B.A.B.E. Week 7: Infrastructure and cloth diapers

This week has been our first week at home and a better week in terms of how Elle feels. As the last couple of blog posts have talked about, Elle has had some fussiness and seems to have an allergy to my dairy consumption.  Since I have cut my dairy consumption, she seems to not be in as much pain as before.  But there are still times (like at 4 am this morning) where she just can’t seem to get comfortable.   In addition to watching Elle’s development and adjustment to being in the Bahamas, this week has been all about creating baby (and mom and dad) infrastructure as we settle into being a family at home.

Lots to do…

There has been a lot to do on the baby infrastructure front –

•  assembling and registering  (or failing to register) various baby tools such as a swing, stroller, etc.;
•  creating a thermodynamically cool car in the Bahamas heat (our A/C hasn’t worked for the past year);
• registering for Elle’s visa to the Bahamas and civilian US passport;
• learning to use and clean Bumgenius cloth diapers,
• new parent obligatory internet research (such as how do you use a tummy time pillow);
• figuring out Elle’s healthcare here in the Bahamas; and
• finding a nanny. 

Finding a nanny and creating a cool car have both been multi-step processes thus far.  We need a nanny for when I start work again in August.   And without a cool car, Elle,and I are trapped in the house during the heat of the day.  And because this is the Bahamas in the summer then the heat of the day is basically all the time.   So I have imposed our own captivity because I don’t have anyway to carry Elle out in the heat yet.  My mesh ring sling is yet to arrive for walks under an umbrella and the stroller is too hot after 8:30am and before 7pm.   As I have blogged about before, being careful with Elle in the heat has really felt limiting so I will be very happy when we have more tools to keep her cool.  It will also be nice when she gets a little older and can thermoregulate better. 

Cooling down the car

Cooling down our car has been a challenge.  Here, most places aren’t open during the weekend and without a cool car, I can’t go to get the car fixed with Elle in the car.   Luckily, we found a place that was open for a couple of hours on a Saturday and so Wilson took care of Elle while I we got a temporary fix for the A/C.   The car is now passable at the moment but we are waiting for a part to come in from the US to ensure that the fix sticks.  Unfortunately with the permanent fix, our wallets will be considerably lighter from Bahamian prices.   In general, the Bahamas expense range is different from the States or other countries in that it has a very wide range of expense.  Some things such as almond butter are very expensive ($28 for a normal sized jar), while others, such as a ride on the local bus called jitneys are inexpensive ($1.25).

After we got our temporarily cool car, I  took Elle to get our windows tinted.  I pulled up to the window-tinting place and realized why the Bahamas prices were favorable to us this time (only $100).   Bahamas prices were inexpensive this time because the window-tinter was a local guy in a carport in a less-desirable area of town.  So Elle and I sat there in the carport for an hour as the windows were tinted.  It wasn’t the most ideal conditions but Elle seemed pretty happy to stare at the red and green fence and feed under the nursing shield and now we have some sweet dark windows for our '02 Subaru Impreza Outback.

The last step to securing a cool car was organizing the garage to actually fit the car in the garage.  It is strange how Wilson and I went for a year and a half with whatever we could either fit in our backpacks when we were abroad or in our car when we were stateside.  Now we have a house with stuff in it and a garage so full of stuff that it didn’t fit our car before I organized.  Funny and surprising how life can shift so quickly…

You can see Elle's bulky cloth diaper poking out from her "awesome sauce" onesie

Cloth Diapers

Speaking of life shifting, cloth diapers have not been as life shifting as you would think.  Sure, they are intimidating at first.  But surprisingly (and knocking on wood), they seem to hold in the payload better.  We haven’t had any of the massive blowouts all up the back that we had with the disposable diapers.   Moreover, the cloth diaper situation has been relatively painless because we have all the tools to take care of them easily right at our disposal (washing mashine, drying rack, and water sprayer insert).  

When we lived in San Francisco, we didn’t have a washing machine in our apartment and so dealing with dirty cloth diapers would have been much harder.  Also with cloth diapers, one needs a drying rack because you must to air dry the diapers (which has been relatively easy to just throw them on the drying rack.)  Finally, Wilson installed a water sprayer on one of our toilets.  We use the water sprayer to spray the poop into the toilet.  This step can get kind of tricky when you are caring for an infant who can’t be held in one arm easily because she can't yet hold her head up.  But we have found ways to secure the baby (e.g. place her in the bassinet).   Earlier today, I didn't put Elle in her bassinet (she doesn't particularly like that), instead I wore her in the Baby Bjorn and tried to spray off some poopy diapers.  That wasn’t my best effort as I ended up turning the sprayer on me and Elle (which didn’t help either of our moods).  But water sprayer misadventures aside, cloth diapers have been working out well so far.   Hopefully, they will continue to work well for the next couple of years. 

Next week, I hope to write a little more (and to have done a little more) in the exercise aspect of things.  We'll see how this week goes.