Dad tip #2: Wind-up mobiles are crap

$50 might sound like a ridiculous amount of money to spend on something as seemingly trivial as a mobile. After all, you can only use it in your baby's crib until they begin pushing up on their hands and knees, at which point, it becomes a safety hazard.

However, let's think about the first few months of your life as a new parent. You're learning how to change diapers, you're feeding the baby all the time, you're insanely sleep deprived, and the biggest decision of your weekend is whether you should eat, pee, or shower with the ten free minutes you have.

Enter the $50 mobile (we have the Tiny Love Symphony, Light & Music Mobile). It rotates in a billion different places, it lights up, it plays music, it makes nature sounds, and most importantly, it keeps your kid mesmerized for up to 20 minutes straight.

Let's compare these attributes with those of a traditional wind-up mobile. It plays an annoyingly jaunty version of some children's song like "How Much Is that Doggie in the Window", it plays that song about 20 times over before stopping after three minutes, and it forces you to rush back to the crib in a panic to rewind the mobile HOPEFULLY before your baby starts flipping out.

In retrospect, I'd probably go back and buy the model that comes with a remote control so that Sunday mornings when baby wakes up at 5:45am, I can fire up the mobile from our warm cozy bed for an extra 20 minutes of sleep. Think about it ... wind-up mobiles really are crap and your sanity is worth way more than $50.