A Tale of Two High Chairs
Alternately: The Most Boring Post On The Internet.
I didn’t have jack shit of my own when I was pregnant with Ben. Everything I had and everything that he had was graciously given to me by other people as I had no influx of income, only a douchy ex who wanted me to itemize everything I ever bought for Ben. I know. I KNOW. I sure knew how to pick ’em.
Ladies, don’t all clamor for his number at once, please. And stop throwing your underwear at the computer, I promise it won’t help you win his heart.
But anyway, because I was not exactly rolling in the dollar bills, I had to kind of make do with whatever people gave me for Ben. Baby Stuff is something most people are really eager to hand down to others, usually by the carful, because, well, it costs a fucking fortune and usually can be used and reused. So, I was showered with hand-me-downs, which, awesome. Unless it involved swishy-looking pastels, which, not QUITE as awesome.
By the time that Alex was born–5 years later–the hand-me-downs were long gone, handed down to someone else. I had some of the clothes from Ben, but even those had been scavenged before I got to them again. No fear, though, because this time around, I was fortunate enough to be in a decent enough financial situation to not require castoffs.
Meticulously The Daver and I began to pick up painstakingly researched gear: the car seat, the pack-n-play, the swing and the bouncy seat. And the high chair. While Dave had been content with just having Ben, I’d wanted a gaggle of kids. We settled on two–Ben and Alex–with the option to have #3. With that in mind, we tended to try and pick out the more resilient options so that we didn’t have to buy it all again.
What we hadn’t really taken into account is who the fetus flipping about in my body cavity was: Mr. Destructo. I should have known, as he never stopped wriggling and flipping, nestling his tiny toes into my liver using and my internal organs to box. Being pregnant with Alex was a violent, violent act.
As a child, Alex just beats on things. He’s not destructive for the sake of destroying things, thankfully, but I worry one day that a well placed kick to a particular support beam will send my house into rubble. It wouldn’t have been on purpose, likely it would have been something that just sort of happened. Alex is Chris Farley in miniature form, frequently flinging his body onto the ground (or into a wall or something) just to make you laugh.
Ben is distractible, Alex is destructible.
The first of our carefully executed choices to be broken was the swing, which was Alex’s bed for the first 6 months of his life. It just…stopped working one day. Next to go was the bouncy seat, which somehow lost an entire screw somewhere along the lines from his constant movement. His crib is missing a couple of screws too, although they’ve been replaced, because he’s somehow managed to wriggle them loose as he flings himself at the mattress from a standing position.
And his high chair? ALSO missing some screws.
So. Yeah. Plan. B.
It was obvious Amelia wasn’t going to inherit anything from Alex save for the saucer toy.
Also obvious was my desire not to acknowledge that she’s growing up. Because while I simply couldn’t WAIT to stick spoonfuls of cereal and fruits into the screaming and indignant mouths of my boys, I’ve only half-heartedly tried Amelia on the cereals and fruit. She’s suitably underwhelmed with them all and I haven’t pushed it. I mean, she’s only a BABY after all, right Internet?
Except no, she’s 6 months old and ready, but getting her a high chair was not even a wee blip on my radar. She’s my last baby and I’m just not ready for her to grow up. It always annoyed me when people would tell me to savor it; it goes so fast, because dude, OBVIOUSLY.
But it does. It goes so, so fast.
(I did not have a digital camera back then and I do not have a scanner now, so I cannot add Ben at this age. Instead, I will show you a picture that will carefully show you what Ben thought about rice cereal)
I was cruelly serving Ben PIZZA.
Captain Destructo, himself.
Dude. Who knew Heaven was shaped like a Wagon Wheel?
I used to be rough on stuff growing up, but now that I am the one who has to pay to replace it… well, I’m a lot more gentle now.
All of mine wanted to eat at different times. And yes, I had one who did grab food off my plate and out of my hand on its way to my mouth. That child’s first solid food was smoked mullet because she got it in her mouth before I could stop her.
And some of mine would still be living on breastmilk had I allowed that.
By the way- CUTE kids. Beautiful kids.
OHMYGAWD THE EYES!!!!!!
NOM NOM NOM……
ps- sorry ben.
My daughter is just over a year and she doesn’t want to eat real food. I’m not in any hurry to advance her past the pureed goop, but I almost feel like I’m doing her a disservice. Every other kid is gnawing on steak by this point, it seems.
