Did You Sing to Your Babies/Children and If So, Which Songs?

For whatever reason, my son always liked me to sing "Close to You" by the Carpenters when he was a baby, toddler, and preschooler. And "In a cabin, in the woods..." complete with all the hand motions to the In a cabin, in the woods" song.

I used to make up songs for my second DS. I doubt I could remember any of them, now. I once made a scrapbook page about a song my mom made up for my niece, but never thought to do the same with the song I song to DS.

With DS #1, I used to sing songs from my childhood (Hush Little Baby, You Are my Sunshine, Raindrops Keep Falling on my Head, A Bushel & a Peck) along with songs from the Sound of Music.

I used to make up songs, like ds16 I used I used the tune of chitty chitty bang bang - first name middle name I love you!

Ds10 I sang "Jesus Jesus Jesus, there's something about that name" as a lullaby. We sing that every once In awhile with goofy little grins. I have a friend who has been sendings songs on YouTube almost every day. She must be pretty special because he told me to send her OUR song.

I used to sing Brahm's Lullaby, Secret Love (Doris Day), Don't Sit Under The Apple Tree, and Days by Kirsty Maccoll. I tended to alter the words somewhat, and still sing them with my own words to this day!

I also used to sing a Mauritian lullaby that my sister-in-law sang to the kids. That's the one they remember best!

This Pretty Planet

My "little girl" is now 12 and I haven't sung this in a long time.  Thanks for bringing back the warmest of memories!

This is another favorite:  Servant Song

The Marvelous Toy
The Zoo Song
5 Little Monkeys
Hush-a-Bye don't you cry, we shall go to grammy's. Over the hill and by the mill to see the little lambies.

Hush little Baby don't say a word, mama's gonna buy you a mockingbird...

I had a little doggie who used to sit and beg. And doggie tumbled down the stairs and broke his little leg. Now doggie I will nurse you and try to make you well. And you shall have a collar and a pretty silver bell...

And to wake up in the morning (I still sing this to my grown up 23 year old DD)
Way up in the sky the little birds fly, way down in their nest, the little birds rest. With a wing on the left, and a wing in the right the little birds sleep sll through the night. (Shhhhh, they're sleeping!) the bright sun comes up, the dew falls away, "good morning good morning!" the little birds say! (Sung complete with ridiculous hand gestures and chirpy voice)

I sang to my daughter You are my Sunshine, Jesus Loves You, the theme song from the Mickey Mouse Club & It's a Small World and many others! For my grandkids I usually made up songs that included things about them and their names. My grandson would always ask me to sing the J.J. song!! We are going to have a great grandson in a few weeks, so I better get my songs ready! lol!

Return to Pooh Corner by Kenny Loggins. They still ask for it especially when they aren't feeling the best. They are 19,15 and 13.?

I used to sing Desperado to DS when he was little bitty. I always sang I Will (beatles) to DD. Somewhere over the rainbow was our bedtime song though. I would stand in the hallway between each of their doors and sing to them at bedtime. I remember once we had guests staying with us and DD was NOT going to go to sleep unless I sang…Lord help me I sang the worst rendition I have ever sung of anything that night just because other people could hear me.  I still hear about that from my SIL LOL.

More recently, DS especially will text me screenshots of whatever he is listening to at any given time. It's pretty random, but I love that he gives me that little glimpse into his day. Simple Man is our song now. If it comes on, whatever is happening, he stops and we dance  . I'm having the DJ play it at his graduation party this weekend. <sigh> the tears are just constant these days...

We were at a birthday party for an old friend a few months ago and they had the same singer/dj guy we are using for for the party - he sang "Your Song" (Elton John) and DS tried to get his girlfriend to dance with him, but she's kind of shy and wouldn't. He said "let me and mom show you how it's done.." Ah! That made me so happy. We danced like fools. This group of friends of ours are all the same age as us, but we had our kids really young and they all had kids later than us and have elementary age and toddlers - I had more than one mom say she hoped she had a relationship like that with her son/daughter when they were teens. 

Lord the time passes so quickly..

In terms of getting them to sleep, my kiddos preferred Paul Anka's "Put Your Head On My Shoulder."  It just came out one night.  I remember my mom singing it when I was a child.

I sang camp songs to my girls - Today, I see the Moon, Wee Baby Moon, Grab Brass Rings. When one of our DD's as decorating her son's nursery she found a plaque "God Bless the Moon and God Bless Me" and that was the colors the nursery was decorated in. Taken right from the song I see the Moon.

Our youngest DD and her husband has picked a song for their son - The Rainbow Connection and she sings him all the camp songs too. They want a special song for each child.

Of course, none of us can carry a tune, but we make a joyful noise.


A camp song too!
And to wake up in the morning (I still sing this to my grown up 23 year old DD)
Way up in the sky the little birds fly, way down in their nest, the little birds rest. With a wing on the left, and a wing in the right the little birds sleep sll through the night. (Shhhhh, they're sleeping!) the bright sun comes up, the dew falls away, "good morning good morning!" the little birds say! (Sung complete with ridiculous hand gestures and chirpy voice)

For my youngest, I would sing him Sweet Caroline. No idea where it came from, but I changed the Caroline's to my sons name. He still loves it when I bust it out every now and then. It would always work when he was upset. Also when he was less than 6 months old and would get fussy I would put Bruce Springsteen's "Brilliant Disguise" on repeat and dance him all over the living room. He loved it.

I sang to all 3, but mostly pretty standard little kid songs. Twinkle twinkle, old McDonald, Mary had a little lamb, etc. They really liked being sang to. We would sing songs before bed every night when they were tiny. After we read a few bedtime stories.

My Mom used to listen to and sing Que Sera, Sera by Doris Day while she was in the kitchen. It stuck with me.

When I had my dd, we recorded a video to send to all the parents. It was about 2 hours long and it just had little tidbits of our week. When my Mom saw it, my sister says she started crying and had to stop the tape when it came to a part in the video that showed my dancing with my dd, then about a month old singing Que Sera, Sera. That became our song without really thinking about it.

When I had my ds, dd didn't like it, but our dance duo became a trio. To this day my kids sing it and half the time I don't think they are aware of it.

Jennifer

I would sing Too Ra Loo Ra Loo Ral [Irish Lullaby] in my absolutely awful singing voice. When DD grew up, she told me, laughingly, that she used to think "Please don't sing, Mommy, please don't sing", but she put up with it, and probably went to sleep out of self defence!