I've never understood why people think it's a good idea to jog babies up and down. Would that put YOU to sleep?

But anyway, congratulations on the new grandson. It sounds like you are enjoying him.

Yes, the babies like the singing. Scientists have studied newborns in hospital nurseries and learned that the speech centers of their brains activate when people speak. They ignore other sounds. So part of the success of lullabys is that they contain speech.

In fact, babies are alert to speech even before being born. For example, Italian babies respond to Italian but ignore German because the rhythm is different.

My mother used to put babies to sleep by singing the same lullaby repeatedly, softer and softer and softer...