The Woolly Mom

I’ve discovered something miraculous and untold in the secret mommy world: Wagons are the coolest and best toys ever. Ever, ever. Why other mommies didn’t clue me in on this, I have no idea!

Lil’ got a wagon for her birthday from her Uncle Tom, and so we assembled it (or rather, made Uncle Tom do it himself thank you very much) and let her play with it in the family room a bit - just until the new shininess wore off. But what a treat it’s been!

Door opens. Door closes. Door opens. Door closes. All day long. She puts her best good stuffed friends inside. And closes the door. She sets her Cheerios snack cup in the cup holder, then sits down on the little seat to watch Alpha Pig sing the Super Why! alphabet song on TV (thank you, Alpha Pig!). Any toys misbehave? They are sent over the side of the wagon. Drop. Toss. Launch. Poor little Pinky. He didn’t mean to get in Edward the Bear’s way.

And the best part is that it’s all plastic, so I can just mop up the milk at the bottom of the wagon, spritz the whole thing with bleach water at the end of the night, and I’m done! Cheerio bits fall under the wagon? Oh, I know! Let me just roll this magical tub aside, and Pesto! (yes, I meant pesto - not presto…I’m a carb fan).

Only trouble is I may need to buy a second wagon to use outdoors. I should be very sad if this one got dirty or buggy. At least until the day comes when Lily tries to make me walk the wagon plank. Then it’s going in the shed.

Greetings, ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to the First Annual Lily Awards!

I am your host, Pinky (Lily’s favoritist and bestist guinea pig), and in celebration of Lily’s first birthday, I’m here tonight to present several awards to honor the best products, best entertainment, and best tips of the year! And it’s all based on Lily’s personal experiences - successes, failures, pratfalls, and happiness. So what you’ll see here tonight is the best in Lily’s first year!

So without further ado, please allow me to introduce the first category of the evening:

Best of Toys

The nominees are…
Gloworm
Parent’s Magazine Alpha Blocks
Harold the Hungrian Hippo
Horton
Discovery Puppy

(click each nominee to see what product looks like)

….And the winner is…..Parent’s Magazine Alpha Blocks!

This amazing toys wins for it’s diversity, not only as very knock-overable foam blocks, but also because most of the blocks have a hard plastic rattle toy inside. Lily’s had endless hours of play with those rattles which are virtually indestructible (trust me!). This toy’s gotten more hours of play throughout her first year than any other toy, hands down.

Best of Feeding

The nominees are…
Stonyfield Baby Yogurt
NUK Glass Bottles
Snack Trap Cups
Gerber Puffs
Avent IQ24 Sterilizer

(click each nominee to see what product looks like)

….And the winner is…..NUK Glass Bottles!

Hard to find in the U.S., I had to comb U.K. websites to find these treasures. Glass bottles are hands-down superior to plastic, not only because they don’t leach harmful chemicals, but they stand up to the daily wear and tear of washing, sterilizing, and feeding. They cost more, but they’ll last as long as your baby needs them, and beyond. Plastic bottles get dirty, cloudy, and smelly long before.

Best of Comfort

The nominees are…
Fisher-Price Rainforest Bouncey Seat
RaZ-Berry Teether
Tie Blanket & Quilt Handmade for Lily by Friends
Gloworm
Fisher-Price Rainforest Play Yard Mobile

(click each nominee to see what product looks like)

….And the winner is…..Blankets!

You just can’t go wrong with homemade blankets. They’re lovable, huggable, washable, and made with love. These are soft pieces of comfort that she will be able to treasure for years. I hope every baby is lucky enough to receive such wonderful blankets from loved ones.

Best of Sleep

The nominees are…
Gloworm
Classical Music CD
Halo SleepSacks
Dreams-In-Sight Projection Mobile
The SleepEasy Solution Book

(click each nominee to see what product looks like)

….And the winner is…..The SleepEasy Solution Book! 

It’s hard not to award the Projection Mobile, which is just wonderful and I highly recommend to all parents. But the clear winner by a mile here is the SleepEasy Solution book. This is an instruction book on how to get your baby to sleep through the night at age 4.5 mos.+. It falls somewhere in between the cry-it-out method and the super comfort method. We were frustrated, exhausted parents with an exhausted baby. Then within 3 days of buying this book, she was sleeping 11 hours a night - instead of 4! The authors even personally answered email questions for us. I HIGHLY recommend this book to ALL parents.

