Thursday, December 1, 2011

Rub a Dub Dub

When describing Piper's first sponge bath out our house, a few words come to mind- screaming, weeping, gnashing of teeth...


Not exactly the most adorable photo-op.

I was so looking forward to baby bath time...the sweet smelling baby soap, the cute little hooded baby towels, the squeaky clean cuddly baby. At no point did my dream contain a miserable, wailing child that is behaving as if we're ripping out her toenails, rather than just patting her with a washcloth. We learned quickly that piper hates being cold. HATES it (she may look like Dustin, but there is a little bit of me in there for sure). And unfortunately, it's really hard to keep a baby warm during a sponge bath. We certainly tried to make her comfy cozy, but in the end- we settled for speed. If we couldn't make it enjoyable, at least we could make it fast.

So for her second bath, I thought I learned a lesson. I decided to relocate the operation to the bathroom tub. I made special effort to heat the room before hand....I had all of our supplies ready, I made sure the water was warm, we got her in the tub....
And she screamed. Oh did she scream. Turns out no amount of preparation could change the fact that she just hates the bath.

Her third bath? Utter failure again. (In her defense, it was 11:30pm, and it was a bit of an urgent situation as she had just thrown up all over her jammies.)

So I resigned myself to having a bath-hating baby. We wouldn't star in any John and Johnson commercials, but I figured we could suffer through a quick scrub every few days.

But then her umbilical stump fell off (yuck!)- which allowed us to change up our strategy- we could skip the sponging, and take a "real" bath. For our first attempt, we were at my mom's house, so we didn't have an official baby bathtub, but a beverage tub works in a pinch, right?

So was she just as miserable in deeper water?

No!

As we lowered her in the water, and started to splash around a bit, I kept waiting for wailing to begin...But it didn't! I wouldn't say she looooved it (hard to say when she can't smile yet) but she seemed perfectly content the whole time.



She even lounged long enough for us to take some pictures. And dream of dreams, when it was over, we wrapped her up in a little hooded towel, and she cuddled right up. No tears.

I mean really, is there anything cuter than a baby in a hooded towel? I struggle to even put clothes on her after seeing her like this. Ever day, a new hooded towel. Should be good until at least kindergarten, right?

She was even checking herself out a bit...


And fortunately, the joy extended to our next attempt when we got home. We plopped her into her own little tub, and after a few tears, she settled in just fine.

And then we got to wear another hooded towel. Success!


It's the simple things right? Happy bathtime everyone!

2 comments :

  1. I used to just bring T in the shower with me. She didn't seem to mind it, as long as I was holding her. Just be careful if you try it, they're slippery little things when they're wet!

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  2. I'm pretty sure it's the prospect of a cozy, warm, cute hooded towel that has her happy in the bath ;) I saw the little teddy bear bath sponge in one of those pics- thx for the reminder that I have a few things to pick up in the next 50 days!!!

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