Our Little Baby Blog

It's a girl!

By now most of you know that we learned we're having a baby girl. We had asked the doctor to put the answer in an envelope so we could open it up at a later date. Well, the technician put a picture of the ultrasound in a card we gave her and we opened it a few weeks ago. I realize that we've been so bad about updating the blog that anyone who didn't know about it would still be wondering. So now ya know... it's a girl!!

Now that we're entering the 31st week of pregnancy (all pregnancies are on a 40 week timetable) it's becoming VERY real. Mike has started cleaning out all his CDs and books from our second bedroom to make way for a lovely white crib and changing table and we purchased a "travel system" today. For those of you unfamiliar with the term, it means a stroller and carseat that match. This month Consumer Reports basically shredded the list of most popular car seats and left only two as safe in a high speed crash. Despite the fact that the Consumer Report survey about car seats has since been withdrawn, we're still suckers about that stuff so we opted for the one that received the highest rating anyway - Graco's metro lite. Talk about causing parents to flip out... call a baby item unsafe and watch the panic begin.

It's totally mystifying, all the stuff that a new baby requires. It's just so confusing to decipher which products to buy. Do you go with the one that looks the cutest? Do you go with the one that makes the most financial sense (i.e. won't prevent you from contributing to that 529 fund you're also supposed to be setting up), or the highest safety rating? What if ithe highest safety rating one is ugly? I know that looks don't really matter... but they sorta matter... don't they?

And what about the crib? Yet another decision we finally made this weekend (alright, so I'm more the stickler than Mike is... he would have purchased the first one he saw and called it a day). I gotta say it wasn't easy. The ones I like are expensive. I mean REALLY expensive. Pottery Barn Kids is not our friend. One step in that store and all of a sudden you begin contemplating purchasing a crib that costs more than our own bed. Fortunately, we did not fall prey to the cute catalogs which feature the most beautiful and, I'm sure emotionally and physically perfect, children on the planet. We ended up choosing sort of a middle ground crib that I'm sure will look great in our nursery and allow our little bundle of joy to sleep soundly (please, please, please) for the next two years.

We also attended an infant CPR class this weekend. I pray we'll never have to use any of the skills we acquired, but I feel a lot better knowing that if the time ever comes, Mike and I will know what to do. I highly recommend it for anyone, even if you just babysit a little neice or nephew on a regular basis. We heard lots of stories about how kids can choke on anything - food, toys, anything. Next week we go to Lamaze class where our friends have told us we'll see some crazy videos of women giving birth that will shatter any illusions we have that this will be a nice natural, peaceful process. Excellent. Can't wait.