We visited Lisa's nephew, Kevin, and wife to see their new home in Lancaster. Thankfully, our passports were still valid and made the trip without a problem. The wife, Shelvey, is expecting her first child in December so she and Kevin are busy getting the house ready for the newborn.
I was showing the baby's room to Emma and memories of my own experiences with our own babies came flooding back. If you're interested in any of my memories, please feel free to click to "Day 1" of this blog and continue to read through Day 365.
Emma was curious about all of the things in the baby's room.
"What's that?" she asked.
"That is a blanket to wrap the baby in," I answered.
"What's that?"
"That is a strap that you connect to the baby's pacifier."
"What's that?"
"A bag of weed."
Well, maybe not everything in the baby's room was for the baby.
But the one thing Emma asked about that opened a wide door for me to screw up was when she pointed to the Boppy -- the pillow you use to breast feed a baby. At first, I simply explained that the Boppy was a pillow to feed the baby. Emma asked where you put the Boppy. I told her you put the pillow around the mommy's tummy. Emma asked where do you put the baby. I explained you put the baby on top of the Boppy. Then Emma asked, "But how does the baby eat?"
I put my brain on pause. Do I skirt the question and just tell Emma that you give the baby a bottle? Or am I just honest with her and matter of factly tell her that a baby receives food via mama's titties? I decided to take the high road and tell Emma the truth although the words "breast feeding" makes me giggle.
"When babies are really young, they get their milk from their mommy's chest," I explained.
"Huh?" Emma said with a crinkled nose.
Oh boy. I better watch myself here. "When a mommy has a baby, the...umm...breasts on the mommy's...err...chest makes milk. And this is how a baby gets food. The mommy breast feeds..tee hee...their baby."
"The boobies make milk?" said Emma with disbelief. "And babies drink it?"
"Yes, Emma. The boobies make milk."
Emma stared at me for a few seconds trying to soak it all in. But the longer she stared at me, the more I wanted to giggle and shout out, "TITTY MILK!" But I think I handled the situation pretty well considering my immaturity about such things like titties and milk. I didn't want to give the impression to Emma that there was anything unusual or shameful about breast feeding (tee hee). As a parent, I always thought it is important to be forthright and honest with your child because if you can't be honest with them, how can you expect them to honest with you.
As I continued my inner thoughts about my parenting skills, Emma burst out laughing and incredulously said, "Mommy's boobies make milk? HAHAH! Boobies make milk? ANDREW! ANDREW! MOMMY'S BOOBIES MAKE MILK!"
I stood in the baby's room by myself as I heard Emma run towards her brother with news about booby milk. As Emma and Andrew began to laugh and continue to scream "booby milk", I pathetically shut the door and crawled into the crib to whimper myself to sleep, but not before one last giggle as I thought about breast feeding.
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