How Bebe Du Nord Toys Help Your Baby’s Development

Educational toys are crucial in helping your baby develop essential skills they will need throughout their life. From the very beginning, babies are eager to learn about the world around them. The texture, shapes and colors of toys stimulate a variety of learning experiences. Here are three great ways that Bebe du Nord toys help your baby’s development.

Nurture Creativity and Imagination

Stuffed animals like the Polka Dot Club rabbits and bears from Bebe du Nord help nurture creativity and imagination for your baby’s development. These toys encourage pretend play that helps build the groundwork for future social skills. As your baby grows, stuffed animals can become imaginary friends to help your child cope and manage their emotions. 

Develop Fine and Gross Motor Skills 

Bebe du Nord toys can help your baby develop fine and gross motor skills. From the age of one month, these toys help stimulate your child’s senses. Stainless steel toy keys and wooden rattles encourage eye-hand coordination as the baby reaches out to grab them. 

Encourage Problem Solving

Bebe du Nord toys like the wooden stacking toy in our product catalog encourage problem-solving skills for your baby’s development. These toys encourage your baby to figure out how to think about the steps involved in putting things together. Through experimentation, your baby develops concentration and focus to come up with solutions.

Shop Bebe du Nord Toys for Your Baby’s Development

Playtime is the best time for learning and teaching. Toys provide numerous potential experiences for your baby to build skills for a successful future. Your baby can develop all the vital skills for their development with high-quality heirloom toys from Bebe Du Nord that are built to last. Our toys are all-natural, easy to care for and non-toxic for your baby. Shop our online collection of Bebe du Nord toys today.

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A VERY RICH SPRING

“What can I do to help?  Can I answer phone calls?”  Lois, my very own sweet mother that still worries about her baby. 

Flowers are not the only beauty that I have seen this spring.  I have been fortunate enough to have the privilege of answering the calls, texts, and emails of families that have welcomed a new baby into their family.  They are elated, exhausted, worried, overjoyed, unsure, confident, grateful, barely hanging on, but with every single family there is a palpable love.

All of these babies are loved. They don’t just know it, they feel it and experience it. A palpable love. A love so strong, it comes through in the voice of a worried grandma, in the email of a detail-oriented father, in the words of a strong mother with twins, while she chases her toddler trying desperately not to drop her phone, in the words of a mother that assures me (actually assures me!), that it’s ok that we can’t be there every night, she is just grateful and at peace with the nights we can be there. 

So many babies. This has been our busiest spring. So many late nights, early mornings, and long days working behind the scenes, and it would all be impossible without my assistant, Lisa. Lisa intuitively picks up where I left off so that I can spend time with my new granddaughter. 

Palpable, strong love. 

“All of the care we have had has been fantastic.” And this leads me right into the incredible outpouring of love and support for these families through our care providers. They have juggled schedules, filled in for one another, sacrificed an event, or simply a night in their own bed to help a family. Sometimes, I then worry that they are working too hard, and I want to be sure that they are also prioritizing their health and families. So, we talk. But the thing is ~ they love this work. It fills them up to the brim.

A palpable, strong love. 

This love weaves through everything that we all do every day and every night. A team of incredible care providers working so hard to help our incredible families.  It’s a miracle that it all works.  But love does that – makes the impossible possible.    

“It has been busy and amazing at the same time. Thank you for your patience and for the lovely opportunity. It is a privilege to work for you and even more so families and their precious gifts.”  Sheila  Emoji  Emoji  Emoji 😊

“What do you want for dinner?”, “Emoji I love you. Emoji”, my husband, Phil ❤️

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How the Beauty of Simplicity is Beneficial for Your Baby

Your baby’s environment can influence how they learn and behave. Being surrounded by numerous toys and items can cause sensory overwhelm and stress. Babies need only a few high-quality things to help them grow. Buying less stuff is also good for the planet for future generations. Here is how the beauty of simplicity can be beneficial for your baby.

Simplicity Fosters Creative Play

The toys and items in your baby’s environment can help stimulate creativity and imagination. Choosing fewer items helps your baby figure out ways to play with toys in resourceful ways. Many of today’s toys for babies do their playing for them. Simple items are less distracting and allow your baby to figure out new ways to have fun with them.

Simplicity Encourages Gratitude and Appreciation

The simplicity of fewer baby items helps encourage gratitude and appreciation. Fewer toys are easier to care for and teach your baby to value what they have as they grow. Toys that are seen as disposable can quickly get broken and destroyed without care because your child can just get another. As your baby gets older, they can learn how to become conscientious consumers when asking for new toys.

Simplicity Creates a Calmer Home

Many new parents can easily become overwhelmed with all the items they think their baby might need. Too many baby items create chaos and stress with the constant cleanup. Simplicity helps create a calmer and cleaner environment for both you and your baby so you can live happy and healthy lives.

