Little Evan had his 18 months check-up yesterday, and since this blog is my baby book I should probably record his stats here, rather than lying to myself and pretending I’m going to hold onto this “Baby’s Health and Growth Record” they gave me at his first visit and I shove in my purse before each appointment.

Height: 32 inches
Weight: 24 lbs 3 oz
Head circumference: 47.6 cm

All of that puts him somewhere between the 25th and the 50th percentiles and back on the kind of “healthy curve” the doctor is happy with and doesn’t require coming in every freaking month to make sure I’m not starving him to death. They made me schedule his next appointment on the way out, which is his 2 YEAR CHECK-UP. I was not only mentally unprepared to think of him as being 2, I am incapable of picking a “good” time and day for an appointment in April, when I will have 2 babies. My day planner doesn’t even go past December, because that’s when I figure my whole life will just turn into chaos and won’t ever leave the house anyway.

In “things that make my life easier news”, we also went to Best Buy and bought this:

HUGE. But useful.

Our current TV stand (which, if you REALLY need to see it, is the in background of 85% of my pictures) has solid wood doors, which means when you close them you can’t control anything with the remote. Design FAIL. We took one of the doors off a long time ago and that was a workable solution for a while…until we had a kid. A kid who likes buttons. And knows which button turns the TV on and off. And thihks pushing it is HILARIOUS. Our new stand will prevent the button-pushing and cord-pulling, as well as give us a lot more storage for E’s giant electronics collection and free up space on our bookshelves for, you know, those things with the pages and the words. Oh yeah, BOOKS.

We also ordered this:

Nursery Glider

It’s the Newco Serenity Classic Glider to go in the new nursery/playroom. You can’t see the fabric closely in the picture, but it’s a chenille corduroy that is very soft AND very stain resistant. I was torn between buying the chocolate brown and ordering it in the green version, but when the sales guy said the green was “special order”, which meant it would take 10-12 weeks AND I couldn’t use my BRU 20% off coupon, the brown won. Easily. It will work just fine with beige and orange and if I end up hating the color I’ll just throw a blanket over it.

Also, if you read all the reviews of the chair they’re split between people who love it and people who hate it because it squeaks, and although squeaking is annoying the cheap Target glider we have already is INCREDIBLY squeaky and it never ever bothered Baby Evan. Comfortable is really my only concern.

Next weekend starts our new master bedroom renovations and also the start of fourteen bazillion posts featuring MORE crap I want to buy. I know you’re already excited.

I learned some lessons on round 1 of the baby ride, especially when it came to baby gear. We bought stuff we liked, we bought stuff we hated, we bought stuff that seemed unnecessary but is OMG VITALLY IMPORTANT and we bought stuff that seemed VITALLY IMPORTANT but ended up being useless.

I discovered a “co-sleeper” is just a  fancy word for “$150 bassinet” and if you plan to actually sleep with the baby you can save yourself $150.

The high chair I thought was very very necessary is collecting dust in the dining room while the clamp-on Phil & Ted’s chair I thought was probably a huge waste of money gets used 3x a day.

Nursery bedding sets are a joke. Buy a pack of 3 fitted sheets. The end.

If your baby hates tummy time, there is no tummy time mat on the planet that will convince them they don’t.

Sometimes a $7 umbrella stroller is all you need – and sometimes spending $400 on a car seat is totally worth it.

But if there was one most important lesson I learned, it’s to READ THE REVIEWS and LISTEN TO YOUR FRIENDS when it comes to baby stuff. If someone on the internet says “Hey, this high chair had a bunch of pieces fall off after a few weeks” they’re probably not making that up. And when your friend says “My kid REALLY loves that Sophie giraffe teether thing” you should stop balking at the $21 price tag and just BUY ONE. So when it comes to the stuff we’re going to need for round 2, I’m not spending a single cent until I get some advice from you.

We need a crib. Eventually. After Baby Sandy starts sleeping in 4 hour chunks of time, outgrows the co-sleeper and I decide I need my bed back. I’m thinking Ikea – they seem pretty well liked, I don’t think they’ve had any major recalls, and some even convert to toddler beds.

Advice needed #1: Does anyone own an Ikea crib they love? Or hate?

We need at least one double stroller. Probably two. I want a side-by-side jogger for Stroller Strides and in case I ever actually, you know, jog. Plus I want a tandem double for regular use, like at the mall or the aquarium or walking around the neighborhood. Since I’m not really interested in the jogging part, my plan is to buy a used side-by-side cheap (like really cheap, like probably from my friend Sarah for $20)(if she still has it)(Hey Sarah, I still want your jogger) and invest in a tandem.

