Back when I did the post on baby carriers, commenter bellegourmande asked if I could also do a post on strollers, since the world of baby-pushing devices is hard to navigate. Unfortunately, my knowledge of strollers is divided into two categories: “the one that came with my car seat” and “ones I can’t afford”. Pretty much every stroller worth buying falls into that second category. Or at least they did until last week when I found my AWESOME NEW STROLLER on Craigslist.

Before my AWESOME NEW STROLLER, I was using my Chicco Cortina Travel System stroller at Stroller Strides and it was…meh. The Chicco is really more for mall walking/shopping/casual strolling* than for pushing a baby around trails covered in leaves and pine cones so I’ve been keeping my eye on Craigslist for a jogger. Not that I plan to do any actual jogging (I’ve never been much of the jogging type, and even less so now that I’m in danger of giving myself a black eye at every bounce), but the rugged style of a jogger is more suited to the park. And then the stars aligned, the heavens smiled down and my AWESOME NEW STROLLER appeared on The List as if by magic.

BEHOLD:

It's a Quinny Freestyle, bought in Canada as a gift for a nice mommy down in Niantic a couple years ago and hardly used. It has amazing shocks, great steering, and is easy to push even though it's ginormous. My favorite part is the baby can face in towards me...OR...

...out towards the world! Baby Evan loves both directions, but having him face in is especially nice when I know he's going to take a nap.

As you can clearly see, Baby Evan likes it. The padding is very comfy - especially the pillow. It's basically a giant, squishy recliner. I wish someone would push me around in one of these all day.

Total cost? $80 plus $4 for a Starbucks Pumpkin Spiced Latte. (The Starbucks was RIGHT THERE next to their condo complex! And I was ten minutes early! I needed to stall!) Original cost? Over $300, and the super fancy Quinny’s they sell in the U.S. go for $600 or more. I luuuuurve it. Lurve.

Ok, here are the negatives of my AWESOME NEW STROLLER: It weighs a ton, doesn’t fold up very small and takes up the whole back of my Jeep. I doubt it would fit in the trunk of a smaller car. I can’t switch the direction the baby is facing while he’s in it. It doesn’t have cup holders or a snack tray. None of those end up being real negatives for my strolling needs, so my lurve continues.

*Quick review of my Chicco: Very easy to fold, light enough for me to get in and out of the car no problem, Baby Evan likes it, basket can hold my whole diaper bag plus more, cup holders. Negatives: too big for shopping in some stores (women’s section at Target, Gymboree), no really suspension, steering isn’t great at faster speeds or with one hand.

And while I’m at it, here’s the review of my $7 consignment store umbrella stroller (Babies R Us brand, you can buy them for $20): Best $7 I’ve spent on the baby so far. Tiny, light, fits in even the smallest, most crowded clearance sections of the outlet stores, Baby Evan loves it and didn’t make a peep during three hours of shopping. Negatives: doesn’t recline, no basket for storage (although it does have a bag that hands on the back I can keep a burp cloth or a blanket it), no cup holders, probably not tall enough for E to push comfortably.

So right there is everything I know about strollers. Which one do you use? Do you like it?

Baby consignment stores are scary, scary places. The faded plastic toys. The car seats with no manuals or instructions. The cheap nappy stuffed animals. And of course, the racks and racks of old, slightly smelly, scratchy polyester baby clothes.

And yet, I cannot resist a good deal on baby crap, so I always always stop. It’s part of my furniture-on-the-curb-free-books-OMG-A-YARD-SALE-STOP-THE-CAR disease. My case comes from my mother’s side of the family and is very severe and totally incurable. E handles my condition very well for the most part, indulging me sometimes but preventing the house from filling up with wobbly end tables, dressers to refinish, and broken chairs I’m going to recane just as soon as I learn to how exactly one recanes a chair.

During my pregnancy, my disease totally reversed itself and I suddenly hated anything that had been touched by hands other than my own. I wanted things totally new, straight from a box, wrapped in bubble wrap and smelling like plastic chemicals. If I could have gone directly to the car seat/stroller/crib/exersaucer factory and done the actual production myself I would have, just to make sure no one else’s germs every got on my stuff. Who cares what it costs? Nothing is too good for my precious snowflake! (My only exception was a Craigslist crib and changing table, barely two years old, for only $100. I figured the hundreds of dollars I saved on furniture would come in hand for buying other stuff. Like baby hats. HUNDREDS OF BABY HATS.)

