This is a sponsored post written by me on behalf of Arlo Baby. All opinions are 100% mine.
Every time Chelsea and I have a baby, people inevitably ask where the baby's sleeping in relation to us and his brothers. The concept of four kids under six years old IS mind-boggling, sure. The bigger issue people seem to be grappling with, however, is the idea of getting any baby to go from sleeping in the parents' room to sleeping in a room with siblings.
So, I'll admit it. Here's our big secret.
Our baby sleeps in the living room.
Chelsea has this theory that the best way to transition babies out of their parents' room is to slowly increase the distance between the parents' bed and the bassinet. Studies show that babies can smell their mothers as much as 100 feet away, so my wife thinks that babies tend to freak out at night mostly because that comforting smell is becoming faint or unrecognizable. They feel abruptly abandoned. I'll admit I was skeptical at first, but then we noticed that our first baby always cried inconsolably whenever Chelsea showered. Hard to argue with that. So she tested out what she calls the “slow crib creep” method, inching our son's bassinet further away from our bed night-by-night away, moving into the hallway next, and so on until he finally landed in his own room.
It worked. Since we started implementing that tactic, all of our kids have made a smooth transition.
Now, we live in a ranch house with a sprawling kitchen, a living room, a hallway and three other rooms between our kids' bedroom and our own. Doing things this way, it was inevitable that our babies would wind up sleeping in the living room at some point. He won't stay here long and it's really not that far from us, but I wanted extra reassurance that he was safe when I couldn't see him at night.
Enter our sponsor, Arlo Baby Monitoring Camera. We've had various monitoring cameras throughout the house, but I had some specific requirements for the monitor that would be watching over my mini me. It had to be able to auto-record clips in 1080 HD, have absurdly-crisp night vision, and allow me to talk or play music at him. Check, check and check.
With the free Arlo app, I can see from my phone or computer that he's safe.
It even alerts me about the air quality around him and any sounds or motion that's detected, with the ability to discern baby-crying from other ambient noise.
Given our constantly-mobile situation with the play pen moving all over the house, one of the biggest selling points was the fact that it has a rechargeable battery so I can unplug it to temporarily record different views or move to a new position. We used to have a home monitoring camera that had to be perpetually plugged-in, and that was a problem whenever we had a power outage or even just a shuffled furniture around.
This one also gets bonus points for having little bunny ears on it, and no scary blinking red lights to freak our other kids out. Chelsea called it the “Cutest Monitor Ever!!!” (exclamation points are her own). I don't have much to say about the adorability of my technology, but I do appreciate the baby-focused nuances such as ability to play a variety of lullabies or nature sounds or even record my own voice with an auto-timer shut-off so our son doesn't get too used to hearing music all night long.
We've used the nightlight feature a ton, activating a trippy light show if he cries in the middle of the night. It's way better than any separate mobile. I'm also impressed by how customizable it is, with the ability to turn motion detection on and off, control it by geofencing and even setup a schedule based on our habits. Another big priority for me is the ability to constantly monitor, even if my screen's off or I'm across the country on business while Chelsea's holds the fort down at home.
I can even securely share a livestream with relatives and download recordings in case we feel some weird compulsion to put them on YouTube (in this family, it just might happen).
So while I know that our trusty Bjorne is on the scene, we've got an extra eye on our little guy.
Just in case.