It's the last week of (relative) calm before the second kid is due, and DT reader Adam Bell decided to pimp out his kid's crib so he could listen to mad lullabies whenever he wants.
The solution:
The OnTour is held securely via 2 wood screws (the wife was worse than OSHAYou do everything you can, and the kid'll probably turn out to be a Microsoft programmer.
in making sure the thing wouldn't drop and give the new guy an everlasting JBL imprint on his forehead.) And the iPod sits in a belt clip carrying case that attaches to one of the ties from the crib bumper.Next up: trying to mount an old 15" Powerbook to the end of the crib for video.
Pimp out your own kid's crib with a JBL On Tour portable speaker system ($70.24) and a 20gb iPod (now $284 at Amazon).
I dunno.. our little one likes white noise more than music for sleeping.. also doesn't look very portable (we use our sound machine all over the place)..
Plus, I am sure this will lead someone to cruise on over to Daddytypes and lecture us about the evils of crib bumpers for newborns.
(just the the record, we took the bumpers out of our crib, but that's because we are paranoid)
I am considering, however, replicating this setup on our own bed!
About those bumpers: I didn't post the picture that shows the little hey-newborn-don't-roll-around system.
And I'll check with Adam [hey Adam!], but my sense is that the On Tour hangs on two screws like a wall-mounted phone, making it easy to remove.
My own preference would be for a non-screw option, maybe put them on a bracket of some kind which hangs over the crib rail. That'd be my lazy expert opinion.
The OnStage is mounted like an old-tyme telephone. It takes quite a bit of finagling to get it off, but it's still portable. As for the bumper debate: To each their own. Oh, and thanks Greg for posting this in the first place.
re: my bumper comments - in almost all cases, I agree, to each his own. I was just pointing out our own. I'd love to hear others' opinions on the whole thing, because I like the look of bumpers...
as for the attachment - do the speakers come with the holes for the telephone-like attachment already, or did you have to add those yourself?
Mmm, you might wanna think about a cable harness. Not a concern for the first couple of months, but as soon as the lil' one starts to roll or move around those wires are an easy target. I installed working lights above the changing table with the wires coming down. It seemed like a good idea. 6 months later the turtle thinks he's Tarzan and pulls on them every time we try to change a diaper. Re-routing the cables is on the to-do list.
The OnStage unit has a nice lip the wraps around the screws for a firm hold. The wiring harness is a really good point. I have a few feet of that flexible wire snake stuff that holds all the wires inside a tube.
Let's forget about the bumper debate for now and see what you guys have done/could do to pimp out a crib either in real life or just for shits and giggles.
Now that the wee one is standing up in her crib, and I spent last night lowering the crib (again), this time to its lowest level, my wife tells me we need a step stool in order for her to reach in to put the baby in, or pat her belly (the baby's, not my wife's) to get her to go to sleep.
If I knew how, I'd love to have some kind of quiet hydrolics or something to raise and lower the mattress without waking the baby.
And the gauntlet has been thrown!
Now, about breast feeding, which I hear is every parent's moral obligation...
I've been thinking about the same thing as I want a way to develop playlists for our little one when she gets here in June. Just a thought, but has anyone thought about using the radio transmitters you can find now and just have a normal radio near the crib? Seems like less work for the same thing. Plus, you could transmit the signal to anywhere you could find a radio.
Seems to make more sense to me.
I'd be afraid of the interference. Last thing you'd want is a blast of interference when your baby's sleeping. Not sure what the range is, either.
If you could afford it, the Sonos digital music system would be sweet.
Greg - _every_ parent?!? I'm not sure my man-breasts are up to the task...
No excuses.
The Nursing Father
And I'd love to see some playlist recommendations, and steer clear of the unpredictability of the radio. We got burned repeatedly last spring, when our local public radio/classical station was running promos for "Candide" at Lincoln Center. The commercial always started with this long, loud oboe or something, and it repeatedly startled the 4-8wk old kid. And me. Damn you, Candide.
If anybody could make a play-by-play instruction manual for hydraulics on a crib, that would be sweeeeeet. I get Kaz' dilemma. When we got our wooden crib, it was turned out to be deeper than the grand canyon. You could hardly reach the turtle and I was forced to raise the platform with some blocks. Soon I'll have to find a hack for the Stokke crib. It does go down 1 level, but it's going to be really deep.
Maybe I should get back into the gym and start working on those back muscles.
I want to know what you think of the stokke crib. Is it better than the others?