I just recently gave away my last bits of babyness left in the house. So sad 🙁
The pizza picture cracks me up! It reminds me of the time that I had had all I could take of my oldest son’s picky eating and insisted that he take one single bite of the squash soup I had made–which was, other than the color, largely indistinguishable from the tomato soup he loves. He finally managed to swallow the tiniest spoonful ever–then vomited it all over the kitchen table. That’s when I realized I had to find a system other than the “you will take one bite, so help me God” system. Of course, I still haven’t.
Between my own kids and day care, I’m coming to appreciate truly durable kids’ stuff. Our cheap, practical high chair now looks like it’s been gone after with a butcher knife. Enjoy the high chair shopping; it may not be fun to be thinking of her leaving her itty-bitty-babyhood behind, but there’s some marvelous stuff to look forward to!
I waited on solids until my daughter was 8 months old. I’ve read that if they aren’t ready and interested, it’s just not necessary to spend your time pushing spoons of goo into their mouth and watching most of it come back out again. I’ve known other moms who said their baby started grabbing food off of their late and eating it at six months old, so every baby is different. Good luck!
i don’t have much to say except your children so freakin’ adorable!
Alex and Amelia look so much alike here!
Oh you are such a mean mommy serving that poor kid pizza. What were you thinking? LOL. And yeah Amelia & Alex really do look alike!
Oh My. Alex and Amelia DO look alike, don’t they?
With my last two, I skipped baby food altogether, and just started table food at 6 months. We’re very lucky since we don’t have food allergies, and I’m lucky that they agreed to eating what the family eats.
MoD didn’t eat purees until close to a year and solids until closer to 18 months. I am determined to not repeat that with Juzilla. Similac might as well just have open access to our bank account.
Finished Mimi’s hat but it seems big. Will try it on juzilla for size. Just have to close up the top, but since it’s a million degrees out, guessing you aren’t in any huge hurry 😉
Because there is 13 years between my middle and youngest we had nothing when Henry came along. There is some really cool kid shit out there today but I went for the practical highchair and we had our crib given to us.
PS – Can I nom nom the baby? Just a little?
You mean mommy. Pizza – I mean really. 🙂 🙂 🙂
On vacation I made my daughter eat chicken nuggets and got the same reaction. It’s a CHICKEN NUGGET for pete’s sake.
Not escargot. Which, thanks to spell check I can spell correctly thus deflecting the boringness of my response to the actual comments rather than the realization that if you can’t spell a word you probably shouldn’t use it. Oops, spell check doesn’t think that boriningness is a word.
No matter, you know what I mean.
I think.
Kids are gorgeous. You should be forced to reproduce. The world needs more beautiful people. And yes, I know I’m shallow.
Um, we had nothing with kid #4 because I was done having kids like seven years prior. We never had a crib, and the high shcair? total waste of funds, as he refused to sit in it because he wanted to sit with the big kids. On my lap.
As for food, well, the baby was allergic to corn; go figure. So he ate a lot of baby food longer than I normally would have fed it to him because everything else has hig-fructose corn syrup in it. I switched from feeding him real food to almost exclusively breast-feeding when he was 8 months old-which also meant I couldn’t eat anyhing that had any corn or corn derivative in it. Yeah, even sour cream. So-my whole point to that was of course to point out how much harder it was for me, right? HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH. Feeding kids = hell if said kid is at all, um, different. And I can’t look at those pictures any longer becuase my ovaries are already hurting from seeing several other baby-related posts and I am SO done.
*nomnoms on Mimi for an early morning snack*
I can only hope that Baby Soup is not as destructive as Alex is….if only because I think my dad and husband would shoot me if I asked for them to make another cradle….
My girls lived in their infant car seat carryer thingies for the first 8 months of their lives. It was car seat-cradle-boucy-highchair extrordinaire! To the point where I asked to doctor if their bones would develop in the sitting position.
and Cpt. Destructo and Amelia look so much alike, huh?
Um, I have a confession – I love wagon wheels. They’re a great snack! And the sweet potato puffs. Mmmm. Melt in my mouth!
Cute ass kids, for real. I wish I could bottle them up.
OK, so:
1. What kind of mother serves pizza to a kid? I mean, really?
B. Could Alex and Amelia look any more alike?
My step son and I just turned my oldest son (who only eats fruit) against red grapes about 10 minutes ago.
He by saying that the inside of the grapes were filled with poop, and me by trying to explain that that was the meat of the grape. How DARE I suggest that my son was eating MEAT!
Duncan doesn’t cry when I give him a non-fruit item though. He takes one bite, informs me that he hates it and then ignores it (and me, if I suggest he eat more) the rest of the day.
