‘Til There Was You

My baby gets around. It’s summer, it’s (occasionally) not raining and Sunnyside – with the exception of the smoothie place and a great Mexican joint on 48th ave – is the most boring place in New York; so we wander! Virginia has already ridden the 7, N, W, 1, 2 and E trains and spent time in the three relevant boroughs (sorry Bronx and S.I. – it might be a while). The midwife had suggested not taking her on the subway until she was 6 weeks old but that just wasn’t practical so I ride at off-peak times, keep her in the sling the whole time and don’t touch her until I reach my destination and can wash my hands. Obviously not letting other people touch her goes without saying. It’s worked so far. Virginia has been to the High Line twice, the NYC zine fair, the Kate Spade store *and* J. Crew!

Yesterday, we went on a mother-daughter trip to Bloomingdale’s and encountered a whole bunch of folk’s opinions – starting before we even got to Queens Blvd. Two dudes sitting on a stoop of the apartment building where they worked cautioned me against leaving her in the sling, suggesting that her very bones were going to warp and grow improperly. “Uh .. oh .. yeah.. she seems to really like it. Goes to sleep instantly…only ever in there for a few hours…”

Then once we got to Bloomingdale’s, the Borghese make-up counter lady, upon hearing how old she was, told me I should be at home. “No. We’re fine. It’s boring at home.” She then told me that I can’t have any more children because I work. Ugh. I hate that I let people talk to me like this but what am I going to do? Pick a fight with a make-up counter girl? Seem culturally insensitive because she is obviously old-country eastern-euro or some crap?

Can’t people just tell me she’s really cute and leave it at that??

It wouldn’t even OCCUR to me to give my two cents to a mom just walking around a department store unless I perceived some impending real danger like, “Your baby’s arm is about to get stuck in the wheels of your Bugaboo Cameleon” or “There’s a knife wielding man with a shirt that says ‘Child Mauler’ following you through the shoe department…” Yeah, uh… I can’t even think of a real example because engaging with the public is something I loathe? I’m just not an It-takes-a-village type, I’m more of a walk-around-the-block-to-avoid-running-into-neighbors-in-my-lobby type. I guess I save getting up in people’s business for really exceptional circumstances is all.

Anyway, I was planning on strolling Virginia over to the Fred Flare store in Greenpoint today to pick up some new some new sunglasses. Hopefully the sewage treatment plant employees won’t feel it’s their duty to tell me how many hormone-disrupters are contained in the lining of disposable diapers. (We’re using Gdiapers pretty much all the time now – BTW)

Yesterday my mom and I took the nuggie on a tour of a beautiful daycare facility near my office called Smarter Toddler. My mom, who arrived a few minutes before me and Virginia asked the receptionist if there were any infant spots available for September and her reply, “THIS September?” reminded us that ‘oh yeah, we’re in New York City, let’s register her for kindergarten, grammar, and prep school now and let the bribes begin!’ Dahh!! It’s easy to forget how different things are now. After all, I grew up downtown and went to private school -but back then it was more like an interview to make sure you weren’t a tiny jerk, and “Got money? Great. See you after Labor Day.” No waiting lists, or tears or presents for the admissions director – like I hear about now. We’ll probably get outta dodge before I have to think about that stuff (not like I could afford to (or necc. want to) send V to the schools I attended anyway).

But I digress! Smarter Toddler was SUPER nice. It was really big, cool and clean and they keep the kids busy and engaged all day. They take them out to parks or wheel the little ones around in ‘kindervans’, they have a music curriculum that begins at the infant level right on up to preschool and feature an open door policy so moms can come in and nurse or dads can come cuddle their babies at lunch. Everyone there knows infant CPR and first aid and some speak 2 or even 3 languages. So cool!

I might try to see a few more places just to see what else is out there but I think I’d feel really comfortable knowing V was in such good hands and so near by during the day.

Now, does anybody have any floors they need scrubbed or crimes they need committed? I sorta need to raise a boatload of cash to pay for this place.

Major bummer about Michael Jackson. As my pal Molly said to me yesterday, “You’ll have to explain him to Virginia.”

*sigh*

Where to begin…

Mike, Mom and I took Virginia up to the High Line on Friday night, just before closing time. Wow. Virginia slept the whole time (what else is new!) but Mike and I were absolutely awed by what they’ve done up there. It’s so wonderful to see great design brought to the people like that. No detail was left to chance – every bench is thoughtfully constructed, its placement intentional and relevant. The lighting of the plantings is subtle and unobtrusive and the greenery itself is appropriately wild and scraggly. I can’t wait to go back on a sunny afternoon and make a day of it!