But now that I already own every baby gadget known to man, I’ve realized “new” only lasts an hour and pretty much anything your baby can get on their stuff washes out. A baby swing used by someone else’s kid for three months works just as well as a new one and costs a quarter of the price. Until a kid is mobile their clothes are mostly decoration – adorable decoration, yes, but at the rate these little monsters grow you better take a picture the first time they wear something. We’re quickly reaching the Playskool age, where giant plastic monstrosities in primary colors begin to breed and multiply across our house until we’re left cowering in a corner with the dog frantically trying to take the batteries out of anything that makes music or talks.

Unfortunately, those Playskool toys don’t actually breed – you have to buy them (or get them as Christmas gift from your mom. Hi Mom!) – so I’m on the hunt for a quality baby consignment store. The one I’ve been to already is…not quality. That doesn’t mean I haven’t bought stuff, I just haven’t hauled away a car full of amazing bargains. So far I’ve stuck mainly to lightly worn clothes and stayed away from the gear, but this past week I picked up an umbrella stroller for $7, and that d0ggie-eared hat in the hat fashion show for $2. I’m really excited about the stroller, which came with the owner’s manual and is BRIGHT ORANGE, which will make it easy to find in the black hole pit of blankets, empty cups and baby toys that is the back seat of my car. Plus it matches my little ginger’s hair and I am all about making him look as red-headed as possible.

I’m going to check out our local Goodwill and I’ve heard good things about a consignment shop down in Mystic and of course I check my local Craigslist regularly (E: What are you doing on Craigslist? We don’t need any more STUFF! Me: But what if it’s a really really good deal? I mean, look! A real wooden rocking horse for only $100!!! E: NO NO NO NO NO) but I’m afraid that stroller might be my greatest find.

Our house is old and full of character, hardwood floors, big windows and high ceilings. Unfortunately, now our house is also full of baby crap, and I don’t mean in the diapers. One of the things that had not yet been moved/covered/replaced/changed to accommodate the baby was our beautiful, shiny hardwood floors. We had them refinished early in my pregnancy and figured that was probably good enough. I’d just sweep up the dog hair and run the Swiffer over them once a day. They don’t get that dirty. I mean, they’re not spotless but they’ll be fine. THEY WERE NOT FINE. The amount of dog hair that drifts across the room on any given day is ridiculous, not to mention the cat hair and the dirt all of us track in. I had been putting the baby down on a blanket or a towel but now that he can roll those aren’t really big enough. “You know what we need?” I said to E, “We need a really big thick towel that covers the whole middle of the floor and has a sticky back so it doesn’t slide everywhere.” “Let’s go buy a rug,” said E.

And so we did.

It was $25 at Target (75% off!) which was just too good to pass up. We also got one for the nursery for $12 so now I’m not tempted to put Baby Evan down in the crib for play time. I think he really likes his new rug…

…even though it confused him a little at first. It’s much better for scooting than the slippery floor. It is NOT, however, thick enough to prevent crying if the baby accidentally falls on his face because you thought he was sitting up on his own but he’s really not. Not that anyone here would ever do that. And by anyone I mean me. Maybe we should have gotten something a little bigger, since His Rolliness cannot be contained.

Pay no attention to those cords behind the baby. We’re terrible childproofers.

I lie to my pediatrician. At every appointment the doctor or his nurse goes through a whole list of questions regarding our home life with the baby. They asks: What does the baby eat? (Actually, they usually ask how many bottles of formula he gets and I have to remind them I’m breastfeeding.) How many wet diapers? How long does he sleep? And then they ask: Where does he sleep? and I lie. I look my doctor right in the face and say “Oh my baby sleeps in his crib”.

Now, I have no idea if my ped supports co-sleeping but he always nods in approval when I say “in his crib”. I doubt I would get the same nodding if I said “He sleeps in our bed”. Maybe he has a secret button under the counter for people like me that sets off an alarm at CPS headquarters so they’re already waiting by my car to take the baby because OMG TOTALLY UNFIT. But the truth is, where my baby sleeps is not really a medical problem and therefor not something a pediatrician is trained to discuss. Most people’s knowledge of co-sleeping is limited to that story they heard about someone who accidentally rolled over and smothered their child or the mom whose six year old STILL sleeps in the bed… and dad sleeps on the couch. Those are not the norm. I would bet good money there are thousands of people across the country who are secret co-sleepers just like me. If you want more (positive, well-researched) information on co-sleeping I highly suggest www.askdrsears.com or The Baby Book also by Dr. Sears.

