I used this along with some netting to go around the inside of the bonnet to frame my face.  Took a bit more stabilizer to gather the netting, but it went in easily.

Feeling very good about the way everything was going, I used some silk chiffon from my daughter's wedding for the bavolet.  The chiffon was originally white, but I had dyed it black, which resulted in it coming out a plum color.  The plum, I thought, would go very well with the pansies.  I planned on using two layers, but after messing around with it, decided to line it not only with cotton netting, which is very stiff, but a layer of black silk as well.  Then I used some black cotton trim around the bottom of the bavolet, that I had from a previous project.

I attached the flowers and some feathers to the side, which went on without any complaints.

Being the bonnet fiasco story, though, I was not done with missteps.  I ordered some bright pink silk to use for ties, and unfortunately when it came I did not like the color.  I then ordered purple moire ribbons instead, and messed up the order and only ordered a yard rather than two.  The eBay seller was very gracious about letting my change my order and the ribbon ties came quickly.

Whew.  Finished the project today, which is a good thing as the reenactment I hoped to wear it to is this Saturday.  Nothing like a new bonnet to make a girl feel properly decked out!

Tempering Your Strengths to Become a Better Leader

What kind of leader are you?  Skilled interventionist?  Great communicator?  Arrogant?  Nurturing?  How do you think other people view you?  For after all, what people think of you when you are trying to lead them is even more important than how you view yourself.

Casting aside self-awareness when intent on getting a job done is not making the most of your strengths.  Never having time to lead an examined life will produce insensitivity and a tendency to use people to gain your ends.  You can only bring out the best of your team by seeing how they view you and what they base that on, because you are then able to temper your strengths.

Temper strengths?  Does that mean not use them?  Or use less of them?  Why would you want to do that?

Consider if a football team used the same play every time.  Consider if a piece of music consisted of a single note plinking repeatedly.  In their overuse, they have rendered themselves irrelevant.  We've all seen leadership become arrogance, or a nurturing humility become martyrdom.  Creativity can become impractical farce and a laser vision can become an obsession.

The four dimensions of a good leader are: confidence, enabling, planning and operating.  So what do you consider your natural talent when it comes to leadership?  If you easily identify a talent in one of these areas, the more likely you will be to utilize it, and thus overuse it.  Therefore, you must assess the situation and see if your strength is the best answer, or if you need to choose a different strategy.  Soft music may be the best fit for the baby's quiet naptime, not rock music, even though we may like rock music.  Forceful commanding might not be the best approach when handling a wedding or a funeral.

In calibrating which approach is most effective, and going with that even though it may not be our greatest strength may lead us to discover that our underused talents improve with time, thus giving us a greater return on our leadership.

I Hate Getting a Haircut

Every woman I know simply loves getting their hair done.  My mom went every single week to get hers done.  I consider the beauty shop a house of horrors.  On top of that, you have to pay them.  They rank right up there with gynecologists are as least favorite activities. 

I’ve tried taking pictures.  Make me look like this!  Whack.

I’ve tried commenting after every cut. “Little shorter there.  No!  Not so much.”  Butchered.

Just got it cut this week.  Does pulling on your hair make it grow faster?

A few rare times I’ve found one I’ve liked and they’ve moved, or simply lose interest and yak to their fellow operators.  I walk out looking like a buffoon.  Most of the time I race home as fast as I can.  Don’t even stop by the grocery store.  I dunk my head under the faucet and apply the hair dryer to repair the mess.  Then eat chocolate.

When I got my hair done for my wedding, I paid a goodly sum. The stylist, “John Pierre” asked how I liked it.  I could not resist reaching for his comb and re-doing what I could.  My mom was horrified that I hurt his feelings.  The bride-to-be rushed home and dunked her head under the faucet.

I must fail at articulating that I want the top fuller than the chin line.  I never come out that way.  I don’t want to look like a pixie or an elf or Dorothy Hamil.  It takes about three weeks to recover, at least.

My daughter says I should learn to cut it myself.  My husband say while some of my cuts do nothing for him, most are fine.  He suggests to keep trying with a photo of a style I like.  Most everyone else says, “Really?  I loooooooove getting my hair done.” 

Is there an activity that YOU hate?  One that everyone else just loves?

Maybe I just like the chocolate I console myself with.  Think I’ll go have some more.

What is Your Favorite Phone App?

Which phone app can't you live without?  How often do you use it?  Is it a navigation aid?  Coupon app?  I love being able to check email and Facebook on the phone, as well as texting, but I'm not counting those as apps.  Nor the two games I play.

Winner: Probably the one that I currently use the most right now is a white noise app for the grandchildren during nap time, but that is just a temporary phase.  It's called Relax and Sleep, and it plays everything from rocking chairs to waterfalls.  I've combined three of them (campfire, frogs and owl) to make a very soothing scenario, but the one they seem to like best is a train clicking over the tracks.

Semi-winner: I've got one that reads recipes out of Cooking Light magazine called Digimarc.  I aim it at a photo in the magazine and it puts the recipes, preparations info and shopping list right on my phone.

Loser: I've got an app called Level Up that allows me to pay for certain things with my phone, but I don't use it.  In fact, I've never had the occasion to.

Another lesser used app: I've got a navigation aid, but prefer paper maps as it gives me a bigger picture.  By the way, good luck finding a paper map at your local store these days, they are being phased out.  More's the pity, I like them.  That bitty screen doesn't compare.

Used it a couple times app: Slacker Radio.  I liked it until I had to give them my email.  Phooey.  Now I've got to set up a fake email account.  Bother.

Also used a couple times when we were traveling last year: Currency converter.

So what do you like and use?