cribs

It is Saturday at my house which means it is clean up day. I have been walking around putting things to right. It has been a relatively quiet week this week and things are not looking too bad. I have discovered a baseball bat behind the couch. This missing remote control has located on a window sill.
I am home alone today and the house is subdued. The television is off and the radio is turned down low. There is some random road traffic as cars go by. The predominate sound is the neighbors children playing in the yard. I am going from room to room and am off in my zone. Some days now my mind wanders away from me.
Today my mind has sent me back to when my oldest child was born. I remember all of the excitement. What sticks out the most is going to a major retailer and bringing home the crib. A new baby needs a bed right? At the time we were living in an apartment on the third floor. It was a rather nice apartment as far as apartments go. It was light and airy, the rooms were large and there was plenty of closet space.
We were having a baby and all was well in life. The only thing we needed was a crib, a car seat, a couple of bottles ,some diapers and really small clothes. Babies are little people right? A baby is supposed to expand your family and double your love to your spouse We knew children would be expensive, but we figured that would be later, like about 16 yrs later when it was time to get them a car or 18 years later when it was time to send them off to college. No where and at no time did anyone mention to us that that we had to have stuff for the baby. And by stuff, they meant stuff, as in if it was in the baby department, the baby needed it. And that meant that our nice roomy, airy 3rd floor apartment would never be the same. How can a 9 pound human being that will only grow about 15 pounds in 1 year need so much stuff. The crib and car chair are reasonable things. But where is it written that it " needs" a changing table, play pen, rocking horse, strollers, portable playpen. Someone brought us cases of diaper for every stage of life ( hidden in one case I swear was sanitary napkins and a bag of depends). We received portable highchairs, regular highchairs, booster seats and a child sized lounge chair. All of these gifts are wonderful items. Most of these items came from people that have very neat, extremely tidy homes that would no more have an out of place item than a stray speck of dust.

The child arrived with out much fuss or drama. But one thing I did notice after loading all of the portable items down the steps and into our car and out again at what ever our destination was, was that the child never ever got to use these items. The baby went from lap to lap to lap. The best portable item would have been a rocking chair.

That 1st born child is now mostly grown and I look in its bedroom only to see a small neat desk and laying in the middle of the bed a palm sized music device