cabbage baby

For whatever reason, I am not good at keeping track of where I am at in my pregnancy. Knowing I have an appointment with my midwife this week, I just used my "favorite" online due-date calculator. This particular calculator, while accurate, really cracks me up. This week, for example, I am 30 weeks pregnant and "my baby is the size of a head of cabbage". Other times it was "the size of a large bell pepper," or the worst, "the size of a large chicken breast." As Swedes say -- "va?" Could we not find something a little more human to connect it to? A chicken breast is the best we can do?

Now we are raising my own little cabbage head, so we have begun the rather daunting search for "things we need", such as baby car seat, stroller, and a larger laundry rack. It's a whole new, confusing world -- a new kind of Western excess that I haven't been exposed to before. A million contraptions, do-dads, gizmos and luxuries. We have come across a jetted baby spa, (in Canada) and a red pleather children's armchair (Sweden.) You can shop at "Retro Baby" or "Hip Baby" or even "cool baby".

There is every temptation to trap parents into dolling themselves up into eco-friendly (except the diapers, of course) yuppy parents. We bought a baby car seat last weekend, and I jokingly asked Martin if we were going to turn into "those people" (quite of few of them milling around in the store.) No, no, we are not. Phew.

Thankfully we live in the "countryside", where things are a just a little simpler. Not too many yuppies zipping around our neighborhood. I can't recall even seeing a Baby Bjorn. (I only learned what these things were about five months ago.) There's no noticeable social culture of having a new $1,500 CDN stroller, or the brand-name baby clothes. People are a little more practical, a little more earthy.

But maybe we'll buy into some of these crazy products. Why not buy a helmet for your child, so you can send them off to play without fearing they may konk their head? They even make them with little Mickey Mouse ears. At least, I think that is what they are. (Check out the website.) Or what about a prenatal education system? Electronics that you strap on your belly and expose your child to noises mimicking, for example, a mother's heartbeat. Or a fur changing pad?

Personally, I think a faux fur changing pad sounds very practical. An animal-friendly twist on Viking baby care.