Taken... again.
Friday, August 29, 2008 at 9:19AM Damn you - you marketing types! With all your words, and expressions and phrases that make me feel like I NEED something. Not just want it, not just think it's cool, but NEED it. A need that stems from the pit of stomach and erupts from my head in a fiery mess.
I am the ULTIMATE consumer. I love things. All kinds of things. Things that will make my life better, my hair shiny, my skin glowier, my baby less messy and way cuter. I am a marketer myself, so I read all the labels and get physically excited when I see something that may be the answer to all my problems and desires. Like heart palpitations excited.
Yes, Insane, blah blah blah, I know.
Last week I made a stop at Babies R Us, which if you have been lucky enough never been to, is like Baby Mecca. You need it or want it, they have it. Except for the car seat that we needed last October, but whatever. They have it all. My Dad exasperated for 20 minutes after visiting one for the first time. The man who traveled across EU on a Norton and bathed in the Ganges river in India in the 60's kept going on and on about how his "mind was blown by that store". Go figure.
Zoe, now almost 10 months (sniff..sniff) is eating up a storm these days. She's almost, dare I say it, chubby. That girl will eat ANYTHING you put in front of her from noodles to tandoori chicken. (wow, 2 references to India in one post!) The one product I DESPISED with Lucas was the high chair we registered for. To put it frankly it was a messy piece of shit. From week one of watery rice cereal I wanted to throw it out the window. I moved Lucas to a booster as soon as I could. So imagine my detest when I had to pull out that old, blue POS to feed my precious baby girl in. But alas, I was told that I could not drop $200 on the Svan. So, instead I bought a pretty cute, basic little wood highchair from Ikea. It's perfect, but it is also tray-less, which honestly not the end of the world since it pushes up nicely to the edge of our (also Ikea) kitchen table. It even matches. The only down fall is that the mess is not contained to the tray. Stuck on bananas and cheerios end up all over... surely SOMEONE must make a product to solve this problem?! Shopping to the rescue again!
The first thing I seek out is the Kiddopotamus Tiny Diner mat . It sticks! It catches! Its won a couple of awards! It sucks!
Why does it suck? Well, the "tight suction to the table".. yea. Hmm. Lookie there. The 9 month old could pull it up, thus spilling Joes O's on the floor and crying because, WTF? She's hungry and I give her a plastic mat.
My thought was, "wow, I put the mat down on the table, then I just pick up and clean the mat!" Sounds good, right? No. The truth is, I have to scrub the shit out of clean the mat, clean up the mess under the mat from where the baby pulled the mat up and squashed bananas on, clean up the high chair, and clean the floor from the tossed about O's since we have the ONLY dog in the world that turns his nose up at baby tossed cereal.
All this and it's only 8:30 am.
So at lunch, I decide to try out my next item of easy eating, the Boon Catch Bowl. Listen to the description and tell me it doesn't sound like it may solve all the worlds greatest problems:
The Catch Bowl is the perfect way to help first-time eaters control little spills. The built-in food catcher extends toward the child, funneling runaway food back into the bowl. Made from easy-to-clean soft material, the food catcher flexes when bumped. To help avoid bigger spills, a suction cup bottom keeps the Catch Bowl firmly in place.
Key words: control spills, keeps firmly in place, easy to CLEAN. Ok, I will give it that one - dishwasher = easy. The rest. ALL SHITE.
I pushed that sucka down hard. I jiggled it. It seemed secure. Zoe looked up at me questioningly and sweetly reached in an picked up a few puffs and smiled at me.
I turned around to get lunch for me and heard "pop" and "clack clack"
Another mess. Another $15 down the drain.
Reader Comments (3)
oh, I wanted to get that bowl
Oh, I bought that mat thing when Meg was a baby and agree, it sucks. I bought it mainly for restaurants so she wasn't eating her French fries off the table. Well, most restaurants either have a textured table top or wooden with a serious grain and therefore the dang thing doesn't stick. I also dragged it out for Belle and she pretty much did the same thing Zoe did.
I have that mat! That same mat and it sucks the same way... I am a huge sucker all around, but esp. w/ the baby products...