The final baby items

Weirdly, strangely, ironically...the universe is telling me it's all okay, perhaps?


I was going to start this post and talk about my final two baby items that i've been holding onto. Two things that I couldn't give to expectant friends with everything from my nursery, two things I couldn't put on Craigslist or sell at a garage sale.

And when i went back in my archive to read what I had written then about these items, I noticed that it was four years ago. To the day.

Anything I bought in the last year has gone to my expectant friend, to a garage sale, to Craigslist.

The things I've been buying and holding onto all these years, including the Derek Jeter t-shirt I bought in 1998, will stay with me. Packed away and hopefully to be pulled out someday.


And so I was about to write about the very first quilt I made, with its bright colors, which had been tucked away in the bottom dresser drawer in my guest room. I would think about it, would pull it out every so often, and by putting it back, by not enjoying it or letting someone else enjoy it, I was giving it more power to make me sad than it deserved.

A couple weeks ago, I pulled it out, washed it and put it on the end of the bed. And when it was time to go to bed, covered my four-legged baby with it. (Yes, my dog loves to be covered with a blanket.) I alternate between this and his other, but it's in use. It has lost its power and I realized that last night when he rested his bead, ever-so-sweetly on it.

There was one other item, one that I had called out in that post from four years ago. A Derek Jeter t-shirt, size 18 months. I wondered if it would fit on a teddy bear. Or even on the dog. 

And then a new friend, someone I've known less than a year, who only has the Cliff Notes version of those five years of my life, suggested I make a pillow out of it.

It was the perfect suggestion.

And I think that's it. That's the end of everything for Baby Rookie. it's not that I'll never think of the baby that never came, it's just that i've replaced that notion with the baby who has now has four legs; who whines a little when he wants me to go in the basement to throw a ball for him; who gives me the look of "oh my god, you came back, i missed you so much" every day when I get home from work; and who wakes me up in the middle of the night because his blanket came off and I need to cover him back up.