Baby Things I Forgot I Knew

I was able to spend a day all by myself with my granddaughter recently. I had the most flexibility in my work schedule at the time, so I went to help out since their daycare provider was ill.

Now, it has been a day or two since I had a little one to look after. I am pretty much used to taking care of myself and it has been a couple of decades since I had been around little ones.

The things I forgot I knew are:

Don't drink anything unnecessary because bathroom breaks for grownups don't necessarily happen when little one's naps. Even if you hurry, the minute you hit the bathroom, they know it and they let you know.

Just because the little one naps for everyone else, don't mean they nap for grandma.

Dogs and babies work as a team and use food to communicate. Babies eat and dogs sit patiently right by the high chair waiting for the baby to 'drop' something. This even goes on when the baby looks around for the dog and looks away while slyly dropping food to their canine companion.

Babies like to babel but their babel has a purpose. Babies will get after the dog or whichever grown up is watching them. They learn inflection and tone of voice very early even if the grownups can't understand the babel.

No means yes. Yes means no. Yes means yes only when the baby decides it mean yes.

One dirty diaper means another will follow closely behind.

Socks are not meant to stay on little feet and it takes the grown up half a day to give up and leave them off the little feet.

Cheerios are a food group in and of themselves.

Toys are not meant to stay in any type of toy box for any length of time. Even if it takes the grandma ten minutes to pick everything up. It takes the baby three and one-half seconds to totally empty out the full toy box.

There are different muscles used to pick up babies that aren't used at any other time in your life. If you haven't used said muscles for a long time, just spend a day picking up a baby, because those muscles will remind you they are there.

And yes, I had to come home go to bed early just to rest up to go back to work. But I would not have traded that day for anything, sore muscles and all.