PEARLS & AMBER

BABY SHOWERS IN THE NEW YEAR

My social calender has started off with a bang.

I am going to not one, but two BABY showers.

Neither of these baby showers are for any future grandchildren of mine--

So I am vaguely computing if this is an age appropriate thing for me to be spending my time and money on.

One of the babies, to be sure, will be a baby over whom I intend to hover and spoil...that is until the advent of grandchildren of my own--

(For which I am in no hurry.  The dogs and cats of my grown children are totally all that is necessary at this point.)

This baby, Lilly Isabelle, will be a grandchild once removed, in that she is the actual grandchild of a former...er...male companion, who has segued into good friend.  So that I even get the best part of grandparenting--giving gifts and spoiling to death, with no babysitting, even, involved.  When the baby grows rambunctious, I will just hand her back to her grandfather--

The other baby, Zoe, (at last count), is the baby of a friend who, tired of waiting for the perfect man, has gone on to do this without benefit of a husband...at least for now.  She is glowing.  She has no shred of doubt.  There is only triumph and huge anticipation.

So, it being just after Christmas, I am off to buy more gifts, baby gifts.  Both mothers having registered at various baby places, presumably to make my shopping easier...in fact shopping that can be done right here in front of my laptop.  That does put a crimp in my style.  As of course I have my opinion about what a baby gift looks like.  Like first editions of Winnie the Pooh, for instance.  Baby clothes from Lisbon, Portugal, which, as we all know, are the creme de la creme of infant wear.  Maybe a silver spoon or two?

Wait--or is it, given the times, no spoons at all, encouraging the return to the eating with our hands, (which babies prefer anyway), thereby saving money and energy spent on the washing, thereof, of utensils.

At least the color is not an issue.  PINK.  Unless one of them wants a tomboy, in which case pink should defer to cranberry.  Gone are the days of the vagueness of yellow and pale green, androgynous nurseries, jammies and stuffed animals.

Unless there has already been a backlash of knowing the sex of one's child beforehand.  So not wishing to be pushy on such matters of taste, nor willing to draw the conclusion, for instance, that little Savannah will just naturally prefer Shirley Temple dolls as opposed to gun toting androids, androgyny IS IN, and totally big in the baby gift giving sphere today.

I see that I am totally out of step with this segment of the population--

So, obviously I must do the appropriate thing, which is to defer to the new mothers' wishes.  I will go to BabyBarn.com or wherever they have directed, click a few times, and voila, present will be bought and sent, gift wrapped, with no fuss or muss.

And I will save the fun of creative gift giving until these baby girls are sixteen and looking for trouble.

MY FIRST ICEBERG

So, today, I read someone proclaiming "You never forget your first iceberg."

I had no idea it was that common of an experience...akin to "You never forget your first kiss." 

Kisses are pretty easy to come by, but  icebergs?  There aren't any icebergs around where I live.  It would take $10,000 and a twenty hour flight (not to mention the hours spent inside airports) to get to my first iceberg.

So, this is the trouble.  I haven't seen my first iceberg yet, and this, it turns out, is like being a virgin long passed when the event should have occurred--

I am consumed with dismay. 

I was even in Alaska once, visiting a BFF, and she, it turns out, let me down.  She did not drag me to see my first iceberg.  She did not insist she wanted to see my face when I saw my first iceberg.  She obviously didn't give a rat's ass if I saw an iceberg or not. 

I've seen ice cubes. 

I've seen snowflakes in my eyelashes.

I've seen ice skating rinks.

I've seen snow drifts after blizzards--

I'VE BEEN AROUND, okay?

But, I haven't seen my first iceberg, and I don't think, I'll ever see my first iceberg.

So that at the next party I go to, when the conversation inevitably turns to everyone's else's first iceberg, I will have to remain silent.  I will not be able to partake in the conversation.  I will not be able to brag about MY FIRST ICEBERG--

...unless...I lie.

 

BATHTUB IN THE BEDROOM

Today reading the now defunct House and Garden, once again I saw a beautiful ad featuring a cool, chic, super sensual bedroom...with bathtub in it.

Not to my taste at all. 

First there's that lack of...a certain solitude.  How can I light my candles and make sand castles with the soap bubbles if he is over there, reading in bed.  What if he's the kind of reader who reads to you, companionably, of course, every last thing he finds interesting.  Which would be the whole book, magazine or cartoon strip, because since he's reading it, he must find it enthralling, right?

What about the humidity?  Aren't bathrooms by nature, damp little entities?  Awash with the scents of soap, shampoo, shaving cream, perfume, aftershave, and toothpaste?  Aren't towels always not quite dry?  Don't washcloths collect mildew like stamp collectors collect stamps?

What about splashes.  Aren't we risking water damage to the new wood floors, or the white shag carpet, or even the cold bathroom tiles surrounding the tub--

Which would, to my mind, detract from the overall ambiance of the rest of the floor, because certainly one wouldn't have bathroom tile floors in one's very own bedroom, would one?  

Especially not that certain someone who, once upon a time, thought of the bathtub in the bedroom, within whistling distance of the bed, once upon a time that person thought it was one hell of a romantic gesture.

And certainly, although he/she is most certainly living to rue the day the tub came anywhere near the comforter, he/she cannot be faulted.

Because all the world loves a romantic. 

IRONING BOARD

Most recently, in Dwell Magazine, was a photograph of an ironing board, loaded up with a charming bunch of freshly laundered cotton clothing.  It was sitting in a room especially created for laundry.  Not just a small slot for the washer and dryer.  No, this was a large room designed so the owner of the house could leave the ironing board out, all ready to go.  In the background were billowing curtains, and streaming sunlight.

I fell in love with the story here.  So Dutch.  So French.  So twentieth century.  So lace.  So geraniums.  So snowflakes at Christmas.  So warm and fluffy, and everybody in this house just got along so perfectly. And whoever was in charge of the ironing was so confident and at peace with this most mundane of household tasks, she wished to create a visual ode to the art of ironing.

Way back, mid last-century, my mother ironed.  She never seemed to mind it.  And if I was lucky, she let me iron my father's handkerchiefs.  An extremely zen-like process.

Later, during marriage, the husband involved used to relax by ironing six or seven pairs of his slacks.  In the bedroom.  As we were getting ready for bed.  It too had its eider-down comforter elements.

Still later, my grown son asked me to show him how to iron a shirt.  Somewhere during his formative years he must have missed watching his father iron those pants.  And obviously he missed me ironing at all.

This is because I don't iron...because of the ironing board. 

I can never, and I mean never, get the ironing board to close.  Therefore I am intimidated by the ironing board, much like how I felt about horses when riding one was introduced to me by my daughter.

Until help arrives, in the form of someone who does not have a fear of closing ironing boards, my ironing board sits, blocking traffic, slanted across the narrow hallway where the washer and dryer are. It is belligerent in its claim to the area, fixed in its desire to remain out in the open, amongst the family, just like the respected, indeed beloved, ironing board in Dwell Magazine.

But so, is this a trend?  The custom fitted laundry room?  The bespoke ironing board?  The filigreed iron? 

Not to mention the opulent wardrobe worthy of such surroundings?

There are worse things to go nuts over--