Yummy Sand
Baby Bug woke me up at 5:30 in the morning yesterday. She thinks getting up before the sun gets up is perfectly acceptable. I’m getting closer and closer to co-sleeping as I heft her out of her crib and attempt to snuggle her next to me in bed so I can eek out just a few more minutes of much needed sleep. Some mornings she snoozes in the crook of my arm. Those mornings are heavenly. Other mornings she crawls all over me and then heads for the cords and plugs and other forbidden things like the cat box that is just down the hall.
If she doesn’t wake me up completely, then my cat Pounce does with his old standard routine of meowing until I get up and feed him. Together Baby Bug and the cat are quite a team. Meanwhile, I’m a wreck because I’ve been drinking coffee at night so I can stay up and get some freelance work done.
Since I was feeling sorry for my tired self and looking for a fun outing with the baby who refuses to sleep in the morning, I headed off to the coffee shop at the end of my street. At least they’re always up and smiling at five am. I ordered a half decaf latte (my standard these days) and a chocolate croissant as a special treat. I love chocolate croissants. They remind me of Paris.
With coffee and treat in hand and Baby Bug strapped to the front of me in the baby carrier, I headed off to the beach to watch the sun come up. I was thinking I’d take some pictures of the waves at dawn like I used to do when I walked every morning early early in the morning. But as the sun slowly crept into the sky it became very apparent that it was foggy. Nothing but gray on gray and then some more gray. So I unhooked Baby Bug and plopped us both down in the sand so we could enjoy our crack of dawn breakfast (I share bits of my croissant with Baby Bug, the bits without chocolate of course) .
What I didn’t foresee was that Baby Bug would find the sand almost as tasty as flakey bits of croissant. Last time we were at the beach she didn’t find sand particularly interesting to put in her mouth, so why is it such a delight this time? And instead of being a good mom and scooping her up away from the dirty sand and scraggly bits of sea weed and seagull crap, I proceeded to take out my camera and take pictures of her. She shoveled it in fistful after fistful. Mmmmmm yummy gritty salty sand. A perfectly healthy treat for babies!
I figured she’s going to eat sand sooner or later, I might as well let her get her fill of it. We do live at the beach and we probably have just as much sand embedded into our carpet (from me tracking it in every day after my walk on the beach). She inadvertently eats sand and cat hair and a zillion other gross things because we are soooooo tired of rinsing her pacifier after it falls on the floor every other second. I’m just over it! Here, kid: Have a taste of some kitty litter. It’s just like sand except even more icky.
You know what my brother calls cat poop in the litter box? Tootsie roll surprises. (Kiddingly of course…) You see, this is what happens when you have kids and cats and you just give up. Don’t send the worried emails yet though. I haven’t let Baby Bug anywhere near the cat boxes yet. Currently we are just avoiding the hallway (where the dirty cat things are) altogether. She knows something very interesting is there though. Whenever I let her crawl freely, she beelines it straight for the forbidden zone. I just haven’t figured out how to baby-proof that area yet.
I’m thinking that a perfect use of the old seventies crib would be to turn it upside down and over top the cat boxes. That way the cats (who would have to lose some weight) could fit through the bars and do their business well out of the reach of Baby Bug. I could put the cat’s water bowl and food on top of the upside down crib and then we’d have a solution to the whole kid-proofing hallway problem. Unfortunately, when I told Toby about my idea he looked at me like I was a couple fries short of a happy meal. He told me it would look ugly and completely ruin the aesthetics of our house. Hmph. As if that’s a priority. I’ll raise you one exersaucer, a disgusting rug, an office full of piles of paper on the floor and one brightly colored obnoxious activity mat…. case closed, sorta. What I really want is this.
21 Comments
Emily
Wow that cat box is nicer than my first apartment. If I still had a cat, I would buy that for sure. And lady you are not alone, my little girl ate more than her fair share of sand last weekend. It is going to happen sooner or later so why not get it over with now! Your little bug is adorable!
rosie
I probably leave this comment at least 3 times a week on someone’s blog, but: YOU ARE SO LUCKY TO LIVE AT THE BEACH!
