Baby's new home

This is officially the nursery post. I planned to do a big nursery post, but that was before Baby decided to make an early arrival, and also before the final piece was in place: an end table to hold the cutest lamp I've ever seen. Of course, the nursery wouldn't have been complete without the cute lamp, so the post had to wait.

The post was going to be about how high-maintenance babies are, with all their stuff. And probably Matt's reaction to it--his "my wife's gone crazy and I just have to roll with it" attitude that has sailed us through many a weird situation.

Fortunately, it's now going to be about how amazingly useful a nursery is. In short, I've been vindicated. It turns out that I'm actually not crazy, and a 6-pound baby really does need 100x her weight in "stuff." Matt admitted being pleasantly amazed at everything I'd managed to pull together before Kalina moved in.

It's like camping. You can camp with nothing more than two sticks to rub together to make fire. Or, you can buy all kinds of yummy campfire food, extra-soft sleeping pads, tents you can stand up in and portable showers and haul it with you. It's a lot of extra work and expense, but it sure does make camping a lot easier on those of us who appreciate a little comfort. That's what baby supplies do.

And so far, so good. Except for one trip to Wal-Mart yesterday to pick up the aforementioned end table, we've had on hand everything Baby could possibly need, lamp and all. I think she appreciates our foresight, seeing as we manage to keep her relatively comfortable except when we're torturing her with diaper changes and sponge baths.

But then there's the cuteness factor. Fortunately, Kalina is pretty adorable, so I think it makes sense somewhere in Matt's scientific mind that her gear needs to be adorable as well. It's a correlation thing: cute baby = cute stuff. At least I hope that's the connection he's making, or he's going to spend the next 18 years very confused all the time. Poor guy.