What's your simple magic trick?

[nilatti]

A while ago, somebody posted a link, which I can't find now, to a list of ways to get a baby to sleep. One item was about nursing to sleep: immediately after getting your nipple out of the baby's mouth, apply upward pressure on his chin, holding his mouth shut. This creates pressure on his jaw that mimics nursing and can keep him from feeling the sudden lack of boob.

So, I tried it...and it worked like a charm!

Now I want to know, what other little tricks do you have? I don't really mean things that everyone knows, like swaddling or rocking, and I wouldn't limit it just to sleep. 

I'll start with one my friend taught me. She calls it "the box trick."

You find a box that is just barely big enough for your baby who is beginning to sit independently, but isn't sturdy enough for you to walk away while he's sitting. You put him in the box with some toys--it might buy you 10 minutes...it's like the poor mom's Bumpo...

Edited by nilatti - 3/19/11 at 3:02pm

[P.J.]

I visited a friend recently who had this one:

They have some wind chimes hanging in their hallway (this is in an apartment in a big city). While I was there, there were a few incidences where their baby girl ended up crying (for example once she got her fingers caught under the door, nothing serious but a little owie). They bring her over to the wind chimes and swish the cord around so the chimes make their sound, and it distracted the baby from her pain and all of a sudden she stopped crying. Worked like a charm!

In light of the recent thread about how good it actually is to let your baby express emotions or to "shush" them...well, I think you need to use discretion as to when it's appropriate to distract your baby away from crying. But IMO sometimes it does help and is not suppressive, and in such cases, those wind chimes sure did the trick!

[kl5]

Two tricks that have been working well for me and my 6 month old: I do a nipple remove maneuver like the one described above (known to some as the "Pantley pull-off from NCSS), but instead I pull the nipple out of his mouth and at the same time (tricky at first), pull whatever clothing I am wearing over my nipple and while I am doing that, sort of push one finger gently into his chest to keep him from trying to latch back on. If he is truly ready to go down, it works really well. It just stops the automatic re-latch that he seems to do while still sleeping. The second is that when I put him down in his crib, if he starts to wake or fuss, I put my hand gently on the top of his head and it usually works like magic and he goes right back to sleep. To the point where when I figured it out I couldn't believe I had lived that long without doing it... 

(And nilatti, my LO is also a Silas, born 9/13!)

[LittleBirdy]

I can't remember where I heard about this, but when nursing to sleep and they are doing that flutter sucking?  Remove your nipple immediately after the end of one suck, rather than waiting for the long pause in between sucks.  For my DS he is much more likely to accept removal of the nipple at this time!  (On a good night we are down to 8 minutes of nursing and then off to bed... far cry from the old days when it was like 35 minutes!!)

[Jules09]

If a baby is fussing, have several people sing happy birthday together. It calms them right down! I've seen it work on a room of about a dozen noisy babies. Utter silence at the end of the song!

[Blessed1]

Originally Posted by Jules09 

If a baby is fussing, have several people sing happy birthday together. It calms them right down! I've seen it work on a room of about a dozen noisy babies. Utter silence at the end of the song!

This seems to work for us every time right now.  Usually any song will do but her favorite is "happy bday" or "if your happy and you know it".  Works for diaper changes too! :)

[colorclash]

Not super magic (cause it doesn't work every time)...

When I stick my finger in DD's mouth to unlatch her when she's asleep, I'll keep my finger in her mouth and put a little pressure on her lower jaw.  I keep my finger there for a few seconds, until I can see that she won't wake up if I take my finger out.  It seems the gradual removal of everything from her mouth makes her less likely to wake up.  I might try the timing thing mentioned above.

[heybabyquepaso]

I'd like to see that list! I feel like what works changes each week :) But I've noticed that bath/showers and massage work. There are times when I wish my son would nurse to sleep (sometimes he does but not regularly enough for me to think he's addicted). At any rate, I tend to let him when he does and then once it's clear he's asleep and sucking as though I'm a paci, I take him off per the Pantley method.

