Baby stuff and meatballs!

My sister, Laura, called yesterday and asked if Ingrid and I wanted to join her for a quick trip to Ikea and maybe some meatballs, too. We ate first, since we were all fresh off of work, then we looked at a few things and bought a reading lamp. It feels like most of our time was spent checking out baby stuff. We didn’t buy anything on this trip but there might be something in our future.

The further we get into the pregnancy the harder it is not to buy some stuff. Our strategy has been not to buy anything until after the shower, especially the cute little stuff. But it isn’t easy.

Not knowing the baby’s gender is helping us stay away from random stuff a little. On this trip, for instance, we found all sorts of stuff, most of it was kitchen or tool related. (Not sure what to do with that. If we have a girl, I’d like her to know more than I do about mechanical stuff and should we have a boy, I hope he knows how to handle himself around a stove.) So we sit here, night after night, looking up stuff on craigslist or clicking through websites inspecting all the cute stuff and wondering when we get to buy something.

The truth of the matter is that I’m a little afraid that once we start buying stuff there will be no end to it. And frankly, our house isn’t that big! I’ve heard from friends that I am not prepared for the metric-ton of kid crap that we will pick up. And honestly, I’m a little nervous. I’m sure there are some social norms that keep average families form becoming hoarders as they work there way through this process, but I’ve never really thought either of us was normal. So, we need to be careful.