• Bug,  illos

    high needs baby

    I shouldn’t gloat. But I have to admit I am taking guilty pleasure in the fact that when I left Baby Bug with Toby for a half an hour today while I ran to the store, she screamed bloody murder the entire time. When I got back she stopped crying and wouldn’t let Toby get near her. He tried to make goo goo eyes at her while she snuggled into my shoulder and just the sight of him sent her into another attack of the shrieks. It’s like he pinches her or something when I’m not looking.

    She loves me, that little squirt. I guess all the one-on-one time I’ve been spending with her day in and day out is paying off. It’s an amazing feeling to know that I’m her mom. I’ve never been anybody’s mom before. I’ve been the super aunt… but this is a whole new level of being loved. It blows my mind.

    Baby Bug has a lot of personality. She’s very determined and she knows exactly what she wants. This causes me a lot of frustration all day long. If I want to get anything done I have to figure out how to do it and pacify her at the same time. If she decides that she wants to be draped over my shoulder like a sack of potatoes then I have to drape her over my shoulder until I think my arm is going to fall off. Nothing else will do. She won’t play nicely on her blanket on the living room floor, her crib gives her the heebie jeebies, her bouncy chair that vibrates and plays music is a complete waste of money and her changing pad is a fun place to hang out but I can’t leave her there without worrying that she’ll flip herself off it and face plant onto the floor. I’m getting very good at doing things with one hand.

    But when she finally does fall asleep in my arms at exactly seven-oh-one, she is the most adorable little lump of soft breathing marshmallow baby fluff that you ever rested your eyes upon. I completely forgive her for being so difficult all day long.

  • Bug,  The Hood,  the laundry

    Fluff and Fold Baby

    Today was another day of laundry fun. The excitement is killing you, I can tell. Oh boy…. I thought if I did laundry every week instead of every other week, I’d have half as much laundry to do. That would make sense. I thought wrong. I still had too much laundry to take over in one trip in the bugaboo. Where is all this laundry coming from?

    One word: baby.

    This time Toby felt sorry for me and decided to take us to the laundromat in his van. It’s just across the street, but when you have to make four trips with giant over-flowing bags of laundry, it’s easier to drive. The plan was he’d take the laundry over and I’d walk over with the baby strapped into the sling. But then Toby had to go and get paranoid about us crossing the street. He’s a very over-protective first time dad. But he does have good reason to worry about us crossing Pacific Coast Highway. It is a major highway and there are a lot of morons on the road.

    I have to cross at a light and no matter how careful I am, there always seems to be somebody turning right and cutting me off either just as I’m about to step into the street or just as I’m coming to the other side. It’s scary out there when you have a baby. Everything seems like a potential life threat.

    So we did something even more dangerous. I rode in the van, hiding in the back with Baby Bug strapped into her sling. I didn’t put her in her car seat. I didn’t put my seat belt on. I pulled a Britney and broke the law!!! I felt horrible for it too. Like I was just asking for trouble. Toby said it was probably safer than crossing the street in front of cars that want to run me over. We were only going across the street but still, I felt like that time I had to drive home from a party and I’d had one glass of wine. (I hardly ever drink so I’m paranoid) I know I can drive just fine but watch me get pulled over for a fix-it ticket and then end up with a DUI. Call me a prude but I worry about these things.

    While Toby sang some song by Judas Priest about breaking the law, I cowered in the back and imagined a hundred and one ways that I could end up through the windshield with my baby. Of course we made it to the laundromat just fine and my worry was for nothing.

    Toby says, “why are you telling the whole wide internet about that?” Because I have nothing else to talk about. For being the best years of my life I have surprisingly little to talk about. I did laundry ALL DAY TODAY. I started at 11am and finally put the last matched and folded sock away at 7pm. What a life.

    Baby Bug was a very good laundry baby today. I call her my fluff and fold baby. I put her up on the counter where we fold clothes and she waved and batted at the bright sunlight coming in the window. She loves bright windows. When I carry her away from the window she cries.

    She likes shadows and lines of light. I figured this out because when we go on walks, she talks to the moving shadows that criss cross on the canopy hood that shades her from the sun. When we go under a tree or into the shade of a building, she cries because her friends the shadows are gone. It’s the funniest thing. I used to feel bad for her because when she is laying down inside the bassinet of the stroller and I have the canopy up, she can’t see anything but red felt. She can’t see the sky or the trees or the ocean. Going for walks must be awfully dull for her, I thought. But then I realized she’s fascinated with the moving lines of light and dark that reflect on the bassinet walls around her. Maybe she will grow up to be a graphic artist.