Perambulation

The day after we discovered that we were soon-to-be parents of a daughter we went and purchased a suitable carriage, we bought her a pram. This must be the single most expensive purchase that will be made by a soon-to-be-parent.

I know many Dads pour over technical specifications as if they were buying a car; we didn’t really do that. We had two criteria: it has to fold up small enough to go in my mini (which I refuse to swap for an estate car anytime this millennium), and have a proper carry cot i.e. be a pram not just a buggy. I’m an old fashioned girl who wants to see her baby slumbering peacefully in her pram in the fresh air while I am, obviously, a serene together lady-who-lunches (look a girl can dream).

Armed with this criteria I felt my choices had been limited to the over-subscribed- celebrity/Richmond-accessory the Bugaboo and the Quinny. The Bugaboo, as much as I hate to admit it, is a great pram hence it’s popularity, yes it’s expensive but it is good. The Quinny seems to be gaining in popularity with it’s nifty hydraulic self-rising thingamajig, but is heavier than the Bugaboo, although slightly cheaper and much simpler to operate. Okay, so it was these two choices that I introduced to RD while sitting outside a pub by the river; it was a sunny bank holiday and every configuration of these two prams went by. RD managed, between pints, to feign some level of interest. I briefly flirted with a much cheaper, third option a Nippabout which is sold in one of the only independent nursery shops near me, Happicraft (to be honest I nearly bought it simply because of the shop’s independent status). All these fitted in the boot my mini.

Considering his distinct lack of interest, imagine my, and his, surprise when RD came home from town one day and announced that he had seen a good looking pram in the window of Mamas and Papas. I felt it my duty to investigate an option that had actually grabbed his attention. So a couple of Saturdays ago, we braved Regents Street on a Saturday and went to look at said pram – the Ziko. It’s cool, it’s green, it’s light, has a tight turning circle (a must in Victorian terraced house) and it’s a pram. Best of all, Mamas and Papas do a car seat in which the baby can lie down when it’s not in the car, i.e. when it’s on the pushchair or free standing. This is a big plus for someone whose journey home to visit her grandma would take longer than the 2 hours recommended for sitting in a car seat (it crushes their diaphragm apparently).

So we bought it, we bought it all, but because of superstition all we have to show for our investment is a receipt! (It’s believed that to have the pram in the house before the baby is bad luck.

RD has since made another, unaccompanied, baby purchase: we have a cool Baba Bing! nappy bag, chosen because it has labels on the pockets so he knows what to put in them.