Honker babies

If you and/or your husband are larger than the norm -- taller, or big-headed or wide-footed -- your children will inherit these traits. I know that sounds obvious but it's now surprised me twice.

You ARE going to have a honker baby, big people, so you are going to need different stuff than your friends get for their shrinky-dinky babies. (Who are just as beautiful, I might add, just in miniature.)

First of all, here is what you don't need: newborn clothes, newborn diapers, newborn socks, crap like that. OK, maybe you need one cute newborn outfit to stuff your baby into as you leave the hospital. But other than that, you can snag a few of the shirts from the hospital for your Baby Huey to sustain you through the first couple of weeks, when your child will graduate to 3-6 month sized clothes.

I completely forgot that this would happen before Baby V was born. I stocked up on newborn duds and relished the teeny tiny newborn diapers (the whole CASE) I bought, crowing, "I can't believe I'm going to have a baby this small!"

Hey dope! No, you're not.

Anyway, the other products that come in handy for honker babies are big car seats. When Chebbles was nine weeks old, she graduated from her Britax Companion into the Britax Marathon she uses now. That was nine whole weeks of bucket seat action, during which she screamed most of the time. It was too small for her. Even on the biggest settings, it wasn't designed for children with long torsos.

For Baby V, I found the Chicco KeyFit 30 instead. This was designed to fit kids up to 30 pounds, but I can't imagine how that's possible. Chebbles isn't yet 30 pounds, and when she gets into Baby V's carseat (on a daily basis) she has to scrunch her long crazy body in. And I am NOT carrying a 30 pound baby around in a bucket seat. She can carry ME at that size. The point of this carseat is that it fits Baby V's freakishly long torso and her outsized bowlegs quite nicely. Perhaps we'll make it to 12 weeks with this one.

And let me also introduce you to Susie's Swaddlers. Susie is a nice lady who must have had honker babies because she created extra large stretchy receiving blankets. At $20 each, they aren't cheap, but we bought three of them before Baby V came home, because the "normal" receiving blankets work for about two seconds after we come home from the hospital. We needed longer ones that can wrap around massive baby bellies and bodies throughout the "fourth trimester" of swaddling fun.

Finally, if you've got a kid with wide feet like Chebbles, don't dick around with the local shoe store. I have learned, after hundreds of dollars in shoes that they PROMISED fit just fine, and then killed her feet after a few weeks, to go directly to Zappos.com, and to read the comments there from other parents of wide-footed children. You can search for shoes designed specifically for your Sasquatch, then she can wear the shoes around the house for a while, and we can determine if they really are comfortable.

Oh, and Converse. Converse shoes fit the honkers too.

Anyway, please don't waste all the money and time I did, start out with one package of Size One diapers, and a CASE of Size Two, exercise your arm muscles as much as possible and prepare for the big-headed marvels that issue forth!