Simplicity with Heirloom Quality Baby Products

The beauty of simplicity and less is more is foundational for your baby’s success. Adopting a less is more attitude with your parenting can help your baby in numerous ways. Bebe Du Nord offers heirloom-quality baby products that will last for generations. Embrace the beauty of simplicity by shopping our collection today!

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Benefits of Swaddling with Baby Blankets

Swaddling is a technique used for thousands of years to help soothe newborns and help them sleep. Figuring out how to swaddle takes a little bit of a learning curve but well worth the time invested. Here are three benefits your baby will receive from swaddling.

Swaddling Helps Your Baby Feel Secure

The world can be a harsh environment for newborns. Bright lights and new noises can be discomforting. Swaddling techniques help mimic the warm and secure environment of the womb to help them feel safe. It can stabilize a baby’s heart rate and lower cortisol levels to help them self-soothe.

Alleviates the Startle Reflex

Newborns can often experience a startle reflex in the first four months of life. This normal neurological response creates a free-falling sensation for your baby. This reflex can be disruptive to your baby’s sleep. Swaddling with baby blankets can help minimize these spontaneous movements to help them get the rest they need.

Helps Calm Colic Symptoms

A baby with colic can be an incredibly difficult experience for any parent. Many parents often feel helpless trying to calm their crying baby. Colic symptoms are believed to be the result of a baby’s developing digestive system. An inability to digest food can create intense pain and gas, which results in prolonged crying and fussiness. Swaddling with a baby blanket can be therapeutic by applying light pressure to the baby’s stomach to relieve colic symptoms.

Swaddling with Bebe Du Nord Blankets

Swaddling with baby blankets can be an effective technique to help your baby feel comfortable and safe. The heirloom blankets available at Bebe Du Nord can last you for generations to come. With our baby blankets, you can keep an online family history diary of who the blanket originally belonged to and the generations swaddled with them in the future. Shop our collection today!

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3 Vital Benefits of Baby Mobiles

Baby mobiles are an essential part of any nursery. These devices can soothe your baby to sleep and keep them entertained while they are awake. Mobiles are more than simply nursery decor.  They are an indispensable educational tool to help your baby’s overall development. Here are the vital benefits your baby can receive from mobiles.  

Brain Stimulation for Neural Development  

The primary benefit for a baby mobile is to stimulate brain function for neural development. As your baby’s eyes follow the swaying of the hanging toys, the experience helps sharpen spatial reasoning and depth perception. The mobile will also help lull the baby to sleep, which is imperative for proper brain development.  

Development of Strength and Fine Motor Skills  

Mobiles are highly beneficial for helping your baby develop fine motor skills. As your baby starts to sit up, they will need to turn their head to sit up. This can help strengthen muscles in the neck and back. As the baby reaches for the dangling toys, hand-eye coordination improves motor skills development.  

Strong Educational Start with Baby Mobiles  

You can also use a baby mobile to teach your baby new words, shapes, and colors. If the baby mobile features toy animals, you can help your baby learn about where those animals live and the sounds they make. Counting the number of dangling objects can give them a head start on their math skills.  

Looking for a Baby Mobile for Your Nursery?  

Choosing the best baby mobile is crucial. There are many options to choose from so you can fit your decor. Ideally, you will want to choose a mobile that features colors to stimulate brain development and keep your baby entertained. At Bebe Du Nord, we offer the highest quality selection of baby mobiles, clothing, and toys. Shop our collection today! 

DISCLAIMER: “if you do choose to use mobiles, make sure they do not hang low enough to entangle your baby, especially once she begins to roll or get up on her hands and knees. In fact,  once your baby is 5 months old or able to sit up, it will definitely be time for her mobile to come  down.” – AAP Healthy Children 

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Calling All Grandparents

Covid.  So many changes for everyone.  We moved into a new home, and my parents moved in right next door. Duplexes are making a comeback!  Our hearts are at rest knowing they are safe. 

Moving meant a new office, with room for all of our Bébé du Nord goodies, and it is a room filled to the brim with art, books, beautifully scented soaps, and glorious bunnies and bears that beg to be touched and loved, especially the Polka Dot Club classic bear. Is it weird that this grandma could not let go of this magnificent handmade mohair bear, and actually thought of carrying it around all day?  

My granddaughter, Monica, loves to come into my office and promptly proceeds to fill a bag with all things BDN!  As you can imagine – it is tough to pull them back out and put them back on the shelves. So today, I had what I think is a great idea!  Filling a beautiful wooden crate in my office with all of my favorite things and making it accessible to any babies and children that happen to visit my office is the way to go. 