Like MK, I eat the sweet potato puffs, too!
Feeding kids is a trip — watching their reactions. And seeing the differences in siblings.
And ditto on the adorable kids.
Awww…poor Ben!!! Shame on you for serving that child deliciously cheesy bread filled with sauce and spiced pepperonis!
Don’t you know that child wanted broccoli??!!!
Your kids are so freakin’ cute. I don’t think there are many high chairs designed to keep up with any 1 or 2 year old boy, period.
It’s obvious you abuse poor Ben and never, ever feed him anything good.
Alex would get along wonderfully with Gabe. Captain Destructo meet TDB (the demon Briel)
dude my kid loved those wagon wheels when she was wee! She also did not have a high chair until she was 6 months old because I just never got around to buying her one (yeah I am mother of the year), so for the first two months she at from her bumbo seat, she didn’t seem to mind.
I tried, I reallly did, but I cannot move beyond “Alex is destructible.” I mean, we all are destructible, when you think about it, but you really shouldn’t suggest that we destroy Alex simply because he is destructive.
That first picture of Ben is too cute! Then I thought the next picture was Amelia until I read the caption. Do they still look alike?
That’s quite a trio of gerber babies.
I know of the destruction that kids can bring. I have two and they are BOTH like that and then some. And it doesn’t get any better as they get older. You need to have a “Replacing Shit All The Time” fund or you they will drain you dry.
They are so darn precious!! I just want to nibble them!
My oldest daughter at 17 still is not a fan of the pizza. She will eat it, but if I try to force her to eat cheesey goodness more then once a month, she gets filled with teenage angst about PIZZA. For pete’s sake.
Maybe I ate it too much when she was inutero?
I’m with you…this is my LAST baby and even though she’s only 2 months old (NOT almost 3 months, I don’t care what you say, mom) I’m not ready to push her to do much of anything. She’s not rolling over yet? So what? She WILL…eventually. She’s not sleeping through the night YET? Again, so what (although this is one milestone I wouldn’t exactly MIND)?
You’re right…savor it. And if you HAVE to buy a new highchair and since this is your last at least you can get pink and fru-fru if you want, right?
I reference to the hand-me-downs: I am willing to give my child the same initials as yours if you want to give me all of your monogrammed stuff! Just saying….
p.s.- I want to eat your children because they are just so darn precious.
So… My son refuses to do things at home like he does them at daycare. I could win laziest mom award, because I wait for the daycare to train him to do things and then work with him at home on it… It’s just how he’s been since infancy. I don’t know if it’s being around all the other kids (peer pressure beings in infancy, yo) but he would REFUSE to do things at home that he’d mastered at daycare. Eating with a fork? Potty training? fuguddaboudit. He had to do it there before he’d consent to do it at home. I’m not even kidding when I tell you that my son took past the age of three to become potty trained. But the kid will miraculously develop overnight. Not even kidding. You can’t force him to do anything he doesn’t want to do until he’s ready for it.
He also never ate in a high chair at home. He lived in his Excer-saucer at mealtime, but hated to be in it otherwise. I used to put him in it after he hit two, because it made an excellent time-out. Until he figured out how easy it was to climb out. 🙂 Haha. If my next child, when and if they arrive, loves high-chairs, I’m actually going to have to buy one. I do have about 6 boxes of boy clothes sitting in storage, because my uterus controls me and won’t allow me to give them up. I used to get so pissed when my mom would email me saying, “I told so-and-so that you have a ton of baby clothes. When can I pick them up?” Because I didn’t want to get rid of them. It was painful and still is. I do have certain outfits set aside in a special box, like his coming-home outfit, and a BabyGap outfit my bff bought him that says ‘Handsome Devil’ on the butt. It’s too cute. 🙂
Your kids are too cute, btw… Perhaps if my son and Amelia got together when they were older, they’d spawn Super-Beautiful Babies. 😉 I’m still planning on getting him to marry Shiloh Jolie-Pitt. I have high expectations, and I want cute grandchildren, damn it. lol
My Aidan has been pratt falling since the age of two. We have called him Chris Farley (without the drug use and early death, of course) for years (he is five). At first we thought it was an affliction, but then we realized he was just a more physical kid than most.
In my opinion, you can do without the highchair. Get a booster seat, which clean up fabulously (I can shove mine in the dishwasher), and are nearly indestructible.
thank you for only half heartedly feeding your baby cereal and fruit by 6 months. I was feeling terrible about only having given my baby (almost 7mo) her first few tastes of cereal and still giving her a bottle all the time. But she’s my last baby too and I just can’t take her growing up! when did she stop being a tiny tiny infant? aaaaaaggh!
