Laundry Drama

I thought you might be interested to know about what doing laundry is like right now.

We have a washing machine.  It takes somewhere around two to four hours to run a cycle.  No, I don't know why.  No, I can't make it go faster.  Then I have to take the clothes out of the washing machine and hang them on the lines in the yard, which is simple, but it is something to do.  Then I have to take them off the line and bring them upstairs, and then ideally I would fold them and put them away, but lacking that we can just get our wrinkled clothes from a big pile.

The washing machine doesn't work when the power is out.  The drying doesn't work when it's raining out.  I kind of expect it to rain at night.

The power likes to go out from mid-morning until late afternoon or dinner time.  I believe that the company deliberately turns it off to save power, not usually  that something goes wrong.  There would be some logic in this if, say, the power was out every Tuesday and Friday or something.  But no.  We will have an entire week with barely any power, and then it will go for a while completely on.  It is the long periods of no power that start to get difficult, because you can't just do things on the days that it is on, because the next day it's off too.

So the power is usually on first thing in the morning and at night.  Obviously, putting laundry in at night means that it sits in the washer all night, and if there are errands the next day, it sits there the whole day.  Then when I get home, it's too late to put the laundry out that day, so it sits again.

So starting laundry in the morning makes sense.  Except there isn't enough water in general in this house.  If I start laundry, it might use up all the water, and when I go to take a shower it only dribbles out, which does not actually turn into a shower.  So I don't want to start laundry until I've taken my shower for the morning.  Which does not give it the requisite four hours to finish before the power goes out.  Actually, come to think of it, I'm not sure there would ever be time to finish a laundry cycle on a power-out morning.  Of course, I don't know that it's a power-out morning until it happens, and sometimes it randomly comes back on again, too.

That leaves exactly no reasonable time for running the washing machine.  I try to tell myself that at least it's still easier than washing everything by hand, and apparently it is, because I could do that with the power is out, and I don't.

Then there is hanging out to dry.  If the weather is bad, that can take several days.  It shouldn't, because you are supposed to run out and bring your clothes off the line as soon as it starts to sprinkle, and then put them back up when it stops raining.  If you did that, you could probably get them dry almost every day.  But sometimes I'm out of the house, and sometimes I forget, and sometimes I decide they're already too wet to bother.  Of course, once they get rained on, they are significantly wetter than they were fresh out of the washing machine, and it's at least a day backwards in terms of progress.  There have also been way too many times when I have taken the clothes off the line, and then not had a chance to get around to putting them back up again, and they sit in a half-damp pile.  I am not sure which makes clothes mold faster, sitting in a half-damp pile or hanging on the line soaking wet.  Yes, clothes mold.

When it's not raining, there's sun.  That is great for drying clothes, but otherwise not great for clothes.  I have this nice idea that I will try and take the clothes off the line as soon as they are dry so they don't get all faded, but it rarely seems to work out that way.  Meanwhile, I just try and hang them right-side-out, so the stained sides are towards the sun.  I have some vague hopes that some of the stains might go away before the entire garment fades or disintegrates.

The children each go through approximately three changes of clothes a day.  This is not a problem like a little spot on their clothes; this is something like spilling most of their lunch down themselves, or peeing all over, or deciding to mop the floor and turning into a mop oneself.  That, and Hibiscus is apparently in a clothes-changing kind of phase, and is old enough to do it herself, so I have no idea why she goes through so many clothes.  In fact, I think mangoes are yummy and I ought to be enjoying their tropical availability, but between the strings in the teeth and the fact that all three children have to change after serving mangoes, I find myself avoiding them.  So the clothes-laundry piles up.

Now that we have the system explained, I will discuss what needs to get washed.

The kids go through approximately three changes of clothes apiece, each day.  Also, have I mentioned that Africa has ruined all our clothes?  Between the sun, the red dirt, general kid-messiness, tough washing machines and detergents, and just general hard use, almost everything we have used for several months is ruined.  Of all the clothes Emerson and I brought over in June, the only things that are still in decent shape are his Hanna Andersson shirts (which I find so impressive I'm even mentioning the brand name!).  I put on a shirt I thought was okay the other day, and noticed that the back has become see-through and a slightly sweatier colored than the original version.  As for the girls, some of their clothes haven't been used as long, so they're not in QUITE as terrible condition.  But Buttercup has outgrown everything, and Hibiscus could not be harder on her clothing if you set her in a room full of scissors and permanent markers and told her to go to town.

Then there are all the rags and towels and mess cloths.  I try to wash them on their own so they don't get ketchup and floor gook all over everything else.

I also wash the wraps on their own.  Except their problem is usually that dust has settled in, or perhaps some blobs of food have hardened, which means they need to be soaked.  The efficient washing machines don't have the ability to soak, so I have to do that beforehand.  However, our laundry basin/handwashing tub is the same basin and tub which the kids take their baths in, or have water play on the lawn, or whatever else we need some sort of basin or tub that isn't as dirty as a mop bucket.  So I have to find a time to start soaking them when no one is going to need to bathe for several hours, and when the washing machine is at a point that when someone does need to bathe and I suddenly need to move the soaking wraps, I can move them straight into an empty washer.  I need to mention that none of my wraps show any signs or stains, fading, or wear either.  The difference between high-quality and average/poor/made-in-China textiles is just spectacular!

Then there are things like shoes and hats and backpacks.  They need to be washed too, but don't go in the washing machine.  You are supposed to put shoes in a bucket and scrub them with a brush, and then hang their tongues out and leave them to dry in the sun.  Between the red dirt, the sweat, and the sun, absolutely everything gets dirty here.  Things that are once-a-season washing at home, like coats, are once-a-week washing here, if you want to look clean.  Or, as Hibiscus says, "if your --- is not clean, then you will smell bad and no one will want to be your friend."