But, what am I really creating?  Memories. Memories of a warm home with a room where grandma’s passion for caring for every new life is ever-present. A room filled with joyful, beautiful, heirloom toys and books that they will always remember.  In reality, it’s a room filled with a grandmother’s love. A love that is so strong, so deep, so profound that it’s hard to put into words. And this grandma wants to create those memories not so much that they remember these physical things, but that they remember her long after she is gone, and the love that she showered upon them.  It’s the dream of every grandparent.  

In turn, it is also creating memories for me.  These memories will become pictures of the past that I will always relish.  

Feel free to send us an email, or call if we can put together an heirloom crate for your grandchildren.  

Take a peek inside:  

Treasured books, our new forever baby book made of solid wood from Little Wooden Wonders,  with illustrations by our very own in-house artist, Kayla from Angora Moose. https://bebedunord.com/shop/forever-wooden-book/

A handmade stacking toy, large rattle, and of course a hedgehog on wheels from Little Wooden Wonders. https://bebedunord.com/shop/babys-first-wood-stacking-toy/

https://bebedunord.com/shop/little-wooden-wonders-large-wooden-rattle/

https://bebedunord.com/shop/wooden-hedgehog/

A stunning and soothing baby board book from one of my best friends, Minnesota author Vicki Sheaffer, illustrated by the amazing Minnesota artist Kristie Frudden that includes the softest plushie already adored by Monica. Oh, wait a minute ~ no plushie in the picture.  I fear we have a shoplifter. Only kidding, I let Monica take it home because she adored it so much. https://www.longoverduebooks.com/order-oh-mother-how-funny

A Polka Dot Club Bear with clothing on the way. https://bebedunord.com/shop/polka-dot-club-classic-bear/

A Polka Dot Club Bunny with clothing on the way. https://bebedunord.com/shop/polka-dot-club-medium-rabbit/

A Minnesota State Teether from Sweetpea and Co for my new granddaughter due in a few weeks.  Oh, the excitement!  https://bebedunord.com/shop/minnesota-wood-teether/

A set of hand-cast pewter utensils from Beehive.  https://bebedunord.com/shop/baby-bird-baby-spoons-handmade/

A beautiful washable (key-washable) 100% wool (naturally germ and odor resistant) blanket from Faribault Mills to throw over the carpeted floor so any child or baby can play comfortably. https://bebedunord.com/shop/faribault-superfine-merino-wool-blanket-with-memory-mill-tag/

 

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In Honor of the Black Bears of the North and Bill Lea

This past summer seemed to present so many unique opportunities for so many families.  I don’t think we would have ever rented an RV and so boldly headed north for the Superior National Forest in Minnesota.  But, we did! (Notice the dirt road!)

We learned how to bake fresh, green pine cones by the fire to open up their scales so we could collect the seeds. How to search for pieces of birch bark since it was not the right time to harvest it off the trees. And to then take this birch bark and to peel apart the many layers, some so thin, they were like paper.  We love working with birch bark thanks to Pat Kruse.  Our grandchildren made little mini books, and mini pieces of art that we treasure.  Notice Cecilia’s camper. We became keen as to when the wolves would start to howl, the loons would start to wail, and knowing when a sound we heard was coming from an Aspen tree. We relished the abundant array of fir trees, and we were ALWAYS looking for moose.

We visited the International Wolf Center, and had planned on visiting the Vince Shute Wildlife Sanctuary to see Minnesota Black Bear.  We didn’t make it this year, but we are planning a return trip to see them next summer. While visiting their website, a photo popped up.  It is now one of my favorites, and is the inspiration for our love for black bears of the north and our logo. I think it reflects how many of us have felt during the pandemic.

I reached out to the photographer, Bill Lea, requesting permission to use his photo. I explained to Bill that like most businesses, we were suffering a huge loss, and we were pursuing Ecommerce. Our main business, and first love, North Star Newborns, provides in home care for newborns and infants, and it was hit hard.  Bill’s reply was thoughtful and kind ~  “As a professional photographer, I normally charge a fee for the use of any of my photos by a for-profit business.  However, these are unusual times and it sounds like the current epidemic is presenting you with some challenges.  So, yes, you can use the photo of the bear cubs on the tree branch.  My wife and I co-founded The American Bear Association and the Vince Shute Wildlife Sanctuary near Orr, MN.  I am also a nature photographer, specializing in black bears and the Great Smoky Mountains.”  I have included some of his other amazing photo’s that you can purchase as art. The link is below. 

Our artist Kayla from Angora Moose painted a beautiful rendition of a full grown bear with a baby. It is amazing to me that after looking at the work of Bill Lea, Kayla already knew the intimate connection of a mother and baby bear. It shines through her piece that Hagen and Oats reproduced in perfect way. Kayla’s art will be available soon.

All of us at Bébé du Nord and North Star Newborns wish you and your babies all the very best. Goodbye for now!  Ellen

                                                                                 https://www.billlea.com/

 

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