Bumpwatch: Week 27

Happy Halloween!





Aethelbert is dressed as a pumpkin for his first Halloween. We're off to Robin's house to distribute candy to the hordes of children on Harper Ave. It's going to be my job to design and build costumes for Aethelbert as needed. How do you like my first effort with the marker pen?

Baby product namers: take note!

As we found when putting together our baby registry, there's something really weird about baby-product names. In the first place, baby companies have grotesquely twee names, like "Natures Purest" (btw: where's your apostrophe!), "Kiddopotamus," "Summer Infant" and the like. Incidentally, there's actually something a bit horrible about the notion of a kiddopotamus, but anyway.

In the second place, companies that have these twee names then give their products titles that are equally twee, but which don't quite sit right with the company name, leading to weird mixed metaphors and peculiar images. For instance, the "Summer Infant Dr. Mom Brush and Comb Set". Is the name supposed to evoke a freakishly clever child doctor a la Doogie Howser, but summery-er? Or a combination doctor-mother who ministers only to children born between June and September?

Sometimes products just sound strange, like the "Natures Purest Bassinet -- Hug Me." Who, me? And why should I hug a bassinet, even if it is the purest one? Or the Koala Baby Frog Stripe Super Towel -- for when an ordinary towel just won't do. Or the Summer Infant Mother's Touch Large Comfort Bather. This, the blurb tells me, is a product to help you bathe especially large babies. I like the way that Summer Infant have attempted to allude to this euphemistically by suggesting that the bather gives an especially large amount of comfort to one's baby, but have ended up with merely a baffling product name that neither sounds attractive nor explains what the item is for.

Then, perhaps best of all, there are the products which combine weird saccharine imagery with the utilitarian business of explaining what the product is actually for -- these things have a Philip-K.-Dick style uncanny feeling about them. In this line we have the "Kiddopotamus SwaddleMe Organic Cotton Adjustable Infant Wrap" -- only for adjustable infants! By the way, check out the ghastly photoshopping on the picture for this one -- fear the tiny-headed baby! Also see: the Natures Purest Sleepy Safari Diaper Stacker -- because when I think of diapers I always think "purity." Or "safari."

Mmm

What do you think of when you think of baby food? Maybe some wholesome fruit puree:



Or how about some blitzed-up chicken and noodles? Hearty!



Or how about these?



Yes, that's right, it says "meat sticks." Tiny hot dogs suspended in some kind of preserving liquid. I dread to think. Now surely stuff that's not safe for pregnant women to eat shouldn't be given to babies. Making it tiny doesn't change the fact that it's made from hoof-and-eyelid emulsion...still, could be worse. At least there's no baby cheeseoning.

Weekend of cooking and fun

We were just having too much fun to post last weekend. Richard visited, and brought sherry:



Then Dave, Amara, Melissa and Chris came over and we cooked lasagna (or lasagne, according to your nationality), making our own pasta, mozzarella and ricotta. Here's the ricotta draining:



Yes, we drained the cheese in baby's first bathroom.



Sorry baby. However Elizabeth was able to eat the cheese even though it was fresh cheese because we made it ourselves, with pasteurized milk. Take that, guilt mime!

Bumpwatch: Week 26

Belated bumpwatch:

Bumpwatch: Week 25

Our new place

Here it is, unpacked at last!

Living room...

dining area...

extra kitchen bit outside the kitchen...

aethelbert's room -- nothing much here yet except books...

except baby's first shower curtain. Because every baby needs his own bathroom.

Bumpwatch: Week 24

Note the new maternity yoga pants. It's not so weird that they don't have a fly because yoga pants never have one.

Out our window

For those who've been asking to photos of our new apartment, we'll get round to it shortly, I promise! In the mean time, here's our view of the city. It's kind of better in real life than in this photo, plus the screen isn't so obvious...we took one of the sailing boats we could see on the lake, too, but they came out like tiny white dots on a miniscule sliver of blue in the far background, so I didn't post it!

Bumpwatch: Week 23