Then there is ironing.  Luckily, we don't have much that needs to be ironed, but the things that need it, really need it.  The landlord never brought by an ironing board, so I use the dining room table.  Now then, ironing wraps on a table is less convienant than using a regular board, but with some reaching and fussing with the towel, it's manageable.  But table-ironing shirred little-girl dresses, or neatly tailored women's dress shirts, is simply an exercise in frustration!  So before I can iron, I need to clear off the table, move all the placemats and napkin baskets and eating things over, and wash the table off.  Obviously, this usually means that I end up scrubbing all the placemats, and the chairs that get sticky hands all over them, and the sides of the table where things dribble, and so on and so forth.  I also have to find a clean towel to put on top of the table.  Finally, the power has to be on.  That one can be easy to forget, but it's frustrating to do all the other steps and realize that the iron won't turn on!  Then you sit around hoping that the power will come back on before you have to serve dinner, in which case all the cleaning will revert to it's original state as soon as the children simply look at the table.


So, that is the story of my laundry.  There are solutions for everything, and it isn't that complicated if you are around the house and willing to spend time with your laundry during the perfect opportunity for completing that step of laundry.  However, I am usually gone for several hours a day, but at various times.  And I will confess, when I am home I do not always feel like communing with my laundry, even if that happens to be the ideal moment to move something around or start a load or whatever.  Which is probably why people in Uganda either live in large family groups, where some of the members can work and some of them can spend all day doing laundry; or that everyone middle-class has full-time maids.  Because even with a machine, doing laundry is apparently a full-time job!

My Children Are Butterflies

On Sunday, the children spent all afternoon outside, playing on their own.  This was how their day wound up.  I was told to come look, and I took some pictures.  They went around and around and around the courtyard, sometimes together and sometimes veering away on their own.  Sometiwmes Buttercup followed, and sometimes she got stuck and came back to me.  When their wings got tangled, Hibiscus carefully and lovingly re-arranged them, so they could all fly together again.

  When I posted them for some friends, I was amazed at the strength of the response, and how this touched so many people, including many who said they had tears in their eyes.  The picture is captioned by someone who was able to sum up the beauty and the majesty of the moment.  The butterflies are their own description.

"That they are flying away from you with the very fabric you used to hold them close, give them love, and make them strong makes me cry. Sometimes children at play perfectly reflect the face of God if we have eyes to see..."

Wrapping pictures

Here are some pictures of different wrapping styles.  I focused on pictures of how the weight is distributed on me.  Somehow, I didn't end up with a picture of simple ruckstraps, which would just be over my shoulders, and around my waist or not.  In some of the pictures from behind, you can see that some are multi-pass carries, and some are simple seats.  Now I'm going to try and go through and add information about the wraps, if it will let me do that much editing.

Christina's Back Carry in 50% wool, Ellevil's Ben

 A ruck with crossed chest straps, in Zara Blossom size 4

 This is a chest belt added over ruck straps, again in Ellevil's Ben size 5

 This is tying Tibetan with Oscha Fern, size 4.  Isn't it pretty?

This is a Double Hammock with sling rings in Natibaby wool Mea, size 2This is 

This is a multi-layer, arms out carry from behind.  You can see that she's leaning, but she can only move her shoulders and the rest of her body stays secure.

 This is another kind of integrated chestbelt, in a Double Rebozo Shoulder To Shoulder, or DRS2S, with linen Diva Milano size 6.

 This is a simple ruck from behind.  You can see that this is just one layer that goes under her bottom and over my shoulders.  This can be the quickest carry.
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This is the Zara Blossom 4 in a Secure High Back Carry, which is my favorite carry with a 4.

This is a Back Wrap Cross Carry with a Sweetheart Chestbelt.  That's a long name, but tied well, this ends up distributing the weight very well onto the torso itself.  The wrap is an Oscha Alto Bluebell, size 7..

Here's a back view of a multi-pass carry, probably the Secure high Back Carry.

Wrapping Logistics

Q: How do you do it?

A: All the different carries are made up of just four different wrapping patterns, such as a rebozo pass goes over one shoulder, under the baby's bottom but not under their leg, and under the wrapper's opposite arm (e.g., diagonal across the bodies).  So once you learn a few basic techniques, they turn into infinite combinations.

Q: Is it hard to learn?

A: It seems more or less difficult for different people.  I didn't find it that hard to get started, and when I was wrapping Emerson about once a day I felt competent within a month.  I still got good carries during that time, but it took me longer and I had to re-start more often.  I started out with one front and one back carry, and when I was good at those I added a different size and one new carry.  After focusing on one carry at a time for a while, now it's easier to add a new carry in quickly.

Q: What are the basics?

A: The two main techniques are forming a good seat for the child's weight to sit in, and evenly tightening each pass so the whole carry turns out snug but not tight.  It is much easier to learn these things by watching someone do it, but many people learn by watching videos on-line.

Here is a photo tutorial for my first favorite carry.

http://bwbozeman.creocommunico.com/?p=566

Q: How many carries do you know, anyways?  Isn't that complicated?

A: I regularly use four shortie carries, six mid-length carries, and five long-wrap carries.  Oh, plus two front carries and a hip carry.  Some of those are variations on each other.  

Maybe it's complicated, but that helps make it interesting.  Sometimes life with small children gets a bit... uninteresting.  I really like having something to think about and something to work on improving.

Q: What do you mean by "good" wrap job?

A: A good wrap job is extremely comfortable, but there are a lot of variations and sometimes it is NOT a good wrap job!  Often that is user error, like getting a loose pass and then it gets saggy.  The child being wrapped also makes a difference.  Some children push their feet and straighten their legs, so using under-leg passes work better for them; some are leaners so carries with a high horizontal pass helps hold them in.  

