Dad's Bag of Parenting Tricks

The fine art of baby soothing Fortunately, there are as many ways to calm a crying baby as there are, well, crying babies. Some infants will only quiet down with a drive in the car, an hour in the baby swing, or after being tightly swaddled. Others prefer dimmed lights, relaxing music, or being stripped down to a diaper. You just have to experiment to figure out what works. Though it may seem counterintuitive, adding even more noise to a wailing baby's environment may help calm her -- so try running the vacuum cleaner or hair dryer. And, needless to say, don't overlook the obvious: Make sure your baby is dry, fed, and burped.

It could be the testosterone. Or it might be a natural part of coupledom  -- checks and balances, the yin and the yang. Whatever the reason, dads do things differently. Sure, it can be infuriating sometimes (no, let's not put a dash of hot sauce in the baby's food and see if he likes it). But most of us realize that flexibility, more than anything else, is the yellow-brick road to happier children and parents. Which got us thinking: What quirky soothing techniques and coping strategies might stay-at-home fathers have up their flannel sleeves? To find out, we went undercover (fake mustache, utility belt) and brought back the following manly maneuvers.

Master soothers

"One day, during what I call the witching hour, I was trying to calm down my four-month-old daughter with some music on iTunes. When the music visualizer appeared on the computer screen, she instantly began staring at the pulsating patterns and making little cooing noises. It was almost spooky, it was so easy."
 -- Chris Ford, Las Vegas, Nevada

"To help my son wind down at nap time, I would try to fool him into thinking that everyone was going to sleep. I would lie on the floor near him and close my eyes. Sometimes I'd fall asleep myself."
 -- Gary Drevitch, New York City

"Back when my son was one month old and wouldn't sleep, I'd put on the sound track for Les Misè rables and play a song called 'Stars.' Not only did he stop screaming right away, he went into a hypnotic trance! Sixteen months later, whenever he hears the opening note, he stops crying and relaxes. That's his number one song, but rock soothes him, too: Madonna, Aerosmith, Bon Jovi  -- anything with a good beat."
 -- Chris Scofield, Kissimmee, Florida

"My oldest child was the worst napper on the face of the earth. I'd have to walk him up and down for 30 minutes to get him to sleep, and then he'd nap for only 20 minutes  -- if I continued to hold him. Since I never had time for the gym, I decided to kill two birds with one stone: I'd change into workout gear, put him in a lightweight carrier, place a radio on each landing, and climb up and down the stairs while he slept."
 -- Jeff Nygaard, Richmond, Virginia

Barbara Aria is a freelance writer in New York City.