The Arbolog |

Kale was given a sweet little gee-tar for his birthday from his great-grandma. It goes with the awesome drum that his Nana gave him. These two items are some of the more popular items from Kale’s birthday gifts – and get heavy play with regularity. The little song that comes with the guitar, especially, is incredibly catchy and Ross and I both find ourselves humming along and singing the little tune. I often think about the woman who was hired to sing the little jingle, and I think about how many takes she must have had to do to make it suitably cheery for kids but still reasonably authentic, without veering off into Too-Husky-Land.

In any event, my friend Sharon popped by the other day with a gift for Kale, as she hadn’t been able to make it to Kale’s party, and she had also bought the Leapfrog Learn N Groove Guitar, and so last Wednesday, Kale and I headed over to Toys R Us to exchange it.

The third item in the set is a pair of maracas. One of them is empty, and is nothing more than a plastic maraca filled with something rattly, which is awesome in it’s own right. The other one is electronically controlled, and responds to motion to either count, say colours, or play random noises. Kale is pretty happy with the maracas – he likes shaking them and banging them.

I also bought Kale a little present I wasn’t planning on – a present from me to him. I saw it and I remembered this toy from my childhood – maybe it wasn’t my toy, but it was a toy I saw while young and a toy I remember fondly. I’m talking about the Chatter Telephone.

But this isn’t a post about what toys Kale likes. This is a post about packaging: how much and how annoying.

We got home from Toys R Us – and admittedly I don’t often shop there, but it was an exchange so there we were – and Kale was grousing from having been strapped in the car for as long as he had been, and he was careening around the house like he does, anxious to be a part of whatever fun thing I was obviously doing on the table. So it was relatively important that I reward him for being a happy go lucky monkey, and quick-like.

Chatter Telephone: 30 seconds. Slice through one piece of transparent tape. Open box, remove tissue paper. Hand toy to child.

Leapfrog Learn N Groove Maracas: 5 minutes. Slice through five separate pieces of transparent tape. Open box. Slide out cardboard insert. Undo four separate twist ties. Remove plastic wrapped advertising booklet. Remove plastic grommet /  brackets from twist ties. Unthread twist ties from maracas. Remove small plastic tab from battery cover of toy. Turn on. Hand toy to child.

Jesus H Christ on a cracker. What is with the packaging? Why was all that necessary? I realize that part of it is for display, so that it doesn’t move and can handle childrens’ fingers poking and prodding. And I realize that some of it is for shipping – China is a long way away by boat and god knows there is a lot of wave turbulence the maracas have to undergo while crossing the Pacific. But seriously… is that much non-recyclable packaging and worse yet, advertising required in my box when I have already given them my money and don’t need to be convinced to buy more? Having been given three separate toys in the last few months made by Leapfrog I can safely say that they are all packaged that way. I’ve only ever purchased the one Fisher Price toy, so I can’t say with certainty that they are all as simply packaged. But I can also safely say that I’m definitely going to make my next toy purchase Fisher Price simply based on the past experience we’ve just gone through.

And Kale, well, he loves them both.  

But I’m disgusted.

Every picture we take of Kale these days is blurry. He’s so busy and constantly on the move. He’s a camera ham, too. Here he is in the bath, playing with the scrubber wearing his crocodile washcloth for a hat. Those googly eyes are usually in his mouth during a bath, but I gave him the scrubber and that was apparently more entertaining. He has outgrown his little bath seat – well, outgrown isn’t the right word – he doesn’t want to sit in the boring bath seat anymore. So now we have to trap him in our legs while it’s bath time because he still hasn’t quite mastered the art of sitting. He can do it, but the second he sees something interesting, he tries to grab it and that results in a lot of faceplants into the bath water. 

From Kale 6 to 9 months

He explores everything. If it can go in his mouth, it does. If it can’t, his mouth goes to it, and if that’s not possible, it is closely inspected. If he can turn it over and look at it from different angles, he does. Things that make noise, like door stoppers are awesome. Things he can bang together are even more fun. 

From Kale 6 to 9 months

The good old chip bag, once Toy Numero Uno, got recycled today because it hasn’t been used in weeks. Spatchy (the silicone spatula) is boring now. Amazingly, the two plastic disks from my breast pump are still in use – although they are now “cymbals” he bangs together. Toys now in heavy rotation: the round wooden blocks from a train set. A small funnel. A skinny measuring thing from Enfamil we never used. A container that formerly housed dipping sauce from a Vietnamese restaurant. A Discovery Toys fabric cube that contains a crinkly fish, a rattly bunny, a textured flower, a crinkly AND textured moon, a squeaky soft duck, and a rattly satin heart. The Fisher Price Rock A Stack we got as a gift from Auntie Andrea is quickly becoming a favorite, as is the Infantino Spiral Spin Top (which, embarrassingly, I don’t remember who gave to us). Kale is finally showing an interest in books – I’ve been reading to him for about 6 months and it’s only just now that he seems to be interested in the books for something other than cramming them in his mouth. 

I also just bought two items from the baby store, that I went to so I could by a plastic bowl that suctions onto Kale’s high chair tray because he really wants to feed himself and my glass ramekins are not gonna cut it. They were sold out of all of the brands they carry that suction. So, I perused the store and picked up two items: the Sassy Hug and Tug Sprout (curiously not listed on their website but all over Amazon Japan??? What do Japanese people know that I don’t?), and the RaZ-Berry Teether, both of which Kale seems to love. 