Some people define a good wrap job as that the child feels "weightless."  I would not define the sensation that way, but sometimes the child's weight is so well distributed that I cannot feel it in any one place; it seems like there is no weight particularly on my shoulders or my chest or my hips; I just am overall heavier than usual.  A not-good wrap job is not nearly as comfortable, but I rarely find it more uncomfortable than a regular carrier.  Besides, usually you can just re-tie, although of course the child is bound to fall asleep right after you realize you really hate the wrap job!

Also, many carries are adjustable as you wear them, so as the child moves or the fabric settles into place, or you want to adjust the weight, you can tweak and adjust as you go along.

Q: What about little babies?

A: Woven wraps are great for little babies!  That's an age when they like to be held all the time, and wrapping leaves mom's hands free and takes the pressure off her back and shoulders.  It might have saved me from my back problems exacerbating!  

And one really amazing fact: since the wrap itself is so supportive, you don't have to wait until the baby can support his own head and weight.  You can safely wrap even a newborn on your back!  

Q: Would I like wrapping?  Would it help me out?

A: If you are a parent of a baby or toddler, babywearing is a big help.  If you are a parent of multiple children including a baby or toddler, I don't know how you can manage without it!!!

Q: How could I get started or learn more?

A: There are many local babywearing groups, where you can try out wraps and get hands-on suggestions and help.  There is also lots of information on-line.  The forum thebabywearer.com has a ton of information and support, or you could find the facebook group Babywearing 102.  I hear that Babywearing Faith has really good YouTube tutorials.  If you are curious and looking on-line, don't get discouraged or overwhelmed by seeing people who have tons of wraps or are talking about really expensive or hard-to-find wraps.  Like any hobby, there are people who are willing to put a lot of time and money into their hobby, but that doesn't mean that they are representative of everyone.  Most of us are treasuring every moment with our babies, not focused on getting the most gorgeous collection.

Q: Where do I buy wraps, and how much do they cost?

A: There are large used forums on facebook and thebabywearer.com, where I have gotten most of my wraps.  Since most parents don't wrap, they aren't carried in most stores, so most people buy on-line, either from specialty shops or directly from the manufacturers.

As for the cost, first of all: baby carriers are expensive, good quality fabric is expensive, only high-quality fibers will create a wrap strong enough to carry a child, and many companies create exclusively fair-trade and organic fabric.  All of that adds up; it's not JUST a piece of cloth.  A good all-purpose wrap costs around $100; many wraps are much more.  But you can also find wraps for much less!

Q: That seems like a lot of money!

A: One way to look at it, is that a wrap is saving us visits to the chiropractor and pediatric occupational therapist, and those add up fast!

 After Emerson's babyhood, I realized that I had used our baby carrier more than anything else in our entire house... and I didn't even like it that much.  I kept thinking I wouldn't be using it much as he got older, so I didn't buy a new one.  The second time around, it doesn't seem worth it to try to skimp.  I absolutely enjoy every moment of our wrap snuggles, and I know they won't last forever.  I will sell the carriers when we're all done with them, and use the money for something important in mid-childhood, but nothing is more important right now than security, bonding, and snuggles.

Let me know if you have any more questions!  I love sharing about my latest hobby, and I really believe that it is such a valuable parenting tool.

More About Wraps

Q: How much do you wrap your children every day?

A: Right now, I usually wear Buttercup between about 3 and 6 hours a day, occasionally less and sometimes more.  We go through periods when I wear one of the bigger kids every day for half an hour or so, although sometimes we are busy with school and it doesn't happen.  Every single day I wear Buttercup for nap, school pick up, getting the big kids ready for bed, and a few quick ups and downs.

Q: When you say "wrap," what do you mean?  Is it like a Moby?

A: I am talking about the category of "German woven wraps."  A Moby is a stretchy wrap, and not supportive beyond the little bitty stage.  A regular woven wrap is some of the strongest, softest, and most supportive fabric there is.

Q: What makes wrapping more physically comfortable than other kinds of babywearing?

A: First of all, a good wrap holds the child very close to the wearer's body.  The closer any weight is to the carryer's core, the easier it is to carry.  When the child has even an inch or two of space between their torso and their parent's, that makes carrying the child much more difficult and tiring.  It is easiest to carry a child wrapped with their arms in, because then they have less weight to move around away from the wearer, but even when wrapping arms-out a good wrap job will pin the child's whole torso, from their underarms down, right against the wearer's body.  This is perfectly comfortable for the child, and much less exhausting for the wearer than if the child had wiggle room.

Secondly, there are many different ways to wrap.  You can wrap the child in different positions.  I find a high carry tends to not exacerbate my back issues, and I can wrap any of the children high enough that their shoulders are slightly above mine.  They also like that because they can look around and interact with their environment.  However, when either me or the child is tired, I can also wrap Buttercup low enough that her head rests between my shoulderblades, or anywhere in the middle.  This uses different muscles and allows me to wear her for a longer period over the whole day.  You can also wrap on the hip or front, although I find those more difficult with the logistics of dealing with three children.

Different carries also distribute the child's weight to different part of the body.  I prefer carries with an integrated chest belt, which places most of the weight right in the center of my chest, and nothing at all towards my outer shoulders.  But after wearing something like that for a couple of hours, I might choose a carry with "ruck" straps (like a backpack) for variety.  I can add a chest belt to those carries, which takes pressure off the shoulders but in a different way than the center-chest-belt carries.  There are also carries with a torso pass, which distributes weight all across the torso.  The tie around the waist actually moves a little weight to the waist or hips, and sometimes I wrap it twice around my weight which actually distributes even more weight to my lower body.

