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Zebra Imaging makes detailed holographic maps. Here's a video of a toddler exploring one and getting confused by the optical illusions that it creates.

via Super Punch | Company Website

Doctors at a hospital in Berlin created a MRI machine that allows a woman to give birth while being scanned. They hope that this machine will allow them to learn more about the mechanics of childbirth:

The new machine will enable the researchers to study in greater detail how the baby moves through the mother’s pelvis and down the birth canal – issues that have long been studied and debated. The hospital’s Institute for Radiology and Obstetrics Clinic will work closely together on the project.

Among other benefits, it should help researchers to understand why about 15 percent of pregnant women need a Caesarian section because the baby does not progress properly into the birth canal.

http://www.thelocal.de/sci-tech/20101207-31649.html via Geekologie | Image: The Local

Actually, it's a just a "Deep Space Fighter Bed and Galaxy Mural", but it's clear that the TIE Fighter from Star Wars was the inspiration for the design. This is a custom-made bed by Posh Tots, a company that makes luxury furniture for children. You can view five more images at the link.

Link via Born Rich

Previously: From Cradle to Grave: The Story of Life Told with Beds

Thomas Perkins is an Emmy Award-winning animator. He's also a father, and he draws pictures on the lunch bags of this three children. At the link, you can find his blog devoted to the medium.

Link via Super Punch

Previously: Lunch Bag Art

Helen Osborne of Leicester, UK, gave birth in the backseat of her car after she was stuck in a traffic jam on her way to the local hospital. The entire scene was caught on a closed-circuit video recording:

Closed circuit television operators who witnessed the birth were so marked by the event they witnessed that they tracked the couple down and presented them with a video of the birth.

Mr Sullivan said: "It has to be the ultimate birth video and one which we’ll treasure forever.[...]

In the footage, a motorist in a silver Land Rover is seen pulling in front of the couple's Peugeot and lending Mr Sullivan his mobile phone. The father-to-be called the emergency services who talked him through the birth.

A passing off-duty police officer and a patrol car arrived on the scene and directed traffic around the couple's car.

Video at the link.

Link

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YouTube user JAMagicFilms took a picture almost every day during the first ten years of his/her daughter Natalie's life. The mostly consistent color coordination was a nice detail.

via reddit

Artist Amanda Vissell made four posters to inspire girls to be self-reliant and strong. I want this one for my girls' room.


Link via Boing Boing

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CERN is the European Organization for Nuclear Research. Its facility in Geneva, Switzerland, includes the Large Hadron Collider. To explain what they do there, the physicists at CERN have published a pop-up book called Voyage to the Heart of the Matter.

Link via GeekDad

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Aaron and Melanie Richman were relocating from Colorado to Missouri when they stopped for gas. They left their six month old baby inside the car while talking to the people who were driving the rental truck full of their belongings. That's when a carjacker decided to take their car:

The Richmans both ran towards the car and Aaron tried to push Melanie into the car, but instead she smashed out the passenger side window with her elbow. Aaron was able to climb inside the vehicle, while Melanie was dragged for a short time before letting go of the outside of the car.

Inside the vehicle, police said, Aaron hit and kicked the driver as he tried to save his child. The beating caused the carjacker to crash the car and then he fled the area on foot.

http://www.kctv5.com/news/25904899/detail.html via Buzzfeed

The NeoNature infant incubator by the firm Design That Matters isn't so much a particular design, but an approach to building incubators. The focus is on how to use certain parts from many different cars to consistently build usable incubators:

The greatest design challenge for the group has been resisting standardization. “As soon as you say, ‘You can only use a 4Runner’s headlight,’ the value goes out the window,” Mr. Prestero said. This problem might ultimately determine what aspects of NeoNurture’s approach will translate to mass production.

“Dashboard fans for circulation, signal lights and door chimes for alarms, the battery — those pieces aren’t so difficult to source locally,” Mr. Prestero continued. “A headlight filament might use a different gas, though, and that’s when it gets complicated.”

Whatever form a production version takes, NeoNurture has already posed a compelling — and empowering — argument. “I don’t know where you get a replacement incubator filter in a remote Nepalese village,” Mr. Prestero said, “but you likely can find someone there who can replace a car’s air filter. That’s where this idea really has virtue.”

Link via Gizmodo | Photo: Design That Matters

Previously: Backpack Neonatal Incubator

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At first I thought, "This is a hoax." But then Zach created, on camera, a detailed painting of Leonardo from The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

via Geekologie

Previously: 8-Year Old Artist Sells Paintings for Tens of Thousands of Dollars

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Instructables user Steve Moseley made a large kinetic marble run on the walls of his son's bedroom. Well, it's mostly kinetic. There are two battery-powered lifts to help keep the marbles in motion.

Link via Make

ABC News writes about a significant increase in the number of American boys who are competing in toddler beauty pageants and taking up cheerleading and ballet:

An estimated 10 percent of contestants are now boys, up from 5 percent five years ago.

Some boys take the stage mere days after being born. "Kevin did really well," one mother said of her 2-week-old son on "Toddlers and Tiaras." "He was awake and wasn't crying."

In some cases, pageant moms admit their sons are filling a void. "When I see little girls, I always think, I could turn my little boys into girls," another mom said. "These are my girls I never had!"

But Miller insists Zander is living out his own dream. "The people who say this is not for little boys need to wake up. We are in 2010. Heading into 2011. I honestly never thought I'd be doing pageants with my son. But he loves it. Everyone loves him."

Video at the link.

Link via J-Walk Blog | Photo (unrelated) via Flickr user Jennifer Donley used under Creative Commons license

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Parenting is hard because children are vulnerable and the world is cruel. At some point, a father must introduce his children to Star Wars. Doing so will lead to uncomfortable questions, such as about Greedo. And then there's Jar Jar Binks.

If you have babies or toddlers, watch this video and prepare yourself for "The Talk".

via Comics Alliance

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This brief animated short presents an episode of Dora the Explorer written by Lauren Kyanka, age 4. The cosmology depicted in it is absolutely fascinating.

via Buzzfeed

Previously: Inception Spoof Featuring Dora the Explorer