Am I a Redneck?

My husband posed a question to me that I really hadn't thought of and I guess I have tried to ignore ever since he asked it.

Ham often crawls around in a diaper. Just a diaper.

And she never wears shoes (I have been told by the pediatrician and my chiropractor that it's best not to put babies in hard-soled shoes). That may be why she has excellent balance and can stand while clapping or 'dancing' without holding onto anything.

So, the other day, Genius asked me how many parents we knew that probably let their babies crawl around in just a diaper. My reply, "I dunno."

He mentioned one of my friends in particular who has quite a bit of style and has grown up with quite a bit of money. He said that he couldn't imagine her letting her baby go all day (around the house) in a diaper. He wasn't trying to knock me...I don't think...or her...I'm sure of that...but he was "just wondering."

This is the thing. Ham HATES clothing. I think she would even rip her diaper off if she could figure out the Velcro and something tells me that she isn't far from learning how to do that.

She also hates shoes (I've tried putting some cute little soft-soled shoes on her).

However, she acts like she doesn't even know how to crawl when she has shoes on.

It's like when you put clothes on a cat. They just lay there like they've gone catatonic....

OK, I didn't even mean to do that!

Cat-a-tonic.

Pure GENIUS!

So, I don't make her wear clothes if she doesn't have to, right? I don't make her wear cutesy shoes, so what? I mean, it's been a blazing 90-something degrees for a while now (not counting the unnaturally cool nights we've had lately thanks to El Nino).

Does my half-naked baby mean that we are rednecks?

I don't cart her around like that outdoors! Uhh...I mean.

Do you notice that I also let my child eat dirt and leaves?

Well, it was hot these days!

If anything, I go TOO far when we go out to run errands.

Dress, check. Diaper cover (I prefer to call them 'bloomers'), check. Bow in her sparse hair, check. What else is there? A purse? Lipstick? Glitter fingernail polish? Diamond earrings? BLLLLEEEECCCKKKK! No thanks. She doesn't even get to take her lovey with her!

I'm such a meanie.

Besides, I love looking at her, count 'em, FOUR rolls that get hidden by clothes she doesn't even like. If I'm a Redneck, then I guess I'll just have to live with it.

However, I will say that this is totally unnecessary exposure. This was at our Family Reunion. Usually at least 10 people are around at any given time.

Family Reunion

Saturday, July 5th, we drove down to Quitman, MS for the reunion. Every time Genius (aka My Husband) and I go to the McLeod Family Reunion, I am blessed. It was a little smaller this year. About 50 people came instead of the usual 100, so it seemed pretty bare. Now that we have a baby, we got to sleep in a nice, cool part of the house instead of the South Room which reaches about 100 degrees during the day and a cool 90 at night. (I don't know the exact temperatures, but all I know is that it was stinkin' hot even when I wasn't 6 month pregnant.) We got to ride down with Genius's sister and brother-in-law...and Baby Bear (due in January) and it was really fun. Ham did great! She either slept or played peek-a-boo behind her poodle lovey (it was the first time she initiated the game by herself).

Also, anytime my SIL's MP3 played The Cure, Ham would start 'singing.' It was so cute. I am obsessed love The Cure and for her to like it too, was just icing on the cake of this already delicious child. We didn't have much time to see everyone because we then left on Sunday, but it was relaxing and fun. Ham got to see more fireworks and she did good. These were a LOT louder than Anthony's, so we just covered Ham's ears. She didn't really react at all. I think she was too tired to think much of anything. She was still up at 10PM at that point, only having napped once for about an hour since 8AM.

The hardest part of the trip, for any of us, was that Ham bawled manipulatively every chance she got slept in a crib in our room. It was the first time she had slept in the same room with us. Even after she was born, she went straight to her crib. No bassinet, no co-sleeping, just bundled like a burrito in her own bed. Since, she's had a hard time sleeping anywhere else. (With the next kid, I think we'll try letting them sleep in different places and in the pack-n-play so they can be more adjusted to sleeping outside of their crib.)

So this scenario made it interesting for all three of us. She cried for over an hour that night until she just passed out. I also nursed her in our bed until she drifted off (something I have never condoned because I don't want it to be a habit). She needed her sleep, though, and I knew it would work. Though, once her head hit the crib mattress, she was up again, crying.

However, Genius and I took it well. We knew it was going to be hard, so we were mentally prepared. We were hiding our faces behind our pillows to muffle the laughter and pretending to be asleep as she kept hanging on to the side of the crib, crying pitifully, and trying to stay awake as long as possible. I felt so bad for the other people in the house.

Please don't think we're terrible parents for laughing, but we knew she was OK. She would lose her grip on the railing, fall down, and then we'd see this little hand come up the side and hear her grunting and huffing, exhausted as ever, trying to get back on her feet to see us and make sure we saw her. Then she would start crying again. OH, OH, at one point, she was crying uncontrollably and her flailing hand caught her attention. So she stopped crying and started looking at her fingers move around, then realized she had gotten distracted from her real goal, and began crying again. It really was funny. We LOST it.

The scariest part of the night was when I heard Ham smacking her lips and almost left it alone. However, Mommy instinct told me not to go back to sleep, and when I went over to her, she had a cotton ball-sized piece of batting hanging out of her mouth. There was a hole in the bumper pad and she had worked her fingers into it and pulled out the stuffing. It's one of those moments that, as a mom, you envision what could have happened if you didn't intercede. I don't like to think about it, but it's a reality. Of course, I took the bumper pad out...quite angrily. But, I was happy to hear her crying off and on the rest of the night. At least I knew she was OK. Her position of choice for sleeping? In the corner of the crib, in a sitting position, bent over double with her head on her feet. At one point, she grabbed her Bunny Bear and used it as a pillow. This was so she could get back into a standing position a little easier. Pitiful.