Of Cats and Babies

I have decided that we have been groomed over the past two years to raise a child. Ever since we brought Belle home, we have been learning valuable lessons about child-rearing and I thought I would share some things that Belle has taught us about children:

- if it's important, they want to put it in their mouth
- books on the shelf are meant to be pulled off
- water glasses are for knocking over
- they become very persistent (or in Belle's case, obnoxious) when they are hungry
- they love waking you up in the early hours of the morning before the alarm goes off
- they think all visitors are there to see them
- grown up people food is much more interesting than their food
- they do not like to be dirty and they like it when you clean up after them
- if you do not clean them, your home will smell
- you cannot control their behavior
- they look at you like you're the crazy one
- they both like to have staring contests
- they both adore books, though not for the reasons most people love them
- sometimes you just can't tell what's going to make them happy
- sometimes they just need to be held
- they both want all your attention, all the time
- they like toys, but often cardboard boxes are the best
- they are obsessed with paper
- if you don't clip their nails/claws, they will scratch you
- and good luck trying to clip those nails! It's really a two-person job!
- they are very curious
- it's very fun to crawl all over you – you're like a giant obstacle course
- you cannot tell what is going on inside their heads, but you can tell the wheels are turning
- they love it when you play with them

So really, not a lot changed when we brought Baby M home. Belle has taught us some very valuable lessons. We've learned to be flexible, we've learned that the chances of having a picked up home all the time are slim, we've learned that we have to make plans and take extra steps when we want to go out of town, and we've learned that someone else is relying on us to meet their needs. And we've learned that having another being around is a lot of fun. I am of course not saying that Belle and Baby M are the same, just that Belle prepared us for Baby M in ways we never expected.