Advice needed #2: Does anyone have a tandem double stroller they love? Or hate? My top choices so far are the Baby Jogger City Select, the (much more afforable) Kolcraft Contour Options Tandem II, the Phil & Teds Inline, or the Uppa Baby VISTA with the doubles kit. Advice on the brands in general is also welcome.

And I think we need another glider/rocking chair. The glider in Baby Evan’s nursery was such a last-minute decision – I had resisted buying one, mostly because the ones at Babies’R’Us seemed so expensive – but it gets used more than any other piece of baby equipment except for the crib. Our current glider is from Target. It is…functional. I mean, the arms are really loose and one of them keeps coming unattached and several screws seem to have fallen out and it squeaks a lot and it doesn’t recline so you can’t really sleep in it. But it still rocks. I guess we’ve gotten our money’s worth in the last 18 months.

Advice needed #3: PLEASE recommend your glider. It doesn’t have to be expensive but it can be. I learned my lesson when it comes to cheap chairs.

That’s it. Unless you have an absolute favorite baby item you cannot live without and want to recommend. Especially if it’s the sort of thing that helped you survive life with TWO children. Because I’m more than willing to take advice.

One of my very earliest memories is of our house in New Jersey, the one we lived in when my little sister was born. It was the first house my parents ever bought and I can only imagine how exciting it was for them to buy the BRAND NEW 4 bedroom, 2 bath colonial with a big yard on a cul-de-sac. Something about being a homeowner just feels so grown up, even more than kids or a minivan or health insurance. I spent oh so many hours running around that neighborhood or playing on the swing set or cutting my own hair and then hiding under a chair so Mom wouldn’t yell at me reading quietly in the family room.

It was a good house.

One of my OTHER earliest memories is sneaking downstairs right around Christmas to find my parents and an aunt and uncle or two huddled around this:

Charming starter home on spacious lot, great location & schools

They were putting the finishing touches on the doll house as a Christmas present. My dad was SO DISAPPOINTED I saw it before Christmas morning. I still remember him rushing me back upstairs and telling me I was absolutely NOT allowed out of bed again no matter what. I tried super hard not to even think about the house – and I know I didn’t talk about it – until it was officially mine, although I don’t think anyone tried to tell me my presents were “from Santa” after that.

Center entry, formal living and dining rooms

The doll house is an exact replica of the actual house we living in in New Jersey, from the floor plan and carpet color right down to the wallpaper. There was no kit or plans, just my dad and a tape measure and his amazing attention to detail.

Even though we moved to Long Island after a couple of years…and California a few years after that…and then Massachusetts…and finally to Virgina, my parents had this GIANT doll house shipped with our stuff EVERY TIME. Dad built a special crate and wrapped it in packing paper and Styrofoam so not a single wall is cracked or damaged even though it’s been almost two decades since it was uncrated.

And ever since I announced I was pregnant the first time my parents been dreaming of the day the dollhouse is no longer their problem. Baby #2’s girl parts sealed the doll house’s fate (although Baby Evan has already greatly enjoyed putting various items in the windows – Attack of the giant corn! Watch out for the tiny killer dump truck! On noes we’re all going to be eaten by the singing frog!) so now it lives in my dining room.

House has great bones, but some cosmetic repairs needed

As well as it was taken care of, NO house can hold up to 20 years of abandonment. Peeling paper, moldy carpets, and water damage all abound.

I’m sort of conflicted about fixing up the doll house – I want it exactly as I remember it (even though it’s already not) and it feels disloyal to my parents to tear apart even a minute of their hard work. But some of that decor is in really bad shape.

Orginal 1980's kitchen and baths. In case you're into "vintage".

Like that middle upstairs bathroom. Yikes.

And I don’t think anyone ANYWHERE still sells that wallpaper, so matching it is out of the question.

I guess I’m going to be redecorating.

FIREPLACE! The highlight of every realtor's tour!

And hey, since I don’t have the time and/or money to redecorate my entire REAL house (again) right now, this is a great place to channel my creative energy. Tiny rooms to paint! Tiny rugs! Tiny appliances! All new tiny furniture! And the best part, there’s only a tiny bit of wallpaper to peel off and carpet to tear up.

Stay tuned for the very exciting renovation coming soon.

Damn, I was hoping for hardwood.

Here’s today’s parenting tip: Do not read to your child, especially if you value your sanity.