Q: Why do you have so many different wraps?

A: There's a lot to that answer!  Let's make it into smaller questions.

To start with, this is a really dirty climate, and I let my kids eat in the wrap and Buttercup is not usually wearing a diaper and has accidents.  My wraps get really dirty, and fast.  I don't have an ordinary washer and no dryer, so if it's rainy it can take two days to wash and dry a wrap, or more if I'm busy.  That means I need two or three wraps to alternate out and do the same job.

Size:

First of all, wraps come in different sizes, from 1-8, and you can do different carries with the different sizes.  I have wraps in sizes between 2 and 7, which are 2.7 to 5.2 meters long, and one can basically think of it as shorties, mid-length, and long wraps.  Since I am fairly petite, a 5 is my base size and I can do almost all carries with a 6.  

The benefit of the shortest wraps is that they lend themselves to very quick carries, they do not drag on the ground while wrapping, and they fold up small in a backpack.  The downside is that the quick carries are not as supportive as multi-layer carries.  This is more tiring for me as a carry-er, and if my wrappee is tantruming or really trying, she can escape the carry.  I find them useful for things like quick ups and downs like making lunch or snacks, or putting one kid up for bedtime routine for someone else.  It's also useful on an outing when I won't be carrying all the time but we might need it for waiting in line or a quick walk.

The longest wraps make the most supportive, multi-layer carries, and have extra length for things like adding reinforcement on the chest or waist.  The down side is that they take longer to wrap with, and rest on the floor while being wrapped, so I don't like wrapping with them out of the house.  I use them when I will have a long carry that I won't have to re-do, like when I am picking the children up from school.  I also like them for naps, because the longer carries tend to have space for the child to get all snuggled down.

The mid-length wraps are a great compromise, and I use them for all my long outings.  They are not so long that I can't manage them in public or small space, but long enough that I can do supportive, multi-layer carries. I can also do several different carries so I can distribute the weight differently over the course of the day.  I can also do the quickest up-and-down carries, that I could use the shorties for, with longer but not unmanageable tails.

Materials:

Many wraps are all cotton, but some are linen, wool, silk or other blends.  I have a kapok wrap right now -- I had never even heard of that fiber!  Even different cotton wraps have very different textures and weights.  

So, for instance, the linen blends are strong and supportive, and I love them for my big kids or a long walk, but I don't think they're very snuggly for a nap and they are difficult to get a good wrap job quickly.  The wools are breathable, soft on the shoulders, and supportive for the big kids, but they are not practical during the hot days.  

Wrapping qualities:

Every wrap feels different when it's being used!  It's one of the things that makes wrapping interesting.  Some are grippy and some slide smoothly, some hold the child rock-solid and some have bounce, some are breathable and some are snuggly, some are cushy on the shoulders and some are thin.  Like everything in life, every up-side has an opposite!  A cushy wrap tends to be thick and not so good in hot weather; a wrap that has bounce also has sag; a solid wrap gets tiring on the shoulders.  Different wraps are valuable in different situations.

Beauty: 

I just love beautiful fabric, and the wraps are truly beautiful!  I just enjoy the colors and the textures and the feel.  Besides, when you are wearing a child for hours a day, the wrap is part of your outfit!  I totally coordinate my wraps and my clothing for a day out, and I feel like it's a beautiful finishing touch.

Q: Couldn't you get by with just one wrap?

A: Yes.  Absolutely, especially if I had a quick washer and dryer.  If anyone is curious about wrapping, you certainly don't need a whole lot of wraps, and I know people who carry all the time with one wrap.

But at the same time, I really use and appreciate each and every wrap that I have, and I enjoy having a variety to choose from.  I buy most of my wraps used from other wrap afficianados, and I know that if I don't love something I can sell it on the same networks.  

Q: Wait a minute, I thought you said there were NOT sizes for wraps!

A: The wraps are different sizes, but anyone can use any size.  I could wrap any of my three children in any of my wraps, and my 6-foot-2 father could use any of the same wraps that I use.  The determining factor is which carry to choose.

For instance, I can do a Secure High Back Carry with a size 4 for Buttercup, but I would choose a size 5 for my bigger kids.  A large adult might choose a 6 for the same carry.  But if we had a size 4 wrap, that larger adult could wrap their child in a Reinforced Ruck.  I think the most logical way to think about wrap sizing is Base Size, and plus or minus.  So the Secure High Back Carry is Base -1.  I am a base 5, so I do it with a 4; someone else might be a base 7, so they could do it with a size 6, and a 4 would be a shortie wrap for them.

All About Wrapping: Intro

This isn't specifically about living in Africa, but I've gotten many questions about my wrapping, and it's something I'm really enjoying right now, so here's some basics about wrapping and my personal story!

Q: Why do you like wrapping specifically, instead of other carriers?

A: I fell immediately in love with wrapping when I realized that I could carry my children without back pain.  A good carry with a wrap is absolutely night and day for me!  Emerson was in an odd position for most of my third trimester, and I have had lower-middle back pain ever since then, probably exacerbated by nursing and leaning over my baby and being in a fog when I didn't take care of myself.  As his babyhood progressed, so did my pain, until eventually I spent a year in chiropractic care, took up yoga, and spent months in physical therapy.  The consensus was that my back problems are chronic and the best I can do is manage them, which I have learned to do.  Meanwhile, I limited myself to carrying Emerson for an hour a day, and when Emerson was not quite three I tried to stop lifting him altogether.  I now really regret that I felt like I had to limit him like this, and I am sad that I missed out on all those sweet-baby snuggles, and spent so much effort trying to make him be on his own.  I first tried wrapping when Emerson was FOUR YEARS OLD, and it was immediately more comfortable than when I was trying to wear him as a baby!  

