Baby Helps

When we brought Claire home, my crazy horomonal mind starting thinking about all the things we couldn't do, or would have to change, now that we had a baby in the house. While, many of these things were trivial or simply overblown by my post-pregnancy mind, some seemed pretty legitimate. For example, Jeff and I do a lot of projects around this place to fix it up. How was I going to help when I had a baby on my hip? Sure I could grab a tool for him or hold something for a minute, but I couldn't be out working on a project for hours at a time with Baby alone in the house.

Well its taken me three months or so, but I've learned how to do some of these things with Baby. It has helped that it's warmed up now so I can have Baby out in her swing near me when I'm doing an outdoor project like gardening or building a dog pen for Prince. Here are a few pictures of my adventures in learning to get stuff done with Baby.

Scrapbooking with Baby

Browning meat for dinner with Baby



In general, hobbies and housework stuff is pretty doable while wearing Baby. I tried scrapbooking with Baby in her swing first, but she didn't find it very entertaining to watch me scrapbook and would get fussy pretty quick. The only thing that is hard to do while wearing Baby is bending over. She doesn't like it and will start to wiggle and squirm. I've definitly gotten a lot better at squatting instead of bending, or doing the task with one hand while I hold her firmly against me.

This next set of pictures shows the things I've been able to do since baby has started really paying attention to my movements and finding them entertaining.

Baby loves to watch my hands as I fold laundry

building Prince's pen

Gardening in the front yard

Caulking Papa's new office



The biggest consideration when working with baby is making sure I have everything set up safetly before I bring her in. For example, no tools or building materials that are close enough to fall on her, proper ventilation, etc. When we're outside I make sure to put her in the shade and that she isn't in a spot where Prince might come crashing into her. I also make sure I have all my supplies  laid out before I bring her into to the front yard so I'm not leaving her alone to go grab something. In general though, I've found that if she's comfortable and can see me then I have a good hour worth of work time that she is more than happy to sit and watch. Yay for feeling productive again!