19 February 2009

Baby wrap - a swaddling aid


I've just made a prototype that I'm calling the Baby Wrap (Baby Burrito was already trademarked!). It's purpose is to help new parents swaddle their babies. Swaddling is so important to the well-being of newborns but unless you're willing to take the time to learn how to swaddle your little bundle snugly (and I think some Dads give up when their swaddles come undone because they're afraid of wrapping up something so precious and fragile too tightly), it can be a frustrating act that gets handed over to mom, or left out all together.

Rather than make a blanket (everyone has tons of baby blankets already), this wrap is intended to go around the outside of a blanket - no matter how you've bundled or swaddled the little one. My hope is that it will hold together even a loose swaddle, but I'll have to wait for my neighbors to report on its usefulness since they are my first testers - and the inspiration behind the design.


The outside is a soft quilter's cotton with 1/2" double-fold bias tape.

The inside is a super-soft Minky fabric with stars. My prototype went together quickly but I'll wait to have it tested with a real baby and daddy before making changes and improvements.

Due to a lack of infant models in my house, here's parrot, modeling the swaddle, which did a great job of holding his wings in close and snug to his body! If we had more baby dolls around, it probably would have made for a less comical model and I could have showed it with a blanket or sleeping sack. Anyway, there are two 6" strips of velcro on the inside to make it adjustable and hopefully easy to tighten around baby. I will send this little creation to my neighbors and see what they report after a few days of use. If all works well - I'll post a tutorial and make another one for my bambino on the way so Kevin won't be so frustrated when it's his turn to swaddle his little bundle.

1 comment:

Unknown said...

As the tester.....
GREAT idea! Only problem was that by the time we tried this on Waverly, she was 6-7 weeks old and too big for it. A longer wrap (or a smaller baby) and this would have worked wonders for my husband's less than stellar swaddling abilities. Like Sara mentioned, even after nearly 4 months (yes, I'm still swaddling), all of the swaddling gets passed off to me. Oh, well, hopefully other babies & new parents can benefit from Sara's ingenuity!