Best of Television

The nominees are…
Teletubbies
Super Why!
The Price is Right
Sesame Street
Gilmore Girls

(click each nominee to see what product looks like)

….And the winner is…..Super Why!

Drew Carey just barely got snubbed on this one. Hehe. Ok, Super Why! was a clear winner because it’s freakin’ adorable, has catchy songs (too catchy, if you know what I mean…), makes Lily dance a whole bunch, and she’s learning. Plus it’s not so tedious or annoying that I throw up in my mouth a little each time it’s on (I’m looking at you, Barney).

Best of Bath & Hygiene

The nominees are…
Munchkin Tube of Squirty Bath Toys
Boudreaux’s Butt Bath
Boudreaux’s Butt Paste
Pelican Bath Pitcher (couldn’t find a link. Got it from Target. It’s a big pelican pitcher. Water pours out of its mouth.)
Safety 1st Tub Seat

(click each nominee to see what product looks like)

….And the winner is…..Boudreaux’s Butt Bath!

The butt bath really stands out, and not just for it’s funny name. This stuff isn’t just for bathing butts actually, it’s really a full bath wash for baby. Works great as a body wash and a shampoo. It’s tear-free, dye-free, non-irritating, and it smells great (but not too fragrancy at all!). Plus it’s not test on animals. Big bonus! Lily always comes out clean, tear-free, and smelling great. Plus this one bottle has lasted us forever, so you’re really getting your money’s worth. I highly recommend this over a lot of the perfumy nighttime washes you’ll see on the market.

Best of Books

The nominees are…
“The Very Hungry Caterpillar” by Eric Carle
“Goodnight, Gorilla” by Peggy Rathmann
“On the Night You Were Born” by Nancy Tillman
“Llama, Llama Red Pajama” by Anna Dewdney
“Corduroy” by Don Freeman

(click each nominee to see what product looks like)

….And the winner is…..Llama Llama Red Pajama! 

This book is adorable with a captial “A”. It’s written in a sing-song rhyming style that is best read aloud. It’s filled with emotion and vibrant pictures that keep Lily plenty engrossed. And somehow, it’s ended up being her favorite daytime reading book. If Lily’s dady were awarding this prize, it might’ve gone to “Goodnight, Gorilla” instead which turned out to be a real surprise bedtime favorite.

Well folks, that does it for the 2007-2008 Lily Awards. Whew! What a ride it’s been. I’ve laughed, I’ve cried. Poor Gloworm is just the little Susan Lucci of the house, isn’t he? I feel for him. Really I do.

Well alright, until next year, this is Pinky saying so long, and be nice to your guinea pig!

With all the mayhem of Lily’s trip to her grandparents’, I nearly forgot a surprising discovery we uncovered for her trip. Every time she wants to go and stay at Grandma’s, we’re flummoxed by how much crap we have to pack up for her - most of it bulky and unwieldy. My parents (for all their faults) have been very accommodating in not only providing their own diapers and formula and really cool toys, but also in shelling out big dough to get her a brand-new crib (soon to be toddler bed) to keep at their house.

But lately the question has become, what about a highchair? Lily really has transitioned out of her Bumbo chair, which for a few months had served as a travel highchair. She’s practically ready to Hulk her way out of that rubber molding. And lap feeding doesn’t work unless you’re sitting in a bathtub covered in plastic sheeting - and even then she won’t get much of it in her mouth.

So what to do? Not surprisingly, the grandparents weren’t anxious to go drop another wad of fat cash for a new highchair, only to store the bulky thing 90% of the year (hence why mom-to-mom sales weren’t quite the answer). But my mom came up with a very clever alternative on her own that I want to share with all of you who take their highchair-bound babies on the road a lot: The Booster Seat! Oooh. Aaaah.

It retails for about $33 normally, straps to any standard kitchen chair, and doesn’t take up much space. In fact, I’m kind of wondering why we don’t just use one of these. So there’s the big baby Eureka! for the weekend. Hope you had some good Eurekas! yourself.

Wait until you see these toys that I found - where else? - at Etsy (www.etsy.com), the ultimate online store of homemade crafty goodies. I worship at the altar of Etsy, because of course I’m not crafty (have you read my bio?), I only wish and dream I was. So I count on others to be crafty for me. Illusion complete.