Like so many next-time-around parents, this time I want to treasure every moment and enjoy my little girl for as long as she is little.  I am grateful every day that I can wear my little one for all the time that her heart needs or wants wearing, without feeling like I am compromising my own health.

Q: When and why do you wrap your baby?

A: I wear Buttercup for her naps, when we are out and walking, when she starts getting out of control and destructive, when I need to be helping the older kids and she is in the way, when we have to wait around in a non-kid-friendly place, to keep her safe, to help her calm down, when she is feeling lonely, when she is feeling overwhelmed, when she wants to watch what I'm doing, and most of the time when I'm cooking (which meets many of the above categories!).

Q: Why do you wrap your bigger kids?  They are definitely old enough to walk!

A: Wrapping is love.  It really is.  Big kids needs love too... they need lots of it.  That's basically it.

Logistically, there is more to it.  I started wrapping Emerson to help with his sensory processing issues, and I could see a huge difference.  One reason I wrap Hibiscus is because she needs a chance to "go back to babyhood" and have a chance to bond with a mother.  Also, since wraps can fit any child, if I have one on hand it will serve me in an emergency.  Emerson has fallen and hurt himself badly a couple of times, and I have been able to carry him home.  

The physical pressure of the wrap on their body is very instinctually soothing.

Hibiscus's Wrapping Day

Hibiscus's Wrapping Day

The kids had the day off school, so we just stayed around the house and I didn't spend that much time wearing them.  But you know who had a really intense day of wrapping?  Hibiscus.

With the wraps that finally made it to the house yesterday, there were included little instruction manuals with lots of pictures of how to do some basic carries.  That might have been handy for me with my actual first wraps (bought used) but not so much anymore, but all the kids loved loved LOVED looking at them, especially the girls.  All the booklets and pictures were scattered all over the living room along with the wraps within minutes of the package opening.  I put them all away last night, but they were spread all over the room again immediately this morning. Buttercup loves looking at the pictures, and maybe she thinks it's a story about one of her favorite activities, with lots of other friendly babies.  Hibiscus was seriously studying the pictures, then added her frog "baby," and my Zara.  She was really concentrating for a long time, and I was proud of her ability to choose something and focus on it.  Not to mention, I hadn't even talked about what the book was, she figured out that it was instructions for what I do all the time, and set her own self to de-code it.

Here she is, very proud of the result.

[IMG]https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJ4LJPSZ6fXzUZBr5XafXn66MUYj7NOWbEwkv6fs2Mng8DeEUSBBdlBP6K28Dk6mxwS1Of7mSLvLa90FiUkH368XF4JsSgqSM9dPApdG5caMLd4YUggiNNtfy8xNtHHo-vwQIhh1HCdC42/s1024/IMAGE_F7C0D352-498F-4030-A080-74C154822BB0.JPG[/IMG]

Hm, it looks like she was working on a hip carry!  I never do those, so that was all from the pictures!

She wore her frog the entire morning, through whatever other chores or play she was doing, in several different wrap jobs.  Then Buttercup brought me the Pao ring sling and wanted to go up in it, and Hibiscus got really excited because SHE was wearing HER baby in a ring sling, TOO.  So here we are, with our babies in our ring slings!

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Then we moved on to sister wrapping.  I have more mixed feelings about this.  Little kids carry their young siblings all the time in this country, but just with their hands under their bottoms and the little one holding on, so if they fell, they would fall apart and fall independently.  I feel like a wrapped-in fall could be much worse, especially with all the crazy stairs we have around here, and the grown-up length tails dragging on the ground.  I do teach her and help her with the ring sling, which I feel like is a reasonable compromise, but only in the house please!

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After quite a bit of staggering around like that, it was only logical to put Sister in the REAL wrap.  This I am not going to facilitate because I think it could get dangerous, so I just watched quietly.  Buttercup was really happy with the game and lay there pleasantly for a long time.  Hibiscus is not only able to learn from pictures, she is incredibly observant and an amazing imitator.  This is a rebozo pass, which goes over one shoulder and under the other, holding baby's bottom in the middle.  When manipulating a wrap, it is natural to put both side either under the shoulders or over the shoulders, so clearly Hibiscus knows exactly how I do it.

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And then she's "tightening strand by strand."  At least, she knows what the gesture looks like, but she doesn't know what she is supposed to be doing, so it ends up so loose she's just holding Buttercup under the bottom, in the traditional African way.  They sat on the couch together and rocked, because Hibiscus could not actually carry Buttercup around.  That and maybe she was worn out from all the ring-sling-ing and balanced-on-back part!

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Then I insisted on getting Buttercup back and putting her in the REAL wrap for her nap.  Ugh, that was a disaster!  Hibiscus did not want to stay in her bed, and she kept calling me or grabbing something exciting, thus rousing Buttercup.  And if Buttercup does not START her nap, she cannot FINISH her nap.  I ended up wearing her for her "nap" for almost three hours, about half of which was asleep.

Then Hibiscus started thinking about HER "rainbow wrap" which had arrived.  Because the cloth for wraps is so strong, when they are brand new they are often stiff and crunchy feeling, and the more they are used the softer they become.  A stiff wrap is not only not very pleasant on the skin, it's really difficult to get a good wrap job, because getting everything pleasantly snug is so important.  You can just wear them until they get soft, but I don't want to wear an even slightly uncomfortable wrap!  So today, we needed to work on "breaking in" the new wraps.  

The rainbow Storch Inka is a brand that is famous for being very stiff at the beginning, and eventually becoming incredibly soft and supportive.  At this point, the darn thing actually could stand up on its own!

