Bath Time (sort of)

This is pretty much a regular thing before bed, these days. I don't know how a kid can get SO dirty in one day. But it's summer, now.

This didn't used to be a regular routine. I've never been much good at making sure he gets regular baths. It's not really something I enjoy (nor do I think it's necessarily healthy what with soaps and the chemicals they contain...). What's wrong with dirt, anyway? Kids are washable. If you actually wash them. Okay, so I might be a little neglectful. Or a lot. Whatever.

I know the common advice is to bathe the baby each night before bed. My baby was doin' really good if he got a bath every week...

After he started crawling, he followed me into the shower one evening and loved it. So from then on, he pretty much just took showers with us. Er, well, until he got his little thumb stuck in the drain cover. Then it swelled up. Nathan was about to use a hack-saw. On my baby's thumb. [ETA: WHOA! I just realized that that is NOT what I intended to say there... My husband is NOT, repeat, NOT a baby-digit-slicer! REALLY! He was thinking of the hacksaw for the drain-cover not the thumb. He was gonna be really careful. But I still wouldn't have it. He's a fantastic Daddy! I'm sorry for making us sound like particularly negligent parents.] No way in heck. I was envisioning a trip to the emergency room with a seven-month-old with a drain cover stuck on his thumb. But then Nathan got it off. The drain-cover, I mean. So, "no more showers" declared Daddy, but that didn't last long. I couldn't take having to actually bathe him, so I would just make sure to have my foot on the drain. (Oh, boy, does that make me look rotten.)

And last summer, he could get pretty darned dirty, but I rarely filled the tub. If we didn't have opportunity for a shower, I'd usually stand him in the tub and wash him up quickly in running water.

Poor kid. He really lost the mother-lottery.

But now! Now, he's hit the bath jackpot. Now, he's very dirty every day and there's really no getting around the bath-before-bed thing. Okay, I guess the main reason is that he's getting old enough to wash himself. Kind of. More self-sufficient, anyway.

So he gets a bath (not always with soap, I'm afraid) every day.

And how do you like my tub? It has jets! Which I've never been brave enough to actually use. Also, it take two hours to get enough water into for a decent bath, and by that time, I may as well have filled it with the hose if you consider the temperature. And then there's an Rust Factor. Suffice it to say that I don't actually take baths very often, myself (okay, but I do shower regularly).

But, I'm proud to report, Jonah does.