Hey, it’s Lori..I’m the one that my son also had periorbital cellulitis…anyway, you were a follower of my blog but I just made it private. I sent you an invitation to read if you want to. Just thought I’d give you the heads up!
Thanks,
Lori
They are so adorable!! I just want to pinch all their cheeks (gently, of course) and gobble up their toes. I love the babies!! I wish I could have two or three more, but I don’t know where we would put them!
Such cute babies….. loved the post
Hmm a cross Atlantic cultural divide moment here. Our wagon wheels are two biscuits sandwiching a marshmallow layer covered in chocolate. I’m guessing yours aren’t.
I found that you can avoid the entire ‘baby spitting rice cereal or strained whatever at you’ period in a baby’s life by not feeding the kid that mushy stuff and waiting until they’re old enough to pick up Cheerios, vegetables, etc. and feeding themselves.
Actually, it was my daughter who refused to eat from a spoon, who taught me this lesson!
Of course this requires round the clock nursing, which leads to heat rash for mother (boobs and arms) and baby (face and anything that touches Mom) if months 7 to 10 of the child’s life happen to coincide with summer….
I understand…. when my oldest was one, and not walking, we followed her around like a virtual boot camp- holding her hand to make her take steps… buying her push toys for her to walk with, and a shopping cart to roll around. It was like every day we wanted her to grow a little faster.
Now my youngest is one and not walking, and I’ll be damned if anyone teaches her to!! She’s a baby!! My baby!! She can take all the time she needs! (Plus, two of them walking… I get a migrane just thing about it!)
Oh… highchairs… it all seemed so complicated then and now in retrospect it seems so simple. My Boy starts middle school two weeks from today. I’m going to need some medication. Today at middle school band camp they had hookers disguised as eighth grade girls.
I’m thanking my lucky stars for my quiet children. I’m surprised you manage to switch on the computer, let alone write a post. I would be exhausted!
I’m having that difficulty with the baby-ish stage just now. I like the part where they start to speak and they make sense of everything. One to three, roughly. Of course, I love them before and after, too, but that’s the stage that pains my heart when it stops.
Lucky for me, my son was born one of the most careful human beings on the planet. He likes to carry around random things and place them where they are Never To Be Seen Again, but at least his baby stuff is in reasonable condition. Now for the tricky part: let’s see if I can actually give birth to another.
I heard that if a child starts crying about the food and you then proceed to eat their food instead, they will learn for next time (or go hungry).
Such cute kids!
I never bought a single jar of baby food, not even when I was working 40 hour weeks when the youngest was under a year. I just blended up whatever veggie I cooked and fed them that and gradually added more and more of whatever I was eating. I also ignored the warnings not to eat peanut butter while pregnant and all my girls tasted it (and loved it) around a year old.
The only real food issues were with my youngest. The first being allergic to strawberries which we didn’t realize until she was about 4 years old. Since I’m allergic to them, they really weren’t in the house that often and she never wanted to eat any with her sisters. It took a lovely strawberry milkshake seen in reverse for us to realise. The other food issue with her is she’s a selective eater. Basically, she’s just like me…food wise.
I always throw my underwear at the computer when I read your blog. Always. But they’re always meant for you.
Cuuuute pictures.
Darin and I are torn between having cute (and well-researched) baby stuff for Oscar, and realizing that WE HAVE NO SPACE. So we have this little portable high chair for now that sits on the living floor (which is where we take all of our meals anyway).
I know how you feel about Amelia! I was torn between wanting to wait as long as possible to give Oscar solids to starting him on Pad Thai.
My babe’s gonna be eight months old Saturday and I still have not bothered to drag the highchair out of the attic. I sit him on my lap to feed him, and he gags dramatically if I serve him anything that involves even a tiny chunk.
For risk of being cheesy: it does move so fast.
My baby just turned 4 today. It was so hard for me. I actually cried all day. What was making it tougher was the fact that, even though I rationally don’t want any more children, I irrationally want another baby. Luckly I can’t, we made sure of that when I delivered her by c-section. But even that made it worse.
Oh, I can relate – I’ve taken a completely laid back approach to my second child. With the first, I rushed him to do everything – my second one takes his time. He also was uninterested in food until very recently. He completely skipped baby food and went straight to eating what we were eating!
