There are many facts about babies in their first year of life that are both fascinating, entertaining, and educational. The truly amazing facts about babies however may just be those dealing with a baby from the time it is conceived until immediately following its birth. Here is a collection of facts about babies, some of which you may already be familiar with, while others you may find a bit surprising.
Dad gets to decide the sex of the baby. In truth, he doesn’t have all that much control over the decision; it’s programmed into his sperm.
A baby undergoes some amazing transformations while in the womb. Initially, when it is still a fertilized egg, it is more or less a growing mass of cells. When the fertilized egg leaves the Fallopian tubes and is implanted on the wall of the uterus (womb) it is considered to be a human being, although it is not much larger than a grain of rice. That grain of rice grows quite rapidly, and within a couple of weeks a heart has formed, starts beating, and the baby begins to grow its own circulatory system, separate from that of the mother’s. A head of sorts begins to form, which for quite some time will make up the largest part of the baby’s body.
Along with the fingers and toes, fingernails and toenails appear and at about this time, the 16th week, the male or female genitals have appeared. Also at about this time, the baby takes up swimming. It actually will move around in the womb with a swimming motion until it gets so large that it is no longer able to. At 18 weeks the baby could cry if it wanted to as by that time its vocal cords will be fully developed.
Facts About Babies Just After Their Birth
There are statistics that say a baby is born every 3 seconds. Other statistics say one is born every 8 seconds. Given our knowledge, or at least approximate knowledge, of the world’s population, and the increase in that population from one year to the next, it would seem that the discrepancy in statistics could be easily resolved.
It’s no surprise that babies appear to recognize their mother soon after birth, even though they don’t see very well. Speaking of baby’s eyes, if you want your baby to have blue eyes, you’re in luck, at least for a while. All babies are born with blue eyes. Some keep the color, while others change eye color almost immediately after being born.
It’s been established that men are actually better at changing a baby’s diapers than are women. At least men are faster, nearly twice as fast in fact. Maybe they’re just more sloppy about it.
Babies are born with nearly 100 more bones than they will have once they are fully grown. The “missing” bones don’t get lost, or just disappear; they fuse with other bones as the child starts to grow. On the other hand, even if it has more bones to start out with, a baby is born without kneecaps. They come later.
When your baby has it’s first birthday, he or she can celebrate it with around 9 million other one year olds, who were born on the same day.
Babies are pound for pound, stronger than adults are. They are even stronger than oxen. If a baby is gripping something while asleep you can’t get it to lose its grip without breaking its fingers.
If your child weights twice as much at 6 months as it did when it was born, it’s right on track.
