Nesting

Because of the complications of where I was going to living for the birth, where I had my main baby shower, and just overall confusion, most of Jude's things were at my mom's house, 300 miles away. A couple days ago, she drove up in a truck with an incredible amount of stuff. Baby clothes, car seat, strollers, baby swings, pumping materials (yikes! Scary looking stuff) bottles, toys, blankets, weird looking pillows, pacifiers, a charger for my car for my breast pump (*wonders what situation I will need this in*) a baby bumper, an infant to toddler high chair, a bouncy chair thing ("Babies LOVE those! You'll need one."), and about a thousand other randoms, half of which I had to ask, "What the heck do I need this for?"

It filled the truck bed and the back seat and just about gave me a heart attack. Half of this stuff I'd been given at the baby shower, and the other half had been great finds from my mom. Gently used baby helping instruments that probably saved me a couple grand (at least, from the look at this!). We unloaded all of this stuff and started organizing. Although I'd been nervous and downright dreading this because nothing says "You're gonna have a baby!" by owning more things for the baby than yourself, but as we got started, I didn't want to stop.

Tearing off tags, putting things into piles of soft toys, hard toys, things the baby will eat from, things I will need for breastfeeding, linens, clothes, first aide, diapers, diaper changing accessories, bath time fun, and those random little things that I've been told I have to have, and I was in heaven. Asking my mom questions, laughing and complaining about how much they constrain onesies together (seriously? Are they going to escape if you don't glue them to the cardboard, tape the arms down, roll them up, and then tape the roll together?) and talking about how each thing needed to be cleaned and put away. Suddenly my room is a nursery and I couldn't be happier about it.

There were some tense moments. The small tiff of a wicker basket ("No mom, I do not need another wicker basket." "Yes you do! It's to keep his dirty clothes in, separate from yours!") which lead to the inevitable debate over whether babies need a special detergent for washing their things, ("Sara, what if he has an allergic reaction to the non-hypoallergenic wash that you use and he stops breathing?" "I'll take off his clothes?") but it all ended up working out as we compromised. (I now own a wicker basket for his clothes and am currently washing everything he wears with Dreft! A newborn safe clothes detergent.)

I couldn't have done any of it without my mom. I was incredibly overwhelmed just by looking at it, and she helped break it down for me. The more that we organized and worked and she told me how to clean each thing and what I'd need it for, the more confident I felt in this. Now, I am a cleaning machine, throwing everything removable and cloth into the wash (With Dreft, baby safe detergent!) and even considering counting just how many onesies I have.

Speaking of, I have a load of laundry to switch out, and I will leave you with this one question: How do I clean the cloth items that cannot be removed from the appliance it covers, like a carseat or stroller? If anyone can answer me that, they will probably save me from cutting off everything, washing it, and then sewing it back on. I'm on a roll people.