Firstly, if you're confused, the above subjects are unrelated--apart from the fact they both concern my wee one, as does everything these days. I'll start with the 2nd topic. I just heard that Angelina Jolie, who I usually think is super cool, recently gave birth to twins. She named the girl Vivienne and is calling her, no joke, Vivi. Even though she's going to be "Viv-ee," whereas ours is "Vee-vee," I fear I'll spend the rest of my life answering that, no, we did NOT name our child after Brangelina's. Does anyone else feel the twinge of irony that we went out of our way to choose a unique name only to have a huge celebrity steal it 2 months later? Ha! Oh well. As my mom said, at least we're in fashion.
On to the more fun topic. I began using cloth diapers yesterday, and I'm happy to report that as I had heard through the mommy blogosphere, they leak WAY less than disposables. I'll spare the details for everyone bored by these baby talks, but if you're into using "real nappies," as they're called in jolly ol' UK, I'm happy to share the nitty gritty. It took me hours of searching and reading to figure out whether to use them and what kind, so I'd love to be able to spare other moms the time. In fact, if I were an entrepreneur and knew how to do it, I'd create a website devoted to spreading the baby dirt, as it were. But like I was saying, cloth diapers are great. With the advent of fleece and velcro, they're softer than and almost as easy as disposables, as long as you're at home and close to a washing machine where you can easily throw them before you spread poo everywhere. You may have heard the controversy over whether they're better for the environment or not. While living in the UK, where probably about 25% of the public use real nappies and where they actually fund such research, their version of the EPA undertook a big study and the result...cloth diapers ARE about as bad for the environment as their disposable counterparts, when you consider the energy, water, and chemicals used to clean them. So why are we (he hem, I mean me) using them? They're cheaper! Since we'll probably use most of these over again on future kids, we could save $2k+ in the end. And as you all know, I do love a bargain!
My FDA interview went really well, so I'm hoping to hear back soon about the 2ND round of interviews (sigh). In other news, Nathan is working really hard non-stop with a real estate guy and a mortgage guy to try to get us into a house. We're going hunting this weekend, so fingers crossed we find a good deal. I took Vivi to her first church service last Sunday, at the Unitarian church in Arlington. While the sermon wasn't as great as the ones in Madison, I was pleased to meet so many pleasant folks, and I'm hoping to get involved in their social network. Next up, find an awesome lady who wants to watch Vivi for a great price, and who preferably lives near us, oh and is bilingual. Shouldn't be hard, right? Sha! Stay tuned.
