Oscar’s still sleeping in the bed with us, but at some point he’s going to have to move to the crib. If the first three months are any indication, I’m anticipating it won’t be the easiest transition.

With that in mind, the $200+ pricetag on this Amby Baby thingamabob doesn’t seem too bad. It’s a bouncing, swinging baby-cocoon* sort of thing, and unlike regular baby swings, it’s safe for extended sleeping. The fact that Oscar sleeps like.. well, a baby, when he takes naps in his Fisher Price swing makes me think even if he resists the crib, he’d be way into the coziness and motion-y-ness of the Amby Baby.

Anybody out there tried it?

- Matt

*Not to be confused with old-people cocoons

Those kooky Aussies have invented Lullabub, four little pistons that go under the legs of your crib, and then fire in sequence to rock the crib. What is the cartoon am I thinking of where a bed comes to life and gallops down the street like a horse?

I think I would hire West Coast Customs to pimp it out so I could raise and lower it to the strains of “Get Crunk” by Lil’ Jon & the East Side Boyz.

GET CRUNK!

I knew from day one that my kid was going to need his own stereo. However, my affinity for high quality warm audio and today’s modern “Boom Boxes” (as the kids are calling them nowadays) don’t really see eye to eye. I also knew that we wanted a portable unit that we could take to the hospital to play soothing music on during the magic hour, and not have to deal with wires and stringing stereo cables off to seperate speakers all over the delivery room.

I journeyed around to all of the big box stores and even some stereo shoppes in our area and decided one thing: All plastic-encased boomboxes sound pretty lousy, no matter how many “Mega BASS” ports they add.

The one I liked the best and ended up buying was the Sony ZSSN10PS PSYC CD Boombox which I found at Sears. It has the best sound out of all of the ones that I tried (which ain’t saying a whole lot, but still, it does an impressive job for what it is working with).

There were basically several functions I thought were key for a nursery boombox:

Sleep Timer: so we can set it to shut off after the little tyke nods off.

All-In-One Design: One unit with a handle on the top…no seperate speakers or anything.

Decent Sound: If this is gonna be my kid’s first introduction to Rubber Soul on a regular basis, It should at least sound listenable.

Quiet Playback: I don’t want the thing to sound like a 747 taking off when the CD drive spins up.

This unit also has some stuff that I was interested in but were not dealbreakers:

Line-In: So I can run a cable from my laptop and use that unit as the speakers if need be.

A Customizable EQ: It comes with Rock, Jazz, and Classical EQ settings, but also allows you to tweak the five bands of EQ into a custom setting of your own devising.

The ability to play MP3 discs and ATRAC3/ATRAC3plus files: So basically you can load 490 songs onto a CDR and this machine will play them (with varying degrees of shuffle). I have not goofed around with this aspect, but you know I will.

The only thing that I wished it had was a volume knob (this only has volume buttons), but PJ really turned me around on this one, saying that this way the kid can’t make one swipe at it and crank the volume up to 11 damaging his golden ears, so maybe buttons are the way to go.

So overall, I’m very happy with the purchase. It sounds pretty good…not too tinny or plastic-coated, and the option to shut off the fakey bass effect is there, so overall I’d recommend this unit to audiophiles who are willing to make some sacrifices in sound for the convenience of having a self-contained unit.

See the Sony site Here:

If attaching robotic feet to your old-timey analog crib just doesn’t cut your techno-mustard, then the Intellicot was designed with you in mind. Also, you’re probably a rich lunatic. Don’t get me wrong, I dig gadgets way more than a human should, but there’s something very ominously reminiscent of like eight-dozen different sci-fi movies about this “crib” that features automated rocking, air circulation, built-in video-monitoring, an electric lifting system and a mind-melting laser-beam that assimilates all non-believers.

So, yeah, if your baby happens to be named D.A.R.R.Y.L., then you might want to pick one of these up when they become available later this year. There’s no price on the website, but our analysts have crunched some numbers and are estimating a pricetag of three plasma screen TVs, eleven XBox360s and a year’s supply of Bell’s Oberon.

Link via Gizmodo.

Thigamababy offers this post about blackout curtains for the baby’s room (a spectacular idea), which lead to this post about Dooce covering her windows with tinfoil:

“Like clockwork she woke up at 6 AM on Saturday morning. Jon and I braced for the screeching, but after thirty seconds of loud rustling she fell back asleep. She didn’t wake back up until 8:15. HAH! When I got up to go and get her I did a stylish moonwalk out our bedroom door and pumped my arms in the air like the pistons of an engine, a victory dance to signify our victory over the tyranny of a two-year-old who regularly sneaks into the bathroom to scratch her underarms with my toothbrush.”

Jackie and I went to see some friends’ new baby a couple months ago and we got to talking about baby furniture. Before settling on a very nice wood (I think it was oak) crib, dresser/changing-table set at Babies R Us, they’d visited a higher end specialty store that only sold baby furniture. The cheapest crib in the joint was a grand, and that was just for the crib. No dresser. No changing table. No diamond-studded Mickey Mantle rookie card. Just the crib. A whole furniture set would cost over $3000.

Listen, I get that people want the best for their children, because I want the best for mine. That’s why Jackie and I went with this Jenny Lind 3-and-1 crib from Delta. It’s simple, classically designed and it only costs $109. But that’s not why we chose it. Turns out this bargain is the top-rated of all the cribs reviewed by Consumer Reports. It’s sturdy, easy to assemble, and most of all, it’s safe.

There’s a matching cradle and changing table available too, and the whole set can be had for about 300 smackers. You’ll save about 2700 bucks over the schmancy expensive stuff, and with that can buy you…

• 9 iPods
• 226 copies of Hall & Oates Greatest Hits
• 4337 Mozzarella Cheese Sticks
• 1/4 of a Diamond-Studded Mickey Mantle Rookie Card
- Matt