Daddy-daughter day

Margaret and I spent a day puttering around the suburbs of DC out near where Abby works. Since we had to get the car serviced at a dealer out there anyway, we figured that we'd spend the day going to the outlets (to buy baby clothes) and, gasp, Walmart (to buy cheap diapers and wipes.)

After the oil and front headlight were changed, we stopped at a Petco to get food for Maddie. Although Margaret fell asleep in her captain's seat in the car (Abby likens it to a Barcalounger since it's so plush) and I managed to transition her from the car to the Baby Bjorn without waking her up, I just had to wake her in Petco to see the ferrets and other animals. The fish got a giggle as did the birds, but the big hit was the hamsters, especially those running on their wheels and the ones messing around on the glass to check us out. We also met Samson, a very frisky golden retriever puppy whose owner kept trying to reign him in as Margaret giggled uncontrollably while he sniffed her.

Our trip to the outlets was uneventful with a few purchases of baby wear and some minor fussing, the latter of which probably stemmed from Dad's hesitance to bother with the changing room. Given that it's so cold and Margaret's bundled up, it's difficult to justify a full scale visit to the "family bathroom" without a really pressing concern (i.e. a stinky diaper.) A diaper change in these conditions involves 5 minutes of clothes removal which inevitably makes everyone involved unhappy. The result of this inattention on Dad's part led to a wet diaper that weighed about 2 pounds by the time that we got around to changing it. But I don't think that Margaret was too uncomfortable since the technology behind diapers is amazing at this point (something that I never appreciated before her arrival.)

Beyond appreciation for the advanced technology of baby hygiene, another new development is the type of stores that we visit when we go shopping. There appears to be an entire genre of stores that I never ever ever frequented before Margaret's appearance, but that now comprises our primary destinations and serves as the site of our little shopping triumphs - we got a Osh Kosh B'gosh winter coat for next season for $9.99? Whooo hooo. There's a Little Me outlet? Carters? Baby Gap?!?! I start hyperventilating when I think about how much money we can save compared to the outrageous mark-ups that are charged on baby clothes at retail. Funny how priorities change, although as befits the genes that I inherited from my maternal grandfather, I've always been, ahem, frugal.

While waiting for Abby to get off work, we did another exciting first: a car wash! Margaret wasn't pleased to be in her car seat at that time of the day and the line for the car wash was long, so to keep things from getting really unpleasant, I reclined my seat and kept inserting Cheerios into her mouth to keep her happy. When we got into the car wash, there was an initial moment of apprehension after which she seemed to be trying to figure out what the heck was going on. She wasn't really entertained (or scared) so much as she was perplexed. But she was engaged as she kept looking back at forth while the big mats when swish-swish over and around the car. Before getting Mom, we then stopped to eat some kiddie food in a Burger King parking lot at which point, as I was talking with a friend on the phone, Margaret, with a full mouth of mixed-up raspberries, pears and cereal, looked at me, grinned and gave me a big bronx cheer.