Baby On Board!

A typical mindset about having a baby is that it turns one’s life upside-down—and I agree with that, though not necessarily in the negative sense. An interesting thing we noticed with our firstborn, though, is that he enjoys being part of everything we do. I assume this is typical of all kids, and I like the thought that kids naturally want to be part of something they perceive as wonderful.

(Just as the Babywise book pointed out, when the couple is so in love and enjoying each other, the baby will naturally want to be involved in the love-relationship. Sounds like a person who wants to know Jesus because of what another person is perceived to have and enjoy?)
 
In any case, one of the best baby furniture we invested in with regards to this line of thought is the high chair. Uh, correction: one of the best baby furniture we have, because it was a gift from JD’s Aunt Beth, sent all the way from Singapore. She bought the Antilop model from Ikea, and I like several things about it:
 
1. The high chair is very lightweight, which means we usually took it anywhere we went—at least for the first month. It’s not foldable though, so unless you drive a family van like we do, I guess taking it around isn’t such a hot idea!
 
2. The chair height is exactly level with our dining table. Sure, it came with a tray, and durind JD’s first few months of eating solid food, he ate with the tray on, but the removable feature made it possible to pull him to join us and eat right from the dining table!
 
3. JD spent considerable time in it not only when eating, but even when watching occasional videos on the laptop while I did other errands like washing the dishes or doing the laundry. The security belt lent some sense of peace, although of course I still kept an eye out for him if ever he suddenly decided to climb out of it.
 
Anyway, what I seriously appreciate about the whole deal is that with JD’s getting incorporated into our lives, he learned to eat all by himself—well, he insisted on doing it—from a very young age, sometime before one year old (and now, at 2 years old, is only hard to handle when the chair he’s sitting on is too low, as he tends to stand up at the table). People usually marvel at the skill he has reached, and even we wonder how that happened. In any case, I’m just glad the high chair has made meal times much easier!