He absolutely HATED any baby food with chunks – yet eats potatoes, bread, any kind of meat, and whatever else we serve him – as long as we’re eating it too. HA!
Why do I not think Alex and Amelia look anything alike? Maybe it’s the angle.
I was in a similar financial situation when I had Lady H and hand me downs were just fine with me. Except being 19 and having not one friend with children, I didn’t get a lot of them. Now I’m perfectly happy to throw my stuff at other people’s kids, just for the sake of getting rid of it. A garage sale would be nice too but I am just too friggin lazy.
Dude, those babies do look just alike. Vinomom is off her vino. NOM.
I make wee babies so high chairs are too friggin’ big and we like the Bumbo – still feeding in it now at just turned one year and guess what? When the baby is in the Bumbo she sits right in front of you so you can see the whole baby AND nom on her feet while she eats. It is way more fun than a high chair until the eatin’ really gets going.
Hey, can I mail you some baby clothes? Oh wait, Amelia is probably sized appropriately. Shit, there goes my chance to unload some clothes so I don’t have to have more girls.
Toss my panties at the computer screen? I take them off special, just before I read your blog! And in the past, I had enough shitheads numbers, thanks. Aren’t they in a hurry to give out those digits? Must have something to do with that mullet. (you know he had a mullet) :o)
Hand-me-downs? Impossible, since our 2 ‘surprises’ are 7 years apart. Finally, after having my garage full of baby items, I sold them all in a yard sale. My grandmother assures me, this is what got me pregnant. (let’s’ not tell her about all the sweating and non-panty wearing with the hubby) Oddly enough, we have tons of stuff for the new baby, to much one would say. We do have generous parents. :o)
Highchairs? We decided to get a small chair that fits/straps on top of our dining room chairs. That way our wee nugget is included when we sit down to dinner, and it encourages us all to sit together. Because, really, what is funnier than a 6 month old spitting up his peas? Or laughing because he seems to have a non panty relationship with applesauce? :o)
Why is my whole post about panties? Am I hormonal or what??
love you, love your blog. Just to be different – kids look nothing alike. ha
NOM NOM NOM!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Peanut is 4.5 months old and we started her on brown rice cereal last week and nanners this week and I think she likes the mix of the cereal and bananas since the cereal tastes like cardboard. I don’t think she’s digging the concept but it does help her sleep longer at night and at this point that’s all I care about.
I can’t believe you made Ben EAT PIZZA – you heartless woman you 😉
Amelia is way too cute for her own good! Must take after her Mamma!
xxx
Aislyn makes that same face about pizza. She HATES the stuff.
Your kids are all pretty smooshable. 🙂
i miss my babies…my youngest is 5! waaaaaaaaaahhhhhhhhhh! :0(
We actually had folks stop at our table in a restaurant and say, “We’ve never seen a baby eat that much food” when our older daughter was a toddler.
My first 2 boys still barely eat – I don’t know how they survive. The next 2 kids never stop eating -especially the aforementioned daughter who despite her food load is as skinny as a licorice whip (definitely not my genes). We just started Rissa on solids last week and she’s a big fan. She screams if we don’t shovel it in fast enough.
We have/had those same glasses in your photo of Ben (Baaa!!)
I tried to feed my son solids at 6 months.. He was totally not interested. In fact, he was not interested until he was about a year old. Really, no harm done… don’t feel like you are married to a timeline on this or anything else. After all, how many adults do you see still in diapers and drinking from bottles…
“Alex is Chris Farley in miniature form, frequently flinging his body onto the ground (or into a wall or something) just to make you laugh.”
This sounds like someone I need to meet.
Can I have Ben’s leftover pizza?
So, I returned the portable high chair I got at my baby shower, because I thought we’d get a hand me down from my SIL. That never materialized, and we waited and waited to repurchase. So one day, my neighbor came over to watch my daughter for a little bit, and was feeding her in my usual manner (in my lap). She then brought over the high chair that her 20+ year old sons had used, and we used that for the duration. So, get yourself a handy neighbor with good stuff!
she’s so cute!
Dude, Number 2 and Number 3 could be twins!!!!
I sold all my/the boy’s baby stuff on Craig’s List, including the antiqued high chair I just had to have, and made a crapload of money. Didn’t miss it for a second. Wish I had more to sell 😉
The only baby stuff I still use for Cenzo are his crib and his pack-n-play, because it’s all about containment with that kid. The rest has been passed on to good homes. *sigh* Your children could not be any cuter. Truly.
That pic of Ben is priceless.