I have to admit I initially agreed with Grandma that Mom was way out of her comfort zone with her latest mission.  Mom’s two cousins are each expecting babies, which has her very excited.  To welcome these little ones, Mom wanted to buy them gifts.  However, Grandma was a bit worried that Mom was out of her element shopping for human babies, and with good reason.  Mom’s the first to buy puppy gifts for friends and family, but babies are a bit of an enigma to her.  However, Mom was determined to prove us wrong.  Armed with the puppy shopping list she made for Lemmy’s impending arrival oh so many years ago, Mom headed off to the store determined to buy the human equivalent.

First up piddle pads.  Well that’s a no brainer.  Diapers are of course the human equivalent of that gift.  This is going to be easy.  Next on the puppy list was a collar.  Again, no problem!  A baby onesie is the substitute here.  Ok, so Mom did ask for some advice on sizing from a fellow shopper.  There wasn’t the greatest selection of “newborn” clothes.  But she rationalized just like when I was a puppy, babies must grow fast too.  Besides, Mom thought the outfits the next size up were cuter.  Third on her list was an id tag.  For some reason people are more concerned about having their dogs returned if they go missing and not their babies, because there is no infant equivalent for dog tags.  Clearly this proves the great significance humans place on puppies over babies!  But I digress…

Next on the list were chew toys.  Now this made Mom pause for a moment.  Should she get something cloth that could be frozen to soothe sore gums?  Perhaps she should buy the babies each a Knots of Fun toy?  Those definitely got us through our teething stage.  But babies don’t always appreciate a good game of tug-of-war.  As a puppy our Aunt gave us a puppy pacifier, but to be honest we never really liked it.  However, Mom reasoned just like individual dogs prefer different types of textures, so might babies.  So pacifiers it is!  The fifth item on Lemmy’s puppy list was a blanket.  Again, no brainer.  Mom liked the selection in the baby section so much that she almost bought us a new one too.  But then she reasoned if these two cousins happen to visit with their babies, they may get jealous that the same blanket looked much better on our dog beds than in their cribs.  So just the tiny humans got new blankets on this shopping trip.

Training treats were next on the list.  This one was difficult.  Mom likes to give friends’ puppies Old Mother Hubbard Dog Treats.  But just as they can be a choking hazard to overenthusiastic pups, the same is true for babies.  Besides, babies don’t have teeth!  Better leave this gift up to the professionals and skip it.  Besides, babies are really lazy and sleep a lot, so the new Moms won’t be training them anytime soon.  Instead she bought more teething toys.  Just like with puppy toys there are so many colorful options and shapes, Mom couldn’t resist buying more than one!

At this point Mom realized her cart was getting really full.  So she quickly skimmed Lemmy’s old list to see if she was missing anything important.  That’s when Mom started laughing out loud in the store.  What about a crate?!  Grandma, not to mention the Department of Youth Services, would be awfully concerned if Mom bought crates for each of her cousins’ babies.  But she couldn’t help but laugh thinking once these kids are mobile toddlers her cousins are going to wish they could crate train them!  However, laws are laws, so with that Mom concluded her baby shopping spree and happily headed to the dog section of the store so she could stock up on our Bacon Scented Squeaky Balls.  Gee, I wonder if babies would like those too?