But I’m getting away from myself. What I’m really excited about today are Zadyballs! These are the oddest, cutest, weirdest little baby and toddler toys I’ve seen in sometime.

They’re plush creatures that are meant for loving and tugging and chewing of the baby kind. They have knotted little cotton and flannel arms for baby to tug on, and a soft poly fill for baby to smoosh into. And, apparently the little octo-owl squeaks when you squeeze him! I think I’ll need to name him Hootie (no relation to the Blowfish).

I also find it awesome that you can custom order one. The seller even has a large selection of fabric swatches to choose from so you can design one just right for your baby. Although, there’s something about a couple of these designs that I just love as-is. Don’t you think?

So I don’t think I have a choice. I stumble across Zadyballs, my baby’s birthday is just a coupleweeks away, I love to support crafty homemade businesses, and my husband’s not here to take the credit card out of my hand. Score!

Now watch, just like all magical toys I find for her, she’ll completely reject it and play with the box I wrap it in. Maybe she’ll let me play with the Zadyball then!

UPDATE: Sorry if they’re out of stock of the owl right now. I can’t imagine who went and ordered the last one! I’m sure they’ll have more in stock soon if you’re a smitten kitten.

There’s this product I just discovered. Had no idea they made anything like it - even though it’s ingenious. Baby knee pads! My little crawler could completely use some protection for her poor little scuffed knees, which now are turning all rough and scratchy compared to her sausage-like legs with skin like butta. I’m not so sure if they hurt her, but I bet a little padding would feel nice. And they’re absolutely adorable. They look like some kind of adult fashion trend that I’m thinking I should spearhead. Forget the leg warmers of the 80s, it’s all about fashion knee pads in the…00s (?…still haven’t figured out this whole new millennium thing yet). Make mine purple!

Here’s the real question though. How long do I think it would take her to rip them off and throw them at the pug? Yeah, I better get me a big roll of duct tape to go along with these.

Need to spice up your chores a bit? Sure ya do! Making dinner can get just a wee bit dull after you’ve done it for the 197 thousandth time. Who wants Hamburger Helper?….again?But lookie what I found over at Think Geek, an amazing toy and useful gadget to completely distract all of us geeks into messing up our home recipes dinner kit box directions: The Equal Measure Cup!

In addition to measuring out our standard boring quanitites of milk, sugar, and tequila, this cup gives an educational lesson and handy reference guide. Now we can measure out the amount of water in a bus-sized cumulous cloud. Finally! And a bee hive’s worth of honey? Thank goodness. <mom fantasy>What’s that, Timmy? Teacher gave you homework where you need to make a Jell-O mold of a Tyrannosaurus’s brain exactly to scale? Well, I think I might just have what we need right here! </mom fantasy> Wow, I’m gonna be the coolest mom on the block with one of these.

Finally the world has started to recognize that us nerds do more than play video games and create websites [shifts eyes back and forth ironically], we clean the house, we raise children, and we cook, too! Nerd mom power, baby!

Woo. I let the power of the measuring cup go to my head a little bit there.

I think I need some pancakes to calm me down. Here, let me just pull the pancake recipe off the Think Geek website, and get to work:

Light and Fluffy 1337cakes

1. Mix dry ingredients in medium bowl. Pourbuttermilk and milk into 2-cup Pyrex measuring cup. Whisk in ovum cytoplasm; mix yolk with melted butter, then stir into milk mixture. Dump wet ingredients into dry ingredients all at once; whisk until just mixed.

2. Meanwhile, heat a large flat ferrous sheet to approximately 464 degrees Kelvin. Brush the sheet generously with oil. Pour batter onto the ferrous sheet so that the batter disks are no closer than 3cm apart. Flip the pancakes when the bottoms are the color of Pantone-472C, approximately 150 seconds. Cook for an additional 90 seconds. Re-oil the skillet and repeat until your supply of batter has been depleted.

Funky. Awesome. I just stumbled across these amazing art prints at this Etsy store. They’re neat-o because not only have they got a dark and playful edge to them, but many of them also have a family theme (which, it turns out, I’m into right now!). I love the mother-child portrayal. These are surprisingly touching to me. And for original prints, you cannot beat what the artist is selling them for.

Hmmm…time to update my Christmas list!

Lily’s back from Grandma’s house, and I couldn’t be glowing anymore if you rubbed my cheeks with Brillo pads. I’m so happy to have her back and rampaging around the family room again. And she’s back just in time to start a new teething phase - just when I thought we had found a sunny clearing in the teething woods of drooling and misery.