I miss it soooo much. (Am in Denver)
Your morning looks delicious!
beck
You are especially lucky to live near THAT beach. =)
Leta
Her outfit (pj’s??) is SO cute! Adorable pics.
Liane
LOVE the pictures!
Jabberwocky
You might like this, too.
http://www.kattbank.com/home.htm
josephine
oooooh neato! if only I had a couple extra grand….
comfortablycrazy
Remember, what goes in must come out. You may want to up her fruit intake for the next couple of days to make sure the works don’t stop.
paula
everything is cute: the clothes, the hat, but my favorite is the expressions, the personality that oozes out of every pore. what a little person!!! :)
Tiel S-K
see, I would have just stuck my head under the pillow and pretended I was asleep. Looks like you had heaps of fun. Lets hope that she didn’t enjoy it too much and that you won’t be going so early on a daily basis, especially when it gets cold.
mmm, sand! You know where it will end up. Yes, prunes, prunes pears and more prunes.
Very cute all around.
Felix
Love the outfit – so adorable!
Love the cat box idea (I’ve been dreaming up something like that for a few years) – I think I need to find a used toy box and then I can convert it into one of those for a small fraction of the price. Hum…project time.
When Baby Felix wakes up too early on the weekend, Mr. Felix always gets up to hang out with her and let me sleep – not sure what I’d do with out all his help (probably go crazy).
jP
Sand is a fond memory for Brion. He says he can’t eat red licorice because it isn’t salty or sandy. It was always a treat on a trip to the beach as a child.
I thought I would be clever and buy a cat box with a lid to keep litter off the floor. The cat refuses to use it when the lid is on (too small). If the lid is on she uses the bath mat!!! Old cats don’t learn new tricks.
Amy
she looks like a little valentine baby! that cat furniture looks really cool.
Susie
She’s so freakin’ cute, it’s painful! What an awesome morning (if you have to get up before dawn, I mean). When my oldest was Baby Bug’s age, he also used to get up WAY too early like that, but we did not have an awesome beach and an early-bird coffee bar nearby. Oh, how my life might have been different… :-)
BTW, I thought your idea for That 70s Crib was awesome. Oh, and how much would I love one of those cat hotels?
carosgram
Love the idea of the upside down crib. May use it myself.
Aunt Kathy
I just checked your Paris pics and I love them! It makes me want to travel again. We’re going to the Oregon Coast on Monday (D.V.) but that’s not far enough away for me to get it out of my system!
BB is a doll. I miss her.
Tzitos
healthy sand!!!!
xD
Jennifer
Lots of healthy minerals there :) Sounds like you made the most of your early morning. Does the fresh air help for longer naps later in the day? It usually did/does for my kiddos. Our cat box surprises are call Almond Roca.
Donna
Where did you get that precious outfit?!!
ioi
our cat box was in our bathroom and when Dolly started to crawl, we put a baby gate up in the bathroom door… the cats were lazy at first and didn’t want to jump over the gate, so I raised the gate off the floor about 3-4 inches. The cats would squeezed underneath and the baby stayed out. Until she started trying to squeeze underneath the gate herself. Then we lowered the gate and the cats had to just put the extra effort into jumping over the gate. I don’t know what your hallway looks like, but you could either gate just the area that the cat stuff is in… or the whole hallway. You could do this with either one or two gates. Just a thought…
Nila
I’d like to get me some of that baby bug love. She’s so cute in all those hearts.
A little sand never hurt anyone. Don’t they say that the more germs babies are exposed to, the healthier they are. I am a true believer. We have 4 dogs, and lots of germs. My kids get a mild cold every year, and have each had about 2 ear infections. And I didn’t breast feed. Bring on the cat hair and sand!