I don’t know why I was in such a hurry for my kid to like books. Obviously I didn’t remember just how mind-numbingly boring most books aimed at small children are. MIND NUMBINGLY BORING. We’re not talking classics like Little House on The Prairie or Where the Wild Things Are or even Harold and the Purple Crayon He’s Probably Going To Fall On and Accidentally Stab Through His Eyeball Because He’s Not Very Smart. Those are stories. The crap aimed at the diaper-wearing crowd is just colors and noises infused with some sort of toddler-brain crack that gets them hooked and then you’re forced to read the same eight words over and over and over to avoid the horrible toddler crack brain withdrawal meltdown that ends when you give in and slowly shove bamboo splinters under your own nails while pointing out the doggie and the ball and the triangle and the cloud and the DEAR GOD PLEASE TAKE ME NOW.

Seriously, HIDE THE BOOKS.

Or if you still want to be a “Good Parent” and encourage “literacy” and “education” and all that BS, just read to them from adult books you actually enjoy – and avoid these in particular:

Trucks Go by Steve Light

THE GARBAGE TRUCK GOES: BURBABA BURBABA BURBABA SCREECH BEEP BEEP BEEP CRUNCH CRUNCH CRUNCH.

I can keep going if you want. I’ve got the damn thing memorized.

Unless you want truck noises taking up valuable space in your brain for the rest of your life, never ever ever let your kid see this book. The bright colors and the random noises are immensely entertaining to small children while being seizure inducing in sane adults.

Baby Einstein Let’s Look!: First Look and Find

I did not buy this book. Obviously the “friend” who gave it to me clearly isn’t a “friend” at all, since I wouldn’t give this to my worst enemy. It’s actually a whole set of terrible books with these crazy unidentifiable animals dressed as people (anteater? REALLY? my toddler is supposed to know that?) doing ridiculous things while you read poetry even less well written than “There once was a man from Nantucket” and encourage your child to point at the red birdie and the blue drum and the…what the heck is that? A telescope? You want my baby to find a TELESCOPE? How about we work on basic body parts before we get to astronomy equipment, mmkay?

I usually just throw this one behind a chair. Somehow Baby Evan keeps finding it anyway.

Knuffle Bunny: A Cautionary Tale by Mo Williams

Don’t let the fancy awards and accolades and reviews on Amazon fool you. Right in the middle of the rather disturbing tale of a child whose horrible, careless father LOSES her beloved stuffed animal there are three pages of NOISES. Yelling noises. Noises that will make your kid laugh hysterically and cause him to bring you this book over and over and over until you’re tempted to just “lose” it in the washing machine too.

Bee tee double you: Can someone PLEASE tell me how to say “Knuffle Bunny”???? Is it a silent K like knife? Is it “kan-uffle?” I need to KNOW these things so I don’t send my kid to preschool totally confused. WARS HAVE BEEN FOUGHT OVER LESS THAN THIS.

Monkey About with Chimp and Zee by Catherine and Laurence Anholt

There is a page in this book that says you should lick it. LICK IT. I’m even more disturbed because this too is a hand-me-down book, which means someone else has probably licked it. The rest of it’s not that bad – very short – but that’s sort of like saying “Well yes, the meal at that restaurant was lovely besides the part where I found a pubic hair in my salad.”

Peek-A Who? by Nina Laden

The whole book is just stuff that rhymes with “who”. Moo, zoo, boo, choo-choo. It takes approximately 24 seconds to read the entire thing (even including the baby kissing the mirror on the last page because he luuuurves the bebeh in the book). Which means you can read the whole thing approximately 150 times in an hour. And you will. Better get those bamboo shoots ready for your fingernails. Or at least some special Mommy-juice.

A Child’s Good Night Book by Margaret Wise Brown

Don’t let the adorable illustrations and calming words and the charming bedtime prayer at the end fool you. This book is…short…and…nice…and…OK, fine. This is pretty much my favorite kid’s book ever. We read it when we wake up. We read it at naptime. E reads it to Baby Evan before bed. And I would happily read this fourteen bazillionty times a day – no stupid rhymes, no goo-goo-ga-ga, no talking down to children, no activities. Just beautiful words and pictures and a few minutes with a peaceful baby in my lap. Damn you Margaret Wise Brown and your fantastic children’s books.

I guess maybe I’ll keep reading to my kid after all.

(Disclaimer: The links above are through my Amazon Associates account. So if for some TOTALLY INEXPLICABLE REASON you decide you actually want to purchase any of these terrible terrible books I get something like three cents commission. Which isn’t even close to enough money to pay for the shrink I need to see to get the damn garbage truck out of my brain.)