I think I might order this DVD. According to the website “the BeFit-Mom system provides a unique set of progressive exercises that specifically target postnatal physiology and concerns.”

Hopefully these exercises can be performed in the world’s tiniest living room…

So glad the sun finally decided to show its face today. We took Virginia out for a little stroll in the neighborhood, which also served as a diaper/ wipes/ garbage bags/ paper towels run. She isn’t big enough for her gdiapers yet so we’re being bad environmentalists and using Pampers Swaddlers. I will say this though– those big brands know what’s what- they have this stripe on the front that turns blue when the baby needs to be changed? So easy!! Doesn’t *quite* justify their 500 years on this planet unfortunately.

Yesterday Mike, my mom, Virginia and I drove out to Lakewood, NJ to celebrate Father’s Day with my family and introduce V to her great-grandparents, Joe and Alice. She was a big hit and responded to the ocean of love by snoozing most of the time.

Hanging out in bed, June 17 (i think?)

The day before that (Friday, June 19 – for my own memory) Virginia had her follow-up visit with the pediatrician. He wanted her to be back up to birth weight, which she was and then some! The wiggler now weighs 9lbs 2oz. Her belly button stump had fallen off on Day 6 and the doc just cauterized it with some ash so we’re able to give her proper baths now. Her hair was getting pretty greasy (doesn’t take much) so Mike, my mom and I gave her a bath at my mom’s place that night. That’s right- it took three adults to give that 9 pounder a bath. She started out liking it well enough (enough to relax and have a pee) but wasn’t so into getting water poured on her head. Thankfully that was the last step and then daddy wrapped her in a nice hooded towel and cuddled her. I should have taken pictures but that would have required a 4th person.

Number of times Virginia has soaked the changing pad cover because we forget to slip a clean diaper under her butt as we chuck the dirty one: 2

Number of times Virginia’s business has exploded all over the place because of an improperly sealed diaper: 2

Number of times we read a few chapters in a new baby book, took its advice, only to learn its a totally controversial, widely disputed, potentially dangerous tome put out by a child-hating evangelical Christian ‘family ministry’ that, had we read further, would have advocated us hitting our kid and cautioning them not to tell anyone: 1

Ugh.

So. Back in December my mom and I went to my old alma mater’s (St. Luke’s) Christmas Fair – something we like to do every year even though it is completely devoid of the community spirit and thoughtfulness that made it really fun and special when I was growing up. Anyway, they have a ‘book room’ and I found a copy of this book ‘On Becoming Babywise’ and it promised that if you followed its doctrines, your infant would be sleeping through the night by 8 weeks and everyone in the family would rejoice. Not yet knowing anything about real live babies I thought that sounded pretty awesome so I invested one American dollar in it.

On Tuesday, while Virginia and I were hanging out on the couch I finally decided to start reading it. The first chapters sounded pretty alright. They were all about how not to lose sight of the importance of the husband-wife bond and how that is a priority relationship because if a child senses that there is discord among his parents it will create a low-lying anxiety that will affect his sleep, health, learning, etc. The book advocated a philosophy that a child is a welcome member of the family but not the center of it. (Seems a little hard-assed but their point was that in the future they wish to avoid creating “me-centric” child who expects everyone to cater to him as his parents once did)

Subsequent chapters explained their “PDF” or ‘Parent-Directed Feeding’ program and their sleep manifesto which cautioned against the use of “sleep props” such as rocking a baby to sleep, nursing a baby to sleep, using sound machines, or drives in the car to soothe a baby to sleep- and advocated putting the child in the crib awake and letting them cry it out if need be.

Long story short, we tried this once – Virginia was hysterical, I was practically convulsing with tears, hating myself for doing this to her / hating the book/ beginning to hate Mike for “making me” do this. It was bad. When I finally couldn’t take it anymore and demanded Mike give me my baby after he changed her I held her so tight to my chest and just sobbed and sobbed until finally we were both calm enough to attempt sleep.

I felt even worse when I read THIS article the following day. Disgusting. My mom came over later in the afternoon and she said we should get the hateful tome out of the apartment because it was creating negative energy and so we ceremoniously took it outside and threw it in the trash, then paraded Virginia around Sunnyside in her massive buggy.

She is such a good baby and sleeps so well already- I was foolish to doubt my own instincts and won’t do it again.

Virginia is now one week and 3 minutes old!!

Virginia got her wheels yesterday! The Uppababy Vista is sturdy, smooth, has a great turning radius and allows just enough bumps and rumbles to enter the carrycot to soothe Virginia into a total trance. It’s awesome.