I don’t really enjoy singing. I rarely sing hymns at church, unless it’s a song I really like. I’ve already admitted that I never do more than mouth “Happy Birthday.”
But there’s something about having tiny children that has changed that.
I’m still not sure that I enjoy it, but I definitely do it a lot. Half the time it’s because I get asked to sing a specific song. “Old McDonald! Horsey! Cow! Horsey! Duck! Cow!” Over and over again. You never realize how short and weird a song is until you’ve sung “Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes” a couple hundred times. But the other half of the time? They’re made up songs that have popped into my head and stuck.
I’m not sure where they came from or why, but when I noticed E singing a few of them recently I started laughing. Some day he’s going to realize that our family has our own unique set of nursery rhyme type songs. These songs are usually around some of the routines we have in our house, and just singing them can sometimes trigger something in a small toddler’s brain, and he’ll start doing whatever we need him to without asking him.
For example, when baby G was tiny and I was struggling with solo bedtime and getting everyone upstairs, I started singing a song about it. And pretty soon instead of chasing down a toddler and trying to carry him up the stairs with a baby in my arms as well, I’d sing the song and he’d drop whatever he was doing and climb up the stairs. MAGIC.
Which has meant we have a lot of songs. I’m not going to sing them for you (unless you spend some time here and then you’ve probably heard a few of these), but I’ll paste in the lyrics so you can laugh at the ridiculousness that is our house right now:
The go upstairs song. “Dad” is added/removed depending on if he’s home or not:
We all go upstairs.
We all go upstairs.
Mama, [Dad], baby, E,
We all go upstairs.
Brush, brush, brush your teeth
Before you go to bed.
Brush every single tooth,
Inside your little head.
We’re gonna change your diaper,
Your diaper, your diaper.
We’re gonna change your diaper,
Because your butt is dirty.
We’re gonna change your diaper,
Your diaper, your diaper.
We’re gonna change your diaper,
So your butt will be dry.
This is a random one that popped in my head one morning as we were heading to breakfast, where E usually has a cup of milk as well as a cup of water. (To the theme song from ‘Married with Children’ aka love and marriage). It also usually ends with tickles now:
Milk and water.
Milk and water.
Milk and water,
FOR E!
While that’s a song E only likes me to sing, Tom has his own song he sings in the morning with him. When I’m working from home, Tom wakes E up. When they come downstairs I usually hide and jump out at them from around a corner (I swear E loves it!) This is the song that Tom sings:
We’re looking for a Mama,
A Mama, a Mama.
We’re looking for a Mama,
I wonder where she is?
This is probably the longest song we sing, but it sometimes takes this long to get pants on a squirmy toddler:
You gotta put on pants,
You gotta put on pants,
Because if you don’t your legs will be cold,
You gotta put on pants.
You gotta put on pants,
You gotta put on pants,
Because if you don’t people will laugh at you,
You gotta put on pants.
You gotta put on pants,
You gotta put on pants,
It’s just a thing you gotta do,
You gotta put on pants.
This is a song I started singing to baby G when he was tiny, hence the nickname Lovey. Recently he’s been upset and crying on the drive home, and to my surprise if I sing this song over and over while driving, he stops crying and calms down. (And yes this is a very short and obnoxious song to sing over and over. But I only have myself to blame?
(To tune of Louie Louie – for baby G):
Lovey Lovey, oh oh
Mama loves you so
Yeah yeah yeah yeah
To be fair, E has a song I sing to him too:
Mama loves you
Yes I do, Yes I do, Yes I do.
Mama loves you
Yes I do. I do, I do, I do.
You’ve also probably heard us sing the clean up song originally from Barney. Daycare uses it, and so do some of our friends. Boy does it work!
Clean up, clean up
Everybody everywhere.
Clean up, clean up
Everybody do their share.
So yes, it’s weird here. But hopefully the tiny humans will love our kind of weird.
(I’ve also probably forgotten some songs that I’ll remember randomly when I start singing them in a few days).
