Three and a half years ago, I had a baby boy. He was sweet, cute, cuddly, and happy. He nursed well, he slept well, and he was an “easy†baby. Perhaps he was a little too easy, because when I became a mother for the second time, my daughter totally rocked my world. She was cute and cuddly all right, and she always nursed well, but she was not exactly content and happy like her brother had been, and she was never really a good sleeper.
Since she was also a wild child while still in my womb, I’d had a feeling this might happen, and on the advice of my very smart (beautiful, savvy, etc.) cousin Emily, I had purchased a Miracle Blanket before Sophia was born. The Miracle Blanket is a swaddling blanket and it truly is miraculous.
You see, swaddling, which is very comforting to a newborn, is only comforting if you do it exactly right. Doing it exactly right can be quite complicated, especially for one or two sleep-deprived, bleary-eyed parents. When Emily first told me about the Miracle Blanket, it was in an email, in which she said, “If I’d had a Miracle Blanket, it wouldn’t have taken me and Andy both to swaddle Kate correctly.†I am happy to say she is right!
When you have a Miracle Blanket, you can swaddle an infant quickly, correctly, and safely – all by yourself! I am functionally retarded (ask anyone who knows me!) and even I can do it. This blanket has a pouch for baby’s legs, flaps to hold baby’s arms tightly at her side, and uses no buckles, Velcro, or snaps. We used a swaddler (with Velcro) for my son that he could easily get out of by the time he was three weeks old, but the Miracle Blanket is made to fit babies up to four months old, and my daughter fit in hers until she was five months (and she is on the higher side of the growth chart). It was truly a sad day for Bobby and me when we had to take Sophie “off blanketâ€. She loved being swaddled, and every night around ten p.m. when she’d start to get fussy, we’d just quickly wrap her up tight like a baby burrito in the Miracle Blanket and she’d calm down. I mean girlfriend would get happy. Since she couldn’t kick and flail her limbs about, she didn’t startle herself awake, and she started sleeping for three and four hour stretches at night instead of for just 1-2 hour stretches. Thus I was able to function during the day and parent both my children instead of just lying on the couch like a zombie or calling my own mother to please come save me.
The Miracle Blanket costs around $30 (click here to purchase one) and it is worth every penny. Actually if I had to do it all over again I’d pay twice as much because there’s no way I could have survived Sophia’s first three months without it. Luckily, you won’t even have to pay full price because the good folks at The Miracle Blanket are offering $5 off to Mommin’ It Up readers! Just use coupon code MOMUP231 at checkout! It’s good until the end of the year! They come in several different color combinations (I got a gender neutral green so I can pass it along to Emily if she ever pops out another kid) and they clean beautifully in the washer and dryer. (You’ve never SEEN me do a load of laundry as fast as when I had to wash the MB, because it had to be ready for Sophia’s bedtime.)
The moral of the story is, if you’re pregnant, do yourself a huge favor and get one, and if you’re going to a baby shower, it’s the perfect present for a new mom. It truly is the gift that keeps on giving. It makes nursing and soothing a fussy baby so much easier, and helps baby take longer naps during the day, too. Which might mean that mommy gets a nap or a shower – another miracle!
