The Danger of Online Shopping

In the first trimester, when the baby is the size of a poppyseed and the thought of keeping down any solid food (other than tacos, apparently) makes you gag, you look for ways to make your pregnancy feel "real" and exciting -- especially since many times you haven't shared your news with friends and family yet.  You can't very well get caught shopping in Gymboree or your whole cover would be blown, so instead you sit on the couch with your vanilla milkshake (the only other thing that sounds remotely good to you) and you shop online.

Well, you browse online, since you realize that the poppyseed growing inside you will soon make you very, very broke.

It's a dangerous habit.  In those first few months, Stephen and I spent hours looking at different outfits, nursery themes, and baby gear online.  Well before we found out we were having a boy, we knew exactly what his bedding and room decor would look like:

We had everything all picked out for a girl too.  We were nothing if not fully prepared for this baby to go either way (granted that it was ONE baby and not TWO...phew!)  And for our birthdays, my parents and grandma gifted us a huge portion of the adorable sports-themed set we had spent so much time drooling over in those early months.  We were also gifted a fun assortment of clothes, books, and our travel system.  We felt (and continue to feel) beyond thankful and lucky to have such supportive people surrounding us.

Now, the real danger of online shopping arises when you already HAVE a certain item -- say, a baby bouncer/swing -- and then you look online and see this:

Literally, the Cadillac of baby swings.  We became fixated.  Here we were with a perfectly adorable, well beyond adequate baby swing ALREADY PAID FOR AND IN OUR POSSESSION, and along comes the MamaRoo to make us jealous with its IPod capabilities and "move as you do" slogan.  Long story short, we are now the proud owners of the MamaRoo pictured above.  Again, I'd like to thank my grandma for indulging our crazy first-time parent behavior.  

They say that after you find your wedding dress, you should stop looking.  Don't browse through wedding magazines.  Stop DVRing Say Yes to the Dress.  By continuing to look, you are tempting yourself to fall out of love with your dress and in love with another -- because, let's be honest, most wedding dresses are gorgeous and most of us wish we could wear more than one (or five) for our big day.  Online shopping, particularly for baby clothes, is very similar.  Most baby clothes are adorable.  They are small and soft and have cute characters and bright colors.  It is easy to picture your unborn child looking precious in every single thing you see.  Most recently, I have fallen in love with this:

I want to dress my son up in this Davy Crockett outfit, hat and all.  I can't help it.  I picture my little boy with that raccoon hat and in my mind I think I must have that I must have that I must have that.  Now, of course, I've felt that way with most outfits I've seen (ESPECIALLY the ones with little coordinating hats), so I just visit the Gymboree site day after day, put the whole outfit in my online shopping bag, and click the "x" in the corner once I see how much Gavin as Davy would cost us.  (A lot.  It's always a lot.)

Anyway, the whole point is that online shopping is too easy, too tempting, and too darn expensive.  And yet somehow I feel that this is only the beginning...

Thank goodness for registries.  :)