The Number Field

A week ago today, Jenny and I went to Babies-R-Us to start our registry, assisted by our sister-in-law Karina.  I am finally ready to write about it.  After we were done, Jenny tried to quell my dissatisfaction by saying "Don't you remember registering for our wedding?  Did you expect that it would be any different?"  I didn't say this to her because it didn't come to mind at the time, but on further reflection, I remembered that I didn't much enjoy certain parts of the wedding registration process either!

If you ask Jenny, she might say that I was a wet blanket for the whole thing.  However, I can now say that most of what we did was pretty painless, and even enjoyable.  I enjoyed looking at and helping to pickout many of the smaller items--bath towels, blankets, a few small toys, and so forth, although I'm afraid that my tiredness prevented any show of positive emotions.  I woke up at five that morning to go to a rare early morning rowing practice, and had a hard day beyond that.

I struggled with the big ticket items, starting with the stroller in particular.  I couldn't get behind any of the choices, and disagreed with Jenny on what kind of stroller we need or want.  For the record, I'm a proponent of getting a basic stroller frame for the car seat, then reevaluating our needs after a couple of months of actual usage, once Sunflower arrives.  Jenny would like to pick out and register for a travel system that would last longer.  I won't discuss the pros and cons of each approach here, but encourage any suggestions and thoughts in the comments!

More than that, I am worried that by only registering at Babies-R-Us, we are artificially limiting our options with regards to the big ticket items.  For example, what if Babies-R-Us doesn't sell the stroller that we want?  Jenny argues that most people who want to buy us a gift (even an expensive one) will, by default, look up our registry at a common store like Babies-R-Us and let that guide their decision.  They won't find anything we don't register for there.  (I hope I don't sound greedy--let me make it clear that we don't expect to get everything on our registry, much less the more expensive things.  Jenny and I share the opinion that people like giving gifts, and they like to have lots of options, so that they can pick something they like, and know that we'll like it too.  We don't have any expectations or demands.)  I think that if someone plans to give our baby a larger gift, it's likely to be a very close friend or family member, and they'll ask us beforehand about our preferences, especially if there isn't anything on our registry.

I would like to make a supplementary, online-only registry, for items in which Babies-R-Us is deficient.  I've found a website that claims to allow multi-store registries, with all the items listed on one page.  It's called The Things I Want.com , and while I haven't used it yet, I think it looks promising.  I haven't explained the details of this to Jenny yet, but she thinks that most people don't like shopping on the internet; that they want to try things out before buying them.  I think that people enjoy the convenience of internet shopping, and would give it a try.  I can anticipate Jenny's other question: how will people find a registry on an obscure website?  But I think I have an answer for that--for one thing, they might read the blog and find the link.  If they don't do that, we can include a message on our registry at Babies-R-Us.  I haven't tried this, so it might be prohibited, but I think I will be able to say that we're also registered at another website, and give the address.

Please leave a comment with your thoughts about TheThingsIWant.com.  What do you think about shopping for gifts on the internet?  And, since you made it all the way to the end of this post, here's our Babies-R-Us Registry .  Be aware that it's in a state of flux, and we will be removing some things and adding others over the next few weeks and months.