When my little brother was young, I read Are You My Mother? to him so many times that we had it memorized. It’s the story of a baby bird on a mission to find his mother. (She left the nest briefly to find food since the egg was about to hatch.) He comes earlier than expected, jumps out of the nest, and questions everyone from a kitten to a tugboat, “Are you my mother?”. (Stop reading now if you don’t want to know the ending.) An obliging bulldozer returns the birdie to its nest just in time for the mother’s return. He immediately realizes who she is, snuggling under her wing and announcing, “You are my mother!”

Tate has finally reached the stage where we can read together, meaning that he doesn’t try to eat the book as soon as I open it up. I still have to go pretty quickly to match his short attention span, but it’s great! So sweet to have my active little guy sitting on my lap, listening to my voice and looking at the pictures, and of course this book is one of our favorites.

He’s been experiencing separation anxiety for the last couple of months, right on schedule according to all the parenting books. It’s frustrating when he’s so clingy, but there’s also part of me that feels a little honored by his devotion. I realized that it really makes me feel like a mom. Not that all the other parts of motherhood haven’t been significant, or that I haven’t already felt bonded to my child. But somehow, the fact that he wants me, only me, makes it seem more real. My baby bird knows that I am his mother!

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So Halloween is coming, you’re pregnant, and you need a great costume. You’ve come to the right place! Whether you’re going to a party, trick-or-treating with the kids, or just handing out candy at your house, why not feature your most noticeable feature?

Take off your socks and shoes…you’re “barefoot and pregnant”

Spend the evening in backbend position and you’re a camel! (dromedary?) Okay, just kidding, but if you actually can do a backbend right now, give yourself an A for the day.

Wear a brown shirt and put a nametag on your belly that says Ruth. You’re a Baby Ruth candy bar!

Smear some jelly on a old t-shirt and hand out Jelly Belly jellybeans to the trick or treaters or other partygoers.

Dress in orange, with a green hat, and you’re a pumpkin (you probably feel like this anyway, so it won’t be to hard to get into character!).

Remember the Friends episode where Phoebe thinks a pair of Santa pants are maternity pants? Ha-loved it! Well, you’ve already got the “bowl full of jelly”, so go as Santa Claus. Extra credit if you can get your husband to dress up as Mrs. Claus!

Wear a bright-colored shirt and put three small circles on your belly with black cloth or black marker. You’re a bowling ball! You could also add a “necklace” by tying string around the necks of a set of plastic/toy bowling pins.

The Thrifty Fun site has lots more great ideas. My favorite is from Belle, whose pregnant friend went as a jar of Prego spaghetti sauce. She doesn’t give specifics, other than that the expiration date was her due date. I’m guessing that she wore red with a label attached around her stomach. This could be as simple as writing the brand name on a sheet of paper, or as elaborate as replicating the entire label, depending on how crafty you are.

Along those same lines, why not be a “Preggo” waffle? If you’ve got a toaster oven, you could simply string the baking rack around your neck so that it hangs over your stomach. Or you could go all out: buy 2 pieces of tagboard and cut them into circles. Draw the waffle pattern, and some pats of butter, then use string to attach them over your shoulders (allow enough so the front piece will lie flat), sandwich-sign style. If people try to touch your belly, say, “hey, leggo my preggo!”

Okay, hopefully you found something that will work, or at least these suggestions sparked your own creative juices. Let me know if you have other costume ideas for the pregnant gals out there!

Photo Courtesy:
makelessnoise
mbaylor
Sonny Side Up
jsc

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I’ve taken hundreds (thousands?) of pictures of Tate during his short life (see I Love My Digital Camera), but the need for a professional portrait has always loomed in the back of my mind. It seems an important rite of passage, with specific pages in the baby book just waiting to be filled. Oh, wait, I haven’t bought a baby book yet either. But anyway…

Several photographers in our area offer specials for 3, 6, 9 and 12- month shots, and you select one from each sitting to be matted and framed. It seems that most families get pictures taken at one if not all of those milestones. I’ve hesitated, though, because the whole concept seems stressful…I never know exactly when he’ll be napping, so how can I set up an appointment time? He spits up food somewhat frequently, so how are we going to make sure that special outfit isn’t ruined before the picture is taken? And his face always seems to have some sort of scratch because I’m really bad at keeping his nails trimmed.

I remind myself that there’s a magic thing called airbrushing for facial mishaps, and we can change him into his outfit right before the shoot to avoid messes. So I aimed for a six-month photo and by the time I pulled the details together he’s past seven months, but we have an appointment for today! Best of all, my photographer is very understanding (she has 2 kids of her own) and let me move the time of the shoot since Tate slept in a bit this morning, making a normally awake-time into either a crabby or just-started-a-nap-time. So here goes…

…We’re back from photo-taking and it was great! Tate was a total ham, working the camera like a professional model (has he been paying attention while we watch Project Runway?!) In just one hour we got photos in 3 outfits (or lack thereof). Gina, our photographer was great, right down on the floor with him. I loved how she just captured him doing his thing naturally, instead of trying to set up specific poses.

Obviously he started to melt down a bit at the end, but overall I would call it a great success! Now it’s just deciding which ones to put in that baby book I need to buy…

Tip: Get photographer referrals from friends or family members with kids. Based on what I’ve heard from others, a great photographer isn’t necessarily a great kids’ photographer. With all the variables involved in getting your little one photo-ready, you want to be assured that the photographer is going to be ready for anything. At the same time, do be conscious of meal and naptimes when scheduling your appointment.

