On Friday the doorbell rang. It was the UPS man. When I opened the door he looked tired and pissed.
UPS Guy: (pissed) Here’s your package lady. No signature required.
I took the package which he practically threw at my face and when I shut the door thought, “Geez. What’s his problem.”
Within five seconds I knew what his problem was. Why? Because the box started singing to me. That’s right – singing to me in a loud, Casio keyboard sounding, off-tune version of “It’s A Small World After All” over…and over…and over…and over again. I’m sure the poor UPS guy had the pleasure of listening to it the entire day at the bottom of his truck as he drove all over Brooklyn. I didn’t know what was inside the box but I thought to myself – this can’t be good.
We have gotten many, many amazing gifts for Lilian. Many of them from her thoughtful grandparents. Before Lilian was born we asked that everyone please respect the fact that we have a tiny, tiny apartment and when buying her gifts PLEASE do not buy her anything LARGE or worse – that involved batteries.
A good friend of mine – a Mom of two kids – heard this rule I attempted to set up and snorted and laughed:
Friend: Good luck with that one!
The friend had just finished up the holidays with a visit from her in-laws. It involved a GIANT gift from them to her son – an ugly, plastic, mini basketball court complete with bleachers – in her beautifully decorated living room.
When I got upstairs I tore open the box. It was like opening up an animated box of Lucky Charms as rainbow light beams flashed in my eyes, music blared and tiny pink hearts, yellow moons, orange stars, and green clovers flew out of the box and projected themselves on the wall. Apparently it came with its own batteries.
What the hell is this thing? After recovering from the near seizure moment I rubbed my eyes and saw that this was in fact a gift. A present from someone. And of all things it was an object one can clip on to a baby’s crib to entertain them. Ironically the photo on the box showed a baby ‘sound asleep’ with its head turned away from the object (who could blame him) which was clipped on the crib an inch from its face. I don’t buy it.
In our hippie overpriced, birthing class they warned us of this. They said so many parents are tempted to stuff their kids cribs with flashing light toys, musical mobiles, tons of stuffed animals, wild print blankets, posters on the wall, etc. Yes – while babies do love some of those things some of the time those objects can often prove to be way overstimulating and just freak them out and make them cranky and exhausted. I am guilty of doing this often. Playing music for Lili while having the TV on while talking on the phone while shaking a rattle or reading her a book all at the same time. Believe me does a baby tell you when it all becomes too much. Can you say, WAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
The craziest thing that I discovered about this gift that it was from all people – my mother. Lili’s thoughtful ‘Zen’ Grandmother. The same one that buys Lili beautiful, soft cotton clothes and delicious smelling baby lotions made from all natural ingredients. The same Zen Grandmother that holds her grandchild tenderly and speaks to her in soft, calm voices – so much so that Lili picks up on this and never looks happier and more calm than when she is with her. What happened???
Mom blames a small tumbnail photo on the web site in which she ordered it. I blame her missing Lili. Regardless we shared a good laugh over the object. Now if we could only apologize to that UPS man…
If you manage to avoid all large and/ or battery-operated toys, you are my hero. I gave in because of the five minutes it would buy me from time to time, which is the same reason I gave in to TV. Because I am lazy.
If Lilian turns out to be like all the little girls we know, invest now in 10,000 dolls and strollers and blankies and cradles and those stupid bottles that look like they are filled with milk (not present in our home currently, but we have experienced them TWICE this weekend and it is clear we need to get on our parenting mojo and get those silly things), and baby baths and powders and lotions. They are really the hit. Battery-free and they seem small, but when you have 100, they still manage to take up space.
We moved to a bigger place.
We laugh when we reminisce about how we swore Oliver’s toys wouldn’t have batteries. But if you could SEE him doing his little rock dance or sway dance to the Leap Frog table that is now on the couch because he TOWERS over it when it’s on its own legs. Granted there are things that we deliberately do not put batteries in – Melissa & Doug make a wood puzzle that makes noise when you put the piece in the right place…or at night when you switch off the lights if the piece is long gone. Evil puzzle.