Sophie

I first know about Sophie through seeing a girlfren's FB photos of her son. In one, her boy was holding Sophie the giraffe, a teething toy. And in the comments below, another girlfren exclaimed that her son, too, had Sophie the giraffe. I was intrigued and asked the girls about this famous Sophie and apparently it is the ONE teething toy that all mums swear by and is a must-have for the babies.

I looked at it and for the life of me, could not understand why. It looks plasticky and its design looks dated, just like one of those plastic toys that one would play with in the 80s. And when I checked the price online, I was astonished and all the more put off. This little dated plastic toy costs about 12 pounds, about S$24! No way am I spending that kind of money!

Today, I am eating my words as I receive Julien's own Sophie from Amazon. According to the pamphlet inside, Sophie was born in France on 25 May 1961, designed by a Monsieur Rampeau, who perceived that not only will such an exotic animal as the giraffe make the toy a first in the European market, its size and shape will also be ideal for a baby's little hands to grasp. Sophie looked exactly the same today as the day she was born, so this toy is one of great history. Sophie also squeaks when pressed, so helping her to be a great success with the babies. Apparently, Sophie is still "traditionally" produced today, with a process that involves more than 14 manual operations. She is made from 100% natural rubber and food colouring. I think reading all these does give Sophie a sort of legendary, larger-than-life feeling, but her usefulness to Julien remains to be seen.

So what changed my mind about getting Sophie? Seeing other babies chewing Sophie so happily, of course. It's a teething toy and they are all holding it easily and giving it a hard chew, so that means it works, right? That is how tupperware parties work, except that in our case, we have babies of the same age instead of tupperware. So, this group of women hangs out together for a weekly coffee and at each house, we check out each other's latest baby gadgets, toys etc and inevitably, after that meeting, at least one person will buy something that she saw in the house.  So, after our last meeting, 2 of us, one being me, placed an order for Sophie.

C received Sophie and reported that her baby loves it to bits. Julien has sadly given it a rather lukewarm welcome. I think it is because he is grabbing things, but has not really reached the point of gripping them tightly for long yet. So, he is happy to chew on Sophie when we hold it to his mouth. And he would still rather go for his fingers (and sometimes whole fist in his mouth) rather than looking for Sophie. 

I suppose it is not a bad thing. As one fren puts it, with toys and dummies, they can fall out of the hands or the mouth and baby will cry forever till he finds them again. However, with fingers, one can never lose or drop them now, can we? :)  

Well, I still hope Julien will like Sophie in due course. She did, after all, cost a handsome 12 pounds!