Thank the lurdy that I have found one of the most excellent teething aids on the expansive baby product market - the RaZ-berry teether. Moms, if you don’t have one, get one. Right now. I’ll wait.

This little (adorable) teether is brilliant mainly because it doesn’t deflate with each maw like a normal pacifier would - this one’s a solid hunk of silicone with massaging little berry bumps. Lily even loves to stick the durable silicone handle in her mouth (so my baby looks like she has a giant raspberry growth protruding from her mouth all day) and rake it across her gums. The little “vines” wrapped around the handle must feel good scraping against the tender tissue in her mouth. Rake. Rake. Scrape. Ahhhhhh.

Is it totally wrong for me to stockpile loads of children’s movies that I want to watch? And then watch them. After my baby’s gone to bed. I don’t want to be that mom that plays with her kid’s Barbie dolls after she’s asleep (ok, I kind of do). But I am completely stoked about a DVD collection I just found at Circuit City. It’s inspiringly named the “Warner Brothers 4 Film Favorites - Children’s Fantasy“. Whoever named the collection should win some kind of award. Honestly. Because that’ll be easy to find in an Internet search. Which is exactly why there is no product link for you. Suffer.

We paid $9.99 for this collection of movies that includes: The Never Ending Story, The Witches, The Secret Garden, and 5 Children & It (I know, I’ve never heard of that last one either, but it stars Freddie Highmore and his little Charlie Bucket chipmunk cheeks, so how can you say no?).

Did you hear what I said? The Witches! Starring Anjelica Huston! She turns children into mice. And something about other witches think kids smell like dog poo. And there’s this fat kid. He eats a lot of cookies. And then Mr. Bean shows up. And he tries to diddle a maid in a closet. Whew! Good times. Good times.

Dave’s stoked about The Never Ending Story, which I always thought didn’t sell itself very well with its title. Never have seen it (partially for that reason), which means I’m in some kind of “Child of the 80s Club of Ostracism“. Our initiation was eating a bunch of Neccos and then singing the Punky Brewster theme song (♪”Ev-ry time I turn around, do-dodododo…”♪). We’re such rejects.

Anyway, I have these big dreams that Lily’s going to completely fall under some kind of pseudo-nostalgic trance and fall in love with the movies as deeply as I adore them. Ok, trying to keep it realistic here - I remember that I never fulfilled my mother’s dreams of loving The Flying Nun or Gidget (hey, she had a thing for Sally Field!). So I’m not holding my breath that my girl will appreciate the classic brilliance I have stocked her DVD library with.

But at the very least, I hope she doesn’t grow up to fully realize what a reject I am because I watch The Goonies while she’s at school all day. Or am I doomed?

When my husband first shoved this gaudy play rug into our Home Depot shopping cart, I rolled my eyes at him. It’s a giant rug play mat dotted and snaked with little roads, service stations, and (yes) Home Depots for your kiddies to drive their little Hot Wheels on/to. See, now their little Hot Wheels drivers can have a selection of 57 different types of hammers, none of them under $20. And then have a Home Depot hot dog on the way out to their Hot Wheel parked 8 miles (or I guess that would be 4 inches) away in the crowded parking lot. Yum. Home Depot hot dog. I hate to admit it, but sometimes those make the best lunch while you’re sitting in a hot car, not wanting to go home and start caulking the tub.

Anyway, where was I? Oh, yes. The car rug. Cute idea. I probably would’ve played with it a bunch when I was 7 years-old. But 10 months old? I’mmm thinkin’ Lily’s more likely to lick the roads than drive anything on them. But what the heck. Dave seemed so proud to be buying it for her. I like to let him dream.

Who knew I would LOVE this rug so much? I rolled it out right in the middle of my horribly stained and dirty beautiful beige carpeting in her play room (formerly known as my family room). And now it’s the catch-all for every green bean splatter, every dirty bootprint (thanks, Dave), and every pile of cat vomit. (Why do the cats always run to whatever room I’m in to show me the hairball they’re about to bring up?) And when I have to clean a carpet stain elsewhere in the room, I no longer have to fear my baby or cats will go and lick up the cleaner residue (which trust me, they would - they’d push and shove to see who gets it first). I just tug on the carpet until it covers up the offending spot.

Voila! Always-clean carpet. You have GOT to get yourself one of these things!