Grace Sense2Soothe = no more tears
August 24, 2018
I was given the Graco Sense2Soothe swing by the weeSpring Parent Panel and I'm surprisingly IN LOVE with it. I say surprisingly because my colicky baby hates most baby gear. She loves movement, but she wants ME to hold her all day and bounce her around the house, and I just can't do this when I'm also trying to meet the needs of my three year old. When the swing arrived I was excited but skeptical, and I am officially a big fan and promotor of this swing. To begin with, the swing is visually appealing. Its clean, white, and light accent color scheme design prevents it from being an eyesore in the living room. Off the bat, this was a huge selling point for me, because Baby gear has recently taken over my house, and for the most part, it's all loud, vibrate colors that scream, "welcome to the circus." The irony is uncanny.
Prior to receiving the swing from weeSpring we were the owners of a basic, generic swing, a baby glider, and various other electronic rockers that simply collected dust in the corner, because my daughter would only last about 3-5 min in them before becoming extremely fussy, and by the time I got her strapped in, I was having to unbuckle her and get her out. The Graco Sense2Soothe swing bucket seat is deep and adjustable in position, which creates a cradle like hold for Baby, much like momma's arms. The seat can be reclined or inclined to meet baby's sleep needs, or his or her desire to look around and engage with their surroundings. The seat can also be removed and reattached perpendicular to the base of the swing if Baby prefers more of a side to side motion versus a front to back motion. The seat itself can be removed from the base of the swing and it becomes portable if Baby needs to be transported to a different room. This is a very nice feature if Baby falls asleep and you don't want to jostle him or her when moving into a new room. This is also nice when momma needs to move about the house and she wants to keep Baby close. When removed from the base, the bucket seat acts as a manual rocker as well.
The swing has 4 different motion options, and 3 different speeds, which is nice, because for one, not all babies like the same type of movement, and for two, we all know babies can easily need a variation in movement to remain content in the swing. In addition, the swing has a vibration feature, which is an ideal feature for most babies, but most definitely colicky babies. The swing also has 3 different sound options (nature, white noise, and music). The music sound feature has a variation of tone songs, all of which are calming to both Mom and baby's ears. There is a volume level increase and decrease option on the swing for the sounds, and the top volume level is still not very loud. Since most babies sleep in a variation of loud white noise, this could be seen as a disadvantage if the swing is used for sleep. However, in my opinion, the low volume level on the sound feature would not be enough of a reason to deter me from purchasing this product.
The baby cry detection feature is probably the coolest thing about this swing, and what separates it from the rest on the market. Since my little one is general pretty fussy, I knew we would surely see this feature in action in no time. When my daughter was having an "overtired and I've had enough" moment during the witching hour of the day, I placed her in the swing to see how the cry detection worked. When she started to fuss on and off a bit, the blue face remained blue instead of turning green, to detect cry, and I was confused by this, but once she started to really wail, the detection jumped into action. I was a bit surprised it didn't detect her on and off fussing, but the more I thought about it that made sense, because Baby fussing, cooing, and talking is sometimes not something that needs intervention, and it appears the swing is programmed to agree with this idea. The cry detection can be programmed to respond two different ways. Graco has a preprogrammed suggestion (the star button) of what it believes would be most soothing to a baby in distress, or the parent can manually program the swing (the heart button) to operate how he or she believes Baby would be best soothed when upset. My husband and I have both agreed that the programmed Graco button seems to provide a great combination of movement, sound and vibration that is most soothing to our daughter, and so we've had no need to program an alternative option, but this is definitely a nice option for particular babies. I must admit, again, I was truly skeptical if this feature would actually soothe my baby when she was upset, and i can honestly say it did. I couldn't believe it. I said this previously, but we've tried several different Baby swings and rockers, ranging from inexpensive to "this better be worth the money" expensive, and my daughter has disliked them all, with the exception of the Graco Sense2Soothe. Well done Graco. My little one is a tough critic and your swing has passed the test. I will definitely be recommending this swing to my mommy friends in the future. Thank you to the weeSpring panel for bringing this swing into our lives. This tired momma needed some mini breaks throughout the day.
This product review was collected by the manufacturer.