A message to those selling baby items on Craigslist

Dear people selling baby items on Craigslist,

Thank you. You’ve provided me hours of entertainment. Sometimes multiple hours in one night. In fact, as I write this, between sentences I am checking through the baby items that are for sale. (Period. Check items. Write. Period. Check items…)

First of all, I do love your crib! It is beautiful, as you described in your title and your description. It’s odd to me, though that yours, along with about 75% of the other cribs listed, is “like new” because your baby “liked to co-sleep” and so they slept in it only a few times. Really? All of these co-sleeping babies! All of these hardly used cribs! Parents, aren’t you worried you’re going to roll over and smoosh your little beautiful clean non-chewing, anti-crib babies?

And for some items, your pictures are so nice! Professional, even. I love how you eliminated the entire background of the photo, so only the item was showing, just like in a catalog. In fact, if I compare it to the item on BabiesRUs.com, your photo is the exact same. They used your photo! You should call, as this must be a breach of your rights.

Speaking of the original place of purchase, interesting how so many items are so “like new” that you are selling for 90% of the original cost. Thank you for taking $5 off the cost of that baby bouncer. Such deep discounts will really help curb the cost of the baby, and it really is worth it to buy used. Especially since the item was only at Grandma’s house, so it was only used twice. (Grandma must either live in Timbuktu, or she was mean and crotchety, and not very fun to visit!)

Also, thank you for listing that same item today and yesterday, and the day before that and that. It helps me to be sure each time it’s listed that I don’t want it. Again. And again. And again.

Lastly, no, I don’t want your used breast pump. *Shudder.*

As I said earlier, I’m a big fan of yours. I will keep checking your items, looking for that perfect treasure. So keep on posting!

Sincerely,

Mollie, Craigslist Addict

Bargain Baby

From doing a little research, I’m noticing babies are quite expensive. In addition to the medical costs of doc visits, tests, and a brief hospital stay where the baby will be sneezed out (here’s to hoping), we have to consider all the supplies Babies R Us makes me think I need (or want badly, at least, because they’re so cute and my little baby will look so cute using that _____ [insert cute little baby item here]).

So I’m starting early in order to cut corners where appropriate. If you know my mom, you know she loves a good garage sale. And she loves my baby. The perfect combination for making my baby the bargain baby spokesbaby!

We’ve already scored a pretty sweet stroller/carrier/carseat set (blue…again, here’s to hoping), a cute jungle-themed swing that makes rain and monkey noises, a bathing system, and little velcro pillows for a baby carrier to keep the little lumps head steady (in the image on the package, the baby looks so darn happy to be smooshed between two cotton pads, who could resist buying it?).

I’m also lucky…I’ve got one friend that offered me to rifle through her baby items she won’t be needing any more. And I’ve recently discovered the Craigslist baby items section. I fully plan on checking that every day for new treasures.

There’s also the small matter of maternity clothes…a sudden need for a new wardrobe that I can only wear for 5 or so months. I’ve tried extending my regular wardrobe as long as possible. The issue is, I walked into a room to ask Wally if one of my shirts I was wearing was too short, and before I had the chance to ask, Wally just laughed at me. Yipes!

Luckily, my sister is one of those tiny girls that baby doll shirts look fab on, so she has about 10. And she was generous to do a “shirt exchange” with me for the summer. I gave her some of my tops that I don’t want to stretch out, and she gave me a few weeks worth of shirts. Work friends, get ready to see me in the same handful of shirts over and over for the next few months.

Also, there’s my new favorite invention: the belly band. My sister-in-law just gave me two of these puppies over the weekend. I almost don’t want to reveal the secret, because it’s such a good one. But basically, it’s a tube of spandex material that I can wear around my stomach and hips, and it’s tight enough to hold up my pants and mask that they are not buttoned. If it sticks out the bottom of my shirt, it’s fine, as it looks like the bottom of my underneath tank top. Hats off to whoever invented these cloth tubes of magic and wonder!

