I started wearing DD because of trying to keep her happy, and trying to keep myself sane! But I have been amazed at hom much more involved she is in my adult conversations. I wear her in a RS 99% of the time in an upright position.

One time in particular, I remember my husband was watching me talk to an instructor for a class we took. He said it looked like Morgan was at a tennis match, turning to watch each of us speak in turn, and completely attentive to the conversation. She was just 6 months old at the time. I love that she is becoming such a social baby!

this happened to me at a children's resale clothing shop. A couple was in the store that looked very different from anyone else because of how they were dressed and the husband came up to me and talked to me about wearing DS and how they do that from where they were from.

It was so amazing and felt that connection to Sonja when he said "in my town in Africa, children are always carried as you do here." He went on for a while and told me they were visiting family from out of town and checking out the local shoppes.

I will never forget that day

i was in a sri lankan restaurant and the waiter talked about his country as well...

just read about how kids learn about language (Kids - How Biology and Culture shape the way we raise our kids. By Meredith Small). They learn by listening to our conversation, rather than by being talked to. Hearing that other parents observe what I'm starting to see in my son is... oh, so very exciting.

I always put myself in his shoes... I observed that my son would rather be in a sling watching me go about doing chores and errands, than just sitting in the stroller staring blankly. When he's with me at my level, he touches the oranges and lemons we buy, he watches conversations, etc. In a quiet alert state. I love that about the sling.

As a reward, i usually swing by a pet store to show him fish in the tank.

My family never approves... they always say... "u're carrying him too much"... but as a mom, I know what works for me and him.

That's so cool Sonja!

I haven't experienced anything like that yet (DS is only 3 months but i'm sure I will in time)

One nice thing I've found is that people touch my daughter less. Before I got the hang of the sling & would have her in a carrier, strangers would come up & touch her when they told me how cute she was. They would grab her foot & shake it or poke @ her somehow. I didn't want to jerk her away & ask them to get their potentially germy hands off!

Now that she's in a sling, I get lots of smiles but very very rarely do people touch her. Then they ask the standard stuff like: how old is she? (actually they often say "he" because I *gasp* have her wear blue sometimes), how big was she when she was born? etc.

I love that it makes people so respectful!

one of the great things i've found about wearing my girl is that she's not disturbed by noise. we we're at a mommy and me program and a little boy slammed a large plastic lego about 2 feet away and it made this loud boom. She didn't even jump and all the parents in the area we're shocked it didn't wake her. whoo hoo for washing pots and pans with her in the sling!

We had a little Woman's dinner out thing a month or so ago at a Ethiopian restaurant. I wore my baby on the front coming in, but put him on the back in the wrap/mai-tai on the way out. The owner came over and went on and on how they wear babies like that in her country, not on the front all the time like they do here (USA). She even took us back to show us a drawing of a mother babywearing in the group dinner room. So fun and neat!

When I'm wearing my baby, I noticed somehow he realized that when I'm busy talking to someone (phone, cashier, friends, etc.), my attention is not available to him. So he just make do with looking about or touching my face, etc... not fussing too much for my attention. Sometimes, if I'm taking too long... he'll just doze off in his little sweet spot. He manages to find things to do to occupy himself, perhaps because he knows even though I'm not available to him, I'm still there. Is he picking up the hint that I'm not always ready to play with him, and he has to wait his turn? Is this an early stage of learning his manners? Maybe, maybe. Maybe I'm too naive to think that this is how it's gonna be... he's only 7 months old, who knows what will happen when he's 2 yrs old.... but for now, I would like to think that this is an unexpected benefit of baby wearing.