The Art of Bathing a Baby...

Robby and everyone else left Ohio and I decided to stay for another week to help Caitlin adjust to becoming a new mommy.  Oh, she was quite impressing me already but there were a few things she needed help with, such as laundry, dishes, late night rocking and preparing meals.  The one thing, however, that she wasn't real confident in doing was bathing a baby.

I suppose I just took it for granted that everybody who has a baby,  automatically knows how to change them, feed them and bathe them.  I forgot that a baby doesn't come with instructions or the innate ability to just "know" how to take care of them; and THAT is why grandmothers are needed.  It makes us feel wanted and needed to be asked how to do this and should I do that; I suppose it is some sort of consolation prize for growing older.  Thus, when Caitlin decided it was time to give Holli her first bath, she asked me to do it and let her watch and learn.  The second bath time, it was her turn.

Before we began, Caitlin said she wasn't sure she was going to be able to do this after I left and just show up on my doorstep in June saying, "Mom, please bathe this baby; she hasn't had a bath since you left!"  I laughed and told her she would get the hang of it; "Bathing babies," I told her was "like bathing a puppy or kitten".  They didn't necessarily like it right now so you just need to get it done.  There is plenty of time for those "fun bath times" when Holli gets a little older.  I also reminded her that you can move the baby around, it won't hurt them.  I told her to recall how they held her up by her feet and slung her around when she was born!  And so with those few instructions, bath time began...

                                   Unwrapping sweet little Holli in preparation for her bath.

                                    "What in the WORLD are these two about to do to me?!"

You need to talk to them while getting them ready for their bath...and, of course, the paci is a MUST!

Test the water and put some in the bottom of their little tub.  I love that mesh sling!  It makes rinsing their back side off so much easier.

                               And try as you might, they are still most likely going to cry...

Then bundle them up in one of these cozy, hooded towels, pop a paci in their mouth and suddenly they become content again!

Bathing a baby isn't that difficult, it just takes a little practice and in due time, they will begin to enjoy it; when they learn how to splash around...and then they will ask to take a bath and not want to get out.

I'm so glad that I was able to be here to help give Holli her first couple of baths and I will miss not getting to do it on a regular basis.  Although I have complained a LOT about the weather here, I find as my time winds down, I dread leaving.  It is going to be very difficult to get on that plane Saturday morning and fly home, knowing that I won't be able to see my daughter and grand daughter until June.  But there is nothing that can be done about it; that is just the way things are, so I must soak up every minute I have with them and savor all of the precious memories we have made,  to take out and wrap myself in when I become lonely.  Four more years...I'm just not gonna think about that right now.  I vow to treasure the moment...