Undie Hats

Poor Sam. He is Child #5. And as such he has to wear Hannah Montana underwear on his head like a little French beret. And then he is made to say "Cheese" or fromage or queso or whatever. Such a good sport.

I Don’t Own a Crib

Don’t freak out on me here. Stay with me. Hear me out.

The year was 2000, and my boss gave me a sweet bonus for Christmas. Seeing as how I was a whopping 2 months pregnant, I knew it was time to go baby shopping. But what to get? There was so much out there. I decided on a $100 double stroller which I still have (duct taped on the storage basket underneath, of course, because that’s just how I roll … cheap) and a crib.

I got a $400 crib and a $100 mattress. My kid would have to have the best, hardest, safest mattress and the prettiest crib. Dark wood with a storage drawer underneath.

Fast forward to our first night with a new baby at home. We tried, like normal people, to lay him in the crib once I nursed him to sleep. Lucky for me, I got me a husband who could not stand to hear our baby cry, and not just because he wanted some sleep. I nursed baby Joel in bed and we fell asleep and never looked back.

After that, the crib was kept for sentimental purposes and because we were maybe hoping to have a baby who would at least NAP in the darn thing, but crazy me always wanted to hold my babies for naps, so the crib sat all lonely.

When I was pregnant with my third, I tried to sell the crib. A first-time preggie came by with her husband wondering why I was selling it and I told her we sleep with our kids and they looked at me like I told her I’m a polygamist. They did not buy the crib.

A family friend ended up trading us the crib for a cool couch for our living room. This is the same couch on which Sam was almost born.

To answer your question in advance: no, we don’t sleep with all 5 of our kids. The oldest boys sleep in bunk beds in their own room and have for about 4 years. Callie just moved in to her own room after Aron got it all painted and pretty for her. Eva sleeps in her own twin bed pushed up to our bed. Sam snuggles with us every night and sleeps on me every day while I read to the kids, watch some TV, return phone calls, homeschool or whatever.

Thanks for listening. I'm not so crazy after all, am I? Don't answer that.

Kids and Chores

Heck, yeah, we start 'em early at my house. The 1.5 year old can certainly earn his keep by vacuuming, am I wrong?

*Just kidding, sheesh!

Baby Junk You Don’t Need

Some of my biggest goals in life currently are to save money and to save space in my 1,327 square foot (gross living area) home. Here’s some stuff I don’t have or store most of the time or just never needed.

Some of this stuff costs a lot of money, and it floors me when broke people go further into debt (in addition to their freaking welfare and food stamps) to purchase stupid baby equipment at full price. As if the baby will care! Trust me, your kid cares a lot more that you were AROUND and that you were, I don’t know, maybe, LOVING and nurturing and caring.

High chair takes up too much space in my house, even if it folds up. I used one religiously for my first 4 kids as a feeding space AND as a place to park the baby. But Sam wasn’t havin’ it, so we put it back in the basement. We fed him on our laps or he stood in a chair (supervised, of course). Recently I got him a baby seat that straps onto a chair for $5 at a thrift store.

Boppy … unless you get this as a gift, just use pillows. I loved it with my first 3 kids until my first two pulled it apart tug-of-war style. I was too cheap and lazy to buy another so I just used pillows and built up my arm muscles or rested my arm on my Yoga-posed leg (just kidding!) when pillows weren’t available.

Playpen. My mom always says I needed one of these, and Lord knows enough people gave me their used “play yards.” But I was always holding my babies or else parking them in a stationary walker (is that an oxymoron or what?!) or in the bouncy seat. If they were on the floor, I was watching closely and yelling at my other kids to NOT STEP ON THE BABY OR I WILL STEP ON YOU.

Wipes warmer. Use the body heat on your hand, moron. My kids will probably not bring up in therapy that I wiped their butts with cold wipes in the middle of winter.

Shoes. Please don’t get me started. Moms, you know these are only for decoration and serve no purpose, kinda like a spleen or appendix.

A crib. We’ll visit this one in the next post.

Sibling Torture

I'm sure when my child therapist friend brought over this tub full o' goodies she never thought the kids would use it to trap their baby brother.