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It happens nearly every time we’re changing his diaper. We pull off the diaper, usually congratulate Jasper on the ungodly stink being emitted, clean him up, and right before we put a new diaper on, we start singing:
“You’ve got to (pause) (pause) AIIIIIIR it out!”
Jasper typically dissolves in giggles, waves his hands around, and we sing the song three or four more times before closing up his fresh diaper.
I’m pretty sure this behavior–making up songs to entertain the baby–is incredibly common in the parenting world. Gone are the days of singing traditional nursery rhymes (because, for real, have you LISTENED to the words of “Rock-a-bye, Baby” lately?), and in their place we have a whole litany of songs tailored to specific routines, moments, or babies themselves.
More of my favorites:
- While in the grocery store the other day, I spontaneously started changing “We’re going down the ai-sle, going down the ai-sle, going to get some food! Going to get some food!” Sean started dancing, I drummed on the cart, and Jasper grinned at us like the fools we are. Other parents stared us like we’re crazy, but another kid started dancing to our chant as well, so I consider it a victory for awesomeness worldwide.
- Sean and I are SO BAD about substituting “baby” or “smoosh” for actual words in popular songs. One of Jazz’s favorites is when we bust out “all the babies standing in the line for the bathroom!”, complete with beatboxing and and different inflections. I’ve also sung “every-baby, every-baby, every-baby wants to be a smoosh” and (this one is going to kill some music purists) “haaaaave you ever been, have you ever been–to electric baby land?” with absolutely no shame.
- We also make up songs that have no reason or meter to them whatsoever, and basically serve to narrate whatever Jasper is doing at that time. However, they always have rhythm and rhyme, because we keep it real. You know, something like “he’s crawling, he’s crawling, he’s all over the place–he’s climbing, he’s climbing, up on Kali’s (the dog) face.”
- We MIGHT also sing “smooshie” over and over again to the Mos Eisley cantina song. You know what I’m talking about, right?
What songs have/did you made up for your babies?
Oh Stephanie, the similarities between us are so crazy. I sing a narrative all day long, especially to the dogs! The hubs and I substitute “smoosh” or “smooshie” for words all the time — we say “I smoosh you” instead of “I love you” a lot. (And dare I even admit, “I smoosh your smooshiness.” And the Cantina song is my ring tone. 😉
My parents did this for us growing up and now my hubby and I do it all the time! =D Most of our songs include Asher’s name and what he’s doing at the time and are usually to the tunes of Twinkle, Twinkle or Row Row Row Your Boat. Last night, for example, my little guy was wide awake and giggling at 3am, so I was singing a song with endless verses about why he was awake, how he should be sleeping like his papa, how I wanted to be sleeping. He was cooing back, so maybe we’ll have another singer on our hands!
Our girl has a ton of names Georgia, Bonzo, Biscuit-Bear, Hotdog, Snarfleface and any variation on those you could imagine, and most of her names get written into songs.
We do: “She’s…My…LittleOl’Lil’Ol’Lil’Biscuit, LittleOl’Lil’Ol’Lil’Biscuit, LittleOl’Lil’Ol’Lil’Biscuit Girl…” Which is supposed to be vaguely to the tune of getaway banjo music.
and one that goes “Miss B, Miss B, you’re the one for me…”
And obviously we change the words of Miss New Booty to “Miss Poo Booty” as needed.
Early on with Conan I started “customizing” traditional lullabies, because yeah, the original lyrics are kind of atrocious. Our favorite is You Are My Sunshine, which now has about 700 possible verses.
You are my [sunshine/baby/Conan]
My darling [sunshine/baby/Conan]
You make my Happy
When Skies are Grey
I’m gonna Love you
Now and forever
Clouds can’t take
my Sunshine away
that’s about as close to the original lyrics as we ever get anymore. 🙂
Oh yes, we both do this a lot! One of my favorites is Drunken Sailor substituted with “silly baby.” I’ve made up all sorts of verses for it. Jaimie Boy is now Melody, and when I bath her I sing the Naked Baby In The Tub song which is totally made up. DH has some of his own songs he sings too.
We usually make up songs involving “Jonah”, “rockstar”, and “punkface” (quite the term of endearment in our household). I also am a pro at songs about bathtime and duckies, and stinky diapers. My son, at 8 months old, already thinks butts are hilarious.
I love this post! Everyone always makes fun of us because my partner and I make up songs about EVERYTHING. We often wonder if Oliver and Lucy will be dissapointed when they grow up and discover that life isn’t actually a musical 🙂
Our grocery store song is “The Age of Asparagus” which I began as a kid.
my dad’s a professional musician, so my family had quite a lot. The two that I particularly remember from my little brothers’ early childhood were “This is the way we tidy up!” and “Going for a ride in the car-car”
when we have a poopy diaper, we sing “you’ve got a big doody from your big booty.” lol
I have a massive baby bump (first child) and we have already started singing silly songs. The other day I went to the mall, at 39 weeks pregnant. I was joking with my husband and we were singing to “Jenny from the Block” – ..Used to have a little belly, now I’ve got a lot. Don’t you know that I’m the most pregnant on the block. But I know where it came from.
Oh my gosh, my husband and I do this ALL the time!! From taking the Madagascar(??) movie song (who likes to poop it poop it) to changing up Yo Gabba Gabba songs. Everything we seem to do and see becomes some sort of ridiculous kid song. It’s to the point where we hardly notice the strange looks of onlookers;) Kids do let us be kids again.
Allie had a TON of songs just for her. We used to turn every task into a song for her, diapers, baths, cleaning up her toys, everything. My mom called her “Allie-Oops” when she was a newborn (she was an unplanned homebirth- Loooooong story). One of her first songs was “Allie ooper, sooper pooper” which had it’s own tune and no definite set of lyrics. My mom also made up a song to help her spell her full name that went “A-L-E-X-A-N-D-R-A, won’t you please come out to play” to the tune of the ABC song. We alter the words to some of the Noggin songs for various situations, we sing variations on “Yellow Submarine” for her. We’re always singing. All of us love to sing, and now Allie makes up her own words. I think it’s a beatiful (albeit sometimes ridiculously silly) thing that has done nothing but benefit all of us.
Super Pooper (ABBA, don’t you know? too bad i’m weak on the rest of the words – the tune has also been used for “Scuba Doula”) and the new one – Splodey Splodey Splodey Poo (Cab Calloway!) are our favorite diaper changing songs. i also try the Jesus Christ Superstar as a lullaby, but it calms me down more than Herself. 🙂
Heaven only knows what we end up singing in the middle of the night….