The truth is, co-sleeping means a lot of different things. I’ve technically been co-sleeping since the very beginning, since the baby has always slept within an arm’s reach of me. It wasn’t until we achieved success at breastfeeding in the side-lying position that we started bed-sharing. And it is AWESOME. I think learning to nursing lying down is the single most important key to successful breastfeeding (once you get past basic mechanical issues, I mean). Unless you have a partner who is willing to get up and fetch the baby and then get up and put the baby back to sleep EVERY TIME, save your sanity by practicing the side-lying position until you get the hang of it. Here’s my tips: Lie so you’re truly belly to belly, the baby should have to tip his head back and stretch out his neck to latch on. He’ll be tucked into your arm pit, not lying on your arm. And if you’re a roller like I am put a body or king-sized pillow behind your back so you don’t accidentally pull your nipple away if you drift onto your back because, ideally, you’ll be back asleep long before he’s done nursing.

The major concern with co-sleeping is safety, but it has never felt unsafe to me – it just feels natural. There are scary stories out there involving smothered babies and Sudden Infant Death Syndrome being more common among those who co-sleep. The supporters of co-sleeping actually believe it REDUCED SIDS because a baby uses the mother’s breathing patterns to help regulate his own. To prevent accidentally rolling onto the baby there is NO CO-SLEEPING if I have taken anything stronger than a Tylenol. No alcohol before bed, no sleep aids, no drugs, nothing to help me relax. My ability to wake up if I sense something is wrong with the baby is vital to a safe co-sleeping situation. Since I’m not a heavy sleeper to begin with, it took a few nights of bed-sharing before I got used to not waking every time Baby Evan sighed. (He’s surprisingly still when he sleeps though, no tossing or rolling. When we get to that stage of toddlerhood we might rethink the bed-sharing.) Now I sleep just as well as I ever did before the baby.

The other half of this equation is E, but to be honest, he’s really not involved in the co-sleeping. He didn’t even know I had brought the baby to bed the first couple nights! When Baby Evan was smaller I always kept him between me and the actual co-sleeper bassinette*. Now that the baby is a little less helpless I don’t mind putting him in the middle although I still put a pillow between E and Baby Evan. I also unswaddle the baby’s arms so he has the ability to push a blanket or pillow off him JUST IN CASE. (Here’s my other co-sleeping tip: Buy a huge bed. We went to a king-sized mattress after two years of sleeping on a full and cannot even imagine trying to bed-share with anything smaller. Sure it’s a little less cuddly but we weren’t cuddiwee sweepers to begin with.) I actually think E – even though he is a heavy sleeper who doesn’t hear the baby at night – is almost as physically aware of Baby Evan as I am. I’ve seen him roll in his sleep but it’s always away from the baby and when he tosses the pillows around he’s never even gotten close to a smothering situation.

Finally, I have to say I just really enjoy sleeping with the baby. He’s so cute and warm and snuggly when he’s asleep. I know it’s not for everyone – I had no idea it was even for me until I tried it – but for now it is what works best for our family, despite my lying to the pediatrician.

*Our Arm’s Reach Co-Sleeper never worked quite as advertised because we have a bed frame with rails and I couldn’t get it flush against the side of the mattress. But with the side lowered and the leg extenders I can still reach Baby Evan without having to get up. I wouldn’t say you HAVE to have one – a regular bassinette or a pack’n’play bassinette next to the bed would work just as well – but we love ours.

As of now, the baby’s nursery is still being used mostly as a place to rock him to sleep in the dark before we bring him into our bedroom. Once the baby is mobile and needs to be contained for my sanity safety the nursery will end up being our primary place space. I planned for that with lots of book shelves and toy storage but didn’t do much on the interactive/educational side. But since we moved the changing table downstairs* I had a big blank wall to fill. Maybe I just read too much Odeedoh but I couldn’t resist trying out some chalkboard paint.

Before:

After:

My art skills are a little lacking but I thought it fit nicely with our Wild Things theme. Plus that’s the magic of chalkboard paint, I can erase it and start over! I outlined the painted are with some molding spray painted green so it looks like a frame.

*Is my child the only one who is no longer interested in letting me use the changing table? His table-top acrobatics are getting out of hand. Am I doomed to change him on the floor for the next three years?