Swing Me, Baby

Smiling faces from my children's things have always bothered me.  Clothing, toys, baby gear and just about anything are game for designers to slap a grinning bear or some other cuddly creature.  With my first child, when people asked me what I wanted as a gift, I had only one cavet: no smiling faces (or any faces for that matter).  I was quickly humbled when the very first gift I received was a navy blue Graco stroller with, yup you guessed it, a bear head smiling up from the padding.

I take issue with this design feature for a few reasons:

1) Simple, clean and plain are preferred when it comes to dressing me and my posterity.  I'm a jeans and t-shirt kind of gal.

2)  I have deep seeded issues with children's cartoons like Arthur.  Why can an aardvark cavort around with a bunny as a best friend, talking up a storm, yet own a dog that can only bark?  How does that make any sense?  I realize it is a plot element in almost all children's entertainment, but come on, it makes no logical sense!  Of course talking animals don't make sense either, but let's not get into that.

3)  Faces, more specifically eyes, bother me on inantimate objects.  I have a laundry basket brimming over with unloved, unused stuffed animals that I just can't get rid of.  They have eyes!  They can see me, I know it.  

So yesterday, as I perused the swings at my local baby megastore, I was struck once again with the faces.  Although I've eased up over the years and permitted plenty of smiley lovable clothing into our home, large furniture items just shouldn't go there.  It's wrong.  One particular swing, which had a great design with a retractable mobile and timer, had the most garish large face as the headrest cushion.  When I inspected underneath it to see if it could be removed, there it was again, printed on the entire seat cushion. Ugh.

In the end I settled on the lesser evil: a swing that had giant ears on the cushion and featured one very cute smiling face I would never tire of ...

P.S.  Wondering why I was buying a swing?  Well, in 9 years of babies, I've never owned a swing.  But I borrowed one from my sister when Baby Honey was born.  And seeing as how she is uprooting her family and returning to the land of stars and alamos, I had to return said swing to its owner.  And, furthermore, as I have become dependent on the late afternoon snooze only achieved in the swing, it became a necessary evil.  Since his head is about 1 inch from the top bar and his feet are threatening to dangle, I give him about 3 weeks.  At that time one very lucky person will be able to buy an almost new cuddly lamb swing at a fraction of the price.  And me?  Well, I've always said my sanity doesn't have a price tag.  But this week it cost $159.95.