The more the fabric is manipulated, the softer it will become.  We found some bars, wound it in and out, and pulling back and forth like a see-saw!  Actually, the wrap is over 5 meters long, so it's more like a "my first train" going back and forth on its little track!  The picture shows Buttercup and Hibiscus on opposite ends, but Buttercup didn't really understand the game, she just liked to pull.  It actually worked when Hibiscus and I were at opposite ends.  

After we had been going for a while, I thought about adoption-bonding suggestions of doing something back and forth where your bodies affected each other, like feet together, holding hands and rocking while singing "Row Row Row Your Boat."  I think this is a good school-aged substitution!  A 6-year-old likes that there is a productive result and she can come up with variations, and it really involved her whole body and used her endless, overwhelming energy.  The next day, after a while she tied the wrap around her waist and dragged it like that, and then she dove down and started running like a monkey.  There was also a lot of collapsing on the grass as the pressure became greater or less, and lots of laughter.  I'll call that bonding!

After a day of working so hard on wrapping, obviously she needed to be the wrappee for a while!  She wanted to go up while I made dinner.  At first that sounded too exhausting, but then I agreed.  And of course she brings over our carpet!  It was a little better, but it still felt more like something I would pull up the mast of my husband's boat than use to cuddle my baby.  Are you sure you don't want one of the nice soft ones in our pile?  Oh well, okay.

I tried a carry that I haven't used with the big kids, and it worked very well and I got the most comfortable carry yet for my giant "baby."  I managed to make most of dinner without getting worn out, even leaning over to get things out of the fridge.  (Squatting, not leaning, that is!)

I take a lot of pictures of wrapping, because first of all, that way I can see what I'm doing, and secondly, I share them in on-line conversations with other wrappers, and third of all, I've realized that if I take a picture when I'm wrapping, I end up with a pretty good account of our days, and lots of pictures of the kids as they grow.  When the bigger kids are home, I let them take some pictures, and my son is becoming quite the photojournalist.  He likes the action shots, and he thinks of the whole story.  "No, keep cutting things, I need one with you cutting," he tells me.  "And then one at the sink, and one in the fridge.  ....You haven't gone to the sink yet, we need one at the sink."

After all this planning, I later went through the pictures, and not only were they blurry, apparently he was experimenting with the artistic effect of holding the camera low (as though he weren't already low enough!), which involved a lot of artistry of my derriere.

Then Hibiscus needed to get down and do her dinner chores, and Buttercup needed to go up so she didn't un-do them.  I switched to a different wrap, because I thought Inka needed about 50 pounds to hold her down!  And now Hibiscus needed to take pictures, because Emerson just got a turn.  However, she found the indoor lighting insufficient.  She is not a photojournalist, she is a portrait artist.  The traditional kind.  She wants everyone to look at her and smile, and then she stands there for minutes and minutes on end while decided whether or how or when to push the button, until Buttercup gets distracted and starts doing something else, and then Hibiscus needs to yell at her to smile and start all over again.  A lot of her pictures, my mouth looks funny because I'm saying "push the button now, you need to just take the picture!"

And then the kids threw a giant fit about cleaning up before dinner, and we won't get into that because we are talking about Hibiscus's wrapping day, not her grumpy day.  But all the fits precluded any more wrapping until...

Within minutes of getting out of bed, all three children had their babies up in their wraps!  Buttercup and Emerson came over to me for help, and got adorable little matching carries with their little scarves.  But Hibiscus spent a while by herself with the instruction booklet, and eventually emerged with Froggy in a recognizable ruck.  Good morning!

The Rescue, or....

My Wraps are Rescued from the Ferocious, Slobbering Jaws of the Post Office

Often it is something small and almost inconsequential that can drive us past the edge of feeling able to cope, and that's how I felt about my package being held up by Uganda buerocracy.  Yes, we are dealing with some genuine tragedies, and I see more of them around me every day; and yes, we can survive and remain healthy without new wraps.  But I know that abuse and poverty are complicated problems; buying new baby gear shouldn't be that hard!  I think the main element which made me feel so unsettled is that wrapping is my own personal escape from all the chaos around me, and I couldn't bear my wraps getting involved in another mess.  The other part is that most of the wraps I have are really not well-suited to the climate and the way I am currently wearing, and this particular package contained some very practical replacements for the heavy-weight wraps that make Buttercup sweat and cry, so although not life-saving, it would have real value to us.

Well, I have them in my hands now.  Unlike some other things, like a stupid judge to give us a stupid court date so we can actually LEAVE!!  But, like everything else in Uganda (grumble grumble) it had to turn into a long story!

Well, first of all, it would have been nice if Miss B had called me to tell me that a package had arrived but she wasn't able to pick it up, instead of waiting for me to ask over and over.  She told me that they had assessed 360,000 shillings as tax, because they thought that because there were three wraps that I was in business selling them.  That's a very large number, and even in Ugandan shillings it's a lot of money, over $150.  Also, I have received a number of packages in Uganda, including wraps (only two at a time), and a medical machine for Emerson that surely was worth more than the wraps.  No one has ever discussed taxes before!

I needed to get the picking-up paper from her and go to the main post office myself, but I was kind of sick and so was Buttercup, so I wasn't up to making the trip.  The main post office is downtown and I pass it all the time, so it wouldn't be that difficult to technically do, but going downtown ends up being a long day.  So I had days of just being annoyed about the post office, but not being able to do anything about it.  By the end of last week, I decided this was bugging me so much I would prioritize the errand, so I got ready to go on Friday.  But when I called Miss B, she was out of town and there was no way for me to get the silly little paper.  She said she would leave it for me and I could go the next day, but I was not up for a difficult errand downtown with three kids!

I hired a car on Tuesday, hoping to get to the post office, the internet office to argue about my data pirate, pick up supplies for my parents' upcoming visit, and go to the big grocery store and buy a bunch of heavy staples that I didn't want to carry on my back.