I’m supposed to start feeling the baby kick sometime in the next few weeks, so hopefully that will be my next post!

Things I want for Baby Ottenhoff

The past few weeks, I’ve started to shift away from thinking about pregnancy toward thinking about what happens after. Since, as they say in Juno, pregnancy can often lead to an infant.

We’re working more on clearing out the baby room, and as it gets emptier, I’m able to imagine more and more what it will be like to have a little baby hanging around. I picture him sleeping in his crib, hanging out in his daddy’s arms, wrapped up in big soft blankets, hanging out in his little carrier, swinging in his little swing, bouncing around in a little jumper thingy (when do they stop being tiny lumps of things and start bouncing?). I picture him laughing, scooping the dog poop, going to school, graduating, getting married.

Anyhow, picturing the little guy makes me think about all the things I want for him. So here’s an incomplete list, to date:

1. I want him to be healthy. Like, 100th percentile, all organs in place and functioning, blood flowing, lungs breathing, 10 digits on hands and feet healthy. (Although, a friend I know through work had a son with 6 digits on each hand. It would be kind of awesome to say to my baby, “You have 6 fingers on your left hand. Someone was looking for you.”)
2. I want him to forgive me for using him as my diaper-changing, lump-bathing, midnight-feeding, spit-up wiping guinea pig.
3. I want him to have a sense of humor, and a big baby laugh.
4. I want him to have Wally’s athletic ability and grace. And if he gets my grace, I want him to be a fast healer and to come with a lifetime supply of band-aids.
5. I want him to love books and reading as much as I do. I want him to beg for one more book to be read to him at night.
6. I want him to know both sets of grandparents equally well. Because of proximity, he’ll see Gramps (isn’t my dad just born to be a “Gramps”) and Mama D often. I want him to get at least every-other-week visits with Grandma Ott and Coach. (We’ll have to let Wee V come up with a name for Coach, as it has to be equal parts strange and funny. One of Wally’s grandmas is called “Donno” because Wally’s oldest cousin, Adam, called her that when he was learning to speak because she liked donuts. Coach likes chocolate, his bike named “Yettibear”, and Rob and Big. He could be called anything!)
7. He’s blessed to have 5 great grandparents. I want him to get as much time as possible in their arms, basking in their warmth and wisdom.
8. I want him to have his Uncle Joe’s laugh, Auntie LizE’s calm and easygoingness, Uncle Joel’s natural smarts, Auntie Jane’s charm, Uncle (Earl) Joe’s level head, and Auntie Liz’s pluckiness, scrappiness, and general sillyness. And I want him to know “Uncle Joe” is not one word (since all he has is a Joe, Joe and Joel, but I’m not sure how to teach that).
9. I want him to be best friends with Jane and Joel’s little guy, who’s making his debut at the end of this month.

I’ll take one boy, please!

I have been getting slack for calling him a he, so I’d better ‘splain myself. Wally is Walter Ben Ottenhoff IV. And while there’s no pressure from Wally’s family, I feel very responsible for carrying on the roman numeral! It wouldn’t be so bad if we were only the 3rd generation or so. But we’re talking 5th! There have been 4 successful traditions of Wally Bens, all with their little Y chromosomes, hanging out, showing off, and in true Ottenhoff fashion, winning. So I want to be successful also. I want to win!

Don’t get me wrong. I will be just as excited for a little girl. We plan to have 2 kids, so we’d have another try. I just don’t want that second try to take on all the pressure!

We have a beautiful name picked out for a little girl. If she is a she, I will dress her in pink, paint her nails, and put bows in her hair. I will take her to ballet, and laugh at her like my mom laughed at me, if she is as ungraceful as I am. I will love her and hug her and tell her I’m so glad she ended up being a girl, because I can’t imagine anything more perfect than her.

