The Norwegian way

I came across an interesting article the other day, about the Scandinavian practice of letting babies sleep outdoors. It’s not the first time I’ve seen an American perspective on this, but it’s still interesting to me because it sort of highlights the differences in raising a child the American way, and raising a child the Scandinavian way.

I very much like the idea of letting Ben sleep in his stroller outside. Sadly, while the majority of comments on all these articles seem positive to the idea, they only seem positive to the idea in Scandinavia. I have no doubts that any attempt at doing this in the US would quickly result in someone calling CPS on me. I am not at all above admitting this makes me a sad panda.

Raising Ben in a Scandinavian way matters a lot to me, not only because I want him to have some of my own Norwegian upbringing, but because quite frankly – some American child rearing practices seem too cautious to me.

A lot of Scandinavian parenting practices have been, or will be, very easy to import.

Some people have expressed shock that I’ll take Ben for walks in cold weather (even in the subzero, freezing temperatures and annoyingly biting winds of western PA). I’m more shocked that kids would be kept indoors in bad weather, to be honest. I can’t even imagine not going outside on rainy, snowy or windy days when I was a child. And you bet your ass I will kick Ben’s little tush outdoors to play in the same weather conditions, as well. And all I have to do to keep him nice and toasty on our walks, is dress him well.

We have a saying in Norway; “There’s no bad weather, just bad clothes.” And it’s true. While I haven’t found as many clothes in the US that meet my criteria for keeping Ben snug and warm even on the coldest or rainiest days, I make sure to stock up when I go home. Norway has a lot of excellent wool clothes, and just over our visit so far this Christmas I made sure to pick up a ski mask (finlandshette) for Ben, as well as a Voksipose (stroller bag – and hello, mommyboner, by the way! GTFO BundleMe!) and a sheep skin.

The sheep skin is for another Scandinavian way of life that is easy for me to import to America.

Have you ever seen those ads, “This is what safe sleep looks like?” With the overhead photo of a sleeping baby?

The baby is wearing pajamas, lying on its back, and is in a crib with absolutely nothing in it except a crib sheet. The importance of back sleeping and keeping things out of the crib is drilled into parents’ heads over and over. No loose blankets, no stuffed animals, nothing that could cover the baby’s face; sleep sacks are okay if they zip up or otherwise close so the baby can’t get tangled up in them.

Yeah, Ben and I didn’t get that memo. Or rather, we got it, but we chose to ignore it.

In addition to sleeping on the soft sheep skin, the baby comforter (dyne) is common in all Scandinavian countries, and a lot of people also have a separate sheep skin and dyne for their stroller (good luck finding a travel system stroller in Norway – it’s all about the pram style, baby!). Ben certainly loves it.

Some Norwegian parenting practices will be difficult or impossible to implement, however. I realize that the crime rate in even more rural areas of America is higher than in Norway. I realize that if I were to leave the stroller outside the window of a coffee shop in America, I’d probably get arrested and/or get a visit from CPS. And baby kidnappings, as awful as they are, happen in this country.

I realize I’ll probably have to search extra long and hard to find a daycare/kindergarden/preschool that will make the kids go outside and play in all sorts of weather. I realize it’ll be a pain in the ass to find a school that doesn’t serve what I perceive to be dinner foods for lunch (pasta, potato dishes, etc).

When it’s time for us to buy a house, we’ll be picky with the neighborhood, not just for safety. I can’t even imagine living somewhere where Ben couldn’t ride his bike or walk a few blocks over to a friends’ house, or to school. I can’t imagine living somewhere where children would be confined to indoor play once the sun sets.

Of course, things could change. We could get to that point where we own a house, and Ben is ten years old, and I realize that it just isn’t safe for him to walk to a friends’ house by himself after dark. If that time comes, we’ll reconsider things seriously. But in the meantime, I’ll be trying my hardest to raise Ben in the most Norwegian way possible.

Except, of course, leaving my stroller outside somewhere.

I don’t actually want a visit from CPS, after all.