The first skirmish

After writing my brave manifesto last Sunday, I lay awake that night trying to figure out what my first move should be.  The next day bright and early, I stood at the foot of Mr. Baby's crib, saying "good morning!".  I took a close look at him.  Why not start with the child himself, I thought, and work out from there?  He's clean, and as well-groomed as one can be who only has about a hundredth of a gram of hair... but the clothes, ah, the clothes.  There's a challenge!

He looked pretty cute in his penguin sleeper, although I giggled nervously to myself as I considered the background they're on... kind of a bright, light red, could I say?  Or, well, to be honest, those penguins are cavorting on a shocking pink background, the kind that screams THIS IS A GIRL BABY! to casual passersby.

We're big fans of hand-me-downs in this house... witness the fact that I'm wearing a pair of my mother's cast-off pyjamas as I type this, and even my fourteen-year-old didn't turn up his nose at a bag of shirts from the neighbour's 20-something son last week.  The baby's current crop of sleepers are from a dear friend who, when hearing that Baby had outgrown all the ones that fit when the weather got warm in the spring, turned out her daughter's dresser drawer on the spot and promptly sorted out the too-small ones for me to take home.  So, lately his nightwear has consisted of a lot of flowers, frogs with pink ribbons, sea creatures in pink and purple, and other adorableness that I wouldn't have had an excuse to buy.

This is the hand-knit sweater Pinterest says he should be wearing.

Vintage is all very well, but I've never really developed the knack of taking "used" and putting it together in a snazzy way.  I figured I had better fall back on my mad knitting skillz, but babies are not exactly famous for giving you time to knit.  I rifled through a memory box and found a striped navy sweater I'd knitted the first time around, and put it on baby with a plain t-shirt and a pair of jeans (coincidentally hand-me-downs from another blogger on the site).  He looked pretty cute, and I tentatively chalked one up for my side of the battle.

The cat-hair covered, misshapen, and apparently hole-y sweater he actually wore.

Later that day we were out on the subway, making our twice-weekly pilgrimage to the office where I drop off and pick up the work for my main paid gig.  Baby sat eagerly upright in his stroller, smiling and laughing at any person he could make eye contact with.  I was able to relax and enjoy, until I suddenly noticed something on the sweater - I leaned in closer and found - a hole!  Right on the arm, big enough to show clearly the white of the t-shirt underneath.  Obviously it wasn't bad enough for me to notice in the hours before that, but boy, did it stick out once I'd noticed it.

So, in summary... week 1, sartorial challenged, battle lost.

On the upside, though, notice what I did for you there?  I joined Pinterest just so I could steal a picture to show you.