Baby Cuteness Overdose

Today I went shopping for my sister-in-law's baby shower- which is next week. Since I found out that I was pregnant, I have been trying so hard to avoid the baby aisles in every department store. I love baby clothes. Imagining all those tiny outfits on cute tiny baby parts makes me explode from an overdose of warm fuzzies and cuteness. But I was a little afraid that endulging these my baby senses would jinx the entire thing.

Today I had a viable excuse, however, for perusing aisle after aisle of dollsized onesies, hats, bibs, booties, mittens, and those adorable, soft baby towels with the folded corners. I overdosed on baby items of all kinds, breathed them all in, touched the tiny materials and imagined even tinier baby fingers and toes inside them. I have to say that even though newborns look kinda squished and wrinkly, a newborn is my favorite kind of baby. They are so tiny and wobbly. So helpless yet so strong. So incredibly mini in all ways. Even those powerful yet unperfected newborn cries have no comparison. I just want to nurture them to death.

I know there is something seriously wrong with me when it comes to babies. When I was young (like ten or eleven), I would try to fall asleep at night by imaginging me at an animal zoo where all the animals had babies and I would steal the animal babies and take care of them myself. It was a sick fantasy, I know. But this just shows how I have been enamored with babies my entire life.

Newborns are as close to the power/divinity of creation that we will ever get. Living proof that there is some miraculous power behind the design of each human cell, that same power that is orchestrating each step of the complex development process. It's so incredibly amazing that our cells know exactly what to do to shape us into what we become- a self sufficient body of organs and systems with independence, emotions, senses, individuality.

I still can't get myself to buy any baby items for our future baby. I guess I need to know whether it will be a boy or a girl first. Maybe I feel guilty endulging my desire to touch baby clothes and imagine my own baby wearing it. Maybe I still can't fathom the though of having a baby, a baby that is mine to care for.

I think newborns appeal to me so much because opportunities to care for them are so scarce. Moms with newborns do not often let babysitters care for the newborns, especially if they are breastfeeding. Newborns don't stay newborns very long either. It's hard to believe that not only will I be able to hold and love and take care of a newborn- but I will have unlimited access to the baby. Finally, a baby I can guiltlessly smother with my love for hours and hours. I won't even have to share! Do I really have to wait seven more months!?! OMG!