12/19/2025
A reminder that we are enough, during this busy and sometimes crazy holiday season.
STOP ENTERTAINING YOUR BABIES
A Loving Call to Young Mothers in a Screaming World
STOP ENTERTAINING YOUR BABIES.
Let the words land gently, but let them land.
Our world is a constant screaming mess—
advertising booming from every corner,
billboards shouting “Buy, buy, buy…
Subscribe, subscribe, subscribe.
Join our Membership, join, join..
Freebies….Freebies….
phones buzzing with notifications that steal the moment,
social feeds blasting perfect lives, perfect toys, perfect milestones.
Toys….Toys….Toys…
Useless plastic that lay around everywhere without purpose.
Even the supermarket aisle assaults the senses with flashing packages promising to make your baby smarter, calmer, advanced.
Busyboards…busier than the name with no intent except to waste precious time.
Into this madness we bring our tiny, sensitive babies; little humans.
And then, exhausted by the noise, we feel we must add our own:
songs, toys, videos, constant chatter,
because silence feels like failure
in a culture that equates quiet with neglect.
You do not need to match the world’s volume.
Your baby does not need more stimulation.
Your baby needs refuge.
Magda Ge**er, who watched infants with the reverence they deserve, would say softly:
“Do less; observe more; enjoy most.”
And:
“What infants need is the opportunity and time to take in and figure out the world around them…
Let them be.
Let them struggle a little.
Trust them to learn.”
Fifty years ago, young mothers—often starting families even younger than today—lived in a quieter weave.
The house was the world:
sewing tiny clothes from scraps,
knitting booties that didn’t match,
baking lopsided birthday cakes with real butter and too much icing,
gardening beside toddlers who ate half the peas straight from the pod.
Meals were cooked daily—simple, seasonal, shared at a table without phones.
Breastfeeding was a quiet rhythm, skin to skin, without a phone in the free hand scrolling for validation or distraction.
Children played.
Outside until the streetlights came on.
Inside with board games—Snakes and Ladders, Ludo, Scrabble with made-up words allowed because laughter mattered more than rules.
Backgammon and Monopoly.
Parents met their friends for card game nights, Canasta, Rummy, Poker nights.
Boredom was allowed.
It was trusted.
Television was limited; advertising was background, not bombardment.
Today, the screaming is everywhere.
Billboards, buses, phones, televisions, even children’s apps wrapped in ads.
The message is relentless:
You are not enough.
Your child is not enough.
Buy this to fix it.
Young mothers absorb this roar and believe they must amplify it at home:
constant entertainment,
enrichment classes before the child can walk,
screens to fill every gap.
But the child’s nervous system, so new and tender,
was not built for this volume.
Ge**er’s wisdom cuts through the noise:
“Allow the child to be bored.
Boredom is the precursor to creativity.”
And the gentlest truth:
“When we do less, the child does more… and becomes more.”
From a holistic view—Montessori’s prepared environment, Steiner’s rhythmic days, Malaguzzi’s hundred languages, Ge**er’s respectful care—we know development happens in calm,
in real touch,
in slow observation of dust motes or rain on glass,
in the satisfaction of folding a cloth or stirring dough.
Young mother,
turn down the world’s volume in your home.
Create one small island of quiet.
Put the phone away for one feeding, one playtime, one walk.
Let the baby lie on a blanket and watch the ceiling fan,
or the leaves moving outside the window,
or simply your face—
undivided,
unhurried,
unperforming.
Bake a simple cake together—messy, imperfect, delicious.
Plant a pot of herbs on the windowsill.
Sit on the floor and let the child explore a wooden spoon longer than any app would allow.
The world will keep screaming.
You do not have to echo it.
Your baby needs refuge in you—
calm presence,
trust in their own unfolding,
space to simply be.
Stop entertaining your babies.
Start protecting them from the roar.
Start trusting that quiet,
real life,
and your loving, imperfect attention
are more than enough.
©️Althea Cutting
19th December 2025
©️Global Montessori Community