But for now, he’s a he, until we find out otherwise. We’ll find out in June. Here’s to hoping!

The first noise, if the baby had ears…

My Mama May (one of Baby V’s future great grandmas) and mom have been cooking up a plan to tell my Aunts, Uncles and cousins for some time. They’ve had a few weeks to work out when and where, and they picked last night when everyone would be at an Easter dinner in Sun City. I was excited to tell, but I have to admit, my mom and Mama May could not be beat in that excitement. Here’s my evidence at how much they were looking forward to the night:

• I showed up late to the event, so everyone had arrived by the time I got there. My Mama May came over to hug me, and gave a HUGE obvious wink. Then while hugging, she whispered loudly, “We’re going to tell in a few minutes!!!!”
• The HUGE winks continued every time I looked her direction as I greeted the rest of the folks there.
• My mom apparently had been taking Wally aside since he got there a few hours before and showing him the Easter egg she’d be giving me that had onesies in it.
• Wally claimed to have gotten about a hundred HUGE winks in the hour before I arrived.

Finally the moment arrived, and my mom handed me a large Easter egg. I pretended to not know what was going on, and proceeded to open it up. It had a onesie inside (doll size, really! The baby will only be able to wear it the first day!) that said, “Grandma loves me.” I held it up over my belly. There was a moment of silence. Then my Aunt Becky burst out with, “Wait, does this mean…?” I shook my head yes.

Then it happened. If the baby had ears yet, I’m sure this would be the first noise she ever heard. My mom, Aunt Sara, and Aunt Becky, all whoop-scream-laughing in unison, for a good few minutes. Enough time for me to hug my Aunts, Uncles, and for about 200 tears to be shed. And it confirmed what I suspected. This baby is so loved already.

My Grandpa’s hope

My Grandpa is a great man. He’s sweet, quiet, gentle, a good storyteller (like all respectable Mays), and when he says, “Hey, beautiful,” you really do feel beautiful. The day after he found out about the baby, I called his house to ask my Mama May a question, and she wasn’t around. His first comment on the phone was, “So, how’s the future mommy?” Since he found out, that has been his first question every time I’ve seen him. But I didn’t realize exactly how important the baby was to him until tonight.

At dinner (more on dinner tomorrow), Wally and I got to sit by him. In the middle of dinner, he called the table to attention (“I have something to say to Mollie and Wally,” and when he says this, people listen intently). He gave us a memorable speech:

“Over the past year or so, I’ve been reading about WWII vets. They are dying at the rate of 1,000 per day. So I have just been living each day, day to day. But ever since I heard your news, I have a longer term goal. I have to stay around until at least October 30, because I need to meet my great grandbaby!”

We’re lucky because the doc recently told him he’s the healthiest 85 year old he’s ever had as a patient. And the baby can’t wait to meet him!

Introducing…Baby Ottenhoff!

We decided to tell the families last weekend and this weekend, as we were having large family birthday gatherings where we could tell multiple people at once. We decided to handle it the same way at each party…Give a birthday card from Baby Ottenhoff to one of the birthday guests, announcing his near arrival. At Wally’s family, the card was for Bops (his grandpa) and at mine it was for Liz and Earl (sis and bro-in-law). Memorable moments from the events:

• Bops read the card to himself first, then hushed the table of 14 and read aloud.
• Wally’s dad, Walter III, nudged me the whole time, asking who the card was from?
• Liz read the card, and freaked out mid-way through to stop reading. She thought it was a lie (I had poured myself a glass of wine just before to throw them off).
• My mom hugged me for a good 3 full minutes, then offered to provide full time daycare, then couldn’t taste her food the whole meal.
• A minute or so after being told they couldn’t tell anyone yet, Jane (Wally’s sister) pulled out  her  phone to call her friends and let them know.
• Mary (Wally’s cousin) was the first person to ask me, “So, when are you due?” That made it feel real!
• The whole family is still on a bit of a high from the news!