Dad-Hack > Become a master of putting babies to sleep
I’m known as the one guy that you can give any baby, in any horrible state of a fit and in five minutes I’ll have that baby snoring like a trucker. A wise man once gave me some incredible advice on how to put a baby to sleep that I will now pass on to you. His advice was simple:
- It has to be the dad. [something about the timbre and resonance of the male vocal range]
- Place the baby upright with his/her head resting on your chest with an ear resting directly on your chest.
- Sing. Sing anything you want, but keep it calm.
This was great advice and I’ve perfected it by adding one simple thing — dance. A waltz to be specific. That’s right, a basic box step and a song in 4/4 is all it takes to put any baby to sleep.
Because I’m a child of the 80’s my go to song is Kenny Loggins “All the Pretty Little Ponies”, but really any song with four beats per measure will work. Some other examples of 4/4 songs — “Fat Bottomed Girls” by Queen, “I Can See Clearly Now” by Jimmy Cliff and “A Long December” by The Counting Crows.
And thank you Kenny Loggins for getting us out of the danger zone. Sorry, I had to — it’s a dad thing.
Feature Image: bartdubelaar/Flickr
Box step image: Wikipedia