Photo Courtesy:
Gina Lang Photography

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…continued from Big Boy Car Seat

Round 10: Knowing that our roadtrip to Chicago is this weekend, I reluctantly drag Tate and myself back to Babies ‘R Us to buy an (in my opinion) unattractive seat… but eureka, what’s this?! There’s a new Symphony seat from Evenflo, in “Liberty” (gray and black, but no icky fake-leather trim). Plus, it reclines more than the others in the rear-facing position and it’s good up to 100 pounds. The BRU employee is still setting up the display, it’s so new, but after she gives me a quick demo and answers a few questions, I’m sold.

The Saga Continues: The huge box for our new convertible car seat barely fits in the front seat of my Dodge Neon. I have limited rear-view vision because the mirror is all askew, but we make it home safely. I lug the massive seat out of the box. While my son sits in the stroller, parked in the grass next to the car, I struggle to install new seat into my suddenly even more painfully small backseat. Since my antique (2000) car doesn’t have the LATCH system, I have to unclip the front of the fabric cover to thread the seatbelt through, then re-clip it while it’s jammed into the back of the seat. Not easy, but finally, I’ve got it in.

On our first ride, I’m happy to see that I can still see him in the mirror positioned on the backseat. Online reviews of most other models say the seat is too tall to allow that.

Of course as we’re driving home, Tate falls asleep. Skeptical that I’ll be able to get him out while still sleeping, I compromise and sit on the deck to read the newspaper while he sleeps in the car seat with the windows rolled down. This won’t always be practical, but as Dr. Leo Marvin would say, “baby steps…baby steps”.

My next challenge is to keep his head from flopping forward when he sleeps, which always seems to happen despite the greater recline this seat has compared to others. I google “head flopping forward in carseat” and while suggesting “did you mean head flopping forward in car seat?”, it also gives me 22,800 links to possible solutions. I love the internet.

Most of the links seem to be for people with my problem, but not a good solution. The best was using a necktie to hold the baby’s head in place…sounds like the strangulation risk would be greater than head-flopping, so I guess we’ll be floppy for now. Anyone out there have a solution? Anyone out there clever enough to develop a product that roughly 22,800 people would buy?! I’ll take the first one…

All you expecting parents or those whose babies are younger-than-1-year and/or less-than-20-pounds wonder “why does it matter so much?!” Well, my friends, with the travel system, a baby that falls asleep in the car can be carried into the house or clicked into a stroller without being removed from the car seat. That means the chance that he or she will continue sleeping is much, much higher, and as Martha would say, “that’s a good thing.”

Exhibit A: Baby falls asleep; carseat and baby go into the restaurant; I get to enjoy lunch with my mom and brother.

Maybe we’ll do a flashback blog later to discuss travel system options, but let’s live in the now, for now…

Round 1: Staring at the row of convertible car seats at Babies ‘R Us, I notice another family shopping for the same. Their daughter chirps “I want the pink one!” which makes me think “I’m glad my son can’t voice his opinion- my own is enough!” and then suddenly “Other children that need the bigger car seat are old enough to speak in sentences!”

Rounds 2-9: Talking with friends, lots of browsing online, multiple visits to BRU, Target and other various baby-essential-supplying stores, in hopes of finding the magic seat that satisfies all of my needs. I know they all meet the safety regulations, so now it’s down to convenience and, I’m embarrassed to admit, color. The Evenflo Triumph Advance models had the easy-to-adjust sliding shoulder straps that I wanted, but honestly I just didn’t like the color/fabric options. Flaky, I know.

To be continued…

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New parents and grandparents are known for being camera-happy, and I’m certainly no exception. Especially in the first few weeks, every expression, every new outfit, every visitor holding the new babe created a must-have photo opportunity. I started carrying the camera with me wherever I went in the house, in fear of missing something amazing. I’ve scaled back on that a bit, but we certainly never leave the house without the camera in the diaper bag. Usually I remember extra diapers and a change of clothes, but I always have the camera!

Even before our son’s arrival, my husband often mentioned that he’s glad I’m on top of the family memory-keeping. Now, he comments how thankful he is that we live in the age of digital cameras, rather than an era in which the cost of film and developing would deplete Tate’s college fund before he’s a year old! (okay, truthfully, my husband doesn’t think we should pay for college anyway, but that’s a topic for a different day’s blog).

I got to share some of those first-week shots on our birth announcements from MagnetStreet. Being a former employee there, I was able to have a designer tweak the design for me. I’m excited to see the new Design Online functions launching soon, which will allow any customer to do their own tweaking!

We ordered matching return address labels and seals, and thank you notes (an opportunity to show off another photo!). I loved how the same look was coordinated through all the pieces. If someone had already sent a gift, I just put the thank you note and the announcement in the same envelope.

Tip: Those first few weeks and months were so busy, and writing thank you notes was not often at the top of my to-do list. As presents came in the mail, or were dropped off by friends, it was really helpful to keep a written record. I just jotted them down in my pregnancy journal, but many baby books have a page just for this, or any small book would work. Before putting the gift away, I simply listed what it was and who it was from. Then after I sent a thank you note, I checked it off in the list…no worries about forgetting to thank someone!

Birth announcements - did you make them or order them?

• Made them from scratch
• Assembled from a kit
• Ordered them ready-made

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