Manhattan Toy Infant Stim-Mobile > Reviews (1)

This is a fantastic product! Young babies (up to the age of about 4-6 months) can't see in colour. Which is a shame, because many mobiles and other products allegedly designed for small babies are in pastel colours. Great if you're a grown-up, with a sophisticated eye for colour - useless if you're a little baby! Babies love stark images as well, because their eyesight (as well as being monochrome) is quite poor. Well, to be more accurate, their eyesight is fine, but their brain can't yet process the information their eyes are giving them! When they're newborn, they can only focus about 8 to 15 inches away. They can see the face of the person holding them, but not much more, mainly because that's all they need to see.

So what this company have done is give babies what they want - a mobile with stark black and white and primary coloured images. The mobile is very lightweight and made of 5 sets of plastic discs - some round and some square. There are geometric patterns of various types and colours on the various discs, which can even be wiped clean if necessary. It's very easy to click together and you can swap the discs round every now and again to mildly befuddle your baby temporarily and keep him even more interested!

I was a bit skeptical at first as it's quite unlike other mobiles. How wrong can you be - our son was fascinated by this mobile virtually from birth. He lies in his Moses basket giggling and "chatting" to the mobile incredibly happily, and we move it to his cot for overnight. If he wakes up before us, he'll perfectly happily watch the mobile for ages before yelling for his breakfast! You can virtually hear his brain working as he looks back and forth at the different patterned discs. To see how engaged he is, and how much he loves this mobile, see my profile picture! We've been incredibly impressed with this mobile and would heartily recommend it. You can buy them on eBay, sometimes on Amazon and at some toy shops and websites geared towards more "developmental" toys. It costs between 15 and 20 quid and it would be cheap at 10 times the price for the stimulation it gives your baby and the time it buys you!

I even copied the idea and drew some black and white designs (of a car, crosses, hearts, faces, etc) and put them in a holder for my son to look at when travelling in his carseat. Again, he looks back and forth at all the images until he falls asleep - he hardly ever cries in the car. I noticed when researching this review that the company actually do a proper "carseat gallery". I'm sure that would be great as well.

I've had to answer dumb questions as part of this review about this mobile and how many positions its sides have (?!?!). Please ignore that bit!