First of all, we stopped so I could get out some cash.  I think I could appreciate living in a cash economy if there were a bank or an ATM within walking distance!

Then we drove out of the gas station with the ATM.  Now then, in Uganda, there are some seat belts, but of course there are no car seats, and half of a seat belt in the back seat is not enough to contain a toddler, so Buttercup was wriggling around on my lap in the front as I tried to juggle things in and out of the backpack and keep her from diving out the window.  The driver pulled over at a police stop, which are incredibly common, and they usually ask for the paperwork and are obnoxious in varying degrees -- for instance, when we were driving with our friend the priest, he got politely waved through the traffic stop wearing his collar, but the next day in a regular shirt he got a thorough questioning!

This traffic police started off very snippy and condescending, and she immediately informed me that I was going to get a ticket for not wearing my ticket, me personally, and insulted me a little bit.  Luckily I've been in Uganda long enough to know to apologize but not pull out my wallet!  Remember the part about the cars occasionally having seat belts?  I felt like getting a ticket for not wearing one was a little bit beyond reasonable.  After ten minutes or so of questioning me and talking with the driver and pulling out the book and making me read the rule in question out loud to her (!!!), she decided to let us go.  I felt irritated and flustered, and was trying really hard to not cry or let this put me out for the whole day.  I had a feeling I needed to walk into the post office with my patience intact!

So, finally, the Post Office: the singular is a misnomer, because actually there seem to about fourteen different businesses operating inside the building, and half of the actual postal part is in adjoining buildings.  So I tried several sets of locked doors, was examined by security ("is dat your baby?")  in order to enter at the proper door, and was confronted with desks for sending money, buying different airtime, recieving money, a bank, advice for getting visas for Great Britain, options for passport photos, other booth with advice about getting visas for the US, more airtime, other money options, and even a gift shop where you could conveniently buy EARRINGS, for heavens sake!

I asked a nearby person where I might start.  I went upstairs to a help desk.  (Why put the introduction desk on a different story than the rest of the building, I don't know....)   She sent me to another desk.  She looked at my paper, looked at her computer, and after a while, told me the package was still in transit.  I said it wasn't.  She told me to go to the next building, where they deal with packages.  Outside, around the large building, up some stairs, turn, up more stairs, to the package office.  Went to the desk and asked what to do.  Was sent to a different area across the room, where eventually someone wandered out to talk with me, and then someone else wandered out who seemed to know something different.  

But you have to remember that each of these people must be addressed properly.  In Uganda, you cannot go up to someone and say "good morning, can you tell me where to collect a package?"  No, you must stand there for a moment until both parties feel like it is appropriate to make eye contact.  Then one may say "good morning," and the other person will return the favor.  Next is "how are you?" and "I am fine, thank you, how are you?" But -- especially if the party in question is a woman -- it is more polite to look down at one's lapels and murmer "hmm, mmm" in between questions and answers, in order to ensure that the whole greeting process does not move too fast.  After establishing that everyone is well today, and standing a few moments in companionable silence, it is appropriate to ask a question or for some help.  So asking six people whom to ask for a package is quite a project!

And now it was time to actually make friends with the two women who were helping me.  How was my baby, what is her name, is she my baby, why are her arms wrapped up, isn't she uncomfortable?  They listened and nodded when I said she was my foster daughter, and that she preferred to have one arm in because she felt shy, but she was perfectly capable of putting it out if she felt like it.  We needed to confirm that point at length.  The women pursed their lips and clucked about parents abandoning their children.  One of them also had a two-year old.  We arrived at my also having older children, who were in school right now, and whom they were biologically related to, and our apartment in Ggaba.

Three is a good number of children to have around here, especially when the only one present is the baby, and she is appropriately wrapped on my back.  I have had a number of people compliment me on my "nice big family," which at first surprised me, given that the average birth rate in this country is seven!  But I begin to understand it: many modern women, especially those with professions, are embracing the western two-child family.  Every professional woman I know, and almost all the families at the children's school, has one or two children.  Simply by having more than two -- and they are young enough that more might still follow -- I proclaim myself as part of the traditional, child-embracing mentality.  Even the modern Ugandans admire that choice.  

Also, by having a biological son, I am considered fully a mother, so also adopting children I am a generous mother, instead of merely kind-hearted but slightly pathetic, as I would be if I hadn't given birth.  (Sorry, that's painful to even write!)  And with all my children at school or wrapped up, so they can't act like children, everyone is even more appreciative!

At some point the package was produced and opened.  Yes, there were my three beautiful wraps!  But ah, the reason why it was held up was that there were taxes assessed.  The package was worth more than 50 US dollars, and that meant that there were taxes.  They had to assess the taxes.  How much did I pay for the wraps?  What were they worth?  I honestly couldn't remember exactly.  I bought them well over a month ago, in a currency I've never personally used, and I've looked at a lot of other wraps in the meantime.  Also, since the package was direct from a store, the actual value was written on the box, and I didn't want to get the number wrong in case they called me out on it.  Eventually I said I thought it was about $85.  I thought one of them had been somewhat more and one had been somewhat less, so that seemed like a nice random number.  

Eighty-five dollars?  Each, or for all of them?  Fro each one, was I sure?  That much, for some cloth?  We examined the cloth together, and they agreed that actually it was much nicer cloth than you can buy in the marketplace.  But eighty-five dollars?  I explained that most clothing and similar things in America or Europe cost $85, and I just preferred to buy things from home, it was my one indulgence, getting this beautiful cloth to carry my baby, sometimes a mother needs one special thing.  We nodded and thought about a mother wanting something beautiful for herself, and someone looked at Buttercup and commented that I was so good to take on these children.  But $85 each, was I really sure?

