Give Teddy a Break (Tomy Beam A Dream Show)

Member Name: sersha

Product:	Tomy Beam A Dream Show
Date:	08/10/05 (728 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: soothing music, repeat play when baby cries

Disadvantages: can overstimulate a tired and grumpy baby !

We received this nightlight as a gift for Leah, and started to use it when she was about 10 weeks old. We incorporated it into her bedtime routine, which meant that she quickly began to associate the WInnie the Pooh theme tune with going to sleep. I sometimes wonder if she heard the same tune playing elsewhere by chance during the day if she would just close her eyes and nod off! The tune is gentle, twinkly and soothing and keeps her nice and calm when placed in her cot, distracting her from the fact that cruel mummy thinks she ought to go to sleep. It's also more hygenic than her other favourite sleepy pastime - sucking the face of her poor teddy bear...

The box itself can either stand alone or clip onto the side of the cot. It's fairly solid and I've dropped it several times with no ill effects, so it's likely to last for subsequent children without any problems. The lightshow comes from a circle in the centre which is surrounded by bright stick ons of Pooh and friends. The circle lights up to create a soothing, atmospheric light effect which isn't too bright for baby's room.

Images are projected from the circle (balloons, leaves, clouds, butterflies, bees) which move in rotation, sending pictures onto the ceiling or wall, wherever you choose to point the box! Leah didn't really notice the images at first but just liked to listen to the music. As she got older, she began to be entranced by the lightshow. If we put her to bed in a good mood, she would enjoy watching it and drift off to sleep happily. However it had the opposite effect if she was already grumpy when put to bed - it overstimulated her and made her even more awake and fed up! As new parents it took us a while to get the timings right, but now we mostly manage to get her to bed before she is overtired, and she enjoys the show every night.

There are two settings - a long play and a short play. The short play setting uses voice activation to restart the music again, so if baby starts another cycle of crying, the music starts up again instantly to soothe them back to sleep. This would usually work well, but occasionally after sneaking in to check on Leah the dreamshow was activated by my footsteps and it was a race to turn it off before it woke her up! It's extremely sensitive and the slightest noise could start it up again. This is a good thing if you have a crying baby, but not so good if your baby is just making sleepy noises and isn't actually unhappy, as the show could actually distress her if it woke her up from her sleep.

Thankfully because there is an automatic shut-off facility, this rarely happens as the box knows to shut itself down after a long period of quiet.

The lightshow uses 4 x AA batteries, and it uses them up more quickly than you might expect. We have replaced ours twice in five months.

The dreamshow is now a regular part of Leah's bedtime and I wouldn't be without it, as I am sure it helps her settle herself.

Best price I could find:
£18.99 from Kiddicare
(also widely available at Boots and other major chains.)

NB - this review refers to the Tomy Winnie the Pooh dreamshow, which is a slightly different version from the image depicted here (but not different enough to require a new category!)

Summary: A clever self-activating nightlight that babies love