I’ve decided to buy the bowl/plate I want from Raspberry Kids, a local company selling higher quality items, because this is now like, the millionth time I have gone to Baby’s World and they didn’t have what I wanted or were sold out or wanted twice as much as other stores. So the $70 I have left on our giftcard I will slowly chip away at but seriously… enough with supporting their business because quite frankly, I am ALWAYS disappointed with them. 

I had to move a cabinet full of breakable glass things today to a corner that we can protect better, and I have emailed a local company to find out about getting a fireplace screen made. I HATE HATE HATE the ones that are offered at baby stores made by Kidco because they look like boring balcony railings and are ridiculously expensive. So I found a local company that custom makes free standing fire screens and have asked for a quote. 

It’s happening so fast that Kale is developing, I sometimes feel like I can’t keep up!

Hi.

I’m a Keebler Elf.

From Kale

Kale and I went “visiting” yesterday. We went to my workplace’s head office, and also my workplace. It was a long day for Kale, and I suspect I may have pushed it a tad too far. I so seldom get the car that I wanted to cram in as much stuff as possible. It was great though, to show off my lovely baby and get out of the house. But I think I was as frazzled as Kale by the end of the day and we both had some relaxing downtime when we got home.

The outfit Kale is wearing is sort of his current “socializing” outfit. At home, he is usually in a onesie and socks and if its chily, some pants. I don’t ever really care if they match or if they are stained – we are just at home. But when we go out, I make a point of dressing Kale in some of the many adorable outfits he was given before he was born and the one above is a favorite as it has all sorts of co-ordinating seperates. There are two other onesies and also a striped pair of pants and they all match. Under those bootie things are a pair of socks and I just want to show you a picture before I continue:

From Kale

Why exactly do infants need grippy feet on their socks? Is it just for show? Or do they think that there are super babies out there who are walking at 2 months? Seriously. What is that all about?

Today Kale and I are expecting visitors – a dear friend of mine and her family are coming over. Karina and I have known one another for ages and her and I have really enjoyed comparing notes because we were both pregnant at the same time and her son Caden was born a week after Kale. So this is the first time the boys are meeting and I am looking forward to seeing them all.

One last thing: Melanie, you will be excited to know that I am well on my way to creating those felt toys – I am buying a die cutter (a manual machine, used, off Craigslist, just for a trial) and am going to build a little set of the felt toys. I am also trying to find out if Mrs. Lois Allan can sue me if I start making my own version of Fuzzy Felt under another name? I also found a company that makes a die cutter machine that hooks up to your computer so you can program it to cut ANY shape and if the felt toys I plan on making take off, I will be buying that machine. I just can’t justify buying it quite yet though. Does anyone want to volunteer to be a toy tester? I’m going to make ten sets and would like kids to try them out and report back.

Kale is showing a remarkable predilection for sitting upright and he loves the kicking. But, sitting propped up in the couch is only cool for so long because a) it gets hot being wedged in between cushions and b) it can get a bit slidey and pretty soon Kale is about 3 inches tall and smooshed down into himself. And that, my friends, causes the “regurgitation”. ( I can hear my midwife, Linda, saying to me “Now, Jennifer, newborns don’t ‘puke’ per se, they regurgitate.” Dude – my butt they don’t puke – see exhibit A, my wardrobe of smelly clothing).

I spied a bouncy seat some time back in the good old days of “just being pregnant” at my neighbourhood Sears outlet, and was enamoured with its “old-skoo-meets-new-skoo” design elements. It didn’t light up, speak to my child in some grammatically incorrect Muppet voice, make a cheese sandwich, or any of the other shite that today’s children’s items seem to all do. It had wood dangly toys, metal structuring, and (this was the kicker for me) no effing Disney or Winnie the Pooh decals. Man do I hate me some Disney. Of course, there were only four left, they were on clearance, and you think I could find a brand name to do some comparison shopping? Yeah, of course not.

Today, however, I went on the hunt for the elusive Perfect Bouncy Seat and was pleasantly surprised that a quick google search of “bouncy seat with wood toys” returned the answer! A-ha! It is the Combi Pod Bouncer in Wasabi Green. According to Combi’s American website, it has a MSRP of $90 US and the one at Sears was on clearance for (as I recall) $75 so as far as I am concerned, it seems like a good deal. If you didn’t go and check out that link, dude, the bouncer has a freakin MP3 hookup. Awww yeah! Who is the most techie nerd baby evah? You got it! Hopefully Sears still has these puppies in the corner. They were collecting dust – my guess is that they didn’t have enough damn Elmo all over them so I am hopeful they are still there.

So, my mom was over for a visit Friday (hi grandma!) and we went to Sears and I bought the bouncy chair. We brought it home and strapped Kale into it and HA HA HA he thinks its awesome.

It was hilarious watching him make friends with “Starry” and then notice “Roundy” and then “Moony” as they dangled from the toy bar. It’s awesome. And (and I know this is totally vain and completely lame but oh well) it matches our house.

Here is Kale partying in his chair with his new friends Starry, Roundy, and Moony. (And yes, his outfit matches his new chair – I am all about the matching.)