When he was younger (0-3 mos.ish), he did well with swaddling, bouncing, vibrating, etc. I used to lay him on my lap and bounce my legs (hard to explain), and he would sleep. And pacifier. I felt bad about using the paci in the beginning, but it ended up being something that really made a difference in getting him to sleep. He has been sleeping regularly with a mobile and lovey for a while now as well.

In thinking about it, if he does wake up, I usually try to nurse him back to sleep and stroke his hair. He loves sucking and having some kind of softy/lovey against his cheek (which was so strange when I figured it out). We also end up bringing him to are bed often and I think maybe being close to us makes a difference.

[nilatti]

I just learned a new one!

Baby Silas and I both have a pretty nasty cold. I was trying to get him to sleep, and he was losing his mind--really freaking out. Diaper was fine, didn't want to potty, nurse, or rock. What finally worked was holding him really tight (basically swaddling him with my arms), and rocking HARD left-right-left-right while SHHHHHHing. This is what we used to do when he was a tiny infant, but he hasn't been into that kind of thing for a few months now. But it worked like a charm, he relaxed, and fell asleep.

I was thinking about it, and I realized that, when I'm sick, I really want someone to do the stuff my mom did when I was little--bring me ginger ale and animal crackers and let me watch reruns of Saved by the Bell all afternoon. Maybe Silas wants to be treated like he was when he was little too!

[porcelina]

I would love to see a thread on how everyone gets their babies to sleep! It is so different for each one! It does change all the time -- my LO is just 6 months today.

One thing we discovered on a recent trip out of the country is the white noise application on the iPhone. This is really nothing new, except that one night as I was shushing next to LO's ear for a while, and he just couldn't tune out all the background noises (kids playing), I turned it on and put it right next to the ear. It worked like a charm. He calmed immediately. I used it for the rest of the trip every time he was in a noisy place and needed to sleep. In the carseat, I put it right next to the ear and then had my hand on the side of his face, in the carrier, I put it right next to his ear, etc. It worked every time!

[ar2974]

I wrap him up in a blanket, hold the running hair dryer and one hand and rock him from side to side.  It works in minutes.  I used it with his sister for about a year and I've been using it with ds since he was born (he's 4 1/2 months now).  The minute I wrap him up, it's an immediate sleep cue and he drops right off.

[Monarchgrrl]

My midwife taught us this when we were having a very hard time at the beginning and calls it "Bondage, Beating and Sucking". 1) Swaddle 2) Hard pats on her fluffy diapered booty and 3) A pacifier (or boobie- I EP, so no boobie). The pats are much harder than I thought would be appropriate. But the harder they are, the faster she falls asleep. This has worked since the first week and it works in about 2 minutes or less, every time.

[whozeyermamma]

"What finally worked was holding him really tight (basically swaddling him with my arms), and rocking HARD left-right-left-right while SHHHHHHing. "

OMG - we did this with DD all the time when she was a baby! I would rock her hard back and forth and it was the only thing that calmed her down. I remember doing it at a party once and people were like "Holy crap you're going to kill that kid ..." but it freakin' worked, man.

With this little DS, sometimes when he's almost out asleep I can stroke the bridge of his nose and it makes him close his eyes ... and I can trick him into sleep!

[heybabyquepaso]

Originally Posted by Monarchgrrl 

My midwife taught us this when we were having a very hard time at the beginning and calls it "Bondage, Beating and Sucking". 1) Swaddle 2) Hard pats on her fluffy diapered booty and 3) A pacifier (or boobie- I EP, so no boobie). The pats are much harder than I thought would be appropriate. But the harder they are, the faster she falls asleep. This has worked since the first week and it works in about 2 minutes or less, every time.

Ah the booty pats! I'd forgotten about those! Yes, those got us through the first couple of months too :) (And then they stopped working. I was SO frustrated!) My LO is teething now- I noticed yesterday when I was holding a fussy babe that for a moment it seemed he remembered how comforted he used to get with those )