Should I survive my child’s first year, I know how I’ll make my fortune. I shall bring one or more of the following inventions to market (consider this my patent-pending claim).

1. The Baby Keeper – Think of this as an emergency baby shelf. A flexible sheet of impermeable material is suspended between two rails, and the frame holding those rails is attached to a wall or cabinet. It’s relatively shallow (8-10 inches), and about two feet wide.
    
   When you find yourself in an emergency situation that requires two hands for a moment, rather than needing to run your cub to the nursery and coming back, only to need to go get him again because the instant you put him down, the squalling begins, you simply pop your youngin into the Baby Keeper for a moment. His weight pulls the material snug on either side of him, like a momentary swaddle. He can’t roll or climb out, because the sides are smooth and taught, and he is at the bottom.
    
   One of these should be bolted to the wall of every room in my house (two each in the kitchen and bathroom), the side of both our cars, every restaurant table, the telephone poles along the route where we walk the dogs (often with our child), every aisle in the supermarket, and on every exercise machine known to man. Just take my word for it.

 

2. The Insta-swaddle – This adjustable baby-sleeve is made of hollow, airtight tubes of flexible material connected to a CO2-cartridge-powered inflator. Pop the kid into the sleeve, pull the trigger, and bang, your child is instantly immobilized, just the way he likes it.
    
   It’s perfect for when it’s 4 AM and you don’t have the fine motor skills necessary to wrap and re-wrap your child with intricately knotted cloth (or perhaps your super-human infant was born already smart and strong enough to either untie or pull apart said knots), and as an added bonus, if you accidentally drop your child in a lake, he’ll float!

 

3. The Power Baby – this invention brings green power technology to child-rearing! A small wind turbine and electrical generator** is fitted into a pacifier-like mouthpiece. When your baby won’t be soothed, substitute this for his regular binky, and utilize the incredible power of a cranky infant’s bellowing to charge your cell phone or other small devices. Comes with USB and bayonet output adapters. Let’s face it. You won’t be sleeping anyway, so why not websurf on your tablet for free?
    
   ** Can also be fitted with a hydro-power turbine, if you’ve got a spit-up super-star.