I was not sure if this argument was because they were actually incredulous, or if they were inviting me to change the value I listed in order to lower the taxes.  Again, since the value was listed right on the package, and because I do try to be an honest person, I didn't want to count on the latter.

So they got out a calculator, added 85 three times, put in some taxes, multiplied by the exchange rate, and showed me the numbers that taxes would be 160,000 shillings.  That's still a lot to pay for a box of stuff that was already mine, but it was manageable for a mistake.  (NOT having things sent from a store to Uganda again!!)  We discussed whether this was a business tax, and they said it wasn't, everything that comes into the country that is valued over $50 has to have taxes assessed.  Anything that the package says more than $50.  If it is written on the package that it is above $50.  If the number on the customs sheet is more than $50.  

That much was clear... send over all my diamond necklaces, honey, just make sure to write the number $49!

Then they left me with my box and went into their back offices to write out the assessment, and left us there for at least 20 minutes.  I was starting to wonder if I was supposed to take the package and just walk out, thus saving everyone some work, but I didn't want to get Miss B in trouble in case I was wrong.  Meanwhile, Buttercup and I admired the wraps.  One had butterflies and flowers, which got her excited, and another one had peacocks, which look a lot like chickens, and Buttercup loves to talk about chickens.  So we talked about chickens.

Eventually the women came back, and one apologetically showed me the calculator.  She had put in the numbers wrong, the tax is actually 54%.  And that means the tax is over 300,000.  See, this number.

Remember what I said about the traffic officer, and not pulling out my wallet?  I let us all stand there in silence for a minute, and then I said "that's too much.  I can't pay that much," and we all stood there for another minute.  We were all friends now, mothers with little children, and they were glad I was taking care of the abandoned African babies.  They didn't want to charge me that much either.

"I can't change the tax," the slip-writer explained, "it's written in the computer.  All we can change is this number.  How much can we say the wraps are worth?"  I paused for a minute, not sure how much I could reduce the value all of a sudden, especially given the little detail about the value being written on the box!  "How about we say the whole box is this much?" she suggested, typing "$100" on the calculator.  We all agreed that that was exactly how much the box was worth, obviously.  She went to write up a new slip.

At that point Buttercup was doing this wiggling dance on my back that I know meant she had to go potty, and when I asked her she wailed "potty!"  I always put her in a diaper when we do errands, because we can't always find a potty (and she gets distracted and doesn't tell me she needs to go), but every parent of a potty-training toddler knows that if the child is bothering to hold it and beg for a potty, you want to get them there!  I was told that the only toilets available were too dirty to take a baby into.  There was an upscale/western style restaurant across the street, so I took us over there.  There were several signs noting that toilets were for customers only, but I went straight to a waitress, and, trying to remember the correct British-African term for "bathroom" I just slipped into the vernacular and said "my baby has to sou-sou!" while Buttercup did her urgent dance. I was forgiven the missing greeting ritual and quickly directed to the right place!

After that, to Buttercup's noisy disappointment, we had to continue our post office vigil.  Also, now she was not feeling so shy, and wanted to be wrapped arms-out, which any wrapper knows is more tiring and also allows the child in question to get into a lot more trouble!  Now we had to go back to the main building and pay the charge on our slip.  But where to pay?  Again, I asked a customer, and then went upstairs to the help desk, and was told to go next door the other way.  But after standing in line and talking with a couple of people, that was not the right place either.  I needed to go back to the bank in the main building.  So I returned to the tiny bank kiosk, where at least in all my meandering the line had faded.  That did not actually help me, though, because no sooner had I ascertained that I was in the right place and handed over my money, someone else came over my shoulder, and on the pretense of asking a simple question, managed to argue about his bank fees for quite some time, while the teller calmly looked up statement after statement for him.  After all this, the teller glanced at my page and told me they hadn't put the PRN number (or something like that, I have no idea!) on it, and he couldn't help me without a PRN number, I had to go back and get that number and then come back.

This is where the block and the three sets of stairs between the two buildings started to get noticeable.  Back up.  Asked for the number, and woman apologized for forgetting it, commiserating that I must be tired now and my baby probably wants to eat.  For my whole trip back down to the bank and back up for the package, Buttercup helpfully wailed "lunch, lunch!" alternating with "food-oo, foooood--oooo!!!!" while grabbing everything within reach.  Since the bank kiosk had approximately four square feet in which the customers could stand in, there was quite a bit within reach.

My charge was 137,780.  I handed the man 140,000, and he stamped my sheet (in triplicate; somehow my one small package needed three entire sheets with the taxes fully explained, and both stamps on all three sheets!), and then ignored me.  I stood there, afraid that if I had to ask for my balance I might not be able to keep the irritation out of my voice, but not in the mood to give the post office even the paltry dollar that was left!  After a while, he gave me a look and very slowly got out a change purse and handed me a 200 shilling coin.  The bank had the window with the little slit underneath to hand things back and forth, but apparently they haven't yet invented the mesh window in the middle to talk through, because you couldn't understand each other back and forth.  So it took three tries for him to inform me, haughtily as though I should have already known, that there was a bank fee of 2,000 shillings for the privilege of the transaction.  Good grief!

Back around the block and up the stairs.  I got my package.  And it turned out that there was someone else standing in the corner to thoughtfully and thoroughly examine my paperwork before I was allowed to depart, despite having been ten feet away and fully capable of watching the entire preceding interaction and all the paperwork involved.  I did not have that exact paper which she was looking for, so my new friends had to go back into their office and find the slip that Miss B had given me to begin with, which wasn't the right thing exactly but they agreed that it would suffice!

Needless to say, I did not get all my errands done that day.  But I have three beautiful and practical wraps, and I am never letting the Ugandan government get their hands on them again!