toby of the day, 3.22.2008

This weekend, toby’s new high chair arrived. After a few weeks of trying to keep him corralled between my legs while spoon feeding him zucchini only to have most of it end up smeared onto my pants and the rug, we decided that there was a reason people own high chairs. Although as we searched for one, it quickly became clear that style and attractiveness were not additional reasons people own high chairs. At some point, someone seems to have misinterpreted a study on things that make kids smarter and concluded that really ugly things are incredibly important to child development. I imagine a group of designers in a little room looking at a royal blue chair with orange stripes and fluorescent green stars and saying, “hmmm, how can we make this uglier”. Fortunately, toby’s uncle micah rescued us from certain disaster by directing us to a Swedish high chair. We now have a beautiful wood chair that is exactly what I imagine Sweden to be like, simple, clean, and sturdy, and we have another allen wrench to add to our collection. Now we can all eat together at the kitchen table, or at least sit together while tossing food on the floor and mushing up parsnips with our fingers. Mmmm, parsnips.